Chapter Seven
hundred years, hundred more
someday we may see a
woman king, wristwatch time
slowing as she goes to sleep
"Carson says that you're going to get better, so please…"
Teyla jerked awake, clutching a pillow to her chest, and feeling so much fear that it couldn't have been conjured from nothing.
It was the condemned man, again. The professor had been executed weeks ago, but his ghost haunted her each time she closed her eyes to rest. She had given the order, yes, but Centris had insisted, had pulled her aside and convinced her to believe that she had no choice in this or in anything else.
That is how Teyla remembered it, now, even though she sometimes had difficulty distinguishing between truth and confabulation.
"Centris!" she called, as dusk colored the distant horizon. "Centris! Come here!"
"Your Maje?" It was a handmaid, coming from her waiting place in the hallway.
"Get me Centris! I must speak with him at once."
"He is outside of the gate, my lady, but will be back at supper to dine with you. Shall I dress you for dinner?"
Teyla looked at her clothing, at the silks and shining robes with velvet details running down the seams. These beautiful things felt so soft against her skin and looked so lovely matched with her copper hair.
"Yes. No," she wavered. "I prefer not to dine this evening. I wish a carriage to take me out of the gate, for a ride at sunset."
The handmaid frowned. "Yes, my lady. Your Maje shall have it."
Teyla nodded as the servant left. Then she hurried to her chiffarobe, which opened to reveal dozens of brilliantly colored ruffled dresses and beaded gowns, all made by the most talented hands, each stitch evenly spaced, with tight bodices and buttoned foresleeves and heavy skirts hobbling her as much as the manacles the pale man wore after she had condemned him. She wanted to wear something darker and more like the guards' breeches, something that she could run in, fly across the fields and valleys beyond the castle wall.
In a short while, her carriage was waiting, with Centris standing beside it.
"I thought that you were away until supper," she remarked.
"My Maje, come with me, please. I wish to show you."
"My carriage…"
"Will wait until you return."
She looked at him for a moment, and then followed him back into the fortress. He led her to the Great Hall, a breathtakingly beautiful room with high stained-glass windows and gilded chandeliers and friezes up where the walls joined the arched ceilings. These murals depicted the long history of Teyla's relations, and the righteous battles that they had fought and won. Along the walls hung life-sized portraits, each footed by a metal plaque identifying the subject.
"These are your family," Centris said, gesturing to the room in general.
"I know that, Prime Minister," Teyla answered wearily. "I am of them, am I not?"
"Of course," he said, bowing respectfully. "And I am sorry for the uprising that killed your kin only just a short time ago. It must have been a difficult time for you."
Teyla nodded, knowing that it had been, but not feeling it that much. She noticed Centris peering at her carefully and tipped her head curiously in response.
"I am sorry, Your Maje. You are the image of your sister, the queen. She and the king had been so happy with each other."
"I…I know," She looked down, only partially remembering this, as if seeing it out of the corner of her eye. Then, raising her head, feeling suddenly confident again, she said, "But now I am king."
"As you say," he responded, obsequious as always.
"You bring me here to remind me again, as if I would forget."
"Why did you call up a carriage to travel from this house? It will take you nowhere you want to see."
"I wish to visit the grave of the pale man, the professor."
At this, Centris paused. A dart of his eyes and Teyla saw a speck of fear in them, a secret that began to nag at her then like a stone in her shoe.
"Of course, Maje Teyla, you may go wherever you desire. After supper we can travel together."
"I will go there now. And I will not be dining this evening," she dismissed, turning to leaving the gilded room. and its half-lit memories behind her.
"As you wish," he said, courteously. "I am certain that you will always choose to do what is best for your people. Even if those choices are difficult ones."
Teyla paused at the threshold to the Great Room. There were images in her mind of her people, but they were changing from one picture to another, from the tall portraits hung on the walls, to real people someplace quite different, as if Sey were her beloved home and her prison, as well.
OoOoO
After the team's return from their torture and separation on Dorav, when Teyla's fever had spiked frighteningly high, McKay had stayed at her bedside because she meant more to him than he expected, and he was more worried that she would die than he had ever thought possible. She had become part of his history, and knew him better than his sister or his mother had, maybe even better than Heightmeyer. And he had told Heightmeyer everything.
This was the first time he really felt horrified and emptied out at the thought of her leaving like this. When he had been brave, she had told him so. When he had been stupid, she had told him that, as well, but usually in a nice way, the Teyla way, especially after she'd choked him with her sticks on the Mainland that time.
"I am lost!" she said in her delirium. "Aiden, please, I am so thirsty…"
Teyla spoke unwittingly to a lot of people she dreamed during this time, to Lt. Ford, the Colonel, Ronon, her mother. She even spoke to McKay, although she was watching him in her head and not seeing him beside her.
She exclaimed, "Watch where you are stepping, Doctor. There are traps laid all along this path."
McKay tried to recall a time when they had voyaged to such a place, but couldn't recall anything specific. Then he realized that every planet and settlement that they had been to was like that in one way or another—with hidden threats strewn everywhere.
Teyla's blistering fever lasted eight days. McKay stayed with her until Carson sent him away to collect himself.
The physician said, "Go on. Get some sleep. I don't want to see you here for at least six hours. I only just released you a few days ago. You're going to end up sick again, as well."
"But you said that Teyla's not contagious."
Beckett breathed evenly and worked his jaw to stifle a full-blown argument with his friend.
"If there's any change, I'll let you know."
McKay left the infirmary, but returned exactly six hours later, looking as rumpled as when he had last been there. Ronon had come by in the meantime and left a charm of some sort, something that McKay had seen him buy at a market on P4X-998, hanging off of the heart monitor.
Taking Teyla's hand, McKay seated himself. This was many days into her illness. She was pale and thin and looked almost aged, despite Carson's best efforts to keep her hydrated, to bring down the fever.
He held her hand and spoke to her. "Teyla, this is Rodney McKay," he said. "I hope that you can hear me. Carson says that you're going to get better, so please…" He really didn't know how to finish saying this, especially since he was lying. He never thought he'd be saying these things to anyone, let alone her.
"Please," he repeated.
OoOoO
McKay had walked and crept and crouched and hidden for three days. Now the sun was setting over the distant mountains, and the parapet surrounding Teyla's fortress rose up before him, black and impenetrably massive, but nothing more than a problem to be solved to the positive thinker who stood below it.
On his trek, McKay had stopped by the field where he'd last seen Sheppard and Ronon. There were no slaves laboring out there that day, which seemed odd. But, then, this entire adventure was odd, what with Teyla ordering her friends be poisoned and enslaved, while she lived in a castle wearing ball gowns in the afternoon.
He used the impending darkness and his nondescript clothing to ease his way around the wall's perimeter, seeking a crack in the façade, an opening large enough to allow him in. The construction was millennia old and pitted with crumbled places and tell-tale holes made in wars long past. One portion of the outer wall appeared lower than the rest, sinking into a collapsing substrate, perhaps where an aquifer lay beneath.
"Simple," McKay said to himself. He pushed up his sleeves and hitched his breeches to give himself more range of motion. Then, placing a thinly booted foot into a hole in the wall, and taking hold of the mortarless edge of the lowest block, he heaved himself up and immediately began searching for another foothold, another handhold, another opportunity to breach the imposing edifice.
On one occasion, he lost his grip and almost fell back to the ground. His stomach leaping with fear, he managed to hang still to catch his breath, limbs shaking with strain.
Teyla could do this, he knew. She wouldn't have the least bit of trouble with it, either.
He continued, one hand, one foot, another hand, another foot, doubting that he would succeed, but never doubting that he should try. Then came the moment when McKay realized that he had made it, climbed a high wall without ropes or carabiners or help of any kind, and he giggled a little with surprise and delight.
The wall was about four feet thick, and offered McKay enough room to lie flat and take a breather when he reached the top. Still with luck on his side, no one appeared at all interested in this part of the cordon, nor had anyone seen him. He was so very proud of himself, until he realized that dropping down onto the other side meant pretty much a 20-foot freefall.
"Great," he muttered. There were no artillery scars on the insides of the containment wall, no advantage like that. Expecting the worst, he hung his legs over the side and lowered himself until only his fingertips clung to the top. Then he let go, dropped down about 15 feet, and was pleasantly surprised to feel only a giant shudder run up his spine but receive no apparent injuries.
"This is good," he said, pleased with himself. "No broken leg so far."
McKay had seen Teyla's carriage roll out beyond the fortress at sunset, before the moon rose. He hoped that it wouldn't return before he had a chance to find some food and discover how the Athosian leader had come to think of herself as the ruler of the muddy Seyans and their stinking fields.
Mostly recovered from the toxin he'd been forced to consume, McKay still felt some residual pain in his belly and bouts of dizziness. His food had been depleted a day ago. Surely going hungry was not going to make him stronger. So, McKay tiptoed to the rambling citadel in search of food and answers.
…..
Well into the night, the carriage pulled to a stop in front of the fortress. Teyla emerged and walked briskly inside, with Centris following closely at her heels.
"Please, Your Maje, you must eat or lose your strength!"
"I am perfectly strong as it is. Too much food has made me fat and lazy."
"You have been ill, King, taken to your bed for weeks. You awoke out of sorts with your body. At least allow me to administer your medicine."
"No," she said, stopping and facing her minister. "I was strong when I recovered but I'm failing, now. The medicine seems to be weakening me. Even this clothing weighs me down."
"Your royal vestments..."
"Just…just leave me be, High Counsel!"
With that, she bounded up the stairs, angry at how winded she felt at the top of them. Then, brushing aside the handmaids' offers of assistance, she stormed into her room and slammed the door. The window beckoned again, the silvery moon rising, making things vague beyond the magenta curtains.
"Please…" She heard this again and again, and the chasm inside of her yawned impossibly wide and she felt like crying for the stranger whose burial mound she'd patted hopelessly in the cemetery.
…..
McKay moved closer to the kitchen and its delightful aromas. He'd seen the carriage return, watched as Teyla and the sadist who'd ordered him chained stepped out and went inside. He heard them arguing but could not hear what was said. Just outside the kitchen door, secreted beside a large rain barrel, McKay waited until the cooks and cleaners completed their tasks, blew out their lanterns and left the room. Then it was time for McKay to enter and gather a light meal for himself. Once he was sufficiently strong, again, he would find Teyla and see her safely back to Atlantis with him.
…..
The king could no longer stand pacing about her chambers with silly handmaids at her elbow, distracting her with their fluttery concern. This night she needed to move, to flee, to sweat from effort rather than from the multitudinous layers of clothing hanging on her. This night, after so many thinking about the pale man and after today, when she missed him without ever having known him, Teyla needed to run.
The professor had been weak, so she had condemned him for it. This was the Seyan way; Centris had told her so. The professor had been alone and frightened like an orphaned child, but she had killed him anyway, had turned her back on him as he screamed her name, as the sound of it echoed in the dungeon.
Her clothing rustled loudly in the halls, and there was nothing for it but to find lighter materials, something practical that could withstand anything. The king wandered the halls of her own palace, lost and yet not. At the base of the back stairs, she discovered a dark portico, a mudroom for removing soiled boots and stacking deliveries. Cleaner clothing, men's clothing, was stored there, recently washed and hung to dry.
Off came her heavy brocade skirt and multiple petticoats. She unlaced her tight bodice and threw it aside. Next she removed her camisole and then the stiff corset, the bones of which left red welts on her skin. To be rid of this thing felt best of all and she inhaled deeply, feeling energized for the first time since coming out of her sick stupor.
The manly clothing fit her well enough, if she cinched the tie-belt and hitched up the breeches. Brushed suede boots replaced her dainty slippers and neither chafed nor flopped around.
"Your Maje…" a soft voice spoke from the kitchen doorway. A cook or a cleaner, come to finish up some last little thing.
"Dustmaid," Teyla acknowledged, feeling caught. But why? This was the king's home, her home. These clothes were rightfully hers to wear.
"You are dressed strangely, Your Maje."
"I am going walking," she said firmly, moving towards an outside door.
The servant hurried away, and Teyla feared that she would be stopped. This was her in the night, not some child lost on the highway! Still, Centris seemed to like keeping her inside, as if the trees or the shining moon would change her.
No moon shone in this night, and the fortress windows threw out precious little light to go by. Still, the darkness felt enthralling, mysterious and full of potential. She hadn't gone far, was still in the courtyard, when a voice distracted her.
"So the Woman King is forgetting her fortunate life!"
Centris spoke from a distance, his words carrying easily in the quiet.
Then he cried, in mock surprise, "My king, look! See what it means to have incompetents responsible for protecting the royal line!"
Two sentries opened a door near the kitchen and shoved a struggling figure, unrecognizable in the darkness, into the yard. He was panting fearfully and the unmistakable clanking of chains echoed off the high walls around them. Many more sentries gathered, their usually stoic expressions now eager, hungry almost.
"Come closer, Your Maje."
Teyla did not move.
A rear guard pushed forward with a lantern and illuminated the prisoner—it was the pale man, the useless professor! His face was leaner and even paler than before, as he twisted his chin over the iron collar and chain that had been clamped around his tender neck.
"Tey—"he managed before a sentry pole axed him with an iron rod. The professor fell over awkwardly, as his hands were clasped by iron shackles and his feet strung with a short chain between them. He rolled in the dust, holding his head and moaning softly.
Centris approached and stood over the stricken man with rod raised to deliver a death blow.
"Stop!" Teyla shouted, and her Minister jerked in surprise.
"Yes, Your Maje?"
"He has escaped his fate. Perhaps he is meant to live."
"What, this feeble excuse for a man?"
And Teyla looked down at McKay's blanching skin, his hands that now bore scars and calluses on the palms. The empty place inside of her opened wider, filling itself with pictures of him leaning over tables all day, pushing buttons and talking a lot, and walking away from her with a smirk painted all over his face. Teyla found herself becoming irritated at him, annoyed as if he had pestered her for years.
She leaned over him and said, "You were carted away for execution, professor. Why have you returned?"
"To take you home." These words made no sense at all but sounded so right and so perfect coming from this stranger.
She saw crumbs on his clothing, now, a shining dribble of dried juice on his chin. The reprehensible scoundrel! She grabbed at McKay's collar and brought his face close. "You have been stealing our food, our drink?"
He spoke haltingly, as if the effort to speak were draining the life out of him. "Walking for days. Hungry."
"All of my people are hungry!" she said, and in a moment she grabbed a sentry's rod and pulled at McKay's collar chain to force him upright. There was no pleasure in beating a man while he lay in the dirt. His eyes opened a crack and then widened when he saw the rod held aloft menacingly.
"No, Teyla, I can explain…"
She was both angry and tearful, hearing his tremulous voice, seeing the rivulets of blood running down the side of his head, over his ear and onto the heavy collar.
"You are a thief and a weakling. You fail to show me the respect that I deserve by speaking as if I were not your king but some servant girl. If you are so smart, professor, surely you realize that I don't know you!" she spat, jerking him closer, showing him the rod that would soon beat him to death.
"You do you do you do you do! We're friends. I swear it!"
"Swear! You swear to the air and to the mud. A man will say anything when he knows that he is about to die!"
Teyla raised the weapon higher and brought it down swiftly, and the pale man closed his eyes and whispered, "Teyla, please!"
TBC...