That didn’t make any sense, but the strange thoughts were not leaving her. She decided to talk with them instead. She made a painful swallow to clear her mouth and tried to speak as best as her fragile voice could allow. “Where am I?”
Still, no sound came to her other than the strange thoughts drifting up from the back of her scattered mind.
Vantaiga forced herself to focus on the shifting images about her. The images were steadier now, and she was able to recognize them as the branches of the willow tree draped around her. The dim light was from what must be the lantern at the entrance of the garden. She ran her fingers in the grass to assure herself. It was soothing and still damp from a cooling winter rain that must have passed through. A strange wonderment settled into her confused head.
Was she insane?
Vantaiga partly laughed, partly sobbed, and partly winced in pain. She decided to take it for granted she was insane. Pretending to talk to the willow tree was giving her some comfort though. She thought she would talk to the flowers later, but for now, she was wondering what had happened to her.
Sadness washed over Vantaiga, and she suppressed a sob. She didn’t want to get up again. She tried moving her right leg, but it hurt too much to bend. She didn’t know if she would be able to get up again. She wanted to know how she had been hurt, and what had happened to her before she was dropped in the garden.
Vantaiga’s head spun too much to remember. She tried to concentrate. There were memories in her head. They were images. They floated and swayed with the throbs of pain as she struggled to understand them.
There was a dress…
a room…
a hallway…
many people…
many feet.
The images spun about and made her head hurt more. She drew in a slow breath, relaxed herself into the cool earth, and tried to focus on the spinning memories again.
She began to recall them and drag them slowly and erratically up to her awareness. The memories wavered and shifted before her. They seemed to move back and forth to the motion of her spinning head. She couldn’t hold on to them very long. They faded in and out, making her continuously have to pull them up again.
There was a dress…
There was a dress…
A dress…
There was a dress in a room…
It was the eldest daughter’s dress…
A dress…
A room…
The effort to hold on to the memories was overwhelming her concentration. Vantaiga took in a stammered breath and forced the images out. She focused on her breathing to ease her rattled mind.
They were in the daughter’s room…
She retrieved the dress for her…
She retrieved the dress… She placed it on the bed…
It was the wrong dress… She placed it on the bed…
It was the wrong dress… She ripped the dress…
She was pushed…
She turned, she was pushed, she ripped the dress…
A tinge of horror crept over Vantaiga. She knew the dress. It was a very expensive dress. It was a dress for the eldest daughter’s presentation to her future in-laws. She was beginning to tense up and it made her side ache. She relaxed again, this time focusing on the still night air…
There was yelling…
There was a stick…
Vantaiga touched the aching bruises on her shoulder and arm. Not a stick. A rod.
There were more voices, more shouting. She was out in the hallway.
She was on the floor. There were feet.
There was kicking.
She was commanded to get up. She got up and she fell. Something struck her in the leg, in the knee.
She fell. She fell into the head maid.
There was more shouting. There was more kicking. There were more things hitting her.
There were more things hitting her in the face, head, ear, mouth.
There were words. She remembered words. The only words her scattered brain could recall: “Throw her to the garden if that’s all she’s good for.” She couldn’t tell who had spoken them, but she remembered them clearly.
She was picked up off the floor. She was thrown. Someone strong threw her down the hallway. The Master of Servants? No, stronger—a guard. A guard threw her down the hall. Her leg gave way. She fell.
There was a kick. This kick was different. It was not a kick she was familiar with as a slave. It was not a kick to punish or humiliate. It was not a kick with sandaled feet or shoes. It was the kick of a soldier with a soldier’s boot. It was a kick to destroy.
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The boot landed with an impact that exploded pain into Vantaiga’s side. She heard the sickening pop of a rib snapping within her. With a sodden groan, the air was forced out of her lungs. The muscles of her chest and abdomen clenched, twisting her insides. She gagged so strongly she felt she was swallowing her tongue. Another kick, another rib snapped. She curled into a ball, clutching her ribs. A third kick, a third rib broken. Stars danced across her watering eyes as she gagged and choked for breath.
A fourth kick.
A ringing impact.
A brilliant blow to the head.
White nothingness.
Vantaiga opened her eyes in tears as she stared into the darkness beyond the leaves of the willow tree. There were no memories after that. She drew in a stammering breath that sent ripples of pain throughout her body. She should have died. They would have killed her if not for the garden. She attempted to wipe away her tears without aggravating her swollen eye. It didn’t work. She sobbed and grimaced at the pain. She wished they had killed her.
Vantaiga looked more closely at an errant branch that swayed by her face, alone and out of place from the others. She looked around at the rest of the branches that draped down and encircled her and the tree. None of them were moving. The night air was still.
A wave of fear and awe swept over her. Her head was clearing, and she began to grasp that she was actually talking to a tree. Her muscles involuntarily shuddered, bringing along a fresh wave of agony, nausea, and white sparkles to her eyes. She gasped from astonishment as well as pain. Why would a tree want to talk to her?
The thought of the willow tree plodded its way into her mind:
Vantaiga managed a slight smile. She found it poetic that a tree could be a slave like her and appreciate her attention. She liked to think they were grateful but never imagined they would talk to her. She couldn’t help but wonder why the tree would only talk to her now.
The thought of the tree’s response slowly came to her:
Vantaiga suppressed a laugh. It was such an obvious statement to such an unobvious situation. The tree was right though. She had always kept herself busy to distract herself from the pain of her life and the pain of her abandonment. She never took time to listen to the trees or the flowers. She was too busy trying to seclude herself from a world she didn’t want to be in.
With great effort, she gingerly pulled herself up enough to lean her head against the tree. She placed her good ear on the trunk and listened. A new, incomprehensible thought began crawling through the back of her mind. She had the strange impression the tree was laughing at her. She felt like laughing at herself. What was she expecting to hear anyways?
Vantaiga could not comprehend how to use the tree for medicine.
Vantaiga looked curiously at the branch that dangled before her. Did the tree actually want her to pull off a branch?
The thought then occurred to her
Her hand wavered as she raised it to grasp the branch. She pulled with what strength she had. It took some effort before the ropy branch finally snapped off and fell about her. She looked at it for a moment with a puzzled and somewhat disgusted look. Was she supposed to eat it?
She looked at the thin, wispy branch with concern and scepticism. Finally, she placed the end in her mouth and tried chewing it and sucking what sap it might have. The branch had a bitter, acrid taste. She struggled not to be disgusted by it as the expression would be too painful with her battered face. She tried swallowing the juices, but it irritated and clung to her throat, splinters of wood sticking in her teeth. She removed the chewed end of the branch from her mouth, but the taste lingered. She wondered if it would work as a tea.
A new thought came to her:
Vantaiga looked up the trunk of the willow and fixed it with her good eye. She really didn’t know what to think of the strange conversation. Was she crazy?
Questions began to fill Vantaiga’s head. But then she contemplated if she was actually going to have a conversation with a tree. She decided that she was too injured and tired to make a judgement on it. It would be best to rest and think about it later.
She tried to lift herself, but pain shot up and down her body. Her head swirled and she collapsed back to the ground. Thumping her head on the ground sent an aching throb through her skull and a piercing ring through her ears. She was becoming both accustomed to and frustrated by the now-familiar agony.
She collected her breath and held back the urge to cry. She couldn’t get up. She gave the willow tree a pleading look for its help.
A reassuring thought came to her. With growing endearment, Vantaiga decided to humour the strange tree and thought of asking it to help her up. Without hesitation, the leaves of the willow tree rustled, and the branches twisted towards her supine body.
A shiver crept over Vantaiga as the bows creaked and the thin branches dropped down to wrap around her legs and beneath her back. Vantaiga watched, awestruck, as the willow’s vine-like branches slid underneath her and gently entwined themselves around her. Slowly, they began to lift her up.
An agonising stretch pulled along her ribs. She gasped in shock and pain. “Stop! Stop! Stop!” The willow tree stopped, but her ribs were still torturing her. She tried to suck in a breath but couldn’t. “Back down. Back down. Back down.”
The willow tree lowered her back to the ground. It responded to her commands but did not understand her pain. Its thoughts crept into her head again:
Vantaiga lay on the ground with her eyes closed. A different tactic was required. She was both grateful and fascinated that the tree could lift her while at the same time disappointed that it couldn’t carry her away like some prince of her childhood stories. She scolded herself for thinking such a thing even though so many unthinkable things were happening before her.
She thought of the tree pulling her slowly over onto her good side. The tree lowered its branches again and gently pushed over her shoulder. She groaned as she rolled. The move was excruciating, but Vantaiga knew she had to return to the slave quarters lest the guards find her in the morning and finish their work on her. With careful coordination and a few missteps, the tree was able to bring Vantaiga to one knee, then eventually to stand.
She finished the awkward affair with her body almost straight. She let the branches support her a little longer, partly to let her body become accustomed to the new pains and spinning of being upright, partly to enjoy the moment with the tree a little more.
She couldn’t remember when someone had tried to help her or had even been there when she needed help. She shifted and limped with a shaking right leg over to lean against the tree. The leg could not support her weight, and the world wobbled uneasily around her, but she managed to steady herself.
She rolled up the willow branch she’d clutched onto throughout the ordeal of being lifted. Considering everything that just happened, she felt she should give the tree a chance to prove it actually had medicine in its bark. She tucked the branch into her bloodstained tunic, thanked the tree with a small hug and pat, and slowly and carefully limped her way back to the slaves’ quarters.