Nerdy, I know. Here I stand, his eyes afire, his tongue ablaze, his hands alight. And only over a simple mistake.
“Shut up!” said Lord Da Quian as he shoved me to the ground. “You insolent girl! You will fetch me what I want!”
“Lord Da Quian, please,” I begged, and he slapped my face. It burned, and anger bubbled up inside of me. “We have no rice!”
“Then go buy some from the marketplace!” he demanded. “However, I will not go hungry!”
“Live a day in my life and you will,” I retorted. “You care nothing for me. You only care for me to serve you and bear sons of your name.”
“You will say no more,” he instructed, surprisingly calmly. “Go to your room. I will have my servants fetch me rice. You will eat no dinner tonight.”
I quietly walked back to my quarters and lied down in my bed. His quarters were fancy and large, while mine were quite small. His bed was canopied and comfortable, while mine was uncovered and hard.
I had been enslaved by the Wu dynasty three years earlier, when my peaceful village had been attacked. In order to spare my life, Lord Da Quian took me as his wife, but death seemed better. Lord Da Quian was eleven years older than I was, at only seventeen, and he had a terrible temper. I did not care to be married yet, but apparently, he did.
I looked into my mirror at my reflection, and tears filled my eyes. This life was, indeed, worse than death. He truly did not care anything for me at all. Why he even chose me to be spared was an idea I had not yet grasped. He treated my kindly at first, but he changed shortly after the second year with him.
“Mistress Da Mei, would you like some water?” asked a maidservant. Her name was Xon Wynn. She was much older than me, her hair a light grey color, mine a dark black. She was like a mother to me, since mine had been killed in the attack to my village.
“No, Wynn, I am well for now,” I said, lying just a bit. “Please, won’t you go rest? I do not need anything at the moment.”
“Mistress Da Mei, you are not telling the truth to old Xon Wynn,” she said, referring to herself objectively as she often did. “Child, you know you can speak of anything with me.”
“Please, Wynn, do not address me so formally,” I said, sighing. “I am nothing but a friend.”
“Ah, but you are not,” she corrected, her plump cheeks wrinkling up as she smiled. “But I do know you well enough to know that something is the matter.” She sat down. “Sit and talk.”
“Lord Da Quian’s temper was something horrible,” I said, shivering at the thought of his broad hand striking my pale cheek. “He cares nothing for me whatsoever. I am afraid he might kill me after he has had a son.”
“If he chose to kill you, I would find a way to get you out of here before he had the chance,” she said, the information comforting to me, but then I thought of the consequences for acting against my Lord’s will, and again, tears flooded my dark brown eyes. “Hush, child, what is the matter?”
“Wynn, he would kill you immediately! I would rather die than you,” I said, thinking of life without old Xon Wynn.
“Mei, Mei, do not fret,” she said. “You fear for the worst all the time. It is time to realize that things do not always happen the way that they seem that they will.”
“Xon Wynn,” I said. “What would I do without you? You have been nothing but kind to me, and I am nothing but a nuisance!”
“Is that what you think?”
“It is what I know.”
“You always fear for the worst,” she repeated, and held my hand in between both of her hands. With that, old Xon Wynn stood up and was gone.
“Mei!” came a loud roar from Da Quian’s mouth. I ran to him as quickly as my legs would allow.
“Yes, my Lord,” I said, bowing my head in obedience.
“You servant, that old Xon Wynn woman has convinced me to allow you to have some dinner. You may eat it in your room tonight.”
“Thank you, my Lord,” I said “I am privileged.”
I walked back to my room and sat down upon my bed, waiting for something to occur, but nothing did.
After a long while, one of Lord Da Quian’s servants walked to my bed, set down a plate of rice and water, and walked out.
And then from downstairs, I heard the talk and laughter of several men, Lord Da Quian’s
acquaintances. They joked about how strange I was, the girl from a separate region of China.
“Has she been good to you?” asked one of them.
“Hardly!” replied Da Quian. “She is disrespectful and insolent.”
“Quian, why did you even bother sparing her life?” asked a different man.
“She was too young to die at only fourteen.” After saying this, my Lord fell silent, and the men changed the subject with great haste.
“How are your servants?”
“They should be well enough off,” he said. “I pay them well, and I feed them their morning and noontime meal.”
“You are far too gracious,” muttered one of them.
I almost laughed at hearing this, for I knew my Lord paid the servants nearly nothing, and he gave me only the small room that I had. My clothes were for merely practicality, except when guests actually saw me. Then he would have me dressed up as if I were treated like an empress.
But he despised me. As much as I tried to please him, Lord Da Quian hated me still.
The men laughed about something that his friend had said. Something that I did not find particularly humorous. They were talking about how ugly I was.
And I sat in my quarters and allowed them to do this to me, to make my worth disintegrate. But I could not stop them. I could be beaten or killed if I dared defy my husband’s friends. I was under his reign. He was my Lord. My efforts to make them stop their unkindness would be wasted, so why should I even try?
Eventually, the subject of their jokes shifted, and I was no longer being dashed to the ground by their ugly words. But the burning in my heart to stop them, to do them justice never went away.
And it wasn’t going to anytime in the near future.
Gender:
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