Once We Were Starlight

“Haziq,” he grumbled, “is a bastard and a fool. And you sound like his pet parrot.”

Stung, I drew back. A parrot was a bird that repeated all its master’s words, regardless of their worth. Tal sang a funny song about one sometimes, entertaining us in the courtyard.

At my hurt reaction, Zakai flinched. “I’m sorry, little star.”

“It’s okay,” I said, sighing. I knew that despite his own memories of starvation and despair, Zakai still longed for . . . some form of freedom I seldom desired. I had a home I loved. I had the eagle owl with eyes as orange as the setting sun, the playful goats that gifted us their milk, the date palms heavy with crimson fruit, and the delicate desert roses heady with perfume. I had the dragonflies with their iridescent wings, and the moon that grew so large in the star-laden night sky that sometimes I reached up to see if I could touch it, it seemed so close. And I had him, the other half of me.

I didn’t like the eyes that watched. But they didn’t harm me. Zakai had taught me to laugh at them. To call them names. And I had learned to listen to their secrets.

“The demented frog,” I mused, remembering his protruding eyes and the tongue that continually darted out to lick his thick lips. “I heard someone say his name. It’s Rami Erdagar. I drew it in my book.” I didn’t know letters, but I had my own language, a set of pictures that I used to sound out words and names.

“I don’t know why you bother.”

I shrugged. I wasn’t sure why I drew their names when I picked them up through snatches of conversation that drifted across the room. It had become habit. I had a list three pages long now contained in the small notebook with the yellow cover that I hid under my bedding.

I drew stories too, collected from those who came to repay a debt on Sundara, some of whom had left, and some who still remained. I sketched the things they told me about from the imaginings of my own mind, like the great blue whale that blew water from its spout, and the buildings that cut through the clouds.

“What word caught your attention tonight?” he asked.

I sighed, dragging my fingers over the stone, rubbing a few grains of sand between my fingertips. “Tantalizing,” I said. “Bertha says it means very good.” My brow flickered. I loved Bertha. She was older than I was, so she knew more things, but she’d never gone to school.

Zakai breathed out a laugh. “They must have been describing you.”

My brow smoothed as I shot him a smile. “Or you. I wrote it down.”

“Someday maybe you’ll string all those words together and they’ll tell a story.”

“What kind of story?”

“Something good, little star. Something that inspires hope.”

Hope. What was hope? I looked toward the sand-filled emptiness beyond our wall. Why wish for things you could not see? It was better to love the things in front of you, to appreciate what you’d been given, no matter how small.

Wasn’t it?

Zakai pulled me close, dipping his face to mine and using his hand to cup my chin. He tightened his fingers, tilting my head suddenly so that I let out a surprised gasp, his tongue probing my mouth roughly and causing my thoughts to flee. My body thrilled. This was the Zakai he only shared with me. “You want me, don’t you?” he grated. “Without the eyes on us? Without others watching?”

“Yes. Yes,” I moaned, beginning to climb down to the lush green grass. But Zakai moved over me so that I was forced to lean back on the thin strip of rock that made up the top of the wall. My heart leapt as my head turned toward the drop on the other side. Any small movement and I might roll right off and plummet to the hard-packed sand below.

Zakai pushed up the linen dress I wore and with a quick snap of his wrist, tore my underwear away. I let out a sound that was half gasp, but mostly moan as he went up on his knees on the wall, taking my ankles in his hands and bringing them to his shoulders. I teetered slightly, using each hand to grip the opposite sides of the wall, attempting to hold myself steady. My palms spread, the rock scratchy and still warm from the sun that had scorched the daylight hours. Zakai lowered his head, his tongue dancing along my thigh with quick little laps, drawing closer to the warm, wet place I was begging him to taste. He flicked his tongue closer and then away until I let go of the wall, grabbing his hair in my fingers, and forcing his head between my legs. He let out a satisfied laugh that was quickly muffled by my desperate, aching flesh. He knew just what to do, knew my body as well as he knew his own. Knew the exact pressure to use, the precise number of strokes that would cause me to claw at his head and see the stars from which we’d once fallen burst behind my closed lids.