\nThe nuns are drunk; they’ve asked us to bring them the head of Catraz before the sun rises. Lyonn chews off the tip of her thumbnail and spits it to the floor beside Sister Baobosa\u2019s club foot.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cHow much?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cName your price,\u201d Sister Baobosa says.\n<\/p>\n
\nLyonn strokes her chin. My sister was once the greatest warrior in Marrion, but then the wine took her. Now she\u2019s thirty-five and all of eighteen stone, with a belly like a burlap sack ripping at the seams.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cTwelve pieces for me,\u201d she says. \u201cAnd twelve more for my brother.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThe nuns take in my pubescent moustache and coffee-coloured arms bedecked in jewellery. I expect them to make the sign to acknowledge our mutual faith, but Sister Haerga simply curls a lip. \u201cWhy do you need the boy?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cPrayer,\u201d Lyonn says, delighting in the irony. \u201cYves is my second, and that\u2019s my offer. Take it or find someone else.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThe nuns confer. The eldest wraps her bony knuckles on the corner table. She gestures in one of the now-defunct finger languages. A few nod in agreement while another belches loudly, as though to settle the matter.\n<\/p>\n
\nSister Baobosa stands and drains her flagon, upends it on her head-dress so wine trickles down her cheeks and coif. She approaches, and the stench of her halitosis almost makes me gag.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cHow old are you, pretty boy?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cSeventeen,\u201d I answer.\n<\/p>\n
\nShe extends a crooked finger and traces the yellow nail down my jawline. I stare at her purple teeth and the nuggets of plaque between them.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cYou ever killed a woman, Yves?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nI scan the nuns’ faces. \u201cI follow the six,\u201d I say simply, gesturing to my necklaces.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cIt was Yves who insisted on bringing you an offering,\u201d Lyonn explains. \u201cHe suggested oranges from the orchards of Suiz. I assured him you would prefer the wine.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nSister Baobosa grins indulgently. \u201cTwelve pieces now, and the rest when you return. Go and sin for us. You have the blessing of the spirits.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cAnd don\u2019t forget to bring us the head,\u201d another barks from the back. \u201cWe believe only in what we can see.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThey guffaw as Lyonn makes for the door. I linger for one final look at the sisters.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cYou forgot to bless it,\u201d I remind them. \u201cThe wine.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nSister Haerga withdraws the flagon from her lips and extends her wine-stained tongue. She makes the sign of the six spirits on her wrinkled forehead, then dredges up a knot of phlegm in her throat and launches it at the floor. It hits the cold stone with a slapping sound, like a slug being catapulted against a wall.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cSatisfied?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nLyonn beckons me to the door. I follow her out of the Priory with the sisters still cackling into their drinks.\n<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\nSeven floors above, Lyonn plunges a finger into the tin bowl and stirs her rice wine. Her curved knife sits between us. A kukri blade; between sips she gazes at her reflection in the clean steel. Looking back at her, I\u2019m sure, is the teenage cut-throat that used to break necks and hearts in a single evening.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cCatraz drinks in The Apology on the nights of Odilla,\u201d she says, watching me across the table.\n<\/p>\n
\nI\u2019m painting my fingernails in the colours of the fifth spirit, with olive and plum pastes mixed from beeswax and vegetable dyes. When finished, I open the tin of safflower powder and apply the maroon paste to my eyelids.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThe sisters surprised you, didn’t they?\u201d Lyonn asks.\n<\/p>\n
\nI don’t reply. The nuns must have been distracted by the prospect of a holy trial, that’s all.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cYou haven\u2019t danced the columns in years,\u201d I remind my sister.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cAnd neither has Catraz. Don\u2019t worry, brother, I was winning trials when you were still pissing the bed. You just worry about your spirits. We leave when these bowls are empty.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nShe grabs the battered kettle and refills my bowl.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cDrink,\u201d she commands.\n<\/p>\n
\nI lift the bowl to my lips and the pale liquor coats my tongue with a sour film. I wince as I swallow, much to Lyonn’s mirth.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cWhy do the nuns want Catraz?\u201d I ask.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cBecause she\u2019s a little shit. She\u2019s been after the Priory for months. You\u2019ve never seen her, have you? She used to have wonderful legs.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cShe was the one, wasn’t she?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nLyonn’s never told me about the woman who broke her heart, though I’ve heard rumours. She picks up her knife and tilts it to observe the deep line of her cleavage, her black skin shining with perspiration.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cYou should have seen me back then, little brother. Men used to spoil their pants just sitting this close to me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nI close my safflower tin. \u201cI need to pray before we leave.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nLyonn rolls her eyes towards the flaming torches on the Hangman walls. Two men stand at adjacent windows and piss into the moat that surrounds the tower.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cYou\u2019ve seen how the sisters pray these days,\u201d she says. \u201cYou\u2019re in The Well, brother, the holiest place in Marrion. To be closer to the spirits, all you have to do is climb.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n
\nThe Well is sixty storeys high, a cylinder of ancient stone towering above the heart of the city. It was taken from the church years ago when the common folk converted from gods to liquor. There are two hundred taverns and pubs in its walls, my sister tells me, though only a few dozen are well known, even to the most debauched residents of Marrion.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThe higher you go,\u201d Lyonn says, catching her breath on the winding stair, \u201cthe more you pay to poison your liver. Nowhere beneath the twentieth floor is worth a bronze coin. They\u2019re all shit-smelling hovels with beer that tastes like water and water that tastes like piss. Card sharks and crooked dice rollers, and wrinkled crones pouring their pensions into shot glasses.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nWe ascend the meandering staircase ever more ponderously. Lyonn’s ragged breaths echo off the walls like the death throes of a wounded animal. She pauses at every window, sun-shaped cavities in the stone walls. Drunks stumble by, and many stop to flirt with my sister and delay our progress even further.\n<\/p>\n
\nFinally we reach the fiftieth floor, home to three of The Well’s most frequented establishments. We pass through Raev’s Keep, heavily perfumed with the city’s best imported whiskies; then The Cat and Fuckmuffin, a poorly-lit tavern specialising in Suiz wines and infamous sellbodies. A beautiful Suiz woman plucks at a harp before a scrutinizing crowd; musicians in The Well either end their nights rich as royals, or with their shattered teeth floating in a rancid moat of piss.\n<\/p>\n
\nLyonn is dragged to a corner table before we make it half-way. I watch from the wall as she is bombarded with wine. A half-naked young man sits on her knee while a woman caresses her cheeks. I appeal to the spirits; my sister has lost her way, but I can save her. With the help of the six, she will find the righteous path again.\n<\/p>\n
\nWhen Lyonn sees my expression she unburdens herself and stands. She whispers something to each of the sellbodies, and they send kisses through the air as we pass through a beaded curtain into The Apology.\n<\/p>\n
\nWe’re assaulted by the scents of cinnamon, woodsmoke, and silverweed, along with Flower, the nine year-old daughter of the owner. She struts before us in leather trousers, a sword at her belt and a scar stretching from her hooked nose to the crown of her shaven head.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cLyonn the Sinner,\u201d she says.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cHow’s business tonight?\u201d Lyonn asks.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThey’re running the barrels dry. Are you here for a drink or a bounty?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cI’m here to make you forget the question,\u201d Lyonn says, beckoning me forward. I drop to one knee and take Flower’s hand in my own, draw it to my lips and plant kisses on the knuckles. Flower looks down at me and smirks. I wonder if this is the real reason I’m at Lyonn’s side; to observe formalities, to play the part of the clown that no one understands. Is this the world we live in now? One where even children view the faith with contempt?\n<\/p>\n
\nFlower bows and stands aside when she feels the silver coin slip between her fingers. I return to my feet, feeling smaller than ever.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe Apology is shrouded in the smoke of a log fire that crackles and spits in the centre of the room. Patrons sit cross-legged around low tables on fading floral carpets spattered with flakes of ash. Others lean on oak beams, sipping from cinnamon-topped stouts in glass vases. Tapestries conceal nooks around the walls, spaces reserved for plots, gamblers, or impulsive couples.\n<\/p>\n
\nLyonn makes for a tapestry guarded by two men wearing the black swan necklaces of the Quissa Isles.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cCatraz in tonight?\u201d she asks.\n<\/p>\n
\nOne of them shakes his head. The other stares at me.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cI’ve business for her.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThe first guard opens his mouth to reveal a single blackened tooth. \u201cThere’s a price on her head. Would that be your business?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cIt could be.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThat’s why she isn’t here tonight, and she won’t be here tomorrow night. If you stand here ten seconds longer, you won’t be here, either.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nLyonn turns to me and smiles; it\u2019s a smile I\u2019ve seen many times before. The knife is out of her belt before the guards can even blink.\n<\/p>\n
\n
\nCatraz is alone, her legs crossed beneath a candle-strewn table of burnt mahogany. She gestures for us to sit.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cLet me guess,\u201d she says in a voice deeper than any man\u2019s I\u2019ve ever met. \u201cThe sisters have asked for my head.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nShe\u2019s older than I expected, perhaps sixty; her thin, vulture-like face has a pale and clammy aspect, and blue bags sag under her eyes.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThey think you want the Priory,\u201d Lyonn says.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cI do<\/em> want the Priory. The Well is no longer a holy place, and the nuns are sitting on valuable real estate.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nCatraz raises an aged hand and drags the greasy auburn wig from her head. She scratches at her naked scalp, a purple-veined dome stained with liver spots. The sound of her nails fills the grotto.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou were with them once,\u201d Lyonn reminds her.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cA lot of us were,\u201d Catraz says, replacing the wig. \u201cWe stumbled through life with our eyes closed, blind following blind. Now when I close my eyes I see a lot more than six spirits, and all of them are fucking blurry. Who’s your friend?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMy brother, Yves. He follows the six.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYes, I’ve noticed his pretty nails and necklaces. Did you come to pray over my corpse, boy?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI came to see that it was done right,\u201d I say. \u201cYou were once a sister of the faith and the spirits haven\u2019t forgotten.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThe bitches in the Priory haven\u2019t forgotten either, unfortunately. He\u2019s young,\u201d she adds to Lyonn.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cHalf my age and twice my wits, but he doesn\u2019t know how to use them,\u201d Lyonn says, chastising me with her level stare. \u201cHe thinks love means whispering words into the sky. He should try whispering between a pair of sweaty legs, then he\u2019ll know what love and living mean.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI wince at my sister’s vulgarity, but Catraz laughs, a throaty wheeze. \u201cGive him time. Only those who have been blind can see in all clarity.\u201d She drains her glass and slams it on the table. \u201cSo how\u2019s it going to go, Lyonn the Sinner? Are you going to butcher me here as you\u2019ve butchered my guards? As you butchered my husband?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI look at my sister.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAh, I see your brother doesn’t know everything of your colourful history. We were lovers once, your sister and I, did you know that, boy?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nLyonn only stares into the dancing blue flames before her.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMy fellow sisters weren’t too pleased with the idea, of course. Relations are forbidden by the six, and the age difference\u2026 well, I could have been her mother. I ended it. I left the service of the spirits and later took up with a man. Your sister gutted him while he slept, hung his entrails around my room.\u201d She turns again to Lyonn. \u201cI\u2019ll wager you were pleased to finally receive the bounty for me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIf it were up to me I’d end you here and now,\u201d Lyonn says. \u201cBut the sisters don\u2019t want it that way.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThey want a trial of the six,\u201d Catraz says. \u201cFitting, seeing as neither of us believe in them.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI believe in the nuns’ silver,\u201d Lyonn says.\n<\/p>\n \nThey contemplate each other, their eyes shining with the reflections of flickering flames. I try to make sense of them; two women, both so confident in their ignorance. I wonder how it’s possible for two such capable people to fall so far astray.\n<\/p>\n \nCatraz runs her tongue along her lower lip and pinches the life from a candle. \u201cIt\u2019s been too long,\u201d she says, her lips curling into a hungry smile. \u201cWhat are we waiting for? Let\u2019s give the spirits something to talk about.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAnd you, boy,\u201d she adds, addressing me, \u201clet’s see how close to the spirits you feel when the first spray of blood hits your face.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n \nThe roof of The Well is naked under a brooding charcoal sky.\n<\/p>\n \nI climb one of the Jury Ladders that rise from the circumference of the rooftop, while onlookers jostle for position on the rungs below. Lyonn accepts vases of Suiz reds from the galvanized drunks who have secured standing space on the roof. Across the arena, Catraz tightens the straps of her leather cuirass and inspects the edges of her blade.\n<\/p>\n \nOdilla\u2019s Bell is rung, and the combatants climb. The trial is fought across an assemblage of wooden columns, four feet in diameter and fifteen feet high. The onlookers below crane their necks while I pray to the sky, asking for the virtuous requests of the nuns to be granted. The nuns, I think with a returning disappointment, drinking their unblessed wine.\n<\/p>\n \nCatraz and Lyonn take their positions on the outer columns. Lyonn plants her feet shoulder-width apart, sideface, eyes twinkling at her opponent. Catraz turns a slow circle, eyeing the spectators watching from the Jury Ladders. Her gaze rests on me. Even in the dark I feel her eyes fixed on mine, the smile playing on her lips.\n<\/p>\n \nThe second bell rings, and silence falls upon The Well. For what seems like minutes, the only sound is the wind.\n<\/p>\n \nGradually the onlookers begin to chant. Still Catraz pins me with her penetrating stare. The voices beat like a terrible drum through the night air; I feel it in the pit of my stomach, throbbing against my ribs, and Catraz\u2019s magnetic eyes underscore the rhythm that pulses through my veins. In her gaze I see the lust for life, the fearless acceptance of the next world, the stubborn refusal to regret.\n<\/p>\n \nWhen Odilla\u2019s Bell rings for the third time, a great roar erupts. I offer one final prayer, but see nothing above except suffocating clouds, and my prayers stick in my throat. The trial begins.\n<\/p>\n \nLyonn draws the kukri knife from her belt and hurtles it with a backhand toss. The curved blade spins towards Catraz in a winding arc, slicing the air three inches above her head before returning to Lyonn\u2019s outstretched hand. My sister catches the leather hilt of the spinning blade in her gloved hand. An inch out and she would have lost her fingers.\n<\/p>\n \nCatraz responds with a fierce toss of her own. Lyonn leaps with surprising dexterity to the next platform, avoiding Catraz\u2019s knife before releasing her own an instant later, so that both knives catapult towards Catraz at once. She ducks the first and catches the second, all without moving her feet. Applause and approving roars from below.\n<\/p>\n \nBoth women remain motionless for a moment, watching each other. I look for an indication of action, but these are two masters whose bodies give nothing away. Watching from below, they must seem like statues.\n<\/p>\n \nSuddenly Catraz leaps, releasing her knife mid-jump. Lyonn reacts a millisecond later, hopping to her left and tossing her own. Catraz stumbles and drops to her stomach, hugging the column with her arms and legs. Lyonn’s knife soars harmlessly above her, but Catraz is slow to return to her feet, and her own knife soars between Jury Ladders and disappears into the night sky.\n<\/p>\n \nLyonn\u2019s supporters yell triumphantly and I whisper thanks into my hands. Into my hands, I realise, and not to the sky. Lyonn simply coughs into her armpit, showing her first signs of fatigue. Catraz returns to her feet wielding a new kukri, passed from the ladder behind. She weighs the new blade in her hands, catching her breath, while Lyonn rearranges her feet. The bell rings again.\n<\/p>\n \nLyonn makes the first move, tossing her knife with a wide forehand. Catraz dodges the knife and leaps forward, reducing the distance between them to a dozen feet. Lyonn avoids Catraz\u2019s next toss with a forward leap that brings the women even closer together.\n<\/p>\n \nLyonn throws again and Catraz, off-balance, is too slow to react. The spinning blade of silver cuts through her neck as if it were a bag of flour. The head falls first, dropping onto a garden of scrambling fingers that try to claim it. The body tumbles after, held aloft by a sea of blood-splattered hands.\n<\/p>\n \nMost of the crowd cheer while others utter lamentations of despair; others still lose the colour from their cheeks.\n<\/p>\n \nLyonn is dragged down by admirers, who proceed to pour drinks into her open mouth. I look automatically to the sky to thank the six, though I hear nothing of them above the sound of the crowd.\n<\/p>\n \n \n\u201cYour spirits saved me,\u201d Lyonn says with a wry smile. \u201cBe sure to give them my thanks.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nCatraz’s head is in a sack under my arm. The bottom is damp with blood.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cDid it hurt?\u201d I ask. \u201cSeeing her die?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nLyonn watches me carefully.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAlmost as much as it hurt when she left me.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nHer eyes are glazed with tears, but she doesn’t let them fall. The crowd behind us beg for her attention and she raises a hand to acknowledge them.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI never wanted to be the Sinner, you know. I just didn’t want it to end\u2026 I regret it, what I did. You don’t know how it feels – it broke me. That\u2019s when I lost the faith; none of it mattered anymore. I wish you could know the power of a love like that.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMaybe one day I will.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI wanted you to see tonight,\u201d Lyonn says, her face softening. \u201cThis world. Her.<\/em> That there might be more to life. You can choose your own path, you know; there isn’t only one.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nA swathe of bodies arrive to drag her back to the party. The mask that appears on her face is uncanny \u2013 the wide smile, the carnival energy in her eyes. The others would never know what was going on beneath. I hadn’t.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cCome straight back up here when you’re done,\u201d Lyonn calls to me, and she disappears between bodies and glasses.\n<\/p>\n \n \nThe severed head of Catraz sits on the table, surrounded by flagons of wine. Sister Baobosa takes it in her hands, all bone and blue vein, and tosses it over her shoulder, satisfied. The nuns cackle.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cAnd where\u2019s your beloved sister, the Sinner?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cCelebrating. She has an appointment in The Cat and Fuckmuffin. Two appointments.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nA bead of sweat detaches itself from Sister Baobosa’s nose and drops into her wine. She sneers at me and removes a bag of coins from her habit, throwing it at my chest.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNow clear out of here.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nI hesitate. \u201cWill Catraz meet the spirits with honour?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nSister Haerga spits another slug onto the stone floor. \u201cPiss off, pretty boy, and don\u2019t come back.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cUnless you have more of that wine,\u201d Sister Baobosa adds.\n<\/p>\n \nI close the door behind me but still hear the nuns’ hyena laughs from the other side. The sound echoes through the hall as I stand at the window, watching the sky bronze at the horizon. I lift my necklaces over my head and hold them before me like a prisoner holding his own chains.\n<\/p>\n \nI imagine my sister several storeys above; the smiles and laughter and music that orbit her. I recall the look in Catraz\u2019s eyes before the trial.\n<\/p>\n \nWith a final look at the clouds, I toss my necklaces into the sky and make for the stairs.\n<\/p>\n Tomas Marcantonio is a novelist and short story writer from Brighton, England. His fiction has appeared in numerous anthologies and journals, both online and in print. Tomas is currently based in Busan, South Korea, where he teaches English and writes whenever he can escape the classroom. You can follow him on Twitter @TJMarcantonio<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The nuns are drunk; they’ve asked us to bring them the head of Catraz before the sun rises. Lyonn chews off the tip of her thumbnail and spits it to the floor beside Sister Baobosa\u2019s club foot. \u201cHow much?\u201d \u201cName your price,\u201d Sister Baobosa says. Lyonn strokes her chin. My sister was once the greatest …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107043,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,20006],"tags":[20007],"class_list":["post-137810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction","category-tcl-35-spring-2020","tag-the-colored-lens-35-spring-2020","entry entry-center"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/107043"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=137810"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137810\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":137811,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137810\/revisions\/137811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=137810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=137810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=137810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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