NAILS

Sarah Zama

Translated by Sarah Zama and John Pritchard

Moor threw the shovel out of the pit and arched his back, his fists against his hips. Then he straightened and looked at Abdefatha. The shaman was older and much wearier than he was, panting hard while leaning on the box. Moor thought he could see the old man’s arm trembling with the effort of supporting even his inconsiderable weight, so he waited a while before he bent and seized the lower corners of the case. Abdefatha gave him a withering look. He was still panting, albeit Moore softly. None the less, he took his own shovel which was leaning against the rim of the case, threw it out of the pit, and bent as well.

Moor looked into his face, waiting for a sign. When it came, the two men lifted the burden together, grunting, and let it fall just outside the pit, on the opposite side from the shovels.

Abdefatha remained where he was, leaning against the wall of earth, his arms loose on the fresh-turned rim. He was panting hard again.

Moor clambered out, shook the earth off his clothes, and dragged the heavy case clear by himself, moving it by one end, then the other. Then he came back to Abdefatha and held out his hand.

The shaman raised his head and grasped the hand. He let the younger man drag him out of the pit. Then, without a word, he went to his bag which was lying nearby, sat down and  waited for his breath to find its rhythm once again.

Moor left him to it, and took a moment for himself. He scanned the land slowly, his hands on his hips. Dusk was quickly turning into night. This was the moment when the steppe was at its finest. Its undulating land – the knolls and depressions dotted with copses and underbrush - was tinged with blue and violet. It seemed to be turning into a motionless sea, inhabited by shadows that spread and crouched amid the waves of land. There was something magical and timeless in that moment, when the day was over and its problems could be forgotten for a while, but night was yet to come and bring its fears and superstitions. It was the moment of true peace.

In the distance, probably near the mountains where the sun had just gone down, Moor saw the tiny, trembling fires of an encampment. A little further northward, he saw closer flames, another camp. His own.

It looked very close, but distance is deceptive in the steppe. It would take a day of hard, fast march to get there, by men on foot with loaded animals. A march from dawn till dusk with just a few brief stops. He knew it because he had led his people and set the pace himself.

He had meant to go as far as possible, getting men and animals increasingly tired. They had welcomed the last stop with real relief. And while the people were pitching camp by the light of the setting sun, Moor and Abdefatha had taken two of the strongest horses and come back here.

It wouldn’t stay a secret. What he’d come to do would be notorious the next day, he was convinced. His behaviour all that day had been suspicious, and he knew it. Someone must have seen him going off with the shaman. Maybe Abdefatha had told someone. He knew that there were certain things that could not be concealed. But better if the people do not see them.

He turned with a start as he heard Abdefatha coming nearer, holding a thick chisel and a hammer. He knelt beside the long case, and inserted the chisel beneath the edge of the lid, near one of the corners. A hefty blow and, levering, he prised the nails out. He did the same midway along, and round the other sides. Moor saw the old man wrinkle his nose up as he struck the third blow.

With the lid loosened on three sides, the men grasped the long edge, pulled and opened up the case.

A heavy stench of balsam rose to meet them. The smell of decomposition was already mixed with it, a nauseating blend which made Moor’s head reel for a moment.

The body lying inside seemed uncorrupted, but that was clearly just its outward look. Moor’s lips twisted in a faint smile as he reflected on the irony. Barek had always looked powerful and proud, he was a king but also a warrior, and his word and will had carried a particular power. But he had always been rotten inside - Moor had known that better than anyone else. Except Ghimara, maybe. She had discovered it long after Moor, but much Moore clearly – and violently.

Barek was dressed in his finest clothes and all his jewels. His weapons were buried with him and the coffin had been lined with his three cloaks. His hands gripped the hilt of the sword on his chest, as if in spasm, and his face – the only visible part of his body – wore a vicious, brutal sneer, the teeth uncovered. His eyes were closed but not completely. His complexion, once tanned, was now grey with a pale strip round the forehead where the diadem of leadership had sat. The diadem that Moor was wearing now.

Now you’re revealing your true self, the young man thought with contempt. He felt a lump of hate constrict his throat, but swallowed it. No need of it now. All that was useless now.

Moor raised his eyes from the corpse, and glanced at Abdefatha as he heard him moving his tools in the bag.

The shaman did not trust his new king. Moor could read it in the old man’s eyes, the same way he could read mistrust in the eyes of all his people.

Barek had never had sons of his own, but had raised him up like a son. Yes, like a son -  so Moor was Barek’s heir, and that was just. What wasn’t just was the way Barek had died. Poisoned. A warrior should not die of poison. A warrior does not poison his opponent in order to take his place, his power, his wife, his wealth. And then, from fear, do this.

From fear…

Moor swallowed hard and pressed his lips together.

Yes, fear had been his sin.

Abdefatha straightened and turned toward his king. He still held the hammer in one hand but had two nails in the other. Two nails, each as long as a man’s forearm. He approached the coffin, staring at the body inside, but he raised his eyes again as Moor approached.

The young man held his hand out.

“Give them to me,” he said. “I’ll do it myself.”

This would have changed nothing and Moor knew it, but he felt a need to do this.

Maybe Abdefatha thought so too, in those few moments of hesitation. Then, without a word, he gave the hammer and the nails to his king.

Moor eyed him levelly while taking them, then turned toward Barek – or what had once been Barek. He knelt beside the coffin and placed the point of one nail on the dead man’s forehead. He wavered only a moment, hearing the shaman start the magic chant, then he lifted the hammer and let it come down hard. The frontal bone broke and sank inward, so that the temples bulged and deformed the face. Moor tried not to look at him, tried to focus on the broad head of the nail. The point drove through the fracture, sinking down into the brain as if through butter, and struck against the bone of Barek’s neck. The young man landed another blow and the nail broke through the skull and pierced the wood of the coffin. Two Moore violent blows and the head of the nail was nearly flush with Barek’s forehead.

Moor thought he would have liked to strike again and again, destroying Barek’s head and all the rest, but things would have not changed for this. Nothing would.

With a conscious effort he placed a second nail on Barek’s chest, just over the heart. That one, too, he buried to its head. Then he took two other shorter nails, which Abdefatha handed him, and nailed the dead man’s hands and feet with them.

He finally straightened. Now he was panting.

“This will be useless,” the shaman’s grim voice said as the magical chant ended, and the young man raised his head. “Barek was a strong man, and his body was as strong as his hate.”

Moor stared at him, saying nothing, getting his breath. Then he said: “Help me bury him again.”

* * *

Ghimara heard the noise of someone there, outside the tent, then saw the shadow move against the light. She raised herself from the bed, propping herself up with an elbow - holding one of the furs to her bare breast. Staring at the shadow which approached her.

The flap of the tent was moved aside, and a man’s shape stood in silhouette against the moonlight. He was a warrior dressed in leather and fur, powerfully built and strong-armed. His dark hair covered his shoulders, Although Ghimara could not make out his face, she saw the moonlight shining on the gold ring round his forehead.

Only a few days ago, another man had stood on that threshold, someone she used to fear utterly. But now she said: “Moor?” with a note of relief in her voice.

The young man let the edge of the tent fall down and came wearily inside, his shoulders bowed. There weren’t many things inside the tent, but everything there was, was precious - the furs on the bed, the embossed brazier in the middle. This stood on bare ground but there were carpets all around it, scattered in disorder, but all thick and with elaborate designs.

Moor knelt beside the brazier, his hands clenched into fists. The dying embers  tinged his grim face red.

He said nothing.

Ghimara waited several moments longer, then rose up, wrapping herself in one of the blankets and came to him where he crouched beside the embers.

“I was getting scared,” she whispered, sitting down beside him. “It’s nearly dawn.”

“We finished long ago, but I couldn’t come straight back.” Moor was staring at the dying embers, his voice hoarse and low. “I couldn’t stand his smell on me – I could not stand it. So I forced Abdefatha to come with me to the Pool of the Moon, although he didn’t want to.”

He wavered for a moment. Clenched his jaw.

“The pool was as black as pitch. The spirits were drifting over it like grey curls of mist, but I dived in all the same. Anything was better then to have his smell on me.”

Ghimara pressed herself against him. She laid her head on his shoulder.

“And you know what I was thinking all the while? That all those spirits were people, once. I wondered what were the sins they had committed, to be trapped between life and death like that, eternally, in darkness.”

Ghimara’s shoulders quivered with a sob.

“It’s all my fault,” she said, her voice muffled, her face hidden against Moor’s shoulder.

The young man turned toward her and put an arm around her shoulders.

“No,” he whispered softly. “It’s my fault.” His face hardened again. “Only mine.”

* * *

The next day he ordered his people to strike camp. This gave rise to protests and to whispers, but Moor gave no attention to them. He demanded a forced march all day long and at night they made camp once Moore. The young king noted that many of the people built makeshift tents, glancing at one another as they did so.

Moor thought about those glances all night long, and also of other things as he twisted and turned in his bed of fur, trying not to wake Ghimara up. He finally got up, restlessly. Dressing, he took his horse and rode away. He told himself he was simply trying to work his tension off, but when he realized he had returned to the tracks of his caravan, he stopped. He peered into the deepest dark, looking back along the trail. He saw nothing, but this gave him no peace. None the less, he forced himself to turn his horse and ride back to his bed.

The following day he ordered camp struck once again, and once again demanded a fast march. This gave rise to fewer protests, but Moore glances were exchanged behind his back. Moor realized but pretended not to see.

At noon Ghimara drew her horse alongside his.

“Are we not stopping?” she asked. “This is a good place, and the people and their animals are tired.”

“No, we’re marching on,” Moor replied abruptly, not turning toward her. He knew, without having to look, that she tensed and wavered then, probably parting her lips as if to say Moore, but in the end she said nothing. He didn’t need to look. He could sense her emotions, just the same way as she didn’t need his words to know his heart. They had always known each other. They had always loved each other.

Ghimara stayed with him all day but they said nothing else. Moor felt so awkward that, come evening, he stayed with her just a short time, saying little. Then, as night fell, he wrapped himself in his thickest cloak and wandered restlessly amongst the makeshift tents. Their precariousness was his humiliation. They meant his people knew that he would order them to move again next day. He would resume his flight.

Moor hugged himself inside the mantle. Days were very hot, but nights were icy in the steppe. It was dark. The moon was a thin sickle in a sky scattered with tiny, distant stars. The wind blew languidly and its cold breath seemed to the young man like the caress of all those men and women who had died so long ago with a sin on their hearts.

He drifted aimlessly and finally found himself on the dark path they had come down. But he wasn’t walking it tonight. ToMoorrow he would keep on going forward.

“The spirits could say nothing good to you, my king.”

Moor whirled, alarmed at the unexpected sound of Abdefatha’s hollow voice. The shaman – emaciated, grey and nearly naked – had come from behind him with no sound. Moor could hardly make his shape out of the shadows, as if the shaman was actually one with them. Maybe all shamans were.

“I wasn’t listening,” the king replied, a little hesitant. He did not trust the shaman who had also been Barek’s shaman, but he could not ignore the fact that they’d performed the rite together. Moor could not have done the thing without him. That odd complicity made him feel angry yet insecure about the old man.

“Of course you were listening.”

Moor remembered that Barek did not trust Abdefatha either.

“They speak of reMoorse.”

Then again, Barek had never trusted anyone.

“Their voices are louder at night time, aren’t they?”

Moor only looked at him and said nothing.

“You cannot escape him, Moor.”

“I’m not escaping him.”

Abdefatha grinned, a half sneer in the shadows.

“Barek was a powerful man. I told you, but you knew it anyway. A man of hate. He will come back and take revenge upon whoever murdered him so shamefully, and we can do nothing to stop him.”

“I’m not afraid of him.”

“Are you not? You won’t strike camp toMoorrow, then?”

Moor did not reply. He only glared to the shaman, resentfully.

The old man turned away from him, unfazed, and disappeared in the shadows.

* * *

The next day, Moor gave no order.

His people woke up early and were ready to strike camp and leave when the sun was still low on the horizon, but no-one saw the king. He stayed in his tent, together with his queen. He lay amongst the fur, saying nothing, staring at the canvas ceiling of the tent while the dusty light of the sun oozed through it.

Ghimara came and lay at his side.

“Are you afraid?” she asked, leaning her head of chestnut hair against his shoulder.

Moor smiled bitterly: “I’ve always been,” he said.

“You’re not a coward!” she protested, lifting her head sharply. “I’ve seen you fight, even with older, Moore experienced warriors. I saw you standing up to them … and Barek too.”

“But I’ve always thought only of myself. Isn’t that the greatest cowardice?”

“Barek would have taken me anyway, whether you’d opposed him or not.”

“But I didn’t try to. I hadn’t the courage to risk it.”

He turned his face to her and they looked at each other.

“I thought my people would consider me as greedy and brutal as him. I was so scared by the idea of being like him that I became worse.”

Ghimara shook her head.

“We all do wrong, Moor, we’re just human …” Her voice tailed off. Moor sighed.

“Maybe I’m still doing wrong,” he said, then added in a different tone: “Let Abdefatha come here. I need to speak to him.”

For a moment Ghimara did not move – she did not like the shaman either – but then she stood up and moved away. Moor lay pensively for some moments, then he stood up, went and knelt beside the now dead brazier. He tipped his head backward and looked at the ceiling. Voices and daily sounds were all around him. His people. His people?

The dust was dancing in the filtered sunlight. It seemed suspended in eternal motion. Moor wondered whether these were spirits too. Sinless spirits, forever dancing in the light.

Abdefatha came in and Moor dropped his gaze to him. The shaman looked pleased with himself and this irritated the king, but he nodded to the shaman to come and sit in front of him and the brazier.

“I thought about your words,” the young man began.

“I’m glad to hear it.”

“And I believe you’re right. I’m not going to escape him. He will always pursue his murderer till his rage is satisfied.”

Abdefatha shook his head, as if in disbelief.

“Why did you kill him that way? Had you killed him like a warrior, his soul would have found peace.”

“I don’t think so.”

“You were his heir. You were going to have everything. Everything. Was it worth it - for a woman?”

Moor narrowed his eyes and clenched his jaw.

“Ghimara is not a woman, she’s my woman. We belong to one another. That’s what Barek never accepted.”

“Both of you could have had her.” The shaman arched his eyebrows as if to say: It was that simple! Moor got angry. He had to swallow and take a breath, but couldn’t keep from speaking in a hiss. “Do you know what he did to her?”

“No.”

“Nor do I. She doesn’t want to tell me. What I do know is that she couldn’t bear for me to touch her – even me! – the first nights we were together again.” He breathed in sharply. “Barek was a pig. He’d been killing men, women, children all his life. He had humiliated warriors a thousand times better than himself. He’d raped, sacked, destroyed, dishonoured anyone and anything. There were many reasons why he should have died, but this is what he died for, and I believe he met the end that he deserved.”

Abdefatha’s face hardened but he did not reply. Moor closed his eyes and forced himself to stay calm.

“How does he know I was the one?” he finally asked.

“The same way we all know it. Only you, Barek and Ghimara were in the tent and many of us had heard him shouting your name before he fell to the ground. Have you forgotten that?”

“No, I haven’t forgotten it,” Moor whispered. “But I thought the dead don’t remember everything.”

Abdefatha grinned. “That’s true, but they always remember their murderer’s name and that’s what leads them on . He will remember yours.”

Moor said nothing.

* * *

The evening breeze was lovely: not the stifling breath of day, nor the cold touch of night, but a tepid, languid caress. It was not dusk yet, but would be soon. The sun was an orange ball of fire, suspended just above the mountain ridge.

Moor had stayed alone in his tent all day, avoiding everyone. Then, as the sun had begun to sink, he had taken his horse for a wander near the camp, alone. He had finally come back to the previous day’s trail and now he was standing there, watching the path he had already walked now fading in the shadows of sunset.

He heard the sound of hooves behind him and turned in the saddle. He saw Ghimara coming closer, dressed like a man, riding like a man, her long hair tied up in a braid which fell onto one shoulder. She approached him.

“It’s dusk,” she said. “Don’t stay here. The spirits will come soon.”

“They’re not going to hurt me,” Moor answered.

Ghimara said nothing for a while, then spoke again: “Abdefatha says that he will follow you and find you.” Her face was troubled.

Moor smiled. “You don’t believe that,” he replied, amused.

She did not smile. “Barek was an evil man, a man of hate.”

“And now he’s dead.”

“You performed the rite of nails.”

“One Moore reason not to worry. He won’t rise from his coffin.”

“It’s not right that you pay for this.”

“I’m the king, now.”

“But Barek –“

“Ghimara…” Moor touched her arm, caressed her. She was so upset, he had to smile again. “Barek’s dead. He left us his fear, because he’d nothing else to leave us, but he can’t hurt us anyMoore.”

She bit her lip. “So why have you come here tonight?”

“To say goodbye to him for ever. Its me who has to do it. You go back to our tent, now.”

“And you?”

“I’ll be there soon.”

She did not move.

“Go,” Moor urged her softly. Ghimara pulled the reins and turned the horse, still gazing at him, then rode away slowly.  Moor stared after her, not moving, until he saw her disappear amongst the distant tents. Only then did he turn his horse onto the track again, and studied it. The path was dark, now. He spurred his horse along it.

Night fell quickly, the air got colder, the spirits began to whisper. Moor retraced his course along the path already travelled, at a gallop, to the copse which he had passed through on the second day of march. There he slowed down to a walk, instinctively or simply out of fear. The night was dark, even gloomier under the trees, but he could still make out the path. The milky light of the moon cast eerie shadows. The breeze moved the branches of the trees. They whispered ominously.

Barek was coming down the path towards him.

He looked as he had always done, with his rich clothes and his shining jewels, the sword at his side, the tanned face and the gold ring round his forehead. But his smile was somehow feral, and his eyes weren’t eyes but rotten, lifeless things. Moor saw this as the man advanced, until his horse side-stepped, whinnying with its ears down, and refused to budge in spite of all Moor’s urgings.

Barek stopped and laughed maliciously. Moor halted his horse and slapped its neck and heard its heavy breathing. He felt nothing.

It’s just a trick,’ he thought and slid down from the saddle.

“I thought you’d keep on running like a rabbit - till the moment I bit your neck,” Barek laughed.

“That’s if your teeth don’t fall out all around you.” Barek’s laughter was suddenly cut short. “You’re dead, Barek. I’m not afraid of you.”

“I will be dead when a warrior’s blade pierces my body. That hasn’t happened yet,” the other snarled.

Moor unsheathed his long sword from the saddle. “I’m here to satisfy you, then,” he hissed, while thinking: But a dead man can’t die twice.

He moved in with his sword on guard, as Barek drew his own.

I defeated other warriors, the young man thought. I’ll beat him too.

Moor hurled himself toward his opponent, letting the fear flow through him and transform itself to rage, so long as neither took control of him. The swords clanged again and again, so violently that sparks scattered everywhere - again, again, again. Moor’s horse whinnied and moved away every time the men came close, but kept on turning around, never straying too far from its master.

When Moor drew back in order to catch his breath again, he was soaked in sweat and the air scratched in his throat. He had several cuts on his arms and legs – he could see them even if he didn’t feel the pain. He looked furiously at Barek. The other man wasn’t sweating, tired or bleeding.

He’s not alive!

Moor let the fury surge though him once again, driving fatigue out of his muscles, and sprang forward. The swords clashed, sparks blackened clothes and skin, sweat dripped in his smarting eyes. And suddenly he felt one foot sliding away on the rough path. He bent his body in order to stay balanced, and Barek’s blow, aimed at his head, went just above him. Moor swiftly changed direction, thrust in under his opponent’s blade and ripped his chest open with the butt of his sword.

Barek went rigid.

Moor whirled and jumped away with a gasp of relief - then swayed, his eyes wide open.

Barek took up his guard again, grinning. His chest was split open but not a spot of blood was to be seen. The torn muscles were sickly grey, the colour of his opened abdomen. Inside the ribs there was only rot and worms. Moor’s stomach twisted at the sight, although he could smell nothing.

“You cannot kill me!”

Barek sprang at Moor and the young warrior was so dismayed that he was taken by surprise. He parried the first blow but could not move backward. He blocked the second  too, but his balance was lost. He fended off the onslaught, trying to win a little room, but he wasn’t quick enough. Barek was on him.

Moor withdrew frantically, thinking: Don’t withdraw! If you withdraw, you’re lost!. He’d been taught this many years ago, but had never known the truth of it till now. He felt his mind becoming dull, distracted by the movement of his legs - backwards, but not swift, not swift enough! His arms moved by blind instinct, parrying his opponent’s blows in fear and despair. He felt his rage turn into panic as he realized that he could not think anyMoore. Balance went. Moor realized he had fallen when he found himself in the dust of the path. Only then did his mind focus – on the sword point that was hanging over him.

Barek was lifting it, but suddenly he froze. Moor stared, not knowing why at first,  then saw there was another sword sunk deep in Barek’s neck, the blade protruding outward several inches.

A disgusting smell of putrefaction broke over the young man, taking his breath away. Barek’s face was now unrecognisable. Grey skin fell away in rags, the eyes were full of worms, the forehead had been fractured in the middle; the head of the nail that Moor had hammered in was buried there. Instinctively Moor dragged himself away on his back. He could think of nothing.

He saw Barek lift a putrefied hand, touch the blade with his palm and force it from his neck. The blade fell to one side in an arc. Barek’s head lolled wretchedly, half severed, and when the dead king turned his back to Moor, the young man saw Ghimara there behind him. The woman was holding a sword in one hand, the other at her mouth, her eyes wide open. She withdrew two steps then stopped.

“You!” Barek snarled. Even his voice was rotting.

Ghimara stiffened, her face hardened and a different light shone in her eyes, a light that Moor had only seen once, that night in Barek’s tent. The night when Barek died, the night he had been poisoned.

“What’s the matter?” Ghimara asked, her voice distorted by hate. “Are you surprised this plaything from your bed has will and strength? I killed you once, Barek. I can kill you again!”

“You! It cannot be you!”

Barek lifted his sword. Ghimara gripped her own sword in both hands. It was the only way she could lift the weapon, but she would never be quick enough. Moor realized it in a flash and even as he thought: Only a coward stabs his opponent in the back, he was already jumping up, sword in hand. He transfixed Barek with a single thrust.

The dead man stiffened. Ghimara brought her blade down on Barek’s neck and cut his head off this time. It fell and rolled on the ground. Moor twisted his own blade in the wound and tore the body open. Barek collapsed like an empty sack.

Ghimara ran to the severed head and split it with another furious blow, spraying grey matter, worms and shards of bone around her. Beside herself, she struck again, again…

Moor ran to her, grasped her shoulders, pulled her back. She squirmed and wept, but then she let him hold her. She leaned her head on his shoulder, let the sword fall, let Moor draw her away. She was sobbing violently, her face bathed in tears. The horses galloped off as Moor helped her to a tree, and they leaned against its sheltering trunk.

“I had to do it myself!” Ghimara sobbed, her voice scratching her throat. “I had to do it myself!”

Moor nuzzled her neck, and put his arms around her waist.

“No,” he whispered back. “I had to do it.”

© 2000 Sarah Zama