Sofia Samatar - A Stranger in Olondria

The Hotel Urloma, the “Arch of the Dawn,” stands in the Street of Copper, in the lively mercantile district to the north of the Great Harbor. Here the walls of the buildings are thin, so that one can hear voices and thuds from inside, feet clattering up and down the stairs, flute-playing, the cries of cats. The hotel is a tall old building of wood and stone with a roof of coppery slate, one of those roofs, turned greenish now, which gave the street its name. As we drew up before its wide, pillared porch flanked by a pair of cypresses, a fresh burst of sweat bloomed over my skin like a cool dew, and I shivered.

“The hotel,” said Sten, looking at me with veiled eyes, gauging my approval. I nodded and tried to smile, my dry lips cracking. Then the door flew open and a tall, portly Bainishman emerged and hurried down the steps, clumsy in loose leather slippers.

“Welcome, welcome!” he cried out in abominable Kideti, waving his arms in their billowing white shirtsleeves. He hastened toward the wagon as the driver took down the wooden steps and placed them at the side for our descent. “Welcome,” shouted the gentleman. His mild, gold-colored eyes flickered nervously across my servants’ faces. “ Apkanat? ” he asked, again mangling the word in Kideti. “No apkanat ? You have no apkanat ?” Meanwhile the driver, ignoring the gentleman’s impatient cries, looked up at me with black and steady eyes, reached out his hand, and stamped one boot on his steps with an almost scornful confidence, as if declaring that I might trust them absolutely. I gripped his hand and rose, swaying, surrounded by worried murmurs, the sound of the servants and Sten, who placed his hand on the small of my back; the strange hotel and the dark, bristling spears of the cypress trees seemed to leap and swing in the sunlight as I clambered down from the wagon. When I reached the ground and the driver released me, I stumbled. The portly gentleman supported me with a large hand on my shoulder. “Welcome,” he said; and then, in Olondrian, shaking his head as he spoke to himself: “Poor soul! Nothing but a boy! And he calls himself an interpreter!”

I felt that I should correct him but could not find the words in his language. I looked up into his ruddy face and compassionate topaz eyes; his gray hair, sculpted so that a curl lay precisely on either temple, exuded a powerful odor of heliotrope. I felt that sensation of smallness which our people must feel in the north: my head barely reached the scented gentleman’s shoulder. I was fascinated by his great hands, so moist, with their moon-white nails, on which he wore several rings set with aquamarines.

“ Apkanat ,” he said slowly, peering down into my face. I cleared my throat and opened and closed my mouth. He sighed, turned, then rolled his eyes in despair at the sight of Sten and the wagon driver, who were communicating with energetic gestures. This method, however, seemed to succeed, for Sten hurried toward me and said: “Ekawi, I will escort the servants to their own inn. After some days you may wish to see their accommodations yourself—but for now I suggest you rest and await me here…” He looked at me uncertainly, then glanced at the Bainish gentleman, who was looking at us both with intense interest. I felt, like a heavy blow, the shame of being unable to speak—of proving, at the great moment, such a poor student.

I summoned my courage and nodded. “Of course! I shall see to our rooms.” Sten looked relieved and hurried back into the wagon, but I saw him kiss the tips of his slender fingers as he went, and his lips moved rapidly as if in prayer.

The reins struck the backs of the horses. I turned to the Bainishman beside me, squared my shoulders, and said: “Good afternoon.”

His gold eyes widened. “Good afternoon! What!” He reached out his hand, smiling, and enveloped mine inside it. “Good afternoon to you, telmaro !” He leaned in closer, searching my face for any sign of comprehension. “Do you speak Olondrian? Are you the apkanat ?”

I laughed and answered him clumsily enough, but with delight: “I am a merchant from the Tea Islands. My father—he used—he was coming—”

“Yes, yes!” said the gentleman. “But come in out of the sun.” He ushered me toward the hotel along a pathway of pink slate. “So you are the son of the bald gentleman! Yes, I expect him every year! I hope no misfortune…” He trailed off as we went up the stairs to the porch.

“He is dead,” I said.

“Ah!” The gentleman’s brow was creased with such a look of pain that I was sorry I had not spoken with more delicacy. “That is dreadful, dreadful! And he no older than myself! But forgive me—I am called Yedov of Bain.” He put his hand on his heart and bowed, showing me the round patch of pink skin at the top of his skull; when he had risen I bowed also, saying: “Jevick of Tyom.” At this he gave a rich, merry laugh. “Marvelous! Such an education! Ah, but your father was shrewd! Come, step inside.”

He clasped the brass ring on the door and pushed it open, leading me into a vast, cool room, empty but for a vase of white roses on a table. His leather slippers smacked on the tiles, and the tails of his light-green morning coat fluttered as he passed through this hall and into the gloomy corridor beyond. The entire hotel possessed, like its owner, an odor of cedar, old carpets, and heliotrope. Somnolent parlors yawned on either side of the passage, each with a high, marmoreal fireplace gleaming in the shadows and shapeless pieces of furniture pushed against the walls. At length we came through a set of peaked double doors onto a veranda flooded with sun, and I stood blinking in the robust sea light of Bain. “I’m here,” I murmured in the tongue of the north, gripping the ornate curves of the balustrade. The iron was cold on my palms, unyielding, foreign, delightful.

My host offered me a chair—a long, low object covered with a green silk shawl—and hurried off to fetch me “a drop of the country.” I reclined on the chair, breathing in the scent of the garden, the perfume of exhausted pansies mingled with the odors of dust and ancient plaster. The sky was deep blue, the balconies like necklaces. I lowered my gaze: the arm of my chair with its cover of pear-green cloth seemed to pulse in the tireless light. There was my hand, narrow, dark, languid. In Olondria. When my host returned with the wine, I had drifted into a blissful sleep.

I awoke rumpled and sweaty and sat up, evening light on my face, thinking of books. It was the kebma hour, named for the bread that is eaten at dusk: across the garden I could see lights in the windows, and in one overgrown yard a woman’s voice called insistently: “Valeth, come in.” I started up, turned, and went into the hotel, knocking against furniture in the gloom until a light in the corridor led me to my host. He sat at a table laden with food, his face and oiled hair shining in the rays of a splendid table lamp in a netting of pink crystal.

“Come in, come in,” he cried, beaming and standing up so swiftly he bumped the table, provoking a gentle clatter of glass. “I didn’t like to wake you, but I’m glad you’ve arrived at last. I don’t mind telling you that our conversation has been strained!”

With a wave of his hand he indicated his sole dinner companion: my steward, Sten. Colorless, doleful, looking shrunken beside the tall Bainishman, Sten sat before a plate heaped with an array of foreign delicacies, rose-colored claws and forbidding blobs of aspic.

“Sten,” I said, trying not to laugh.

“Ekawi,” he returned in a mournful tone. “The gentleman insisted I sit. I felt I could not refuse.”

“No, no, you did right. Listen, Sten, I need money, Olondrian money. Just give me half of what you’ve got in the purse.”