Inked Whiskers

Inked Whiskers

By Sala Farris

The impressive figure of a woman stepped through the palace doorway. With her broad lips, hard jawline, black hair, and flat nose, she had a sort of harsh, eastern quality that had a strangely pleasing effect when complimented by her mauve silk gown. Jade adorned her strong neck and fingers and shone in the chandelier light.

“Your name?” asked a dapper servant. His white gloved hands delicately held a quill and strip of parchment, ready to scrawl down information. The end of his long, grey mustache dragged in the ink, creating haphazard lines across the names already there.

“Ti Biyu,” came the reply in a heavy accent, barely understandable to the western ears of her listener. She held out her hand and he bent to kiss it, his mustache drawing a line of ink on her olive skin. With a disapproving look at the mark, she wiped it disdainfully on his sleeve as she glided past him down the stairs.

Hurriedly standing up straight at the top of the steps, he cleared his throat and announced “Her ladyship, Ti Biyu of the Eastern Lands!”

Lurking behind the imposing figure of the noblewoman was a girl dressed in the simple smock of a serving girl. Aside from the difference in attire and demeanor, this girl could be the very same Lady Ti Biyu. The be-mustached chamberlain approached her and asked “And you, what is your name?”

In an accent that matched her mistress’s exactly, she looked the ground and whispered “Ti Daiyu of her ladyship’s household, nothing but a maid. Do not announce me.” And with a faint bow, she scurried after her eminence. The chamberlain simply shrugged, flipped another drop of ink off the end of his whiskers, and scribbled and announced more names.

“Daiyu!” lady Ti shouted. “Fetch me refreshment. I tire already of the awful western stench in this place.” Daiyu bowed quickly and left. It wasn’t long however before she was caught in the beauty and decadence of the ball. The orchestra was playing the minuet, men and women in bright colors everywhere danced and laughed, and the lights threw glamour across the entire spectacle.

Only a few minutes after Daiyu had left her mistress, the master of the ball approached her. “Lady Ti Biyu of the Eastern Lands?” He bowed deeply and kissed her hand. She blushed and started to correct him, but his flattery killed the words on her tongue. Instead, she simply nodded and bowed to him as well. “My lady! You bow to no one here! You are the guest of honor! After all, it is because of the treaty between our peoples that the whole affair has been put together.” And with that, he escorted the flustered maid into a side room.

“Biyu, I have no doubt that your father has told you that the treaty is contingent upon our marriage.” They gazed at each other. He was quite handsome, and she very lovely. “I must say, I think we should get to know each other tonight.” He pulled open a closet door at the end of the room, winked, and gestured inside. “No one will discover us here.”

But it was not so. They had only been sequestered in the little locked space for a moment when there came a ferocious knock at the door. When the Lord of the House opened the door, the real Lady Ti Biyu stood towering over the pair of them, eyes aflame with rage.

“Daiyu! Get out of there! You little rat of a sister, you have betrayed me!” Embarrassed, the poor girl stumbled from her Lord’s arms and fled the room.

The stunned Lord sat and gaped like a startled koi. “Daiyu? Who is Daiyu? Who are you?”

Her ladyship was mad with fury. “I am the true Ti Biyu! That was my idiot twin sister, Ti Daiyu. She was abandoned at birth because she was born too small. It was only out of the kindness of my heart that I hired her as my maidservant. And now she has betrayed me! And lied to you about her identity! The little wastrel! She will pay…” The woman stalked toward the main room, footsteps leaving behind a trail of fire. Over her shoulder she shouted “and you my Lord? You may know that that treaty is off!”

The sisters Ti left for their homeland and were never seen in the western world again.