This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination. The characters in this novel are imaginary, though references are made to historical people, occurrences, places, events, and issues to add realism. Any resemblance to real events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Published by Akashic Books
©2013 by Elsie Augustave
Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-61775-165-3
eISBN: 9781617751738
Library of Congress Control Number: 2012954507
All Rights Reserved.
Akashic Books/Open Lens
PO Box 1456
New York, NY 10009
Table of Contents
___________________
To wander through this living world And leave uncut the roses Is to remember fragrance where The flower no scent encloses. —Langston Hughes
For Sébastien
Prologue
From whatever place I write,
you will expect that part of my “Travels”
will consist of the excursions in my own mind.
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge
As I approached death hours after giving birth to Zati, my hospital bed floated above blue water. My body felt weightless, my head light and airy. The salty freshness of the sea penetrated my nostrils; foamy waves swallowed the pains in my womb. A woman stood above the sea, her smile as bright as the colors that crowned her.
“Iris,” she said, leaning toward my bed, “I am here to grant you your last wish.”