Fireborn

by Talya Andor

  Privately, Thaniel was certain he already was the vessel, given the fact that his status as gods' chosen had been determined so long ago, which meant he ought to be able to skip the prayers. He already knew the expressions that would cross his attendants' faces if he were to try and explain this line of reasoning to them. Dorothea would be shocked, Sabine would be offended, and Andrade would still gently but implacably usher him to the temple.

  Thaniel had enjoyed his freedoms for the past four years, but it was at an end now.

  Sabine bound his hair back from his face with a slim golden ribbon, and Dorothea patted his shoulder, looking him over with a last critical eye before clasping an arm band onto his upper arm. It was inscribed with a copy of the glyph that had woken for him those four years ago.

  "It's time," Sabine told him, while Thaniel was thinking back to Blaise's comment on how sooner or later, the water ran out for everyone.

  He wondered what loss Blaise had undergone to hold such a perspective. He and Blaise had never talked about anything deep, only played their childish games from one side of the city to the other, idling away time in a world where none of the adults had time for them.

  Now time had run out.

  "I know," Thaniel replied, squaring his shoulders.

  *~*~*

  Next in a series of ceremonial proceedings that day was Thaniel's meeting with Anatole, the grizzled, fatherly old priest who had supervised his comfort and educational pursuits over the past four years. It was one part counseling, one part spiritual preparation, Thaniel supposed. Though Thaniel had been allowed to do as he liked from the day he'd set foot on the temple grounds, Anatole had been the one to encourage him to engage his mind, learn about things that interested him, and take up pursuits that would do more than pass the time, but would inspire him as well as potentially endure beyond his own tenancy in life.

  Thaniel had learned there was an entire body of literature written by gods' chosen, but reading those volumes had put him in a sorrowful mood. He had found the paintings and artwork to be far more moving, and had ended up setting his hand to a fair number of his own.

  Most of the gods' chosen had never put a face to the god who would come to claim him. Thaniel had remained in keeping with that omission. The one thought that had occurred to him had been so blasphemous, he hadn't dared set it to paper or canvas.

  "Will it hurt?" Thaniel inquired of Anatole the instant he was seated across from the priest. The two of them were ensconced in seats beside an immense window that opened out onto the gardens, typically a spectacular view, but now gnarled and brown for lack of water.

  Anatole narrowed his eyes but didn't need to ask what would hurt. It required no clarification. He clasped one hand over the other.

  "The ceremony, you mean," he prompted anyway. The long wrinkles in his face seemed even longer than ever before.

  Thaniel bobbed his head.

  Anatole propped his chin on a fist and gazed out the window beside them. It afforded a view of the tangled hedges that surrounded that side of the temple, all brown and gray and leafless for now. It was the blooming season, but they were still dead.

  "I have presided over six ceremonies as head priest," Anatole said. "All I can tell you is what I have witnessed, and it may be some comfort."

  Thaniel grimaced slightly. He wanted to know whether it would hurt, and Anatole gave him one of his roundabout answers as usual, more question than reply.

  "I have never heard a cry of agony from the throat of a chosen," Anatole told him. "Not once. The body must not be profaned, so you can't take any drugs prior to the ceremony to dull sensation. Yet, there has never been a sound of pain or distress. Afterward, there is an expression of serenity unlike any I have seen—other priests call it god-touched, which only makes sense, as the god has come for them."

  Thaniel pulled in a deep breath and regarded Anatole warily. "But they all die," he reminded the head priest.

  "We all die some time," Anatole said, looking back at Thaniel with large, sad eyes. "The gods choose the youth, and perhaps it's why they weep. All that potential, consumed in a single blaze."

  "If the body is consumed," Thaniel said with growing apprehension that he'd caught Anatole in the midst of a well-meaning lie, "then how do you know the … the remains had an expression of serenity?"

  "Figure of speech," Anatole said, and at first that explanation stirred greater unease. His immense gray brows were knit together, making him appear stern. "We set the ceremonial fire, Thaniel, and the sacrifice is completed. Yet when we perform our concluding ablutions, the … remains lie on the altar as unmarred as they were in life." He squinted at Thaniel, though he wasn't near-sighted.

  Thaniel took in a quick breath. "Not burned?" he said skeptically.

  "Untouched," Anatole said with emphasis. "Not a mark on them. Looking peaceful as a pleasant sleep. It's the gods' miracle, yet they have unmistakably accepted the sacrifice. That and the rain prove that the covenant is kept."

  "So … it won't hurt," Thaniel decided, already past philosophical considerations and focused on the final, practical concerns.

  "I do not believe so," Anatole said.

  For Thaniel, that would have to be good enough.

  "Do you have more questions for me?" Anatole inquired, his bushy brows easing into relaxed lines.

  Thaniel thought for a moment. The biggest question, to him, was something he was sure that even the head priest couldn't answer.

  "The same question I've had since I was chosen," he murmured.

  Anatole sat up a little straighter. "Why you were chosen," he guessed.

  Thaniel dipped his head, reaching up to tug on a lock of hair. "It's strange, I … When I was younger, when I realized after my grandfather died that we all die, that we pass away, there were two things that went through my head back then, and I thought of them again and again when my mother got sick."

  Anatole waited, his head cocked in a listening pose.

  "That I didn't want to die like that," Thaniel confessed. It was a horrible, petty shame he'd kept to himself for so long. This was his last chance to unburden himself. "Wasting away, becoming nothing, sapped of all my strength and even my memories … I didn't want that."

  Anatole nodded, his eyes kind, but he said nothing.

  "And that … I wanted to leave something behind," Thaniel concluded. "Something lasting. I wanted to make a difference. I don't know if I've done that …"

  "Do not ever doubt that you have," Anatole told him, speaking up in a rough tone. His brows had lowered again, but he didn't seem angry, only focused.

  "You think I have?" Thaniel's smile was somewhat twisted. "Because I'll help bring the rains again?"

  "Because you bring life," Anatole corrected. "You give yourself to the gods, so that the rest of us might continue to live. And we will never forget. So long as your sacrifice endures through the ages, you have left something lasting for all of us."

  Thaniel bowed his head. "And that's why I wondered. If maybe that's why I was chosen."

  "Only the gods may answer," Anatole said, making Thaniel's mouth curve in a wry half-smile; it was the response he'd expected. He wasn't expecting Anatole to continue. "Yet those qualities you mention—wanting to leave a mark, determined to die vital, not fading away or perhaps eschewing the prospect of aging—these are qualities I have seen in others chosen."

  Thaniel frowned at his hands. He hadn't expected that. In a way, he didn't like that. It meant he wasn't unique, after all.

  He was like any other who'd come before him.

  "Are you prepared?" Anatole asked him, taking control of the conversation and lacing his large, wrinkled fingers together.

  "Can anyone really be prepared?" Thaniel wondered rhetorically. He shook his head and gave Anatole a slight smile when the priest looked alarmed. "I'm ready, Anatole. The god is coming to claim me, so that the rains can fall again."

  Anatole inclined his head. "Then, let us pray together."

  Thaniel
suppressed a sigh but bowed his head as well to the weight of duty. Here came the part he wasn't so fond of, but like the rest, it was a ritual step in the dance that had already been set.

  *~*~*

  It was dark by the time Thaniel returned, thrice-cleansed, to his quarters for a last night of rest. Being bathed by the sexless acolytes had been an embarrassingly long part of the evening, considering they washed him in wine, then milk, then cleansed him with resin-scented water. He felt like the piece of marinated meat he'd joked about with Marisha.

  He stripped to his underthings and tossed his ceremonial robe to slump in a pile on the low-lying couch by the window, ready to climb into his bed. A noise at the window startled him—a click, a ticking, a patter like hard rain—and his head turned in time to see a small, dark shape hit the window again. Thaniel hurried over to the window, peering through.

  "Blaise?" he exclaimed, hastening to run up the sash.

  Emerging from the hot, fragrant night, Blaise hung by his arms over the sill and grinned up at him. "Hey," he said. "Figured you might like a last ice for the evening."

  "You brought me a sweet?" Thaniel inquired, touched.

  "Yeah," Blaise said, turning up empty palms. "But, you have to come outside to eat it."

  Thaniel gave him a wry look. "I'm still here, Blaise; I'm not gone yet."

  "I know!" Blaise said brightly. "But, it's a nice night outside, so. Come and join me?"

  Thaniel glanced off to the side, knowing there were attendants beyond his door who would be alert to his every movement. He was surprised no one had checked on him already to ask if he were talking to himself.

  "Unless you're too scared," Blaise added, beginning to withdraw from the window.

  "No, wait," Thaniel protested, grabbing a robe to pull over his head and starting after him. He'd challenge anyone who accused him of showing fear. He'd already been brave enough by anyone's measure, but he wouldn't sit back and take any crap, either.

  He climbed out of the window practically on top of Blaise and lost balance when one of his feet hooked on the inside on his way out. He windmilled his arms, clamped his mouth shut to avoid shouting, and fell directly on top of Blaise.

  Blaise was shaking. For a split second Thaniel was concerned until he pushed himself up and realized that Blaise was quaking with laughter that he couldn't unleash, for fear of drawing unwanted attention.

  "Oh, get off," Thaniel muttered, pushing at Blaise's face and climbing to his feet. He offered a hand to Blaise, though, unable to leave the situation as it was.

  Blaise's smile glimmered up at him as he reached up and grasped his hand. "That's my line," he said, and patted Thaniel's shoulder. "You're heavy. Come on."

  They tiptoed through the scrubby brush that surrounded the temple walls.

  "Where did you get the ice?" Thaniel wondered. When the silence went on too long, he added in a knowing way, "Stole it, huh?"

  Blaise slanted a haughty look down his nose at Thaniel, from the great distance of a few finger-lengths of superior height. "I'll have you know, I had a patron."

  "Oh!" Thaniel said, affecting surprise. "Do tell! And did they know they were funding the cause?"

  Blaise smirked at him. "Do you not want this ice? I can eat yours and mine; it's no trouble."

  "No, no, I want the ice," Thaniel said hastily.

  Jostling one another, they hastened their steps until they broke from the foliage onto the portion of the grounds that revealed a low stone wall. Two white cups awaited, heaped with pale mounds.

  "Who was even still selling it, this close to the ceremony?" Thaniel wondered, hurrying forward to pick up one of the cups before Blaise could retract the offer. "There's hardly any water left anywhere."

  "A very enterprising vendor of my acquaintance who'd managed to save up enough stock to make a handsome profit tonight," Blaise replied, climbing onto the low wall and seating himself cross-legged.

  Thaniel raised a brow at him as he followed suit, arranging his white robe across his knees. "You disapprove?"

  Blaise shrugged. "It's the way of things," he replied, sticking his flat wooden stir into the ice and using the broad end to bring up a mouthful.

  Thaniel dug his own wooden stir through the melting ice for a moment before tasting it. The bright citrus flavor spread across his tongue. "Thank you," he offered. "It's good."

  Overhead, bright red and gold sparks trailed upward into the black sky before blossoming into tremendous fireworks.

  "Oh!" Thaniel exclaimed, as the brilliant display continued, multi-colored bursts shooting up to dispel the darkness. "Did you know?"

  "Thought you'd want to see it," Blaise replied, nudging Thaniel's knee with his.

  "Yeah," Thaniel replied, rapt. Washes of color reached Blaise's face, turning it from a pale oval against the dark into a canvas of reflected shades from orange and crimson to heathery purple and pale blue. "Beautiful." He raised his eyes to the sky again.

  Together they finished their flavored ice in silence, until the screaming whistles of the far-distant gunpowder and the crack and boom of the fireworks had faded. Thaniel set aside his paper cup and folded his arms over his knees. He wouldn't mind being sleepy-eyed tomorrow, so long as it meant he'd gotten to enjoy this.

  "Well," Blaise said, pushing himself up off the wall and dusting his hands across his thighs. "Suppose you'd better sneak back in."

  "Only because someone dared me to sneak out," Thaniel said with a smile.

  Even in the dark, Thaniel could see the mischief of Blaise's return grin. "Ah, but you're the one who made the choice to follow."

  That caused Thaniel to cast his eyes down, troubled. He wondered now if the choice had been made for him so long ago, if he'd gone along because that was what was expected of him, or whether he truly had chosen his own destiny.

  "Hey," Blaise's voice ghosted near his ear, and Thaniel's head jerked up.

  Blaise was close beside him, near enough to touch, and it made his heart perform a quick, uneven thudding in his chest. Thaniel couldn't remember the last time someone's face had been so near to his.

  "I thought a goodbye kiss might be nice," Blaise murmured, tipping his face to bring his mouth into range of Thaniel's.

  "B-Blaise?" Thaniel stuttered, jerking back slightly. "But I … The ceremony tomorrow …" He'd been faithful to the restrictions laid on him as chosen, and never enjoyed physical gratification with another. He'd never shared so much as his first kiss.

  Blaise pursed his lips. "You've never thought of it?" he murmured, wheedling. "No one will know, Thaniel."

  Of all the people who had come in and out of Thaniel's life since he'd been pledged to the gods' chosen, Thaniel had never given much consideration to the fact that he was forbidden from forming the bonds of love, true partnership. Only one person had made that much of an impression on him—only Blaise. The fact that Blaise had never shown any sign of wanting anything beyond friendship from Thaniel had been the only thing keeping Thaniel from regret for being unable to deepen their relationship.

  "I can't," Thaniel said, leaning back. His throat closed for a moment, preventing him from managing words. He wanted to nudge forward and meet the promise of Blaise's sweetly offered mouth so badly, but he was held back by his awareness of what tomorrow had in store for him. "I … you know I'm promised to the altar tomorrow."

  He compressed his lips. He wasn't allowed to take a single thing for himself, not even his first kiss.

  "I know," Blaise acknowledged, reaching up to tug at a twisted lock that had tumbled over Thaniel's shoulder. He offered up an impish grin. "Maybe that's why I want to."

  "But then …" Thaniel began, and broke off, looking away with a scowl. "You never said …" That last, he muttered too low to hear.

  "Wouldn't it make it terribly sad?" Blaise replied. He reached up to pat Thaniel's cheek. "It's all right, Thaniel. Stop looking as though you've dishonored the gods."

  Thaniel slanted a baleful glance at him from beneath his lashes.
"It was close," he replied, thinking to himself that in a fashion, he already had.

  He was stricken to his core by the thought that he might not be an acceptable offering now. Their land could wither and die from his selfishness. All because Thaniel found Blaise too alluring, and might hold him in higher esteem than he should.

  "You have nothing to worry about," Blaise told him, as though reading his mind, though it was likelier Thaniel's expression was simply that obvious.

  "Why did you …" Thaniel began, and fell silent. He turned his back on Blaise and began to make his way through the scrubby foliage. The gnarled branches seemed to reach out for his white robes and he had to hold them tight against his thighs to prevent them from getting caught.

  A hand touched his shoulder. Thaniel kept his eyes transfixed on the wall of the temple.

  "Perhaps I simply wanted to know," Blaise told him.

  "You wanted to know I feel?" Thaniel said with a hollow laugh. "I'm not allowed to feel."

  "But, if you did …" Blaise persisted. The light touch retracted from his shoulder, as though Blaise knew it was too much.

  Long denied physical affection, it was something that Thaniel craved now more than anything.

  "I would feel for you," Thaniel said, the words coming slow and difficult to his tongue. Satisfied? He wanted to add, but that would be cruel to both of them. There was no satisfaction either of them could have. "You ask too much, Blaise."

  "So I've been told," Blaise said, sounding blithe. "Yet I feel I've asked enough."

  Thaniel stood his ground for a long moment, staring at the ground and summoning up the nerve to confront Blaise or chastise him. He wanted to turn and walk away, his back to Blaise communicating all that was needed in the end. When he looked up at last and turned around, the moment must have been longer than he'd thought. Blaise was gone.

  Without a word, without a goodbye.

  Heart sinking heavily to his sandaled feet, Thaniel returned to the little window that had let him out onto the world for his last taste of freedom.