Then Mara shouted to the soldiers, 'Brave warriors, I am Mara of the Acoma. Tradition holds that you now lead a masterless existence as grey warriors, and that all who were your officers must die.' The front rank of men who had once worn plumes received her words impassively. They had expected no less, and their affairs were settled in preparation for the end.
Yet Mara did not order them to fall upon their swords. 'I find such a practice a crime and a dishonour for men who were but loyal to their lawful Lord. It was not your choice to be led by men of evil nature. That fate decrees a death without battle honours is a foolishness I have no intention of perpetuating!'
Softly, to the Force Commander at her side, Mara murmured, 'Lujan, did you find him? Is he here?'
Lujan inclined his head to speak in her ear. 'I think he stands on the right in the first rank. It's been years, so I can't be sure. But I'll find out.' Stepping away from his mistress, he called out in his field commander's voice, 'Jadanyo, who was once fifth son of the Wedewayo!'
The soldier who had been identified bowed in obedience and came forward. He had not seen Lujan since boyhood and had thought him dead in the destruction of the Tuscai, so his eyes widened. 'Lujan, old friend! Can it be you?'
Lujan waved introduction to Mara. 'Mistress, this man is Jadanyo, by blood my second cousin. He is an honourable soldier and worthy of service.'
The Lady inclined her head toward the former Minwanabi warrior. 'Jadanyo, you have been called to serve the Acoma. Are you willing?'
The man stumbled over his words in dismay. 'What is this?'
Lujan gave a devilish grin. In a laughing voice he said, 'Say yes, you idiot, or will I have to wrestle you into submission as I did when we were children?'
Jadanyo hesitated, eyes wide. Then, in a joyful shout, he cried, 'Yes! Lady, I am willing to serve a new mistress.'
Mara saluted him formally, then signalled Keyoke forward.
In the tone that once commanded armies, her battered Adviser for War cried out, 'Irrilandi, who was my friend as a child, present yourself!'
The Minwanabi Force Commander took a moment to recognize a former friend and rival, resplendent as he was in the glittering finery of an adviser. With a glance in wonderment at the crutch, and the face whose chiselled lines still held vitality and pride, he moved from his place before the front ranks of his dishonoured soldiers. By every tradition he expected to die this day, along with all his subofficers. Too old a campaigner to set any store in miracles, he heard without belief as Keyoke said, 'Mistress, this man is Irrilandi, who is brother to one who married my cousin's wife's sister. He is therefore my cousin and worthy of service to the Acoma.'
Looking at Tasaio's former Force Commander, and moved by the iron courage that masked a turmoil of confusion, Mara said kindly, Irrilandi, I will not kill good men because they faithfully discharged their duties. You are called to serve the Acoma. Are you willing?'
The old officer searched the Lady's eyes for a long moment, speechless. Then restraint, suspicion, and disbelief gave way to boyish abandon. Swept by irrepressible elation, he said, 'With all my heart, my most generous mistress, with all my heart.'
Mara gave him her first command. 'Marshal all of your soldiers and compare bloodlines with those in my retinue. Most will have ties to soldiers serving the Acoma, or at least they will have, by the time the last of you have sworn service. All here are worthy; therefore, let the forms be observed that all may be lawfully committed to duty. If there are any among you, officers or common warriors, who feel they could not give loyalty to my house, you have my leave to permit them to fall upon their swords or depart in peace, as they choose.' A handful of soldiers stepped from the ranks, and departed, but fully nine men in ten remained. Mara said, 'Now, Irrilandi, will you come before the Acoma natami and vow your obedience, that the task ahead may begin?'
The old officer bowed deeply in gratitude, and as he rose with a shining smile, the ranks of leaderless soldiers erupted into uncontrollable cheers and shouts. The name 'Acoma! Acoma!' rang in the morning air, until Mara was nearly deafened by the clamour. The cheering continued unabated for long minutes while the rising smoke from the Minwanabi pyre rose on the clear air, forgotten.
Over the waves of noise, Mara told Saric and Incomo, 'Sort this out and ready these men to swear before the glade. I am going now to place the natami in its new home.'
A priest of Chochocan, the Good God, and Keyoke accompanied Mara to the contemplation glade. Waiting outside with a shovel in hand was the gardener who was the traditional keeper of the grounds. He expected the Minwanabi natami to be buried face down forever, in the timeworn custom of a house fallen to conquerors. The moment came at last, and Keyoke surrendered the burden of the Acoma natami to Mara. Her escort halted outside the entrance, while the priest and gardener accompanied her inside.
The glade was much larger than the one upon the Acoma estates and was tended in impeccable fashion, with fragrant flowers and fruit trees, and a series of pools interconnected by the trilling splash of waterfalls. Mara gazed in wonder upon a beauty that stopped her breath. Half-dazed, she said to the gardener, 'What is your name?'
All but trembling in apprehension, the dutiful servant replied, 'Nira, great mistress.'
Softly she said, 'You do honour to your office, gardener. Great honour.'
The sun-browned man brightened at the compliment. He bowed and set his forehead to the earth he had tended so lovingly. 'I thank the great Lady.'
Mara bade him rise. She walked on down shaded paths to the place where the ancient rocks bearing the Minwanabi crest rested. For a long moment she regarded the talisman, so much like her own; except for the weatherworn sigil, it might have been the twin to the one she carried. Poignantly reminded that all great houses of the Empire shared a common beginning, she renewed her dedication to make that a common future as well. At last she said, 'With reverence, remove the natami.'
Nira knelt to do her bidding as she turned and faced the priest. 'I will not bury the Minwanabi natami.' She needed no symbolic act to rejoice in the recognition that the struggle she had fought most of her life had at last come to an end. She had risked much, and lost a great deal that was dear to her, and the thought of even ritual obliteration of a family's memory made her feel sour inside. Too easily, all too easily, the defeated house might have been her own.
In deep recognition of her own strengths and failures, and the legacy they might leave to her son and future children, she nodded to the Minwanabi family talisman. 'Once heroic men bore that name. It is not fitting they should be forgotten because their offspring fell from greatness. The Acoma natami shall rest here, where I and my children may sit in peace with the shades of our ancestors. But another place on a hilltop overlooking the estate will be set aside for the Minwanabi stone. I would have the spirits of those great men see their ancestral lands are well cared for and nurtured. Then they, too, will rest easy.'
To the gardener she said, 'Nira, you are free to choose this site. Plant a hedge and a garden of flowers and let no feet tread there but yours, and those of your appointed successors. Let the ancestors who participated in the founding and continuance of this nation know sunlight and rain, that the memory of a great house shall endure.'
The man bowed low and expertly dug around the base of the ancient rock. While the priest of Chocochan intoned a blessing, his work-callused hands raised the talisman and shifted it aside. Mara gave over her own family stone into the hands of the priest of the Good God. He raised the Acoma natami toward the sky and recited his most powerful incantation for Chochocan's everlasting favour. Then he returned the Acoma natami to Mara, who in turn passed it to the gardener. 'Here is the heart of my line. Tend it as you would your living child, and you will be known as a man who has done honour to two great houses.'
'Mistress,' Nira said, bowing his head over his new charge in respect. Like every other servant on the estates, he had expected slavery, but instead he discovered he was being given a new life.
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The priest consecrated the ground around the natami as Nira trampled soil around the base. At the completion of the ritual, Chochochan's servant sounded a tiny metal chime and departed, the gardener following on his heels.
Mara remained alone with the stone that bound her ancestors' spirits to renewal on the Wheel of Life. Careless of her fine silks, she knelt in the earth and ran her fingers across the surface, the faint lines of the shatra bird crest worn with age.
'Father,' she said quietly, 'this is to be our new home. I hope the site pleases you.' Then she added words for the dead brother whose absence even yet left a wound in her heart. 'Lanokota, rest you well and know peace.' Then she thought of all those who had died in her service, those close and loved and others barely known. 'Brave Papewayo, who gave your life to save mine, I hope you return to the Wheel of Life as a son of this house. And Nacoya, mother of my heart, know the woman you raised as a daughter sings your praises.'
She thought of her beloved Kevin, who now was back among his own family, and prayed that he would find a happy life without her. Tears flowed freely down her cheeks, for both losses and victories, joys and sorrows. The Game of the Council as she had known it was forever changed, and by her hand. Yet as she knew her people, she understood that their nature would accept this new order slowly; politics would shift and she would be required to work hard to preserve peace. The wealth she would gain from her Midkemian trading concessions would help underwrite such efforts, but the difficulties ahead in establishing Ichindar's power would require as much nurturing as any plan she had completed to defeat enemies.
Mara arose, both sobered and exhilarated by the weight of new responsibilities. Inspired by the beautiful gardens, and by old trees lovingly tended, she arrived at the gate that marked the entrance to her family's sacred glade. There she encountered her inner cadre of advisers, and thousands of Minwanabi soldiers upon their knees with Lujan before them. 'Mistress,' he called gladly, 'to a man, these remaining warriors embrace Acoma service.'
Mara waved him a salute. Even as she had restored hope and honour to a band of houseless outlaws as a girl green to the ways of power, she said, 'Swear them to honourable service, Force Commander Lujan.'
Proud in his plumes, the Acoma Force Commander led them in the short vow that he had undertaken those same years before, when he had been among the first soldiers in the Empire to receive the grace of a second chance at honourable life.
As he finished and marshalled the warriors newly dedicated to the Acoma natami, Mara's eyes lifted to the distant shores of the lake. A flash of movement there snagged her attention, and her spirit soared with emotion. Setting a hand upon Keyoke's shoulder, she said, 'Look!'
Her weathered Adviser for War turned his gaze where she indicated. 'My eyes are not young, mistress. What do you see?'
'Shatra birds,' came Mara's awed reply. 'By the grace of divine favour they come to nest in the marshes on our shores.'
From his place beside the youthful Saric, Incomo said, 'The gods seem pleased with your generous heart, mistress.'
'We can only hope, Incomo'
To her circle of advisers she said, 'Come. Let us make our new home ready. My husband-to-be shall arrive soon, in the company of my son and heir.' Mara led old ministers and new toward the house she had so long admired, now to be home to her family, and a roof to join two great houses dedicated to the betterment of the Empire.
Mara of the Acoma passed the ranks of her newly sworn soldiers, men who but days before had been her confirmed enemies, zealous in their duty to bring ruinous ending to her house. That she could work miracles was now firmly believed by most who watched her, for not only had she defeated three Lords of the most powerful house in the Empire, she had forgiven their servants and embraced them as if they had never done her harm. Such generosity and wisdom would shelter them and make them prosperous.
And she bore the most ancient and honourable title ever bestowed, Servant of the Empire.
Empire - 02 - Servant Of The Empire Page 79