“Amina wants to see the monument first.”
“Of course.”
Dyami clutched Teo's shoulder; the other man brightened a little. “We will visit you,” Dyami said.
* * * *
A cart filled with passengers rolled past as Dyami and Amina left the main road. Dyami glanced at the group; a few of the people wore sashes. He found himself wondering how many of them had stood by, closing their minds to anything that might require them to act, and how many had actively aided Ishtar, convinced that anything the Guide did was right.
In the clearing where the monument stood, a small gardening robot was watering the grass. Amina took his arm as they approached the pillar. “Here it is,” Dyami said. “I trust it's what you expected.” She looked up at the faces of Iris and Amir without speaking. “My grandfather came here once in a while to polish the monument—he never thought anyone else was tending to it properly. His own memorial's with the other pillars.”
They walked toward the other monuments. He was about to point out Chen's image to her when a holo image on the pillar next to it caught his eye. Chimene's large dark eyes stared out from the top of that pillar; the image was alone, far above the other faces clustered near the center and base of the memorial. A trampled wreath of flowers lay in front of the monument; a torn banner was attached to the wreath.
He bent forward and read the banner's lettering:
to the memory of our guide,
chimene liang-haddad,
who loved us all and who lives on
Dyami straightened. “Playing a martyr's role,” he said hoarsely, “is becoming something of a family tradition.” Amina's hand tightened around his arm. “We'll never be free of her, will we?”
“You shouldn't have seen this now,” she said. “Have you decided what you're going to tell your parents?”
“I think I have.” He turned away from the pillar. “When the hearings were over, I expected that one of the things we'd have to endure was the pity of others and their efforts to reassure us that everything was fine now. What I didn't expect was that they'd want us to reassure them. They want to forget—they don't want to think that all of us are capable of certain deeds. They prefer to think it was just all caused by a few misguided or malicious people.”
“Dyami—”
“And now I'm supposed to forgive and forget.”
“No. We're supposed to remember without passing those hatreds on.” She pulled at his sleeve. “Your parents will be waiting. Let's not put this off any longer.”
* * * *
Risa and Grazie were leaving the greenhouse as Dyami and Amina walked up the path toward them. The two women quickly set down their baskets and hurried to him; Risa threw her arms around him as Grazie dabbed at her eyes.
“It's been so long,” his mother said; her tears were wetting his shirt. He finally managed to free himself before leaning over to kiss her. “And you must be Amina.” Risa clasped the blond woman's hands. “This is Grazie Lauro, one of my housemates. I—”
Dyami was afraid his mother might cry again. Amina glanced from Risa to him, then said, “Perhaps Grazie can show me the house while you two talk. You'd probably like a chance to visit alone first.”
Dyami shrugged out of his pack and handed it to Amina; Grazie picked up the baskets. “Kolya's made some of his bread,” Grazie said, “and there's fresh fish, and when Andy Dinel heard you'd be visiting, he sent over a bottle of his whiskey. We have a fine dinner planned for you later.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Just the household,” Risa said; he relaxed. “Go ahead, you two. I'll sit with my son out here for a little.”
Grazie led Amina into the house; Risa seated herself on the grass. “Well,” she whispered.
He sat down next to her. “Well.”
She smoothed back his hair, then touched his cheek lightly. “So you have a housemate now. You didn't tell me very much about your arrangement.”
“Don't look so hopeful, Risa. Amina's no more interested in me sexually than I am in her, but we're friends, and we've been close. We have certain scars in common.” He paused. “Amina's lover Tasida wanted to form a household with some friends, and Amina's still shy of living with that many other people, so I offered her a place in my house. It suits us, and our lovers visit us there.”
“That's all right then.” She patted his arm. “I'm just happy to know you won't be alone in that house anymore. I worried about you being so alone. And are you going to stay in Turing?”
“For the foreseeable future.”
“You know you can always come back here,” she said. “This house seems so empty now sometimes, but that will probably change soon. With my work and the Council's business, I'll need help here, but I'm sure I'll find someone among the new settlers.”
She was avoiding the issue that had brought him here. “You finally got the child,” he said.
“Yes. They took her out of the womb chamber two weeks ago. She seems strong enough and healthy, but of course we expected that.”
“You told me in your message,” he said.
“You didn't tell me how you felt.”
He put his larger hands around her small ones. “Why don't you tell me how you feel about it now?”
She rested her graying head against his arm. “Do you remember what I used to tell you about Chen, how bitter and despairing he was when Iris died? All he wanted to do was to forget—that's what he told me. He didn't want a child that would only remind him of her and of all the ways he might have failed her himself. But bringing me into the world helped him heal, and he was glad he'd made that decision afterward, that he'd decided to stay here instead of trying to escape his grief.”
“This is hardly the same sort of situation.”
“But Mahala has given me some consolation. Still, I have someone else I must consider, and that's you.”
The door to the house opened; Sef walked outside, carrying a small bundle in his arms. It stirred, and Dyami heard a faint cry.
He was about to speak when Risa pulled her hands from his. “Don't say anything yet until I've finished. My brother Benzi has offered to care for Mahala if you can't bear the thought of her living among us. He's a relative, too, and he could make a case for raising her himself. He's willing to stay on Island Two until she reaches maturity, and maybe it would be good for others to see that kind of bond between a Habber and one of our people. I'll give her up if keeping her here is just going to divide us. You wouldn't have to think about her any more.” Her mouth twisted. “You might even take a kind of perverse pleasure in seeing Chimene's child raised by one of the people she hated so much. It would be one kind of revenge, and perhaps that's all you want now.”
Sef was standing next to him. Dyami got to his feet and peered at the infant as Sef drew the cloth from her face. Her dark eyes gazed up at him; a few strands of fine black hair curled against her nearly bald bead. She opened her mouth as if about to wail, then reached out with one tiny hand. He did not know what he had expected to feel; she was only another child after all.
“She usually cries around strangers,” Sef said. “She seems to like you.”
“I suspect she didn't cry only because I look so much like you.”
Risa stood up. “I promised Benzi a message. You can think of what you want me to tell him. He'll come here as soon as he can if that's your decision—I wouldn't want her to bond too closely with us before he takes her.”
Dyami said, “I don't know if that's a good idea.”
“Better than waiting too much longer,” she replied.
“What I meant,” Dyami said, “is that it might be hard for her—being raised by a Habber without being one herself, knowing she might have had a home here, thinking that her own family would see only her mother in her. That would be a burden. She'd grow up as an outsider, in a way, always wondering if anyone really cared about her. It'd make more sense for her to stay here and for Benzi to visit her—they could still establish a bond that way.”<
br />
“Are you saying—” Risa raised a hand to her mouth. “You wouldn't be angry with me?”
“No. I won't be angry.” He swallowed. “She might want to visit Turing eventually. She'd have a place to stay, get to know me in case I come back to Oberg later.”
Mahala caught one of his fingers; Dyami let her hold on. Another burden, he thought, another creature who would share the history of this world, who would look out from this dome and try to imagine a world of light and life outside. Yet for the first time since leaving the place that had been his prison, he felt free.
* * *
Visit www.ereads.com for information on additional titles by this and other authors.
Venus of Shadows Page 70