by Doris Egan
She touched the silver bracelet on her arm and for a moment I thought she was going to pull it off and throw it to the floor, in keeping with the level of high tragedy. But this was the woman who told Loden Broca to go back and burn the IOUs. She pulled the cuff of her sleeve down over it, turned, and bowed to her father for the last time.
Let the Brocas care for her.
Self-willed or not, there are damned few jobs in the capital for someone without family pull. I know this very well. And what was she trained in, but being a cultured and elegant young lady of the Six Families? A position no longer open.
So the cage was opening, now that there was no place to fly. She would never again have to placate Jusik, satisfy her chaperones, wear satin slippers in the snow and laugh delicately at the witticisms of wealthy suitors.
She turned, smoothed the wrinkles from her outerrobe with a gesture, and—quietly, carefully, gracefully—she left the room.
It felt as though a hurricane had passed. I looked at the others; they seemed as wrung-out as I felt. We all sat there for what must have been a good five minutes, like people dazed, before Jusik blinked and said, "Sir Cormallon. Gracious lady. We may consider this incident closed, I think. I would thank you to discuss it no further."
Ran bowed.
My mind still followed Eliana mentally, out into the garden, past that gatehouse for the last time. She must be well aware that that silver bracelet wouldn't last her very long.
So she'd taken her dignity and her dream of independence and turned to the nice-smelling security guard, Loden Broca Mercia, screwing up her life beyond any hope of redemption. What irony. She'd have been happier marrying whatever wedding card her family slapped down before her, regardless of age or temperament. She'd have had her brideprice rights, her divorce rights, her children with their duty to obey and defend her—she could have carved out a bearable, compromised life for herself. It's what I would have done. I mean, there are always books.
And plays. And sunsets. The way the capital looks from an aircar early in the morning when you're approaching from the west. I'd have taken the chips I had and banked them, and not risked all that on a question mark.
But I'm a prudent little soul, born to buy insurance. My own wild chances were always forced on me; Eliana was made of more splendid stuff. She'd have been happy as a man in this culture, or as a woman on, say, the sane part of Tellys. She chose Destiny with a capital D, chose the madness (an Ivoran phrasing) of sexual love over self-interest, recognized her enemies for who they were, regardless of family name. I admired and disliked and pitied her all at once.
I think I was the only one in Jusik's library who felt that first emotion, though.
Ran stood and helped me up. "Thank you for your time, noble sir," he said, and nudged me into an awareness of my manners. We both bowed.
There was a scream, loud and piercing, from the other side of the house. The garden side.
Everyone got to their feet. Ran looked at me. "The lizard," I said.
I must not have been the only one who thought so. Ran and I turned and started running, down the hall, down the stairs… behind Coalis. With Leel Canerol gaining on us, and Jusik just beyond.
We tumbled out onto the porch. At the far end, a shining patch of blue and green… We raced over.
The emerald lizard stuck his narrow tongue out at us all, his calm eyes gazing at this sudden invasion of madmen. His poison sac was still half-full.
"That's as full as it was when we came in," said Ran, puzzled.
I said, "I know. And where—"
Another scream, from beyond the jinevra bushes. We ran through the garden, Leel easily outdistancing us all.
An old woman in tattered servant's dress stood at the edge of the blue pool. Eliana floated in the center, surrounded by a pink halo. Beyond the long waving curtain of her black hair, you could just make out her knife on the bottom.
Chapter 19
Eliana had kept a flute on her windowsill. I'd seen one exactly like it in Loden's room at the inn. From such little things are suicides made.
Twelve days later I got an unexpected invitation from Coalis, and on an unseasonably cool late afternoon, almost early evening, I went to the Poraths' for the last time.
The garden was crowded. A closed wagon was parked near the east wing porch, crushing the flowerbed, and as I watched I saw Jusik's writing table being carried out and placed inside. Were they so hard up they were selling off the furniture? A thick hose ran from the blue pool to a groundtruck nearby. The truck was vibrating, making a woompah-woompah sound, and a workman stood beside it peering down into the pool. I peered, too.
It was nearly empty. Old leaves and dirt eddied in the shallow remains. The bushes around the edge looked mournful and precarious of life. Maybe they'd always looked that way and the pool just took your attention from it. Or maybe all the truck activity had upset their growth.
Coalis waited by the front step, one of the Scythian yellow toms in his lap. He stroked it absently. He glanced up at me as I approached.
"They're draining the pond," he said.
"So I see."
"The ferocity of feeling in violent suicide must be expunged. The emotion would leave its shade behind, fouling the pool. It has to be drained."
"Ah."
He ran his hand gently from the tom's forehead to the tip of its golden tail. "They tell me you barbarians don't believe in that kind of thing."
"You're a na' telleth. What do you believe?"
He smiled humorlessly. "Maintaining a distance from violent emotion is always wise. Besides, the pool would be a shame to my father. People would point to it and say, 'There's where Eliana Porath slashed her own throat, when she was rejected by her family.' Probably what she had in mind when she did it. She should have known Father would have the spot drained."
"Can he avoid the social shame that way?"
"Oh, no. The shame will last for years. Eliana's last gift." He smiled again. There was no blame in his tone, only a light affection. "That's why we're leaving the capital."
"You are?" He'd taken me by surprise.
"Father has a gentleman's farm, out in Syssha Province. It's one of the last pieces of property my family managed to hang onto. That's where we're going." He nodded toward the wagon. "Father's sending the heirloom pieces on ahead with the servants."
Father this, Father that. "What about you, Coalis? Are you going, too? Your tutors are here in the capital, aren't they?"
"Oh, yes, I'm going, too. Father made that very clear. That's why I invited you over today, Theodora, to say good-bye. You're one of the few people in this town I wanted to say it to formally."
Thank you, I think. "But what about your studies? Couldn't you stay with one of the other Six Families?"
"I am no longer to be exposed to the corruption of the city," he said. "We are to return to a simpler, more moral time, learning the lessons of the harvest and the seasons among good-hearted country folk."
"I see."
"Father blames the capital for what happened. He believes his children have lost touch with the true virtues. He's dropped his hobbies to concentrate on the important aspects of life. / am to be his sole focus now; me, the cats, and any farm stock."
"I'm very sorry."
"Yes." He grimaced. "He fired Leel Canerol for suggesting his concern was a bit late. He invited her along with us at first, you know. To protect the goods on the way, and to help on the farm."
"Not her speed, I would think."
"Well, you never know who harbors these unsuspected rural longings. Perfectly innocent looking people, sometimes." Not you, though, apparently. "Anyway, Leel was wrong to have mentioned it, even if she was upset. Besides, if Father had piled the weight of his full attention on Eli before this—"
She might have suicided that much sooner, I filled in. Coalis closed his mouth firmly. There were limits even a na' telleth did not pass in speaking of one's parents; at least, not on Ivory.
I st
eered back the subject. "She's all right, then? He just fired her, nothing else?"
He rubbed the cat under its chin and a low purring sound began to gain strength. "You think he might have blackballed her in the capital? Beaten her before throwing her past the gate, without any clothes?"
"Well…"
"The fire's gone out of him, Theodora. Except for this farm scheme. You don't dare say a word against that for your life. Not even Grandmother." He sighed. "She's taking it better than we all thought. After her breakdown when Kade died, we assumed she'd lose control entirely. Father was even afraid it would kill her. But she's handling it better than he is. And she was closer to Eli, too—figure that out."
I sat down beside him, keeping a distance from the cat. "And what about Auntie?"
"Fighting a guerrilla campaign." He chuckled. "Holding on for dear life. I don't think she has any family left, and she doesn't dare ask for references. So she keeps to the corners and doesn't say a word. Father hasn't officially asked her to accompany us to Syssha. I'm betting she'll slip into the wagon and come anyway."
What a life. What a family. Jusik appeared at the other end of the east porch; he directed a workman to load a small cabinet of inlaid marble into the wagon. He glanced over at me where I sat and then turned back to his chore, as though dealing with anyone unnecessarily was more than could be expected of him. What in the world was Coalis going to do way out in Syssha Province? Loan-shark the sheep and cows? Collect three or four kembits a day from the peasantry?
The choice was not his, any more than the choice was Eliana's, though she'd tried to make it so. Possibly in the back of his mind Coalis was hoping for an early paternal heart attack and an early return to the capital; what was love and what was duty in his attitude toward his father, I certainly couldn't determine.
"I thought you'd like a souvenir," said Coalis, drawing my attention back.
I could not possibly conceive why he would think so. But he reached into a pocket and drew out a tiny bluestone globe trisected by a silver triangle. He put it in my palm. I'd seen the symbol before, over the entrance to a na' telleth monastery. No doubt I had more chance of seeing that monastery again than Coalis did. Even if Jusik died, no decent Ivoran boy would go into a monastery when he was the last of his family.
The woompah-woompah sound stopped and I saw the workman by the truck disengage his hose. He started hauling it back from the dry pond. In my mind I saw Kade, bully and loanshark; Eliana, going over the line in her plan to escape her father's house; Coalis… I wasn't sure exactly what Coalis' problems were, but he wasn't the boy next door. Just a typical Ivoran family, I thought, a little hysterically. Save this planet, people. Start a creche, ban family names, the way we did on Pyrene.
… And Jusik, tyrannizing over the rest. Except he didn't look like much of a tyrant right now.
I said to Coalis, "Does this mean you've given up monkhood forever?"
"It's not a profession, Theodora, it's a state of mind."
One you would do well to emulate, I heard unspoken. He was probably right.
I stood up. "Farewell, and good fortune. Your acquaintance has been… unforgettable."
"Oh, Theodora." He stood and bowed over my hand. "Believe me, your acquaintance has made quite an impact."
Indeed, and it was courteous of him not to kill me because of it.
I walked past the dry pond, the crushed flowers, and the still-tall jinevra bushes. It would be good not to come back here.
Behind me, the bones of a dying family stirred themselves for the move.
I thought of Coalis sometimes and his quest for achieving the true state of "na' telleth-ri"; a quest whose cold arm reached into the most normal, taken-for-granted moments of life. The last line of a disagreement with one's husband, for instance: "What do you want me to do?"
An interesting word, want. Close enough to care to make the na' telleths nervous. What do you want? A chair, a bed, the salt passed? I ask to be polite; I'm human myself, I know how we are. Any desires hanging on your back, pinching your toes, stirring your drink for you so it no longer tastes good? Justice, vengeance, sexual satisfaction? Feel free to speak up, we're all siblings here.
It's how we deal with each other, the basic web of civilization. We start with barter, move on to a system; we're no fools. Here, have some money, you can buy what you want. Should we go to the play tonight? If that's what you want. Me, I only want you to be happy.
Jack Lykon had returned to Tellys, but his specter remained. And as I snapped at Ran, "What do you want me to do?"
Not that he had asked me to do anything.
At the end of the month we went to the fair in the Imperial Park.
Twice a year the lowest level of the park, beside the river, is given over to craftspeople and farmers from the provinces who bring in every old piece of crockery and wagonload of fruit they think they can unload on city folk. Mixed in with them are acres of riches: Unexpected delights in the way of painted bowls showing mythological creatures drawn out in fiery symmetry; handblown goblets; finely patterned paper to use for decoration; and all manner of dishes, pipes, tah-burners, ceramic flowerpots… The park, needless to say, is crowded on such days. Stuff that would be auctioned off at a fine arts house on Athena can be picked up for a smile and a handful of old coins.
We'd wandered around for half the day to our artistic and monetary satisfaction, and toward late afternoon we started to aim for the food and spice wagons, to bring things home for supper. Today countrypeople were free of the spice monopoly's prices and could bring their whitemint and pepperfall direct to the consumer—and the consumers were lined up, happy to wait for bargains.
I stopped to look at a row of candlestick holders. A man went by in a yellow brocade robe, a little girl on his shoulders, giggling. Two others followed behind him, sucking lemon ices. Lately it seemed that everywhere I went there was a high tide of children. And the families all looked so happy. What happened to the harassed mothers, screaming red-faced at their kids, smacking them as they wailed and making passersby feel uncomfortable?
"Excuse me," said a voice. I turned to see a young woman in very plain standard dress, a fellow barbarian. She looked about twenty, verging on pretty, and out of place. "I'm sorry to bother you," she said, uncertainty in her voice, "but you look like you know your way around here. Do you think these—" and she extended her hands, each holding a cheap brass candlestick, "look all right?"
"Well…" I said, not sure how to respond; actually, I've always found brass candlesticks quite ugly, and the pair she had chosen had to top the list in that department.
"You see, I'm having a guest for dinner, and I want it all to look nice," she said.
"I've never been fond of brass," I said.
"They're about all I can afford," she said frankly. She gazed at them with dissatisfaction.
They were the cheapest pair in the row, I saw. I picked up one of the less expensive looking crystal holders and glanced at the vendor. He raised four fingers. My fellow barbarian followed the exchange and her face fell.
"Is your guest Pyrenese?" I asked hopefully. A Pyrenese would hardly notice or care about the artistic merits of his dinnertable. In fact, it would be considered morally beneath him to take note of such things.
"He's Ivoran," she said.
"Oh, dear." And you don't know what you're letting yourself in for, my child.
Ran appeared then; he'd been lingering over a set of marble paperweights two wagonloads back. A true Ivoran, an aesthetic question engaged his interest at once.
"Why don't you buy one of those bowls with the phoenix-griffin design? —You remember them, Theodora.
They're down by the water's edge—the craftsman was packing to leave, and selling them for almost nothing. Then you can fill it with scented water and put a few of those floating candles in."
"I never heard of floating candles," she said doubtfully.
"It would look splendid," he insisted. "Come on, I'll point you in t
he right direction. —You'd best get a spot for us in line, Theodora. I'll be back in five minutes."
An appeal for aesthetic judgment will get Ran's attention where an appeal for mercy may leave him cold. He pulled his victim/charitable object after him, and I filled up a string bag with fruit and pastries, and went to stand in line at the spice wagon.
Several people had brought their own carts, now piled high with loot from the day. Good gods, there were eight— no, nine—children in line in front of me, and a tired woman with the voice of a drill sergeant watching over them. Wasn't she young to have— One of the older children's robes rustled as she moved, and I saw the character for "property of." I watched till she turned around, and read, "Kenris Training School."
Trocha children: Orphans and "superfluous offspring" brought up to be sold into trade apprenticeships. Even they didn't look unhappy. They demanded attention of their guardian freely, constantly tugging on her sleeves, and she gave it to them as their due.
All a facade, I thought, standing there, remembering the Poraths and wondering about what had gone wrong in my own past.
I remember once talking to one of the therapists on Athena about the strangeness of "family" to a Pyrenese creche-graduate like me. I'd been saying nice things about the Cormallons, thinking of the relationship between Kylla and Ran, and the therapist had grinned and remarked that the older he got the more he felt the phrase "dysfunctional family" was redundant.
He had a point. But is it just families? Is the Pyrenese system really better? It didn't give me a happier childhood. And would I have found the same painful rubbing-together, one wound against another, in any group that had to live with each other, even nonrelatives on Pyrene? I never gave it a chance, so I suppose I'll never know.
I have my suspicions, though. What is it about us human beings, anyway? How can we possibly hurt each other as much as we do and still feel so put-upon while we're doing it? I sometimes feel we would all benefit greatly from having our lives recorded and played back, so we could see every wrong move we make from a spectator seat; every harmful remark and then a close-up on the eyes of the person we're talking to.