Ravno sat up high and off the ground, as he savored the sensation of the icy pinch and finding the window. Their delight in being together lured cautiously under their dangling feet, pressured by the weight of what came before. They wanted what they had, but at least still had what they have, while they sat in the crux of the arbutus under insulate Wawasen skies.
‘At first were you worried that you had a problem or something?’ She moved to his branch, grateful to rearrange her bum on the bark, and grateful, too, that it was an arbutus and not a spruce.
‘Not really, but Helena made me go to the Ishi.’
Keba wrinkled her nose. ‘That guy creeps me out like he’s out to find something wrong with you.’
‘Oh, I didn’t go to the one in Phoyara. I went to Vesta. Near Notou. Aron brought me there—though I’ve been there before.’
‘Did she notice anything unusual?’
‘No, not that I could tell,’ Ravno said. ‘But that’s when we ran into Jasmin, who got us to come to the Bhavata. And then I saw you again. So I’m happy I went to her nonetheless.’ He laughed.
They danced like the night before, when they were back on the ground and on their capas. There was a crackle of sticks every time they moved. He was still warmer and warmer under her body, and faster, but he looked forward rather to the slowing of blood and the freezing of the fingers of his mind; he looked forward to the slowing of mindful thoughts giving way to the free birds, their bodies aligned with legs in a stitch. He matched her breath, in through the nose, he smelled her hair, out through the nose. He moved his leg, he bent his arm. His fingers lay at rest in the sheets of papery arbutus. Her fingers traced his forearm. Down on the ground, he couldn’t see the empty nest of the grey crow through his own eyes or through hers when he switched with her. But he could feel sincere joy in her core, a buoyancy unfamiliar to the red forest floor.
How Ravno realizes what he must do
The frequency of batsu omhaals this year is unusual. And so, two days after they climbed the arbutus, and when Keba’s uterus was again refreshed as the forthcoming new moon of bulanost, Keba and Ravno and Jasmin came to support yet another victimized family in the process of their public marking. Dabi, as usual, travelled from village to village to educate the people about their responsibility with population control.
The small crowd converged near the Kuroshio Drifts in the white north of Lurruna. They gathered in a sun-bleached field surrounded by black walnut groves. A phenomenon of ocean air temperatures, unfettered chemical bitteries, and the early solstice light flung a sugar plum band low in the sky. The purple banner of shame suffused the trees and surrounded a teenage boy, branded along with his mat and two younger saudaris. Their ottsa was nowhere in sight since the last term of the pregnancy; only the boy and three girls stood exposed in the field. Roka, the boy, had his deferentectomy rendered at daybreak in Phoyara. He was weak in the groin and unsteady on skinny legs. The Ammit’s hand brought him to his knees with momentary relief. Shortly thereafter, though, and with a squeeze, the universe closed in on Roka’s throat and he could barely whisper his suppliance to forgo the brand for his new baby saudari. The groan, as it was more of a groan than a whisper, was cut thin by the Kawani as she looked at his mark and cried, ‘No ini kayama!’
Though Ravno wanted to abort his switch with Roka, as it was so troubling and pregnant with disgrace, he clutched the icy fingers tightly and with stubbornness. He pressed his forehead into his forearms on the sandy grass. His host’s eyes were hazy and Ravno watched with the boy as he despairingly fixated on the clearly inscribed noh on the first side of his baby saudari’s fleshy neck. The Ishi passed the baby to the mat. The boy’s hatred welled in gales but tempered with shame. Roka glared through hot tears. What an unnecessary punishment. What a heavy sign to bear. Just a baby, unable to stand, and all her life she’ll be singled out and alone.
Alone.
Brow scrunched on forearms as thought quickly turned to icy command and the fingers fell away. Ravno said it aloud, ‘She’s alone, but she doesn’t have to be….’
Keba drew a nose full of coca corba as she came to her haunches and looked over at him.
‘What?’ She had been looking at Jasmin Sanjukta gingerly spread oil on the newborn’s wound. Now she looked squarely into Ravno’s eyes.
‘She doesn’t have to be alone, Keba. If we’re all like her then she won’t be alone.’
The initial pasty, drowned look of pain on Ravno’s face fell away like granules of sand when his smile widened and eyes flared.
‘K, we’ve got to get branded!’
An emotional potpourri spilled over Keba’s face. She startled with fear but realized, then envisioned, yet faltered, and celebrated and loved. Her mind screamed, Branded? Quiet Rav, she won’t be alone…. And everyone would—but would they, really? The entire archipelago. Yes, yes….
Never before had Ravno been so quickly convinced of what he must do. He acted in confidence—so as to avoid the next barrage of questions from Keba and from his own mind, perhaps. He left no time for that. He dropped his night-blue capa beside Keba and bolted through the grove. The great arms of the black walnut trees held vigil over Ravno’s flight.
The trio diminished under hues of purple. The bald Ammit lumbered half a step behind the Kawani explosion and greyly subdued, taciturn Ishi. As the three neared the Teratas Canal, the Kawani heard Ravno’s portent steps and reeled around, uncertain. One of the many scrolls she held contained the inventory list of all those branded; as she turned, it fell to the cordgrass near the canal. Ravno picked up the scroll, rough in his hands. He gave it back to the Kawani. His mind raced. He faced the Ammit.
‘Cahaya, I’m Ravno. What a powerful ceremony today, my friend. It pierced my heart.’
The Ammit mumbled cahaya and possibly his name, though Ravno didn’t catch it. The Ammit turned back to the canal.
Ravno urgently cleared his throat to stop him, and asked, ‘May I feel the weight of the billet? The large one, if you don’t mind.’
The Ammit’s thick shoulders and neck tensed. He hesitated a moment. Ravno switched with him and sensed his hesitation. More importantly, Ravno noted his burgeoning sense of pride.
‘To appreciate your distinction, Ammit,’ Ravno said.
The Ammit presented the creambush rod to Ravno. The freshly used noh hung like a deflated number nine or a sperm with a cowered tail. The bulky, bald man was eager to satisfy Ravno’s curiosity and wished to prolong this rare praise and open appreciation. Bolstered by the pompous look on the bald Ammit’s face and a quick switch to sense the suspicion spidering through the Kawani’s chest, Ravno wasted no time. He grabbed the billet and dove off the bank into the deep intersection of the two canals. Just before he plunged into the heightening tide, the Kawani shrieked and whirled around to reach for his capa. But Ravno didn’t have it on and he disappeared in the salty water. The trio dashed down the ramp to the awaiting boto.
‘Follow him!’ the Ammit commanded as his weight and heavy step gracelessly rocked the dory. He shook the smallest noh with rage. The grebets eyed the navita cautiously then pushed off by her decisive sign. Their spruce paddles dug into the fearful water and their muscles quivered with the excitement of the chase.
Ravno swam awkwardly with the rod in his second hand. He blinked his first eye wildly to expel a piece of debris. As his body accordioned on to the opposite canalside, his fingers tried to clear the chaff in his eye. His feet scrambled up the embankment. A shoot of hair on the back of his head pointed upward like the needle of Vorra Mound that he ran toward.
The boto with the Ishi, Ammit, Kawani, two grebets and navita was halfway across the intersection. Ravno had a solid lead but his chest heaved frighteningly. He still couldn’t clear his eye. Ravno heard the Kawani shriek again as she pulled herself up the embankment with her claws and brought her face above the canal’s edge. She held only the scroll with the names of those inscribed. In the heat of the hunt, she began to cite the other scrolls as th
ey are read at the batsu omhaal.
‘A nirdosa no ini abisua,’ she said through her teeth, ‘souviens a bhavi.’ But it also acts as a summons to those not iniquitous to remember the future….
Ravno barely heard her words as he quit the trail that lead north around Vorra Mound. He broke west through bush and bramble off the trail to cut straight for the mound, Vorra’s tooth as beacon. Before the forest density enshrouded him, he caught only the last of the Kawani’s exclamation, ‘Kaku vie bezona kaku vie.’ He realized that running from the council or any of its designates prompts mistrust among the closest of friends. But even the ocean-sprayed ocean spray on his head followed his set direction. There was no turning a capstan.
In his hurry, Ravno unknowingly caused a sitka deer to abandon its foam-flowered lunch. He could not hear the discreet hooves run into the distance. Rabbits bounded about in the brush, and shrews, gophers and lemmings fled from the path of the oncoming biped. Tight branches scraped at his sides and left their mark. No ini kayama.
The Kawani softly muttered her proclamations to the forest fairies. She stopped on the marked path and lingered near the edge of it where the plants and trees grew uncontrollably. ‘Pada sariana dari kaku sankasha,’ she whispered hoarsely. Her words were lost in the trees
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