by Marian Gray
“Lars.”
He rolled his eyes with a sigh. “He hasn’t stopped complaining about him since we arrived in Lungdal. For some reason, the boy really gets under skin. I mean, we all find him annoying and pretentious, but Brungen is the only one talking about it nonstop.”
“Yeah.” I leaned back with my arms stretched out behind me, propping my weight. “And he’s not one to revolve around things for too long. This is definitely out of character.”
Cirithe’s black eyes dropped to the firelight and held for a while, absorbing the dancing light. “How well do you know him?”
“Brungen?”
Cirithe nodded, raising his gaze to my face. “Yes.”
“I would like to think I know him better than most. He’s been one of my best friends for decades now. There’s a reason I chose him to join me in Arus,” I answered truthfully. My curiosity was blooming by the second.
Cirithe rubbed the tiny hairs on his jaw. His movements were quick and agitated. “How do you think he will react when I seek out my freedom?”
The question knocked the wind from my lungs. Why would he ask me this of all people? Cirithe and I rarely spoke outside of passing messages and commands. We weren’t close by any means. I liked him fine by all measures, but I didn’t consider him a friend. “Do you intend to do that? Seek out your freedom?”
The question gave him pause. He cocked his thick brow. “What slave doesn’t?”
“That’s fair.” He was right. It was a silly question, and an even sillier idea that he intended to stay with Brungen forever. “To put it bluntly, I don’t think Brungen will be in favor of it.”
“Aye.” Cirithe took a deep breath. “I didn’t think so.”
“He did vote to keep you alive, after all. Even though he believed you and Derethe guilty of murder,” I added. “I think he enjoys your companionship too much. He’s never been one to be alone for too long.”
“This isn’t about wanting to be his friend or not wanting to be his friend. This is about me serving only myself and going where I please. I know I am nothing but a servant to you, but I am still human. I carry my dreams and aspirations with me.”
“I understand.” But unfortunately for Cirithe, this cycle through life would be spent in servitude. “How is it you intend to achieve your freedom, by the way?”
His shoulders dropped, and his entire body seemed to button up in a way. “Forgive me, but I think it best I keep this to myself.”
Did he know about Derethe’s abilities? The two were practically inseparable whenever they were around each other, and she had shown me her powers. He must know too. “Derethe can’t save you,” I blurted out. “What she is will only save herself. Her powers do have limits.”
“What?” He rubbed his jaw again in that same fidgety fashion as before. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He did. Otherwise he wouldn’t be so nervous. His denial was an attempt to protect her. Something I had tried to do but failed. She was the only one that could raise herself and keep herself from harm. It would be a tough lesson, but she would learn or die trying.
“How do you know Sairan so well?” he asked.
I paused as the question marinated in my mind. It was an abrupt change in direction. “You’re rather talkative tonight.” I rarely heard more than a few sentences come out of his mouth.
He shrugged. “I’m bored.”
I picked up a stick nearby and stoked the flames, sending tiny embers shooting into the air. “I learned Sairan from our slave. My father was a raider and a blacksmith too. He was in the first wave that came over, and he brought back Beatha. She helped my mother raise the four of us. Until…” I stopped myself, not wanting to pour my history out to a slave.
“Until what?” he asked. His voice was inviting, encouraging me to go on.
“Do you know why Varund abandoned all her outposts and settlements on the peninsula almost a decade ago?”
“No.” He shook his head. “It is a great mystery to us that we still talk about to this day.”
“A bad sickness spread across the region, and despite Varund’s mountainous walls, it still made its way into the city. Our settlers were called back because this disease ravaged the population. Unfortunately, my mother and two of my siblings were taken by this illness.”
“And Beatha stepped in and raised you and your other sibling?”
“Yes,” I muttered as I nodded my head. “I set her free after my father passed, but she stayed with me. We were family.” My mouth felt dry all of a sudden. “She passed several years after that.”
“I am sorry for your loss.” His eyes were sincere and voice genuine.
“Thank you.”
“How did she die?”
“Old age.” I shrugged. “Her cycle had ended.”
Cirithe nodded, piecing together my meaning. “And what of your sibling? I didn’t even know you have a sister or a brother.”
“Brother.” I swallowed hard. “He’s older than me by a few years. When my father passed, my brother was just on the verge of manhood. So he packed his bags, hopped on a boat, and sailed away. I haven’t seen or heard from him since.”
“Do you think he’s still alive?”
“I have no way of knowing. I mean, I hope he is. He’s all I have left. My aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents were all killed by the illness. And those that survived, left.”
“Why did you stay then?”
“Beatha. I couldn’t leave her. She had spent fifteen years caring and tending to me. The least I could do was to comfort and provide for her in her old age. Especially since there were so many times when she could’ve run. My father often left her home alone with us, while he went out on voyages and jobs in other cities. But she stayed and made sure we were fed, dressed, and educated.”
“She was a good woman. Sounds like one of our best.”
I nodded, not wanting to speak of it any longer. There was a hole in my heart, left from when she had passed away that I had sewn up tight. I could feel it throbbing in my chest, pounding against my rib cage.
“Cirithe,” Irska said, walking over to us. “It’s your turn to keep watch.”
Without a word, the slave hopped onto his feet and strode to where she had just been stationed as a lookout.
“Are you okay, Iver?” she asked as she crouched down beside me, placing a hand on my shoulder.
I released a deep breath, feeling my insides harden once again. Where flesh had been, stone replaced it. “Yes, I’m fine.”
XXIV
Patriarch Menaries
The chatter around me grew to a soft chirp. My eyes stared at the page before me, and my ears struggled to shut themselves to the world. Despite having taken a vow to reject worldly wealth, the sisters could only ever talk about all the fine clothes, jewels, and metals they wanted to wear once we had finished our seminarial education. Twenty-seven birds tweeted all at the same time, desperate to get a word in before Mother Sepia returned.
“What kind of fine things did you have in Sairasee, Derethe?” Sister Zoa asked me. She sat a row above me, with her white scarf hanging lopsided on her head.
When Patriarch Menaries had introduced me to my sisters, he had fabricated a fantastical tale about how I’d grown up wealthy in the Sairan king’s court. I planned to live a life fit for royalty, until the sun spoke to me and told me that he wanted me to follow him. So, I followed the sun across land and sea until I came to Essony. Over top the Mont, the sun sat, unmoving. And this is where I decided to stay.
His Blessedness claimed he had told that story to save me: the girls would think less of me if they knew the truth. But I didn’t believe it. It was ploy to make him and the Mont appear more grand and otherworldly than they were. I played along though. Living within the Mont put me closer to the king than I would be if I were out living in the city like a commoner. On the highest tier, the Esson king’s castle was a stone’s throw away. I hadn’t seen him since my first day in the Mo
nt, but I knew I’d get another chance. I needed to be patient, wait, and seize the opportunity when it arrived.
“Did you have any diamonds or opals or gold?” Sister Ladice added.
I nodded my head. I had no idea if diamonds and opals even existed in Sairasee, but that’s what they expected wealth to look like. Essony was a mining city. Precious gems and metals adorned every dress and tunic of the rich.
“What I would’ve given to have your life.” Sister Zoa smiled at me. Her lips stretched wide with sweet innocence.
“It is wrong to covet, Sister Zoa,” Mother Sepia snapped as she entered the classroom. The air within the room chilled, and the chirping silenced. “If Derethe’s life of wealth and privilege back in Sairasee was so great, she wouldn’t have left it for the Mont.”
“Yes, Mother Sepia,” Zoa whispered, sinking in her seat.
“You are women of the Lord our Sun, now.” Mother Sepia’s tone thickened the tension in the room. “You do not want. You do not need. You are only to obey. Obedience and servility.”
The words made me sick to my stomach, but the girls all smiled and nodded. It was the same thing they did for every command and lesson. Smile and nod. Smile and nod. Smile and nod.
We weren’t allowed to speak, unless someone with authority spoke to us first. Perhaps that’s why they couldn’t contain themselves in the classroom. It was our refuge from the outside world. The only place we were allowed to hang up our hair scarfs when Mother Sepia stepped out to use the restroom.
“Sister Zoa, please remind the class about the Tenets of the Sun as ascribed to woman.”
“Yes, Mother Sepia,” she said as her small frame stood from her chair. We were all expected to stand whenever we recited religious dogma.
But a knock on the door drew our attention away from the upcoming performance.
“Yes?” Mother Sepia sang the word.
The pointed-arch door opened and a man poked his thimble-sized head inside. “Patriarch Menaries has requested for Sister Derethe to visit his observatory.”
Several gasps were released by the girls. Ladice offered me a very sympathetic glance over her shoulder.
“Sister Derethe, please follow Brother Roneos to the patriarch’s observatory.”
“Yes, Mother Sepia.” I stood and bowed my head before turning to the door.
“Be strong,” one of my sisters whispered as I joined Brother Roneos.
I walked at a pace of three steps behind him as we traversed the Mont. That was considered the appropriate length when a woman walked with a man in Essony. Four if she respected him. This concept was so ingrained into the culture that even their verb for ‘to marry’ literally meant ‘she who walks four steps behind her husband’. But I never walked four steps behind anybody. I wasn’t lesser or naturally subordinate because I was a woman.
Maybe if I had never been captured this concept wouldn’t feel so debasing to me. Sairans weren’t that far away from this, I assumed. Most public places didn’t permit women without their fathers or husbands. Perhaps the three-step rule was a good middle ground in that regard. The women could go about the city unaccompanied, and the men weren’t robbed of their sense of superiority.
I had yet to even venture around Essony. They kept us under close scrutiny here. But I wasn’t an anomaly amongst my sisters. Half of them had been raised in mining camps outside the city and were given to the Mont when their sixteenth name day came. The others, the older ones, were a mixture of young widows and daughters of craftsmen or herders. We were all below thirty though. The Mont didn’t take any new female acolytes above that age.
I didn’t know why they placed a cap on the age, but it unnerved me. What was it that age brought to us that men feared so much? Was it the end of naivety? The end of being gullible? The end of being taken advantage of?
Brother Roneos stopped before the large door with a sun carved into its face and knocked four times.
“Come in,” Patriarch Menaries droned from the other side.
Brother Roneos opened the door and bowed his head. “I bring Sister Derethe as you have requested, Your Blessedness.”
“Ah.” Menaries looked up from his desk. His usual cap was missing, revealing his bald scalp and wreath of white hair that sat just above his ears. “Excellent. You may go, Brother Roneos. I haven’t any need for you for a while.”
“Yes, Your Blessedness,” Brother Roneos answered, keeping his head bowed as I passed. He even managed to shut the door with his eyes still on the ground.
“How may I serve you, Patriarch Menaries?” I asked.
He cocked an eyebrow at me, and his lips formed a thin line.
My head bowed, dropping my eyes to floor and away from his face. “I apologize, Your Blessedness, I am still learning the ways of the Mont. I did not intend to insult you.”
“Just as the Lord of the Sun shines his radiance on his people, I shower you with my forgiveness.” His voice was level, but his tone magnanimous, as though he were giving a sermon before a congregation.
“Thank you, Your Blessedness.”
“Come stand before my desk, so that I may look upon you.”
With small steps, I crossed the room, keeping my gaze pointed only a few feet ahead of me. I passed by the unusually large set of furniture and circled around the long table before the legs of his desk came into view. The urge to glance over my shoulder struck me. The long table was normally empty and bare, but I could’ve sworn I glimpsed a white sheet laid atop its surface.
We stood before each other in awkward silence before Patriarch Menaries spoke again. “Are your sisters kind to you, Derethe?”
“Yes, Your Blessedness.”
“Are the mothers of your ward kind to you?”
“Yes, Your Blessedness.”
“Are the brothers and the fathers that serve the Mont kind to you?”
Once again, I answered, “Yes, Your Blessedness.”
“Are you satisfactorily fed and clothed and bathed with a comfortable bed, pillow, and blanket?”
“Yes, Your Blessedness.”
“Have we not taken you in and made you a part of our family without prejudice?”
“Yes, you have, Your Blessedness.”
“Then why is it that you are so sad?”
“I’m sad?” I spoke again before he had a chance to correct my casual demeanor. “I’m sorry, Patriarch. I don’t know why you believe me to be sad here?”
He sighed as a father does with a child when they ask a silly question. A smirk played across his lips. “You never smile, Derethe.”
But the brothers and the fathers never smiled either. Did he believe they were sad too? “I haven’t noticed, Your Blessedness.”
“The Lord loves it when you smile.”
Smile and nod. Smile and nod. “Yes, Your Blessedness. I shall make sure to smile more.” One of my feet took a step back, preparing to turn and leave once he dismissed me.
“No, I don’t think that’s the solution to our problem,” he said, halting my retreat. “You can’t just mask the problem. It only allows the dilemma to fester and grow. No.” He shook his head. “I won’t allow one of my children to suffer like that.” He sounded affronted. “It’s indecent, inhumane. Instead, I think it best you receive help. I personally”—he pressed a hand to his chest—“shall counsel you, and together we’ll defeat this sadness inside you with regular sessions.”
I knew he wanted me to grovel and thank him, but that felt as difficult as climbing one of Varund’s mountains. “Oh, Your Blessedness, I thank you for your generosity, as it is never-ending, but I assure you, I shan’t need that. I am happy here, and it would be a waste of your holy and most sacred time. I am not worthy.”
“Nonsense, I am the patriarch here. What kind of father would I be if I didn’t care for my children, no matter how young they were?” He rose from his chair. I opened my mouth to refute him again, but he cut me off. “Stand by the table, please. We will first assess you, so that the Sun Lord may f
urther direct me.”
I wanted to tell him ‘no’ and leave, but I couldn’t even fathom how painful my punishment would be. I doubted I would keep my life after something as disobedient and disrespectful as that. “Yes, Your Blessedness,” I said and did as he requested.
He followed me, observing closely. “Remove your garments.”
My eyes widened. “My garments?”
“Yes, your hair scarf too.”
My stomach twisted into an agonizing knot. I stood for a few seconds, hoping he would change his mind. But he said nothing.
With trembling hands, I untied my apron. The cloth dropped to my feet. Then, I bent over and gripped the hem of my dress. My breath stifled as I lifted the fabric overhead. I had been naked in front of people before, but this was the first time I had ever wanted to hide my body behind my hands. My fingers plucked the pins from my hair, and the scarf fell to the floor.
“On the table.”
I climbed atop the white sheet. The surface was hard and cool beneath my body. A shiver shot through from my spine, despite not being cold.
“During our sessions, I’ll need you to lie still. I can only cure you if you allow me to work,” he instructed. “The more efficiently you allow me to perform my tasks, the sooner we’ll have you smiling again.”
“Yes, Your Blessedness,” I whispered. My voice had ran and hid.
He undid the ties on his silk blue robe and slipped it from his shoulders, resting it on a nearby chair. The patriarch was naked himself, save a cloth wrapped around his hips that reminded me of a baby’s diaper. His torso wasn’t as copper as his face and hands but held more of an olive color. His pecs had a slight droop that mimicked his small gut. Age spots dotted his collarbone, and random white hairs sprung across his chest.
He raised his hands above me and closed his eyes. “Show me, Lord of Sun. Touch me with your everlasting wisdom and direct my hands so that I may know the origin of your child, Derethe’s, sadness.” His stare followed his palms as our flesh met. His hands were neither warm nor hot but rigid. “Do not fear. The sun’s power is within me now.”