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not hear. And then she stopped. It took her only a moment to pass from life to
death, but it was unmistakable. Not a sleep. An emptying out. And that was
that. Except for the cleaning up after."
"That... is not especially helpful," sighed Ista.
"It was what I saw. I suspect she saw more. But I can scarcely imagine what."
"In my dream the dream you entered into the god kissed me twice. The first
time on the brow" she touched the spot "as His Mother once did, and so I
recognized it as the gift of second sight, of seeing the world of spirit
directly as the gods do, for I had received it so before. But then he kissed
me a second time, on in my mouth. More deeply and disturbingly. Learned, tell
me, what was the meaning of that second kiss? You must know you were right
there."
He gulped and blushed. "Royina, I cannot guess. The mouth the Bastard's own
theological sign and is signifier upon our bodies, as the thumbs are upon our
hands. Did He give you no other clues but me?"
She shook her head. "The next day, Goram, with some very confused notion about
a royina even if only a dowager royina being able to undo what a princess had
done, invited me in to kiss his master.
And for an elated moment, I thought I'd solved the riddle that it was to be a
kiss of life, as in the children's story. But it didn't work. Nor on Lord
Arhys, when I attempted him, later. I did not take the trial further afield,
fortunately for my reputation in this castle. The kiss was clearly something
else, some other gift or burden."
Ista drew breath. "I face a three-way knot. Two parts may be loosed together;
if I could find some way to banish Cattilara's demon, Illvin would be freed,
and the marchess saved. But what hope may be found for Arhys? I saw his soul,
Learned. He is surely sundered, or my inner eyes are blind. It would be bad
enough to complete his death, and lose him to his god. It would be worse to
secure his damnation, and lose him to nothingness."
"I ... um . . . know that some souls, suffering especially disrupted deaths,
have lingered for a few days, to be helped on their way by the prayers and
ceremonies of their funerals. Slipped through the doors of their deaths before
they quite shut."
"Might the rites of the Temple help him find his way to his god, then?" It was
a bizarre image; would
Arhys walk to his own funeral, lie down on his bier?
He grimaced. "Three months seems very late. Choice is the trial of all who are
trapped in time; and that choice is the last one time imposes. If his moment
for decision still lingered, through some habit of the body, could your second
sight tell?"
"Yes," said Ista lowly. "It can. But I want another answer. I do not like this
one. I had hopes of that kiss, but it failed."
He scratched his nose in puzzlement. "You said the god spoke to you. What did
He say?"
"That I was sent here, in answer to prayers, Illvin's among others, probably.
The Bastard dared me, by my own son's god-neglected death, not to turn aside."
She frowned fiercely in memory, and dy Cabon edged a little back from her. "I
asked Him what the gods, having taken Teidez, could give me that I
would trade spit for. He answered, Work.
His blandishments were all decorated about with annoying endear merits that
would have bought a human suitor a short trip to the nearest mud puddle by the
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hands of my servants. His kiss on my brow burned like a brand. His kiss on my
mouth" she hesitated, went on
doggedly "aroused me like a lover, which I most certainly am not."
Dy Cabon edged farther back, smiling in anxious placation, and made little
agreeing-denying motions, his hands like flippers. "Indeed not, Royina. No one
could mistake you for such."
She glowered at him, then went on. "Then He disappeared, leaving you holding
the sack. So to speak. If this was prophecy, it bodes you ill, Learned."
He signed himself. "Right, right. Um. If the first kiss was a spiritual gift,
so ought the second to be. Yes, I
quite see that."
"Yes, but He didn't say what it was.
Bastard. One of his little jokes, it seems."
Dy Cabon glanced up as if trying to decide if that were prayer or expletive,
guessed correctly, and took a breath, marshaling his thoughts. "All right. But
He did say. He said, Work.
If it sounds like a joke, it was probably quite serious." He added more
cautiously, "It seems you are made saint again, will or nil."
"Oh, I can still nil." She scowled. "That's what we all are, you know.
Hybrids, of both matter and spirit.
The gods' agents in the world of matter, to which they have no other entree.
Doorways. He knocks on my door, demanding entry. He probes with his tongue
like a lover, mimicking above what is desired below. Nothing so simple as a
lover, he, yet he desires that I open myself and surrender as if to one. And
let me tell you, I
despise his choice of metaphors!"
Dy Cabon flippered frantically at her again. It made her want to bite him.
"You are a very fortress of a woman, it is true!"
She stifled a growl, ashamed to have let her rage with his god spill over onto
his humble head. "If you don't know the other half of the riddle, why were you
put there?"
"Royina, I know not!" He hesitated. "Maybe we should all sleep on it." He
cringed at her blistering look, and tried again. "I will endeavor to think."
"Do."
At the other end of the courtyard, Foix and Liss were now sitting closer
together. Foix held Liss's hand, which she did not draw back, and spoke
earnestly over it. She was listening to him, in Ista's jaundiced view, with
entirely too credulous an expression on her face. Ista rose abruptly, and
called her to attend.
She had to call twice to summon her notice. The girl scrambled up hastily, but
her smile lingered like perfume in the air.
* * *
LADY CATTILARA, IN SOME DESPERATE ATTEMPT TO SUSTAIN HER role of chatelaine
before her new guests, held a dinner that afternoon in the same chamber where
she and her ladies had entertained Ista on the second night. Arhys was again
out; a very few of his officers attended, clearly more to make a convenient
hasty meal than to play courtier. Cattilara had seated Foix as far from [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]