Chapter XVII #3
“Fia,” the Priest said, shifting Celina onto one knee so that she fit comfortably in the crook of his arm.
The child, evidently accustomed to a cloister full of friends rather than a court full of enemies, happily leaned against him and began to toy with the hem of his sleeve.
“What’s gone wrong? And where’s Miriel?”
“She’s over there,” Fia said. “Across the room with Soria Beatrice and a foundling girl called Maya.”
“Not with you?”
Fia hesitated, her brief silence laden with both hurt and anger.
“No. Not with me. I thought I’d be away three days, but it’s been nearer two weeks.
And Miriel… she doesn’t want me any longer.
Apparently, she’s not fond of strangers at this point, and I’ve become a stranger to her.
Soria Beatrice says it won’t last, now I’m back, but… ”
Her voice trailed off.
“Gods,” the Priest said. “I’m so sorry.”
“Yes,” Fia said, more defeated than he’d ever known her to be. “So am I. But at least Celina and I have something in common now—family that’s passed us over.”
“Miriel’s only a baby yet,” the Priest offered. “She’ll warm to you again.”
“I know. I know she will. But I had been thinking of going back to the mountain with Ariana, after all this. Of keeping my position as Justus’s nurse, and riding to the cloister for a few days each month to see Miriel.
I hate to do it, and it would have been difficult, but Ariana needs someone, at least until she’s stronger, and I’m best placed to be a support for her. If Miriel’s forgetting me, though…”
Uncertainty laced the postulant’s words.
The Priest could hear in her voice that she’d lost her way.
The decisiveness that characterized her was gone, shattered by divided loyalties and her daughter’s rejection.
That, more than anything else, brought home to the Priest how deeply Miriel mattered to Fia.
He could not imagine her ever becoming lost or despairing over an action of his, or the queen’s, or even Dolenza’s.
Angry or aggrieved, yes. But rudderless, no.
It woke an instinctive urge in the Priest to smooth the road ahead for her as best he could.
“I don’t think anyone expects you to come back with us again,” the Priest lied.
In truth, he’d assumed nothing of the kind.
It hadn’t even occurred to him that this journey might mean an end to Fia’s presence at court.
If he’d thought of it at all, he’d have reached that conclusion, but he hadn’t.
He hated to think of Ariana being deprived of the consolation Fia provided.
Equally so, he hated to think of himself returning to the cavern sanctuary and his ghosts, with no sunburst interludes of the postulant’s burning presence to enliven the endless dark.
For her sake, he feigned lightness and self-assurance.
“We’ve all assumed a part of this journey was Matria Dolenza recalling you to the cloister.
You’ve accomplished what she intended—bringing about the beginning of better relations between Raea’s daughters and the castle.
Your coming may even be the thing that finally nudges Orden back toward peace.
Besides which, Ariana’s regained much of her strength over these last few days.
There’s no need for you to stay at court now. ”
“You’re lying,” Fia accused.
“Yes,” the Priest owned, his altruism only carrying him so far. “Is it making you feel any better?”
“No.”
“Well, I’m afraid comforting distressed mothers isn’t a religious duty of mine,” the Priest said.
As he spoke, he carefully disentangled Celina’s prying hands from a leather cord he wore around his neck, a piece of petrified wood that had supposedly fueled the first Inver fire suspended from the end of it.
“If you want a blood sacrifice, I’ve become very efficient at them.
If you want a shoulder to cry on, better ask Matria Dolenza instead. ”
Fia let out an undignified snort. “I can’t see myself ever crying on Matria Dolenza’s shoulder.”
“Such an arrangement,” Dolenza’s voice said from the refectory doorway, “would surely be disagreeable for both of us.”
Several people entered the refectory in Dolenza’s wake, sweeping over to the table where the Priest and Fia sat.
“Dolenza, Orden, Ariana, Lucian, and Gaius,” Fia breathed to the Priest before they were in earshot.
There followed a general commotion as the Inver party sat, Dolenza on the Priest’s right, and Lucian just past her.
Orden took the place across from Fia, with Ariana at his side and Gaius solicitously flanking the queen.
All this, the Priest knew from Fia’s whispered commentary, and from his own attempts to track voices as seats were chosen and remarks made on the size and brightness of the refectory.
“Here we are, brother,” Orden said as Dolenza called to one of the sorias to fetch food and wine. “First king and first Priest to set foot in Raea’s house. What do you think of it all?”
There was a hungriness and a satisfaction in his voice that immediately put the Priest on guard.
It was the same air Orden had worn during their younger years, whenever he was certain of some new conquest or acquisition of power.
All at once Fia placed Justus in the Priest’s arms, gathered up Celina, and strode away.
The Priest wondered at that—perhaps Ariana had been showing some sign of distress over her cast-off daughter’s presence.
“I haven’t been in Raea’s great cloister nearly long enough to have made up my mind,” he answered Orden with impenetrable reserve. Given present company, he wouldn’t have shared his impressions for the world.
Fia’s empty place felt cold, in a sanctuary built for heat.
A little procession of sorias arrived and busied themselves with setting platters of food down before Orden and his inner circle.
It was nothing like the ornate fare the court lived on—pheasant and venison and mutton, barley bread and egg puddings and dainties concocted from mountain berries and moraine pine syrups.
Instead there were the scents of exquisitely soft, herb-encrusted wheat loaves.
Sun-roasted vegetables sliced thin and drizzled with honey.
Poached fish, steaming gently, the flesh flaking from the bone.
Summer wine, the vintage older than the Priest himself, smelling of oak and vine-ripened fruit, of sea wind and the sun-soaked earth.
“Gods, Matria,” Orden said with an appreciative groan as he took a first mouthful. “You sit down here by the sea and eat like a king every day.”
“Not every day,” Dolenza answered, sounding amused.
“We are, for the most part, more sparing in our habits. But on feast days and important occasions, yes, we enjoy the abundance Raea has blessed us with. I consider this a most noteworthy event, and I will not prevaricate, Majesty. It is not the way of the daughters of the sun to waste words, or to dance around what must be said. So let us not wait but speak plainly and at once.”
Orden made no answer, and it chafed the Priest, not to be able to see his face, and to read disapproval or acceptance there.