The Lotus Ascension (3 page)

Ajalira's eyes
flashed, despite the tears in them. “Sillara, you are cruel to us.”

Frustration
welled up in Sillara's breast, but she forced it down. “My brother is not dead.
Not only is he not dead, he is happy. He is, indeed, half-distract with
excitement.” She looked from her father, with his sorrowing black eyes, to her
mother, with her bowed head and loosed hair, and Sillara knew that there was no
more she could do to comfort them. “I cannot explain to you how I know this,
but I do. I
know
that he is alive. Soren is well.” Sillara turned then
to Konas. “And is not today my oral examination on the history of the
Seranimesti House?”

A sob caught in
Ajalira's throat, and Kamen put his arms around her. “Lord Konas, humor her.”

As Konas
escorted her from her father's receiving chamber, Sillara could not help but
hear Kamen whispering.

“
She will be forced to face it, my Lira. Today was the day his ship
was due, and tomorrow she will have to acknowledge it.”

“
My son will have to rest as a Tamari, for his body cannot rest as a
Sunjaa's. It is … gone.” Ajalira's tears flowed freely, and Sillara was not
sorry to be left alone with Konas. Though she suspected he did not believe her
either, at least he did not try to force her to pretend her brother was dead.
They walked through the spacious apartments of her father's Arinport house, and
Konas was silent. Sillara did not mind. She was in the midst of composing a
song in her mind, a more complex piece of music than any she had composed
before, and she hoped it would be ready in time for the party she was planning
for Soren that night.

“
Your
Grace.” Konas
gestured for her to go ahead of him into her school-room. It was a large
apartment overlooking the sea, and the scent of ocean-spray filled the room.
Sillara loved the smell. It reminded her of Soren, for he had been two years at
sea.

“
I am ready for the examination, Lord Konas.” Sillara seated herself
with her back to the window. The sea breeze ruffled her hair, and she found
herself mentally calculating the distance from her chair to the deck of a ship
a dozen miles from Arinport's harbor. Having to determine the difference
between a heavily-laden
ship
, as Soren's would
doubtless now be full of plunder, and a ship carrying only sufficient
provisions for its sailors was a pleasant diversion. The fact that she sat in a
tower a fixed height from the ground would otherwise have made the question too
easily solved to occupy her mind while Konas took his seat and got out the
three texts he used for the history of her soon-to-be House.

“
I'm not going to examine you today, Your Grace.” Konas did not yet
have the books out, but Sillara had already finished her calculations.

“
Why not?”
Sillara hoped it was not that he considered her to have gone mad.

“
Because you could probably write
those books from memory.”
Konas laughed as he
gestured behind him to the shelf, and Sillara smiled.

“
So what lesson will you give me then?”

“
One not written in any text, for it is the secret treasure of the
Seranimesti House.” Konas pulled his chair closer to hers. Though he rarely
neglected to give her the title due her as the Queen of the Ausir, he was
otherwise as familiar as their long relationship authorized. He had been her
tutor since her official schooling had begun at the age of five, and even
before that he had been a daily visitor to her father's home.

“
Tell me, Lord Konas, for I must know all the secrets of His Grace's
House.”

“
You know that my father was only the younger son of his father,”
said Konas.

“
Yes. Your uncle was Lord Faloth, heir to the Seranimesti lands and
title, and he became the first High Priest of the goddess Abrexa. Followed,”
said Sillara with a smile, “by
my
great-uncle, Prince Nethrin.”

“
And they both, therefore, died without issue.” Konas shifted
uneasily in his chair, and Sillara heard the slight increase in his breathing.

“
Why 'therefore'?” asked Sillara.
“For there are,
now at least, priests of Abrexa who marry.”

“
That is so, but prior to the death of King Kiltarin the goddess
Abrexa dwelt among us mortals.” Konas's eyes dropped as he went on, but Sillara
ignored the lapse. “She actually
lived
in the King's house, and the High
Priest would go to her and worship her body … with sex.”

Sillara
laughed, though her cheeks burned. “She allowed that?”

“
She required it,” said Konas. “And outside the Seranimesti sons, no
one has known of this, for it seems that High Priest Nethrin never spoke of
it.”

“
She required it?” Sillara tilted her head to the left. “But was she
not wedded to the King? Why would she desire another lover?”

“
Because she was—is—a goddess. No one so far beneath her as King
Kiltarin, despite the touch of divinity in his blood, could satisfy her. She
was meant for the Master-Smith.”

Sillara
considered this. According to the priests of both orders, Abrexa River-goddess
had received her golden chain from Veirakai, and he had become her lord and
lover. But only a few hundred years ago she had dwelt among mortals, veiling
her divinity, and apparently fucking two men at once. “So she was unchaste?”

“
No,” said Konas. “Her husband liked it, wanted it, too.”

Sillara did not
know where to look.

“
And the goddess has favored the Seranimesti House ever since. Lord
Faloth's love and worship pleased her so greatly that she granted the crown to
the Seranimesti.”

My father
did that.
Sillara did not speak her thought,
however, but said instead, “And the Seranimesti have worshiped Abrexa solely
ever since. But though I will be pleased to worship Abrexa, for she is the
River-goddess of the Sunjaa, I cannot give up the worship of Alaxton.”

“
You would not be expected to.” Konas laughed. “You are of Tamari
blood. How could you be expected
not
to worship the Battlebringer?”

“
Alaxton Battlebringer is also Alaxton, Keeper of the Word.”

“
And Abrexa River-goddess is also Abrexa of the Golden Chain.”

“
The goddess of love.”
Sillara heard distant footsteps approaching her chamber.

“
And the goddess of lust,” said Konas. “They go together for Abrexa.”

“
And how should this be?” asked Sillara. “How should it be that the
Ausir King shared his wife with another man? Would not the Ausir then despise
her as a whore? Is it not the Ausir way to keep the virtue of their women
unsullied and above all reproach?”

Konas's wry
smile told Sillara that he understood as well as she did the incongruity of the
Ausir attitude toward sex. “As a goddess she was above mortal morals, and,
besides, she was too much for any one mortal man.”

Sillara's
cheeks were burning afresh. She knew that her own mother had been, because she
had trained as a Lotus, considered a whore and prostitute by Konas's brother,
her own soon-to-be-husband. She heard the alteration in Konas's breathing, and
she knew he sensed her discomfort.

“
Why are you so hopeful your brother is alive?” asked Konas.

Sillara could
almost have laughed at the abruptness of his change of subject. She knew that
he was always careful of her feelings, and this was only another fresh instance
of it. “It is not hope. It is knowledge.” Sillara had no other words to express
her certainty. She
knew
that Soren was living as surely as she knew she
herself drew breath.

“
Your Grace, I will not say that you must—”

The footsteps
Sillara had earlier detected were now at the door, and it opened. “Mistress,
there are three invoices requiring your signature.” One of Sillara's
body-slaves brought forward three rolls of papyrus.

Sillara smiled,
and she glanced over the contracts. “The dancers are to be engaged for the
entire night.” Sillara made a slight emendation to one of the contracts.
“Otherwise all is in order.” She signed the papers with the quill the slave
provided.

“
You are certainly sure of yourself.” Konas gestured to the
retreating body-slave. “It must have taken all your personal funds for six
months to pay for this celebration.”

“
Do you think that I would allow my brother to return and not have
his first long leave properly celebrated? He has served two years.” Sillara
paused. Those two years had been the hardest of her life, even though she had
known all the while of Soren's safety and well-being. “Thank you so much for
letting me
have
the use of your city house for this.
My parents would not let me attend even the first hour of a party anywhere
besides your house or the King's, and … I could not give my brother the sort of
party a sailor wants if I had had to hold it in my personal apartments.” She
smiled then. “And when you do not even believe me that he is alive—”

 
Suddenly the sound of
the harbor horn echoed through the city, and Sillara rose to her feet. Konas
joined her, and they both darted to the window. The voices and cries that
spread through the city in waves soon reached their ears.

“
Orien returns!”

Sillara turned
her shining eyes on Konas. Orien was Soren's captain, and his return meant the
return of his men.

“
The Scourge is defeated!”

Sillara and
Konas exchanged glances. The Scourge was the most vicious pirate in all the
Meshkenet Sea, and it was supposed to have been in battle with him that Soren's
ship had sunk.

“
It appears you were right,
Your
Grace.”

Sillara laughed
and threw her arms around Konas in her joy. Then she turned and fairly ran through
the halls to her father's receiving chamber. There she saw Kamen and Ajalira
holding each
other,
and she ran to them.

“
Sillara!”
Her father pulled her into their embrace, and Sillara could not
help laughing. She was as joyous as they were, but their sudden change from
such sorrow to this unlooked-for delight had left her parents half-dazed.

“
Please, may I go to the docks?” asked Sillara. She disengaged from
their arms and made a low curtsey in the Ausir fashion. “I want to meet my
brother.”

“
But, daughter, we cannot.” Ajalira's eyes were
more
green
than blue, and Sillara recognized the unmistakable sign of
happiness. “We must wait here for Soren to come home.”

Sillara knew
what her mother meant. As nobles, it would hardly be appropriate for their
family to trek down to the docks. The stir it would cause would be
disproportionate for what was supposed to be the expected return of but one
ship in the King's navy. The fact that this ship was returning after having
been thought lost would not make any difference.

And still
Sillara did not care. She dropped to her knees, and whether by Ausir or Sunjaa
standards it was a shocking action. “Please.”

“
There was a time I would've taken a horse to the docks myself,” said
Kamen, reaching down to pull Sillara to her feet. “But this isn't the time.
This is Orien's victory, his ship, and if we, first family of Arinport outside
the King's own, show up at the docks then we will be upstaging him, stealing
his glory.”

Sillara did not
take her father's hand and remained on her knees. “I will go quietly,
privately. Just, please, let me go.”

“
You cannot go quietly,” said Ajalira. “You are the Queen of the
Ausir.”

“
That is why you must not do anything,” said Kamen.

Sillara heard
Konas's breathing in the doorway, but she did not bother to turn to him. He
would, doubtless, agree with Kamen. “I just want to see my brother,” she said.
“It has been two years since I have seen his eyes.” She pressed her forehead to
the cool marble of the floor. “I shall not move until you give me leave to go.”

Konas was at
her side immediately, and he was prostrate on the floor with her. Sillara knew
that because she was, having been betrothed to Konas's brother on the day of
her birth, the Queen of the Ausir, he would not elevate himself above her.

“
She is
your
daughter,” said Kamen, and Sillara, though her
eyes were fixed on the floor, heard her mother's low laugh. “I suppose you may
go, but you shall not go alone. We will all have to go. Konas and I can take to
horse, and you may ride in your mother's litter.”