Our Lady of the Islands (56 page)

Pino’s funeral was a relatively small affair, as formal state occasions went. The Factora and her son had invited only the most important people: Sian, of course, and her lover, Konstantin Reikos; the Mishrah-Khote’s new Father Superior, there to officiate; the Butchered God’s once-renegade priest, now in retirement according to the rumor mill; the de facto leader of a humble raft warren on Home’s southern shore, his unwed cousin and her mute daughter; Pino’s bewildered parents, a poor old fisherman and his wife, from an island north of Malençon too tiny to be named; and, last but not
entirely
least, a small host of foreign dignitaries, important government officials, and senior representatives from all of Alizar’s most illustrious families.

To accommodate even such a modest gathering, it had been necessary to enlarge the hilltop meadow on Little Loom Eyot. With astonishing speed, an army of Factorate-supplied laborers had removed half its trees and brush, and leveled or terraced its irregular contours. An elegant stone crypt and monument had been constructed, surrounded by beautifully landscaped lawns and walks, pergolas, and gazebos. This place would henceforth be a site of national significance. Little Loom Eyot — at Alizar’s outermost fringe — would never be anonymous again, or truly private. Not that Sian cared. She wanted Pino close. But not forgotten. Ever.

The crowd on that sunny, breeze-swept afternoon was itself perhaps the clearest tangible manifestation yet of how
new
the world truly was in Alizar. Rothkin and his family had been given many gifts in appreciation of their help that dreadful night — including some simple but elegant formal silk attire, from Sian. Now she watched the young man moving like a peacock through the crowd of cordial and respectful, if not entirely comfortable, aristocrats, doubtless wondering how to work this windfall to his advantage. Rothkin had already been appointed to the new Factora’s council of advisers, and was thus not to be lightly dismissed, even by them, however dubious his pedigree.

Earlier that morning, Het had quietly informed Sian that Rothkin’s cousin, Hilara, and her daughter Paola had accepted his invitation to become the Mishrah-Khote’s first anointed female acolytes.
The girl will be greater than any of us,
he’d told her,
if she is not already. Her rapport with the otherworld is generating awe within the temple. It is my hope that her poor mother too will find real refuge and some greater purpose of her own among us now. I fear she has been more needed than wanted since the girl’s gift appeared — by many, including her cousin.

Upon hearing this, Sian had found herself recalling Paola’s refusal of a voice that night in Rothkin’s hut, and wondered if that refusal had been for her mother’s sake. How quickly might Hilara have been cast away again — or worse — if she had ceased to be the only gateway to her daughter’s secret knowledge? Could such a young child have understood this — more clearly than even her mother had perhaps?

Pino’s distraught parents seemed most lost here. They had known nothing at all of their son’s involvement in the short-lived war, much less of his death, having assumed him well out of harm’s way, working at some little textiles firm on the world’s other edge. It had taken weeks just to locate them. Now they sat beside the Factora and Konrad, under a small pavilion tent erected for Arian and her most honored guests, gazing about, often tearfully, at all the lofty people who suddenly seemed so grateful for their son’s life. Sian had tried to tell them what a fine employee and dear friend he had become, how sorry she was for their loss. They had been very polite, very honored by her words — and clearly not that much consoled. Such fine compliments would obviously have meant so much more had they been delivered while Pino was still alive. But who ever thought of such things while there was still time to act on them?

Still, Sian meant to try harder from here on.

There were brighter events to note, of course. Also in the Factora’s pavilion, just behind Arian and her son, sat Commander Ennias, the new head of her personal guard, beside his new affair of the heart, Maronne.

Having awakened that next morning to find Escotte Alkattha gone and his house under attack, it seemed Maronne had simply fled the house, impeded by no one in all the chaos. She had remained in hiding on Cutter’s until the fighting seemed done, then reappeared at the Factorate only a day after Sian’s long sleep had started.

Maronne’s brief liaison with then-Sergeant Ennias during the ‘dress-maker plot,’ as they now called it, had apparently proven unexpectedly enjoyable — for both of them, regardless of the fact that Ennias was nearly fifteen years her junior. From what Sian had heard, their affair had the Factora’s whole-hearted approval. And Lucia had quietly informed Sian that the new commander’s skill as a poet was proving quite surprising too — according to Maronne, at least, who was, to date, the sole inspiration and recipient of these unanticipated artistic endeavors.

When the guests had all arrived, and been given time to greet others before getting settled, the long ironwood horns were blown at last, toward the east and west, day’s rising and its setting. Great carved onyx bowls of incense were lit, and the islands’ dissonant, many-layered ritual music was sung with moving solemnity by a temple choir, as Pino’s richly carved teak and copper sarcophagus was borne into the center of the meadow and laid upon its flower-strewn bier before the shrine.

Het’s eulogy was focused on the impact one humble boat boy’s bravery and sacrifice could have on an entire nation. Though heartfelt, it was brief. Like most there, he had never met Pino, or even heard of him before that week. When his own remarks were finished, Het invited the Butchered God’s onetime priest forward to speak as well, to the quiet satisfaction or discomfort of the Factora’s extremely varied guests. The controversial young man had known Pino better than most in attendance there, after the boy’s parents and Sian, who had all declined to speak publicly. The former fugitive stepped onto the speaker’s platform, dressed in a clean, plain robe of white silk. He nodded his respect, first to Pino’s parents, then to the Factora and her son, and finally, Sian, then turned soberly to address the assembled gathering.

“Not quite a year ago, Pino came to me out of a crowd one day, like so many others, speaking of a hole he felt inside himself. A call, he said, a thirst, a vision, endlessly persistent, but never clear enough to name, much less to satisfy, though he claimed that it had been there all his life. I had heard such claims before. The sense of something missing, something imminent but elusive, was what drew all of us to the Butchered God. But Pino had what I can only call pure spirit. He seemed made of it entirely. And that was nothing I had ever seen before — or have seen since.

“There seemed no shadows in him. He did not envy those who had what he did not. He was not ruled by fear, or by ambition, or shame, or greed, or anger, or any of the darker things that shape and drive so many of us. He was honest to a fault, never defensive or more concerned for himself than for others. His one quiet but abiding passion was an endless search for the very light he seemed not to see burning inside himself, though so many others saw it there. When he could not find that light, he did little else but look for it. Whenever he found it, though, even for a moment, he threw himself into its service without hesitation or counting costs.” The young priest paused, seeming lost in some sudden, private reflection. “Even on the night he died, I doubt he was much afraid. I cannot know, of course, but I suspect that even as his boat was struck, his full attention was still fixed entirely upon the light he followed at that moment. For all I know, he may be following that light still.” He turned to Pino’s parents, at the Factora’s side. “I thank you for the love and wisdom it must have taken to nurture and permit such a pure, remarkable boy, such a singular life, such an example for each of us and for this nation, as so many of us look up and around at last to find and follow the light we had lost track of for so long. It has cost you more dearly than most to help make our world new. We are forever in your debt, and in your son’s.”

With that, the Butchered God’s enigmatic priest stepped back off the speaker’s platform and out of his ‘priesthood’ forever, Sian felt sure.

There was further pomp and ceremony after that, but Sian was rarely more than partially aware of it, lost now in recollection of that final night in Pino’s life. Her mind kept returning to his awkward little profession of love on Reikos’s behalf. For fear that Konstantin might not survive to tell her. She had thought him only young and somewhat foolish then, failing to see how selfless it had been to think of Reikos rather than himself at such a moment. Reikos had thought him reckless, but perhaps that too had just been purity in action.
Oh, Pino. Why did this light you sought so earnestly not watch over you more carefully?

When the last words of ritual had been sounded, and Pino’s body committed to its solitary rest inside the crypt, and the long horns blown one more time — in all six of the sacred directions — Het came to take Pino’s parents aside and speak with them more privately. There were more explicit, if less public, expressions of thanks and concern to be conveyed, more tangible privileges and reassurances to be explained now, in compensation for all their son had done for the Factora, her heir, and the nation. It had been agreed that Het was best equipped to express all this to people so clearly overawed and discomfited by those of high station. Despite his own new title, Het knew how to put humble people at ease. He had always been, and would always be, one of them.

As the other guests began to mingle and dissipate, Sian and Reikos were invited to join Arian, Konrad, Lucia, Maronne, and Ennias for some light refreshment in a private section of the pavilion tent. Once there, however, conversation faltered. After hours of such gravity, neither further gravity nor frivolous small talk seemed quite … apropos. Sian was not the only one to glance at young Konrad, and look away again without speaking. He had returned to them such a strangely grave and quiet boy.

“So, a great deal of rebuilding now, I must assume,” Reikos said at last, breaking their awkward silence as perhaps only an outsider of sorts could be allowed to.

“Oh … well, yes,” said Arian. “We’ve already started with the most essential sites, of course: bridges, docks, marinas, businesses … But there will be much more, eventually. I intend to see the new Factorate House and Census Hall rebuilt of local materials, and in the architectural styles of Alizar, not those of the continent. It seems time the nation left its colonial past entirely behind.”

That foreign bride of his
… Sian thought, as she and the others nodded their approval of her plan. How many times had she heard Escotte dismiss Arian that way? And yet, she doubted
he
would have approved this plan to abandon foreign pomp and make the nation’s architectural monuments truly Alizari. It seemed just, if ironic, that her dreadful cousin should end up exiled to the continent he had pretended to despise, while Viktor’s
foreign bride
should be here, leading Alizar into its own, at last.

“Unfortunately, we now require a new Census Taker too.” Arian sighed. “I dread the task of finding someone to fill that post. The office is supposed to be impartial, though that pretense has always been a farce. After all we’ve just been through, however, I think it really must be filled this time by someone Alizar’s people can genuinely trust to serve them first. Sadly, I am having trouble thinking of any candidate who quite answers that description.” She shook her head. “In the current atmosphere, I will be accused of political pandering anyway, no matter whom I choose.”

As Sian listened, the solution occurred to her with such force and clarity that she wondered if the Butchered God wasn’t in her mind again, still meddling in Alizar’s affairs after all. “My Lady Factora, if I may be so bold, I believe I may have someone to suggest.”

“Really?” Arian’s smile betrayed the slightest hint of wry amusement. “Are
you
interested in the job, my dear?”

“The gods forbid! No … I’m sure this will sound crazy, but … I think the Butchered God’s former priest would be perfect for the job, in more ways than may seem apparent.”

The astonished silence around her was embarrassingly profound. Only young Konrad appeared to watch her with something less than surprise on his grave face.

Wishing she had not promised to keep the priest’s tale secret, Sian saw no choice now but to soldier on. “I’ve come to know him somewhat better during these past few weeks. He is a far more educated man than anyone assumes, and clearly a forceful and effective organizer. It must have taken considerable political and logistical skill to lead a massive popular movement capable of bringing down Alizar’s whole economy, while managing to remain not only free of capture, but of any formal criminal charges.”

“All of which recommends him how?” Arian asked, not quite concealing her incredulity. “I cannot imagine any leading house supporting such a nomination.”

“They might not wish to,” Sian said, “but you can’t have forgotten that huge crowd assembled,
peaceably
, outside the Factorate. And neither will they. He has the unqualified support of Alizar’s people, my lady. Nearly all of them. I would be surprised to see any of the leading houses risk opposing such a massive bloc of popular opinion. Not overtly anyway. And no one could accuse you of political pandering. Allegations of allegiance between himself and
any
of the leading houses would be absurd.”