A part of me knew this had been coming. Lily’d talked about leaving Alskad since we were brats. Their parents were dead, and they’d no family left in Penby. What family they did have had immigrated to Ilor before they were born, hoping for a better life, more opportunities. It made sense that Lily had always seen their future on those hot, jungle islands.
“You can’t actually be considering it. Haven’t you heard the rumors? Just yesterday a news hawker was lighting up the square with a story about an estate burned to the ground by some kind of rebel group.”
Sawny laughed. “And last week I heard one of them say that Queen Runa had taken an amalgam lover. Come on, Vi. You know better than to believe everything you hear.”
“There’s no such thing as amalgams, you oaf.”
“You grew up with the stories, same as me.”
The amalgam were the stuff of childhood horror stories, meant to scare children into good behavior. Twins who’d become one in the womb, they were said to have magic that let them see the future and control the minds of other people. They were supposed to be more ferocious, more bloodthirsty than even the diminished, willing to do anything to gain power and influence. Legends said they thrived on fear and power, like most monsters. I’d never believed they were real. If they were, they would’ve ended up under the temple’s watchful eye, like every other threat.
Like me.
I made a face at him. “Stop trying to distract me. There’s got to be something for you here. Surely you don’t have to cross the whole damn ocean to find work.”
“It’s only a few years, Vi. We’ll work hard and save our pay, and when the contract’s over, we can start a new life. Maybe I’ll open a bakery. Hamil’s teeth, you could even come over with us.”
I rolled my eyes. “Don’t be an idiot. No captain would ever let a dimmy onto a ship planning to cross the Tethys, Hamil’s blessing or no.”
“You don’t know that.”
I tore a piece of bread off my chunk of the loaf and rolled it between my fingers, considering, before popping it into my mouth. The sticky butter clung to my fingers, and I licked each one, unwilling to waste even a ghost of sweetness and glad for a moment to think through what I’d say next.
“The only work you’ll get is on a kaffe farm.”
Sawny pushed a hank of black hair behind his ear and nodded. “We know.”
“It’s hard work. Backbreaking, and there’s no law there. None to speak of, at least. Nothing to protect you if something goes wrong.”
“Fair point,” Sawny said. “But since when did laws ever do any good to protect folks like you and me? The work’ll be hard, sure. Harder than anything we’ve had to do here.”
“Maybe not harder than enduring Anchorite Bethea’s worship seminars.”
Sawny’s laugh burst out of his chest, shattering the stillness of the night.
“No,” he said. “Not harder than those. But there’s no other option, Vi. And once we pay off our passage, we’ll earn a wage. Can you imagine?”
I could imagine. I’d spent hours thinking about the day I’d be free of the temple and earning my own living. Free to live what was left of my life happy, or as close to it as I could manage with the threat of inevitable, violent grief looming over me. For a moment, my mind slipped away from thoughts of that life and pondered the path our friend Curlin had chosen. She’d—Magritte’s teeth, it made me so mad!—gone and joined the Shriven. Broken every promise we’d ever made to each other and to Sawny.
That was the only other option for Sawny and Lily. It’d keep them safe and fed and earn them a kind of respect none of us could ever hope to gain on our own. We all knew it, but—unlike Curlin—we respected the promise we’d made each other, and we wouldn’t break it. Not even if it was the only sure way to keep us together. It wasn’t worth what we’d have to become.
I didn’t need to say it. I could tell Sawny was thinking the same thing.
“When’ll you leave?”
“Couple of days, I think.”
I reached out and smacked his arm, hard, without thinking. “A couple of days? How long have you been planning this?”
He scowled at me, but when he saw the tears streaking down my cheeks, he wrapped an arm around my shoulders and drew me close. “Vi...” His voice trailed off, and I knew there wasn’t anything he could say. Our friendship, no matter how important it was to both of us, was nothing compared to the bond between twins.
“You couldn’t’ve told me sooner?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.
“Lily only settled the details yesterday. I didn’t want to tell you until it was a sure thing.”
I shoved my anger and pain down, cinching it tight into a heavy ball of misery in the pit of my stomach. Anger was dangerous, and I wouldn’t let Sawny’s leaving be the thing that broke me. Not after all this time. “I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too, Obedience,” he said, teasing me with the given name he knew I hated.
I elbowed him in the ribs. “I take it back. I won’t miss you at all,” I said, laughter slipping into my voice.
But we both knew that wasn’t true.
* * *
Some days, there was no way to avoid the actual temple itself. On high holy days, the cusps of each season and the Suzerain’s Ascension Day, every person who ate at the temple’s table or was under their protection was expected to stop everything and haul themselves to adulations. Most folks in Penby made a show of attending adulations, even the Queen. Not many had so little to lose that they could afford to find themselves on the bad side of the Suzerain. Even folks like me, folks with nothing, weren’t stupid enough to risk it. Because I knew that even with nothing at all, I might still have something to lose.
On the day the Suzerain celebrated their twenty-third Ascension Day, I sidled into the haven hall just after the adulation started, but—thank all the gods—before the Suzerain made their entrance. Lily and Sawny were perched on the edge of a bench on the far side of the hall. As I navigated my way through the crowd toward them, Lily caught sight of me first. She shot me an evil look, but I grinned at her and winked. Even though she’d never have to think about most of these folks again, the girl still couldn’t stand to be seen with a dimmy.
“Scoot,” I whispered.
Sawny passed me a cantory, and Lily heaved a sigh as he nudged her over to make room for me. I settled onto the long, scarred wooden bench next to Sawny just as the gathering sang the final note of the Suzerain’s Chorale. The anchorites were at the front of the hall decked out in their finest, with pearls gleaming at their necks and wrists and their hair tied up in intricate braids, freshly shorn on the sides. Their silk robes, in shades of yellow and orange and red, whispered as they stood, and a hush fell over the crowd. Everyone’s eyes turned to the two initiates drawing open the thick metal doors at the back of the haven hall. The high holiday adulations followed the same damned formula every single time, but somehow, folks still acted like it was some kind of glamorous and captivating performance.
The Shriven initiates entered the hall first, their white robes and freshly shorn heads gleaming in the light of the sunlamps. Their staves smacked the stone floor in unison with every step as they filed to the front of the hall and spread out to flank either side, leaving gaps at each of the altars. Sawny elbowed me.
“See Curlin?”
I shook my head. “Don’t know how you could pick her out at this distance.”
“She’s the one with the black eye.” He pointed, squinting.