The Totem-Maker (part one hundred forty-four)

The Totem-Maker

Chapter Thirteen

The Citadel

(part one hundred forty-four)

“Your brother,” I said, “is named Ami?”

“When we are affirmed, we take the name of a patron god.”

“But Ami?”

“Any of many hundred.”

“You have not told me yours.”

“Neither have you told me yours.”

“Lotoq, then.”

“Lotoq, does this way seem good?”

The six remaining sisters walked in graceful silence, and at our back gathered. The warmth of my guide could not disguise the ceremony, again, in which I felt myself playing a prescribed role. But I thought also that these impressions might be, must be, challenged.

“I am not affirmed,” I said. “I revere Lotoq. I would not be called by his name.”

“Shall you be Nur-Elom?”

Somehow, I found I could not wish this either. The humor had gone flat. “Call me Totem-Maker. I have come to ply my trade.”

Descending the way chosen for me, I wriggled free of the hand on my arm, and mounted Cuerpha. This zhatabe, who had told me no name to call her, might mean to escort me on foot. Or the women might wave me on, myself and Castor.

What occurred was not precisely either. Cuerpha knew the pressure of my knees, and began a light trot. I did not leave them in anger, but wanted my movements rejecting of nonsense. True, I felt unsentimental about Castor’s matching my haste, or lagging so far behind as to be lost. The road would lead to the Citadel.

Bright sun crept on to bless the day, and a breeze of mountain coolness and fragrant meadow blew against my face, saddening me with nostalgia. I could not recall a time when I had idly wandered such meadows. My childhood terrain had been Lotoq’s ashes, and the hard things growing there.

Then lessons, and Elberin’s refusal to care, whether his tasks were fair for my age, whether his corrections hurt me. And the old woman and her chores; more of the household on my shoulders as newcomers arrived, and she gave her days to bartering with them.

So what did this scent of the Citadel’s land make me long for?

I laughed at this, finding myself alone on the road. How sad for my race, if this longing affliction were as the gods had made us, raised by their other gifts of sun and gentle air! Made to miss unhappy things; or things we had never had, and never would.

148

The Citadel

The Totem-Maker (part one)

(2018, Stephanie Foster)