“You’ve excelled in your studies. What may seem minor can be very great. Solace can be found in a simple cup of tea.” Compassionata gestured toward the Temple priest, still silent. “It’s said when the Allcreator found his bride in the forest, what won him was not her face or body, but the comfort she gave his weary body with a simple cup of tea.”
Prudence made a low noise in her throat. “Listen to Annalise. She says she’s not ready, she’s ever been uncertain of her ability to serve. I say she’s not uncertain at all. She knows it’s not in her nature to serve. She might’ve done well enough with mixing herbs and embroidering cuffs, but put a cleaning rag in her fist and see how straight the line of her spine. And of service on her back, well, we all know if skill in that arena was all it took, there’d be no need for the Order at all. Any brothel would suffice, instead.”
“Are you calling me a whore?” Annalise looked Prudence square in the face.
Prudence looked slightly taken aback, as though surprised Annalise had dared respond. “No. I’m saying that just because you’ve managed to acquire a goodly number of bedroom skills, you’re no more prepared to take your vows than someone who just walked in from the yard.”
“Someone who walked in from the yard might be entirely ready to serve without even a minute’s training,” Annalise said. “Some are born to it, isn’t that so?”
“And some,” Prudence said, “are not.”
Deliberata had watched this exchange in silence, but now she tutted. “Prudence speaks on your behalf, though it would seem she opposes you. You call yourself unable to serve, and she agrees.”
Annalise frowned. “So I should go against her out of spite?”
“No.” Deliberata shook her head while Prudence shifted, sighing. “You should make this choice from within your heart. Not because you’ve nothing to which to return . . . or nothing for which to stay.”
Annalise’s throat closed and she couldn’t speak no matter how hard she swallowed. The Mothers-in-Service knew of her shame, and she couldn’t be surprised. She pressed her fingertips to her eyelids, willing back the tears not because she was too ashamed to weep in front of them, but because she feared once begun they would not cease.
“Only days ago your faith was strong. Your decision made. You were as ready as any novitiate I’ve ever known, Annalise. You’d found your purpose and had taken pleasure in it. Is this not so?” Deliberata asked.
“The fact that much has changed in those few days should be reason enough for me to doubt, should it not?”
Compassionata shook her head. “Oh no, my dear. Any Handmaiden who never wonders if she’s chosen the right path is too full of arrogance to be able to truly serve. The fact that you’ve doubted is a sign to me, above all else, you’re ready.”
“Should I not know this, someplace in my heart? Someplace deep inside me?” She asked them all. “I thought you might tell me when it was time, not ask. I thought . . . many things. Most of which were wrong. And now I’m uncertain of the path I should choose.”
“Most paths are uncertain. I say it’s those that lead to uncertain destinations that teach us the most,” Deliberata said.
“I’m not sure I can bring anyone to solace.” There. She’d said it. “I believe myself an utter failure at such a task.”
Deliberata shook her head gently. “A flower is made more beautiful by its thorns. Your doubt is your thorn, Annalise.”
“Selfish is the heart that thinks first of itself,” Annalise replied. “I have ever been selfish, Mothers. I have ever thought first of myself.”
“Not in everything,” Deliberata said, but went no further than that. Instead she clapped her hands together softly and leaned forward in her chair. “Let me ask you this. If you were granted a lifetime to serve and bring solace to a hundred patrons but knew even those hundred arrows would not be enough to finally fill the Holy Quiver, or if you were granted one patron who needed that lifetime of service before reaching solace, yet his was the arrow that filled the Quiver and brought about the return of the Holy Family, which would you choose?”
“A hundred brought to solace, or only one but his would bring back the Return?” Annalise shook her head, thinking. “Mother, I can’t decide that. To be the one responsible for bringing back the Invisible Mother—”
“And the Allcreator, and the First Son,” put in Prudence.
Annalise gave her a steady glare. “To be the one responsible for that would be the greatest honor I could ever imagine.”
She meant it. Knew her sincerity from deep within her soul. Doubts had batted at her like buzzing flies, mindless and annoying and unswattable . . . but now some of them, at least, began to fall away.
“But to serve a hundred patrons,” she continued, thoughts like silken festival banners unfurling in her mind, “to know I’d been able to help a hundred people . . . that too, would be an honor.”
She looked at the three Mothers-in-Service and at the priest, too. “I cannot decide. I’m sorry. More proof I’m not fit for the vows.”
Deliberata stood and held out her hands. “On the contrary, my dear, you’ve answered with perfection. Mine was a question without an answer.”
Confused, Annalise took the offered hands. Deliberata’s fingers were warm and soft, and she squeezed to pull Annalise a little closer. “You are ready to take your vows, child, even if you don’t feel it. And it’s my pleasure to grant your new name and welcome you as my own dear Sister, Certainty.”
The new name settled on Annalise’s shoulders, the finest and warmest of cloaks, yet she couldn’t wrap herself within it. Not yet. “I fear you’ve confused me, Mother. Certainty?”
“Oh, yes. For you’ve ever been certain of yourself, no matter your course.”
“Respecta would have been an unsuitable choice,” Prudence said with a grudging smile. “But Certainty I will also own suits you.”
Compassionata laughed. “Welcome, Sister!”
The priest, at last, stood. He reached inside the draping scarf of his tunic and withdrew a small pot he uncorked and dipped a thumb inside. “Come closer, Sister Certainty, and be anointed, that you might begin your new life within the Order of Solace.”
Annalise—Certainty as she was now named, and would she ever grow used to being so called?—let go of Deliberata’s hands and moved toward him. He smudged some oil on her forehead. He smiled at her.
“Certainty, do you so vow to spend your days in the service of the Order of Solace, beneath the gaze of the Invisible Mother?”
“I do.”
“Welcome,” said the priest and kissed both her cheeks.
“That’s it?” Annalise touched her face where the warmth of his lips had pressed. “Naught more than that?”
“Naught more,” Deliberata promised.
Giddiness swept her, and Annalise felt for the back of a chair to keep her knees from buckling. “I thought there would be more.”
“There’s naught magic about it, I’m afraid.” Deliberata laughed. “Though I think you’ll find yourself much changed.”
“Indeed.” Prudence shook the folds of her skirt as she stood. “But first, I suggest a meal. I’m fair famished. Come, Certainty. Join us.”
As simply as that, it was done. No longer Annalise Marony but Certainty, Handmaiden in the Order of Solace, as yet unassigned to her first patron but no longer uncertain she would ever be ready.
It should’ve been a shining moment and was tarnished by but one thing—she had no Cassian to share it with.
Chapter 24
You know we would miss you greatly, Cassian.” Deliberata poured him not a mug of tea but a glass of cordial, bright as cherries. “You’ve been an asset to the Order, and I fear we’ll not find a worthy replacement.”
Cassian swirled the ruby liquid in his glass and sipped, expecting sourness. Unexpected sweetness didn’t tempt him to drink. He’d have preferred the bitter. “You know as well as I there are Temple priests aplenty who can provide the same service.?
??
“Perhaps, but not for so long or consistently. Your friend Roget has ever been good to us here as well, yet to imagine him as a teacher of basic instruction is laughable.”
Cassian didn’t laugh. “There are many teachers you could find.”
She sighed and nodded, then steepled her fingers together on the desktop. “You’re certain you must go?”
He nodded after a moment, then met her gaze. “Yes. I must. I can no longer in good conscience continue teaching what I don’t believe. What I haven’t believed for a goodly long time.”
“I understand. Though I daresay you’ve done a fine enough job of it. None of the novitiates you’ve trained have had any trouble with their teaching.”
“They deserve a teacher who believes what he’s asking them to believe.”
Deliberata smiled. “Of course. So. You shall collect your wages and go. As simply as that?”
He hesitated, knowing the other woman too well to believe she would make it that easy. “Such is my intent, yes.”
“And the boy?”
“What about the boy?”
Deliberata tilted her head to look him over. “When you came here to serve, it was with the understanding it was because you wanted to watch over him. You claimed at the time it was your duty. Your Calling, if you will. Perhaps you don’t recall saying so?”
He remembered all too well. “I haven’t forgotten the boy. He has a home here. He will have a life with what the Order provides.”
“What? An education? Food and clothes, shelter?”
“Love,” Cassian added, seeing where she meant to go with this. “You cannot deny he’s also been much loved.”
“By many, yes. And also by you. But that love has come with the weight of guilt, has it not?”
“He wasn’t mine, was never meant to be mine. And yet . . . he might’ve been,” Cassian said, “if only I’d been able to forgive his father.”
Deliberata smiled, and it was easy to see how she’d brought solace to so many. “It’s not too late. Not yet, anyway. Not for forgiveness and not for you and the boy.”
“His mother has come to claim him.”
“I know. She’s petitioned the Mothers-in-Service to take him away. It has thus far not been our pleasure to approve her request. It is not my pleasure to ever do so.”
“But others might agree?”
“Others might always agree to what I do not,” Deliberata said. “Give me a reason to approve another path for the boy.”
“You suggest I . . . ?”
“Cassian, Cassian, Cassian. You have been as much a father to him as he’s ever known. Kellen is nearly ten years old, in the shortest of years to become a man. We can offer him much here in the Order, it’s true, and we do for all our Blessings. But you know he was not meant for that life.”
“I can scarcely provide him better.”
“You can provide him with a choice, which shall necessarily be enough. Ask the boy if he’d like to go with you. If he says no, we shall know the Invisible Mother has claimed him.”
“If he says yes?”
Deliberata laughed. “Then I believe, even if you don’t, that She still has Her hand upon you both.”
Cassian nodded stiffly, then drained his glass. He stood. “And his mother?”
“She will abide by the Order’s rule or she won’t.” Deliberata shrugged. “She’s found a good life, a pleasure and a purpose. No matter your past with her, she’s gone on to make a life. You might’ve done the same, Cassian. Now’s your chance, and too long in the making.”
He nodded stiffly. Deliberata sighed. She poured herself another glass of cordial and sipped it, eyeing him.
“And of the woman?”
He could scarcely bring himself to say her name. “I’ve wronged her. Tell me what penance to provide and I’ll do my best to make it.”
“I suppose the most obvious solution has escaped you.”
It had not, but as much as he couldn’t bear to speak her name, so he couldn’t stand to speak aloud what he knew Deliberata meant. She smiled, shaking her head. She settled back in her chair.
“As a priest you were required to speak for those who couldn’t speak for themselves, yes?”
“Yes.”
“So. Though it’s not often our case here, sometimes we in the Order do so as well. Come here, child, and let me bless you so that you might move on your way.”
Cassian went to her, kneeling to allow her to place both hands upon his head. He closed his eyes, thinking of his mother, long passed. She’d blessed him and his brother just this way.
“May the Invisible Mother bless you and keep you, all the days of your waking.” Deliberata tapped his head. “Rise you up and get you gone, Cassian Toquin. And may She keep you in the palm of Her hand. Go, now.”
Annalise had thought there’d be much changed after taking her vows. She waited to feel different. Like a Handmaiden. “Women we begin and women we shall end,” she said aloud to her reflection.
She understood it better now.
Still uncertain if the purpose she’d come to accept would indeed become her pleasure, Annalise busied herself with minor studies. She spent long hours in meditation. She took over the teaching of Cassian’s class.
A fortnight passed before she was called to Deliberata’s office and given, without the fanfare she’d expected, a small sheaf of papers tied with red ribbon and a hand-trunk in which to pack her few belongings. She held the papers and the trunk and waited for her heart to thump with anticipation and anxiety, but all she felt was an overwhelming sense of relief. She packed swiftly and was within the carriage within the span of a few chimes.
She thought she’d have to ride for hours, would have time to thoroughly read and study the information she’d been given. Instead the carriage took her through the nearest town and down a long country lane. It stopped in front of a modest but comfortable-looking stone house surrounded by a tidy yard with gardens behind and forest all around.
“You’ll be fine, miss,” said Steven, the driver, with a tip of his cap. “Good mazel to you.”
Annalise had ridden in the carriage, but Certainty went to the front gate. She opened it. Stepped through. The gravel crunched beneath her toes as she walked, and it seemed quite important she recall every sound, each scent, every sight before her for this first time.
They’d all blend together after a while, she thought as she stood in front of the red-painted door. But this first one, she would have to cherish forever.
She knocked.
He answered.
“If you were given the choice of serving a hundred patrons, providing each with absolute solace yet knowing the Holy Quiver would remain unfilled, or you could have but one patron to serve for the rest of your life but know his would be the final Arrow . . . which would you choose?” Cassian’s voice hadn’t changed, but he had. No longer clad in the high-necked jacket, he wore a loose-fitting white shirt, a dusting of flour on one cheek and his hair in disarray. From inside the house, Certainty heard the laughter of a child. The boy.
“My answer, sir, is that I would be first grateful to have been given a choice at all.”
He drew in a slow breath, his smile hesitant and endearing. “And the second answer?
“I would choose the single patron,” she said, stepping up to him. “So long as it was you.”
He put his arms around her, and he kissed her. She needed no tinkling bells or flutter of wings to feel in his kiss what his words next shared. “I love you, Annalise.”
She didn’t correct him. There’d be time much later for the rest of all this—the small acts and gestures that would soothe him and bring him solace. Or not. Somehow, the idea of her task taking the rest of her life was not daunting, but delicious.
“I like you when you love me, Cassian.”
He kissed her again, kicking the half-open door all the way open and sweeping her into his arms so that he might carry her into the house. “Then you shall be well-pl
eased with me for a long time, for I don’t intend to stop.”
She wound her arms around his neck, holding tight. “I have a question for you, first, before you take me inside.”
He paused to look into her eyes. “Anything.”
“What would you have done had I not been the one assigned to you?”
Cassion smiled. “I didn’t send for a Handmaiden, love.”
This answer surprised her. “But you . . . the question you asked when you opened the door . . .”
“Sometimes,” Cassian said, “just as the priests speak for those unable to speak for themselves, the Invisible Mother answers the prayers of those unable to pray.”
“Sometimes, it would seem the Mothers-in-Service do the same,” she said wryly.
“Much to my joy.”
She looked at him seriously. “Is it your intent to allow me to try and make you happy?”
He kissed her. “Aye, and yes. It is.”
“And what of solace, Cassian? Is it your intent I should try to grant you that, as well?”
Another kiss, softer this time. “Yes.”
“Even if it takes a lifetime?”
“In truth, sweetheart,” he said as he took her through the door and closed it behind them with a thud, “I intend for it to take just that long.”
Which was all she could really ask, and everything she could give.
Megan Hart, Selfish Is the Heart
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