Paladin of Souls - Lois McMaster Bujold [175]
Foix, startled, said, “Royina, Lord Arhys would not desire this!”
“Quite,” said Ista coolly. “No one else here will offer you this choice, Cattilara.”
“You cannot do this behind his back!” said Foix.
“I am the appointed executor of this rite. This is women’s business now, Foix. Be silent. Cattilara”—Ista drew breath—“widow you are and shall be, but the grief you will carry into the rest of your life will be different depending on the choices you make tonight.”
“How better?” snarled Cattilara. Tears were leaking from her eyes now. “Without Arhys, all is ashes.”
“I didn’t say better. I said, different. You may accept the part apportioned to you, or you may lie down and be passed over. If you do not take your part, and he fails, you will never, ever know whether you might have made the difference. If you accept the part, and he still falls—then you will know that, too.
“Arhys would have protected you from this choice, as a father would a beloved child. Arhys is wrong in this. I give you a woman’s choice, here, at the last gasp. He looks to spare you pain this night. I look to your nights for the next twenty years. There is neither right nor wrong in this, precisely. But the time to amend all choices runs out like Porifors’s water.”
“You think he will die in this fight,” grated Cattilara.
“He’s been dead for three months. I did not war against his death, but against his damnation. I have lost. In my lifetime, I have looked two gods in the eye, and it has seared me, till I am afraid of almost nothing in the world of matter. But I am afraid of this, for him. He stands this night on the edge of the true death, the death that lasts forever, and there is none to pull him back from that precipice. Not even the gods can save him if he falls now.”
“Your choice is no choice. It’s death all ways.”
“No: death in different ways. You had more of him than any woman alive. Now the wheel turns. Be assured, someday it will turn for you. All are equal in this. He goes first, but not uniquely. Nor alone, for he will have a large Jokonan escort, I do think.”
“He will if I have anything to do with it,” growled Foix.
“Yes. Do you imagine not one of them is also beloved, as Arhys is? You have a chance to let Arhys go out in serenity, with his mind clear and unimpeded, concentrated as the sword which is his symbol. I will not give you leave to send him off harassed and dismayed, distracted and grieved.”
Cattilara snarled, “Why should I give him up to death—or to the gods, or to you, or to anyone? He’s mine. All my life is his.”
“Then you shall be hollow and echoing indeed, when he is gone.”
“This disaster is not my doing! If people had just done things my way, this all could have been averted. Everyone is against me—”
The food on the tray was all gone. Sighing, Ista touched her ligature, and opened the channel wide once more. Cattilara sank back, cursing. The flow of soul-fire from Catti’s heart was slow and surly, but it would suffice for the next few hours.
“I would have liked to give her a chance to say good-bye,” said Ista sadly. “Lord Illvin’s remarks on kisses withheld and words unspoken weigh much on my mind.”
Foix, his face appalled, said, “Her remarks were better left unspoken to Lord Arhys just now, I think.”
“So I judged. Five gods, why was I appointed to this court? Go, Foix, get what rest you may. It is your most urgent duty now.”
“Aye, Royina.” He glanced at Liss. “Will you come down to see us off? Later on?”
“Yes,” whispered Liss.
Foix started to speak, seemed to find his throat strangely uncooperative, nodded thanks, and bowed his way out.
ISTA, TOO, EVENTUALLY WENT TO LIE DOWN IN HER CHAMBERS FOR A few hours. She