building. Glancing over her shoulder at the last soft light from the setting sun behind her, Fasilla hesitated, chills creeping across the back of her neck. «If this werena' for me Yafatah, I wouldna' do this thing,» she grumbled, and walked into the Mayanabi stronghold. Fasilla was met inside by a tall man with a beard and quiet brown eyes named Himayat. He was about forty-five, his temples graying. He wore a pair of brown glasses perched on his large nose. He smiled at Fasilla and welcomed her in her native tongue. From his physical appearance, she judged Himayat to be Asilliwir-born like herself. Relieved, Pasilla said, «Well, I do be pleased to meet you, Mr. Himayat. I was fierce scared that—well, never you mind Tis me own fears.» Himayat chuckled, his brown eyes forgiving. «Be of good cheer. You're among Friends,» added the Mayanabi, putting ever so slight an emphasis on «Friends.» Fasilla took a deep breath. «Well, that be good news.» She smiled raggedly. «I be looking for the Jinnjirri named Aunt. Do you know where I may find her?» Himayat's face sobered. He reached for Fasilla's hands. She gave them to him without knowing why she did so. Himayat's eyes grew wet with tears. «I am sorry.» He paused. «Aunt died early this afternoon.»
Fasilla's face paled. «Died?» she said in a disbelieving voice. Tears sprang to her own eyes now and slipped down her cheeks. «Aunt is dead?» Sobs
rose from deep inside her. Aunt had been Fasilla's closest and oldest friend. They had shared everything together. Fasilla's knees gave way and she slumped to the floor. Himayat put his arms around her and held her as she wept. After a few minutes, Fasilla coughed back her tears and said, «I came because Aunt told me something in me mind. Something important. It
must've been just before she died,» added Fasilla, her voice trailing off into a numb silence. Her mind felt empty with shock. «We will speak of it, Fasilla. But perhaps not right now? Maybe you would
join us for a bite of supper. You may bathe first if you so desire. Our house is yours,» he added, opening his arms to include the entirety of the Inn of the Guest. «But why?» asked Fasilla, her expression bewildered. «I doon't even know you.» «You are Aunt's friend. That makes you our Friend.» Fasilla swallowed. Hospitality as generous as this wasn't known to Fasilla outside her own Asilliwir clan. She closed her eyes, feeling suddenly overwhelmed. Without introduction, she asked Himayat how Aunt had died. Himayat replied calmly, «Aunt was stung by a holovespa wasp. She had a lethal reaction to it. It happens sometimes. Even with people who have no previous history of allergies.» Fasilla pressed her lips together. Not to Aunt, she thought stubbornly. Fasilla didn't know how she knew, but she was absolutely certain that Aunt had not died from a toxic reaction to a wasp. Something in the urgency of Aunt's last message made Fasilla feel suspicious—and angry. But why? she asked herself. I have noo reason to think this Himayat a liar. Then she thought, Maybe he didna' know Aunt as well as me. Fasilla nodded quietly to herself. Taking a deep breath, she got to her feet and asked where she could bathe. She would talk to these Mayanabi. She would find out everything they knew and didn't know about Aunt's death. Then maybe she would know why Aunt thought Yafatah was in danger. As it turned out, dinner was a preparation for Aunt's burial ceremony—Mayanabi style. The meal was celebrated in the same spirit as a wedding feast. Those cooking for it referred to the Presence as the Beloved and to Aunt as the lover who was now returning to the Beloved's house. This was a strange concept to Fasilla, but she held her tongue as she helped decorate cakes and other pastries. As evening wore on, out-of-town Mayanabi began to arrive in Window by the droves. It seemed that Aunt had been very well known and well loved by several generations of Mayanabi. Incredible, thought Fasilla, when one remembered Aunt was thirty-six years old at the time of her death. Special Dunnsung-born musicians gathered in the cozy eating hall of the Inn of the Guest. As they set up their lotaris and drums, Fasilla overheard the following conversation. «I came by way of the Feyborne, how about you?» «I'm wintering in Dunnsung. So I rode in from the south. Weather's chill on the peninsula. More chill than I've ever remembered it, Shruddi. Here, let me help you with that case.» «Thanks,» said the first musician, pulling out a ceramic drum with a floral design stained on the leather drumhead. «It was so weird,» she added. «What was?» «What I saw—I mean, what I didn't see on the cliffs.» «You're not making any sense. Start over.» «You know the flower the winterbloom?» «Sure. They bloom in the dead of winter.» He grinned. «When no flower in its right mind would do so.» «That's right. That's their magic. Their message. Winterbloom flower when nothing else can. And this is their season. Winter.» Shruddi paused, her voice slightly tense. «There wasn't a single winterbloom to be seen in the Feyborne.» The lotari player shrugged. «There's been an awful lot of snow, Shruddi. Maybe the blooms were buried.» She nodded. «That's what I thought. So I got off my horse and dug into the snow. I found the winterbloom. They were dead.» The lotari player, who was also a Mayanabi Nomad, stiffened. «Dead?» He whistled low under his breath. «What kind of sign is that?»
«I don't know,» said Shruddi anxiously. «But I think we better have a council and discuss it. Nature doesn't act like this. Even during a Jinnaeon, it doesn't act like this. I'm worried.» Fasilla stopped arranging the dried winter flowers on the table in front of her. She straightened. Now she was more than certain Aunt's death wasn't an accident. She could feel it in her draw and in the uneasy voices of the musicians. A few minutes later, Himayat called all the Mayanabi together. He indicated
that Fasilla could sit in their circle. The food rested on tables behind the
circle near a roaring fire. Fasilla sat in a kneeling position next to Himayat. Himayat took her left hand and the Dunnsung musician named Shruddi took her right. They closed their eyes. Fasilla kept hers open, feeling sad and out of place in this strange group. The Mayanabi began an invocation: «O Thou, Beloved Guest, Be Thou welcome in our midst. Enter every wounded heart, Lighten every earthly burden, For ours is not a caravan of sorrow But an abode of joy Where all meet at one table And give Thee thanks.» When the invocation was finished, the Mayanabi Nomads sat in silence for a few moments, their bodies still, their breathing regular. Fasilla felt a deep sense of peace emanating from all those seated around her. Fresh tears sprang to her eyes. This was the same peace she had always felt around Aunt. She shut her eyes tightly, trying to keep back the pain of her
loss in Aunt as a friend. Since the others held her hands, Fasilla could not wipe her face. Her tears streamed freely down her cheeks. Himayat opened his eyes. Seeing Fasilla's distress, he motioned for one of the Mayanabi near Fasilla to hand her a handkerchief. Feeling someone touch her arm, Fasilla opened her eyes, her expression startled. Seeing the handkerchief, she took it gratefully and blew her nose. As she did so, several Mayanabi left the room. Fasilla noted that all of them were wearing white. When this group of six returned, they carried Aunt's body with them. Fasilla stiffened. She had not expected to see such disfiguration in Aunt's face from the swelling caused by the wasp venom. Fasilla blinked, mildly horrified. At that moment, Himayat leaned toward her and asked, «Would you like to take part in this?» He offered a slip of
white paper with words written on it. Fasilla accepted the paper weakly, her face pale. «I'll tell you when to speak,» he whispered. Fasilla nodded, feeling too shocked by the day's events to say anything. Himayat got to his feet slowly. He was dressed in a long robe of black. He wore a red belt around his middle. It ended in tassels and tiny bells that tinkled gently like lilting wind chimes as he moved. Bowing to his own people and to Fasilla, Himayat began the burial service saying: «Mourn not o'er the death of the beloved, call not back the traveler who is on her journey toward her goal; for ye know not what she seeketh! Ye are on the earth, but now she is in heaven. «By weeping for the dead, ye will make sad the soul who cannot return to earth; by wishing to communicate with her, ye do but distress her. She is happy in the place at which she has arrived; by wanting to go to her ye do
not help her; your life's purpose still keepeth you on earth. No creature that hath ever been born belonged in reality to any other; every soul is the beloved of the Presence. Doth the Presence not love as we two-leggeds cannot? Death, therefore, doth unite man and woman with the Presence.
For to whom doth the soul in truth belong, to the Presence in the end is its return, sooner or later. «Verily, death is a veil behind which is hidden life that is beyond comprehension of the man or woman on earth. If ye knew the freedom of that world and how the sad hearts are unburdened of their load; if ye knew how the sick are cured, how the wounded are healed, and what freedom the
soul experiences as it goes further from this earthly life of limitations, ye would no more mourn those who have passed, but pray for their happiness in their further journey and for the peace of their souls.» After Himayat finished speaking, a man of Piedmerri draw handed him a golden censer. Himayat lit the cones of woody incense inside. As the pungent smoke spilled into the eating hall, Himayat circled the body of Aunt, going from left to right. He did not swing the censer but carried it motionless in his cupped hands. The smoke followed his movements, swirling into filmy ribbons of gray behind him. Himayat handed the censer back to the Piedmerri. Then he knelt beside Aunt's shrouded form and said his people's Prayer for the Dead: «O Thou, the Cause and Effect of the whole Universe, the Source whence we have come and the Goal toward which all are bound. Receive this soul who is coming to Thee into Thy parental arms. May Thy forgiving glance heal her
heart. Lift her from the denseness of the earth, surround her with the light of Thine own Spirit. Raise her up to Heaven, which is her true dwelling place. We pray Thee, grant her the blessing of Thy most exalted Presence.
