“Some of the abstractionists do, but they’re not part of the guilds, and no one buys their works.” No one respectable, anyway.
“I think we’ve discussed this . . . filthy . . . subject enough,” Mother interjected.
After a moment of silence, I turned to Father. “How is the wool business?”
“We’re doing well. You know Rousel is doing well with the branch factorage in Kherseilles. That makes it easier to ship the heavier woolens to the north of Jariola and to the Abierto Isles. He’s already increased our shipments by a third.”
That sounded like Rousel. He could talk anyone into anything-anyone but me, at least. “He’s doing well, then.”
“Enough that our profits are up by a quarter.”
“And he and Remaya are expecting,” Mother interjected, “in early Juyn, they think.”
“I’m happy for them,” I replied, “and it’s good that Rousel is doing so well.” For now, I thought, hoping that Rousel was not sprinting the edge of the precipice. I was spared having to say more because Nellica cleared away the dinner platters, and then returned to set the winter pudding and dessert plates before Mother.
The pudding was as good as she had promised, and I did take seconds, but then, so did Culthyn. After he finished his second helping, he stared at the remaining pudding.
“Seconds are acceptable at times, Culthyn,” Mother stated. “Thirds are merely greed. Don’t act like a Pharsi.”
Culthyn counterfeited a disconsolate expression, then said. “Remaya’s not greedy.”
Khethila hid a smile.
“She’s different,” Mother said, turning to me. “Did you know that Armynd D’Sholdchild has offered a proposal to Khethila? For when she’s older, of course.” She smiled broadly.
“Mother!” exclaimed Khethila.
“Armynd has?” We’d been at the grammaire together, but he’d gone on to the university. His father held thousands of hectares of grainlands and vineyards out in the westlands. “He’s even older than I am.”
“An older husband is always better. He’s more established. And you’re not getting any younger, Rhenn. It wouldn’t hurt for you to keep an eye out for a likely wife.”
“As an artist?” murmured Father.
“Wealthy women have been known to prefer artists, dear. Look at Madame D’Shendael. She’s a High Holder in her own right.”
“But she had to marry another to keep her rights,” Khethila interjected.
“Do I have to hear her name all the time?” asked Father.
“You asked.”
“Her husband is a landscape architect, not an artist, and he designs grand gardens.”
“He’s still an artist,” Mother affirmed, “and Rhenn is going to be a great artist.”
“He’d better hurry, then,” Father replied with a laugh, pushing back his chair.
As Father rose, Mother looked to me. “Will you go to services with us?” Her voice was not quite pleading.
Solayi night was when most families in L’Excelsis went to services, those who respected the Nameless, that is. I supposed I did, in my own way. I had nothing better to do, and Mother had never asked that much unreasonable of me, unlike Father. “Yes, but I’ll have to leave right afterward. Master Caliostrus . . .” I shrugged without completing the explanation.
“We understand.” Mother beamed.
Once everyone was bundled into their coats, we stepped out the side door where Charlsyn had pulled up, and I squeezed into the coach on the rear-facing seat with Khethila and Culthyn. At least, once the service was over, and it was never that long, I’d be much closer to Master Caliostrus’s dwelling.
“Isn’t this almost like old times? Now, if Rousel were just here,” Mother said.
“If Rousel were here, none of us would be able to move,” Culthyn observed.
Even Father smiled at Culthyn’s wry tone.
We arrived at the anomen early enough, a good quarter before the sixth glass, so that we didn’t have to hurry, but that also meant we had to stand in the cold until the service began with the small choir singing the choral invocation-“Paean to the Nameless,” I thought.
Chorister Aknotyn had been at the Anomen D’Este since I could remember. His high tenor pierced the gloom as it always had in the wordless ululating invocation. Then he spoke.
“We are gathered here together this evening in the spirit of the Nameless and in affirmation of the quest for goodness and mercy in all that we do.”
The opening hymn was “Pride Leadeth to a Fall.” I merely mouthed the words, mainly because I was in fact proud and unwilling to have others hear just how badly I did sing.
After that was the Confession.
“We do not name You, for naming is a presumption, and we would not presume upon the creator of all that was, is, and will be. We do not pray to You, nor ask favors or recognition from You, for requesting such asks You to favor us over others who are also Your creations. Rather we confess that we always risk the sins of pride and presumption and that the very names we bear symbolize those sins, for we too often strive to arrogate our names and ourselves above others, to insist that our petty plans and arid achievements have meaning beyond those whom we love or over whom we have influence and power. Let us never forget that we are less than nothing against Your nameless magnificence and that all that we are is a gift to be cherished and treasured, and that we must also respect and cherish the gifts of others, in celebration of You who cannot be named or known, only respected and worshipped.”
“In peace and harmony,” we all chorused.
Then came the offertory baskets, followed by Chorister Aknotyn’s ascension to the pulpit for the homily. “Good evening.”
“Good evening,” came the reply.
“And it is a good evening, for under the Nameless all evenings are good, even those that seem less than marvelous . . . and we all know that there are many of those . . .”
Aknotyn’s dry aside brought low murmurs of laughter to the congregation.
“The other day a youngster asked me why we do not name the Nameless, and I almost repeated the Confession to him, but I realized that he was asking what really was behind the Confession. While our meeting place, the anomen, means place of no name, in fact we name everything, and so often when we name it, we assume that we know it. The name becomes the identity, and it is always a limited identity. Look at it in this fashion. You have a friend. Let’s call him Fieryn, and we’ll say that he has red hair and a certain lack of patience. Each time that you encounter Fieryn or talk to him or watch him, you build a more complete picture in your mind, and when Fieryn is not around, in effect, to you, that picture is Fieryn. But is the picture really Fieryn? Does it include the time he spends with his crippled cousin, whom you do not know? Does it include the glasses he has spent telling stories to his failing aunt who cannot leave her bed? Or the time he drank too much and kicked a poor simpleton? Yet, by calling up his name, we think we know Fieryn. But do we?
“Using names to excess and thinking that the name is the individual is often called the mark of the Namer, because one of the great sins in life is to accept that a name is all that there is of reality . . .
“Now, if there is so much we do not know about those we call family or friends, how much more is there about the Nameless, who created all that there is, that we cannot know and will never know? . . .”
Chorister Aknotyn went on to describe the magnificence of the Nameless and the unmitigated presumption of mere mortals to offer a name and think that they might know even a fraction of what the Nameless might know or understand. I’d heard similar homilies before, and I couldn’t say that I disagreed. The only thing I might have added, if only in my mind, was the question of whether the Nameless, with all that magnificence, would even have cared what I thought or did.
While the walk from the Anomen D’Este to Brayer Lane and Master Caliostrus’s establishment, even by the winding Bakers’ Lane, was only half the distance I’d walked to get to Father’s, I didn’t even have to do that. Mother had Charlsyn go that way-and she slipped me two silvers as well, when Father wasn’t looking, just before I got out of the coach. So I wasn’t all that chilled by the time I reached my room.
