This was Ratel’s.
Fragrant white blossoms and sharp white teeth. Maytera Marble meditated upon names. Flowers—or plants of some kind, at least—for bio girls; animals or animal products for bio boys. Metals or stones for us.
Both together:
Her old name had been—
Her old name had been …
A crash, as a chair fell. Maytera Marble rose stiffly, one hand gripping the windowsill. “Stop that this instant!”
She could bring up a list of her nonfunctioning and defective parts whenever she chose. She had not chosen to do so for close to a century; but from time to time, most often when the cenoby lay on the night side of the long sun, that list came up of itself.
“Aquifolia! Separate those two before I lose my temper.”
Maytera Marble could remember the short sun, a disk of orange fire; and it seemed to her that the chief virtue of that old sun had been that no list, no menu, ever appeared unbidden beneath its rays.
Both together:
“Well, neither of you are going to,” Maytera Marble told them.
Another knock, too loud for knuckles of bone and skin. She must hurry or Maytera Rose might go, might answer that knock herself, an occasion for complaint that would outlast the snow. If the snow ever arrived.
“I am going to go myself. Teasel, you’re in charge of the class until I return. Keep them at their work, every one of them.” To give her final words more weight, Maytera Marble paused as long as she dared. “I shall expect you to name those who misbehaved.”
A good step toward the door. There was an actuator in her right leg that occasionally jammed when it had been idle for an hour or so, but it appeared to be functioning almost acceptably. Another step, and another. Good, good! Praise to you, Great Pas.
She stopped just beyond the doorway, to listen for an immediate disturbance, then limped down the corridor to the door.
A beefy, prosperous-looking man nearly as tall as Patera Silk had been pounding the panels with the carved handle of his walking stick.
“May every god favor you this morning,” Maytera Marble said. “How may I serve you?”
“My name’s Blood,” he announced. “I’m looking at the property. I’ve already seen the garden and so on, but the other buildings are locked. I’d like you to take me through them, and show me this one.”
“I couldn’t possibly admit you to our cenoby,” Maytera Marble said firmly. “Nor could I permit you to enter the manse alone. I’ll be happy to show you through our manteion and this palaestra—provided that you have a valid reason for wishing to see them.”
Blood’s red face became redder still. “I’m checking the condition of the buildings. All of them need a lot of work, from what I’ve seen outside.”
Maytera Marble nodded. “That’s quite true, I’m afraid, although we do everything that we can. Patera Silk’s been repairing the roof of the manteion. That was most urgent. Is it true—”
Blood interrupted her. “The cenoby—is that the little house on Silver Street?”
She nodded.
“The manse is the one where Silver Street and Sun come together? The little three-cornered house at the west end of the garden?”
“That’s correct. Is it true, then, that this entire property is to be sold? That’s what some of the children have been saying.”
Blood eyed her quizzically. “Has Maytera Rose heard about it?”
“I suppose she’s heard the rumor, if that’s what you mean. I haven’t discussed it with her.”
Blood nodded, a minute inclination of his head that probably escaped his own notice. “I didn’t tell that towheaded butcher of yours. He looked like the sort to make trouble. But you tell Maytera Rose that the rumor’s true, you hear me? Tell her it’s been sold already, sib. Sold to me.”
We’ll be gone before the snow flies, Maytera Marble thought, hearing her future and all their futures in Blood’s tone. Gone before winter and living somewhere else, where Sun Street will be just a memory.
Blessed snow to cool her thighs; she pictured herself sitting at peace, with her lap full of new-fallen snow.
Blood added, “Tell her my name.”
THE SACRIFICE
As it was every day except Scylsday, “from noon until the sun can be no thinner,” the market was thronged. Here all the produce of Viron’s fields and gardens was displayed for sale or barter: yams, arrowroot, and hill-country potatoes; onions, scallions, and leeks; squashes yellow, orange, red, and white; sun-starved asparagus; beans black as night or spotted like hounds; dripping watercresses from the shrinking rivulets that fed Lake Limna; lettuces and succulent greens of a hundred sorts; and fiery peppers; wheat, millet, rice, and barley; maize yellower than its name, and white, blue, and red as well, spilling, leaking, and overflowing from baskets, bags, and earthenware pots—this though Patera Silk noted with dismay that prices were higher than he had ever seen them, and many of the stunted ears were missing grains.
