Page 79 of Grave Flowers
“Bold words to speak to a Fely princess who is poised to be your queen,” I said. But even though I defended my heritage, my words rang empty. I knew nothing of that side. Inessa and I had never once been to the shoreline where Mother’s family dwelled.There’s no need,she would always quickly say if ever I asked. She strove to hide her accent, even though it was inlaid in her words, like thin veins of gold embedded in our stony, harsh Radixan dialect. Sometimes I would stare at her, marveling at the fact she had an entire family outside of us, one we’d never known. Any questions were met with deflection, and I suspected her lineage embarrassed her. Yet she couldn’t suppress it. It flowed from a hidden well inside her. It had been embodied in turns of phrase, her penchant for layers of jewelry, her secret commitment to the Fely understanding of the faith, and her face itself, which was a portrait of her people, no paint or canvas needed. I wished to know more and drink from this water myself, but I never could.
“Perhaps. Boldness is needed when protecting important things,” the monasticte returned fervently. “Which makes me wonder why you’ve come here with such an object.”
“It’s merely an old heirloom, one about which I seek more history. Mayhap you should restrain your judgment, especially as a man of the faith,” I said, torn between hiding my quest and defending my mother and our grave flowers. “You may go.”
The monasticte departed, his expression of disapproval giving way to one of disappointment as he realized it was too late to pursue Aeric’s admittance. I returned the plaque to my pocket. How might I find this Alifair? I thought about the address on the note.
7 Veris Row.
“Excuse me!” I called out to a passing neophyte, whose light-red robes indicated his status. “What is For the Father’s address?”
“Correspondences are simply addressed For the Father in Acus,” he replied. “The monasterium spans several streets, so there’s no number associated with it, and since it’s the largest and most famous one, no other monasteriums have the same name.”
“Oh.” I frowned. If there was no number, why had Inessa noted down a seven? “By chance, are there sections with numbers? Or perhaps chambers?”
“Only the holy isolation cells,” the neophyte replied. “They are numbered from one to thirty and are toward the southeast corner. I fear I might feel the call to holy isolation if I pass by them, so I avoid the area at all costs. I’m willing to do anything for the Father, but I’m too talkative for such a pursuit.”
His eyes widened, as though considering whether the topic rising in conversation might be the pull of the Father on his heart to holy isolation. I hid an amused smile and dismissed him.
I walked toward the southeast. Halls spread out like tree branches stemming from one central nave. In one hall, I caught glimpses of academia monastictes scribing on huge manuscripts with quills dipped in liquid gold, and in another, I found choir monastictes chanting melodically. As I made my way toward the back, the doors became cruder and the passageways simpler. The monasterium shed its finery like a woman removing her jewelry. Eerie sounds reverberated through the wood, rock, and clay walls—flapping reminiscent of trapped birds, invocations that began as whispers but mounted into screams, and the crisp severing retort of tearing fabric.Father, Mother, Son,andDaughterwere carved into the walls, over and over. The farther I went, the more convoluted the carvings became, the words running into each other:faughter, motherson, faother, saughter.
Eventually, I came to a large round room with a series of arched iron doors. Hands cast from the same iron surrounded each door. Some of thehands were closed in tight fists, while others spread open like pronged stars. A few were limp. Grates were at the bottom of the doors. I’d reached the holy isolation cells. Monastictes engaged in the vocation lived here, receiving their essentials through the grates. From what I knew about the practice, they were allowed to speak to others only once a week through the grate and spent all their time inside their cells. Radix had such accommodation at our monasteriums, but they were empty.
“Who would’ve thought holy isolation was so popular?” I murmured at the sight of so many doors, finding reassurance in hearing my own voice. I hadn’t traveled far, but this part of the monasterium was so different from anything I’d experienced that I felt like I’d gone miles upon miles. Squinting, I stepped closer to the nearest door. On the palm of an open iron hand was the number one.
Then I smelled it.
A floral scent so intense, most would sneeze.
But not a Radixan.
I hurried to the source, guided by the scent even over the numbers. The smell led me to the seventh door, marked with 7. Grave flowers grew inside. I knocked on the cell, but the minute my knuckles connected with the iron, the door creaked open a fraction of an inch. It wasn’t locked. It made sense. Monastictes in holy isolation weren’t prisoners. They could leave anytime they wished, should they decide to break their vows.
“Hello?” I called. There was no response. I pushed the door. It screeched. I had to use both hands. It had probably been years since anyone crossed over the threshold—in fact, the last person to do so might’ve been whichever monasticte resided within, when he’d entered his holy isolation. I opened the door enough to slip inside.
I found myself in a kitchen repurposed for gardening. The smell of musty gardening tools, sulphury salt water, and grave flowers filled my nose.
It smelled of home.
Eagerly, I looked around, trying to take in everything at once. Pots, stacked in perilously tall towers, listed on the counters. Soil in huge canvas sacks bulged in the fireplace and the bread oven. The spit in the oven had gardening tools hanging from it in place of a cauldron. Colorful pottery and porcelain vases filled every open spot. Small green shoots grew in some, and seeds soaked in others. Sketches and notes on different flowers were pinned to the walls, the windowsills, the inside and outside of cabinet doors, the fireplace. Vines crawled in through the windows and over a small altar set up in the corner. They curled around paintings, like the ones I’d seen on Mother’s table. They lifted the paintings, so they were suspended, clutched by the vines.
“Get out!” A raspy voice startled me.
I turned. A man stepped into the kitchen from outside. He wore a simple stained robe completely unlike the heavily embroidered ones of the other monastictes and had a long beard. Several gold and silver necklaces hung around his neck, making me think of Mother. But that was the least of their similarities. A gasp escaped my lips. Above the beard, his eyes and nose were a masculine and older version of hers, so much so that I thought I’d walked into a memory.
He lifted a knife. For a man of the Family, he was surprisingly comfortable brandishing it. He headed toward me, purpose in his steps, his face set.
“Stop!” I cried. “I’m Princess Madalina Sinet, and you—you look like my mother, Queen Agathine.”
At that, the monasticte halted. The knife lowered. His lips moved as he tried to speak, but no words came out. He coughed, cleared his throat. Hoarsely, he said, “Princess Madalina … you’re here? After all our letters, we finally meet.”
x
I, Leander Tachibana, write this account. I’m sitting close to home. I can hear the familiar crash of waves on rock and, when I close my eyes, the songs of our women as they poison the lines with grave flower nectar for fishing. Maybe that part is only in my head, because the song becomes one voice—Florin, my sister. Twins are common for Felys. But while Florin and I are not twins, we sometimes pretend to be because we are so close. We were born only nine months apart, as though the Mother realized too late that we should’ve been twins.
But I must set aside longings and capture in ink what’s transpired. King Llyr has held me captive to learn what I know about grave flowers. After all, Felys have our own ways with them, ways we’ve protected. He’s a dangerous man. One full of bombastic rage only superseded by his constant preening. I imagine there’s a dialogue always running through his mind, saying, “Llyr, you are handsome today. You are the smartest and strongest king alive. You are adored and admired by all.”
Everyone is seen in relation to him, as though we are leaves from his central stem. It’s “my wife” or “my Fely prisoner” or “my son” or “my guards”—I would wager, in his mind, that we cease to exist once we are out of his sight, that he is oblivious to us having our own lives, loves, losses. Queen Nerisa, rest her, was a smart woman, and she moved my heart. I should’ve never let her unburden herself to me because it was too dangerous, but I wondered if I might use her to gain knowledge of King Llyr. Little did I know I condemned her to death.
