Page 109 of The Castle & the Cloister

“I hope I’ll stay,” Fia said. “But that’s the Matria’s decision, isn’t it?”

“She’ll bethrilledto see you,” Beatrice said, taking Fia by the hand and pulling her forward. “She’s been anxious ever since you left the second time. Can’t settle to one thing or another, and has someone running to the dovecote twice a day in hope of news from the castle.”

Tactfully, Beatrice said nothing about the nature of that news, or of Dolenza’s opinions on it. She drew Fia on through the labyrinth of outbuildings and halls and breezeways, to the wide, sunny interior courtyard where long ago, Fia had first petitioned to make her fidelity oath.

Dolenza was not sequestered in her study this time. Instead, she knelt beside a bed of vegetables, carefully showing Celina Inver how to pick beans by their tops, so that the pods did not snap. A few other fosters worked in the garden beds, or played in the shade of the twisted oldphelamon tree in one corner of the courtyard. Maya sat there with Miriel on her lap, the baby happily beating the top of a pie pan with a stick.

Kings rose and fell, lived and died, and it seemed that Raea’s house never changed. Fia wrapped her arms tight around her waist, trying to contain the sudden fire burning through her—a blaze not of anger, or grief, or ambition, but of joy.

Dolenza glanced up, and whatever concern for Fia’s safety she’d shown to the other sorias, she did not reveal it to Fia herself.

“I see you’re back,” the Matria said calmly. “There’s an empty basket just there; you can help us.”

Glancing wistfully at her daughter, Fia did as she was told. She knew better, this time, than to attempt to resume her old place in Miriel’s life at once. She would become the axis of her daughter’s world again gradually, until one day Miriel could not recall her absence. For now, Fia was sure of where she might find welcome.

“Hello,” she said to Celina, kneeling at her side. “I have a kiss for you, from your mother.”

Celina squinted up at Fia, frowning as if trying to remember something half-forgotten. Then her small face broke into a grin and she threw her arms around Fia’s neck.

“Fee!” she squealed, and Fia buried her face in the girl’s black hair. Even here, she wasn’t entirely separated from the Priest or Ariana, Glora or Orden, Nikolau or Hadrian or any of the people she’d striven beside and against on the Invers’ mountain, whether they’d been friend or foe. Celina would always serve as a reminder of her time there, and the things she’d said and done.

“Matria Dolenza,” Fia said as Celina returned to the absorbing job of pulling beans from their stems. “Let’s not drag this out any longer than we need to. Will you or will you not hear my fidelity oath?”

Dolenza rocked onto her heels and wiped the back of one hand across her forehead. When she fixed her eyes on Fia, her face was serene.

“No. I won’t.”

Fia had expected a mighty flare of temper to rise up in her if it came to this. But she felt nothing. One rejection had been shocking. The second disheartening. A third felt only inevitable.

“Is there any other service I can perform for the cloister, in order toearn a position here?” Fia asked. “I can’t help with trade or records, for I don’t have my letters yet and can’t figure either. But I could help with the laundry, the gardens, the children. With the harvest. With making the houseless welcome. There are many things I could do without bearing a soria’s title or privileges. I have reconciled myself to that—I told you before that I would not have the cloister unless I served my goddess here, but I can serve her in lesser ways. I can make do with even the faintest cast-off rays of her light. I know that now.”

Dolenza watched Fia closely. “You wouldn’t rather return to Inverlyn? You’ve made friends there and could have a position at court if it’s what you wanted. They’d keep you very comfortably—you could govern Honoria yourself, standing beside the Priest.”

“No,” Fia said, the word coming out sharper than she’d intended. “I know myself too well for that. I’d lose who I am—become one of them in time. Eventually I would convince myself that Inver fire is only another form of Raea’s light.”

“Isn’t it?” Dolenza asked. “Or rather, couldn’t it be, perhaps not yet, but someday? If that fire was tempered with peace and mercy? Orden Inver, for all his flaws, was not so far wrong. It was only ever his means that were lacking.”

Fia said nothing, not knowing how to answer.

“Do you know what is required of a soria, child?” Dolenza pressed. “Of the women who inhabit the role you’ve so stubbornly pursued?”

“Obedience to Raea,” Fia said quickly. “I can do that. I can submit to her will if I have the cloister walls around me.”

Dolenza shook her head. “It’s not just obedience. A soria must be humble and temperate in disposition, content with her lot in life, and a strict adherent of the blood prohibition. Do you feel you can fulfill those requirements? Do you feel you have embodied them during your time apart from us?”

Miserably, Fia looked away. How quickly her returning joy had dissipated.

“No,” she said. “Certainly not.”

“And do you know what is required ofmyrole?” Dolenza asked. “Of Raea’s voice and hands and highest representative?”

“Perfect faith?” Fia ventured. “To be a soria like no other?”

“In Lyria’s order, yes. But I was never a soria.” Dolenza smiled at Fia’s shock. “The requirements for Raea’s Matria preclude her ever having been one. We must be ruthless. Relentless. Forever striving toward greater peace and a better world. Willing to do anything necessary in pursuit of that goal. Do you feel you could fulfillthoserequirements?”

Fia could not draw breath.

“What… what are you asking me?” she managed at last.