“Yet they could not have become who they became, so stubborn in strife, without my daughter time and again undoing their lives,” the Queen said. “Long I waited in fear, dreading that their time and this fate should approach, and sa’Rraah would not have that moment of spite that brought her to the Hearth and set these events in motion: for my daughter’s will must be as free as all others’, if she is to come back to the Hearth at last.”
“’So our sister is part of creation again, as she has been for long,” said Aaurh the Mighty to the Queen. ‘But this time she knows it. And now she has back something that was once hers once and was taken from her; and of her own will.’
“And the Queen said nothing, but merely purred, as is Her way when She feels it wise to let the moment’s silence speak its own word. She and Her daughters returned at length to the Hearth, the fire of which burned on, and burns still. As for Sehau and Aifheh, none have seen them since they crossed into the Tenth Life. Now they are Love personified, and Love does not need to be seen to be known. But no uncertainty of their whereabouts can change the fact that not even the Lone Power could destroy what they had – for while we have their story, we have both them, and what they had.”
Hwaith was looking a little unfocused. Rhiow glanced over at Urruah, who was studying his toes. The Silent Man, who had stopped writing a little while ago and had been sitting with his hands clasped loosely in his lap, the pencil still sticking out of them, now opened his eyes, looked sidelong at Rhiow and Urruah, and said, Malarkey.
Urruah looked at him in bemusement. Rhiow said, “Excuse me?”
Malarkey, he said. Especially about Pittburgh. Nothing like that ever happened in Pittsburgh.
Urruah gave him an amused look. “It could have been New York…”
The Silent Man thought about that, and after a moment, smiled just the slightest smile, nodded. So it could. He put his pencil down and reached out to the coffee cup, drained it, made a face at the cold stuff. Anyway, that’s some love story, he said. Make a good long opera.
Urruah put his whiskers right forward. “That’s one of the ways it’s done,” he said. “It’s often sung – part of it, or the whole thing — when there are enough queens in season, and enough toms in the neighborhood…”
The Silent Man smiled a little sourly. Bet I’ve heard it, some nights. He pushed his pad away. Love conquers all, huh?
“If it’s smart,” Hwaith said, “and careful… and lucky.”
But slowly the Silent Man’s face slipped out of that smile; his eyes looked off into some preoccupied distance. They got lucky, he said slowly. Doesn’t happen often…
“Not often enough,” Urruah said, “no. But we’re working on that.” He looked at Rhiow.
Rhiow idly wondered why. But the Silent Man was looking at her as well. A myth? he said.
“No myth,” Rhiow said. “Some of us get that last chance…that tenth life. But we get something more than just that. In Sehau’s and Aifheh’s lives we know that not even sa’Rraah herself can stop someone who’s just one play more determined than she is.”
The Silent Man nodded, and rubbed his face.
“It’s been a long night,” Rhiow said, feeling a shadow of his physical pain without even trying to get into synch with him. “Let’s call it over. There’s no point in you staying up for any news from the youngsters, cousin: we’ll wake you if anything urgent comes up.”
The Silent Man nodded, turned off the desk light, got up and headed for his room. In the dimness he paused by the couch to pick up Sheba: she stirred and muttered and dozed off again almost immediately in his arms. He nodded at the People and headed off to his bedroom. A second later the door closed.
Urruah got up and stretched. “I might go have a bite to eat,” he said, jumping down and heading for the cat food dishes.
“After that buffet?” Rhiow said, incredulous. But he was already out the back door.
“I think the Silent Man’s got the right idea,” Hwaith said. “I’m going to go check my gate…. I’ll be back later. If you hear anything from Arhu – “
“I’ll let you know,” Rhiow said. “Go well…”
Hwaith vanished.
Rhiow stayed as she was, listening to the darkness. In it she could hear an echo, distant, a voice telling itself something it really wanted to believe – and telling it at one remove, so that it was more believable: If I have all the tears that are shed on Broadway by guys in love, I will have enough salt water to start an opposition ocean to the Atlantic and Pacific, with enough left over to run the Great Salt Lake out of business. But I wish to say I never shed any of these tears personally, because I am never in love, and furthermore, barring a bad break, I never expect to be in love, for the way I look at it love is strictly the old phedinkus, and I tell the little guy as much…
