Mara froze, resisting all attempts to lead her away. ‘Kevin,’ she said frantically, ‘I want him brought to my chambers and tended there.’
‘Lady,’ Lujan said firmly, ‘I already presumed to give orders to that end.’ He caught her more firmly around the waist and propelled her into the corridor that led to her chambers. Someone thoughtful, probably Jican, had ordered every lamp lit, so no step she took was in shadow.
Again the eyes of Force Commander and Adviser for War met. Keyoke knew that Mara’s party had suffered ambush; he was impatient to hear the details. Lujan nodded in wordless indication that he would relate the event, but out of Mara’s hearing. She had grief enough in her heart without being made to endure a repetition of the day’s unpleasantness.
They reached her private apartments. The screens were opened wide and attended by a dozen armed warriors. Inside, half-lost in a sea of cushions, a small figure lay with white bandages wrapped around his neck. Someone sat with him; Mara did not look to see whom, but pulled herself out of Lujan’s hold and fell to her knees by her child. She touched him, transparently surprised by his warmth. Then, tenderly cautious of his hurts, she gathered him into her arms. She wept then, beyond all control, and her tears rinsed Ayaki’s cheek.
Her officers averted their faces in staunch disregard of her shame, and the person sitting on the cushions tactfully rose to leave.
Mara glanced through brimming eyes and identified Jican. ‘Stay,’ she said shakily. ‘All of you, stay. I don’t want to be here alone.’
For a very long time the lanterns burned, while she sat and rocked her young son.
Later in the night, after Kevin had been placed on a mat by Ayaki’s side, Mara ordered the lights put out. She dismissed Keyoke, Jican, and Lujan to their long-deserved rest, and, guarded by a relief watch of warriors at every entrance to the house, she sat in silent vigil over her loved ones. She thought, and saw too clearly where selfishness had steered her near to ruin. Her arrogant assumption of the Clan Warchief’s seat now seemed the act of an idiot.
She did not undress for bed, though the healer who came periodically to check on his two charges begged her to take a draught to bring rest. Her eyes stung unpleasantly from crying, and she did not wish the oblivion of sleep. Guilt weighed upon her heart, and too many thoughts upon her mind. At dawn she gathered her courage, rose stiffly from her cushions, and left her room and her loved ones. Alone, watched only by her guarding soldiers, she moved like a waif through darkened corridors to the nursery, where the body of the woman who had raised her had been laid on a bier of honour.
Nacoya’s bloody robes had been changed for rich silks bordered by Acoma green. Her wrinkled old hands lay at peace by her sides, sheathed in soft leather gloves to hide the cruel cuts from the assassin’s cord, and the knife that had slain her rested on her breast, as badge of homage to Turakamu that she had died a warrior’s death. Her face, nested in silver-white hair, seemed more peaceful than it ever had in sleep. Cares and arthritis and hairpins that never stayed straight could not trouble her now. Her loyal years of service were over.
Mara felt fresh tears spring under her swollen eyelids. ‘Mother of my heart,’ she murmured. She sank to the cushions beside the dead woman and gathered up one cold hand. She fought and steadied her voice. ‘Nacoya, know your name shall be honoured with the ancestors of the Acoma, and your ashes shall be spread inside the walls of the sacred glade, within the garden of the natami. Know the blood you spilled today was Acoma blood, and that you are as family and kin.’ Here Mara paused, as her breath caught. She raised her face in the grey light coming through the screens and looked out into the mist that clothed the lands of her people.
‘Mother of my heart,’ she resumed, shamefully unsteady, ‘I did not listen to you. I was selfish, and arrogant, and careless, and the gods took your life for my folly. But hear me; I can still learn. Your wisdom lives yet in my heart, and on the morrow when your ashes are delivered to the gods, I will swear this promise: I will send the barbarian Kevin away, and write a betrothal contract to Shinzawai asking for marriage with Hokanu. These things I will do before the season turns, wise one. And to my sorrow, to the end of my days, I will regret that I chose not to heed while you were alive at my side.’
Mara gently laid the withered hand back at the dead woman’s side. ‘Not enough did I tell you this, Nacoya: I loved you well, mother of my heart,’ she ended, ‘and I thank you for the life of my son.’
24 – Breakthrough