To the gardener she said, ‘Nira, you are free to choose this site. Plant a hedge and a garden of flowers and let no feet tread there but yours, and those of your appointed successors. Let the ancestors who participated in the founding and continuance of this nation know sunlight and rain, that the memory of a great house shall endure.’
The man bowed low and expertly dug around the base of the ancient rock. While the priest of Chocochan intoned a blessing, his work-callused hands raised the talisman and shifted it aside. Mara gave over her own family stone into the hands of the priest of the Good God. He raised the Acoma natami toward the sky and recited his most powerful incantation for Chochocan’s everlasting favour. Then he returned the Acoma natami to Mara, who in turn passed it to the gardener. ‘Here is the heart of my line. Tend it as you would your living child, and you will be known as a man who has done honour to two great houses.’
‘Mistress,’ Nira said, bowing his head over his new charge in respect. Like every other servant on the estates, he had expected slavery, but instead he discovered he was being given a new life.
The priest consecrated the ground around the natami as Nira trampled soil around the base. At the completion of the ritual, Chochochan’s servant sounded a tiny metal chime and departed, the gardener following on his heels.
Mara remained alone with the stone that bound her ancestors’ spirits to renewal on the Wheel of Life. Careless of her fine silks, she knelt in the earth and ran her fingers across the surface, the faint lines of the shatra bird crest worn with age.
‘Father,’ she said quietly, ‘this is to be our new home. I hope the site pleases you.’ Then she added words for the dead brother whose absence even yet left a wound in her heart. ‘Lanokota, rest you well and know peace.’ Then she thought of all those who had died in her service, those close and loved and others barely known. ‘Brave Papewayo, who gave your life to save mine, I hope you return to the Wheel of Life as a son of this house. And Nacoya, mother of my heart, know the woman you raised as a daughter sings your praises.’
She thought of her beloved Kevin, who now was back among his own family, and prayed that he would find a happy life without her. Tears flowed freely down her cheeks, for both losses and victories, joys and sorrows. The Game of the Council as she had known it was forever changed, and by her hand. Yet as she knew her people, she understood that their nature would accept this new order slowly; politics would shift and she would be required to work hard to preserve peace. The wealth she would gain from her Midkemian trading concessions would help underwrite such efforts, but the difficulties ahead in establishing Ichindar’s power would require as much nurturing as any plan she had completed to defeat enemies.
Mara arose, both sobered and exhilarated by the weight of new responsibilities. Inspired by the beautiful gardens, and by old trees lovingly tended, she arrived at the gate that marked the entrance to her family’s sacred glade. There she encountered her inner cadre of advisers, and thousands of Minwanabi soldiers upon their knees with Lujan before them. ‘Mistress,’ he called gladly, ‘to a man, these remaining warriors embrace Acoma service.’
Mara waved him a salute. Even as she had restored hope and honour to a band of houseless outlaws as a girl green to the ways of power, she said, ‘Swear them to honourable service, Force Commander Lujan.’
Proud in his plumes, the Acoma Force Commander led them in the short vow that he had undertaken those same years before, when he had been among the first soldiers in the Empire to receive the grace of a second chance at honourable life.
As he finished and marshalled the warriors newly dedicated to the Acoma natami, Mara’s eyes lifted to the distant shores of the lake. A flash of movement there snagged her attention, and her spirit soared with emotion. Setting a hand upon Keyoke’s shoulder, she said, ‘Look!’
Her weathered Adviser for War turned his gaze where she indicated. ‘My eyes are not young, mistress. What do you see?’
‘Shatra birds,’ came Mara’s awed reply. ‘By the grace of divine favour they come to nest in the marshes on our shores.’
From his place beside the youthful Saric, Incomo said, ‘The gods seem pleased with your generous heart, mistress.’
‘We can only hope, Income’
To her circle of advisers she said, ‘Come. Let us make our new home ready. My husband-to-be shall arrive soon, in the company of my son and heir.’ Mara led old ministers and new toward the house she had so long admired, now to be home to her family, and a roof to join two great houses dedicated to the betterment of the Empire.