Funny to remember that now, as I’d never practiced the custom in all the years since. In prison, time went by unmarked by celebrations of any kind, grinding along like a stone wheel over grain, reducing us to spineless ash. The White Brothers, of course, looked to Glorianna, so while they marked her sister Moranu’s feast, they did not observe with more than a lit candle.
My parents, though, kept the candles and fire blazing high, holding vigil in silence and reflection until midnight. Not a thing a kid stays awake for very well, and I’d only made it once, that last winter before Father died. But they always wakened me a bit before midnight, and we’d take what we’d written and a candle each, then go out to the village square where the bonfire towered with hot flame. Keeping silent, our neighbors would throw their remembrances into the fire—sometimes fancy scrolls, other times bits of leather or bark. Occasionally someone tossed in an object.
Then we’d wait, holding the candles up to the sky in our cupped palms—toward Moranu’s moon if it was in the sky that year. We were supposed to concentrate on our hopes for the coming year. Mostly I’d be curious about what everyone else threw into the fire, imagining stories behind the occasional object I glimpsed. Back then my hopes had been confined to thinking about the iced spiced bread that awaited me. Odd to remember, too, that time when I’d been innocent enough for hope not to be a jagged blade that tore me from the inside out.
At the stroke of midnight, the village elders doused the bonfire, and we blew out our candles. We’d stand there in the abrupt darkness, shivering with winter chill, smoke billowing and burning my nose. Then, one by one, people relit their candles, passing the flame from one to the next, until the darkness was illuminated again by all the candles reflecting on faces now wreathed in smiles.
Many of the adults stayed up until dawn, keeping the candles alight and celebrating with drinking and dancing. I’d never seen that part. I would have been just getting old enough when everything changed. Shaking myself from the reverie, I hurried on, certain I must be late, and they’d be waiting supper on me.
I paused at one of the rare glassed-in windows, the big one that looked east, on a high floor with a grand foyer before it. Several staircases led onto the foyer, making a landing of the otherwise unused space. I’d always figured it for a lookout point, but it had been decorated for the feast, tall candelabras and torchieres ringing the space, garlands hanging from the walls. Snow piled deep on the sills, the night beyond nearly white with the swirling flakes illuminated by the glow from the castle.
Entering the main hall, I found only Ami present. She stood near the great fire, and turned at the sound of my bootsteps, a mug of wine cupped in her hands. She looked radiantly lovely—more so than usual—in a gown of deep purple, scattered with stars. Jewels fashioned to look the same as those decorating her skirts draped over her wrists and delicate collarbones, which always made me think of a white-winged bird about to take flight.
I halted, clearing my throat. “I didn’t realize I should have dressed up.”
She smiled ruefully and waved a hand, dismissing the elaborate gown. “No, I was silly to do it. This is—” She shook her head at something and drummed up a different smile, a brighter one to cover whatever emotion had choked her up. “It’s the Eve of Moranu’s Feast, you know. Or maybe you don’t, being sick and asleep so much.”
“I didn’t realize. Though I wondered when I saw all the candles.” This room, too, had candles glowing their simple flames from the niches, all the way up to the ceiling, which gave the feeling of stars shining from the shadows. “When I was a kid, we only ever lit them the night of the feast,” I offered, feeling awkward.
Interest lit her face. “Oh? At Ordnung they stayed lit for a week. For all the parties and everything. It was always such a mad whirl…” She trailed off, clearly realizing my life would have been nothing like that. I tried to think of something to reassure her. I wondered if I should go change clothes.
“Anyway,” she said into the suddenly uncomfortable silence. “I’ve had this dress for nearly two years, made for this occasion, and I’ve never gotten to wear it. So…” She shrugged, her fair shoulders gleaming like moonlight against the deep hue of the velvet, her breasts rising in tantalizing curves above the indecently low neckline. “I thought, might as well. At the rate I was going, it would have hung in my closet here forever, unworn. And it’s so pretty.” She stroked a hand over the full skirt, a sensuous caress that went through me like fire, reminding me of how she’d once touched me. “It would have been just sad to only leave it for the moths to eat.”
She lifted the mug in a toast. “Happy Eve of Moranu, Ash. May the goddess bless you.”
Feeling like an ass—more than usual—I picked up the other empty mug and filled it, toasting her in return. “Happy Eve to you as well, Amelia. I have no doubt Moranu is terribly jealous that Glorianna claimed you all to Herself.”
Ami blinked back some dampness, her eyes a luminous blue. “You say the loveliest things when you put your mind to it.”
Which wasn’t nearly often enough, I knew. I searched for something else to say to please her, but most of what came to mind fell into treacherous territory. “Where are Willy and Nilly?” I asked instead.
“Asleep.” Ami raised her elegant brows in significant delight. “Nilly hasn’t awakened, and if she’s like you after healing, I’m sure she’ll sleep straight through till morning. And Astar went down an hour ago, the consequence of diligent practice over hours with a garden stake he found and declared to be his sword.”
I groaned at that. “I’m sorry. I wish they hadn’t seen that.”
She cocked her head, a curling tendril falling against her temple. She’d put her hair up somehow, with more of the stars in it. I wondered where she’d dressed, as I’d been in her rooms.
“I’m not sorry,” Ami was saying, and I dragged my thoughts back to the topic. “The twins were born into dangerous times and I doubt that will change any time soon. It’s good for them to see that there are men like you—men of integrity, honor, and courage—who will risk everything to protect them from the monsters.”
I studied my wine, bemused by her description of me. Not how I saw myself.
“Astar might as well start learning to hold his ‘sword’ correctly, as he’s so determined,” Ami added, pouring us both more wine. “Maybe you can get him started.” Before you go, she didn’t say, but we both heard the words anyway, our gazes catching on each other with a heated intensity that went to my core.