L. Modesitt - Imager

“I do.” Her voice was warm and husky.

“The rings, if you will.”

I handed the ring to Rousel.

After taking the simple gold bands, one from Rousel and one from Remaya, Osyrahm held them up so that all could see them before lowering them and addressing the couple. “These rings are a symbol of love, for gold cannot be changed, nor imaged into what it is not. In exchanging and accepting these rings, you have pledged that your love will be as unchanging as the gold of which they are made, that no tyranny of names substituting for substance shall ever cleave you apart, and that your love for each other will endure in times good and evil, through sickness and health, and in darkness and in light, so long as your spirits endure.” Then he returned the rings to them.

Remaya, in the Pharsi tradition, was the first to place her ring, easing it onto Rousel’s finger. Then he slipped his ring upon hers.

“From two have come one, and yet that unity shall enable each of you to live more joyfully, more fully, and more in harmony with that which was, is, and ever shall be.”

The chorister stepped back, and Rousel and Remaya kissed under the canopy of late-spring flowers.

Then they turned and faced family and friends. Remaya’s sister Semahla stepped forward and handed the small green wicker basket of flower petals to Rousel. He held it while she scooped out a handful and cast them forward and skyward. Then she took the basket, and he scattered his handful.

After that, they walked back toward the roofed section of the courtyard, and Semahla and I followed.

We had barely stepped into the shadows when Remaya turned back to me.

“Thank you so much, Rhenn.” Remaya’s smile was dazzling, but it always had been, even when I’d first seen her at the girls’ grammaire when she’d been twelve. “Without you, I would never have met Rousel, and never known this happiness, foretold as it was.”

Foretold. She’d said that when she had first laid eyes on Rousel. Those with the Pharsi blood have always been said to be able to see what will be before it comes to their eyes. “I’m so glad everything worked out for you two.” What else could I say? I managed a wide grin as I looked at Rousel. “You heard that, brother.”

He grinned back. “How could I forget?”

I loosened my own neck scarf, because the late-spring afternoon was warm, even in the shade, especially in the formal waistcoat and matching trousers. They were the finest I’d ever owned, and a gift from Rousel.

He’d been kind, and very matter-of-fact about it. When he’d given it to me, made-to-measure, he’d said, “I’m the one who wants you beside me. You’re an artist, and I can’t ask you to purchase a wedding suit. Besides, you can keep it for good occasions.”

I’d just leave it stored with my parents. I certainly wouldn’t need anything that fine for anything involving Master Caliostrus.

At that moment, everyone surged around Rousel and Remaya, and Semahla and I stepped back. I’d only met Semahla a handful of times, and she was certainly bright and pleasant, if more angular than her younger sister.

“The past few days must have been crowded,” I observed.

She laughed. “Hectic, but fun. Everyone likes Remaya. She’s always been the kind one.”

“I’m sure you are, as well.”

“It comes naturally to her. I have to try.”

I supposed I could have said the same about Rousel, except it would have been about charm. He could charm anyone, just by looking at them.

Serving girls appeared, carrying trays with goblets of sparkling grisio. I picked two goblets off a tray and offered one to Semahla.

“Thank you.” She inclined her head, then took a sip.

So did I. The coolness helped a dry throat.

“Rousel said you are a fine artist.”

“I am an artist. Some days I think I might someday become a master with a studio.”

“The portrait you did of Remaya is lovely. Everyone says so. Mother looks at it and wishes that Remaya would leave it with her.”

“Thank you.” I’d done the best I could. It had been my wedding gift to them. What else could I have given?

“Oh . . . Remaya needs me.” With that, Semahla slipped away.

That was for the best. I’d about run out of pleasantries, not that Remaya’s family weren’t good people. Her father was a spice broker, which placed him between a factor and a shopkeeper, but meant he was still a tradesperson of sorts. Still, from the house, they certainly weren’t poor.

Rousel eased over to me. “How are you doing?”

“Fine. How about you?”

He grinned sheepishly. “I just wish the dinner and the toasts were all over.”

I could understand that. “You only have to do this once.”

“Twice. Once for me, and once for you. Maybe three times. Culthyn might want us.”

“You’re an optimist.”

“Now that you’ve made journeyman, you need to look around for someone,” Rousel said.

“I’m not ready for that. I only get my own commissions now and again.” I didn’t point out that I wasn’t a successful factor’s assistant, because both Father and Rousel would have noted that it had been my choice not to go into trade. But then, I would have made a botch of trade. “Besides, it will be almost another five years before I can even be considered as a master portraiturist. It might be years beyond that. The masters don’t easily approve other masters.”

“You can still look.”

I had looked, and she’d married Rousel. I just smiled. “We’ll see.”

“Rousel!” That was Remaya.

“You better go.”

“Don’t be too hard on me when you give your toast.”

“I won’t.” And I wouldn’t. We don’t choose where our hearts lead us.

754 A.L.

Contrary to poetry and populisms, Avryl is far from the cruelest month of the ten. Rather Feuillyt is, for it is in the month after harvest when everyone comes to understand that the bounty of nature and man could have been far greater than it was, no matter how much better the gathering of grain and golds happened to be than in previous years. So it was no surprise to me when Master Caliostrus appeared on the twentieth of that Feuillyt, to stand behind my shoulder and peer at the uncompleted likeness upon my easel. The twentieth of every month is a Vendrei, of course, whether the year is 754, as it was, or any other year.

“That’s not an acceptable portrait, Rhennthyl.”

Without Factor Masgayl being present, I’d been working on the detailing of his crimson and gold brocade vest, a vest that, for all its richness, had seen better days, not that the portrait would show that. “Sir?”

“You can’t do that with the eyes.”

“But that’s the way the factorius looks, exactly the way he appears.” Incautious as that statement was, coming as it did from a journeyman portraiture artist to his master, we both knew that the portrait was far more flattering than the reality of Masgayl Factorius, one of the more junior, yet least self-effacing, factors in the city.

“It is not the way he looks,” replied Master Caliostrus, “not to himself and not to those who patronize his establishment, and not to his family.”

The problem was not with my eyes, but with those of Master Caliostrus, for his had become a slave to his desires for influential patrons, rather than lenses of artistic impartiality.

“You do not paint a man with deep-set beady eyes, even if his eyes are as hard and as tiny as those of a shrewt,” Caliostrus went on. “That is, if you wish to remain a portraiture artist in L’Excelsis. Without satisfied patrons, even if you become a master, you will not remain long an artist. You will not become a master, because I certainly cannot support or lend my name to a portraiturist who is insensible to the self-images of his potential patrons.”