We see others not as they are but as we see. We see ourselves not as we are but as we see—and as we are seen, for we each cast our light on each other, too. Surrounded by those who cast only brutal light, we see some truth, and sometimes necessary truth, but a lie if we think it all the truth.
Kip had been shedding filters and lampshades for the last few years now. Being stripped of drafting was different, though. It not only changed his sight, but it changed the very light he cast in the world. It certainly was changing how people saw him.
He’d gone to the Threshing Chamber immediately, hoping his loss might be temporary. But the testing stick had shown nothing. He’d kept it like a bad-luck charm: he was a mund.
Others had paid more in this war. Others had worse injuries. This burden wasn’t going to be easy, and yet . . . he felt hopeful. As one must wear clothing, one must wear shades—clothing itself is one of them!—one must present oneself to the world, and yet he felt that now he could bring more of his light to the world than ever before. He looked now into the mirror and felt, well, approval.
“Looking pretty good there, soldier,” he said. He straightened his back—not that these clothes let him slouch much—and then he flexed a bit.
Someone whistled behind him, and he felt the blood rush to his face. He spun.
It was Rea Siluz, in a shimmering burnous, a strand of pearls at her neck, and a bright galabaya down on her strong brown shoulders. She was literally radiant. Skin bright and luminous, eyes brighter still and mischievous. A smile like a current in a river where you thought, ‘That’s a nice smile,’ and then suddenly you were three leagues downstream wondering what had happened. Every part of her was beautiful and strong and potently feminine, and the sum was more than its parts.
“Wow! You’re just—wow!” Kip said. He suddenly understood why people had worshipped the immortals.
“I didn’t want to underdress for your big day. Still . . .” She seemed to dim a bit. A couple of smile lines appeared, and her teeth suddenly seemed less than perfectly straight, and her proportions shifted slightly. “Better?”
“Perfect for starting a riot,” Kip said.
She sniffed. “Here you said you loved a spectacle.” But she shifted still further, until she looked like the prettiest mother in the city rather than in the history of the world.
“You came,” he said, smiling broadly. His heart welled with appreciation. “I wasn’t exactly sure how to send you an invitation. The luxiats looked at me funny when I asked.”
“It’s a big day. Days of profound healing capture our attention as much as days of war.”
“It’s so good to see you again. But I have to admit, I’m still not really sure why I’m doing this. I’ m—well, look,” Kip said. He picked up the Threshing testing stick and showed its lack of colors to her. “I’m not even a drafter now. Not a satrap—oops, missed that bet, I guess. Not a king. Not, not anything. And don’t get me wrong, I’m pretty much delighted just to be alive, but I don’t really understand doing the whole big-spectacle-wedding thing.”
“It’s not really for you,” Rea Siluz said.
“And if you’re going to get married a second time, don’t you usually go more casual rather than more formal?” Kip asked. The entire island was celebrating the party of a century. “Seven days! Do you know I have to give four speeches, and that was with me winning the argument about how many I had to do!”
“Kip. It’s not for you.”
Kip knew it wasn’t only for Gavin and Karris, and certainly not for the much-lesser-known Kip and Tisis. It was a celebration of victory, and of life. It was as necessary as midwinter festivals amid the chill and death of every year. The people had mourned, and now was time to celebrate.
“So I had this question,” Kip said.
“About me running away when you faced Abaddon,” Rea said.
“Well, I wouldn’t put it that way,” Kip said. He paused, then admitted, “Out loud.”
She laughed. She’d apparently forgotten to tone down the beauty of that sound.
“You said once that you were less than he had been but more than he currently is. I kind of took that to mean you’re more powerful than Abaddon.”
“Kip, our power isn’t measured by numbers in a ledger.”
“But . . . I didn’t really misunderstand, did I?”
“No,” she admitted.
“And you don’t lie, do you?”
“Oh, my little Guile bulldog. Next you’re going to ask—”
“Why did he kick your ass?” Kip said.
“Why indeed?” she asked as if baffled.
Or as if teasing him.
Kip cocked his head as the possibility dawned on him. “You . . . you didn’t.”
She nodded.
“You let him win?” Kip asked, outraged.
“I prefer to put it that I wagered on you, Kip. Yes, I had the power to push him out of your world for a time, but only you could bring him fully into it and thereby make him vulnerable to being banished from this world forever.”
“Well . . . dung,” Kip said. “I mean, well done.”
“Good job, little one. Controlling that tongue will be harder for you than killing ‘gods’ ever was.”
“Hold on. You’re not going to leave now, are you? This feels like goodbye. Before this torture of a wedding, too. You got dressed up and everything!”
“There are . . . oddities to how mortal and immortal time overlap. Every moment I am with you is a moment I cannot be elsewhere in the other realms. My liege has few warriors as gifted as I.”
“Is that an answer, or a dodge?” Kip asked.
“A dodge,” Rea admitted happily. “But don’t worry, my tenacious Turtle-Bear, it is granted to me that I may come to you in your moments of deepest need. You see, Kip, you are the mirror in blood of my own deepest temptation.”
“Huh? That doesn’t sound good.”
“When the Thousand Worlds were young, many of my dear brothers and sisters fell. Much is given to us, as the first created of the Am. But we have no bodies, though we can filter our light such that we put on bodies for a time. But we don’t experience a body as an organizing principle of our selfhood, as you do. We are not given in marriage. We have no children. Thus, even as your kind wish to taste our powers, never realizing the costs therein, so our kind thirst for what you humans have that’s denied to us. The rebels among us promised us that we could have it all, that we could transcend the bounds laid out for us. And in some things, they did not lie, though they knew not all the truth, and spoke less. My great temptation was to be a mother, as you mortals experience such things. Motherhood is a true and good and beautiful thing. How could one impugn such a desire?! I thought. A true and good and beautiful thing—reserved for others? What an outrage! This I longed for: to be a demi-creator, to be all the source of sustenance and love to one utterly dependent on me. To experience the unquestioning love of a babe looking up from the breast, though unknowing, utterly dependent, utterly sated, utterly adoring? It is a true love, a mother’s. It is godly and good—but it is a love and gift and burden meant for mortals, not my kind. I was tempted to covetousness, because here was a love denied me. Who could deny me love? If He denied me this love, He must not love me. Was that not the work of a tyrant? Surely the Name above Names was holding out on me.