The Cerulean Read online

  “I am a novice now,” Elorin said. “I will be settling into the dormitory tonight.”

  Leela did not want to think about all her friends moving on, finding their purposes in the City, leaving their mothers’ dwellings. She wanted everything to go back to how it was.

  “That is wonderful news,” she forced herself to say. “You must be very happy.”

  Elorin nodded, then bit her lip. “I thought she was very brave,” she said, leaning close so that only Leela could hear her. “Sera, I mean. I do not know if I would have had the grace and courage she did.”

  Tears once again sprang to Leela’s eyes—she felt as if her body had become an unending reservoir that would never run dry.

  “Thank you for saying that,” she whispered.

  Elorin touched her shoulder. “Come to the temple if you need solace,” she said.

  Leela’s smile was a frail, feeble thing. She did not want solace from the temple. She wanted her friend back and she wanted the world to make sense again. Elorin left her with a halfhearted wave, and Leela took her leave of the creamery with its clattering of pails and sharp, tangy scent of cheese.

  What would Sera do now were she in my place? she thought. Had she heard what I heard, what course of action would she have taken? She probably would have walked right up to the temple and asked to speak to the High Priestess.

  Was Leela brave enough to do the same? It was not just a matter of being brave, either. A tendril of hope was creeping into her mind, more tentative than the sunburst but with just as much power. What if she was wrong? What if she had simply misunderstood? It made far more sense if she thought about it—that Leela’s young and untrained mind had misinterpreted what she heard was much more likely than that the High Priestess was somehow responsible for Sera’s death. Perhaps Leela could ask about the choosing ceremony and how it had come about. That seemed a reasonable enough query. Maybe she could put her own mind at ease. Maybe then she would stop snapping at everyone and the storm growing inside her might be soothed.

  She set off for the temple, making her way through the meadows and passing the orchards, until she was crossing Aila’s Bridge and facing the gleaming copper doors. The temple seemed larger than it ever had before, its tip pointing to the sky like an admonishing finger. Leela’s legs trembled and her chest seized up—she could not do this; she was not the Cerulean Sera had been. She did not know how long she stood there, her courage faltering, her heart torn. She wished she felt more grown-up, more sure of herself.

  She wished she were not so alone.

  “Leela?”

  Acolyte Klymthe was walking down the steps of the temple, a watering can in one hand.

  “Good afternoon, Acolyte,” Leela said. The time was now. She must be brave, like Sera. “I was hoping perhaps I might speak to the High Priestess.”

  Acolyte Klymthe’s eyebrows rose high above her close-set eyes. “Why, what on earth for, my child?”

  Leela felt she should have better prepared herself for this situation now that she was in it. “I thought I might . . . ask her about . . . the choosing ceremony.”

  Acolyte Klymthe’s expression softened. “She is sequestered for a time. Her energies are very low, I’m afraid.”

  Leela saw an opportunity to play on the acolyte’s sympathies. “As are mine,” she said. “With Sera gone, the City feels like a stranger to me.”

  “I am sure it must. But remember that time heals all. There will come a day when the hurt will not be so grave.”

  “I cannot seem to understand,” Leela said. “Why was Sera chosen at all?”

  Acolyte Klymthe sighed, and it sounded sincere, but Leela could not be certain. She was not used to detecting falsehoods. Cerulean rarely lied.

  “Grief breaks us in different ways,” she said. “For some, the need to seek answers can be powerful. But there are no answers to give here. Only the pain of loss and the solace of prayer. But do not fear. Even those Mother Sun deems unworthy of sacrifice are still held in her everlasting embrace. Sera may not have been the right choice, but she will not be forgotten by our Mother.”

  Leela’s anger rekindled at the word unworthy, a spark that gave her the nerve she needed. She looked right into Acolyte Klymthe’s eyes and said, “But I thought Mother Sun did not make mistakes.”

  A flicker of shock passed across the acolyte’s face, and in that brief moment Leela knew she had not misheard or misunderstood. Whatever secret Leela had stumbled upon, Acolyte Klymthe knew and was part of it.

  “She does not,” Acolyte Klymthe said firmly. “But sometimes we cannot see the true shape of her plan at first. All will be revealed in time. Meanwhile, I must tend to the roses in the Moon Gardens. I will tell the High Priestess you called.”

  Leela was left with her head spinning and her heart in her throat. There was too much mystery, and she did not know where to begin. She needed help. But she could not share this with Koreen or Daina or even Elorin, kind as she had been earlier. She needed someone older, wiser, someone she was certain she could trust, someone who would believe her.

  Inspiration struck in a flash, a meteorite lighting up the dark recesses of her mind. She was shocked she had not thought of it before.

  The only person who might believe her was the only person who missed Sera as desperately as Leela did.

  Sera’s purple mother.

  25

  THE FIRST WEDDING TOOK PLACE THE NEXT DAY AT THE hour of the lamb.

  Fireflies lit the canopy of trees above as the Cerulean watched Plenna, Heena, and Jaycin circle each other over and over, repeating oaths of fealty. The girls wore wreaths of white roses in their hair, and delicate garlands of baby moonflowers around their necks. Their waists were belted with fire lilies glowing red-gold like the sun. The High Priestess held the three ribbons—orange, purple, and green—on a small white pillow. When the girls stopped circling, she lifted the pillow above her head.

  “Mother Sun, bless this union now and forever, so that this triad may live together in harmony until the day they return to your everlasting light. May they find peace in times of discord, comfort in times of sadness, and constancy in the face of chaos; for the union of three souls is sacred and not to be undertaken lightly. This we pray.”

  “This we pray,” the Cerulean echoed. Leela only mouthed the words. She kept her eyes fixed on the High Priestess, searching for a suspicious look or gesture, but she was as serene and elegant as ever. If Leela could detect any change at all it was that she seemed a bit tired—there were thin lines around her eyes and mouth.

  Plenna tied an orange ribbon around Heena’s neck, then Heena tied a green ribbon around Jaycin’s neck, and finally, Jaycin tied a purple ribbon around Plenna’s neck. Sera had been certain Plenna would be a purple mother, Leela thought sadly. She could almost hear her whispering, Told you so, in her ear.

  When the last ribbon was secured, the High Priestess proclaimed, “A new triad is formed! All praise them! Praise Mother Sun!”

  “Praise her!” the Cerulean called back. Plenna began to cry, and Jaycin took her in her arms and kissed her while Heena stroked her hair. And then all the Cerulean were laughing and clapping because young love shone brighter than the brightest star—that was what Leela’s green mother always said.

  The ceremony was repeated as another triad was wed, then another. Four weddings that lasted until the hour of the owl, when finally it was time for the celebratory feast.

  Minstrel flowers sang as tables were brought out and laden with food and drink. Pitchers of crystal-clear water and decanters of sweetnectar were placed among platters of crisp fried eggplant, freshly sliced tomatoes with basil and seresheep cheese, stuffed squash blossoms, salads of apples, plums, and nasturtiums, and of course, a traditional Cerulean wedding cake in the shape of a dome, light and spongy and frosted with silver icing, dotted with blue roses.

  “Go run and help Freeda with the water,” her purple mother said, and Leela hurried to carry one of the large earthen pitche
rs to a table that was wanting.

  “Thank you,” Freeda said. She towered over Leela, clutching the remaining pitcher against her large chest. “Be a dear and bring those forks along as well, will you?”

  Leela grabbed the forks and put them beside the pitcher, but she did not go directly back to her mothers. She wandered through the crowds, searching . . . until at last she found Sera’s purple mother. She was sitting at a table alone, twisting a napkin in her hands and staring at a platter of glazed carrots with unseeing eyes. She looked worse than before—thinner, fragile, her bones straining prominently underneath her skin.

  Leela was not quite sure what to do. She took a hesitant step forward. Sera’s purple mother looked up from the carrots, and when their eyes met, Leela stopped in her tracks.

  It was as if a light had been turned off inside her. Cerulean eyes were bright with the magic of their blood—it was the place where their magic shone through most clearly. But the eyes Leela stared into were dark and flat. They frightened her. Sera’s purple mother had always been full of joy and laughter. Leela did not know the woman sitting before her, and her heart sank.

  She could not help Leela any more than Leela could help herself. She should not have thought to burden Sera’s poor mother with more heartache when she was clearly too distraught with grief. The bench opposite was empty, and she sat across from Sera’s mother, no longer thinking of her own plans, wishing only to comfort.

  “I miss her, too,” Leela said, not sure if Sera’s mother was listening or if Leela herself just needed to talk to someone who understood. “I miss her more than anything. It’s an ache in my chest that won’t go away, a pain in my heart that throbs worse with every beat. I am angry all the time. I am angry at my mothers, at my friends. I do not even know who I am anymore. And I wished to . . . to speak with you about something, but now I think I would only make things worse.” She looked down at her hands folded in her lap. “Perhaps I need to learn to deal with things on my own,” she murmured.

  “The Night Gardens,” Sera’s purple mother said. Her voice was faint and hollow, like it was coming from the bottom of a well.

  “Yes,” Leela said. “The Night Gardens. That’s where she . . . where she was lost to us.”

  Sera’s mother lurched forward, holding her head in her hands. “Leela . . .”

  “I am here.” Leela reached out and put a hand on her elbow. Sera’s mother peered at her from between her fingers.

  “I feel I am going insane,” she whispered. “I remember things that can’t be real. Ever since the Night Gardens.”

  “I have brought you some food, Kandra.” Sera’s green mother appeared with a plate piled high. Leela sat up, putting her hands back under the table. “Oh, good evening, Leela.”

  “Good evening, Green Mother.”

  Sera’s green mother smiled, but her smile was too tight and did not curve upward. “How have you been?” she asked. “We do miss hearing your laugh around our dwelling.”

  Sera’s purple mother flinched.

  “I have been . . .” Leela trailed off. She could not lie to Sera’s mothers. “I have been very sad.”

  Sera’s green mother swallowed. “Yes. It has been difficult for us all. But what a lovely celebration.” She swept out her hand at the crowds eating and drinking and chattering happily. “It is sure to put all grief out of mind.” But her voice cracked on the last word and a tear spilled down her cheek. Sera’s purple mother closed a frail hand around her wrist.

  “Stop it, Seetha,” she said. “Stop pretending. Please.”

  Sera’s green mother scrubbed the tear away, putting the plate on the table. “You must eat, Kandra. You must.”

  Leela opened her mouth, unsure of what to say but devastated at what was happening to Sera’s family. At that moment someone shouted, “The Lunarbelle, the Lunarbelle!” A group of novices began to sing, the minstrel flowers joining them, and several Cerulean musicians took up their harps and lyres and frame drums. Everyone rushed to form circles to begin the dance.

  “Leela!” Elorin was at her side, smiling, with a wreath of pink and yellow tulips in her hair. “Come, let us dance!”

  Leela allowed herself to be pulled away from the grieving women, joining Elorin as they formed a circle with Baarha, Crailin from the Aviary, and a few of the cheesemongers. They clasped hands and began the complex, intertwining dance, but when the Lunarbelle ended and everyone sat down to eat, Leela saw Sera’s purple mother sitting in the same spot, her plate of food untouched, twisting the same napkin with a lifeless expression.

  Later that night, Leela lay awake, her stomach in knots.

  She wondered if she would ever have a night of unbroken rest again. But she could not ignore the niggling feeling in her chest that was telling her to go to the Night Gardens. Even though Sera’s purple mother had seemed beyond the reach of reason, something told Leela that she would find her there. Some deeply buried instinct called to her to trust herself.

  She threw off her covers and slipped out of the window, her orange mother’s snores fading as she crept through the glass dwellings, past the Apiary, wading through the moonflower fields until she came to the Night Gardens. Silence enveloped her completely as she entered them. No birds sang or crickets chirped. The Night Gardens had always filled Leela with a sort of fearful wonder, but tonight all she could think of was the last time she had been here. Yet she was determined not to let the past frighten her.

  She brushed aside a low-hanging cloud on the leaf of a nebula tree and made her way through the gardens, all the scarlets and purples and grays bleached white in the moonlight. A will-o-wisp floated past her, its eerie blue light casting strange shadows on the tree trunks. She knew where she was going without really knowing, her feet carrying her of their own accord, and when she reached the raised dais jutting out over the falling water of the Estuary, she stopped. The memories were painfully clear—she could almost see Sera standing there again, falling into nothingness. Into death.

  Her heart in her stomach, she stepped up onto the dais, seeing the glittering blanket of stars as Sera had last seen them. The planet below was so dark she could not discern the shapes of Kaolin and Pelago. She reached out and felt the barrier, pliable beneath her fingertips.

  “Sera?”

  Leela whirled around, nearly losing her balance. Sera’s purple mother stood before her, her face wild with a hope that faded as soon as she saw who it was.

  “Good evening, Purple Mother,” Leela said.

  Sera’s mother raised her eyes to the skies above, but they did not reflect the moonlight. “I am not a purple mother anymore,” she said. “You should call me Kandra.”

  Leela stepped down off the dais. “You are still her mother,” she said gently.

  Kandra cringed. “We are the only two who dare return to this place. No one else will come here.”

  “What about Sera’s green and orange mothers?”

  “We deal with her loss in different ways,” Kandra said. “Otess will not stop praying. She has become cold and hard as a stargem in her devotion. Seetha tries to be positive, to look to the future, to see a time when we will not be so enshrouded with pain. For me it is like . . . like she took a piece of me with her. And I cannot seem to figure out how to live without that piece.”

  Leela was relieved to hear Sera’s mother speaking so clearly, so rationally.

  “That is very much how I feel,” she confessed. “I am glad to find you here.”

  “I am always here,” Kandra murmured. “I am close to her here. I cannot . . . I cannot bear that dwelling. I can’t set foot in her room. It still smells of her. Seetha wanted to pack her things away, but Otess and I would not allow it. Her hairbrush is right where she left it. I can see it from the hall. In the very same place she left it . . .”

  She reached out as if seeing it now, as if she could touch its burnished silver handle.

  “And since she has gone I’ve begun to see things, things that cannot possibly be . . .�
� Her voice trailed off, her gaze shifting out over the gardens.

  “What sorts of things?” Leela asked. Kandra did not seem to hear her.

  “I am so angry,” she continued, and Leela had the sense that she was confiding something she had told no other soul. “I feel I am a terrible person for this but . . . I am angry with Mother Sun. My heart should be full of love and trust in her endless wisdom, but it is not. It has become jaded and unyielding, and I fear I am losing myself. It is unfair to Otess and Seetha, unfair to our City. But I cannot change it. I can’t bring myself to be at peace with what has happened. And I remember things that cannot be, that cannot be. . . .” She covered her face with one hand. “I am so sorry. You are a child. You do not need to be burdened with my fears.”

  This was her chance. Leela took a deep breath and pretended she was brave.

  “I am angry too,” she said. “And then I overheard something. Something bad. About . . . Sera.”

  “Yes, I have heard things as well,” Kandra said, rubbing her eyes. “They blame her. Unworthy, they call her.” Her breath caught in her throat. “There was never a girl more worthy of light and love than my daughter. Never.”

  “I know,” Leela said. “But what I meant was . . . I heard the High Priestess talking about Sera. In the Moon Gardens, not two days ago. She didn’t know I was there.”

  Kandra looked up, shock etched across her face. “The High Priestess?”

  “Yes.”

  “You are certain?”

  “I am.” Leela felt this was significant to Kandra in a way she could not yet comprehend.

  “What did she say?”

  “I . . . it’s . . . I am not sure you will believe me,” she said. “I have been scared to whisper a word of it to anyone.”

  There was a sudden flash of color in Kandra’s eyes, a spark of blue that vanished almost as soon as it appeared. “You will tell me what you heard,” she commanded, and Leela took a step backward. Kandra seemed to realize she was being frightening—she softened, her shoulders wilting. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Please.” She crossed the space between them and took Leela’s hands gently in her own. “I swear to you on the light and grace of Mother Sun and her Moon Daughters, on my love for this City and the love I bore my own child. I will believe what you say and I will not repeat to a soul what you reveal to me here.”