“Asharan,” Shai Vishal said, very much on his dignity. “If you would come with me for a moment.”
“Yes, your Reverence,” Ashar said, and barely kept himself from sayingyes, please.
He followed Shai Vishal through the Temple, trying to look as though he belonged. Trying to walk with confidence, rather than the awkward tangle of owed penance and concern for the man whom he could not think of as Rahat, could not think of by the title he ought not know, and could not speak of too revealingly under Sami’s name, in case Shai Vishal had not gazed as lingeringly into those glorious gazelle-soft eyes as Ashar himself had. He bowed to each of the cat-goddesses’ statues in their lamp-lit, incense-fragrant nooks, and washed and dried his hands at the door to Shai Vishal’s study.
Two cats looked up from the sunny window ledge Ashar had been drawn to during his previous visit. One of them yawned and stretched and leapt down; the other looked like quite an old cat, and she curled back up with supreme confidence that no young whippersnapper would dare lay unwelcome hands upon her. Shai Vishal had also come into possession of a jasmine plant that appreciated the sunbeams just as avidly as the cat, and Ashar wondered what he meant by it, because Shai Vishal never presented symbolismaccidentally.
“Where should I offer my penance?” Ashar asked as lightly as he could. “And which temptation to sin would you prefer I embody for you?”
Shai Vishal blinked, his hands hesitating by his brushes, and so Ashar realized he had misstepped again.
“I’m sorry,” he sighed. “I don’t know why I can’t put a foot right for you, your Reverence. But I am here to embody a sinner’s penitence; clearly I am not a model of virtue.”
“You are here toexperiencea penance, for your heart’s ease,” Shai Vishal said. “You are here to practice how to embody your devotion in stillness, rather than in frenetic service. But this book isThe Devotions.Every devotion is a virtue. Everydevotion is an offering of love, enduring. Your love for your community, for your neighborhood, for the children and kittens who drink a sweet cup of chai before their daily lessons. Your love in compassion, in your hands’ easing of pain and your heart’s soothing of spirits. Your love in faith, when many other young men of your generation claim to have outgrown such matters.”
“Your Reverence,” Ashar said, a bit uncomfortable, “when I have a bad day, I hang out a sign and close the door, or I ask Kalyani and Hira to cover for me.”
“In other words, you are human?”
“Well, yes, but so are you. And still your cauldrons are filled every single day.”
“In other words, you are one human with two assistants. Rather than, for example, a centuries-old faith with a dozen sworn priests in this Temple alone, and devotees across the Empire to call upon when more support is needed. As it will be needed for the Greater Convocation.”
Ashar was not a child to squirm at a scolding from an elder, but somehow he couldn’t stop squirming at a gently reproving word of understanding. Shai Vishal studied him with both a priest’s eye and an artist’s.
“Your heart still troubles you.”
“Since the inquisition, have you seen—” He couldn’t sayRahat.He couldn’t saymy heart’s treasure.He couldn’t eventhinkof that lofty title. And in his panic, he suddenly couldn’t remember the other name his sweet treasure had used in the Temple.
“Sami and his cat are both safe and well,” Shai Vishal said, and Ashar couldn’t help his sigh of relief. “I understand that his cat has safely borne her kittens, and the bureaucrats in thehaveliare in thrice the uproar between the kittens, theproclamation inviting yet more cats, and some impressively failed attempts at artifact-guarding witcheries.”
“Thank you, your Reverence. I’m sorry.”
“Whatever for?”
Despite the penance of stillness, Asharneededsomething to do with his hands, and some way to hide his face. He busied himself with the jasmine plant, plucking off faded blossoms and brittle leaves, turning the pot to investigate the other side, as he thought through what he could and could not admit aloud, even to a priest.
“The one whom my heart holds dear is as far beyond my reach as Sami,” he murmured. “You can ask after Sami, your Reverence, and you will be answered. You speak the languages of power. You could walk with him among those halls, if you wished. You are a man that anyone would be honored to stand beside. But someone like me… how could I be anything but a distraction at best, and an embarrassment at worst? I cannot so much as ask after his well-being. I don’t even speak his language. I have no place in his world, and I know it.”
“Don’t be absurd,” Shai Vishal said firmly. “It doesn’t suit you.”
Startled, Ashar spilled the palmful of leaves. “Your Reverence?”
“You have also told me that you are somehow too sullied for Madhur’s company, when I know how dearly he treasures both your friendship and the relief of pain he finds in your attentive hands,” Shai Vishal said. “Your place in his world is right here. In the Temple of Bastet who loves mischief and kittens and all manners of pleasure. And your place in his world is at Upaja’s cauldrons, whereallare welcome. If anyone says to you that either of you are not welcome in Bastet’s Temple or Upaja’s shrine, send them to me for a swift re-education.”
“Oh,” Ashar breathed, and sank carefully onto the pillow while his knees would still hold him. The elderly cat gave him a gimlet eye, then huffed and settled back into her drowsing. “Oh, might we…” But he stopped himself short at the thought of askinghis Reverence Shai Vishalif he could arrange to share a private place with his treasured one. The places where people made such arrangements were in brothels and bath-houses, notthe Temple.
“Go on,” Shai Vishal said, gently.
“You have many books here, in many languages,” Ashar said. “I don’t… I’m not… good with writing. Words or numbers. But if I might listen while someone studies their scriptures, perhaps I might learn more of the sound of his speech…?”
“You’d said ‘we,’” Shai Vishal reminded him.
Ashar had briefly hoped he might have missed that. “I cannot possibly ask either of you to tutor me in the court’s tongue.” Just as he couldn’t askShai Vishalto carrylove-notesfrom a bath-house courtesan to theGod-Emperor’s brother, however tempting it had been for a moment’s fancy.
“And likewise you cannot ask the aunties and uncles who had the language from their grandparents, because you would never hear the end of the gossip about why you asked it of them,” Shai Vishal agreed, rueful. “Suppose I were to task Madhur with learning the court’s speech for our ministry’s sake…?”
“Only a terrible friend would make Madhur’s life more difficult for reasons that are not even his own!” Drooping against themashrabiyascreen, Ashar said, “Even if I learn the language, the Imperial courtiers would all know at a glance or a word that I did not belong in those halls, not even to visit the kittens.”
