ADMAT WAS MERCIFUL. I wonder if he may grant me more time in a month.
Nia, who is at my elbow, bows to me, her face awed. She backs out of the courtyard.
Pado and Mati and I smile at one another.
“See how happy we are to have a month.” Mati wipes her eyes. “A month.”
“Hush,” Pado says. “We’re grateful, Admat.”
I swallow my tears. I will not spend my last month weeping. “Don’t cry, Mati. Did I get dirt on the tunic?”
“Mati . . . Pado . . . the wedding. We’ll miss the priestess’s song.” I’m dressed, but they must change their clothes.
“Never mind the song,” Mati says. “Come with me.” She takes my hand and leads me away.
In the family storeroom I stand close to her while she bends over to open a small basket. She says something. I can’t concentrate. I hear caravan, exchange, and horse. Horses are valuable. I’ve never seen a caravan. I wonder if I’ll see one before— I choke off the thought.
Mati opens the basket. Inside is a necklace, which glitters. My vision blurs.
Mati holds the necklace out to me. “Put it on.”
Her hands seem to wag back and forth. I feel as if I’m underwater. Mouth open, I suck in air.
“Put it on.”
I grasp Mati’s arm to keep from fainting again. She pulls me into her. I feel the necklace against my neck and smell her clove perfume. I don’t know how long we cling. My dizziness comes and goes in waves.
Eventually I feel better and draw away. “Give me the necklace.”
She puts it into my hands in a jumble. My hands drop an inch because I don’t expect the weight. I untangle the jumble. Blue and orange gems alternate with gold beads.
“It was for your wedding day.” She cups my chin in her hands. “Put it on. Wear it today. My love, wear it today.”
While I fumble with the clasp, she searches through a pile of baskets until she finds the one she wants. This one holds a pair of earrings, each one a gold crescent moon hung with gold cones. “These were my mati’s. Put them on too.”
I do. At the wedding I’ll be more bejeweled than the bride.
Mati digs through more baskets. “Everyone will remember my beautiful daughter.”
“Mati?”
She looks up from her search, more jewelry in her hands.
“Did Admat choose me because Aunt Fedo uses a cane, and I don’t have a blemish?” Sacrificial animals must be without a blemish or they’re not acceptable to Admat.
“Admat’s ways—” She’s crying too hard to finish. The bracelets in her hands clank against one another.
Admat’s ways are unknowable. We can’t understand his plan, which is always for the best.
She holds out a copper arm bracelet and two silver ones plus a gold ankle bracelet. “Wear everything. People will speak of you forever.”
I nod and put on the bracelets. Mati ties my hair with a ribbon of hammered copper.
Before we leave for the wedding, I run to my room and roll up one of my favorite rugs as a wedding gift, since the rug I was working on isn’t ready. In this rug, two full-grown date palms stand side by side, their fronds mingling. Next to them are two baby date palms, one a little taller than the other. They are a family, and the mati and pado wouldn’t grow so close and share the rainfall if their love weren’t strong.
I’m proud of this rug because of my workmanship on the overlapping fronds. Admat! That was hard to do.
Pado and Mati are waiting for me in the reception room. They have put on street faces. Neither one is crying, but their expressions are grim.
“Come,” I say. “I’m alive today. Please don’t grieve yet.”