It Was a Holy Day - 1. It Was a Holy Day

“Has Uncle Prude come yet?” Torzet asked of his brothers and cousin as he pulled the frock over his head and settled it smoothly over his shoulders.

“He’s been here and gone,” Alvaz told his elder brother, “and noted your tardiness. You are not going to get to sing another one. His ship arrived late last night.”

“I’ll bet he’s discussing it with the priests now,” Windal chimed in, taunting his elder brothers and elbowing his cousin, Matov, in the side as he did.

Matov usually did not join in the brothers’ bickering unless invited, like this, so he grinned, crossed his arms and asked his cousin, “So, just what were you doing to cause yourself to be late this of all mornings?”

Alvaz hooted and slapped Matov’s back then turned to his brother, “Yes, my brother, where were you, exactly? Are you still next in line or will the curse jump from Uncle Prude to me?”

“Ha! By the time our Uncle is finally bound I will have a son old enough to perform the rituals,” Torzet said with scorn.

“Rix isn’t that bad,” Matov said quietly to the backs of the others as they filed out. As youngest, he went last.

“He’s not bad. He’s so odd though, don’t you think? Him being Unbound and all and nearly twenty-five? Mamma says if he remains Unbound for much longer, he will go crazy. It has happened in the past. Going crazy might be the best way to go…. Not that I want him to go crazy,” Windal said.

“Perhaps I already am,” Rix said from the back of the line, interrupting the boys’ conversation, “and you all just don’t know it yet.”

“Are what?” Matov asked grinning.

“Crazy!” Rix grinned back and shooed the boys ahead of him to begin the procession that would end with the Ritual of the Sunrise, the job of the eldest unbound male, Rix’s job. One he would be more than happy to give over to anyone else if it were possible without shackling himself to someone he did not want to be with.

Rix and his nephews entered the temple in quite the orderly fashion with solemn expressions and proper mannerisms for such an important ritual. Nothing else would do. The boys walked two by two up the aisle with the elder boys in front and the younger in back and Rix in the center forming something of a cross pattern. Rix carried the altar cloth for the Ritual of the Sunrise and each of the boys carried a holy item. The walk was a short one up a flight of stairs with the entire family in attendance along with every sycophant in the palace. High Holy Days were decreed mandatory attendance that only guard duty, severe illness, or childbearing could get a person out of attending. Rix could count the Holy Days he had missed on one hand since he joined the procession when he was five. Then when he began leading them at about Matov’s age, there had only been one. Torzet was perfectly capable of singing the part. He occasionally gloated over the fact too, but then again, so were any of the others.

Rix found his mind drifting to the day when his twenty-year-old cousin found himself suddenly bound to a woman twice his age. She even had children near his cousin’s age. He came to the practice in tears and took Rix to the top of the stair then they both tried to step through. Rix found he was able to pass the final barrier, but his cousin was not. When they came back down the stair, his cousin gave him the tokens of his new rank. The sadness in his cousin’s eyes was something he would never forget. It was something he had avoided much to everyone’s displeasure. Moreover, it was something he would continue to avoid for as long as possible, Rix determined as Torzet and Alvaz crossed the first threshold. He went to take the step, but felt a force field keeping him back. Puzzled, he nodded to Windal and Matov go on, handing Matov the altar cloth.

As Matov went to step through he paused, “Is everything all right, Rix?” he asked.

“Fine, I think. Tell Torzet he will have to ascend this morning, I think the gods have finished with me.”

“He’s the Eldest Unbound now?”

“Seems so.”

“But who is your Bound?”

Rix laughed because the only other thing he could manage right now would be to cry and that just would not do. “I don’t know, Matov. Now go on so he can finish. I’m sure he’s curious as to what is taking me so long.”

Rix would have tried to sneak away, but there was nowhere to hide, nowhere to run, and no way not to face his entire family who would have seen and heard it was not him performing the ritual. He had no clue to whom he had Bound. Mentally he tried to put together a list of people he slept with since the last time he faced this boundary. It was a very short list. No wonder the boys called him Uncle Prude behind his back. Rix sighed.

Rix waited at the top step. It was all he could do until the ritual was over. Then, without looking at or speaking to the boys, he preceded them back down the stair. It went without saying there would be questions. However, he did not expect the pandemonium that broke out. No one could have expected that. The fact that the barbs started with Torzet hurt most of all. Halfway down the stair there was a snigger behind him, and a hastily whispered rebuke. He would have almost sworn the voices were of Alvaz and Matov, which meant the snigger, had to have been Torzet.

A few steps later came the words, just at a level where he could hear them, “I guess ‘Uncle Prude’ isn’t such a ‘Prude’ after all.”

“Is she ugly, Rix?” Windal whispered to Rix’s back, “or old?”

Rix felt his back stiffen as the younger boy joined his brother in the taunting, but felt a bit satisfied when he heard the younger boy grunt. Matov truly had his back; it was a shame the boy was fourth in line for his heir. Rix would have to research and see if there was a way to change that order due to – well anything.

Then again, he could always have a son of his own. He was Bound now. It was an option. A smile spread across his face as the thought took root about the same time as he hit the bottom of the stair. The anteroom was ahead and on the other side the entire family would be waiting. He may never have another chance to do this. He turned on his heel with the boys still on the stairs behind him and spread his arms denying them passage.

“Enjoy your time as Eldest Unbound, Torzet. Know that now that I am Bound, whether my Bound is old or ugly, I am still heir and any child that I produce – with any willing partner -- will supplant you as heir. Even if that child were female, her sons will come before you as heirs. Your time to shine is limited. Your power is limited. Your influence is limited. Learn your lessons well, boy. Bond well with the choices you are given, and remember your place in my father’s court while you pray you have one in mine.”

Then Rix looked at the other three before turning on his heel again and entering the anteroom, stripping off the religious garment for the last time as he did so. It felt slightly odd to exit the anteroom in his own garments knowing he would never enter that room again except to maybe take his son there one day. Then again, his father did not take him, but left that job to one of his cousins.

He was correct in thinking he would not get a moment to think once he left the anteroom. He opened the door to face Sophim and Gilban.

“Your esteemed father ‘requested’ we escort you to his presence, my prince,” Sophim informed Rix with a grin, “he sent two of us in the event you should attempt to flee.”

“We were given direction to ‘knock some sense into you and drag you before him if necessary’,” Gilban snorted. “We do hope it won’t be necessary. It does set a bad example for the young ones who already display enough airs for courtesans thrice their years.”

“I’ll go willingly,” Rix told them, “I know my duty and I won’t be dragged before my father to face it.” With that, he stepped past Gilban, but Sophim stepped alongside him.

“I knew my duty too, Anarix. Yet when the day came to face it, I wanted to run to the hills and howl at the moon, and your sister is among the most comely of women. We know nothing of your bound. Maybe I should at least walk here and Gilban walk there,” he indicated the other side, “so that if the animal in you decides to run we can help you subdue him.”

“I thank you, my brother, for your wise words and kind thoughts,” Rix said as he submitted to Sophim’s authority according to his father’s will. “You should be proud of Matov. He is a fine boy. You’ve done a fine job raising him.”

Sophim smiled. “It wasn’t just me. Quite a bit of that was your sister’s doing.”

It was not a long walk, or a complicated one, to reach his father, who was unusually accompanied by the queen and surrounded by all three of Rix’s sisters, the one brother-in-law that was not sent to fetch him, a dozen or so courtesans, and his mother. Sophim and Gilban led Rix right up to King Quaret and Queen Pavicia, where they made a show of bowing deeply to their monarchs. Rix inclined his head for a moment then met his father’s eye.

“Father.”

“Anarix. It seems to us this morning there was a new Singer at the Ritual of the Sunrise. Do you have some news you would like to share?”

“It seems the gods have grown bored with my voice and have chosen the vocal repertoire of a younger virtuoso. I do wish Torzet the best during his indenture and pray for him it is a short one.”

“Just bored?” Quaret asked his last surviving son.

Rix shrugged, “The general idea is that I am now Bound, but to be quite honest the list of possible people I could be Bound to is fairly short and I have no idea which of them to call upon first to ask if it might be them.”

“How short, Anarix, dear?” Pavicia asked.

Rix thought a moment, “I can’t think of a single person with whom I have intentionally shared both blood and semen. There are four with whom I have shared either blood or semen, that I may have possibly and without intent shared the other and one person that I vaguely recall…” Rix smiled at the memory, “who…” he blushed slightly, “but I don’t recall…” His eyes widened a little as he looked at Jozet then at Sophim, “Oh!”

“You have a name for us?”

“No. No. No name.” Rix shook his head, “I need to think. That night is a little fuzzy.”

“Which night, dear?” the Queen inquired.

“Gilban’s bachelor night,” Rix admitted at a whisper.

“That long ago?” Quaret bellowed, glaring from his son to his sons-in-law. “An unclaimed Bound from what is now five? Six? Weeks ago? That can harm the poor girl’s psyche. What if she thinks you don’t want her Anarix, even though you can now have no other?”

Rix looked thoughtful for a few moments. “I have no answers for you, Father. I do not believe I have rejected anyone, or made anyone feel rejected. If…” he looked toward Sophim for support, but Sophim would not meet his eyes, “if it is the person of whom I am thinking, well, I need to go back there. Otherwise, I may never find them.”

“How will you find her son?”

Rix looked uncertain. “I… I don’t know.”

“I do not like this, Anarix,” his father said, “Take a full guard. There are things you cannot possibly understand and that cannot be explained to you alone. If you were truly Bound just before Gilban and Elmera’s marriage, then you must find the young woman you have bound yourself to before the moon turns again. If you can’t find her by then,” Quaret looked over at Pavicia, who blanched but nodded, just once, “we will have to declare you Bound to the gods themselves and declare Torzet our heir in all rights.”

“Yes, Father. Before the moon turns again. May I have leave to begin now then? I have no time to waste.”

“Go, son, with our love,” his mother responded from her place at the side of the queen before Quaret could come up with any response. Rix took that for a dismissal and fled with as much decorum as he could muster in the middle of a breakdown. Gilban and Elmera followed.

He did not stop until he was in his quarters with the doors closed. Once there, he flung himself across his bed, grabbed a pillow, and attempted to strangle it. He heard the door open and close and knew who it had to be. His guess was confirmed when a familiar weight dropped on the bed next to him.

“Remind me when I am king that I do not know all about all and most especially remind my Bound not to ‘yes, dear’ me, ever. You may tell him that I have given him full permission to disagree with me on the day that I found out that I was his and he was mine because that was something he would not be able to disagree with, ever.” Rix squeezed the pillow. “I HATE this archaic method of mate finding. Look for the one that smells right, feels right, tastes right. See if you are physically compatible. Then and only then, if the gods bless your union you will be Bound. But what if the people involved aren’t emotionally ready to be Bound? Or interested?”

“Can you truly say that Rix?” Elmera asked her elder brother. “Can you honestly say you are not emotionally ready to be Bound?”

Rix only nodded into the pillow.

“I don’t know what goes on in that head of yours. You are fully grown, Rix. It’s time you began acting it. Father deserves his heir to have an heir. He went through such pains to get you,” Elmera chided her brother. “Honestly I think this is the best thing that could have happened. Even if the way it happened is kind of… sucky.”

Gilban crossed his arms and looked at Rix, “Your father keeps us close for now, but we all know that when it’s your rule that we will have to find other places to live. Or, we must learn to integrate ourselves into your court. And while some of us are trying to be your friend and confidant, others, well they are promoting their own interests.”

“Torzet is becoming such a little tyrant, that’s his mother’s doing isn’t it? Did you know she tried to drown me while I was still in the nursery? Then when Torzet was born, she would not leave me alone with him until he came into my care as my heir. Then he always had a guard nearby, in case he fell, or something terrible happened. You would think she didn’t trust me with my own nephew.”

“It’s a little of Jozet’s too. A second born son marrying a first born daughter isn’t really a step up,” Gilban added. “He has high aspirations for his sons. Now did I hear you correctly when you said we were looking for a him?”

“Yes, I think so,” Rix looked up from the pillow. “He’s the only one of my recent liaisons that makes any sense. I remember his scent. Gods he smelled so right that night I just wanted to take him and he did not resist. I didn’t have time for protection and I did not want to stop, in fact, I wanted to never stop. Jozet found us clinging together in the back alley like schoolboys having our first tryst and he said it was time to go. I vaguely remember there being blood, but I do not know if it were his or mine. I know I didn’t use any protection, nor did he although he released between us.”

“So, you are telling us that our eldest sister’s husband found you in a possible state of being bound and disrupted you?” Elmera said slowly and with more than a little malice in her voice.

“I’m saying it’s possible. I got his number. I had planned on going back, or calling, but…” Rix scooted across the bed to his nightstand and pulled out a folded sheet of Space Corps memo paper, there was an unreadable name scrawled across the paper and a number that looked local to the area they were in that night. “I came down with that illness right after coming back from the space station and was quarantined.”

“For the wedding no less,” his sister reminded him.

“Then Father has kept me busy on the far side of the sector and I couldn’t escape. I’ve felt no different with none of the signs of Bonding everyone schooled me to watch for. I thought maybe I had escaped again or the gods wanted me after all because I was going to go crazy eventually if I didn’t bond, all the histories say so.”

“There have been signs,” Elmera told him. Gilban nodded his agreement.

“You’ve become quite a bit more assertive, Rix. In our meetings you’ve taken control and not given it back.”

“Really?”

“Truly. We were waiting for you to announce her, or him, when you came home or this morning at least.”

“We didn’t know you were as in the dark about this as Father or we would have helped you before now.”

“So, how can we help you, big brother?”

Rix smiled. “Can I borrow your husband for a few weeks?”

Elmera grinned at him then reached over and tweaked his nose. “Yes, but only because you have one of your own now.”

All three of them laughed. It was something they had always done easily together but rarely had the chance. Rix was glad they had the chance now, because he did not think he would be having another one any time soon.

With the guards and baggage his father insisted he drag along, it took Rix nearly three agonizing days to get back to the little party sector of the space station where he found his partner. They arrived in the late afternoon and had no problems checking into the hotel rooms. Their group took up a whole floor in the assigned wing of their hotel. Rix had a room that adjoined with Gilban’s. He was not sure whose idea it was to put him in there, but he was just glad it was not a guard on the other side of the door when he looked. Gilban at least would respect his privacy somewhat as the polite knock sounding now proved.

“Enter.”

“So, do you want to give that number a ring?” Gilban asked pointing to the phone on the side table.

“No?” Rix said as he sat on the edge of the bed and rummaged through one of his personal bags.

“Aw, come on now, it won’t be that bad. What is the absolute worst that can happen?”

“He can say sod off.”

“Which just means you get to knock him on the head and we can drag him home to meet your father before setting him free again, yes?” Gilban asked as he picked up the phone. “Call.”

Rix took the archaic "landline" and dialed the numbers, but there was a recording. He stared at the device in disbelief. “The number is no good.”

“What?” Gilban asked as he took the device from Rix’s hand and dialed it himself. Indeed, there was a recording -- the number had been disconnected. “But it had been connected at one time, which means there are records. We can access those records and get his name. It might take a little time, but we can do it.”

Rix nodded trembling slightly, “It’s no good, Gilban. What if he didn’t want me at all? What if… what if I was only a…”

“So what Anarix? For all the gods Above, Below, and In-between! Do you think you would be the first idiot Bound into an unwanted pairing? It is done and there is nothing you can do about it but smile, appear to be happy, and get on with your life.”

“Are you happy Gilban?” Rix looked up at his friend, his golden eyes brimming with tears.

“Yes, Rix, I am happy. When we were children, I loved your sister nearly as much as I loved you and when… well I’m glad if it could not have been you that it was her. But right now, we have to find your young man. We know he’s connected to the Space Corps. Not too many of our kind connected to the Space Corps.”

“No, not too many,” Rix repeated, “if he were our kind.”

Gilban looked at him oddly. “What do you mean?”

“I should be able to sense him if he were near, if the bond were working properly. I should be able to do a lot of things according to my lessons. But none of them are working. I can’t feel him at all.”

“That’s never happened before.”

“There are lots of people not like us working for Space Corps.”

“Heaping lots.”

“They have a research station near here,” Rix said, “with people from all over the universe stationed there. Easy transport from there to here for a weekend off.”

“You looked into it?”

“Had three days and little else to do while the guard got ready to mobilize. I requested a list of people who visited their sick bay for two weeks after our night. They’re supposed to be sending it by tonight.”

“Why did you do that?”

“In case the number didn’t work. I still can’t read the name, can you?”

Gilban shook his head. “He needs penmanship lessons.”

They laughed.

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