“But to understand all that, you have to
understand how she got to be queen.
“The old queen, Disidaya, when she ascended
the throne after King Ganafa passed beyond, she chose as her successor, her spiritual son, a warrior, according to tradition. After every priestess a warrior, and
after every warrior a priestess. The successor rules by the emperor’s side, and the
succession is peaceful. In this way our kingdom stays secure, and balanced,
age by age.
“Prince Komfo, Lord of Sage Virtue, as the new successor
styled himself, seemed a good choice. He’d tamed the hill tribes of east,
made them orderly vassals. He’d broken the revolt in the delta and persuaded
the traitors to surrender their leaders without firing single arrow. My father
was there, a foot soldier, at the walls of Gajafar. He said only Komfo would
dream of marching in with three armies, and marching away an avowed friend of
the city. Only Komfo.
“That campaign made him—and that campaign undid him. It
marked him in every eye as a man worthy to rule. His name rose higher than even
Disidaya’s that year. But he hadn’t just bargained with Gajafar as general of three
armies and a worthy friend. He came to them as one of them, as a follower of
the cult of the Western Sun. That detail was suppressed back in the capital. No
one wanted to call the nation’s hero an infidel. Maybe some people hoped it
was a fad, a passion of youth. Some of the generals, I know, harbored Sun
sympathies of their own. Regardless, at Komfo’s coronation Queen Disidaya led him in
the Prayer of the Faithful, and he repeated every word, in sight of the whole
nation. She adopted him her son, and crowned him emperor-elect.
“But Disidaya must have known what he was. By the time I joined the
Capital Legion, it was an open secret among them. He took a wife from the Gajafar,
and the Sun clerics visited her in his home. Before long they walked openly in
the palace itself.
“At that time my uncle, my mother’s brother, gained his
seniority, and he secured a spot for me in the Temple Guard. It was a life’s
ambition of my mother’s to see me there. They posted me at the Widow’s Court—and
that was where I first laid eyes on Her Holiness, Danafreya. I knew her for my
future queen the moment I saw her.
“She had a light in her. Of course every priestess should
receive the Light on her ordination; but in Danafreya you could actually see it
shining out of her. She walked like a queen, but she was a mother to every
widow and orphan who came to the Temple. Farmer or merchant or warrior or drudge,
it made no difference. She was young for a minister of such an important
partition, and such a difficult one, always better honored than funded. The
other councilors praised her for doing it with such ease. But I knew how late
she worked every night, and how early every morning she rose to prayers. I have
known many a petty priestess, many an venal priest in my time as a fighting
man. But Danafreya was a true instrument of the Great Good. Her faith was so
great … she made me believe.
“By this time Prince Komfo’s paganism was public
knowledge. There was no hiding it, when he was funding missionaries to spread
his ancient folly all over the land. Warriors who idolized the
emperor-elect converted to his faith. Farmers who still loved the People’s Hero
allowed rock altars to be piled on their hilltops, and their sons to wear the Sun
men’s white sash to market. Queen Disidaya could turn a blind eye no longer. Not
for the sake of the kingdom, and not for the sake of the faith. She called
Komfo to the palace altar room, threw the windows open to the sun, and locked
the two of them inside. It was a challenge: the two of them would stay in that
room and pray, day and night, with no food, no allies, only their faith and
whatever succor their gods could provide. The would stay until one relented—or until one died.
“By nightfall half the leading warriors were calling on
all soldiers to retreat from the palace, and from the temple. A lot
of them obeyed, out of loyalty, or out of fear. We faithful remained. And
Disidaya and Komfo kept to their vigil.
“Days passed—weeks. According to tradition, Disidaya and
Komfo refused all food, allowing only water and weak wine into the chamber.
There were rumors everywhere: Old
Disidaya is weakening and strong Komfo would prevail. Disidaya’s faith preserves
her and Komfo had begun to faint. The Warriors cried that Disidaya had
betrayed her son and tried to rile the people against her. But the farmers have
long memories for rain and plenty, and they called her Wise Mother, and stayed at
home. The craftsmen care nothing for the sun, or warrior pride. The merchants
will offend no one who might enrich them. Only the northern delta declared for
the mighty Sun King. But alas, their sea vessels draw too great a draft to reach
the capital. So the warriors had to wait, to see who would emerge triumphant, sure
that it must be Komfo the brave at last.
“Thirty days passed, and no one entered the chamber, and
no one left. The faithful flooded the temple, offering prayers for the nation. The
loyalists paraded through, to be seen showing support. Finally, on the thirty-first
day, a cry rose up from palace quarter, and spread through the whole city. Disidaya had emerged. Disidaya lived. Long
live Disidaya.
“Komfo’s body was delivered to his people that very
night, in view of the whole capital. There was no injury on him, though he had
withered to half his once-great size. Many whispered afterward that he had a
dark spot on his chest, in the shape of a blackened sun. About that, I don’t
know. I didn’t see him. I was at the temple.
“The warriors’ opposition, of course, collapsed. The Sun
cult retreated back to the delta, and for two weeks the nation celebrated our
queen’s great honor and victory.
“At the end of the festival, the warriors brought new
candidates before the queen. They were the most pious men from among
our tribe, and women too, every one loyal throughout the crisis. But she spurned them
all. She declared that Komfo had polluted the kingdom with his heresy, and that
only a ruler of supreme holiness could set our land aright. She declared that rule
must pass back to the priestesses another term—for the sake of the nation’s
soul.
“In my father’s day it would have meant nothing short of
civil war. But Komfo’s collapse had gelded the warriors. The farmers and the
lower classes loved nothing and no one but Disidaya, and against them all the warriors dared not
stir. So Disidaya chose a priestess for her new successor: the most holy from among the
holy class, the Mother of Orphans, Danafreya.”
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