At the Feet of the Sun (Lays of the Hearth-Fire, #2)

by Victoria Goddard

Ghilly laughed. “This was much funnier.”

“You called him beloved,” Ludvic said quietly. “I heard you. You’ve loved him for a long time, Cliopher, but you did not call him that before you left.”

The Islander language is … compounding, I guess you could say. Words radiate out from the seed-meaning.

hebrew coded

He had dreamed his whole life of a fanoa, of his fanoa, and at last he had reached him, and been met as an equal.

The tanà shows the Islanders who they are,” he said, and he knew he was right—his whole life had led to this moment—it had to have led here—“and the tana-tai shows them who they can be.”

“Of course not,” Ludvic said simply. “He is like you. Changing course according to the conditions, but always aimed in the direction of his heart’s desire.”

and he looked up to see that Fitzroy was standing at the open door. He had heard quite a bit of the conversation, he must have; he was just barely not weeping, his eyes shining and his hand over his mouth.

and went downstairs to the bathhouse, where he and the iguana had a somewhat contentious negotiation over who got to use the shower.

“Galen and I are so glad you’ve finally acknowledged your fanoa. Everyone’s always told us it’s old-fashioned, you know—‘no one does that any more’—‘don’t be like Kip and go off chasing viaus’—whoops!” She giggled. “But they do say that, you know.”

“And somehow you resisted all the terrible innuendoes and never even smirked.

“Yes,” she replied, half-mockingly, half-sincerely. “We can set a new fashion. I bet more people will follow Galen and me, it’s easier to run a restaurant than the whole world.”

and yes, they knew they were supposed to be leaving Kip alone while they were ‘mending their sails’, but they’d seen the vaha, its sails were perfectly usable.

“Where are they all coming from?” Fitzroy whispered

“I think,” she said frankly, “that everyone says you were a little strange before. But they also say you made everything better, so I guess it’s okay to be strange. Good-bye!”

and since there wasn’t an island there I raised one for him …” “As you do,” Mardo said, his lips twitching.

“I’m going to spin threads of starlight from your new star to string them on,” Fitzroy declared. “Is that a new skill?” Ludvic asked politely,

“Well, My Lord,” Cliopher said, “may I take those, please?” “That’s the iguana!” Fitzroy called from outside.

and you sly thing, dropping such dramatic pronouncements as ‘my hair has grown out by a good foot’ into the middle of your metaphysical vision-quest or whatever it was—I hope you are taking excellent care of it.

there is iconoclasm and then there is fucking the icon.

LMAOOOOOOOOOOOO

but then there is another part of me that acknowledges (what have you people done to me) that it would probably do him a world of good to get done and also that you’d be the best person to do it, by which I mean him.

LMAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO PLEASEEEEEEEEEEE

The letter from his mother was long—very long, he found as he unfolded page after page, glued together accordion-style for some unfathomable reason—and

Cliopher shrugged. “He turned into a crow and flew away, but I think he’ll probably join us when we go out.” Ludvic tilted his head. “He turned into a crow?”

And good shoulders, too,

And I had a vision, a dream, of someone—a boy with bandaged hands, opening Aurora and—and—” He caught his breath, as if he were barely a moment away from sobbing. “And loving it,” said Cliopher, swallowing hard.

“and then we can talk about your interpretations and why almost all of them were wrong.”

Fitzroy gave him a burning, gloriously amused look, the sort that had made everyone fall in love with him. But Cliopher was the one he had chosen back.

“Obviously, the ones you wrote in your exhortation about the poet laureate were the more correct. But the ones from when you were a teenager are much funnier.”

so true!!!!!

“Two celestial fanoa for the fanoa down below.”

“They made fanoa mean what they needed it to.” He smiled, looking up at the windows of Fitzroy’s solarium, which were catching the faint peachy and lavender and dove-grey tints of dawn. “Just as we will.”

“You’ve got it bad, boy,”

tehehe

And a woman to keep you hopping, men really aren’t the same.

pls????

oh, this is good. This is very good. Because I bet you—oh! You’re also the lord emperor, aren’t you?” “Alas, yes.” “No, no, that’s perfect, because you know about magic. Kip’s never read any philosophy of magic, he always used to say ‘why do I need to know about magic, I have the Lays’, but he’s also the man who said ‘just don’t think about time,’and really, Fitzroy, he can’t get his own way all the time, can he?” “I understand,” Fitzroy said even more gravely, “that it’s bad for the character.”

fine, Ludvic, I’ll start pacing—why

“Kip,” said Fitzroy, “what are you even writing? I’m not saying anything!”

he’s so drama!

meeting Fitzroy’s gaze with as much guilelessness as he could demonstrate while he wrote down their words.

His voice could have seduced the Moon or half the Nine Worlds into following him.

Oh, thought Cliopher, very clearly: There it is.

He managed to keep a straight face through a dozen increasingly hilarious innuendos, supposedly the first conversation between Aurelius and Elonoa’a, until Fitzroy dropped euphemism and began outright description.

he’s soooooo silly!

“You disagree with the plantain? Trust me.” “To know what is most poetically appealing?” “That too, of course,” Fitzroy replied very serenely.

Cliopher stared disbelievingly at him. “You’re going to make up an erotic epic about Elonoa’a and Aurelius Magnus.”

but I wanted to be sure I’d be accurate. Auri and I had a fun afternoon collecting various bananas to compare.”

PLSSS

“I was not involved in measuring anyone’s penis,” Cliopher exclaimed in exasperation, which was the point where Ludvic finally broke down into laughter.

Because he wasn’t Aurelius Magnus, was he?” “I’m not providing comparative measurements,” Cliopher said desperately. “You can get your own banana scale.” “I beg your pardon?” Toucan said. “I am fascinated by what could possibly have led to that response.”

LMAOOOO

A harp strung with starlight and shadow sounds very fine, doesn’t it?”

“No, Fitzroy, you put it behind your left ear if you’re single—your right if you’re taken.” Fitzroy gave Cliopher a very brilliant look and carefully moved the flower to his right ear.

tehehehehehe

“Don’t hurt yourself,” Toucan whispered. “He’ll still be there tomorrow.”

“Although I can imagine that there might be parts of my new epic I’d like to keep a surprise …”

😳👀

“Dad left his keys somewhere, so Mum’s sending me everywhere to look for them and I’m missing the party—” Clio stopped looking under the sink and looked slowly and suspiciously up. “Uncle Kip?”

“Uncle Kip and, er, Dad said I shouldn’t call you Uncle Fitzroy but you are, aren’t you? More or less?” Fitzroy, visibly choked up, nodded speechlessly.

🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

Clio nodded with complete unconcern for upending someone’s world. “Great. I thought so.

i love him sm