“Cururunelvia?”
A couple of small pink petals danced through the open window.
Cururunelvia didn’t wake up again.
We took Cururunelvia’s coffin to the island’s graveyard. A huge crowd had gathered to say their final farewells, and there were many tears. Sniffling and weeping could be heard from every quarter. A few people, unable to contain themselves, fell to their knees.
Only two people there weren’t crying: me, and Cururunelvia’s student.
“Riviere,” the student said as she stood and stared at the coffin. “Did the mistress have any last words for me?”
Once Cururunelvia was bedridden, her student had taken on the bulk of her actual work and had had very little time to spend with her teacher.
I nodded. “There was one thing she wanted me to tell you.”
“What?”
“That it’s in your hands now.”
After a pause, the young woman said, “I see.”
We didn’t cry, nor would we. Not because we weren’t sad. Not because it didn’t hurt. But because she had entrusted us with what came after.
“And did she say anything to you?” the other woman asked me.
“She did.”
“What was it?”
Instead of answering, I silently closed my eyes. I felt as if, by doing that, I could meet her anytime I wanted. The days I spent with Cururunelvia lived again in my imagination.
“I remembered,” the Cururunelvia in my memory said softly. It had been one day when she was watching the seasons go by from the window of her sickroom; summer had passed, and the colors outside were fading.
I cocked my head. “Remembered what?”
“The rest of my dream.”
“Tell me about it.” I leaned forward ever so slightly.
Her expression grew softer as she spoke. “You see, I’ve always had this wish. I wanted to found a country where people could live in peace. People who have made bad choices, people who have been persecuted. Even people who move along an entirely different ‘timeline’ from those around them. A country where people of every status and tribe could greet each other with a smile.”
“Yes, you told me.”
And she had achieved it. Cururunelvia, the land of prayer, where we now stood, was the realization of her dream.
“But one thing I never pictured there was myself. I can’t oversee this country’s development or support its people.” She had been suffering with her illness for far too long.
“That’s why you created the sancta, right?”
“That’s right.”
The ability to make wishes and have them granted was proof that Cururunelvia had lived; it was precisely what made this country unique. You could even argue that these objects would oversee the country’s development and support its people on her behalf. It might not be an exaggeration to say that the sancta were Cururunelvia herself.
“Riviere…,” she said.
“What is it?” I asked.
“When I’m gone, would you watch over the sancta for me?”
“What does that even mean, ‘watch over’?”
“Exactly what it sounds like.” She turned and gazed at the scenery outside the window. “Keep watch over them so that people can maintain an appropriate distance from the sancta.”
“I still don’t follow.”
“As time passes, there may be people who forget the proper way to use sancta. There may be people who suffer alone, without turning to what could help them. There might even be people who use sancta for nefarious ends. I want you to show people the right way to use sancta, so that the world doesn’t become like that.”
She told me that the “appropriate distance” from sancta was not purely to use them for their advantages, but to let them bring people closer to their own lives.
“Maybe I should open a shop that deals in sancta, then.”
“That’s a great idea!” Cururunelvia nodded eagerly.
A shop that specialized in sancta could even help increase the chances that someone might find something to grant their wish without praying themselves. The more ways there were to take the edge off inequality, the more people might be saved.
Plus, if I went into the business of recovering sancta, I could also help apprehend those who sought to work evil with them.
“Maybe I could wish…to entrust you with this country’s future,” Cururunelvia said.
I paused for a long moment, but really, there was only one thing I could say. I could never deny Cururunelvia’s wish.
“Of course,” I said, and I took her hand. Her soft, warm hand.
Its owner gave me a joyful grin.
“It seems she gave both of us burdensome tasks,” Cururunelvia’s student said with a wry but concerned smile.
To her, Cururunelvia had entrusted the running of the country. And to me, she had given the duty to watch over its future. To each of us our respective roles. It was an honor—and at the same time, a terrible weight that I could feel pressing down on me at every moment.
This duty hardly left me a moment to weep.
“Are you all right?” I asked. Even more than myself, I was worried about her, the one tasked with the business of running the country. That’s what led me to suggest, “I would be happy to be your assistant if you’d like. I was helping Cururunelvia, too, and I’m sure I could be useful.”
She, however, shook her head. “Thank you, but no. I can handle it on my own.” She looked straight at me. “You just make sure to fulfill your role to the best of your ability, Riviere. I’m sure that’s what my mistress would have wanted.”
I was quiet. In her words I felt not concern for my well-being but an attempt to distance herself. To me, her dark eyes seemed to convey that she sought no one to help her, wanted nobody at her side.
If she said she was all right on her own, then I wasn’t going to push the matter.
“If you need help, please call me anytime,” I said.
“Thank you very much.” With that studied reply, she turned and walked away. I watched her grow smaller in the distance until she disappeared.
After that, Cururunelvia’s student officially led our country as its second queen. She dressed all in black, as if she were in mourning; her eyes were black, and she tied her black hair with a blue ribbon like the one Cururunelvia had worn.
This woman, black almost from head to toe, was named Carredura.
A name she shared with the person whose shop sold so many sancta of such malice.