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Birdsong woke Beartongue before dawn, and she remembered that she was alone.
She rolled over on her side in bed, facing the narrow, high window. The night dark sky was faintly smudged with something pale, down near the horizon. Istvhan was likely asleep still, in the arms of the massive and curvaceous woman that his fellow paladin Galen had described to Beartongue. Was it jealousy, to think this thought?
No, but it's nonsense.
She had to let her lover go, before something that had been warm and living became dead and mummified. To the member of her flock, the man who had protected her and all the members of the White Rat's temple in Archenhold, it was only a farewell, nothing permanent. He still served the White Rat where he was. He might come back again sometime, with or without the redoubtable and mighty Clara, and she would greet him with a smile.
Wouldn't she?
She gave up. None of her arguments were soothing her ragged heart. Instead she recited prayers to herself, but they weren't the solace she sought either. At last she admitted that the air coming through the window was chill, even though by the middle of the day, the summer's heat would make her wish for this coolness. It was the nature of a human being to be dissatisfied with current conditions, but to hell with philosophy. She got up and dug out a heavy, shapeless jersey that had belonged to her grandmother. It had been a soft mauve, but now it was more or less grey. She wrapped it around herself, pulled out a book of decidedly non-religious poetry, and huddled into her armchair, reading away the time until she could expect anyone else to be awake.
The darkness in the window receded, replaced by a clear yellow light, and the birdsong grew louder and busier. Beartongue could hear the faint noises of the servants of the temple starting to go about their business. It was high time she did so herself. She stripped off the jersey and her bed-shift, sponged herself down, dried her skin. The growing light revealed her lanky body, what curves she had ever had pared away by time, her skin no longer as fresh and rosy.
Her impatience with her self-pity pushed out of her in an exasperated breath. Look at these clothes, all made or provided for you by your devoted followers! This shift, as soft as anything ever worn by a noblewoman. These drawers, in linen too expensive for a workingwoman. These silken stockings, and these carefully fitted shoes of bleached leather. These beautifully embroidered vestments, even though they are simply day robes and not my festival best!
The embroidery finally broke her mood. The whimsical little rats, white on cream, frolicking along the collar, down the front, and then 'round the hem. All this love directed toward her! And here she was mourning the departure of one man. It was a new day, with the sky growing bluer by the moment and the smell of new bread stealing into her room.
Abruptly, Beartongue laughed until she cried. Then she splashed her face with cold water, patted it dry, and left her room for the refectory. Several others were breaking their fast early: Zale, Rigney, Francis, Judith, Gramm.
"Good morning, bishop," said Rigney. Gramm left his seat and went to the kitchen door. "Annot!' he called. "The bishop's ready for her breakfast!"
Rigney pulled out the chair at Beartongue's usual place, and she thanked him as she seated herself. "What have we on the docket today?" she asked.
"A broken pump at Old Bakery Square. No one seems to know whose business is it to see it fixed, let alone pay for it. A fire last night on River Street: contained, but two families are now homeless … ."
In so many ways, this morning was the same at any morning in the Temple of the White Rat. And yet every incident, every person involved, was unique. Time's river flowed on, different from second to second. A time to build up, a time to tear down. A time to love, and a time to say farewell.
Her mind left the tired groove it had been wearing since dawn, and in a second her thoughts were busy with names, places, problems, solutions.
Bishop Beartongue spent another second to thank her god for giving her work to do and resources with which to do it, and then plunged wholeheartedly into the day.