Ch 212 A Day to Give

Chapter 212: A Day to Give

I thought of the holiday while looking for a place to put Garrick’s boat.

He had left it in my boot.

Carol had placed a ribbon inside the boat, and the whole arrangement was hidden beneath our bed.

I found it because I was looking for the boot.

Evelyn watched me draw it out.

“Did you put those there?”

“No.”

“Then they’ve made you a gift.”

“Are they expecting one in return?”

“Garrick will want his boat back.”

I set it on the bed. The ribbon was blue, worn at one end from where Carol had carried it.

For a moment, I remembered another room. Caroline had hung colored paper from its ceiling and made me wait outside until she was finished.

“What is it?” Evelyn asked.

“I was thinking of a holiday from home.”

We talked after the children were asleep.

“There were decorations,” I told her. “Green branches indoors. Lights. People gave one another gifts.”

“On whose birthday?”

“That depends on whom you asked. My family kept it together because it gave us a reason to make the dark part of winter feel warm.”

Evelyn tucked the blanket around Garrick.

“Caroline liked it?”

“She started preparing before anyone else thought it was time.”

“What did she give you?”

“One year, a little box she had made. It was meant for keeping important things.”

“Did you use it?”

“She filled it with her things before I could.”

Evelyn laughed softly.

“She said I wasn’t using it enough,” I added.

Aurelia came to breakfast the next morning carrying one of Mary’s calendars.

I had asked Mary when Aurelia’s birthday was.

Mary had not told me.

She had sent Aurelia to answer for herself.

“You have been asking after my birth,” Aurelia said.

“That sounds more alarming than I intended.”

“What did you intend?”

“A holiday.”

She sat down.

Carol immediately offered her a piece of bread she had already tasted.

Aurelia accepted it.

“When?” she asked.

“On your birthday.”

She looked at me over the bread.

“Why?”

“Because I’d like everyone to have a day to give something to someone else. You brought so many people home. It seems a good day to remember that.”

Aurelia turned a page of the calendar.

“My birthday is in winter,” she said. “Mary knows the date.”

“Mary refused to tell me.”

“She may have wanted to see this conversation.”

Mary, at the far end of the table, continued cutting an apple for Garrick.

“I wanted Aurelia to decide whether she wished it known,” she said.

Aurelia closed the calendar.

“I don’t mind people knowing. I do mind the idea of a whole city being told to bring me presents.”

“They wouldn’t,” I said. “They would give them to one another.”

Her expression softened.

“That is different.”

“It would still be your birthday.”

“It would,” she said.

She sounded uncertain what to do with that.

Melody heard of the idea before noon.

I had told Mary.

Mary had told Evelyn.

Evelyn had mentioned decorations to Helena.

I never found out which of them told Melody.

“You want to hang things from the ceiling again,” she said.

“Not the entire ceiling.”

“You said that before the twins’ birthday.”

“Carol found the ribbon anyway.”

“That was my point.”

She folded her arms.

“What are you calling this holiday?”

“I haven’t decided.”

“Good. Don’t call it Aurelia’s Day unless she asks you to.”

“She won’t.”

“Then we agree on one thing.”

I found Aurelia in the chapel.

She was helping Ada put the patient records onto shelves that had finally been fitted along the wall.

“You needn’t organize your own birthday,” I told her.

“I’m not. I’m putting away papers.”

“That is what Mary says when she’s organizing everything.”

Ada took the next stack before Aurelia could answer.

“She was asking me whether people who travel here have somewhere to sleep in winter,” Ada said.

“That seems a reasonable question.”

“It is,” Aurelia replied. “A holiday would bring visitors.”

“Would that bother you?”

“No. I want us to know where they’ll stay.”

That sounded like Aurelia.

We took the idea to the council.

Mary wanted the date and the name.

Eliza wanted to know whether the watch would keep its usual posts.

“Of course,” I said.

“Then people on duty should be able to take part.”

“We can bring gifts and food to the posts.”

Dorian offered to keep the western beacon that evening. Melody reminded him that volunteering months ahead did not settle the roster.

Eleanor asked where the decorations would come from.

“Green branches,” I said. “Ribbon. Things people already have and want to use.”

“Candles?” Helena asked.

I thought of Carol lifting her cup across a table.

“High above the children.”

“High above more than the children,” Eliza said. “We still have a wooden roof in the hall.”

We agreed to use lanterns.

“What if someone can’t afford a gift?” Liora asked.

“They can make something,” I said.

“And if they have no time?”

“They don’t have to give anything.”

She studied me.

“I want that said plainly when you announce it.”

Mary wrote it down.

Nara suggested a table where anyone could leave a gift without naming who brought it.

“For people who want to give but don’t know to whom,” she said.

“And another place for things someone needs,” Ilyen added.

Evelyn shook her head gently.

“If someone needs blankets or medicine, they should receive them before the holiday.”

“Yes,” Ilyen said. “You’re right.”

“We could still ask what would make the day pleasant,” Nara said.

That, everyone liked.

The question of a name took longer.

Aurelia objected to anything that sounded like worship.

Melody objected to anything that sounded like a council proclamation.

Garrick Valewood listened to six suggestions before offering one of his own.

“The Giving Day.”

Mary wrote it down.

“It is clear,” she said.

“It sounds as though you’re ordering people to give,” Liora replied.

“Winter Welcome?” Sel suggested.

“That could be confused with the first snow,” Veyra said.

“We could hold it on the first snow,” I said.

Aurelia looked at me.

“Then it wouldn’t be on my birthday.”

“That is true.”

She smiled.

“You did begin with a date.”

We left the name open.

Mary did not enjoy that.

I noticed her looking at the empty space on the calendar as the meeting ended.

“You’ll have months to fill it,” I said.

“That does not improve an empty line.”

“You left one for the twins’ second birthday.”

“They are likely to tell us what they want by then.”

“Carol already would.”

“She wants your stone, the cloth book, and anything Garrick is holding.”

“She has been very clear.”

Mary shut the calendar.

Aurelia asked me to walk with her afterward.

We went as far as the chapel foundation. Its first walls had risen high enough to cast shadows across the ground.

“I haven’t celebrated my birthday in a long time,” she said.

“Why?”

“At first, I forgot it. Later, remembering seemed to trouble other people.”

“How?”

“Some thought they ought to mark it with a ceremony. Others were afraid of leaving me out if they did nothing.”

“We can keep it simple.”

“You have invited the whole city to decorate.”

“I said can.”

She glanced at me.

“Your sister would have liked this.”

I swallowed.

“Yes.”

I told her about Caroline cutting paper into shapes she refused to explain until they were hung.

“Were they beautiful?” Aurelia asked.

“Some were. Others were difficult to identify.”

“Did you tell her?”

“Once.”

“What happened?”

“She made me cut the next one.”

Aurelia laughed.

We stopped beside the entrance to the new chapel.

“I would like a day when people can enjoy each other’s company,” she said. “If they remember it is also my birthday, I won’t hide from them.”

“That sounds settled.”

“The name isn’t.”

“Mary will remind us.”

“She will.”

Liora’s second lesson with Thesra took place that afternoon.

She could now sense the edge of the old injury in her hand without becoming caught in it. Thesra showed her how to notice when another person’s working was near.

Aurelia waited until Liora could release that attention easily.

“Do you want to continue?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Today?”

Liora flexed her fingers.

“Tomorrow. I promised the Southmere apprentices I would hear what they learned this morning.”

Thesra nodded.

I heard about it later from Evelyn.

“She is taking to the lessons,” I said.

“She is. She’s also making us stop at sensible points.”

“A rare student.”

Evelyn looked at me.

“I stop.”

“You do,” I said.

She narrowed her eyes.

“I meant it.”

Caldris made me hold the air through Perrin’s practice door that evening.

At the fifth mark, a breeze entered the chamber strongly enough to stir both hanging strips of cloth.

I kept them moving evenly.

Then Thesra called from the passage.

One strip lifted higher.

I adjusted.

The other fell still.

“Too much,” Caldris said.

“I can see that.”

“Again.”

By the end, the strips moved together while Thesra called and Veyra opened a window behind me.

When Caldris closed the door, the air settled.

I waited to see whether cold had gathered along the frame.

There was none.

“You’re smiling,” Veyra said.

“Perrin will be pleased his door survived.”

“He’ll ask where we set it tomorrow.”

“He has marked two more places on the floor,” Caldris replied.

My smile faded.

At supper, the twins learned there would be a holiday.

I had not intended to explain it yet.

Carol heard Helena say “decorations” and demanded to know whether that meant ribbon.

“Yes,” Helena said.

“Blue?”

“Some blue.”

Carol nodded, satisfied.

Garrick heard “gifts.”

“Boat,” he said.

“You already have a boat,” I told him.

“Big boat.”

Garrick Valewood looked away.

I stared at him.

“You have begun making one.”

“I’ve made no promise.”

“That is not an answer.”

“Your son has made a request,” he said.

Helena laughed.

Later, Evelyn and I sat with Mary’s calendar.

Aurelia’s birthday had a mark beside it. Beneath the date, Mary had written only holiday proposed.

“She resisted leaving the name blank,” I said.

“She showed remarkable restraint.”

Evelyn turned to the page with the twins’ second birthday.

Cake remained the only note.

“Would they like decorations too?” she asked.

“Carol would move every ribbon into her room.”

“Then we’ll hang them after she’s asleep.”

“She’ll find them in the morning.”

“That is the idea.”

I looked at her.

“You’ve begun planning.”

“So have you.”

When the children slept, I went to the cupboard where we kept the things neither of them should find.

My training stone was there.

So was the blue ribbon I had taken from Garrick’s boat.

I held it for a while.

At home, Caroline had been capable of making a gift out of anything she could cut, fold, or persuade someone else to carry. I could remember the sound of her calling me into the room when she had finished decorating it.

I put the ribbon beside the stone.

There were months before Aurelia’s birthday.

Time enough to make something.

Time enough, I hoped, for Aurelia to grow used to the thought that people wanted to celebrate her.