“I wouldn’t mind.”
The crowd was spreading out; more tents were rising. A town would take shape here. Houses would rise, land would be tilled, more trees would grow, more domes would rise around this one until Oberg was a cluster of domes.
Chen adjusted his bags and pack, took Risa’s hand, then followed Bettina until they came to a small rise in the land. Bettina flung her bag and pack down. “How about here?”
“Seems fine,” Chen replied. “Is it all right if I leave my things with you for a bit? There’s something here I have to see first.”
“Of course. I think I know where you’re going. Get back soon, though. You’ll want to pitch your tent before the light fades.”
“Maybe I should join you in yours, then.”
Bettina laughed. “I wouldn’t mind.”
Chen led Risa past other settlers, who were sitting outside their tents. They smiled and waved as the two passed them; their faces were bright with hope. Chen wondered if they could sustain that hope during the years of work ahead.
At last they came to the eastern wall. Several paces from the edge of the dome stood a small column made of metal, with an inscription on one side. Chen looked up at the top of the column, where the faces of Iris and Amir were embedded above the inscription.
Iris’s friends and a few Habbers had made the small monument. The Administrators, even in the midst of all the preparations for the settlers, had seen that it was placed here to greet the first arrivals. Chen himself had carved the faces used as models for those on the pillar.
Iris’s large eyes would see Oberg rise around her; her proud face would be honored by her descendants. Chen had gazed at her recorded image for hours, but then had carved the girl he still saw in his mind, the face unmarked by disappointment and failure, the face of one who dreamed. Some of her brave spirit seemed to inhabit Amir’s face as well, but his eyes were partly closed; Chen, not knowing how Amir had at last come to view the world, had carved a man at peace.
As he gazed at them now, captured together in the monument, he forgot the bitterness he had once felt toward Amir. Iris, at least, had not died alone. She had not forsaken the company of other men in this life; if there was a life beyond death for her, it was better that she had a companion share it until Chen joined her.
“That’s your mother,” he said to Risa.
The child stretched a hand toward the pillar. “Who’s the man?”
“One who loved her,” he replied. “Can you read the inscription to me?” Iris’s friends, who had wanted the monument to provoke some thought and quiet meditation, had not included a recorded voice to recite the words.
Risa drew herself up. “It’s in Anglaic,” she announced as she squinted at the inscription. “In honor of Iris Angharads and Amir Azad, the first true Cytherians, who gave their lives to save our new world. They shall not be forgotten. May their spirit live on in all those who follow them. They rest forever on the world they helped to build.”
“Is that all?” Chen asked.
The little girl nodded.
“Iris would have been happy to see you here.”
Risa rubbed her eyes with one small hand. “I’m hungry.”
Chen picked her up and lifted her small body to his shoulders. “We’ll have some supper with Bettina. Maybe she’ll tell you another story.”
He strode away from the monument, carrying his child across the tented plain.
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