“But, you’ll want to someday … “
She cried, “Never. I don’t want to be married, I don’t want children, the idea of being married off to some man is just … repulsive.”
Pearla flushed. “Well, Ornery, it’s not wonderful, I know. I mean, my intended, he’s nice enough, but … oh, he doesn’t stir me at all. None of the Family Men I’ve met do. They seem all tangled up in these deals and games and strategies of theirs. They give you a flower and candy, they say sweet things, and it all comes out like Oram being polite to Grandma Miby.”
They both laughed, wiping tears. Oram had had to be extensively coached to say, “Hello, Grandma Miby, how are you today?” and it always came out in a completely wooden voice.
“But,” Pearla went on, “there’s Hunks, Ornalia! And they’re oh, they’re wonderful. My mother-in-law, she has one, and she says they make life worth living. Some of the things they know how to do … “ She sighed. “And I’m only twenty, so by the time I’m thirty, I’ll have a Hunk of my own!”
Ornery shook her head. “Call me Ornery, Pearly. I don’t feel like being Ornalia, and I don’t want a Hunk, either.”
“You could serve the Temple as a Hagger … “
“Doing what? I’d have to give up all life except Temple life. I’d have to serve wherever the Hags say to serve. That’s no life for me, Pearly. What I’d really like is a stephold for myself. A tiny croft with a few sheep, a garden, and a loom for winter work. Some women have done it, begging sickly lambs from the neighbors and nursing them into a flock, building their own shelter of turf, getting by through full season or lean … “
“Some women have done it, true, but they weren’t young or fertile,” said Pearla. “I doubt the Hags would allow you to buy even a stephold farm, though you will have some money coming.”
“From where?” Ornery was astonished.
“If Mama and Papa are dead, if Oram is dead … my dowry will come to you.”
“But I can’t use it as I like,” cried Ornery.
“Even if they’d let you buy a farm, they wouldn’t let a healthy young woman stay unmarried.” Pearla stared thoughtfully into the fire, shocked by all this loss into an unusual consideration for her sister. “There’s an idea creeping around in my head, though. You say the family who helped you thought you were Oram?”
“They did.”
“I can see why, the way you’re dressed, and how you always looked alike. All of us were born at home, not at the Panhagion birthing center, so you—that is, my sister Ornalia—was registered at the Temple at six months age, as all girls must be, but they don’t have a DNA sample, as they would if you’d been born there, and Oram, he wasn’t even registered, and he’s not required to make Temple visits, so why not go on being Oram?”
Momentarily shocked, Ornery thought about it. “Veils,” she said at last. “If I’m wearing veils … “
“Which Oram always would be, in public, at least. And you’re not built like me or Mama, but like Papa’s sisters, very lean, with hardly any chest at all.”
“But what will I do? I can’t live here with you.”
“No. But my soon-husband is a decent sort of man. He owns ships, Ornery. If we can think up a way, he could put you on a ship, as an apprentice boy. You’re seventeen. Old enough. Then when you’re older yet, you could buy a farm.”
“Close quarters on a ship,” said Ornery, who had heard their father talk about the summer he spent as a sailor, when he was young, a mere supernume, before he inherited the farm. “They’d soon find out I was female.”
“We could say you were sold as a chatron,” said Pearla, after a moment’s thought. “You had it cut off, but then the family that wanted to buy you was killed when the mountain exploded. So now here you are, a chatron, but you no longer need to be sold. The farm is gone, so now you’d prefer to go to sea. My dowry will more than pay your apprenticeship if I can’t get my soon-husband to pay it. I’m sure I can make him arrange it, one way or the other. He likes me, Ornery. He said he was afraid he’d have to dower some woman he couldn’t fancy making children on, but he likes me.”