After all, Ram is the heir to the throne. If I understand these things correctly, when it is his time to become Grand Darionis he will in effect become identical with his father. The King may already regard Ram as nothing more than a literal continuation of his own identity. And Ram may already have come to see himself as the actual reincarnation of the King, the older man in a new body.
I don’t really know how this works, yet. Do they have a way of transplanting the entire memory files of the King into his son? (Or daughter. As in England, the throne usually goes to the oldest child, male or female.) If so, it has to be done while the King is still alive, right? Unless they do it in the moment of death.
Or possibly, there’s no literal transfer of memory at all, and the whole concept is just a kind of convention, a political fiction, like calling the Emperor of China the “Son of Heaven.” If that’s so, all the kings may have the same name, and they may be very closely imprinted with the beliefs and values of their predecessors, but they can’t actually be regarded as identical to all the kings who have gone before them.
So far, I’ve probed Ram very cautiously about this whole matter. It may be a really sensitive area for him, in which case he might become aware of me as I go poking around in his mind. That’s the last thing I need.
What I’ve learned, though, seems to indicate that they really do have some way of merging minds, personalities, stored memories, and such. And it’s done in stages, each one marked with a big ceremony.
First comes the Rite of Designation, in which the young child is named as heir apparent. This is done at the age of ten.
Then there’s the Rite of Joining, at thirteen. I don’t quite understand what this is, but it involves creating some kind of deep bond between the ruler and his heir. My guess is that it’s the opening of a sort of mental conduit through which psychic impulses flow from the older one to the younger—the beginning of the transfer.
The third step is the Rite of Anointing. That happens when the heir apparent is eighteen, which means the Anointing of Ram ought to be due to take place very soon now. In this, the Prince enters full adulthood and heavy responsibility. He receives certain mystic powers, which are so secret that not even Ram himself seems to know what they are yet. He gets to live in a palace of his own. And he becomes a kind of viceroy of the realm, a junior king, with areas of authority and obligation far beyond anything he’s had to undertake before. Once this rite is performed, he is permitted to marry. Is expected to marry, as a matter of fact.
(As far as I can tell, Prince Ram, with the Rite of Anointing just around the corner, has no particular woman in mind to become his Princess. Perhaps she’ll be chosen for him by his father and her identity won’t be made known to him until the official moment. Brrr!)
The fourth and final rite is the Rite of Union. This, I assume, is the ultimate transfer of identity from king to prince, as the time gets close for the handing over of the throne to the chosen heir. When this takes place, or how, I don’t know. All details concerning this rite are buried so deeply in Prince Ram’s consciousness that I’d need to do major excavation to get to them. Obviously it’s something he doesn’t want to think about, or isn’t allowed to.
What will it be like for me, I wonder, when Prince Ram experiences the Rite of Union? What will it feel like when all those additional mental impulses come flooding into his mind? Pretty chaotic, I imagine. I suspect it’ll be something like sitting up in the top of a tall tree while a hurricane is going on all around you.
But of course I might not even be here by the time he does the Rite of Union. We’ve only got a six-month assignment here, after all. As I say, I have no way of telling how soon Ram is due for the fourth rite, but my guess is that it’s going to be more than six months down the line.
Some real mixed feelings here. On the other hand I’m uneasy about the impact of the Rite of Union on me if I’m still inside Ram’s mind when it happens. On the other hand I suddenly realize that I’m hoping Home Era will let me stick around long enough to observe it, regardless of the dangers. The rite would probably give me answers to a lot of the questions I’m starting to ask myself about Athilan. I don’t want to be yanked back to our own time until I’m good and ready to go. Until I’ve soaked up everything I can possibly learn about this place.
But of course I’ve got no control over that. When the time’s up, back to Home Era I go, whether or not I want to. I return to “reality.” I return to you. But I give up Atlantis. Don’t misunderstand me, Lora. I’d give anything to be with you again after this separation. And yet, and yet—to be here for the Rite of Union—to have a ringside seat when all the accumulated memories of all the kings of Athilan go pouring into Prince Ram’s mind—
Well, we’ll see. It’s entirely out of my hands. I don’t care for that very much. There are times when I feel like a puppet on a string. Which I know is a dumb attitude. It was understood from the start that we were here only for a specific length of time and then we’d be brought back to Home Era. That was the deal, and no use complaining about it now. All the same, I have a funny feeling that I’m going to resent it when they yank me back, because it’s going to come just as something tremendously important is about to happen.
Why am I worrying so much? All this fidgeting and dithering about things?
Just lonely, I guess. Thinking of you. Missing you.Maybe sending “emotionally connected pairs” on these trips into the past isn’t such a great idea after all.
The Prince is an active and vigorous young man, and his days are full ones.
He’s up at dawn. Prayers, first. (These Athilantans are very devout. They seem to have a couple of dozen gods, who are, however, all regarded as aspects of the One God.) Then, before breakfast, he swims in the marble-lined pool in the courtyard of the palace’s rear wing. Fifty laps. ( Everything here seems to be made out of marble. There’s a big stone quarry somewhere on the far side of Mount Balamoris, but also they bring finer grades of marble in by ship from Greece and Italy.)
Breakfast, then. Fruits, most of them strange tropical ones that I can’t identify, followed by roast lamb. And a rich, sweet red wine. Wine for breakfast—well, that isn’t anything I’d care to do. But the Prince is strong as an ox and it doesn’t even make him a little bit tipsy. And these Athilantans, like all the Mediterranean peoples who I believe are descended from them, love their wine. There are vineyards all over the island. (All their wines are sweet. I know that real wine connoisseurs claim that the best wines are dry ones, but the Athilantans probably wouldn’t care. They like it the way they like it. I suppose a Frenchman wouldn’t approve, if there were any Frenchmen in existence. But there aren’t any yet. Nor are there any vineyards right now, over there in the icebound land that will someday be France. And there aren’t going to be for thousands of years.)
After breakfast Ram meets with the King. They go over all sorts of official documents and reports.
Most of what they deal with concerns the flow of raw materials that Athilantan ships bring in from Africa and southern Europe. These Athilantans are the world’s first imperialists. They’ve colonized every part of the world within reach, importing things they need—minerals, mostly, but certain foodstuffs also—and giving not very much in return. Of course there isn’t much that they could give, considering how primitive all the other humans of this era are. Your typical modern-era colonial power imports raw materials from backward countries and exports manufactured goods, but semi-nomadic Stone Age hunters don’t have a lot of need for light bulbs, fancy plumbing fixtures, or rubber tires.