Daniel Abraham - THE

Galt to her-"

"Vanjit has the right to see her mistakes," Otah said. "She's done this.

She should look at it. We all should look at what we've done to come here."

Maati looked at him as if seeing him for the first time. There was a

deep confusion in the old poet's face. Otah took a pose that asked a

favor between equals. As a friend to a friend.

"Take Ana," Otah said.

Maati's jaw worked as if he were chewing possible replies.

"No," he said.

Otah took a pose that was at once a query and an opportunity for Maati

to recant. Maati shook his head.

"I have trusted you, Otah-kvo. Since we were boys, I have had to come to

you with everything, and when you weren't there, I tried to imagine what

you might have done. And this time, you are wrong. I know it."

"Maati-"

"Trust me," Maati hissed. "For once in your life trust me. Ana-cha must

not go."

Otah's mouth opened, but no words came forth. Maati stood before him,

his breath fast as a boy's who had just run a race or jumped from a high

cliff into the sea. Maati had defied Otah. He had betrayed him. He had

never in their long history refused him.

For a moment, Otah felt as if they were boys again. He saw in Maati the

balled fists and jutting chin of a small child standing against an older

one, the bone-deep fear mixed with a sudden, surprising pride in his own

unexpected courage. And in Otah's own breast, an answering sorrow and

even shame.

He took a pose that acknowledged Maati's decision. The poet hesitated,

nodded, and walked to the riverside. Idaan leaned close to Ana,

whispering all that had happened which the girl could not see.

Kiyan-kya-

Sunset isn't on us yet, but it will be soon. Maati is

sulking, I think. Everyones frightened, but none of us has

the courage to say it. I take that back. Idaan isn't afraid.

Just after Maati refused to take Ana Dasin with him to this

thrice-damned meeting, Idaan came to me and said that she

was fairly certain that if Vanjit kills us all, she'll die

of starvation herself within the year. Uanjit's hunting

ability hasn't impressed her, and Idaan has a way of finding

comfort in strange places.

Nothing has ever come out the way I expected, love. It

seemed so simple. T' e had men who could sire a child, they

had women who could bear. And instead, I am sending the

least reliable man I know to save everything and everyone by

talking a madwoman into sanity. If I could find any way not

to do this, I'd take it. I appealed to what Maati and I once

were to each other when I tried to convince him to accept

Ana's company. It was more than half a lie. In truth I can't

say I know this man. The boy I knew in Saraykeht and the man

we knew in Machi has become a stew of bitterness and blind

optimism. He wants the past back, and no sacrifice is too

high. I wonder if he never saw the weakness and injustice

and rot at the heart of the old ways, or if he's only

forgotten them.

If I had it all to do again, I'd have done it differently.

I'd have married you sooner. I'd never have gone north, and

Idaan and Adrah could have taken Machi and had all this on

their heads instead of my own. Only then we'dhave been in

Udun, you andl, andl wouldhave had yourcompany for an even

shorter time. There is no winning this game. I suppose it's

best that we can only play it through once.

You wouldn't like what's become of Udun. I don't like it. I

remember Sinja saying that he kept your wayhouse safe during

the sack, but I haven't had the heart to go and look. The

river still has its beauty. The birds still have their song.

They'll still be here when the rest q f us are gone. I miss

Sinja.

There's something I'm trying to tell you, love. It's taking

me more time than I'd expected to work up the courage. We

all know it. Even Maati, even Ana, even Eiah. None of us can

speak the words; not even me. You're the only one I can say

this to, because, I suppose, you've already died and so

you're safe from it.

Love. Oh, love. This meeting is all we can do, and it isn't

going to work.

MAATI LEFT IN TWILIGHT. THE STARS SHONE IN THE EAST, THE DARKNESS RISing

up like a black dawn as the western sky fell from blue to gold, from

gold to gray. Birdsong changed from the trills and complaints of the day

to the low cooing and complexities of the night. The river seemed to

exhale, and its breath was green and rotting and cold. Maati had a small

pack at his side. In the light of the failing day and the flickering

orange of the torches, he looked older than Otah felt, and Otah felt

ancient.

He tried to see something familiar in Maati's eyes. He tried to see the

boy he'd gone drinking with in dark, lush Saraykeht, but that child was

gone. Both of those children.

"I will do my best, Otah-kvo," Maati said.

Otah bit back his first reply, and then his second.

"Tomorrow's going to be a very different day, Maati-cha," Otah said.

Maati nodded. After so much and so long, there should have been more.

Sinja appeared for a moment in the back of Otah's mind. There had been

no last good-bye for him. If this was to be the ending between the two

of them, Otah thought he should say something. He should make this

parting unlike the others that had come before. "I'm sorry it's come to

this."

Maati took a pose that agreed but kept the meaning as imprecise as Otah

had. One of the armsmen called out, pointing at the looming threat of

the Khai Udun's palaces. In a wide window precisely above the river, a

light had appeared, glittering like gold. Like a fallen star.

Ana and Danat were in a corner of the quay, their arms wrapped around

each other. Idaan stood among the armsmen, her expression grim. Eiah sat

alone by the water, listening. Otah saw Maati's gaze linger on her with

something like sorrow.

With a lantern in his unsteady hand, Maati walked off along the ruined

streets that ran beside the river. Otah guessed it would take him half a

hand to reach the palaces.

"All right," Idaan said. "He's gone."

Otah turned to look at her, some pale attempt at wit on his lips, and

saw that the comment hadn't been meant for him. Idaan crouched beside

Eiah. His daughter's face was turned toward nothing, but her hands were

digging through the physician's satchel. Danat glanced at Otah,

confusion in his eyes. Eiah started drawing flat stones from her bag and

laying them gently on the flagstones before her.

No, he was wrong. Not stones, but triangles of broken wax. The contents

of old, broken tablets with symbols and words inscribed on them in

Eiah's hand.

"You could try being of help," Idaan said and gestured toward the shards

at his daughter's knees. "There's a piece that goes right here I haven't

been able to find."

"You did enough," Eiah said, her hands shifting quickly, fitting the

breaks together. Already the wax was taking the shape of five separate

squares, the characters coming together. "Just going to the campsite and

bringing back the bits you did was more than I could have asked."

"What is this?" Otah asked, though he already knew.

"My work," Eiah said. "My binding. I hoped I'd have time. Before we

actually came across Vanjit-cha, there was the chance she was spying on

us. She'd always planned to kill me by distracting me during the

binding. But now, and for I think at least the next hand and a half, her

attention is going to be on Maati-kvo. So..."