"As you say, most high."
"I told you there was no place in a poet's life for a family. A lover
here or there, certainly. Most men are too weak to deny themselves that
much. But a wife? A child? No. There isn't room for both what they
require and what we do. And I told you that. You remember? I told you
that, and you ..
The Dai-kvo shook his head, frowning in remembered frustration. It was a
moment, Maati knew, when he could apologize. He could repent his pride
and say that the Dai-kvo had indeed known better all along. He remained
silent.
"I was right," the Dai-kvo said for him. "And now you've done half a job
as a poet and half a job as a man. Your studies are weak, and the woman
took your whelp and left. You've failed both, just as I knew you would.
I'm not condemning you for that, Maati. No man could have taken on what
you did and succeeded. But this opportunity in Machi is what will wipe
clean the slate. Do this well and it will be what you're remembered for."
"Certainly I will do my best."
"Fail at it, and there won't be a third chance. Few enough men have two."
Maati took a pose appropriate to a student receiving a lecture.
Considering him, the Dal-kvo responded with one that closed the lesson,
then raised his hand.
"Don't destroy this chance in order to spite me, Maati. Failing in this
will do me no harm, and it will destroy you. You're angry because I told
you the truth, and because what I said would happen, did. Consider while
you go north, whether that's really such a good reason to hate me."
THE OPEN WINDOW LET IN A COOT, BREEZE THAT SMELLED OF PINE AND RAIN.
Otah Mach], the sixth son of the Khai Machi, lay on the bed, listening
to the sounds of water-rain pattering on the flagstones of the
wayhouse's courtyard and the tiles of its roof, the constant hushing of
the river against its banks. A fire danced and spat in the grate, but
his bare skin was still stippled with cold. The night candle had gone
out, and he hadn't bothered to relight it. Morning would come when it came.
The door slid open and then shut. He didn't turn to look.
"You're brooding, Itani," Kiyan said, calling him by the false name he'd
chosen for himself, the only one he'd ever told her. Her voice was low
and rich and careful as a singer's. He shifted now, turning to his side.
She knelt by the grate-her skin smooth and brown, her robes the formal
cut of a woman of business, one strand of her hair fallen free. Her face
was thin-she reminded him of a fox sometimes, when a smile just touched
her mouth. She placed a fresh log on the fire as she spoke. "I half
expected you'd be asleep already."
He sighed and sketched a pose of contrition with one hand.
"Don't apologize to me," she said. "I'm as happy having you in my rooms
here as in the teahouse, but Old Mani wanted more news out of you. Or
maybe just to get you drunk enough to sing dirty songs with him. He's
missed you, you know."
"It's a hard thing, being so loved."
"Don't laugh at it. It's not a love to carry you through ages, but it's
more than some people ever manage. You'll grow into one of those pinched
old men who want free wine because they pity themselves."
"I'm sorry. I don't mean to make light of Old Mani. It's just ..."
He sighed. Kiyan closed the window and relit the night candle.
"It's just that you're brooding," she said. "And you're naked and not
under the blankets, so you're feeling that you've done something wrong
and deserve to suffer."
"Ah," Otah said. "Is that why I do this?"
"Yes," she said, untying her robes. "It is. You can't hide it from me,
Itani. You might as well come out with it."
Otah held the thought in his mind. I'm not who I've told you I am. Itani
Noygu is the name I picked for myself when I was a child. My father is
dying, and brothers I can hardly recall have started killing each other,
and I find it makes me sad. He wondered what Kiyan would say to that.
She prided herself on knowing him-on knowing people and how their minds
worked. And yet he didn't think this was something she'd already have
guessed.
Naked, she lay beside him, pulling thick blankets up over them both.
"Did you find another woman in Chaburi-Tan?" she asked, halfteasing. But
only half. "Some young dancing girl who stole your heart, or some other
hit of your flesh, and now you're stewing over how to tell me you're
leaving me?"
"I'm a courier," Otah said. "I have a woman in every city I visit. You
know that."
"You don't," she said. "Some couriers do, but you don't."
"No?"
"No. It took me half a year of doing everything short of stripping bare
for you to notice me. You don't stay in other cities long enough for a
woman to chip through your reserve. And you don't have to push away the
blankets. You may want to be cold, but I don't."
"Well. Maybe I'm just feeling old."
"A ripe thirty-three? Well, when you decide to stop running across the
world, I'd always be pleased to hire you on. We could stand another pair
of hands around the place. You could throw out the drunks and track down
the cheats that try to slip away without paying."
"You don't pay enough," Otah said. "I talk to Old Mani. I know what your
wages are.
"Perhaps you'd get extra for keeping me warm at nights."
"Shouldn't you offer that to Old Mani first? He's been here longer than
I have."
Kiyan slapped his chest smartly, and then nestled into him. He found
himself curling toward her, the warmth of her body drawing him like a
familiar scent. Her fingers traced the tattoo on his breast-the ink had
faded over time, blurring lines that had once been sharp and clear.
"Jokes aside," she said, and he could hear a weariness in her voice, "I
would take you on, if you wanted to stay. You could live here, with me.
Help me manage the house."
He caressed her hair, feeling the individual strands as they flowed
across his fingertips. There was a scattering of white among the black
that made her look older than she was. Otah knew that they had been
there since she was a girl, as if she'd been born old.
"That sounds like you're suggesting marriage," he said.
"Perhaps. You wouldn't have to, but ... it would be one way to arrange
things. That isn't a threat, you know. I don't need a husband. Only if
it would make you feel better, we could ..."
He kissed her gently. It had been weeks, and he was surprised to find
how much he'd missed the touch of her lips. Weeks of travel weariness
slipped away, the deep unease loosened its hold on his chest, and he
took comfort in her. He fell asleep with her arm over his body, her
breath already soft and deep with sleep.