exhausted; Utah could see it in the flesh below his eves and in the
angle of his shoulders. His lips were cracked and blood}, from the cold
and his work. Utah put a hand on the man's shoulder.
"One last time," he said. "Call them all to fall back to the tunnel's
entrance. "There's nothing more we can do on the surface."
The trumpeter took an acknowledging pose and walked away, warming the
instrument's mouthpiece with his hand before lifting it to his bruised
mouth. Utah waited as the melody sang out in the snowy air, listened to
the echoes of it fade and he replaced by acknowledging calls.
"We should surrender," Otah said. The Khai Cetani blinked at him.
Beneath the red ice-pinched cheeks, the man grew pale. (bah pressed on.
"We're going to lose, Most Iligh. We don't have soldiers to stop them.
All we'll gain is a few more hours. And we'll pay for it with lives that
don't need to end today."
"We were planning to spend those lives before," the Khai Cetani said,
though Utah could see in the man's eves that he knew the argument was
sound. They were two dead men, fathers of dead families, the last of
their kind in the world. " \V'e always knew there would be deaths."
"'T'hat was when we had hope," Utah said.
One of the servants cried out and fell to her knees. Otah turned to her,
thinking first that she had overheard him and been overcome by grief,
and then-seeing her face-that some miraculous arrow had found its way
through the air to their roof. The men around her looked at the Khaiem,
embarrassed at the interruption, or else knelt by the girl to comfort
her. She shrieked, and the stones themselves seemed to take up her
voice. A sound rose from the city in a long, rolling unending moan.
'T'housands of voices, calling out in pain. Otah's skin seemed to
retreat from it, and a chill that had nothing to do with the
still-falling snow ran down his sides. For a moment, the towers
themselves seemed about to twist with agony. This, he thought, was what
gods sounded like when they died.
Around him, men looked nervously at the air, gazes darting into the gray
and white sky. Utah caught the runner by his sleeve.
"Go," he said. "Go, and tell me what's happened."
Dread widened the boy's eyes, but he took an acknowledging pose before
retreating. The Khai Cetani seemed poised to ask something, but only
turned away, walking to the roof's edge himself. Utah went to the
servant girl. I Ier face was white with pain.
"What's the matter?" Otah asked her, gently. "Where does it hurt?"
She couldn't take a formal pose, but her gesture and the shame in her
eyes told Otah everything he needed to know. He'd spent several seasons
as a midwife's assistant in the eastern islands. If the girl was lucky,
she had been pregnant and was miscarrying. If she hadn't been carrying a
child, then something worse was happening. He had already ordered the
other servants to carry her down to the physicians when Cehmai appeared,
red-faced and wide-eyed. Before he could speak, it fell into place. The
girl, the unearthly shriek, the poet.
"Something's gone wrong with the binding," Otah said. Cehmai took a pose
of confirmation.
"Please," the poet said. "Come now. I furry."
Otah didn't pause to think; he went to the stairs, lifting the hem of
his robes, and dropping down three steps at a time. It was four stories
from the top of the warehouse to its bottom floor. Otah felt that he
could hardly have gone there faster if he'd jumped over the building's side.
The space was eerie; shadows seemed to hang in the corners of the huge,
empty room and the distant sound of voices in pain murmured and
shrieked. Great symbols were chalked on the walls, and an ugly,
disjointed script in Nlaati's handwriting spelled out the binding. Otah
knew little enough of the old grammars, but he picked out the words for
womb, seed, and corruption. Three people stood in tableau at the top of
the stair that led down to the tunnels. NIaati stood, his hands at his
sides, his expression blank. Otah's belly went tight as sickness as he
saw that the girl at Nlaati's feet was Eiah. And the thing that cradled
his daughter's head turned to look at him. After a long moment, it drew
breath and spoke.
"Otah-kya," it said. Its voice was low and beautiful, heavy with
amusement and contempt. The familiarity of it was dizzying.
"Seedless?"
"It isn't," Nlaati said. "It's not him."
"What's happened?" Otah asked. When Maati didn't answer, Otah shook the
man's sleeve. " Nlaati. What's going on?"
"He's failed," the andat said. "And when a poet fails, he pays a price
for it. Only Nlaati-kvo is clever. He's found a way to make it so that
failure can't touch him. He's found a trick."
"I don't understand," Otah said.
"My protection," Maati said, his voice rich with despair. "It doesn't
stop the price being paid. It only can't kill me."
The andat took a pose that agreed, as a teacher might approve of a
clever student. From the stairwell, Utah heard footsteps and the voice
of the Khai Cetani. The first of the servant men hurried into the room,
robes flapping like a flag in high wind, before he saw them and stopped
dead and silent.
"What is it doing?" Utah asked. "What's it done?"
"You can ask me, Most High," Sterile said. "I have a voice."
Utah looked into the black, inhuman eyes. Eiah whimpered, and the thing
stroked her brow gently, comforting and threatening both. Utah felt the
urge to pull Eiah away from the thing, as if it were a spider or a snake.
"What have you done to my daughter?" he asked.
"What would you guess, Most High?" Sterile asked. "I am the reflection
of a man whose son is not his son. All his life, Maati-kya has been bent
double by the questions of fathers and sons. What do you imagine I would
do?"
""fell me."
"I've soured her womb," the andat said. "Scarred it. And I've done the
same to every woman in the cities of the Khaiem. Lachi, Chaburi- Ian,
Saraykeht. All of them. Young and old, highborn and low. And I've gelded
every Galtic man. From Kirinton to Far Galt to right here at your doorstep."
"Papa-kya," Eiah said. "It hurts."
Utah knelt, drawing his daughter to him. Her mouth was thin with pain.
The andat opened its hand, the long fingers gesturing him to take her.
The Khai Cetani was at Utah's side now, his breath heavy and his hands
trembling. Utah took Eiah in his arms.
"Your children will be theirs," it said. ""I'he next generation will
have the Khaiem for fathers and feed from Galtic breasts, or else it
will not be. Your history will be written by half-breeds, or it won't be
written."
"Maati," Otah said, but his old friend only shook his head.