apprentice showfighter's first night, I'm sending an invitation to
Ana-cha for a formal dinner at which we can further discuss her poor
treatment of our hospitality. And then I'm going to meet my new lover."
"Your new lover?"
"Shija Radaani has offered to play the role. I think she was flattered
to be asked. Issandra-cha is adamant that nothing makes a man worth
having like another woman smiling at him."
"Issandra-cha is a dangerous woman," Otah said.
"She is," Danat agreed.
They laughed together for a moment. Otah was the first to sober.
"Will it work, do you think?" he asked. "Can it be done?"
"Can I win Ana's heart and make her want what she's professed before
everyone of power in two empires that she hates?" Danat said. Saying it
that way, he sounded like his mother. "I don't know. And I can't say
what I feel about the way it's happening. I'm plotting against her. Her
own mother is plotting against her. I feel that I ought to disapprove.
That it isn't honest. And yet ..."
Danat shook his head. Otah took a querying pose.
"I'm enjoying myself," Danat said. "Whatever it says of me, I've been
struck bloody by a Galt boy, and I feel I've scored a point in some game.
"It's an important game."
Danat rose. He took a pose that promised his best effort, appropriate to
a junior competitor to his teacher, and left.
There had to be some way that he could aid in Danat's task, but for the
moment, he couldn't think what it might be. Perhaps if there was a way
to arrange some sort of isolation for the two. A journey, perhaps, to
Yalakeht. Or, no, there was the conspiracy with Obar State there that
still hadn't been rooted out. Well, Cetani, then. Something long and
arduous and cold by the time they got there. And without the bastard
who'd struck his son ...
Otah finished his fish and rice, lingering over a last bowl of wine and
looking out at the small garden. It was, he thought, the size of the
walled yard at the wayhouse Kiyan had owned before she became his first
and only wife and he became the Khai Machi. That little space of green
and white, of finches in the branches and voles scuttling in the low
grass, might have been the size of his life.
Until the Galts came and slaughtered them all with the rest of Udun.
And instead, he had the world, or most of it. And a son. And, however
little she liked it, a daughter. And Kiyan's ashes and his memory of
her. But it had been a pretty little garden.
Otah returned to the waiting supplicants with his mind moving in ten
different directions at once. He did his best to focus on the work
before him, but everything seemed trivial. No matter that men's fortunes
lay in his decision. No matter that he was the final appeal for justice,
or if not that, at least peace. Or mercy. Justice and peace and mercy
all seemed insignificant when held next to duty. His duty to Chaburi-Tan
and all the other cities, to Danat and Eiah and the shape of the future.
By the time the sun sank in the western hills, he had almost forgotten
Idaan.
His sister waited for him in the apartments Sinja had found for her. She
looked out of place among the sweeping arches and intricately carved
stonework. Her hands were thick and calloused, her face roughened by
sun. Some servant had arranged a robe for her, well-cut silk of green
and cream. He considered her dark eyes and calm, weighing expression. He
could not forget that she had killed men coldly, with calculation. But
then so had he.
"Idaan-cha," he said as she rose. Her hands took a pose of greeting
formal as court, but made awkward by decades without practice. Otah
returned it.
"You've made a decision," she said.
"Actually, no. I haven't. I hope to by this time tomorrow. I'd like you
to stay until then."
Idaan's eyes narrowed, her lips pressed thin. Otah fought the urge to
step back.
"Forgive me if it isn't my place to ask, Most High. But is there
something more important going on than Maati bringing back the andat?"
"There are a hundred things that are more certain," Otah said. "He may
manage it, but the chances are that he won't. Meantime, I know for
certain of three ... four other things that are happening that could
unmake the cities of the Khaiem. I don't have time to play in might be."
He'd meant to turn at the end of his pronouncement and walk from the
rooms. Her voice was cutting.
"So instead, you'll wait until is?" Idaan said. "Or is it only that you
have too many apples in the air, and you're only a middling juggler?"
"I'm not in the mood to be-"
"Dressed down by a woman who's only breathing because you've chosen to
let her? Listen to yourself. You sound like the villain from some
children's bedtime story."
"Idaan-cha," he said, and then found that he had nothing to follow it.
"I've come to tell you that your old friend and enemy is harnessing
gods, and not for your benefit. It's the most threatening thing I can
imagine happening. And what's your response? You knew. You've known for
years. What's more, knowing now that he's redoubling his efforts, you
can't be bothered even to consider the question until you've cleared
your sheet of audiences? I've held a thousand opinions of you over the
years, brother, but I never thought you were stupid."
Otah felt rage bloom in his chest, rising like a fiery wave, only to die
with the woman's next words.
"It's the guilt, isn't it?" she said. When he didn't answer at once, she
nodded to herself. "You aren't the only one that's done this, you know."
"Been Emperor? Are there others?"
"Betrayed the people you loved," she said. "Come. Sit down. I still have
a little tea."
Almost to his surprise, Otah walked forward, sitting on a divan while
the former exile poured pale green tea into two carved bone bowls.
"After you set me free, I spent years without sleeping through a full
night. I'd dream of the people I'd ... the people I was responsible for.
Our father. Adrah. Danat. You never knew Danat, did you?"
"I named my son for him," Otah said. Idaan smiled, but there was a
sorrow in her eyes.
"He'd have liked that, I think. Here. Choose a bowl. I'll drink first if
you'd like. I don't mind."
Otah drank. It was overbrewed and sweetened with honey; sweet and
bitter. Idaan sipped at hers.
"After you sent me away, there was a time I went about the business of
living with what I'd done by working myself like a war slave," she said.
"Sunrise to dark, I did whatever it was I was doing until I could fall
down at the end half-dead and too tired to dream."
"It doesn't sound pleasant," Otah said.