offered to bind Wounded. Why do you want that?"
She blinked and released his arm. Her eyes were wider, her mouth thin.
It was his turn to take her arm, and he did, leaning close enough to
speak almost into her ear.
"I have known more poets than I can count," he said. "Only a few held
the andat, and none of them took joy in it. My own first master, Heshai
of Saraykeht, planned out a second binding of Seedless. It could never
have worked. It was too near what he'd done before, and part of
Sterile's failure was that I borrowed too much from his design."
"I don't know what you mean, Maati-kvo," Vanjit said. Three women had
stepped into the dancing space and were thumping in a simple pattern,
keeping time with one drum or the other.
"I mean that everyone wants a second chance," Maati said.
"Clarityof-Sight. . ."
Maati bit down, glancing to see if anyone had heard him. The music and
the dance were the focus of the room.
"The little one," Maati said, more quietly, "isn't what you'd hoped. But
neither would the next one be."
He might just as well have slapped her. Vanjit's face went white, and
she stood so quickly the bench scraped out from under her. By the time
Maati rose, she was halfway to the door leading out to the stables and
courtyard, and when he reached her, they were outside in the chill. A
thin fog blurred the lantern hanging above the wayhouse door.
"Vanjit!" Maati called, and she turned back, her face a mask of pain.
"How could you say that? How could you say those things to me?" she
demanded. "You had as much to do with that binding as I did. You are
just as much responsible for him. I offered to take Eiah's place because
someone would have to, not because it's something that I want. I love
him. He's my boy, and I love him. He is everything I'd hoped. Everything!"
"Vanjit-"
She was weeping openly now, her voice high, thin, and wailing.
"And he loves me. No matter what you say, I know he does. He's my boy,
and he loves me. How could you think that I'd want a second chance? I
offered this for you!"
He took her sleeve in his fist, and she pulled back, yelping. She tried
to turn away, but he would not let her.
"Listen to me," he said sternly. "You don't need to tell me how deeply you-
Vanjit snarled, her lips pulled back from her teeth like a pit dog's.
She pulled away sharply, and Maati stumbled, falling to his knees. When
he rose, he could hear her running footsteps fading into the dark, but
the fog had thickened so badly that he couldn't see his own hand in
front of his face.
Except that, of course, it hadn't.
He stood still, heart racing, hands trembling. The raucous sounds of the
dance came from behind him and to the left. The poorly played drums
became his polestar. He turned and made his slow, careful way back
toward the wayhouse. The ground was rough under his feet, gravel and
weeds taking him at slightly different angles with every step.
He shouldn't have tried to hold her. She was upset. He should have let
her go. He cursed himself for his stubbornness and her for her lack of
control. The drums had given way to a flute and a low, warbling singer.
Maati's outstretched fingers found the rough planks of the wall. He
leaned against it, unsure what to do next. If he went back to the main
room, his sudden infirmity would call attention to him, to the others,
to Vanjit. But if he didn't, what would he do? He couldn't navigate his
way back to his room, couldn't reach shelter. His robes were damp with
the fog, the wood under his palm slick. He could stay here, pressing
against the wayhouse like he was holding it up, or he could move. If
there was only some way to find Eiah ...
He began inching away from the door. He could follow the walls around
the building, and find the deck. If he waited long enough, Eiah would
come looking for him, and that might well be one of the first places
she'd look. He tried to recall where the deck's railing began and ended.
He had been there for hours earlier, but now he found the details
escaped him.
He stumbled over a log and bruised his knee, but he didn't cry out. The
cold was beginning to numb him. He reached the corner and a set of
stairs he didn't remember. The prospect of sitting in the cold at the
edge of the unseen lake was becoming less and less sustainable. He
started devising stories that would cover his blindness. He could go
near the common room, cry out, and collapse. If he kept his eyes closed,
he could feign unconsciousness. They would bring Eiah to him.
He stepped in something wet and soft, like mud but with a sudden,
billowing smell of rotting plants. Maati lifted his foot slowly to keep
the muck from pulling off his boot. It occurred to him for the first
time that they had done this-precisely this-to a nation.
His boot was heavy and made a wet sound when he put weight on it, but it
didn't slip. He started making his way back toward where he'd been. He
thought he'd made it halfway there when the world suddenly clicked back
into place. His hands pink and gray against the damp, black wood. The
thin fog hardly worth noticing. He turned and found Vanjit sitting
cross-legged on the stones of the courtyard. Her dark eyes were
considering. He wondered how long she'd been watching.
"What you said before? It was uncalled for," she said. Her voice was
steady as stone, and as unforgiving.
Maati took a pose that offered apology but also pointedly did not end
the conversation. Vanjit considered him.
"I love Eiah-cha," she said, frowning. "I would never, never wish her
ill. Suggesting that I want her to fail just so I could remain the only
poet ... it's madness. It hurts me that you would say it."
"I never did," Maati said. "I never said anything like it. If that's
what you heard, then something else is happening here."
Vanjit shifted back, surprise and dismay in her expression. Her hands
moved toward some formal pose, but never reached it. The shriek came
from within the wayhouse. The music stopped. Vanjit stood up muttering
something violent and obscene, but Maati was already moving to the door.
The large room was silent, drums and flute abandoned where they had
fallen. The woman who'd screamed was sitting on a stool, her hands still
pressed to her mouth, her face bloodless, and her gaze fixed on the
archway that led to the private rooms. No one spoke. Clarity-of-Sight
stood in the archway, its hands on the wall, its tiny hips swaying
crazily as it lost and regained and lost its balance. It saw Vanjit, let
out a high squeal, and waved its tiny arms before sitting down hard and
suddenly. The delight never left its face.
"It is," someone said in a voice woven from awe and tears. "It's a baby."