THE (tlpq-4) (34 page)

"That is my High Council," Otah said. "Here with you as witness, I

invest them with the power to administrate the Empire until Danat or I

return. Is that clear enough?"

"Most High," the Master of Tides said, her face pale and bloodless,

"there has never ... the authority of the Emperor can't be ... and Gice-

cha isn't even ..."

Otah strode across the room toward her, blood rushing in his ears. The

Master of Tides fell back a step, anticipating a blow, but Otah only

plucked the ledger from her hands. The charcoal had fallen to the floor,

and Otah scooped it up, turned to a fresh page, and wrote out the

investment he'd just spoken. When he handed it back, the Master of Tides

opened and closed her mouth like a fish on sand, then said, "The court.

The utkhaiem. A council with explicit imperial authority? This ... can't

be done."

"It can," Otah said.

"Most High, forgive me, but what you've suggested here changes

everything! It throws aside all tradition!"

"I do that sometimes," Otah said. "Get me a horse."

Danat's force was small-a dozen armsmen with swords and bows, two

steamcarts with rough shedlike structures on the flats, and Danat in a

wool huntsman's robes. Otah's own robe was leather dyed the red of

roses; his horse was taller at the shoulder than the top of his own

head. The wicker traveler's basket jounced against the animal's flank as

he cantered to Danat's side.

"Father," Danat said. He took no pose, but his body was stiff and defiant.

"I heard your speech. It was rash," Otah said. "What was your plan, now

that I've sent you off to find and kill this new poet?"

"We're going north to Utani," Danat said. "It's central, and we can move

in any direction once we've gotten word where he is."

"She," Otah said. "Wherever she is."

Danat blinked, his spine relaxing in his surprise.

"And you can't announce a plan like this, Danat-kya," Otah said. "No

matter how fast you ride, word will move faster. And you'll know when

the news has reached her, because you'll be just as crippled as the Galts."

"You knew about this?" Danat murmured.

"I know some things. I'd had reports," Otah said. His mount whiskered

uneasily. "I had taken some action. I didn't know it had gone so far.

Utani is the wrong way. We need to ride west. Toward Pathai. And

whichever rider is fastest goes ahead and stops any couriers heading

back toward Saraykeht. I'm expecting a letter, but we can meet it on the

road."

"You can't go," Danat said. "The cities need you. They need to see that

there's someone in control."

"They do see that. They see it's the poet," Otah said.

Danat glanced at the steamcarts with their covered burdens. He looked

nervous and lost. Otah felt the impulse to tell him, there on the open

street, what he was facing: Maati's plan, his own reluctance to act, the

specter of Eiah's involvement, Idaan's mission. He restrained himself.

There would be time later, and fewer people who might overhear.

"Papa-kya," Danat said. "I think you should stay here. They need ..."

"They need the poets ended," Otah said, knowing as he said it that he

also meant his daughter. For a moment, he saw her. In his imagination,

she was always younger than the real woman. He saw her dark eyes and

furrowed brow as she studied with the court physicians. He felt the

warmth and weight of her, still small enough to rest in his arms. He

smelled the sour-milk breath she'd had before the soft place in her

skull had grown closed. It might not come to that, he told himself.

He also knew that it might.

"We'll do this together," Otah said. "The two of us."

"Papa.. ."

"You can't stop me from this, Danat-kya," Otah said gently. "I'm the

Emperor."

Danat tried to speak, first confusion in his eyes, then distress, and

then amused resignation. Otah looked out at the armsmen, their eyes

averted. The steamcarts chuffed and shuddered, the sheds on them larger

than some homes Otah had kept as a child. The anger rose in him again.

Not with Danat or Eiah, Maati or Idaan. His anger was with the gods

themselves and the fate that had brought him here, and it burned in him.

"West," Otah called. "West. All of us. Now."

They passed the arch that marked the edge of the city at three hands

past midday. Men and women had come out, lining the streets as they

passed. Some cheered them, others merely watched. Few, Otah thought,

were likely to believe that the old man at the front was truly the Emperor.

The buildings west of the city proper grew lower and squat. Instead of

roof tiles, they had layers of water-grayed wood or cane thatching. The

division between the last of Saraykeht and the nearest low town was

invisible. Traders pulled aside to let them pass. Feral dogs yipped at

them from the high grass and followed along just out of bowshot. The sun

slipped down in its arc, blinding Otah and drawing tears.

A thousand small memories flooded Otah's mind like raindrops in an

evening storm. A night he'd spent years before, sleeping in a hut made

from grass and mud. The first horse he'd been given when he took the

colors of House Siyanti and joined the gentleman's trade. He had

traveled these very roads, back then. When his hair had still been dark

and his back still strong and Kiyan still the loveliest wayhouse keeper

in all the cities he had seen.

They rode until full dark came, stopping at a pond. Otah stood for a

moment, looking into the dark water. It wasn't quite cold enough for ice

to have formed on its surface. His spine and legs ached so badly he

wondered whether he would be able to sleep. The muscles of his belly

protested when he tried to bend. It had been years since he'd taken to

the road in anything faster or more demanding than a carried litter. He

remembered the pleasant near-exhaustion at the end of a long day's ride,

and his present pain had little in common with it. He thought about

sitting on the cool, wet grass. He was more than half afraid that once

he sat down, he wouldn't be able to stand.

Behind him, the kilns of the steamcarts had been opened, and the armsmen

were cooking birds over the coals. The smaller of the two sheds perched

atop the steamcarts had been opened to reveal tightly rolled blankets,

crates of soft fuel coal, and earthenware jars inscribed with symbols

for seeds, raisins, and salted fish. As Otah watched, Danat emerged from

the second shed, standing alone in the shadows at the end of the cart.

One of the armsmen struck up a song, and the others joined in. It was

the kind of thing Otah himself would have done, back when he had been a

different man.

"Danat-kya," he said when he'd walked close enough to be heard over the

good cheer of their companions. His son squatted at the edge of the

cart, and then sat. In the light from the kilns, Danat seemed little

more than a deeper shadow, his face hidden. "There are some things we

should discuss."

"There are," Danat said, and his voice pulled Otah back.

Otah shifted to sit at his son's side. Something in his left knee

clicked, but there was no particular pain, so he ignored it. Danat laced

his fingers.

"You're angry that I've come?" Otah said.

"No," Danat said. "It's not ... not that, quite. But I hadn't thought

that you would be here, or that we'd be going west. I made arrangements

with my own plan set, and you've changed it."

"I can apologize. But this is the right thing. I can't swear that Pathai

is-

"That's not what I'm trying ... Gods," Danat said. He turned to his

father, his eyes catching the kiln light and flashing with it. "Come on.

You might as well know."

Danat shifted, rose, and walked across the wide, wooden back of the

steamcart. The shed's door was shut fast. As Otah pulled himself up,

grunting, Danat worked a thick iron latch. The armsmen's singing

faltered. Otah was aware of eyes fixed upon them, though he couldn't see

the men as more than silhouettes.

Otah made his way to the shed's open door. Inside was pure darkness.

Danat stood, latch in his hand, silent. Otah was about to speak when

another voice came from the black.

"Danat?" Ana Dasin asked. "Is it you?"

"It is," Danat said. "And my father."

Gray-eyed, the Galtic girl emerged from the darkness. She wore a blouse

of simple cotton, a skirt like a peasant worker's. Her hands moved

before her, testing the air until they found the wood frame of the

shed's door. Otah must have made a sound, because she turned as if to

look at him, her gaze going past him and into nothing. He almost took a

pose of formal greeting but stopped himself.

"Ana-cha," he said.

"Most High," she replied, her chin high, her brows raised.

"I didn't expect to see you here," he said.

"I went to her as soon as I heard what had happened," Danat said. "I

swore it was nothing that we'd done. We hadn't been trying to recapture

the andat. She didn't believe me. When I decided to go, I asked her to

come. As a witness. We've left word for Farrer-cha. Even if he

disapproves, it doesn't seem he'd be able to do much about it before we

returned."

"You know this is madness," Otah said softly.

Ana Dasin frowned, hard lines marking her face. But then she nodded.

"It makes very little difference whether I die in the city or on the

road," she said. "If this isn't treachery on the part of the Khaiem,

then I don't see that I have anything to fear."

"We are on an improvised campaign against powers we cannot match. I can

name half-a-dozen things to fear without stopping to think," Otah said.

He sighed, and the Galtic girl's expression hardened. Otah went on,

letting a hint of bleak amusement into his voice. "But I suppose if

you've come, you've come. Welcome to our hunt, Ana-cha."

He nodded to his son and stepped back. Her voice recalled him.

"Most High," she said. "I want to believe Danat. I want to think that he

had nothing to do with this."

"He didn't," Otah said. The girl weighed his words, and then seemed to

accept them.

"And you?" she said. "Was any of this yours?"

Otah smiled. The girl couldn't see him, but Danat did.

"Only my inattention," Otah said. "It's a failure I've come to correct."

"So the andat can blind you as easily as he has us," Ana said, stepping

out of the shed and onto the steamcart. "You aren't protected any more

than I am."

"That's true," Otah said.

Ana went silent, then smiled. In the dim light of the fire, he could see

her mother in the shape of her cheek.

"And yet you take our side rather than ally with the poets," she said.

"So which of us is mad?"

18

The snow fell and stayed, as deep as Maati's three fingers together. The

winds of autumn whistled through the high, narrow windows that had never

known glass. The women-Eiah, Irit, and the two Kaeswere in a small room,

clustered around a brazier and talking with hushed fervor about grammar

and form, the distinctions between age and wounds and madness. Vanjit,

wrapped in thick woolen robes and a cloak of waxed silk, was sitting on

a high wall, her gaze to the east. She sang lullabies to

Clarity-of-Sight, and her voice would have been beautiful if she'd been

cradling a real babe. Maati considered interrupting her or else

returning to the work with the others, but both options were worse than

remaining alone. He turned away from the great bronze door and retreated

into the darkness.

It would be only weeks until winter was upon them. Not the killing

storms of the north, but enough that even the short journey to Pathai

would become difficult. He tried to imagine the long nights and cold

that waited for him, for all of them, and he wondered how they would

manage it.

A darkness had taken Eiah since her return. He saw it in her eyes and

heard the rasp of it in her voice, but there was no lethargy about it.

She was awake before him every morning and took to her bed long after

sunset. Her attention was bent to the work of her binding, and her

ferocity seemed to pull the others in her wake. Only Vanjit held herself

apart, attending only some of Eiah's discussions. It was as if there

were a set amount of attention, and as Eiah bore down, Vanjit floated up