THE (tlpq-4) (56 page)

Eiah didn't speak, and the andat went still again. Anger flashed in its

eyes and Maati's hand went out, touching Eiah's. She patted him away

absently, as if he were no more than a well-intentioned dog. The andat

hissed under its breath and turned away. Maati noticed for the first

time that its teeth were pointed. Eiah relaxed. Maati sat up; his breath

had almost returned. The andat shifted to look at him. The whites of his

eyes had gone as black as a shark's; he had never seen an andat shift

its appearance before, and it filled him with sudden dread. Eiah made a

scolding sound, and the andat took an apologetic pose.

Maati tried to imagine what it would be like, a thought that changeable,

that flexible, that filled with violence and rage. How did we everthink

we could do good with these as our tools? For as long as she held the

andat, Eiah was condemned to the struggle. And Maati was responsible for

that sacrifice too.

Eiah, it seemed, had other intentions.

"That should do," she said. "You can go."

The andat vanished, its robe collapsing to the floor in a pool of blue

and gold. The scent of overheated stone came and went, a breath of hell

on the night air. The others were silent. Maati came to himself first.

"What have you done?" he whispered.

"I'm a physician," Eiah said, her tone dismissive. "Holding that

abomination the rest of my life would have gotten in the way of my work,

and who told you that you were allowed to sit up? On your back or I'll

call in armsmen to hold you down. No, don't say anything. I don't care

if you're feeling a thousand times better. Down. Now."

He lay back, staring up at the ceiling. His mind felt blasted and blank.

The enameled brick was blurred in the torchlight, or perhaps it was only

that his eyes were only what they had been. The cold air that breathed

in through the window too gently to even be a breeze felt better than he

would have expected, the stone floor beneath him more comfortable. The

voices around him were quiet with respect for his poor health or else

with awe. The world had never seen a night like this one. It likely

never would again.

She had freed it. Gods, all that they'd done, all that they'd suffered,

and she'd just freed the thing.

When Danat returned, Eiah forced half a handful of herbs more bitter

than the last into his mouth and told him to leave them under his tongue

until she told him otherwise. Idaan and one of the armsmen hauled

Vanjit's body away. They would burn it, Maati thought, in the morning.

Vanjit had been a broken, sad, dangerous woman, but she deserved better

than to have her corpse left out. He remembered Idaan saying something

similar of the slaughtered buck.

He didn't notice falling asleep, but Eiah gently shook him awake and

helped him to sit. While she compared his pulses and pressed his

fingertips, he spat out the black leaves. His mouth was numb.

"We're going to take you back down in a litter," she said, and before he

could object, she lifted her hand to his lips. He took a pose that

acquiesced. Eiah rose to her feet and walked back toward the great

bronze doors.

The footsteps behind him were as familiar as an old song.

"Otah-kvo," Maati said.

The Emperor sat on the dais, his hands between his knees. He looked pale

and exhausted.

"Nothing ever goes the way I plan," Otah said, his tone peevish. "Not ever."

"You're tired," Maati said.

"I am. Gods, that I am."

The captain of the armsmen pulled open the doors. Four men followed, a

low weaving of branches and rope between them. Eiah walked at their

side. One of the men at the rear called out, and the whole parade

stopped while the captain, cursing, retied a series of knots. Maati

watched them as if they were dancers and gymnasts performing before a

banquet.

"I'm sorry," Maati said. "This wasn't what I intended."

"Isn't it? I thought the hope was to undo the damage we did with

Sterile, no matter what the price."

Maati started to object, then stopped himself. Outside the great window,

a star fell. The smear of light vanished as quickly as it had come.

"I didn't know how far it would go."

"Would it have mattered? If you had known everything it would take,

would you have been able to abandon the project?" Otah asked. He didn't

sound angry or accusing. Only like a man who didn't know the answer to a

question. Maati found he didn't either.

"If I asked your forgiveness ..."

Otah was silent, then sighed deeply, his head hanging low.

"Maati-kya, we've been a hundred different people to each other, and

tonight I'm too old and too tired. Everything in the world has changed

at least twice since I woke up this morning. I think about forgiving

you, and I don't know what the word means."

"I understand."

"Do you? Well, then you've outpaced me."

The litter came forward. Eiah helped him onto the makeshift seat, rope

and wood creaking under his weight, but solid. The gait of the armsmen

swayed him like a branch in the breeze. The Emperor, they left behind to

follow in the darkness.

31

The formal joining of Ana Dasin and Danat Machi took place on Candles

Night in the high temple of Utani. The assembled nobility of Galt along

with the utkhaiem from the highest of families to the lowest firekeeper

filled every cushion on the floor, every level of balcony. The air

itself was hot as a barn, and the smell of perfume and incense and

bodies was overwhelming. Otah sat on his chair, looking out over the

vast sea of faces. Many of the Galts wore mourning veils, and, to his

surprise, the fashion had not been lost on the utkhaiem. He worried that

the mourning was not entirely for fallen Galt, but also a subterranean

protest of the marriage itself. It was only a small concern, though. He

had thousands more like it.

The Galtic ceremony-a thing of dirgelike song and carefully measured

wine spilled over rice, all to a symbolic end that escaped him-was over.

The traditional joining of his own culture was already under way. Otah

shifted, trying to be unobtrusive in his discomfort despite every eye in

Utani being fixed on the dais.

Fatter Dasin wore a robe of black and a red ocher that suited his

complexion better than Otah would have expected. Issandra sat at his

side in a Galtic gown of yellow lace over a profoundly celebratory red.

Danat knelt before them both.

"Farrer Dasin of House Dasin, I place myself before you as a man before

my elder," Danat said. "I place myself before you and ask your

permission. I would take Ana, your blood issue, to be my wife. If it

does not please you, please only say so, and accept my apology."

The whisperers carried his words out through the hall like wind over

wheat. Ana Dasin herself knelt on a cushion off to her parents' right

and Danat had been sitting to Otah's left. The girl's gown had been an

issue of long and impassioned debate, for the swell of her belly was

unmistakable. With only a few minor modifications, the tailors could

have done much to hide it. Instead, she had chosen Galtic dress with its

tight fittings and waist-slung ribbons, which would make it clear to the

farthest spectator in the temple that summer would come well after the

child. Etiquette masters from both courts had gone at the issue like pit

dogs for the better part of a week. Otah thought she looked beautiful

with her garland of ribbons. Her father apparently thought so as well.

Instead of the traditional reply, I am not displeased, Fatter looked

Danat square in the eyes, then turned to Ana.

"Bit late for asking, isn't it?" Fatter said.

Otah laughed, giving his implicit permission for all the court to laugh

with him. Danat grinned as well and took a pose of gratitude somewhat

more profound than strictly required. Danat rose, came to Otah, and

knelt again.

"Most High?" he said, his mouth quirked in an odd smile. Otah pretended

to consider the question. The court laughed again, and he rose to his

feet. It felt good to stand up, though before it was all finished, he'd

be longing to sit down again.

"Let it be known that I have authorized this match. Let the blood of the

House Dasin enter for the first time into the imperial lineage. And let

all who honor the Khaiem respect this transfer and join in our

celebration. The ceremony shall be held at once."

The whisperers carried it all, and moments later a priest came out,

intoning old words whose meanings were more than half forgotten. The man

was older than Otah, and his expression was as serene and joyous as that

of a man too drunk to stagger. Otah took a welcoming pose, accepted one

in return, and stepped back to let the ceremony proper begin.

Danat accepted a long, looped cord and hung it over his arm. The priest

intoned the ritual questions, and Danat made his answers. Otah's back

began to spasm, but he kept still. The end of the cord, cut and knotted,

passed from Danat to the priest and then to Ana's hand. The roar that

rose up drowned out the whisperers, the priest, the world. The courts of

two nations stood cheering, all decorum forgotten. Ana and Danat stood

together with a length of woven cotton between them, grinning and

waving. Otah imagined their child stirring in its dark sleep, aware of

the sound if not its meaning.

Balasar Gice, wearing the robe of a high councilman, was at the front of

the crowd, clapping his small hands together with tears running down his

cheeks. Otah felt a momentary pang of sorrow. Sinja hadn't seen it.

Kiyan hadn't. He took a deep breath and reminded himself that the moment

wasn't his. The celebration was not of his life or his love or the

binding of his house to a wayhouse keeper from Udun. It was Danat's and

Ana's, and they at least were transcendent.

The rest of the ceremony took twice as long as it should have, and by

the time the procession was ready to carry them out and through the

streets of Utani, the sunset was no more than a memory.

Otah allowed himself to be ushered to a high balcony that looked down

upon the city. The air was bitterly cold, but a cast-iron brazier was

hauled out, coals already bright red so that Otah could feel the searing

heat to his left while his right side froze. He huddled in a thick wool

blanket, following the wedding procession with his eyes. Each street

they turned down lit itself, banners and streamers of cloth arcing

through the air.

Here is where it begins, he thought. And then, Thank all the gods it

isn't me down there.

A servant girl stepped onto the balcony and took a pose that announced a

guest. Otah wasn't about to stick his hands out of the blanket.

"Who?"

"Farrer Dasin-cha," the girl said.

"Bring him here," Otah said. "And some wine. Hot wine."

The girl took a pose that accepted the charge and turned to go.

"Wait," Otah said. "What's your name?"

"Toyani Vauatan, Most High," she said.

"How old are you?"

"Twenty summers."

Otah nodded. In truth, she looked almost too young to be out of the

nursery. And yet at her age, he had been on a ship halfway to the

eastern islands, two different lives already behind him. He pointed out

at the city.

"It's a different world now, Toyani-cha. Nothing's going to stay as it was.

The girl smiled and took a pose that offered congratulations. Of course

she didn't understand. It was unfair to expect her to. Otah smiled and

turned back to the city, the celebration. He didn't see when she left.

The wedding procession had just turned down the long, wide road that led

to the riverfront when Farrer stepped out, the girl Toyani behind them

bearing two bowls of wine that plumed with steam and a chair for the

newcomer without seeming awkward or out of place. It was, Otah supposed,

an art.

"We've done it," Fatter said when the girl had gone.

"We have," Otah agreed. "Not that I've stopped waiting for the next

catastrophe."

"I think the last one will do."

Otah sipped his wine. The spirit hadn't quite been cooked out of it, and

the spices tasted rich and strange. He had been dreading this

conversation, but now that it had come, it wasn't as awful as he'd feared.

"The report's come," Otah said.

"The first one, yes. Everyone on the High Council had a copy this

morning. Just in time for the festivities. I thought it was rude at the

time, but I suppose it gives us all more reason to get sloppy drunk and

weep into our cups."

Otah took a pose of query simple enough for the Galt to follow.

"Every city is in ruins except for Kirinton. They did something clever

there with street callers and string. I don't fully understand it. The

outlying areas suffered, though not quite as badly. The first guesses

are that it will take two generations just to put us back where we were."