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"I am proud of all my children It&039;s why I am not of one mind on this," the Khai said "You would think that I should be, but I am not With every day that the search continues, the truce holds, and Kaiin and Danat still live I&039;ve known since I was old enough to know anything that if I took this chair, my sons would kill each other It wasn&039;t so hard before I knew them, when they were only the idea of sons But then they were Biitrah and Kaiin and Danat And I don&039;t want any of theh If they did not-"
"I knohy theydying rets It&039;s likely that which kills us as much as the sickness I soo That they had slaughtered each other in their childhood Then I ht have at least one of them by me now I had not wanted to die alone"
"You are not alone, h The whole court
Maati broke off The Khai Machi took a pose accepting correction, but the ale of his shouldersthe old man&039;s point
"I can&039;t say which of the thoughtfully on his pipe "I love them all Very dearly I cannot tell you how deeply I miss Biitrah"
"Had you known him, you would have loved Otah as well"
"You think so? Certainly you knew hiht well of o back? After you took your robes? Did you go to see you parents?"
"My father was very old when I went to the school," Maati said "He died before I co We did not know each other"
"So you have never had a fa to keep the tightness in his chest fro the tone of his voice "A lover and a son I had a faer They died?"
"They live Only not withslowly With his thin, wrinkled skin, he re bird The Khai&039;s gaze softened, his brows tilting in understanding and sorrow
"It is never easy for fathers," the Khai said "Perhaps if the world had needed less fro h"
The Khai exhaled a breath of gray, his gaze trapped by the s," the old ed when Saraykeht fell"
"The Khai Saraykeht has a poet," Maati said "He has the power of the andat"
"It took the Dai-kvo eight years and six failed bindings," the Khai said "And every time word came of another failure, I could see it in the faces of the court The utkhaiem may put on proud faces, but I&039;ve seen the fear that swims under that ice And you were there You said so in the audience when I greeted you"
"Yes,you knew," the Khai said "Did you?"
The yellowed eyes fixed on Maati The intelligence in the what had happened to thewith only moments before
"Ithat is "
"There were rury east island girl&039;s revenge The Galts were mentioned"
"And Eddensea," Maati said "And Eyh Soed When the cotton trade collapsed, a great nue"
"They lostat the air with the ste the cities They don&039;t signify Saraykeht was the death of certainty They lost the conviction that the Khaiem would hold the world at bay, that ould never come to Saraykeht And we lost it here too"
"If you say so,touched by chaos is neverback into his cushions "Do you knohat they mean by that, Maati-cha?"
"I have some idea," Maati said, but the Khai went on
"Itunthinkable can only happen once Because after that, it&039;s not unthinkable any longer We&039;ve seen what happens when a city is touched by chaos And now it&039;s in the back of every head in every court in all the cities of the Khaiem"
Maati frowned and leaned forward
"You think Cehrnai-cha is in soht away, stirring the smoky air "No Not that I think my city is at risk I think Otahiven you, a voice murmured in the back of Maati&039;s mind The voice of Seedless, the andat of Saraykeht They were the words the andat had spoken to Maati in the instant before Heshai&039;s death had freed it
It had been speaking of Otah
"I&039;ve called you here for a reason, Maati-cha," the Khai said, and Maati pulled his attention back to the present "I didn&039;t care to speak of it around those ould use it to fuel gossip Your inquiry into Biitrah&039;s death You must move more quickly"
"Even with the truce?"
"Yes, even at the price ofto their tradition If I die without a successor chosen-especially if Danat and Kaiin are still gone to ground-there will be chaos The fa that perhaps they would sit in Your task isn&039;t only to find Otah Your task is to protect h"
"You do not, Maati-cha The spring roses are starting to blooh summer Neither of us has the luxury of time"
THE GATHERING WAS ALL THAT CEHMAI HAD HOPED FOR, AND LESS SPRING
breezes washed the pavilion with the scent of fresh flowers Kilns set along the edges roared behind the an, flute, and drueiven s, and the youth of the high families week after weary week to tire of the cold and dark and the terrible constriction that deep winter brought to those with no business to conduct on the snow
Cehhed and clapped tiht his eye, and he, theirs The heat of youth did where heavier robes would otherwise have been called for, and the draw of body to body filled the air with soer than the perfu death of the Khai lent an air of license Mo, the world&039;s order was changing, and they were young enough to find the thought ro le&039;s mask pressed a bowl of hot wine into his hand, and spun away into the dance Cehe of the pavilion In the shadows behind the kilns, Stone-Made-Soft stood rass, and watched the revelry Two youngaround the wide grounds in nothing but theirfrom their necks The andat shifted like the first shudder of a landslide, then was still again When it spoke, its voice was so soft that they would not be heard by the others
"It wouldn&039;t he the first time the Dai-kvo had lied"
"Or the first time I&039;d wondered why," Cehmai said "It&039;s his to decide what to say and to whom"
"And yours?"
"And mine to satisfy my curiosity You heard what he said to the overseer in the mines If he truly didn&039;t wantinto more than the library, and that&039;s certain"
The andat sighed Stone-blade-Soft had no more need of breath than did a mountainside The exhalation could only be a co even before the andat spoke
"She&039;s co, Idaan Machithe dancers Her mask hid only part of her face and not her identity Wrapped as he was by the darkness, she did not see hi in his breast as he watched her ht, for so theirls and woraceful, or the best spoken, or any of the hundred things that Cehirl should fascinate hi, and none of the others were
"It won&039;t end well," the andat un," Ceh end when it hasn&039;t even started?"
Stone-blade-Soft sighed again, and Ceh at his robes to smooth their lines The h
"Come back when you&039;ve finished and we&039;ll carry on our conversation," the andat said
Cchnored the patience in its voice and strode forward, back into the light The reed organ struck a chord just as he reached Idaan&039;s side He brushed her arm, and she turned-first annoyed and then surprised and then, he thought, pleased
"Idaan-cha," he said, the exaggerated for hiested "I&039;d al us"
"I alht you&039;d be here"
The organ set a beat, and the druain Cehmai held out a hand and, after a pause that took a thousand years and lasted perhaps a breath, Idaan took it The an in earnest, and Cehmai spun her, took her under his arm, and was turned by her It was a wild tune, rich and fast with a rhyth, though not at hi stones beneath the, and the sky above them received it
As they turned to face each other, he could see the flush in Idaan&039;s check, and felt the saain
In the center of the frenzy, so round and hard was pressed into his hands A ently in his ear
"Hold this"
Cehone He was suddenly standing alone in a throng of people, holding an ei took Idaan Machi through the steps and turns of the dance The pair shifted away from hihten He turned and walked through the shifting bodies, handing the bowl to a servant as he left
"He is her lover," the andat said "Everyone knows it"
"I don&039;t," Cehs all the ti you have in mind," Stone-Made-Soft said "You shouldn&039;t do it"
Cehray eyes set in the wide, placid face He felt his own head lift in defiance, even as he knew the words were truth It was stupid and i wasn&039;t even entirely in the wrong There was a perspective by which the little hu so openly with another man&039;s love
And yet
The andat nodded slowly and turned to consider the dancers It was easy enough to pick out Idaan and Adrah They were too far for Ceh It hardly mattered Ceh in time with the drums while Idaan danced to the flutes He doubled his attention, feeling it through his own body and also the constant storm at the hack of hiswith two bodies and a perle at the heart And then, at just the ht, Cehave way, the smooth stone suddenly soft ason his rear, legs splayed Cehmai waited a moment for the stone to flow back nearer to smooth, then let his consciousness return to its usual state The storm that was Stone-Made-Soft was louder, more present in his mind, like the proud flesh where a thorn has scratched skin And like a scratch, Ceho," Ceh childish"