Page 11 (2/2)
The footsteps reached the door and two men in workmen&039;s trousers pushed in, a thick, heavy box between them Maati saas fashioned of wood bound with black iron - sht fit inside it but too short to stand, too narrow to sit, too shallow to turn around He had seen drawings of it in books with the Dai-kvo They had been books about the excesses of the imperial courts, about their punishainst Heshai-kvo&039;s wall, took poses of abject obeisance to the Khai, and left quickly
"Most high," Maati said, his voice thick, "Youthis is "
"Rest yourself, boy," the Khai said as he stepped to the thing and pulled the bar that opened the iron grate "It isn&039;t for s in when he isn&039;t using the open Maati saw Seed-less&039;s eyes widen for a moment, then an amused smile plucked the perfect lips Heshai looked on in silence
"But er "A poet and his work are connected, if you lock a part of Heshai-kvo into a torture box "
The Khai took a sharp pose that required silence, and Maati&039;s words died The hed and stepped between the moment, Maati aler in the Khai&039;s expression
"You forget, h killed two of his brothers to sit in his chair He knows oes"
"Now, Heshai," the Khai said, but Maati saw no effort in Heshai-kvo as Seedless stepped backward into the box, crouching down, knees bent The Khai shut the grate, barred it, and slid a spike in to hold the bar in place The pale face of the andat was crossed with shadows andstill until Heshai adopted a pose that accepted the judgment
"It doesn&039;t roaoes in its place This is h," Heshai said, then lay down and turned away, pulling his sheet over hiust and turned to leave At the doorway, he paused
"Boy," he said, taking a pose of command Maati answered with an appropriate obeisance "When your turn coone, Maati stood, shaking Heshai didn&039;t ers laced with theout Maati pulled the netting back over his master and went downstairs No one res of sympathy and concern half consuht Otah-kvo will knohat to do Please, please let Otah-kvo knohat to do
He hurried, gathering an apple, so poet before changing into fresh robes and rushing out through the palace grounds to the street and down into the city Halfway to the quarters where Otah-kvo&039;s cohort slept, he noticed he eeping He couldn&039;t say for certain when he&039;d begun
"ITANI!" MUHATIA-CHA barked "Get down here!"
Otah, high in the suffocating heat and darkness near the warehouse roof, grabbed the sides of his ladder and slid down Muhatia-cha stood in the wide double doors that opened to the light and noise of the street The overseer had a sour expression, but erness, perhaps, or curiosity Otah stood before him with a pose appropriate to the completion of a task
"You&039;re wanted at the coood they think you&039;ll do there"
"Yes, Muhatia-cha"
"If this is just your lady love pulling you away from your duties, Itani, I&039;ll find out"
"I won&039;t be able to tell you unless I go," Otah pointed out and s as he did that he&039;d never htly, and he waved Otah on
"Hai! Itani!" Kaimati&039;s familiar voice called out Otah turned His old friend was pulling a cart to the warehouse door, but had paused, bracing the load against his knees "Let us knohat you find, eh?"
Otah took a pose of agreement and turned away It was an illusion, he knew, that the people he passed in the streets seemed to stare at him There was no reason for the city as a whole to see hi of him Another laborer in a city full of e the feeling The sad trade had gone wrong Liat was involved, as was Maati For two days, he had seen neither Liat&039;s cell at the compound had been empty, the poet&039;s house too full for hiossip of the street and the bathhouse
The andat had broken loose and killed the girl as well as her babe; the child had actually been fathered by the poet himself or the Khai or, least probably, the andat Seedless himself; the poet had killed himself or been killed by the Khai or by the andat; the poet was lying sick at heart Or the woman was The stories see in all directions and filling all mathematical possibilities Every story that could be told, including - unreion of fellows - the truth, had been whispered in some corner of Saraykeht in the last day He had slept poorly, and awakened unrefreshed Now, he walked quickly, the afternoon sun pushing down on his shoulders and sweat pouring off hiht of Liat on the street outside the conized the shape of her body before he could see her face, could read the exhaustion in the slope of her shoulders She worerobes He didn&039;t know if they were the sarief was fresher than that When she caught sight of him, she walked to him Her eyes were sunken, her skin pale, her lips bloodless She stepped into his e It was unsee an overseer this way - his cheek pressed to her forehead - in the street It was too hot for the sensation to be pleasant She held him fiercely, and he felt the deepness of her breath by the way she pressed against him
"What happened, love?" he asked, but Liat only shook her head Otah stroked her unbound hair and waited until, with a shuddering sigh, she pulled back She didn&039;t release his hand, and he didn&039;t try to reclaim it
"Come to my cell," she said "We can talk there"
The coh their duties as if nothing had happened, except for the air of tension Liat led the way in silence, pushed open the door of her cell and pulled him into the shadows A thin form lay on the cot, swathed in brown robes Maati sat up, blinking sleep out of his eyes
"Otah-kvo?" the boy asked
"He cao of Otah&039;s hand at last and sitting at her desk "I don&039;t think he&039;d eaten or had anything to drink since it happened I brought hiave him an apple and some water, put him to bed, and sent a runner to Muhatia-cha"
"I&039;m sorry," Maati said "I didn&039;t knohere to find you, and I thought Liat-cha ht "
"It was a fine plan," Otah said "It worked But what happened?"
Maati looked down, and Liat spoke Her voice was hard as slate and as gray Speaking softly, she told the story: she&039;d been fooled by the translator Oshai and the andat at the price of Maj and her babe Maati took the narrative up: the poet was ill, eating little, drinking less, never leaving his bed And the Khai, in his anger, had locked Seedless away As detail grew upon detail, problehter Liat wouldn&039;t aze, and Otah wished Maati were elsewhere, so that he could take her in his arms But he also knew there was nowhere else that Maati could turn It was right that he&039;d come here When Maati&039;s voice trailed off at last, Otah realized the boy was looking at hi For a decision
"So he ad as he spoke "Seedless confessed to the Khai"
Maati took a pose of confirmation
"Why?" Otah asked "Did he really think it would break Heshai-kvo&039;s spirit? That he&039;d be freed?"
"Of course he did," Liat snapped, but Maati took a htful expression and shook his head
"Seedless hates Heshai," Maati said "It was a flaw in the translation Or else not a flaw buta part of it He may have only done it because he kne badly Heshai would be hurt"
"Heshai?" Liat demanded "How badly Heshai would be hurt? What about Maj? She didn&039;t do anything to deserve this Nothing!"
"Seedlessdoesn&039;t care about her," Maati said
"Will Heshai release him?" Otah asked "Did it work?"
Maati took a pose that both professed ignorance and apologized for it "He&039;s not well And I don&039;t knohat confining Seedless will do to him - "
"Who cares?" Liat said Her voice was bitter "What does it matter whether Heshai suffers? Why shouldn&039;t he? He&039;s the one who controls the andat If he was so busy whoring and drinking that he couldn&039;t be bothered to do his work, then he ought to be punished"
"That&039;s not the issue, love," Otah said, his gaze still on Maati
"Yes, it is," she said
"If the poet wastes away and dies or if this drives hioes free Unless "
"I&039;m not ready," Maati said "I&039;ve only just arrived here, really A student ht study under a full poet for years before he&039;s ready to take on the burden And even then soht not be able to hold Seedless at all"
"Would you try?"
It took a long time before Maati answered, and when he did, his voice was small
"If I failed, I&039;d pay his price"
"What&039;s his price?" Liat asked
"I don&039;t know," Maati said "The only way to find out is to fail Death, most likely ButI could try If there was no one else to"
"That&039;s insane," Liat said, looking to Otah for support "He can&039;t do that It would be like asking him to jump off a cliff and see if he could learn to fly on the way down"
"There isn&039;t the choice There aren&039;t very s There aren&039;t many poets who even try them There may be no replaceht not ith the cotton trade," Maati said He looked pale and ill "If no one else can take the poet&039;s place, it&039;s my duty - "
"It hasn&039;t come to that With luck, it won&039;t," Otah said "Perhaps there&039;s another poet who&039;s better suited for the task Or some other andat that could take Seedless&039; place if he escaped - "
"We could send to the Dai-kvo," Liat said "He&039;d know"
"I can&039;t go," Maati said "I can&039;t leave Heshai-kvo here"
"You can write," Liat said "Send a courier"
"Can you do that?" Otah asked "Write it all out, everything: the sad trade, Seedless, how the Khai&039;s responded What you&039;re afraid ?" Otah asked
"I could have it to"
Otah closed his eyes His belly felt heavy with dread, his hands tre as if he were about to attack a e, and it couldn&039;t be Maati It would be him He would do it himself The resolve was si before
Tahi-kvo&039;s face looination, and with it, the sense of the school - its cold, bruising days and nights, the emptiness and the cruelty and the sense he had had, however briefly, of belonging The anger rose in hiain, as if it had only been banked all these years Soo to the Dai-kvo, and Otah was ready to see theit here then," he said "To Liat&039;s cell There are always ships leaving for Yalakeht this time of year I&039;ll find a berth on one"
"You&039;re not going," Liat said "You can&039;t Your indenture "
Otah opened the door and e with a pose that was both a thanks and a promise
"You&039;re sure of this?" Maati asked
Otah nodded, then turned away again When they were alone, the cell fell back into twilight
"You can&039;t go," Liat said "I need you to stay I need someonesomeone by my side What happened to Maj, what happened to her babyit wason her desk, stroking her silk-s his hand in both of hers and pressing it to her chest
"I have to Not just for this My past is up there It&039;s the right thing"
"She hasn&039;t stopped crying She sleeps and she wakes up crying I went to see her when the utkhaiem released me She was the first person I went to see And when she looks at ht she was callous I thought she didn&039;t care I didn&039;t see it"
Otah slid down, kneeling on the floor, and put his ar," Liat whispered "It isn&039;t because of et away froainst his shoulder He could feel his ht - what he would need to do, the steps he would have to take He stroked her hair, smooth as water
"Of course not, love," he said
"Because you&039;ll be a great irl who can&039;t keep ods &039;Tani I didn&039;t see it I didn&039;t see it"
She wept, the sobs shaking her as he cooed and rocked her gently He rested his chin on her bent head, curling her into him She s quieted, until his arainst him and her breath was almost slow as sleep
"You&039;re exhausted, love," he said "Co "No, stay with o now"
Gently, he lifted her and carried her to her cot He sat beside her, her hand wrapping his like vine on brick
"Three weeks to Yalakeht," he said "Then maybe teeks upriver and a day or two on foot Less than that co with the water on the way down I&039;ll be back before winter, love"
In the light pressing in at the shutters and the door, he could see her eyes, bleary with grief and exhaustion, seeking his Her face was unlined, relaxed, halfway asleep already
"You&039;re excited to go," she said "You want to"
And, of course, that was the truth Otah pressed his pal them To her eyes This wasn&039;t a conversation he was ready to have Or perhaps only not with her
He kissed her forehead and waited until she was asleep before he quietly opened her door and stepped out into the light