The Price of Spring

by Daniel Abraham

  The envoy read the letters-ciphered and sent between a fictional merchant in Obar State and Cehmai himself here in Utani. They outlined the latest advance in the poetmaster's rebuilding of the lost libraries of Machi, which also had not happened. Cehmai sipped tea from an iron bowl and looked out the window. He couldn't see the steam caravan from here, but he had a good view of the river. It was at the point he liked it most, the water freed by the thaw, the banks not yet overgrown by green. No matter how many years passed, he still felt a personal affinity with earth and stone.

  The envoy finished reading, his mouth in a smile that would have seemed pleasant and perhaps a bit simple on someone else.

  "Is any of this true?" the envoy asked.

  "Danat-cha did send a dozen men into the foothills north of Machi," Cehmai said, "and Maati-kvo and I did spend a winter there. Past that, nothing. But it should keep Eddensea's attention on sneaking through to search for it themselves. And we're in the process of forging books that we can then `recover' in a year or so."

  The envoy tucked the letters into a leather pouch at his belt. He didn't look up as he spoke.

  "That brings a question," the man said. "I know we've talked about this before, but I'm not sure you've fully grasped the advantages that could come from leaning a little nearer the truth. Nothing that would be effective. We all understand that. But our enemies all have scholars working at these problems. If they were able to come close enough that the bindings cost them, if they paid the andat's price-"

  Cehmai took a pose of query. "Wouldn't that be doing your work for you?" he asked.

  "My job is to see they don't succeed," the envoy said. "A few mysterious, grotesque deaths would help me find the people involved."

  "It would give away too much," Cehmai said. "Bringing them near enough to be hurt by the effort would also bring them near to succeed„ ing.

  The envoy looked at him silently. His placid eyes conveyed only a mild distrust.

  "If you have a threat to make, feel free," Cehmai said. "It won't do you any good."

  "Of course there's no threat, Cehmai-cha," the envoy said. "We're all on the same side here."

  "Yes," the poetmaster said, rising from his chair with a pose that called the meeting to its close. "Try to keep it in mind."

  His apartments were across the palaces. He made his way along the pathways of white and black sand, past the singing slaves and the fountain in the shape of the Galtic Tree that marked the wing devoted to the High Council. The men and women he passed nodded to him with deference, but few took any formal pose. A decade of joint rule had led to a thousand small changes in etiquette. Cehmai supposed it was smallminded of him to regret them.

  Idaan was sitting on the porch of their entranceway, tugging at a length of string while a gray tomcat worried the other end. He paused, watching her. Unlike her brother, she'd grown thicker with time, more solid, more real. He must have made some small sound, because she looked up and smiled at him.

  "How was the assassin's conference?" she asked.

  The tomcat forgot his string and trotted up to Cehmai, already purring audibly. He stopped to scratch its fight-ragged ears.

  "I wish you wouldn't call it that," he said.

  "Well, I wish my hair were still dark. It is what it is, love. Politics in action."

  "Cynic," he said as he reached the porch.

  "Idealist," she replied, pulling him down to kiss him.

  Far to the east, an early storm fell from clouds dark as bruises, a veil of gray. Cehmai watched it, his arm around his lover's shoulder. She leaned her head against him.

  "How was the Emperor this morning?" he asked.

  "Fine. Excited to see Issandra-cha again as much as anything about the caravan. I think he's more than half infatuated with her."

  "Oh please," Cehmai said. "This will be his seventy-ninth summer? His eightieth?"

  "And you won't still want me when you've reached the age?"

  "Well. Fair point."

  "His hands bother him most," Idaan said. "It's a pity about his hands."

  Lightning flashed on the horizon, less that a firefly. Idaan twined her fingers with his and sighed.

  "Have I mentioned recently how much I appreciate you coming to find me? Back when you were an outlaw and I was still a judge, I mean," she asked.

  "I never tire of hearing it," Cehmai said.

  The tomcat leaped on his lap, dug its claws into his robe twice, kneading him like bread dough, and curled up.

  For even if the flowergrows from an ancient vine, the flowers of spring are themselves new to the world, untried and untested.

  EIAH MOTIONED FOR OTAH TO SIT. SHE WAS GENTLE AS ALWAYS WITH HIS crippled hands. He sat back down slowly. The servants had brought his couches out to a wide garden, but with the coming sunset he'd have to be moved again. Eiah tried to impress on her father's servants that what he needed and what he wanted weren't always the same. She'd given up convincing Otah years earlier.

  "How are you feeling?" she asked, sitting beside him. "You look tired."

  "It was a long day," Otah said. "I slept well enough, but I can never stay in bed past dawn. When I was young, I could sleep until midday. Now that I have the time and no one would object, I'm up with the birds. Does that seem right to you?"

  "The world was never fair."

  "Truth. All the gods know that's the truth."

  She took his wrists as if it were nothing more than the contact of father and daughter. Otah looked at her impatiently, but he suffered it. She closed her eyes for a moment, feeling the subtle differences of his pulses.

  "I heard you woke confused again," she said. "You were calling for someone called Muhatia-cha?"

  "I had a dream. That's all," Otah said. "Muhatia was my overseer back when I was young. I dreamed that I was late for my shift. I needed to get to the seafront before he docked my pay. That was all. I'm not losing my mind, love. My health, maybe, but not my mind. Not yet."

  "I didn't think you were. Turn here. Let me look at your eyes. Have the headaches come back?"

  "No," Otah said, and she knew by his voice he was lying. It was time to stop asking details. There was only so much physician's attention her father would permit. She sat back on the couch, and he let out a small, satisfied breath.

  "You saw Issandra Dasin?" she asked.

  "Yes, yes. She spent the better part of the afternoon here," Otah said. "The things they've done with Chaburi-Tan are amazing. I was thinking I might go myself. Just to see them."

  "It would be fascinating," Eiah agreed. "I hear Farrer-cha's doing well?"

  "He's made more out of that city than I could have. But then I was never particularly brilliant with administration. I had other skills, I suppose," Otah said. "Enough about that. Tell me about your family. How is Parit-cha? And the girls?"

  Eiah let herself be distracted. Parit was well, but he'd been kept away from their apartments three nights running by a boy who worked for House Laarin who'd broken his leg falling off a wall. It had been a bad break, and the fever hadn't gone down quickly enough to suit anyone. It seemed as if the boy would live, and they were both happy to call that a success. Of Otah's granddaughters, Mischa was throwing all her free time into learning to dance every new form that came in from Galt, and wearing the dance master's feet raw in the effort. Gaber had talked about nothing besides the steam caravan for weeks, but Eiah suspected it was more Calin's enthusiasm than her own. Gaber assumed that Calin rose with the sun and set with the moon.

  Eiah didn't realize how long she'd been telling the small stories of her family until the overseer came out with an apologetic pose and announced that the Emperor's meal was waiting. Otah made a show of rubbing his belly, but when Eiah joined him, he ate very little. The meal was fresh chicken cooked in last year's apricots, and it was delicious. She watched her father pluck at the pale flesh.

  He looked older than his years. His skin had grown as thin as paper; his eyes were always wet. After his hands had fallen to th
eir weakness, the headaches had begun. Eiah had tried him on half a dozen different programs of herbs and baths. She wasn't convinced he'd followed any of them very closely.

  "Stop," Otah said. Eiah took a pose that asked clarification. He frowned at her, his eyebrows rising as he spoke. "You're looking at me as if I were a particularly interesting bloodworm. I'm fine, Eiah-kya. I sleep well, I wake full of energy, my bowels never trouble me, and my joints don't ache. Everything that could be right about me is right. Now I'd like to spend an evening with my daughter and not my physician, eh?"

  "I'm sorry, Papa-kya," she said. "It's only that I worry."

  "I know," he said, "and I forgive you. But don't let tomorrow steal what's good about tonight. The future takes care of its own. You can write that down if you like. The Emperor said it."

  The flower that wilted last year is gone. Petals once fallen are fallen forever.

  IDAAN ROSE BEFORE THE DAWN AS SHE ALWAYS DID, PARTING THE NETTING silently and stealthily walking out to her dressing chamber so as not to disturb Cehmai. She was not so important a woman that the servants wouldn't leave her be or that armsmen were needed to hold the utkhaiem and councilmen at bay. She was not her brother. She picked a simple robe of dusty red and rich blue and fastened all the ties herself. Then sandals and a few minutes before a mirror with a brush and a length of stout ribbon to bring her hair into something like order.

  No one had assigned her the daily task of carrying breakfast to the Emperor. It was one she'd simply taken on. After two weeks of arriving at the kitchens to collect the tray with its plates and bowl and teapot, the servant who had been the official bearer simply stopped coming. She'd usurped the work.

  That morning, they'd prepared honey bread and raisins, hot rice in almond milk, and a slab of roast pork with a pepper glaze. Idaan knew from experience that she would end with the pork and the honey bread. The rice, he might eat.

  The path to the Emperor's apartments was well-designed. The balance between keeping the noises and interruptions away-not to mention the constant possibility of fire-and getting the food to him still warm meant a long, straight journey almost free from the meanderings to which the palaces were prone. Archways of stone marked the galleries. Tapestries of lush red and gold hung on the walls. The splendor had long since ceased to take her breath away. She had lived in palaces and mud huts and everything in between. The only thing that astounded her with any regularity was that so late in her life, she had found her family.

  Cehmai alone had been miraculous. The last decade serving in court had been something greater than that. She had become an aunt to Danat and Eiah and Ana, a sister to Otah Machi. Even now, her days had the feel of relaxing in a warm bath. It wasn't something she'd expected. For that, it wasn't something she'd thought possible. The nightmares almost never came now; never more than once or twice in a month. She was ready to grow old here, in these halls and passageways, with these people. If anyone had the poor judgment to threaten her people, Idaan knew she would kill the idiot. She hoped the occasion wouldn't arise.

  She knew something was wrong as soon as she passed through the arch that led to Otah's private garden. Four servants stood in a clot at the side door, their faces pale, their hands in constant motion. With a feeling of dread, she put the lacquer tray on a bench and came forward. The oldest of the servants was weeping, his face blotchy and his eyes swollen. Idaan looked at the man, her expression empty. Whatever strength remained in him left, and he folded to the ground sobbing.

  "Have you sent for his children?" Idaan asked.

  "I ... we only just ..."

  Idaan raised her eyebrows, and the remaining servants scattered. She stepped over the weeping man and made her way into the private rooms. All together, they were smaller than Idaan's old farmhouse. It didn't take long to find him.

  Otah sat in a chair as if he were only sleeping. The window before him was open, the shutters swaying slow and languorous in the breeze. The motion reminded her of seaweed. His robe was yellow shot with black. His eyes were barely open and as empty as marbles. Idaan made herself touch his skin. It was cold. He was gone.

  She found a stool, pulled it to his side, and sat with him one last time. His hand was stiff, but she wrapped her fingers around his. For a long while, she said nothing. Then, softly so that just the two of them could hear, she spoke.

  "You did good work, brother. I can't think anyone would have done better."

  She remained there breathing the scent of his rooms for the last time until Danat and Eiah arrived, a small army of servants and utkhaiem and councilmen at their backs. Idaan told Eiah what she needed to know in a few short sentences, then left. The breakfast was gone, cleared away. She went to find Cehmai and tell him the news.

  Flowers do not return in the spring, rather they are replaced. It is in this difference between returned and replaced that the price of renewal is paid.

  "No," ANA SAID. THE AMBASSADOR OF EYMOND LIFTED A FINGER, AS IF BEGging leave to interrupt the Empress. He made a small noise at the back of his throat. Ana shook her head. "I said no. I meant no, Lord Ambassador. And if you raise your finger to me again like I was a schoolgirl talking out of turn, I will have it cut off and set in a necklace for you."

  The meeting room was as silent as a grave. Even the candle flames stood still. The dark-stained wood of the floor and beautifully painted abstract frescoes of the walls seemed out of place, too rich and peaceful for the moment. A back room at a teahouse was the better venue for this kind of negotiation. Ana enjoyed the contrast.

  She knew when she first heard of Otah Machi's death that she was going to have to be responsible for holding the Empire together until Danat regained his balance. She hadn't yet lost a parent. Her husband and lover now had neither of his. The lost expression in his eyes and the bewildered tone in his voice made her heart ache. And so when their partners and rivals in trade took the opportunity to renegotiate treaties in hopes of winning some concession in the fog of grief, Ana found herself taking it personally.

  "Lady Empress," the ambassador said, "I don't mean disrespect, but you must see that-"

  Ana raised her finger, the mirror of the man's gesture. He went silent.

  "A necklace," she said. "Ask around if you'd like. You'll find I have no sense of proportion. None."

  Very quietly, the ambassador took the scroll up from the table between them and put it back in its satchel. Ana nodded and gestured to the door. The man's spine could have been made of a single, unarticulated iron bar as he left. Ana felt no sympathy for him.

  The Master of Tides came in a moment later, her face amused and alarmed. Ana took what she thought was the proper pose to express continuity. The Khaiate system of poses was something that was best born into and learned from infancy. She did her best, and no one had the audacity to correct her, so Ana figured she was close enough.

  "I believe that is all for the day, Most High," the Master of Tides said.

  "Excellent. We got through those quickly, didn't we?"

  "Very quickly," the woman agreed.

  "Feel free to offer any other audiences the choice of meeting with me or waiting for my husband until after the mourning rites."

  "I will be sure to sketch out the options," the woman said in voice that assured Ana that she would make room in her schedule to help Danat with his father's arrangements.

  Ana found her mother in the guests' apartments. Her return trip had been postponed, the steam caravan itself waiting for her. The blue silk curtains billowed in the soft breeze; the scent of lemon candles lit to keep the insects away filled the air. Issandra sat before the fire grate, her hands folded on her lap. She didn't rise.

  Ana would never have said it, but her mother looked old. The sun of Chaburi-Tan had darkened her skin, making her hair seem brilliantly white.

  "Mother."

  "Empress," Issandra Dasin said. Her voice was warm. "I'm afraid our timing left something to be desired."

  "No," Ana said. "It wouldn't have mattered
. Tell father that I appreciate the invitation, but I can't leave my family here."

  "He won't hear it from me," Issandra said. "He's a good man, but time hasn't made him less stubborn. He wants his little girl back."

  Ana sighed. Her mother nodded.

  "I know his little girl is gone," Issandra said. "I'll try to make him understand that you're happy here. It may come to his visiting you himself."

  "How are things at home?" Ana asked. She knew it was a telling question. She started to take a pose that unasked it but lost her way. It wasn't part of their conversation anyway.

  "The word from Galt is good. The trade routes are busier than Farrer's seafront can accommodate. He's filling his coffers with silver and gems at a rate I've never seen," Issandra said. "It consoles him."

  "I am happy here," Ana said.

  "I know you are, love," her mother said. "This is where your children live."

  They talked about small things for another hour, and then Ana took her leave. There would be time enough later.

  The Emperor's pyre was set to be lit in two days. Utani was wrapped in mourning cloth. The palaces were swaddled in rags, the trees hung heavy with gray and white cloth. Dry mourning drums filled the air where there had once been music. The music would come again. She knew that. This was only something that had to be endured.

  She found Danat in his father's apartments, tears streaking his face. Around him were spread sheets of paper as untidy as a bird's nest. All of them were written upon in Otah Machi's hand. There had to be a thousand pages. Danat looked up at her. For the length of a heartbeat, she could see what her husband had looked like as a child.

  "What is it?" Ana asked.

  "It was a crate," Danat said. "Father left orders that it be put on his pyre. They're letters. All of them are to my mother."

  "From when they were courting?" Ana asked, sitting on the floor, her legs crossed.

  "After she died," Danat said. Ana plucked a page from the pile. The paper was brittle, the ink pale. Otah Machi's words were perfectly legible.

  Kiyan-kya-