Price of Spring lpq-4

by Daniel Abraham

  "Eiah Machi," the andat said, its voice low and amused, "the little girl who saved the world. Is that how you see it? Or is this how you apologize for slaughtering a whole people?"

  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 fir
st 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."

  "Assuming nothing else happens," Otah said. Below, a fanfare was blaring.

  "You mean Eymond," Farrer said. "They're a problem, it's true."

  "Eymond. Eddensea, the Westlands. Anyone, really."

  "If we had the andat..

  "We don't," Otah said.

  "No, I suppose not," Farrer said, sourly. "But to the point, how many of us are aware of that fact?"

  In the dim light of the brazier's coals, Farrer's face was the same dusky red as the moon in eclipse. The Galt smiled, pleased that he had taken Otah by surprise.

  "You and I know. The High Council. That half-bastard council you put together when you headed out into the wilderness. Ana. Danat. A few armsmen. All in all, I'd guess not more than three dozen people actually know what happened. And none of them is at present working for Eymond."

  "You're saying we should pretend to have an andat?"

  "Not precisely," Fatter said. "As many people as already know, the story will come out eventually. But there might be a way to present it that still gave other nations pause. Send out letters of embassage that say the andat, though recovered, have been set aside and deny the rumors that certain deaths and odd occurrences are at all related to a new poet under the direction of the Empire."

  "What deaths?"

  "Don't be too specific about that," Farrer said. "I expect they'll supply the details."

  "Let them think… that we have the andat and are hiding the fact?" Otah laughed.

  "It won't last forever, but the longer we can stall them, the better prepared we'll be when they come."

  "And they do always come," Otah said. "Clever thought. It costs us nothing. It could gain us a great deal. Issandra?"

  Farrer leaned back in his chair, setting his heels on the parapet and looking up at the stars, the full, heavy moon. For the space of a heartbeat, he looked forlorn. He drank his wine and looked over at Otah.

  "My wife is an amazing woman," he said. "I'm fortunate to have her. And if Ana's half like her, she'll be running both our nations whether your son likes it or not."

  It was the opening to a hundred other issues. Galt and the cities of the Khaiem were in a state of profound disarray. Ana Dasin might be the new Empress, but that meant little enough in practical terms. In Galt the High Council and the full council were each in flux, their elections and appointments in question now that their cities were little more than abandoned. Otah would be hated for that destruction or else beloved for the mending of it.

  "It is the point, isn't it? If we are two nations, we're doomed," Farrer said, reading his concerns. "We have too many enemies and not enough strengths between us."

  "If we're one… how do we do that? Will the High Council be ruled by my edict? Am I supposed to cede my power to them?"

  "Compromise, Most High," Farrer said. "It will be a long process of compromise and argument, idiotic yammering debate and high melodrama. But in its defense, it won't be war."

  "It won't be war," Otah repeated. Only when the words had come out into the night air, hanging as if physical, did he realize he had meant it as an agreement. One nation. His empire had just doubled in size, tripled in complexity and need, and his own power had been cut at least by half. Farrer seemed surprised when he laughed.

  "Tomorrow," Otah said. "Call the High Council tomorrow. I'll bring my council. We'll start with the report and try to build something like a plan from there. And tell Issandra that I'll have the letters of embassage sent. Best get that done before there's a debate about it, ne?"

  They sat for a time with
out speaking, two men whose children had just joined their families. Two enemies planning a house in common. Two great powers whose golden ages had ended. They could play at it, but each knew that it was only in their children, in their grandchildren, that the game of friendship could become truth.

  Farrer finished his wine, leaving the bowl by his chair. As he walked out, he put a hand on Otah's shoulder.

  "Your son seems a fine man," he said.

  "Your daughter is a treasure."

  "She is," Farrer Dasin said, his voice serious. And then Otah was alone again, the night numbing his feet and biting his ears and nose. He pulled the blanket around himself more tightly and left the balcony and the city and the celebrations behind him.

  The palaces were as quiet and busy as the backstage at a performance. Servants ran or walked or conducted low, angry conversations that died at Otah's approach. He let the night make its own path. He knew the bridal procession had returned to the palaces by the number of robes with bits of tinsel and bright paper clinging to the hems. And also by the flushed faces and spontaneous laughter. There would have been celebration on into the night, even if they hadn't scheduled the wedding on Candles Night. As it was, Utani as a whole, from the highest nobility to the lowest beggar, would sleep late and speak softly when they woke. Otah doubted there would be any wine left by spring.

  But there would be babies. He could already name a dozen women casually who would be giving birth when the summer came. And everywhere, in all the cities, the conditions were the same. They would miss a generation, but only one. The Empire would stumble, but it need not fall.

  Even more than the joining of the Empire and Galt, the night was the first formal celebration of a world made new. Otah wished he felt more part of it. Perhaps he understood too well what price had brought them here.

  He found Eiah where he knew he would. The physicians' house with its wide, slate tables and the scent of vinegar and burning herbs. Cloth lanterns bobbled in the breeze outside the open doors. A litter of stretched canvas and light wood lay on the steps, blood staining the cloth. Within, half a dozen men and two women sat on low wooden benches or lay on the floor. One of the men tried to take a pose of obeisance, winced in pain, and sat back down. Otah made his way to the rear. Three men in leather aprons were working the tables, servants and assistants swarming around them. Eiah, in her own apron, was at the back table. A Galtic man lay before her, groaning. Blood drenched his side. Eiah glanced up, saw him, and took a pose of welcome with red hands.