A Betrayal in Winter
To Kat and Scarlet
This book and this series would not be as good if I hadn't had the help
of Walter Jon Williams, Melinda Snodgrass, Yvonne Coates, Sally Gwylan,
Emily Mah-Tippets, S. M. Stirling, Terry England, Ian "I regellis, Sage
Walker, and the other members of the New Mexico Critical Mass Workshop.
I also owe debts of gratitude to Shawna McCarthy and Danny Baror for
their enthusiasm and faith in the project, to James Frenkel for his
unstinting support and uncanny ability to take a decent manuscript and
make it better, and to 'lbm Doherty and the staff at Tor for their
kindness and support of a new author.
And I am especially indebted to Paul Park, who told me to write what I fear.
""]'here's a problem at the mines," his wife said. "One of your
treadmill pumps."
Biitrah Machi, the eldest son of the Khai Machi and a man of fortyfive
summers, groaned and opened his eyes. The sun, new-risen, set the
paper-thin stone of the bedchamber windows glowing. Iliarni sat beside him.
"I've had the boy set out a good thick robe and your seal hoots," she
said, carrying on her thought, "and sent him for tea and bread."
Biitrah sat up, pulling the blankets off and rising naked with a grunt.
A hundred things came to his half-sleeping mind. It'r a pump-the
engineers can fix it or Bread an,-1 tea? Ain I a prisoner? or Take that
robe off, dove-let's have the mines care for themselves fora morning.
But he said what he always did, what he knew she expected of him.
"No time. I'll cat once I'm there."
"Take care," she said. "I don't want to hear that one of your brothers
has finally killed you."
"When the time comes, I don't think they'll come after me with a
treadmill pump."
Still, he made a point to kiss her before he walked to his dressing
chamber, allowed the servants to array him in a robe of gray and violet,
stepped into the sealskin boots, and went out to meet the bearer of the
had tidings.
"It's the I)aikani mine, most high," the man said, taking a pose of
apology formal enough for a temple. "It failed in the night. They say
the lower passages are already half a man high with water."
Biitrah cursed, but took a pose of thanks all the same. Together, they
walked through the wide main hall of the Second Palace. The caves
shouldn't have been filling so quickly, even with a failed pump. Some
thing else had gone wrong. He tried to picture the shape of the Daikani
mines, but the excavations in the mountains and plains around Machi were
numbered in the dozens, and the details blurred. Perhaps four
ventilation shafts. Perhaps six. He would have to go and see.
His private guard stood ready, bent in poses of obeisance, as he came
out into the street. Ten men in ceremonial mail that for all its glitter
would turn a knife. Ceremonial swords and daggers honed sharp enough to
shave with. Each of his two brothers had a similar company, with a
similar purpose. And the time would come, he supposed, that it would
descend to that. But not today. Not yet. He had a pump to fix.