"There are very few ways to do it perfectly. And if a binding goes wrong
... Existing isn't normal for them. If you leave an imprecision or an
inaccuracy, they escape through it, and the poet pays a price for that.
Usually it comes as some particularly gruesome death. And knowing what
an andat is can be subtle. Stone-Made-Soft. What do you mean by stone?
Iron comes from stone, so is it stone? Sand is made of tiny stones. Is
it stone? Bones are like stone. But are they like enough to be called
the same name? All those nuances have to be balanced or the binding
fails. Happily, the Empire produced some formal grammars that were very
precise."
"And you describe this thing...."
"And then you hold that in your mind until you die. Only it's the kind
of thought that can think back, so it's wearing sometimes."
"Do you resent it?" Idaan asked, and something in her voice had changed.
Cehmai opened his eyes. Idaan was looking past him. Her expression was
unfathomable.
"I don't know what you mean," he said.
"You have to carry this thing all your life. Do you ever wish that you
hadn't been called to do it?"
"No," he said. "Not really. It's work, but it's work that I like. And I
get to meet the most interesting women."
Her gaze cooled, flickered over him, and then away.
"Lucky to be you," she said as she sat up. He watched her as she pulled
her robes from the puddle of cloth on the floor. Cehmai sat up. "I have
meetings in the morning. I'll need to be in my own rooms to be ready
anyway. I might as well go now."
"I might say fewer things that angered you if you talked to me," Cehmai
said, gently.
Idaan's head snapped around to him like a hunting cat's, but then her
expression softened to chagrin, and she took an apologetic pose.
"I'm overtired," she said. "'T'here are things that I'm carrying, and I
don't do it as gracefully as you. I don't mean to take them out on you."
"Why do you do this, Idaan-kya? Why do you come here? I don't think it's
that you love me."
"Do you want me to stop?"
"No," Cehmai said. "I don't. But if you choose to, that will be fine as
well."
"'That's flattering," she said, sarcasm thick in her voice.
"Are you doing this to be flattered?"
He was awake again now. He could see something in her expression pain,
anger, something else. She didn't answer him now, only knelt by the bed
and felt beneath it for her hoots. He put his hand on her arm and drew
her up. He could sense that she was close to speaking, that the words
were already there, just below the surface.
"I don't mind only being your bed mate," he said. "I've known from the
start that Adrah is the man you plan to be with, and that I couldn't be
that for you even if you wanted it. I assume that's part of why you've
chosen me. But I am fond of you, and I would like to be your friend."
"You'd be my friend?" she said. "That's nice to hear. You've bedded me