"What are we going to do in Cetani, Most High?"
The boy's face was sharp and focused. Eager. Otah saw something of what
he had been at that age. He knew the answer to Nayiit's question as soon
as it was spoken, but still it took him a moment to bring himself to say it.
"You aren't coming, Nayiit-cha. I need you to see those books back to
Maati."
"Anyone can do that," Nayiit said. "I'll be of use to you. I've been
through Cetani. I was there just weeks ago, when we were coming to
Machi. I can-"
"You can't," Otah said, and took the boy's hand. His son's hand. "You
called a retreat when no one had given the order. In the Old Empire, I'd
have had to see you killed for that. I can't have you come now."
The surprise on Nayiit's face was heartbreaking.
"You said it wasn't my fault," he said.
"And it isn't. I would have called the retreat myself if you hadn't.
What happened to our men, what happened here, to the Dai-kvo.. . none of
that's yours to carry. If you'd done differently, it would have changed
nothing. But there will be a next time, and I can't have someone calling
commands who might do what you've done."
Nayiit stepped hack, just out of his reach. Ah, Maati, Otah thought,
what kind of son have we made, you and I?
"It won't," Nayiit said. "It won't happen again."
"I know. I know it won't," Otah said, making his tone gentle to soften
hard words. "Because you're going back to Machi."
UDUN WAS A RIVER CITY. IT WAS A CITY OF BRIDGES, AND A CITY OF BIRDS.
Sinja had lived there briefly while recovering from a dagger wound in
his thigh. He remembered the songs of the jays and the finches, the
sound of the river. He remembered Kiyan's stories of growing up a
wayhouse keeper's daughter-the beggars on the riverside quays who drew
pictures with chalks to cover the gray stone or played the small reed
flutes that never seemed to be popular anywhere else; the canals that
carried as much traffic as the streets. The palaces of the Khai Udun
spanned the river itself, sinking great stone stanchions down into the
river like the widest bridge in the world. As a girl, Kiyan had heard
stories about the ghouls that lived in the darkness under those great
palaces. She had gone there in boats with her cohort in the dark of
night, the way that Sinja himself had dared burial mounds at midnight
with his brothers. She had kissed her first lover in the twilight
beneath a bridge just North of here. He had spent so little time in I.
dun, and yet he felt he knew it so well.
The wayhouse where Sinja housed his men was south of the palaces. Its
walls were stone and mud and thick as the length of his arm. The
shutters were a green so dark they seemed almost black. It hadn't been
built to fit as many men as Sinja commanded, but the standards of a
soldier were lower than those of it normal traveler. And the standards
of a soldier as likely to be mistaken for the enemy by his alleged
fellows as killed by the defending armsmen were lower still. The great
common room was covered from one wall to the other with thin cotton
bedrolls. 'T'he upper rooms, intended for four men or fewer, housed