even though it would cost him his honor and prestige and the only place
he had in the world. Heshai-kvo had refused, and he had died for the
decision.
"Most High," Otah began, but the Khai Cetani held up a hand to stop him
without even so much as looking back. Otah could see it in the man's
shoulders in the moment the decision was made; they lifted as if a
burden had been taken from him.
18
Even the winter she had passed in Yalakeht had not prepared Liat for the
fickleness of seasons in the North. Each day now was noticeably shorter
than the one before, and even when the afternoons were warm, the sun
pressing down benignly on her face, the nights were suddenly hitter. In
the gardens, the leaves all lost their green at once, as if by
conspiracy. It was unlike the near-imperceptible changes in the summer
cities. In Saraykeht, autumn was a slow, lingering thing; the warmth of
the world made a long good-bye. Things came faster here, and Liat found
the pace disturbing. She was a woman of the South, and abrupt change
uneased her.
For instance, she thought as she sipped smoky tea in her apartments, she
still imagined herself a businesswoman of Saraykeht. Had anyone asked of
her work, she would have spoken of the combing rooms, the warehouses. I
lad anyone asked of her home, she would have described the seafront of
Saraykeht, the scent of the ocean, the babble of a hundred languages.
She would have pictured the brick-built house she'd taken over when Amat
Kyaan had died, and the little bedroom with its window half-choked with
vines. She hadn't seen that city in over a year, and wouldn't go back
now before the spring at best.
At best.
At worst, Saraykeht itself might be gone. Or she might not live to see
summer again.
The city in which she now passed her days was suffering from change as
well. Small shrines with images of the vanished andat had begun to
appear in the niches between buildings, as if a few flowers and candles
could coax them back. The temples had been filled every day by men and
women who might not have sat before a priest in years. The beggars
singing with boxes at their feet all chose songs about redemption and
the return of things lost.
She sipped her tea. It was no longer hot enough to scald her lips, but
it felt good drinking it. It warmed her throat like wine, only without
the casing in her muscles or the softness in her mind. The morning
before her was full-coordinating the movement of food and fuel into the
tunnels below Machi, the raising of stores into the high towers where
they would wait out the cold of winter. "There wasn't time for dark
thoughts. And yet the darkness came whether she courted it or not.
She looked up at the sound of the door. Nayiit stepped in. The nights
were not so long or so cold as to keep him in his rooms. Liat put down
her howl.
"Good morning, Mother," he said as he sat on a cushion beside the fire.
"You're up early."