"No.,,
"You're sure?"
"I am."
"Because if they did, if they're spreading it through the city that you
have-"
"They aren't. I was there when she realized it. Only me. No one else."
Kiyan took a long, low, shuddering breath. If it had been otherwiseif
someone had told Eiah as part of a plan to spread word of Nayiit's
parentage-Kiyan would have asked him to have the boy killed. He wondered
what he would have done. He wondered how he would have refused her.
"They'll leave the city as soon as we have word from the Dal-kvo," Otah
said. "Either they'll go back to Saraykeht or they'll go to the
I)aikvo's village. Either way, they'll be gone from here."
"And if they come back?"
"They won't. I'll see to it. They won't hurt Danat, love. He's safe."
"He's ill. He's still coughing," Kiyan said. That was it too, of course.
Seasons had come and gone, and Danat was still haunted by illness. It
was natural for them-Kiyan and himself both-to bend themselves double to
protect him from the dangers that they could, especially since there
were so many so close over which they were powerless.
It was part of why Otah had postponed for so long the conversation he
was doomed to have with Liat Chokavi. But it was only part. Kiyan's
chair scraped against the floor as she rose. Otah put his hand out to
her, and she took it, stepping in close to him, her arms around him. He
kissed her temple.
"Promise me this all ends well," she said. "Just tell me that."
"It will he fine," he said. "Nothing's going to hurt our boy."
They stood silently for a time, looking at each other, and then out at
the city. The plumes of smoke rising from the forges, the black-cobbled
streets and gray slanted roofs. The sun slipped behind the clouds or
else the clouds rose to block the light. The knock that interrupted them
was sharp and urgent.
"Most High?" a man's voice said. "Most High, forgive me, but the poets
wish to speak with you. Maati-cha says the issue is urgent."
Kiyan walked with him, her hand in his, as they went to the Council
chamber where Maati waited. His face was flushed, his mouth set in a
deep scowl. A packet of paper fluttered in his hand, the edges rough
where he'd ripped them rather than take the labor of unsewing the
sheets. Cehmai and Stone-Made-Soft were also there, the poet pacing
restlessly, the andat smiling its placid, inhuman smile at each of them
in turn.
"News from the Dai-kvo?" Otah asked.
"No, the couriers we sent west," Cehmai said.
Maati tossed the pages to the table as he spoke. "The Galts have fielded
an army."
THE THIRD LEGION ARRIVED ON A BRIGHT MORNING, THE SUN SHINING ON the
polished metal and oiled leather of their armor as if they'd been
expecting a victory parade instead of the start of a war. Balasar
watched from the walls of the city as they arrived and made camp. The