high wind. When he was awake enough to make sense of the world, he saw
that the sun had sunk almost to the treetops, and the cart was sitting
in the yard of a wayhouse. The memory of the morning's foul message
flooded back into him, but not so deeply as before. It would rise and
fall, he knew. He would be jarred by the loss of his friend again and
again and again, but less and less and less. It said something he didn't
want to know that mourning had become so familiar. He plucked his
traveling robes into their proper drape and lowered himself to the ground.
The one thing he truly didn't regret about the journey was that his
servants were all in Utani or Saraykeht. Walking into the low, warm main
room of the wayhouse without being surrounded by men and women wanting
to change his robes or powder his feet was a small pleasure. He tried to
savor it.
"Half a day east of here," a young man in a leather apron was saying,
but he was pointing north. "Must have been five or six days ago. Raised
ten kinds of trouble, then left in the middle of the night. So far as I
can see, no one's talked about anything else since."
"Did you see them?" Danat asked. His voice had an edge, but Otah
couldn't see his face to know if it was excitement or anger.
"Not myself, no," the young man said. "But it's the ones you asked
after. An old man with a physician, and nothing but women traveling with
him. There was even some talk he was trying to start a comfort house or
something of that kind, but that was before the baby."
"Baby?" The voice was Ana's.
"Yes. Little one, not more than eight months old from the size. So I'm
told. I didn't see him either, but they all saw him over at Chayiit's
place. Walked right out in the middle of the main room."
Otah slipped down at a bench by the fire grate. The fire was small but
warm. He hadn't realized how cold he'd gotten.
"Those are the people," Danat said.
"Five, six days then," the young man said with a pleased nod. He glanced
over at Otah, their eyes meeting briefly. The other man paled as Otah
took a pose of casual greeting and then turned his attention back to the
flames. The conversation behind him grew softer and ended. Danat came to
sit at his side. Through the open door, the yard fell into evening as
the armsmen finished unloading and leading away their horses.
"We've gotten closer," Danat said. "If they keep traveling as slowly as
they have up to now, we'll overtake them well before Utani."
Otah grunted. There was a deep thump from overhead and voices lifted in
annoyance. Danat's fingers laced his knee.
"I told Balasar that I would beg," Otah said. "I told him that I would
bend myself before this new poet and beg if it meant restoring him and
Galt."
"And now?"
"I don't believe I can. And more than that, having heard Ashti Beg talk
about this Vanjit, it's hard work thinking it would help."
"Maati, perhaps. He holds some sway with her."
"But what can I say that would move him?" Otah asked, his voice thick.
"We were friends once, and then enemies, and friends again, but I'm not