formed it more precise.
It was difficult to call the process to a halt, but in the end, it was
Vanjit and Vanjit alone who would make the attempt. They might help her
and advise her, but he allocated two full weeks in which the binding was
hers and hers alone.
Low clouds came in the morning Eiah returned. They scudded in from the
north on a wind cold as winter. Maati knew it wouldn't take. There were
weeks of heat and sun to come before the seasons changed. And yet, there
was a part of Maati's mind that couldn't help seeing the shift as an
omen. And a positive one, he told himself. Change, the movement of the
seasons, the proper order of the world: those were what he tried to see
in the low, gray roof of the sky. Not the presentiment of barren winter.
"The news is strange," Eiah said as they unloaded her cart. Boxes of
salt pork and raw flour, canisters of spice and hard cheese. "The Galts
have fallen on Saraykeht like they owned it, but something didn't go
well. I can't tell if my brother thought the girl was too ugly or she
fell into a fit when she was presented, but something went badly. What I
heard was early and muddled. I'll know better next time I go."
"Anything that hurts him helps us," Maati said. "So whatever it was,
it's good."
"That was my thought," Eiah said, but her voice was somber. When he took
a pose of query, she didn't answer it.
"How have things progressed here?" she asked instead.
"Well. Very well. I think Vanjit is ready."
Eiah stopped, wiping her sleeve across her forehead. She looked old. How
many summers had she seen? Thirty? Thirty-one? Her eyes were deeper than
thirty summers.
"When?" she asked.
"We were only waiting for you to come back," he said. Then, trying for
levity, "You've brought the wine and food for a celebration. So
tomorrow, we'll do something worth celebrating."
Or else something to mourn, he thought but did not say.
9
"By everything holy, don't tell Balasar," Sinja said. "He can't know
about this."
"Why?" Idaan asked, sitting on the edge of the soldier's bed. "What
would he do?"
"I don't know," Sinja said. "Something bloody and extreme. And effective."
"Stop," Otah said. "Just stop. I have to think."
But sitting there, head resting in his hands, clarity of mind wasn't
coming to him easily. Idaan's story-her travels in the north after her
exile, Cehmai's appearance on her doorstep, their rekindled love, and
Maati's break with his fellow poet and then his return-had the feel of
an old poem, if not the careful structure. If he hadn't had the pirates
or Ana or her father or his own son or the conspiracy between Yalakeht
and Obar State, or the incursions from the Westlands, he might have
enjoyed the tale for its own sake.
But she hadn't brought it to him as a story. It was a threat.
"What role has Cehmai taken in this?" he asked.