Seasons of War

wide, arched galleries of the tunnels below the palaces. The bathhouses were at least warm. If he wasn’t to sleep, he could at least be miserable in comfort.
    The public spaces were surprisingly full with men and women in the glorious robes of the utkhaiem. It made sense, he supposed. Cetani had not only brought its merchants and craftsmen. There would be two courts living under the palaces this winter. And so twice the social intrigue. Who precisely was sleeping with whom would be even more complex, and even the threat of their death at the hands of a Galtic army wouldn’t stop the courtiers playing for rank.
    As he passed, the utkhaiem took poses of respect and welcome, the servants and slaves ones of abasement. Maati repressed a swelling hatred of all of them. It wasn’t their fault, after all, that he had to save them. And himself. And Liat and Nayiit and Otah and all the people he had ever known, all the cities he had ever seen. His world, and everything in it.
    It was the Galts who deserved his anger. And they would feel it, by all the gods. Failed crops, gelded men, and barren women until they rebuilt everything they’d broken and given back everything they took. If he could only think of a better way to say removing .
    He brooded his way along the dim galleries and through the great chambers until the air began to thicken with the first presentiment of steam, and the prospect of hot water, and of finally warming his chilled feet, intruded on him.
    He found his way into the men’s changing rooms, where he shrugged off his robes and boots and let the servant offer him a bowl of clear, cold water to drink before he went into the public baths and sweated it all out again. When he passed through the inner door, Maati shivered at the warmth. Voices filled the dim, gray space - conversations between people made invisible by the steam rising from the water. There had been a time, Maati considered as he stepped gingerly down the submerged stairs and waded toward a low bench, when the idea of strangers wandering naked in the baths - men and women together - had held some erotic frisson. Truth often disappoints.
    He lowered himself to the thick, water-logged wood of the bench, the hot water rising past his belly, past his chest, until the small warm waves danced against the hollow of his throat. At last, his feet felt warm, and he leaned back against the warm stone, sighing with a purely physical contentment. He resolved to move down toward the warmer end before he went back to his rooms. If he boiled himself thoroughly enough, he might even carry the heat back to his bed.
    Across the bath, hidden in the mist, two men talked of grain supplies and how best to address the problem of rats. Far away toward the hotter end of the bath, someone shouted, and there was a sound of splashing. Children, Maati supposed, and then fell into a long, gnawing plan for how best to move the volumes in the library. His concentration was so profound he didn’t notice when the children approached.
    ‘Uncle Maati?’
    Eiah was practically at his side, crouched low in the water to preserve her modesty. A gaggle of children of the utkhaiem behind her at what Maati supposed must be a respectful distance. He raised hands from the water and took a pose of greeting, somewhat cramped by being held high enough to be seen.
    ‘I haven’t seen you in ages, Eiah-kya,’ he said. ‘What’s been keeping you?’
    The girl shrugged, sending ripples.
    ‘There are a lot of new people from Cetani,’ she said. ‘There’s a whole other Radaani family here now. And I’ve been studying with Loya-cha about how to fix broken bones. And . . . and Mama-kya said you were busy and that I shouldn’t bother you.’
    ‘You should always bother me,’ Maati said with a grin.
    ‘Is it going well?’
    ‘It’s a complicated thing,’ Maati said. ‘But it’s a long wait until spring. We’ll have time.’
    ‘Complicated’s hard,’ Eiah said. ‘Loya-cha says it’s always easy to fix things when there’s only one thing wrong. It’s when there’s two or three things at once that it’s hardest.’
    ‘Smart man, Loya-cha,’ Maati said.
    Eiah shrugged again.
    ‘He’s a servant,’ she said. ‘If you can’t recapture Seedless, we can’t beat the Galts, can we?’
    ‘Your father did once,’ Maati said. ‘He’s a very clever man.’
    ‘But we might not.’
    ‘We might not,’ Maati allowed.
    Eiah nodded to herself, her forehead crinkling as