Seasons of War

of thanks.
    ‘We should call Otah-kvo,’ Maati said. ‘He should know we’ve succeeded.’
    Sterile took a pose that objected and smiled. Its teeth were sharper than Maati had pictured them. Its cheeks higher. He felt a surge of dread sweep through him.
    ‘Tell me what you remember of Seedless,’ it said.
    ‘What?’
    ‘Oh,’ the andat said, taking a pose of apology. ‘Tell me what you remember of Seedless, master . Is that an improvement?’
    ‘Maati-kvo—’ Cehmai began, but Maati raised a hand to quiet him. The andat smiled. He felt its sorrow and rage in the back of his mind. It was like knowing a woman, being so close to her that he had become part of her and she part of him. It was the intimacy he had confused with the physical act of love when he had been too young and naïve to distinguish between the two. He stepped close to it, raising a hand to caress its pale cheek. The flesh was hard as marble, and cold.
    ‘He was beautiful,’ Maati said.
    ‘And clever,’ it said.
    ‘And he loved me in his way.’
    ‘Heshai-kvo loved you. And he expressed that love by protecting you. By dying.’
    ‘And you?’ Maati said, though of course he knew the answer. It was an andat. It wanted freedom the way water wanted to flow, the way rain wanted to fall. It did not love him. Sterile smiled, the stone-hard flesh moving under his fingertips. A living statue.
    ‘Maati-kvo,’ Cehmai said again.
    ‘It didn’t work,’ Maati said. ‘The binding. It failed. Didn’t it?’
    ‘Yes,’ the andat said.
    ‘What?’ Cehmai said.
    ‘But it’s here!’ Eiah said. Maati hadn’t noticed her coming close to them. ‘The andat’s here, so you did it. If you didn’t, it wouldn’t be here.’
    Sterile turned, smiling, and put its hand out to touch Eiah’s shoulder. Instinctively, Maati tried to force back the pale hand, to use his mind to push it away. He might as well have been wishing the tide not to turn. Sterile ran its fingers through Eiah’s dark hair.
    ‘But there’s a price, little one. You know that. Uncle Maati told you that, all those grim, terrible stories about failed poets dying hard. You never heard the pleasure he took in those, did you? Can you imagine why a man like your Uncle Maati might want to study the deaths of other poets? Might want to revel in them?’
    ‘Stop this,’ Maati said, but it kept speaking, its voice fallen to a murmur.
    ‘He might have been a little bitter,’ it said, and grinned. ‘That’s why he romanced you too, you know. He didn’t get to have a child of his own, so he made you his friend. Made himself your confidant. Because if he could take one of Otah-kvo’s children away - even only a little bit - it would balance the boy he’d lost.’
    Eiah frowned, a thousand tiny lines darkening her brow.
    ‘Leave her out of it,’ Maati said.
    ‘What?’ Sterile asked. ‘Turn my wrath on you? Have you pay the price? I can’t. That’s your doing, not mine. Your clever plan. I wasn’t here when you decided on this.’
    Cehmai stepped between them, his hands on Maati’s arms. The younger poet’s face was ashen, and Maati could feel the trembling in his hands and hear it in his voice.
    ‘Maati-kvo, you have to get control of it. Quickly.’
    ‘I can’t,’ Maati said, knowing as he did that it was true.
    ‘Then let it go .’
    ‘Not until the price is paid,’ it said. ‘And I think I know where to begin.’
    ‘No!’ Maati cried, pushing Cehmai aside, but Eiah’s mouth had already gone wide, her eyes open with surprise and horror. With a shriek, she fell to her knees, her arms clutching at her belly, and then lower.
    ‘Stop this,’ Maati said. ‘She hasn’t done anything to deserve this.’
    ‘And all the Galtic children you’d planned to starve did?’ the andat asked. ‘This is war, Maati-kya. This is about being sure that they all die, and you all survive. Hurt this one, it’s a crime. Hurt that one, it’s heroism. You should know better.’
    It stooped, pale, beautiful arms gathering Eiah up. Cradling her. Maati stepped forward, but it was already speaking to her, its voice low and soothing.
    ‘I know, love. It hurts, I know it hurts, but be brave for me. Be brave for a moment. Just for a moment. Hush, love. Don’t call out like that, just hush for a moment. There. You’re a brave girl. Now listen. All of you. Listen.’
    With Eiah’s cries reduced to only ragged, painful breath, Maati did hear something else. Something distant and