Seasons of War

untouched by care. She was beautiful and, for the first time since Maati had met her, comfortable in her beauty. Her laughter seemed genuine and her movements relaxed. Maati thought he was seeing confidence in her, the assurance of a woman who was about to do a thing she had no thought might be beyond her. His opinion didn’t change until after all the bowls had been gathered and rinsed, the cored apples and spilled grain swept up and carried away to the pit in the back of the school, when she took him by the hand and led him gently aside.
    ‘I wanted to thank you,’ she said as they reached the bend of the wide hallway.
    ‘I can’t see I’ve done anything worth it,’ he said. ‘If anything, I should be offering you . . .’
    There were tears brimming in her eyes, the shining water threatening her kohl. Maati took the end of his sleeve and dabbed her eyes gently. The brown cloth came away stained black.
    ‘After Udun,’ Vanjit began, then paused. ‘After what the Galts did to my brothers . . . my parents. I thought I would never have a family again. It was better that there not be anyone in my life that I cared for enough that it would hurt me to lose them.’
    ‘Ah, now. Vanjit-kya. You don’t need to think of that now.’
    ‘But I do. I do. You are the closest thing I’ve had to a father. You are the most dedicated man I have ever known, and it has been an honor to be allowed a place in your work. And I’ve broken the promise I made myself. I will miss you.’
    Maati took a pose that both disagreed and asked for clarification. Vanjit smiled and shook her head, the beads and shells in her braids clicking like claws on stone. He waited.
    ‘We both know that the chances are poor that I’ll see the sunset,’ she said. Her voice was solemn and composed. ‘This grammar we’ve made is a guess. The forces at play are deadlier than fires or floods. If I were someone else, I wouldn’t wager a length of copper on my chances if you offered me odds.’
    ‘That isn’t true,’ Maati said. He hadn’t meant to shout, and lowered his voice when he spoke again. ‘That isn’t true. We’ve done good work here. The equal of anything I learned from the Dai-kvo. Your chances are equal to the best any poet has faced. I’ll swear to that if you’d like.’
    ‘There’s no call,’ she said. From down the hall, he heard voices in bright conversation. He heard laughter. Vanjit took his hand. He had never noticed how small her hands were. How small she was, hardly more than a child herself.
    ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘Whatever happens, thank you. If I die today, thank you. Do you understand?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘You’ve made living bearable,’ she said. ‘It’s more than I can ever repay.’
    ‘You can. You can repay all of it and more. Don’t die. Succeed.’
    Vanjit smiled and took a pose that accepted instruction, then moved forward, wrapping her arms around Maati in a bear hug. He cradled her head on his breast, his eyes pressed closed, his heart sick and anxious.
    The chamber they had set aside for the binding had once been the sleeping room for one of the younger cohorts. The lines of cots were gone now. The windows shone with the light of middle morning. Vanjit took a round of chalk and began writing out her binding on the wide south wall, ancient words and recent blending together in the new grammar they had all created. From Maati’s cushion at the back of the room, the letters were blurry and indistinct, but from their shape alone, he could see that the binding had shifted since the last time he’d seen it.
    Eiah sat at his side, her hand on his arm, her gaze fixed on the opposite wall. She looked half-ill.
    ‘It’s going to be all right,’ Maati murmured.
    Eiah nodded once, her eyes never leaving the pale words taking over the far wall like a bright shadow. When Vanjit was finished, she walked to the beginning again, paced slowly down the wall reading all she’d written, and then, satisfied, put the chalk on the ground. A single cushion had been placed in the middle of the room for her. She stopped at it, her binding behind her, her face turned toward the small assembly at the back. She took a silent pose of gratitude, turned, and sat.
    Maati had a powerful urge to stand, to call out. He could wash the wall clean, talk through the binding again, check it for errors one last time. Vanjit began to chant, the cadences unlike anything he had heard before. Her voice was soft, coaxing, gentle;