Seasons of War

hoped, Eiah was waiting outside his door.
    ‘That seemed to go well,’ Maati said. ‘I think Irit’s solution was fairly elegant.’
    ‘It has promise,’ Eiah agreed as she followed him into the room. He sat in a leather chair, sighing. Eiah blew life into the coals in the fire grate, added a handful of small tinder and a twisted length of oak to the fire, then took a stool and pulled it up before him.
    ‘How do you feel about the binding’s progress?’ he asked.
    ‘Well enough,’ she said, taking both his forearms in her hands. Her gaze was locked somewhere over his left shoulder, her fingers pressing hard into the flesh between the bones of his wrists. A moment later, she dropped his right hand and began squeezing his fingertips.
    ‘Eiah-kya?’
    ‘Don’t mind me,’ she said. ‘It’s habit. The binding’s coming closer. There are one or two more things I’d like to try, but I think we’ve come as near as we’re going to.’
    She went on for half a hand, recounting the fine issues of definition, duration, and intent that haunted the form of her present binding. Maati listened, submitting himself to her professional examination as she went on. Outside the window, the snow was falling again, small flakes gray against the pure white sky. Before Vanjit, he wouldn’t have been able to make them out.
    ‘I agree,’ Maati said as she ended, then plucked his sleeves back into their proper place. ‘Do you think . . .’
    ‘Before Candles Night, certainly,’ Eiah said. ‘But there is going to be a complication. We have to leave the school. Utani would be best, but Pathai would do if that’s impossible. You and I can leave in the morning, and the others can join us.’
    Maati chuckled.
    ‘Eiah-kya,’ he said. ‘You’ve apologized for letting Ashti Beg go. I understand why you did it, but there’s nothing to be concerned about. Even if she did tell someone that we’re out here, Vanjit could turn Clarity-of-Sight against them, and we could all walk quietly away. The power of the andat—’
    ‘Your heart is failing,’ Eiah said. ‘I don’t have the herbs or the baths to care for you here.’
    She said it simply, her voice flat with exhaustion. Maati felt the smile fading from his lips. He saw tears beginning to glimmer in her eyes, the drops unfallen but threatening. He took a pose that denied her.
    ‘Your color is bad,’ she said. ‘Your pulses aren’t symmetric. Your blood is thick and dark. This is what I do, Uncle. I find people who are sick, and I look at the signs, and I think about them and their bodies. I look at you, here, now, and I see a man whose blood is slow and growing slower.’
    ‘You’re imagining things,’ Maati said. ‘I’m fine. I only haven’t slept well. I would never have guessed that you of all people would mistake a little lost rest for a weak heart.’
    ‘I’m not—’
    ‘I am fine!’ Maati shouted, pounding the arm of the chair. ‘And we cannot afford to run off into the teeth of winter. You aren’t a physician any longer. That’s behind you. You are a poet. You are the poet who’s going to save the cities.’
    She took his hand in both of hers. For a moment, there was no sound but the low murmur of the fire and the nearly inaudible sound of her palm stroking the back of his hand. One of the threatened tears fell, streaking her cheek black. He hadn’t realized she wore kohl.
    ‘You,’ he said softly, ‘are the most important poet there is. The most important one there ever was.’
    ‘I’m just one woman,’ Eiah said. ‘I’m doing the best I can, but I’m tired. And the world keeps getting darker around me. If I can’t take care of everything, at least let me take care of you.’
    ‘I will be fine,’ Maati said. ‘I’m not young anymore, but I’m a long way from death. We’ll finish your binding, and then if you want to haul me to half the baths in the Empire, I’ll submit.’
    Another tear marked her face. Maati took his sleeve and wiped her cheek dry.
    ‘I’ll be fine,’ he said. ‘I’ll rest more if you like. I’ll pretend my bones are made of mud brick and glass. But you can’t stop now to concern yourself with me. Those people out there. They’re the ones who need your care. Not me.’
    ‘Let me go to Pathai,’ she said. ‘I can get teas there.’
    ‘No,’ Maati said. ‘I won’t do that.’
    ‘Let me send Large Kae, then. I can’t stand by and do nothing.’
    ‘All right,’ Maati said, holding up a