Seasons of War

others he’d already done. And there would be tomorrow. There would at least be tomorrow.
    ‘How is he?’
    ‘His color is better, but he has less energy. The fever is gone for now, but he still coughs. I don’t know. No one does.’
    ‘Can he travel?’
    Kiyan turned. Her gaze darted across his face as if he were a book that she was trying to read. Her hands took a querying pose.
    ‘I’ve been thinking,’ Otah said. ‘Planning.’
    ‘For if you’re killed,’ Kiyan said. Her voice made it plain she’d been thinking of it as well.
    ‘The mines. If I don’t come back, I want you to take to the mines in the North. Cehmai will go with you, and he knows them better than anyone. If you can, take the children and as much gold as you can carry and head west. Sinja and the others will be there somewhere, working whatever contract they’ve taken. They’ll protect you.’
    ‘You’re sending me to him ?’ Kiyan asked softly.
    ‘Only if I don’t come back.’
    ‘You will.’
    ‘Still,’ Otah said. ‘If . . .’
    ‘If,’ Kiyan agreed and took his hand. Then, a long moment later, ‘We were never lovers, he and I. Not the way . . .’
    Otah put a finger to her lips, and she went quiet. There were tears in her eyes, and in his.
    ‘Let’s not open that again,’ he said.
    ‘You could come away too. We could all leave quietly. The four of us and a fast cart.’
    ‘And spend our lives on a beach in Bakta,’ Otah said. ‘I can’t. I have this thing to do. My city.’
    ‘I know. But I had to say it, just so I know it was said.’
    Otah looked down. His hands looked old - the knuckles knobbier than he thought of them, the skin looser. They weren’t an old man’s hands, but they weren’t a young man’s any longer. When he spoke, his voice was low and thoughtful.
    ‘It’s strange, you know. I’ve spent years chafing under the weight of being Khai Machi, and now that it’s harder than it ever was, now that there’s something real to lose, I can’t let go of it. There was a man once who told me that if it were a choice between holding a live coal in my bare fist or letting a city of innocent people die, of course I would do my best to stand the pain. That it was what any decent man would do.’
    ‘Don’t apologize,’ Kiyan said.
    ‘Was I apologizing?’
    ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You were. You shouldn’t. I’m not angry with you, and there’s nothing to blame you for. They all think you’ve changed, you know, but this is who you’ve always been. You were a poor Khai Machi because it didn’t matter until now. I understand; I’m just frightened to death, love. It’s nothing you can spare me.’
    ‘Maati could be wrong,’ Otah said. ‘The Galts may be busy rolling over the Westlands and none of it anything to do with Stone-Made-Soft. I may arrive at the Dai-kvo’s village and be laughed at all the way back north.’
    ‘He’s not wrong.’
    The great stones of the palaces creaked as they cooled, the summer sun fallen behind the mountains. The scent of incense long since burned and the smoke of snuffed lanterns filled the air like a voice gone silent. Shadows touched the corners of the apartments, deepening the reds of the tapestries and giving the light a feeling of physical presence. Kiyan’s hand felt warm and lost in his own.
    ‘I know he’s not,’ Otah said.
    He left orders with the servants at his door that unless there was immediate threat to him or his family - fire or sudden illness or an army crossing the river - he was to be left alone for the night. He would speak with no one, he would read no letter or contract, he wished no entertainments. Only a simple meal for him and his wife, and the silence for the two of them to fill as they saw fit.
    They told stories - reminiscences of Old Mani and the wayhouse in Udun, the sound of the birds by the river. The time a daughter of one of the high families had snuck into the rooms her lover had taken and had to be smuggled back out. Otah told stories from his time as a courier, traveling the cities on the business of House Siyanti under his false name. They were all stories she’d heard before, of course. She knew all his stories.
    They made love seriously and gently and with a profound attention. He savored every touch, every scent and motion. He fought to remember them and her, and he felt Kiyan’s will to store the moment away, like food packed away for the long empty months after the last leaf of autumn has fallen. It was,