Shadow and Betrayal

in her heart. The one seemed so little related to the other. Itani was her heartmate, the man she’d shared her bed with for months. Maati was her friend, her confidant, her only support in a world empty even of the other man. For hours at a time and especially in his company, she could forget the guilt and the dread. She didn’t know how it could be like this: so easy and so difficult both.
    The chill touched her bones, and she turned, swimming easily to the shore. The rich mud squelched between her toes. Against wet flesh, the air was much colder than the water had been. By the time she found her robe, she was shivering. The night around her was silent, the insects and night birds gone still.
    ‘There must be some etiquette to address situations like this,’ Seedless said from the darkness, ‘but I’m sure I don’t know what it is.’
    The andat’s face seemed hung in the air, the pale lips quirked in a smile both amused and grim. He moved forward as she pulled on her robe. His cloak - black shot with blue - seemed to weave in and out of the darkness. He pulled something bulky from a sleeve and held it out to her. A hair cloth.
    ‘I brought this for you,’ he said. ‘Once I understood what you were doing I thought you’d want it.’
    Liat took it, falling into a pose of gratitude by reflex. The andat returned it dismissively, squatted on the grassy slope and, his arms resting on his knees, looked out over the pond.
    ‘You got out of the torture box.’
    ‘One of them. Heshai-kvo let me out. He’s been doing it for several days now on the condition that I promise to stay within sight of the house. I’ve sworn a sacred oath, though I imagine I’ll break it eventually. It’s why he’s improving. Locking away a part of yourself - especially a shameful one - gives that part power over all the rest. It’s the danger of splitting yourself in two, don’t you find?’
    ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Liat said.
    Seedless smiled in genuine amusement.
    ‘Dry your hair,’ he said. ‘I’m not judging you, my dear. I’m a babykiller. You’re a girl of seventeen summers who’s taken a second lover. It hardly gives me the high ground.’
    Liat wrapped her hair in the cloth and turned to leave, dry leaves stirring at her ankles. The words that stopped her were so soft, she might almost have imagined them.
    ‘I know about Otah.’
    She paused. As if on cue, the chorus of crickets began again.
    ‘What do you know?’ she asked.
    ‘Enough.’
    ‘How?’
    ‘I’m clever. What do you intend to do when he comes back?’
    Liat didn’t answer. The andat turned to consider her. He took a pose that unasked the question. Anger flashed in Liat’s breast.
    ‘I love him. He’s my heartmate.’
    ‘And Maati?’
    ‘I love him, too.’
    ‘But he isn’t your heartmate.’
    Liat didn’t reply. In the dim light of moon and star, the andat smiled sadly and took a pose that expressed understanding and sympathy and acceptance.
    ‘Maati and I . . . we need each other. We’re alone otherwise. Both of us are very, very alone.’
    ‘Well, at least that won’t last. He’ll be back very soon,’ Seedless said. ‘Tomorrow, perhaps. Or the day after.’
    ‘Who?’
    ‘Otah.’
    Liat felt her breath go shallow. It was a sensation quite like fear.
    ‘No, he won’t. He can’t.’
    ‘I think he can,’ the andat replied.
    ‘It’s a full three weeks just to Yalakeht. Even if he took a fast boat up the river, he’d only just be arriving now.’
    ‘You’re sure of that?’
    ‘Of course I am.’
    ‘Then I suppose I must be mistaken,’ the andat said so mildly that Liat had no answer. Seedless laughed then and put his head in his hands.
    ‘What?’ Liat asked.
    ‘I’ve been an idiot. Otah is the Otah-kvo that Maati told me of. He doesn’t wear a brand and he’s not a poet, so I never connected them. But if Maati’s sent him to see the Dai-kvo . . . Yes. He must be.’
    ‘I thought you knew all about Otah,’ Liat said, her heart falling.
    ‘That may have been an exaggeration. Otah-kvo. A black robe who didn’t take the brand or become a poet. I think . . . I think I heard a story like that once. Well, a few questions of Heshai, and I’m sure I can dredge it up.’
    The horror of what she’d done flooded her. Liat didn’t sit so much as give way. The leaves crackled under her weight. The andat looked over to her, alarmed.
    ‘You tricked me,’ she whispered.
    Seedless tilted his head with an