Shadow and Betrayal

side. At first, near the palaces, he had put his arm around her waist, thinking that it would be a comfort. Her body told him, though, that it wasn’t. Her shoulder, her arm, her ribs - they were too tender to be touched and Otah found himself oddly glad. It freed him to watch the doorways and alleys, rooftops and food carts and firekeepers’ kilns more closely.
    The air smelled of wood smoke from a hundred hearths. A cool, thick mist too dense to be fog, too insubstantial to be rain, slicked the stones of the road and the walls of the houses. In her oversized woolen cloak, Liat might have been anyone. Otah found himself half-consciously flexing his hands, as if preparing for an attack that never came.
    When they reached the edge of the soft quarter, passing by the door of Amat Kyaan’s now-empty apartments, Liat motioned to stop. The two men looked to Otah and then each other, their expressions professional and impatient, but they paused.
    ‘Are you all right?’ Otah asked, his head bent close to the deep cowl of Liat’s cloak. ‘I could get you water . . .’
    ‘No,’ she said. Then, a moment later, ‘ ’Tani, I don’t want to go there.’
    ‘Where?’ he asked, his fingertips touching her bound arm.
    ‘To Amat Kyaan. I’ve done everything so badly. And I can’t think she really wants me there. And . . .’
    ‘Sweet,’ Otah said. ‘She’ll keep you safe. Until we know what’s . . .’
    Liat looked at him directly. Her shadowed face showed her impatience and her fear.
    ‘I didn’t say I wouldn’t,’ she said. ‘Only that I don’t want it.’
    Otah leaned close, kissing her gently on the lips. Her good hand held him close.
    ‘Don’t leave me,’ she said, hardly more than a whisper.
    ‘Where would I go,’ he said, his tone gentle to hide that his answer was also a question. She smiled, slight and brave, and nodded. Liat held his hand in hers for the rest of the way.
    The soft quarter never knew a truly quiet night. The lanterns lit the streets with the dancing shadows of a permanent fire. Music came from the opened doors of the houses: drums and flutes, horns and voices. Twice they passed houses with balconies that overlooked the street with small groups of underdressed, chilly whores leaning over the rails like carcasses at a butcher’s. The wealth of Saraykeht, richest and most powerful of the southern cities, eddied and swirled around them. Otah found himself neither aroused nor disturbed, though he thought perhaps he should be.
    They reached the comfort house, going through an ironbound doorway in a tall stone wall, through a sad little garden that separated the kitchens from the main house, and then into the common room. It was alive with activity. The red-haired woman, Mitat, and Amat had covered the long common tables with papers and scrolls. The island girl, Maj, paced behind them, gnawing impatiently at a thumbnail. As the two guards who’d accompanied them moved deeper into the house greeting other men similarly armed and armored, Otah noticed two young boys, one in the colors of House Yanaani, the other wearing the badge of the seafront’s custom house, waiting impatiently. Messengers. Something had happened.
    Amat’s closer than she knows. There isn’t much time.
    ‘Liat-kya,’ Amat said, raising one hand in a casual greeting. ‘Come here. I’ve something I want to ask you.’
    Liat walked forward, and Otah followed her. There was a light in Amat’s eyes - something like triumph. Amat embraced Liat gently, and Otah saw the tears in Liat’s eyes as she held her old master with one uninjured arm.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ Amat said. ‘I though you’d be safe. And there was so much that needed doing, that . . . I didn’t understand the situation deeply enough. I should have warned you.’
    ‘Honored teacher,’ Liat said, and then had no more words. Amat’s smile was warm as summer sunlight.
    ‘You know Maj, of course. This is Mitat, and that brute against that wall is Torish Wite, my master of guard.’
    When Maj spoke, she spoke the Khaiate tongue. Her accent was thick but not so much that Otah couldn’t catch her words.
    ‘I didn’t think I was to be seeing you again.’
    Liat’s smile went thin.
    ‘You speak very well, Maj-cha.’
    ‘I am waiting for weeks here,’ Maj said, coolly. ‘What else do I do?’
    Amat looked over. Otah saw the woman called Mitat glance up at her, then at the island girl, then away. Tension quieted the room, and for a moment,