Shadow and Betrayal

trade - using the andat to end a pregnancy - wasn’t the sort of business House Wilsin had undertaken before now, though other houses had acted as brokers in some instances. She wondered why the change in policy, and why the secrecy, and why Marchat Wilsin would have told her to arrange for the bodyguard if he hadn’t wanted her, on some level, to find answers.
     
    Maati held a pose of greeting, his heart in his throat. The pale-skinned man walked slowly around him, black eyes taking in every nuance of his stance. Maati’s hands didn’t tremble; he had trained for years, first at the school and then with the Dai-kvo. His body knew how to hide anxiety.
    The man in poet’s robes stopped, an expression half approval, half amusement on his face. Elegant fingers took a pose of greeting that was neither the warmest nor the least formal. With the reply made, Maati let his hands fall to his sides and stood. His first real thought, now that the shock of his teacher’s sudden appearance was fading, was that he hadn’t expected Heshai-kvo to be so young, or so beautiful.
    ‘What is your name, boy?’ the man asked. His voice was cool and hard.
    ‘Maati Vaupathi,’ Maati said, crisply. ‘Once the tenth son of Nicha Vaupathi, and now the youngest of the poets.’
    ‘Ah. A westerner. It’s still in your accent.’
    The teacher sat in the window seat, his arms folded, still openly considering Maati. The rooms, which had seemed sumptuous during the long worrisome days of Maati’s waiting, seemed suddenly squalid with the black-haired man in them. A tin setting for a perfect gem. The soft cotton draperies that flowed from the ceiling, shifting in the hot breeze of late afternoon, seemed dirty beside the poet’s skin. The man smiled, his expression not entirely kind. Maati took a pose of obeisance appropriate to a student before his teacher.
    ‘I have come, Heshai-kvo, by the order of the Dai-kvo to learn from you, if you will have me as your pupil.’
    ‘Oh, stop that. Bowing and posing like we were dancers. Sit there. On the bed. I have some questions for you.’
    Maati did as he was told, tucking his legs beneath him in the formal way a student did in a lecture before the Dai-kvo. The man seemed to be amused by this, but said nothing about it.
    ‘So. Maati. You came here . . . what? Six days ago?’
    ‘Seven, Heshai-kvo.’
    ‘Seven. And yet no one came to meet you. No one came to collect you or show you the poet’s house. It’s a long time for a master to ignore his student, don’t you think?’
    It was exactly what Maati had thought, several times, but he didn’t admit that now. Instead he took a pose accepting a lesson.
    ‘I thought so at first. But as time passed, I saw that it was a kind of test, Heshai-kvo.’
    A tiny smile ghosted across the perfect lips, and Maati felt a rush of pleasure that he had guessed right. His new teacher motioned him to continue, and Maati sat up a degree straighter.
    ‘I thought at first that it might be a test of my patience. To see whether I could be trusted not to hurry things when it wasn’t my place. But later I decided that the real test was how I spent my time. Being patient and idle wouldn’t teach me anything, and the Khai has the largest library in the summer cities.’
    ‘You spent your time in the library?’
    Maati took a pose of confirmation, unsure what to make of the teacher’s tone.
    ‘These are the palaces of the Khai Saraykeht, Maati-kya,’ he said with sudden familiarity as he gestured out the window at the grounds, the palaces, the long flow of streets and red tile roofs that sprawled to the sea. ‘There are scores of utkhaiem and courtiers. I don’t think a night passes here without a play being performed, or singers, or dancing. And you spent all your time with the scrolls?’
    ‘I did spend one evening with a group of the utkhaiem. They were from the west . . . from Pathai. I lived there before I went to the school.’
    ‘And you thought they might have news of your family.’
    It wasn’t an accusation, though it could have been. Maati pressed his lips thinner, embarrassed, and repeated the pose of confirmation. The smile it brought seemed sympathetic.
    ‘And what did you learn in your productive, studious days with Saraykeht’s books?’
    ‘I studied the history of the city and its andat.’
    The elegant fingers made a motion that both approved and invited him to continue. The dark eyes held an interest that told Maati he had done