Shadow and Betrayal
servant, when he came, wore robes of deep red shot with yellow and a silver armband. He took a pose of greeting so brief it almost hadn’t happened.
‘Itani Noygu. You’re Itani Noygu, then? Ah, good. I am Piyun See, the Master of Tides’ assistant. He’s too busy to see you himself. So House Siyanti has taken an interest in Machi, then?’ he said. Otah smiled, though he meant it less this time.
‘I couldn’t say. I only go where they send me, Piyun-cha.’
The assistant took a pose of agreement.
‘I had hoped to know the court’s schedule in the next week,’ Otah said. ‘I have business—’
‘With the poet. Yes, I know. He left your name with us. He said we should keep a watch out for you. You’re wise to come to us first. You wouldn’t imagine the people who simply drift through on the breeze as if the poets weren’t members of the court.’
Otah smiled, his mouth tasting of fear, his heart suddenly racing. The poet of Machi - Cehmai Tyan, his name was - had no reason to know Itani Noygu or expect him. This was a mistake or a trap. If it was a trap, it was sloppy, and if a mistake, dangerous. The lie came to his lips as gracefully as a rehearsed speech.
‘I’m honored to have been mentioned. I hadn’t expected that he would remember me. But I’m afraid the business I’ve come on may not be what he had foreseen.’
‘I wouldn’t know,’ the assistant said as he shifted. ‘Visiting dignitaries might confide in the Master of Tides, but I’m like you. I follow orders. Now. Let me see. I can send a runner to the library, and if he’s there . . .’
‘Perhaps it would be best if I went to the poet’s house,’ Otah said. ‘He can find me there when he isn’t—’
‘Oh, we haven’t put him there. Gods! He has his own rooms.’
‘His own rooms?’
‘Yes. We have a poet of our own, you know. We aren’t going to put Cehmai-cha on a cot in the granary every time the Dai-kvo sends us a guest. Maati-cha has apartments near the library.’
The air seemed to leave the room. A dull roar filled Otah’s ears, and he had to put a hand to the wall to keep from swaying. Maati-cha. The name came like an unforeseen blow.
Maati Vaupathai. Maati whom Otah had known briefly at the school, and to whom he had taught the secrets he had learned before he turned his back on the poets and all they offered. Maati whom he had found again in Saraykeht, who had become his friend and who knew that Itani Noygu was the son of the Khai Machi.
The last night they had seen one another - thirteen, fourteen summers ago - Maati had stolen his lover and Otah had killed Maati’s master. He was here now, in Machi. And he was looking for Otah. He felt like a deer surprised by the hunter at its side.
The servant girl fumbled with her strings, the notes of the tune coming out a jangle, and Otah shifted his gaze to her as if she’d shouted. For a moment, their eyes met and he saw discomfort in her as she hurried back to her song. She might have seen something in his face, might have realized who was standing before her. Otah balled his fists at his sides, pressing them into his thighs to keep from shaking. The assistant had been speaking. Otah didn’t know what he’d said.
‘Forgive me, but before we do anything, would you be so kind . . .,’ Otah feigned an embarrassed simper. ‘I’m afraid I had one bowl of tea too many this morning, and waters that run in, run out . . .’
‘Of course. I’ll have a slave take you to—’
‘No need,’ Otah said as he stepped to the door. No one shouted. No one stopped him. ‘I’ll be back with you in a moment.’
He walked out of the hall, forcing himself not to run though he could feel his heartbeat in his neck, and his ribs seemed too small for his breath. He waited for the warning yell to come - armsmen with drawn blades or the short, simple pain of an arrow in his breast. Generations of his uncles had spilled their blood, spat their last breaths perhaps here, under these arches. He was not immune. Itani Noygu would not protect him. He controlled himself as best he could, and when he reached the gardens, boughs shielding him from the eyes of the palaces, he bolted.
Idaan sat at the open sky doors, her legs hanging out over the void, and let her gaze wander the moonlit valley. The glimmers of the low towns to the south. The Daikani mine where her brother had gone to die. The Poinyat mines to the west and southeast. And below the soles of her bare
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