Shadow and Betrayal

The smell of them wasn’t rotten, not yet, but it was disturbing - coppery and intimate. They had only been dead for minutes. If all of them were dead.
    ‘We’re the men who’ve come to take you out of here,’ the commander said. He was the one actually standing in the doorway. He had the long face of a man of the winter cities, but a Westlander’s flowing hair. Otah moved forward and took a pose of gratitude that seemed to amuse him.
    ‘Can you walk?’ he asked as Otah came out into the larger room. The signs of struggle were everywhere - spilled wine, overturned chairs, blood on the walls. The armsmen had been taken by surprise. Otah put a hand against the wall to steady himself. The stone felt warm as flesh.
    ‘I’ll do what I have to,’ Otah said.
    ‘That’s admirable,’ the commander said, ‘but I’m more curious about what you can do. I’ve suffered long confinement myself a time or two, and I know what it does. We can’t take the easy way down. We’ve got to walk. If you can do this, that’s all to the good. If you can’t, we’re prepared to carry you, but I need to have you out of the city quickly.’
    ‘I don’t understand. Did Maati send you?’
    ‘There’s better places to discuss this, Otah-cha. We can’t go down by the chains. Even if there weren’t more armsmen waiting there, we’ve just broken them. Can you walk down the tower?’
    A memory of the endlessly turning stairs and the ghost of pain in his knees and legs. Otah felt a stab of shame, but pulled himself up and shook his head.
    ‘I don’t believe I can,’ he said. The commander nodded and two of his men pulled lengths of wood from their backs and fitted them together in a cripple’s litter. There was a small seat for Otah, canted against the slope of the stairway, and the poles were set one longer than the other to fit the tight curve. It would have been useless in any other situation, but for this task it was perfect. As one of the men helped Otah take his place on it, he wondered if the device had been built for this moment, or if things like it existed in service of these towers. The largest of the men spat on his hands and gripped the carrying poles that would start down the stairs and bear most of Otah’s weight. One of his fellows took the other end, and Otah lurched up.
    They began their descent, Otah with his back to the center of the spiral staircase. He watched the stone of the wall curl up from below. The men grunted and cursed, but they moved quickly. The man on the higher poles stumbled once, and the one below shouted angrily back at him.
    The journey seemed to last forever - stone and darkness, the smell of sweat and lantern oil. Otah’s knees bumped against the wall before him, his head against the wall behind. When they reached the halfway point, another huge man was waiting to take over the worst of the carrying. Otah felt his shame return. He tried to protest, but the commander put a strong, hard hand on his shoulder and kept him in the chair.
    ‘You chose right the first time,’ the commander said.
    The second half of the journey down was less terrible. Otah’s mind was beginning to clear, and a savage hope was lifting him. He was being saved. He couldn’t think who or why, but he was delivered from his cell. He thought of the armsmen new-slaughtered at the tower’s height, and recalled Kiyan’s words. How do you expect to protect me and my house? They could all be killed, his jailers and his rescuers alike. All in the name of tradition.
    He could tell when they reached the level of the street - the walls had grown so thick there was almost no room for them to walk, but thin windows showed glimmers of light, and drunken, disjointed music filled the air. At the base of the stair, his carriers lowered Otah to the ground and took his arms over their shoulders as if he were drunk or sick. The commander squeezed to the front of the party. Despite his frown, Otah sensed the man was enjoying himself immensely.
    They moved quickly and quietly through maze-like passages and out at last into an alley at the foot of the tower. A covered cart was waiting, two horses whickering restlessly. The commander made a sign, and the two bearers lifted Otah into the back of the cart. The commander and two of the men climbed in after, and the driver started the horses. Shod hooves rapped the stone, and the cart lurched and bumped. The commander pulled the back cloth closed and tied it, but loose enough he