Shadow and Betrayal

face my stupidities just as well as he did. The Dai-kvo wants to know who killed Biitrah? I’ll find out. He can tell me it’s too late and he can tell me to come home, but he can’t make me stop looking. Whoever gets that chair . . . whoever gets it . . .’
    Maati frowned, confused for a moment, and a sudden racking sob shook him. He leaned forward. Cehmai moved to him, certain for a moment that Maati was about to pitch off the walkway and down to the distant ground, but instead the older poet gathered himself and took a pose of apology.
    ‘I’m . . . making an ass of myself,’ he said. ‘You were saying something. ’
    Cehmai was torn for a moment. He could see the red that lined Maati’s eyes, could smell the sick reek of distilled wine on his breath and something deeper - some drug mixed with the wine. Someone needed to see Maati back to his apartments, needed to see that he was cared for. On another night, Cehmai would have done it.
    ‘Idaan,’ he said. ‘She must have been here. They’re burning her brother and her father. She had to attend the ceremony.’
    ‘She did,’ Maati agreed. ‘I saw her.’
    ‘Where’s she gone?’
    ‘With her man, I think. He was there beside her,’ Maati said. ‘I don’t know where they went.’
    ‘Are you going to be all right, Maati-kvo?’
    Maati seemed to think about this, then nodded once and turned back to watch the pyre burning. The brown leather book had fallen to the ground by the wineskin, and the andat retrieved it and put it back in Maati’s sleeve. As they walked away, Cehmai took a pose of query.
    ‘I didn’t think he’d want to lose it,’ the andat said.
    ‘So that was a favor to him?’ Cehmai said. Stone-Made-Soft didn’t reply. They walked toward the women’s quarters and Idaan’s apartments. If she was not there, he would go to the Vaunyogi’s palace. He would say he was there to offer condolences to Idaan-cha. That it was his duty as poet and representative of the Dai-kvo to offer condolences to Idaan Machi on this most sorrowful of days. It was his duty. Gods. And the Vaunyogi would be chewing their own livers out. They’d contracted to marry their son to the Khai Machi’s sister. Now she was no one’s family.
    ‘Maybe they’ll cancel the arrangement,’ Stone-Made-Soft said. ‘It isn’t as if anyone would blame them. She could come live with us.’
    ‘You can be quiet now,’ Cehmai said.
    At Idaan’s quarters, the servant boy reported that Idaan-cha had been there, but had gone. Yes, Adrah-cha had been there as well, but he had also gone. The unease in the boy’s manner made Cehmai wonder. Part of him hoped that they had been fighting, those two. It was despicable, but it was there: the desire that he and not Adrah Vaunyogi be the one to comfort her.
    He stopped next at the palace of the Vaunyogi. A servant led him to a waiting chamber that had been dressed in pale mourning cloth fragrant from the cedar chests in which it had been stored. The chairs and statuary, windows and floors were all swathed in white rags that candlelight made gold. The andat stood at the window, peering out at the courtyard, while Cehmai sat on the front handspan of a seat. Every breath he took here made him wonder if coming had been a mistake.
    The door to the main hall swung open. Adrah Vaunyogi stepped in. His shoulders rode high and tight, his lips thin as a line drawn on paper. Cehmai stood and took a pose of greeting which Adrah mirrored before he closed the door.
    ‘I’m surprised to see you, Cehmai-cha,’ Adrah said, walking forward slowly, as if unsure what precisely he was approaching. Cehmai smiled to keep his unease from showing. ‘My father is occupied. But perhaps I might be able to help you?’
    ‘You’re most kind. I came to offer my sympathies to Idaan-cha. I had heard she was with you, and so . . .’
    ‘No. She was, but she’s left. Perhaps she went back to the ceremony.’ Adrah’s voice was distant, as if only half his attention was on the conversation. His eyes, however, were fixed on Cehmai like a snake on a mouse, only Cehmai wasn’t sure which of them would be the mouse, which the serpent.
    ‘I will look there,’ Cehmai said. ‘I didn’t mean to disturb you.’
    ‘We are always pleased by an audience with the poet of Machi. Wait. Don’t . . . don’t go. Sit with me a moment.’
    Stone-Made-Soft didn’t shift, but Cehmai could feel its interest and amusement in the back of his mind. Cehmai sat in a