Shadow and Betrayal

if they were afflicting someone else.
    When he opened his eyes, the andat had shifted, its gaze on him and expressionless. Cehmai felt the storm on the back of his mind shift, as if taking stock of the confusion in his heart, testing him for weakness. Cehmai waited, prepared for Stone-Made-Soft to press, for the struggle to engulf him. He almost longed for it.
    But the andat seemed to feel that anticipation, because it pulled back. The pressure lessened, and Stone-Made-Soft smiled its idiot, empty smile, and turned back to the ceremony. Adrah was standing now, a long cord looped in his hand. The priest asked him the ritual questions, and Adrah spoke the ritual answers. His face seemed drawn, his shoulders too square, his movements too careful. Cehmai thought he seemed exhausted.
    The priest who stood behind Idaan spoke for her family in their absence, and the end of the cord, cut and knotted, passed from Adrah to the priest and then to Idaan’s hand. The rituals would continue for some time, Cehmai knew, but as soon as the cord was accepted, the binding was done. Idaan Machi had entered the house of the Vaunyogi and only Adrah’s death would cast her back into the ghost arms of her dead family. Those two were wed, and he had no right to the pain the thought caused him. He had no right to it.
    He rose and walked silently to the wide stone archway and out of the temple. If Idaan looked up at his departure, he didn’t notice.
    The sun wasn’t halfway through its arc, and a fresh wind from the north was blowing the forge smoke away. High, thin clouds scudded past, giving the illusion that the great stone towers were slowly, endlessly toppling. Cehmai walked the temple grounds, Stone-Made-Soft a pace behind him. There were few others there - a woman in rich robes sitting alone by a fountain, her face a mask of grief; a round-faced man with rings glittering on his fingers reading a scroll; an apprentice priest raking the gravel paths smooth with a long metal rake. And at the edge of the grounds, where temple became palace, a familiar shape in brown poet’s robes. Cehmai hesitated, then slowly walked to him, the andat close by and trailing him like a shadow.
    ‘I hadn’t expected to see you here, Maati-kvo.’
    ‘No, but I expected you,’ the older poet said. ‘I’ve been at the council all morning. I needed some time away. May I walk with you?’
    ‘If you like. I don’t know that I’m going anywhere in particular.’
    ‘Not marching with the wedding party? I thought it was traditional for the celebrants to make an appearance in the city with the new couple. Let the city look over the pair and see who’s allied themselves with the families. I assume that’s what all the flowers and decorations out there are for.’
    ‘There will be enough without me.’
    Cehmai turned north, the wind blowing gently into his face, drawing his robes out behind him as if he were walking through water. A slave girl was standing beside the path singing an old love song, her high, sweet voice carrying like a flute’s. Cehmai felt Maati-kvo’s attention, but wasn’t sure what to make of it. He felt as examined as the corpse on the physician’s table. At length, he spoke to break the silence.
    ‘How is it?’
    ‘The council? Like a very long, very awkward dinner party. I imagine it will deteriorate. The only interesting thing is that a number of houses are calling for Vaunyogi to take the chair.’
    ‘Interesting,’ Cehmai said. ‘I knew Adrah-cha was thinking of it, but I wouldn’t have thought his father had the money to sway many people.’
    ‘I wouldn’t have either. But there are powers besides money.’
    The comment seemed to hang in the air.
    ‘I’m not sure what you mean, Maati-kvo.’
    ‘Symbols have weight. The wedding coming as it does might sway the sentimental. Or perhaps Vaunyogi has advocates we aren’t aware of.’
    ‘Such as?’
    Maati stopped. They had reached a wide courtyard, rich with the scent of cropped summer grass. The andat halted as well, its broad head tilted in an attitude of polite interest. Cehmai felt a brief flare of hatred toward it, and saw its lips twitch slightly toward a smile.
    ‘If you’ve spoken for the Vaunyogi, I need to know it,’ Matti said.
    ‘We’re not to take sides in these things. Not without direction from the Dai-kvo.’
    ‘I’m aware of that, and I don’t mean to accuse you or pry into what’s not mine, but on this one thing, I have to know. They did