Shadow and Betrayal

action. That night, he waited until the others were asleep before he pushed off the thin blankets, put on every robe and legging he had, gathered his few things, and left his cohort for the last time.
    The stone hallways were unlit, but he knew his way well enough that he had no need for light. He made his way to the kitchen. The pantry was unlocked - no one would steal food for fear of being found out and beaten. Otah scooped double handfuls of hard rolls and dried fruit into his satchel. There was no need for water. Snow still covered the ground, and Tahi-kvo had shown them how to melt snow with the heat of their own bodies walking without the cold penetrating to their hearts.
    Once he was provisioned, his path led him to the great hall - moonlight from the high windows showing ghost-dim the great aisle where he had held a pose of obeisance every morning for the last three years. The doors, of course, were barred, and while he was strong enough to open them, the sounds might have woken someone. He took a pair of wide, netted snowshoes from the closet beside the great doors and went up the stairs to the listening room. There, the narrow windows looked out on a world locked in winter. Otah’s breath plumed already in the chill.
    He threw the snowshoes and satchel out the window to the snow-cushioned ground below, then squeezed through and lowered himself from the outer stone sill until he hung by his fingertips. The fall was not so far.
    He dusted the snow from his leggings, tied the snowshoes to his feet by their thick leather thongs, took up the bulging satchel and started off, walking south toward the high road.
    The moon, near the top of its nightly arc, had moved the width of two thick-gloved hands toward the western horizon before Otah knew he was not alone. The footsteps that had kept perfect time with his own fell out of their pattern - as intentional a provocation as clearing a throat. Otah froze, then turned.
    ‘Good evening, Otah Machi,’ Milah-kvo said, his tone casual. ‘A good night for a walk, eh? Cold though.’
    Otah did not speak, and Milah-kvo strode forward, his hand on his own satchel, his footsteps nearly silent. His breath was thick and white as a goose feather.
    ‘Yes,’ the teacher said. ‘Cold, and far from your bed.’
    Otah took a pose of acknowledgment appropriate for a student to a teacher. It had no nuance of apology, and Otah hoped that Milah-kvo would not see his trembling, or if he did would ascribe it to the cold.
    ‘Leaving before your term is complete, boy. You disgrace yourself.’
    Otah switched to a pose of thanks appropriate to the end of a lesson, but Milah-kvo waved the formality aside and sat in the snow, considering him with an interest that Otah found unnerving.
    ‘Why do it?’ Milah-kvo asked. ‘There’s still hope of redeeming yourself. You might still be found worthy. So why run away? Are you so much a coward?’
    Otah found his voice.
    ‘It would be cowardice that kept me, Milah-kvo.’
    ‘How so?’ The teacher’s voice held nothing of judgment or testing. It was like a friend asking a question because he truly did not know the answer.
    ‘There are no locks on hell,’ Otah said. It was the first time he had tried to express this to someone else, and it proved harder than he had expected. ‘If there aren’t locks, then what can hold anyone there besides fear that leaving might be worse?’
    ‘And you think the school is a kind of hell.’
    It was not a question, so Otah did not answer.
    ‘If you keep to this path, you’ll be the lowest of the low,’ Milah said. ‘A disgraced child without friend or ally. And without the brand to protect you, your older brothers may well track you down and kill you.’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Do you have someplace to go?’
    ‘The high road leads to Pathai and Nantani.’
    ‘Where you know no one.’
    Otah took a pose of agreement.
    ‘This doesn’t frighten you?’ the teacher asked.
    ‘It is the decision I’ve made.’ He could see the amusement in Milahkvo’s face at his answer.
    ‘Fair enough, but I think there’s an alternative you haven’t considered.’
    The teacher reached into his satchel and pulled out a small cloth bundle. He hefted it for a moment, considering, and dropped it on the snow between them. It was a black robe.
    Otah took a pose of intellectual inquiry. It was a failure of vocabulary, but Milah-kvo took his meaning.
    ‘Andat are powerful, Otah. Like small gods. And they don’t love