A Shadow In Summer(15)

By the afternoon, twinges of resentment had begun to join the suspicion that he was once again being duped. Even as he swept the floors that had clearly gone neglected for weeks, he began almost to hope that this further abandonment was another plot by the andat. If it were only that Heshaikvo had this little use for him, perhaps the Dai-kvo shouldn't have let him come. Maati wondered if a poet had the option of refusing an apprentice. Perhaps this neglect was Heshaikvo's way of avoiding duties he otherwise couldn't.

It had been only a few weeks before that he had taken leave of the Dai-kvo, heading south along the river to Yalakeht and there by ship to the summer cities. It was his first time training under an acting poet, seeing one of the andat first hand, and eventually studying to one day take on the burden of the andat Seedless himself. I am a slave, my dear. The slave you hope to own.

Maati pushed the dust out the door, shoving with his broom as much as sweeping. When the full heat of the day came on, Maati opened all the swinging walls, transforming the house into a kind of pavilion. A soft breeze ruffled the pages of books and the tassels of scrolls. Maati rested. A distant hunger troubled him, and he wondered how to signal from here for a palace servant to bring him something to eat. If Heshaikvo were here, he could ask.

His teacher arrived at last, at first a small figure, no larger than Maati's thumb, trundling out from the palace. Then as he came nearer, Maati made out the wide face, the slanted, weak shoulders, the awkward belly. As he crossed the wooden bridge, the high color in the poet's face—cheeks red as cherries and sheened in an unhealthy sweat—came clear. Maati rose and adopted a pose of welcome appropriate for a student to his master.

Heshai's rolling gait slowed as he came near. The wide mouth gaped as Heshaikvo took in the space that had been his unkempt house. For the first time, Maati wondered if perhaps he had made a mistake in cleaning it. He felt a blush rising in his cheeks and shifted to a pose of apology.

Heshaikvo raised a hand before he could speak.

"No. No, it's . . . gods, boy. I don't think the place has looked like this since I came here. Did you . . . there was a brown book, leather-bound, on that table over there. Where did it end up?"

"I don't know, Heshaikvo," Maati said. "I will find it immediately."

"Don't. No. It will rise to the surface eventually, I'm sure. Here. Come. Sit."

The poet moved awkwardly, like a man gout-plagued, but his joints, so far as Maati could make them out within the brown robes, were unswollen. Maati tried not to notice the stains of spilled food and drink on the poet's sleeves and down the front of his robes. As he lowered himself painfully into a chair of black lacquer and white woven cane, the poet spoke.

"We've gotten off to a bad start, haven't we?"

Maati took a pose of contrition, but the poet waved it away.

"I'm looking forward to teaching you. I thought I should say so. But there's little enough that I can do with you just now. Not until the harvests are all done. And that may not be for weeks. I'll get to you when I have time. There's quite a bit I'll have to show you. The Dai-kvo can give you a good start, but holding one of the andat is much more than anything he'll have told you. And Seedless . . . well, I haven't done you any favors with Seedless, I'm afraid."

"I'm grateful that you were willing to accept me, Heshaikvo."

"Yes. Yes, well. That's all to the good, then. Isn't it. In the meantime, you should make use of your freedom. You understand? It can be a lovely city. Take . . . take your time with it, eh? Live a little before we lock you back down into all this being a poet nonsense, eh?"

Maati took a pose appropriate to a student accepting instruction, though he could see in Heshai's bloodshot eyes that this was not quite the reply the poet had hoped for. An awkward silence stretched between them, broken when Heshai forced a smile, stood, and clapped Maati on the shoulder.

"Excellent," the poet said with such gusto that it was obvious he didn't mean it. "I've got to switch these robes out for fresh. Busy, you know, busy. No time to rest."

No time to rest. And yet it was the afternoon, and the poet, his teacher, was still in yesterday's clothes. No time to rest, nor to meet him when he arrived, nor to come to the house anytime in the night for fear of speaking to a new apprentice. Maati watched Heshai's wide form retreat up the stairs, heard the footsteps tramping above him as the poet rushed through his ablutions. His head felt like it had been stuffed with wool as he tried to catalog all the things he might have done that would have pushed his teacher away.

"Stings, doesn't it? Not being wanted," a soft voice murmured behind him. Maati spun. Seedless stood on the opened porch in a robe of perfect black shot with an indigo so deep it was hard to see where it blended with the deeper darkness. The dark, mocking eyes considered him. Maati took no pose, spoke no words. Seedless nodded all the same, as if he had replied. "We can talk later, you and I."