A Shadow In Summer(55)

"Yes," he said. "Always."

Maati waited, but the andat said nothing more. At last, Maati gathered his things and rose to go inside. He paused beside the unmoving andat and touched Seedless' sleeve. The andat didn't move, didn't speak, accepted no more comfort than a stone would. Maati went to the house and lit the night candle and lemon candles to drive away the insects, and prepared himself for sleep.

Heshai returned just before dawn, his robes stained and reeking of cheap wine. Maati helped him prepare for the audience, the sad trade, the ceremony. Fresh robes, washed hair, fresh-shaved chin. The redness of his eyes, Maati could do nothing for. Throughout, Seedless haunted the corners of the room, unusually silent. Heshai drank little, ate less, and as the sun topped the trees, lumbered out and down the path with Maati and Seedless following.

It was a lovely day, clouds building over the sea and to the east, towering white as cotton and taller than mountains. The palaces were alive with servants and slaves and the utkhaiem moving gracefully about their business. And the poets, Maati supposed, moving about theirs.

The party from House Wilsin was at the low hall before them. The pregnant girl stood outside, attended by servants, fidgeting with the skirts that were designed for the day, cut to protect her modesty but not catch the child as it left her. Maati felt the first real qualm pass over him. Heshaikvo marched past woman and servants and slaves, his bloodshot eyes looking, Maati guessed, for Liat Chokavi who was, after all, overseeing the trade.

They found her inside the hall, pacing and muttering to herself under her breath. She was dressed in white robes shot with blue: mourning colors. Her hair was pulled back to show the softness of her cheek, the curve of her neck. She was beautiful—the sort of woman that Otahkvo would love and that would love him in return. Her gaze rose as they entered, the three of them, and she took a pose of greeting.

"Can we do this thing?" Heshaikvo snapped, only now that Maati had known the man longer, he heard the pain underneath the gruffness. The dread.

"The physician will be here shortly," Liat said.

"He's late?"

"We're early, Heshaikvo," Maati said gently.

The poet glared at him, then shrugged and moved to the far end of the hall to stare sullenly out the window. Seedless, meeting Maati's gaze, pursed his lips, shrugged and walked out into the sunlight. Maati, left alone before the woman, took a pose of formal greeting which she returned.

"Forgive Heshaikvo," Maati said softly enough to keep his voice from carrying. "He hates the sad trade. It . . . it would be a very long story, and likely not worth the telling. Only don't judge him too harshly from this."

"I won't," Liat said. Her manner was softer, less formal. She seemed, in fact, on the verge of grinning. "Itani told me about it. He mentioned you as well."

"He has been very kind in . . . showing me the city," Maati said, taken by surprise. "I knew very little about Saraykeht before I came here."

Liat smiled and touched his sleeve.

"I should thank you," she said. "If it wasn't for you, I don't know when he would have gotten the courage to tell me about . . . about his family."

"Oh," Maati said. "Then he . . . you know?"

She took a pose of confirmation that implied a complicity Maati found both thrilling and uneasing. The secret was now shared among three. And that was as many as could ever know. In a way, it bound them, he and Liat. Two people who shared some kind of love for Otahkvo.

"Perhaps we will be able to know each other better, once the trade is completed," Maati said. "The three of us, I mean."

"I would like that," Liat said. She grinned, and Maati found himself grinning back. He wondered what they would look like to someone else—the student poet and the trade house overseer beaming at each other just before the sad trade. He forced himself into a more sober demeanor.

"The woman, Maj," he said. "All went well with her, I hope?"

Liat shrugged and leaned closer to him. She smelled of an expensive perfume, earthy and rich more than floral, like fresh turned soil.

"Keep it between us, but she's been a nightmare," Liat said. "She means well, I suppose, but she's flighty as a child and doesn't seem to remember what I've told her from one day to the next."

"Is she . . . simple?"

"I don't think so. Only . . . unconcerned, I suppose. They have different ways of looking at things on Nippu. Her translator told me about it. They don't think the child's a person until it draws its first breath, so she didn't even want to wear mourning colors."

"Really? I hadn't heard that. I thought the Eastern Islands were . . . stricter, I suppose. If that's the way to say it."