Leaning on her cane, she passed the wide mouth of the Nantan and into the warehouse district. The traffic patterns in the streets had changed—the rhythm of the city had shifted as it did from season to season. The mad rush of harvest was behind them, and though the year's work was still far from ended, the city had a sense of completion. The great trick that made Saraykeht the center of all cotton trade had been performed once more, and now normal men and women would spend their hours and days changing that advantage into power and wealth and prestige.
She could also feel its unease. Something had happened to the poet. Only listening from her window during the evening, she'd heard three or four different stories about what had happened. Every conversation she walked past was the same—something had happened to the poet. Something to do with House Wilsin and the sad trade. Something terrible. The young men and women in the street smiled as they told each other, excited by the sense of crisis and too young or too poor or too ignorant for the news of yesterday's events to sicken them with dread. That was for older people. People who understood.
Amat breathed deeply, catching the scent of the sea, the perfume of grilling meat at the stalls, the unpleasant stench of the dyers' vats that reached even from several streets away. Her city, with its high summer behind it. In her heart, she still found it hard to believe that she had returned to it, that she was not still entombed in the back office of Ovi Niit's comfort house. And as she walked, leaning heavily on her cane, she tried not to wonder what the men and women said about her as she passed.
At the bathhouse, the guards looked at her curiously as they took their poses. She didn't even respond, only walked forward into the tiled rooms with their echoes and the scent of cedar and fresh water. She shrugged off her robes and went past the public baths to Marchat Wilsin's little room at the back, just as she always had.
He looked terrible.
"Too hot," he said as she lowered herself into the water. The lacquer tray danced a little on the waves she stirred, but didn't spill the tea.
"You always say that," Amat Kyaan said. Marchat sighed and looked away. There were bags under his eyes, dark as bruises. His face, scowl-set, held a grayish cast. Amat leaned forward and pulled the tea closer.
"So," she said. "I take it things went well."
"Don't."
Amat sipped tea from her bowl and considered him. Her employer, her friend.
"Then what is there left for us to say?" she asked.
"There's business," Marchat said. "The same as always."
"Business, then. I take it that things went well."
He shot an annoyed glance at her, then looked away.
"Couldn't we start with the contracts with the dyers?"
"If you'd like," Amat said. "Was there something pressing with them?"
Her voice carried the whole load of sarcasm to cover the outrage and anger. And fear. Marchat took a clumsy pose of surrender and acquiescence before reaching over and taking his own bowl of tea from the tray.
"I'm going to a meeting with the Khai and several of the higher utkhaiem. Spend the whole damn time falling on my sword over the sad trade. I've promised a full investigation."
"And what are you going to find?"
"The truth, I imagine. That's the secret of a good lie, you know. Coming to a place where you believe it yourself. I expect our investigation—or anyone else's—will show it was Oshai, the translator. He and his men plotted the whole thing under the direction of the andat Seedless. They found the girl, they brought her to us under false pretenses. I have letters of introduction that I'll turn over to the Khai's men. They'll discover that the letters are forged. House Wilsin will be looked upon as a collection of dupes. At best, it will take us years to recover our reputation."
"It's a small price," Amat said. "What if they find Oshai?"
"They won't."
"You're sure of that?"
"Yes," Wilsin said with a great sigh. "I'm sure."
"And Liat?"
"Still being questioned," Marchat said. "I imagine she'll be out by the end of the day. We'll need to do something for her. To make this right. She's not going to come out of this with a reputation for competence intact. They've already spoken with the island girl. She didn't have anything very coherent to say, I'm afraid. But it's over, Amat. That's really the only bright thing I can say of the whole stinking business. The worst that was going to happen has happened, and now we can get to cleaning up after it and moving on."
"And what's the truth?"
"What I told you," he said. "That's the truth. It's the only truth that matters."