Liat nodded, took a long drink, and held the cup out for more. Otah poured.
"It's all my fault," she said as she sat hack. "I should never have brought him here. I never saw it. I never saw you in him. He was always just himself. If I'd known that ... that he resembled you quite so closely, I wouldn't have."
"Late for that," Otah said.
Liat sighed her agreement and looked up at him. It was hard to believe that they had been lovers once. The girl he had known hack then hadn't had gray in her hair, weariness in her eyes. And the boy he'd been was as distant as snow in summer. Yes, two people had kissed once, had touched each other, had created a child who had grown to manhood. And Otah remembered some of those moments nowshowering at the barracks while she spoke to him, the ink blocks at the desk in her cell at the compound of House Wilsin, the feel of a young body pressed against his own, when his flesh had also been new and unmarked. If those days long past had been foolish or wrong, the only evidence was the price they both paid now. It hadn't seemed so at the time.
"I've been thinking of it," Liat said. "I haven't told him. I wasn't sure how you wanted to address the problem. But I think the wisest thing to do is to speak with him and with Maati, and then have Nayiitkya take the brand. I know it's not something done with firstborn sons, but it's still a repudiation of his right to become Khai. It will make it clear to the world that he doesn't have designs on your chair."
"'T'hat isn't what I'd choose," Otah said. His words were slow and careful. "I'm afraid my son may die."
She caught her breath. It was hardly there, no more than a tremor in the air she took in, but he heard it.
"Itani," she said, using the name of the boy he'd been in Saraykeht, "please. I'll swear on anything you choose. Nayiit's no threat to Danat. It was only the Galts that brought us here. I'm not looking to put my son in your chair...."
Otah put down his bowl and took a pose that asked for her silence. Her face pale, she went quiet.
"I don't mean that," he said softly. "I mean that I don't ... Gods. I don't know how to say this. Danat's not well. His lungs are fragile, and the winters here are bad. We lose people to the cold every year. Not just the old or the weak. Young people. Healthy ones. I'm afraid that Danat may dic, and there'll be no one to take my place. The city would tear itself apart."
"But ... you want ..."
"I haven't done a good job as Khai. I haven't been able to put the houses of the utkhaiem together except in their distrust of me and resentment of Kiyan. There's been twice it came near violence, and I only held the city in place by luck. But keeping Machi safe is my responsibility. I want Nayiit unbranded, in case ... in case he becomes my successor.
Liat's mouth hung open, her eyes were wide. A stray lock of hair hung down the side of her face, three white hairs dancing in and out among the black. He felt the faint urge-echo of a habit long forgotten-to brush it back.
"'There," Otah said and picked up his wine bowl. "There, I've said it."
"I'm sorry," Liat said, and Otah took a pose accepting her sympathy without knowing quite why she was offering it. She looked down at her hands. The silence between them was profound but not uncomfortable; he felt no need to speak, to fill the void with words. Liat drank her wine, Otah his. The wind muttered to itself and to the stones of the city.
"It's not a job I'd want," Liat said. "Khai NIachi."
"It's all power and no freedom," Otah said. "If Nayiit were to have it, he'd likely curse my name. There are a thousand different things to attend to, and every one of them as serious as bone to someone. You can't do it all."
"I know how it feels," Liat said. "I only have a trading house to look after, and there's days I wish that it would all go away. Granted, I have men who work the books and the negotiations and appeals before the low judges and the utkhaiem ..
"I have all the low judges and the utkhaiem appealing to me," Otah said. "It's never enough."
""I'here's always the descent into decadence and self-absorption," Liat said, smiling. It was only half a joke. "They say the Khai Chaburi- 'Ian only gets sober long enough to bed his latest wife."
"Tcnipting," Otah said, "but somewhere between taking the chair to protect Kiyan and tonight, it became my city. I came from here, and even if I'm not much good at what I do, I'm what they have."
""That makes sense," Liat said.
"Does it? It doesn't to me."
Liat put down her bowl and rose. He thought her gaze spoke of determination and melancholy, but perhaps the latter was only his own. She stepped close and kissed him on the check, a firm peck like an aunt greeting a favorite nephew.