Seasons of War

by Abraham Daniel

Her mouth tightened, and her eyebrows rose as if she were asking a question. She said nothing.

  ‘You’re sure you want this?’ he asked. ‘You have seen all the women we’ve lost. You know the dangers.’

  ‘I want this, Maati-kvo. I want to try this. And . . . and I don’t know how much longer I can wait,’ she said. Her gaze rose to meet his. ‘It’s time for me. I have to try soon, or I think I never will.’

  ‘If you have doubts about—’

  ‘Not doubts. Only a little despair now and then. You can take that from me. If you let me try.’ Maati started to speak, but the girl went on, raising her voice and speaking faster, as if she feared what he would say next. ‘I’ve seen death. I won’t say I’m not afraid of it, but I’m not so taken by the fear that I can’t risk anything. If it’s called for.’

  ‘I didn’t think you were,’ he said.

  ‘And I helped bury Umnit. I know what the price can look like. But I buried my mother and my brother and his daughter too, and they didn’t die for a reason. They were only on the streets when Udun fell,’ she said, and shrugged. ‘We all die sometime, Maati-kvo. Risking it sooner and for a reason is better than being safe and meaningless. Isn’t it?’

  Brave girl. She was such a brave girl. To have lost so much, so young, and still be strong enough to risk the binding. Maati felt tears in his eyes and forced himself to smile.

  ‘We chose it for you. Clarity-of-Sight,’ she said. ‘I saw how hard it is for you to read some days, and Eiah and I thought . . . if we could help . . .’

  Maati laid his hand on hers, his heart aching with something equally joy and fear. Vanjit was weeping a bit as well now. He heard voices coming down the hallway - Eiah and Ashti Beg - but Irit and Large Kae were silent. He was certain they were watching them. He didn’t care.

  ‘We’ll be careful,’ he said. ‘We’ll make it work.’

  Her smile outshone the sun. Maati nodded; yes, they would attempt the binding. Yes, Vanjit would be the first woman in history to hold an andat or else the next of his students to die.

  7

  ‘No, I will not forbid her a goddamned thing. The girl’s got more spine than all the rest of us put together. We could learn something from her,’ Farrer Dasin said, his arms folded before him, his chin high and proud. And when he said the rest of us, Otah was clear that he meant the Galts. The courts of the Khaiem, the cities and people of Otah’s empire were not part of Farrer Dasin’s us; they were still apart and the enemy.

  Six members of the High Council sat at the wide marble table along with Balasar Gice and Issandra Dasin. Otah, Danat, and representatives of four of the highest families of the utkhaiem sat across from them. Otah wished he’d been able to scatter each side among the other instead of dividing the table like a battlefield. Or else keep the group smaller. If it had been only himself, Farrer, and Issandra, there might have been a chance.

  Ana, the girl who had taken a stick to this political beehive, was not present, nor was she welcome.

  ‘There are agreements in place,’ Balasar said. ‘We can’t unmake them on a whim.’

  ‘Yes, Dasin-cha. Contracts have been signed,’ one of the utkhaiem said. ‘Is it Galt’s intention that any contract can be invalidated if the signer’s daughter objects?’

  ‘That isn’t what happened,’ the councilman at Farrer’s right hand said. ‘We have our hands full enough without exaggerating.’

  And so it started off again, voices raised each over the other with the effect that nothing but babble could be heard. Otah didn’t add to the clamor, but sat forward in his chair and watched. He considered the architecture - vaulted ceiling of blue and gold tiles, the sliding wooden shutters. He found a scent in the air: sugared almonds. He struggled to hear a sound beyond the table: the wind in the treetops. Then, slowly, he pulled his awareness back to the people before him. It was an old trick he’d learned during his days as a courier, a way of withdrawing half a step from the place where he was and considering the ways that people moved and held themselves, the expressions they wore when they were silent and when they spoke. It often said more than the words. And now, he saw three things.

  First, he was not the only silent one at the table. Issandra Dasin was rocked a degree back in her chair, her eyes fixed on the middle distance. Her expression spoke of exhaustion and a barely hidden sorrow, the complement to her husband’s self-destructive pleasure. Danat was also withdrawn, but with his body canted forward, as if he was trying to hear every phrase that fluttered through the heavy air. He might as easily drink a river.

  Second, Otah saw that neither side was united. The Galts across from him ran the gamut from defiant to conciliatory, the utkhaiem from outraged to fearful. It was the same outside. The palaces, the teahouses, the baths, the street corners - all of Saraykeht was filled with agreements and negotiations that were suddenly, violently uncertain. He recalled something his daughter had said once about the reopened wound being the one most plagued by scars.

  Third, and perhaps least interesting, it became clear that he was wasting his time.

  ‘Friends,’ Otah said. Then again, louder, ‘Friends!’

  Slowly, the table grew quiet around him.

  ‘The morning has been difficult,’ he said. ‘We should retire and reflect on what has been said.’

  Whatever it was, he didn’t add.

  There was a rumble of assent, if not precisely agreement. Otah took a pose of gratitude to each man and woman as they left, even to Farrer Dasin, for whom he felt very little warmth. Otah dismissed the servants as well, and soon only he and Danat remained. Without the pandemonium of voices, the meeting room seemed larger and oddly forlorn.

  ‘Well,’ his son said, leaning against the table. He was wearing the same robe as he had at the botched ceremony the day before. The cloth itself looked weary. ‘What do you make of it?’

  Otah scratched idly at his arm and tried to focus his mind. His back ached, and there was an uneasy, bright feeling in his gut that presaged a sleepless and uncomfortable night. He sighed.

  ‘Primarily, I think I’m an idiot,’ Otah said. ‘I should have written to the daughters. I forget how different their world is. Your world, too.’

  Danat took a pose that asked elaboration. Otah rose, stretching. His back didn’t improve.

  ‘Political marriage isn’t a new thing,’ Otah said. ‘We’ve always suffered it. They’ve always suffered it. But, once the rules changed, it stopped meaning so much, didn’t it? As long as Ana-cha has been alive, she hasn’t seen political marriages take place. If Radaani married his son to Saya’s daughter, they wouldn’t be joining bloodlines. No children, no lasting connection between the houses. Likewise in Galt. I doubt it’s stopped the practice entirely, but it’s changed things. I should have thought of it.’

  ‘And she could take lovers,’ Danat said.

  ‘People took lovers before,’ Otah said.

  ‘Not without fear,’ Danat said. ‘There’s no chance of a child. It changes how willing a girl would be.’

  ‘And how exactly do you know that?’ Otah asked.

  Danat blushed. Otah walked to the window. Below, the gardens were in motion. Wind shifted the boughs of the trees and set the flowers nodding. The scent of impending rain cooled the air. There would be a storm by nightfall.

  ‘Papa-kya?’ Danat said.

  Otah looked over his shoulder. Danat was sitting on the table, his feet on the seat of a cushioned chair. It was the pose of a casual boy in a cheap teahouse. Danat’s face, however, was troubled.

  ‘Don’t bother it,’ Otah said. ‘It might be a new world for sex, but there was an old world for it too. And I’m sure there are any number of other men who’ve made the same discoveries you have.’

  ‘That wasn’t the matter. It’s the wedding. I don’t think I can . . . I don’t think I can do it. When it was just thinking of it, I hadn’t seen what it would be to be married to someone who hated me. I have now.’

  His voice was thick with distres
s. A gust of stronger wind came, rattling the shutters in their frames. Otah slid the wood closed, and the meeting room dimmed, gold tiles turning bronze, blue tiles black.

  ‘It will be fine,’ Otah said. ‘At worst, there are other councillors with other daughters. It won’t be a pleasant transition, but—’

  ‘A different girl won’t fix this. At best we’d find a girl less willing to struggle. At worst, we’d find someone who hated me just as much, but better versed in deceit.’

  Otah took his seat again. He could feel his brow furrow. If he hadn’t been so tired to begin with, it wouldn’t have taken him as long to think through Danat’s words.

  ‘Are you . . .’ Otah said, then stopped and began again. ‘You’re saying you won’t have Ana?’

  ‘I thought I could. I would have, if she hadn’t done what she did. But I’ve spent all night looking at it, and I don’t see a way.’

  ‘I do. I see it perfectly clearly. High families have been arranging marriages for as long as there have been high families. It binds them together. It shows trust.’

  ‘You didn’t. You were Khai Machi. You could have had dozens of wives, but you didn’t. Even after the fever took Mother, you didn’t. You could have,’ Danat said. And then, ‘You could now. You could make one of these girls your wife. Marry Ana-cha.’

  ‘You know quite well that I couldn’t. A man of my years bedding a girl? They wouldn’t see a marriage so much as a debauch.’

  ‘Yes,’ Danat said. ‘And putting me in your place would only change how it looked, not what it was. I’ll do whatever I can to help. You know that. I could marry a stranger and make the best of it. But I won’t father a child on an unwilling girl.’

  ‘Don’t be an idiot,’ Otah said, and knew immediately that it was the wrong thing. His son’s smile was a mask now, cold and bright and hard as stone. Otah raised his hands in a pose that took the words back, but Danat ignored it.

  ‘I won’t do something I know in my bones is wrong,’ Danat said. ‘If it’s the only way to save us, then we aren’t worth saving.’

  Otah watched the boy leave. There were a thousand arguments to make, a thousand ways to rephrase the issue, to make something different of these same circumstances. None of them would matter. He let his head sink to his hands.

  There had been a time when Otah had been young and the world had been, if not simple, at least certain. Decades and experience had made him sure that his sense of right and wrong were not the only ones. Before he’d had that beaten out of him by the gods, he might well have taken the same stand Danat had just now. Do what he believed to be right and endure the consequences, no matter how terrible.

  If only his children were less like him.

  There had to be a way. The whole half-dead mess of it had to be salvageable. He had only to see how.

  Voices and argument filled the halls as he made his way through the palaces. Columns wrapped in celebratory cloth mocked him. Uncertain, falsely bright gazes met his own and were ignored. The thick air of the summer cities left sweat running down Otah’s spine and the sense of a damp cloth pressed against his face. There was a way to salvage this. He had only to find it.

  Letters and requests for audiences waited for him, stacks of paper as long as his forearm. He ignored them for now and sent his servants scurrying for fresh paper and chilled tea. He sat at his desk, the pen’s bright bronze nib in the air just above the brick of ink, and gave himself a moment before he began.

  Kiyan-kya—

  Well, love, it’s all gone as well as a wicker fish boat. Ana won’t have Danat. Danat won’t have Ana. I find myself host to the worst gathering in history not actually struck by plague. I think the only thing I’ve done well was that I didn’t wrestle our son to the ground when he walked away from me. I feel like everyone is wrapped up in what happened before, and I’m alone in fearing what will come after. We won’t survive, love. The Khaiem and the Galts both are sinking, and we’re so short-sighted and mean of spirit we’re willing to die if it means the other bastard goes down too.

  I don’t mean Ana or Danat. They’re only young and brave and stupid the way young, brave people are. I mean her father: Farrer Dasin is happy to see this fail. I imagine there are a fair number in my court who feel the same way.

  There are two sides to this, love. But they aren’t the two sides we think of - not the Khaiem and the Galts. It’s the people in love with the past and the ones who fear for the future. And, though the gods alone know how I’m going to do it, I have to win Danat and Ana over from the one camp to the other:

  Otah paused, something shifting in the back of his mind. It felt the way it had when Kiyan was alive and speaking to him from the next room, her voice too low to make out the words. He put down the pen and closed his eyes.

  Win Ana over. He had to win Ana over.

  ‘Oh,’ he said.

  ‘Issandra-cha. Thank you for coming. You know my son, I think,’ Otah said.

  The sun touched the hills to the west of Saraykeht. Ruddy air rich with the scent of evening roses came through the unshuttered windows. A small meal of cheese and dried apple and plum wine waited for their pleasure on a low lacquered table. Issandra Dasin rose from her divan to greet Danat as he came forward.

  ‘Issandra-cha,’ Danat said and returned her welcome.

  ‘Danat needs your help,’ Otah said. Danat glanced over at him, surprise in his gaze. ‘You see, your daughter has convinced him that it would be wrong to marry an unwilling woman. I can argue it to be the lesser evil, but if we two work together, I think the issue might be avoided altogether.’

  Issandra returned to her seat, sighing. She looked older than when Otah had first met her.

  ‘It won’t be simple,’ Issandra said.

  ‘What won’t be simple?’ Danat asked.

  ‘Wooing my daughter,’ Issandra said. ‘What did you think we were talking about?’

  Otah took a bit of dried apple in his mouth while Danat blinked. Words stumbled over the boy’s tongue without finding a sentence.

  ‘You won’t have a different girl for fear she’ll hate you and lie about it,’ Otah said in the tone of a man explaining the solution of a simple mechanical problem. ‘Ana, we are all quite aware, isn’t going to hide her feelings on the matter. So if she chooses you, you can believe her. Yes?’

  ‘We have a small advantage in that her present lover is something of a cow,’ Issandra said. ‘I suspect that, had the circumstances been otherwise, she would already have grown tired of him. But he’s a point of pride now.’ She fixed Danat with her eyes. ‘You have a hard road before you, son.’

  ‘You want me to seduce your daughter?’ Danat asked, his voice breaking slightly at seduce.

  ‘Yes,’ Issandra said.

  Danat sank to a cushion. His face flushed almost the color of sunset.

  ‘I thought he might deliver an apology,’ Otah said. ‘It would give him a reason to speak with Ana-cha in private, separate him from the political aspect of the arrangement, and place him in her camp.’

  ‘Apologize for what?’ Danat said.

  ‘Well, for me,’ Otah said. ‘Express your shame that I would treat her so poorly.’

  ‘She’ll smell that in a heartbeat,’ Issandra said. ‘And if you begin by giving her the upper hand, you’ll never have it back. Ask an apology from her. Respect her objections, but tell her she was wrong in humiliating you. You are as much a pawn in this as she is. And do you have a lover?’

  ‘I . . . I was . . .’

  ‘Well, find one,’ Issandra said. ‘Preferably someone prettier than my daughter. You needn’t look shocked, my boy. I’ve lived my life in court. While you poor dears are out swinging knives at each other, there are wars just as bloody at every grand ball.’

  A scratching came at the door, followed by a servant woman. She took a pose of abject apology.

  ‘Most High, there’s a courier for you.’

  ‘It can wait,’ Otah said. ‘Or if it can’t, send for Sinja-
cha.’

  ‘The courier’s come from Chaburi-Tan,’ the servant said. ‘The letter is sealed and signed for you alone. He says the issue is urgent.’

  Otah cursed under his breath, but he rose. As he stepped out to the antechamber, he heard Danat and Issandra resume the conversation without him. The antechamber felt as close as a grave, heavy tapestries killing any sound from within the greater meeting room. The courier was a young man, hardly more than Danat’s age. Otah saw the calm, professional eyes sum him up. If the boy had been longer in the gentleman’s trade, Otah would never have noticed it. He accepted the letter and ripped it open there, not waiting for a blade to cut the silk-sewn edging.

  The cipher was familiar to him, but it made for slower reading than plain text. It was from the Kajiit Miyan, servant to the Emperor Otah Machi who had founded the Third Empire. Otah skipped down past the honorifics and empty form, decoding words and phrases in his mind until he reached something of actual importance. Then he read more slowly. And then he went back and read it again.