The moon-faced servant spoke in the island girl’s tongue from his stool by the doorway. Maj looked down at the pair of them, blushing. Her skin clearly showed the blood beneath it. The tailor switched the knotted cord to the inner leg, his hand rising well past the girl’s knee. She squealed and spoke again, more loudly this time. Liat bit back frustration.
‘What’s she saying?’ Liat demanded.
‘In her culture, people are not so free with each other’s bodies,’ Oshai said. ‘It confuses her.’
‘Tell her it will be over soon. We can’t start making the robes until we get through this.’
Liat had thought, in all the late nights she’d woken sleepless and anxious, that negotiating with the Khai Saraykeht and his poet would be the worst of her commission. That shepherding the client through things as simple as being measured for robes would pose a greater problem had never occurred to her. And yet for days now, every small step would move Maj to fidget or pepper her translator, Oshai, with questions. Thankfully, the man seemed competent enough to answer most of them himself.
The tailor finished his work and stood, his hands in a pose of gratitude. Liat responded appropriately. The island girl looked on in mute fascination.
‘Will there be anything more, Liat-cha?’ Oshai asked.
‘The court physician will wish to see her tomorrow. And I’m due to speak with a representative of the accountancy, but she won’t be required for that. There may be more the next day, but I can tell you that once the schedule’s been set.’
‘Thank you, Liat-cha,’ he said and took a pose of gratitude. Something in the cant of his wrists and the corners of his mouth made Liat look twice. She had the feeling that he was amused by her. Well, let him be. When Amat returned, Liat knew there would be a chance to comment on Oshai. And if Amat took offense, he’d never work for House Wilsin again.
She made her way out to the narrow streets of the tailors’ quarter. The heat of the day was fierce, and the air was thick and muggy. Sweat had made her robes tacky against her back before she’d made it halfway to the laborers’ quarters. She was more than half tempted to take them off and bathe under the rough shower Itani’s cohort used. There was no one at it when she arrived. But if someone did see her - an acting overseer of House Wilsin - it might reflect on her status. So, instead, she walked up the stone steps worn smooth by generations of men and into the wide hallway with its cots and cheap cloth tents instead of netting. The sounds of masculine laughter and conversation filled the space like the reek of bodies. And yet Itani lived like this. He chose to. He was a mystery.
When she found him, he was seated on his cot, his skin and hair still wet from the shower. She paused, considering him, and uneasiness touched her. His brow was furrowed in concentration, but his hands were idle. His shoulders hunched forward. Had he been anyone else, she would have said he seemed haunted. In the months - nearly ten now - since she had taken him as her lover, she’d never known him to chew himself like this.
‘What’s the matter, love?’ she said softly.
And the care vanished as if it had never been. Itani smiled, rose, took her in his arms. He smelled good - of clean sweat and young man and some subtle musk that was his alone.
‘Something’s bothering you,’ she said.
‘No. I’m fine. It’s just Muhatia-cha breaking my stones again. It’s nothing. Do you have time to go to a bathhouse with us?’
‘Yes,’ she said. It wasn’t the answer she’d intended to give, but it was the one she meant now. Her papers for Wilsin-cha could wait.
‘Good,’ he said, and the way he smiled convinced her. But there was still something - a reservation in his hands, a distance in his eyes. ‘Your work’s going well, then?’
‘Well enough. The negotiations are all in place, I think. But the girl frustrates me. It makes me short with her, and I know I shouldn’t be.’
‘Does she accept your apologies?’
‘I haven’t really offered them. I want to now, when I’m away from her. But in the moment, I’m always too annoyed with her.’
‘Well. You could start the day with them. Have it out of the way before you begin.’
‘Itani, is there something you want me to apologize to you for?’
He smiled his perfect, charming smile, but somehow it didn’t reach the depths of his eyes.
‘No,’ he said. ‘Of course not.’
‘Because it seems like we made our peace, but . . . but you haven’t seemed the same since I went before the Khai.’
She pulled back from him and sat on his cot. He hesitated and then sat beside her, the canvas creaking under their combined weight. She took a pose of apology, her expression gentle, making it more an offer and a question than a literal form itself.
‘It’s not like that,’ Itani said. ‘I’m not angry. It’s hard to explain.’
‘Then try. I might know you better than you think.’
He laughed, a small rueful sound, but didn’t forbid it. Liat steeled herself.
‘It’s our old conversation, isn’t it?’ she said, gently. ‘I’ve started moving up in the house. I’m negotiating with the Khai, with the poets. And your indenture is coming to a close before long. I think you’re afraid I’ll outgrow you. That an overseer - even one low in the ranks - is above the dignity of a laborer.’
Itani was silent. His expression was thoughtful, and his gaze seemed wholly upon her for the first time in days. A smile quirked his lips and vanished.
‘Am I right?’ she asked.
‘No,’ he said. ‘But I’m curious all the same. Is that what you believe? That I would be beneath your dignity?’
‘I don’t,’ she said. ‘But I also don’t think you’ll end your life a laborer. You’re a strange man. You’re strong and clever and charming. And I think you know half again what you let on. But I don’t understand your choices. You could be so much, if you wanted to. Isn’t there anything you want?’
He said nothing. The smile was gone, and the haunted look had stolen back into his eyes. She caressed his cheek, feeling where the stubble was coming in.
‘Do you want to go to the bathhouse?’ she asked.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘We should be going. The others will be there already.’
‘You’re sure there isn’t something more I should know?’
He opened his mouth to speak, and it was as if she could see some glib rejoinder die on his lips. His wide, strong hand enfolded hers.
‘Not now,’ he said.
‘But eventually,’ she said.
Something like dread seemed to take Itani’s long face, but he managed a smile.
‘Yes,’ he said.
Through the evening, Itani grew more at ease. They laughed with his friends, drank and sang together. The pack of them moved from bathhouse to teahouse to the empty beaches at the far end of the seafront. Great swaths of silt showed where the rivermouth had once been, generations ago. When the time came, Itani walked her back to the Wilsin compound, the comfortable weight of his arm around her shoulders. Crickets chirped in chorus as they stepped together into the courtyard with its fountain and the Galtic Tree.
‘You could stay,’ she said, softly.
He turned, pulling her body near to his. She looked up into his eyes. Her answer was there.
‘Another time, then?’ she asked, embarrassed to hear the plea in her voice.
He leaned close, his lips firm and soft against hers. She ran her fingers through his hair, holding him to her like a cup from which she was drinking. She ached for him to stay, to be with her, to sleep in his arms. But he stepped back, gently out of her reach. She took a pose of regret and farewell. He answered with a pose so gentle and complex - thankfulness, requesting patience, expressing affection - that it neared poetry. He walked backwards slowly, fading into the shadows where the moon didn’t reach, but with his eyes on her. She sighed, shook herself, and went to her cell. It would be a long day tomorrow, and the ceremony still just over a week away.
Liat didn’t notice she wasn’t alone until she was nearly to her door. The pregnant girl, Maj, was on the walkway and unescorted. She wore a loose gown that barely covered her breasts and a pair of workman’s trousers cut at the knee. Her swollen belly pressed out, bare in the moonlight.
To Liat’s surprise, the girl took a pose of greeting. It was rough and child-like, but recognizable.
‘Hello,’ Maj said, her accent so thick as to almost bury the word.
Liat fell into an answering pose immediately and felt a smile growing on her lips. The girl Maj almost glowed with pleasure.
‘You’ve been learning to speak,’ Liat said. Maj’s face clouded, her smile faltered, and she shrugged - a gesture that carried its load of meaning without language.
‘Hello,’ Maj said again, taking the same pose as before. Her expression said that this was all that there was. Liat nodded, smiled again, and took the girl by the arm. Maj shifted Liat’s hand, lacing their fingers together as if they were young girls walking together after temple. Liat walked back to the guest quarters where Maj was being housed until after the ceremony.
‘It’s a good start,’ Liat said as they walked. She knew that the words were likely meaningless to the island girl, but she spoke them all the same. ‘Keep practicing, and we’ll make a civilized woman of you. Just give it time.’
7
Two days later, after his work was complete and his friends had gone to their night’s entertainments, Otah stepped out from his quarters and considered. The city streets were gaudy with sunset. Orange light warmed the walls and roofs, even as the first stars began to glimmer in the deep cobalt of the eastern sky. Otah stood in the street and watched the change come. Fireflies danced like candles. The songs of beggars changed as the traffic of night came out. The soft quarter lay to his right, lit like a carnival as it was every night. The seafront was before him, though hidden by the barracks of other labor cohorts like his own, employed by other houses. And somewhere far to his left, off past the edge of the city, the great river flowed, bearing water from the north. He rubbed his hands together slowly as the light reddened, then grayed. The sun vanished again, and the stars came out, shining over the city. Liat was in her cell, he supposed, to the north and uphill. And beyond her, the palaces of the Khai.
The streets changed as he walked north. The laborers’ quarter was actually quite small, and Otah left it behind him quickly, barracks giving way to the shops of small merchants and free traders. Then came the weavers’ compounds, windows candle-lit, and the clack of looms filling the streets as they would even later into the night. He passed groups of men and of women, passed through the street of beads and the blood quarter where physicians and pretenders vied to care for the sick and injured, selling services, as everything in Saraykeht was for trade.
The compounds of the great houses rose up like small villages. Streets grew wider near them, and walls taller. The firekeepers at their kilns wore better robes than their fellows lower in the city. Otah paused at the corner that would have taken him to House Wilsin, through the familiar spaces to Liat’s side. It would be so easy, he thought, to go there. He stood for the space of ten heartbeats, standing at the intersection like the statue of some forgotten man of the Empire, before going north. His hands were balled in fists.
The palaces grew up like a city of their own, above the city inhabited by mere humans. The scents of sewage and bodies and meat cooking at teahouses vanished and those of gardens and incense took their places. The paths changed from stone to marble or sand or fine gravel. The songs of beggars gave way to the songs of slaves, almost it seemed without losing the melody. The great halls stood empty and dark or else lit like lanterns from within. Servants and slaves moved along the paths with the quiet efficiency of ants, and the utkhaiem, in robes as gaudy as the sunset, stood in lit courtyards, posing to each other as the politics of the court played out. Vying, Otah guessed, for which would have the honor of killing a son of the Khai Udun.
Pretending that he bore a message, he took directions from one of the servants, and soon he’d left even the palaces behind. The path was dark, curving through stands of trees. He could still see the palaces behind him if he turned, but the emptiness made the poet’s house seem remote from them. He crossed a long wooden bridge over a pond. And there the simple, elegant house stood. Its upper story was lit. Its lower had the front wall pulled open like shutters or a stage set for a play. And sitting on a velvet chair was the boy. Maati Vaupathai.
‘Well,’ a soft voice said. ‘Here’s an oddity. It’s a strange day we see toughs reeking of the seafront dropping by for tea. Or perhaps you’ve got some other errand.’
The andat Seedless sat on the grass. Otah fell into a pose that asked forgiveness.
‘I . . . I’ve come to see Maati-cha,’ Otah stumbled. ‘We were . . . that is . . .’
‘Hai! Who’s down there?’ another voice called. ‘Who’re you?’
Seedless glanced up at the house, eyes narrowed. A fat man in the brown robe of a poet was trundling down the steps. Maati was following.
‘Itani of House Wilsin,’ Otah called out. ‘I’ve come to see Maati-cha. ’
The poet walked more slowly as they approached. His expression was a strange mix - concern, disapproval, and a curious delight.
‘You’ve come for him?’ Heshai-kvo said, gesturing over his shoulder. Otah took a pose of affirmation.
‘Itani and I met at the grand audience,’ Maati said. ‘He offered to show me the seafront.’
‘Did he?’ Heshai-kvo asked, and the disapproval lost ground, Otah thought, to the pleasure. ‘Well. You. Itani’s your name? You know who you’re with, eh? This boy is one of the most important men in Saraykeht. Keep him out of trouble.’
‘Yes, Heshai-cha,’ Otah said. ‘I will.’
The poet’s face softened, and he rooted in the sleeve of his robe for a moment, then reached out to Otah. Otah, unsure, stepped closer and put his hand out to the poet’s.
‘I was young once too,’ Heshai-kvo said with a broad wink. ‘Don’t keep him out of too much trouble.’
Otah felt the small lengths of metal against his palm, and took a pose of gratitude.
‘Who’d have thought it,’ Seedless said, his voice low and considering. ‘Our perfect student’s developing a life.’
‘Please, Itani-cha,’ Maati said, stepping forward and taking Otah’s sleeve. ‘You’ve gone out of your way already. We should go. Your friends are waiting.’
‘Yes,’ Otah said. ‘Of course.’
He took a pose of farewell that the poet responded to eagerly, the andat more slowly and with a thoughtful attitude. Maati led the way back across the bridge.
‘You were expecting me?’ Otah asked once they were out of earshot. Poet and andat were still watching them go.
‘Hoping,’ Maati allowed.
‘You weren’t the only one. The poet seemed delighted to see me.’
‘He doesn’t like my staying at the house. He thinks I should see more of the city. It’s really that he hates it there and can’t imagine that I like it.’
‘Ah. I see.’
‘You see part, at least,’ Maati said. ‘It’s complex. And what of you, Otah-kvo? It’s been days. I was afraid that you wouldn’t come.’
‘I had to,’ Otah said, surprised by his own candor even as he said it. ‘I’ve no one else to talk with. Gods! He gave me three lengths of silver!’
‘Is that bad?’
‘It means I should stop working the seafront and just take you to tea. The pay’s better.’
He had changed. That was clear. The voice was much the same, the face older, more adult, but Maati could still see the boy who had worn the black robes in the garden all those years ago. And something else. It wasn’t confidence that had gone - he still had that in the way he held himself and his voice when he spoke - but perhaps it was certainty. It was in the way he held his cup and in the way he drank. Something was bothering his old teacher, but M
aati could not yet put a name to it.
‘A laborer,’ Maati said. ‘It isn’t what the Dai-kvo would have expected.’
‘Or anyone else,’ Otah said, smiling at his cup of wine.
The private patio of the teahouse overlooked the street below it, and the long stretch of the city to the south. Lemon candles filled the air with bright-smelling smoke that kept the worst of the gnats away and made the wine taste odd. In the street, a band of young men sang and danced while three women watched, laughing. Otah took a long drink of wine.
‘It isn’t what you’d expected either, is it?’
‘No,’ Maati admitted. ‘When you left I imagined . . . we all did . . .’
‘Imagined what?’
Maati sighed, frowned, tried to find words for daydreams and secret stories he’d never precisely told himself. Otah-kvo had been the figure who’d shaped his life almost more than the Dai-kvo, certainly more than his father. He had imagined Otah-kvo forging a new order, a dark, dangerous, possibly libertine group that would be at odds with the Dai-kvo and the school, or perhaps its rival. Or else adventuring on the seas or in the turmoil of the wars in the Westlands. Maati would never have said it, but the common man his teacher had become was disappointing.
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