"I left him," Liat said. "I took you when you were still a babe, and I
was the one to leave him."
She saw a moment's shock in his expression, gone as fast as it had come.
His face went grave, his hands as still as stones. As still as a man
bending his will to keep them still.
"Why?" he asked. His voice was low and thready.
"Oh, love. It was so long ago. I was someone else, then," she said, and
knew as she said it that it wasn't enough. "I did because he was only
half there. And because I couldn't see to all of his needs and all of
yours and have no one there to look after me."
"It was better without him?"
"I thought it would be. I thought I was cutting my losses. And then,
later, when I wasn't so certain anymore, I convinced myself it had been
the right thing, just so I could tell myself I hadn't been wrong."
lie was shaken, though he tried to cover it. She knew him too well to be
fooled.
"tic wasn't there, Nayiit. But he never left you."
And part of me never left him, she thought. What would the world have
been if I had chosen otherwise? Where would we all be now if that part
of him and of me had been enough? Still in that little hut in the low
town near the I)ai-kvo? Would they all have lived together in the
library these past years as Nlaati had?
"Those other, ghostlike people made a pretty dream, but then there would
have been no one to hear of the Galts and the missing poet, no one to
travel to Nantani. And little Tai would not have been horn, and she
would never have seen Amat Kyaan again. Someone else would have been
with the old woman when she died-someone else or no one. And Liat would
never have taken House Kyaan, would never have proven herself competent
to the world and to her own satisfaction.
It was too much. The changes, the differences were too great to think of
as good or as bad. The world they had now was too much itself, good and
evil too tightly woven to wish for some other path. And still it would
be wrong to say she found herself without regrets.
"Maati loves you," she said, softly. "You should see him. I won't
interfere again. But first, VOL] should go tend to your guest. Smooth
things over.
Nayiit nodded, and then a moment later, he smiled. It was the same
charming smile she'd known when she was a girl and it had been on
different lips. Nayiit would charm the girl, say something sweet and
funny, and the pain would be forgotten for a time. He was his father's
son. Son of the Khai Machi. Eldest son, and doomed to the fratricidal
struggle of succession that stained every city in each generation. She
wondered how far Utah would go to avoid that, to keep his boy safe from
her schemes. 't'hat conversation had to come, and soon. Perhaps it would
he best if she took it to the Khai herself, if she stopped waiting for
him to find a right moment.
Nayiit took a querying pose, and Liat shook herself. She waved his
concern away.
"I'm tired," she said. "I've come all this way back to have my own bed
to myself, and I'm still not in it. I'm too old to sleep in a lover's
arms. They twitch and snore and keep me awake all night."
"They do, don't they?" Nayiit said. "Does it get better, do you think?
With enough time, would you he so accustomed to it, you'd sleep through?"
"I don't know," Liat said. "I've never made the attempt."
"Like mother, like son, I suppose," Nayiit said as he rose. He bent and
kissed the crown of her head before he retreated back into the shadows.
Like mother, like son.
I,iat pulled her robe tighter and sat near the fire, as if touched by a
sudden chill.
7
The jeweler was a small man, squat but broad. To his credit, he seemed
truly ill at ease. It took courage, Otah thought as he listened, to
bring a matter such as this before a Khai. He wondered how many others
had seen something of the sort and looked away. Any merchant has to
expect some losses from theft. And after all, she was the daughter of
the Khai....
When it was over-and it seemed to take half a day, though it couldn't
have lasted more than half a hand-Otah thanked the man, ordered that
payment be made to him, and waited calm and emotionless until the
servants and court followers had gone. Only the body servants remained,
half a dozen men and women of the utkhaiem who dedicated their lives to
bringing him a cracker if he felt like one, or a cup of limed water.
"Find Eiah and take her to the blue chamber. Bring her under guard if
you have to."
"tinder guard?" the eldest of the servants said.
"No, don't. Just bring her. See that she gets there."
"Most High," the man said, taking a pose that accepted the command. Otah
rose and walked out of the room without replying. He stalked the halls
of the palace, ignoring the Master of "fides and his ineffectual
flapping papers, ignoring the poses of obeisance and respect turned to
him wherever he went, looking only for Kiyan. The rest of these people
were unimportant.
He found her in the great kitchens, standing beside the chief cook with
a dead chicken in her hands. The cook, a woman of not less than sixty
summers who had served Otah's father and grandfather, met his eyes and
went pale. Ile wondered belatedly how many times the previous Khaiem of
Machi had visited their kitchens, great or low.
"What's happened?" Kiyan asked instead of a greeting.
"Not here," Otah said. His wife nodded, passed the bird's carcass back
to the cook, and followed Otah to their rooms. As calmly as he could,
Otah related the audience. Eiah and two of her friends-Talit Radaani and
Shoyen Pak-had visited a jeweler's shop in the goldsmiths' quarter. Eiah
had stolen a brooch of emerald and pearl. The jeweler and his boy had
seen it, had come to the court asking for payment.
"He was quite polite about the whole thing," Otah said. "He cast it as a
mistake. Eiah-cha, in her girlish flights of attention, forgot to
arrange for payment. He was sorry to bother me with it, but he hadn't
been sure who I would prefer such issues be taken to and on and on and
on. Gods!"
"How much was it?" Kiyan asked.
""Three lengths of gold," Otah said. "Not that it matters. I've got the
whole city to put on for taxes and half a thousand bits of jewelry in
boxes that no one's worn in lifetimes. It's ... She's a thief! She's
going through the city, taking whatever catches her eye and ..."
Otah ran out of words and had to make do with a rough, frustrated grunt.
He threw himself down on a couch, shaking his head.
"It's my fault," he said. "I've been too busy with the court. I haven't
been a decent father to her. All the time she's spent with the daughters