were, he wouldn't. The andat were too powerful, too dangerous to be
given to anyone whose heart wasn't strong or whose conscience couldn't
be trusted. That was the lesson, after all, that had driven his own life
and Cehmai's and the Dai-kvo himself. It was what elevated each of the
poets from boy children cast out by their parents to the most honored
men in the world. And yet, if there were someone bright enough to hand
the power to, he suspected he would. If it brought the army back from
the field and put the world back the way it had been, the risk would be
worth it.
"Maybe one of the other poets will come," Liat said, but her voice had
gone thin and weary.
"You don't have hope for the Dai-kvo?"
Liat smiled.
"Hope? Yes, I have hope. Just not faith. The Galts know what's in play.
If we don't recapture the andat, the cities will all fall. If we do,
we'll destroy Galt and everyone in her. "They'll be as ruthless as we will."
"And Otah-kvo? Nayiit?"
Liat's gaze met his, and he nodded. The knot in her chest, he was
certain, was much like his own.
"They'll be fine," Liat said, her tone asking for her own belief in the
words as much as his. "It's always the footmen who die in battles, isn't
it? The generals all live. And he'll keep Nayiit safe. He said he would."
"They might not even see battle. If they arrive before the Galts and
come back quickly enough, we might not lose a single man."
"And the moon may come down and get itself trapped in a teabowl," Liat
said. "But it would be nice, wouldn't it? For us, I mean. Not so much
for the Galts."
"You care what happens to them?"
"Is that wrong?" Liat asked.
"You're the one who came to Otah-kvo asking that they all be killed."
"I suppose I did, didn't I? I don't know what's changed. Something to do
with having my boy out there, I suppose. Slaughtering a nation isn't so
much to think about. It's when I start feeling that it all goes
confused. I wonder why we do it. I wonder why they do. Do you think if
we gave them our gold and our silver and swore we would never hind a
fresh andat ... do you think they'd let our children live?"
It took a few breaths to realize that Liat was actually waiting for his
answer, and several more before he knew what he believed.
"No," Maati said. "I don't think they would."
"Neither do I. But it would he good, wouldn't it? A world where it
wasn't a choice of our children or theirs."
"It would be better than this one."
As if by common consent, they changed the subject, talking of food and
the change of seasons, Eiah's new half-apprenticeship with the
physicians and the small doings of the women of the utkhaiem now that
their men had gone. It was only reluctantly that Maati rose. The sun was
two and a half hands past where it had been when he woke, the shadows
growing oblong. They walked back to the library, hand in hand at first,
and then only walking beside each other. Nlaati felt his heart growing
heavier as they came down the familiar paths, paving stones turning to
sand turning to crushed white gravel bright as snow.
"You could come in," Nlaati said when they reached the wide front doors.
In answer, she kissed him lightly on the mouth, gave his hand a gentle
squeeze, and turned away. Maati sighed and turned to lumber up the
steps. Inside, Cehmai was sitting on a low couch, three scrolls spread
out before him.
"I think I've found something," Cehmai said. "There's reference in
Nlanat-kvo's notes to a grammatic schema called threefold significance.
If we have something that talks about that, perhaps we can find a way to
shift the binding from one kind of significance to another."
"We don't," Nlaati said. "And if I recall correctly, the three
significators all require unity. "There's not a way to pick between them."
"Well. "Then we're still stuck."
"Yes."
Cehmai stood and stretched, the popping of his spine audible from across
the wide room.
"We need someone who knows this better than we do," Maati said as he
lowered himself onto a carved wooden chair. "We need the Daikvo."
"We don't have him."
"I know it."
"So we have to keep trying," Cehmai said. "The better prepared we are
when the Dai-kvo comes, the better he'll he able to guide us."
"And if he never comes?"
"He will," Cehmai said. "He has to."
16
"Yes," Nayiit said. "That's him."
Otah's mount whickered beneath him as he looked up at the Dal-kvo's
body. It had been tied to a stake at the entrance to his high offices;
the man had been dead for days. The brown-robed corpses of the poets lay
at his feet, stacked like cordwood.
They had taken it all as granted. The andat, the poets, the continuity
of one generation following upon another as they always had. It grew
more difficult, yes. An andat would escape and for a time and the city
it had left would suffer, yes. They had not conceived that everything
might end. Otah looked at the slaughtered poets, and he saw the world he
had known.
The morning after the battle had been tense. He had risen before dawn
and paced through the camps. Several of the scouts vanished, and at
first there was no way to know whether they had been captured by the
Galts or killed or if they had simply taken their horses, set their eyes
on the horizon, and fled. It was only when the reports began to filter
back that the shape of things came clear.
The Galts had fallen hack, their steam wagons and horses making a fast
march to the east, toward the village of the Dal-kvo. "There was no
pursuit, no rush to find the survivors of that bloody field and finish
the work they'd begun. Otah's army had been broken easily, and the
Galts' contempt for them was evident in the decision that they were not
worth taking the time to kill.
It was humiliating, and still Otah had found himself relieved. More of
his men would die today, but only from wounds they already bore. They
had given Otah a moment to rest and consider and see how deep the damage
had gone.
Four hundred of his men lay dead in the mud and grass beside perhaps a
third as many Galts, perhaps less. Another half thousand were wounded or
missing. A few hours had cost him a third of what he had, and more than
that. The men who had survived the retreat were different from the ones
he had spoken to at their cook fires before the fight. 'T'hese men
seemed stunned, lost, and emptied. The makeshift spears and armor that
had once seemed to speak of strength and resourcefulness now seemed
painfully naive. 'T'hey had come to battle armed like children and they
had been killed by men. Otah found himself giving thanks to any gods