of the Khaiem.
"It went well?"
"Well enough," Sinja said. "I made a small mistake and had to do some
very pretty dancing to cover it. But the Khai's got few enough hopes, he
wants to trust me. flakes things easier. Now, here. These are rough
copies of the maps he's used. They're filling in the main entrances to
the underground tunnels to keep us from bringing any single large force
down at once. The largest paths they've left open are here," Sinja
touched the map, "and here."
"And the poets?"
"They have the outline of a binding. I think they're going to try it.
And soon."
Balasar felt the sinking of dread in his belly, and strangely also a
kind of peace. Ile wouldn't have thought there was any part of him that
was still held hack, and yet that one small fact-the poets lived and
planned and Would recapture one of the andat now if they could-took away
any choice he might still have had. He looked at the map, his mind
sifting through strategies like a tiles player shuffling chits of bone.
"'T'here are men in the towers," Balasar said.
"Yes, sir," Sinja said. ""They'll have stones and arrows to drop. You
won't be able to use the streets near them, but the range isn't good,
and they won't be able to aim from so far up. Go a street or two over
and keep by the w+alls, and we'll he safe. There won't he much
resistance above ground. 'T'heir hope is to keep you at hay long enough
for the cold to do their work for them."
't'hree forces, Balasar thought. One to clear out the houses and trading
shops on the south, another to push in toward the forges and the
metalworkers, a third to take the palaces. He wouldn't take the steam
wagons-he'd learned that much from Coal-so horsemen would be important
for the approach, though they might he less useful if the fighting moved
inside structures as it likely would. And they'd be near useless once
they were underground. Archers wouldn't have much effect. "There were
few long, clear open spaces in the city. But despite what Sinja said,
Balasar expected there would he some fighting on the surface, so enough
archers were mixed with the foot troops to fire back at anyone harassing
them from the windows and snow doors of the passing buildings.
"Thank you, Sinja-cha," Balasar said. "I know how much doing this must
have cost you."
"It needed doing," Sinja said, and Balasar smiled.
"I won't insist that you watch this happen. You can stay at the camp or
ride North and Join Eustin."
"North?"
"I Ie's taken it to guard. In case someone tries to slip away during the
battle."
"That's a good thought," Sinja said, his tone somewhat rueful. "If it's
all the same, I'd like to ride with Eustin-cha. I know he hasn't always
thought well of me, and if anything does go wrong, I'd like to he where
he can see I wasn't the one doing it."
"A pretty thought," Balasar said, chuckling.
"You're going to win," Sinja said. It was a simple statement, but there
was a weight behind it. A regret that soldiers often had in the face of
loss, and only rarely in victory.
"You thought of changing sides," Balasar said. "While you were there,
with all the people you know. In your old home. It was hard not to stand
by them."
""That's true," Sinja said.
"It wouldn't have changed things. One more sword-even yourswouldn't have
changed the way this battle falls."
"'That's why I came back," Sinja said.
"I'm glad you did," Balasar said. "I've been proud to ride with you."
Sinja gave his thanks and took his leave. Balasar wrote out orders for
the guard to accompany Sinja and other ones to deliver to F.ustin. Then
he turned to the maps of Machi. Truly there was little choice. The poets
lived. Another night in the cold would mean losing more men. Balasar sat
for a long moment, quietly asking God to let this day end well; then he
walked out into the late-morning sun and gave the call to formation.
It was time.
23
Liat had expected panic-in herself and in the city. Instead there was a
strange, tense calm. Wherever she went, she was greeted with civility
and even pleasure. 'T'here were smiles and even laughter, and a sense of
purpose in the face of doom. In the interminable night, she had been
invited to join in three suppers, as many breakfasts, and howls of tea
without number. She had seen the highest of the utkhaicm sitting with
metalsmiths and common armsmcn. She had heard one of the famed choirs of
h~Iachi softly singing its Candles Night hymns.'1'he rules of society
had been suspended, and the human solidarity beneath it moved her to weep.
She and Kiyan had taken the news first to the Khai Cetani and the
captains of the battle that had once turned the Galts aside. When the
plans had come from Otah's small Council-where to place men, how to
resist the Galts as they tried to overrun the city-the Khai Cetani had
emerged with the duties of arming and armoring the men who could fight.
As the underground city was emptied of anything that could be used as a
weapon-hunting arrows, kitchen knives, even lengths of leather and
string cut from beds and fashioned into slings-Liar had seen children
too young to fight and men and women too old or frail or ill packed into
side galleries, the farthest from the fighting. Cots lined the walls,
piled with blankets. In some places, there were thick doors that could
be closed and pegged from the inside. 'T'hough If the Galts ever came
this far, it would hardly matter how difficult it was to open the doors.
Everything would already be lost.
Kiyan had made the physicians her personal duty-preparing one of the
higher galleries for the care of the wounded and dying who would he
coming back before the day's end. They'd managed seventy beds and
scavenged piles of cloth high as a man's waist, ready to pack wounds.
Bottles of distilled wine stood ready to case pain and clean cuts. A
firekeeper's kiln, cauterizing irons already glowing in its maw, had
been pulled in and the air was rich with the scent of poppy milk cooking
to the black sludge that would take away pain at one spoonful and grant
mercy with two. Liat walked between the empty beds, imagining them as
they would shortly be-canvas soaked with gore. And still the panic
didn't come.
By the entrance, one of the physicians was talking in a calm voice to
twenty or so girls and boys no older than Eiah, too young to fight, but
old enough to help care for the wounded. Kiyan was nowhere to he found,