trees and coal we can feed into those traveling kilns of theirs. The
water we can get from the rivers.
"If the cities North of here can organize-if they can burn the food and
the trees so we have to spend more of our time finding supplies, if they
foul the wells so that we can't move far from the rivers, if they get
small, fast bands together to harass our hunting parties and scouts-we
could still be in for hell's own fight. We took Nantani by surprise.
"I'hat won't happen twice. And that's why I need every man among you
here, keeping that from happening. And besides that, any of you that
leave, the general's going to hunt down like low-town dogs and slit your
bellies for you."
Sinja paused, looking out at the earnest, despairing faces of the boys
he'd led from Machi. He felt old. He rarely felt old, but now he did.
"Don't be stupid," he said, and got down from the plank.
The men raised a late and halfhearted cheer. Sinja waved it away and
headed back to his tent. Overhead, the stars shone where the smoke
didn't obscure them. The cooks had made chicken and pepper rice.
Stinging flies were out, and, to Sinja's mild disgust, Nantani seemed to
be a haven for grass ticks. He spent a quiet, reflective time plucking
the insects out of his skin and cracking them with his thumbnails. It
was near midnight when he heard the roaring crash, thunder rolling
suddenly from the ruined city, and then silence. The dome had fallen, then.
How many of his men would know what the sound had meant, he wondered.
And how many would understand that he'd given them all the strategy for
slowing the Galts, point by point by point. And how many would have
snuck away to the North by morning, thinking they were being clever. But
he could tell the general he'd done as he was told, and no man present
would be able to say otherwise. So maybe he could lull the general back
into trusting him for a while longer at least. And maybe Kiyan's husband
would find a good way to make use of the time Sinja won for him.
"Ah, Kiyan-kya," he said to the night and the northern stars, "look what
you've done. You've made me into a politician."
"MOST HIGH," ASHUA RADAANI SAID, TAKING A POSE. THAT WAS AN APOLOGY and
a refusal, "this is ... this is folly. I understand that the poets are
concerned, but you have to see that we have nothing that supports their
suspicion. We're in summer. It's only a few weeks before we have to
harvest the spring crops and plant for autumn. The men you're asking for
... we can't just send away our laborers."
Otah frowned. It was not a response his father would have gotten. The
other Khaiem would have raised a hand, made a speech, perhaps only
shifted hands into a pose asking for the speaker to repeat himself. The
men and horses and wagons of grain and cheese and salt-packed meats
would simply have appeared. But not for Otah Mach], the upstart who had
not won his chair, who had married a wayhouse keeper and produced only
one son and that one sickly. fie felt the urgency like a hand pressing
at his hack, but he forced himself to remain calm. He wouldn't have what
he wanted by blustering now. He smiled sweetly at the round, soft man
with his glittering rings and calculating eyes.
"Your huntsmen, then," Otah said. "Bring your huntsmen. And come
yourself. Ride with me, Ashua-cha, and we'll go see whether there's any
truth to this thing. If not, you can bear witness yourself, and reassure
the court."
The young man's lips twisted into a half-smile.
"Your offer is kind, Most High," he said. "My huntsmen are yours. I will
consult with my overseer. If my house can spare me, I would he honored
to ride at your side."
"It would please me, Ashua-cha," Otah said. "I leave in two days, and I
look forward to your company."
"I will do all I can."
They finished the audience with the common pleasantries, and a servant
girl showed the man out. Otah called for a howl of tea and used the time
to consider where he stood. If Radaani sent him a dozen huntsmen, that
took the total to almost three hundred men. House Siyanti had offered up
its couriers to act as scouts. None of the families of the utkhaiem had
refused him; 1)aikani and old Kamau had even given him what he asked.
The others dragged their feet, begged his forgiveness, compromised. If
Radaani had hacked him, the others would have fallen in line.
And if he had thought Radaani was likely to, he'd have met with him
first instead of last.
It was the price, he supposed, of having played the game so poorly up to
now. Had he been the man they expected him to be all these years-had he
embraced the role he'd accepted and fathered a dozen sons on as many
wives and assured the ritual bloodbath that marked the change of
generations-they would have been more responsive now. But his own
actions had called the forms of court into question, and now that he
needed the traditions, he half-regretted having spent years defying them.
The tea came in a bowl of worked silver carried on a pillow. The
servant, a man perhaps twenty years older than Otah himself with a long,
well-kept beard and one clouded eye, presented it to him with a grace
horn of long practice. This man had done much the same before Otah's
father, and perhaps his grandfather. The presentation of this howl of
tea might be the study and center of this man's life. The thought made
the tea taste worse, but Otah took as warm a pose of thanks as would be
permitted between the Khai Machi and a servant, however faithful.
Utah rose, gesturing to the doorway. One of his half-hundred attendants
rushed forward, robes flowing like water over stones.
"I'll see him now," Otah said. "In the gardens. And see we aren't
disturbed."
The sky was gray and ivory, the breeze from the south warm as breath and
nearly as gentle. The cherry trees stood green-the pink of the blossoms
gone, the crimson of the fruit not yet arrived. The thicker blossoms of
high summer had begun to unfurl, rose and iris and sun poppy. The air
was thick with the scent. Utah walked down the path, white gravel fine
as salt crunching like snow under his feet. Ile found Nlaati sitting on
the lip of a stone pool, gazing up at the great fountain. Twice as high
as a man, the gods of order stood arrayed in has-relief shaped from a
single sheet of bronze. The dragons of chaos lay cowed beneath their
greened feet. Water sluiced down the wall, clear until it touched the
brows and exultant, upraised faces of the gods, and there it splattered
white. Utah sat beside his old friend and considered.
"The dragon's not defeated," Nlaati said. "Look. You see the third head