Traitors Gate

Kesh flung up his hands. T want nothing! I have no plans!'

'You want something.'

Ah.

There it stood, between them.

'Miravia,' said the chief, 'is a fine, well-mannered, and intelligent young woman, if not particularly handsome.'

'Not handsome!' cried Kesh. 'She's the most beautiful woman I have ever seen!'

'Nothing compared to that girl Avisha,' continued the chief.

'Avisha! That spring-blooming flower, pretty for a season and then likely to wither? The hells! Are you blind?'

'The mistress wished me to marry her, because her family cast her out and Mai wanted to be sure that her dearest friend would always have the protection of a clan. It's a hard world for any person thrown without kin into the crueLpattle of life, is it not?'

'As I know! I lived twelve years as a debt slave.'

'And bought yourself free, which means you're an intelligent lad, if a reckless and irritating one. I will marry Miravia, Master Keshad, if that is what Miravia wishes. Because it's what Mai wanted. It would be the wise thing for Miravia to do. She'll never lack, as part of the captain's household.'

'You forget there's a war.'

'I don't forget it. But unlike you, the captain is not a reckless man. He has his plans laid well in place, a substantial army, and an additional five hundred Qin soldiers to back him up.'

'Commander Beje's men!'

'No. These are men who would have been placed under Anjihosh's command had he been allowed to take his army on the eastern frontier of the Qin empire, but either way, it does not matter. We Qin who are soldiers fight for the man who commands us, and when we are sent elsewhere, there we fight. For Anjihosh now. In time, for his son.'

'I thought you fought for the Hundred.'

Tuvi gestured, and Kesh handed him the cup of juice. It was, in fact, difficult for Tuvi to grasp the cup with his burned hands, but the man was determined to recover enough to travel. To serve his captain. To do his duty. To fight.

'I will marry Miravia if that is what she wishes, and I'll treat her well. Although,' he added thoughtfully, 'the visits to that garden will have to stop. What a cursed wrongheaded thing that is! Hu!' He held out the empty cup, and Kesh took it. 'But if she wants a different man, one who assures me she will not lack for any of the comforts and security Mai would have wanted her to have, then I will not raise my sword against that man, nor will I hold a grudge.'

'Do you want more juice?' asked Kesh.

'No. I'll sleep now.'

'Here. Let me help you with the pillows.' Kesh settled the pillows so they braced the chief comfortably. 'Do you want the silk over your legs?'

'No. The air cools the burns. Is that all you have to say?'

Kesh really looked at him, seeing a man of indeterminate years, forty or fifty, hard to say because the Qin hid their age so well with their weathered faces and easy smiles. An honest man, in his way, clear-eyed and clear-spoken. Brutal when he must be, but unexpectedly kind.

'You're a cursed road more generous than I could ever be, Chief Tuvi. She matters more to me than anything.'

'I'm not generous, lad. Don't make the mistake of thinking so. I have a wife back in the grasslands, a good woman I'll never see again. It would be pleasant to have a wife again, if it falls out that way. Nevertheless, I'm a soldier, and my loyalty was given long ago and completely, as it must be. I'm Anjihosh's man. He is my life. Now, go on. I suppose you will find her by the pool. It's where she goes to mourn.'

She had not taken a lamp, but he found her easily enough, kneeling beyond the waterfall and its ruins in the darkness of the cave where, so the tale had it, Atani had been born within a net of firelings. Kesh didn't believe the story, not precisely, because everyone knew firelings lived in storms, not in caves, but people would tell tales to fit what they wanted to believe. It made life easier.

'Miravia,' he said.

She knelt before plaited wreaths heaped upon a stone slab meant to be an altar. There were no flowers; this wasn't a season for flowers. She didn't look up. She must have seen the light. She must have guessed it was him.

'If only I had-' she began through tears.

'Will blaming yourself bring her back?'

She said nothing, lips pressing tight in that stubborn way he was coming to adore. The overhang smelled faintly of wet season storms, a memory of thunder. Water pounded at their backs in a constantly shifting curtain. Where the pool's edge lapped at the rim of stone, right where the water fell and had gouged out the deeper pool, waves stirred and sighed as if trying to speak.

'Mai is gone,' she whispered. 'How can I endure it?'

Each step brought him closer until he knelt beside her, careful

not to touch however desperately he wanted to stroke her arm, embrace her body, gentle the wreck of her hair. He set the lantern on the stone beside the wreaths; its light caught crystal in the ceiling and glimmered there as thoughts catch and brighten where there is love.

'It's too early to speak of such things,' he began, 'but I wanted to say-'

'Mai wants me to marry Chief Tuvi. He's a good man. It would make her happy.'

'Is that what she wanted? I ask an honest question. I didn't know her, not truly. Did she truly want you to marry Tuvi, or is it just that she wanted you to be safe and protected, as she was?'

'She wasn't safe! They killed her!' The storm of weeping broke over her again, and she raged and bawled with a fierce anger that might have given the mountains pause, thinking they could match her in passionate outbursts. How had she lived all those years within such bindings as the Ri Amarah set on their women? Or did he just not understand them? Maybe they bred such women within their walls, and it was only that those outside their clans never saw them.

When the storm quieted, he spoke.

'Where did you lay out the body?'

'There was no body. She sank into the depths. When Chief Tuvi tried to wade in to grab her, he was burned. No one can touch the pool.'

'Water can't burn.'

'Chief Tuvi says demons took her. Priya and the reeves say it was the gods who took her. But Atani was born in the midst of a storm, with firelings aloft in the sky and a net of fiery blue threads a swarm in this cave. Mai thinks — thought — this valley is home to firelings. They must have a home, too, mustn't they? "Delvings in the deep, merlings in the sea, wildings in the wood, lendings in the grass," as it says in the tale. "Humans in their villages, demons hidden among all."'

'" And the firelings live in the storm,"' finished Keshad.

'Threads of blue fire. A pool of water whose touch makes the hair on your neck stand on end, just like the air snaps before lightning storms crash down. The firelings are the ones who took her. Maybe she's still alive-'

'Miravia! Don't cling to hopeless-'

'It's not hopeless! Corpses float, do they not? So where is hers? The water falling down off the mountains is water and yet…'

She strode to the curtain, stuck a hand in. Kesh copied her; bracingly cold water poured over his skin.

'Stick your hand in the pool!' Her stare challenged him.

At the lip worn by an eternity of water pounding away at the stone, he thrust his fingers into the dark pool. Yelped as the liquid crackled and stung. As the hair on the back of his neck prickled, rising. He fell back onto his rump, shaking his hand. 'Eiyi!'

Her gaze devoured him. 'There's sorcery here, Keshad. We can't know what truly happened. We have to be patient.'

A love-struck man, in the tales, is usually portrayed as a figure of fun, bound to make a fool of himself time and again in his efforts to please the beloved one. He swallowed a retort and, without smiling, got to his feet opening and closing his hand although that did not make the stinging go away. She would know at once if he tried to humor her. If he lied.