but acting as if Malta were her only concern. Then Selden and then the healer. Sleep had fled.
She gave in and opened her eyes. She stared at the domed ceiling. The wickerwork reminded her of a basket. Trehaug was certainly not what she had expected. She had envisioned a grand marble mansion for the Khuprus family in a city of fine buildings and wide roads. She had expected ornate chambers decorated with dark wood and stone, lofty ballrooms and long galleries. Instead, it was just what Selden had said it was: a tree-house city. Airy little chambers balanced in the upper limbs of the great trees along the river. Swaying bridges connected them. Everything in the sunny upper reaches of the trees was built as lightly as possible. Some of the smaller chambers were little more than very large wickerwork baskets that swung like birdcages when the wind blew. Children slept in hammocks and sat in slings. Anything that could be woven of grass or sticks was. The upper reaches of the city were insubstantial, a ghost of the ancient city they plundered.
As one descended into the depths of Trehaug, that image changed. Or so Selden told her. Malta had not ventured from her chamber since she had awakened here. Sunny chambers like hers were high in the treetops, while close to the base of the trees, workshops, taverns, warehouses and shops existed in a perpetually shady twilight. In between were the more substantial rooms of the Rain Wild Traders' homes, the dining rooms, kitchens and gathering halls. These were built of plank and beam. Keffria had told her that they were palatial rooms, some spanning several trees, and as fine as any grand Bingtown mansion could have offered. Here the wealth of the Rain Wild Traders was showcased, not only in the old city's treasures but in all the luxuries that their exotic trade had bought them. Keffria had tried to lure Malta from her bed with tales of the art and beauty to be seen there. Malta had not been tempted. Having lost all, she had no wish to admire the wealth of others.
Trehaug swung and hung over the banks of the Rain Wild River, adjacent to the open channel. But the river had no true shores. Swamp, muck and shifting bogs extended back from the open river far under the trees. The corrosive waters of the river ruled the world, and flowed where they wished. A patch of ground that was solid for a week could suddenly begin to bubble and then sink away into muck. No one trusted the ground underfoot. Pilings driven into it were either eaten away or slowly toppled over. Only the far-reaching roots of the Rain Wild trees seemed able to grip some stability there. Never had Malta seen or imagined such trees. The one time she had ventured to her window and peered down, she could not see the ground. Foliage and bridges obscured the view. Her chamber perched in the forked branch of a tree. A walkway over the limb protected its bark from foot traffic. The branch was wide enough for two men to walk abreast on it, and it led to a spiraling staircase that wound down the trunk. The staircase reminded Malta of a busy street, even to the vendors who frequented the landings.
At night, watchmen patrolled, keeping the lanterns on the staircases and bridges filled and alight. Night brought a festive air, as the city bloomed in necklaces of light. The Rain Wild folk gardened in hammocks and troughs of earth suspended in the trees. Foragers had their own pathways through the trees and over the swamplands. They harvested the exotic fruits, flowers and gamebirds of the Rain Wild jungle. Water came from the sprawling system of rain catchers, for no one could drink much of the river water and hope to live. The thick boats, hollowed out from green tree trunks, were pulled out of the river each night and hammocked in the trees. They were the temporary transportation between the 'houses,' supplements to the swaying bridges and pulley carts that linked the trees. The trees supported the whole city. A quake that caused the wet ground below to bubble and gape did no more than make the great trees sway gently.
Below, on the true ground, there was the ancient city, of course, but from Selden's description, it was little more than a lump in the swampland. The little bit of solid ground around it was devoted to the workshops for salvage and exploration of the city. No one lived there. When she had asked Selden why, he had shrugged. 'You go crazy if you spend too much time in the city.' Then he had cocked his head and added, 'Wilee says that Reyn might be crazy already. Before he started liking you, he spent more time down there than anyone else ever had. He nearly got the ghost disease.' He had glanced about. 'That's what killed his father, you know,' he'd added in a hoarse whisper.
'What's the ghost disease?' she had asked him, intrigued in spite of herself.
'I don't know. Not exactly. You drown in memories. That's what Wilee said. What's that mean?'
'I don't know.' His newly discovered ability to ask questions was almost worse than his former long silences had been.
She stretched where she lay on the divan, then curled back into her coverlet. The ghost disease. Drowning in memories. She shook her head and closed her eyes.
Another scratch came at the door. She did not reply. She kept still and made her breathing deep and slow. She heard the door rasp open. Someone came into her room. Someone came close to the bed and looked down on her. The person just stood over her, watching her feign sleep. Malta kept her pretense and waited for the intruder to leave.
Instead, a gloved hand touched her face.
Her eyes flew open. A veiled man stood by her. He was dressed completely in dull black.
'Who are you? What do you want?' She shrank back from his touch, clutching the coverlet.
'It's me. Reyn. I had to see you.' He dared to sit down on the divan's edge.
She drew her feet up to avoid any contact with him. 'You know I don't want to see you.'
'I know that,' he admitted reluctantly. 'But we don't always get what we want, do we?'
'You seem to,' she responded bitterly.
He stood up with a sigh. 'I have told you. And I have written it to you, in all the letters you've returned to me. I spoke in desperation that day. I would have said anything to get you to go with me. Nevertheless, I do not intend to enforce the liveship contract between our families. I will not take you as payment for a debt, Malta Haven. I would not have you against your will.'
'Yet here I am,' she pointed out tartly.
'Alive,' he added.
'Small thanks to the men you sent after the Satrap,' she pointed out acidly. 'They left me to die.'
'I didn't know you'd be in the coach.' His voice was stiff as he offered the excuse.
'If you had trusted me enough to tell me the truth at the ball, I wouldn't have been. Nor my mother, grandmother or brother. Your distrust of me nearly killed us all. It did kill Davad Restart, who was guilty of no more than being greedy and stupid. If I had died, you would have been the one guilty of my death. Perhaps you saved my life, but it was only after you had nearly taken it from me. Because you didn't trust me.' These were the words she had longed to fling at him since she had pieced that last evening together. This was the knowledge that had turned her soul to stone. She had rehearsed the words so often, yet never truly known how deep her hurt was until she uttered them aloud. She could scarcely get them past the lump in her throat. He was silent, standing over her still. She watched the impassive drapery across his face and wondered if he felt anything at all.
She heard him catch his breath. Silence. Again the ragged intake of air. Slowly he sank down to his knees. She watched without comprehension as he knelt on the floor by her bed. His voice was so choked she could scarcely understand him. The words flooded out of him. 'I know that it's my fault. I knew it through all the nights when you lay here, unstirring. It ate at me like river water cuts into a dying tree. I nearly killed you. The thought of you, lying there, bleeding and alone… I'd give anything to undo it. I was stupid and I was wrong. I have no right to ask it, but I beg it of you. Please forgive me. Please.' His voice broke on an audible sob. His hands came up to clench into fists against his veil.
Both her hands flew up to cover her mouth. In shock, she watched his shoulders shake. He was weeping. She spoke her astonished thought aloud. 'I never heard a man say such words. I didn't think one could.' In one shattering instant, her basic concept of men was re-ordered. She didn't have to hammer Reyn with words or break him with unflinching accusations. He could admit he was wrong. Not like my father, the traitor thought whispered. She refused to follow it.
'Malta?' His voice was thick with tears. He still knelt before her.
'Oh, Reyn. Please get up.' It was too unsettling to see him this way.
'But-'
She astonished herself. 'I forgive you. It was a mistake.' She had never known those words could be so easy to say. She didn't have to hold it back. She could let it go. She didn't have to save his guilt up to club him with later, when she wanted something from him. Maybe they would never do that to each other. Maybe it wouldn't be about who was wrong or right, or who controlled whom.
So what would it be about, between them?
He came to his feet shakily. He turned his back to her, lifted his veil and dragged his sleeve across his
