'The general. Balasar-cha. He doesn't want a bloody battle. He wants it over quickly, with as few of his men lost as he can manage. I agreed to come here and discover your defenses if he spared you. Gave you to me when it was all over with. Prize of war. It's not all that uncommon.
Kiyan rose, her small foxlike face turned feral. Her fingers were splayed in claws, and her chest pressed forward like a bantam ready for the fighting pit. Otah's heart warmed with something like pride. ,, If you let them touch l iah and Danat, I would kill you in your sleep,' she said.
'But Balasar-cha doesn't know that,' Sinja said, shrugging and looking into the fire. He couldn't meet her eyes. 'He expects a report from me, and I'll give him one. I'll give him whatever report you'd like.'
'Gods,' Kiyan said, her eyes still ablaze. 'Is there anyone you haven't betrayed?'
Sinja smiled, but Otah thought there was sorrow in his dark eyes.
'Yes, there is. But she was in love with someone else.'
Cchmai coughed, embarrassed. Otah raised his hands.
'Enough,' he said. 'We haven't got time for this. We may have a little as a day to get ready. Maati, you prepare your binding. Cehmai will help you. Kiyan. Liat. You've arranged food and quarters for two cities. Do what you can to arm them and keep people from panicking. Sinja and I will work out a plan to defend the city and a report to deliver to the Galts.'
Kiyan's eyes carried a question, but Otah didn't answer. There was no reason to trust Sinja-cha. It was just the risk he chose to take.
Servants brought maps of the city, of the low towns to the south, and the mountains and mines to the North. Machi hadn't been built to withstand a war; there were no walls to defend, no pits that the enemy would have to bridge. The only natural barrier-the river-was already frozen solid enough to walk across. Any real defense would have to he on the black-cobbled streets, in the alleys and tunnels and towers. They talked late into the night, joined by the Khai Cetani and Ashua Radaani, Saya the blacksmith and Kiyan when she wasn't out among the tunnels spreading the word and making preparations. Sinja's shame, if it was still there, was hidden and his advice was well considered. By morning, even the Khai Cetani suffered interruption from Sinja-cha. Otah took it as another sign that the Khai had changed.
If things went poorly, there was still the mine in the northern moun tains. A few people could take shelter there. Eiah and I)anat. Nayiit. If the binding failed, they could send Nlaati and Cehmai there as well, sneaking them out the hack of the palace in a fast cart while the battle was still alive. Otah didn't imagine that he would be there with them, and Sinja didn't question him.
Afterward, Otah looked in on his children, both asleep in their chamhers. 1-IC found the library where Cehmai and Nlaati were still arguing over points of grammar so obscure he could hardly make sense of them. The night candle was guttering and spitting when Otah came at last to his bed. Kiyan sat with him in silence for a time. IIe touched her, tracing the curve of her cheek with the knuckles of one hand.
'I)o you believe Sinja?' he asked.
'What part of it?'
'I)o you think that this General Gicc really believes the andat arc too dangerous to exist? That he wants them destroyed? What he said about killing the poet… I don't know what to think of that.'
'If burning the library is really one of his demands, then maybe,' Kiyan said. 'I can't think he'd want the hooks and scrolls burned if he hoped to hind more andat of his own.'
Otah nodded, and lay hack, his gaze turned toward the ceiling above him, dark as a moonless sky.
'I'm not sure he's wrong,' Otah said.
Wordless, she drew his mouth to hers, guided his hands. Ile would have thought himself too tired for the physical act of love, but she proved him wrong. Afterward, she lay at his side, her fingertips tracing the ink that had been worked into his skin when he had been an eastern islander leading one of his previous lives. He slept deeply and with a feeling of peace utterly unjustified by the situation.
He woke alone, called in the servants who bathed and dressed a Khai. Or, however briefly, an Emperor. Black robes, shot with red. 'Thick-woven wool layered with waxed silk. Robes of colors chosen for war and designed for cold. He took himself up through the great galleries, rising toward the surface and the light, being seen by the utkhaiem of both NIachi and Cetani, by the common laborers hurrying to throw vast cartfuls of rubble into the minor entrances to the underground, by the merchants and couriers. The food sellers and beggars. The city.
The sky was white and gray, vast and empty as a blank page. Crows commented to one another, their voices dispassionate and considering as low-town judges. High above, the towers of Machi loomed, and smoke rose from the sky doors-the sign that men were up there in the thin, distant air burning coal and wood to warm their hands, preparing for the battle. Otah stood on the steps of his palace, the hitter cold numbing his cheeks and biting at his nose and ears, the world smelling of smoke and the threat of snow. Distant and yet clear, like the voice of a ghost, hells began to ring in the towers and great yellow banners unfurled like the last, desperate unfallen leaves of the vast stone trees.
The Galts had come.
Snow fell gently that morning, drifting down from the sheet of clouds above them in small, hard flakes. Balasar stood on the ridgeline of the hills south of the city. Frost had formed on the fold of his leather cloak, and the snow that landed on his shoulders didn't melt. Before him, the stone towers rose, seeming closer than they were, more real than the snow-grayed mountains behind them. No enemy army had marched out to meet him, no party of utkhaiem marred the thin white blanket, still little more than ankle-deep, that separated Balasar from Machi. Behind him, his men were gathered around the steam wagons, pressed around the furnace grates that Balasar had ordered opened. The medics were already busy with men suffering from the cold. The captains and masters of arms were seeing that every clump of men was armed and armored. Balasar had been sure to mention the warm baths beneath Machi, the food supplies laid in those tunnels-enough, he assumed, to keep two cities alive for the winter.
Smoke rose from the tops of the towers and from the city itself. Banners flew. He heard a horseman approaching him from behind, and he glanced back to see Eustin on a great bay mare. The beast's breath was heavy and white as feathers. Balasar raised a hand, as Eustin cantered forward, pulled his mount to a halt, and saluted.
'I'm ready, sir. I've a hundred men volunteered to come with me. With your permission.'
'Of course,' Balasar said, then looked back at the towers. 'Do you really think they'd do it? Sneak out. Run north and try to hide in the low towns out there?'
'Best to have us there in the event,' Eustin said. 'I could be wrong, sir. But I'd rather be careful now than have to spend the cold part of the season making raids. Especially if this is the warm hit.'
Balasar shook his head. He didn't believe that the Khai Machi Sinja had described to him would run. He would fight unfairly, he would launch attacks from ambush, he would have his archers aim for the horses. But Balasar didn't think he would run. Still, the poets might. Or the Khai might send his children away for safety, if he hadn't already. And there would he refugees. Eustin's plan to block their flight was a wise one. He couldn't help wishing that Eustin might have been with him here, at the end. They were the last of the men who had braved the desert, and Balasar felt a superstitious dread at sending him away.
'Sir?'
'Be careful,' Balasar said. ''That's all.'
A trumpet called, and Balasar turned back to the city. Sure enough, there was something-a speck of black on the white. A single rider, fleeing Machi.
'Well,' Eustin said. 'Looks like Captain Ajutani's come back after all. Give him my compliments.'
Balasar smiled at the disdain in Eustin's voice.
'I'll be careful too,' he said.
It took something like half a hand for Sinja to reach the camp. Balasar noticed particularly that he didn't turn to the bridge, riding instead directly over the frozen river. Eustin and his force were gone, looping around to the North, well before the mercenary captain arrived. Balasar had cups of strong kafe waiting when Sinja, his face pink and rawlooking from his ride, was shown into his tent.
Balasar retuned his salute and gestured to a chair. Sinja took a pose of thanks-so little time back among the Khaiem and the use of formal pose seemed to have returned to the man like an accent-and sat, drawing a sheaf of papers from his sleeve. When they spoke, it was in the tongue of the Khaiem.
