Far to the east, an early storm fell from clouds dark as bruises, a veil
of gray. Cehmai watched it, his arm around his lover's shoulder. She
leaned her head against him.
"How was the Emperor this morning?" he asked.
"Fine. Excited to see Issandra-cha again as much as anything about the
caravan. I think he's more than half infatuated with her."
"Oh please," Cehmai said. "This will be his seventy-ninth summer? His
eightieth?"
"And you won't still want me when you've reached the age?"
"Well. Fair point."
"His hands bother him most," Idaan said. "It's a pity about his hands."
Lightning flashed on the horizon, less that a firefly. Idaan twined her
fingers with his and sighed.
"Have I mentioned recently how much I appreciate you coming to find me?
Back when you were an outlaw and I was still a judge, I mean," she asked.
"I never tire of hearing it," Cehmai said.
The tomcat leaped on his lap, dug its claws into his robe twice,
kneading him like bread dough, and curled up.
For even if the flowergrows from an ancient vine, the flowers of spring
are themselves new to the world, untried and untested.
EIAH MOTIONED FOR OTAH TO SIT. SHE WAS GENTLE AS ALWAYS WITH HIS
crippled hands. He sat back down slowly. The servants had brought his
couches out to a wide garden, but with the coming sunset he'd have to be
moved again. Eiah tried to impress on her father's servants that what he
needed and what he wanted weren't always the same. She'd given up
convincing Otah years earlier.
"How are you feeling?" she asked, sitting beside him. "You look tired."
"It was a long day," Otah said. "I slept well enough, but I can never
stay in bed past dawn. When I was young, I could sleep until midday. Now
that I have the time and no one would object, I'm up with the birds.
Does that seem right to you?"
"The world was never fair."
"Truth. All the gods know that's the truth."
She took his wrists as if it were nothing more than the contact of
father and daughter. Otah looked at her impatiently, but he suffered it.
She closed her eyes for a moment, feeling the subtle differences of his
pulses.
"I heard you woke confused again," she said. "You were calling for
someone called Muhatia-cha?"
"I had a dream. That's all," Otah said. "Muhatia was my overseer back
when I was young. I dreamed that I was late for my shift. I needed to
get to the seafront before he docked my pay. That was all. I'm not
losing my mind, love. My health, maybe, but not my mind. Not yet."
"I didn't think you were. Turn here. Let me look at your eyes. Have the
headaches come back?"
"No," Otah said, and she knew by his voice he was lying. It was time to
stop asking details. There was only so much physician's attention her
father would permit. She sat back on the couch, and he let out a small,
satisfied breath.
"You saw Issandra Dasin?" she asked.
"Yes, yes. She spent the better part of the afternoon here," Otah said.
"The things they've done with Chaburi-Tan are amazing. I was thinking I
might go myself. Just to see them."
"It would be fascinating," Eiah agreed. "I hear Farrer-cha's doing well?"
"He's made more out of that city than I could have. But then I was never
particularly brilliant with administration. I had other skills, I
suppose," Otah said. "Enough about that. Tell me about your family. How
is Parit-cha? And the girls?"
Eiah let herself be distracted. Parit was well, but he'd been kept away
from their apartments three nights running by a boy who worked for House
Laarin who'd broken his leg falling off a wall. It had been a bad break,
and the fever hadn't gone down quickly enough to suit anyone. It seemed
as if the boy would live, and they were both happy to call that a
success. Of Otah's granddaughters, Mischa was throwing all her free time
into learning to dance every new form that came in from Galt, and
wearing the dance master's feet raw in the effort. Gaber had talked
about nothing besides the steam caravan for weeks, but Eiah suspected it
was more Calin's enthusiasm than her own. Gaber assumed that Calin rose
with the sun and set with the moon.
Eiah didn't realize how long she'd been telling the small stories of her
family until the overseer came out with an apologetic pose and announced
that the Emperor's meal was waiting. Otah made a show of rubbing his
belly, but when Eiah joined him, he ate very little. The meal was fresh
chicken cooked in last year's apricots, and it was delicious. She
watched her father pluck at the pale flesh.
He looked older than his years. His skin had grown as thin as paper; his
eyes were always wet. After his hands had fallen to their weakness, the
headaches had begun. Eiah had tried him on half a dozen different
programs of herbs and baths. She wasn't convinced he'd followed any of
them very closely.
"Stop," Otah said. Eiah took a pose that asked clarification. He frowned
at her, his eyebrows rising as he spoke. "You're looking at me as if I
were a particularly interesting bloodworm. I'm fine, Eiah-kya. I sleep
well, I wake full of energy, my bowels never trouble me, and my joints
don't ache. Everything that could be right about me is right. Now I'd
like to spend an evening with my daughter and not my physician, eh?"
"I'm sorry, Papa-kya," she said. "It's only that I worry."
"I know," he said, "and I forgive you. But don't let tomorrow steal
what's good about tonight. The future takes care of its own. You can
write that down if you like. The Emperor said it."
The flower that wilted last year is gone. Petals once fallen are fallen
forever.
IDAAN ROSE BEFORE THE DAWN AS SHE ALWAYS DID, PARTING THE NETTING
silently and stealthily walking out to her dressing chamber so as not to
disturb Cehmai. She was not so important a woman that the servants
wouldn't leave her be or that armsmen were needed to hold the utkhaiem
and councilmen at bay. She was not her brother. She picked a simple robe
of dusty red and rich blue and fastened all the ties herself. Then
sandals and a few minutes before a mirror with a brush and a length of
stout ribbon to bring her hair into something like order.
No one had assigned her the daily task of carrying breakfast to the
Emperor. It was one she'd simply taken on. After two weeks of arriving
at the kitchens to collect the tray with its plates and bowl and teapot,
the servant who had been the official bearer simply stopped coming.
She'd usurped the work.
That morning, they'd prepared honey bread and raisins, hot rice in
almond milk, and a slab of roast pork with a pepper glaze. Idaan knew
from experience that she would end with the pork and the honey bread.
The rice, he might eat.
The path to the Emperor's apartments was well-designed. The balance
between keeping the noises and interruptions away-not to mention the
constant possibility of fire-and getting the food to him still warm
meant a long, straight journey almost free from the meanderings to which
the palaces were prone. Archways of stone marked the galleries.
Tapestries of lush red and gold hung on the walls. The splendor had long
since ceased to take her breath away. She had lived in palaces and mud
huts and everything in between. The only thing that astounded her with
any regularity was that so late in her life, she had found her family.
Cehmai alone had been miraculous. The last decade serving in court had
been something greater than that. She had become an aunt to Danat and
Eiah and Ana, a sister to Otah Machi. Even now, her days had the feel of
relaxing in a warm bath. It wasn't something she'd expected. For that,
it wasn't something she'd thought possible. The nightmares almost never
came now; never more than once or twice in a month. She was ready to
grow old here, in these halls and passageways, with these people. If
anyone had the poor judgment to threaten her people, Idaan knew she
would kill the idiot. She hoped the occasion wouldn't arise.
She knew something was wrong as soon as she passed through the arch that
led to Otah's private garden. Four servants stood in a clot at the side
door, their faces pale, their hands in constant motion. With a feeling
of dread, she put the lacquer tray on a bench and came forward. The
oldest of the servants was weeping, his face blotchy and his eyes
swollen. Idaan looked at the man, her expression empty. Whatever
strength remained in him left, and he folded to the ground sobbing.
"Have you sent for his children?" Idaan asked.
"I ... we only just ..."
Idaan raised her eyebrows, and the remaining servants scattered. She
stepped over the weeping man and made her way into the private rooms.
All together, they were smaller than Idaan's old farmhouse. It didn't
take long to find him.
Otah sat in a chair as if he were only sleeping. The window before him
was open, the shutters swaying slow and languorous in the breeze. The
motion reminded her of seaweed. His robe was yellow shot with black. His
eyes were barely open and as empty as marbles. Idaan made herself touch
his skin. It was cold. He was gone.
She found a stool, pulled it to his side, and sat with him one last
time. His hand was stiff, but she wrapped her fingers around his. For a
long while, she said nothing. Then, softly so that just the two of them
could hear, she spoke.
"You did good work, brother. I can't think anyone would have done better."
She remained there breathing the scent of his rooms for the last time
until Danat and Eiah arrived, a small army of servants and utkhaiem and
councilmen at their backs. Idaan told Eiah what she needed to know in a
few short sentences, then left. The breakfast was gone, cleared away.
She went to find Cehmai and tell him the news.
Flowers do not return in the spring, rather they are replaced. It is in
this difference between returned and replaced that the price of renewal
is paid.
"No," ANA SAID. THE AMBASSADOR OF EYMOND LIFTED A FINGER, AS IF BEGging
leave to interrupt the Empress. He made a small noise at the back of his
throat. Ana shook her head. "I said no. I meant no, Lord Ambassador. And
if you raise your finger to me again like I was a schoolgirl talking out
of turn, I will have it cut off and set in a necklace for you."
The meeting room was as silent as a grave. Even the candle flames stood
still. The dark-stained wood of the floor and beautifully painted
abstract frescoes of the walls seemed out of place, too rich and
peaceful for the moment. A back room at a teahouse was the better venue
for this kind of negotiation. Ana enjoyed the contrast.
She knew when she first heard of Otah Machi's death that she was going
to have to be responsible for holding the Empire together until Danat
regained his balance. She hadn't yet lost a parent. Her husband and
lover now had neither of his. The lost expression in his eyes and the
bewildered tone in his voice made her heart ache. And so when their
partners and rivals in trade took the opportunity to renegotiate
treaties in hopes of winning some concession in the fog of grief, Ana
found herself taking it personally.
"Lady Empress," the ambassador said, "I don't mean disrespect, but you
must see that-"
Ana raised her finger, the mirror of the man's gesture. He went silent.
"A necklace," she said. "Ask around if you'd like. You'll find I have no
sense of proportion. None."
Very quietly, the ambassador took the scroll up from the table between
them and put it back in its satchel. Ana nodded and gestured to the
door. The man's spine could have been made of a single, unarticulated
iron bar as he left. Ana felt no sympathy for him.
The Master of Tides came in a moment later, her face amused and alarmed.
Ana took what she thought was the proper pose to express continuity. The
Khaiate system of poses was something that was best born into and
learned from infancy. She did her best, and no one had the audacity to
correct her, so Ana figured she was close enough.
"I believe that is all for the day, Most High," the Master of Tides said.
"Excellent. We got through those quickly, didn't we?"
"Very quickly," the woman agreed.
"Feel free to offer any other audiences the choice of meeting with me or
waiting for my husband until after the mourning rites."