I was a dead man until a little before dawn today. But if you want ..."

"I wouldn't have left the wayhouse for you, 'Tani. It's where I grew up.

It's my home, and I wouldn't give it up for a man. Not even a good man.

I made that decision the night you told me who your father was. But for

the both of you. Or really, even just for her. That's a harder question."

"Her?"

"Or him," Kiyan said. "Whichever. But I suppose that puts the decision

in your hands now. The last time I saw you, I turned you out of my

house. I won't use this as a means of forcing you into something you'd

rather not. I've made my choice, not yours."

Perhaps it was the fatigue or the wine, but it took Otah the space of

two or three breaths to understand what she was saying. lie felt the

grin draw hack the corners of his mouth until they nearly ached.

"I want you to be with me, Kiyan-kya. I want you to always be with me.

And the baby too. If I have to flee to the Westlands and herd sheep, I

want you both with me."

Kiyan breathed in deeply, and let the breath out with a rough stutter.

He hadn't seen how unsure she'd been until now, when the relief relaxed

her face. She took his hand and squeezed it until he thought both of

their bones were creaking.

"That's good. That's very good. I would have been . . ." laughter

entered her voice ". . . very disappointed."

A knock at the door startled them both. The commander opened the door

and then glanced from one of the laughing pair to the other. His face

took a stern expression.

"You told him," Sinja said. "You should at least let the man rest before

you tell him things like that. He's had a hard day."

"He's been up to the task," Kiyan said.

"Well, I've come to make things worse. We've just had a runner from the

city, Otah-cha. It appears you've murdered your father in his sleep.

Your brother Danat led a hunting party bent on bringing back your head

on a stick, but apparently you've killed him too. You're running out of

family, Otah-cha."

"Ah," Otah said, and then a moment later. "I think perhaps I should lie

down now."

They burned the Khai Machi and his son together in the yard outside the

temple. The head priest wore his hale robes, the hood pulled low over

his eyes in respect, and tended the flames. Thick, black smoke rose from

the pyre and vanished into the air high above the city. A~Iachi had

woken from its revels to find the world worse than when they'd begun,

and Cehmai saw it in every face he passed. A thousand of them at least

stood in the afternoon sun. Shock and sorrow, confusion and fear.

And excitement. In a few eyes among the utkhaicm, he saw the bright eyes

and sharp ears of men who smelled opportunity. Ile walked among them,

Stone-Made-Soft at his side, peering through the funereal throng for the

one familiar face. ldaan had to be there, but he could not find her.

The lower priests also passed through the crowds, singing dirges and

beating the dry notes of drums. Slaves in ceremonially torn robes passed

out tin cups of bittcrcd water. (,'China] ignored them. The burning

would go on through the night until the ashes of the men and the ashes

of the coal were indistinguishable. And then a week's mourning. And then

these men weeping or staring, grim or secretly pleased, would meet and

decide which of their number would have the honor of sitting on the dead

family's chair and leading the hunt for the man who had murdered his own

father. Cehmai found himself unable to care particularly who won or

lost, whether the upstart was caught or escaped. Somewhere among all

these mourners was the woman he'd come to love, in more pain than she

had ever been in since he'd known her. And he-he who could topple towers

at a whim and make mountains flow like floodwater-couldn't find her.

Instead, he found Maati in brown poet's robes standing on a raised

walkway that overlooked the mourning throng. 'T'hough they were on the

edge of the ceremony, Cehmai saw the pyre light reflecting in Maati's

fixed eyes. Cehmai almost didn't approach him, almost didn't speak.

'T'here was a darkness wrapped around the poet. But it was possible he

had been there from the ceremony's beginning. He might know where Idaan

was. Cehmai took a pose of greeting which Maati did not return.

"Maati-kvo?"

Maati looked over first at Cehmai, then Stone-Made-Soft, and then back

again at the fire. After a moment's pause, his face twisted in disgust.

"Not kvo. Never kvo. I haven't taught you anything, so don't address me

as a teacher. I was wrong. From the beginning, I was wrong."

"Otah was very convincing," Cehmai said. "No one thought he would-"

"Not about that. He didn't do this. Baarath ... Gods, why did it have to

be Baarath that saw it? Prancing, self-important, smug ..."

Maati fumbled with a sewn-leather wineskin and took a long deep, joyless

drink from it. He wiped his mouth with the back of a hand, then held the

skin out in offering. Cehmai declined. Maati offered it to the andat,

but Stone-blade-Soft only smiled as if amused.

"I thought it was someone in the family. One of his brothers. It had to

be. Who else would benefit? I was stupid."

"Forgive me, N,laati-kvo. But no one did benefit."

"One of them did," he said, gesturing out at the mourners. "One of them

is going to he the new Khai. He'll tell you what to do, and you'll do

it. He'll live in the high palaces, and everyone else in the city will

lick his ass if he tells them to. That's what it's all about. Who has to

lick whose ass. And there's blood enough to fill a river answering

that." He took another long pull from the wineskin, then dropped it idly

to the ground at his feet. "I hate all of them."

"So do I," Stone-Made-Soft said, his tone light and conversational.

"You're drunk, Maati-kvo."

"Not half enough. Here, look at this. You know what this is?"

Cehmai glanced at the object Maati had pulled from his sleeve.

"A book."

"This is my teacher's masterwork. Heshai-kvo, poet of Saraykeht. The

Dai-kvo sent me to him when I was hardly younger than you are now. I was

going to study under him, take control of Seedless.

Removing-the-Part-ihat-Continues. We called him Seedless. This is

Heshai-kvo's examination of everything he'd done wrong. Every

improvement he could have made to his binding, if he'd had it to do over

again. It's brilliant."

"But it can't work, can it?" Cehmai said. "It would he too close...."