Eiah's lips closed hard. Kiyan took a turn, telling Eiah that she'd done

wrong, and they all knew it. Even she had to know that simply taking

things wasn't right. They had paid her debt, but now she would have to

make it good herself. 'T'hey had decided that she would work with the

physicians for a week, and if she didn't go, the physicians had

instructions to send for ...

"I'm not going to," Eiah said. "It's not fair. "Ialit Radaani sneaks

things out of her father's warehouse all the time and no one ever makes

her do anything for it."

"I can see that changes," Otah said.

"Don't!" Eiah barked. The birds startled away; a flutter of wings that

sounded like panic. "Don't you dare! 'Ialit will hate me forever if she

thinks I'm making her ... Papa-kya! Please, don't do that."

"It might be wise," Kiyan said. "All three girls were party to it."

"You can't! You can't do that to me!" Eiah's eyes were wild. She pushed

back the chair as she stood. "I'll tell them Nayiit's your son! I'll tell!"

Otah felt the air go out of the room. Eiah's eyes went wide, aware that

she had just done something worse than stealing a bauble, but unsure

what it was. Only Kiyan seemed composed and calm. She smiled dangerously.

"Sit down, love," she said. "Please. Sit."

Eiah sat. Otah clasped his hands hard enough the knuckles ached, but

there weren't words for the mix of guilt and shame and anger and sorrow.

His heart was too many things at once. Kiyan didn't look at him when she

spoke; her gaze was on Eiah.

"You will never repeat what you've just said to anyone. Nayiit-cha is

Liat's son by M1aati. Because if he isn't, if he's the thing you just

said, then he will have to kill Danat or Danat will have to kill him.

And when that happens, the blood will he on your hands, because you

could have prevented it and chose not to. Don't speak. I'm not finished.

If any of the houses of the utkhaiem thought Danat was not the one and

only man who could take his father's place, some of them would start

thinking of killing him themselves in expectation of Nayiit-cha favoring

them once he became Khai Nlachi. I can't protect him from everyone in

this city, any more than I can protect him from air or his own body. You

have done a wrong thing, stealing. And if you truly mean to hold your

brother's life hostage to keep from being chastised for it, I would like

to know that now."

Eiah wept silently, shocked by the cold fire in Kiyan's voice. Utah felt

as if he'd been slapped as well. As if he ought somehow to have known,

all those years ago, in that distant city, that the consequences of

taking to his lover's bed would come back again to threaten everything

he held dear. Ilis daughter took a pose that begged her mother's

forgiveness.

"I won't, Mama-kya. I won't say anything. Not ever."

"You'll apologize to the man you stole from and you will go in the

morning to the physician's house and do whatever they ask of you. I will

decide what to do about 'l alit and Shoyen."

"Yes, :Mama-kya."

"You can leave now," Kiyan said and looked away. Eiah rose, silent

except for the rough breath of tears, and left the room. The door closed

behind her.

"I'm sorry-"

"Don't," Kiyan said. "Not now. I can't ... I don't want to hear it just

now.

Otah rose and walked to the window. The sun was high, but the towers

cast shadows across the city all the same, like trees above children.

Far to the west, clouds were gathering over the mountains, towering

white thunderheads with bases dark as a bruise. "There would be a storm

later. It would come. One of the sparrows returned, considered Otah once

with each eye, and then flew away again.

"What would you ask me to do?" Otah said. His voice was placid. No one

would have known from the words how much pain lay behind them. No one

except Kiyan. "I can't unmake him. Should I have him killed?"

"How did Eiah know?" Kiyan asked.

"She saw. Or she guessed. She knew the way that you did."

"No one told her? Maati or Liat or Nayiit. None of them told her?"

"No.,,

"You're sure?"

"I am."

"Because if they did, if they're spreading it through the city that you

have-"

"They aren't. I was there when she realized it. Only me. No one else."

Kiyan took a long, low, shuddering breath. If it had been otherwiseif

someone had told Eiah as part of a plan to spread word of Nayiit's

parentage-Kiyan would have asked him to have the boy killed. He wondered

what he would have done. He wondered how he would have refused her.

"They'll leave the city as soon as we have word from the Dal-kvo," Otah

said. "Either they'll go back to Saraykeht or they'll go to the

I)aikvo's village. Either way, they'll be gone from here."

"And if they come back?"

"They won't. I'll see to it. They won't hurt Danat, love. He's safe."

"He's ill. He's still coughing," Kiyan said. That was it too, of course.

Seasons had come and gone, and Danat was still haunted by illness. It

was natural for them-Kiyan and himself both-to bend themselves double to

protect him from the dangers that they could, especially since there

were so many so close over which they were powerless.

It was part of why Otah had postponed for so long the conversation he

was doomed to have with Liat Chokavi. But it was only part. Kiyan's

chair scraped against the floor as she rose. Otah put his hand out to

her, and she took it, stepping in close to him, her arms around him. He

kissed her temple.

"Promise me this all ends well," she said. "Just tell me that."

"It will he fine," he said. "Nothing's going to hurt our boy."

They stood silently for a time, looking at each other, and then out at

the city. The plumes of smoke rising from the forges, the black-cobbled

streets and gray slanted roofs. The sun slipped behind the clouds or

else the clouds rose to block the light. The knock that interrupted them

was sharp and urgent.

"Most High?" a man's voice said. "Most High, forgive me, but the poets

wish to speak with you. Maati-cha says the issue is urgent."

Kiyan walked with him, her hand in his, as they went to the Council

chamber where Maati waited. His face was flushed, his mouth set in a

deep scowl. A packet of paper fluttered in his hand, the edges rough