"Excuse me, Nlaati-cha," Danat said, his face screwed into a knot of

concentration, his words choppy from being rehearsed. "Papa-kya's still

not back. And I've finished all these. I wondered ..

The words fell to a mumble. \laati smiled and shook his head.

"You'll have to speak louder," Nayiit said. "Hc can't hear you."

"I wondered if you had any others I could read," the boy said, staring

at his own feet as if he'd asked for the moon on a ribbon and feared to

he mocked for it.

Behind him, where the boy couldn't see, Nayiit grinned. This is who he

would be, Nlaati thought. This is the kind of father my boy would be.

"\V'ell," he said aloud. "We might be able to find something. Come with me."

He led them out and along the gravel path to the library's entrance. The

air had a bite to it. I Ic could feel the color coming to his own

checks. When he'd been young, a child-poet younger than Nayiit, he'd

spent his terrible winter in Saraykeht with Seedless and Otah and Liat.

In the summer cities, this chill would have been the depth of winter. In

the North, it was only the first breath of autumn.

Cehmai looked tip when they came in, a scroll case of shattered silk in

his hand. A smear of dust marked his check like ashes. Boxes and crates

lay about the main room, stacked man-high. One of the couches was piled

with scrolls that hadn't been looked over, two others with the ones that

had. The air was thick with the smells of dust and parchment and old

binder's paste. Uanat stood in the doorway, his eyes wide, his mouth

open. Nayiit stepped around him and drew the boy in, sliding the doors

closed behind them. Cehmai nodded his question.

"Uanat was asking if we had any other hooks," NIaati said.

"You have nll of them," the boy said, awe in his voice.

Maati chuckled, and then felt the mirth and simple pleasure fade. The

shelves and crates, boxes and piled volumes surrounded them.

"Yes," lie said. "Yes, we have all of them."

19

"I low many do we have?" Otah asked.

The bows had been made for killing bears. Each one stood taller than a

man, the bow itself made of ash and horn, the drawstring of wire. It

took a man sitting down and using both legs to draw it back. The arrows

were blackened oak shafts as long as short spears. The tips-usually a

wide, crossed head like twined knives-had been replaced by hard steel

points made to punch through metal. The chief huntsman of the Khai

Cetani nudged one with his toe, spat, and looked out through the trees

toward the road below them.

"'Iwo dozen," he said. His voice had a \Vestern drawl. "Sixty shafts,

more or Tess."

"More or less the Khai Cetani demanded.

"We're fashioning more, Most I ligh," the huntsman said.

"I low many men do we have who can use them?" (bah asked. "It won't

matter if we have a thousand bows if there's only five men who can aim

them."

"Bear hunters are rare," the huntsman said. ""There aren't any old ones."

"I low many?"

"Fight who are good. "Twice that who know how the bow works. With

practice ..."

The Khai Cetani frowned deeply, and turned to Otah. Otah chewed at the

inside of his lip and looked down and to the east. The trees here were

thick, unlike the plains nearer to the newly abandoned city where the

need for lumber had created new-made meadows. The leaves were red and

gold, bright as fire. The days were still warm enough at their height,

but the nights were cold and getting colder. Soon it would be freezing

before morning, and soon after that-a week, ten days-it wouldn't be

thawing by midday.

"We have two and a half thousand men," Otah said. "And you're telling me

only eight can work these things?"

"They're not good for much apart from hunting big animals that need

killing fast. And there aren't many who care to do that, if they can

help it," the huntsman said. "Why learn something with no use?"

Otah squatted and took one of the bows in his hand. It was heavier than

it looked. It would be able to throw the bolts hard. Otah wondered how

close they could afford to get to the road. Too far back, and the trees

would offer as much protection to the Galts as cover for Otah's men. Too

close, and they'd be seen before the time came. It wouldn't take much

skill to hit the belly of a steam wagon if you were near enough. He

tossed the how from hand to hand as he weighed the risks.

"Go ask for volunteers," Otah said. "Ask on both sides of the road.

Anyone who says they're willing, test them. Take the twenty best."

"A man who doesn't know what he's doing with this can scrape the meat

off his legs," the huntsman said.

Otah stopped tossing the bow and turned to consider the man. The

huntsman blushed, realizing what he had just said and to whom. He took a

pose of obeisance and backed away from the two Khaiem, folding himself

in among the trees and vanishing. The Khai Cetani sighed and took a pose

of apology.

"He's a good enough man," he said, "but he forgets his place."

"He isn't wrong," Otah said. "If this were a better time to have our

orders questioned, I'd have listened to him. But then, if it were a

better time, we wouldn't be out here."

The last of the men and women fleeing Cetani had passed them five days

before, carts and wagons and sacks slung over hunched backs. For five

days, the combined forces of Cetani and Machi had haunted these woods,

sharpening their weapons and planning the attack. And growing bored and

hungry and cold. Two nights ago, Otah had ordered an end to all fires.

The smoke would give them away, and the prospect of a halfsleeping man

dropping a stray ember on the forest floor was too likely. The men

grumbled, but enough of them saw the sense of it that the edict hadn't

been ignored. Not yet.

It wouldn't be many more days, though. If the Galts didn't come, the men

would grow restive and careless, and when the time came, it would be the

battle before the Dai-kvo again, only this time, the Galts would march

into Machi. The bodies left in the streets wouldn't be of poets. They

would be the families of every man in the hidden clumps that dotted the

hills. "Their mothers, fathers, lovers, children. Everyone they knew.

Everyone that remained. That Was good for another day. Perhaps two.

"You're thinking of the frost," the Khai Cetani said. "You're worried