The Price Of Spring

The weeks spent at the school had let Maati forget the ways in which the world broadened when he was traveling, and also the ways in which it narrowed when he was traveling with company. Living in the same walls, the same gardens, and surrounded as he had been by only a few deeply familiar faces had begun to grate on him before they left, but there had still been a way to find a moment to steal away. On the road, all of them together, the chances for private conversation were few and precious.

Since the andat had spoken, he hadn't found himself alone with Eiah, or at least not so clearly so that he would risk speaking. He didn't want either of the Kaes or Irit to know what had happened. He was afraid that they would say something where Vanjit could hear them. He was afraid that Vanjit would find out what the andat had said and take some terrible action in her fear and in her own defense.

He was afraid because he was afraid, and he was half-certain that Vanjit knew he was.

They reached the lands surrounding the river sooner than he would have wanted; if the long days and nights on the road had kept him in close quarters with the others, the days ahead sharing a boat would be worse. He had to find a way to talk with Eiah before that, and the prospect of his lessening time made him anxious.

Cold and snow hadn't reached the river valley yet. It was as if their journey were moving backward in time. The leaves here clung to the trees, some of them with the gold and red and yellow still struggling to push out the last hints of green. As they approached the water, farms and low towns clustered closer and closer. The roads and paths began to cling to irrigation channels, and other travelers-most merely local, but some from the great cities-appeared more and more often. Maati sat at the front of the cart, his robes wrapped close around him, staring ahead and trying not to put himself anywhere that the andat could catch his eye.

He was, in fact, so preoccupied with the politics and dangers within his small party that he didn't see the Galts until his horses were almost upon them.

Three men, none of them older than thirty summers, sat at the side of the road. They wore filthy robes that had once been red or orange. The tallest had a leather satchel over his shoulder. They had stepped a few feet off the path at the sound of hooves, and the tall grass made them seem like apparitions from a children's epic. Their eyes were blue, the pupils gray. None of them had shaved in recent memory. Their gaunt faces turned to the road from habit. There was no expression in them, not even hunger. Maati didn't realize he had slowed the horses until he heard Eiah call out from the cart's bed behind him. At her word, he stopped. Large Kae and Irit, taking their turns on horseback, reined in. Vanjit and Small Kae moved to the side of the cart. Maati risked a glance at Clarity-of-Sight, but it was still and silent.

"Who are you?" Eiah demanded in their language. "What are your names?"

The Galtic apparitions shifted, blinking their empty eyes in confusion. The tall one with the satchel recovered first.

"I'm Jase Hanin," he said, speaking too loudly. "These are my brothers. It isn't plague. Whatever took our eyes, miss, it wasn't plague. We aren't a danger."

Eiah muttered something that Maati couldn't make out, then shifted a crate in the back. When he turned to look, she had her physician's satchel on her hip and was preparing to drop down to the road. Vanjit, seeing this as well, grabbed Eiah's sleeve.

"Don't," Vanjit said. The word was as much command as plea.

"I'll be fine," Eiah said. Vanjit's grip tightened on the cloth, and Maati saw their eyes lock.

"Vanjit-cha," Maati said. "It's all right. Let her go."

The poet looked back at him, anger in her gaze, but she did as he'd said. Eiah slipped down to the ground and walked toward the surprised Galts.

"You're a long way from anyplace," Eiah said.

"We were out in the low towns," the tall one said. "Something happened. We've been trying to get back to Saraykeht. Our mother's there, you see. Only it seems like we're put on the wrong path or stolen from as often as we're helped."

He tried what had once been a winning smile. Maati tied the reins to the cart and lowered himself to the road as well.

"Your mother?" Eiah said.

"Yes, miss," the Galt said.

"Well," she said, her voice cool. "At least you weren't a band of those charming liars out selling the promise of women in the low towns. What's in the satchel?"

The Galt looked chagrined and desperate, but he didn't lie.

"Names of men, miss. The ones who wanted wives from Galt."

"I thought as much," Eiah said.

"Don't help them," Vanjit said. She'd climbed to the front of the cart, but hadn't taken up the reins. From the way she held her body, Maati guessed it was a matter of time before she did. He saw the andat's black eyes peering over the cart at him and looked away. Eiah might as well not have heard her.

"We were going to do the right thing with them, miss," the tall man said. "There's a man in Acton putting together women who want to come over. We had an arrangement with him. All the money's been taken, but we still have the lists. God's word, we're going to keep our end of the thing, if we can just get back to Saraykeht."

"You stole from them," Eiah said, pulling a leather waterskin from her satchel. "They stole back from you. Seems to me that leaves you even. Here, drink from this. It's not only water, so don't take more than a couple of swallows, any of you."

"Eiah-kya," Irit said. Her voice was high and anxious, but she didn't say more than the name. Large Kae's mount whickered and sidestepped, sensing something uneasing in its rider's posture. Eiah might as easily have been alone.

"These ... put out your hand. These are lengths of silver. I've put a notch in each of them, so you'll know if someone's trying to switch them. It's enough to pay for a passage to Saraykeht. The road you're following now, it will be about another day's walk to the river. Maybe longer. Call it two."

"Thank you, miss," one of the other two said.

"I don't suppose we could ride on the back of your cart?" the tall man said, hope in his smile.

"No," Maati said. There was a limit to what Vanjit would allow, and he wasn't ready for that confrontation. "We've spent too long at this. Eiah."

Without a word, without meeting his gaze, Eiah turned back, climbed into the cart, and went back to the wax writing tablets she'd spent her morning over. Maati climbed back up into the cart and started them back down the road, Vanjit at his side.

"She shouldn't have done that," Vanjit murmured. Soft as the words were, he knew Eiah would hear them.

"There's no harm in it," Maati said. "Let it pass."

Vanjit frowned, but let the subject go. She spent the rest of the day beside him, as if guarding him from Eiah. For her part, Eiah might have been alone with her tablets. Even when the rest of them sang to pass the time, she kept to her work, steady and focused. When the conversation turned to whether they should keep riding after sunset in hopes of reaching the river, she spoke for stopping on the road. She didn't want Maati to be tired any more than was needed. Large Kae sided with her for the horses' sake.

The women made a small camp, dividing the night into watches since they were so near the road. Vanjit sharpened their sight in the evenings but insisted on returning them to normal when dawn came. She, of course, didn't have a turn at watch. Neither did Maati. Instead, he watched the moon as it hung in the tree branches, listened to the low call of owls, and drank the noxious tea. Vanjit, Irit, and Small Kae lay in the bed of the cart, their robes wrapped tightly around them. The andat sat beside its poet, as still as a stone. Eiah and Large Kae had taken the first watch, and were sitting with their backs to the fire to keep their unnaturally sharp eyes well-adapted to the darkness.

You have to kill her, it had said, and when Maati had reared back, his fragile heart racing, the andat had only looked at him. Its childish eyes had seemed older, like something ancient wearing the mask of a baby. It had nodded to itself and then turned and crawled awkwardly away. The message had been delivered. The rest, it seemed to imply, was Maati's.

He looked at the bowl of dark tea in his hands. The warmth of it was almost gone. Small bits of leaf and root shifted in the depths. An idea occurred to him. Not, perhaps, a brilliant one, but they would reach the river and hire a boat in the morning. It was a risk worth taking.

"Eiah-kya," he said softly. "Something's odd with this tea. Could you...?"

Eiah looked over at him. She looked old in the dim light of moon and fire. She came to the tree where he sat. Large Kae's gaze followed her. The sleepers in the cart didn't stir, but the andat's eyes were on him. Maati held out the bowl, and Eiah sipped from it.

"We need to speak," Maati said under his breath. "The others can't know."

"It seems fine. Give me your wrists," Eiah said in a conversational tone. Then, softly, "What's happened?"

"It's the andat. Blindness. It spoke to me. It told me to kill Vanjit-cha. This is all its doing."

Eiah switched to compare pulses in both wrists, her eyes closed as if she were concentrating.

"How do you mean?" she whispered.

"The babe was always clinging to Ashti Beg. It made Ashti-cha feel that it cared for her. Vanjit grew jealous. The conflict between them was the andat's doing. Now that it thinks we're frightened of it, it's trying to use me as well. It's Stone-Made-Soft encouraging Cehmai-cha into distracting conflicts. It's Seedless again."

Eiah put down his wrists, pressing her fingertips against his palms with the air of a buyer at a market.

"Does it matter?" Eiah murmured. "Say that the andat has been manipulating us all. What does that change?"

Eiah put down his hands. Her smile was thin and humorless. Something scurried in the bushes, small and fast. A mouse, perhaps.

"Is all well?" Large Kae called from the fire. In the cart, someone moaned and stirred.

"Fine," Maati said. "We're fine. Only adjusting something." Then, quietly, "I doubt it changes anything. Vanjit's more likely to side with Clarity-of-Sight than with us. If it is scheming against her-and, really, I can't see why it wouldn't be-it's better placed to get what it wants. It is her. It knows what she needs and what she fears."

"You think she wants to die?" Eiah asked.

"I think she wants to stop hurting. Binding the andat was supposed to stop the pain. Having a babe was supposed to. Revenge on the Galts. Now here she is with everything she wanted, and she still hurts."

Maati shrugged. Eiah took a pose of agreement and of sorrow.

"If she weren't a poet, I'd pity her," Eiah said. "But she is, and so she frightens me."

"Maati-kya?" Vanjit's voice came from the darkness over Eiah's shoulder. It was high and anxious. "What's the matter with Maati-kvo?"

"Nothing," Eiah said, turning back. Vanjit was sitting up, her hair wild, her eyes wide. The andat was clutched to her breast. Eiah took a reassuring pose. "Everything's fine."

Poet and andat looked at Maati with expressions of distrust so alike they were eerie.

THE RIVER QIIT HAD ITS SOURCE FAR NORTH OF UTANI. RAINS FROM THE mountain ranges that divided the cities of the Khaiem from the Westlands flowed east into the wide flats, gathered together, and carved their way south. Utani, the ruins of Udun, and then far to the south, the wide, silted delta just east of Saraykeht.

At its widest, the river was nearly half a mile across, but that was farther south. Here, at the low town squatting on the riverfront, the water was less than half that, its surface smooth and shining as silver. Eight thin streets crossed one another at unpredictable angles. Dogs and chickens negotiated their peace in bark and squawk, tooth and beak as Maati drove past. Two wayhouses offered rest. Another teahouse was painted in characters that made it clear there were no beds for hire there, and grudgingly offered fresh noodles and old wine. The air smelled rich with decay and new growth, the cold water and the dust of the road. There should have been children in the streets, calling, begging, playing games both innocent and cruel.

Maati drew the cart to a halt in the yard of the wayhouse nearest the riverfront itself. Large Kae dismounted and went in to negotiate for a room. After the incident with the andat, the agreement was that someone would always be in a private room with the shutters closed and the door bolted, watching the andat. If all went as he intended it, they would be on the river well before nightfall, but still ...

Vanjit's scowl had deepened through the day. Twice more they had passed men and women with pale skin and blind eyes. Two were begging at the side of the road, another was being led on the end of a rope by an old woman. Eiah had not insisted on stopping to offer them aid. Happily, there were no Galtic faces at the wayhouse. Vanjit paused in the main room, her hand on Maati's shoulder. The andat was in her other arm, concealed by a blanket and as still as death.

"Maati-kvo," she said. "I'm worried. Eiah has been so strange since we left the school, don't you think? All the hours she's spent writing on those tablets. I don't think it's good for her."

"I'm sure she's fine," Maati said with what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

"And giving silver to those Galts," Vanjit said, her voice creeping higher. "I don't know what she means by that. Do you?"

Large Kae came in from a dark corridor and motioned them to follow. Maati almost had to pull Vanjit to get her attention. She glared at Large Kae's back as they walked.

"It seems to me," Vanjit continued, "that Eiah is forgetting who are her allies and who are her enemies. I know you love her, Maati-kvo, but you can't let that blind you. You can't ignore the truth."

"I won't, Vanjit-kya," Maati said. The room was on the first floor. Fresh rushes on the floor. A small cot of stretched canvas. Oak shutters closed against the daylight. "You leave this to me. I'll see to it."

Large Kae left, murmuring something about seeing to the animals. When the door closed behind her, Vanjit let the blanket fall and set the andat on the cot. It cooed and burbled, waving its hands and grinning toothlessly. It was a parody of infantile delight, and seeing Vanjit's smilepleasure and fear and anger all in the smallest stretching of her lipsmade Maati's flesh crawl.

"You have to do something," she said. "Eiah-kya can't be trusted with the andat. You wouldn't ..."

The baby shrieked and flopped to its side, trying to lower itself to the floor. Vanjit moved forward and lifted it back up before she went on.

"You wouldn't let someone you can't trust bind the andat. You wouldn't do that."

"Certainly, I'd try not to," Maati said.

"That's a strange answer."

"I'm not a god. I use the judgment I have. It isn't as if I can see into someone's heart."

"But if you think Eiah can't be trusted," Vanjit said, anger growing in her voice, "you will stop her. You have to."

Who am I speaking to? he wondered. The girl? The andat? Does Vanjit know what she's saying?

"Yes," Maati said slowly. "If she isn't fit to be a poet to wield the andat, it would be my duty to see that she does not. I will stop her. But I have to be sure. I can't do this thing until I'm sure there's nothing I can do that will mend her."

"Mend her?" Vanjit said and took a pose that scorned the thought.

"I won't kill someone unless there is no other way."

Vanjit stepped back, her face going pale. The andat's gaze shifted from one to the other and back, its eyes shining with unfeigned delight.

"I never said to kill her," Vanjit said, her voice soft.

"Didn't you?" Maati said as if making it an accusation. "You're sure of that?"

He turned and left the room, his hands trembling, his heart racing.

He'd been an idiot. He'd slipped. Perhaps making him say more than he'd intended had been the point; perhaps the andat had guessed that it could make him go too far. He paused in the main room, his head feeling light. He sat at one of the tables and lowered his head to his knees.

His heart was still pounding, and his face felt hot and flushed. The voices of the keeper and Irit seemed to echo, as if he were hearing them from the far end of a tunnel. He gritted his teeth, willing his body to calm itself, to obey him.

Slowly, his pulse calmed. The heat in his face lessened. He didn't know how long he'd been sitting at the little table by the back wall. It seemed like only moments and it also seemed like half the day. Both were plausible. He tried to stand, but he was weak and shaking. Like a man who'd just run a race.

He motioned to the keeper and asked for strong tea. The man brought it quickly enough. A cast-iron pot in the shape of a frog, the spigot a hollow tongue between its lips. Maati poured the rich, green tea into a carved wooden bowl and sat for a moment, breathing in the scent of it before trying to lift it to his lips.

By the time Irit arrived, he felt nearly himself again. Exhausted and weak, but himself. The woman sat across from him, her fingers knotted about one another. Her smile was too wide.

"Maati-kvo," she said and belatedly took a pose of greeting. "I've just come from the riverfront. Eiah has hired a boat. It looks like a good one. Wide enough that it isn't supposed to rock so much. Or get stuck on sandbars. They talked a bit about sandbars. In any case-"

"What's the matter?"

Irit looked out toward the main room as if expecting to see someone there. She spoke without looking at him.

"I'm not ever going to make a binding, Maati-kvo. I may have helped, I may not. But we both know I'm not going to do the thing."

"You want to leave," Maati said.

She did look at him now, her mouth small, her eyes large. She was like a picture of herself drawn by someone who thought poorly of her.

"Take your things," Maati said. "Do it before we get on the river."

She took a pose that accepted his orders, but the fear remained in the way she held her body. Maati nodded to himself.

"I'll tell Vanjit that I've sent you on an errand for me. That Eiah needed some particular root that only grows in the south. You're to meet us with it in Utani. She won't know the truth."

"Thank you," Irit said, relief in her expression at last. "I'm sorry."

"Hurry," Maati said. "There isn't much time."

Irit scuttled out, her hands fluttering as if they possessed a life of their own. Maati sat quietly in the growing darkness, sipped his tea, and tried to convince himself that his strength was coming back. He'd let himself get frightened, that was all. It wasn't as if he'd fainted. He was fine. By the time Eiah and Small Kae came to collect Vanjit and Clarity-of-Sight, he mostly believed it.

Eiah accepted the news of Irit's departure without comment. The two Kaes glanced at each other and kept loading their few remaining crates onto the boat. Vanjit said nothing, only nodded and took Clarityof-Sight to the bow of the little craft to stare out at the water.

The boat was as long as six men laid end to end, and as wide across as five. It sat low in the water, and the back quarter was filled with coal and kiln, boiler and wide-slatted wheel ready to take to the river. The boatman who watched the fires and the rudder was older than Maati, his skin thin and wrinkled. The second who took duty whenever the old man rested might have been his son. Neither man spoke to the passengers, and the sight of the baby struggling in Vanjit's arms seemed to elicit no reaction.

Once they were all on and their belongings tied down, Eiah took a pose that indicated their readiness. The second called out, his voice almost a song. The riverfront clerk called back. Ropes were untied, the evil chuffing from the wheel grew louder, and the deep, violent slap of wood against water jerked them away from the bank and into the river. It seemed as if a breeze had come up, though it was likely only the speed of the boat. Eiah sat beside Maati, taking his wrists.

"We told them the child was the get of one of the utkhaiem on a Westlands girl. Vanjit is the nurse."

Maati nodded. It was as good a lie as any. At the bow, Vanjit looked back at the sound of her name. Her eyes were clear, but something in the set of her face made him think she'd been crying. Eiah frowned, pinching his fingertips until they went white, then waiting for the blood to pour back into them.

"She asked about your tablets," he said. "You have been busy with them. The binding?"

"I'm trying to cut deep enough that I can read it with my fingers," Eiah said quietly. "It's a better exercise than I'd expected. I think I've seen some ways to improve the grammar itself. It will mean another draft, but ... How are you feeling?"

"What? Ah, fine. I feel fine."

"Tired?"

"Of course I'm tired. I'm old and I've been on the road too long and ..."

And I have loosed a mad poet on the world, he thought. All the cruelties and tricks of the Dai-kvo, all the pain and loss that I suffered to be a poet was justified. If it kept people like Vanjit from the power of the andat, it was all justified. And I have ignored it.

As if reading the words in his eyes, Eiah glanced over her shoulder at Vanjit. The sun was shining off the water, surrounding the dark, huddled girl with a brilliant halo of gold and white. When Maati looked away, the image had scarred his eyes. It lay over everything else he saw, black where it had been light, and a pale shape the color of mourning robes where Vanjit had been.

"I'm making your tea," Eiah said, her voice grim. "Stay here and rest."

"Eiah-kya? We ... we have to kill her," Maati said.

Eiah turned to him, her expression empty. He gestured to Vanjit's back. His hand trembled.

"Before your binding," he said, "we should be sure that it's safe for you. Or, that is, as safe as we can make it. You ... you understand."

Eiah sighed. When she spoke again, her voice was distant and reflective.

"I knew a physician in Lachi. She told me about being in a low town when one of the men caught blood fever. He was a good person. Wellliked. This was a long time ago, so he had children. He'd gone out hunting and come back ill. She had them smother him and burn the body. His children stayed in their house and screamed the whole time they did it. She didn't sleep well for years afterward."

Her eyes were focused on nothing, her jaw forward as if she was facing someone down. Man or god or fate.

"You're saying it's not her fault," Maati said softly, careful not to speak Vanjit's name. "She was a little girl who had her family slaughtered before her. She was a lost woman who wanted a child and could never have one. What's wrong with her mind was done to her."

Eiah took a pose that disagreed.

"I'm saying no matter how little my physician friend slept, she saved those children's lives," Eiah said. "There are some herbs. When we stop for the night, I can gather them. I'll see it's done."

"No. No, I'll do the thing. If it's anyone, it should-"

"It will have to be quick," Eiah said. "She mustn't know it's coming. You can't do that."

Maati took a pose that challenged her, and Eiah folded his hands gently closed.

"Because you still want to save her," she said. Something about weariness and determination made her look like her father.

Otah, who had killed a poet once too.