A Betrayal in Winter (lpq-2) (30 page)

A slow, mad grin bloomed on his face, stretching until the blood left

his lips. There was a hardness in his eyes and a heat. It looked like

fury or possession. He took her shoulders in his hands and pulled her

near him. Their kiss was a gentle violence. For a moment, she thought he

meant to open her robes, to drag her back to the bed in a sad parody of

what they were expected to be doing. She pressed a palm to his sex and

was surprised to find that he was not aroused. Slowly, with perfect

control and a grip that bruised her, Adrah brought her away from him.

"I did this thing for you," he said. "I did this for you. Do you

understand that?"

"I do."

"Never ask me for anything again," he said and released her, turning

away. "From now until you die, you are in debt to me, and I owe you

nothing."

"For the favor of killing my father?" she asked, unable to keep the edge

from her voice.

"For what I have sacrificed to you," he said without looking back. Idaan

felt her face flush, her hands ball into fists. She heard him groan from

the next room, heard his robes shushing against the stone floor. The bed

creaked.

A lifetime, married to him. There wouldn't be a moment in the years that

followed that would not be poisoned. He would never forgive her, and she

would never fail to hate him. They would go to their graves, each with

teeth sunk in the other's neck.

They were perfect for each other.

Idaan walked silently to the window, took down the blue silk and put up

the red.

THE ARMSMEN GAVE HIM ENOUGH WATER TO LIVE, THOUGH NOT SO MUCH AS to

slake his thirst. Almost enough food to live as well, though not quite.

He had no clothing but the rags he'd worn when he'd come back to Machi

and the cloak that Maati had brought. When dawn was coming near and the

previous day's heat had gone from the tower, he would be huddling in

that cloth. Through the day, sun heated the great tower, and that heat

rose. And as it rose, it grew. In his stone cage, Otah lay sweating as

if he'd been working at hard labor, his throat dry and his head pounding.

The towers of Machi, Otah had decided, were the stupidest buildings in

the world. Too cold in winter, too hot in summer, unpleasant to use,

exhausting to climb. They existed only to show that they could exist.

More and more of the time, his mind was in disarray; hunger and boredom,

the stifling heat and the growing presentiment of his own death

conspired to change the nature of time. Otah felt outside it all, apart

from the world and adrift. He had always been in this room; the memories

from before were like stories he'd heard told. He would always be in

this room unless he wriggled out the window and into the cool, open air.

Twice already he had dreamed that he'd leapt from the tower. Both times,

he woke in a panic. It was that as much as anything that kept him from

taking the one control left to him. When despair washed through him, he

remembered the dream of falling, with its shrill regret. He didn't want

to die. His ribs were showing, he was almost nauseated with thirst, his

mind would not slow down or be quiet. He was going to be put to death,

and he did not want to die.

The thought that his suffering saved Kiyan had ceased to comfort him.

Part of him was glad that he had not known how wretched his father's

treatment of him would be. He might have faltered. At least now he could

not run. He would lose-he had lost, and badly-but he could not run. Mai

sat on her chair-the tall, thin one with legs of woven cane that she'd

had in their island hut. When she spoke, it was in the soft liquid

sounds of her native language and too fast for Otah to follow. He

struggled, but when he croaked out that he couldn't understand her, his

own voice woke him until he drifted away again into nothing, troubled

only by the conviction that he could hear rats chewing through the stone.

The shriek woke him completely. He sat upright, his arms trembling. The

room was real again, unoccupied by visions. Outside the great door, he

heard someone shout, and then something heavy pounded once against the

door, shaking it visibly. Otah rose. There were voices-new ones. After

so many days, he knew the armsmen by their rhythms and the timbre of

their murmurs. The throats that made the sounds he heard now were

unfamiliar. He walked to the door and leaned against it, pressing his

ear to the hairline crack between the wood and its stone frame. One

voice rose above the others, its tone commanding. Otah made out the word

"chains."

The voices went away again for so long Otah began to suspect he'd

imagined it all. The scrape of the bar being lifted from the door

startled him. He stepped hack, fear and relief coming together in his

heart. This might be the end. He knew his brother had returned; this

could be his death come for him. But at least it was an end to his time

in this cell. He tried to hold himself with some dignity as the door

swung open. The torches were so bright that Otah could hardly see.

"Good evening, Otah-cha," a man's voice said. "I hope you're well enough

to move. I'm afraid we're in a bit of a hurry."

"Who are you?" Otah asked. His own voice sounded rough. Squinting, he

could make out perhaps ten men in black leather armor. They had blades

drawn. The armsmen lay in a pile against the far wall, stacked like

goods in a warehouse, a black pool of blood surrounding them. The smell

of them wasn't rotten, not yet, but it was disturbingcoppery and

intimate. They had only been dead for minutes. If all of them were dead.

"We're the men who've come to take you out of here," the commander said.

He was the one actually standing in the doorway. He had the long face of

a man of the winter cities, but a westlander's flowing hair. Otah moved

forward and took a pose of gratitude that seemed to amuse him.

"Can you walk?" he asked as Utah came out into the larger room. The

signs of struggle were everywhere-spilled wine, overturned chairs, blood

on the walls. The armsmen had been taken by surprise. Utah put a hand

against the wall to steady himself. The stone felt warm as flesh.

"I'll do what I have to," Otah said.

"That's admirable," the commander said, "but I'm more curious about what

you can do. I've suffered long confinement myself a time or two, and I

know what it does. We can't take the easy way down. We've got to walk.

If you can do this, that's all to the good. If you can't, we're prepared

to carry you, but I need to have you out of the city quickly."

"I don't understand. Did Maati send you?"

"There's better places to discuss this, Otah-cha. We can't go down by

the chains. Even if there weren't more armsmen waiting there, we've just

broken them. Can you walk down the tower?"

A memory of the endlessly turning stairs and the ghost of pain in his

knees and legs. Otah felt a stab of shame, but pulled himself up and

shook his head.

"I don't believe I can," he said. The commander nodded and two of his

men pulled lengths of wood from their backs and fitted them together in

a cripple's litter. There was a small seat for Otah, canted against the

slope of the stairway, and the poles were set one longer than the other

to fit the tight curve. It would have been useless in any other

situation, but for this task it was perfect. As one of the men helped

Otah take his place on it, he wondered if the device had been built for

this moment, or if things like it existed in service of these towers.

The largest of the men spat on his hands and gripped the carrying poles

that would start down the stairs and bear most of Otah's weight. One of

his fellows took the other end, and Otah lurched up.

They began their descent, Otah with his back to the center of the spiral

staircase. He watched the stone of the wall curl up from below. The men

grunted and cursed, but they moved quickly. The man on the higher poles

stumbled once, and the one below shouted angrily back at him.

The journey seemed to last forever-stone and darkness, the smell of

sweat and lantern oil. Otah's knees bumped against the wall before him,

his head against the wall behind. When they reached the halfway point,

another huge man was waiting to take over the worst of the carrying.

Otah felt his shame return. He tried to protest, but the commander put a

strong, hard hand on his shoulder and kept him in the chair.

"You chose right the first time," the commander said.

The second half of the journey down was less terrible. Otah's mind was

beginning to clear, and a savage hope was lifting him. He was being

saved. He couldn't think who or why, but he was delivered from his cell.

He thought of the armsmen new-slaughtered at the tower's height, and

recalled Kiyan's words. How do you expect to protect me and my house?

They could all be killed, his jailers and his rescuers alike. All in the

name of tradition.

He could tell when they reached the level of the street-the walls had

grown so thick there was almost no room for them to walk, but thin

windows showed glimmers of light, and drunken, disjointed music filled

the air. At the base of the stair, his carriers lowered Otah to the

ground and took his arms over their shoulders as if he were drunk or

sick. The commander squeezed to the front of the party. Despite his

frown, Otah sensed the man was enjoying himself immensely.

They moved quickly and quietly through mare-like passages and out at

last into an alley at the foot of the tower. A covered cart was waiting,

two horses whickering restlessly. The commander made a sign, and the two

bearers lifted Otah into the back of the cart. The commander and two of

the men climbed in after, and the driver started the horses. Shod hooves

rapped the stone, and the cart lurched and bumped. The commander pulled

the back cloth closed and tied it, but loose enough he could peer out

the seam. The lantern was extinguished, and the scent of its dying smoke

filled the cart for a moment and was gone.

"What's happening out there?" Otah asked.

"Nothing," the commander said. "And best we keep it that way. No talking."

In silence and darkness, they continued. Otah felt lightheaded. The cart

turned twice to the left and then again to the right. The driver was

hailed and replied, but they never stopped. A breeze fluttered the thick

cloth of the cover, and when it paused, Otah heard the sound of water;

they were on the bridge heading south. He was free. He grinned, and then

as the implications of his freedom unfolded themselves in his mind, his

relief faltered.

"Forgive me. I don't know your name. I'm sorry. I can't do this."

The commander shifted. It was nearly black in the cart, so Otah couldn't

see the man's face, but he imagined incredulity on the long features.

"I went to Machi to protect someone-a woman. If I vanish, they'll still

have reason to suspect her. My brother might kill her on the chance that

she's involved with this. I can't let that happen. I'm sorry, but we

have to turn hack."

"You love her that much?" the commander asked.

"This isn't her fault. It's mine."

"All this is your fault, eh? You have a lot to answer for." There was

amusement in the man's voice. Otah felt himself smile.

"Well, perhaps not all my fault. But I can't let her be hurt. This is

the price of it, and I'll pay it if I have to."

They were all silent for a long moment, then the commander sighed.

"You're an honorable man, Otah Machi. I want you to know I respect that.

Boys. Chain him and gag him. I don't want him calling out."

They were on him in an instant, pushing him hard onto the rough wood of

the cart. Someone's knee drove in between his shoulder blades; invisible

hands bent his arms backwards. When he opened his mouth to scream, a wad

of heavy cloth was shoved in so deeply he gagged. A leather strap

followed, keeping it in place. He didn't know when his legs were bound,

but in fewer than twenty breaths, he was immobile-his arms chained

painfully behind him at his wrists and elbows, his mouth stuffed until

it was hard to breathe. The knee moved to the small of his back, digging

into his spine with every shift of the cart. He tried once to move, and

the pressure from above increased. He tried again, and the man cursed

him and rapped his head with something hard.

"I said no talking," the commander murmured, and returned to peering out

the opening in the hack cloth. Otah shifted, snarling in impotent rage

that none of these men seemed to see or recognize. The cart moved off