pushing forth new growth. It wouldn't be many weeks before the lush spring took root, grabbing at the daylight that the winter stole away. The messenger told him what he could, but it was little enough, and before they had reached the halfway point, a wind rose whuffling in Biitrah's ears and making conversation impossible. The closer they came, the better he recalled these particular mines. They weren't the first that House Daikani had leased from the Khai-those had been the ones with six ventilation shafts. "These had four. And slowly-more slowly than it once had-his mind recalled the details, spreading the problem before him like something written on slate or carved from stone.
By the time they reached the first outbuildings of the low town, his fingers had grown numb, his nose had started to run from the cold, he had four different guesses as to what might have gone wrong, and ten questions in mind whose answers would determine whether he was correct. He went directly to the mouth of the mine, forgetting to stop for even bread and tea.
HIAMI SAT BY THE BRAZIER, KNOTTING A SCARF FROM SILK TIIREAD AND LIStening to a slave boy sing old tunes of the l- mpire. Almost-forgotten emperors loved and fought, lost, won, and died in the high, rich voice. Poets and their slave spirits, the andat, waged their private battles sometimes with deep sincerity and beauty, sometimes with bedroom humor and bawdy rhymes-but all of them ancient. She couldn't stand to hear anything written after the great war that had destroyed those faraway palaces and broken those song-recalled lands. The new songs were all about the battles of the Khaiem-three brothers who held claim to the name of Khai. Two would die, one would forget his name and doom his own sons to another cycle of blood. Whether they were laments for the fallen or celebrations of the victors, she hated them. They weren't songs that comforted her, and she didn't knot scarves unless she needed comfort.
A servant came in, a young girl in austere robes almost the pale of mourning, and took a ritual pose announcing a guest of status equal to Hiami's.
"Idaan," the servant girl said, "Daughter to the Khai Machi."
"I know my husband's sister," Hiami snapped, not pausing in her handwork. "You needn't tell me the sky is blue."
The servant girl flushed, her hands fluttering toward three different poses at once and achieving none of them. Hiami regretted her words and put down the knotting, taking a gentle pose of command.
"Bring her here. And something comfortable for her to sit on."
The servant took a pose of acknowledgment, grateful, it seemed, to know what response to make, and scampered off. And then Idaan was there.
Hardly twenty, she could have been one of Hiami's own daughters. Not a beauty, but it took a practiced eye to know that. Her hair, pitch dark, was pleated with strands of silver and gold. Her eyes were touched with paints, her skin made finer and paler than it really was by powder. Her robes, blue silk embroidered with gold, flattered her hips and the swell of her breasts. To a man or a younger woman, Idaan might have seemed the loveliest woman in the city. Hiami knew the difference between talent and skill, but of the pair, she had greater respect for skill, so the effect was much the same.
They each took poses of greeting, subtly different to mark Idaan's blood relation to the Khai and Hiami's greater age and her potential to become someday the first wife of the Khai Machi. The servant girl trotted in with a good chair, placed it silently, and retreated. Hiami halted her with a gesture and motioned to the singing slave. The servant girl took a pose of obedience and led him off with her.
Hiami smiled and gestured toward the seat. Idaan took a pose of thanks much less formal than her greeting had been and sat.
"Is my brother here?" she asked.
"No. There was a problem at one of the mines. I imagine he'll be there for the day."
Idaan frowned, but stopped short of showing any real disapproval. All she said was, "It must seem odd for one of the Khaiem to be slogging through tunnels like a common miner."
"Men have their enthusiasms," Hiami said, smiling slightly. Then she sobered. "Is there news of your father?"
Idaan took a pose that was both an affirmation and a denial.
"Nothing new, I suppose," the dark-haired girl said. "The physicians are