The Price of Spring (Long Price Quartet #4)(127)

"You and I know. The High Council. That half-bastard council you put together when you headed out into the wilderness. Ana. Danat. A few armsmen. All in all, I'd guess not more than three dozen people actually know what happened. And none of them is at present working for Eymond."

"You're saying we should pretend to have an andat?"

"Not precisely," Fatter said. "As many people as already know, the story will come out eventually. But there might be a way to present it that still gave other nations pause. Send out letters of embassage that say the andat, though recovered, have been set aside and deny the rumors that certain deaths and odd occurrences are at all related to a new poet under the direction of the Empire."

"What deaths?"

"Don't be too specific about that," Farrer said. "I expect they'll supply the details."

"Let them think ... that we have the andat and are hiding the fact?" Otah laughed.

"It won't last forever, but the longer we can stall them, the better prepared we'll be when they come."

"And they do always come," Otah said. "Clever thought. It costs us nothing. It could gain us a great deal. Issandra?"

Farrer leaned back in his chair, setting his heels on the parapet and looking up at the stars, the full, heavy moon. For the space of a heartbeat, he looked forlorn. He drank his wine and looked over at Otah.

"My wife is an amazing woman," he said. "I'm fortunate to have her. And if Ana's half like her, she'll be running both our nations whether your son likes it or not."

It was the opening to a hundred other issues. Galt and the cities of the Khaiem were in a state of profound disarray. Ana Dasin might be the new Empress, but that meant little enough in practical terms. In Galt the High Council and the full council were each in flux, their elections and appointments in question now that their cities were little more than abandoned. Otah would be hated for that destruction or else beloved for the mending of it.

"It is the point, isn't it? If we are two nations, we're doomed," Farrer said, reading his concerns. "We have too many enemies and not enough strengths between us."

"If we're one ... how do we do that? Will the High Council be ruled by my edict? Am I supposed to cede my power to them?"

"Compromise, Most High," Farrer said. "It will be a long process of compromise and argument, idiotic yammering debate and high melodrama. But in its defense, it won't be war."

"It won't be war," Otah repeated. Only when the words had come out into the night air, hanging as if physical, did he realize he had meant it as an agreement. One nation. His empire had just doubled in size, tripled in complexity and need, and his own power had been cut at least by half. Farrer seemed surprised when he laughed.

"Tomorrow," Otah said. "Call the High Council tomorrow. I'll bring my council. We'll start with the report and try to build something like a plan from there. And tell Issandra that I'll have the letters of embassage sent. Best get that done before there's a debate about it, ne?"

They sat for a time without speaking, two men whose children had just joined their families. Two enemies planning a house in common. Two great powers whose golden ages had ended. They could play at it, but each knew that it was only in their children, in their grandchildren, that the game of friendship could become truth.

Farrer finished his wine, leaving the bowl by his chair. As he walked out, he put a hand on Otah's shoulder.

"Your son seems a fine man," he said.

"Your daughter is a treasure."

"She is," Farrer Dasin said, his voice serious. And then Otah was alone again, the night numbing his feet and biting his ears and nose. He pulled the blanket around himself more tightly and left the balcony and the city and the celebrations behind him.

The palaces were as quiet and busy as the backstage at a performance. Servants ran or walked or conducted low, angry conversations that died at Otah's approach. He let the night make its own path. He knew the bridal procession had returned to the palaces by the number of robes with bits of tinsel and bright paper clinging to the hems. And also by the flushed faces and spontaneous laughter. There would have been celebration on into the night, even if they hadn't scheduled the wedding on Candles Night. As it was, Utani as a whole, from the highest nobility to the lowest beggar, would sleep late and speak softly when they woke. Otah doubted there would be any wine left by spring.

But there would be babies. He could already name a dozen women casually who would be giving birth when the summer came. And everywhere, in all the cities, the conditions were the same. They would miss a generation, but only one. The Empire would stumble, but it need not fall.

Even more than the joining of the Empire and Galt, the night was the first formal celebration of a world made new. Otah wished he felt more part of it. Perhaps he understood too well what price had brought them here.

He found Eiah where he knew he would. The physicians' house with its wide, slate tables and the scent of vinegar and burning herbs. Cloth lanterns bobbled in the breeze outside the open doors. A litter of stretched canvas and light wood lay on the steps, blood staining the cloth. Within, half a dozen men and two women sat on low wooden benches or lay on the floor. One of the men tried to take a pose of obeisance, winced in pain, and sat back down. Otah made his way to the rear. Three men in leather aprons were working the tables, servants and assistants swarming around them. Eiah, in her own apron, was at the back table. A Galtic man lay before her, groaning. Blood drenched his side. Eiah glanced up, saw him, and took a pose of welcome with red hands.