The Price of Spring (Long Price Quartet #4)(72)

"Children," Maati said. The pain in his chest was easing, the shock of the news fading away. "I'll speak with Vanjit. She did this all. She can undo it as well. And ... and it does speak to the purpose. We wanted to announce that the andat had returned to the world. She's done that in no small voice."

"Maati-cha," Eiah began, but he kept talking, fast and loud.

"This is why they did it, you know All those tests and lies and opportunities to prove ourselves. Or fail to prove ourselves. They broke us to the lead first, and gave us power when they knew we could be controlled."

"It looked like a wiser strategy, if this is the alternative," Eiah said. "Do you think she'll listen to you?"

"Listen, yes. Do as I command? I don't know. And I don't know that I'd want her to. She's learning responsibility. She's learning her own limits. Even if I could tell her what they are, she couldn't learn by having it said. She's ... exploring."

"She's killed thousands of people, at the least."

"Galts," Maati said. "She's killed Galts. We were never here to save them. Yes, Eiah-kya. Vanjit went too far, and because she's holding an andat, there are consequences. When you slaughter a city? When you send your army to kill a little girl's family in front of her? There are consequences to that too. Or by all the gods there should be."

"You're saying this is justice?" Eiah asked.

"We made peace with Galt," Maati said. "None of Vanjit's family were avenged. There was no justice for them because it was simpler for Otah to ignore their deaths. Just as it's simpler for him to ignore all the women of the cities. Vanjit has an andat, and so her will is now more important than your father's. I don't see that makes it any more or less just."

Eiah took a pose that respectfully disagreed, then dropped her hands to her sides.

"I don't argue that she's gone too far," Maati said. "She's killing a horsefly with a hammer. Only that it's not as bad as it first seems. She's still young. She's still new to her powers."

"And that forgives everything?" Eiah said.

"Don't," Maati said more sharply than he'd intended. "Don't be so quick to judge her. You'll be in her position soon enough. If all goes well."

"I wonder what I'll forget. How I'll go too far," Eiah said, and sighed. "How did we ever think we could do good with these as our tools?"

Maati was silent for a moment. His memory turned on Heshai and Seedless, Cehmai and Stone-Made-Soft. The sickening twist that was Sterile, moving through his own mind like an eel through muddy water.

"Is there another way to fix it?" Maati asked. "After Sterile, is there a way other than this to make the world whole? All those women who will never bear a child. All those men whose money is going to charming Galtic liars. Is there a way to make the world well again besides what we're doing?"

"We could wait," Eiah said, her voice gray and toneless. "Given enough time, we'll all die and be forgotten."

Maati was silent. Eiah closed her eyes. The flame of the night candle fluttered in a draft that smelled of fresh snow and wet cloth. Eiah's gaze focused inward, on some landscape of her own mind. He didn't think she liked what she saw there. She opened her mouth as if to speak, closed it again, and looked away.

"You're right, though," Maati said. "This is twice."

They found Vanjit in her room, the andat wailing disconsolately as she rocked it in her arms. Maati entered the room first to Vanjit's gentle smile, but her expression went blank when Eiah came in after him and slid the door shut behind her. The andat's black eyes went from Vanjit to Eiah and back, then it squealed in delight and held its thick, short arms up to Eiah as if it was asking to be held.

"You know, then," Vanjit said. "It was inevitable."

"You should have told me what you intended," Maati said. "It was a dangerous, rash thing to do. And it's going to have consequences."

Vanjit put Clarity-of-Sight on the floor at her feet. The thing shrieked complaint, and she bent toward it, her jaw clenched. Maati recognized the push and pull of wills between andat and poet. Even before the andat whimpered and went silent, he had no doubt of the outcome.

"You were going to tell the world of what we'd done anyway," Vanjit said. "But you couldn't be sure they would have stopped the Emperor, could you? This way they can't go forward."

"Why didn't you tell Maati-kvo what you were doing?" Eiah asked.

"Because he would have told me not to," Vanjit said, anger in her voice.

"I would have," Maati said. "Yes."

"It isn't fair, Maati-kya," Vanjit said. "It isn't right that they should come here, take our places. They were the killers, not us. They were the ones who brought blades to our cities. Any of the poets could have destroyed Galt at any time, and we never, ever did."

"And that makes it right to crush them now?" Eiah demanded.

"Yes," Vanjit said. There were tears in her eyes.

Eiah tilted her head. Long familiarity told Maati the thoughts that occupied Eiah's mind. This girl, sitting before them both, had been granted the power of a small god by their work. Maati's and Eiah's. The others had helped, but the three of them together in that room carried the decision. And so the weight of its consequences.