A Betrayal in Winter (lpq-2) by Daniel Abraham Page A

Perhaps he had
    ambitions even then."
     
    He was a boy, and angry, Maati thought. He had beaten Tahi-kvo and
    Milah-kvo on his own terms. He'd refused their honors. Of course he
    didn't accept disgrace.
     
    The utkhaiem high enough to express an opinion nodded among themselves
    as if a decision made in heat by a boy not yet twelve might explain a
    murder two decades later. Maati let it pass.
     
    "I met him again in Saraykeht," Maati said. "I had gone there to study
    under Heshai-kvo and the andat Removing-the-Part-ThatContinues. Otah-kvo
    was living under an assumed name at the time, working as a laborer on
    the docks."
     
    "And you recognized him?"
     
    "I did," Maati said.
     
    "And yet you did not denounce him?" The old man's voice wasn't angry.
    Maati had expected anger. Outrage, perhaps. What he heard instead was
    gentler and more penetrating. When he looked up, the redrimmed eyes were
    very much like Otah-kvo's. Even if he had not known before, those eyes
    would have told him that this man was Otah's father. He wondered briefly
    what his own father's eyes had looked like and whether his resembled
    them, then forced his mind back to the matter at hand.
     
    "I did not, most high. I regarded him as my teacher, and ... and I
    wished to understand the choices he had made. We became friends for a
    time. Before the death of the poet took me from the city."
     
    "And do you call him your teacher still? You call him Otah-kvo. That is
    a title for a teacher, is it not?"
     
    Maati blushed. He hadn't realized until then that he was doing it.
     
    "An old habit, most high. I was sixteen when I last saw Otah-cha. I'm
    thirty now. It has been almost half my life since I have spoken with
    him. I think of him as a person I once knew who told me some things I
    found of use at the time," Maati said, and sensing that the falsehood of
    those words might be clear, he continued with some that were more nearly
    true. "My loyalty is to the Dai-kvo."
     
    "That is good," the Khai Machi said. "Tell me, then. How will you
    conduct this examination of my city?"
     
    "I am here to study the library of Machi," Maati said. "I will spend my
    mornings there, most high. After midday and in the evenings I will move
    through the city. I think ... I think that if Otah-kvo is here it will
    not be difficult to find him."
     
    The gray, thin lips smiled. Maati thought there was condescension in
    them. Perhaps even pity. He felt a blush rise in his cheeks, but kept
    his face still. He knew how he must appear to the Khai's weary eyes, but
    he would not flinch and confirm the man's worst suspicions. He swallowed
    once to loosen his throat.
     
    "You have great faith in yourself," the Khai Machi said. "You come to my
    city for the first time. You know nothing of its streets and tunnels,
    little of its history, and you say that finding my missing son will be
    easy for you."
     
    "Rather, most high, I will make it easy for him to find me."
     
    It might have been his imagination-he knew from experience that he was
    prone to see his own fears and hopes in other people instead of what was
    truly there-but Maati thought there might have been a flicker of
    approval on the old man's face.
     
    "You will report to me," the Khai said. "When you find him, you will
    come to me before anyone else, and I will send word to the Dai-kvo."
     
    "As you command, most high," Maati lied. He had said that his loyalty
    lay with the Dal-hvo, but there was no advantage he could see to
    explaining all that meant here and now.
     
    The meeting continued for a short time. The Khai seemed as exhausted by
    it as Maati himself was. Afterward, a servant girl led him to his
    apartments within the palaces. Night was already falling as he closed
    the door, truly alone for the first time in weeks. The journey from his
    home in the Dai-kvo's village wasn't the half-season's trek he would
    have had from Saraykeht, but it was enough, and Maati didn't enjoy the
    constant companionship of strangers