Ah. Now I knew where she was heading. And it apparently wasn't Alimat, if she had anything to do with it. "This is why you're crying?"

Color stained her face. "Because it's beautiful, yes. Because it offers us everything we could want. Because it gives us a future different from anything we've known, something we can build together, starting over again."

Carefully I noted, "That's what I'd planned to do at Alimat."

"In the sun. In the heat. In the sand. Where, if there's water, it's always warm. Where I have to paint my horse's eyes and hang tassels off his browband so he doesn't go blind."

"Hey, that was your idea! I told you to get another horse, remember?"

"He's got the softest walk I've ever ridden. Probably softer than any you've ridden, you with that stubborn, nasty-tempered, jug-headed demon—"

"Now, let's not get personal about my horse!"

"—who'd just as soon throw you as carry you a yard—"

"All right!" My hand was in the air, silencing her. "We've established that your gelding has a better walk than my horse. Go on."

Del glared. "Because for the first time in more years than I can remember, I can let down all my walls. I thought I had forgotten how. My song is sung, Tiger. I found my brother and lost him again. I avenged my family by killing Ajani. I've proven to you I can dance with all the skill and honor of male sword-dancers—"

"With more skill and honor."

"—and defeat them as well." She was as fierce in her focus as I had ever heard her. "I have accomplished all that I set out to do, that day along the border when Ajani and his men killed my family, abducted my brother, and raped me. And I have given up a daughter, killed my an-kaidin, blooded—and broken—my jivatma, and have been exiled forever from my homeland." Her tone was sere as desert sand. "You asked me once what kind of man I dreamed of finding, and I told you I had stopped thinking of that the day Ajani came. I gave up all my dreams, all my hopes, all my humanity to become the weapon needed to kill Ajani. I even made a pact with the gods to keep me from conceiving again, so another child would not delay my plans as Kalle did." Her face was stark with pain. "So I would not have to give yet another child up."

"Del—"

"Two things, two things only, existed in my life: finding my brother and finding Ajani. I did both. My song is ended."

"Del—"

"And I was crying because this place is so beautiful it hurts my heart and because I know you won't want to stay here because there's Alimat, always Alimat—" She broke it off, drew a tight, rasping breath, began again. "And I even understand that because it's your song, your goal, your need, the way making myself into a weapon was mine. I understand it, and I hate it. I hate the sun and the sand and the heat, and the men who refuse to see a woman's true worth is in being something other than a vessel to bear babies and keep houses—" Now the tone was angry. "—and I hate it that you made yourself an outcast for my sake, breaking all your oaths and sentencing yourself to death by declaring elaii-ali-ma in front of all the others and Abbu Bensir—"

I raised a hand. "Del—"

Her voice tightened. "—and I hate it that you don't want children, because I'm going to have one and you'll want to leave."

Standing there suspended in disbelief, I discovered that once again I lacked the ability to find words, any words at all that began to address the situation in a calm, rational, sensible manner. Or, for that matter, that even approached coherency.

"And I hate it because I want this one to have a mother and a father of its blood—" She was running out of breath and intensity. "—and to keep it, to keep it, instead of giving it away as I gave away Kalle, to be a mother, a true mother, even though I know you'll want no part of this child or this life."

Empty of everything save sluggish shock and a wish to end a pain I could not begin to comprehend—and thus would lessen by any attempt—I walked away from her on unsteady legs and stood at the stream's edge, staring into rushing water. Lost myself in the sound, the tumult, the motion that required no words, no decisions, no compromises.

The cantina stool was getting harder all the time.

I squatted, leaned, scooped up and drank water. Sluiced it over my face and through my hair. Considered falling face-first into the stream and drowning myself, just so I never had to find myself yet again so utterly, completely, incoherently stunned.

Too much. All of it, too much. And Del knew it. Expected my reaction. Because I had told her what I'd told everyone: no children for me.

Go? Oh no. I had sworn oaths to Del, though she was unaware. And these I would not break.

And then I thought, I'll be dead in twelve years.

I would never see the child as an adult, like Neesha. Another good-looking, smart kid with a head on his shoulders—or a girl with all the glorious beauty and strength of her mother.

But twelve years, ten years, were better than none.

It seemed, after all, there was no decision to make. No reluctance to forcibly sublimate. There was merely comprehension– and a little fear.

Then I remembered the dream. Me, alone, as everyone I knew—and some I didn't—walked away from me. That is what my life could be like. Me, refusing to accept responsibility for my own actions. Even for my children. And deserted because of it.

I'd survived hoolies all alone among the Salset. I wouldn't– couldn't—do it again.

I pressed myself up from the ground and went to Del. I cradled her jaw, smoothed back her hair, kissed her on the forehead, then took her into my arms.

Her body was stiff, her voice tight and bitter. "And here I was prodding Neesha to tell you his secret, when I've been keeping my own."

Into her ear I said, "I think I'd have figured it out one of these days even if you never said anything."

She pulled back. Walked away from me. Stood staring at something I couldn't see and probably never would. Her tone was oddly detached. "Don't worry, I don't expect you to stay."

It hurt. Badly. But I had done it to her. Had done it to myself.

She turned. The angles of her cheekbones were sharp as glass. Her eyes were ice. "I will not force a man to stay who has no wish to. I have been alone in much of what I've done since my family died; I can be alone in this."

I drew in a shaking breath that filled my head with light. "Well, it's not an entirely new idea, this being a father. I've had all of, oh, about a day to adjust to the idea of Neesha being mine."

Her tone was scathing. "Neesha is not a child."

"But it's a start. I mean, you're not going to drop this kid tonight or tomorrow." I paused. "When is it due?"

"Around six months from now."

I shrugged off-handedly, keeping it light. It was what she was accustomed to. "I figure if I can get used to having Neesha around, I can get used to a baby."

Del was not in the mood to be amused. "Babies are considerably more trouble than a twenty-three year-old man."

"Bascha …" I wanted to go to her, to take her into my arms once again. But I had learned to read her over the years, and that was not what she wished me to do. So I stayed where I was and told her the truth. "I knew when I stepped out of Sabra's circle and declared elaii-ali-ma that the life I'd known was over. I knew when Sahdri chopped off my fingers that the life I'd known was over. There on that island, with you lying next to me in the sand, I decided to build a school and become a shodo. Whether it's here or at Alimat isn't important; what matters is that I'd already made the decision to stick in one spot. Knowing there's to be a baby doesn't alter that." I paused. "Though I confess I'm not exactly sure how this has happened, since you made that pact with the gods. But then, I don't have much to do with gods—except when I curse—so what do I know?"