The Bloody Throne, page 26
“No, my dour companion. We will change our names.” Dao nuzzled at the side of his neck, a warm spot sweet as kouri. “I will be Cao Zhien, you will be Hamori Baiyua.”
Hui’s shoulders sagged. He rubbed at his face, telling himself it was only the smoke, and Dao exhaled softly, his own tension slackening for a few moments.
“Or,” he continued finally, “you may be Takari Hui, and I will be Takari Dao, and we shall sell our services to lords who do not deserve such fine defense. Or you may choose a name, I care not.”
“I should name you for Murong Cao’s faithful steed.”
“Ai, my love calls me a donkey.” The joke was only partly salacious; Dao laughed softly and shivers slid like silk down Hui’s spine. “Come help me pack.”
“Dao.” Hui caught his husband’s wrists, unwilling to relinquish the closeness just yet. “I would not… if you chose to return to Khir, I would not hold it against you. Your clan—”
“As far as they know, I am dead. They will miss the sword, but should we leave our host, who is to say whether we survived the fall of Shan’s capital or not? We will be free, Hui. Is not that a thing to long for?”
It was, and yet Hui could not halt the objections, like a maiden denying a suitor she did, after all, desperately want. “I do not wish you to regret it.”
“I regret I did not meet you sooner, that is all.” Dao rocked back upon his heels, drawing Hui away from the tent flap. “Come. The earlier we are rid of these barbarians, the better.”
“You only wish to enjoy yourself upon a saddle instead of a pile of skins.” He let himself be drawn, for the suspicious prickling in his eyes had turned to a deep loosening behind his heart. His liver, still cautious, had not quite properly seated itself.
Dao laughed; he was of a much merrier temper than his husband. “Not to mention a proper bed, once we reach a place these beasts have not fouled. And is there anything wrong with that, I ask?”
Well, tomorrow Dao could change his mind, and Hui would accept the pain then. For now, he seemed sure, and it was enough. “No,” he answered, and let himself be coaxed farther into the smoke-haze to finish their preparations. “Nothing wrong at all.”
MIDMORNING MEAL
Early upon a fine bright summer morning, the Second Mother’s part of the Kaeje was full of well-ordered bustle. Haesara was at a low, exquisitely carved desk of hau-tree wood, traditional for writing letters in the hope that a hau’s graceful fluidity would be imparted to a writer’s brush. Her hair was piled high upon her head and her morning-robe was slightly disheveled, but neither mattered to her eldest son, who was consuming a very fine cup or two of smoky eong tea while he read a treatise upon certain mechanical innovations in harnessing the power of streams and other flowing water. Eong was far too strong for a morning drink, but he preferred it to cut the dust in the dry season, so his mother made certain to have it to hand on those frequent occasions her eldest visited for breakfast.
By long-standing habit, neither of them spoke. The quality of their silence was such that it provided all the commonplace polite observations others might have made on a fine morning—the weather, the night’s rest, if one had eaten recently. The first midmorning meal, light as both preferred, would be brought in a short while and neither would speak, again, until it was halfway consumed.
Then the day could begin.
Makar poured himself a fresh ration, not needing to glance at table, pot, or cup to perform such a familiar operation. The cargo of hot, fragrant liquid was arrested halfway to his mouth and he cocked his head, his topknot-cage of stiffened leather incised with the character for abundance well secured by a pin of darkened bone. He would change his dark scholar’s robe for something more fitting later in the day while attending a council meeting with the new Emperor and chief ministers, but at the moment he wore what pleased him.
Raised voices, hurrying feet. Makar set the treatise aside, watching his mother’s steady writing, the brush held just so, her profile one of serene concentration. It was pleasant to see her working without a care, and he hoped it would continue until the partition opened.
When it did, revealing the long horse-face of his mother’s faithful steward Nehu, he was ready.
“My lord Fourth Prince.” Nehu was upon his knees, the traditional posture from which a servant delivered bad news. It was strange to see him so; he was very conscious of his high position in comparison to other household dependents. “There is a letter from the peerless Emperor of Zhaon. The Golden bringing it—”
So soon? Well, he had lost his temper the other day on the training ground; it was too much to hope for that Kurin would see that another son of Garan Tamuron might have a right to a measure of his own pride. “I see. Mother, will you pardon me for a moment? This needs attending.”
His mother had half-turned upon her cushion. A fat ink-drop depended from the tip of her brush, and she paled with alarming rapidity, the color draining from her beautiful coppery cheeks, only needing the lightest dusting of zhu to achieve the most pleasing effect.
She lifted her chin slightly. “Bring the Golden to us, Nehu. I would hear what the lord Emperor intends for my son.”
Nehu, knowing finality when he heard it in his mistress’s voice despite her son’s ruling of the Hanweo clan, bowed again and pulled the partition shut. There was more hurrying, and excited murmurs.
“I would spare you this,” Makar said quietly.
“I shall be spared nothing.” She remembered her brush and laid it aside, frowning at an unsightly blot upon what had no doubt been a well-constructed letter. “Is it Sensheo, do you think?”
“I may have embarrassed Kurin the other day.” He took care to make his hand steady upon the cup, his tone even and unconcerned. “You have little need to worry, Mother. I have made arrangements for your safety.”
“What good are they, if my son is not safe?” She set to arranging the paper, inkstone, and brush to rights, stacked neatly or set aside so her entire attention could be given to another task. Her quality of serene precision had been his early guide, and he was grateful for it now, too, though she was still very pale.
“He cannot afford to kill me just yet.” A humorless smile touched Makar’s rather thin lips. He did not bear the round face that was a mark of handsomeness, and his nose was too large—but he was certainly striking, or so his mother had often told him. “And if it is some mischief of Sensheo’s…” He did not complete the sentence; she would not agree that perhaps his little brother might need a salutary, if fatal, lesson upon his own lack of discretion and talent.
A mother loved all her children, filial or otherwise. A brother could do no less than care for his junior so far as fate would allow. “Hush,” she said, a quite unnecessary precaution, for he could hear the steps in the hall.
The partition opened, and Nehu bowed the Golden in. Bright-armored but bootless, the man had taken some time to remove his footwear—which boded well. But the missive in his hands was bright scarlet, borne before him with reverence as an Emperor’s official wishes should always be.
For a moment Makar’s humors turned cool and loose, pooling in his belly. The physical body was a timid beast when lashed by worry; a sage was supposed to master such irrelevancies by living fully now. The Awakened One had many lessons upon the matter, but Makar preferred Hurong Dhun and his observation that fear was quite natural, and the attempt not to feel it caused more irritation than simply noting its effects as if they belonged to some other person’s baggage.
He rose as custom demanded, performing a deep bow to the letter clutched and held aloft—the poor soldier’s arms must be aching by now. All the same, Garan Makar could not forego a minor show of pride.
Again. “What beneficence,” he observed. “My brother the Emperor has sent a missive. What does Heaven intend?”
Haesara, as a dowager queen, did not need to rise, but she arranged herself in an attitude of profound reverence while Makar bowed again, broke the seal ceremonially, and deliberately did not dismiss the Golden. Let his show of obedience be spread and gossiped about, it would only advance his cause.
And it seemed Garan Makar would have a cause, sooner rather than later.
Kurin’s brushwork was fine indeed, though not as strong as his father’s, and not as vigorously clear as some of the scholars among Makar’s clients. The Fourth Prince scanned the letter twice, his head-meat working furiously but his outer self composed, an eyebrow rising slightly as the chessboard took on a different configuration inside his skull.
Oh, my elder brother. You think yourself very clever indeed.
It was a command to take the generalship of Zhaon’s Southron Army, to meet the Tabrak in battle, and to destroy them.
Which was not quite what Makar had hoped. But it could be turned to advantage indeed. “The Emperor speaks,” he intoned. “And his brother obeys. Pray tarry for a while and accept a cup of tea, my Golden friend, while I brush a reply.”
His mother did not make a sound. What it cost her to wait to find out, Makar did not like to think—but he hoped she trusted him enough to keep her peace. Sensheo would not have, of course.
But Sensheo was not here, and Makar was, in very unbrotherly fashion, glad of that fact.
She could not eat much in this terrible heat, but Yala did enjoy midmorning tea. There was double-strained broth with walanir greens floating upon its broad yellow back, too, and that was most agreeable. Best of all, her new husband was largely taciturn until he had finished his own morning repast, which suited her own preferences perfectly. Of course, had he been a morning singer, as the proverb went, she would have accommodated with conversation.
But it was… pleasant, to pour his tea and attend to her own while watching the small gemlike garden of this new house, just beginning to recover from a certain measure of neglect, blink sleepily under thick golden sunlight. The pond had been attended to, and a new babu water-clock chopped equal fragments of time with indefatigable punctiliousness.
Takshin selected a piece of aiju, offering it balanced upon his eating-sticks with a quick, delicate motion; she shook her head. The musky melons were not her favorite, though sometimes after an evening meal they were pleasant enough. He nodded, understanding, and returned to his own breakfast.
Yala took another sip of tea, her smallest finger held just so. “I have invited Sixth Prince Jin to dinner,” she said softly, watching for any hint of irritation.
Takshin simply nodded again, staring at the garden. The kyeogra in his left ear gleamed, bright and burnished; a wind whispered through yeoyan saplings in broad ceramic pots, arranged to give pleasant lacy shade. Sometimes, when he relaxed into thoughtfulness, there was an intimation of what he would have looked like without the scars.
“Third Mother is still grieving,” she prompted, and that gained her a single dark glance, his brow furrowing.
“Over Sabi? She always was a brat.” But the shadow that crossed his face was pained instead of displeased, and he exhaled sharply, setting his eating-sticks aside. “I am not able to bring those barbarians to account for her just yet. I worry for Kiron, too.”
The king of Shan. Of course, Takshin felt much affection for his adoptive-brother. As much as Kai felt for his adoptive-mother—though Yala should not be thinking of Zhaon’s great general. So she schooled her expression and took another sip. Plain golden tea from Arun-An to the north, a blessing upon such a hot morning. The dust crawled into one’s nose, dried one’s mouth, and quite possibly settled in one’s joints too. “I believe her worries lie in a different direction.”
“And well they might,” Takshin muttered. “Don’t worry, little lure. Kurin is easily managed, and has other affairs which need tending at the moment. Or is it that woman she fears?”
Well, at least he was not unaware, nor did he chide her for discussing something close to politics at breakfast. Still, it was thought-provoking, especially the fact that he rarely said my mother. Only that woman, and his scarred lip twisted each time. “There are many dangers at court.”
“I see they have already made you a shield. Or have you been prodding about, trying to discover who ordered a princess’s fate?” His lip twisted again, but not with ill humor. All his attention had settled upon her now. Some would no doubt quail under such a weight, but Yala was beginning to believe she had his measure, now. “I would not trouble you with such matters at breakfast, Lady Spyling.”
“Nor would I trouble you, my husband.” She settled her teacup, holding her sleeve—pale yellow silk, a very fine morning-robe—well aside. “It seems the way of Zhaon wives to be troublesome, though.”
“I look forward to it.” The slight curve to the unscarred half of his mouth was true amusement. “Who else has requested your patronage, little lure?”
“None as of yet.” Yala was faintly surprised he would ask so directly, but then again, such seemed his nature. “Second Mother has shown me every kindness, Lady Gonwa as well. It will make matters easier.”
“Hm.” He glanced at his eating-sticks as if he could not remember laying them aside, their tips upon a small fish-shaped dish meant expressly for such a duty, and reached for his teacup without needing to glance at where it rested. “Your merchant friend Narikh. What do you know of him?”
Her heart lunged inside her ribs, and she was glad she was not engaged upon the act of swallowing tea. “He was the son of a nobleman,” she said, carefully. “And he rendered much aid during the Crown Prince… the Emperor’s…” For a moment she could not remember the proper address.
Takshin saved her the trouble in a very husbandly way, forging ahead. “The merchant is gone now, but he left traces. Yala, have you considered…” He paused, and she was for a single vertiginous instant certain the Khir emissaries and Daoyan had been caught. “Have you considered,” he began again, “that there may have been those in the North who did not wish your princess to live?”
Had she heard him correctly? Yala’s hand twitched; her fingertips wanted to rise and touch her mouth. She denied the movement. “But my princess brought peace,” she managed, blankly. “And none would dare…” After all, Mahara was the daughter of the Great Rider. It would be akin to blasphemy for a Khir to even attempt such a thing.
“Your friend Narikh had at least three bolt-holes in the Khir quarter. Probably more, though there is little use in looking for them now. None who met him believed him a mere merchant and more than one noted his martial skill, though he sought to hide it. He made no transactions save the buying of a few baubles, no doubt to pique your interest. And he was seen with at least two impresarios—you are familiar with the term?” When she shook her head, he continued. “It means a theater-manager, but it also means those who arrange for certain walkers of the Shadowed Path to find rich clients who cannot risk their reputations, and vice versa. Your friend Narikh was very busy among them.”
He kept mispronouncing the clan name of Ashani Daoyan’s mother, which was quite natural for a Zhaon, but she could not find the strength to correct him. How close was he to guessing Daoyan’s true name? And yet, impresarios. The word took on an ominous cast.
Did she truly believe Dao had come all the way from Khir just for a single noblewoman? Was he attempting to save his sister, hunting from behind, and thus had to spend time among such theater-managers? Why would he not tell Yala as much, then, after Mahara’s misfortune?
Her fingers were cold. So were her toes, which was odd. It was such a warm morning.
“He was not the only one.” Takshin was eyeing her rather closely. “While I do not know who exactly bought my Eldest Brother’s death, I am fairly certain your princess was prey for a Northern hunter, little lure.”
It cannot be so. “You… there is no doubt?” She sounded breathless even to herself.
“Not much, I am afraid. I suspected that woman of the deed in order to avoid an heir, but I think it unlikely she would plan so far ahead. She merely lashes out at the closest helpless thing, rather like the Mad Queen.” One of his broad shoulders twitched. Now Yala knew all that lay under the black Shan tunics he always wore, and the map of scars across his muscled torso was enough to make her ashamed she had not, in the secret chambers of her liver, wished to marry him.
No wonder he was bitter. He had suffered much, including a whip-scar gained from protecting Yala herself, and such treatment made for an acrid stew indeed. The only wonder was that he was not actively cruel.
“So.” Takshin regarded her steadily. Was there pity in his dark gaze? It did not seem possible. “The two impresarios Narikhi was seen with are currently guests of the Night Watch captain in the Khir quarter, as a personal favor to me, and being put energetically to the question. Sooner or later they will mention if the merchant was part of the plot, but one thing is clear: A Khir noble paid for the death. Possibly upon Zlorih’s orders, though I cannot be sure of that part.”
“But… her father. He is her father.” Everything within Yala revolted at the thought. The Great Rider was a terrifying figure; Mahara had confided he was sometimes given to banging upon the table at dinner when displeased, too. The very thought of that august man’s anger had certainly made young Yala quail, and there was no shame in such trepidation since even a minister or head of a clan might well feel it too. “To do such a thing…”
“Perhaps they wish another war. Perhaps an heir to both countries was not to be desired on that side of the border, either. Khir has no wish to be ruled by Zhaon.” His expression changed, and Yala realized her own face must be speaking rather loudly at the moment. “I am sorry, little lure. It is unwelcome news, no matter who is to blame. And I am rather glad the fellow is gone, for it is probable you were his next target.”
Ridiculous. Dao would never… She could not even complete a thought, the news was so unexpected. “You are certain?” she persisted.
“I am certain of little under Heaven, Yala. But in this particular matter…” He halted, and his expression softened as he regarded her. Precious few would believe him capable of this much tenderness, and she was surprised each time by its advent. “I am sorry.”
