As the Shadow Rises: Book Two of The Age of Darkness

by Katy Rose Pool

  Before I could do more than consider running down into the yard to ask, her carriers moved off, making space for more palanquins and the emperor’s horse, which meant it wouldn’t be long until we were called to step into our carriage for another interminable day on the road. Tanaka would grumble. Edo would try to entertain him. And I would get so bored of them both I counted every mile.

  Tanaka had not yet left his room, so when the gong sounded, I went to tap on his door. No answer came through the taut paper panes and I leant in closer. “Tana?”

  My heart sped at the silence.

  “Tana?”

  I slid the door. In the centre of the shadowy room, Tanaka and Edo lay sprawled upon their mats, their covers twisted and their hands reaching across the channel toward one another. But they were not alone. A grey-clad figure crouched at my brother’s head. A blade hovered. Small. Sharp. Easy to conceal. Air punched from my lungs in a silent cry as I realised I had come too late. I could have been carrying fifty daggers and it would have made no difference.

  But the blade did not move. Didn’t even tremble. The assassin looked right at me and from the hoarse depths of my first fear my cry rose to an audible scream. Yet still he just sat there, as all along the passage doors slid and footsteps came running. Tanaka woke with a start, and only then did the assassin lunge for the window. I darted forward, but my foot caught on Tanaka’s leg as he tried to rise. Shutters clattered. Sunlight streamed in. Voices followed; every servant in the building suddenly seemed to be crammed into the doorway, along with half a dozen imperial guards shoving their way through.

  “Your Highnesses, is everything all right?” the first demanded.

  Sharp eyes hunted the room. One sneered as he looked me up and down. Another rolled his eyes. None of them had seen the man, or none of them had wanted to. Edo pushed himself into a sitting position with his arms wrapped around his legs, while Tanaka was still blinking blearily.

  “Yes, we’re fine,” I said, drawing myself up and trying for disdain. “I stepped on a sharp reed in the matting is all. Go back about your work. We cannot leave His Majesty waiting.”

  “I hate being cooped up in this carriage; another day on the road will kill me more surely than any assassin,” Tanaka said, stretching his foot onto the unoccupied seat beside me. “I hope His Majesty pushes through to Koi today. It’s all right for him, getting to ride the whole way in the open air.”

  “Well, when you are emperor you can choose to ride wherever you go,” I said. “You can be sure I will.”

  Tanaka folded his arms. “When? I wish I shared your confidence. This morning proves that His Majesty still wants me dead, and an emperor who wants me dead isn’t likely to name me his heir.”

  It had been almost two years since the last attempt on either of our lives, and this morning’s assassin had shaken me more than I dared admit. The way forward had seemed clear, the plan simple—the Chiltaens were even pressing for an announcement. I had been so sure we had found a way to force His Majesty’s hand, and yet . . .

  Across from me, the look Edo gifted Tanaka could have melted ice, but when it was returned, they were my cheeks that reddened. Such a look of complete understanding and acceptance, of true affection. Another day on the road might kill me too, if it was really possible to die of a broken heart like the ladies in the poems.

  Edo caught me looking and smiled, only half the smile he kept for Tanaka. Edo had the classical Kisian features of the finest sculpture, but it was not his nose or his cheekbones or his long-lashed eyes that made the maids fight over who would bring his washing water; it was the kind way he thanked them for every service as though he were not the eldest son of Kisia’s most powerful duke.

  I looked out the window rather than risk inspiring his apologetic smile, for however imperceptive Tanaka could be, Edo was not.

  “His Majesty will name Grace Bachita his heir at the ceremony,” Tanaka went on, scowling at his own sandal. “And make Sichi marry him instead. Not that Manshin will approve. He and Cousin Bachi have hated each other ever since Emperor Kin gave Manshin command of the army.”

  Edo hushed him, his expressive grimace the closest he ever came to treasonous words. He knew too well the danger. Like Sichi, he had come to court as a child and was called a guest, a member of the imperial household, to be envied such was the honour. The word hostage never passed any smiling courtier’s lips.

  Outside, four imperial guards rode alongside our carriage as they always did, rotating shifts at every stop. Sweat shone on the face of the closest, yet he maintained the faint smile I had rarely seen him without. “Captain Lassel is out there,” I said, the words ending all conversation more surely than Edo’s silent warning ever could.

  In a moment, Tanaka was at my shoulder, peering out through the latticework. Captain Lassel could not know we were watching him, yet his ever-present little smirk made him appear conscious of it and I hated him all the more. The same smile had adorned his lips when he apologised for having let an assassin make it into my rooms on his watch. Three years had done nothing to lessen my distrust.

  Tanaka shifted to the other window and, looking over Edo’s shoulder, said, “Kia and Torono are on this side.”

  The newest and youngest members of the Imperial Guard, only sworn in the season before. “Small comfort,” I said.

  “I think Kia is loyal to Mama. Not sure about Torono.”

  Again Edo hushed him, and I went on staring at the proud figure of Captain Lassel upon his horse. He had found me standing over the assassin’s body, one arm covered in blood from a wound slashed into my elbow. At fourteen I had been fully grown, yet with all the awkwardness and ill-assurance of a child, it had been impossible to hold back my tears. He had sent for my maid and removed the body and I had thanked him with a sob. The anger had come later.

  The carriage began to slow. The captain rose in his stirrups, yet from the window I could see nothing but the advance procession of His Majesty’s court. All horses and carriages and palanquins, flags and banners and silk.

  “Why are we slowing?” Tanaka was still peering out the opposite window. “Don’t tell me we’re stopping for the night—it’s only mid- afternoon.”

  “We can’t be,” Edo said. “There are no inns within three miles of Shami Fields. He’s probably stopping to give thanks to the gods.”

  Removed as we were from the front of His Majesty’s cavalcade, I had not realised where we were until Edo spoke, but even as the words left his lips, the first kanashimi blossoms came into view, their pale petals spreading from the roadside like sprinkled snow. A flower for every soldier who had died fighting for the last Otako emperor. Though more than thirty years had passed since Emperor Tianto Otako had been captured here and executed for treason, it was still a fearful sight, a reminder of what Emperor Kin Ts’ai was capable of—an emperor whose name we carried, but whose blood we did not.

  Mama had whispered the truth into my ear as a child, and with new eyes I had seen the locked gates and the guards, the crowd of servants and tutors, and the lack of companions for what they were. Pretty prison bars.

  The assassins hadn’t been coming for Miko Ts’ai at all. They had been coming for Miko Otako.

  “Shit, Miko, look,” Tanaka said from the other side of the carriage. “Who is that? There are people in the fields. They’re carrying white flags.”

  “There’s one over here too,” I said, pressing my cheek against the sun-warmed lattice. “No, two. Three! With prayer boards. And is that . . . ?”

  The carriage slowed still more and Captain Lassel manoeuvred his horse up the line and out of view. When the carriage at last drew to a halt, I pushed open the door, stepping out before any of our guards could object. Ignoring their advice that I remain inside, I wound my way through the halted cavalcade, between mounted guards and luggage carts, hovering servants and palanquins bearing ladies too busy fanning themselves and complaining of the oppressive heat to even note my passing.

  “Your Hig
hnesses!” someone called out behind me, and I turned to see Tanaka had followed, the gold threads of his robe glinting beneath the high sun. “Your Highnesses, I must beseech you to—”

  “Some of those men are carrying the Otako flag,” Tanaka said, jogging to draw level with me, all good humour leached from his expression.

  “I know.”

  “Slow,” he whispered as we drew near the front, and catching my hand, he squeezed it, gifting an instant of reassurance before he let go. I slowed my pace. Everywhere courtiers and councillors craned their necks to get a better view.

  Some of the men blocking the road were dressed in the simple uniform of common soldiers, others the short woollen robes and pants of farmers and village folk. A few wore bright colours and finer weaves, but for the most part it was a sea of brown and blue and dirt. Their white flags fluttered from the ends of long work poles, and many of them carried prayer boards, some small, others large and covered in long lines of painted script.

  Upon his dark horse, His Imperial Majesty Emperor Kin Ts’ai sat watching the scene from some twenty paces away, letting a black-robed servant talk to the apparent leader of the blockade. The emperor was conversing with one of his councillors and Father Okomi, the court priest. They might have stopped to rest their horses, so little interest did they show in the proceedings, but behind His Majesty, his personal guards sat tense and watchful in their saddles.

  In the middle of the road, Mama’s palanquin sat like a jewelled box, her carriers having set it down to wipe their sweaty faces and rest their arms. As we drew close, her hand appeared between the curtains, its gesture a silent order to go no farther.

  “But what is—?”

  I pressed my foot upon Tanaka’s and his mouth snapped shut. Too many watching eyes. Too many listening ears. Perhaps it had been foolish to leave the carriage, and yet to sit there and do nothing, to go unseen when His Majesty was mere days from announcing his heir . . . It was easy to get rid of people the empire had forgotten.

  Only the snap and flutter of banners split the tense silence. A few guards shifted their feet. Servants set down their loads. And upon his horse, General Ryoji of the Imperial Guard made his way toward us, grim and tense.

  “Your Highnesses,” he said, disapproval in every line of his aging face. “Might I suggest you return to your carriage for safety. We do not yet know what these people want.”

  “For that very reason I will remain with my mother, General,” Tanaka said, earning a reluctant nod. “Who are these people?”

  “Soldiers. Farmers. Small landholders. A few very brave Otako loyalists who feel they have nothing to fear expressing such ideas here. Nothing you need worry about, my prince.”

  My prince. It wasn’t a common turn of phrase, but we had long ago learnt to listen for such things, to hear the messages hidden in everyday words. Tanaka nodded his understanding but stayed his ground, tall and lean and confident and drawing every eye.

  “General?” A guard ran toward us. “General Ryoji, His Majesty demands you order these delinquent soldiers and their company out of his way immediately.”

  Ryoji did not stay to utter further warning but turned his horse about, and as he trotted toward the head of the procession, I followed. “Miko,” Tanaka hissed. “We should stay here with—”

  “Walk with me,” I said, returning to grip his hand and pull him along. “Let’s be seen like heirs to the Crimson Throne would be seen at such a time.”

  His weight dragged as Mother called a warning from behind her curtains, but I refused to be afraid and pulled him with me.

  Ahead of our cavalcade, General Ryoji had dismounted to stand before the protestors on equal ground. “As the commander of the Imperial Guard, I must request that you remove yourselves from our path and make your grievances known through the proper channels,” he said. “As peaceful as your protest is, continued obstruction of the emperor’s roads will be seen as an act of treason.”

  “Proper channels? You mean complain to the southern bastards who have been given all our commands about the southern bastards who have been given all our commands?” shouted a soldier near the front to a chorus of muttered agreement. “Or the southern administrators who have taken all the government positions?” More muttering, louder now as the rest of the blockade raised an angry cheer. “Or the Chiltaen raiders who charge into our towns and villages and burn our fields and our houses and murder our children while the border battalions do nothing?”

  No sense of self-preservation could have stopped a man so consumed by anger, and he stepped forward, pointing a gnarled finger at his emperor. Emperor Kin broke off his conversation with Father Okomi and stared at the man as he railed on. “You would let the north be destroyed. You would see us all trampled into the dust because we once stood behind the Otako banner. You would—”

  “General,” His Majesty said, not raising his voice, and yet no one could mistake his words. “I would continue on my way now. Remove them.”

  I stared at him sitting there so calmly upon his grand horse, and the anger at his attempt on Tanaka’s life flared hot. He would as easily do away with these protestors because they inconvenienced him with their truth.

  Slipping free from Tanaka, I advanced into the open space between the travelling court and the angry blockade to stand at General Ryoji’s side.

  “No blood need be shed,” I said, lifting my voice. “His Majesty has come north to renew his oath and hear your grievances, and if they are all indeed as you say, then by the dictates of duty something will be done to fix them. As a representative of both the Otako family through my mother’s blood and the Ts’ai through my father’s, I thank you for your loyalty and service to Kisia but must ask you to step aside now that your emperor may pass. The gods’ representative cannot make wise decisions from the side of a road.”

  Tense laughter rattled through the watchers. They had lowered their prayer boards and stood shoulder to shoulder, commoners and soldiers together watching me with hungry eyes. Their leader licked his lips, looking to General Ryoji and then to Tanaka as my twin joined me. “You ask us this as a representative of your two families,” the man said, speaking now to my brother rather than to me. “You would promise us fairness as a representative of your two families. But do you speak as His Majesty’s heir?”

  General Ryoji hissed. Someone behind me gasped. The man in the road stood stiff and proud in the wake of his bold question, but his gaze darted about, assessing risks in the manner of an old soldier.

  “Your faith in me does me great honour,” Tanaka said. “I hope one day to be able to stand before you as your heir, and as your emperor, but that is the gods’ decision to make, not mine.” He spread his arms. “If you want your voices heard, then raise your prayer boards and beseech them. I would walk with you in your troubles. I would fight your battles. I would love and care for all. If the gods, in their infinite wisdom, deem me worthy, I would be humbled to serve you all to the best of my ability.”

  His name rose upon a cheer, and I tried not to resent the ease with which he won their love as the crowd pressed forward, reaching out to touch him as though he were already a god. He looked like one, his tall figure garbed in gold as the people crowded in around him, some bowing to touch his feet and to thank him while others lifted their prayer boards to the sky.

  We had been careful, had spoken no treason, yet the more the gathered crowd cried their love for their prince the more dangerous the scene became, and I lifted shaking hands. “Your love for my brother is overwhelming,” I said to the noise of their prayers and their cheers. “But you must now disperse. Ask them to step aside, Tana, please.”

  “Isn’t this what you wanted?” he whispered. “To let His Majesty see what he ought to do?”

  “He has already seen enough. Please, ask them to disperse. Now.”

  “For you, dear sister.”

  “Listen now.” He too lifted his arms, and where the crowd had ignored me, they descended into awed silence for h
im. “It is time to step aside now and make way for His Imperial Majesty, representative of the gods and the great shoulders upon which Kisia—”

  While Tanaka spoke, I looked around to see the emperor’s reaction, but a dark spot in the blue sky caught my eye. An arrow arced toward us, slicing through the air like a diving hawk.

  “Watch out!”

  Someone screamed. The crowd pushed and shoved in panic and Tanaka and I were trapped in the press of bodies. No guards. No shields. And my hands were empty. There was nothing I could—

  Refusing the call of death, I snatched the first thing that came to hand—a prayer board from a screaming protestor—and thrust it up over our heads. The arrowhead splintered the wood. My arms buckled, but still vibrating, the arrow stuck. For a few long seconds, my ragged breath was all the sound left in the sultry afternoon.

  “They attacked our prince under a flag of peace!”

  The shout came from behind us, and the leader of the blockade lifted his arms as though in surrender. “We didn’t! We wouldn’t! We only ask that His Majesty name his heir and—”

  An arrow pierced his throat, throwing him back into the men behind him, men who lifted their prayer boards and their white flags, begging to be heard, but imperial guards advanced, swords drawn. One slashed the throat of a kneeling man, another cut down someone trying to run. A few of the protesting soldiers had swords and knives, but most were common folk who had come unarmed.

  “Stop. Stop!” Tanaka shouted as blood sprayed from the neck of the closest man. “If I do not—”

  “Back to your carriage!” General Ryoji gripped Tanaka’s arm. “Get out of here, now.”

  “But they did not—”

  “No, but you did.”

  I followed as he dragged Tanaka away from the chaos and back to the cavalcade to be met with silent stares. Mama’s hand had retreated back inside her curtained palanquin, but His Majesty watched us pass. Our eyes met. He said not a word and made no gesture, but for an instant before doubt set in, I was sure he had smiled, a grim little smile of respect. Wishful thinking. No more.