Imperial Lady (Central Asia Series Book 1)

by Andre Norton

  He looked up at her, laughing as a child does when it sees a bright toy. Before Silver Snow thought, she greeted him in the tongue that her father and his men had taught her, and he all but jumped in amazement.

  Nearby him, his face somewhat averted as if he participated in this ceremony only with the greatest reluctance, was a man of the Hsiung-nu, whose sable-trimmed robes marked him out as one of importance, perhaps even a prince. Hearing his own uncouth speech in the mouth of a Ch’in lady, he glanced up, jolted out of his rigid stance of attention. Then his eyes glazed the way they do when a man looks at a horse, but decides that he does not wish to buy it. Quickly he looked away and, once again, became like a statue, and not a breathing man.

  So these were Hsiung-nu, she thought. They were hardly the brutes about which the ladies of the Inner Courts had terrified themselves into frenzies. Take away their ornaments and their furs, dress them in a soldier’s worn garb, and they would look remarkably like her father’s guardsmen.

  But the Son of Heaven was speaking; it was not for the likes of her to fall into daydreams just at the moment for which she had waited. The very thought brought a blush to her face.

  “What exquisite modesty,” mused the Emperor. “It is a woman’s greatest ornament. Look up, daughter.”

  To disobey the express word of the Son of Heaven was treason or worse. Having no choice, Silver Snow looked up and, in the next instant, shrank back as the Emperor gasped.

  “Again, it is my lady, my lost favorite!”

  To Silver Snow’s amazement and the muttered horror of the court, the Son of Heaven did not use the “we” of propriety, and he spoke to her as if the two of them were the only people in the splendid, crowded room.

  “Child, you have my dear lady’s look, her walk, her very aspect!” the Emperor told Silver Snow. In that instant, the distinctions between Emperor and woman fell; they were left facing one another, a grieving man and the woman whom he had grievously injured.

  “Why did no one tell me?” demanded the Son of Heaven.

  He had spoken to no one in particular; no one, therefore, would dare to take upon himself the responsibility of framing an answer: no one, save for Silver Snow.

  “Most dreaded Son of Heaven,” said Silver Snow, “this one begs your forgiveness for the insolence, but she suggests most humbly that you ask Mao Yen-shou.”

  As she spoke, her voice rose from the die-away murmur in which she had been drilled to a strong, echoing voice. From the corner of her eye, she saw the Hsiung-nu turn, drawn by the power in her voice. One of them, the most richly dressed except for the hostage, set his lips and glowered in what Silver Snow realized was approval.

  “Rest assured: that we shall do,” said the Emperor. Once again, his words and voice were those of the Son of Heaven, not the scholar so ill-suited for the Dragon Throne. “But before we bring Mao Yen-shou before us, lady, I ask it again. I ask it. How was I not told that you are the image of my dear, lost lady?”

  “Most Sacred Majesty,” began Silver Snow, but the Emperor held up a hand.

  “No,” he said, his voice so soft and warm that Silver Snow knew that he spoke through her to a familiar, most beloved ghost. “Would she call me that? Speak, my dear child, and do not fear.”

  Silver Snow sank once again on her knees, grateful for the cool solidity of the floor. She had come to the irrevocable choice now: lie to the Emperor, which was almost blasphemy; or denounce the very powerful master of the Inner Courts, which might be deadly. As much as any battlefield might be, this was death country, and she had no choice but to attack.

  The knowledge restored her courage and her composure. “Mao Yen-shou did not wish for you to see me,” she spoke calmly, as if she discussed history with Li Ling. “When I came to court, Majesty . . . ” he held up a hand, but he was smiling.

  “When I arrived, the Administrator . . . suggested that your favor might lie in his hands and brush, which could be inspired by a suitable gift. But I had no gifts . . . save one; and that gift was reserved for you.”

  The Son of Heaven smiled at her, a smile that seemed to inquire where that gift was and to reassure her that she herself was the finest gift that he could ask.

  “Most Sacred, I mean, my lord, my father’s lands are poor; we have lived desolate for years under the affliction of your disfavor. Even the dowry that I brought to Ch’ang-an was more than my father might easily spare, but he provided that with a willing, obedient heart. And he provided more besides.

  “My lord, our house had one great, remaining treasure—two suits of jade armor worthy, despite our own unworthiness to possess such treasures, for an Emperor and his First Lady to be buried in. These he entrusted to me, and he commanded me that, should I win your favor, the . . .” She was scarlet, as if she had dipped her hand in scalding water. “ . . . first night . . .” Silver Snow shook her head, and finished quickly. “He told me to give them to you as a token of his obedience.”

  A commotion, quickly stifled at the door, told her that Mao Yen-shou had sought to leave the hall and been restrained.

  “The girl lies!” he cried, and his finely trained, high voice rang out to the rafters.

  “Do I?” demanded Silver Snow, who turned so that she could see both him and the Emperor whose face had darkened with anger. Disheveled by his struggle for escape, he seemed fatter and less formidable than the man who had terrorized a tired girl from the North who had a father and a maidservant to protect. “Then call this a lie too: you took the jade armor and, when I protested, you showed me old teeth that you had dropped into the chest that held them. And you said that if I protested, you would accuse me of grave-robbing, and bring my father’s house to less than naught!”

  She turned back to the Emperor. “I beg you,” she cried, “seek for that armor and then judge between us as we deserve. This one is wretched, weak, and would rather die than live longer in the icy shadow of your displeasure.”

  The Emperor waved, and footsteps backed down the hall, headed, no doubt, for wherever Mao Yen-shou sequestered his greatest treasures. Only then did Silver Snow have time to invent fears for herself. What if Mao Yen-shou had sold or broken up the armor? He could not have sold it; for who would buy such a treasure? And its worth lay not so much in the jade or the gold but in its workmanship and antiquity; thus, he would not have broken it up, either. The guards would have to find it.

  Even though her reason told her clearly that that was the truth, her teeth chattered, and she wanted very much to weep with fear. Yet, this was death country, and she had laid her plans, launched her attack, and, like a general—like her father himself—she must abide by the wisdom of her battle plan, whether it brought her to victory or to disaster.

  She heard footsteps echoing toward the hall. The guards must be returning! She refused to look at them, concentrating instead on the sounds about her. How slow, how labored were their steps! Surely, they walked as if they bore something heavy . . . something like two suits of jade armor?

  How she hoped so!

  The guards strode up the hall, dropped what they bore on the floor, and bowed abjectly. Now Silver Snow forced herself to look at what they bore: she knew those chests! From them Mao Yen-shou had lifted the jade armors and claimed them for his own.

  The Son of Heaven gestured impatiently. Well, his agitated hand motion revealed, open, open them.

  The peaceful, mellow green of fine jade and the splendor of gold winked out of the chest at them.

  “I trusted you!” the Son of Heaven shouted at Mao Yen-shou, who prostrated himself, his face on the floor. “I trusted you, and you painted me this lie of a likeness, this slander of a portrait of a lady worthy to be Illustrious Companion. Had you not treasure enough already? Was I not a generous master?”

  Mao Yen-shou’s face went so red that Silver Snow feared, for a single, unselfish moment, that he might collapse right then and there. Almost, she could pity him. His mouth opened and closed; the folds of flesh at his throat, enclosed by the high
collar of his rich silk robe, shook, but no words came out.

  “Take him away.” The Emperor waved his hand, his voice bored. “I want his head to adorn the western gate by sundown.”

  This time, Mao Yen-shou did find voice enough only for a sharp, wordless cry of protest before the guardsmen dragged him past his former companions (who drew their robes aside from the contamination that he now represented with a rapid hiss of satin) and out toward his death.

  For a moment everyone in the hall stood transfixed, staring at the door. Then the eyes flickered back to Silver Snow.

  “This one begs the Son of Heaven to accept her father’s worthless gift for the sake of the love and loyalty that he has borne the Son of Heaven all of his life.” There! The words, the ones that she had journeyed all the way to Ch’ang-an to say, were finally out.

  The Son of Heaven rose from the Dragon Throne to the accompaniment of gasps of amazement. Slowly, deliberately, he walked over to the jade armor and ran one finely kept hand over the smooth, cool jade.

  “We accept the gift,” he announced. “And we thank Chao Kuang, whom we restore to all of his old titles and honors. Once again, let him be marquis and general. The scribes shall record it, and an edict shall be sent to Chao Kuang.”

  Silver Snow laid her brow against the cool floor so quickly that the kingfisher feathers fluttered in her hair and the pearls rang against one another. Tears heated her eyes, and what felt like a knife transfixed her at the center of her chest; but she did not care.

  If I die in the next moment, she told herself, I have lived long enough. I have my victory, and, my father, you have your honor back.

  To her astonishment, a gentle hand touched her hair.

  “Rise, lady,” whispered the Emperor. “I have my burial armor, it seems. But, who is the lady to wear its companion through forever? You, perhaps?”

  “Dread Emperor,” whispered Silver Snow, “I am pledged to the shan-yu. What am I beside the sanctity of your word?”

  The Emperor gestured to the Hsiung-nu party. Not at all to Silver Snow’s surprise, the young, richly dressed barbarian strode up, bowing tardily and with an awkwardness that was astounding, considering that the young man must have spent his entire life in the saddle. He was muscular, stocky, though not as portly as a Ch’in prince would be, and about as tall as the Son of Heaven himself.

  “Prince Vughturoi,” called the Son of Heaven, and his voice was very crisp. “Let us discuss the bargain that we have made. This is not the princess whom we promised to your father. Another lady will be provided as a bride. Will you and your companions accept that lady?”

  The young Hsiung-nu ambassador jerked his head at Emperor Yuan Ti, then turned back to his fellow ambassadors and the shamans who stood in attendance on them.

  The eldest of them stepped forward.

  “Emperor,” he said bluntly, “we will not.”

  CHAPTER 11

  “We are well content with this lady as a bride for our shan-yu” said the old barbarian. “She is very fair, and our kam-quams, those who speak to spirits, tell us that she is most auspicious.”

  “I cannot let her go,” the Emperor whispered, more to himself than either to Silver Snow or to the Hsiung-nu. “My lost lady . . . the rustle of a skirt as she walks down the hall. I have lost this lady, dreamed her, and found her. Shall I see her for the first time, only to lose her again?”

  The Hsiung-nu muttered among themselves, and the crowds of courtiers and ladies in the hall parted, as if they expected the Hsiung-nu to draw bows in that very instant. Such ripples and eddies in the groups enabled Silver Snow to see Li Ling for the first time since she had entered the hall. To her astonishment (and no little horror), he winked at her.

  Then she turned her attention back upon the Hsiung-nu. She could understand, however haltingly, their speech.

  “He seeks to take this lady from us and give us some lesser woman, perhaps with a squint or a mole,” said the man called Vughturoi. “Yet we are not prisoners in this city of stone tents. Shall we permit it?”

  “Indeed not,” said the eldest of the ambassadors. “Surely if this is the lady promised to the sban-yu, it is an auspicious sign. Behold her beauty: were the Emperor of the Middle Kingdom not afraid of us, or did he not favor us above all others, would he part with such a treasure to buy peace at our hands?”

  Vughturoi snorted something about gilded birds and the impossibility of keeping a peace treaty, given . . . But he was immediately hushed.

  Silver Snow found herself looking once again at Li Ling, who had edged adroitly into a position where the Emperor was certain to see him and demand his counsel. He raised a brow at her. Do you wish to stay? he seemed to ask.

  If she did not want to leave Ch’ang-an, she might well stay; stay and adorn the Inner Courts as the most illustrious of Illustrious Companions in centuries, perhaps, with a palace full of women to fawn upon her. She could avenge every slight ever dealt her; she could beg to bring her father to court, enrich him, favor Li Ling . . .

  Or she could be true to her birth and her upbringing, and could keep her word, which lay in the Emperor’s promise to send her to the frontier. She had the example of her father, who kept faith during the ten years of his exile among the very Hsiung-nu to whom she would be dispatched, and thereafter, when he was condemned as a traitor. She had the example of Li Ling, who continued to serve, though he lost reputation, family, and manhood thereby, but who served because he had vowed to do no other.

  Before her stood the Son of Heaven himself, a quiet, moody man who seemed to want her to remain with him. Silver Snow thought that she had made her last throw, but now she saw that yet another throw remained in the game.

  She considered it. What if she remained? What would happen to the peace that the Son of Heaven and these Hsiung-nu had just forged? It would be shattered, of course. How long would any such agreement with barbarians last? That was a question she knew that she had to ask. But if she went out to the plains, perhaps it might last for years.

  They are not barbarians! she remembered her father’s words.

  Well then, what of the men of Ch’in? How long might she expect the Son of Heaven’s favor to last, especially were she to become the cause of a war? He was shifting, changeable, unlike the Hsiung-nu who now confronted him.

  “Let us give you another princess, and we will offer you more gold, more jade and silk . . . ” The eagerness in the Son of Heaven’s voice cut deeply.

  “Offer us another princess,” said the Hsiung-nu, “and we shall offer you war!”

  The Emperor turned to her, the look of a man whom fate had driven to his limits. “What would you, lady?” he asked, and it was almost pleading.

  “This one begs His Most Sacred Majesty to consider the health of the Middle Kingdom, which is our Mother,” she whispered. Tears gushed into her eyes, as she spoke to condemn herself to exile. “This one is nothing beside that.”

  “We will give you her weight in gold and pearls!” cried the Son of Heaven, and desperation quivered in his voice.

  The Hsiung-nu folded arms across their chests and did not bother to speak. Slowly, the Son of Heaven sank back onto the Dragon Throne. He gestured halfheartedly, and Li Ling was at his side, whispering as the Hsiung-nu grumbled among themselves. Silver Snow knew that the eunuch was trying to convince the Emperor that no woman was worth a war.

  “But how will she live out there, among barbarians?” She heard the question, not of an Emperor, but of an anguished man who wished to accord her a protection that she had never known before. She did not know whether to laugh or to rage. Having the right to do neither in the Emperor’s presence, she kept her face expressionless as Li Ling assured the Son of Heaven of her strength, her vitality, her knowledge of the language and some customs of the Hsiung-nu.

  “I had forgotten,” came the Son of Heaven’s words, pitched just loudly enough that she could hear them. “This lady speaks the tongue of the Hsiung-nu, and writes, do you say? She writes to h
er father?”

  Li Ling bowed his assent.

  “Then, she shall write you too, and I shall read those letters; that much, at the very least, I shall have of her!” the Son of Heaven concluded. “I shall read her letters to her father, and his to her. Thus let it be done,” commanded the Emperor.

  Li Ling bowed and left the hall. Silver Snow stood alone, facing the Son of Heaven, terribly conscious of the Hsiung-nu who still observed her as if she were a horse that, after spirited bargaining, they had contrived to buy. Or to steal. The old man bowed and left the hall, and the Emperor Yuan Ti assured the Hsiung-nu that Silver Snow could leave whenever they were prepared.

  “The lady,” the young man called Vughturoi gave her title a small, wry stress, “must travel rapidly and with a minimum of companions. She may have her own traveling carriage and a donkey. If she proves able to ride, we may also provide her with a horse.”

  For a moment Silver Snow knew anger and embarrassment: did these Hsiung-nu think that she was such a paltry creature that they would not sully the back of one of their horses to carry her? Or did they simply think that she was soft? Despising them, she decided at that moment, could harm her; she must win their respect. Thus, when the information was relayed to her, she nodded.

  “I will need no companions beside Willow,” she said. “I came to Ch’ang-an with her, and I will not be parted from her now. That way, I shall require no court ladies, which, I am certain, will reassure all of them.”

  She could imagine Lilac accompanying her on this journey, and her ears ached with even the thought of that much weeping and whining.

  “That is as well,” said Vughturoi. “The grasslands in winter are no place for sheltered ladies.” Silver Snow did not think that she had imagined the disdain in his voice for such soft, frail creatures. “I shall send riders ahead to summon wives and daughters of our horde to greet and serve the princess.”

  Vughturoi raised his head and kept his eyes fixed on a point behind Silver Snow’s shoulder. For the first time Silver Snow quailed inwardly as she wondered what those wives and daughters would make of her. Would they be kinswomen of the shan-yu, forced to yield precedence to a woman of the Middle Kingdom, which had been their enemy for as long as they could remember? For that matter, what of this guide of hers, this Vughturoi? He was said to be a son of the old man who would be—she suppressed a shiver—her husband. Was his mother still alive? What would such a woman do, if the shan-yu required her to call a young woman of Ch’in “elder sister”?