“I don’t want to believe he intended all that,” said Tai, gripping his wine cup.
The problem, the real problem, was that he did see it as possible. He had been thinking that way himself through that terrible day. And the thoughts had not left him since.
He looked at the two Kanlins. He drew a breath and said, quietly, “You are right. But that is one of the reasons I’m not going north. I accept that what you say may be true. I even accept that those are deeds men must do at court, in power, if they are to guide the empire, especially in wartime. But it is … I do not accept it for my own life.”
“I know that,” said Song, in a quieter voice. “But if you are to pull away, to remain safe and not under suspicion, you need to bring him the horses first and be seen to bow, wearing the ring he gave you. The emperor has to see you are not hiding from him. Hear you petition for leave to go. Decide he trusts you.”
“She is right, my lord,” said Lu Chen.
“Master Sima would agree with me,” Song repeated.
Tai glared at her. “Master Sima has never in his life held any position at—”
“I know,” she interrupted, though gently. “But he would still agree with me. Shen Tai, take the horses north, then beg him to let you go home as your reward.”
“And if he refuses?”
She bit her lip. Looked young again, suddenly.
“I don’t know. But I know I’m right,” she said defiantly.
HE HAD CALLED for a writing table, paper and ink, brushes, lamps for his room.
The storm had passed. His window faced south, which meant good fortune; his was the best room, at the end of the long hallway upstairs. He’d pushed the shutters back. The air was sweet and mild, the heat broken by the rain. Tai heard the sound of water dripping from the projecting eaves. The sun was almost down when he began writing.
It was a difficult letter. He started with a full salutation, impeccably formal, summoning everything he’d learned about this while studying for the examinations. First missive to a new emperor, explaining why he was not coming back as instructed. Because his small Kanlin guard wasn’t the only defiant person at this inn.
He employed every imperial title he could remember. He used his most careful calligraphy. This was a letter that could decide his life.
Because of that, he even invoked Li-Mei, thanking the imperial family, the Ninth Dynasty, for the great honour done his father’s only daughter. Of course, that expression of gratitude was also a reminder that the Shen family was linked to the dynasty, and could surely be considered loyal.
He didn’t mention his brother. Liu had died honourably, bravely, but it was wisest not to raise any connection to Wen Zhou.
He did hint, also obliquely, that his mother and his father’s much-loved concubine were living alone with only a still-maturing young son in the household, and had been doing so for a long time.
He mentioned that he himself had not yet seen his honourable father’s headstone and the inscription on that stone. Had not been able to kneel before it, or pour his ancestral libation. He’d been at Kuala Nor. Sardian horses were coming to the emperor because of that, had already arrived, if Shinzu was reading this letter.
All but ten of the Heavenly Horses (he was keeping ten, because he had people to honour and reward for their help) were humbly offered by Shen Tai to the exalted Emperor Shinzu, to use as the Son of Heaven and his advisers saw fit. It was a matter of great pride to the glorious emperor’s most unworthy servant, Shen Tai, son of Shen Gao, that he could assist Kitai in this way. He used all of his father’s offices and titles at that point in the letter.
He wrote of his own devotion to the Ninth Dynasty and to the emperor himself, since he who now held the Phoenix Throne (and would rise like the phoenix from the ashes of war!) had helped Tai himself, deigning to intercede one day at Ma-wai, and another time in the palace, against the murderous intrigues of a man whose disgraced name Tai would not even write.
He’d thought about that part for some time, as the night darkened outside, but it was surely right to make it clear that Wen Zhou had wanted Tai dead.
He hesitated again, sipping wine, reading over what he’d written, then he mentioned the rings the august and illustrious emperor and father-emperor, may the gods in all nine heavens defend them and grant them peace, had each given the unworthy but devoted Shen Tai, by their own hands.
He was looking at that part, and wondering about it, if it could possibly be read as a thought that the father, not the son, should be on the throne, when he heard the door to the room open.
He didn’t turn around, remained on the mat before the writing table, facing the open window. There was a breeze, and stars now, but the three lamps lit the room too much for them to be clearly seen.
“If I were someone who wanted you dead, you would be by now,” she said.
Tai laid down his brush. “That was one of the first things you ever said to me, at Iron Gate.”
“I remember,” she said. “How did you know it was me?”
He shook his head impatiently, looking out. “Who else would it be?”
“Really? Not an assassin from Tagur, perhaps? Trying at the last minute to stop their horses from crossing the border?”
“I have Kanlin guards,” Tai said. “He wouldn’t have gotten near this room. I recognized your footfall, Song. I do know it by now.”
“Oh,” she said.
“I thought I barred the door this time.”
“You did. This is an old inn. The wood shifts, too much space between door and wall. A sword can be used to lift the bar.”
He was still looking out the window. “Shouldn’t I have heard it?”
“Probably,” she said, “though someone trained can do it quietly. This is why you need guards.”
He was tired, but also amused. “Really? Why would an assassin bother with me? I am apparently of no use to anyone, in wartime.”
She was silent a moment. “I was angry. I didn’t mean that.”
“It is true, however. Once the emperor has the horses.”
“I don’t … I don’t think it is true, myself. I was trying to be persuasive.”
Her footfall, moving into the room.
A moment later one of the lamps was blown out. The one closest to him, illuminating his writing table. And because she’d come nearer he caught the scent of perfume. She never wore perfume.
He turned.
She had already crossed to the second lamp. She bent and blew that one out as well, leaving only the one by the bed. She turned to him.
“I’m still trying to be persuasive,” Wei Song said, and let her tunic slip from her shoulders to the floor.
Tai stood up quickly. He looked away a moment, then his eyes were pulled back to her. The lithe form. She had a long, shallow gash across the ribs on one side. He knew how she’d received that wound.
“Please forgive my shyness with the lights,” she murmured.
“Shyness?” Tai managed to say.
The single lamp beside her lit one breast more than the other, and the left side of her face. Slowly, she lifted both her hands and began unpinning her hair.
“Song, what … this is to persuade me to go north? You do not have to—”
“It isn’t,” she said, hands lifted, exposing her body to his gaze. “That wasn’t true, about persuading. It just sounded like a clever thing to say. A pleasure district remark? They are clever there, I know. And beautiful.”
She set one long pin on the table by the bed, and then removed and set down another, moving slowly, the light falling upon her. “This is a goodbye,” she said. “We may not meet again, since you will not come north.”
Tai was mesmerized by her movements. She had killed for him, he had seen her do it at Chenyao, in a garden. She was barefoot now, wore only thin Kanlin trousers, nothing down to the waist.
The last hairpin slipped free and she shook out her hair.
“Goodbye?” Tai said. “You were hire
d for ten years! You are mine until then!” He was trying to be ironic.
“Only if we live,” she said. She looked away, he saw her bite her lip. “I am willing to be yours,” she said.
“What are you saying?”
She looked back at him, and did not answer. But her wide-set eyes were on his, unwavering, and he thought, yet again, of how much courage she had.
And then, for the second time that day, Tai realized that within himself something had already happened, perhaps some time ago, and that he was only, in this lamplit, after-thunder moment, coming to know it. He shook his head in wonder.
“I can leave now,” she said, “and be gone before morning, to collect the horses.”
“No. I have to be there, remember?” Tai said. He drew a breath. “I don’t want you to leave, Song.”
She looked young, small, almost unbearably exposed.
He said, a roughness in his voice, “I don’t want you ever to leave.”
She looked away again, suddenly. He saw her draw a breath this time, then let it out slowly. She said, “Do you mean that? It isn’t because I have been so … because I did this?”
“I have seen women unclothed before, Song.”
She looked up. “I know. And I am thin, and have this new wound, which will be another scar. And one more on my leg, and I know I am insufficiently respectful and—”
She wasn’t very far away at all. He moved forward and put a hand, gently, over her mouth. Then he took it away and kissed her, also gently, that first time. Then he did so again, differently.
He looked down at her, in the one light left burning. Eyes on his, she said, “I am not greatly experienced in these matters.”
SOME TIME LATER. Her left leg across his body where they lay in the bed, her head against his shoulder, hair spread out. The lamp had been extinguished some time ago. The rain had stopped dripping from the eaves. They could see moonlight, hear a night bird singing.
Tai said, “Not greatly experienced?”
He felt more than he saw her smile. “I was told men like hearing that from a woman. That it makes them feel powerful.”
“Is that what it does?”
“So I was told.” One of her hands was playing at his chest, drifting down towards his belly then back up. “You were on Stone Drum Mountain, Tai. You ought to remember what happens there at night. Or did none of the women …?”
“I don’t think I’m going to answer that.”
“Not yet, perhaps,” she murmured.
The moon laid a trail of light along the floor of the room.
“You seem to always be coming into my chamber,” he said.
“Well, once I was saving you from a fox-woman, remember?”
“She wasn’t a fox-woman.”
“She was a trap. Extremely pretty.”
“Extremely,” he agreed.
She sniffed. “Even if it wasn’t a daiji, Sima Zian and I agreed you were not in a state to resist her that night, and bedding a governor’s daughter would have put you in a very difficult position.”
“I see,” Tai said carefully. “You and the poet agreed on this?”
“We did. They wanted you in a difficult position, of course. Xu Bihai was after the horses.”
“You don’t think she might simply have fallen in love with me?”
“I suppose there’s that possibility,” said Song. Her tone suggested otherwise.
“She was very pretty,” Tai said.
Song said nothing.
“So are you,” he said.
“Ah. That will surely make me fall in love.” She laughed again. “I’d have attacked you if you’d come into my room on the road.”
“I believe that.”
“I wouldn’t do that now,” she said, mock-contrite.
His turn to laugh. “I am pleased to hear it.” After a moment, he said, “Song, I wanted you on the first night at Iron Gate, when you came in.”
“I know,” she said. He felt her shrug. He knew that motion by now. “I didn’t feel flattered. You’d been alone two years. Any woman …”
“No. It was you. I think from when you walked up in the courtyard.”
“My hair was down,” she said. “Men are very predictable.”
“Are we? Am I?”
A silence. “Not you so much.”
They listened to the bird outside.
“I’ll come north,” he said.
She shook her head emphatically. “No. You’ve made that decision, Tai, bad luck to start a journey after that. Finish your letter. We will take it with us. We have decided that your sister and the fact that Zhou tried to kill you should keep you safe. With the horses.”
“You have decided that?”
“Yes, Lu Chen and I.”
“And what if I decide—?”
“Tai, you already did. It was an honourable choice. I was only afraid.”
“And now I’ll be afraid for you. There is a war, you’re going a long way.”
She laughed softly. “I’m a Kanlin Warrior, riding among sixty others. That is one fear you need not sensibly have.”
“When is fear sensible?”
Her hand stopped moving, lay against his chest.
“And after?” he asked. “After you reach the emperor?”
She hesitated. “There is one thing I need to do.”
He lay there remembering: We wish to kill two of them later. It must be done.
He squeezed her arm. “Song, if you kill those two yourself, and anyone links you to me—”
“I know,” she murmured. “That isn’t it. Those two from the Second District army are likely dead already. They shamed us, and our sanctuary will not permit that. I think the emperor knows it. I don’t think he will be unhappy. That is not what I meant.”
“Then what …?”
“I have to ask leave to withdraw from the Kanlins. I must do it at my own sanctuary.”
He said nothing. He was deeply moved.
She misunderstood his silence. “I ask for nothing, Tai. If this is only tonight, I am—”
He placed a hand over her mouth again. “You have to come back, Song. I need you to show me another way to live.”
“I have only been a Kanlin,” she said, as he moved his hand away.
“Might we teach each other?”
He felt her nodding her head. “But I don’t believe the world will let you stay by that stream all your days.”
“It might not. But I do not want to be lost in the dust and noise. To be what Liu became. In the Ta-Ming.”
“If they even reclaim the Ta-Ming.”
“Yes.”
“Do you … do you think they will?”
Tai lay in darkness, thinking about it.
“Yes. It may take time, but the new emperor is wiser than Roshan, and I think Roshan will die soon. This is not the end of the Ninth Dynasty.”
“There will be changes.”
He ran a hand through her hair: the unimaginable gift of his being able to do so. “This is a change, Song.”
“I see. You prefer me this way? Obedient and submissive?” Her hand began moving again.
“Submissive? Is that like the inexperience, before?”
“I have much to learn,” she murmured. “I know it.” And she lifted her head from his shoulder and slipped down towards where her hand had gone.
A little later, Tai managed, with some effort, to say, “Did they teach you that on Stone Drum Mountain?”
“No,” she said, from farther down the bed. And then, in a different voice, “But I’m not a concubine, Tai.”
“Hardly,” he murmured.
He felt her head lift. “What does that mean? I lack the skills you are accustomed to?”
“You could possibly acquire them,” he said judiciously. “With effort and time enough to—”
He made a sharp, strangled sound.
“I didn’t hear that last,” she murmured sweetly.
He made an effort to compose himself. “O
h, Song. Will I survive a life with you?”
“If you are more cautious about what you say,” she said, sounding meditative, “I see no reason why not. But I’m not a concubine, Shen Tai.”
“I said I know that,” he protested. “Before you bit me.”
He cleared his throat. He felt amazingly sure of himself. Sure of the world, or this small part of it.
He said, “It would be a great honour if, Mistress Wei Song, before you took my horses north, I were permitted to learn your father’s name, and your mother’s, and the location of their home, that my mother might correspond with them as to possibilities for the future.”
She stopped moving. He had a sense she was biting her lower lip.
She said, “Your servant would be pleased if your honourable mother were willing to initiate such a correspondence.”
Which formality, given where she was just then, and what she now resumed doing, was remarkable.
He reached down and drew her up (she was so small), and laid her upon her back, and shifted above her. She began, shortly thereafter, making small sounds, and then more urgent ones, and then, some time after, with the bird still singing outside, she said, halfway between a gasp and a cry, “Did you learn that in the North District?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Good,” she said. “I like it.”
And twisting her body the way he’d seen her do springing up a wall in Chenyao or fighting assassins alone with two swords, she was above him again. Her mouth found his, and she did something with her teeth that made him realize, suddenly, that it hadn’t been any fox-woman he’d been dreaming about so vividly those nights on the road from Chenyao. It had been her.
The strangeness of the world.
There was a brightness growing within him, vivid as the first spring flower against snow, and a sense that this was all deeply undeserved, that he was not worthy of such a gift.
There was also now—and Tai would not let himself turn away from it—a farewell taking place inside himself, a painful one: to green eyes and golden hair, music, and her own courage.
You were surely allowed to remember these things? It would be wrong not to remember, Tai thought.
Branching paths. The turning of days and seasons and years. Life offered you love sometimes, sorrow often. If you were very fortunate, true friendship. Sometimes war came.
Under Heaven Page 55
