by Fonda Lee
Now, he thought after some time, I can plan for death.
CHAPTER
49
Overture to Adamont Capita
The ferry crossing was located in a part of the Docks now under Mountain control. Gont’s Fists and Fingers patrolled the area, on the lookout not only for any counterattack by No Peak, but for thieves and smugglers who might take advantage of the change in territorial oversight to step up their activities. When Maik Wen walked up to the gangplank of the ferry, one of Gont’s Fingers stopped her and asked to see her ticket. “You’re going to Euman, miss?”
“Yes, jen,” Wen said. “My grandmother was born in Shosone.” A small fishing village on the western coast of Euman Island, now a tourist town catering to both Kekonese vacationers and Espenian servicemen. “She wanted to be returned and laid to rest there.” Wen dropped her eyes sadly to the blue funeral urn cradled in her arms. She was dressed in a simple white sweater and a long, white woolen skirt, and her face was brushed with white powder. Her heart was beating slightly faster than usual, but surely it was normal for anyone stopped by an unfamiliar Green Bone from a recently conquering clan to be a little nervous, even if they had nothing to hide. This young man with the jade studs in his ears wouldn’t Perceive anything out of the ordinary.
“Let the gods recognize her.” Looking deeply embarrassed, he handed her ticket back and said, “I’m afraid I must ask you to open the top of the urn.”
Wen sucked in a breath of indignation. “Jen,” she protested.
“There’re many criminals these days,” the Finger said apologetically. “We have to check everyone’s possessions as they board, for weapons and contraband.”
And jade. Euman had many long stretches of unguarded coastline, and most intelligent smugglers would rather risk being caught by the Espenians than by Green Bones. Jade scavenged in a clan war and ferried out of Janloon by boat could find its way to the Tun mainland or the Uwiwa Islands. Wen cast a look of deeply convincing insult at the Mountain Finger but let her gaze drop quickly. She lifted the glazed lid of the vessel and allowed the man to peer inside.
If he touched the urn or took it from her to examine it, all was lost. They would not kill her, not right away. The Mountain would find out who she was and use her against Hilo. Wen thought, I’ll hurl myself into the harbor. Both she and the urn would sink to the bottom.
The young man said, “Go ahead, miss. Forgive my disrespect to you and your grandmother.” He stepped aside to let her board the ferry. Wen replaced the lid of the funeral urn and walked up the gangway onto the boat deck. Her face, resettled in an expectedly solemn expression of filial mourning, betrayed none of her relief, just as her body exuded no jade aura. She saw the Mountain Finger tug his right earlobe as she passed, but it was to ward off any spiritual ill will he might have accrued from examining the remains of the deceased, and not because he knew she was a stone-eye. Wen held the urn closer to her chest. She no longer cared how heavy a stigma of bad luck she carried, not if it shielded her and served a purpose. Her deficiency was like a misshapen object, undesirable and unattractive in isolation, that made perfect sense when set in the right place.
The other people on the boat—commuters, day-trippers, tourists—kept a considerate distance as she took up a seat near the bow. The ferry whistle blew shrilly and the vessel pulled away from the dock. With satisfaction, Wen watched the waterfront recede. She could’ve chartered a private boat instead of risking this ferry crossing, but then there would be a record with the Maik name on it, one that might be examined if she was stopped and searched by a coast guard patrol. This was more anonymous, the personal risk worth the potential gain.
When Wen disembarked at the small harbor on Euman Island an hour and a half later, there was a car waiting for her. Shae had arranged it for her ahead of time. Euman Island, like Little Button, was not part of Janloon proper, but while Little Button was a minor independent municipality, Euman was essentially run by the Espenians. As soon as the car began driving through the small-town streets, Wen saw shops with signs written in two languages, currency exchange booths displaying the current conversion rates between Kekonese dien and Espenian thalirs, shiny foreign chain stores and restaurants, and most conspicuously of all, Espenians on the streets, in and out of uniform.
Wen felt as if she’d arrived in another country, someplace that was a hybrid of Kekon and what she imagined Espenia would be like. Of course, one often saw foreigners on the streets of Janloon these days, but nowhere near as many as there were here. Euman Island held twenty-five thousand Espenian military personnel, a fact that most Kekonese seemed content to ignore so long as they remained ensconced on this rocky and wind-blasted volcanic stump of land. The clans did not control this place, but so close to Janloon, they were far from without influence. The driver of the plain gray sedan that picked Wen up opened the door for her respectfully and did not ask any questions during the drive.
Wen rehearsed what she would say when she arrived. She had not, to her great regret now, learned much of the Espenian language, and as the car drove past airfields and vistas dotted with silos and wind turbines, she spent the quiet minutes rolling the unfamiliar sounds around in her mouth, repeating what Shae had instructed her to say.
“Sir, what is your name?” Wen asked the driver.
The driver glanced over his shoulder at her. “Me? My name is Sedu.” Mr. Sedu was a ruddy man with a short beard and callused fingers. Wen never forgot a name or face, and she filed Sedu away in her memory. According to Shae, the man was the son-in-law of a Luckbringer who worked directly under Hami Tumashon and could be counted on to stay quiet. “What do you do, Mr. Sedu?” Wen asked, giving him a smile warm with true curiosity.
“I’m an electrician,” said the man.
“Is that a good business to be in?”
“Ah, pretty good,” Mr. Sedu said, relaxing somewhat. Wen suspected that when he’d been told to pick up a representative of the clan at the ferry dock and speak of the task to no one, Sedu had imagined he would be driving an intimidatingly high-rank Green Bone such as Hilo or one of Wen’s brothers.
“Do you do a lot of work for the Espenians?”
“Yes, a lot,” Mr. Sedu said. “They have many facilities here and are always needing work done. I have three apprentices now and am looking to bring on a fourth. The Espenians pay well, always on time and in thalirs.”
“You must be very busy. I appreciate you troubling to drive me.”
Mr. Sedu made a dismissive motion, any remaining tension leaving his shoulders. “It’s no trouble. One should always provide a favor when possible. Different foreigners come and go, but the clans will always be here.”
Wen smiled. “Do you speak Espenian well, Mr. Sedu?”
“Enough to get by. Not as well as my daughter. She wants to go study in Espenia, but I wouldn’t trust her to live alone in that country. Espenian men, they do whatever they want, and there are no repercussions.”
“Will you practice a little Espenian with me now, as we drive?”
An hour later, Mr. Sedu’s car pulled up to a gate set in a tall chain-link metal fence topped with security cameras and signed with large, red antitrespassing notices. Behind the gate was a sprawling cluster of low, gray-green buildings. The flag of the Republic of Espenia whipped loudly in the island’s stiff breeze. Mr. Sedu stopped the car before they reached the guard box.
Wen got out and walked the rest of the way, holding the blue cremation urn in front of her. Euman’s relentless wind tugged at her clothes and at the stern knot in which she’d imprisoned her hair. She breathed slowly to keep calm, more fearful now than when she’d faced the Finger back at the ferry dock. From here on in, her success depended entirely on the accurate judgment of Kaul Shae. And while she did not doubt the Weather Man’s intelligence, Wen did not fully trust the Weather Man herself. Hilo’s sister had turned her back on the family and left Kekon before. What was to stop her from doing so again?
Wen had come to
o far now and had no choice but to put her faith in the other woman. She would’ve been even more apprehensive if the Weather Man had not, at least, been honest about her misgivings. “Lan’s ghost will spit on me for this,” Shae had said, with such gloom that Wen had been a little surprised. She had always thought of Kaul Shae as remote, even unfriendly; she suspected Hilo’s sister must be feeling desperate indeed, to confide in her so.
“Lan would do anything to save the family. He would be grateful to you for doing the same,” Wen assured her. The ongoing clan war was already courting the risk of Espenian involvement; this was No Peak’s chance to make a move before the Mountain did.
Shae nodded, resigned. “The Espenians aren’t afraid to fight,” she said, “but if there’s one thing I know about them, it’s that they believe anything they want can be purchased.”
A guard with a pistol holstered at his waist came out of the box as Wen approached. He began to ask her a question, but Wen interrupted, raising her voice so the Espenian words could be clearly heard over the wind. “Colonel Deiller. Please, I speak with Colonel Deiller. I come from Kaul Shaelinsan of the No Peak clan with a message for Colonel Deiller of Espenia.”
Colonel Leland Deiller, the commanding officer of the Republic of Espenia Seaborne Infantry at Euman Naval Base, was enjoying a rare moment of quiet at his desk after a morning spent on the phone. In the nearly four years he’d been in this post, he’d never before seen so much attention trained on the island of Kekon. His superiors in Adamont Capita were focused on containing and deterring the growing threat from Ygutan, so as long as Kekonese jade regularly made its way over the ocean, the top brass was satisfied. That was no longer the case, and Deiller was suddenly getting concerned calls from top generals and even the Secretary of the War Department.
There was a knock at his door. His executive officer, Lt. Colonel Yancey, thrust his angular face into the office. “Sir, I think you need to come see this.”
Yancey filled him in as they walked. “A woman showed up an hour ago. She asked for you by name. Claims she’s an emissary of Kaul Shaelinsan.”
That was a name Deiller had not heard for some time. “Kaul as in the Janloon clan family,” he said. “This woman was sent by the granddaughter?”
“That’s what she says.”
“I thought Kaul Shaelinsan left the country and emigrated to Espenia.”
“Apparently she’s returned.” Yancey stopped outside the door of a small meeting room. “You want me to pull everything we have on her?”
“Do that,” said Deiller. They entered. The woman sitting in the chair was dressed in Kekonese mourning attire and held a stone cremation urn on her lap.
The colonel glanced at his XO questioningly, then back at the unexpected visitor. “I’m Colonel Deiller, the commanding officer here.”
“My name, Maik Wenruxian,” said the woman, in broken but understandable Espenian. “Kaul Shaelinsan of the No Peak clan sends regards.”
Deiller said to Yancey, “Can we get a translator in here?” He turned back to the woman. She would’ve been checked for any weapons and gone through the metal detector to get in here, but nevertheless, his eyes fell suspiciously on the urn she was carrying. “And what exactly do you mean by that, Miss Maik?”
The woman stood up and removed the lid of the ceramic vessel. To the colonel’s utmost surprise, she tipped the contents onto the table. A stream of gray and white ash poured from the mouth of the container. “What in the—” Deiller exclaimed, and then he stared as chunks of green rock tumbled from the urn. They clinked together, landing in a dusty pile on the mound of powder that had concealed them. The woman emptied out the last stones, then set down the urn and gave a small, smug smile at their flabbergasted expressions. “Jade,” she said.
Yancey whistled. “Must be worth a goddamn fortune.”
“Call Gavison in here,” said Deiller. “Tell me if those rocks are real Kekonese jade.”
The translator, Mr. Yut, arrived. His eyes nearly bugged out of his head at the sight of the jade on the table. Deiller said to the woman, “Explain why you have so much jade and how you got it here.” Mr. Yut translated his question.
“As the Kekon Jade Alliance is under investigation for financial irregularities, all mining and export operations have been suspended, including official jade sales to the Republic of Espenia. We appreciate that this is inconvenient.” The woman paused to let the translator catch up, then gestured toward the gemstones spilled on the table. “The No Peak clan has its own stores of jade, and the Weather Man would like to discuss establishing a confidential arrangement that would ease this sudden disruption to the supply.”
Deiller’s eyebrows rose. Disruption was right; ever since clan warfare had erupted in Kekon’s largest city, the military analysts in Adamont Capita had become increasingly concerned that whichever clan prevailed might assume near absolute political power. That could mean existing contracts with the Republic of Espenia being reneged upon or unfavorably renegotiated. Kekon was vital to the ROE’s military and political strength in the region: It hosted several Espenian military bases, was a rapidly growing and modernizing economy with historical hatred of Shotar and Tun, and most importantly, it possessed the only supply of bioenergetic jade on earth. Deiller had already been on several calls with his superiors to discuss the potential for military action to secure the mines on Kekon if things went further south.
“Can you prove you’re a representative of the clan?” Deiller asked.
The woman’s watchful gaze and the white powder on her face made her seem even more coy and aloof than the usual Kekonese female. She inclined her head and said, “Kaul Shae asked me to tell you that the cormorant can still fish.”
At that moment, Dr. Gavison came into the room. He pulled on lead-lined gloves and used metal tongs to pick up one of the green rocks and examine it under a small loupe. He did this with several stones. “Bioenergetic mineral structure, all right,” he declared. “Raw Kekonese jade.”
“Miss Maik,” said Colonel Deiller. “If you’ll please wait here.”
The woman nodded and sat back down. “I wait.”
Seated in his office behind closed doors, Deiller asked, “How did she transport that much unsecured jade? She’s not one of the aborigines.”
“She must be nonreactive,” Dr. Gavison said. “It’s a naturally occurring but uncommon genetic trait. The Kekonese call them stone-eyes.”
Yancey handed a file folder to the colonel. “I pulled what we have on Kaul Shaelinsan. She graduated from Belforte Business School in Windton last spring. Not only is she back in Janloon, she became second-in-command of the clan when her eldest brother was assassinated a couple of months ago.”
Deiller flipped through the pages in the file. There were records and photos of Kaul Shaelinsan from five years ago. As a local informant to the ROE, she’d done a few impressive and useful things for the Espenian military, provided information that would’ve been difficult or impossible to garner otherwise. Deiller had crossed paths with her only once, but he recalled her as an alarming individual, a young woman wearing more jade than a whole navy special ops team. It had made him wonder if the ROE couldn’t recruit more of these killers to their side.
“Sir, did you notice her code name? Cormorant.’”
“The cormorant can still fish,” Deiller said, repeating the emissary’s words. He recalled now that Kaul’s work for them had caused some commotion at the time; orders had come swiftly from diplomatic higher-ups to terminate her status as a human intelligence asset. That wasn’t to say ties couldn’t be renewed if circumstances had changed. “What of this Maik woman? Do we know anything about her?”
“Nothing,” said Yancey. “Except that she has the same family name as two of the top clan members. The Maik brothers are considered the closest advisors and strongmen of the second Kaul son, who’s now the leader of the clan. If she’s telling the truth, she’s probably a sister or a cousin.”
“She’s go
t to be high up in a Janloon clan to have access to that kind of jade,” said Gavison. “That’s not stuff that gets smuggled by criminals—that’s high-quality, near flawless, bioenergetic Kekonese jade, one of the most valuable substances in the world. The amount she poured out of that urn is probably worth a couple hundred million dien, twenty or thirty million thalirs.”
“How much jade are we losing out on every month with this government suspension?” Yancey wondered. “What’s the long-term risk to the supply?”
Deiller frowned and turned to his executive officer. “Make sure Miss Maik is comfortable and that jade is secured. I don’t want this getting out, so have a talk with Mr. Yut as well. I need to make a call to General Saker in AC.”
CHAPTER
50
The Green Brotherhood
The severed head of Lott Penshugon was delivered to the Kaul estate in a vegetable crate. Hilo’s howls of rage rang through the courtyard. No one, not even Shae, dared to try to comfort him. It was the third of his Fists who’d been ambushed, murdered, and beheaded in the past three weeks. Lott Pen had not been a pleasant man in life, but Hilo counted him as one of the clan’s most tireless and fearsome lieutenants, a man who, with the right word of encouragement, would do anything Hilo asked of him without question.
The loss of each good Fist—Lott, Niku, and Trin most recently, but also Goun, Obu, Mitto, Asei, Ronu, and Satto—felt to Hilo like a personal wound delivered by Gont Asch directly. The methodical bastard was bleeding out No Peak, killing each of Hilo’s men before he came to Hilo himself.
