by T. A. Miles
“I believe past pause was to establish a pattern in defense against the statement I have just submitted,” Xu Liang said.
“That Han Quan is guilty of treachery?” Song Da-Xiao asked, for clarification. She had detected the accusation when he made it. “What would the benefit of trapping the spear within the temple be to the Chancellor?”
“I believe he meant to steal it, my Empress,” Xu Liang answered, without hesitation.
“Why?” she asked.
“To assassinate you,” he replied, transporting her back to the discussion that they had partaken of before the sequestering and his departure from the Imperial City. He had been certain her life was in immediate danger then, though he had not pointed to anyone specifically. “I also believe that he intends to discredit the valor of the bearers in order to separate them from their weapons as well.”
“Their valor is yet unproven,” Song Da-Xiao said, again pulling from conversation that had recently occurred between herself and Han Quan. That it was so specifically feeding Xu Liang’s dialogue—enabling him to say precisely what Han Quan had argued against in advance—was distressing.
“I believe their coming here is in favor of their honorable intentions,” Xu Liang said, his expression relaxing for the first time since he arrived at the pavilion, though it was only briefly.
That flicker of gentleness, for a group of people Song Da-Xiao had not even had a glimpse of, touched her suddenly, and in a way that was both upsetting and moving simultaneously. He cared for these people, and she had no ability to know how or why. Warmth rimmed her eyes.
“Furthermore,” Xu Liang continued, “if I should become discredited in your eyes, he might separate Pearl Moon from its bearer as well.”
Song Da-Xiao refrained from protesting that possibility. Seeing that he had begun to study her expression, she determined to maintain her resolve all the more.
“I believe that the Chancellor intends for you to be left vulnerable to an uprising,” her tutor explained. “I have reason to believe that he secretly admires the Scholar General of the Spring Uprisings, and that he intends to use the Swords against the Song Dynasty.”
“Have you any way of proving this?” she asked him, finding that her hands had once again taken hold of the fabric in her lap.
“Yes,” Xu Liang said, “but I require the full trust of my Empress in order to do so.”
She kept her gaze with his and stated firmly, “You are my beloved tutor and tactician, and my brother by a vow that cannot be broken.” She drew in a breath and held it for a moment, pushing it out with her next words and ignoring the moisture that slid down her cheek. “You are also the first man whom I have fallen in love with. The Empire is more within your grasp than you will ever allow yourself to realize.”
This seemed to startle her tutor, genuinely.
If Song Da-Xiao were completely alone, she might have cried over that, but she couldn’t…and she wouldn’t. She took a longer, more even breath. “I think I understand now why that scares members of the court, and why I must remain unmarried. It would be dangerous to have you, and there is no one else I could want. You are my father’s most trusted, and he loved you as he loved his son. I will not disregard your advice…and I ask that you continue to support me.”
Redness invaded the edges of Xu Liang’s eyes, and she could see the shine of tears in them. It made her want to cry all the more, especially when he smiled at her, and said, “I will serve you until my time in this world has ended.”
When his conversation with the Empress had ended, Xu Liang was left facing the girl he had rescued from aggressive traitors of her brother and father, and simultaneously with the woman she had somehow come to be without his notice. He felt ashamed for not having dignified her maturing heart by even acknowledging that it might have a desire beyond the love the Heavens had enlightened her with; an empress’ love for her people. He recognized now that he had turned his focus to that so completely that he had utterly failed to see when her focus had broadened beyond his narrow vision. He would have kept her a child goddess. In a demonstration of remorse, as her oath brother more than as her servant, he knelt before her for several long moments, during which she held his fingers in hers. They were both quiet and the duration of that time felt almost meditative. It had been some time since he’d sat so quietly and deliberately with his sister. Having her admiration as a man honored him deeply. He did not intend to make such an impression, and he hoped that she would forgive him his ignorance. He would continue to dissuade her, but he would do it from a better informed and better aware standpoint. Love, for an empress, was perhaps the most delicate relationship to tailor, maintain, and nurture of any in Sheng Fan. To be her consort was to open a pathway to the throne, one that could easily be claimed if an empress was not careful. Xu Liang would never have made such a claim, but he also could not love her beyond the bond they shared by oath. Even if he could, he did not want the shelter of such a role. He could not best serve her interests bound to the Imperial City in such a way.
During their extended shared silence, he finally opened his mind to the words of Ahjenta, and understood with further shame, that he could have been fairer to Tristus. He had used his duties, his quest, and even his health to justify inhibitions and to construct a solitude around himself that he would admit to still wanting, but that he understood now did not have to be so coldly defended.
It was the Lady Song Bin Ce who eventually reminded the Empress of the gathering of the court. Xu Liang rose, and assisted the Empress to a stand, walking with her from the Imperial Garden. Song Bin Ce followed at a distance while he escorted her back to the palace, where they parted ways. The Empress would join her officers in the throne room, once she had been redressed for a court appearance.
It had become apparent to Xu Liang during their prior conversation that she was at odds between at least two of her officer, and perhaps which of them held the better interests of Sheng Fan in their heart. He understood with clarity now, how confusing it must have appeared in the Empress’ eyes; that he had traveled so far from her court and from her, and taken upon himself to declare the worth of barbarians before and above her scrutiny on the matter…that he had taken these unproved individuals into his home and into his heart. She had struggled with feelings of neglect, possibly of abandonment…and possibly of betrayal. She desired that normalcy, as she understood it, resume. But as the Empress, she must have known before any of them that change was upon Sheng Fan. The winds of fortune—whether for the better or the worse—had turned direction over the Empire the moment her father passed away. With Song Lu’s departure so soon afterward, it seemed that it was for the worse, and that ill fortune was upon them. In spite of discovering and ceasing the spells in the Temple of Divine Tranquility, it may yet have been a dragon that breathed this doom over the land. Xu Liang knew that she yet feared that, and that she yet believed in her father’s spiritual guidance, which had begun even before his death when he first encouraged the study of the legend of Chaos to his scholars.
But Han Quan’s charm was insidious. Xu Liang was only now fully realizing that. The Empress was above all things, but could still be swayed by trickery that pulled upon her innate want and duty to protect her people. Han Quan had known better than to paint Xu Liang a villain, but he had evidently made careful strokes of incompetence and neglect over the Empress’ image of him. Had the Empress truly lost faith in Xu Liang, the Chancellor’s plot might have succeeded.
Heart of Stone
“If this is to occur, it should happen within the Temple of Divine Tranquility.”
Xu Liang had been prepared by the Empress for Han Quan to make such a request, and so he was not surprised by it.
It was Huang Shang-san who said, “But we all know that the temple has not been safe for…”
“But Xu Liang has investigated the matter for us,” Han Quan interrupted, sweeping a hand toward
Xu Liang’s location beside the throne and the Empress. “Surely, the potential for threat has been resolved, or do you doubt the Imperial Tutor’s skill as a mystic of Sheng Fan?”
“My Empress,” Xu Liang said, “the union of the Blades should take place in the Hall of Celestial Harmony.”
“The weapons cannot come together there,” Han Quan pointed out. “If the Spear of Heaven remains where the Empress has decreed it be placed, and kept…”
Xu Liang looked at him, saying nothing deliberately.
“You would not have taken the Spear of Heaven from its place, in an attempt to prove the combined value of these weapons by placing them all together prematurely?” The manner in which Han Quan issued his question was an attempt at entrapment.
Xu Liang found himself far more alert to the Chancellor’s tactics, now that he was certain of his betrayal. “The Empress ordered that the Spear of Heaven be returned to the hand of her ancestor,” he replied, repeating understood knowledge without contributing new information. Again, it was a deliberate strategy.
“Xu Liang, you will bring the outsiders before me at the Hall of Celestial Harmony,” the Empress decided. “The outsiders alone. We will concern the court with the Blades after we have assessed the scruples and sincerity of your unusual candidates to hold such important artifacts.”
With Han Quan’s sudden quiet, it became clear that he had asked for this in advance, just as Xu Liang had asked for Song Da-Xiao’s silence on the relocation of the Sun Blade. In fairness, she had provided them both the opportunities to prove their positions.
By sunset of the companion’s third day in Sheng Fan, their host returned to them, announcing that it was time for them to appear before the Empress. Xu Liang gathered them in the suite, looked them over after they’d donned their recently finished Fanese clothes, and deemed them fit for the public—at least as fit as outsiders could be. With very few preparatory words, they abandoned the sanctuary of the mystic’s home to be led to one of the many palaces within the interior city, where a court of Fanese nobility waited to judge them.
Tristus had never been so nervous in his life, not even when he was knighted, not even when he was brought before the Order Master to be stripped of his command and his right to hold the title of a Knight of Andaria. He decided not to look at the Fanese officials and in his rising anxiety, he barely caught a glimpse of the extremely young woman who occupied the throne of the Fanese Empire. He didn’t even think about anything, but following Xu Liang’s lead and Guang Ci’s lead. All of them bowed when the mystic did. The Blades themselves had been collected by Xu Liang and left under the protection of his other guards, but Tristus didn’t give the matter much thought. It was currently too difficult to think with his heart in his throat, beating heavily, making it difficult to swallow and almost impossible to breathe. His condition lasted for several hours, he felt—through a heated debate presented in Fanese with no translation.
Out of armor, he stood on display in the center of the throne room, grabbing nervously at the sleeves of his silk robe, darkening the lush red fabric with sweat. He’d never worn a silk quite like it before. It was light and cool and with his armor so far away, his spear not present, and a host of Fanese strangers giving him a critical eye, he felt naked and vulnerable.
There’s no danger here, he kept telling himself. These are Xu Liang’s people.
A glance at Alere told Tristus what the elf was thinking, as if in response to his own thoughts. These were Xu Liang’s people, but so were those who attacked them on the Flatlands, who nearly killed Alere, and who drew out the monster in Tristus, which almost resulted in the murder of Xu Liang. And it was Tristus’ own people who had cast him out of his homeland and turned against him. The Fanese were not safe by association
You mustn’t think that way, Tristus told himself. Xu Liang would not have walked us into open danger. These people are more afraid than we are. The future of their land rests in Xu Liang’s hands and on his decision to trust outsiders with the sacred weapons of their gods.
Words cut across the open room, hailing off the thin lips of an old man dressed in blue robes with a fine, pointed beard that grew from his chin like a white thorn. His brown eyes, gone pale with age, glared at Xu Liang. His wizened hand lifted to gesture at Tristus and the others. Whatever the elder had said, it stirred a chorus of riled voices.
Xu Liang lifted his hand for silence and received it, almost at once. He answered the old man with equanimity and watched him when he stepped back with his ancient hands tucked into the sleeves of his robes. The elder’s eyes smoldered with contempt.
Tristus’ own gaze lingered on that portrait of disdain and resent, even as Xu Liang himself looked away from the elder. He watched it transform into a pure, burning hatred. This was no ally of the mystic’s. That much was certain. Tristus had seen such friction between clerics of the Eristan Order. They had often led to hostilities. Those that couldn’t be settled peacefully or at least lawfully by the Order Master, were secretly taken into the hands of individuals. Assassination tended to be the result.
Tristus frowned, disliking this old fellow, who eventually slipped his hands from his sleeves and folded his arms across his chest. He rolled something in his long-nailed fingers, a marble or something. Perhaps it was his way at reducing his immediate stress. It didn’t seem to be helping. As the moments passed and Xu Liang continued to speak, the elder rolled the object faster and then clutched it suddenly in his fist, which trembled with muted rage. The expression was foreign and yet familiar, stirring unwelcome recall of his berserker side.
Everyone is against you. That’s what you believe, isn’t it?
Somehow Tristus knew very well that it was. He knew, almost intimately, precisely how the old man felt.
In the next moment the old man’s features relaxed. It was too sudden, too eerie the way a smile crept into his expression, his eyes fixed on Xu Liang. When the elder opened his hand, Tristus leapt into action without even a second’s thought. Had he considered, he might have realized he wasn’t wearing his armor. As the old man’s marble struck him at lightning speed and an intense, blinding pain saturated his world, he knew it wouldn’t have mattered.
Xu Liang was in mid-sentence when the motion in the corner of his vision distracted him. Unsure about the physical upset in a room where no one dared raise more than their voice, he had nearly finished his statement before he drew fully alert to the situation.
Tristus had leapt forward and then fallen to the floor in almost the same instant, as if pulled forward by a deathly hand and then dropped unceremoniously where he now lay on his side, all but motionless. He was breathing. Faint moans of anguish escaped on each breath.
In the ensuing moments, Xu Liang saw only the knight. He neither heard nor saw anyone else, not even his empress. He knelt beside Tristus, his hand hovering over him through flashes of memory involving deep mounds of snow and the thunderous footfall of a giant.
And then the world returned full force.
He saw Alere on his knees beside Tristus, speaking demands at the knight. “What happened? Where are you hurt?” At first Tristus did not seem inclined to answer, even as the elf gripped his arm and squeezed it harshly. “Answer me! Tell me where!”
Tristus mumbled weakly.
Alere bent over him to hear him better.
Xu Liang laid his fingers upon Tristus’ neck. Closing his eyes, he reached out of himself, searching the knight’s currently agitated pulse. He traced to his heart and there sensed something that brought him back to the nightmares first induced by the fire of the Phoenix. “His chest,” he told the others.
Alere pushed the knight onto his back and pulled open his robes, searching for the wound. He found a dot of blood on the left side of Tristus’ chest. “It’s only small,” the elf reported. “Barely more damage than a dart would cause. Poison, maybe.”
“There’s no dart,�
� Tarfan pointed out.
“There’s swelling,” Taya said, pushing against Xu Liang while she tried to get closer to Tristus.
Xu Liang looked at a tiny lump under the knight’s skin. It seemed to be growing while he watched it, pushing blood out in the form of a rapidly collecting bead of color. It appeared to be moving further into his flesh. “It must come out,” he said and he’d no sooner formed the words when Alere drew a dagger from his sleeve. No one asked where the elf had gotten the weapon and Xu Liang encouraged its use. “Cut it out quickly before it’s in too far.”
“What is it?” Taya asked tearfully as Alere went to work.
“A stone,” Xu Liang answered, watching impatiently while the elf moved the blade with care and precision.
Tristus set his teeth, biting back the pain, but he held still otherwise.
“A stone?” Tarfan echoed.
“It’s expanding,” Xu Liang said to Alere. “It’ll break through to his heart and kill him.”
Alere muttered something in elvish that Xu Liang did not take the time to decipher, then pried at the growing stone with fingers as well as blade.
Tristus cried out and Shirisae touched her hand to the knight’s forehead. “Be still,” she said soothingly, then stroked the young man’s cheek with the back of her hand before pinning him firmly at the shoulder.
Tristus gave one last gasp when Alere pulled suddenly away from him, his white fingers red with the knight’s blood, holding the stone that had now ceased to grow. Alere dropped his knife immediately afterward and cast the blood-dyed stone aside, pressing both hands over the wound he had worsened for his friend out of necessity.
Tristus was still conscious, breathing heavily, but with more relief than pain.
