by S. C. Emmett
“Husband?” Mahara, tentatively. “Are we leave-going-yes?”
Yala did not murmur the correct Zhaon, but placed her hand upon Mahara’s sleeve. If he was angered by sudden ill news as the Great Rider Ashani Zlorih often was, a moment of feigned clumsiness would distract and hopefully avert any wrath.
But the Crown Prince did not snap a disdainful word or raise his voice. “Leaving soon,” he said, mildly enough. His face did not ease. “Steward, does the messenger wait for a reply?”
Keh Tanh’s gleaming round-moon face did not alter one whit. A burn scar across his left knuckles meant that hand was perpetually somewhat clawed, but it was well healed and he was visibly proud of his station. “He does.”
Prince Takyeo folded his hands. “Inform him that we have already left.”
“Crown Prince…” Keh’s lips pursed. He shone like a dumpling just taken from the steam basket, but it did not seem to be fear-sweat. Instead, he was merely one of those men whose skin produced its own coating. “It may not be wise.”
An idea sparked in Takyeo’s dark gaze. He turned his chin slightly and regarded his wife and her lady-in-waiting, narrowly. “Lady Komor?”
She bowed, gracefully. It was only a matter of time before she was called upon in this fashion. “My lord Crown Prince?”
“There is a messenger from the First Queen, bearing a letter. The Crown Princess and I have already left for the festival. Will you accept receipt of the letter?”
Ah. A neat solution to a possible problem. Whatever Queen Gamwone wished delivered just before a festival was likely to be borderline unpleasant; choosing not to receive it could be seen as an insult—and used to embarrass both crown prince and princess if not handled carefully. Yala’s status was just imprecise enough to avoid open insult if she, possibly ignorant of etiquette, received the messenger and subtracted the letter from his grasp. Lady Kue could be reprimanded if she did so, and the steward, though manumit, would no doubt be eager to both shield his lord and avoid unpleasant repercussions for himself.
“Yala? But why?” Mahara’s forehead creased. “A letter?”
Yala turned her hand on the princess’s sleeve to a soft brushing, as if settling the nap of the fabric. “I would be honored, Crown Prince. Steward, please show the messenger to my receiving-room. Anh, bring tea.” Yala glanced at the steward, whose gaze had turned worried. “I shall write a pretty apology for my forwardness in accepting such an august missive, and tender my regrets that so important a piece of paper arrived while its intended is unavailable.”
The steward’s jaw turned slightly loose, and he glanced at his prince, who smiled like the snow-cat he had chosen for a device.
“No doubt it is sealed.” Takyeo’s dark Zhaon gaze held a question.
But however far Yala was prepared to bend a polite truth, she did not think it wise to be overly useful in this small matter. “No doubt it is.” In other words, I will not find a reason to break the seal, and thus be blamed.
If he pressed… but he surprised her, for he did not. “Yes. Well.” The Crown Prince settled his unembroidered saffron sleeves with an air of relieved regret. “Go, Steward Keh.” The round man backed away, bowing before he left the room; Anh vanished and the other kaburei scattered. “You are quick, Lady Komor.”
And sharp. “You compliment me, Crown Prince.” She changed to Khir, murmuring to Mahara. “My princess, a letter from the First Queen is bound to carry nothing good.”
“Yes, she does not seem the sort to send pleasant tidings.” Mahara suppressed a shiver. Each move made those thin golden discs sway and glitter. “What now?”
Takyeo smiled, and all resemblance to the Emperor of Zhaon was lost. “Now, you take your husband’s arm. The best part of the festival is the fireflowers, but those are not until after dinner.”
Yala bowed as they swept into the cleared hallway beyond, folding her hands thoughtfully as she straightened, for a moment the sole possessor of the receiving-room. The Crown Prince was not unintelligent, but asking Yala openly if she would break the seal upon a royal letter?
He must trust his household deeply. Which was the measure of a kindly lord, but not of a Crown Prince. Daoyan, though simply a byblow, would never have broached such a subject with kaburei present. Nor would Mahara’s elder brothers, or even Komori Baiyan.
It troubled her.
He had not sharpened his tongue upon Mahara, or even upon the steward. It boded well for Mahara’s marriage that her husband was not one to shift ill news onto a lower back.
And yet… it did not bode as well for a man whose own younger brothers might wish to do him some harm. And if Yala—a stranger—could see as much, who else could?
Protecting Mahara was one thing. Seeking to protect a Zhaon crown prince from his own good nature was something else, and a task Yala suspected beyond her capabilities.
It did not change what she was called upon to do at the moment, however. Yala raised her chin, smoothed her skirt, touched her ear-drops hanging from their thin ribbons, and set off to do her duty to her princess’s lord.
LIFE’S STUDY
There had been a time, Garan Yulehi Gamwone reflected, when the Knee-High was her favorite festival. When the rai reached the knees of its tenders spring was assured, and the world would not slide backward into winter’s bony grip.
To have reached a handhold, a brief moment of rest before clawing onward, was to be celebrated. And of course there were the fireflowers, the feasting, and when she was the eldest daughter of the Yulehi—not merely a merchant family, but one in whose veins flowed the blood of the Third Dynasty according to goatskin rolls that were not purchased despite what gossips said—there had been dancing after the groaning tables were cleared. A whirl of color, sensation, suitors begging for her hand, compliments and small gifts, her smile like the sun and her future bright.
Garan Tamuron settled upon a low blue-cushioned seat, barely glancing at the table of appetizers and tiny Shan bonefire cups of last year’s sohju. “You look lovely.”
“Thank you.” For a moment, she could pretend this was what her marriage was. A husband grateful for the effort of inducing kaburei and lazy maids to produce a prettily dressed table in a room draped with tapestries, a wife assured of affection, at least, for doing her duty and producing heirs.
Two fine sons she’d given him, but he was greedy. Being blessed in war and having two fine sons—three if she counted the brat from his dead sword-wife—was not enough for him. No, he wanted all of Zhaon, the Land of Five Winds in its ancient incarnation before the dynasties began their endless warring. Now one held the rai-bowl, now another, endlessly chasing themselves around a wheel.
Garan Tamuron wished to own the wheel, and she had liked the idea before she knew what its cost would be.
“How do you feel?” Tamuron’s shoulders were still broad and his topknot was still luxuriant. There were lines in the corners of his eyes that had not been there before, and bracketing his mouth under the small beard. His cheeks were ruddy, and the skin along his neck looked slightly irritated, as if his robes chafed. “I heard you were ill.”
“Of course I was a trifle unwell.” She was still unwrinkled, and firm. She took care, and massaged oils into her face and body every day to make herself pleasing. Even though the red lanterns never hung from her door at night, there was small comfort to be found in the fact that they did not hang elsewhere, either. “A corpse was dropped upon the front steps of my home.” A mutilated corpse. Distasteful, though the exorcist assured her there was no lingering contamination.
Perhaps she should hire another. The first, with his ragged clothing and haughty gaze, had been expensive enough, but certainty occasionally required more.
The Emperor, lord of all he surveyed, regarded her over a round table meant to bring luck and new growth into the summer. “Yes.” There it was, the distance. The hint of suspicion.
Injured innocence filled her. After everything she had done to prop up this warlord and mak
e him Emperor—filled his coffers, filled his bed, filled her own belly with sons, and he treated her so coolly. Disagreeable things had to be done sometimes, and a good wife did them so her husband did not have to. She had more than once, and well besides. “The investigation into the occurrence…” Her tone lilted upward, a question.
“Is complete.” Did he look uncomfortable? One should not mention death at the Knee-High table. “There is no further evidence.”
She would have chosen a different robe for him, Gamwone decided. And a different topknot-cage. An Emperor should exercise restraint, certainly, but not at festival time. The lower orders did not respect a king who gave them nothing to marvel at. “And your newest son? What of him?” Mentioning that parvenu was distasteful as well. The Second Concubine was a meek little mouse, and Zakkar Kai was very crafty indeed, insinuating himself into her favor.
The general won battles, certainly. But he did not know his place.
“What of him?” Tamuron made a restless movement, as if he longed to rise.
Surely she could be forgiven for thinking it a trifle cowardly of him. “He was attacked as well.”
“You were not attacked, Gamwone.” Tamuron settled his gaze over her right shoulder, a sure sign she was losing his interest.
Did he think her a weak, foolish woman? Perhaps once she had been, but not now. “I have many enemies.” As if he did not know. They whispered and elbowed each other, especially that Hanweo bitch. The concubines were all very well—a stallion sired what he could, where he could—but to take a second queen was a deadly insult to Yulehi’s eldest daughter.
Even if it had been necessary.
“Do you?” he inquired, mildly, pretending to examine an expensive hanging of brightly patterned silk. Did he begrudge her every scrap she used to keep her position, to make this nest comfortable? To show the world that she knew and understood the duty of royalty?
“You could protect me, if you wished to.” If only her father were still alive. He could shame a warlord who insulted his daughter.
But he had fallen in the Battle of Yu-lenei, consigning his coffers and his daughter to the care of a petty warlord who needed prodding and poking to do anything worthwhile. Now Tamuron was Emperor, her maternal uncle was immured in the provinces for half the year caring for the clan, and Gamwone was insulted daily even when that august clan-head returned for his duty to the court.
“You imply I do not?” Garan Tamuron lifted one hand to rub wearily at his eyes.
The conversation was a well-worn rut. She could not change its course, even if she longed to. “Tamuron.” Her prerogative, to use his name. “I gave you sons.” Even if Takshin was worthless, with his cat-eyes and his ungrateful pride.
Sooner or later he would bend. A son was meant to care for his mother, especially when a husband did not.
“Heaven has blessed me, indeed.” In other words, I have many sons.
Perhaps she should try conciliation, since appealing to his duty would not work. “Your throne is assured, Tamuron. It has been assured for years.”
Again, he gave only the blandest of replies. “So it seems.”
Her hands, lying decorously in her lap, tightened. She denied the urge to make fists. Stretching skin over a woman’s knuckles was unsightly. “Then why do you continue this farce?”
“What farce is that, First Queen of Zhaon?”
“First queen.” The bitterness could curdle the small dishes of sweet things, the traditional sticky buns, the very rai itself. She was bringing ill-luck into spring—no, he was, because he was provoking her.
“Yes. First in Zhaon, first in my heart.” A slight, mocking smile. That was part of the songs sung in the marketplace. They admired him, this upstart, the common people longing for a familiar hand to hold the whip poised over their backs.
If they only knew what she did about his dealings. Or how he cried on their wedding night, moaning the name of his commoner sword-wife, dead in childbirth in the ruins of a gutted town, squeezing out that pup called the Crown Prince who lorded it over his proper sons.
His true son. “Do you have a heart?” she hissed. “Do you?”
“Gamwone.” A warning. Be patient, he had said, when she confronted him after the Battle of Red Clay, when that ill-starred slut Haesara’s family sent their poisoned proposal. This is something I must do.
Well, now he was Emperor, and his true sons were adult. One was Shan’s creature, true, and it was ill-luck that the Mad Queen had not killed the already-marred brat who refused to do his duty. Sending him abroad had been necessary, both to give the Shan a hostage and to place at least one of her sons beyond the reach of Zhaon mischief-makers and assassins. She could see that now, even if she’d raged against the necessity when it occurred. “You could send Luswone back to her sheepherding kin, she wouldn’t mind a bit. And that prig Haesara can be settled in Do-yen, she’d be comfortable there.” Her family was powerful, true, but he was Emperor, and she had married him before it was obvious that he would do what he aimed to and unify Zhaon. “You can keep the boys here, that is only right. That Second ninny won’t last long anyway; you can keep her walled in her hole like a mouse.” It was so simple, why would he not simply agree?
For the second time, he issued a warning. “Gamwone.” Pennons lowered and raised, a salute before the battle.
She knew his strategies. How could she not, having made Garan Tamuron her life’s study? “What? Just wait, you said. Be patient, you said. I have been! You have your precious firstborn, you have two other sons in adulthood, why do you make me suffer this? Other wives, other concubines.” A wife had to please her husband, but he was incapable of being pleased at all.
Greedy. Just like every other man, except her darling eldest son. She had seen to it he was raised properly, at least. And Takshin—oh, if only she had been less willing to believe his father’s lies, she could have found the strength to finish what she had started instead of letting the knife be pried from her hands when she heard of her husband’s proposed second marriage.
He was the one who had placed her second son in danger, maneuvering her into those terrible words—oh, why not send Takshin, since you will have more sons soon?
Garan Tamuron sat across the Knee-High table from her, and had the effrontery to look pained but not shamed.
Not shamed at all.
“I cannot send the Second Queen and the First Concubine to their kin. It will be taken as a disgrace, no matter how rich their trains.” Tamuron recited it like a scholar with a dim-witted pupil. “They have done nothing to deserve such treatment, Gamwone, even from you.” Terse, like a battle-bulletin, each syllable a character with slashing diagonals. “They gave me sons too. The political situation—”
“Oh, politics.” As if he did not have the stranglehold upon Zhaon he had so long desired. “The same song as ever.” She was glad she had armored for this skirmish—her most beautiful greenstone ear-drops, the heavy cuffs of gold meshwork, the stiff embroidered robe catching her body heat and bringing out sweat-prickles along her lower back, behind her knees, behind her ears. “How much more will you insult me? I could have left well enough alone, yes, but then you add to my pain by adopting that dog of a foundling.”
“He has been of more use than you, with your endless scheming.” Now the cavalry was let loose, and the archers raising their tips. “Do you think I did not know, Yulehi-a?”
Gamwone bristled at her clan’s proud name in his lying mouth. “Every scheme, as you put it, is to keep you upon the throne and—”
“Every scheme of yours is to keep your own position safe, against illusory enemies. I weary of this.” He moved as if to rise, and obviously remembered that the ceremonies demanded he stay with his first wife for at least a token interval. Tonight he visited each of his wives in turn, then passed each concubine’s door as they stood and waved small green handfuls of rai torn from its liquid home and afterward planted near their water-gardens to bring festival-luck into their homes.
Then came the feast in the greatest hall of Zhaon. And afterward the dancing, but of course Gamwone would be on the dais, unable to step into the measured patterns of flowers, the gentle swaying of branches, the imitation of prowling beasts as the night wore on and the music quickened as the rai, the fruit trees, the gardens, the bellies of animals and women were encouraged to do.
“Come. Let us not have this argument again.” He extended one brown, callused hand over the table. “You are still my first queen. Let it be enough, Gamwone.” Ruling had not robbed his palm and fingertips of roughness. There was a time when she had thrilled to imagine that scraping touch of a warrior’s hand upon her own soft yielding, as a woman should.
Now she was cold. A fallow field, left unplowed even though the soil was still rich. He could have had more sons from her, but instead, he had taken that cold Hanweo bitch because her family had a drop or two of exhausted nobility in their veins and saved him a little trouble upon the battlefield.
Gamwone regarded him. She finally consented to lay her own soft, scented hand in his, and smiled prettily. Her throat was full of an iron taste, the inside of her cheek bitten until it bled. “Very well, husband.”
Oh, she knew he would not consent to send them away. Would it have caused him any harm to pretend he wanted to? No, he was not even willing to grant her that silly little fiction. It might have even satisfied her.
But she would never know if it truly would, since he would not even grant her that tiny, necessary comfort.
Oh, she had known he was greedy when she married him. Yulehi Gamwone had thought it good, for it matched the burning in her. Together, she had thought, they would divide the world.
But he had what he wanted, and consigned her to one of four quarters instead of sharing what she had brought him, what her “scheming” made possible.
The heart of strategy was to see into your opponent’s mind and overturn him without needing battle. Or, if that failed, to meet your enemy where he least expected you and throw his plans into confusion. She set herself to amuse him, and that night’s victory was that he stayed longer than he had perhaps intended to. Tongues would wag, and there would be a comparison of the time spent with each of his queens. Gamwone would win. She had to win.
