The Throne of the Five Winds

by S. C. Emmett

  “It is a Khir custom, this yue.” Kai said it as if Tamuron should have known. “They call it maiden’s blade; it is meant to save them dishonor.”

  “Ah.” Khir women were to be docile and discreet; hearing that a few of them bore such a sting was… well, not quite against nature and Heaven, but certainly disconcerting. Still, it would discourage rape if used with any facility; he wondered what the punishment for misuse was in the cold North.

  Kai obviously expected more than a single syllable from his lord. “I am further told they do not speak of it outside noble houses.”

  “And yet you know.” Now he longed to send his general away, and scratch. The skin had begun to separate; he had to be careful not to tear long strips. A stinging astringent salve was to be applied to the suppurations, reeking of acrid jellied jau. It burned like the God of Fire’s own whips—an irony, indeed.

  Now that he was not goaded past bearing, he could admit it was perhaps hasty to think the Khir lady-in-waiting was more than a decorous prop sent to protect a princess. Spies made themselves agreeable, certainly, but even the aristocracy of Khir would be mad to wish for more war.

  “Now I know.” Kai’s fingers dug into leather, his half-armor creaking. I could have told you, if you would have listened, his tone and stance all but shouted.

  “Does my daughter-in-law have one?” To think of Takyeo within striking distance of a foreign woman with a knife—it turned Tamuron’s liver sideways within him.

  “Ask her, my lord.” Deliberately not Your Majesty, and Kai had not taken steps to find out something he suspected Tamuron would wish to know.

  “Hrm.” Tamuron eyed him narrowly. “What else could I do, Kai? Assassins from the North and an unsanctioned weapon in the palace, upon a foreign woman to boot. An example had to be made.”

  “Oh, it has been,” the general said, darkly, and Tamuron leashed the growling irritation in his gut. Even plain rai tormented his innards, and his favorite pickled walanir spread sores upon the palace-roof of his mouth.

  On his command Zhaon would trample any foe, and yet here he sat pissing strange colors, scratching like a monkey, and unable even to eat. Heaven had turned its face from its chosen one, or perhaps the Five Winds were consuming him from the inside now that he had served his purpose and unified Zhaon. “Are you taking me to task?”

  His general did not shrug, though his shoulders tensed. “Would I dare?”

  Tamuron shook his head. His neck ached. “You of all people, Kai.”

  “My lord, you are Emperor, and yet you shit in a pot like a common soldier.” Kai did not move, and did not take the opportunity to soothe his lord. “The only difference is, a common soldier who whips a woman for performing her duty is punished by his square-leader, and an Emperor is not.”

  “You’re angry.” Do I sound uncertain? Of him? Times were dire indeed if even so steady and uncomplaining a tool as the Head General turned in Tamuron’s hand.

  “Perhaps. The Garan Tamuron I know would not have given such orders.”

  As if he had possessed a choice. Once a blade was drawn, the consequences followed even those with reason to strike. “To deal with someone who brought an unsanctioned weapon into the palace?”

  Now a high flush was mounting Zakkar Kai’s cheeks. Was he raising his own banners, readying for a charge? “To change the hour of a whipping so no clemency was possible.”

  “Change the hour?” Tamuron’s expression darkened.

  “Did you not know?” Kai’s tone suggested he did not believe it. “She was taken from her cell just after the dawnwatch returned to their beds.”

  “Ah.” So, Gamwone’s uncle had arranged for a deeper embarrassment. And Takshin, perhaps anticipating as much, had moved to prevent it. “Lord Yulehi has been busy.”

  “His half of the year is arrived, after all.” Kai dropped his arms and bent in a very correct bow. His own sword, carried by express permission, rode his back, and its dragon-snarling hilt glared over his shoulder. “I shall take my leave, my lord.”

  Tamuron could still remember gifting him that very blade after the Second Battle of Yulehi-Ahu. “Without my leave?”

  “What else would you have of me?” The general did not raise his voice, but his tone held an unwonted edge.

  “Hm.” He studied Kai. “You are quite put out. I hear this Lady Komor visits the Second Concubine often, and so do you.” Help me, Kai. See my condition, and do not make it worse.

  “I am the Second Concubine’s son now.” Stiffly, each edge clipped. The general’s face was blood-suffused granite, the expression he wore when some matter of deep indiscipline was brought to the head of Zhaon’s armies.

  “Take care, Kai.” Perhaps a kind, fatherly injunction would help. “I mean for you to be a shield to Kanbina, not an additional grief.”

  As soon as he said it, Garan Tamuron knew it was the wrong note to strike no matter the instrument. The blood drained from Kai’s cheeks. He watched his lord for several long moments, and finally swallowed visibly, the pad of chewed rai meant to keep a full-grown man from choking bobbing under shaven throat-skin.

  The moment passed, and whatever Zakkar Kai would have said died unborn. His final bow was correct in every particular, and his deep-set eyes glittered. He turned, and left behind only the faint impression of a banked fire, ash and slow fierce heat.

  Garan Tamuron sat in his small, windowless room, the scroll upon the wall with his first wife’s careful brushwork glowering at him, and knew what Kai would have said.

  I could not hope to grieve her more than her lordly husband. Oh, the general might sweeten the pill, or choose a more diplomatic way of expressing himself, for Zakkar Kai had grown into a man of restraint. Perhaps he had modeled such restraint upon Tamuron’s own, and now he was disappointed.

  For he was correct, of course. Tamuron’s judgment had clouded itself in this particular instance. He could not admit as much now, even if he called Kai back. The child had worshipped him and the man fought for him, but the man also judged him. Time wore on, and a father’s feet sank in liquid sand.

  The Emperor of Zhaon coughed into a cupped hand. He had not told Kihon Jiao of the slick coppery heat coating the back of his throat when he did so.

  His time was growing short, and he had indeed shamed himself. Dull fury circled in his belly, and he longed to return to bed, to lie there and watch the ceiling, a beast trapped in a tar-hole.

  The empire he had built would not wait, and must be handed intact to his eldest son even if that son temporarily despised him.

  Garan Tamuron cleared his throat and called for his dressing-servants.

  A DISTORTED MIRROR

  The Jonwa was brim-full of hurrying feet and soft commotion. Lady Yala spoke quietly at the door of a small apothecary-chamber, and Steward Keh’s reply was lost in a tide of whispers. Drawers and cabinets crowded the walls, and a table with the various implements of medicine-making scattered upon its back took up most of the available space. There was enough room for a three-legged stool, and Takshin, placed upon it, set his jaw as jellied jau stung his back with its bright, cold fire.

  The whipmaster had not been cruel, but moving before Yala had placed Takshin closer to the whip, and thus, the fine gradations of an experienced wielder of the sorrowful snake were all but wasted. Fast-moving leather had cut deep, for Takshin disdained to wear padding or armor under his noble’s robe even though he had suspected something of this nature might well occur.

  After all, if he had simply countermanded the orders, they might have surged forward regardless. Better to simply take the blow and balance the threat of one punishment against the certainty of another, both equally unpalatable. This way, he could be blamed and there was nothing that could be taken from him.

  Or so he thought. The danger of loss lay in another direction, now. He dispelled a wince, and Lady Kue made a soft sound of concentration. “The salve will come next,” she murmured, and shifted slightly—perhaps looking over her shoulder.
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  “May I offer my aid?” Yala, quietly, Khir consonants rubbing through the Zhaon. Even her voice had a hidden edge, a claw under velvet.

  She would no doubt see the other scars now, seamed and silvery or livid, striping his back. The Mad Queen’s knotted cord was not a sorrow-snake, but it could still leave marks, especially upon a child’s skin. They stretched as a man aged, too.

  “Hand me that cloth.” Lady Kue made a slight tongue-click, very much like Mrong Banh. “You should be resting.”

  “I find myself unable to settle.” A slight note of amusement, though her voice shook somewhat. The tremor was restrained, of course. “It was a very dramatic morning. Does it sting overmuch, Third Prince?”

  “Not enough.” He turned his head slightly, enough to catch a shadow of her movement in his peripheral vision. She must be fresh from a bath; a sweetness of jaelo bloomed under the jau’s acridity. “I should return for a few more, it would enliven my day.”

  “Hush, now.” Lady Kue’s Shan dialect was still lisp-soft, a reminder of his other country. “Do not pursue bad luck, it will come on its own.”

  He did not reply. Had the blood stopped flowing? Normally, it would irritate him to have a stranger see the torso-scars, but she did not remark upon them. Instead, Lady Yala set down whatever she was carrying. A whisper of silk and that ghost of jaelo, lingering as she did in his thoughts, a constant counterpoint. “Is that Shansian? It sounds gentle.”

  Takshin breathed in, deeply. If he concentrated upon her scent, the pain retreated. It was a new thing, to have such a refuge, and normally he would disdain to use it. But he faced a wall and a cabinet of apothecary drawers, with no one to see any weakness.

  “It is a thorny pleasure to speak one’s tongue in another country.” Lady Kue sponged at his back again. “It will not require stitchery, Prince Takshin.”

  That was a relief. He disliked the needle, for he could not accept any numbing as it stitched flesh together. “Well enough.”

  “Now for the salve.”

  “Then be about it,” he snapped.

  A hand upon his left shoulder—cool soft skin, faintly damp. It had to be hers. “Easy, Third Prince.”

  He stilled. “When will you address me informally, Yala?”

  “I shall begin today, Takshin.” Her fingernails were crescent moons, and though her palm was soft he felt the slight thickening where the greenmetal blade’s hatched hilt would rest. When did she find the time to practice its use? “I cannot even begin to think how to repay—”

  “There is no need, little lure.” His gaze unfocused, the world narrowing to her fingertips as Lady Kue began spreading the salve. It did sting, and plenty, but he decided not to move. “What is one more stripe to add to the collection? Do you wish to ask how I received them?”

  “It may ease a warrior to speak of his wounds.” An echo of their first meeting, a thornblossom pleasure. “Or not.”

  “Is there anything you take offense at, woman?” His traitorous eyes stung, full of salt water. He longed to rid himself of the useless reflex. Pain was not to be shown, no matter how sharp.

  “Would you like me to?” Her gentle pressure upon his shoulder did not alter. “I can, should it please you. It is a small enough gift to give.”

  He could have laughed, but the sweat upon his neck and the salve’s burning would have made the sound painfully bitter. So he did not, simply dropped his chin and closed his eyes. It was a familiar smell—Kiron’s nurse had used something similar upon skinned knees and other wounds, creeping into his quarters at night to treat whatever mishap occurred during the day. Let him take the rot, the Mad Queen would hiss, or alternately coo over wounds she had just inflicted. Oh, you poor little thing…

  Now he preferred those memories to ones of his actual mother. Strange how time became a distorted mirror, changing the shape of events. At least he had expected little good of Shan’s queen, and was not disappointed.

  The diagonal slash burned, scoring deeper, so he inhaled and spoke calmly enough. “I am glad to have arrived in time. It saves me the trouble of cutting a man’s hands off.” And yes, had he marked you, I would have.

  Lady Kue’s fingers paused. Was she exchanging a look with Yala? Two women, both far from their native lands, attending a man rejected by his. If he were a poet, he could have found something witty to mark the occasion.

  “There,” Lady Kue said. “Now, the wrapping. Lady Komor, if you would… yes, thank you.”

  Yala sank gracefully in front of him, averting her gaze from his bare chest as he opened his eyes halfway. The padding was pressed gently against the long slash upon his back, then the wrapping, shoulder to hip, passed between women’s hands with soft murmurs. There… yes, a little tighter, perhaps? Careful…

  He watched the head of her hairpin and the blue-black glimmer of her braids under soft mirrorlight. A Shan longshirt lay folded in his lap, and under it a slim weight. The bandaging finished, Yala sought to straighten and move away, but he shook his head and she halted, her strange, pale Khir gaze fixed upon him. If it pained her to be bent so, she made no sign.

  “Here.” He drew the blade from under his shirt. Wrapped in a rectangle of raw silk, its razor edge had almost worn through the threads. It lay balanced in his palms, and Yala’s quick, embarrassed glance caught upon it. Her pale eyes widened, and she exhaled sharply, almost as if struck.

  She accepted it with both hands, then stepped back, her skirt making a low sweet sound. She sank to her knees, slowly, then bent her forehead almost to the floor, the blade held carefully in both hands. Her hairpin glittered, a rough pebble wrapped in red silken thread dangling a few pale glimmering crystals.

  One she wore often. Familiar, now.

  “My lord Garan Takshin, Third Prince of Zhaon.” Excruciatingly formal, the lowest Zhaon inflection addressing the mightiest. “Your handmaiden thanks thee.”

  The slice across his back twinged as he leaned forward, his clean longshirt almost slithering from his lap as he grasped her wrists, careful of the blade. “Don’t.”

  “I have no other means of expressing my gratitude.” She straightened, and he had to release her. At least she did not use that inflection again. It was unbearable to hear from her soft, pretty mouth. “This is my yue. My honor, returned unto me.”

  In Shan, peasant women carried a nail-paring knife to mark the face of a man who beat them too often. Takshin could not help but smile, and for once the movement of his face did not make him conscious of the scars. “Your honor never left you. I suspect it never will. Never do that again, Yala.”

  “Draw my yue in the palace?” Somber, she regarded him, her skirt tucked prettily under her, the picture of a lady-in-waiting attending a royal patron. “I cannot promise that.”

  “No. Never bow like that. To anyone.” He unfolded his shirt, and Lady Kue’s hands came to help it over his shoulders. He restrained the urge to slap them aside; she was seeking to aid him, and it was beneath him to strike a woman. At least he was better than his cursed father in that respect. “Now, both of you out. Leave me in peace, and go tell my eldest brother to give me a few moments before he comes to scold me.”

  He would have liked to invite Yala to stay, of course. But those shining eyes and her wondering expression made him wary. Better to ration anything sweet, lest he develop a taste. And who would wish to remain in such a dank small closet full of medicinal odors? Certainly not gentle creatures such as these.

  “I doubt the Crown Prince wishes to scold.” Lady Kue began gathering her implements. “Rather, I think he would congratulate you, for he knows how you hate to be thanked.”

  “Nevertheless.” Yala rose, the blade—too long to be a proper knife, far too short to be a sword, and ideal for a woman’s smaller hands and greater flexibility—balanced cherished-carefully upon her palms. “You have my thanks, Takshin. And, should you wish it, my friendship.”

  Not what I want. He occupied himself with his shirt-ties and a single, impolite grunt, wav
ing her away. No, not what he wanted at all.

  But it was a start.

  HORSEKILLERS

  It was a beautiful morning, though too hot, as Zhaon was wont to be. The impresario in dun peasant’s clothing, his shaven head wrapped as a tribesman’s, yawned as he settled more deeply under leafy branches. Sleepless nights of watching and creeping, all wasted; a goodly portion of his funds wasted too.

  If you wished for a silent, difficult task to be accomplished, it was wise to perform it yourself. A harsh lesson, applied over and over until a man took notice—or until he died of the recurring failure to heed Heaven’s warnings.

  He almost wished others attempting to snatch his prize had succeeded. If so, he could be on a horse for the border, leaving this sink of simmering sweat, strange spices that imparted no heat, and slithering incompetence well behind. He longed for a clear breeze across mountain meadows, and also, to be honest, for his promised ingots of sweet metal. He could travel northward and return through the last of summer, and if he was quick and luck was good, he would be in Shan before the winter rains, perhaps, and Anwei shortly thereafter.

  It would not be healthy to remain in Khir after collecting the balance of his fee, after all. And the nobleman sent to hold his leash could make his own travel arrangements.

  Periodically, the man checked his second bow, not the one he had used from the rooftops to make certain city-prey could be netted. This weapon was a long, heavy arc almost as tall as him, and its arrows heavy as well. They were inhuenyua, horsekillers; the bow was juenwa without the double curve of a horseback weapon, and instead of a thumb-ring the archer required a thin, three-finger glove. The single strip of wood, from the muscle and heart of the lyong57 tree, was unwieldy and could not be carried upon the back of a fourfoot cousin—but it would send a barbed arrowhead through plenty of meat, and drop an ox if the archer was skilled and lucky enough. At the very northern fringes of Khir, such a bow was used to pick off lumbering shagbeasts from a herd, and also by peasants to fend off horseback bandits eking a living from violence and the Yaluin’s harsh skirt-hems.