‘New vestment?’ I asked. ‘I do not understand what this means. Please explain.’
‘You know of Qi. Those people of great Qi can move from one state to another as easily as changing one’s garb. And the Autumn Lords are beings of great Qi.’
I frowned. ‘This seems, as they say on the streets of Rume and Ciprea, hollow words from empty sleeves.’
‘Apprehension of the Autumn Lords, like Qi, is difficult, Livia,’ Min said.
I had grown tired of the obfuscation regarding the Autumn Lords and wished to be done with smoke and mirrors. The fey, oblique ways the people of Kithai dealt with straight-forward questions had begun to gall me. Yet, in the spirit of our reconciliation with Min, I let it lie.
My back hurt and Fiscelion was kicking with a vigour typical of the morning, pre-lunch. Breakfast seemed so long ago. I may have been, my dear husband, a tad cranky. This is something you have been spared, my moods, for I have always been even-keeled but now, as Fiscelion approaches, I know not which way my mind or heart will jump with any given thing, any random stimuli. The other morning, in the sun-dappled garden, I found myself crying as I watched the boys and Carnelia at their desperate martial labours. There was something so plaintive about Carnelia’s face as she practised striking with the armatura sword, something that reminded me of when all the world was new and my mother and father were still married and we possessed an innocence forever lost to us now. But there it was, the lustre of it, on Carnelia’s face, the way she looked with adoration on her brother and Tenebrae and most importantly on Huáng, whom they call sifu in deference and even obeisance. For so long I thought she was lost to that, to innocence and pleasure and everything new. Her face looked soft, full of light, and I loved her very much in that moment. And so, I found myself crying, caught in a shaft of light at a little bamboo table and chair, glad no one paid enough attention to me to notice.
Except the boy, Fantasma. He watched me with black eyes like pools, head cocked like a bird’s, his jaw working in and around in his mouth. It was a disconcerting thing, finding him standing there by the footpath to the ponds, staring at me, shoeless. When I turned to fully face him, a lóng or some bird on the wing cried out and he craned his head upwards to find them in the sky and then wandered off.
I wonder about that child. At times he seems to have some sort of reason, some faculty for higher thought, and then he wanders off to stare at flying creatures or insects caught like motes in light.
But today we are packing and Carnelia orders Delia and Lupina around with much delight in her authority over them while my stomach – the great precious expanse of it – is in an uproar. I have enough strength to let blood and write this missive to you. I am upset because you are not here – and I am upset because I am not there. I bear you some anger, and my father and above all Tamberlaine. It is the wiles of man – of men – that have put us apart and you, all of you, bear some guilt in this. Women are too easy to push aside when they become more than simply silent childbearers. We are messy, yes, gloriously messy and from this mess spills life and in that we make you all, men, afraid.
But I shall not end this on that sour note.
Be careful, Fisk, and remain well so that when I return to you we can forget the sorry days that spun out in the interim.
I remain your faithful wife –
Livia
TWENTY-NINE
Kalends of Sextilius, Sixth Hour, 2638 Annum Ex Rume Immortalis, The Malphas, fleeing Kithai, Jiang, and all of the Accursed East
Fisk,
I am weakened, my love, so very weakened. But Fiscelion has come into the world, bright, bloody, squalling. And so very small. Our son is born. I must make this as short as I can because I have lost some blood and am so very tired. Carnelia let blood on my behalf and now, face furious and fierce and protective, watches me from the chair in our stateroom on the Malphas, holding our screaming child. He will not stop. It is hard to marshal my thoughts. Juvenus has given me some sort of drink that makes the daemonlight waver and throb and pushes back our child’s wails and makes everything bright and streaked, as if light itself has become molten and smeary.
The swivel guns boom overhead intermittently, and despair – that peculiar despair that emanates from Hellfire that washes over us with each gun’s report – ratchets Fiscelion’s cries into new heights. I can barely think. I must move to somewhere more conducive to this letter and tell you what I have to tell.
The day after my last missive to you, my love, through the Quotidian to you on the Ides, we had packed for a short trip – three days, nothing more, as Huáng assured us the trip would take but a half-day at most by carriage, and we would be brought before the Autumn Lords on the day after that. On the appointed morning we made ourselves available in the courtyard of Sun Huáng’s manse. An elaborate lacquered bamboo carriage, absolutely massive, drawn by three sets of horses champing and chuffing air through their moist noses, stood waiting for us. Inside the carriage itself was a clever roof-hatch and ladder that allow those riding on the inside to climb up and onto the roof and sit on benches there to enjoy the breeze and watch the city and country-side pass by. There were two armed men at the reins of the carriage, both with Hellfire visible at their waists though seemingly of Medieran design. And there were two more at the rear carrying what looked to be ornate yet deadly blunderbusses, each one festooned with ornate and intricate warding and decoration. Where one left off and the other began, it was hard to tell, though I fancy that Samantha Decius would quite love to find one in her possession.
Our group carried Hellfire, of course, though not enough should we be braced by a large group of … Of … I know not who. I seemed to doubt that Sun Wukong’s monkey-boys would bother us but the people of Kithai and Jiang were and remain an unknown quantity and there could be any sort of fractious cadres of men and women – brigands, blackguards, and shitheels. But looking on our group now there were far more swords in the mix. Carnelia had her lovely jian tucked into a sash at her waist and I had a moment’s remembrance of her as a girl in the atrium of our villa on the Cælian, dashing about with a cat’s tail from the pond and jabbing at servants and slaves, cat’s tail dander flying, shouting in her high-pitched voice ‘I am Iulii of the People!’ and giggling madly. Secundus and Tenebrae also wore rougher swords, not as fine, though both of Kithai design. Sun Huáng carried his cane – which was all the man needed, truly – and Min too had a jian every bit as fine as Carnelia’s.
On the carriage ride Carnelia, Secundus, and Tenebrae climbed up to the roof and rode there, chattering like roosting lóng – while Min and Huáng rode their own personal mounts, finely accoutred, with opulent saddles with long stirrups that guarded the entire leg and ended in near boots that made each horse easy to mount; a very clever saddle that had an girth system that used the neck and back legs as bracing through leather straps so that the saddle and rest of the extensive tack were firmly attached – and I was left in near solitude with only Fantasma and Lupina for silent company. The Kithai carriage had sliding rice-paper windows that we threw back, letting in fresh air and allowing me some breathing space. Fantasma tended toward somnolence in confined spaces and often his body would loll against mine or Lupina’s (though hers less frequently) and my mood had swung, like an internal, invisible pendulum, toward a cranky lethargy as it is wont to do for long periods sitting. The countryside looked much the same as it had when we went to witness the goat offering to the shé outside the village of Uxi: terraced hills of rice paddies, small clutches of well-tended buildings huddling together, rough-spun farmers and farmwives trudging about on well-packed earthen paths, carrying water or baskets of rice or flagons of drink. Beyond the fields, woods covered soft hills and far, far beyond those, the barest blue intimations of mountains and cold. For us westerners, Kithai was massive and obscure, the veiled continent, and in most ways less was known about this land than, say, Ombra Terra, for at least Rumans and Medierans had placed that island country and the dark clouds alway
s looming over it. Its borders had been mapped, if not the landscapes contain within. But Kithai was most unknown except to those Tchinee who had travelled its breadth.
I was forcibly reminded of this as we neared P’ing-Yüan, the Winter Palace. For a short while, it seemed we were following a burbling river (one of the many tributaries that flowed into the Jiang) upwards into a forested rise, and then we were among the ruins, crumbling stone, collapsed roofs, choked with vines and reclaimed by ancient growth. The smell of burning incense and woodsmoke and the rutted trail through the ruinous land were the only indications of any sort of habitation here and it was with some surprise that we came upon the Dōngtiān Gōngdiàn, if I have transcribed that correctly – the Winter Palace of the Autumn Lords.
The land opened up, Huáng’s horse nickered with agitation and pranced sideways, and the carriage slowed. From above, I could hear Carnelia and the boys nattering on, making exclamations of delight and amazement. I called for a stop and exited the carriage, tired and cramped and unprepared for what I was to see.
The scale of the Winter Palace beggared the senses. It was as if some great, horned, ridged turtle had climbed from the sea, out beyond Jiang, and, streaming water, lumbered here to die and within the great shell of the creature a palace had been created with thousands of halls and doors and rooms. It was a scalloped affair, with the ridged roof an angry collection of spines and spires and hard bristling points of white stone. Tamberlaine’s palace could fit inside this building a score of times and have room to spare. The white stone towered overhead and the stairs themselves leading to the front gates were long and shallow and took a mile – at the least – to rise up to the entrance. On the stairs, I could see, were houses larger and once finer than the Cornelian estate on the Cælian, and around those houses, sat like discarded children’s toys in the shade of Dōngtiān Gōngdiàn, I could see the minuscule figures of guardsmen in yellow sashes and blue uniforms.
‘Ia’s balls,’ Tenebrae said, bristling some. A man will become angered if his sense of self-importance takes a blow. And indeed, the Winter Palace was built to cow mankind – of this there is no doubt. Whatever overweening ego built it millennia ago, it was to glorify a single man by making all other creatures seem insignificant. ‘That’s one hellacious jumble of stone.’
Secundus scratched his chin. ‘Wasteful. Why over-build something to this scale? It’s folly.’
Min drew her horse alongside the carriage and Huáng joined her. ‘It was folly, this is true. When this dwelling was built, all of Kithai was under the rule of Yu Xia – a good Emperor, and a beneficent one. That was the year of the great storms, when the sun became black in the heavens, and the first of the Autumn Lords appeared. Yu Xia built this building as a kingdom within his kingdom, where all would be safe indoors, at night.’
‘Safe? From whom?’ Carnelia asked.
‘The Autumn Lords, before the seasons settled on them and they became drowsy.’ She waved her hand forward. ‘We have quite a ways to go and the Great Stair is not easy.’
Tenebrae said, ‘So, the Autumn Lords came to power as an invading force?’
Min shook her head. ‘Things will become clearer, but the Autumn Lords are beings of—’
‘Pure Qi,’ I said. ‘We have heard this before. But what does it mean and how can a nation of people follow leaders that they have to protect themselves from?’
Min gave a sour laugh. ‘I have been to Rume, Livia. People always have to protect themselves from their leaders.’
‘That’s not what I meant,’ I responded. ‘The people of Kithai have to stay indoors at night!’
‘The August Ones came to an agreement with the Autumn Lords.’
‘How?’
‘That knowledge has either been lost to history or concealed.’
Min and Huáng dismounted and we made our way slowly up the steps. Secundus and Tenebrae carried between them the chest we’d brought from Rume. It was not heavy but they began sweating, for the day was warm. The steps themselves were carved from living stone and were worn with the passage of millions upon millions of footsteps over thousands of years. As we approached, I realized that the little clusters of houses along the way to the front entrance of Dōngtiān Gōngdiàn were more in the nature of a small village, rather than individual domiciles – such is the scale of the Winter Palace. A village can sit upon its front stoop and not be noticed. There was a clutch of buildings, built upon one of the evenly spaced terraces leading up, where the stone gave way to earth and opened up onto a grassy field truncated four or five hundred feet away by a retaining wall. There were horses and some odd woolly beasts grazing there. The homes themselves were of stone and wood, very sturdily made, with heavy shutters. We passed this little hamlet and continued on. The sun passed behind the peak of the Winter Palace’s roof, casting us into shadow as we craned our necks to get a better idea of the enormity of the building.
‘Gods and daemons, I’ve never seen the like,’ Secundus said, looking about. ‘I thought the stone was pitted and carious by wear. It is not.’ He pointed to a column. ‘There is a great twining dragon around that one, and all those marks …’ He squinted. ‘I believe they are spearmen, doing battle with the great beast.’
Huáng said, ‘Yes, like much of our world, artists want to focus on the details.’
‘In this case, it was an Imperial edict,’ Min said, a trifle sadly. ‘The Autumn Lords can become bemused easily and that was the hope in these frescoes and decorations. It is rumoured that at one time, a hundred men were employed to keep the exterior details painted in bright colours, almost lifelike.’
‘To draw their attention, as with the zhuìlì?’ I said.
‘Yes. Yu Xia was fabulously wealthy and had many artisan slaves who spent thirty years crafting the exterior of this place.’ She shook her head and pursed her lips, as if tasting something sour. ‘Ten thousand slaves died building it, a terrible waste of the people.’
‘You speak of them as if they’re gold, or silver. A commodity,’ I said.
Min cocked her eye at me but did not react to my tone. I was cranky. My feet were swelling with each step and I needed to take a seat and cool them off with some water – would that we were in Huáng’s garden, where I could dip them in a burbling brook.
‘It is a strange thing to think of them as such, but all of humanity is a resource,’ Min said. ‘I hope not one that is squandered.’
‘You sound like a Monkey-boy, Min, talking about the nobility of common man,’ Huáng said in an even tone, but I knew him well enough now to discern that his tone was near dripping with scorn.
‘Grandfather,’ Min said, ‘I will, of course, defer to your wisdom on this matter, but should we not value the workers, the fieldhands, the craftsmen? Too many taken and there’ll be no rice on tables, no wine in cups. There is honour in wielding a shovel or an awl as much as a sword, is this not true?’
‘Of course, as long as one strives for excellence in this. But what you say sounds like something Sun Wukong might—’
Min gave a small bow. ‘I will cease speaking, then, Grandfather.’
‘That is not what I want. I simply wish you to be …’ He paused. ‘Precise. Each word is a sword strike and what you say reveals who you have trained with,’ he said and looked at her closely. She became tense, agitated. Something passed between them then, though it remained unspoken.
We continued on until arriving near the front entrance. The doors standing there were wood wrapped in burnished bronze, and five elephants standing on each other’s backs could not reach their height, nor, if they battered the door with their bony skulls, could they have budged them. It would take a legendary dragon of old to open these doors, or siege engines. Or one swivel gun.
A small garrison – large enough for thirty to forty men – hid in the lee of a column and a pair of the men stationed outside, watching the steps, ran forward and made obeisance to Huáng, once it became clear an August One stood before them. Huáng exchanged
some words with them and the superior officer, judging from all the golden bangles and braids on his uniform, barked an order at a subordinate.
‘Tsing Huáng is being notified of our arrival,’ Huáng said.
‘Sifu, can you give us any idea what we can expect?’
Huáng remained silent for a bit, marshalling his thoughts. ‘He will offer tea. We will accept. Food will be served. He will attempt to determine who is in charge of you Rumans.’ He raised his eyebrows and looked between Secundus and myself. The point was not lost on me. ‘Then Tsing will begin negotiations and it is then you will offer the present from Tamberlaine,’ Huáng said, gesturing toward the ash chest with the gleaming steel lock.
Secundus said, ‘You have the key, still, TennyShadow?’
‘Of course,’ Tenebrae said. There was an anxious air about the man and I think he might have flinched when Secundus called him “Tenny” but, my love, all of writing is done in reflection, and I colour the past knowing now what I know.
‘Then what, sifu?’ Carnelia asked.
‘After you and Tsing come to some—’ He thought, searching for the word. ‘Some … accord … and Tamberlaine’s message is opened, he will bring you before the Autumn Lords.’
‘Why would we not deal directly with the Autumn Lords?’ I asked. ‘Can they not make decisions themselves?’
Huáng shook his head. ‘They are beyond that sort of thought,’ he said.
‘So, in truth, you and all the other Huángs – you’re their caretakers. You rule, not the Autumn Lords.’
Huáng bowed his head. ‘Of course. I thought this was understood. The August Ones rule and keep the Autumn Lords docile. This is our way.’
I think I already knew then, but it was hard. About many things. A growing dread was upon me and part of it was the weight of Fiscelion swelling within, part was my outraged body swelling without. But some of it was the unanswered questions, the August One’s oblique answers, the near mythic otherness of the Autumn Lords. I found myself furious, with Sun Huáng, with Tamberlaine, with the stupid look upon my brother’s face, the self-satisfied complacency that animated Tenebrae’s features. But Carnelia? She looked at everything as if she were a child taking in her first draughts of sense: vibrant colour, riotous sound, towering vistas. And that quieted if not quelled my mood.
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