Remarin’s men moved at once, fanning out among barrels and casks stacked in neat rows up and down the chamber.
“Where have you taken us?” Remarin asked, holding the dead or dying servant tight in his arms as blood ran down his shirt.
Tigai shook his head. No way to be sure, and Remarin should have known better than to ask.
Remarin scowled as one of the Ujibari stooped to pick up the lamp, casting light on the servant’s last struggles before the man went limp in Remarin’s arms. A poor omen to have a servant here at the moment of their arrival. Then again, the starfield could as easily have put them in the throne room with the Emperor in state, surrounded by sentries shocked to see a company of armed men appear without warning. Just as well they’d appeared somewhere free of sentries, and remote enough, judging from the quiet in the halls beyond.
One of Remarin’s men returned, wearing a stone look without a glance for the dead servant.
“We’re in a cellar beneath a kitchen,” the soldier said. “But it isn’t the Imperial palace proper.”
Both the soldier and Remarin gave him a withering look.
“Never promised I could get us there precisely,” he said, trying for a smile that ended in a grimace through the pain in his head. “Not when my subjects are fresh dead.”
“If the wind spirits smile on us, we’ll be in one of the adjoining palaces,” Remarin said. “The magistrates’ estates, or the servants’ manor. Anywhere else and we call this off. You can return us to Yanjin, yes, my lord?”
“We won’t have time for another attempt,” Tigai said. “It took six weeks to find those three.”
“And the same amount to get accurate maps of the Emperor’s palace. But if you’ve put us somewhere else, even somewhere close, those maps won’t count for the ink they’re drawn with.”
Wit soured on his tongue before he spoke. Remarin was right. Their plan hinged on quiet movement through the Kanjiao Palace, with force enough to overpower any sentries and avoid undue attention before they could escape. A half league in the wrong direction and his magic might as well have put them in the sand seas. Even if they were within the Imperial City proper, scaling the outer walls that ringed the palaces of the Imperial gardens would all but certainly end with their heads parted from their necks by a headsman’s blade.
Remarin led the way through the cellar, the lamplight flickering shadows of the casks against the walls as they passed. The room was dank but wide, with rough stonework on the walls and enough wine and barreled foodstuffs to feed a thousand lords and keep them drunk and laughing. A hundred casks at least, and as many crates and boxes. A good sign that they were at least within a palace, if not the Imperial one. And just as good that Remarin’s men hadn’t yet doubled back with warnings of sentries or other such trouble; a dozen had gone ahead, climbing the stairs at the end of the chamber to clear the rooms above and report their whereabouts as soon as they discerned them.
Blood pooled on the floor at the top of the stairwell, close enough that he almost stepped in it before he saw its source. Three dead cooks, servants with the same misfortune as the man who’d gone to fetch the wine. The rest of the room was quiet. Open flames sizzled beneath iron pots, where cabbages half chopped with onions, peppers, meat, and spices made a pleasant smell that promised dinner, though it would never be finished now. The rest of Remarin’s men arrayed themselves about the kitchen, flanking the entrances in case another servant had the misfortune to join his fellows.
“We’re done here,” Remarin said. “Lord Tigai, prepare to take us back.”
Remarin’s words lanced through him. He’d scarce had time to survey the room. “No,” he said. “Where are we? We have to be sure.”
“Those are eunuchs, my lord,” Remarin said, a pointed gesture directing his meaning to the bodies leaking blood toward the stairwell.
Tigai gave them a second look. Yes, he could see it, as much as one could tell anything from the shape of a corpse’s face. Soft features, hairless like boys. Eunuchs made fine servants, so it was said, though they didn’t come cheaply. To have three—four perhaps, if the first man they’d encountered shared their affliction—meant the owner of this palace was at least a wealthy man. And who would waste eunuchs on kitchen fare, when uncut cooks could be had for a tenth their price?
“Oh, fire spirits fuck me in the eyes,” Tigai said. “We’re in the harem.”
“We’re in the harem’s kitchens,” Remarin said. “And we need to be well on our way back home before His Majesty’s guards come looking. We’re not prepared for this.”
Tigai kept his head down, skirting toward an open window. Tranquil gardens blossomed on the grounds outside, the sort of idyllic pasture he might imagine building, if he owned a score of women devoted to giving him pleasure. Tall reeds stood beside a winding stream, with purple and orange flowers, and gold banners—the Emperor’s colors—hanging from stone walls ringing the enclosure. Great palaces for each consort would be built around the common ground, places for their denizens to lie idle until they were summoned by His Majesty.
Remarin was right; they needed to get out of here. Setting foot in the harem was death, for him, his men, and any girl they came close enough to have had a chance to ruin with their non-Imperial seed. But leaving was death, too, in its way. Leaving meant the banks would have their due. The Yanjin family would be ruined, Dao tried and sentenced as a debtor, Mei auctioned to an end no better than the girls imprisoned here.
“You’re right, of course,” Tigai said.
“Good. There will be another day for riches. I’ll rally the—”
“You’re right, but even if we’re not on the Kanjiao Palace grounds, a eunuch-led escort from these manors can reach the Emperor’s chambers unmolested by the palace guards. If we convince the sentries we’ve been summoned, the rest will follow, simple as a tumble in the hay.”
His words hung in the air for a long moment, Remarin staring at him in disbelief.
“I know,” Tigai said, forcing a grin through his exhaustion. “I’m a bloody fool.”
The already-dead eunuchs’ clothing provided their first set of disguises, four of Remarin’s men donning the bloodstained tunics and robes to scout ahead and signal that the way was clear. Lucky for them a small few wore no beards or mustaches; the Nikkon and Hagali favored clean-shaven looks, though none among them would stand a close inspection, if it came to it. They crossed the grounds without such a disaster, wind spirits be praised, and on his orders made for the nearest consort’s palace, a small manor house adjoining a garden split by a slow-running stream.
His false-eunuch soldiers fanned out as they took the steps leading to the consort’s palace. Tigai and Remarin came last, making for the central chambers while their soldiers swept the side halls for eunuch servants and any attendants in residence. He tensed as Remarin followed behind, waiting for the cries that would signal their discovery. None came. Instead they tracked across a wood floor polished almost to the point of reflection, past banners hung with characters signifying Peace, Joy, Happiness, and came to a paneled door, sliding it open to reveal the mistress of the house.
A young girl, closer to birth than to thirty, stared at them—and, more pointedly, at the full beard that made it all too clear that Remarin had never been a eunuch—showing them a panic in her eyes as though they were death itself. She sat on the floor reclined against a bed, flanked by two maidservants seated atop it, each with half their lady’s hair in their laps and ivory-inlaid brushes in their hands.
“Don’t move, or cry out,” Tigai said as Remarin stepped into the chamber beside him. “To do either is death; nod to assure me you understand.”
Neither maidservant moved so much as a quiver of their lips, frozen as though they’d been cast in stone. Their lady held her stare, but her expression had hardened, whereas her servants wore only fear.
“You’re here to rape us,” the girl said.
“I’m here to steal from you,” Tigai said, “and n
othing so precious as that. I need your garments, your cosmetics, and your servants’ spare dresses as well, if there are any on hand. After, I’ll leave you tied and bound but otherwise unharmed, I swear it on my ancestors’ blood. Cooperate in silence and none of you will be hurt.”
The girl held her stare, this time touched with confusion. “My … garments?” she asked.
“Her garments?” Remarin repeated. “Do you mean to bloody dress up as a princess?”
Tigai turned back to Remarin. “Of course. I said before, an entourage from one of these palaces can enter the Emperor’s chambers unmolested, but that’d be bloody hard to do without one of his prizes at the heart of it, no?”
“I thought you meant to take her with us, or one like her. No one’s going to believe the Emperor chose you for a concubine, no matter how many layers of paint you bathe in.”
He hesitated a moment. “I’ll need their help,” he said, nodding toward the still-frozen maidservants.
“Their help, and an hour or more of preparation we don’t have. Even for you, this is bloody fucking mad.”
“Don’t hurt them,” the girl said, reaching to lay a hand defensively across one of her maidservants’ laps. “My maids go free, untouched and unspoiled. For that price, I will do whatever you ask.”
Tigai looked between Remarin and the girl. Yes, he’d thought to masquerade as a concubine himself, imagining the rest of their soldiers putting enough distance between him and any prying eyes to cover for any inadequacies in his disguise. But Remarin was right. It would take time to don the costume, and any moment might herald sentries come to check the kitchens, or the outer wings of the manor they’d stormed.
“All right,” he said. “Get up. And show us where they keep the palanquins, or whatever other conveyance you use for transport to His Majesty’s bed.”
As it happened, the conveyance of choice was her own feet. Product of their having chosen a Second Consort to His Majesty the Emperor, rather than a First Consort or a recognized Empress, of which there were apparently six. A little-known fact outside the walls of the harem’s palaces, but evidently one of significant weight, judging by the way their captive phrased the titles when she gave her name. Second Consort Zhaoling Xia, a niece of General Zhao himself—not that Tigai knew one military officer from another. He guessed it was right to act as though he knew the name, and judged from her satisfaction he had squarely hit the mark.
The rest of Remarin’s men split the costumes available to them within Consort Xia’s apartments, and now walked in stately procession through the gardens toward the Kanjiao Palace. Six dressed as eunuchs—freshly uniformed, without the blood-torn clothes they’d left behind—with four more as sentries carrying decorative halberds draped with the Emperor’s sigil in gold and black. For Remarin they’d managed a black magistrate’s robe, lending an air of dignity to their party that served doubly well as a means to avoid fitting the Ujibari chieftain into gray-gold eunuch’s attire.
It was more than a Second Consort deserved, according to Xia, and all the more fortunate they’d managed to secure the magistracy for Remarin. With luck the Kanjiao sentries would see no more than two parties collided on their way to His Majesty’s chambers, opting to make common company as they traversed the grounds.
“Scribe Dan, you must share the source of the tonic you procured for First Concubine Liao,” Xia said suddenly as they approached the first gate. Her tone was even, measured as though they’d been engaged in light conversation for the last hundred paces. “Her maids say it has done wonders for her health during the pregnancy.”
Remarin walked forward a few steps before Tigai tsked to get his attention. “What?” Remarin began, then recovered himself. “Oh, yes. A tincture of … moss water and goat’s blood. From Ghingwai. Helps ease … back pain.”
The sentries outside the Kanjiao gate made no move to suggest they’d heard the conversation, nor even that they’d noticed the procession approaching up the stone-laid path. Two spearmen that he could see, with another two armed with muskets atop the walls, looking down, standing at attention. Simple enough to assault the grounds, if it had come to it. He had a pistol and a long knife tucked under his gray-blue servant’s tunic, and most of Remarin’s men carried similar fare hidden beneath their disguises. But where he saw four guards, there would be forty more within shouting distance once they got inside the Kanjiao walls, and four hundred more could be summoned if an alarm was raised that His Majesty was in danger. Consort Xia had only to shout to bring them all, and Tigai had his knife at the ready to silence her if she tried. Perhaps they could claim a fainting spell, a need to visit an infirmary, if he was quick with his cut. Still a better chance than they’d have gotten without her, though it made his knuckles white on the hilt of his blade as they walked.
“Liao speaks highly of your acumen with trade,” Xia said, giving no sign anything was amiss. “She hopes you will carry her compliments to her uncle, in Kongzhen.”
“Yes,” Remarin said. “Of course. The … ah … governor?”
Xia laughed as though he’d made a joke, and Tigai tittered along with a handful of Remarin’s soldiers. Was it possible the consort spoke in some sort of code known only to the sentries that would have half the palace take them before he could shift vision to the strands? Curse him for a bloody fool.
“Second Consort,” one of the gate guards said as they approached, bowing his head slightly. “Master Scribe.” He repeated the gesture for Remarin’s sake.
With that, their party passed through the gate, earning no more than bored looks from gate guardsmen paid to stand and stare for more hours than they spoke to anyone, coming or going.
Tigai’s heart thumped in his chest, and he spared a second glance backward to be certain no sentries hid in the shadows. That was it? For months they’d planned this attack, and he’d botched the arrival by putting them in the concubines’ quarters, and evidently all it took to get them on the grounds was a half-befuddled scribe’s costume and a concubine’s airy laugh.
A limestone walkway as broad as any thoroughfare extended from the wall through gardens twice as lush as those surrounding the harem, and they followed it toward a building rising from the maze of vines and hedges. Here Remarin’s preparation took over; they knew the way from any point in the Emperor’s palace to the vaults, and at once Remarin’s soldiers seemed to recognize where they were. Remarin barked a quick order and two of the eunuch-dressed men split off, trotting ahead to scout the way.
“Is my part done, then?” Xia asked, her tone suddenly sharper than before.
Remarin gave her no notice, delivering orders and scanning the grounds as they approached a side entrance to the palace proper. The sort of gate that would have been used for consorts, small and nondescript for all its surrounding gardens were lush and green. Tigai hadn’t put in the same hours studying the maps they’d procured, but he trusted Remarin’s judgment and the training instilled in their men. He’d intended to stay quiet and out of the way while they moved through the grounds, there to get them in and out again once the Emperor’s vaults had been breached. But Xia provided an opportunity for him to help: to keep her quiet, under watch, and ensure she gave no sign to the palace guard.
“You are with us to the end, my lady,” he said, according her the respect due a scion of a noble house. Which she was, technically, though it was hard to see one of forty women kept for one man’s pleasure as anything more than a whore.
“And what end is that? You abducted me to enter the palace; whatever you imagine your escape will be, I assure you, it is not so easily done for consorts to leave the palace grounds.”
Consort Xia gave no outward sign of the heat in her voice; to observers she would appear no more than a woman on her way to do her duty, a jewel in red silk surrounded by servants in gray and gold. A beautiful girl by any measure, with honey-milk skin, eyes like almonds, and a mouth caught between a pout and a too-inviting smile. A treasure the likes of which could not be found
if a man searched half the cities in the Empire, and he supposed the Emperor had done just that to find her. A travesty, for so much wealth to be held in one man’s hands. Enough by itself to assuage any remaining guilt over planning to steal the Emperor’s gold, had there been any left for him to lose.
“We have our ways,” he said. “But I promise you again: comply with our direction, keep your promise, and you will not be harmed.”
They climbed steps to the doorway, entering into a narrow hall, and Remarin sent scouts left and right while he held out a hand for Xia. She ignored it, hissing a whisper under her breath.
“You are supposed to be a servant, and a eunuch, not a gentleman out courting.”
He retracted the hand, following along as Remarin led them down the left passage. The smell of fresh-polished wood lingered in the air, with paper screens letting in light from the courtyard beyond. Gold inlays came alive with scenes from a mathematician’s dream, intricate patterns echoed on the walls and on carpets laid at the center of the smooth wood floors. Difficult to reconcile the opulence with what had been simple lines on paper, when he and Remarin had first reviewed their maps. So far it seemed Remarin had his bearings, directing them down passages the scouts had pronounced secure—free of sentries or watchful eyes, or made free with quick bladework. As a consequence, the palace seemed asleep, though he knew it was the sleep of a tiger, and their company dared to sneak close enough to fix the bell in place around its neck.
“Why do you do this?” Xia asked in a soft whisper when they made another turn. “Do you not fear for heaven’s wrath?”
“My father taught me to fear the wrath of the banker, and the envious neighbor, before the celestials,” he said. “Coin and treachery; these we can touch, and feel. The rest …” He grinned. “Only dust.”
Blood of the Gods Page 13