Jade City

by Fonda Lee

  He saw that he’d gambled correctly; the old advisor relaxed a little. Surely if the Pillar suspected Doru of treachery or meant to harm him, he wouldn’t show his emotions like this. He would be careful to pretend to reconcile and keep him close. Doru was reassured; he said quickly, “You wound me, Lan-se. I’ve disagreed with you only out of concern for the clan and for your safety. You’re right, of course; we must find out more about the Mountain’s operations in Ygutan. I’ll leave tomorrow.”

  Lan nodded and said, sounding mollified, “I appreciate your concerns, Uncle Doru. I need you now more than ever. I’m sending two of the Horn’s men with you to Ygutan. It’s not a very safe country, and gods forbid anything should happen.”

  The faint smile that had begun to crawl over Doru’s mouth dissolved at this news. He guessed at the truth: Lan did indeed want information about the Mountain’s operations in Ygutan, but more importantly, he wanted Doru out of the way, watched constantly by Hilo’s men, something he could not accomplish here where Doru held sway on Ship Street, surrounded by his own people. He wasn’t worried about Doru’s activities in Ygutan. Hilo’s men would report back regularly and would corroborate everything Doru discovered. There was nothing the man could do against the clan.

  Lan’s outburst of pique had disguised any other negative intent Doru might have Perceived, and having already agreed to go, the Weather Man could not disagree with the Pillar’s security measures. “Whatever you think necessary, Lan-se,” he said.

  As soon as Doru was on a plane, Lan asked Woon to arrange an urgent meeting on short notice with Chancellor Son Tomarho and twenty-five other members of the Royal Council of Kekon over an invited lunch at the Grand Island Grill & Lounge.

  The Grand Island was on the penthouse floor of the twenty-eight-story Eight Skies Hotel in upscale North Sotto. The Lantern Man who owned the Eight Skies closed it to other customers at Lan’s request. The Pillar arrived early with Woon and greeted each of the councilmen as they arrived. News of the duel at the Factory had been all over Janloon, and everyone Lan met these days noticed and remarked on the new jade he’d added to his belt, the cuffs on his wrists, the cord of beads around his neck. If it weren’t for the immense importance of public perception right now, Lan would’ve resisted wearing all the acquired jade. The injury he’d sustained from absorbing and repulsing Gam’s Channeling attack lingered and made it hard to bear the heavy load. He’d been to Dr. Truw for healing sessions and wasn’t feeling as ill as he’d been immediately after the duel, but he wasn’t feeling well either. Sometimes his heart would begin to race or he would break into a dizzy sweat. Anxiety flared without warning. His sleeplessness worsened and he was often edgy, off-kilter.

  “Far do your enemies flee, Kaul-jen,” the councilmen said as they arrived, voicing the traditional expression of congratulations given to a recently victorious Green Bone.

  “By the luck of Jenshu’s favor,” Lan replied, thanking them before inquiring, “How’s your wife’s health, Mr. Loyi?” or “Mrs. Nurh, did your house fare all right in the typhoon?” These twenty-one men and four women were the most senior politicians loyal to No Peak. They came from longtime Lantern Men or Green Bone families and owed their political and financial success to the clan. Together, they held significant sway over the three-hundred-member Royal Council of Kekon.

  After a two-hour-long, no-expenses-spared lunch of mango coleslaw, fire-breathing soup, and grilled octopus, during which no business was discussed, Lan motioned for the table to be cleared. He began by commending Chancellor Son at length for his farsightedness in proposing the recent bill to reform KJA ownership laws. “The No Peak clan completely supports the government’s wish to ensure that the stewardship of Kekon’s jade is balanced and transparent. I’m grateful to be able to count on the clan’s friends in the Royal Council to do what is right for the country.” Chancellor Son beamed and waved a fat hand modestly as the other council members tapped the table in applause. It was all in politeness, as everyone in the room was surely aware it had been Lan himself who’d instructed Son to take such steps.

  Lan let the applause fade, then said, somberly, “Unfortunately, I must make you aware that these efforts come too late to rectify wrongs that have already occurred.” He explained that he had brought them here so they would hear it from him first and directly: He would be exercising his codirectorship powers to suspend the activities of the Kekon Jade Alliance, bringing all mining operations to an immediate and indefinite halt. The clan had discovered significant financial discrepancies between mine production and Treasury records, he said, and given the importance of jade to the nation’s economy, security, and identity, mining could not be allowed to continue until an independent audit was conducted. He strongly urged the Royal Council to call for and administer one as soon as possible. Operations would not recommence until the problems had been identified and the KJA reform bills passed to ensure future oversight.

  Son Tomarho was the first to break the stunned hush that followed the Pillar’s statement. The chancellor leaned his heavy elbows on the table and cleared his throat loudly, in a way that Lan could tell was meant to express the man’s disappointment that he had not been personally consulted before such a drastic decision. “With all respect, Kaul-jen, why is this the first time we are hearing about these accounting discrepancies? And why then is the Weather Man not here to explain them?”

  “The Weather Man is away on other important clan business,” Lan said, answering the second question and ignoring the first. Lan could not have discussed his intentions with Son earlier without risking Doru getting wind of them—unless he’d revealed to the chancellor his unproven suspicions of treachery within the leadership of the clan, something he would absolutely not do with any Lantern Man, no matter how senior. If Doru was indeed a Mountain collaborator and complicit or responsible for the discrepancies Shae had discovered, by the time he returned from Ygutan, it would be too late for him to halt an official investigation into the KJA’s books.

  The long-faced councilwoman Nurh Uma asked the question on everyone’s minds. “Are we correct to assume you believe the Mountain clan is behind this?”

  Lan gestured for the servers to refill the guests’ teacups. He didn’t drink from his own steaming cup; he’d been running a slight fever since last night and hot liquids made him sweat too profusely in public. “Yes,” he said, “that’s exactly what I believe.”

  “I find it difficult to believe that the Mountain is unilaterally manipulating the jade supply so egregiously behind the backs of the council and the other clans,” said white-haired councilman Loyi Tuchada with obvious skepticism in his voice.

  “I would believe it,” said Nurh, who had family members on both the business and military sides of the clan. “But Ayt Mada’s representatives will surely deny any wrongdoing. What do you hope to accomplish with this audit, Kaul-jen?”

  “The clans depend on the support of the people as much as the people depend on the protection of the clans; it has always been this way,” Lan said. “The nation will not want one clan to become too powerful, to control more jade than all the others. If it comes to light that the Mountain has acted against the good of the country, public and political opinion will turn against them. The results of the audit will lend urgency and credence to the council’s goals of passing stricter oversight over KJA activities.”

  Lan stopped to take a surreptitious, focusing breath. He’d abstained from eating much lunch, but nevertheless he felt tired and mildly woozy. It was an effort to keep his attention entirely on controlling this important conversation. Fortunately, it was relatively easy to fool jadeless councilmen. They mistook his moments of weakness for authoritative pauses. “For years, Kekon has been fortunate to enjoy stability and economic growth,” Lan continued. “We have foreign investment, people drive nice cars, our cities are booming—all things that my grandfather’s generation couldn’t have imagined. At the heart of this wealth and security is jade. Which means that the clans
who control jade must be held accountable.”

  The councilmen nodded; this was a point on which they could all agree. One of them, Vang Hajuda, began to say something, but Lan’s Perception began playing tricks on him—it turned abruptly white with background noise. The individual energies of the people in the room, combined with hundreds more on all the floors beneath them, all the way down to the thousands more walking on the busy street and driving past in the cars outside, all crowded into Lan’s mind unfiltered, interfering with one another in a sudden cacophony of nonsense, like a bad television signal blaring static.

  Lan’s head throbbed with pain. He felt, for a second, as if he were dangling high in the air atop a column of nothing but meaningless energy babble. Under the table, he gripped one of his chair’s armrests, hanging on to its reassuring solidity. Lan turned away and brought a hand up to shield his lips as he leaned over to Woon, sitting directly on his left. “Pretend to be telling me something,” he whispered.

  His Pillarman bent next to his ear worriedly. “Is it really bad this time, Lan-jen? Do we need to make an excuse to leave?”

  “No,” said Lan. Sweat had broken out on his brow, but the moment was already passing. The feverish confusion of his jade senses receded. His Perception settled and grew focused again. “Just tell me what he said.”

  “He wants assurances there won’t be more bloodshed.”

  Lan straightened to face the table just as Vang finished asking a question. “I apologize for the interruption,” Lan said.

  There was a minor ripple of consternation down the table; they were watching him closely. Vang repeated himself with a touch of pique. “If we bring these issues you’ve placed before us to the Royal Council, can we count on you, Kaul-jen, to try to reestablish the peace between the clans? No one wants violence on the streets, frightening people and driving away foreign business.”

  “We all want peace,” Lan said. He let his words hang as he wetted his mouth with a bit of tea. “Unless our families are attacked. Then we do what we must.”

  A number of the councilmen murmured in agreement. They were a strange breed, these politicians. As representatives of their districts, they pressured the Pillar for peace, but as clan loyalists and true Kekonese, they would never respect a leader unskilled or hesitant in dispensing violence. Lan killing Gam and wearing his jade gave them confidence in him as a leader and confidence in No Peak’s assertions. They would return to Wisdom Hall and work toward the purpose he’d set them.

  “We understand perfectly where you’re coming from, Kaul-jen,” Vang persisted. He represented an area of Janloon that included the contested territory of Sogen. “You’ve always come across as a reasonable man. But what about your Horn? Does he also want peace? Can we count on him to also be reasonable?”

  Lan laid a flat stare on Vang. “The Horn answers to me.”

  Admonished, Vang fell silent. The Pillar drew his gaze slowly up and down the long table of faces. When no one questioned him further, he rose from his seat. “Stay as long as you like, my friends. Enjoy the tea, and the view.” He nodded toward the expansive windows looking out over the downtown skyline before turning back to the table. “Chancellor. Councilmen. Your friendship to the clan, and your service to the country are, as always, deeply appreciated.”

  Once in the elevator, Lan mopped his brow and leaned against the wall, exhausted. He’d kept it together, but just barely. Dr. Truw had told him that his kie—the essential aura-producing energy of each individual that could be amplified and manipulated by contact with jade—was damaged, like an overstrained muscle. It might be weeks, even months until it fully recovered.

  Lan did not have the luxury of months. He couldn’t afford to continue like this, with his jade tolerance and abilities handicapped, not with so much at stake. “Woon,” he said, putting a hand on the Pillarman’s arm. “I’ve always been grateful I can trust you. I have to ask something of you now that you must keep to yourself. You can’t let it slip even within the family.”

  Woon regarded him with concern. “Lan-jen, I’ll do whatever you require of me.”

  Lan nodded. “I need you to make a phone call.”

  CHAPTER

  27

  Mistakes Revealed

  Shae sat quietly in the back row of the slow bus to Marenia, staring out the window and avoiding conversation while the tourists chatted and took photos out the open windows all along the scenic coastal highway. When she arrived in town, she found her mother walking on the beach behind the family’s cottage. Her mother seemed neither surprised nor especially excited to see her. Perhaps Lan had called her already to tell her to expect Shae’s visit. Kaul Wan Ria embraced her daughter warmly but briefly, as if she’d last seen Shae a month ago, instead of more than two years ago.

  “We can stroll the beach and then have some tea,” Shae’s mother suggested. “If we walk an hour that way, there is a very nice teahouse. The owners are very nice.” These days, she told Shae, she took long walks, gardened, watched television, and attended a class in watercolor landscape painting at the community recreation center. Shae ought to try it sometime. It was very restful.

  The seaside town of Marenia held ten thousand inhabitants and was a far cry from the ceaseless activity of the city. Shae found that it was just what she needed to set herself at ease again, to escape the confusion she’d felt after being around her brothers, who were, she knew, now engaged in a clan war without her.

  In the evenings, Shae practiced alone with the moon blade behind the cottage, the long expanse of wet sand a spongy black sheet under her bare feet, the roar of the ocean replacing the hum of traffic from her balcony in Janloon. In the morning, fresh-fish stands sold the dawn’s catch, surfers rode the warm swells, and people said hello to each other in the streets. No one was a Green Bone.

  It was like when she’d been in Espenia. What a disquieting revelation it had been to live in a place that functioned perfectly fine without jade and without clans. The two things that all the men in Shae’s family worshipped, that she’d been taught her whole life to hold above all else—other places did without them. Clan patronage and settling disputes through duels were seen as backward things. Green Bones were thought of as something exotic and magical, but ultimately archaic and savage. It was Jerald, really, who’d opened her eyes to the wider world; sometimes Shae was not sure whether to thank or blame him for it. Two years abroad had given her a perspective on her home country that she doubted most Green Bones possessed. Her college friends in Espenia could never understand Kekon; they would be bewildered by its apparent contradictions, by the seamless blend of modernity and casual brutality.

  Shae found Marenia charming but her mother’s company depressing. Kaul Wan Ria was like a piece of artwork or furniture that blended in with the rest of a house and went unnoticed. Before she’d been married off, she’d received a basic education and enough martial training to be able to tolerate jade contact but not enough to actually wear or use it. After her husband’s death, she deferred to her father-in-law, and later to her eldest son. If she begrudged her place, it never showed. If she found her life now to be dull or lonely, that didn’t show either. Shae watched her stirring a pot of soup on the stove; her mother had put on some weight and her hair was graying.

  “The boys are always very busy,” Ria said over her shoulder. “Lan comes to visit me sometimes. Hilo—only once. To show me his girlfriend. A very nice, polite girl, but a stone-eye.” Shae’s mother tugged on her right earlobe. “Still, it’s his choice, so long as he’s happy and his brother agrees.” She turned the stove off and moved the pot to the table. “They’ve been in fights, did you know that? Both of them! Hilo of course—always fighting—but Lan said he had to duel as well because of the disrespect to the family. So unfortunate.” She clucked her tongue, as if the Pillar and the Horn of No Peak were small boys who’d been implicated in a schoolyard brawl. No doubt Lan sanitized the things he told her, but still, Shae wondered if her mother preferred to be wil
lfully ignorant about what was going on in the clan, or if, growing up during wartime, she’d long ago accepted such violence as the casual norm for all men.

  “I made it extra spicy, the way you like it,” said her mother, ladling out the soup. “I’ve heard the food in Espenia is not very good. What did you eat there?”

  Her mother listened as Shae told her about Espenia. They discussed superficial things like the food, weather, and clothes. Kaul Wan Ria didn’t ask about Jerald. She didn’t inquire as to why Shae had returned, or what she was doing now. She did not even remark on Shae not wearing her jade, other than to sigh, “Ah, you worked so hard for it before. As hard as the boys! I’m glad you’ve learned to take it easier now. It’s better for your health, not to always be working so hard. As long as your brother doesn’t think it’ll look bad for the family.” As a general rule, she avoided asking prying questions or expressing strong opinions. As a child, Shae had gone to her mother for comfort, but never for advice. Indeed, she could think of little she had in common with her mother besides their eyes and somewhat mannish hands.

  “Do you like it here, Ma?” Shae asked. “Are you happy?”

  “Oh, yes,” said her mother. “You and your brothers are grown up. There’s no need for me to be around Green Bone troubles anymore. Men cannot escape it, of course, it’s in their nature—but you took off your jade and went to live far away, so you understand.”

  She was not sure she did; even now, she couldn’t say if she’d run toward Jerald and the enticing modern world beyond Janloon simply to escape the sting of her grandfather’s displeasure—the humiliation of seeing him, for the first time, openly side with Hilo against her.