by Matt Weber
Datang nodded in appreciation. “And yet, Netten,” she said, with perhaps a trace of emphasis on the freeman’s name, “you have said nothing of how Red Tenshing won his gamble. Which, if I am not mistaken, is the question weighing heaviest on our minds.”
“Ah, Left Hand,” said Netten. “Come, you have fenced. When a foe continually presses the advance, do you need to ask if he is weak on the retreat? When he contorts himself to avoid use of the Cat maneuvers, must you entertain the possibility that he has mastered them?”
“Of course not,” said Datang, though something nagged about the latter point. “But I will use every trick at my disposal to force him into his weakness.”
“Even if he is a friend?”
“The more so if he is a friend, for in that case I will not kill him if I win, and he will learn from his defeat.”
“Be careful what you say you will not do,” said Netten. “Such declamations come back to haunt. But well reasoned nonetheless. So, I will say what you already know. Red Tenshing won his gamble by treating with the bats.”
“And are you, Netten freeman, in a position to do the same?”
The sound was barely noticeable in the howling wind—if anything, it was felt a sudden hush, as though the air’s orchestra had suddenly been covered by a great down quilt. Netten smiled and rose, and Datang thought for a moment she could see the white aura of the Eight Weapon Hand emanating from his hands. “I am only a freeman of Uä,” he said, “but I have learned a few skills, and I have some knowledge of the Orchid Palace. Let us see what they think of my position.”
Lin Yongten looked over at Netten as he arose himself, more slowly. “Do not forget who petitions whom, freeman.”
“A god may petition a King,” said Netten.
“That is just,” said Lin Yongten. “But bats and freemen respect no such congenial treaties.”
Datang jostled Lin Gyat from his slumber; he blinked, then took the cave in as though it had appeared around him while he slept, replacing whatever better place he might have expected to bed down in. “I’m sorry, Supervisor—” He stopped short as lucidity returned. “No. Left Hand. What is happening?”
She offered him her hand; he took it and nearly dragged her down to him, but she spread her feet and set her stance against his weight, and he rose rather than topple her. He stooped to retrieve his monk’s spade. “We are going outside,” she said, “where Netten will save us from being killed by bats.”
He pivoted, hopping, and draped his arm around her shoulder; he was uncomfortably warm from his proximity to the fire, though Datang knew she would welcome that stored heat in a moment. “Bats eat fruit,” he said. “I will send them packing with my monk-stick.”
“Can the Python of Degyen not scare them off?” said Datang.
“The Python of Degyen is inapplicable here,” said Lin Gyat, “for it seduces even as it terrifies. And reptiles abominate the cold in any case.”
Netten and Lin Yongten had left the cave. The firelight flickered off demonic features: fist-sized eyes like obsidian orbs, snub noses smashed up against faces in the shape of fleshy leaves, ribbed wings held to sides in a not-quite parody of menace, tongues moist and gleaming in fanged mouths. Datang and Lin Gyat limped patiently in their direction, away from the fire, toward fate.
Terms of surrender
he sky over the Great South Plain was vast and cloudless, the grass newly studded with gentian and trillium, the golden sun gleaming on the water of the Silver Dragon—all of it a clamor at the doors of Gyaltsen’s mind, which cared for two things only: The soldier in brown and grey who galloped toward them, pulping trillium and gentian alike under his charger’s steel shoes, and, behind mount and messenger, the Iron Eunuch’s host, spread out on both sides of the river in a ragged circle that reminded Gyaltsen of nothing so much as a fungus of the skin. Gyaltsen had seen drips of pine sap move faster down a trunk than this soldier could seem to manage on his visibly undernourished steed—but the man drew up to them at last, unharmed, bearing the crane banner of peace. “The Glib Ape requests fifteen minutes,” he said to Gyaltsen. “Then he will receive your party.”
Gyaltsen thanked him and turned to the Undersecretary for Social Harmony in the Precincts of the Great South Plain, who rode by his side, nearly bowing the back of the only mare docile enough to accept him. “Make your peace, mandarin.”
The two of them accompanied several civilian retainers, a small band of the Cerulean Guard, and a trio of musicians that Gyaltsen had ordered to keep silent at all times, all of them shivering amidst a muddy plain on a chill spring morning. The Minister of Diplomacy had assured Gyaltsen that this was the minimum party that could fail to give insult to the Pretender. That Minister, like most of his colleagues, had an excellent excuse for declining to accompany the party. Only the Undersecretary for Social Harmony in the Precincts of the Great South Plain appeared to have free time in his schedule. Being a jumped-up lumberjack had its perils, Gyaltsen realized with some small, grim satisfaction. Of course, it had not escaped him that the Undersecretary might have come in for this assignment precisely because he had outlived his usefulness, and it would be better for some schemer if his rank were vacated.
“My peace is made,” said the Undersecretary. “We are all going to die horribly. I am reconciled.”
“They will not kill the wielder of the Cerulean Sword,” said Gyaltsen. “This far from the city, it would be a victory for us if they did—it would tear their ranks apart like paper, and barely any harm to ours in Rassha.”
“For me,” said the Undersecretary, “no scenario in which my bones are jellied by the rage-storm of a petulant blue boning-knife can properly be termed ‘victory.’”
“The Crescent,” said Gyaltsen, annoyed, “were you not a soldier once? What victory is not purchased with soldiers’ lives?”
“Whereas generals, spending them, oft survive even defeat,” the Undersecretary said darkly.
“Generals and mandarins alike—yet here we are. The difference between us is that I am here to free my people from the tyranny of this upstart’s siege, and you because you were too stupid or weak to effectuate your cowardice.”
“Not too stupid to save your life, General,” said the Undersecretary, “nor too weak. The city’s assassins are beginning to starve, you know, what with the damnable solidarity that war brings and the restriction of movement attendant on sieges. Rates have never been better. More than one of the old men you lectured thought you had lost your mind with this talk of surrender.”
“But not you.” Gyaltsen looked appraisingly at the Undersecretary. The mandarin shrugged his huge shoulders, but his piggy eyes were as bright and sharp as Gyaltsen’s. “Well, Undersecretary, I regret to say that at least one of your colleagues failed to be persuaded. I think perhaps the drop in assassins’ rates has accompanied a drop in the quality of their work. The man barely put up a fight. Perhaps malnutrition is the issue.”
“The Lotus,” said the Undersecretary. “That is chilling. Who took out the contract?”
“It was the Master of Horse,” said Gyaltsen irritably. “He fancies himself a great intellectual because he does not believe in self-evident truths, such as the Rigors, or the Priestkiller Worm, or the Cerulean Sword, and thus does not believe that it is suicide to murder me. It is a shame his man did not succeed, in truth, for then I would not have to sit on a chilling horse on a spring morning bantering with a jumped-up lumberjack, and the Master of Horse’s brain would be functioning much better in its new role as a thin slime on a piece of shattered masonry.”
The Undersecretary for Social Harmony in the Precincts of the Great South Plain laughed out loud at that—so heartily that both horses started, the musicians ceased practicing, and a flight of grouse rushed skyward from a stand of tall grass. “That is a pretty picture,” he said, “and perhaps it could be realized even without swordly intercession. But really, General, you think the thing could shiver apart the very Orchid Palace? It is half a mountain
, rooted into a whole one. No earthly gale could do more to the Orchid Palace than strip it of its banners and prayer flags. Unless the place would crumble at its nakedness, I guess its stays would survive your death.”
One of the small talents an infantryman learns is the art of shrugging in armor; the act of propagating such a subtle motion at the correct amplitude through the geometry of pauldron and breastplate was no small skill, and Gyaltsen put it to good use. “You may guess what you like, Undersecretary. Do you know where the Cerulean Sword was found?”
“Educate me.”
“You should; it is relevant to your fields of study. The story is complicated of necessity, and was reported by the Thousand Arm Deity in the days when he spoke to men. In it, the sword was found in the hands of a hermit in the ancient Forest Behind the Wall, once part of the Duchy of Palden.” The Cerulean Sword crooned quietly at this, as though memorializing the event.
“The Forest Behind the Wall?” said the Undersecretary. “We traveled through all of Palden from Therku and I never heard of it. Where is it?”
“It would be around us now,” said Gyaltsen, “had Palden’s men not killed the hermit.” And he spurred his horse to trot over the ridge.
It was the first time he had seen the Iron Army massed—he had encountered no shortage of hapless tower defenders, if most often as they shot through the air away from him at fatal speeds, but this was a different thing. The men all stood at attention in their companies, weapons in hand but at their sides, eyes forward. Their uniforms were grey, the company banners grey and a single color. A lane down the middle led to an immense pavilion. Gyaltsen looked over the formation. “This pretender’s men are more disciplined than the last’s,” he said to the Undersecretary.
“Our men were animated with passion. These are here to march in formation.”
“They are rebels too, and yours grew passionate with terror when the tide turned. Or have you forgotten what we did to you at the Red Field?”
“I remember that you gave ground at the Red Field,” said the Undersecretary, “and withdrew to Goat Ridge.”
“My men burned at Goat Ridge,” said Gyaltsen, “but they did not break.” He turned to the army and called out in a ringing voice, unmistakably that of a general accustomed to giving orders over clamor and distance. “I would prefer to speak from here, before your men, rather than in some tent.”
In response, a man emerged from the pavilion tent—on the short side and burly, with arms that seemed to wish to scrape the ground, but with a well-constructed face. He took a step and flung himself into the air as easily as any wasp, landing close to Gyaltsen and the Undersecretary with an impact that startled the horses and drew a muffled snarl from the Cerulean Sword. “I am Chojor jiao Glib Ape, chief strategist for the Iron Eunuch Tenshing Astama, King of Uä,” he said.
“We can wait for your horse,” said Gyaltsen, “so that you may speak to us from an equal vantage, if you prefer.” The Undersecretary was examining the Glib Ape after his leap with some suspicion; the Cerulean Sword growled softly.
“Speak to a King’s general and a mandarin of Rassha from an equal vantage? I know my place, sir,” said the Ape.
Gyaltsen threw him a flinty gaze and, speaking no further, dismounted. He and the Ape were of a height, though the Ape gave the impression of being the shorter by slouching. Gyaltsen looked at him and saw craft, intelligence, strength, and speed greater than his oddly shaped body suggested. “I am Gyaltsen, the King’s General. Why have I not heard your name, Glib Ape? Where did you cut your teeth?”
“Here and there. Undistinguished campaigns in the west. I am informed that you wish to discuss surrender.” The Ape made a show of studying Gyaltsen’s posture, his expression. “Your bearing suggests otherwise.”
Gyaltsen smiled thinly, hiding his teeth. “Will you not hear me out?”
“Were you anyone else, I might cut you down where you stand,” said the Glib Ape. “But fate is not always kind. The move is yours.”
Gyaltsen nodded, then turned to the massed troops positioned below the ridge. He spoke in his ringing general’s voice, imagining that every syllable would reach the last ranks of the last companies. “Soldiers of the Iron Army, I have come to offer terms for surrender. I will personally open the gates of Rassha to you and welcome your Iron Eunuch to the Orchid Throne, renouncing the epithet of ‘Pretender’ and pledging my service, if he wants it, for the rest of my days—or else ceding my position, and my blade, to the Glib Ape or any other strategist of your candidate’s choosing.”
He paused to allow lumberjack minds to catch up with an offer that (he flattered himself) they could not possibly, this fine morning, have anticipated.
“I have but one condition. Let us cease hostilities until the Priestkiller Worm lies dead.”
Gyaltsen let the word “dead” ring across the silent plain.
“If it is the Iron Eunuch who has killed him, we will open our doors to you in gratitude, in celebration, and in peace.”
Gyaltsen paused again. None of the soldiers in his view had reacted. But they would have chosen the best ones to face him; he would have done the same, in the Glib Ape’s place.
“Hear me, men of iron: The Great South Plain is no longer the crucible in which the gods’ wishes are distilled. That crucible is in Pongyo Gorge, and our own King has gone there to be tested. Your candidate need not take Tenshing’s expedient,” and he did stress the kingly name, almost barking the first syllable, “and brave the Cradle Mountains. We will grant safe passage out of the Great South Plain to the Iron Eunuch and an escort of any size. And the victor at Pongyo Gorge will receive the same safe passage back, all the way to the Resting Place Between Heaven and Earth Pavilion, and into the throne room of the Orchid Palace.
“Those are our terms. This much I could have said to the Glib Ape in his pavilion. But do not forget, men of iron, what it means if your candidate refuses.
“For centuries, now, the question of kingship was a question of ancestry. Has some secret bastard perturbed the accumulation of brothers? Has some tiny difference in the time of two boys’ birth disordered our perceptions? But you saw the same sky filled with moths that I did, you lost your voices just as I did. We are beyond the question of men’s claims to the throne by blood—the question now is who can save us, and who will? Your candidate claims he is the only man standing between the Priestkiller Worm and the throats of your wives and daughters. How, then, can you countenance his continued presence in the Great South Plain? How can you explain it? How can he?” Gyaltsen was enjoying his momentum, but he made himself stop—his voice was growing ragged, strident. “I was a soldier of the line once, like you. I pledged my life to a man higher than myself and made myself a weapon. I did it all my life, and Heaven smiled and I advanced. Like your Glib Ape, I fought in countless undistinguished campaigns in the west. I fought in the jungles of Degyen and southern Dhakamma, putting down secessions and the bids of upstart warlords against our kingdom’s lawful duchies. I presided over fat years of peace and planned for war; and when the man we once called Chief-Marshal Kandro raised his banners in Therku and began the march south to Rassha, I opposed him with all the strength in my sinews. Only the Gracious Regent’s forbearance kept me from raising gales against the man in whose name I now fight.”
Another silence, just brief enough for the words to ring; for the bitterness to spread from the back of Gyaltsen’s throat to the front of his tongue. The man who disappeared. The man who set this mountain of a lumberjack between himself and me when the kingdom most needed our collaboration. The man who will never be as good, blood or no, as the man whose name he stole. It was good to have contempt for the enemy who stood before him; only contempt kept him from stepping aside and unbarring their way to Rassha. The men in the front ranks were beginning to grow bored, to avert their gazes. How easy it would be to tear those scornful faces from their very skulls. He suspected the Glib Ape would not let him survive the act—which intensified the temptation
. But there was still the city to defend.
“But I do fight for him,” Gyaltsen managed to choke out. “Blood told, and I listened. Perhaps I misheard. But we can know, now. We can have certainty. If your candidate,” and here he did not stint to paint the word with scorn, “rises to his claim.
“My men know his description. We will know when he leaves the plain. On that day, we vacate the towers. On that day, our army withdraws behind the walls. And if the Iron Eunuch returns with the head of the Priestkiller Worm, that army and that wall are his. All we ask is that he prove his claim. If he refuses…” Gyaltsen used his skill at shrugging in armor again, trusting that enough men would see the gesture. “Come to us when you are ready. We welcome your argument.”