An Inch of Ashes (CHUNG KUO SERIES)

by David Wingrove

  ‘The doctors thought it best. And I... well, for all that happened, I felt she would be safest there.’

  ‘I see. But she is still not quite as she was, I take it?’

  Tolonen looked down, his eyes troubled. ‘Not quite, Chieh Hsia.’

  ‘I thought as much. Well, listen to me, Knut. Knowing how busy you’ll be these next few weeks, I’ve come up with an idea that might put your mind at ease and allow Jelka to come to terms with her experience.’

  ‘Chieh Hsia?’

  ‘You remember the island your family owned? Off the coast of Finland?’

  ‘Near Jakobstad?’ Tolonen laughed. ‘How could I forget? I spent a month there with Jenny, shortly after we were married.’

  ‘Yes...’ The two men were silent a moment, sharing the sweet sadness of the memory. ‘Well,’ said Li Shai Tung, brightening, ‘why not take Jelka there for a few weeks?’

  Tolonen beamed. ‘Of course!’ Then he grew quiet. ‘But as you say, I am far too busy, Chieh Hsia. Who would look after her? And then there’s the question of passes...’

  The T’ang reached out and touched his Marshal’s arm. It was like Tolonen not to abuse the Pass Laws; not to grant permissions for his family or friends. In all the years he had known him he had not heard of one instance of Tolonen using his position for his own advantage.

  ‘Don’t worry, Knut. I’ve arranged everything already. Passes, supplies, even a special squad to guard her.’ He smiled broadly, enjoying the look of surprise on Tolonen’s face. ‘Your brother Jon and his wife have agreed to stay with her while she’s there.’

  Tolonen laughed. ‘Jon?’ Then he shook his head, overcome with emotion. ‘I’m deeply grateful, Chieh Hsia. It will be perfect. Just the thing she needs. She’ll love it, I know she will.’

  ‘Good. Then you’ll take her yourself, tomorrow. After you’ve sorted out this business with the boy. And, Knut?’

  ‘Yes, Chieh Hsia?’

  ‘Don’t hurry back. Stay with her a night. See her settled in, neh?’

  ‘Is that an order, Chieh Hsia?’

  The T’ang smiled and nodded. ‘Yes, dear friend. It is an order.’

  After Tolonen had gone Li Shai Tung went through to his private rooms. He bathed and dressed in his evening silks, then settled in the chair beside the carp pond, picking up the Hung Lou Meng, the Dream of Red Mansions, from where he had discarded it earlier. For a while he tried to read, tried to sink back down into the fortunes of young Pao-yu and his beloved cousin, Tai-yu, but it was no good; his mind kept returning to the question of the Aristotle File and what it might mean for Chung Kuo.

  His son, Li Yuan, had seen it all five years before, in those first few days after he had been told the secret of their world – the Great Lie upon which everything was built. He remembered how Yuan had come to him that night, pale and frightened, woken by a terrible dream.

  Why do we keep the truth from them? Yuan had demanded. What are we afraid of? That it might make them think other than we wish them to think? That they might make other choices than the ones we wish them to make?

  Back then he had argued with his son: had denied Yuan’s insistence that they were the gaolers of Tsao Ch’un’s City, the inheritors of a system that shaped them for ill. We are our own men, he had said. But was it so? Were they really in control? Or did unseen forces shape them?

  He had always claimed to be acting for the best; not selfishly, but for all men, as the great sage Confucius had said a ruler should act. So he had always believed. But now, as he entered his final years, he had begun to question what had been done in his name.

  Was there any real difference between concealing the truth from a man and placing a wire in his head?

  Once he might have answered differently – might have said that the two things were different in kind – but now he was not so certain. Five years of war had soured him.

  He sighed and looked back down at the page before closing the book.

  ‘You were right, Pao-yu. All streams are sullied. Nothing is ch’ing... nothing pure.’

  He stood, then cast the book down on to the chair angrily. Where had his certainty gone? Where the clarity of his youth?

  He had foreseen it all, sixteen years ago, on that dreadful evening when his darling wife Lin Yua had died giving birth to his second son, Li Yuan. That night he, too, had woken from an awful dream. A dream of the City sliding down into the maw of chaos; of dear friends and their children dead, and of the darkness to come.

  Such dreams had meaning. Were voices from the dark yet knowing part of oneself, voices you ignored only at your peril. And yet they had ignored them. Had built a System and a City to deny the power of dreams, filling it with illusions and distractions, as if to kill the inner voices and silence the darkness deep within.

  But you could not destroy what was inside a man. So maybe Yuan was right. Maybe it was best to control it. Now, before it was too late. For wasn’t it better to have peace – even at such a price – than chaos?

  He turned, annoyed with himself, exasperated that no clear answer came.

  He stared down into the depths of the carp pool, as if seeking the certainty of the past, then shook his head. ‘I don’t know...’ he sighed. ‘I just don’t know any longer.’

  A single carp rose slowly, sluggishly, to the surface, then sank down again. Li Shai Tung watched the ripples spread across the pool, then put his hand up to his plaited beard, stroking it thoughtfully.

  And Yuan, his son? Was Yuan as certain as he seemed?

  He had heard reports of trouble between Yuan and Fei Yen. Had been told that the Prince, his son, had not visited his new wife’s bed for several days, and not through pressure of work. He had been there in the palace at Tongjiang with her, and still he had not visited her bed. That was not right. For a couple to be arguing so early in their relationship did not bode well for the future. He had feared as much – had known the match was ill-conceived – but once more he had refused to listen to the voice within. He had let things take their course, like a rider letting go the reins. And if he fell – if his son’s unhappiness resulted – who could he blame but himself?

  Again the carp rose, swifter this time, as if to bite the air. There was a tiny splash as its mouth lifted above the surface, then it sank down again, merging with the darkness.

  Li Shai Tung coiled his fingers through his beard, then nodded. He would let things be. Would watch closely and see how matters developed. But the cusp was fast approaching. He had told Tolonen otherwise, but the truth was that he was not so sure Li Yuan was wrong. Maybe it was time to put bit and bridle on the masses – to master events before the whole thing came crashing down on them.

  It would not harm, at least, to investigate the matter. And if the boy, Kim, could help them find a way...

  The T’ang turned, then bent down and retrieved the book, finding himself strangely reassured by its familiarity. He brushed at the cover, sorry that he had treated it so roughly. It was a book he had read a dozen times in his life; each time with greater understanding and a growing satisfaction. Things changed, he knew that now, after a lifetime of denying it, but certain things – intrinsic things – remained a constant, for all men at all times. And in the interplay of change and certainty each man lived out his life.

  It was no different for those who ruled. Yet they had an added burden. To them was ordained the task of shaping the social matrix within which ordinary men had their being. To them was ordained the sacred task of finding balance. For without balance there was nothing.

  Nothing but chaos.

  It was late afternoon when Li Yuan finally arrived at Bremen. General Nocenzi had offered his office for the young Prince’s use, and it was there, at the very top of the vast, three-hundred-level fortress, that he planned to meet the boy.

  Kim was waiting down below. He had been there since his early morning session with Tolonen, unaware of how his fate had hung in the balance, but Li Yuan did not summon him at once. Instead he t
ook the opportunity to read the files again and look at extracts from the visual record – films taken over the eight years of Kim’s stay within the Recruitment Project.

  They had given the boy the surname Ward, not because it was his name – few of the boys emerging from the Clay possessed even the concept of a family name – but because all those who graduated from the Project bore that name. Moreover, it was used in the Hung Mao manner – in that curiously inverted way of theirs, where the family name was last and not first.

  Li Yuan smiled. Even that minor detail spoke volumes about the differences in cultures. For the Han had always put the family first. Before the individual.

  He froze the final image, then shut down the comset and leaned forward to touch the desk’s intercom. At once Nocenzi’s private secretary appeared at the door.

  ‘Prince Yuan?’

  ‘Have them bring the boy. I understand there’s a Project official with him, too. A man by the name of T’ai Cho. Have him come as well.’

  ‘Of course, Excellency.’

  He got up from the desk, then went to the window wall and stood there. He was still standing there, his back to them, when they entered.

  T’ai Cho cleared his throat. ‘Your Excellency... ?’

  Li Yuan turned and looked at them. They stood close to the door, the boy a pace behind the official. T’ai Cho was a tall man, more than five ch’i, his height emphasized by the diminutive size of the Clayborn child. Li Yuan studied them a moment, trying to get the key to their relationship – something more than could be gained from the summaries in the file – then returned to the desk and sat, leaving them standing.

  There were no chairs on the other side of the desk. He saw how T’ai Cho looked about him, then stepped forward.

  ‘Excellency...’ he began, but Li Yuan raised a hand, silencing him. He had noticed how the boy’s eyes kept going to the broad window behind him.

  ‘Tell me, Kim. What do you see?’

  The boy was so small; more like a child of eight than a boy of fifteen.

  Kim shook his head, but still he stared, his large eyes wide, as if afraid.

  ‘Well?’ Li Yuan insisted. ‘What do you see?’

  ‘Outside,’ the boy answered softly. ‘I see outside. Those towers. The top of the City. And there,’ he pointed out past the Prince, ‘the sun.’

  He stopped, then shook his head, as if unable to explain. Li Yuan turned to look where he was pointing, as if something wonderful were there. But there were only the familiar guard towers, the blunted edge of the City’s walls, the setting sun. Then he understood. Not afraid... awed.

  Li Yuan turned back, frowning, then, trusting to instinct, came directly to the point.

  ‘I’ve called you here because you’re young, Kim, and flexible of mind. My people tell me you’re a genius. That’s good. I can use that. But I’ve chosen you because you’re not a part of this infernal scientific set-up. Which means that you’re likely to have a much clearer view of things than most, unsullied by ambition and administrative politics – by a reluctance to deal with me and give me what I want.’

  He laced his fingers together and sat back.

  ‘I want you to join a scientific team. A team whose aim is to develop and test out a new kind of entertainments system.’

  Kim narrowed his eyes, interested but also wary.

  ‘But that’s not all I want from you. I want you to do something else for me – something that must be kept secret from the rest of the members of the team, even from Marshal Tolonen.’

  The boy hesitated, then nodded.

  ‘Good.’ He studied the boy a moment, aware all the time of how closely the tutor was watching him. ‘Then let me outline what I want from you. I have a file here of R & D projects undertaken by the late Head of SimFic, the traitor, Berdichev. Some are quite advanced, others are barely more than hypotheses. What I want you to do is look at them and assess – in your considered opinion – whether they can be made to work or not. More than that, I want you to find out what they could be used for.’

  He saw the boy frown and explained.

  ‘I don’t trust the labels Berdichev put on these projects. What he says they were intended for and what their actual use was to be, were, I suspect, quite different.’

  Again the boy nodded. Then he spoke.

  ‘But why me? And why keep these things secret from the Marshal?’

  Li Yuan smiled. It was as they’d said; the boy had a nimble mind.

  ‘As far as Marshal Tolonen is concerned, these things do not exist. If he knew of them he would have them destroyed at once, and I don’t want that to happen.’

  ‘But surely your father would back you in this?’

  He hesitated, then, looking at the official sternly, said, ‘My father knows nothing of this. He thinks these files have already been destroyed.’

  T’ai Cho swallowed and bowed his head. ‘Forgive me, Highness, but...’

  ‘Yes?’ Li Yuan kept his voice cold, commanding.

  ‘As I say, forgive me, but...’ The man swallowed again, knowing how much he risked even in speaking out. ‘Well, I am concerned for the safety of my charge.’

  ‘No more than I, Shih T’ai. But the job must be done. And to answer Kim’s other question, he is, in my estimation, the only one who can do it for me.’

  Again T’ai Cho’s head went down. ‘But, Highness...’

  Li Yuan stood angrily. ‘You forget yourself, T’ai Cho!’ He took a breath, calming himself, then spoke again, softer this time. ‘As I said, I too am concerned for Kim’s safety. Which is why, this very day, I interceded on the boy’s behalf.’

  He picked up the warrant and handed it to T’ai Cho, seeing his puzzlement change to bewildered horror. The blood drained from the man’s face. T’ai Cho bowed his head low, one trembling hand offering the warrant back. ‘And you had this rescinded, Highness?’

  ‘Not rescinded, no. Postponed. Kim lives because I wish him to live. My father has made him my responsibility. But I am a fair man. If Kim does as I wish – if he comes up with the answers I want – then I will tear up this document. You understand, T’ai Cho?’

  T’ai Cho kept his head lowered. ‘I understand, Highness.’

  Fei Yen was sleeping when he came in. He stood above her, in partial darkness, studying her features, then turned away, noting her discarded riding clothes there on the floor beside the bed. He undressed and slipped into the bed beside her, her body warm and naked beneath the silken sheets. He pressed up close, his hand resting on the slope of her thigh.

  In the darkness he smiled, content to lie there next to her. He was too awake, too full of things, to sleep; even so he lay there quietly, mulling things over, comforted by her warmth, her presence there beside him.

  He understood now. It was only natural for her to be jealous. It was even possible that some strange, feminine instinct of hers had ‘known’ about his earlier relationship with the girls.

  He closed his eyes, listening to her gentle breathing, enjoying the sweet scent of her, the silkiness of her skin beneath his fingers.

  After a while he rolled from her and lay there, staring up through layers of darkness at the dim, coiled shape of dragons in the ceiling mosaic, thinking of the boy. Kim was promising – very promising – and he would make sure he got whatever he needed to complete his work. And if, at the end of the year, his results were good, he would reward him handsomely.

  That was a lesson he had learned from his father. Such talent as Kim had should be harnessed, such men rewarded well, or destroyed, lest they destroy you. Control was the key. Directed interest.

  He stretched and yawned. He had not felt so good in a long time. It was as if everything had suddenly come clear. He laughed softly. It made him feel wonderful – hugely benevolent.

  A smile came to his lips as he thought of the thing he had bought Fei Yen that very evening, after he had come from the boy. A thoroughbred; an Arab stallion bred from a line of champions. Its pure white flanks, i
ts fine, strong legs, its proud, aristocratic face; all these combined to form an animal so beautiful he had known at once that she would want it.

  He had bought it there and then and had it shipped directly to his stables, here at Tongjiang. He would take her first thing in the morning to see it.

  He smiled, imagining the delight in her face. Beside him Fei Yen stirred and turned on to her back.

  He sat up, then turned, looking down at her. Slowly, carefully, he drew back the sheet, letting it slip from her body, exposing her nakedness. For a while he simply looked, tracing the subtle curves of her body, his fingers not quite touching the surface of her flesh. So delicate she was. So beautiful.

  Wake up, he thought. Wake up, my love. But the wish was unrequited. Fei Yen slept on.

  He lay there a while longer, unable to relax, then got up and put on his robe. His desire had passed the point where he could lie there and forget it. He went through into the marbled bathroom and stood there in the shower, letting the cold, hard jets of water purge him.

  He stood there a while longer, mindlessly enjoying the flow of water over his limbs. It was lukewarm now, but still refreshing, like a fall of rain, clearing his mind. He was standing there, his arms loose at his sides, when she appeared in the doorway.

  ‘Yuan... ?’

  He looked up slowly, half-conscious of her, and smiled. ‘You’re awake?’

  She smiled, looking at him. ‘Of course. I was waiting for you.’

  She slipped off her robe and came to him, stepping into the shower beside him, then gave a small shriek.

  ‘Why, Yuan! It’s freezing!’ She backed out, laughing.

  He laughed, then reached up to cut the flow. Looking across, he saw how her skin was beaded with tiny droplets.

  ‘Like jewels,’ he said, stepping out.

  She fetched a towel then knelt beside him, towelling him, tending to him obediently, as a wife ought. He looked down, feeling a vague desire for her, but he had doused his earlier fierceness.

  She stood to dry his shoulders and his hair, her body brushing against his, her breasts and thighs touching him lightly as she moved about him. Turning from him, she went to the cupboards, returning a moment later with powders and unguents.