The Grass King’s Concubine

by Kari Sperring

  “Dead she can make us no restitutions.”

  “Are you sure of that?”

  Aude began to step away, stopped herself. Neither of the Cadre were armed, as far as she could tell. If she ran, if she showed her alarm, it might make her situation worse.

  Sujien said, “Shirai said alive.” He frowned. “I can use her, alive. I found her. I called her. Shirai agreed to it. But he said alive.”

  “So he did.” Crossing to a heap of cushions under a window, Qiaqia sat down, pulling her legs up under her. “I expressed an observation, not an intention.”

  She had left the faucets running. Aude could see a steam beginning to rise from the bath. It was deep and wide; it would take some time before it overflowed. She said, “Perhaps Mistress Qiaqia could explain matters to me while I bathe? Since she doesn’t, apparently, really intend to kill me.” She stared at the Cadre. She would not let herself be browbeaten. To be safe, to have a chance to escape, she had to stay strong.

  Again, they both looked at her. Sujien said, “We’re not at your orders.”

  “You want something from me. It might help if you told me what it is.”

  Sujien’s hand snaked out, seizing her wrist. His fingers dug in. “Come and see, then. See what you’ve done.” He tugged her toward the arch in the far wall, the one she had not explored. “In here.” The beads of the curtain stung her face as he shoved her through them. Off balance, she stumbled and dropped to her knees. It was a bedroom. A wide divan occupied its center, hung with silk and piled with quilts and pillows. The walls glowed, green and blue and mother-of-pearl, throwing sea-colored shadows across the floor. A scent of stagnant water hung over it all. Sujien hauled Aude to her feet and thrust her toward the divan. “Look. You want to know what you’ve done? Then see.” His free hand closed about her neck, forcing her head toward the bed. “Look.”

  Aude looked. There was nothing and no one there. The quilts lay dented, as if an occupant had risen from them. She said, “I don’t understand…”

  “She’s faded. Your doing.” Sujien’s fingers dug into her neck. She winced. “Your doing.”

  “But I…”

  He shook her, hard, jarring her spine. She could not free herself—his grip was too tight. The pressure of his hand made it hard for her to breathe. For all his statements, he might kill her. He was insane, and he would kill her…Her pride deserted her, leaving fear washed up in its wake. She was alone with this; there was no one to rescue her, to watch over her, to uphold her. She longed for Jehan. Sujien shook her again and let go. She dropped to the floor, muscles weak, panting. She put a hand to her throat, head hanging.

  From the other room, the sound of water running cut off. Qiaqia must have turned off the faucets. Aude swallowed, winced again as her throat protested. She was wholly at their mercy. She did not know what to do. Nothing in her education, in her training, had equipped her for this. If there were rules for dealing with the bodyguard of a domain king, she had never learned them. Nothing she had read provided guidance for that.

  She rubbed again at her neck and looked up. The two bannermen stood over her, watching. She did not want them to think her defeated. She could not think of what to do.

  Qiaqia said, “Let her bathe.”

  “I see no need for it.” Sujien folded his arms, tucking his hands into his sleeves. They were square, those hands, strong-fingered, heavy. Aude would read their traces on her neck for days to come.

  “I see no reason not,” Qiaqia said. “And Shirai offered her shelter. You claim that in the end, she must come to water, after all.”

  That made no sense either.

  Sujien said, “If you would have it, then.”

  “It will do no harm.”

  Sujien shrugged. “Your responsibility, Qia-kai.” He looked down at Aude. “I will have answers, human thing. Be sure of that.” He hesitated, then turned, robes swinging. Chill air shook out from them, shivered over Aude’s skin. The bead curtain bounced behind him.

  Qiaqia looked down at Aude. “I’d bathe now, before he decides it’s a chance to drown you.”

  She must come to water, after all. Nothing told her that she might trust Qiaqia any more than Sujien. Better dead. Those words had come from the bannerwoman. Aude climbed to her feet and stepped backward, out of easy reach. She said, “How do I know you won’t do the same?”

  “You don’t.”

  She had no weapons. Her knife, the carbine, the pistols, and Jehan’s saber were all lost to her, in the Woven House on the plain. If she had them, she might have some chance of defending herself. If she had been thinking, she would have found herself a makeshift weapon in one of the rooms: a heavy lamp, a hand mirror, something. She had tripped herself with her own confidence, and there was no Jehan here to guard her back. She swallowed tears. Then, as calmly as she could, she said, “I’ll bathe.”

  Qiaqia followed her into the bathing room and seated herself on the floor. Aude made a show of studying the range of oils and soaps available. She was accustomed to bathing in company; her maid attended to wash her hair and hand her towels. She kept her head high as she stripped. She was young, after all—her skin was smooth, her limbs strong. She would not be shamed by a stranger’s gaze. She stepped into the bath, down its three carved steps, and slid into the water. It curled about her, warm as Jehan’s hands. It soaked into her hair, loosened the tautness in her neck, nibbled away the tension from scalp and shoulders. She closed her eyes and lay back. She had no certainty of rescue. This brief pleasure should be savored: It might not come again.

  Jehan would be horrified. He would see only her vulnerability, naked and in the company of strangers. Aude allowed herself a few moments more indulgence, then sat up to wash. The soap smelled vernal, redolent of new life. On her skin, it was silken and smooth. She was not used to washing her own hair. On the long journey, the long mass of it had baffled her. That was one of the reasons she had hacked it off to her shoulders. In every inn, on stream banks, Jehan had had to help her. Now, soap stung her eyes as she tried to rinse it clear, and Qiaqia laughed.

  Aude said, “Help me, then, if I’m so inept.”

  “If you wish.” Through suds-clouded vision, Aude watched Qiaqia come to kneel beside the bath, rolling up her long sleeves. Her skin was the chill blue white of skim milk, of dead things. She reached for a brass jug standing on the rim, and the end of her scarf draped into the water. With her other hand, she untied it, dropping it to the floor.

  Aude stared. Corpse skin, black eyes with strong brows, fine bones, straight black hair drawn back in a long complex braid. She had seen such features only in the ink wash paintings from the far edge of the empire of Tarnaroq. Her own skin was dark amber, her eyes and hair brown. Qiaqia caught her watching, and smiled. Then she raised the jug and dumped a stream of cold water over Aude’s head. Aude spluttered and gasped, blinking. “I was born for the first time,” Qiaqia said, “in the wilds of Ashgar. And I died in the Cave City, in the Yellow General’s army. Liyan found me and asked the Grass King to have me reborn to serve as Cadre.”

  Reborn. Qiaqia did not look like the dead thing that had infested the Woven House. And yet…Aude said, “You died…”

  “Yes.” Qiaqia handed her a towel. “That’s the nature of the Darkchild.”

  Liyan was another of the Cadre. That meant…Aude frowned, trying to recall the old tales. “Liyan isn’t of your banner.”

  “He leads fire.”

  “Then why…?” Something in Qiaqia’s face stopped Aude in mid-question. She took the towel, held it at shoulder height as she climbed out of the bath. It was thick and soft and heavy; fine threads caught in the scratches on her forearms and the hard skin on her knees and elbows. She scrubbed at herself, enjoying the tingle and sting of blood flow. She was coming back to herself, a little, despite everything. As she began to towel her hair, she said, “What’s a Darkchild?”

  “Me.” Qiaqia sat back on her heels. “There are five Cadre, one to lead each banner: Darkchi
ld, Firehand, Stonebourne, Windward, and Waterling. Qiaqia and Liyan, Shirai, Sujien, and Tsai. One band of bannermen for each of the domains, and one Cadre for each band.”

  “But you were human. I mean, you fought for the Yellow General.” It was the least confusing thing Aude had heard so far. Every schoolchild read of that war, of the Tarnaroqui renegade who tried to topple an emperor with words and cunning and, finally, arms. If Qiaqia had lived in those times…

  “I was,” Qiaqia said, “but I am no longer.”

  There were tales in the Silver City of ghosts, of hauntings. Ancient men were said to walk corridors and aisles, to lurk in towers and on balconies. Aude had seen none of them, credited none of them until the dry dead thing had shuffled into the kitchen of the Woven House. No longer human. She did not know what that meant. She said, “And the others, are they…?”

  “No. Death is not their domain.”

  That meant, perhaps, that none of the others was even scantly human. She did not like to ask. It did not seem polite, somehow. Qiaqia, Liyan, Shirai, Sujien, and Tsai. Tsai. These rooms belong to the Concubine. To Tsai. But some harm had come to Tsai, whatever she had been, and the Cadre blamed Aude for that. She had no idea why.

  She reached for her tunic, hesitated. She had barely worn it, yet she was reluctant to put it on again after the bath. Qiaqia rose, took a robe from a hook and offered it. “There are many garments in the closets of this room. Choose something.”

  “Your…” Aude was not sure of the correct word. “Sujien might object.”

  “He isn’t here. Nor are these rooms his.”

  Wrapped in the towel, Aude went to the nearest closet and opened it. The door opened in a draft of fragrance, sandalwood and salt. Silk stirred in its wake, robes in every shade of water, blue to green to gray. Their fabric shimmered, finer than any she had seen, even in the highest circles of the Silver City. She did not recognize the styles. There was no trace here of the corsets and petticoats, short bodices and draped skirts to which she was accustomed. Nor did they resemble the tunics and trousers favored by the peoples who clung to the fringes of the plains. She glanced at Qiaqia, found herself watched. There was something here, some meaning she could not read. She said, “These don’t seem suitable.”

  Qiaqia nodded, once. “As you wish. You’ll find plainer garments in the chest by the middle window.”

  “Thank you.” The clothes in the chest were much like those she had found in her room. She dressed quickly, then took a comb from a side table to tidy her hair. The mirror showed her: neat and compact, her skin flushed from the heat of the water, limbs sturdy, features blunt in comparison with Qiaqia. This room did not fit her: She was too human, too ordinary. Laying down the comb, she said, “Why am I here?”

  “We brought you.”

  “Yes. But why?”

  “The earth heard you coming, felt your steps and told Shirai. The air studied you and brought word to Sujien. They smelled you; they tasted you and knew you to be the one we sought. So Sujien called you, and finally you came.”

  Her shining place. Her dreams. Aude said, “But why me?”

  “You taste of the one who stole from the Grass King. We brought you to WorldBelow to restore to us what belongs here.”

  “But I don’t have anything,” Aude said, and stopped. Why does one man have a great deal and another man nothing? Why does my family have wealth and rank and land? Those questions had lured her from her comfort, her rich cocoon in the Silver City, down the long stairway to the Brass City. They had stained her fingers with the ink of pamphlets and books, fueled her questions, her explorations. They had brought her to Jehan, to the Eschappés and their yearnings. They had broken her free from her uncle and his requirements and propelled her out into the world, by sea and by land, to the desiccated plain and the Woven House. They had brought her, at the last, here.

  Why do I have riches? Where did it begin?

  Why?

  And where, oh, where is Jehan?

  14

  The Twins and Marcellan

  THE HUMAN—JEHAN—SLEPT AT THE TABLE, his head pillowed on his arms, hair hanging into his face. Beside him, Marcellan’s book stood open, its pages yellow and brittle, the magic of his words pinning down and shaping the world. Yelena crouched at Jehan’s elbow, ferret-formed and sharp, whiskers curved out, sensing the sweat smell of him, his fatigue, his anger and fear. He had read out loud, voice tripping over the archaic language, frown lines drawn deep between his brows, irritation and frustration shivering from him, until his energy wore out and his speech grew sore and ragged. The syllables, the long sweet words with their crafted meanings dropped from his lips, scurrying across the floor, rustling into corners, shaking windows, echoing down corridors and rattling off doors. The Stone House stood filled with them, expectant, its ancient walls remembering. Yelena’s fur crackled, charged with that memory and the power it held. Outside, the wind shied away, slid off walls that were no longer quite there. In the corner, Clairet dozed, nose dropped low. Julana, in woman shape, hunkered beside her, arm about the pony’s neck, hands knotted into her thick mane, listening to her breath, matching it with her own.

  The walls were wakening out of their long sleep, memory out of stone time, slow and thick, resonant with lost flood and forgotten frost, layered with the little deaths of forgotten creatures. Through them, upward, outward, downward, words—Jehan’s voice, Marcellan’s words—expanded, unlocked. They had been built for this, these walls, placed stone upon stone to hold down the words, to contain their power and sever WorldAbove from WorldBelow. The words lapped against them, seeped into fissures, insinuated long strong fingers into cracks, explored the gaps between blocks, turning back the bindings, the bolts and bars and prohibitions that had held down the gate. The twins shivered with it, skin bristling, prickling, drawn back to their beginnings in the bright dusk and rich fields and soft air of the Grass King’s realm.

  “House hears,” Yelena said, swaying, weaving.

  “House remembers.”

  “We remember.”

  “Marcellan.” Julana’s pointed face softened. “Marcellan walked the lands from side to side.”

  “Watching.”

  “Learning.”

  “Asking questions.” Yelena rose onto her haunches. “Marcellan saw men. Saw beasts. Saw the things of the domains and their ways.”

  “Human people feared us. Shaped us. Twisted us.”

  “Nightmares out of rock. Lovers out of waves.”

  “We remember.”

  “Marcellan saw the shaping, saw its birth in fear and need and expectation.”

  “Marcellan,” said Julana, and her voice was bright, light, loving, “Marcellan made words.”

  “Words to hold things down.”

  “Shaping words.”

  “Making words.”

  “Words to set the bounds.”

  “Ignorance causes danger,” Yelena said. “Knowledge brings calm.”

  “Marcellan told us.”

  “Marcellan,” said Yelena, triumphant, “gave us human shape.”

  There was a silence. Yelena dropped back to all fours, whiskers caressing the book. Her head buzzed, old words, old things recalling themselves, tumbling over and over. Marcellan had crossed the lands of men from coast to coast and remembered what he saw. Marcellan had seen the gaps, the interstices in knowledge and understanding that dragged loss and danger and dispossession in their wake. He had tugged and burrowed out the secrets, the mysteries, the guarded privileges that divided man from man, man from land and air and sea and fire. And he had written them down, where anyone might find them.

  Anyone with the skill to read them, men had said to him, then. Not everyone can read. And Marcellan had turned to them and answered: Anyone can listen. It only takes one person to read aloud. One person to teach another the skill of words, passing it from hand to mouth to hand, back across the lands his steps had measured. And, hand by mouth by step, his words had spread and dragged his learning wi
th them into huts and tents, caves and shacks, halls and longhouses and crofts. And in the other places, in the swirling inchoate heart of fire and stone, air and water and death, the domains had heard those human words, spilling into them willy-nilly, making order out of entropy, describing the domains into hard life. It had long been so, since humans first began to make stories to explain their world. The Grass King in WorldBelow, golden and fertile. The Emperor of Air with his palace of wind and cloud and hierarchy, watching and dancing and hovering. The Fire Witch in her hidden caves, lambent, bright beyond bearing, turning rock to gold and crystal, blessing men with the skills of iron. The Lady of Shoals and Shores in her swirling violent world, benefactor and executioner. And the Masters of Darkness, whose shape was already set by the fears of men, calm and patient in their stronghold. The questions of humans laid the first layer of their foundation and shape. Marcellan’s words had built a layer above. His books had set them, shaped them, somehow. Or so the twins had been told.

  “Marcellan,” Julana said, leaning into Clairet. “Wanderer.”

  “Printer.” Yelena nipped the corner of the book, another love bite amid the many already set there. “Shaper.”

  “Domain lords feared him.”

  “He angered them.”

  “Changed them.”

  “Grass King lured him.”

  “Songs in the earth, in leaf and flower. Promises of newness, of things to be learned.”

  “He came to the gate. Before we were sent to the Stone House. Along the length of Lefmay, to the weakness in the land.”

  “Came to the domain, to WorldBelow.”

  “To the Grass King.”

  “To us.”

  The twins traded glances, bodies trading memory. Marcellan had come alone through the gate that divided WorldAbove from WorldBelow and walked across the twilight paddy fields and amber orchards, through the tall golden wheat and under the shade of the great woods, following the Lefmay as it tracked its course beneath WorldAbove to the bounds of the Rice Palace, where the bannermen stood guard at the great green gate, and the courtiers and officials wove busily through the courtyards and corridors.