The Blood of Whisperers

by Devin Madson

  The room that was my prison already overflowed with what the maids called the “emperor’s generosity” and I called his guilt. There were fine silk robes, hairpins, face powder, scent bottles, and a pair of the finest wooden sandals procured from the imperial artisan; not to mention books, inks and brushes, a bowl of fresh fruit and another of sugared chestnuts. I had left it all, for the most part, untouched. I needed clothes, but I had taken one look at the feminine robes sent to me and felt the chains of womanhood click tighter.

  For two days I had been awaiting the return of the seamstress and now, here she was, bowing before me. A parcel wrapped in thin rice paper sat upon the matting. It rustled as I unwrapped it, and silk tumbled out. It had once been a robe; pale blue with a myriad of white flowers, and while it was still made of the same material, it could no longer be called feminine. A tunic and breeches. The front of the tunic was exactly what I had specified – black, its cut making no attempt to accentuate a womanly figure. The back and the sleeves were made from the blue silk, and were almost all that remained of the original robe, with wide sleeves dipping into deep points, and a pale silk lining that was cool to the touch. The result was perfect, and as I held up the black breeches to inspect the fine needlework, I couldn’t help but glance at the pile of pretty trinkets Kin had sent and smile. If he dared to show himself he would find his opponent no weak woman to be bought with such petty things.

  ‘This is perfect,’ I said to the still bowing seamstress. ‘Sit up. Please, help me to dress.’

  The woman did as instructed. ‘Thank you, my lady. Anything you wish, my lady.’

  This servility made me pause in the act of untying my sash. ‘Your master will be angry with you. I will do my best to divert his attention, but–’

  ‘It is of no matter, my lady. I would do anything for you.’

  She had turned her head, and I spotted a fading bruise crawling up the side of her neck. ‘Why? Wait… are you…?’

  Gaze averted, she said: ‘You saved me, my lady.’

  Her hands were balled into fists upon the matting, and below her neat bun the soft curls of hair at her nape trembled with her. She ran a fist across her eyes. ‘I knew it was you as soon as I saw your face. I don’t think I’ll ever forget.’

  I had to agree. The resistance of the man’s throat was a sickening memory.

  ‘I’m sorry, my lady.’ She took a deep breath and let it out, the air shuddering over suppressed sobs. ‘I didn’t mean to… I–’

  A knock sounded on the door. The seamstress let out a little cry and dabbed her eyes with her sleeve.

  ‘Quick, ‘ I said. ‘Help me dress.’ Raising my voice I added: ‘A moment, if you please.’

  The seamstress shook out the new clothes and handed me each piece. ‘What do you wish me to do with this one, my lady?’ she said, folding the discarded robe over her arm.

  ‘Can you make me another? I will not go to the executioner dressed in a woman’s robe.’

  ‘My lady–’

  The knock came again, and I tied a quick knot in my old black sash, cleaned now of all traces of blood. ‘Come,’ I said, straightening proudly.

  The door slid in its soundless groove, and in the passage a serving man bowed low. ‘His Imperial Majesty, Emperor Kin, requests a moment of your time, my lady.’

  ‘Well, you can tell him I would rather jump out the window.’

  The servant unbent with more speed than grace, his eyes starting from his head. Framed by the dark passage, Emperor Kin appeared in the doorway. Without looking at me he strode to one of the windows and forced it open, its hinges squealing their reluctance. ‘Your window, my lady,’ he said.

  ‘Why don’t you be a gentleman and jump out it yourself?’

  He scowled at me, and looked as though he might have retorted had not the sobbing seamstress caught his attention. ‘You may go,’ he said, barely glancing at her.

  Bowing very low, she backed out of the room.

  ‘What have you been doing to your servants?’ he said as the door shut behind her.

  ‘Rather, what have you been doing to yours, Your Majesty?’

  ‘And what is that supposed to mean?’

  I drew myself up. ‘I mean that that woman, a woman in your employ, has just been thanking me for the service I rendered her when I found her being raped by one of your soldiers.’

  ‘Surely you have noticed my palace is large. I cannot know everything that happens within its walls.’

  ‘Good thing I was there to help her then.’

  His scowl darkened. ‘You ripped out a man’s throat.’

  ‘So you’ve heard about it?’

  ‘Of course I’ve heard about it.’

  ‘But not about your men raping your serving girls.’ I nodded sagely. ‘Interesting how erratically informed you are, Your Majesty. Or perhaps it is a perfectly acceptable pastime under your rule, given I was so nearly raped myself.’

  ‘Stop saying that word.’

  ‘Which word? Rape?’

  Emperor Kin slammed the window shut and the glass shook. ‘You are very vulgar for a lady.’

  ‘I grew up a commoner and became a soldier,’ I said. ‘Just like you.’

  ‘You are no soldier. You are a rebel.’

  ‘And you weren’t?’ I smiled as sweetly as I could. ‘Who were you fighting? The true divine heir to the Crimson Throne, Emperor Tianto, my uncle.’

  He turned from me, picking up a jade trinket from the mantelpiece and weighing it in his hand. ‘You are very naïve.’

  ‘I have nothing to say to you. If you are quite finished insulting me, do feel free to go away.’

  Pursing his lips, he seemed to consider his answer as he glanced down my person for the first time. ‘What are you wearing?’ he demanded, his brows colliding in a harsh frown.

  ‘Oh, do you like it?’ I said, with a passable attempt at feminine frivolity. ‘You sent me such a lovely robe, but it didn’t quite fit, so I had a few adjustments made.’

  ‘Women do not wear breeches.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘You will not do so in my palace.’

  ‘What do you plan to do about it? I know! You could send some of your guards to strip me. They’ll have to force me into a robe while they are at it, because I won’t wear one willingly. I would rather wear nothing at all.’

  Kin’s lips had whitened, his fists clenched tight. I was sure he would snap back, but whatever he wanted to say, he swallowed. Instead, he knelt upon the cushions in the centre of the floor, the voluminous folds of his crimson and gold robe settling about him. ‘I didn’t come here to argue with you.’

  ‘Then why did you come? Have you decided when to have me executed?’

  Kin looked at me as he might an irritating child. ‘If you would stop being hostile for a moment, I might get a chance to tell you. Sit.’

  ‘No.’

  He pointed to the cushion opposite. ‘Sit.’

  ‘No.’

  Kin stood, gripping my wrists with a snarl. His fingers dug into bruised flesh. The cry came involuntarily to my lips and my knees buckled.

  ‘You will sit when I tell you to sit.’

  I glared back, catching my breath. ‘No, I think you have just proved that I sit only when you force me to. At least now I see where your men get their brutality.’

  Kin snorted, and pressing his lips tight, began to pace the floor. His robe swirled around his feet with every turn, light catching on the gold threads of his hem. He did not look how I had imagined. This man was no mere soldier, and yet he was no emperor either, no nobleman of birth. I had always envisioned him with cruel, beady eyes and a thin-lipped sneer, but honesty forced me to admit he had neither.

  Kin stopped pacing and stood before me. ‘I came to ask you to marry me,’ he said.

  My stomach dropped. ‘What di
d you say?’

  ‘Marry me.’

  He frowned down at me, so serious, so stern, that a laugh bubbled to my lips. I tried to swallow it, but when he scowled more ferociously still, I could not keep the laughter caged. Kin did not move, did not smile nor laugh, just stared down at me as though my amusement was not only an insult but also despicably childish.

  ‘Finished?’

  ‘I think so,’ I gasped, clutching my stomach.

  ‘I was not aware that I said anything amusing.’

  The laugh died upon my lips. He was serious. The Usurper, the man I hated above all others, was asking me to marry him.

  ‘Well? What is your answer?’

  I felt sure I had missed something, some attempt to be kind, to woo me as any man should, but he just stood awaiting my answer. I shook my head. ‘No. No, I will not marry you.’

  Kin gave a curt nod. ‘I see. I should have known that would be your answer. You are an Otako. You have chosen to love your blood more than your empire, and on your head be it.’

  Without another word he went to the door, his robe sweeping across the matting.

  ‘Wait!’

  Kin turned. ‘Lady Otako?’

  ‘Did you seriously imagine I would want to marry you? That it would make me happy to marry the man who stole my family’s throne?’

  ‘I was not asking you to be happy about it,’ he said. ‘Do you think I wish to marry you? I assure you, my lady, I would vastly prefer marriage to any other woman than yourself, but I am an emperor. Your father believed that meant he could do as he wished without consequence, that he had no responsibilities, only rights. But he was wrong.’ Kin’s eyes flashed. ‘I ask you to marry me because I have a responsibility to Kisia, to its people, to stability. Nothing would more surely unite all in common cause than the marriage of the last Otako princess to their emperor. Your children would sit upon the throne of your ancestors and rule a whole, united empire, but if that is not your wish then there is nothing more to be said.’

  Kin strode to the window and stood, arms folded, staring down into the sunlit gardens. ‘Your pride,’ he said, speaking to the glass, ‘will condemn Kisia to years of war, famine and death, this for the empire you call your own.’ He turned. ‘I was born a commoner, yes, but I am now an emperor in every sense of the word. I will do what needs to be done.’

  My cheeks burned red, all urge to laugh entirely gone. I was ashamed. He had scolded me like a child, his reasoning hateful.

  ‘So you would marry me for duty?’ I asked.

  ‘It would hardly be for love. Given a choice, I would not take a childish young woman as my wife. One, moreover, who dresses in such a mannish abomination. Undoubtedly, you do so merely to enrage me, but having spent considerable time masquerading as a man and living with rebels does not add to your eligibility. If nothing else, your virtue is quite severely in question.’

  My cheeks burned hotter still and I jumped to my feet. ‘How dare you! I might be a rebel, but I’m no whore.’

  Taken aback, he bowed. ‘I did not say you were.’

  ‘Your implication was enough. I give you my word I–’

  ‘And I would believe you, but as you have refused to accept my offer, further discussion on this point would be excessively indelicate.’

  ‘You brought it up!’

  ‘You enraged me.’

  ‘I enraged you?’

  Again he seemed to struggle with himself, and taking a deep breath he bowed curtly. ‘I apologise for my rudeness, and for any offence my offer has caused. I assure you that you are in no danger from me, no matter what decision you make.’

  For the second time he turned to leave. I stared at his back, equally confused and furious. ‘Did you just apologise?’

  Kin halted and glanced over his shoulder, his strong chin visible in profile. ‘I thought I had already made it quite clear that I am an unusual emperor.’

  He slid the door and might have left on those words, but a breathless servant stood in the passage. Pale-faced, he thrust a battered scroll toward Kin like a talisman. ‘A messenger has come from Ji, Your Majesty, he nearly killed his horse to bring this.’

  Kin took the scroll. I tried to breathe evenly, to appear unconcerned, but a hundred different possibilities had already leapt to my mind. Had they caught Monarch? Surely Ji was too far, but what else could make a man ride so hard for the capital?

  With one tanned finger, Kin broke the seal and unrolled the parchment. It crackled; the only sound in the sucking silence. I watched, my heart pounding, as Kin’s eyes danced across the page. The crease between his brows deepened.

  He lowered the scroll with a snap. ‘Did you know about this?’

  ‘About what?’

  Lifting the page, he read: ‘“Rebel forces have attacked the guardhouse in Ji. Combat entered. Many dead.” It is dated the sixty-fifth day of summer, 1372.’ He looked up from the scroll. ‘There are more details, but I will not burden you with them.’ The scroll crumpled, his fist throttling the thick paper. ‘Marry me.’

  I could only stare at him, numb. Ji was a northern town, loyal to the Otako name since the war, but I had not expected them to move so soon. Had Katashi already claimed the throne? Surely Kin would have demanded answers if that were so. He had said war was coming and he was right. People would die because of us.

  When I didn’t answer, Kin grunted. ‘It seems your arrival has been singularly infelicitous. You have stolen my crown, crippled dozens of my finest men, attempted to assassinate me, and now you happily sit by while Kisia embarks on war.’

  ‘Crippled? I have crippled no one!’

  ‘You deny nothing else? You surprise me.’

  ‘Tell me how I have had the chance to do anything to your men?’

  With the scroll still crushed in his hand, Kin gestured for the servant to leave. ‘You have a short memory, my lady,’ he said when the man had gone. ‘Perhaps it is nothing to you to leave thirty-four men unconscious. They are not physically crippled, but whatever you did to them has made them frightened of their own shadows.’

  Stung, I said: ‘I didn’t do anything to them. I found them like that. If you want to know what happened to them, ask Darius. He was there, not I.’

  Kin froze, his whole body seeming to stiffen from his lips to the hem of his robe. For an instant he closed his eyes, his chest rising as he drew in a deep breath. ‘Darius,’ he said at last, letting it out slowly. ‘Lord Laroth has lived at court for five years, and in all that time I am the only one who has ever called him Darius. Do tell me, Lady Hana, how long have you known him?’

  Chapter 13

  He had been silent too long.

  Days dragged by. The Imperial Council met, but Emperor Kin did not join us. Messages flew back and forth to his generals in other parts of the empire, and every day reports of new conflicts and troubles came from the border towns. Ji had become a battlefield.

  But still Emperor Kin did not call for me. Our Errant game went unfinished.

  My spies had little to report. Hana was being treated well, although it seemed no offer of marriage had been made, and certainly not accepted. Had I misjudged Kin? Had the mere suggestion of such a marriage betrayed my divided interests? I felt like I had cut myself open. A headache had become part of every day’s struggle to maintain the mask, the shield. The prison.

  The teapot steamed. I sat tapping my nail upon the desk as it steeped. In the corner, a secretary was writing replies to my correspondence, tensing every time I tapped a particularly irritating rhythm. Such was my mood that I kept tapping, watching the curls of steam rise and fade to nothing. It was getting hard to concentrate. The Errant board had sat untouched for hours, its pieces still in the pathetic attempt at a zambuck manoeuvre I had created the night before.

  The door slid open. There was a sharp intake of breath and papers scattered as the secre
tary leapt to his feet. Kin stood in the doorway, his face a collection of severe, unmerciful lines.

  The room felt suddenly airless.

  ‘You may leave,’ Kin said, and the secretary departed at speed. He closed the door behind him, shutting me in with my fears.

  Kin did not move. ‘Aren’t you going to invite me in, Darius,’ he said. He spoke gently, with something like regret in his tone that troubled me more than anger.

  I bowed. ‘Forgive me. This is an unexpected honour, Majesty. Do come in.’

  He did so, glancing about him as he approached the table. He looked at the bare walls and the sparse furnishings, his gaze lingering on the sketch of Esvar. ‘It seems I deprive you, Darius.’

  ‘Not at all, Majesty. I prefer my surroundings simple.’

  ‘Perhaps you miss your home?’

  He knelt at the table as he spoke and I resumed my place, hospitality giving me an excellent excuse for ignoring his question. ‘Tea, Majesty?’ I said, the pot tinkling as I set my elbows on the table.

  ‘No. We will finish that game of Errant we started. No game should be left unfinished, don’t you think?’

  ‘That depends on the skill of the opponent, Majesty,’ I replied, comforted by the sound of my usual untroubled timbre.

  ‘You are, of course, a very formidable player,’ he said, removing the pieces from the board. ‘But I would be interested to know how you perceive me? Have I such mean intelligence that you cannot respect me?’

  This was a game. Something had happened, something had changed. He was disappointed. I could see it in the downturn of his lips. Had he tried to woo Hana only to find her thoroughly intractable? Perhaps it had been foolish to hope they could figure something out between them, that it would all fall into place leaving Malice’s new weapon castrated. Katashi Otako would be nothing to the threat of Takehiko.

  ‘I have a very high respect for you, Majesty,’ I said after a pause. ‘I would go so far as to say you are the only person in this city I do hold in respect.’