by S. C. Emmett
The highest-ranking lord of the delegation, Haon Suron, completed the ceremony with a deep bow to the Emperor and a mercifully brief though extremely learned speech of well-wishes for the health of the august Emperor and his family as well as the devout wish that under Heaven, Shan and Zhaon would prosper together. More applause swelled, cymbals and gongs brought by the delegation crashed, and all agreed it was a very fine occasion worthy of the banquet that followed.
Behind the screen, First Princess Sabwone did not move.
Late that night, the markets ran with torchlight and much custom in aphrodisiacs, paper lanterns, and celebratory sweetbuns while outside the palace gates, the scraps and leavings of the feast filled many a beggar’s bowl and belly.
Everyone, it seemed, was well pleased.
FIND OTHER AMUSEMENT
His letter to Lady Komor—not spyling as he had threatened, though the characters for her name could be taken as a somewhat winning rhyme if he were more than an indifferent poet—left the blue-tiled Old Tower the day after the betrothal ceremony, and Takshin might have been impatient for a reply had he not been called upon to attend archery contests, state dinners, and negotiations. How Kiron must have smiled when he wrote the orders for his emissaries to include his battle-brother; he would know how Takshin loathed each moment. His slender stock of diplomacy and patience was exhausted each day, and even retreating to the Old Tower brought no relief, for one of Kiron’s bloodriders might take a fancy to slumming in the sinks and of course it was Takshin’s duty as host to see they were not soaked with cheap sohju, relieved of their stipend slivers, or knifed in a malodorous alley. Suron especially had a mind to sample everything Zhaon-An had to offer, since the Mad Queen had been fond of torching brothels with the customers inside whenever the dark god inside her royal skull whispered too loudly.
Like all newly liberated warriors, especially those relieved and not quite believing their own survival, the Shan delegation was drunk with relief.
Some of it wasn’t unpleasant, like the familiar drinking games, lean hawk-nosed Suron and round knife-scarred Taonjo Kahi spinning their cups and roaring with laughter while Lord Buwon sang a filthy ditty in the dialect of Shan kaburei. Takshin could even believe he was in the sinks of pierce-towered Sho the capital of Shan, the only missing piece Kiron at his shoulder with that lynxlike smile and rough affection.
I missed my playmate. Kiron’s hand-carried letters, their seals breaking with a satisfying snap like a bone between teeth, were full of incident and amusement. Takshin almost felt guilty for not writing as often as Kiron made time to.
It was upon the seventh night, on the edge of the Yuin and the Theater District, that a short sharp fistbrawl between three gamblers and Lord Buwon’s retainer Ohjosi unfolded, and Takshin, his knuckles bloodied and his throat sore from a battlefield yell, did not move when Lord Buwon clapped him upon the shoulder.
“Ah, there is the prince we remember!” Buwon trumpeted, and pounded on his shoulder again—but not very hard.
Ohjosi smeared the blood upon his mouth with the back of his hand. He was a long, thin man with a mournful face, not often given to such displays of temper, but an accusation of cheating was nothing a lord of Shan—or his retainer—could brook. “My lord,” he said in his precise, accented Zhaon, his nose still seeping crimson, “have you been touched?”
Takshin realized the man was asking him, and shook his head. “Only by enjoyment.” He replied in the highborn Shan dialect, the cursed tongue that invaded even his dreams. It was like, and unlike, Zhaon, the words full of doubled sounds Zhaon would never allow to touch each other. “Where did Ku Wuoru go?”
“Over here,” the round, smiling lord of Toakmisho called from a smashed table in a dark corner. The gambling den had cleared quickly once the first strike landed; the proprietor was no doubt waiting at a safe distance for the victorious to retreat so he could be about carrying the vanquished out, picking their pockets clean. “He fell upon me, the bastard.”
“Why did they draw no steel?” Suron wanted to know, still keen-eyed despite the quantity of sohju he’d taken down at their first to fourth stops that night.
“Against nobles? In Zhaon, such a thing is not done.” Takshin stepped through the ruins of the gaming platform, scattered counters, one of the dice-maidens’ torn overwraps. The women had vanished as soon as the accusations had begun, and their retreat had been a spur to men denied the sohju-soaked pleasure of looking at low necklines and bare ankles, not to mention well-modeled arms. “Besides, they are gamblers, armed only with wood. Or knives, if they are serious, but a knife planted in the back of a prince’s companion means the loss of a right hand.”
“How… oh, your ring.” Suron righted a halu lamp, still flickering because the wick-cover had been improperly latched. It was a miracle the entire wooden structure hadn’t caught. Burning down half of White Feather Street would be a disappointing end to the embassy, if not the betrothal. “There is blood upon it.”
“No doubt.” Princedom was a brutal business. Takshin grasped the edge of the splintered tabletop and heaved; the bare-legged, semiconscious Zhaon gambler atop it moaned. “Come forth, Wuoru. The battle is done.”
“I didn’t ask him to fall upon me.” Ku Wuoru rolled free, gaining his feet with a spearman’s lunge. “Excellent! Now we collect our winnings.”
“Only ours?” Suron laughed, bending to pick up a clinking, silken purse. “We shall ride home with bulging saddlebags.”
“Though still much lighter than when we came. Unless we carry the princess’s ladies back upon our saddles!” Lord Buwon glanced at Takshin and sobered.
I might pay to see that. Still, Sabwone was his sister. A wolfish grin lingered on his mouth, and he did not bother banishing it. “Come, we must find other amusement. Or are we done for the night, my friends?” The Night Guard, though dedicated to their work, would not come hastily to the site of such a small battle.
“We have had drinking and fighting.” Ku Wuoru shook his head, tapping above his right ear to settle his thoughts. “Women are next.”
“Ai, Wuoru, do you intend to leave byblows in every brothel?” Buwon cleared his throat, stretching his limbs one by one. “I am bound for the palace.”
Which meant the rest of them had to at least accompany their elder, unless Takshin dissented. He did not. By the time they arrived, no doubt even Wuoru would be ready for sleep instead of sport.
The Old Tower’s quiet would be a marked improvement, and Mrong Banh would have any letters that had arrived. She probably would not reply until the delegation left with Sabwone in a scented palanquin.
An entire cortege of ladies were being readied. Not like the Crown Princess, bringing a single one. Khir might be bled white, subtly insulting, or simply restrained, but Zhaon would send his daughter with a prodigious procession.
Takshin frowned as he made certain another lamp was righted and found his own winnings under the arm of a groaning, spindle-legged combatant. At least they could be certain the gamblers were still alive by the amount of noise they were making. All in all, this small group of Shan lords had been extremely restrained.
The Street of White Feathers—only Heaven knew what had given it that name, since neither a feather nor anything death-colored was to be found along its length—ran with light from torches and lamps as well as calls from the doorways of other gambling dens and a few brothels Takshin had recommended they stay clear of. Retainers like Ohjosi brought the horses forward, worried for their masters but ordered in no uncertain terms to keep the valuable beasts from being led away or worse. The Tooth, his grey bulk looming like a stormcloud, made his displeasure at being out late known by doing his best to soak his rider’s boots with a mighty stream of piss, but Takshin was quickly in the saddle and safe from the spray.
“To the palace!” he called, and commoners scattered. He set a quick but not bruising pace, suddenly eager to be… well, if not home, then at least in the comfortable clutter of Banh’s quarte
rs. His move to the Jonwa had to wait for an auspicious time, and Banh mumbled that the stars were being difficult. Besides, the Crown Princess had only just left her honorable seclusion as a new bride. Moving another prince into the house would have been slightly indecent.
Takshin chose the shortest route, through a patchwork slumjumble at the edge of the Theater District before bursting through a slim malodorous alley onto the Street of Mirrors, more lamps swaying and blue-varnished windows open to usher in any coolness that could be found in darkness after stone and dirt had lost the day’s heat, as well as to let men and women lean out like long-necked stilt-birds, singing their enticement songs. The theaters were full of higher-stakes gambling, actors pouring sohju and other refreshments for their patrons, and the crowd contained other mounts as well, most with their riders swathe-cloaked and masked.
It would not do for some to be seen in the Theater District after dark. Others rode proudly, barefaced, and heads turned as the Shan passed with Takshin before them like the hunters of the fire-god coursing valleys in dry autumn.
The palace was ablaze with lights and shouts, and running feet. For a short while Takshin thought news of a brawl had reached someone, though it would have had to wing like a jaheo48 bird, before the news was shouted up at him and he understood there had been an assassin caught in the Crown Prince’s household.
And Takshin wondered, grimly, why the news caused his heart to lodge so firmly within his throat.
WARRIOR WIFE
It was almost too hot to sleep, but Mahara had just managed relaxation when sudden movement from the other side of the bed roused her. A soft noise of complaint was all she had time for before the clash-slither clangor brought her, sweating, into terrified wakefulness.
Two shadows with glittering, metal-crashing eyes crunched into the screen—a familiar bulky shape, now shuddering like a winter ghost come to strangle a couple in their bed—across the room. Mahara screamed, and Takyeo later told her the cry was quick thinking to alert guards, servants, and others of the danger.
But that was later. The princess rolled from the bed and landed with a thump upon unforgiving wooden flooring, and now she wished she had brought her yue, even though she disliked her practice and had felt only relief when Father told her not to take it.
You will be a woman of Zhaon in all things, and give them no cause for complaint.
“Yala!” she screamed in the close, hot darkness, her voice breaking upon a high note of anguish. “Yala!” But Yala would be rooms away, in her own quarters.
More clanging, and a sudden short, sharp cry from the other side of the room. Assassin, she realized, and with the thought, her witless thrashing stopped.
There was a small table at some distance from this side of the bed, holding fruit, small knives for paring, and an unlit lamp—traditional, in case a newly married couple hungered at midnight, or sleep was hard to find. In Mahara’s own room, of course, Yala would be across the hall, and already alerted.
Mahara lunged for the table, her knees striking the floor hard enough to jar her teeth. The taste of metal warred with night-breath upon her tongue, and she almost ran into her goal, sensing more than seeing it. The dark was a bandage against her eyes—of course, the assassin would have quenched the lowlamp by the door, preparing to do murderous work.
She clutched the wooden edge and heard faraway commotion. Heaving herself up, a crash of pottery breaking as her elbow hit the table-edge too, her hands skidding frantically across the surface.
Yala would already have the knife, or she would have her yue ready. Mahara’s fingertips skated across a familiar wooden shape and she snatched the paring knife up, hoping the lamp was not broken too. A sweet citron tang-scent was the bowl full of early murueh,49 its bowl broken and the yellow-skinned fruit easily crushed before it developed its summertime rind.
The table bumped and skidded, and a wet crunching noise of terrible finality cut through her gasping. There was not enough air in this hole of a room, her thin night-shift—damp from her own sweat and from her husband’s attentions trickling free as she sought to find a cooler place to lie—flapped about her knees. Some Zhaon slept naked when the heat rose, but the only concession a princess of Khir was prepared to make was hemming her shift at the knees instead of the ankles.
The door burst open, torch and lamplight flickering ruddy, and Crown Prince Takyeo rose from the ruins of the screen near the water-closet. He was naked, hard planes and angles of muscle gleaming with sweat, and his hair was a wild glory. Blood decked his left hip, and Mahara gasped, the paring knife clutched in nerveless fingers.
Takyeo’s sword, clasped in a likewise bloody fist, twisted in an indigo-clad body at his feet. The screen was broken beyond repair, and as Mahara watched, her husband ripped the blade free and stabbed the assassin again.
Voices. Guards with likewise naked, shining blades. Cries in the hallway, and Takyeo glanced at the bed. His gaze found Mahara, and relief passed over his whitened face, followed by a flicker of something—was it admiration?
Perhaps. Mahara straightened under the weight of his gaze, aware of dishevelment and of her own idiocy. A paring knife? Ridiculous.
By the time Yala appeared, in a hastily belted robe with her hair a river down her back to match Mahara’s own, the Crown Prince was being attended by Guard Liu, who had some physician’s skill. At least, the somber guard had enough to assure them all the blade was not poisoned.
“Princess!” Yala, winded, reached her at last. She smelled of sleep-sweat, ceduan, and jaelo blossom, and flung her arms around Mahara. Behind her, Anh the kaburei wiped at night-crusted eyes, and Lady Kue—similarly disheveled and sleep-lidded—began to give crisp orders for fresh linens to be brought, warm water for bathing and cool crushed fruit for drinking. “Mahara, my Mahara, are you harmed?”
“No, I…” She realized she was still clutching the silly knife, the blade turned away from her friend. “I…” Words would not come, in Zhaon or in Khir. Her throat was a desert, dry as the season of cracking ice that filled your hair with restless popping and turned every beast fractious.
Yala’s familiar pale eyes swam with tears. “Thank Heaven and all the gods,” she whispered. “Oh, thank the Heavens, each one of them thrice and thrice again.”
“A knife,” the Crown Prince said, as quick serving-hands tied a light sleeping-robe at his bandaged hip. “Truly you are a Khir warrior, my wife. I would not have thought of that.”
Yala dabbed at her eyes and released Mahara, only to touch her shoulders, her hips, patting at her. Mahara almost pushed her hands away, but realized she was only seeking to prove her princess was undamaged. “Your knees,” the Komor girl said, and Mahara looked down.
Her knees were bloody from the mad scramble across the floor, and Mahara longed to ask if Yala had her yue. But of course she did. “Yala,” she whispered, her lips almost dry enough to crack. “Husband.”
“The Crown Princess is not harmed, except for her knees,” Guard Liu said. “Our lord required I examine her first before tending his own wounds.”
“Many thanks,” Yala said, correctly, and slid her own robe free of her shoulders, bundling Mahara in its long flow. Yala’s night-shift brushed her ankles, and was sodden under the arms and at the curve of her lower back. Her small breasts pressed against thin, damp fabric, but she seemed not to care as long as Mahara was covered. “Anh, fetch another robe, and the case with yellow crushflowers painted upon it. Go.”
The kaburei scurried away, her leather-wrapped braids marred from toss-turning. Lady Kue clapped her hands, and in a few moments, full order was restored.
“I am well enough, Liu. Lady Komor, how fares my warrior wife?” Takyeo was still grimly pale, but he bent a warm smile in Mahara’s direction.
She buried her face in Yala’s shoulder, a river of shaking seizing her by the shoulders.
“Well enough, Crown Prince.” Yala’s Zhaon was sharper than usual. “The battle is done, so she shakes.”
&nbs
p; Don’t tell him that. Mahara winced.
“Braver than most,” her husband said. “Send for General Kai and Mrong Banh, and also send a runner to the Kaeje. My father must be told.”
“All is well,” Yala said, in Khir. “All is well, my princess. It is natural, to feel this after a skirmish.” She used the word for a victory dearly bought, a near-run race.
Later, it would occur to Mahara to wonder how Yala knew. At the moment, though, she took deep breaths against Yala’s sweating shoulder, and tried to control her shivering.
Still… a soft, secret thread of pleasure remained at the bottom of fear’s dark well. A “warrior wife, braver than most.”
Did Takyeo really think so?
GOOD FAITH
Rumor raced through Zhaon-An, fluttering under eaves, mantling invisible over dinner tables, winging from girdling wall through noble quarters to merchant houses, seething in the slums. Another assassination attempt upon the Crown Prince, it seemed, had been foiled, this time by the prince himself. Or by his wife, who was of course a fierce Khir barbarian. Some, especially in the Theater District, said a kaburei had taken the blade meant for the prince and died in his arms, but that was a tale no reasonable citizen believed, though they would flock to the stage later that month to see a play loosely based upon it—complete with two songs, both laments, enjoying a transitory popularity among loaders and weavers.
“Sisters,” the man named Huo said bleakly, shifting uncomfortably upon his wooden bench and resting his elbows upon the table. “It’s difficult, you know. My favorite one, she needs a dowry.”
“Even the thriftiest of brothers might find that a burden.” The impresario, his head still wrapped like a tribesman, affected the smooth cadence of a merchant born in the northern borderlands. He had the singer’s gift; his Khir was good enough for a nobleman’s and his Zhaon could take many different dialect-shades. His guest at this tavern-table wore a heavy coat despite the heat, but fine rich yellow cloth peeked from under the raveled collar. “Along with sending much of his pay home.”