River of Stars Read online

  She does not know, then, or now, in morning light, after he has gone, what this all means, what it can mean, if anything at all, but she knows it isn’t contained by what had been her life before she’d stood on the balcony and seen him by the fountain.

  She isn’t thinking clearly, Shan decides, but she feels the world and her body as new today, even amid the ruins of Xinan.

  MID-AFTERNOON A MESSAGE comes from him—a strong, clear hand—thanking her for wine. She laughs, reading it.

  That night he is in the courtyard again, and then her room, her arms, hungry for her, astonishingly so. After lovemaking, he talks—like a man who has never had a chance to do that. She learns of Shengdu and his parents, about bamboo swords and the teacher who left in a time of drought.

  She hears of how he’d left the world he knew, still a boy, after killing seven men, becoming an outlaw himself. And then the day he’d left that behind. He tells her—as he had in Hanjin—how his whole life has felt to be pointing him, like a spear, to battles in the north. Regaining their lost glory. He says he feels as if he has been marked for this all his days, and cannot explain it.

  But her hand is on his back again (she is drawn, almost helplessly, to tracing the characters there) and she knows this about him, by now.

  He asks her (no one ever has) to talk about her life. She says, “The next time, perhaps? What I want to do now doesn’t involve talking.”

  “Are we back with the Dark Girl?” he asks, laughing a little, but she hears the change in his voice, knows he is aroused, and it pleases her, and startles her, that she can do this to him with a few words spoken.

  “She never went away,” Shan says.

  THE MOON RISES, leaves the window again. The man leaves her again, as he must. Another note comes late in the morning, to where she sits at her writing desk. She is very tired. She knows why.

  The letter tells her he has been summoned to Hanjin and the court, must leave that same morning. “I mean everything I have said to you,” he writes.

  He had been able to walk away from a daiji only because of her, he had said. And, I am yours, all my days.

  Lin Shan, the clever one, too tall and thin, overly educated for a woman—a discredit, it is widely said, to her sex—has never thought of herself this way. As someone to whom such words could be spoken. It is a gift, she thinks. The world holds something it has never held before.

  In fact, the summons turned out to be a lie. It was not from the court.

  Daiyan would not learn that for some days. Responding to it, he rode east that morning, alone again, because he needed to be alone with his thoughts.

  Ziji caught up to him, however, on his own new Xiaolu horse, having returned to the barracks the evening before and following east immediately—and that was all right. Ziji being with him was all right.

  He thought about hiding the daiji’s marks from him, knowing Ziji had always feared fox-women, something in his youth, but there was no point—they would be seen eventually.

  So he showed his friend on the first night, readying for sleep in an imperial inn, and he told him the truth of what had happened at Ma-wai. Most of the truth.

  Ziji was as disturbed as he’d expected him to be. As anyone would be?

  “You just walked away from her? Because you ...”

  Because of the spar. But that, Lin Shan, was his own. Needed to be private. He said, “You are looking at the reason. The characters on my back. She marked me with what I said to her.”

  “She just let you go? You were able to do that?”

  He sat down on his bed, visibly shaken.

  “She called it a gift. It doesn’t feel like one. Maybe it is.”

  “The calligraphy is ...”

  “The emperor’s. I know.”

  “How do you know? Who told you?”

  A mistake. “A few at the barracks saw it,” he said. “Then I used a bronze to look. I am not going to hide this. It may even help, in some way.”

  “Backwards, the characters in a mirror.”

  “Yes, but you can tell Slender Gold, even reversed.”

  “She let you go?” Ziji said again, wonderingly. And then, “I don’t like this at all.”

  “I know you don’t,” said Daiyan. “I didn’t want it, you know.”

  “Are you sure?” said Ziji. An odd question. Then he turned on his side on his bed and fell asleep, or seemed to do so.

  THEY WERE WAYLAID some days later, a little west of Yenling. It was done brazenly, right on the imperial road, in summer’s bright daylight.

  Just before the men appeared and surrounded them, Daiyan had been thinking of his father. He’d been picturing him at his desk in the yamen, imagined as younger than he would be now. He was as he’d been all those years ago when his son left home. He’d been thinking about that, his father, while riding a Xiaolu horse on a road far away, wondering if he’d ever see him again.

  CHAPTER XVII

  Dun Yanlu had been chief of the personal guard of former prime minister Hang Dejin for almost twenty years. A prime minister had access, of course, to all the guardsmen of Hanjin, and could claim soldiers in the imperial army, as well. But he was permitted one hundred guards of his own, in uniforms that indicated that allegiance, and Yanlu had commanded these for a long time.

  He still did so, though their number, by regulation, was now twenty, since Minister Hang had withdrawn into retirement near Yenling.

  The favoured eldest son, Hang Hsien, had been the one to tell the guards they were free to leave and would be paid off handsomely (this proved to be true) for their service, depending on how long they had been with the prime minister.

  In the event, the majority of them chose to seek positions elsewhere in the capital, though none ended up in the guard of the new prime minister. There was far too much suspicion between the two men for that to happen. Even Dun Yanlu, who would never have called himself the sharpest of thinkers, knew that much.

  His own strengths were loyalty and steadiness. He respected the son but he loved the father. He cursed the way of fate that had brought blindness upon the old man, forcing him from the court where he was still needed, to this distant estate.

  Fourteen guardsmen had elected to join Yanlu in coming to Little Gold Hill. He’d recruited four others, evaluating competence carefully, though it had to be admitted that really capable men were unlikely to choose serving a retired minister in the countryside. The pay was excellent, but boredom was a factor, lack of opportunity another. They weren’t even in Yenling itself, no access to the evening pleasures of the empire’s second city: the estate was most of a day’s ride west.

  In fact, the son, Hsien, had suggested to Yanlu recently that it might be time for him to think of marrying, starting a family. He had their permission, would always be welcome at Little Gold Hill, whatever came.

  Yanlu knew what that meant. It meant after my father dies.

  It was a generous thing to say. Hang Hsien was a good man. It wasn’t really fair for Yanlu to blame him for their isolated life here. But if Hsien had been a stronger, more compelling man, wouldn’t he be prime minister himself now? Instead of the one who was led around on a donkey’s lead by degenerate wives and a eunuch.

  There was no love lost for Kai Zhen among the men at Little Gold Hill. Not that it mattered. They were all retired now. Their lives had already begun to follow the routine and the rounds of the countryside. The guardsmen were farm workers as much as anything else. The estate was prosperous and there was always work to be done. In addition, they were on alert for the villages around, to deal with outlaws, fires, animals, even murders, if the magistrate from Yenling sent word asking them to. The magistrate did ask, once he understood that the former prime minister was happy to have his guards play this role. It placed the man in their debt, even Yanlu could understand that, but he didn’t see how it would matter.

  A quiet life, after Hanjin and the palace. It was likely, Yanlu decided, that his days of pride at being near to important
men and moments were over. You drank from whatever cup you were offered. A man had a limited span to live, and a more limited time to amount to anything. He wasn’t young any more. They were allowing him to marry, had assured him of a place.

  There were worse ways to grow old, he thought, imagining a young body warming his on winter nights, bringing him ale or sweetened wine in the heat of summer. There were girls on the estate who were easy to look at. One had a ripe, promising figure. Yanlu had no family name, no false pride, it made things easier.

  Then one afternoon a messenger arrived on a horse pushed hard, and not long after Dun Yanlu was summoned to the writing pavilion in the garden. It was summer, midday, hot. Hsien was with his father, no one else. The messenger had been sent to the main house for a meal and a rest.

  Yanlu was given his instructions in the old man’s measured tones: tomorrow he was to waylay two men riding east along the imperial road and bring them to the estate.

  Descriptions were precise, even to horses (very good ones), clothing, and weapons carried—the men had been observed as they came east. Hang Dejin still employed couriers loyal to him, with access to the fastest horses at posting inns along the way.

  The two men, he was informed, were to be treated with respect, not harmed. They were to be disarmed and brought to the farm with extreme discretion. They were dangerous, Yanlu was advised.

  He selected five men, two of them archers, though he was oldfashioned and didn’t really trust bowmen. He dressed, the next morning, with pride, happy to be in action again, to be serving. He felt no need to understand what was happening. He wasn’t one of those men who was always guessing at the purposes of his betters.

  One of the girls he liked smiled at him from where she was feeding the chickens as the six guards rode out. He still looked good on horseback, in uniform, Dun Yanlu decided, squaring his shoulders. It was early morning, not yet hot.

  IT WENT VERY EASILY. Yanlu was prepared to say as much if asked by the father or the son back at Little Gold Hill.

  Other than a single look exchanged between them, followed by a brief hand gesture from the younger man, the two soldiers had proved to be no trouble at all. Not surprising, given that six armed men had emerged from both sides of the road in a deserted spot and surrounded them.

  Yanlu had spoken courteously, but he’d left no ambiguity as to their intentions. The two men were going to be relieved of their weapons and taken off the road right there.

  Their destination? It would be revealed. Their weapons? Would be returned, depending on how they conducted themselves. (He was guessing at that.) They sat their horses coolly, unsmiling, but did not resist as two of Yanlu’s men went forward and took swords and bows from them. The archers, on opposite sides of the roadway, kept their arrows trained on the soldiers throughout.

  Yanlu did see that curious expression flicker between the two men, although he wasn’t skilled at reading such looks. It was likely to have been apprehension. Frightened men behaved in a variety of ways. You didn’t have to be a sage or a scholar to know that, just to have commanded men for a time.

  BACK AT LITTLE GOLD HILL, bowing the two soldiers into the former prime minister’s presence, a successful day began to change, in ways that were not pleasing.

  “Thank you for coming, commander, deputy commander,” the old man said gravely. “It is kind of you.” Yanlu saw both soldiers bow twice, properly.

  “You are very welcome, sir,” said the younger one. It seemed he was the commander, not the older, bigger man.

  “You were also good to spare my guards.” Hang Dejin’s expression was difficult to read, but Yanlu’s ears pricked up. What was he saying?

  “Little point wasting six lives.” The answer was brisk. “You had their leader wear your livery, after all.”

  “I didn’t, in truth. I was certain he would, though, once given the task of bringing you here.”

  There was a silence, then startling, unexpected anger from that younger soldier. “What? You know we’d have killed them if he hadn’t worn that uniform. And you let him ...”

  “I was quite certain he would. As I just indicated. Will you take wine, Commander Ren?”

  “Not yet, thank you. I am unhappy. You played with lives today.”

  “I have few diversions in retirement,” Hang Dejin murmured.

  “My lord!” Dun Yanlu had heard enough. “This arrogant soldier is failing to respect you. I ask permission to discipline him.”

  “Denied. Commander Ren, will you help train my guard commander? He is a good man, one I trust and value.”

  Train? Yanlu felt himself flushing, despite the praise.

  “I am not inclined to do so, just now,” said the younger soldier. The older one, careful and watchful, had not said a word.

  “Indulge an old, blind man,” said Hang Dejin.

  “And you will explain why we are here?”

  “Of course.”

  The younger soldier turned to Yanlu. “Very well. You had the archers too close to the road and directly across from each other. Never do that.” His voice was matter-of-fact. “When we dismounted, my horse was behind me, the other was moved ahead by Commander Zhao. If we had let our reins go, and dropped and rolled towards each of your bowmen, there is a good chance one or both might have shot the other. The archer on the north side was visibly nervous, likely to let fly without thought if either of us moved on him. Ziji?”

  “Both archers had improper grips, thumbs wrongly positioned, they were not going to loose arrows accurately. It is a common error, easily corrected. The other four of you still had your swords sheathed when we dismounted. Courteous, but careless. You were also too close to us. We’d have taken the archers first, as Commander Ren has said. I can generally deal with two civic guardsmen with little difficulty, and Commander Ren, who is particularly an archer, would have had the choice of using the bow of whichever man he killed to shoot the other two swordsmen if they didn’t rush him—or drawing his own sword if they did.”

  Ren Daiyan added, “Your youngest guard, the small man, west side—his sword belt is too high. He needs to wear a shorter sword or become an archer. The blade drags the ground unless he pushes it up, and that means he can’t unsheathe it properly.”

  “I know,” muttered Yanlu, unhappily. “I have told him.”

  “He wants the long sword for the look of it. It is understandable. But it doesn’t work for him.”

  “I know,” said Dun Yanlu again.

  “You were all dead men as soon as you came up on the roadway,” said Ren Daiyan. Yanlu understood who this was now, the man had a reputation. “It would not have taken us long, I’m afraid. There are ways of surrounding and forcing the surrender of armed, capable men. If we have time, we will be honoured to share thoughts with you.”

  He could have said teach you, Yanlu realized. He hadn’t.

  Ren Daiyan turned back to the former prime minister. “My lord, you were reckless with six lives, and you say you value this man.”

  “I also said I was certain he’d wear the uniform.”

  “‘Quite certain’ was the phrase. Yes, I heard. And you were as certain that I would see it and react to it?”

  “I was.”

  Ren Daiyan shook his head.

  “Is he shaking his head?” the old man asked his son.

  “He is,” said Hsien, amused.

  A moment later, for the first time, the man named Ren Daiyan also smiled. He shook his head again.

  “Are you enjoying your retirement, my lord?” he asked.

  The blind man laughed. Yanlu didn’t understand. He didn’t expect to. He was thinking about his archers, directly opposite each other, north and south of the road. And Kou Chin would change swords from today, or be dismissed.

  Ren Daiyan waited for the old man’s laughter to subside. “Now, please, my lord. Why have you interrupted our journey to the palace? You will know we have been summoned.”

  “But you haven’t been,” said Minister Hang.<
br />
  Yanlu took a sudden, extreme pleasure in seeing the expression on Ren Daiyan’s face.

  “I summoned you,” said Hang Dejin, “not the court. Why would a newly made commander of only five thousand be invited to that meeting? Once more, will you take wine?”

  “Yes,” said Ren Daiyan this time, and the word was a kind of surrender, after all.

  ZIJI WATCHED DAIYAN take hold of his anger and master it. It unsettled him that his friend could actually be angry at the man who had essentially ruled Kitai for so long.

  How did one have that kind of response? Anger? In the presence of this man? Directed at him? How did someone from a village in the west, newly an army officer, still young by almost every measure, have the temerity to be this way?

  There were answers. Perhaps the most important was tattooed on Daiyan’s back. Some men knew, early, where they stood in the world. Or where they believed they were meant to stand.

  For himself, he stayed watchful, his usual manner in an encounter like this. Although that was a foolish way to put it. What encounter had ever been like this?

  They’d been lured here by deception, it was clear, as the younger Hang continued to speak, explaining. The last of a relay of messenger birds sent winging to their barracks near Xinan had come from this farm, not from the court.

  It was a crime punishable by execution for anyone not formally authorized to use the messenger birds. The birds were part of a jealously guarded system. That fear of punishment, did not, it seemed, affect the former prime minister.

  Yes, there was to be a gathering in the palace as soon as the emissary sent to the barbarians returned. Lu Chao had landed on the coast, was making his way to court. Hang Dejin knew this, even on his farm. He was making efforts to keep abreast of such matters. And he wanted Ren Daiyan to be there.

  They were waiting to be told why.

  The old man said, “Did you not stop to wonder, Commander Ren, why the court would request your presence? Would it be for ... experienced counsel?”