Under Heaven (18 page)

In the teachings of the Path, beliefs to which he'd tried, erratically, to adhere, Tai knew that coincidence, the fortuitous encounter, was to be accepted with composure.
If grim and unpleasant, such moments were properly understood as tasks, lessons one was meant to master. If benevolent, they were gifts to be humbly received.
Sometimes there was no obvious tilt towards one side or other of that balancing, there was simply a moment, an event, that startled in its unexpectedness.
Regarding these, there was a dispute among teachers. Some said the wayfarer's task was to interpret the meaning of the moment as best he could, and respond appropriately. Others taught that there
were
moments in a life that did not admit of understanding until long after. At such times, they counselled, one was merely to experience, and strive towards comprehension in the fullness of time.
That Sima Zian, the Banished Immortal, most beloved poet of the empire, should be in the reception hall of the White Phoenix Pleasure House of Chenyao, declaiming one of the poems Tai loved most in the world, felt--immediately--to be one of those moments that could not possibly be grasped.
There was no point even trying.
Be in the room
, Tai told himself.
Be aware of all of this. Gather it.
Before anything else, however, it made sense to close his mouth, which was hanging open like that of a child watching fireworks at the Chrysanthemum Festival.
He took a few cautious steps forward. The women, their silks in many colours, like butterflies or flowers, were exquisitely trained in an expensive house. Perfumed deliciously, they made way for him, lingering close in subtle and less-subtle ways to read how he responded, what he liked.
Girls like these, and the wine they offered, and their flute and
pipa
music, had been what he'd dreamed about for two years. They almost didn't matter now.
He moved forward a little more, among other men around the platform. Merchants and soldiers, provincial bureaucrats in their belted gowns. No students, not in a border town, or a house this expensive.
Up close, there was resistance as Tai tried to get nearer to the poet. He saw a willowy girl bend, her hair swept up stylishly, the curves of her perfect breasts showing, to pour for Sima Zian as he paused between verses. He waited for her, smiled, drank off the entire cup. He hesitated, resumed:
I remember my careless maiden time.
I did not understand the world and its ways
Until I wed you, a man of the Great River.
Now on river sands I wait for the wind to change.
And when, as summer begins, the winds are fair
I think: husband, you will soon be here.
Autumn comes, the west wind whistles,
I know you cannot come to me.
Sima Zian paused again, lifted his cup. It was refilled from his other side, another girl, lissome as the first, her dark hair pleasingly disordered, brushing the great man's shoulder.
He smiled at her and Tai saw--for the first time, so near--the poet's notorious tiger-eyes, wide-set.
Dangerous, you might even say. Eyes that would know you, and the world. On the other hand ...
The poet hiccupped, and then giggled. "Oh, dear," he said. "I have friends in Xinan ... I
do
still have friends in Xinan ... who would be disappointed in me, that this small sampling of a good wine should cause me to lose the thread of my own verse. Will someone ...?"
He looked around, optimistically.
Tai heard himself, before he was aware that he was speaking:
But whether you go or come, it is always sorrow,
For when we meet you will be off again too soon.
You'll make the river ford in how many days?
I dreamt last night I crossed the waves in wind
And joined you and we rode on grey horses
East to where the orchids are on the Immortals' Isle.
We saw a drake and duck together in green reeds
As if they were painted on a silk-thread screen.
The crowd by the raised platform parted, turning to look at him. Tai moved forward, aware that he wasn't entirely sober himself, light-headed with what he was doing, overwhelmed to be among this many people after so long alone, all these women. His gaze was met--and held--by tiger-eyes.
He stopped. Had reached the last verse.
Sima Zian smiled. No danger in it at all, only good-natured, inebriated delight.
"That was it!" he exclaimed. "Thank you, friend. And have you left the ending for me?"
Tai bowed, hand in fist; he didn't trust himself to speak. He had loved the words of this man, and the legend of him, since he'd left childhood behind.
When he straightened, a tall girl in crimson silk attached herself to his side, hip against his, a long arm lightly around his waist, head tilted to rest on his shoulder. He breathed the scent of her, felt a surge of desire, over and above and through all else.
Sima Zian, the Banished Immortal, who had never held a single post in the imperial civil service, never even sat an examination, who had been banished from Xinan (as well as heaven!) three times that Tai knew about, who was reliably reported to have not been entirely sober in decades, who could nonetheless extemporize a poem, write it on the spot with immaculate brushwork, and break your heart, said softly, into the hush:
Take pity upon me now. When I was fifteen years old
My face and body were ripe as a summer peach.
Why did I wed a merchant who travels the Great River?
Water is my grief ... my grief is the wind.
There was a further silence. Surely there would always be, Tai thought, a silence after this, everywhere. The hand around his waist lingered. There was musk in her perfume, and ambergris. Both were expensive. This really was, he thought, the best house in Chenyao, if the girls wore such scents.
"Thank you, master," he said.
Someone had to say it, he thought. Sima Zian didn't turn his head at first. He lifted a hand, holding the empty cup. The first girl moved beside him and refilled it. The poet drank it off, held it up again. The second woman, refusing to yield her rights, came forward this time.
The poet's eyes, pale and brilliant in the lamplight, finally turned to look at Tai.
"Join me," Sima Zian said, "if your mourning time is over. It must be, since you are among us. We can drink together."
Tai opened his mouth, realized he had no idea what to say.
The girl beside him pressed her head briefly against his shoulder, a reminder of her presence, a promise, and withdrew. Tai stepped up to the platform, bowed, and slipped off his own sheathed sword, laying it near the poet's. He sat opposite the other man, cross-legged. A cup was handed to him, wine was poured. He lifted the cup in salute. He decided to be careful how much he drank.
He had no idea how Sima Zian knew who he was.
The poet, seen close, was a bigger man than Tai had imagined. His long hair was mostly grey, tied at the back with a nondescript blue strip of cloth, no hairpins. His robe was stained. His face was remarkably unlined, round, flushed, and benign. The bright eyes were unsettling, however. His hands were steady, large, the fingers long.
He said, "I knew of your father, of course. His death was a loss. It has always seemed to me that the best military leaders are gentle in their souls, aware of what war means. I thought this might be true of Shen Gao."
He lifted his cup and drank. Tai did the same, cautiously.
Tai cleared his throat. It was necessary to speak, or be thought simple-minded. The two girls had withdrawn down the two steps, leaving them a space of privacy on this platform. The evening activities of the chamber had resumed. He heard
pipa
music begin, then a flute, and laughter; saw men and women retiring through curtained doorways.
Tai wished he were sober. He said, "Our family is honoured, of course, that you even know who he was. Or ... who I am."
The pale eyes were briefly sharp, then amusement returned. "You
have
been long away," said the poet. "I know your brother, as well. Shen Liu is too close to the first minister not to be known ... and judged."
Tai said, "Judged, but not admired?"
Sima Zian grinned again. A smile seemed to be his natural expression. "Not by all. The same is true, of course, of the first minister himself. We live in challenging times. Assessments are going to be made."
Tai looked quickly around. Only the two girls with their wine were in possible range of hearing this.
The poet laughed. "You are concerned for me? What would Wen Zhou do? Exile me from Xinan again? He would like to, I suspect. So would others. It was decided by friends who care for me that this might be a good summer to absent myself from the capital. That's why I'm drinking in a pleasure house in the west. In part."
A deliberate pause, an obvious invitation. Taking it, Tai murmured, "In part?"
That laughter again, uninhibited, infectious--though Tai was not in a state to share amusement. "The prefect was kind enough to tell me of your arrival, over dinner this evening. He mentioned that you'd inquired about where the best courtesan house in town might be. A sensible query. I wanted to meet you."
"I am ... I am humbled ..." Tai heard himself stammering.
"No," said Sima Zian. "Not after that lake beyond borders. What you did there." His wide gaze was suddenly direct.
Tai nodded, a single awkward bob of the head. He felt flushed. Wine and the room's warmth, the intensity of the eyes holding his.
The poet murmured:
Alone among the pines,
He is a servant of no man.
How could I dream
Of ascending such a mountain?
From below that starlight
I bow my head.
The lines were well known. Zian had written them himself for a friend, years ago. Another poet, older, now gone.
Tai lowered his eyes. "You do me too much honour."
Sima Zian shook his head. "No," he said again. "I do not." Then, quietly, "Do you see ghosts here tonight?"
It was a real question. Tai was startled, looked at the other man and then away. Zian held up his cup and one of the women came forward. She gestured at Tai's and he shook his head. The poet made a face.
Tai tried to ignore that. He said, "I never
saw
them. At Kuala Nor."
"Heard?"
Tai nodded, more slowly. "Every night. Once ... once only, by day." Last afternoon, sun going down. A wind that was not wind.
"Are they angry?"
The girl had stepped back down again, with the wine.
This was difficult. "Some of them. Others are lost. Or in pain."
The poet looked away this time. At length, he shook his head. "Did you ever write about it?"
"How did you know that I ...?"
The smile again, more gently. "You were studying for the examinations, I understand, when your father died. All of you write poetry, son of Shen Gao."
"Or we try," Tai amended. "I had paper and ink. Wrote little I judged worth keeping. I am not equal to their story."
"Perhaps none of us are."
Tai drew a breath. "What else did the prefect tell you?"
He wanted, he badly wanted, a man he could trust. He wanted it to be this man.
Sima Zian hesitated for the first time. Then, "He did inform me about your Sardians, the Heavenly Horses. The princess's gift."
"I see," said Tai.
It was too large a tale to keep, he thought. Every man who heard it would tell.
"They will probably know in Xinan soon," the poet added.
"I hope so. I sent word ahead."
The eyes were thoughtful. "Because?"
"The horses are being held for me at the border. The gift is revoked if I do not claim them myself."
"Clever," the other man said, after a moment. "It might save your life." He didn't smile now.
"A Taguran captain thought of it."
Tai wasn't sure why he'd said that.
"A friend, clearly."
"I think so. While we're at peace."
"Ah. You believe we might not be?"
Tai shook his head, suddenly uneasy. "I've been away two years. I have no information. What should I know?"
Abruptly, he lifted his cup. It seemed he did want another drink. The poet waited until a girl had come with wine and withdrawn, slender and young, in wine-coloured silk that rustled as she moved.
Sima Zian's gaze drifted across the crowded, lamplit room, came back to Tai. "As to saving your life," he murmured, under the music, "don't look away from me, but is there a chance uncivilized men would be here with ill intent towards you?"
His voice was relaxed, almost lazy, as if they were discussing poetry or world affairs.
"It is possible," Tai said carefully. He felt his heart beginning to hammer. Kept his gaze on the poet's.
"Even with that message you sent ahead? The loss of the horses should you die? Of course, they might be here for
me
."
"Truly?"
The poet shrugged. He was deceptively broad-shouldered; the softness hid it. "Unlikely. I offended the prime minister and the chief eunuch in the same room, which is difficult, but I don't believe it was a deadly insult for either. Remind me to tell you the story later."
"I will," said Tai.
Later.
That meant something, didn't it?
He cleared his throat. It took some effort not to look around. He made a decision. He would acknowledge, after, that some of it had to do with the sense of the person that came through in the poetry, and that this might not be a sound basis for judging a man. Nonetheless: "There was an assassin sent west for me, before the gift of the horses was known."
Sima Zian's expression changed again. Watching him, Tai saw curiosity and then--unexpectedly--a hint of pleasure.
"You killed him?"
It was widely reported that the poet had been an itinerant warrior in his youth, two horses, two swords and a bow, sleeping in caves or under stars, defending peasants against landlords and tax collectors like one of the hero-bandits of folk tales. There were stories--legends, really--about his deeds along the Great River in the wild country by the gorges.
"It was a woman," Tai said. "But, no, I didn't. She was killed by the Tagurans and ... and the ghosts."
You had to trust
some
people in life.
The poet considered this, then: "Look now! Near the door. Do you know them?"
Tai turned. There were two men to the left of the entranceway. They were in profile, engaged by three girls. Neither man was dressed for an evening in the pleasure district, let alone the best house there. Their boots and clothing were dusty and stained. They carried two swords each. One of them glanced over his shoulder just then--directly at Tai. Their gazes met, the man flicked his eyes away. It was enough, however. They