"I can be a little dangerous," he heard his Kanlin Warrior say calmly. She wasn't smiling.
The other woman lifted shaped eyebrows, then turned, very deliberately, away from Song, as if from someone inconsequential.
"My name," she said to Tai, "is Xu Liang. You know it. My father introduced us tonight. I am flattered you think me fair enough to be a
daiji
spirit, but it is an error. It would be another error if your woman-servant harmed me."
It was said with the utmost composure. There really was something, Tai thought, about being well-born. You could call Kanlin Warriors woman-servants, for one thing.
It is an error.
He glanced towards the porch. Song was biting her lower lip; he doubted she was aware of it. He was trying to remember if he had ever seen her look this uncertain before. It might have been diverting at any other time. She kept her sword levelled, but without force or conviction now, he saw.
He was still trying to define a proper target for his own rising outrage. Was there
no
privacy in a man's life when he travelled with a guard? Or, for that matter, when some military leader encountered on the road decided to bind him with a daughter? Everyone could just wander into his room as they pleased, when they pleased, day or night, eliciting embarrassing fears of shape-changing spirits?
The daughter in question murmured, still not bothering to look at Song, "Did you not see my guards, Kanlin, in the garden? They rowed me here, to the water gate of the inn. I am surprised, and a little unhappy, that neither of them has killed you yet."
"It would be difficult for them, my lady. They are unconscious, by the trees."
"You
attacked
them?"
She turned to glare at Song. Her anger was pretty clearly unfeigned, Tai decided. Her hands were rigid at her sides.
"I found them that way," Wei Song said, after a hesitation.
Lady Xu Liang's mouth opened.
"They are not dead," Song added. "No blows that I could see, no cups or flasks for poison, and they are breathing. If you have not been claimed by a fox-spirit, governor's daughter, and used for her purposes, it may be ... because something kept the
daiji
away."
Tai had no idea what to make of this. Shape-shifting fox-women were the subject of erotic legends going back to the earliest dynasties. Their beauty impossibly alluring, their physical needs extreme. Men could be destroyed by them, but in such a manner, spun of world-changing desire, that the tales aroused fear
and
inchoate longings.
Further, not every man made the nighttime recipient of a
daiji
's fierce hunger was destroyed. Some of the tales suggested otherwise, memorably.
Wei Song hadn't yet lowered her blade. Tai said, first of half a dozen questions jostling in his head, "How did you know to come back?"
She shrugged. "You couldn't smell that much perfume through the door?" A cool glance at the governor's daughter. "And I was quite certain you hadn't asked for another courtesan. You did say you were tired. Remember, my lord?"
He knew that tone.
Xu Liang folded her arms across her low-cut gown. She looked younger suddenly. Tai made his decision. This was not a girl possessed by a fox-spirit that had chosen to make use of her body--and his--for what was left of tonight. He didn't even
believe
in fox-women.
That did mean, if you were functioning well enough to consider the matter, that the governor's older daughter was remarkably seductive and alarmingly poised. He'd address that issue later.
Or, perhaps better, he wouldn't.
He concentrated on his black-clad guard, not much older than Xu's daughter. "So you went ...?"
Song rattled it off impatiently. "I came back around on the garden side. I saw the two guards in the grass." She looked at Liang. "I never touched them."
The governor's daughter looked uneasy for the first time. "Then what? How were they ...?"
A footfall on the porch, behind Wei Song.
"I'd have to agree it was probably a
daiji
," said Sima Zian.
The poet came up the steps into the room. "I just had a look at the two of them."
Tai blinked, then shook his head in indignation.
"Shall we," he asked caustically, "wake our soldiers and invite them in? Oh, and perhaps the governor's men out front might want to join us?"
"Why not?" grinned Zian.
"No!"
said Xu Liang. "Not my father's guards!"
"Why? You said his soldiers brought you here. It won't be a secret," Song said dryly. These two, Tai realized, had decided not to like each other.
"You are wrong, again, Kanlin. It
is
secret, my being here. Of course it is! The two in the garden are men I can trust," Liang said. "My own guards all my life. If they have been slain ..."
"They are not dead," the poet said. He looked around. Probably hoping for wine, Tai thought. "If I were to shape a conjecture, and I confess I enjoy doing that, I would say that Master Shen was the target of a
daiji
, that our clever Kanlin is correct." He smiled at Song, and then at the governor's daughter. "Your arrival, gracious lady, was exquisitely timed for the fox-spirit--or was guided by her." He paused, to let that thought linger. "But something here, perhaps within our friend, kept the spirit away--from him, and from you. If I am correct, you have cause to be grateful."
"And what would
something
be?" asked Xu Liang. Her painted eyebrows were arched again. They really were exquisite.
"This is ... this is nothing but conjecture!" Tai snapped.
"I did say that," Sima Zian agreed calmly. "But I also asked if you saw ghosts at the White Phoenix tonight, when first we spoke."
"You are saying that you did?"
"No. I have only a limited access to the spirit world, my friend. But enough to sense something about you."
"You mean from Kuala Nor? The ghosts?"
It was Wei Song this time, her brow furrowed. She was biting her lower lip again.
"Perhaps," said the Banished Immortal. "I would not know." He was looking at Tai, waiting.
Another lake, far to the north. A cabin there. A dead shaman in the garden, mirrors and drum. Fires, and then a man, or what had once been a man ...
Tai shook his head. He was not about to speak of this.
When pressed, ask a question. "What could my being at Kuala Nor possibly mean to a
daiji
?"
The poet shrugged, accepted the deflection. "You might draw one as you passed by. She could become aware of your presence, conscious of those protecting you, hovering."
"There are spirits attending upon Master Shen?"
Xu Liang didn't sound fearful. You could say, if you wanted, that she appeared to find the notion intriguing, engaging. She'd uncrossed her arms again, was looking at Tai. Another appraising glance, not dissimilar to ones she'd given him from by the door in her father's reception room.
He really had been away from women too long.
"There are spirits near
all
of us," Song said from the porch, a little too emphatically. "Whether we see them or not. The Way of the Sacred Path teaches as much."
"And the
Dialogues
of Master Cho assert that this is not so," murmured the woman in the red gown. "Only our ancestors are near us, and
only
if they were improperly consecrated to the next world when they died. Which is the reason for our rituals."
Sima Zian glanced happily from one woman to the other. He clapped his hands. "You are both splendid beyond description! This is a wonderful night. We must find wine!" he cried. "Let us continue this across the way, there is music."
"I am
not
entering a courtesan pavilion!" said Xu Bihai's daughter with immediate, impressive propriety.
The fact that she was standing, scented and bejewelled, in a man's bedchamber and had been on the verge of closing the door (lest someone be made envious by what was apparently to transpire) seemed entirely beside the point, Tai thought, admiringly.
"Of course! Of course you aren't," the poet murmured. "Forgive me, gracious lady. We'll bring a
pipa
player here. And perhaps just one girl, with cups and wine?"
"I think not," said Tai. "I believe that Wei Song will now escort the Lady Xu Liang back to her father's mansion. Is the boat waiting for you?"
"Of course it is," Liang said. "But my guards ..."
Tai cleared his throat. "It appears, if Sima Zian is correct, and my Kanlin, that they may have encountered a spirit-world creature. I have no better explanation. We are told they are alive."
"I will return and watch over them myself," Song said, "and tell them when they wake that their lady is home and well."
"They won't believe you if I'm not here," Xu Liang said.
"I'm a Kanlin," said Song simply. "We do not lie. They will know that, if others, less experienced, do not."
The poet, Tai thought, looked ridiculously pleased by all of this.
Liang, he realized, was looking at him again, ignoring the other woman. Tai didn't entirely mind that. He was briefly tempted by the notion of agreeing with Zian, summoning music and wine.
But not really. His sister was a long way north, beyond the Wall by now. And tonight, here in Chenyao, men had--
"I did say earlier," Xu Liang murmured, eyes demurely downcast, "that my father had sent me. You have not asked why."
Indeed. Well, he'd had what seemed a good notion why.
"My apologies." He bowed. "Is it permitted for your servant to ask now?"
She nodded. "It is. My father wished to advise you privately that those two men, when encouraged to discuss their adventurism tonight, suggested only one name of possible significance before they each succumbed, sadly, to the exacting nature of the conversation."
She looked meaningfully at the poet, and then at Song on the porch. Tai understood. "One is my guard," he said. "The other my companion."
Liang inclined her head. She said, "The assassins were bandits from the woods south of here. The man they named lives in Chenyao. He, in turn, when invited for a conversation, was kind enough to offer another name--from Xinan--before lamentably expiring."
Tai was listening very closely. "I see. And that other name is?"
She was crisp, efficient. She said, "Xin Lun--a civil servant at court, we understand--was the name given. My honoured father offers his deepest regret that he was unable to be of greater assistance, but dares to hope this will be of some use to Master Shen."
Xin Lun. Again. Yan had spoken that name before he died. He'd been killed as he said it.
Lun. Drinking companion, fellow student, convivial and clever. Not a student any more, it seemed. If he was in the palace he'd passed the examinations while Tai was away. A card and dice player once, ballad singer at night, a lover of--as it happened--Salmon River wine. Wearing the robes of a mandarin now.
Because of Yan, it wasn't a revelation, not devastating news of betrayal. More a confirmation, an echo. He'd been waiting for a different name, perhaps two, behind these assassins ... and had been deeply afraid to hear one of them spoken aloud.
He showed none of this in his face, he hoped.
He bowed to the governor's daughter. "My thanks to your father. And to you, gracious lady, bearing these tidings so late at night. I do understand why Governor Xu would not trust them to anyone else."
"Of course he wouldn't," she murmured.
She looked directly at him as she said it, then let that slow smile shape her lips, as if the guard and the poet weren't in the room. As if she and Tai were continuing a conversation interrupted earlier, and
so
unpleasantly, by another girl with a blade.
THE OTHER GIRL escorted her out the sliding doors and through the garden. Sima Zian walked them down to the river. Standing on the porch, Tai watched the three of them go towards the trees and the water beyond. He lost them in the dark, then saw the one man come back a short time later and head across towards the music again, head lifted, steps quickening, hearing it.
Tai waited in silence for a time, listening to the night. He caught the scent of flowers, citrus. There were peonies. A slight breeze from the north, towards the river. The stars that ended the night this time of year were rising.
"Daiji?"
he called, greatly, recklessly daring.
He couldn't say why, but it felt as if there might be an answer to something, to
part
of this story, out in the garden.
Nothing stirred in the dark but fireflies.
Flashing go the night-travellers.
The old song about them. He thought of the tale of the poor scholar who could not afford oil for lanterns, gathering fireflies in a bag each evening, studying by their light. They used to joke about that story, in Xinan, the students. Chou Yan, Xin Lun, Shen Tai, the others.
There were other night-travellers tonight. He wondered where his sister was, where in a too-wide world. A hard pull upon the heart. His father was dead. This would not have happened, otherwise.
Deaths, even quiet ones, had consequences.
Three men had died in Chenyao tonight under questioning. For attempting to have him killed.
No movement in the garden, no approach to his call, his foolishness. He didn't believe there had been a fox-creature following him, though it was interesting that Wei Song seemed to fear them. He hadn't noticed her biting her lower lip that way before. He had thoughts about how those two guards had ended up unconscious.
Wind in leaves. Distant music. The bright, low star he'd seen before was still there. It felt as if a great deal of time had passed since he'd come into this room, but it wasn't so.
Tai didn't call again. He turned and went back inside. He washed and dried himself using the filled water basin and towel. He undressed, put out the three lights burning in the room, drew the sliding doors and hooked them shut. Some air came in through the slats, which was good. He closed the main door, which was still ajar.
He went to bed.
A little later, drifting towards sleep as to the shore of another country, he suddenly sat up in the nearly black room and swore aloud. He half expected to hear Song from the portico asking what was wrong, but she wouldn't be back from the governor's mansion yet.
They couldn't leave at sunrise. He'd just realized it.
It was not possible. Not in the empire of the Ninth Dynasty.
He had to visit the prefect tomorrow morning.
Had
to. They were to take a morning meal together. It had been arranged. If he didn't attend, if he simply rode off, it would bring lasting shame upon himself, and upon his father's memory.
Neither the poet nor the Kanlin would say a word to refute this. They wouldn't even think to try. It was a truth of their world, for good or ill. As much a part of it--this ritualized, unyielding, defining formality--as poetry was, or silk, or sculpted jade, palace intrigues, students and courtesans, Heavenly Horses,