Chapter Fifteen.

"Lord Saukendar," Reidi said, his wrinkled face-not so much changed, after all these years-showing the worry natural to a man at such a meeting. But the old lord came forward in person, once his retainer had told him who it was-came forward himself with no guard, elderly as he was, while his retainers drew his troops up at rest on the hill.

"Lord Reidi," Shoka said, and bowed in the saddle. "I appreciate your courtesy."

"You're after more than courtesies, m'lord."

"A free road. Your leave to pa.s.s. Perhaps your advice."

"What advice is that?"

"What's happening in Hoishi?" Shoka nodded his head back toward Ygotai. "What kind of craziness is loose in Chiyaden these days?"

Reidi stared at him as if he had lost his wits.

"So I see I've asked a foolish question," Shoka said. "Am I at fault?"

"I had a report from Mon. Another from a judge-regarding a horse. Unfortunately-I'm not the only one who'll have heard. The word's out. It's going north of here. The Regent's men have been scouring all along your track. And evidently they've attackedme as your ally."

Shoka let go his breath. "You've been a good neighbor, m'lord. I'd never wanted to cause you grief.

Now it seems I've caused more than my company may be worth to you. What about the other lords?

What about Hainan and Taiyi?"

"What about my town, m'lord? What happened at Ygotai?"

"Someone set fires. Someone killed a great number of people. The ones who escaped have taken to the roads. I don't know who fired the town. I rode through when I saw the fires-my wife and I-"

"Wife!" Lord Reidi looked past his shoulder, his jaw clamped like an old turtle, his eyes glittering sharply. "What are you doing to us?" "My wife has a grievance with lord Gitu. From Hua. Relatives. I thought to have a quieter ride than this, by night, by the back roads-take care of the matter and out again, with no grief to Hoishi. It seems I'm sadly mistaken. So I ask you for your advice now-and I offer you my help-if there were anything I can do to make amends."

"You don't know," Reidi said with a shake of his head.

"My lord, no, I don't." Softly, quietly. Reasonably, while his heart was hammering away and he was poised to move. "Would you explain?"

Reidi leaned his hands on the saddle and heaved a sigh. "The Emperor, lord Saukendar. The Emperor-and the Regent. Does it seem reasonable to you that a Regency continues-into an Emperor's thirtieth year?"

"No, m'lord."

"Not to us, either. Not to many of us. We were ready to make that objection-when lord Gitu overran Yijang and Hua. Both likely to support us. Your-wife-has told you nothing about that matter."

"Tell me."

Lord Reidi's brow arched, rearrangement of a myriad wrinkles. "I ask your honesty, m'lord,"

"You have it, my lord. I believe I have yours."

There was long silence. Reidi's horse shifted under him. That was all.

Then Reidi said: "Gitu has hired thousands of mercenaries in the last two years-with the imperial treasury. Fittha and Oghin, while we fight their like on the border. While they take our young men to fight in the Imperial army. And there is no Emperor to rally to. Ghita's sapped the wit he did have. Ghita's a.s.sa.s.sins have taken Meigin...."

"d.a.m.n."

Reidi gave him that one-sided stare again. "Whydid you come back?"

"A man can be a fool at any age."

"In what respect, m'lord Saukendar?"

"Perhaps-to hope there was something changed here."

"Thereis no Emperor."

"Dead?"

"Effectively. There was a chance. There were those of us who would have brought him to the throne-His thirtieth birthday seemed the propitious day-"

"Hua. Two years ago." "Hua and Yijang. Which fell to Gitu's mercenaries in the same month. a.s.sa.s.sinations, elsewhere. Hired killers. Bands of mercenaries traveling under imperial orders. TheEmperor's seal, and the Regent's orders. How do we stop such a thing? How do we prevent it-when every lord able to lead is apprehended, a.s.sa.s.sinated, when they strip us of men, even boys out of the fields-go to Saukendar, some said. Go to Saukendar. Theyurged me to send to you. This time he has to listen, they said. But if I had sent-and Ghita had known-you understand-" Reidi gave an uncomfortable twitch of the shoulders. His horse shifted again. "I had no true hope that you'd come. You'd indicated to the villagers-that you had no wish to hear from anyone. That you would refuse any such pet.i.tions-"

"Youwere watching me."

"It's my village, m'lord-as the Regent pointed out to me again and again,and threatened my life should you leave that mountain. Of course the word came to me. I tried to get a messenger down the road to you when I knew you'd left Mon. I take it that no one reached you."

"They were too late, if they got through at all. Regarding what, my lord?"

"Your intentions in leaving Mon. DidKaijeng send a messenger?"

Did he?There was a sudden chill about his heart.Taizu?

d.a.m.n, no!

"His daughter?" Reidi asked.

"No. I've said. -What would you have expected me to do-leaving Mon?"

"I would say-lord Saukendar-we need you. Webelieved you knew that. We believed you'd come back to deal with Ghita and his partisans."

He felt cold, cold all the way to the bones.

"There are men ready to follow you, lord Saukendar. There are men who've committed their lives to this-We didn't know the hour. We only believed. Now you've come back, we have a leader the other lords will take the risk for-"

He rode quietly back to Taizu, whose face- G.o.ds, the things Reidi had surmised could not be true. Not with that look, that bewildered, worried look she gave him as he reined to a stop in front of her.

"What do they want, master Shoka?"

"They want me to help them," he said. "It seems-the moment we crossed the border-the rumor started north that I'd beencalled north by some conspiracy, to lead an attack against the capital. The local garrisons of Ghita's troops moved to try to prevent me; the rumor may have reached Ghita by now, by messenger bird-and if it has-" Blood flashed to mind, and poison: Ghita's a.s.sa.s.sins: the cup in Meiya's hand. Deaths far and wide across Chiyaden, the last possible friends. The numbness seemed all the way through him. "-if it has, then orders are coming back from Ghita by now, the Guard is moving against everyone who might be disposed against the government-Reidi, some of the other lords-they'llfight. They've had enough. They've committed themselves to this-too far to look innocent. That's the problem. They want me to go to Cheng'di; and I want you-please, please listen to me: I would much prefer you go to Keido and stay there-"

"No."

"Girl, we're not talking about bandits in Hoisan. We're talking about imperial troops, an entirely different kind of fighting. You'll have your chance at the end of this. But not now. Please, go to Keido. Lord Reidi's wife will-"

"No."

"I'm asking you. You can be useful there."

She shook her head. "No. Youtaught me." Her head came up, that chin set. He thought:If not with me, then behind me every step of the way. . . .

"What did I teach you?"

"Honor, master Shoka."

"Where did I teach you a fool idea like that?"

The chin trembled and steadied. "You wouldn't letme go alone. Now you won't go away from lord Reidi and let him go alone against the soldiers. That's what."

Memory painted him gruesome scenes, terrible ways to die. He tried to shove them out. But h.e.l.l if he could hope she would be reasonable and go to Keido; at bottom, he was only grateful she was not talking about an independent a.s.sault on Gitu.

"Then I need you to listen to me," he said, to forestall that before she thought of it. "I ask you-don't surprise me, Taizu. Don't do things like going after Gitu. Later for him. I trust you. I can't say that about any of these people I'm fighting for."

She looked perplexed and worried. Well she might.

"They'll swallow me," he said. It was the only way he could think of it, the people like one vast dragon.

They wanted Saukendar; Saukendar would save them; Saukendar owed them everything. Saukendar was whatever they decided him to be. He always had been. Shoka had lived in the belly of the dragon most of his life. Now the dragon wanted him back and all that could keep him out was a girl saying, "That's nonsense, master Shoka. You're a fool, master Shoka."

The body that was Saukendar could go on fighting long after Shoka was nowhere at all: he was confident of that; but Shoka would go with her, Shoka had no other reason to live; and Shoka was ready to hear her say no, and go away, not even knowing what she took with her-being a young girl, and not understanding a man who had never, but a few years of peace-existed.

"What are you talking about?" she asked him.

It was nothing that even sounded sane. So he said: "Just stay with me." "Is that-marry you, again?"

"No," he said. "It's something different. -Besides, I thought you had."

She bit her lip. "I did, and I'm going with you. You can divorce me if we get to Cheng'di. Meanwhile there's none of the ladies in Chiyaden who'll be any help to you along the way."

"Who said divorce you? I worked hard enough getting you to agree!"

"You just remember I said that." Her jaw clenched. Muscles bunched, making her chin look uncommonly fragile. "You remember that in Cheng'di."

"Then you think d.a.m.n little of me," he said.

"I'm no lady!"

"The h.e.l.l with them!"he hissed, smothering it. "The h.e.l.l with Saukendar, wife. Don't you do it to me!

For G.o.ds'sake , don't you do it to me!"

She stared at him with wide, offended eyes.

Kaijeng's messenger, lord Reidi had surmised. A scheme to get me back across the border, involved with their plots again?

The very thought left him cold.

But the wound that scarred her was real. Her anger was real. Everything she knew and all she did was real. He wavered on the edge of a vast dark and Taizu with that shocked, hurt stare-was the only thread that saved him.

Right now she thought he had lost his mind, and was no little angry at him. Good, he thought.Good for you, girl.

They came among the first of the refugees from Ygotai by full daylight, and it was very different when the people saw their own lord's banner; and when they understood that the tired, travel-stained riders with him were Saukendar and his wife.

Shoka heard the murmurings, saw the change in the people's eyes, saw the respect they gave him.Poor fools , he thought.Your houses are burned; your neighbors are murdered for me. d.a.m.n you for looking at me like that- But if one tried very hard one could ignore the stares, one could blur the faces at the edge of one's vision, one could tolerate the old woman who came and scared h.e.l.l out of Jiro trying to touch him, babbling something about the old Emperor, and the way things used to be, and how she knew Saukendar would set things right.

One could blur one's vision and make one's heart cold and tolerate it, even if it rubbed the soul raw.

They got some satisfaction for it at Ygotai, among the burned sticks and rubble that had been a prosperous town. They found a small band of mercenaries, which Shoka expected: and he had alreadysent thirty of Reidi's men wide around the town to lay an ambush while he and Taizu rode with Reidi and the other hundred of Reidi's men down past the town and onto the dike road where the garrison had put the barricade across the bridge.

It was appallingly easy. Theygave the mercenaries the way out down the main street of the town and chased them all the way to the ambush out on the road, in which they had one minor wound; and the one of the mercenaries that looked apt to escape, went tumbling off into the ditch with an arrow in him.

"Good," Shoka said coldly, calmly. "That'll let us gain a little ground before the word spreads. M'lord, you say you'll go north: are you ready to go now, this hour?"

Reidi looked gray. His white hair flew in wisps. He looked as if the affair around him was more than he had bargained for. But he got his breath and nodded. "Yes. My wife-the system we have-We can get word to the others. The birds-we breed them, you know. Exchange them. That's how we've planned it.

When the day came-we'd loose the birds ... to every one of us."

They had the mercenaries' few horses for remounts-a good chestnut gelding to give Jiro relief and a bay to change off with Taizu's white-legged mare.

It was the ferry on the Chisei that Shoka figured for trouble. So it was more than the horses they borrowed: it was the armor and gear off the dead mercenaries, and when they got as far up the road as the Chisei it was not lord Reidi's men in view, it was himself and five of lord Reidi's best on the mercenaries' horses, in the mercenaries' gear-fifteen more on foot. "You're not going," he told Taizu flatly when she stuck her lip out at him and glared. "You're too d.a.m.nshort , girl, you don't look like anybody they know, so shut up and take orders like anybody else in this company."

She mended her manner then.

And he led the chestnut gelding down to the river where lord Reidi's men were hauling the rope-drawn ferry back across the river.

Small guess why there were no ferrymen. If they had had sense they had run; if they had had no luck they were dead; and if there was not a band of mercenaries on that other sh.o.r.e the enemy were fools.

Slow going: the men playing infantry hauled on the rope, Shoka and the two with horses in charge had the horses to keep steady.