Blood of Tyrants

Page 9

Chapter 9
MIANNING EVIDENTLY DID NOT care to discuss the matter further. It fell to Gong Su to convey the details: he seemed high in the councils of the crown prince, and spent nearly all the day closeted with his own associates within the government; later that evening he rejoined their small and wary party in Laurence’s chambers, and quietly told them, “Lung Tien Chuan was slain six months ago. He was served with poison in his tea.”
Laurence was appalled by the act: a dreadful waste, and it seemed to him pure cruelty, to punish the dragon for merely loving his master, and over a political quarrel with the latter, which the former should have had very little to say to, he imagined. “There are only eight Celestials in full, are there not?” Laurence said.
“Yes,” Gong Su said. “There is no other to be the prince’s companion.”
Laurence only belatedly took the deeper meaning of this intelligence that evening, when he was alone again: he had been quartered in another part of the Imperial palace grounds under Mianning’s control and surrounded by watchful guards loyal to him.
Laurence had closeted himself to write his report of the strange and convoluted events of the day, which yet he preferred to struggling through more of the letter he had not yet sent to his mother to acquaint her with his condition. But he set his pen down abruptly and, sitting up, looked out the window into the courtyard where Temeraire slept, in arm’s reach—in a dragon’s arm’s reach at least—recovering from his exertions.
Hammond had conveyed to him from the other side the necessity of Laurence’s adoption: a Celestial might only be companion to a member of the Imperial family; and Temeraire’s egg had been sent away from China in the first place only to avoid setting up a rival to Mianning. Therefore—the heir to the throne required a Celestial? Perhaps required was too strong: many things might be bent at the will of the Emperor. But tradition had its own power. If Mianning had no Celestial companion—if he had lost his own dragon—
Shipboard, Temeraire had spoken censoriously to him of Hammond. “I do not say he is not clever, in his own way,” Temeraire had said, “but I am very sorry to say, Laurence, that he is not to be relied upon. When last we were here, he wished to insist upon your giving me back to the Chinese only so they would open another port to us.”
Surely that request would come again, now, Laurence realized, and was disturbed by his own reaction to the possibility—a reaction which owed more to the viscera than clear rational thinking. Sensibly considered, he ought to be grateful for such an excuse to be restored to his respectable Navy career and a ship of his own; and if he were not grateful, if he had not wished to do it, nevertheless it would be no less than his duty. And yet—and yet he discovered he had begun to think of Temeraire as his own man, as it were. Such persuasion, coming from one trusted as a friend, would only be honorable if meant sincerely, if given from the heart and in expectation of its advancing Temeraire’s real happiness.
Laurence did not think he could, even at the direct request of the King’s envoy, consent to deceive a friend. To lie in such a cause would be contemptible, a kind of personal treachery. But Laurence felt himself on unsteady ground. It was surely his duty as a captain in the Aerial Corps to use the bond between himself and Temeraire to be both a check and a goad upon the beast, and that bond was one which many another aviator would willingly have taken on in his stead. Perhaps it was a kind of folly to think of a dragon as a friend, as a companion-in-arms; would he skate perilously close to treason to refuse such a demand?
Granby listened willingly enough as Laurence began to outline the situation for him, but Laurence did not reach the question: no sooner had he explained Mianning’s need than Granby broke in, snorting, and said, “Oh, Lord! Yes, Hammond will be after you straightaway, I am sure; I dare say their Lordships would give him a peerage if he managed anything so neat as giving them a treaty and being shot of Temeraire all at once.”
Laurence stared: shocked, silenced; Granby caught his eye, and a slow crimson flush overspread his cheeks. “Well—” Granby said after a moment. “Well—he is too independent by half; he’s thought too clever for his own good—a little troublesome, perhaps—but you see,” he added hurriedly, “you must see I’ve no room to criticize. Iskierka is a demon and a half, and it’s not as though Temeraire hadn’t any provocation, for that matter, you know—”
Laurence made him no reply; he could not conceive of any reply which should be fitting. He did not know: he did not know at all, that he was the captain of a troublesome beast; he did not know that the Admiralty should have been glad to see the back of his dragon, though Britain was desperately short on heavy-weight beasts, even ones of less remarkable capability.
Granby made a hasty and threadbare excuse of having to go see to Iskierka; Laurence mechanically said, “Of course,” and rising left Granby’s quarters. A fine thin rain was presently falling. Granby and the rest of the formation were quartered in one of the guest palaces to the south of Mianning’s personal quarters, where Laurence had been invited to stay; the dragon-wide pathway between the buildings was grey and misty, blurred, and deserted but for a handful of servants, errand-boys, dashing quickly through. Laurence stood beneath the eaves; across the path another great palace stood, with a dragon’s-head as gutterspout giving out a steady clear stream of water washing over the paving-stones.
The guards behind him, Mianning’s chosen escort, shifted their weight behind him; he heard the creak of their armor, their boots on the stone, the nearly stifled sighs. The scene was wholly unfamiliar, wholly strange; in the distance was the great blue bulk of a dragon crossing the pathway, its wings half-furled to its back. It was something from a fairy-tale, nothing he would ever have imagined into his life. It gave his mind no purchase. He did not know, he did not remember, what could have made Granby ever say such things.
Laurence had never studied—to his recollection—to know much of aerial combat or of dragons, beyond learning the signals to bespeak them from his ship, but this much he remembered from the battle of the Nile: the formations wheeling, like flocks of birds, above them in the sky. In modern warfare, dragons fought in formation; and yet Temeraire did not seem to have a place in one. Laurence had not thought on it before: but a dragon so gifted, so powerful, so agile—he must have been placed in formation, if it could be done. If the dragon were not—were not a recalcitrant, mismanaged beast.
He had always prided himself on being a reliable captain, one who did his duty with honor, neither haring off after prizes or unreasonable glory nor guarding his ship too jealously from danger; he had prided himself on a well-run crew. It now bore in on him with sudden force that his crew was strangely depleted, and of a peculiar nature; he had paid little mind to that, struggling as he did merely to learn all the names of those men he did have, but by comparison to the complement Maximus bore, Temeraire had not half so many. His ground crew consisted entirely in a dozen men—several of them, Laurence now realized, former sailors. His officers were a motley and an awkward lot: Forthing, his first officer, was not a gentleman, nor of any particular brilliance which should excuse the same.
Laurence could scarcely imagine whom he might approach on the subject; Granby had certainly been most unwilling to speak. His subordinates he could hardly insult in such a manner, either, as to ask them whether they served on an inferior crew, and why.
Finally he strode out into the rain and returned to his own quarters, to speak with Temeraire himself: if he could not ask for a direct answer, he could ask where they stood with the Admiralty, together, he and the dragon. If Temeraire had some memory of chastisement, some punishment—
Temeraire was awake, in his courtyard, awake and spangled a little by the rain, which he shook off with a rippling shiver of the scales. “Laurence!” he exclaimed with relief. “I wish you had not gone away when there are assassins about: I was on the point of going to look for you. Wherever have you been? Surely you might have stayed here with me, and waited until I woke?”
He sounded an anxious mistress more than anything else, an odd mixture of plaintive and accusatory. “I left word,” Laurence said, a little surprised. “I have been speaking with Captain Granby—”
“Granby had much better come and visit you,” Temeraire said, “than the reverse: no-one is trying to assassinate Granby.”
“No-one is trying to assassinate me, either,” Laurence said dryly. “I had merely the misfortune of being near the crown prince.”
“If they want to kill the prince, I dare say they may want to kill you just as well,” Temeraire said. “After all, you are his brother and the Emperor’s son as well; and if they do not like his being a friend to Britain, how much less must they like your being British, to begin with. But,” he added, in tones which implied he was making a handsome gesture, “I do not mean to fuss: come and let us have a bowl of tea, and then you can read to me; that would be much better than wandering all over this palace.”
“Temeraire,” Laurence said, while the servants leapt without further instruction into a rush about them, bringing out a great porcelain bowl of deep red for Temeraire, and a small ironwork table and chair for himself, with a cup and saucer to match, and kettles full of steaming and fragrant tea. “—Temeraire,” he repeated, unsure how to broach the subject: would a dragon even care anything for the Admiralty, for what men and government should think of him?
“No, of course I do not give two sous for the Admiralty, or the Government,” Temeraire said, straightaway answering all Laurence’s worst fears. “How could anyone, who has known anything of their folly? Why, Laurence, you know that perfectly well.
“I suppose you do not remember this,” he added, “but Perscitia writes me they have still not made all the pavilions, which Wellington promised us during the war; but they are also upset if ever a dragon should chance to sleep by the road, on the way from London to Edinburgh, and perhaps eat a pig left wandering loose. But that is perfectly stupid: if there is no pavilion, and no provender, then how else is one to make a long flight? And nevertheless they complain.
“As far as I can tell, there is no-one in it who is worth two pins; well, except for you, Hammond,” Temeraire added, as that gentleman entered in haste. “You are not a bad sort of fellow; but if you should attempt to do anything scaly underhand, such as tell me I ought to remain here to replace Chuan, I shall be very cross with you.”
Laurence was thwarted in pressing his inquiry by Hammond’s arrival, that gentleman in some disarray, his formal robes far from neatly pressed and showing sharp folded creases in the silk; his hair was disordered. “No, no, not at all,” Hammond said. “I assure you, nothing could be further from my wishes. We cannot afford to lose you. The tie is too valuable to sacrifice, save of course in utter extremis. Without your connection, Captain Laurence’s adoption may be too easily disavowed, and it is that bond which forms the foundation of all our negotiations.
“Naturally we must make some gesture, some effort; but I have had a hint, I believe, from Gong Su; with your permission, of course, I should propose Temeraire’s favoring them with an egg. As I understand it,” Hammond added, “your engaging in relations with an Imperial dragon would be the ordinary way of arranging such things.”
“I should like to know,” Iskierka said, with a hiss of steam and a roiling eye, “what is wrong with our egg. If an egg of yours were wanted, why should anyone look further than that?”
They were being served their dinner in Temeraire’s courtyard: a truly splendid dinner, of stewed oxheads and bowls of live eels, seasoned expertly with pepper and vinegar, which unfortunately Maximus did not seem to much enjoy, nor Immortalis and Messoria; they poked a little anxiously at the squirming masses and then nudged the bowls aside, although they were pleased enough with the oxheads, so tender the meat fell off the bones and with the skull cracked open so one might take them into one’s mouth and suck upon them for the excellent brains.
“I am afraid,” Temeraire said, a little loftily, “that they do not think much of fire-breathers, here in China—and in any case,” he added, “it is a matter of certain particular superior qualities, which belong to the Celestial breed only, and distinguish us from all others, which must be present in the next Emperor’s dragon.”
“Dear one,” Granby said to her, “we don’t at all want to give them your egg: we want to take it back with us, to Britain, and see it in the hands of some proper captain of the Corps.”
“I do not see any reason why it should not stay here and belong to the Emperor of China,” Iskierka said stormily. “No reason at all; it is ten thousand miles back to Britain, and who is to say we will not run into some trouble along the way—someone might steal the egg, or it might be cracked. Of course my egg would be very valuable, in the war,” she added, “but I do not believe in taking foolhardy risks—”
Granby choked heavily upon his own dinner, coughing, and had to be rescued with a steady thumping upon his back, and several glasses of wine.
Iskierka was in no better mood even after their meal had ended with a marvelous shaved ice, flavored with a syrup of plums and studded with the same, imparting delightful tiny bursts of flavor upon the tongue when one happened across them in a swallow. However, she did not hesitate to eat all her share and then some.
“That is something like, I will admit,” Maximus said, licking out his enormous silver bowl, “but I don’t suppose you could ask them for us, Temeraire, what they have done with the rest of those cows? I haven’t any objection to those cow’s heads, very tasty, but I would be glad of a side of beef, or perhaps two,” he added, with a slantwise look at Kulingile—who had at last stopped getting longer, but had only just yesterday sprouted the beginnings of a pair of horns, much to everyone’s bafflement: neither the Chequered Nettle nor the Parnassian, his progenitors, possessed any similar adornments.
“I wouldn’t mind one, either, if they are just lying about somewhere,” Kulingile said, raising his own head; and stifling his own remonstrations, Temeraire addressed the servants and conveyed the request. It was met with some confusion and a great deal of delay; when the beef was at last delivered two hours later, it was presented in the form of a false cow, the meat having been roasted, stuffed with grains and dried fruit, tied up with string, put into a wrapping of dough, and propped up on legs made of sticks; the head was a separate lump of meat, adorned with horns made of bread. Maximus sighed but ate it anyway, particularly after Kulingile had devoured his own share in a few bites.
As the servants began to bring out the bowls for tea, one came to Temeraire’s side and murmured that a visitor had come and sought admittance. “Oh!” Temeraire cried. “Lung Qin Mei! Pray ask her to join us at once: how delighted I shall be to see her again,” and he looked himself over anxiously. If only there were time to send Roland for his talon-sheaths, and if only they had a little black enamel paint—
Mei landed gracefully in the courtyard, though they were crowded and there was little space—but then, she did everything gracefully. Temeraire straightened himself up to meet her, abruptly conscious that he was now more cut-about than when last she had seen him; there was that very nasty scar upon his breast, where the barbed ball had taken him, before the sinking of the Valérie, and he had not filled back out from the long dismay of the sea-voyage and Laurence’s disappearance. He had not had much appetite, of late, and it was difficult to be always competing shipboard with Maximus and Kulingile; one felt a little awkward taking anything more than one urgently needed, with the two of them casting mournful looks at their own share.
Iskierka said rudely, “I do not see why she is come; who wants her, anyway?” when Temeraire presented Mei to the company, but naturally Temeraire did not translate this remark. Iskierka drew herself up and raked Mei with a cold eye. “So that is an Imperial? Skinny, if you ask me; I dare say she could not go eye-to-eye with a Copacati. I don’t see she has any scars at all.”
“Mei,” Temeraire said coldly, “is a great scholar, and took highest honors in the Imperial examinations.”
“Oh!” Iskierka said, dismissive, “say nothing more! She does not fight at all; I see. I hope you have a splendid time talking over books together while you are making this egg of yours: I hope it don’t leave you any more out of frame than you already are. Granby, I should like a flight before bed: pray let us go aloft, and then we shall go have a look in at my egg,” she added, “and I take your point entirely; we shouldn’t want to leave it in this country, where they don’t value courage as they ought.”
Temeraire was ruffled to indignation by this speech, and would surely have made a particularly sharp rejoinder if Iskierka had not gone away directly. The others were more polite to Mei, and looked with respectful interest on her jewels—this evening a collar-like delicate netting of pearls and silver wire, brilliant in the lamp-light against her dark blue scales. Although Temeraire writhed a little inwardly to see Maximus look up from the indelicate gnawing of a leg bone between two teeth and greet her with a mere joggle of the head, scarcely even a nod, saying jocularly, “How d’ye do,” before going back to rattling the bone around in his mouth in what seemed to Temeraire a particularly noisy way.
And then Berkley would say, coarsely, “Put down that leg, you mannerless gobbler: we had better be going along and let the two of them have at their business. Laurence, will you come and have a hand of whist?” which even if Temeraire did not translate it for Mei had too obvious an effect: the dragons and all their captains getting hurriedly up and leaving the tea-bowls half-full, rudely. Even Laurence rose and, speaking softly with Berkley, made to climb aboard Maximus’s back.
Temeraire would rather Laurence had not left, either; he did not see why Laurence should go anywhere. He caught Lily as they departed and whispered, “Lily, you will keep a lookout for Laurence, will you not? Pray do not let him wander off, or be assassinated; or lose any more of his memory.”
“Of course,” Lily answered, stoutly. “I will make sure he stays with Catherine and Berkley, and do not let Iskierka trouble you. I am sure you will make a perfectly splendid egg with this Imperial.”
“Lily, I do not look too wretchedly scarred, do I?” Temeraire asked.
“No,” Lily said, with a quick critical look. “—no; and you will fill out again very soon, with good eating. She must know you have come from a long way.”
This was not terribly reassuring, but there was nothing to be done for it; the others were all leaping into the air: it was only Temeraire and Mei left in the courtyard. The servants laid out fresh bowls and poured the tea again.
Then they withdrew as well, to the hallway where they might hear a call; with a desperate leap into the ensuing silence Temeraire said to Mei, “How well you look—those jewels are particularly becoming.”
“You are very kind,” Mei said, and then to his horror and dismay added, in quite respectable English, “I am glad to see you so well, Lung Tien Xiang: too many times has the moon turned since we last saw one another beneath the boughs of the peach-trees, in the Summer Palace.”
“Why,” Temeraire said, wretchedly, “you have learnt English.”
“Yes,” Mei said, and with her usual tact added, “but I still cannot follow it very well, if someone speaks quickly: I have not had enough chance to practice.”
“I must have words with Iskierka,” Temeraire said. “I will have words with her; oh! I am so very sorry, Mei, that she should have been so rude. I only wish you hadn’t known of it.”
Mei ruffled out her wings a little, but did not pretend any longer that she did not know exactly what he meant. “I do not take any notice of it,” she said. “She must be very attached to you, I suppose: I do not fault her for that. One cannot expect civilized manners from barbarians.”
“She is not very attached to me, in the least,” Temeraire said. “She is only attached to showing away, and annoyed she cannot do it so well as usually.” He fell silent; he was not sure how to approach the matter. Diffidently he added, “I imagine—I expect Hammond has told you—” and then paused helplessly; this was not the breeding grounds of Pen y Fan in Wales, where everyone treated the matter with an easy coarseness, and everyone understood what they were about and merely wished to have the matter over with as quickly and easily as they might.
He had never expected to regret anything of those conditions, anything of being treated as a dumb bestial creature good for nothing else, but at the moment, if old Lloyd had appeared from nowhere to say, “Here now, why don’t the two of you share a nice cow, and then have yourselves a splendid time,” and Mei had acquiesced, Temeraire might almost have managed gratitude. If only Laurence had stayed: Temeraire might have introduced him to Mei, and they might have conversed awhile; they might have been quite comfortable and easy, and the subject of eggs might have been allowed to rise naturally, in the flow of conversation. But that seemed quite impossible now: Temeraire found himself adrift and speechless.
Mei took pity upon him, and said gently, “I have not spoken to Mr. Hammond; I have come at the request of the crown prince. But I will be frank with you, dear friend: your minister’s thoughts have run along behind his, it seems, for I have come to ask if you would consider doing me the very great honor of permitting me to attempt to bear a Celestial egg to you.”
Temeraire felt rather heaped with coals of fire by this gracious speech, and made haste to convey to Mei his own willingness, and gratitude. He hesitated to go too far, in expressing the latter; after all, though he might be cut-about, he had come by his wounds honorably; and he was a Celestial: he did not want to abandon his dignity. Nothing could be less pleasing, he thought, to Mei; he did not want her to feel that she condescended. But he felt he could say, and did, “Nothing should give me greater pleasure than to make the attempt, if you were willing. I am very honored that His Imperial Highness would look to myself, to sire a companion for his reign.”
And then he heaved a sigh of relief, to have escaped the rocky shoals and come safe to harbor; now they could be easy together. He asked her if she had read any English books. “I hope you will let me make you a present of some,” he added, “if you haven’t many here: I do not suppose you have had a chance of seeing the Principia Mathematica? It is of all books my favorite,” and they passed a very pleasant hour discussing the poetry which Temeraire’s mother, Qian, had lately sent him.
“Mei,” Temeraire ventured, “pray tell me, if I might ask—is there not—is there a reason that Qian should not have had another egg?”
Mei said quietly, “The physicians think it inadvisable: she suffered greatly in bearing the twin eggs, last time, and in Imperials, where such a birth has happened once, it oft occurs a second time; the Empress does not wish Qian to risk her health.”
“Oh,” Temeraire said, sadly. “I am very sorry, I am sure; and my uncle?”
Mei shook her head. “A dozen attempts have come to nothing,” she said. “We have been breeding a great deal amongst ourselves,” she added, “—we Imperials, that is, in hopes of another Celestial arising, but without success. I assure you, Xiang, no-one will think any less of you, should we fail: it is well known that Celestials often cannot produce issue.”
Temeraire was glad of an excuse to preen a little; he coughed, and gave Mei to understand he was not in the least concerned, at all. “For Iskierka, you see, has had my egg,” he said. “That is why she is making such a fuss: she does not care to see it passed over, for yours.”
He trailed off, a little puzzled, by the expression of open surprise upon Mei’s face: she stared at him unblinking a moment and then said, in cautious tones, “Is it—perhaps the egg is yet in the shell?”
“Yes,” Temeraire said. “It is in our quarters, under guard, of course.”
Mei hesitated even longer and then said, “Is it not possible the egg should be—the gold dragon’s, perhaps, the very large one? There are many young males in your company—”
“What?” Temeraire said, taken aback. “Why, no; Iskierka particularly wanted my egg; it is not as though just anyone’s would have done for her. She followed me to New South Wales to get it, and threw over an Incan royal dragon for me,” he added, a little wounded that Mei should not think him worthy of such dedicated effort.
“I beg your pardon very much,” Mei said, bowing her head deeply in a courtesy, her wings spread a little. “I would not for the world give offense; only it is not to be heard of, that a Celestial might get an egg on anyone but an Imperial. I have always heard it described as impossible. The divine wind is a great burden, which often defies the powers of the body to support it.”
A little mollified by this explanation, Temeraire forbore to stay offended, and when they had finished their tea, he and Mei repaired to the gardens, to walk awhile, and at length to enjoy a little sport before going on with the breeding: Mei might not be a fighting-dragon, Temeraire silently told Iskierka in his head, with some hauteur, but she was certainly very lithe and agile, and no-one could have complained of the experience.
Afterwards, a little out of breath, they ambled together to the courtyard again and had a refreshing second helping of shaved ice. “We must see the crown prince safely to the throne,” Mei said soberly, when the servants had retreated again. “I know your heart is divided, Xiang, and I am grateful already for what you have given; but I will not conceal from you that I fear deeply for the sake of the nation. The death of Chuan was a grievious crime against the throne, and yet those responsible dare name themselves defenders of the law and of right thinking. What can it portend if such twisted people should gain control over the Celestial Throne? And they will let nothing stand in their way; they have shown as much time and time again.”
“Mei, surely the Emperor must do something to Lord Bayan,” Temeraire said. “Why, I would have slain him myself, if only Laurence and the prince had told me what mischief he had been about; and I would not have let anyone stop me, either.”
“It is not enough to cut off the serpent’s head,” Mei answered. “This one grows another, and another after that. There are too many now who refuse to think of the future. They think only of what will enrich them—what will make them comfortable—what will guard their precedence and their estates. They wish to keep China preserved in glass, and if it could be done, they would not be wrong! I have seen a little of the rest of the world, through your eyes, and I do not think there is anything to compare.
“But so of course the world will be envious, and come knocking at our door. I have seen your monstrous ship in Tien-sing harbor; I have seen men felled by guns. We also must have ships, and more guns, and cannon. Our army must be renewed in strength, and the banners must be brought back to their old strength and discipline.”
She spoke passionately, the tips of her wings nearly trembling with urgency, and leaning towards him rested her neck across his shoulders, coiling loosely about him. “I fear greatly, Xiang,” she said, low, “even if I should bear this egg, if that will be enough. So many things can happen to an egg! They may persuade the Emperor to grant it to one of the other princes; or they may try—they may try—”
She shuddered, silently, and Temeraire bent his own head and nosed at her comfortingly. “I do not blame you in the least for worrying,” he said. “If they are mad enough to try and kill Laurence, and the crown prince, and to murder Chuan, they might do anything at all.”
“That is my own thought as well,” Mei said unhappily. “Xiang, will you forgive me: would you not stay? Let the alliance be made, let China send legions to this war; might you not remain here in their stead, where you alone can act? I do not ask you to forsake your companion,” she added swiftly, “but you might stay to keep watch over your own egg, quite reasonably; you might demand that it go only to the crown prince, and perhaps even—”
She faltered, and then said, low, “I have thought that perhaps the egg might even be bound to him at hatching; though it is not the proper way.”
“Well, I have never found anything to complain of in it,” Temeraire said. “I am very glad indeed to have had Laurence all my life, from the beginning; even if he did not know much about dragons, and nothing at all of China. I see nothing against it, provided that one ensures the captain is quite the right sort of person, which of course Laurence is, and not some wretched fellow like Rankin; that is where it goes all wrong.”
Mei flew away not long afterwards, and Temeraire had just been deciding to go and find Laurence, when he came back into the courtyard: the captains had seen Mei go. “I hope,” Laurence said to him, “—I hope you have had—a pleasant evening.”
“Oh! A splendid evening,” Temeraire said, reassuringly as he could: Laurence sounded so doubtful. “Mei is a magnificent lover,” he added, “whatever Iskierka likes to say about her, and I dare say we may already have made a very handsome egg.”
“Ah,” Laurence said, in a slightly stifled voice. “I—Temeraire, I beg your pardon; I do understand that this is—ordinarily considered in the normal course of your—your duty, but I should hope—that is to say, I should have been certain—”
Temeraire listened a little puzzled, but he soon worked out that Laurence only feared he might not like making the egg. “Oh, I certainly do not mind obliging Mei,” Temeraire said. “I only minded in Wales, when they would set me to every female dragon in the Corps, it seemed, and only the meekest ones at that: some of them only middle-weight, for that matter. It was not what was due to me, I felt; I only obliged them for your sake,” for at the time, of course, Laurence had been a prisoner aboard the ship Goliath: a prisoner, convicted for treason, and sentenced to die.
Temeraire shivered a little; he did not like to remember that dreadful time of separation. He hurried on. “But pray do not think this anything like: after all, this is quite an especial compliment to me, that the crown prince should want my own egg—even if he hasn’t any other choice,” he added.
“Very—very well,” Laurence said, still awkwardly, and then said, “Pray shall I read something to you, this evening?”
“Shall I not read to you, Laurence, instead?” Temeraire said. “Mei has brought me a new book of poetry, which we read into only a little way; I should be glad to read it with you.”
He felt a little craven in making the suggestion: it was merely a delaying tactic. Temeraire could scarcely imagine that Laurence would be willing to stay here in China, with the war in Europe from all reports going badly and Britain in such dire straits; even if an alliance was formed, Laurence would wish to be there. And yet, if they remained, and so protected Mianning and saw him to the throne, that would serve Britain and China both.
He marshaled his arguments in one corner of his mind while they read several of the lovely poems together, and Temeraire explained to Laurence his sense of the meaning; and then as the moon climbed overhead and bathed the courtyard stream in white, Temeraire drew a deep breath and broached the subject at last.
Laurence was silent a long while afterwards, as silent and grave as Temeraire had feared. His ruff drooped against his neck. He could not press Laurence; he was still painfully conscious of the great debt between them yet to be repaid: the loss of Laurence’s reputation, of his countenance, and most sharply and terribly of his fortune of ten thousand pounds. At least Temeraire had seen him restored to his rank—with seniority—but that did not make up for all the rest. Temeraire still woke occasionally with a start from dreams in which he heard Roland saying again, “He has lost his fortune,” and found the eyes of all his friends upon him accusingly, horrified, as they all repeated in unison, “Ten thousand pounds.”
He felt still low and guilty, and so he said hurriedly, “Laurence, I would not for the world distress you—”
“No,” Laurence said, rousing, “no; I was only considering—but no. I beg your pardon. You must consult your sense of what is right, not my feelings. God forbid I should lean upon friendship to stand between you and your duty: it could not be borne. I would not for the world act in so false a character, towards any man—towards anyone. All feeling revolts at the idea.”
“That is just how I feel myself,” Temeraire said, a little puzzled, but relieved: Laurence was not angry. Perhaps Laurence would consider their remaining? It occurred to Temeraire belatedly that if they should remain, then perhaps the Emperor would grant Laurence an estate, and at least surely some finer clothing and jewels might be arranged.
Relief, gladness surged; he meant to add this handsome suggestion to his persuasions, to expand upon them, and then all was shattered—all turned at once dreadfully wrong, for Laurence added, “I hope having said as much, I may add I should most deeply regret the parting,” and Temeraire realized, in slow-rising horror, that Laurence meant he would not stay himself. Laurence would leave him.
Laurence was taken aback by the violence of Temeraire’s response; and only after a sharp recrimination did he understand that Temeraire had meant to propose not a separation but their remaining in China together, as though Laurence had anything to do here but make a cake of himself, prancing about in false honors bestowed for mere politics and luxuriating in a wealthy foreign court, while on the other side of the world, his country-men fought and died to defend their country against an encroaching tyrant.
It had not occurred to him even as a possibility that he should remain. Failing that, he had therefore made the only answer he felt endurable: and he had felt only ashamed of the reluctance which had slowed it coming from his lips—a reluctance which had not even the excuse that he had thought of his duty and Hammond’s wishes. His reluctance had been wholly selfish and irrational: a disquieting pang at the thought of losing Temeraire. But such sentiments had even less place, in a question of duty, than the political considerations which Hammond had put forward.
“But you must see,” Laurence said bewildered, “I cannot contemplate remaining. While Britain stands on the brink of subjugation, my remaining behind, to serve no purpose, could be nothing better than rank cowardice. Your remaining may indeed have some beneficent effect; mine, none. I should be a mere supernumerary, and useless here, just when every able-bodied man in Britain ought beat to quarters, as it were.”
“You said once before we should remain if I liked,” Temeraire said, accusatory, to Laurence’s broad astonishment, “and you needn’t look at me that way, as though you did not believe it, only because your memory is all ahoo; so I do not think I am in the least foolish for having asked. I did not propose keeping you from your duty, which properly considered ought be our duty. Of course I did not. Only, I thought you might have felt as I did, that our duty might lie here. I did not propose we should be parted—that you should go back to those wretched fools at the Admiralty, who do not want us, anyway; not really. And I dare say if I did let you go back without me, they would only hang you.”
So concluding his wild outburst—the most singularly irrational thing Laurence had heard Temeraire say—the dragon flung himself aloft and vanished into the night sky with a rattle of black wings, leaving Laurence calling, “Temeraire—!” after him into the air.
Disheartened and impatient all at once, Laurence turned to his quarters; a cup of tea was offered but he rejected it to pace instead. That he had misstepped, and badly, was plain; but he had no idea how he had gone wrong, and where the fault lay. Temeraire’s final words rankled, as well: that the Admiralty should not want them echoed yet again all Laurence’s worst fears, and hinted at an almost mutinous disposition.
And the absurdity, to talk of the Admiralty hanging him—or perhaps not, if one treated the loss of a dragon like a captain’s loss of his ship; Laurence supposed that he might be court-martialed over it, and yet he could not envision any reasonable jury finding against him in such a case. A ship had not her own mind, and could not decide to run herself onto rocks, or be captured and go over to the enemy, or be sunk in battle or by incompetence. A dragon, possessing its own will, who chose to remain behind, could scarcely be compelled by any man.
He sat down upon the bed, troubled suddenly: and yet that seemed untrue. Temeraire’s anger and their misunderstanding had this real and understandable root: where Laurence had not contemplated remaining, Temeraire had for his part not contemplated separation; he had viewed their connection as indissoluble. In such a case, Laurence realized, he indeed did have the power to compel—he had the power to say, I will go, whether you will or no; and it seemed perforce would Temeraire go as well.
That was a strange and even disturbing power to possess over so great a creature: one which demanded a respect that Laurence was unhappily conscious he had not shown, just now. When in an hour’s time he heard wingbeats returning, and Temeraire settled himself into the courtyard again, Laurence went out to him, ignoring the head curled pointedly beneath its wing. “I hope you will forgive me,” he said, to the dark grey translucence of the membrane, which hid the great blue eye from his view.
“I hope you will forgive me,” he said, “and accept my assurances that I would not for the world have wounded you: I see I have not understood how matters stood between us, and that we may only be stationed together, as it were. I can only beg your pardon and assure you that I stand ready to be persuaded, on the subject.”
Temeraire made him no answer, but there was a shift of the wing-joint, and beneath the membrane as it spread out, Laurence could dimly make out a large narrow-slitted eye watching him.
“I cannot—I cannot pretend,” he added, “that I feel I ought easily be swayed to see it our joint duty to remain here, taken all in all, in the present circumstances. I do not doubt you in the least that, on a prior occasion, I should have been willing to remain; I can only suppose that the circumstances of the war must have been considerably different, at the time. But I will do my best to consider the matter, if you wish to—”
The wing lifted away. “No,” Temeraire said, shortly, “no; I do not see any sense in it. Pray forget I mentioned it,” and he thrust his head back beneath the wing, and was silent again.
Laurence hesitated, torn, and at last gave way and went inside the house again. He did not immediately attempt to sleep: his mind was in an excess of disorder. The guilt of having caused pain to one deserving only consideration at his hands mingled with unanswered disquiet. He wondered if he had been wrong now; or if he had been wrong before: had he spoilt Temeraire? Temeraire was a high-spirited creature, with a remarkable intellect; Laurence could not deny that he took great pleasure in his company, and in the camaraderie that had endured even his loss of memory. Had he indulged that pleasure, and Temeraire’s spirits, at the cost of discipline—at the cost, perhaps, of character?
A dreadful notion, and yet—Temeraire was so certain they should not be missed by the Admiralty; Granby also. It seemed a settled matter with them, scarcely to be questioned. If that were simply a matter of old men preferring more docile breeds, the sort of political caution that saw dull and predictable officers advanced over brilliant ones, Laurence might not have cause to blame himself: God knew he did not find the Admiralty faultless. But if there were something else—
Laurence looked out at Temeraire, who had not stirred out from under his wing. He could not think how he might question Temeraire on the subject, not after this unhappy misunderstanding; he could not make Temeraire feel still more wretched, perhaps without just cause. So he said nothing, while he thought what he might say; and he had still said nothing when a knock upon the door of his chamber interrupted his considerations, and Hammond without invitation thrust his head within, most anxiously. “Captain, I beg your pardon, we must intrude,” he said, and opened the door for a messenger in pale green livery who followed him into the courtyard, and prostrating himself with a quick efficiency presented a letter bearing elaborate seals. Laurence took it up and opened it, and found therein a brief missive from the Emperor himself—a piece of enormous condescension which he supposed had been merited by the assassination attempt.
It contained wishes for his good health, an expression of outrage at the recent events, and concluded with a mild hope of seeing him, at some time. “His Majesty is most generous,” Laurence said to the still-prostrate and waiting messenger, who seemed to be waiting for some immediate answer; but this did not satisfy him: or, at least, it did not make him rise. “Hammond, will you pray tell me how I am to answer this?” He held out the note.
Hammond read the letter through more swiftly than Laurence had managed to puzzle it out, and paled. “Good Heavens,” he said, “we must go at once: and I suppose we have not the first thing for you to wear.”
The Emperor did not look well: a heavy-set man and jowled, fatigue was writ upon his face; he breathed stentoriously and sweat gathered upon his thin mustaches and glistened to the sides of his chin and upon his forehead. Laurence began to realize what particular urgency had driven the conservative party to strike at Prince Mianning so blatantly: they foresaw him coming shortly to the throne. But the Emperor’s ill-health did not place bounds on his temper; his expression was set in grim lines and a glitter of anger that revealed itself plainly when the formalities had been quickly dispensed with.
He was not enthroned in state, but received Laurence in a courtyard with his own Celestial, Temeraire’s uncle Chu, coiled watchful and heavy along a raised dais behind a chair that was a simple and comfortable affair of wood. Temeraire had been permitted to accompany them only so far as the outer court of the pavilion; Laurence had been conscious of that anxious gaze upon his back as they had been ushered away into the inner halls of the palace, and thence to the great central court.
Laurence was not the sole guest; Mianning and Lord Bayan both had preceded him and were seated before the throne. Mianning was the nearer; Laurence followed Hammond’s hissed whisper to seat himself at a distance between the two, and they all three faced the Emperor as if defendants at a trial. Nor was the simile inapt: with the flick of a hand the Emperor dismissed nearly all his attendants, save the well-armed and watchful guards; Hammond, too, was forced to go trailing reluctantly away, leaving Laurence to rely upon nothing but his own uninformed and lately doubtful wits. There was at first no difficulty, however, no call for decision; he had merely to sit and be thundered at in company.
“I scarcely know who to blame the more,” the Emperor said, “for this upheaval of the Imperial court and therefore of the state, its mirror; for whatsoever evil begins here, it will show itself reflected tenfold throughout the nation! What madness should have permitted any man to lay a plot within their hearts upon my chosen heir and my adopted son? What reckless actions, in pursuing foreign involvement and disregarding the sage wisdom of centuries and respect for tradition, should have driven otherwise loyal servants of the court into such madness?”
Laurence wished badly for Hammond, adrift and struggling to pierce the veil of the Emperor’s terms; but despite his inexperience he felt he understood this much: whatever the Emperor might choose to say officially, he knew in private all that had transpired. He surely knew: the cold rage in his eyes, beneath which Bayan flattened his head, was not merely that of a ruler jealous of disruption in his palace, but that of a father. He knew Mianning’s intentions; he knew of Bayan’s assault; what power struggle here transpired, he permitted, to some extent.
But only to some extent: and evidently that extent had been exceeded; he meant to rope them in one and all. Laurence felt cold anxiety settle stone-like in his belly: he did not need Hammond to tell him deadly shoals lurked beneath these waters, and he had neither pilot nor chart nor even soundings to tell him where they lay. One misstep and he might ruin all their hopes as effectively as Bayan might have wished to do. Laurence resolved to shut his mouth and say nothing, so far as he might; he would offer nothing but the meekest response. Mianning should have to speak for their side, if at all.
“I will hear your explanations,” the Emperor said, concluding his tirade, and slumping angry back into his throne; he held a hand out and a cup bedewed with cold was placed within it. He drank heavily and put it aside.
Mianning prostrated himself, and quietly said, “My honored Imperial father, my trespasses against the wisdom of my elders would be unforgivable, save if by respecting that wisdom I should neglect my greater duty to the nation: surely it is my obligation to plant and tend the seed for a future harvest of peace and prosperity, that the fortune of Heaven will continue to smile upon our land. Though in summer the winter storms seem far away to those who must labor on the present harvest, they are coming nonetheless; and one whose shoulders do not yet bow over the sweep of his scythe may look towards the West, and see them approaching from afar.”
Bayan said, “And in looking afar, mislead himself that the distant clouds he sees, which soon will disperse of their own accord, are grave dangers; and worse yet, in chasing a defense against them will forget what nearer danger threatens, and let the crow plunder his fields.”
“This can only be the argument of all men who will not raise up their eyes at all,” Mianning said. “For these clouds have lingered now long years, and the storm grows ever larger.”
He made a quick gesture, and two servants scurrying unrolled a great map of the world over the floor: not entirely accurate as to shape, with China outsize and the other continents somewhat awry, but plain enough to recognize. “My father, already the Emperor of France, Napoleon, has stretched forth his hand to make alliance with mighty nations across the sea.” France itself and all Europe were stained a dark green color; so, too, the Incan Empire and Africa: they stood like dark blots against the pale canvas. “His appetite knows no bounds, and already once have the evils of this foreign conflict crossed our borders, bringing the pestilence which struck at the ranks of our dragons, the breath of our nation. If not for your own foresight in having secured my brother’s service with the bonds of filial devotion, and his courage on that occasion,” he gestured to Laurence, who could only wonder what he had done to merit such an encomium, “who can say how many would have perished?”
“And yet what worse sickness, what worse miasma,” Bayan said, “could enter our nation but the poison which their ships carry unchecked into Guangzhou? How many lives and souls have they destroyed with the crushed seed of the poppy, which makes men drown themselves by their own hand? Thrice have you commanded a reduction in this evil trade; thrice have they obeyed only with sullen reluctance, like disobedient children, and then stealthily permitted it to resurge. And it is the British, those to whom you have in your generous love given most license, who do the most evil in this regard by far. They are poisoners, and liars, and should all be banished from our shores.
“And, Dread Lord,” he added, and Laurence glancing saw him press his forehead to the ground again, “I pray you forgive my humble words: I wish to offer no disrespect to the crown prince—”
Mianning’s shoulders were stiffening, and the Emperor’s eyes narrowed; Laurence had one moment to realize, Now we come to it, and then Bayan concluded, “—but I have received a report of General Fela, whom you charged with repressing the remnants of the White Lotus rebellion, and ensuring they did not flourish to regrow, that he has seen the British bringing those evil traitors aid, in the form of this evil drug.”
“By God,” Laurence said, too outraged to restrain himself, “—that is an outright lie.”
He at once regretted having uttered a word, however justified; Mianning threw him a short unreadable glance, and the Emperor’s eyes turned towards him. Laurence only at the final moment remembered to drop his own gaze, but he was caught: plainly he was now expected to speak. He saw from his lowered eyes Mianning flick his fingers towards the ground, and belatedly made another prostration himself, however reluctant. As he had dug himself a hole, he could only jump into it without complaining.
“Your Majesty,” Laurence said, speaking to the ground, “I must beg to be excused from speaking on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, for which I have insufficient authority; but I have not the least hesitation in most heartily repudiating the scurrilous accusation which Lord Bayan has made against my country which, if true, would be injurious not merely to her honor but to her sense, and which should defy all rational consideration. We have come here for no lesser cause than alliance against Napoleon. How could it profit us in any manner to create turmoil and distress within your borders, which should make you less able to aid us, even were we not the guilty culprits?”
He halted there, hoping at least he had not made matters worse; neither Mianning nor Bayan spoke immediately, which, Laurence rather dismally suspected, meant that he had spoken so far out of turn they had neither of them been prepared to respond to an outburst of the sort. The Emperor gave no sign of his own thoughts yet; but he left the field to them, and after a moment Lord Bayan bent forward and said, “Your Majesty’s adopted son, who to do him credit has shown all the instinct of proper filial respect—”
The instinct only: Laurence supposed this was meant to hint at the deficiencies of his training and education in the same. “—all the instinct of proper filial respect,” Bayan went on, “would scarcely be the confidant of those of his country-men intent upon such dishonorable behavior: even within a band of thieves one man of good character may be found.”
“But not to deceive himself that his fellows are themselves honest men,” Mianning said, “unless we are to believe him a fool.”
They feinted back and forth a little further along these lines, it seemed to Laurence very much like two fencers feeling out their way onto unfamiliar ground, trying to ascertain which of them should take the better advantage from it, in which direction and what manner they wished to press the attack. And then abruptly Bayan made his lunge, adding, “And if nothing else, what he has said is surely true: China can ill afford to involve herself in the disputes of a foreign nation while strife rends the state from within.”
“I am surprised to hear that you have so little confidence in General Fela’s ability to put down the White Lotus resurgence,” Mianning said.
“When a hidden hand props the foe from behind, and he is forbidden to strike at the true source of danger, even the greatest general cannot be expected to easily find success,” Bayan said. “Perhaps,” he added, with a false air of having been suddenly struck with a new idea, “the foreigners should be tasked to go to his aid, under the command of the Emperor’s son and Lung Tien Xiang. If the British are responsible, they may correct their own wrongdoing. If they are not, they may do a singular service to the nation, and thereby properly merit some acknowledgment.”
Laurence heard this proposal with dismay: he could well imagine what Hammond should say to their entire party being sent away from the heart of Imperial power to the hinterlands of China, silenced and expected to clear away a provincial rebellion that might be as much whisper and legend as armed force, and nearly incapable of defeat. Let a man be robbed on the road, and the conservatives might claim rebels had done it. And if the rebellion were real, were some truly dangerous insurgency against the throne, Laurence could scarcely imagine that their own party would be of particular use, stumbling over themselves in a foreign land. They might well merely be in the way, and in so being might make Bayan’s accusations almost true.
He was all the more dismayed, then, to hear Mianning slowly say, “While rising from questionable suppositions, nevertheless Lord Bayan’s proposal has merit.”
Laurence could not help but stare at him, while Mianning serenely continued, “Though the remnants of the White Lotus may not yet have become truly dangerous, the creeping vine is best pruned back early, and with greater zeal than necessary. To send my brother—with a force appropriate to his rank—to see them put down and restore harmony, would be a wise course and a duty befitting his dignities.”
It was little comfort to Laurence to see Bayan as taken aback as himself by Mianning’s unexpected yielding. “What escort could the prince require other than his own company?” Bayan said at once, urgently. “General Fela and the army are there already—”
“And yet have so far been insufficient to halt this insurgency, by your own report,” Mianning said. “Surely you would not propose that such a risk be taken with my brother, nor the honorable Lung Tien Xiang, who have not had the blessings of proper military training. When I myself first led men into battle, I was arrayed not only in armor, but with the wisdom of the senior officers who advised me.”
Laurence could not like the proposal any better for Bayan’s evident dismay; but neither he nor Bayan had any opportunity to object further: the Emperor had straightened in his seat, and it was plain the audience had reached its conclusion.
“My son Laurence,” the Emperor said, “taking General Lung Shao Chu, and consulting at all times his advice and wisdom, you will gather three jalan of dragon bannermen and go south with them, to deal with the rebellion and uncover the source of these strange and evil rumors about your country-men, proving them false if you can. Return swiftly and victorious home.”
He had scarcely finished speaking when one of the half-a-dozen scribes working busily by his side, the one nearest the throne, rose and kneeling before the throne presented him a clean copy of the orders upon a writing-desk. The Emperor took up a brush and signed, swiftly, and taking up the red seal pressed it down; the sheet was folded over thrice by the scribe’s skillful hands even as he turned to offer it to Laurence, who with a sense of numb disaster bowed his head before it.