The Firebird's Vengeance (7 page)

Because she wanted to be able to love him.

But this was not the time, nor the place, and she still had a reputation here. She had to remember that. Prathad and Richikha were not given to gossip, but still, that Sakra would stay after she had gone to bed was outrageous enough, without such overt gestures of affection, and she desperately wanted him to stay. She did not want to be alone with her fears.

She smiled at the awkwardness this kindness of his created and went behind the screens to her sleeping alcove. The bed was a huge affair, big enough to sleep five people who didn’t much care for each other. Posts carved with hawks and running deer held up a canopy and curtains of moss-green velvet.

In contrast, her night dress was pure white with more lace flounces than any one garment should possess. She had spoken with Prathad about acquiring some simpler night attire, and they had met with the seamstress, but for the moment being dressed for bed involved feeling done up like some elaborate French pastry.

She was not sure she wanted Sakra to see her like this. Whatever else might be happening, she still had her pride. But she looked at the bed in the flickering brazier light and thought about lying alone for hours, staring at the blackness, waiting to see something, and afraid of what it might be.

She climbed beneath the layers of throws and blankets, stretching her toes out automatically to reach the felt-wrapped bed warmer Richikha had already placed there. Her maids said nothing about the fact that there was still a man in the room. They reverenced in silent unison and withdrew, taking the lit brazier with them. It was only the reflection of the light beyond the screens that allowed her to see Sakra come and sit beside her. His face was lost in shadow, but she could smell his scents of warmth and spice, and the faint fragrance of oranges that always seemed to accompany him. Now that there was no one to witness it, her hand moved of its own accord, reaching out, telling him with its motion all she needed, and he covered it with his own.

They sat like that for a while, holding hands, Bridget drawing strength and calm from his presence and, after a while, Sakra began to sing. It was a low, slow song, perhaps a lullabye, in some language Bridget could not understand. Perhaps there was magic in it, for Bridget’s hopes and fears gradually sank toward sleep. Her last conscious thought, though, was not of Anna. It was the memory of seeing the Firebird, rising into the night sky, spreading out its flaming wings to encompass the world, and the awe she had felt at that sight.

As sleep took her, she wondered where that magnificent terror had gone.

Chapter Two

The Heart of the World, Hung-Tse, Year of the Son

But where is the Phoenix?

Xuan, the Minister of Fire, felt his whole being strain forward as An Thao, the Minister of the North, spoke.

“The details are not yet clear.” An Thao lowered her eyes slightly to indicate that she felt shame at this inadequacy. “But we do know that the Dowager Empress Medeoan of Isavalta has died or been displaced, and Emperor Mikkel has assumed the throne in full.”

Her words fell heavily into the expectant air of the Chamber of Eternal Voices. All the Nine Elders of Hung-Tse, the Ministers of Directions and Elements, were assembled in their circle, sitting cross-legged on their platforms of camphor wood. The symbols of their offices glittered on their robes in the flickering light from the lanterns and braziers. Behind their tattoos, the Elders’ faces wore identical expressions of composure. Xuan strove to keep his face properly calm as did all his colleagues, but in his heart he wanted nothing more than to leap to his feet and shout.

Where is the Phoenix?

None spoke in answer to An Thao’s blunt statement. His life as one of the Elders had given Xuan the ability to read the weight and quality of the silences that could fill the room like water in a lacquer cup. This news of Isavalta disturbed the other ministers, and it should. They had not planned well for this contingency. All signs, all forecasts, had pointed toward Medeoan dying an early death, which would shatter Isavalta, both removing the threat from the northern border and freeing the heavenly guardian she had imprisoned with a single stroke.

What had changed? How had all the predictions of magic, spies, and politics gone wrong?

And where is the Phoenix?

But it was not his time to speak. Xuan struggled to hold his tongue. He cast his gaze down so that he did not have to look at the others as he fought to compose himself. That was a mistake, because now he saw the Phoenix, emblazoned on his hands, on his robes where they folded neatly across his knees, and even inlaid on the floor at his feet with images of the three other great guardians. It arched its trailing wings and opened its hooked beak in song. Or in a scream of pain. Or in a call to the minister of its element to be free.

Xuan wished the Chamber of Eternal Voices had a window. He wanted to see Heaven’s blue overhead. He wanted to know if there was some sign, some bright star or thunderstroke to show that the Phoenix was at last free from the cage woven for it by the empress of Isavalta. But no window could be permitted here, or even any reflection. The surfaces were all of dull or rough finish. Windows and reflections could become the eyes of a sorcerer, so that they might see to create an attack. Should any be so foolish as to think they might commit an assault on the Nine Elders with the high arts.

And yet wasn’t that what Medeoan had done?

“Is the spell that held their emperor broken?” asked En Lai, the Minister of Earth. Her robes were brown, gold, and green, as were the tattoos on her face and hands. The symbol of the tortoise that was her guardian was repeated over and over across her skin and clothing. Like her guardian and her element, En Lai was a long and purposeful thinker. Just to be next to her was calming and strengthening. Xuan wished she sat beside him now. Instead he sat between Chi Tahn, the Minister of Water, and Quan, the Minister of the South. Their presences spoke of heat and fluidity and only agitated him, sending his thought flaring out.

“Yes, the spell is broken,” said An Thao. She delivered her news in absolute stillness. Her white robes with their embroidery of wolves and snow geese did not flutter at all as she spoke. Xuan did not believe she could feel so calm inside. Isavalta was her special study. This news could mean that the greatest threat to Hung-Tse had just intensified. There could be no knowing yet. “The Emperor Mikkel’s mind is whole again.”

The tale in Isavalta was that their emperor had succumbed to an “illness of spirit” shortly after his marriage. That illness was supposed to have rendered him childlike and incapable of carrying out his duties. This was the lie that had been sent in official communication to the Heart of the World. Whatever the nobles of Isavalta believed, none in the Heart had been taken in. Here, thanks in large part to An Thao and her spies, it was well known that the emperor of Isavalta had been enchanted. The dowager had let it be believed that it was her new daughter-in-law, Ananda, First Princess of Hastinapura, who was responsible for her son’s “illness.” Careful investigation had shown that to be another lie.

“The broken spell is the clearest evidence that the dowager truly has fallen,” went on En Lai. She spoke slowly, as she always had, as if the element she represented infused even her words.

“Are these words official?” asked Chi Tahn, the Minister of Water. Xuan sat at his left hand and could see the blue whorls on his skin and the silver dragons of his robe in minute detail. He searched Chi Tahn’s face for some indication that he was about to ask the important question, the only question.

“Not yet,” An Thao answered. “I received this communication from our informant early this morning. The change took place in midwinter and there was no way to get through until now.” Isavaltan winters rendered road and sea impassable. It was possible, of course, to have spies in place who carried magic with them, but magic was easier to intercept and guard against than a slip of paper, a pair of sharp eyes, or a vague word in the proper ear. “But it is of course expected that Isavalta will soon send a message.”

Nha My, the Minister of the East, shifted her weight. Her green and red robes rustled, giving voice to her uneasiness although her face remained composed. “If the dowager is not dead, is there a possibility that this is a temporary reversal of her fortunes?”

An Thao shook her head. “It does not seem likely. The Lords Master of Isavalta were all said to be eager to take the oath of loyalty to the emperor. I cannot imagine they would do this if there was the possibility the dowager would retake power. No, my brothers and sisters, Medeoan is dead or gone and she has an heir who is of sound mind.”

“But what of the guardian?” The words burst out of Xuan. It was not his turn, it broke the order of direction and precedence, but he could not hold silent anymore. Did it truly matter who held the throne? Did anything matter but that the northern blasphemy had finally been undone? Should he even have to ask this question? Should he not know what had happened already? “What of the Phoenix?”

An Thao bowed. “I regret to say I have no word. If the guardian is free, it has not been seen by our eyes nor heard by our ears.”

Xuan realized his chest was heaving. The rasp of his breath filled the chamber.

“Brother,” said Chi Tahn. “Speak to us. What is it you know?”

“Nothing,” said Xuan and his hands trembled. “Why do I know nothing?”

He gazed at each of them in turn. Together, they were the eternal protectors of the Red Center of the World that was Hung-Tse, and not one of them had an answer for him. They had met in this place for three thousand years, ever since the third emperor had completed the palaces that comprised the Heart of the World. There had always been answers. Always. The Nine Elders commanded the highest magics, the magics of true transformation and summoning. They were gifted by the gods with the ability to manifest on earth the power of the heavenly guardians, as had been done almost thirty years ago to save Hung-Tse from invasion by Isavalta.

But at that time, an unimaginable blasphemy had been perpetrated. Medeoan, then the girl empress of Isavalta, had from somewhere acquired the knowledge to trap the Phoenix, the gift of Heaven, and hold it in a golden cage.

Each of the four walls around them was dedicated to a different guardian. The north wall had been drawn with the tortoise, the east with the
k’i-lin
, and the west with the dragon. Xuan looked to the southern wall, where the chamber’s only door was located. It was covered in images of the Phoenix — his guardian, his element brought into glorious life.

Trapped in a cage in Isavalta for thirty years.

At the base of each wall was a collection of spirit tablets. The initiation of an Elder to their place required many spells, but although they did not speak of it beyond themselves, it was never forgotten that a life was surrendered in service each time the examinations were held and a new Elder was chosen. After the day of choosing, when the bindings began, a spirit tablet was made for the one who would become Elder. It was placed in the appropriate direction beneath the appropriate guardian. There was one beneath the Phoenix for the boy Seong, who had entered this place thirty years ago to become Xuan.

Once the ceremony was done and Seong was Xuan, he remembered all the other times the ceremony had been done. He knew in mind and spirit all the other moments of sacrifice, the glory and pain of transformation, the dissolution of self into the whole that came with the magics and the highest communion of thought.

But that was not how it was this last time. This last time, part of him remained withdrawn. Part of him was lonely and afraid, as a child is afraid, and angry as that same child when he does not understand. He understood why this was, and so did his brothers and sisters. The Ceremony of Naming should have recalled the whole of Xuan into being, weaving the body and power of Seong into the whole, but it could not. Part of Xuan was caged in the form of the guardian, ten thousand of
li
away.

When its work was complete, the Phoenix should have returned to Heaven to wait for that time when its essence would again need to be drawn down to the mortal worlds. So it was each time a guardian was summoned. But it did not, and it had not, and so Xuan remained incomplete.

Xuan wondered what debate the others had held before calling for the examination. Should they wait for the full death of their brother Xuan before his new self was chosen? Could they afford to wait? Without fire represented among them there could not be harmony, so the great spells of protection could not be worked. There had to be balance, or the great ghosts and devils, held at bay for so many years, might break free.

So fire was chosen, but fire was flawed, and Xuan knew it, and so did the others. They looked at him with the composure of courtesy, but they pitied him and they feared for themselves and for Hung-Tse, and the gap between Xuan and his brothers and sisters in art deepened.

Xuan breathed deeply, trying to find control of himself, trying to gain strength from his brothers and sisters, as he had in the past. “Surely when the dowager died, the spell holding the guardian broke and the guardian rose. Such a thing could not have gone unseen.”

And if the Phoenix rose, why did it not send some sign, some dream, so that I might know?

Because you failed
, whispered a voice from the hollow place in his mind that none of the others could touch.
Because in all these thirty years, you could not find, could not free the gift of Heaven. Do you think to still have Heaven’s favor after that?

“The dowager may not be dead,” said Qwan, the Minister of the South. He spoke without sympathy, merely reminding a colleague of a salient point. As Minister of the South, the Phoenix was his guardian as well. Like Xuan, he felt the Isavaltan blasphemy in his bones, but he was complete and he could still hold firm to propriety and right.