The Soldier's Lotus (32 page)

He shook his head in frustration at the thought. Why this
grand conference when the fate of Ulen was obvious? He had killed the King; he
had to pay the ultimate penalty. His life was forfeit. The blood of many –
Sunjaa
and Zenji alike – cried out from the earth for
vengeance.
Vengeance.
Darien’s eyes flitted over to
the figure of
Talex
Chamri
,
a pale-skinned, beady-eyed man whose sharp nose and thin chin came together to
give him the look of a turtle. He looked about twenty years Darien’s senior.
His thin hair he raked across his scalp as he adjusted his collar and brushed
away invisible specks of dust, no doubt wanting to look his best. Gaudy rings
weighed down each fat finger. His gut stretched out his wide belt-like sash.
Behind him stood two stone-faced Zenji guards wearing
longswords
on their hips.

General
Lomenin
walked over to
Kamen and whispered in his ear. Kamen opened his eyes and nodded. Once
Lomenin
stepped away to assume a position in front of the
pillar closest to Kamen, the
Itenu
lord spoke. “Let’s
get started, then. We’re all here?” He looked around, turning his head in weak,
wide movements. He was clearly in no shape to lead negotiations.

Zuren
stepped forward and cleared his throat. “Arinport is
yours, Lord
Itenu
, and Lord
Ahnok
has surrendered all claims to positions taken during his interim as usurper.”
There was no reason to hide his disdain for his former
leader,
for once he had learned about
Jahen’s
existence, he
had abandoned Ulen. “He lied to all of us. We all thought King
Jahen
...” He could not say the word “dead”, for to allude
to the King’s death was tantamount to treason. “May the gods give His Grace
long
life.
”

Everyone in the room nodded and murmured their agreement.

Darien sat forward in his chair. “Where is Ulen?”

“
Under guard in his
house,”
Zuren
said. “He will be held there until his
fate is decided.”

Darien looked around the room at all the impassive faces.
He could not read one of them. Only Kamen looked at him in pain – not physical
pain, but something else. He knew something. “Decided? Isn’t it already
decided? He is a
kingslayer
and an assassin. His
death cannot come too quickly.”

“The Captain is correct,” said Oren, but Darien did not
hear any further agreement with him.

Many of the nobles in the room shook their heads and
whispered to one another. Darien wanted to jump up and bash their heads
together. Then maybe they would have some sense. How could they even consider
any alternative?

“
It’s complicated,”
Kamen said, his voice rising no higher than a harsh whisper.

Darien shrugged, asking with his body how it could be in
any way complicated.

“
A
Vadal
army sits outside
Arinport’s
gates,” some nameless
old noble said. “This does not sit well with the people.”

“
What are you trying
to say?”
Lomenin’s
Sunjaa
was accented and broken, but his irritation was clear.

The old man’s eyes hardened. There was deep animosity
between the
Vadal
and
Sunjaa
,
especially in the older generations. “What if the
Vadal
are here for revenge of their defeat in the war?”

“
It was Lord
Itenu
and Darien who came north to raise an army in support
of King
Jahen
, who, might I remind you, is equal
parts
Sunjaa
and
Vadal
. We
have come to defend his rights.”

“
Yes, but how far will
this defense
go
? Will you leave an armed force in the
city?”

Lomenin
exploded in anger, and a general din of argument ensued
among the nobles, Darien, and
Lomenin
. Eventually
Darien took control of the situation by taking
Lomenin
aside, quieting him, and then going to the nobles and telling them to shut
their mouths. Such was Darien’s anger that the old men looked up at him in fear
and fell silent.

“
Now, to hell with all
this talk about the
Vadal
army,” Darien said. “
Lomenin
is a trustworthy man. He will take his army home
when His Grace is safely seated in his throne.” He stretched out his hand
toward the empty throne that sat in shadows at the end of the hall. Only the
front section of the room was lit with torches. “The real question here is
Ulen.”

“
We cannot kill him,”
the old noble said.

“
Why
not?”

“
He has too many
friends. You are beloved of our people, Darien, because you are a warrior
without equal. You command respect from your men, and I, too, respect your
prowess. But you do not know the ways of court. You are a common man. Ulen did
not pull off his scheme without plenty of support. The men who colluded with
Lord
Ahnok
have fled and taken their armed men with them.
If we kill Ulen, it will plunge the nation into civil war.”

“
The very thing we
have thus far avoided,” Kamen said, looking pointedly at
Zuren
and Ruben, two men whom Darien had been able to sway to the side of right.

“
So we let murdering
dogs go free?” Darien’s roaring voice echoed through the hall.

“We can’t do that.”
Once more Oren, who
had served the king personally for so many years, spoke in agreement with
Darien, but once more no else agreed.

Kamen shook his head. “No, Ulen cannot hold his head up in
Sunjaa
society again. He knows this, and so he has asked to
be sent to the
Dimadan
for his exile.”

Darien spun around to look at
Talex
Chamri
, the man ultimately responsible for the
eradication of Saerileth’s clan, the one in league with Ulen from the
beginning. The only reason Darien did not go over and snap that smug
foreigner’s fat neck was because he knew how much pleasure Saerileth would get
from achieving her vengeance upon his flesh.
“The
Dimadan
.
Of course.
He
wants to run off and hide with the rats
who
made him
rich.”

Talex
just stared at Darien with eyes gleaming in shameless
pride. Darien punched into the palm of his hand, trying to relieve some of his
aggression and keep himself from jamming his thumbs into the fat
pearl-merchant’s eye-sockets.

“
So we exile Ulen in
order to keep things quiet, to keep everything nice and tidy?” Darien asked.

Kamen’s eloquent
raising
of his
eyebrows and pursing of his lips was the only answer Darien got to his
question. “You have the luxury of looking at things with a soldier’s eye. Leave
negotiation to your betters. Ulen’s indiscretion is very grey, indeed, but it
must be overlooked. He must not die.”

“
Indiscretion?”
Darien laughed at the absurdity of the word.

“
His involvement
cannot be proved,” the old noble said. “Not enough to satisfy everyone.”

And by “everyone”, the old man clearly meant the nobles who
had lent Ulen their support. As far as Darien was concerned, they, too, were
just as guilty as Ulen, just as guilty as the ones who had held the knives. If only
Darien could have made the final decision. If only he were at sea where his
word was law.

The wide hall suddenly grew too stuffy for Darien. He
needed fresh air; he needed to talk to Saerileth, to tell her what they were
planning to do with Ulen. He knew she would agree with him that this was all
madness. In a black fury, he stormed out of the throne room, his sense of
helplessness only fueling his rage. He had never in his life felt so utterly
useless.

“
Saerileth?”
Darien looked down the dark outer corridor,
expecting to see his Red Lotus’s beautiful face. Even though she had been
invited to the conference, Darien and Saerileth had decided it would be best if
she listened at the door. After all, she could not trust herself in the
presence of
Talex
Chamri
.
She might have killed him right there, and such an act would surely have
complicated matters, to say the least.

But the corridor was empty, and Saerileth was nowhere to be
seen.

Chapter Nineteen

Saerileth stood in the hallway, leaning against the wall,
her eyes closed. She had heard enough. It was clear to her, though she doubted
that Darien yet understood it, that there would be no execution for Ulen
Ahnok
. No death, though he richly deserved it. Ulen
Ahnok
would live. He would go back to the
Dimadan
.

She sighed and slid down the wall, to sit on the stone
floor. Though without
Talex
Chamri
to blackmail – for she would have killed him by then – Ulen would have less
wealth and freedom than he doubtless hoped, still he would go free. He would
escape justice for what he had done. She felt her blood pounding in her ears.

Ulen
Ahnok
.
Darien’s
enemy.
He would go free. He had burned Darien’s house to the ground,
nearly ruining him. And yet Ulen would go free.

He had tried to assassinate Darien, tried to poison him
with a hired blade. And yet Ulen would go free.

He had slaughtered Darien’s concubines. Here Saerileth
paused. Though she did not doubt that
Lia
had
deserved her death for murdering Darien’s unborn child, none of the others had.
Darien had wanted to save them, protect them. Ulen had slaughtered them like
beasts. And yet Ulen would go free.

He had flogged Darien, had had that beautiful dark flesh
ripped from Darien’s back, until he was near to death. And yet Ulen would go
free.

She opened her eyes.
No.
Ulen would not go free. He
had deserved death; she would give it to him. She slipped out of the king’s
palace and into the royal gardens. She had been here on the night of the
Princess Royal’s festival; she had been here on the day of the royal assassinations;
she had been here on the night she had rescued Kamen. This place had never been
somewhere she entered or exited lightly, and now she left it with death in her
thoughts.

Death had always been her companion, had always been the
backdrop of her thoughts, until Darien had burst into her heart, displacing
everything but his own glories. Even death had ceased to have his old
attraction, his old pull. But now for Darien’s sake, death filled her mind, and
death wore more beauties than ever before. Darien deserved to have this death,
and it would be her honor to give it to him. She had given him Kamen’s life,
and now she would give him Ulen’s death.

“
Lotus?”

Saerileth’s eyes focused on the face of the one speaking to
her. The realization that someone had come upon her without her hearing,
without her seeing, jarred her. She inhaled slowly. “Yes?” She recognized the
dark face of one of the Princess Royal’s former attendants.

“
They say that you
helped carry the young king out of the city. Is that true?” The girl was
perhaps five-and-twenty, and her eyes shimmered with tears.

“
It is.” Saerileth
smiled.

“
I was supposed to be
there.” The girl’s shoulders shook, and her tears spilled over. “I was supposed
to have been with the Princess Royal, to have been attending the little Crown
Prince as was. I was unwell that morning, and the Princess Royal said I could
keep to my bed.” The girl covered her face with her hands. “She was so kind to
me! And the king was almost killed because of me.”

“
No, no.” Saerileth
patted the girl’s shoulder. “No. It would not have mattered. You might have
died with the Princess Royal, but you could not have saved her. And His Grace I
protected myself. He was safe.”

The girl’s sobs gradually quieted, and Saerileth, though
she did not smile, was pleased that the Princess Royal had left behind such
sweet memories. The good she had done had not died with her, and her son by the
king would sit on the
Sunjaa
throne. She was sure
that Ulen, on the other hand, would not have support that would last beyond his
death.

When Saerileth left the palace gardens behind, with a much
comforted
Sunjaa
nursemaid sitting by the pools, she
knew that, despite its uncertain beginnings, King
Jahen’s
reign would not be contested.