Mistress of the Empire (29 page)

She opened her eyes to see her husband bowing over the Lady of the Xacatecas’ hand. He was self-conscious as a boy, an odd mien for a man who had commanded armies in the name of his Emperor, and whose own social grace had made Mara the envy of unmarried daughters of great houses. Yet Isashani’s skills at confounding men were so facile that it was rumored that she was secretly a witch who manipulated her admirers through enchantment. Hokanu
was one of her favorites, and her soft, bantering flattery set him at his ease at once. Men she did not care for had been known to stay tongue-tied in her presence for remarkable intervals of time.

Still half dazzled by Isashani’s charm, Hokanu took a seat beside his wife. He folded Mara’s hand inside his own and said, ‘We also are weary of playing mo-jo-go against the tong.’ He referred to a card game often played for heavy stakes. ‘Really, it would be a relief to us all if Ichindar would sire a son. A male heir to the imperial throne would do much to damp the fires of the traditionalist faction.’

Isashani’s dark eyes flashed amusement. ‘It has been a dull few years for matchmaking, I’ll agree, with every highborn son taking concubines instead of wives, in the hope of winning an imperial daughter for marriage. The parties are getting quite vicious, with so many unwed girls spitting at each other like sarcat cubs.’

From there the subject turned to the trade war between a consortium from the Omechan Clan and a Kanazawai Clan group, which was causing Hokanu’s father setbacks in the resin market. Frustrated by the resultant shortage in the production of laminated hide, the armorers’ guild was on the verge of joining the fray, with the shipmasters and stevedores in Jamar upset by embargoes that disrupted sailing schedules. Since the Acoma had needra hides mildewing in warehouses in Sulan-Qu, and the Anasati did not, the consensus was that Jiro’s allies were behind the disturbance. It did the Omechan no good to recall that their own disunity had provided the opening that had given the Emperor absolute power to begin with.

Afternoon blended into evening. As Mara’s weariness became evident, and she excused herself to retire, Isashani at last took her leave. Seated in her litter in the dooryard, with her bearers in place to depart, she raised her dark eyes to Hokanu and planted one last barbed comment. ‘Really,
young master, you had better take pains to see that your wife eats, or the gossip will go round that you are starving her to an early grave, in the hope of joining the circle of suitors who pant after Ichindar’s eldest daughter.’

Hokanu’s eyebrows rose as though he had been sword-pricked. ‘Lady, is that a threat?’

Isashani smiled with poisonous sweetness. ‘Depend on it. My late husband was fond of Mara, and I don’t want his shade out to haunt me. Also, my Hoppara would probably challenge you to a duel of honor over the issue, were he to see your Lady so sad. After her heroics during the Night of the Bloody Swords, he compares all the young women he meets to her.’

‘Indeed.’ Hokanu’s voice turned serious. ‘No man in the Empire cares more for our Good Servant than I. And your visit has done more for her than you can possibly know.’

Lady Isashani’s visit at least inspired Mara to resume normal care for her appearance. She called upon the skills of her maids, and if at first her improved complexion was solely attributable to makeup, Hokanu was careful not to badger her. If she still kept long hours over her reports, she at least made an effort to eat more; and once she took up the practice of meditating in a small boat upon the lake, her pallor disappeared soon after.

‘It’s very hard to worry with the water all around, peaceful under the sky,’ she said, stepping ashore one evening when the afterglow of sunset turned wavelets and landscape all to gold. Holding her in his embrace, Hokanu hated to disrupt the moment. But soon enough she would find out, and unless he wished to provoke an explosion, he dared not hold back fresh news.

‘Arakasi is back.’

‘So soon?’ Mara lifted her face, kissing her husband’s lips with the absentee air of one already preoccupied. ‘He must
have heard of the attempt on Lord Hoppara before I sent out my summons.’

The moment of warmth was cut short as the Lady hastened to meet her Spy Master. Hokanu accompanied her into the estate house, through hallways dimmed with evening shadows, and past the servants who dispersed to light oil lamps. Faintly, from one of the courtyards, came the echoes of Justin’s happy shouts.

‘What’s got the little one all stirred up?’ Mara asked.

Hokanu put his arm around her shoulder. ‘A new game. Your Adviser for War laid a bet with the boy that he could not be ambushed unawares. Justin has taken to lurking behind the furniture, and the servants won’t use the back hallways anymore, for fear of being set upon.’

‘And Keyoke?’ Mara turned the last corner and passed the length of another corridor tiled in old, worn mosaic. ‘Has he been caught?’

Hokanu laughed. ‘Several times. His hearing is not what it once was, and his crutch makes him easy prey.’

Mara shook her head. ‘Just so Justin doesn’t terrorise him. The old campaigner has received scars enough in Acoma service without getting battered in his twilight years.’

But Keyoke, Hokanu knew, did not mind his bruises in the least, for Justin held the affection of the grandson the old man had never had.

The couple reached the doorway to Mara’s study. There Hokanu lifted his arm and gave his wife a questioning glance. The servants had not reached this hallway yet, and the lamps were still unlit. Mara’s face was a pale oval in the shadows, and her expression was unreadable. After a moment she said, ‘Stay with me this time. Lady Isashani’s news has left me unsettled, and I would like your counsel.’

Hokanu heard the worry in her voice. He asked, ‘Should I send for Saric and Incomo?’

Mara returned a shake of her head. ‘No. They would not condone what I plan, and I see no need to endure their criticism.’

Suddenly cold, there in the warm darkness, with the calls of the servants near to hand, and the smells of supper wafting from the kitchen, Hokanu reached out and tipped Mara’s chin up with one finger. ‘Just what are you thinking, pretty Lady?’ His tone was at odds with the apprehension that bound his breath.

Mara answered after a pause. ‘I am thinking that the Hamoi Tong has made trouble for far too long. I have lost a son and an unborn child to it. I would not see Lady Isashani suffer the same loss, and I owe her late husband, Lord Chipino, at least that much.’

Hokanu released a sigh, distressed by the strain that came between them over the subject of children. ‘It is not the tong but the enemy who employs it that is to be feared.’

Mara gave back a fractional nod. ‘I know. That is why I am going to ask Arakasi to penetrate its headquarters and steal its records. I will know its employer, and have his plots out into the open.’

‘His name is probably Anasati,’ Hokanu said.

‘One of his names.’ Mara’s tone was ominous. ‘I would know the others as well, that no more parents lose young heirs to the cause of murderous politics. Come, let us go and charge Arakasi to undertake this difficult task.’

Hokanu could only nod as he escorted his wife into the hall leading to her study. He held respect close to awe for the Spy Master, since watching him act on the night they had sought the antidote. Yet even for a man of his gifts of guile and disguise, to infiltrate the Hamoi Tong was asking the impossible. Hokanu had no argument for the notion that his Lady was sending her Spy Master off to die at a time when she most needed his services.

Arakasi departed his Lady’s study preoccupied. Talk had left his voice hoarse. This night’s report had been extensive, the end result of many months of labor in the field. The Spy Master had pushed his agents hard, had exhorted them to seek out answers even in the face of the dangers posed by Jiro’s First Adviser, Chumaka. Two men had forfeited their cover to gain information, and had chosen suicide by the blade rather than face inquisition and torture, and risk betraying their mistress. And although they had winnowed out several traditionalist plots and shifts in old alliances against the Emperor, they had come no nearer to setting a name to the employer who had sent the Hamoi Tong against Mara.

More disquieting news than the late failed attempt against Lord Hoppara was that several other attempts had been foiled by Arakasi’s agent in the Xacatecas household. Twice she had been ‘clumsy’ around the cooks, and spilled dishes of food she suspected had been poisoned.

That report had caused Mara to flinch openly. Her face had paled, and then flushed with a depth of anger Arakasi had never seen. Her words still rang in his memory, edged with a grief that never left her since Ayaki’s loss. ‘Arakasi,’ she had said, ‘I ask that you find a way to steal the records of the Hamoi Tong. These attacks against us, and now the allies of our Emperor, must be brought to a stop. If more than the Anasati are behind them, I would have you find out.’

Arakasi had accepted the command, fist over heart in a soldier’s salute. After months of attempts to penetrate the Anasati accounts, and three unsuccessful tries to place new agents on Jiro’s estate, he regarded the order to go directly after the tong almost as a relief. Arakasi had conceded from frustration that Chumaka was by far the most clever opponent he had ever faced. But even as brilliant a player of politics as the Anasati First Adviser would not anticipate a
move as foolhardy as attempting to challenge the assassins. And while Chumaka might not know Mara’s Spy Master by name, he was developing an understanding that let him anticipate Arakasi’s methods. A dose of the unexpected, especially if no clear motives could be discerned, might throw Chumaka off balance for a while.

Quiet as shadow, and deep in his own thoughts, Arakasi turned, keeping to the dimmer passageways out of habit. This narrow hall crossed the oldest part of the estate house. The floors were built on two heights, legacy of some forgotten Lord who had believed he should always stand above his servants. He, or perhaps one of his wives, had also been a devotee of bric-a-brac. The walls held cavernous niches for statuary and artworks. Arakasi personally thought the things a liability, since some were large enough to harbor an assassin, or a large child.

Consequently, he was not taken entirely off guard when an earsplitting yell sounded at his back, and someone gave an athletic leap with intent to hammer him down from behind.

He spun, light and fast, and found himself with an armload of six-year-old, kicking and cross that his surprise attack had been anticipated.

Mara’s Spy Master blew a lock of reddish gold hair out of his lips and said equably, ‘Do I look so much like Keyoke today that you saw fit to test my reflexes?’

Young Justin giggled and squirmed, and managed to raise the toy sword carved from wood and inlaid with lacquer disks. ‘Already killed Keyoke twice today,’ he crowed.

Arakasi’s brows rose. He shifted his grip, surprised at the strength required to restrain the energetic little boy. Certainly he was his father’s son, with his impertinent attitude and legs as long as those of a corani, an antelope-like creature renowned for its fierce speed. ‘How many times did Keyoke kill you today, imp?’

Justin looked sheepish. ‘Four.’ He added a rude phrase in the barbarian tongue, most likely overheard from a soldier in the barracks who had been close to Kevin on the campaign in Dustari. Arakasi took mental note that the boy had ears as quick as his wits; the child was not too young to eavesdrop on his elders. ‘I have the feeling it’s after your bedtime,’ the Spy Master accused. ‘Do your nurses know you’re awake?’ And carefully he began to walk in the direction of the child’s quarters.

Justin shook back a curly mop of hair. ‘Nurses don’t know where I am.’ He smiled proudly, then looked dismayed as doubt crept in. ‘You won’t tell them? I’ll get punished for certain.’

A gleam lit Arakasi’s dark eyes. ‘There are terms,’ he said in all seriousness. ‘You will have to make a promise in exchange for my silence.’

Justin looked solemn. Then, as he had seen the soldiers do at dice to seal a debt, he raised his closed fist and touched thumb to forehead. ‘I keep my word.’

Arakasi choked back a grin. ‘Very well, honorable young master. You will not make a sound when I slip you into your sleeping quarters, and you will lie on your mat without moving, with your eyes closed, until you wake up, and it is morning.’

Justin gave a howl of betrayal. So like his father, Arakasi thought, as he lugged the protesting boy off to the nursery. Neither would Kevin accept protocols, or propriety. He was honest when it was a frank embarrassment, and lied whenever it suited him. He was anathema to any well-run Tsurani household, but life had certainly been less entertaining since his departure through the rift gate back to Midkemia. Even Jican, who had been the butt of more than his share of Kevin’s jokes, had been known to remark wistfully on his absence.

In true form, Justin ceased his outcry on the threshold of
his own room. His tantrum was not worth continuing at the risk of wrath from his nurses. He held to his warrior’s word as Arakasi slid him into his blankets; but he did not close his eyes. Instead he glared in outraged indignation as Arakasi stood by, until at last he lost his battle with fatigue and slipped into the deep and healthy sleep of a young boy.

That he would have sneaked out of his chambers had Arakasi not stood by to enforce his warrior’s given word, the Spy Master had no doubt. In many ways, the boy was more Midkemian in manner than Tsurani, a trait his mother and foster father encouraged.