The Art of War (2 page)

Suddenly I remembered the early levees at Court

When you and I galloped to the Purple Yard.

As we walked our horses up Dragon Tail Way

We turned and gazed at the green of the Southern Hills.

Since we parted, both of us have been growing old;

And our minds have been vexed by many anxious cares;

Yet even now I fancy my ears are full

Of the sound of jade tinkling on your bridle-straps.’

—Po Chu-I, ‘To Li Chien’ (
AD
819)

I
t was night and the moon lay like a blinded eye upon the satin darkness of the Nile. From where he stood, on the balcony high above the river, Wang Hsien could feel the slow, warm movement of the air like the breath of a sleeping woman against his cheek. He sighed and laid his hands upon the cool stone of the balustrade, looking out to his right, to the north, where, in the distance, the great lighthouse threw its long, sweeping arm of light across the delta. For a while he watched it, feeling as empty as the air through which it moved, then he turned back, looking up at the moon itself. So clear the nights were here. And the stars. He shivered, the bitterness flooding back. The stars…

A voice broke into his reverie.
‘Chieh Hsia
? Are you ready for us?’

It was Sun Li Hua, Master of the Inner Chamber. He stood just inside the doorway, his head bowed, his two assistants a respectful distance behind him, their heads lowered. Wang Hsien turned and made a brief gesture, signifying that they should begin, then he turned back.

He remembered being with his two eldest sons, Chang Ye and Lieh Tsu, on the coast of Mozambique in summer. A late summer night with the bright stars filling the heavens overhead. They had sat there about an open fire, the three of them, naming the stars and their constellations, watching the Dipper move across the black velvet of the sky until the fire was ash and the day was come again. It was the last time he had been with them alone. Their last holiday together.

And now they were dead. Both of them, lying in their coffins, still and cold beneath the earth. And where were their spirits now? Up there? Among the eternal stars? Or was there only one soul, the
hun
, trapped and rotting in the ground? He gritted his teeth, fighting against his sense of bitterness and loss. Hardening himself against it. But the bitterness remained. Was it so? he asked himself. Did the spirit soul, the
p’o
, rise up to Heaven, as they said, or was there only this? This earth, this sky, and Man between them?

Best not ask. Best keep such thoughts at bay, lest the darkness answer you.

He shivered, his hands gripping the stone fiercely. Gods but he missed them! Missed them beyond the power of words to say. He filled his hours, keeping his mind busy with the myriad affairs of State; even so, he could not keep himself from thinking of them.
Where are you?
he would ask himself on waking.
Where are you, Chang Ye, who smiled so sweetly? And you, Lieh Tsu, my
ying tao
, my baby peach, always my favourite? Where are you now?

Murdered
, a brutal voice in him insisted. And only ash and bitterness remained.

He turned savagely, angry with himself. Now he would not sleep. Bone-tired as he was, he would lie there, sleepless, impotent against the thousand bitter-sweet images that would come.

‘Sun Li Hua!’ he called impatiently, moving the curtain aside with one hand. ‘Bring me something to make me sleep!
Ho yeh
, perhaps, or
tou chi.
’

‘At once,
Chieh Hsia.
’

The Master of the Inner Chamber bowed low, then went to do as he was bid. Wang Hsien watched him go, then turned to look across at the huge, low bed at the far end of the chamber. The servants were almost done. The silken sheets were turned back, the flowers at the bedside changed, his sleeping robes laid out, ready for the maids.

The headboard seemed to fill the end wall, the circle of the
Ywe Lung
, the Moon Dragon, symbol of the Seven, carved deep into the wood. The seven dragons formed a great wheel, their regal snouts meeting at the hub, their lithe, powerful bodies forming the spokes, their tails the rim. Wang Hsien stared at it a while, then nodded to himself as if satisfied. But deeper, at some dark, unarticulated level, he felt a sense of unease. The War, the murder of his sons – these things had made him far less certain than he’d been. He could no longer look at the
Ywe Lung
without questioning what had been done in their name these last five years.

He looked down sharply. Five years. Was that all? Only five short years? So it was. Yet it felt as though a whole cycle of sixty years had passed since
The New Hope
had been blasted from the heavens and war declared. He sighed and put his hand up to his brow, remembering. It had been a nasty, vicious war; a war of little trust – where friend and enemy had worn the same smiling face. They had won, but their victory had failed to set things right. The struggle had changed the nature – the very essence – of Chung Kuo. Nothing would ever be the same again.

He waited until the servants left, backing away, bowed low, their eyes averted from their lord’s face, then went across and stood before the wall-length mirror.

‘You are an old man, Wang Hsien,’ he told himself softly, noting the deep lines about his eyes and mouth, the ivory yellow of his eyes, the loose roughness of his skin. ‘Moon-faced, they call you. Maybe so. But this moon has waxed and waned a thousand times and still I see no clearer by its light. Who are you, Wang Hsien? What kind of man are you?’

He turned, tensing instinctively, hearing a noise in the passageway outside, then relaxed, smiling.

The three girls bowed deeply, then came into the room, Little Bee making her way across to him, while Tender Willow and Sweet Rain busied themselves elsewhere in the room.

Little Bee knelt before him, then looked up, her sweet, unaffected smile lifting his spirits, bringing a breath of youth and gaiety to his old heart.

‘How are you this evening, good Father?’

‘I am fine,’ he lied, warmed by the sight of her. ‘And you, Mi Feng?’

‘The better for seeing you, my lord.’

He laughed softly, then leaned forward and touched her head gently, affectionately. Little Bee had been with him six years now, since her tenth birthday. She was like a daughter to him.

He turned, enjoying the familiar sight of his girls moving about the room, readying things for him. For a while it dispelled his previous mood; made him forget the darkness he had glimpsed inside and out. He let Little Bee remove his
pau
and sit him, naked, in a chair, then closed his eyes and let his head fall back while she began to rub his chest and arms with oils. As ever, the gentle pressure of her hands against his skin roused him. Tender Willow came and held the bowl with the lavender glaze while Sweet Rain gave him ease, her soft, thin-boned fingers caressing him with practised strokes until he came. Then Little Bee washed him there and, making him stand, bound him up in a single yellow silk cloth before bringing a fresh sleeping garment.

He looked down at her tiny, delicate form as she stood before him, fastening his cloak, and felt a small shiver pass through him. Little Bee looked up, concerned.

‘Are you sure you are all right, Father? Should I ask one of your wives to come to you?’

‘It’s nothing, Mi Feng. And no, I’ll sleep alone tonight.’

She fastened the last of the tiny, difficult buttons, looking up into his face a moment, then looked down again, frowning. ‘I worry for you,
Chieh Hsia
,
’
she said, turning away to take a brush from the table at her side. ‘Some days you seem to carry the whole world’s troubles on your shoulders.’

He smiled and let her push him down gently into the chair again. ‘I am Seven, Mi Feng. Who else should carry the burden of Chung Kuo?’

She was silent a moment, her fingers working to unbind his tightly braided queue. Then, leaning close, she whispered in his ear. ‘Your son,’ she said. ‘Why not make Ta-hung your regent?’

He laughed shortly, unamused. ‘And make that rascal friend of his, Hung Mien-lo, a T’ang in all but name?’ He looked at her sharply. ‘Has he been talking to you?’

‘Has who been talking to me, Father? I was thinking only of your health. You need more time to yourself.’

He laughed, seeing for himself how free from subterfuge she was. ‘Forget what I said, Mi Feng. Besides, I enjoy my duties.’

She was brushing out his hair now, from scalp to tip, her tiny, perfectly formed body swaying gently, enticingly beside him with each passage of the brush. He could see her side on in the mirror across the room, her silks barely veiling her nakedness.

He sighed and closed his eyes again, overcome by a strange mixture of emotions.
Most men would envy me,
he thought.
And yet some days I think myself accursed. These girls… they would do whatever I wished, without a moment’s hesitation, and yet there is no joy in the thought. My sons are dead. How could joy survive such heartbreak?

He shuddered and stood up abruptly, surprising Little Bee, making the others turn and look across. They watched him walk briskly to the mirror and stand there, as if in pain, grimacing into the glass. Then he turned back, his face bitter.

‘Ta-hung!’ he said scathingly, throwing himself down into the chair again. ‘I was a fool to let that one be born!’

There was a shocked intake of breath from the three girls. It was unlike Wang Hsien to say such things. Little Bee looked at the others and nodded, then waited until they were gone before speaking to him again.

She knelt, looking up into his face, concerned. ‘What is it, Wang Hsien? What eats at you like poison?’

‘My sons!’ he said, in sudden agony. ‘My sons are dead!’

‘Not all your sons,’ she answered gently, taking his hands in her own. ‘Wang Ta-hung yet lives. And Wang Sau-Leyan.’

‘A weakling and a libertine!’ he said bitterly, not looking at her; staring past her into space. ‘I had two fine, strong sons. Good, upstanding men with all their mother’s finest qualities. And now…’ He shivered violently and looked at her, his features racked with pain, his hands gripping hers tightly. ‘This war has taken everything, Mi Feng. Everything. Some days I think it has left me hollow, emptied of all I was.’

‘No…’ she said, sharing his pain. ‘No, my lord. Not everything.’

He let her hands fall from his and stood again, turning away from her and staring at the door that led out on to the balcony.

‘It is the most bitter lesson,’ he said fiercely. ‘That a man might own the world and yet have nothing.’

Little Bee swallowed and looked down. She had seen her master in many moods, but never like this.

She turned, realizing there was someone in the chamber with them. It was Sun Li Hua. He stood in the doorway, his head bowed. In his hands was the lavender glaze bowl that Tender Willow had taken out to him only moments earlier.

‘Chieh Hsia?’

Wang Hsien turned abruptly, facing the newcomer, clearly angered by the interruption. Then he seemed to collect himself and dropped his head slightly. He looked across at Little Bee and, with a forced smile, dismissed her.

‘Good night,
Chieh Hsia
,
’
she said softly, backing away. ‘May Kuan Yin bring you peace.’

Sun Li Hua stood there after the maid had gone, perfectly still, awaiting his master’s orders.

‘Come in, Master Sun,’ Wang Hsien said after a moment. He turned away and walked slowly across the room, sitting down heavily on his bed.

‘Are you all right,
Chieh Hsia
?’ Sun Li Hua asked. He set the bowl down on the small table at the bedside, then looked up at his master. ‘Has one of the maids done something to upset you?’

Wang Hsien glanced at his Master of the Inner Chamber almost without recognition, then shook his head irritably. ‘What is this?’ he said, pointing at the bowl.

‘It is your sleeping potion,
Chieh Hsia.
Lotus seeds mixed with your own life elixir. It should help you sleep.’

Wang Hsien took a deep, shuddering breath, then reached out and took the bowl in one hand, sipping from it. The
ho yeh
was slightly bitter to the taste – a bitterness augmented by the salt tang of his own yang essence, his semen – but not unpleasant. He drained the bowl, then looked back at Sun Li Hua, holding out the empty bowl for him to take. ‘You will wake me at five, yes?’

Sun Li Hua took the bowl and backed away, bowing again. ‘Of course,
Chieh Hsia.
’

He watched the old T’ang turn and slide his legs between the sheets, then lower his head on to the pillow, pulling the covers up about his shoulders.
Two minutes
, he thought;
that’s all the good Doctor Yueh said it would take
.

Sun Li Hua moved back, beneath the camera, waiting in the doorway until he heard the old T’ang’s breathing change. Then, setting the bowl down, he took a key from inside his silks and reached up, opening a panel high up in the door’s frame. It popped back, revealing a tiny keyboard and a timer unit. Quickly he punched the combination. The timer froze, two amber lights appearing at the top of the panel.