Part 16 (1/2)
”This blood,” he said, ”is fresh.”
”I'm a slow bleeder.”
He didn't seem impressed. I couldn't blame him. As lies went, it wasn't one of my better ones.
”All right,” I said abruptly. ”Do you want the truth?” It wasn't my normal style, but I figured I didn't have much to lose. ”The truth is, we were attacked by members of the Skang Kei family. I don't know why.”
”Who does?” demanded the soldier.
”Ho does,” I told him.
”Your accent remains strange,” he rumbled. ”I'm asking you, who knows why you were attacked.”
”And I am telling you, Ho knows why.”
”Who knows why?”
”Ho.”
”Who?”
”No, Ho.”
”Who who?”
”Ho is who.”
”Who is who?”
”No, Ho is who.”
He swung a gloved fist and knocked me flat. In retrospect, all things considered, I suppose I couldn't blame him. My lousy luck that in Chinpanese the word for ”who” was the same as in my language.
I lay on the ground, the sword still in my hand but nearly forgotten as I tried to stop the world from spinning. Then I yelped as a heavy pressure settled on my right forearm, immobilizing the hand holding the sword.
”Did you not know there was an edict from the Imperior that there is to be no public brawling!” he demanded.
”No, I didn't,” I said with a grunt, ”but thank you so much for bringing it to my attention. The problem is, it wasn't my fault! We were the ones attacked!”
”Then you should have let yourselves be killed rather than disobey the edict!” Remember earlier how I spoke of the una.s.sailability of someone who possesses both ignorance and arrogance? Such was the situation I was now faced with. I couldn't think of any response to the kind of thinking that encouraged being slaughtered instead of fighting back just to accommodate a rule I didn't know existed, made by a man I'd never met.
”Sorry” was all I could think of to say.
”Do you know what the penalty is for disobeying an edict of the Imperior?”
”A severe scolding?”
”Death!”
”Clearly,” I said desperately, ”you haven't considered the full ramifications of a severe scolding. The mental scarring it can leave is far more damaging to--”
He appeared unimpressed. Instead he gestured for Mitsu to be brought forward. Protesting, the young man was shoved in my direction and tumbled to the street next to me, the man standing on my arm giving way to make room for him. ”Thanks for the support,” I muttered.
”You would have done the same,” Mitsu snapped.
”You don't know that.”
”You deny it?”
”No,” I said, seeing no point to lying given the situation. ”I'm just saying you don't know it.”
The soldiers converged, each of them with his sword out. The blades glistened in the sun. I gripped the tachi sword, knowing there was no place to go. My mind raced, trying to come up with anything, some brilliant lie, that would buy us some time. The emissary-from-the-foreign-land routine would probably be a dead end, literally, if Mitsu's earlier comments were true, but it might be worth a try.
Mitsu, for his part, was looking wildly right and left. As deft as he was with his hands and feet, there was no place for him to go that two or three sword blades wouldn't come at him from several different directions. He was fast, but he wasn't superhuman.
And at that moment, I heard Mordant's voice cry out. Naturally, since no one else was expecting an animal to speak, no one knew that he was the source of it. It came from above. He was doubtless perched upon a roof, keeping out of sight. And what he called out was: ”Don't kill her, you fools! She's the princess!”
The huge soldiers froze in position, looking around for both the origin of the voice and also the alleged princess. Then the one who was gripping Mitsu firmly and painfully by the elbow looked down at him as if seeing him for the first time, and let out a cry of alarm. He released Mitsu's arm as if it were on fire and immediately prostrated himself upon the ground. ”Highness!” he cried out.
The others promptly followed suit, and Mitsu, with an annoyed snarl, reached up and released his hair from the topknot. The black hair cascaded down to shoulder length, long and luxurious, and suddenly there was no doubt at all that this was a female and, from the arrogant look to her, a royal one at that. In a heartbeat, everyone in the fish market was on the ground, except for me; I was gaping at her.
The soldier who had been manhandling her cried out, with his face practically flat against the ground, ”Divinity, in failing to recognize you and treating you in such a fas.h.i.+on, I have disgraced my good offices, my family, and my ancestors going back five generations.”
”Yes. You have. You should kill yourself immediately,” said Mitsu.
In a heartbeat, the soldier pulled out a small dagger, jammed it into his stomach, and ripped it up and then to the side.
”I was joking,” Mitsu told him, looking profoundly annoyed.
”My mistake,” grunted the soldier before he keeled over. He lay there in a rapidly spreading pool of his own blood.
”Divinity,” said another, even larger soldier, who was on the ground along with the others, keeping his eyes fixedly down. ”We are under the strictest orders imaginable. Your absence from the palace has been of great concern to your G.o.dly father, and he has commanded us that if we are to come upon you, we are to return you to the palace immediately, whether it is what you desire or not.”
”Oh, very well,” she said, rolling her eyes, and then she called out, ”This is all your fault! I didn't want to come back here! But no, you insisted we had to come! Let it be on your scaly head, then!”
I, of course, was the only person in the place who knew whom she was addressing.
Then she looked at me and noticed I was making eye contact with her. ”You realize I could have you executed on the spot for gazing upon my G.o.dly countenance.”
”It's a bit late in the game for that. I've been staring at it for quite some time,” I pointed out.
She shrugged. ”Yes. You're probably right. Fine, then,” she said with a dismissive wave. ”You have enough trouble walking anyway, without having to concern yourself about not being able to watch where you're going.”
”You're too considerate, 'Divinity,'” I said.
”Yes, I know,” she replied, oblivious of the sarcasm. I found that annoying. Generally my sarcasm was more obvious than that. I might well have been losing my edge. ”Get your horse. Let's go to the palace.”