Part 7 (1/2)
Juimoshu waved a hand in warning. ”Take care, daughter. I tell you only what the dream says to me, and I cannot be certain about its meaning. To give you false hope would be a terrible cruelty I could not endure.”
Now it was Juimoshu who leaned forward, gaze intense, clenching her hands together in her lap. Her voice was nearly a whisper. ”Even so, I have also dreamed this night, but it was a dream without vision, only words. The voice of a child, crying out in the darkness, and I felt a horrible sadness that left my body aching when your servant came to wake me. And the words were 'Da,' and 'Ma', said over and over again, words as in your dream. Not 'mama', or 'baba'. Did you not notice that in your dream?”
”No. I have heard these words used by children before. They are from the old dialect, before the coming of First Mother.”
”A dialect still used by the outcast peoples to the west, the people your husband would have long ago driven into the sea if it hadn't been for your humane intervention.”
”A Tumatsin child?” asked Weimeng, wondering how that could be. ”A Changeling?”
Juimoshu nodded her head. ”A Tumatsin child is lost, and seeks its parents. Boy, or girl, it is near, for I have felt its sorrow since being awakened and I feel it even now. There is a terrible pain of loss-here.” Juimoshu placed her hand over her heart, and nodded again.
Weimeng stood up, excited, and leaned over the desk. ”There was an attack on a Tumatsin village this morning, and several people were killed! Could there have been prisoners taken? Children?”
Juimoshu stood up, took Weimeng's hands in hers. The wrinkles around her eyes had suddenly deepened and her face was drawn, as if she were experiencing physical pain. ”I hear your thoughts, daughter, and I will make inquiries. But now I must rest. The feelings inside me have grown steadily in intensity since my coming to you, and I must pray to First Mother for relief before attempting sleep again.” She squeezed Weimeng's hands, then turned to leave.
Weimeng felt a lightness in her chest, an euphoria that swept over her, bringing a flush to her cheeks. ”You must find the child, mother! And I will also listen for its call!”
Juimoshu waved a hand to one side, shuffling slowly towards the door. ”You've inherited few of my abilities, daughter, and once that was a disappointment for me. But at this moment, I think you have been blessed.”
Juimoshu reached the door, opened it, and shook her head. ”Such power!” she said, and then she left the room.
Weimeng was too excited to sleep. She drank both cups of tea, now cold, and paced the circ.u.mference of her suite many times before weariness returned. She turned down the lights, and returned to her bed, where she offered up a fervent prayer to First Mother for the gift of a child, hoping there would be a sign, a vision, a voice crying out for her. There was nothing there, and finally she drifted away to a quiet place beyond consciousness.
But in the morning, she arose with the uneasy feeling that someone had called out to her shortly before she'd awakened.
Mengyao took the lift up to the seventh floor of the palace, which housed the offices of the Moshuguang, The Magic Light, The Brotherhood of The Searchers. Mengmoshu's office was centrally located along a long, stark hallway painted white and softly illuminated by ceiling panels. Each door was numbered, without t.i.tles to identify the occupants. He stopped at number ten, and knocked softly three times.
”Come!”
Mengyao entered, closed the door behind him, and seated himself in a plush, white chair before a plain table in the center of the room, behind which the Chancellor of the Moshuguang sat pecking away at a workstation. The office was large, ten meters on a side, but spa.r.s.ely furnished: workstation, table, two chairs for visitors, a plush couch and chair in one corner. There was a thick, red carpet, but no windows, greenish light coming from three ceiling panels. One wall was entirely filled with video monitors, all dark at the moment, another lined with shelves of books and ca.s.settes and the diskettes of the past hundred years of Moshuguang science and politics.
Mengmoshu nodded a greeting, but continued working for several minutes while Mengyao sat in silence. Finally he leaned back in his chair and brushed an errant lock of gray hair from his forehead. ”I've checked every report for the last five years, and there is only one Tumatsin woman who has even traces of green in her eyes. Her name is Manlee, and her children are grown to adulthood with no unusual characteristics. All of them live by the sea. Are you certain we have the right child?”
”There can be no doubt,” said Mengyao. ”We found her beneath a collapsed ger, nearly unconscious, yet her mental call was so strong even some of the men sensed something at a distance. Her mother was killed in the attack, and apparently also her little horse. I tried to s.h.i.+eld her from the sight of bodies, but she saw them, and her grief was so severe I could barely stand up under it. When I tried to control her, it was like grasping a bar of steel, yet her emotions flowed like water. I prayed, Mengmoshu. I prayed to First Mother for relief, and she came not to me, but to the child.”
Mengmoshu's eyes widened. ”She spoke to the child?”
”Yes. She offered words of comfort, endearments, and said the child must do something for Her when she is a woman. The words were meant to be heard by me; She made no effort to s.h.i.+eld them. First Mother has claimed her, Mengmoshu. She is The One.”
Mengmoshu blew softly through pursed lips. ”So it seems,” he said. ”She is somehow connected to Manlee's line, then. Her ordu was formed only eighty years ago, according to our records, and several families have moved in from the west since then. Was her father killed?”
”There is a father, and a younger brother. A report from yesterday says they had gone west to Manlee to try and stop the provocations that have inflamed The Son Of Heaven. As far as I know, they are safe for the moment.”
”Unless w.a.n.g decides to attack the coastal ordus. We must lobby strongly against that when we have our audience. That is in half an hour.”
”We see the Emperor today?”
Mengmoshu waved his hand, unconcerned. ”It is posturing. I will do the talking, but He might ask you for details of what you saw after the attack. The will of the Moshuguang has been clearly overruled in this case. We must handle w.a.n.g delicately, yet let him know of our displeasure, and convince Him again of the importance of the Tumatsin people in our biological programs. He still thinks Juimoshu came from that effort, and I don't intend to tell him otherwise. Where is the child now?”
”In order to quickly meet you, I turned her over to novice Huomeng when he met us at the monorail. I would guess he's taken her to the Hall of Ministers, where there are usually spare rooms for guests.”
”A fine youngster,” said Mengmoshu. ”His memory is prodigious, and his nature gentle. Some find him a bit precocious, but that is to be expected with his intelligence. He shows great promise; his psi abilities appeared at age ten, quite young, yet this girl you've returned with is younger still. I must question her in the morning.”
”Go gently with her, Mengmoshu. She's been horribly traumatized by the attack, and soon her sorrow will turn to hate. She must see us as friends. She must see us as her new family. If she is The One, there must be devotion between us, or we will be destroyed.”
”I understand that, Mengyao, and you know my methods are not harsh. Perhaps it would be good to have Juimoshu present for the questioning. A woman's presence could be comforting to the child. What's her name?”
”Kati.”
”Yes, Kati might find rea.s.surance in a grandmotherly presence. I will see to that.”
Mengmoshu stood up. ”I know you've had a long and difficult day, Mengyao, but now I must ask you to join me in an audience with The Son Of Heaven. It should not take long, but it is necessary.”
”I'm at your service, Mengmoshu,” said Mengyao, rising. There was no thing he would not do for the man who stood before him.
They left the office and walked to the end of the hallway, where elevator doors of bra.s.s were guarded by two troopers with laser rifles and sidearms. The elevator took them down five floors, opening to a reception hall adjacent to the throne room. Panels glowed from a gilded, low ceiling, and lining the room on three sides, set on pedestals, were the bronze busts of all fifty-five past Emperors of Shanji. Tapestries of silk, in paints, inks and embroidery hung on the walls: mountains, village scenes, fields of grain, and various views of the Emperor's city from centuries past.
Mengmoshu went to the reception desk while Mengyao admired the tapestries. All showed scenes of a feudal society as founded by w.a.n.g Chen-Ma, the first Emperor, the one who had fled Tengri-Nayon with his traditionalist followers. Several were portraits of royal courts: a Son of Heaven surrounded by family, those n.o.bles and merchants most influential at the time, heads of craft and trade guilds most adept at bribery and flattery. Only tranquil village scenes commemorated the peasants who made profits for their masters. And there was nothing related to the great agricultural expansion to the east.
Other tapestries had been on these walls, but removed years ago, stored or destroyed. Mengyao remembered the scene of shuttles dropping from the mother s.h.i.+p that had brought the people from the red star to Shanji, the burning city from the time when the Emerald Empress of Tengri sought to reclaim the errant people who had fled her harsh rule. History was selective on the walls of the Emperor's palace.
Mengmoshu soon rejoined Mengyao by the tapestries, looking displeased.
”We are scheduled for this time, but everything is running behind because of the transportation guild's lobbying for a new tunnel to the east. She said it would be less than an hour, and we should sit near the door to be called.”
They went to a pair of ebony benches on either side of the throne room door, and found places to sit there with six other people.
Over an hour later, three men came out of the room, angry and grumbling to themselves about short-term thinking.
The other six people were called one-by-one: two merchants, three farm managers and a man with a wrapped gift from the Arts Guild.
Mengmoshu's face slowly turned into an angry mask, and he s.h.i.+fted his position on the bench with increasing frequency. ”Let him posture all he wishes. We will remain here until he sees us.”
The others came out one by one, all grim, except for the Arts Guild representative, who looked rather pleased with himself.
They would be next, after a wait of over three hours. Mengyao's b.u.t.tocks were numb, and his stomach was grumbling, for he hadn't eaten all day.
The door opened again, and they arose in antic.i.p.ation of the audience, but a young woman came out, leading a little boy by the hand. Both men bowed courteously, for it was the Emperor's second wife and his son. The woman, Yang Xifeng, was in her early twenties, and lovely to behold: small face and features, a long, graceful neck and slender body, tall for a Hansui yet proudly erect and seeming to float as she walked. She nodded to acknowledge their greeting as she pa.s.sed by, the little boy Shan-lan looking up at them shyly. Both men sensed his fear of them, but from Yang Xifeng there was nothing. Both wore the golden robes of the Emperor's court. They crossed the reception hall, and disappeared into the elevator taking them to their living quarters below.
”The boy is too thin for a five-year-old. He does not look healthy,” said Mengyao, as they sat down again.
”I hear he's a delicate child,” said Mengmoshu, ”but even now his presence is required at court, and he likely hasn't eaten for hours. The Emperor begins the training of his heir at childhood, and has a difficult task ahead of him.”
”There will be other children, I suppose.”