River of Stars. Guy Gavriel Kay

and the need for extreme care. But Hang Dejin had been in the palace for a long time, at the summit of all possible achievement. You didn’t arrive there and survive without knowing how to deal with moments such as this.

      “I knew, because I was able to learn it through my own sources, celestial lord. The military reports went to the deputy prime minister. He has not presented them in council or at court yet. The emperor will recall that responsibility for the Pacification Army led by the eunuch Wu Tong was given directly to General Wu’s advocate and supporter, Minister Kai. This was done at Kai Zhen’s own request, which I did not oppose. It was therefore not my place to diminish the honourable Kai Zhen by speaking to the emperor of this tragedy before he … decided to do so himself.”

      Decided to do so was good, Hang Dejin thought. So was diminish.

      It was all true, what he’d said. It just wasn’t the heart of the truth. Of course Dejin had known what had happened as soon as word came, of course he hadn’t carried it to the emperor … but that had been a shared, tacit agreement among all who led Kitai at this court.

      The disaster of Erighaya was one that could imperil them all if Wenzong took it in a certain way. They had all aligned themselves with this war, for various reasons. This nightmare could undo everything, the reforms, their own positions. It could bring back the conservatives! Xi Wengao! The Lu brothers!

      Tidings of this sort could do that. A very large expeditionary army sent to take a barbarian capital city, but not securing its supply lines … and forgetting the siege equipment for when it arrived before the walls?

      What did that demand, for those responsible? What form of execution was adequate, even if the general of that army was the much-loved Wu Tong, who had devised the network that had created this garden?

      Wu Tong himself had evidently fled south ahead of his army. He was still in the west, keeping away from court. Still alive. Sending artifacts and trees for the Genyue.

      What Dejin had heard, disturbingly, was that in the retreat through the desert, harassed by barbarians all the way south, the starving, thirst-maddened soldiers of Kitai had begun killing their officers and drinking their blood.

      People in the countryside ate each other (and their children) in times of extreme famine; it was a sad truth of a hard world. But for the discipline of a Kitan army to break down so utterly? That was terrifying. It brought to mind all the histories of what armies—and their generals—could do if not firmly held in check, under control.

      Better, in some ways, an incompetent, preening, greedy general like Wu Tong than some brilliant leader with the love of his soldiers. His soldiers. Not the emperor’s.

      That choice between evils, thought Hang Dejin, had become part of this dynasty, and they were all involved in it here at court.

      Your thoughts were your own. What he said, as the emperor gazed coldly down at him, was, “My humblest apologies, celestial lord. That the serenity of this garden should be marred by such tidings is a grief to me. Shall I have the gardener removed from the imperial presence? He must be punished, of course.”

      “The gardener stays,” said Wenzong. Too bluntly. This remained an unbalanced moment. “His son has died. He will not be punished. He told us only truth.” He paused. “We have sent for Kai Zhen.”

      Hearing that—just the name, without the title—it became an exercise in self-mastery for the prime minister not to smile.

      For safety, he lowered his head as if in chastened acquiescence to the majesty of the imperial will. After a precisely timed pause, he murmured, “If the esteemed deputy prime minister is to be with us soon, perhaps my lord will be good enough to assist his servant by reviewing two letters I have received today. The calligraphy in both is exceptional.”

      He handed up the second letter first, the one in which the brush strokes would not be familiar.

      He still knew how to talk to Wenzong. Of course he did. He’d tutored him as a boy.

      The emperor reached down and took the letter from his hand. He glanced at it casually, then looked more closely. He sat at the dark-green marble desk, and read.

      He looked up. “This is a character-filled hand. A man of conviction and integrity.”

      It had to be said quickly, lest the emperor feel he’d been deceived: “It is a woman writing, gracious lord. I, too, was greatly surprised.”

      Wenzong’s expression would have been diverting at a less significant moment. The light was good and he was close enough—Dejin could still see.

      The emperor’s mouth opened above the thin, dark beard, as if to exclaim aloud. Then it closed again as he turned back to the letter from Lady Lin Shan, daughter of Court Gentleman Lin Kuo.

      There was an interval of stillness. Dejin heard the breeze in the leaves of trees, and autumn birdsong, and the frightened breathing of the gardener, still face down on the path, still trembling.

      Hang Dejin watched his emperor read, saw him savouring brush strokes, saw him smile—then look startled and dismayed. In those two expressions, the one chasing the other across the imperial features, he knew he had won. There were pleasures left in life, small ones, larger ones.

      Wenzong looked up. “Her strokes are both firm and graceful. We find this unexpected.”

      Dejin had known that would be his first remark. Men were what they were, their passions showed through.

      He nodded respectfully, saying nothing.

      The emperor looked back to the letter, then at Dejin again. “And the second one? You mentioned two letters?”

      “The second is from Xi Wengao, my lord. He adds his voice to her plea.”

      “Your old enemy writes you letters?” A faint imperial smile.

      “My old adversary, celestial lord. I have too much respect for him, as I know the emperor does, to name him an enemy.”

      “He banished you when in power, and you exiled him in turn.”

      “To his home, my lord. Away from court, where his agitations were doing the empire harm. But not—”

      “Not all the way south.” The emperor lifted the letter. “Not to Lingzhou Isle. What did this man, Lin Kuo, do that this should be his fate?”

      A gift, really. The world could hand you opportunities, and it was almost a disgrace not to pluck them like fruit.

      “If we believe the daughter and Master Xi, and I will say that I do believe them, he visited Xi Wengao in Yenling to present to him a book he’d written about gardens.”

      “Gardens?”

      Part of the gift, of course, part of the fruit hanging from the plum tree of this autumn morning.

      “Yes, my lord. But it happened to be on the day Lu Chen came to Yenling to bid farewell to his mentor before going to Lingzhou, to his own banishment. It was many years ago. The order of exile for Lin Kuo has just been given, however.”

      “Lu Chen. Another enemy of yours.”

      “Another man whose views I considered wrongly judged and dangerous. My lord, I have his poetry in my bedchamber.”

      The emperor nodded. “And this Lin Kuo is now ordered to Lingzhou? For visiting Xi Wengao?”

      “Years ago. At the wrong time. The emperor has read the letter. He was taking his young daughter to see the peonies. And bringing his garden book to present to Master Xi.”

      “Ah! Yes. We remember now. We know that book,” said the emperor of Kitai.

      Another plum, dropping into one’s hand.

      “I did not know this, celestial lord.” (It was true.)

      “He had it presented to us when it was completed. We looked through it. Pleasantly conceived,