House of Ch’in built the Wall to keep them apart, House of Han has to keep the beacons alight, Beacons alight and they never go out For these expeditions have never an end:
In the line, hand to hand, they’ll die the same, The horses will fall, call to Heaven their pain, The crows and the kites pick their riders’ guts And fly to dead trees with the bits in their beaks.. . .
Li Po, We Fought South of the Walls, EIGHTH CENTURY A.D.
Life is cheap, flesh plentiful.
COMMON SAYING, 2210 A.D.
PROLOGUE WINTER 2210
Ghosts’ Torches
Ah, silence, such silence, like in a dream, moonlight noble and heartless, in the same dusk, in the same dawn. No elegy to be heard, and no bells tolled. The gate to the world of the departed souk, is solemnly closed, seeing me into the funeral train which marries me to life, demanding I reclaim talent of days gone by. Ah, silence, such perpetual silence, there is no reply, and there is no echo, there are just ghosts’ torches, illuminating my whole life. . . .
Duo Duo, “Death of a Poet,” a.d. 1974
THE GREAT COURTROOM WAS EMPTY, silent. On the bare stone of the walls torches burned brightly, steadily, in their iron cressets, yet the chamber seemed engulfed in shadows, the galleries and wood-beamed ceiling lost in an impenetrable darkness. At the far end of the chamber two huge stone pillars flanked the great double doors. Between them, their figures dwarfed by the entrance arch, walked two men. “Well, Knut,” said one of them, turning a long, horselike face to his companion, “the day has come at last. You must be proud to have brought things to this point.”
Tolonen paused, his smile uncertain. “We have worked hard to bring this about, neh, Chi Hsun? Yet now that the day is upon Us I feel not satisfaction but a strange sadness. It’s as if I haven’t grieved for him. But now that it’s done, now that the matter’s to be decided . . .”
He fell silent, staring away into darkness. Chi Hsun reached out, touching the Marshal’s arm, consoling him. “I understand. . . . Klaus Ebert was a fine man. He stood for all that was good and strong and decent. To have lost such a man was a tragedy for us all. But for you . . . well, you were his friend.” “And he mine,” Tolonen said, lifting his chin, a look of real pain, real hurt, in his eyes. “Since we were boys.” He turned, facing Chi again, a strange sound, half pain, half remembered joy, escaping him. “I had dreams, Chi Hsun. Dreams that his son would marry my daughter. That his grandchildren would be my grandchildren.” He stopped, choked by emotion, unable to say more.
The Chief Commissioner, watching him, nodded. “I’m sorry, Knut. It must be hard for you in view of what happened. But listen. I hear that Ebert’s widow is to be married again.”
Tolonen looked back at him, surprised. “Berta? I’d not heard.” “No. They say she’s waiting until after the Hearing to make the announcement.”
“Ah.” Tolonen walked on, out into the body of the Courtroom, stopping beside the huge, long desk that dominated the center of the chamber. He leaned forward, his hands—one flesh, one burnished gold—pressed flat against the smoothly polished surface, silently looking about him at the empty benches, the dais where, in a matter of hours, the Commissioners would sit and deliberate. Then he turned, looking directly at Chi Hsun. “Where did it all go? That’s what I keep asking myself. Where did they go—all those dreams we had? They seemed so real, so secure. How could it all have gone so wrong?”
Chin Hsun looked down, then came across, stopping beside Tolonen. “The past is gone, Knut. We cannot change it. But the future . . . well, that we can affect. It is why we serve, neh?—why, in the days to come, we must work hard to ensure the best result.” Tolonen met his eyes, a sudden tiredness in his voice. “And what is the best result? To see that wastrel Lutz inherit?” “You think he will?”
Tolonen sighed, then nodded.
“And Berta Ebert?”
Tolonen grimaced. “The most she can realistically hope for is a life interest in the estate. And an annual sum, perhaps, corresponding with her private allowance when Klaus was still alive. Oh, she’ll get to keep the Mansion, probably, but as for the Company . . .” “And if Lutz Ebert inherits? What will happen, do you think? Will GenSyn become again the power it was?”
Tolonen shrugged. “Who can tell? If Lutz has any sense he’ll keep the present management committee in place and let them run things, but I doubt he’ll do that. He has acquired many new ‘friends’ these past few years, his new wife’s family not least among them. I suspect he’ll pack the board with them once he’s inherited. If so, who knows what future GenSyn has? A poor one, probably.”
“And the rumors? You know, of Lutz’s involvement with his nephew, the traitor Hans?”
Tolonen looked down, his face sour. “Ah, that. I had a team looking into it for the best part of a year.”
“And?”
“Nothing. Oh, there were a few shady business deals—the kind of thing that, were the media to get hold of them, would make him even less popular than he is now—but nothing to link him to Hans. Nor will there be, unless we find the young man.”
Chi Hsun glanced across at the dais, then looked back at the aged Marshal.
“And your Master, Li Yuan. . . what does he think of events?” Tolonen looked away, his expression troubled. “My Master has been kept fully briefed. His primary concern is to see that things are kept stable.” It was a diplomatic answer, for, by all accounts, Li Yuan had become something of a recluse since the murder of his wives, letting his Chancellor, Nan Ho, attend to the day-to-day running of things. But where GenSyn was concerned, what Li Yuan thought was of immense importance. GenSyn was still the biggest Company in Chung Kuo, and traditionally its fortunes had been linked directly with the Li family. A decline in the power of GenSyn would mean a corresponding decline in power for Tolonen’s Master. It remained to see whether he would allow it to fall into the hands of Klaus Ebert’s weak half-brother, Lutz. Yet what could he do?
Each of the Seven—the T’ang who ruled Chung Kuo—had appointed a representative to sit on the Hearing Committee and look after their best interests. For Li Yuan to overrule their decision was unthinkable. Yet there were other means.
Chi Hsun looked about him at the empty benches of the Courtroom and sighed. GenSyn. Wherever one turned, the influence of that great Company could be seen: in the food substitutes used throughout the Lowers; in the cheap health treatments that were so popular in the Mids; in the range of prosthetics and “age-at-bay” products used by the rich. Mainly, however, the Company was known as the creator of the Genetic Synthetics, those strange and marvelous creatures grown in its tanks, custom designed for every taste: servants and whores, sportsmen and performers, goat-men and ox-men, brutish bodyguards and the flat-faced, bullish Hei that Security used to put down riots. GenSyn had been a cornucopia, providing something for every level—one of the great pillars on which Chung Kuo was built. But now all that was threatened.
Chi Hsun looked at the Marshal. As he did, Tolonen turned from the table, looking back at him, a tired, sad expression in his eyes. Beyond him the lamps flickered in their iron cressets, making the shadows seem deeper, ingrained almost in the stone and wood of the ancient hall. “Ah, well,” the old man said. “Let’s go now, Master Chi. Sleep. That’s the remedy. A good night’s sleep, neh? Tomorrow will come soon enough.”
alone in his rooms, Tolonen stood before the mirror, staring at his face, trying to see, beyond those rugged, angular planes, some semblance of the man he’d been.