As if confirming Ju-Hai's suspicion, Ting grew pale and slumped in her chair.
Batu looked in the disheartened woman's direction and smiled grimly. He opened the tube and withdrew two sheets of paper, which he gave to the chamberlain. "These letters were meant for you, Divine One." Batu's voice was stiff and emotionless.
The chamberlain carried the letters to the emperor, who accepted them and began reading without a word. A few moments later, he looked up. "How did these come into your possession?"
"The barbarians sent them to me," Batu answered. "They took the letters off a body in Shou Kuan."
"Why would they give the letters to you?"
Batu glanced at Ju-Hai with a curiously apologetic expression, then said, "They want Ministers Kwan and Ju-Hai."
Ju-Hai felt as though someone had dropped a boulder on his chest. He knew without a doubt what the letters revealed. The barbarians could want him and Kwan for only one reason.
"Ridiculous!" Minister Kwan yelled.
"Perhaps, and perhaps not." The very calmness of Batu's voice seemed menacing. "In addition to identifying Minister Ting as a spy, the letters say that you were party to an attempt on Yamun Khahan's life. The barbarians claim that's why they started the war."
"I'd never do such a thing without your instruction!" Kwan shouted, looking to the emperor.
Batu turned back to the Divine One. "Those letters were sent as proof of the barbarian claim. I-" The general paused as the words caught in his throat, then continued. "I recognized Wu's signature, so I knew they were genuine."
"He's lying!" Kwan said. "He forged the letters!"
"Minister Kwan has a point," Ting added. "We have no way of confirming that the letters are genuine." Though she spoke in a calm voice and appeared relaxed, Ting's face was as pale as the fur on her shoulders. She glanced at Ju-Hai, her eyes carrying an unspoken suggestion.
The self-serving thing to do, Ju-Hai knew, was to join forces with Ting and Kwan. With three people calling Batu a liar, the emperor might take it on face value that the letters were forgeries. Even if the Divine One investigated further, the ploy would buy valuable time to maneuver. As unsavory as he found such a confederation, it was not something at which the minister balked. During his long career, he had made hundreds of unpleasant alliances and betrayed the trust of many friends on behalf of Shou Lung.
Ju-Hai realized that the eyes of the entire Mandarinate were fixed on him, anxiously awaiting his acknowledgement or denial of the assassination attempt. Still, the minister was not ready to make his decision. He had to consider one more point.
The minister turned to Batu. "General, if we don't make peace with the barbarians, who will win the war?"
Several people seemed confused by the change of subject, but Batu answered immediately. "I can't say," he said, fixing a vacant stare on the minister. Continuing in an empty voice, he added, "The Tuigan are trapped in Shou Kuan; but they outnumber us and stand a good chance of winning when they sally. Even if they don't attack, we may not be able to starve them out, for I've heard they'll eat their horses and even each other. What's worse is that while the enemy sleeps beneath the roofs of Shou Kuan, our men are exposed to chill weather and autumn rains. The risk of epidemic is high."
The answer was not the one Ju-Hai had hoped to hear. It meant that much more was at stake than his life or Batu's.
The Minister of State bowed to the emperor, but did not dare to look him in the eye. "I beg your forgiveness, Divine One," he said. "The letters are genuine. When I learned of Yamun Khahan's success in uniting the horse tribes, I offered my help to his treacherous stepmother. At my request, Kwan sent an assassin to aid her."
A stunned silence fell over the Hall of Supreme Harmony, but only for a moment. Ting Mei Wan sprang to her feet as if to flee, but the emperor was not taken by surprise. "Minister Ting!" he boomed, pointing a long-nailed finger at her. "At the moment, you face only one death. If you flee, I will see to it that you die a thousand times!"
Ting looked from the emperor to the guards behind Batu. They still had not moved, and Ju-Hai thought his former protege stood a chance of escaping if she acted quickly enough. Then her gaze fell on Batu. The general's face was warped into a hateful scowl and his bitter eyes were locked on Ting's. Without looking away, the Minister of State Security collapsed back into her chair.
"A wise decision," Ju-Hai said. "There is no place you could run that General Batu would not find you."
The Divine One motioned to the guards behind Batu, "Lock her in the First Spire of Ultimate Despair. Ministers Kwan and Ju-Hai are confined to the palace grounds until further notice. Do not let them out of your sight."
"You wouldn't think of sending us to the barbarians!" Kwan protested.
Rising to leave the hall, the emperor said, "That will be decided after Ting's execution."
Kwan started to follow the Son of Heaven. "Divine One, let us explain!"
Ju-Hai rose. "There's nothing to explain, you fool." He knew that the emperor could reach only one conclusion: two lives were a small price to pay for ending a costly war that had little prospect of victory.
The Minister of State turned to the guards assigned to him. "I'd like to spend the day in my garden."
The sword fell and there was a hollow pop. Ting's head, covered by a silk hood, dropped into the waiting basket. The kneeling corpse remained perched on the executioner's block, its hands bound behind its back.
In the pale morning light, everything seemed gray except Ting's cheosong. It was her favorite scarlet dress, the one with the golden dragon that entwined her body. Now, clinging to a headless corpse, it was the dragon that looked full and alive.
Batu had expected to feel something when Ting died: vindication, relief, perhaps elation. Instead, his emotions remained as colorless as the morning. He could not seem to accept that the traitorous mandarin had killed his entire family.
Accompanied by Pe, the general had passed the night at the house where his wife and children had died, but he had not grieved. He had seen Wu's bloodstains in the sleeping hall. He had sat in the courtyard and tried to weep.
Throughout the night, he kept hearing their voices call to him. Once he had dozed off and awakened to the imagined touch of his children's hands upon his back.
The thought had occurred to him that his family's spirits might be trapped at the site of the murders. Though far from a superstitious man, the general had tried talking to them. When he had received no response, Batu had sent for a shukenja. The priest had found no wayward spirits, but had suggested that if Wu and the children were trapped in the house, their murderer's death would free them to begin the journey to the Land of Extreme Felicity.
So, at first light, the general and his adjutant had gone to the Square of Paramount Justice, where they had joined a small group gathered to witness Ting's execution. Although Pe had found ceremonial uniforms for both of them, Batu still wore his barbarian hauberk. The others who had been invited to witness the execution-the emperor, Ju-Hai, Kwan, and Koja-had raised their eyebrows at his attire, but Batu did not care. He could not bear to wear the uniform of the emperor who had turned a blind eye to the murder of his family. Feeling as he did, the general wondered how he could continue serving in the army of Shou Lung-or, for that matter, how he could continue living at all.
For the rest of his life, his mind and his heart would be at war. Though he knew rationally that Wu and the children were dead, he would never believe it in his heart. Batu's only hope of fully accepting their fates, viewing their lifeless bodies, had been taken away. His family had been cremated, their ashes scattered to the winds like those of common thieves. For that insult, especially, Batu had wanted Ting to suffer.