She looked up at him. "Have you your torch, Sung?"
He nodded, not understanding why she should want it, but took it from his pocket and, edging down the bank, reached out and handed it to her, watching as she unscrewed the top, transforming it into a tiny cutting tool. Then she took something from the pocket of her one-piece. Something small enough to fold inside her palm.
The card. The tape that had the record of his theft. Sung swallowed and looked at her. So she had done it. Had saved them both. He shivered, wanting to go down to her, to stroke her and hold her and thank her, but what he wanted wasn't somehow right. He felt the coldness emanate from her, a sense of the vast distance she had traveled. It was as if she had been beyond the sky. Had been to the place where they said there was no air, only the frozen, winking nothingness of space. She had been there. He knew it. He had seen it in her eyes.
She put the card against the bank and played the cutting beam upon it. Once, twice, three times she did it, each time picking up the card and examining it. But each time it emerged unscathed, unmarked.
She looked up at him, that same cold distance in her eyes, then let the card fall from her fingers into the silt below the water. Yes, he thought, they'll not find it there. They could search a thousand years and they'd not find it.
But she had forgotten about the card already. She was bent down now, unbuttoning the lower half of her one-piece, her fingers moving gingerly, as if what she touched were flesh, not cloth.
"Come down," she said coldly, not looking at him. "You want to know what he did, don't you? Well, come and see. I'll show you what he did."
He went down and stood there, facing her, the water cold against his shins, the darkness all around them. He could see that the flap of cloth gaped open, but in the dark could make out no more than the vague shape of her legs, her stomach.
"Here." She handed him the two parts of the torch and waited for him to piece the thing together.
He made to shine the torch into her face, but she pushed his hand down. "No," she said. "Not there. Down here, where the darkness is."
He let her guide his hand, then tried to pull back as he saw what he had previously not noticed, but she held his hand there firmly, forcing him to look. Blood. The cloth was caked with her blood. Was stained almost black with it.
"Gods. . . ." he whispered, then caught his breath as the light moved across onto her flesh.
She had been torn open. From her navel to the base of her spine she had been ripped apart. And then sewn up. Crudely, it seemed, for the stitches were uneven. The black threads glistened in the torchlight, blood seeping from the wound where she had opened it again.
"There," she said, pushing the torch away. "Now you've seen."
He stood there blankly, not knowing what to say or do, remembering only the sound of her crying out in the darkness and how awful he had felt, alone, kneeling there on the dike, impotent to act.
"What now?" he asked.
But she did not answer him, only bent and lowered herself into the water, hissing as the coldness burned into the wound, a faint moan escaping through her gritted teeth as she began to wash.
AT DAWN on the morning of his twelfth birthday—in the official court annals his thirteenth, for they accorded with ancient Han tradition in calling the day of the child's birth its first "birth day"—Li Yuan was awakened by his father and, when he was dressed in the proper clothes, led down to the stables of the Tongjiang estate.
It was an informal ceremony. Even so, there was not one of the six hundred and forty-eight servants—man, woman, or girl— who was not present. Nor had any of the guests—themselves numbering one hundred and eighty—absented themselves on this occasion.
The grounds surrounding the stable buildings had been meticulously swept and tidied, the grooms lined up, heads bowed, before the great double doors. And there, framed in the open left-hand doorway of the stalls, was the T'ang's birthday gift to his son.
It was an Andalusian; a beauty of a horse, sixteen hands high and a perfect mulberry in color. It was a thick-necked, elegant beast, with the strong legs of a thoroughbred. It had been saddled up ready for him, and as Li Yuan stood there, it turned its head curiously, its large dark eyes meeting the Prince's as if it knew its new owner.
"You have ridden my horses for too long now," Li Shai Tung said to his son quietly. "I felt it was time you had your own."
Li Yuan went across to it and reached up gently, stroking its neck, its dappled flank. Then he turned and bowed to his father, a fleeting smile on his lips. The chief groom stood close by, the halter in his hand, ready to offer it to the Prince when he was ready. But when Li Yuan finally turned to him it was not to take the halter from him.
"Saddle up the Arab, Hung Feng-Chan."
The chief groom stared back at him a moment, open mouthed, then looked across at the T'ang as if to query the instruction. But Li Shai Tung stood there motionless, his expression unchanged. Seeing this, Hung Feng-Chan bowed deeply to his T'ang, then to the Prince, and quickly handed the halter to one of the nearby grooms.
When he had gone, Li Yuan turned back to his father, smiling, one hand still resting on the Andalusian's smooth, strong neck.
"He's beautiful, Father, and I'm delighted with your gift. But if I am to have a horse it must be Han Ch'in's. I must become my brother."
Throughout the watching crowd there was a low murmur of surprise, but from the T'ang himself there was no word, only the slightest narrowing of the eyes, a faint movement of the mouth. Otherwise he was perfectly still, watching his son.
The chief groom returned a minute later, leading the Arab. The black horse sniffed the air, and made a small bowing movement of its head, as if in greeting to the other horse. Then, just when it seemed to have settled, it made a sharp sideways movement, tugging against the halter. Hung Feng-Chan quieted the horse, patting its neck and whispering to it, then brought it across to where Li Yuan was standing.
This was the horse that General Tolonen had bought Han for his seventeenth birthday; the horse Han Ch'in had ridden daily until his death. A dark, spirited beast; dark skinned and dark natured, her eyes fiill of fire. She was smaller than the Andalu-sian by a hand, yet her grace, her power, were undeniable.
"Well, Father?"
All eyes were on the T'ang. Li Shai Tung stood there, bareheaded, a bright blue quilted jacket pulled loosely about his shoulders against the morning's freshness, one foot slightly be-fore the other, his arms crossed across his chest, his hands holding his shoulders. It was a familiar stance to those who knew him, as was the smile he now gave his son; a dark, ironic smile that seemed both amused and calculating.
"You must ride her first, Li Yuan."
Li Yuan held his father's eyes a moment, bowing, then he turned and, without further hesitation, swung up into the saddle. So far so good. The Arab barely had time to think before Li Yuan had leaned forward and, looping the reins quickly over his hands, squeezed the Arab's chest gently with both feet.
Li Yuan's look of surprise as the Arab reared brought gasps as well as laughter from all around. Only .the T'ang remained still and silent. Hung Feng-Chan danced around the front of the horse, trying to grab the halter, but Li Yuan shouted at him angrily and would have waved him away were he not clinging on dearly with both hands.
The Arab pulled and tugged and danced, moving this way and that, bucking, then skittering forward and ducking its head, trying to throw the rider from its back. But Li Yuan held on, his teeth gritted, his face determined. And slowly, very slowly, the Arab's movements calmed. With difficulty Li Yuan brought the Arab's head around and moved the stubborn beast two paces closer to the watching T'ang.