And if she did? What then?
He looked down at his hands where they rested in his lap—tiny, childlike hands, scarred and stunted by his experience in the Clay— and wondered what she had made of him that time, remembering how her eyes had met his own. Had he been wrong, or had something passed between them in that instant?
For a moment he sat there, undecided, then, angry at himself, at the doubts that constantly assailed him, he stood and, clearing the screen once more, hurried out, calling farewell to Nong Yan as he went.
THE white SILK envelope lay open, empty on the desktop. The chair behind the great desk was unoccupied, the portrait of Li Kou-lung, great-grandfather to Li Yuan, looking down imperiously on a room where nothing stirred. An ornate dragon lamp cast a pool of yellowed light about the desk, throwing heavy shadows on the tiled, mosaic floor. On the desk beside the lamp, a faint wisp of steam still drifting up from its untouched surface, rested a shallow bowl of soup, the long, straight silver handle of the spoon jutting out horizontally, the dark line of its shadow dissecting the jaundiced whiteness of the silk.
Li Yuan stood in darkness beside the carp pool, Wei Feng's letter held loosely in his left hand as he stared outward, into the shadows.
He had dismissed the servants and ordered that no one should disturb him, no matter how urgent the need. And now he stood there, unmoving, deep in thought, trying to see, in that utter, impenetrable darkness, his way through to clarity: to formulate a decision—a degree of certainty—from the sudden chaos of his thoughts.
Once before he had stood where he stood now, both figuratively and literally, facing this same matter. Back then anger and frustration—and a feeling of betrayal—had formed the thought in him, "Why Seven?" and then, as now, he had passed through the anger to a feeling of peace and to the realization that he had survived the worst his enemies could throw at him. Yet there was a difference, for now he understood that such peace, such respite, was temporary. Whatever he did, however he acted, his enemies would multiply. Cut off one head and two more would grow in its place, like that in the legend. But now, with Wei Feng's letter, something new had entered the calculations of power. Now that thought—"Why Seven?"—was given more than a tentative expression.
Li Yuan sighed. The old man had seen how things stood; had seen the divisions that lay ahead if things remained as they were, and had said to him directly, unequivocally, "Take power, Li Yuan. Grasp it now, before all Seven go down into the darkness." Those, his words, had been mirrored in his son's, Chan Yin's, face. He understood now; knew what that look of deference and humility had meant. And Chan's words, "I am my father's son," they too took on a new significance.
At first he had-not believed what he had read. Slowly, one finger tracing the words, he had mouthed them to himself, then had sat back, oblivious of the servant who had brought his evening soup, trying to take in the profound significance of Wei Feng's final message to him. How would he, in Chan Yin's position, have behaved? Would he, like Chan, have submitted to his father's wishes?
He frowned, realizing he did not know himself as well as that. To give away his birthright. To bow before another when there was no need. He shook his head. No, even filial duty broke before such demands. Chan Yin would have been within his rights to ignore his father's dying wishes; to have dismissed them as the addled ravings of a sick and disappointed man. But he had not.
Beyond this question of duty and birthright lay a second, more complex one: the matter of acting upon Wei Feng's wishes, and the likely political repercussions. Ignoring the morality of it a moment, he could not, even in practical terms, accept what Wei Feng had offered him. He could not be the new T'ang of Eastern Asia in Chan Yin's place. While the letter stated this as Wei Feng's wish, and though Chan Yin and his brothers might agree to and accept the terms of this document—two factors which might make his inheritance incontestable in law—there was not the slightest possibility that the other five T'ang would allow it. Even Tsu Ma would act to prevent it if he knew. No, if he even so much as mentioned the possibility, it would have the effect of isolating him in Council and achieve in an instant what Wang Sau-leyan had long striven to do.
Chan Yin would inherit. The chain would remain unbroken. But in the dark something else had come to the young T'ang of Europe. Some deeper scheme that might build upon what Wei Feng had freed him to contemplate. A scheme whereby the Seven might become both simpler and more effective. Might become—he dared to whisper it aloud—"Just three of us. Tsu Ma. Wu Shih. And I..."
And, once uttered, the idea took root in the depths of him, became a growing seed that he might now begin to nurture with the water of thought and the sunlight of action.
Returning to his study he stood there in the doorway, looking across at the portrait of his great-grandfather, a man he had never known, wondering how he would have viewed such things and whether he, in similar circumstances, would have thought or acted differently. He could ask, of course, consult the old man's hologram, yet he sensed it would do little good. Li Kou-lung's responses had been programmed in a different age; an age of solid certainties when even to think of such matters would have been considered a sign of frailty. Sighing deeply, he crossed the room and pulled at the bell rope, summoning Chang Shih-sen, his secretary.
He stood there, waiting, staring down at the shallow bowl, then reached out and, with one finger, gently breached the cold, congealed surface, thinking to himself, Three. Just Three, before raising the finger to his mouth.
Li Yuan turned from the desk, drawing himself up straight, as Chang Shih-sen entered.
"Call Wei Chan Yin for me," he said, all signs of tiredness gone from him, replaced by a strange excitement. "Ask him if he will come here. At once. He will be expecting my message."
Chang Shih-sen bowed and turned to go, but Li Yuan reached out and held his arm a moment. "And Shih-sen ... ask him to bring Tseng-li, the youngest. I have a use for him. Then rest. I will not need you for a while."
CHAPTER FIVE
The Chain of Being
IN THE FORMAL GARDENS surrounding the great House at Weimar, songbirds were singing in the cypress trees, greeting the dawn. The great House itself was empty, as it had been these past eight years, since Wang Hsien, father of the present T'ang of Africa, read the Seven's Edict of Dis-bandment, but in the pavilion to the east of the vast, zigguratlike mass of the assembly building, a conference was taking place. There, in the shadow of the nearby City, fourteen men—the seven Chancellors of the Seven and seven graybeards, ex-Representatives of the House— sat around a huge circular table, discussing the future of Chung Kuo. On the ceiling directly overhead was a huge chart of Chung Kuo, with the boundaries of the new Hsien, the administrative districts, marked in red against the background white, like capillaries on the surface of a clouded eye. For eleven hours now they had talked, with only two short breaks for refreshments, but now it was almost done.
Nan Ho, seated at the table, looked up frpm the silk-bound folder in front of him and smiled, meeting the eyes of the pigtailed old Han facing him.
"You are a stubborn man, Ping Hsiang, but not unreasonable. What you ask for is far from what my Masters would have wished. But, as I have said many times this night, we are not here to impose. No. We must come to some new compact between Seven and Above. For the sake of all."
There was a murmur of agreement about the table and from Ping Hsiang a taut smile and a single nod of the head.
"Good. Then let us agree on this final point. Let us delay the implementation of the package of measures agreed earlier until ten months after the House has passed the proposal. That way no one can say we have not been fair and open."