"We're lucky to have a general so vigilant about my son's wellbeing," Lady Taeri murmured to him

as they passed one another in the hall, in the native tongue they shared but the rest of the
Hansan court wouldn't understand. Her words made him take heed of the barely perceptible
faltering, because the Lady Taeri Leong rarely pointed such things out except in bringing attention
to herself.

Her fingers brushed his arm in anything but an accident, a faint touch but even more calculated
than her words.

"My son doesn't care about our country. He only cares about Hansa; he has too much of his
father in him. Do you know what they whisper about you because you follow him so, General
Saeng, in the markets and on the streets? Juxian Saeng is a traitor. Juxian Saeng mocks us by
keeping his old name while he pretends to be a Hansan. General Saeng is a witch and is going to
betray us all to Tzu Shen." Taeri leaned in closer, close enough that it would start people talking
about an affair between the Queen Mother and the general.

"At least they have enough regard for me to turn their heads and whisper when they talk." He
knew what was said openly about Lady Taeri, knew that the people from their home country didn't
even pretend at respecting her. "Murderess who killed her lover's wife and heir, witch who drives
out her enemies with spells and poison, pitiful woman who traded her dignity for her ambition."
Unlike her, he didn't bother using their own language to disguise his words; he said them openly
in Hansan.

Taeri put her long, silk-covered fingers over his mouth, stopping any further elaboration on the
matter unless he was rude enough to put his hands on her. He wasn't.

"I am not a witch, and you know that." Of course he knew that; Taeri didn't know anything of
magic from over the mountains in Tzu Shen. She simply had the resources to buy the loyalties of
a few of those who did. "And I haven't killed anyone." That was a lie as surely as the gentleness
of her hand as she reached up from his lips and pushed his loose hair back out of his face. "My
son loves two things in this world: Hansa and you."

"Your son is sixteen years old. He's too young to really love anything but himself. Oh, he thinks he
loves his country, and it may even be true one day. He thinks he loves me, but he'll realize a few
weeks or months from now how silly that is." He knew about his King's adolescent infatuation,
and would have even if the High King had been a far better liar and actor than he really was.
Even if Juxian had been interested, it would have been ridiculous-- he was twice the boy's age,
foreign, and a wish. But he wasn't interested in the slightest. "Unless he takes after you, rather
than his father. Then he'll grow out of both of them and still only love himself."

"Such disrespect," Taeri said demurely, stepping backward ever so slightly so that she wasn't
quite so improperly close. "You know, there are men in this court who would take my coming so
close to them as a sign I loved them."

"It's a shame I'm not stupid enough to believe that, isn't it?" He asked, taking a step backward
that she would have to make two forward to compensate for. She took three, bringing her back
into her original position, and opened her painted blue fan with a practiced flick of her wrist. Lady
Taeri was a tall woman, nearly as tall as he was, and so it was an easy matter for her to shield
their faces with the half-moon of her folding fan and reach up as if to kiss him. She slipped her
face up further, though, so that they were cheek to cheek and she could whisper in his ear.

"No, but now the entire court will think you are," she said very softly. "They'll talk about us in their
ugly Hansan words and names, Lady Tai-li and General Jei-xan are having an affair. Such a
shame, that my son has to spend such a short and tragic reign heartbroken that his beloved
general chose his mother over him."
He decided to risk offending her, something that was often unwise, and step back before she did.
He could feel a smudge of something on his face, and when he touched his cheek his fingers
came away smudged with her white paint.

"Good evening, Juxian," she said, snapping her fan closed. "Unless you've decided to change
your name to Jei-xan in your devotion to King and country."

And with that she walked away, her silk skirts slithering against the floor because she never had
enough regard for her things to hold them up. He kept that thought in mind as he walked in the
opposite direction, the way he had come, to wash the paint from his face before anyone who
hadn't witnessed the display (and he was sure there had been witnesses, even if the hall seemed
deserted now) could see it and spread another rumor. As long as he kept in mind that Taeri had
as much regard for the people she used as she did for her floor-scuffed skirts, he wouldn't be
tempted no matter how many whispers of traitor and witch followed him.

When he next saw his lord, Juxian could not tell whether the shaking really was worse or if he
was merely imagining it. It could have been whatever Taeri had done (because she had done
something, there was no question about that in Juxian's mind) running its course. It could have
been the shock of hearing the rumors of Taeri's conversation with Juxian earlier in the afternoon.
And it could have been Juxian's imagination seeing either of those when they weren't there at all.

"General," Shonwa Hwan Sen said quietly, his eyes hooded and dark under the elaborate face
paint of the High King. "Did you receive the report from the border?" It was unwise for a King to
put so much trust in his advisors, especially when the advisors were all witches and vipers and
traitors. Shonwa surrounded himself with dangerous people, oblivious to the fact they threatened
him more than his enemies. All of the reports of border skirmishes went to Juxian himself and not
through the High King, just as financial matters went through Taeri-- traitorous murderess or not,
the High King's mother had a head for numbers unsurpassed by nearly any man in the court--
and domestic affairs went to the temple for the priests to administer. Shonwa was their King, yet
he only knew what his subordinates chose to tell him.

"They are the same as always." Juxian had not seen the report that arrived that day, not with
Taeri sidetracking him so viciously. But the reports from Tzu Shen never changed; there was
nothing left in the western part of the country to conquer, and the troops would never get farther
east with the solid line of defense running through the middle of the country. Not even their quiet
allies in the south area of the border could get past the soldiers and witches that protected the
heart of the nation in the east. "More men are dead, and we haven't gained any ground." Even if
he was wrong, Shonwa would never know and Juxian would present the changes with the next
report as if new.

"I suppose not," Shonwa said in a voice suddenly even younger than his years, looking down at
his lap wearily. His hands shook where they rested on his knees. "Where is Hsien-yi? I need to
talk to him." Shonwa always called Hsien-yi when he needed advice that the rest of his court
couldn't give him. Hsien-yi was barely older than Shonwa and not the genius that Shonwa thought
him, but he was a witch and from Tzu Shen. The allure of a light-eyed foreigner who could cast
spells made up for many shortcomings in the eyes of such a young King.

"He's probably with your mother." Juxian knew that reminding Shonwa of his mother, and he
didn't care. Better to get Shonwa over this now, so that when they figured out what was wrong
with him and how to stop it he could grow up and take proper control of the country instead of
focusing on an infatuation. If that meant letting him think Juxian would associate with that witch,
then so be it. Even better if it finally made a rift between him and Taeri and Hsien-yi. "And I doubt
he knows anything. He left Tzu Shen when he was a child."

"He was there long enough to know how to be an adept," Shonwa said, looking up at him sharply.
The jade beaded into his long brown hair made a soft clicking sound as he spoke, a quiet
counterpoint to his angry words. "And how do you know what I want him here for? You spend all
of your time with the Lady Tai-li." He rarely used the Hansan transliteration of his mother's name;
he was angry. "And if you would teach me to use sutras, I wouldn't have to ask him."

He's only sixteen, Juxian told himself. Sometimes he lost sight of that fact, because it was rare
Shonwa forgot himself like this.

"I can't teach you what I don't understand myself, and I think you overestimate Hsien-yi's formal
education." He paused. "You've already talked to Hsien-yi. You wouldn't be calling spells and
witches by their Tzu Shen names if you hadn't. HE;s already told you he can't help you."

"No, he hasn't," Shonwa said, looking resolutely past Juxian and at the far wall. "Now go and find
him for me!"

"Of course, my lord," Juxian said coolly, and bowed and walked out of the throne room. He didn't
have to prostrate himself before the High King, not as a witch, and he knew Shonwa resented
that fact. It was an antiquated law from another time, one that was rarely invoked now-- powerful
witches had been common in the court before war had driven Hansa and Tzu Shen apart, but
now there were only the rare (and weak) natural-born witches to take advantage of the legal
favor. Were he anyone else-- besides Hsien-yi, and for the same reason-- he would have had to
bow to his lord's whims and would probably be sharing the boy's bed already. The very thought of
it made Juxian's skin crawl-- Shonwa was so young.

A colorful stone mosaic of the first High King, the Dragon spilled out from the throne and all the
way across the throne room. Juxian didn't walk around the outside of the mosaic as most people
did out of respect; he walked right across it, treading on the bejeweled face of the legendary King
without a second thought.

The mosaic pattern continued on into the hallway outside the throne room, where the doors led
into Taeri's and Shonwa's younger sister the Princess Chan-li's rooms, and the tiled picture went
from red and gold to blue and white. Out here it showed the other half of the battle that began on
the throne room floor. Further down were rooms that had once belonged to the other royal
children, and the one that the Lady Zhang Xan was allowed as a courtesy even though her son
hadn't succeeded his father to the throne. Most people assumed that Taeri had murdered Feitang
Hwan Zhang, although the less-credible rumors about the late High King's youngest son ranged
from his being alive and training as a witch in Tzu Shen to his having been sacrificed by Hsien-yi
and his now-missing brother Li-shao in some dark witch ritual that would give them power over all
Hansa.

That one obviously hadn't been true. Li-shao had fled the city and likely the country with another
witch when Shonwa ascended to the throne, and Hsien-yi had given up his aspirations of
grandeur and become Taeri's court pet. There were rumors, more quietly whispered than even
the ones saying Prince Feitang was still alive, that said Li-shao would come back for revenge and
the throne. After all, he'd made no promise of giving up his ambition when he fled. The laws
making witches royalty were old and little-used, but they still existed.

"Show some respect and do not step on her face," an accented voice spoke up, and Juxian
wondered if his luck was good or ill just then. The speaker was Hsien-yi, coming from Taeri's door
with his hair and clothing rumpled. Juxian had to wonder if he was actually sharing Taeri's bed,
because while they were taking pains to look that way Hsien-yi had never seemed the type to
take up with someone as evil as he was. "I said, do not step on her face."

It took Juxian a moment to realize why Hsien-yi was repeating himself. He had stopped walking,
caught up in his thoughts, and he stood right over the Empress of Tzu Shen's face on the mosaic.
Empress Ying-xian was one of the few rulers of that country to actually have her name
transliterated into Hansan and recorded for her accomplishments; she'd faced down the Dragon
and won, and been the entire cause of Hansa's war with Tzu Shen. Juxian moved quickly, before
Hsien-yi reached out and pulled him off bodily. Not out of respect for him or for her, but to avoid
the annoyance that making Hsien-yi angry was sure to bring. Taeri associated with him for a
reason.

"Our lord is looking for you," he said, the our lord he shared with Hsien-yi rather than the your
Majesty everyone else used for Shonwa. Juxian didn't like Hsien-yi and he certainly didn't trust
him, and it bothered him on some level that they shared such a personal bond as being the only
witches in the court. Even if they'd come by it very differently, it was something Juxian didn't like
sharing with him.

"Of course he is. He thinks I can teach him to be an adept." Hsien-yi pushed his long unbound
hair out of his eyes and carefully stepped around the figure of the Empress Ying-xian set into the
floor. Tiny blue stones spilled out around her, like they would if someone were ever to make a
mosaic out of Hsien-yi. Not that he would ever do something heroic like fight in a war; both he
and his brother were utterly selfish, and had been the entire time Juxian had known them. It was
hard to forget Hsien-yi was only just barely twenty years old, unlike with Shonwa's sixteen years.
He showed his youth in every cowardly word and action.

"I keep telling him it's something that he can't be taught, but evidently you've been telling him
differently. You brought it upon yourself." Juxian couldn't bring himself to feel even such a minor
bit of pity for flighty, foreign Hsien-yi. It was his own fault for building his position in Shonwa's
court on being the mysterious witch-- people treated him like the mysterious witch.

"But it can be taught. I learned." Hsien-yi tightened his sash as he walked, small sure hands
making quick work of the knot even without the aid of a mirror.

"Then lie to him. Stop bringing his hopes up on this and do something useful. Find a cure for
whatever it is that's wrong with him, or find a way to win this war we'll never get out of. If you can
make up a way to destroy half the High Temple or do whatever it is that Lady Tai-li has you do,
you can make up a way to destroy the army on the border or undo whatever it is that Lady Tai-li
has you do." Juxian knew it was stupid to suggest, but he couldn't help himself. It was wrong to
bait a young, impetuous man, and outright moronic to bait one who could destroy him where he
stood, but he was counting on the fact that for all his melodrama and imagined mystique Hsien-yi
had always been steady enough not to do anything as completely stupid as attacking Juxian in
the palace.

"I don't want to destroy the border army-- at least, not the one on the west side of the Haishao,"
Hsien-yi said, using the ugly, slurred Tzu Shen name for both the mountains at the border and the
river to the east of them. "And I know very well what's wrong with our lord." So that was how Taeri
had done it-- not poison or a foreign witch for hire or a curse, but with Hsien-yi. That the boy
would do something so treacherous, even at Taeri's urging, was simply unthinkable. Perhaps
Juxian had been wrong in his assessment that Hsien-yi was dramatic and pretentious but not
stupid.

He had Hsien-yi by the shoulders and had shoved him against the wall before the witch could
react to him.

"What is she doing? What are you doing?" Juxian demanded, clenching his fingers into Hsien-yi's
shoulders-- soft flesh that gave easily, because Hsien-yi had never needed to use a sword-- until
the witch winced. "Stop this madness at once."

"I haven't done anything," Hsien-yi said, trying to wriggle free and failing. "I said I knew what was
wrong. That doesn't mean that I did it, or that I can do anything to fix it! Use your head for once; I
can't turn a man's blood to poison or stop his heart, and you know it. If Lady Tai-li wanted that
done, she would have to hire someone else. And she wouldn't tell me about it."
"Fool," Juxian muttered, letting him go and stepping back. "Get to the throne room before Shonwa
decides to try and walk on the lake. If you haven't encouraged him to try it already, that is."

"Me, do something so obvious to kill the High King?" Hsien-yi actually threw his head back and
laughed. "I think you're the fool here. If I had real plans to kill our lord, you wouldn't even think to
ask me about them. When he turned up floating in Lake Hansa, it won't be my doing."

"Trust you with such a promise?" Juxian asked, walking back the way he'd come. He would take
the long way back. "I'd sooner trust Tai-li than you. At least I can understand what she hisses
behind the court's back, which is more than I can say for you."

He made sure to step on Ying-xian's face as he walked back towards his own quarters. It was
immature, certainly, a gesture he would have expected from the likes of Hsien-yi. It made him feel
better anyway.

As the weeks went on, however, no amount of disrespect to the memory of long-dead Tzu Shen
rulers could lift Juxian's mood. Shonwa grew steadily worse, his breath rattling in his chest and
every movement hesitant and shaking. Taeri grew even more arrogant and proud, which told him
that she had everything to do with Shonwa's illness; Hsien-yi was actually more reserved and
harried-looking, which told Juxian that either he had nothing to do with it, as he'd said, or he had
everything to do with it and wasn't killing the High King quickly enough for Taeri.

"I should go to the border," Shonwa said finally, his voice quiet from weeks of coughing. He'd
never been blooded, never seen combat before. He would need to do that if he wanted to die with
honor; being the High King gave him privileges beyond his sixteen years, but it also came with
adult responsibilities. A man didn't need to see battle to die with honor until he was twenty years
old-- unless he was the sovereign.

"You aren't going to die." Juxian spoke the words as if saying them would make them true. Maybe
they even would come true; he was a witch by birth, even if he was untrained and nearly useless
for it. "The auguries are never wrong."

"Fortunetelling from Juang is never wrong." It was one of the few things Juxian's home country
was known for and the one thing that kept Taeri in her son's court.

"It is when your mother is behind it." Juxian didn't let his voice shake. He wasn't the one dying--
but then, neither was Shonwa, he had to keep telling himself that in the hopes he could make it
true. "She tells nothing but lies."

"She told me I would be King," Shonwa said. He did not get along with his mother, but that didn't
mean he would deny her credit for the only truth she ever gave him. "And I was."

"Only because the rest of us let you. You ascended the throne in dishonor." He found himself
rising to the childish arguments again, this time with the intent of stamping them out. "Keep in
mind that the last of your older sisters is still out there somewhere, alive, and she hasn't
renounced her claim or dishonored herself. Keep in mind that Li-shao is still out there
somewhere, alive, and for all his being a witch and a coward he hasn't renounced his claim or
dishonored himself as you have. You have a younger sister here in Sha Hansa who might want
your throne someday. Your young brother may even be out there somewhere, alive and waiting
for the right moment to take your father's throne." Juxian rather doubted that Taeri had left Feitang
Hwan Zhang alive, but let Shonwa worry that his half-brother was lurking. If it would wake him up
to the danger and keep him alive, Juxian would scare him.

"Quiet!" Shonwa tried for commanding, but it came out a wheeze. "I did nothing to dishonor
myself."
"You were stupid enough to accept a challenge in your own name, instead of having someone
else take it for you. You were stupid enough not to absent yourself from the succession because
of your age, like your younger sister did. It wouldn't have killed you-- your mother was the only
one killing children in that succession. There is dishonor in stupidity, my lord, and you would do
well never to forget that. You dishonored your family name on both sides letting someone barely
older than you were humiliate you in front of the court. You conceded a challenge and begged for
your life. You had no honor left when the temple broke the law and put you on th throne, and it
was only because your sister and I had hope for you and those idiot brothers from Tzu Shen were
too stupid to see the opportunity it presented that you are alive to hold it now." Juxian should have
stopped after the first you were stupid, but he couldn't. He was too angry, he couldn't keep his
words under control anymore. "You sit there and wait to die while you know very well your mother
is behind this."

Shonwa stared at him for a moment, and then shakily rose from the throne.

"Sit down before you kill yourself," Juxian ordered.

"What is wrong with you?" Shonwa asked, taking one halting step towards Juxian and then
another. "She's done something to you, hasn't she."

"The only thing that's wrong with me is the fact that you're dying and I don't know how to stop it,"
Juxian said tightly, stepping back. "And you won't do anything to find out what it is or how to stop
it. Hsien-yi says he knows what's wrong but he can't stop it, and your mother is running amok like
she's the High King herself."

Shonwa stopped, his knees buckling under him, and crumpled to the floor amidst his ornate red
robes. Juxian took two steps forward and knelt down next to his King.

"Why do you have to be like this?" Shonwa asked, bowing his head as the King should never do.
"You won't look twice at me, and I can't order you to like I can anyone else. What do I have to do
to get you to stop treating me like a child like this?"

"Get older," Juxian said, because it was the only thing he could say.

"It won't matter when I do." Shonwa looked up at him, eyes dull under all of the paint. "You'll still
treat me like I'm twelve years old."

"Then act like the High King and not like a boy your age. Don't make all of us regret the fact we
stepped aside for you."

"What is going on here?" It was Taeri, of all the people that could make this situation worse.

"Go away, Mother," Shonwa said, voice firmer than it had been with Juxian a moment before, and
he managed to stand up. He got halfway across the throne room before his knees gave way
under him again.

As he fell, the draperies behind the throne began smoldering and were fully aflame in another
instant.

"You'll burn down the whole palace!" Shonwa said in horror, as if Juxian had done it. Juxian hadn't
done this, though; he'd had his share of accidents in the past, and a not entirely undeserved
reputation for making things like this happen without meaning to, but this wasn't his work. He
wasn't particularly angry now-- quite to the contrary, actually-- and that was what usually
presaged things like that. There was no loss of control, nothing to suggest that he was behind
this.
"What in the names of your ancestors is going on here?" It took a lot to shock Taeri, but walking
into her son's throne room and seeing the drapery catch fire and ignite the tapestries in turn was
one way to do it. She had a group of court ladies with her, her daughter-- the Princess Chan-li--
and the Lady Zhang Xan and a few others not important enough for Juxian to know by name.

"Someone should get Hsien-yi," the Lady Zhang Xan suggested timidly, taking a step backwards
right into Taeri.

"Of course," Taeri said coolly, her words almost parting the group of women. They all shifted in
expectation of being the one asked to go. "Chali, you go. You know where Hsien-yi goes off to
when he's feeling contrary. The rest of us will stay here and make sure the High King comes to no
harm."

Chan-li did as she was told, even if she glared at her mother for not using the Hansan name she
preferred to her birth one. For all her suggestions of helping the King, though, Taeri went back to
the door with her women as quickly as she could. Only Lady Zhang Xan stepped forward to help;
she was too short to really help Shonwa to the door, but she did steady him enough for Juxian to
do the job.

"Looking for a way to kill my son, are we?" Taeri asked when the reached her outside the room,
smiling. Lady Zhang Xan drew back, as close to the door as she could get. It had to be
uncomfortable for her, but she seemed to prefer the heat of the door to the chill of Taeri's
displeasure.

"What did you people manage to do now?" Hsien-yi asked, slinking down the hallway with Chan-li
stumbling along behind him. He looked half-asleep; Chan-li had probably awakened him. He still
had his elegant air, though, even with his clothing rumpled and his hair tied back. Then again, it
wasn't much worse than he looked when he slipped out of Taeri's room at all hours of the day. It
was almost his natural state to look like that, of late. "She was going on about how General
Saeng managed to light the King on fire."

"Everything but me, actually," Shonwa managed before he slumped over coughing. Juxian didn't
bother protesting. Hsien-yi ignored him and motioned for everyone to stand clear; they all took
refuge in the doorway of a nearby room; hopefully whomever owned it wouldn't be coming back
anytime soon. None of them actually went into the room except for Shonwa, who Juxian set on a
chair next to the open shutters. All of the women were pushing one another aside for a better look
at whatever it was that Hsien-yi would do; even Juxian, who would have died before admitting he
was at all interested in whatever it was that Hsien-yi was about to do, took a place among them
once Shonwa was settled. He and Taeri were at an advantage to see, being considerably taller
than the others.

Hsien-yi untied his wide sash and wrapped it around his face. He looked ridiculous with
embroidered feather-patterns covering his nose and mouth, but he ignored the ladies' laughter
(only the Lady Zhang Xan was silent out of the group) and threw the doors open. There was a
brief scorching blast of air and smoke before it was under control, the air still and cool in the
hallway again. The stillness followed Hsien-yi as he walked into the throne room, and the group
slowly migrated over to the main door to get a better look.

The fire was spreading further; books and documents in the back of the room had fed it to
monstrous proportions. Hsien-yi made it to the center of the room surrounded by his quiet chill,
until he stood almost over the face of the Dragon, before he was forced back by the heat even he
couldn't completely contain. Stones popped out of the mosaic at his feet as if he'd removed the
mortar and the air rippled around him, but nothing happened to the fire. He simply stood there
motionless, and Juxian was sure he was about to pass out from lack of air or die from breathing
in the heat. Then one of the windows cracked and then shattered, the rush of warm damp air from
outside sending the fire flaring higher for an instant before Hsien-yi took advantage of it.

He turned suddenly, so that he faced away from the fire, and two more windows burst; whether it
was from the heat and pressure or because of something Hsien-yi did, Juxian didn't know. More
air from outside rushed in and it brought moisture with it; that was exactly what Hsien-yi needed
to work with. He began muttering in the Tzu Shen language, high sharp words telling the water in
the air exactly what to do. More precious stones popped out of the floor and walls, the trace
moisture in the mortar sublimating under his command, and one court lady who inched too far in
the doorway screamed as he face and hands were burned red. She looked as if she'd spent too
long in the sun. This was Hsien-yi's personal form of witchcraft, making the water listen to him. It
was through having to work with him in the court that Juxian knew water hid in the most random
places, from air to mortar to the skin of a pampered noblewoman.

"Stop playing and do something," Taeri said, but her voice was lost in the sound of the fire and
Hsien-yi's strange foreign words. His voice abruptly changed tone, hissing and staccato, and the
fire sputtered. He continued, relentless and getting louder, and the fire got smaller. Then it
sputtered and crackled and flared up again as if Hsien-yi hadn't done anything at all. After another
moment the group had to draw back from the door because of the smoke and heat, but then the
faint patter of rain against the roof began to rise over the crackling.

"It doesn't help if it's outside," Chan-li jeered, as if the entire situation were a game and they
hadn't just been forced back into the hallway from a fire that was rapidly spreading out of control.
She wasn't so much like her mother as she sounded just then, really. Seeing a witch from Tzu
Shen struggle miserably like this was a game in and of itself to most Hansans, no matter how
moral or upstanding they might otherwise be. The rain picked up, pounding hard enough to rattle
the shutters in the rooms down the hall. They could hear it, even through the thin sliding doors of
wood and fabric; Shonwa must have been getting soaked where he sat. Water was coming in
through the throne room windows, and a fourth and then a fifth heavy pane of glass (no rice
paper windows in the throne room, not when storms swept down the plains and right through the
capital all summer) cracked and gave way for it. Juxian threw an arm over his face, so that his
heavy sleeve (the only good thing about a country whose clothes were long and ornate even in
the hot, rainy season) covered his nose and mouth, and took a step forward again. He couldn't
see anything from where he was, not with the smoke and steam and hissing hot air. There was no
way Hsien-yi could still be alive in there, but he had to be. Juxian could still hear him. Finally,
another one of the ladies darted forward and closed the door, and then ran back coughing and
teary-eyed.

"Help him," Lady Zhang Xan implored quietly, too softly for Taeri or anyone else to hear. She was
closest to the throne room door, being the least in Taeri's favor of the group. The former High
King's last and youngest concubine was soft-spoken and kind but not naive; she was quiet and
demure because she knew it made her seem less a threat to the rest of the court and thus kept
her alive. That, and Juxian was sure that Taeri wanted her alive so she could watch the woman
suffer not knowing if her young son was alive in exile or rotting at the bottom of Lake Hansa.
Letting Taeri know that she wouldn't be swayed by rumors of her son's death would have been a
mistake.

"I can't do anything for him," Juxian said through the muffling of his sleeve, but went forward
anyway. At the very least, he might have been able to drag Hsien-yi out alive and have the throne
room sealed off until the fire burned itself out. The walls were thick stone and the windows high;
as long as it was contained, the fire wasn't likely to spread further. Juxian would have picked a
good room to lose his temper and start a blaze in, had he actually been behind this. There was
nothing to be done about the books and maps and records; most of them had copies in the High
Temple, and they were likely already destroyed either by the fire or the rain.

By the time Juxian got the door open again, though, it had gone silent inside the throne room.
When he opened the door with his already-burned hands, steam rolled out into the hallway as if it
were a bathhouse and he thought he could hear Hsien-yi gasping for breath from the middle of
the room. The fire was out, the walls scorched and the draperies and books long since burned
away. Lady Zhang Xan was beside him, having pushed past all the other ladies. Neither Taeri nor
Chan-li made any move to help.

"We need to get him outside," the Lady Zhang Xan said, lifting her delicate skirts and stepping
carefully through the small loose stones strewn about the floor. Hsien-yi knelt on the floor, hands
pressed to the stones to keep himself upright as he coughed and gagged. "Come, you need to
get out of here."

"Hsien-yi," Juxian said firmly, leaning down and pulling Hsien-yi upright with an arm around his
shoulders. Lady Zhang Xan took the other side; she was too short to help Shonwa (who had his
mother's height) but was the perfect size to steady the diminutive Hsien-yi. In fact, if she'd had the
strength to do it alone Juxian would have preferred it that way; he had to stoop down
uncomfortably to help a man over a head shorter than he was. They got him out into the hallway
before he collapsed to his knees again and Juxian had to carry him, though it probably would
have been faster to do that in the first place. Hsien-yi was even lighter than his height suggested.

"We may as well have let it burn itself out, for all the good he did," Taeri said critically, eyeing the
throne room as Juxian carried Hsien-yi past her and Lady Zhang Xan followed them anxiously.

"Bitch," Hsien-yi said, voice hoarse, but only Juxian and the Lady Zhang Xan heard him. He
broke off into another coughing fit against Juxian's shoulder.

"I'll take care of him from here," Taeri said, coming up behind them as they reached a door into
one of the numerous courtyards honeycombing the palace. It was still raining, but she didn't seem
to care. "Go and see to my son, both of you."