Chapter Five
They were in the laboratory. Yaone hated the place; things moved in ways that they should not move, metal working against metal, liquid moving through liquid in a way that was a thousand miles from the simpler stills and alembics of her own craft. Patterns flickered across a computer screen, fluctuating to the rhythms of a pulse. Not her own pulse, fast as it was, but something lighter, quicker. A child's pulse.
"Where is Lirin?" she asked.
"Oh?" Nii released her arm, turned to the rabbit doll again. "There you are, I told you how she couldn't be trusted. Changing her mind already." He laughed, a small cough of a noise. "Show them the carrots and watch them jump."
Yaone folded her arms, shoulders rigid and tense. "You knew that I'd ask about her when you brought me here. It's not impossible to care about more than one thing at the same time."
"Isn't it?" His hand slid lewdly under the doll's clothing. "Don't you believe in -- overmastering passions?"
Try to think as he thinks . . .
"That makes people dolls," she answered. "You do like dolls, don't you, Nii-hakase?"
"My, my." He looked at her, eyes like needles. "Sharper, sharper -- be careful, you'll cut yourself. You want me to tell you where Lirin is, mm? Why should I? We didn't bargain over that."
"No. We didn't. But if you do . . ." Dolls. He makes people into dolls. He thinks he knows what motivates us, what makes us puppets that he can pick up and put down again. Anger stirred in her, very deep, very near to the bone. Kougaiji-sama. Dokugakuji. Myself. Last night's little drama. All a game to him. "If you do I'll answer a question for you." She smiled. It took all she had not to bare her teeth.
"Ohhh." He stepped closer to her. "Mm. I like that."
She wasn't going to shy away.
He grinned and nodded. "I'll play. Tell me, Yaone-kun . . . tell me what Gyokumen said to you that time. And what you answered."
Yaone stiffened. Her first response, hot and furious, of how did you know? died in her throat. Of course he could guess. He was the woman's lover. Of course he could suspect some of it.
"Still want to play?"
She twitched a shoulder, hands balling into fists at her side. "I was summoned to her presence shortly after vowing to serve Kougaiji-sama. He was absent at the time. She was in her private chambers."
The bunny tipped its head to one side as Nii stroked it.
"Two of her waiting women were with her." The words came out in jerks. She could still remember the way that the lamps had been low and burned with perfumed oils. "She didn't send them away."
"Mm . . why should she? Oh, go on." The bunny jerked its head in a nod.
Long flowing robes of silk that concealed their bodies, their nails, their knives. Faces sealed and shuttered, but eyes full of knowledge. It wasn't the first time they'd witnessed something like this. "I knelt before the Empress. She was as sweet as honey." She had smelt of vanilla and spices. "She said that she was aware that Prince Kougaiji had taken me into his service, and that naturally she took an interest in his affairs." She wouldn't mention that the bitch had said, my son. She wouldn't dignify that with remembrance.
Nii waited.
"She said, I am quite sure that your greatest concern will be the safety of -- of Prince Kougaiji -- and of my beloved daughter. She said, I am sure that you have an interest in their welfare. She reached down and put her hand under my chin so that I looked up at her."
Nii's fingers brushed her neck, moved to cup her chin. "Like that, mm?"
Of course he'd know.
"Like that."
"Mm."
"And she said, I am quite sure that we understand each other?"
"And what did you say?"
"I said yes."
"And you did understand each other?"
Yaone met Nii's eyes. "We did. And that was all."
He turned away, releasing her chin.
"It was petty, wasn't it?" She remembered Gyokumen in the hall -- was that earlier? Or was it still now, somewhere in this timeless moment? -- and the light in her eyes, the satisfaction in her posture. Did she ask Doku something like that? Possibly. Will I ever ask him about it? No.
"Now why do you say that?"
Yaone shrugged. The memory still hung around her, foul as overripe fruit, but it was all of a piece with this place; this tower, these people, this world. "Because it was."
"She could change her mind, decide to prove the point." Nii turned back to smile at her. His tongue flicked out to touch the edge of his lips. "What would you do then, mm?"
Yaone shrugged. Hate. But not despair. "She did prove the point. She knew, I knew, she knew that I knew. That was all she wanted."
"So easy, so easy . . . very well. Lirin. The Princess is in a pillar of glass, fast asleep. The pillar is somewhere in the laboratory. So what will you do now, mm? Find her and kiss her awake?" He chuckled again.
"Maybe. I will consider." She forced stiff lips into a smile, and would not, would not let herself shake with relief from the tension that had gripped her. Perhaps I won that. Perhaps I came out even. Just to come out even . . .
A coldness touched her spine. When did this become a game?
Nii took a couple of steps, walking around her. "And you think, that was easy, mm? I can handle him. Like a doll. That you didn't really pay anything -- important. But you're always going to know that you told me about it, aren't you? When you look at her, mm, at me. That I know all about it . . ."
The world rippled like water around her. She was standing next to Dokugakuji, behind Kougaji, in the throne room where Gyokumen sat on the throne and delivered judgement. Nii-hakase was not there; no time had passed, nothing had been missed or lost.
"I know," she said softly. "I know."
---
After court was over, several corridors away from the throne room, Dokugakuji propped his shoulders against the wall and stretched, yawning. His body arched gracefully, like Yaone's own spear, and the skirts of his white robe brushed against the floor.
Yaone tried to laugh. "Would you be feeling better now?"
He pulled away from the wall, rolling his shoulders. "Anything's better than there."
"I know where Lirin is," she said, quickly, before she could think better of it and stop herself. "You asked, in there, but I couldn't say then. She's in a pillar of glass, somewhere in the laboratory -- probably like the one that Kougaiji-sama was in. She's asleep."
Dokugakuji looked at her, silent for a moment, eyes dark. "Why are you telling me that, Yaone? Do you have some sort of plan for rescuing her right this minute?"
"No." She looked away. "I just want to make sure you know."
"In case?"
"In case."
Footsteps whispered on the stone floor, and a shadow appeared at the end of the hallway. They both turned to look.
"It's always good to have an "in case"," the strange youkai from the throne room said. He stood balanced on both feet, his posture all casual arrogance. "I do have the right people, I think? The Prince's servitors?"
"You do," Dokugakuji answered. Out of the corner of her eye, Yaone saw his body tense, ready to strike or dodge. Without conscious thought, her left hand drifted down to the pouches which hung at her belt. "You would be?"
"Zakuro." He shook his hair back from his face, shoulders squared to show off his chest, hips cocked in loose display. He waited for a moment, as though expecting a reaction, then bared his teeth in a smile. "I would like to make a proposition to you."
"You have our full attention," Yaone said politely.
Silence hung in the air. Nobody was prowling this part of the palace at the moment. No scurrying servants, no graceful courtiers, no guards, no slaves.
How interestingly devoid of witnesses, Yaone thought.
Zakuro gestured gracefully. "I've had it suggested to me that you might want to consider travelling south for a while. I'm told that Prince Kougaiji has estates in that direction, and that his servitors might very well spend a while there in peace and quiet, far from the troubles that loyalty can involve us all in. I thought I'd pass this on, in a disinterested sort of way." He spoke with a fluid rapidity, voice accented and cadenced in a way that reminded Yaone of something. Mnemonic rhymes. That's it. Rhythms that catch in your mind and snag there. "From one stranger at court to another."
"We're hardly strangers here," Dokugakuji began, words still within the limits of civility, but sharp. "And -- "
"I must differ," Zakuro broke in. "You're only involved with one person here, from what I've heard? And with his opinions, well, changed . . ." He let the sentence trail away.
"I am afraid you are mistaken," Yaone said, words paid out one by one, eyes on his face. If he tries something he'll do it now that he knows we won't play along. "We have no intention of leaving court."
"I see."
He looked at her, then turned to meet Dokugakuji's eyes.
"I would say that's a pity, but frankly, you should have known better."
Dokugakuji froze, stiffening in position.
"Struggle! Fight!" Zakuro spoke as though to Dokugakuji alone, tone all mockery and condescension. "But how can you fight when there's nobody there to fight, Dokugakuji? You're trapped in my world!"
"What have you done?" she hissed in fury.
Fingers touched her left arm, fever hot against the youkai marking, then brushed for a moment against her eyelids.
Zakuro laughed. "He's trapped in the world of Zakuro-sama! Where I alone am lord! I control everything there! And you too, why should you be left out of it?"
Step by step. She was an apothecary and always would be, whatever else might happen, whatever she might need to do. One worked by careful steps, the cunning hand, the precise eye, the requirements of the task known, the parameters established.
He'd looked Dokugakuji in the eyes and something had changed. He'd taken great pains to look him in the eyes.
Body memory. Remember where you stand. Remember what you were doing. Remember where your fingers are.
She shut her eyes.
"Oh, clever, clever . . ." Zakuro mocked her. "Shall we play games in the dark together?"
Her fingers moved to the correct pouch, slipped the knot that held it closed, flipped out one of the wax-coated balls there.
"Do you think you can throw that and hit me with it?" His laugh echoed round the corridor. "You don't even know where I am! I might be right next to you --"
Petty. Good. She broke the flashpowder ball between her fingers, and it detonated in a burst of light which hurt her eyes even through closed lids, burning her glove and scorching her hand.
Zakuro screamed. The noise came from her left, two paces away, abrupt and genuine. She called her spear into her hands as she turned, gritting her teeth at the pain as she wrapped her burned hand around the wooden shaft, and slammed it directly into him.
A thud. A choke. A collapse. Spear against body, body against wall, body shifting down to the floor . . . She reversed her grip, spinning the spear in her hands, and brought the point round in a quick arc until it touched something which gave under pressure. There. No further. Yet. She held position, keeping the distance between point and floor constant.
"If you kill me," Zakuro spat at her, "your friend will be dead too, and what will the Prince do for a catamite then?"
Yaone felt her mouth curve into a thin smile. "Probably no worse than the Empress will when she tries to find another disposable agent." The quality of the pressure against her spearpoint altered, and she leaned forward till she heard Zakuro gasp. "No. Please don't try anything, Zakuro-san. I think it's better if we both walk away from this, don't you? Then I don't need to explain to Kougaiji-sama how you tried to kill Dokugakuji."
"You think he'd care?"
Still no sound from Dokugakuji. She resisted the urge to open her eyes and look.
"Perhaps not in the way you think," she said, paying out the words, "but yes. We are his sworn servants, Zakuro-san. We are useful. That's why he keeps us." And there was another reason. There will be another reason. I will make it so. "So now I suggest that you release Dokugakuji from your trance, and then I will release you, because I do not wish to have to explain to Gyokumen Koushu . . ." the light the smell the closeness her hand on me ". . . why I have killed one of her servants. That, Zakuro-san, is how these matters are conducted in polite society."
He was silent for a moment. "You will release me?"
"Kougaiji-sama could kill you without needing to explain his actions." Her body was a drawn bow, ready to move and release. "It would be harder for me."
"It would, wouldn't it?" He laughed nastily.
Something released in the air -- a tension snapped, a thread broken. From three paces to her right, Dokugakuji said, "What?" Then again, louder, angrier, "What the fuck?"
Yaone swung the spear away and back, and stepped back from Zakuro. "Run," she suggested helpfully.
Footsteps scurried away down the corridor, present one moment, absent the next. She raised an arm to bar Dokugakuji's way. "I'll explain in a moment," she said, eyes still closed.
But really, next to Nii-hakase, Zakuro had been simple in motivation and action. Comprehended. Dealt with. Managed, until the next time. She'd used her tools and won.
When did this become a game?
---
They were in the laboratory. Yaone hated the place; things moved in ways that they should not move, metal working against metal, liquid moving through liquid in a way that was a thousand miles from the simpler stills and alembics of her own craft. Patterns flickered across a computer screen, fluctuating to the rhythms of a pulse. Not her own pulse, fast as it was, but something lighter, quicker. A child's pulse.
"Where is Lirin?" she asked.
"Oh?" Nii released her arm, turned to the rabbit doll again. "There you are, I told you how she couldn't be trusted. Changing her mind already." He laughed, a small cough of a noise. "Show them the carrots and watch them jump."
Yaone folded her arms, shoulders rigid and tense. "You knew that I'd ask about her when you brought me here. It's not impossible to care about more than one thing at the same time."
"Isn't it?" His hand slid lewdly under the doll's clothing. "Don't you believe in -- overmastering passions?"
Try to think as he thinks . . .
"That makes people dolls," she answered. "You do like dolls, don't you, Nii-hakase?"
"My, my." He looked at her, eyes like needles. "Sharper, sharper -- be careful, you'll cut yourself. You want me to tell you where Lirin is, mm? Why should I? We didn't bargain over that."
"No. We didn't. But if you do . . ." Dolls. He makes people into dolls. He thinks he knows what motivates us, what makes us puppets that he can pick up and put down again. Anger stirred in her, very deep, very near to the bone. Kougaiji-sama. Dokugakuji. Myself. Last night's little drama. All a game to him. "If you do I'll answer a question for you." She smiled. It took all she had not to bare her teeth.
"Ohhh." He stepped closer to her. "Mm. I like that."
She wasn't going to shy away.
He grinned and nodded. "I'll play. Tell me, Yaone-kun . . . tell me what Gyokumen said to you that time. And what you answered."
Yaone stiffened. Her first response, hot and furious, of how did you know? died in her throat. Of course he could guess. He was the woman's lover. Of course he could suspect some of it.
"Still want to play?"
She twitched a shoulder, hands balling into fists at her side. "I was summoned to her presence shortly after vowing to serve Kougaiji-sama. He was absent at the time. She was in her private chambers."
The bunny tipped its head to one side as Nii stroked it.
"Two of her waiting women were with her." The words came out in jerks. She could still remember the way that the lamps had been low and burned with perfumed oils. "She didn't send them away."
"Mm . . why should she? Oh, go on." The bunny jerked its head in a nod.
Long flowing robes of silk that concealed their bodies, their nails, their knives. Faces sealed and shuttered, but eyes full of knowledge. It wasn't the first time they'd witnessed something like this. "I knelt before the Empress. She was as sweet as honey." She had smelt of vanilla and spices. "She said that she was aware that Prince Kougaiji had taken me into his service, and that naturally she took an interest in his affairs." She wouldn't mention that the bitch had said, my son. She wouldn't dignify that with remembrance.
Nii waited.
"She said, I am quite sure that your greatest concern will be the safety of -- of Prince Kougaiji -- and of my beloved daughter. She said, I am sure that you have an interest in their welfare. She reached down and put her hand under my chin so that I looked up at her."
Nii's fingers brushed her neck, moved to cup her chin. "Like that, mm?"
Of course he'd know.
"Like that."
"Mm."
"And she said, I am quite sure that we understand each other?"
"And what did you say?"
"I said yes."
"And you did understand each other?"
Yaone met Nii's eyes. "We did. And that was all."
He turned away, releasing her chin.
"It was petty, wasn't it?" She remembered Gyokumen in the hall -- was that earlier? Or was it still now, somewhere in this timeless moment? -- and the light in her eyes, the satisfaction in her posture. Did she ask Doku something like that? Possibly. Will I ever ask him about it? No.
"Now why do you say that?"
Yaone shrugged. The memory still hung around her, foul as overripe fruit, but it was all of a piece with this place; this tower, these people, this world. "Because it was."
"She could change her mind, decide to prove the point." Nii turned back to smile at her. His tongue flicked out to touch the edge of his lips. "What would you do then, mm?"
Yaone shrugged. Hate. But not despair. "She did prove the point. She knew, I knew, she knew that I knew. That was all she wanted."
"So easy, so easy . . . very well. Lirin. The Princess is in a pillar of glass, fast asleep. The pillar is somewhere in the laboratory. So what will you do now, mm? Find her and kiss her awake?" He chuckled again.
"Maybe. I will consider." She forced stiff lips into a smile, and would not, would not let herself shake with relief from the tension that had gripped her. Perhaps I won that. Perhaps I came out even. Just to come out even . . .
A coldness touched her spine. When did this become a game?
Nii took a couple of steps, walking around her. "And you think, that was easy, mm? I can handle him. Like a doll. That you didn't really pay anything -- important. But you're always going to know that you told me about it, aren't you? When you look at her, mm, at me. That I know all about it . . ."
The world rippled like water around her. She was standing next to Dokugakuji, behind Kougaji, in the throne room where Gyokumen sat on the throne and delivered judgement. Nii-hakase was not there; no time had passed, nothing had been missed or lost.
"I know," she said softly. "I know."
---
After court was over, several corridors away from the throne room, Dokugakuji propped his shoulders against the wall and stretched, yawning. His body arched gracefully, like Yaone's own spear, and the skirts of his white robe brushed against the floor.
Yaone tried to laugh. "Would you be feeling better now?"
He pulled away from the wall, rolling his shoulders. "Anything's better than there."
"I know where Lirin is," she said, quickly, before she could think better of it and stop herself. "You asked, in there, but I couldn't say then. She's in a pillar of glass, somewhere in the laboratory -- probably like the one that Kougaiji-sama was in. She's asleep."
Dokugakuji looked at her, silent for a moment, eyes dark. "Why are you telling me that, Yaone? Do you have some sort of plan for rescuing her right this minute?"
"No." She looked away. "I just want to make sure you know."
"In case?"
"In case."
Footsteps whispered on the stone floor, and a shadow appeared at the end of the hallway. They both turned to look.
"It's always good to have an "in case"," the strange youkai from the throne room said. He stood balanced on both feet, his posture all casual arrogance. "I do have the right people, I think? The Prince's servitors?"
"You do," Dokugakuji answered. Out of the corner of her eye, Yaone saw his body tense, ready to strike or dodge. Without conscious thought, her left hand drifted down to the pouches which hung at her belt. "You would be?"
"Zakuro." He shook his hair back from his face, shoulders squared to show off his chest, hips cocked in loose display. He waited for a moment, as though expecting a reaction, then bared his teeth in a smile. "I would like to make a proposition to you."
"You have our full attention," Yaone said politely.
Silence hung in the air. Nobody was prowling this part of the palace at the moment. No scurrying servants, no graceful courtiers, no guards, no slaves.
How interestingly devoid of witnesses, Yaone thought.
Zakuro gestured gracefully. "I've had it suggested to me that you might want to consider travelling south for a while. I'm told that Prince Kougaiji has estates in that direction, and that his servitors might very well spend a while there in peace and quiet, far from the troubles that loyalty can involve us all in. I thought I'd pass this on, in a disinterested sort of way." He spoke with a fluid rapidity, voice accented and cadenced in a way that reminded Yaone of something. Mnemonic rhymes. That's it. Rhythms that catch in your mind and snag there. "From one stranger at court to another."
"We're hardly strangers here," Dokugakuji began, words still within the limits of civility, but sharp. "And -- "
"I must differ," Zakuro broke in. "You're only involved with one person here, from what I've heard? And with his opinions, well, changed . . ." He let the sentence trail away.
"I am afraid you are mistaken," Yaone said, words paid out one by one, eyes on his face. If he tries something he'll do it now that he knows we won't play along. "We have no intention of leaving court."
"I see."
He looked at her, then turned to meet Dokugakuji's eyes.
"I would say that's a pity, but frankly, you should have known better."
Dokugakuji froze, stiffening in position.
"Struggle! Fight!" Zakuro spoke as though to Dokugakuji alone, tone all mockery and condescension. "But how can you fight when there's nobody there to fight, Dokugakuji? You're trapped in my world!"
"What have you done?" she hissed in fury.
Fingers touched her left arm, fever hot against the youkai marking, then brushed for a moment against her eyelids.
Zakuro laughed. "He's trapped in the world of Zakuro-sama! Where I alone am lord! I control everything there! And you too, why should you be left out of it?"
Step by step. She was an apothecary and always would be, whatever else might happen, whatever she might need to do. One worked by careful steps, the cunning hand, the precise eye, the requirements of the task known, the parameters established.
He'd looked Dokugakuji in the eyes and something had changed. He'd taken great pains to look him in the eyes.
Body memory. Remember where you stand. Remember what you were doing. Remember where your fingers are.
She shut her eyes.
"Oh, clever, clever . . ." Zakuro mocked her. "Shall we play games in the dark together?"
Her fingers moved to the correct pouch, slipped the knot that held it closed, flipped out one of the wax-coated balls there.
"Do you think you can throw that and hit me with it?" His laugh echoed round the corridor. "You don't even know where I am! I might be right next to you --"
Petty. Good. She broke the flashpowder ball between her fingers, and it detonated in a burst of light which hurt her eyes even through closed lids, burning her glove and scorching her hand.
Zakuro screamed. The noise came from her left, two paces away, abrupt and genuine. She called her spear into her hands as she turned, gritting her teeth at the pain as she wrapped her burned hand around the wooden shaft, and slammed it directly into him.
A thud. A choke. A collapse. Spear against body, body against wall, body shifting down to the floor . . . She reversed her grip, spinning the spear in her hands, and brought the point round in a quick arc until it touched something which gave under pressure. There. No further. Yet. She held position, keeping the distance between point and floor constant.
"If you kill me," Zakuro spat at her, "your friend will be dead too, and what will the Prince do for a catamite then?"
Yaone felt her mouth curve into a thin smile. "Probably no worse than the Empress will when she tries to find another disposable agent." The quality of the pressure against her spearpoint altered, and she leaned forward till she heard Zakuro gasp. "No. Please don't try anything, Zakuro-san. I think it's better if we both walk away from this, don't you? Then I don't need to explain to Kougaiji-sama how you tried to kill Dokugakuji."
"You think he'd care?"
Still no sound from Dokugakuji. She resisted the urge to open her eyes and look.
"Perhaps not in the way you think," she said, paying out the words, "but yes. We are his sworn servants, Zakuro-san. We are useful. That's why he keeps us." And there was another reason. There will be another reason. I will make it so. "So now I suggest that you release Dokugakuji from your trance, and then I will release you, because I do not wish to have to explain to Gyokumen Koushu . . ." the light the smell the closeness her hand on me ". . . why I have killed one of her servants. That, Zakuro-san, is how these matters are conducted in polite society."
He was silent for a moment. "You will release me?"
"Kougaiji-sama could kill you without needing to explain his actions." Her body was a drawn bow, ready to move and release. "It would be harder for me."
"It would, wouldn't it?" He laughed nastily.
Something released in the air -- a tension snapped, a thread broken. From three paces to her right, Dokugakuji said, "What?" Then again, louder, angrier, "What the fuck?"
Yaone swung the spear away and back, and stepped back from Zakuro. "Run," she suggested helpfully.
Footsteps scurried away down the corridor, present one moment, absent the next. She raised an arm to bar Dokugakuji's way. "I'll explain in a moment," she said, eyes still closed.
But really, next to Nii-hakase, Zakuro had been simple in motivation and action. Comprehended. Dealt with. Managed, until the next time. She'd used her tools and won.
When did this become a game?
---
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