Darkening Skies Read online

  The young man rose up to his knees and backed to the doorway before bowing his face to the floor once more, then standing and leaving.

  Bored sapphire eyes turned to inspect Lanfen.

  “Which mud-farm village are you from?” the grandmaster asked in a rude tone she was much more accustomed to hearing. She opened her mouth to answer, but was stopped by another dismissive wave of his hand. Firelight glinted off the precious metals and stones in his many rings. “Never mind, I don’t care. I can hardly keep track of them anymore, anyway. Tell me about the latest chosen one. The child is the reason you’ve come here, is he not?”

  Lanfen thought it likely that when faced with this grandmaster’s rudeness, most people cowered and faltered, uncertain of how to proceed, but his discourtesy didn’t upset her composure. She had dealt with many a merchant and noble so rich they could no longer feel anything but superiority.

  She bowed deeply, exposing the back of her neck as if the grandmaster were no more than a fragile elderly man.

  “My apologies for interrupting your evening rest, grandfather,” she said, her voice a patronizing coo. “Your granddaughter will be quick so you can make your way to bed. This child is the thunderbird. He has a moon-mark of the Deep Root for thunder behind his right ear. I will bring him close so your tired eyes can see.”

  She knelt on the edge of the lavish rug and held Raijin out across the desk. With one finger, she folded her son’s tiny ear flat to better expose the pale mark.

  The grandmaster snorted. “Have you any idea how many ancient symbols that supposedly say ‘thunder’ and ‘rain’ and ‘rainbird’ and ‘storm’ I see every year, woman? Never mind that most of you rural bumpkins are too ignorant to tell a moon-mark from a smear of white sauce, let alone read the ancestors’ language. How many of them do you think can actually be the chosen one?”

  “One, grandfather. This one.”

  “Get that bastard whelp out of my face and go back to your teahouse, granddaughter,” he sneered. “I’m sure you have customers waiting.”

  With that dismissal, the grandmaster spread his scroll across his desk once more and returned to his reading as if she were no longer there.

  Lanfen scowled. The weight of the pouch, so reassuring on her journey up the mountain, now hung heavy in her robes. The pipe and sticky ball of brown qajong inside seemed to burn her skin through the layers of fabric. Panic prickled down her arms and into her fingertips, and she saw her son’s life stretch out in two parallel paths: one growing up in the teahouse with a mother who entertained men for room, board, and opiate money and the other in this school.

  In her heart, she knew Raijin was the chosen one. Whether the grandmaster realized the truth didn’t matter. All that mattered was the honorable life her son could lead here.

  Holding Raijin to her heart, Lanfen backed away from the desk off the precious rug and pressed her face to the rattan.

  “Apologies, venerable Grandmaster. Please forgive this lowly sensha’s insolence. She was ignorant and arrogant to assume that her knowledge outweighed the grandmaster’s infinite wisdom. She begs you, please do not turn away this child. His mother’s sins are not his, and her dishonor should not be his, either.” She wasn’t surprised to feel tears wetting the mat beneath her eyelids. “Please, revered Grandmaster, if not as a student, then take this child on as a servant. He is weaned and will soon be old enough to complete simple tasks. He need not be a burden, but a boon to your school.”

  “This isn’t a monastery where you can drop off your unwanted bastards,” the grandmaster said without looking up. “Find the door and leave by it.”

  His words struck like a fist to Lanfen’s solar plexus. She stifled the sob of desperation that shook her shoulders.

  “Please, Grandmaster,” she begged. “Please reconsider.”

  The soft grunt of a cleared throat came from behind Lanfen.

  “Apologies for the intrusion,” a throaty, elderly voice said.

  Lanfen crawled backward once more and turned to the side so she would not be disrespecting either the grandmaster or this new arrival by giving them her back.

  In the doorway stood a stooped, balding, wrinkled old man much closer to her imagined monk. Unlike the grandmaster, the old man’s brown eyes shined from beneath his wild brows with warmth and barely contained humor.

  The grandmaster sighed. “What is it, Master Chugi?”

  “If the grandmaster would honor Chugi so greatly as to consider his input, the school could greatly use another servant.” The old master smiled at Lanfen, his eyes twinkling. “And if in time this new servant should prove to be the chosen one, then at least we won’t have to go looking for him.”

  Hope tightened Lanfen’s throat. Afraid of what she might find there, she turned her gaze to face the grandmaster’s face.

  “Fine,” the grandmaster said as if he were bored of the subject and prepared to say anything just to be left alone. “The boy may stay. But until he’s old enough to work, he’s your responsibility, Master Chugi.”

  “Thank you, Grandmaster.”

  “Feh.” Grandmaster Feng returned to his scroll.

  On her knees, Lanfen crawled to Master Chugi and handed him her son, the tears rolling down her face now.

  In spite of his elderly appearance, Master Chugi took the baby in strong, sure arms. Lanfen swallowed hard as she let her son go. She could already feel his warmth fading from her skin. The cold that replaced it stung like a blade.

  “His name is Raijin, Master,” she whispered, unable to raise her voice any louder.

  Master Chugi smiled down at the boy. “It suits him, granddaughter.”

  Chapter One

  PRESENT

  Koida, second princess of the Shyong San Empire, focused her breathing and stilled her mind. She focused on the meagre amount of amethyst Ro at her heartcenter, circling and swirling like a handful of purple sand tossed into a river. Disordered. Unmanageable. Something that would slip through her fingers the moment she tried to grab it.

  “Are you ready, Second Princess?” Master Lao asked.

  After another moment of intense focus, Koida tried to send the Ro through her shoulder, down the pathway in her arm. Instead, her veins tingled as the energy followed them, seeking out and forcing its way along the easiest routes, traveling down the outside bone of her lower arm and into the heel of her hand. She could feel the Ro manifesting off-balance, but there was nothing she could do to correct it. It was all that she could do to force enough into her hand to manifest a glowing purple bo-shan stick the length of her forearm. By the time she finished, sweat cooled her temples. The stick was barely there, translucent, a ghost of the weapon it should be. The color—still a perfect match for her eyes—was a visual reminder that at seventeen years old her Ro was no more advanced than that of six-year-old.

  Koida opened her eyes. “Ready, Master.”

  Lao stepped forward and swung his glowing red bo-shan stick—this one as solid as stone and the proper color for an advanced Ro—overhanded at her head. Koida sidestepped and countered, then spun and swung a counterattack upward at her master’s thigh. Lao blocked as he evaded, the impact of their sticks ringing in the midmorning air.

  Across the courtyard, Koida’s personal guards looked up long enough to ascertain that she had not been harmed, then returned to their game of Stones and Tiles. It was a ridiculous precaution, being surrounded night and day by guards inside the secure walls of the Sun Palace, but while her father and sister were away, the guards watched over her like a band of mother tigers. Couldn’t leave the helpless Ro-cripple alone.

  Koida bounced backward, evading another strike, and switched her feet. She stepped in and slashed her amethyst stick up from the reverse angle, this time at Master Lao’s ribs. He met her attack, another thwack sounding through the courtyard, then a scrape as he shoved her stick off. He sidestepped and dropped to one knee on the colorful glazed tiles of the courtyard, slapping his stick down at her toes. Koida switche
d feet again to avoid a broken toe and chopped downward at his collarbone. Still kneeling, Lao raised his arm over his head and knocked her attack aside with a hastily manifested High Shield—a glistening ruby shield the length of his forearm. Without a moment’s pause, he swung his stick at her shin.

  She slid her foot backward, forced to waste valuable attacking opportunities on smacking Master Lao’s attack aside with her own bo-shan. She had never been able to manifest a shield. Or anything but a useless stick.

  Lao spun away from her, spiraling up to standing once more. Koida snapped her wrist backward, whipping the amethyst stick over to rap her master on the head. He raised his arm and blocked with his High Shield again.

  Movement by Lao’s left foot caught Koida’s eye. A fuzzy black-and-blue wool worm about as long as her pinkie was crawling across the courtyard. The creature looked frantic, as if it were running for its life from the stomping feet of incomprehensible giants.

  “Your weapon, Second Princess,” Master Lao said, stepping over the wool worm without even noticing it. “Focus!”

  In Koida’s hand, the bo-shan flickered like a guttering lamp and lost most of the little physical substance she’d been able to give it. Like this, a strike would more likely whistle right through the stick than be stopped by it.

  Koida bit her lips together and forced as much Ro as she could manage down through her arm and into the weapon. If she let her mind wander too far, the stick would disappear, the Ro returning to her heartcenter, and there was no telling how long it would take her to remanifest the weapon—or if she even could. She could usually only manage one or two manifestations strong enough to train with per day, and never more than one at a time.

  She still wasn’t able to force the Ro through the correct pathway to manifest the stick with a perfect fighting grip, but slowly, the weapon regained the lost sturdiness and color.

  Koida nodded at Master Lao.

  He pressed forward, feet following the zigzagging step pattern common to bo-shan combat, while he slashed the stick at her diagonally from the left and right, left and right. Koida blocked, blocked, blocked, then pulled her body out of line, giving Lao a smaller target, and spun around to his rear. She lashed out with a backfist from her free hand.

  It almost landed on the back of Master Lao’s skull, but his High Shield arm swooped over his shoulder. Her bare knuckles struck the hard, glowing surface instead of his head. It felt as if they splintered on contact, like she had backfisted a ruby wall.

  “Ah!” Koida cried out as much from surprise as the pain. Her bo-shan stick disappeared as she lost concentration completely. A small amount of her Ro prickled back up through her arm and shoulder into her heartcenter, but the majority formed a small cloud that filtered into Master Lao’s chest.

  “Wait,” she said. “I haven’t conceded. This match isn’t over.”

  With a terse downward snap of his fist, Master Lao dismissed his own bo-shan and grabbed Koida’s hand.

  “You are incapacitated,” he said, studying the angry red skin along the ridge of her knuckles. They throbbed in time with her heart. “The match is over.”

  “But I can continue fighting, Master,” she protested, forcing her voice to return to the polite student-speaking-to-master tone. In truth, it felt like her hand bones were jagged shards of glass, but she didn’t want to quit training for the day. She’d almost had him this time.

  Within the Path of the Living Blade, Ro was absorbed through combat. A little through these training matches when one participant was incapacitated or yielded, and a lot through dueling, battle, and war when an enemy or opponent was killed. Though Koida always lost these training matches with Master Lao, she didn’t think she had lost this particular match, and she didn’t know why her Ro had behaved as if she’d been defeated. She hadn’t admitted defeat or been incapacitated; her weapon had just been broken. She could have finished the fight bare-handed—indeed, she would’ve had to if this had been a fight for her life, as it so often was in the world outside the palace.

  “Apologies, Second Princess, but you cannot continue fighting.” Master Lao probed the red mark, eliciting a wince from her. “You may have a broken hand.”

  “I would like to continue training, Master.” She couldn’t order him to continue their fight outright—even the second princess must respect the rules of the student-master dynamic—but she did infuse her voice with royal authority. She might not be able to remanifest her stick, but there were always hand and foot techniques. Perhaps she would never absorb enough Ro to use the weapon techniques as intended, but to learn them could only do her good.

  Master Lao waved at the guards. “Please escort the second princess to the court alchemists. See if they can mix her a salve to repair the damage.”

  Batsai, the captain of her personal guard, joined them.

  “But, Master, I could practice kicks,” Koida said. “My legs aren’t injured.”

  “This discussion is closed,” Lao said, his voice a stone wall. He covered his closed fist with a flat palm and bowed. “Good training today, Second Princess.”

  “Thank you, Master.” Koida mirrored his motion, trying not to grimace with the frustration of being dismissed or the pain in her knuckles when she covered them.

  Batsai waited for her to precede him, then fell into step beside her. The other three guards in her escort fanned out behind them.

  “That spinning backfist looked good,” Batsai said as they stepped into the cool shade of the courtyard portico.

  Koida frowned. “For a cripple.”

  Batsai stopped and turned to face her.

  “Do I grovel and fawn over you, Second Princess?” he asked. “Am I known to wheedle your favor through empty compliments?”

  Personally responsible for her protection since she was a baby, Batsai was one of the few people in the empire who wasn’t afraid to speak to her that way. His honesty was a rare treasure in a sea of courtiers and nobles all frightened of losing their heads to the royal executioner’s Falling Blade Wall technique.

  “Apologies, Batsai,” Koida said. “My anger took control and shamed me. Can you forgive your princess?”

  The captain let out a grunt and nodded. “Better learn to differentiate between the honesty of a friend and the sweet lies of a foe, little dragon, before you burn us all.”

  Before he turned back and began walking again, his hand shot out, and he tweaked her nose as he had when she was still a child. Koida grinned and caught up to him, the rest of her guard following behind.

  They climbed the steps from the training courtyard into the cool, shadowed halls of the Sun Palace. As they wound through the mazelike corridors, courtiers, officials, and her father’s concubines backed against the walls and bowed to the second princess.

  Proper conduct didn’t require that Koida return their obeisance with acknowledgement—none of them ranked highly enough or were her blood relations or master—so she ignored them. A nod of her head would only serve as permission to speak with her, and she knew they were all dying to ingratiate themselves so she would plead their causes to her father, Emperor Hao. Over the seventeen years of her life, Koida had become adept at avoiding these smiling traps.

  The Eastern tower was the only remaining section of the original castle, a stout stone fortification that the luxurious new palace had consumed long before Koida’s birth. These days it housed the court alchemists and eunuchs, far removed from where an explosion could harm one of the royal family.

  Outside the door of the Eastern tower, Batsai stopped.

  “Wait here,” he ordered the other three soldiers. “Guard the tower until we’ve returned.”

  “Yes, Captain.” They took up spots on either side of the doorway.

  Alone, Koida and Batsai climbed the spiraling stairs.

  “Why leave them behind?” she asked him.

  The captain smirked. “Jun has been desperate to master the Serpentine Spear ever since his brother did. I wouldn’t put it past that i
diot to try making off with something.”

  “Oh.”

  Koida could understand the young guard’s temptation. Though most of her visits to the Eastern tower now were for powders to ease her monthly pain, as a child watching her sister Shingti advance from student to mastery of the Path of the Living Blade with seeming ease, Koida had dreamed of a potion or pill that would advance her Ro and make her as strong and capable as anyone else in the empire. Unfortunately, even with all their knowledge and experimentation, the court alchemists had yet to find a concoction that would cure a Ro-cripple like her.

  The higher they climbed, the more overwhelming the stink of strange metallic vapors and chemical salts became. Floorboards overhead creaked with activity, and muffled voices drifted down from above.

  At the entrance to the laboratory—little more than a hatch in the ceiling—Batsai went in and inspected the room for any hidden threats to Koida, then returned and stood aside, allowing her to enter alone.

  Inside, the smell was even more intense. Busy alchemists and apprentices leaned over bubbling cauldrons, dusting multicolored powders from grindstones into phials and dipping precious gems in smoking solutions.

  “Second Princess?” An aging alchemist with black dye smudging her hairline and charcoal darkening her eyebrows bowed. She rose gracefully and asked, “You wish for your monthly medicine?”

  “Gratitude, Sulyeon, but Master Lao sent me.” Koida pulled her arms from her sleeves and showed Sulyeon her hand. “He believed it to be broken and requested that you mix a salve to repair the damage.”

  In vexation, Sulyeon’s false eyebrows attempted to touch in the center of her forehead.

  “May a thousand suns burn Lao and his ignorance,” she said, prodding Koida’s throbbing knuckles. “We have no salve that can repair broken bones in a day. We practice science here. If the fool wants magic, he should send the second princess to the eunuchs.” Sulyeon finished her rant and inspection of Koida’s knuckles at the same time. “Bruised, not broken. A tincture of distilled Green Haze will soothe the tenderness and prevent discoloration.”