New story!
Apr. 16th, 2002 02:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
camwynMore VicMage.Asia.No_Spoilers foo. Let me know what you think, please?
Oh, yeah. Today's pulp survival tip is #99: Sudden flashes of pain, sudden hearing of voices, or sudden flashbacks to things you don't remember doing in the first place should all be reported. Your companions have a right to know.
The man on the Dragon Throne rubbed at his face wearily with one hand. Gods, he'd known it was coming, but he hadn't expected this nonsense quite so soon... "All right," he said, dropping his hand to his lap. "I'm listening. Let's hear it. Why, exactly, did you take it upon yourselves to summon a river dragon to try and wreck Sky Master Wong's skysteeds?"
The Seeker of Heaven before him, a long-bearded man with the unfortunate name of Yang Wei, stepped forward in a rustle of silken robes. His companions, a delegation of similarly garbed Seekers from the Chang'an Hall of Divine Harmony, murmured softly. "Your... Lordship," the man began. The unfamiliar words clearly grated in his throat, and it was a moment before he could continue. "While no one disputes that these... things..."
"They have a name, wizard." The voice was low and dark, the words lazily spoken from the Sky Master's seat. Somehow, without actually violating the canons of court protocol, Wong managed to convey the impression that he was sprawling across the cushions like a dog in the afternoon sun. That braid of his spilling across half the seat and onto the floor didn't help much, either. Everything about Wong was an insult to someone like Yang Wei, reflected the man on the Dragon Throne. Wong would have to be careful. The Seekers of Heaven were upset enough already.
Yang Wei glared at the speaker and turned back to the Throne. "The skysteeds," he muttered, stumbling over the syllables, "are effective. No one can deny that. All the Ten Thousand Islands know how effective they were in Your Maj-"
"Ah?" The man on the Dragon Throne raised one hand, fixing the wizard with a Look.
"My apologies, your Lordship... er..." The red-garbed wizard looked around uncomfortably, but none of the crowd gathered in the Audience Hall spoke up. "In your Lordship's campaigns against the Ainu, during the days when you were Lord Admiral of the Fleet. We have seen this. We know how much they have done, and how much they can do."
The man nodded; Sky Master Wong grinned, a smile more reminiscent of monkeys than of men. A few of the court functionaries - young women, for the most part - whispered to each other, but otherwise there was silence in the gilded hall.
"The fact is, your - Lordship -" It was borderline cruelty to force the Seekers of Heaven to speak this way, the man on the Dragon Throne thought to himself. But, like everyone else in the Empire, they had to learn. "The fact is that these things are not natural. The Five Elements were never meant by Heaven to conspire so, let alone to ride the winds in this way. Such matters ought to be reserved for the Enlightened alone!" That drew murmurs from the wizards' companions, as well as from the court women; Sky Master Wong scowled, but said nothing. "This is why the Gods made it impossible for men to fly. Only those who are near to Heaven within ought to be able to draw near to Heaven without-"
"Idiot," muttered Sky Master Wong under his breath. The wizard and his companions turned to stare at him; the man stood up, stretching like a tiger roused from sleep. Sometimes it was easy to forget how tall he really was. Unlike the wizards, all of whom were wearing their best ceremonial dress, the Sky Master wore a long brown tunic simple as an archer's over a pair of coarse black trousers. "Your Lordship," Wong said, "may I speak?"
The man on the Dragon Throne nodded.
"The venerable wizard," drawled Wong, "says that what I do is unnatural, and a violation of the will of Heaven. I say he needs to look out his window sometime, and see just how unnatural it is. There's a reason I name the Steeds the way I do..."
"Explain, please." He'd heard this speech already, years ago, when he'd first reached flag rank. The court was another story.
Wong nodded. "My pleasure, your Lordship." He turned to face the wizards, his hands behind his back. "There is absolutely nothing unnatural about the Sky Steeds, Celestial Scholar Yang Wei. Nothing at all. Everything that I've made - every last thing - is in tune with the laws of Creation, and is as natural as taking a shit in the morning." The wizards winced; somewhere in the back of the Audience Hall, someone tittered. Wong grinned and spoke on. "And it works just as easily, too, there's nothing magical about any of it. The first skysteed I built was the Bamboo Raven. There's a reason for that. My wife Tinghui, as you might know, has something of a soft spot in her heart. Found a couple of birds that'd been blown off our roof by a lab explosion - you know how it is with alchemy..."
At that, one of the junior wizards laughed aloud. Yang Wei whirled about, staring at him with a furious gaze that promised dire things. The junior wizard ducked his head and fell to his knees-
"Stop that," said the man on the Dragon Throne sharply. The wizards, to a man, froze in place. "No one kowtows here unless they are kowtowing to me."
Another murmur, louder this time, ran around the Hall. There was a feel of satisfaction to it, he noted to himself. It wasn't official protocol, but it had an Imperial ring; it was the kind of thing the Fifth Emperor would have done. Sighing inwardly, he waved a hand at the half-kneeling wizard. "Make your apologies later," he ordered. "It's still the Sky Master's turn to speak."
Wong nodded. "Thank you, your Lordship," he said simply, unaffected by the mood of the Court. "Anyway. My wife found the birds, see. Most of them were dead. She brought back the corpses, and a live one, and we sat down to study them. Seemed like a good idea, seeing as how birds obviously know something we don't." He started to pace about the green marble floor at the foot of the Throne, hands briefly unclasped as he reached up to throw his braid back over his shoulder. "We found out a few things that way. One of them is that birds are mostly hollow, when you get right down to it. Where it counts, anyway - in the bones. Hollow and light as anything, which is why they break so easily in the kitchen. Another thing we found was that they all had the same wing shape, when it came right-" He stopped, looking over at the delegation of Seekers. "You have something to say?"
The wizards looked at each other, and then back at the Sky Master. Yang Wei shook his head in silence.
Wong grunted. "Not the long way," he continued, "and not in the outline. That's different from bird to bird. Gulls can't fly like falcons, owls can't fly like spittlebirds, that's all in the outline... but when you look at a wing straight on, it's the same shape, no matter who it's from." He sketched a shape in the air, a rounded half-oval of sorts, tailing down to a slender point at the rear. "Blow over the top hard enough, and the wind that passes through moves so quickly it pulls the birds upward. They make their own winds by flapping their wings- I had to do it another way." He shrugs. "Tinghui had the idea to do it by taking a ship's propeller and using it to pull the skysteed through the air instead of pushing a ship through the water. "
Yang Wei scowled. The man on the Dragon Throne remembered that the Seekers were none too happy about ships with engines, either, and cleared his throat. Wong looked up. "After that it was just a matter of getting the fuel right- Yes, your Lordship?"
"I think that's about enough, Sky Master. Please, sit down."
Wong nodded, easing himself respectfully into the chair. The wizards remained standing.
The man on the Dragon Throne sighed quietly, looking from the Seekers to the Sky Master. "Let me see if I understand this properly," he said, leaning forward and propping his elbows on the red lung dragons' heads. "You took bamboo and cloth and built yourself a bird, and then you took metal and wood alcohol-"
"And six years' worth of experimentation."
The man nodded. "Right. And built yourself a device capable of lifting a human being into the sky from a standing start. And you say this is natural?"
Wong shrugged, glancing over at the wizards. "More natural than what they do, anyway-"
"Your Lordship!" one of the wizards protested before anyone could stop him. "What we do, we do in compliance with every ancient principle laid down since before the Cataclysm and the Age of Tigers! Our art was begun in the days when everything was in accordance with Heaven and Earth alike!"
"Yes," said the man on the Dragon Throne very quietly. "So it was..."
He came to his feet, and the crowd in the Audience Hall gasped.
"That was then," he said grimly, striding across the green marble. "When all that we did was the will of the Gods, and the Five August Ones ruled the land as divine sages. When there was land to rule, instead of ten thousand islands. When there were gods who spoke to us, instead of sitting in silence while the Empire wandered in drunken circles waiting for them to deign to send another ruler. Your art was begun in a time when Heaven and Earth were one... but look around you." He gestured sharply, one hand swinging out to encompass the entirety of the Audience Hall. "The Ainu raid the outer islands and carry off more of our people as slaves every day. Qin Shihuangdi's Great Library was burnt to the ground and it took Sima Qian's entire life to assemble even a hundredth of the fragments of what was lost. And you? What have your arts done for our people?" He spun on one heel, staring at Yang Wei, whose eyes suddenly fixed on the floor.
"I am asking you a question," he said very softly. "What have your arts done for China?"
There was silence in the Hall, a silence so great that even a heartbeat could be heard. Eventually, his face drawn into a grimace, Yang Wei murmured something.
"I didn't hear that, Celestial Scholar."
Yang Wei raised his head defiantly. "We have found every Emperor since the Second," he says. "Successfully. We have brought them to their thrones and put them there in accordance with the signs and omens of Heaven."
The man nodded. "That is true," he said quietly.
Emboldened, Yang Wei continued. "We have guided the Imperial Council of Advisors during the times when there has been no Emperor abroad in the land. Like our brothers the Wu Lung, we have made it possible for Heaven's will to be known, and obeyed by the people. It has been our doing that the Empire has remained in Heaven's good graces, and not been allowed to fall to the Ainu, or worse..."
The man folded his arms across his chest, and gave the wizard a long, cool stare. "Really," he said quietly.
There was a space of perhaps two paces around Yang Wei. It had not been there before.
"The Ainu," murmured the man. "Yes. It's something of a miracle that the Empire has not been shattered by the Ainu."
In the slowly expanding space around him a white-faced Yang Wei turned, looking helplessly for the supporting proximity of his fellow wizards.
"Do you have something you want to say to me, Yang Wei?" the man said, even more quietly.
Silently, Yang Wei nodded. It was a tiny gesture, constricted by terror, but it was a nod nonetheless.
The man unfolded his arms, letting one hand drop to the hilt of his broadsword. "Then say it."
The wizard threw himself to the floor, banging his forehead repeatedly against the marble. "Ten thousand pardons, your Majesty!" he wailed. "I did not mean to give such insult! All the Empire knows how much you've done against our enemies-"
"First of all," said the man, very calmly, "you're using that word again."
Yang Wei froze, his head pressed to the floor.
"And secondly," said the man, starting to walk in a slow, casual circle around the wizard, "I'm not even upset about that. Not particularly, anyway. I know you didn't mean it like that..." His eyes rose to the other wizards, then returned to the huddling Yang Wei. "But what bothers me is the way you did mean it."
The court, to the last man and woman, held its breath.
"You bind us to Heaven's will. You. The Seekers of Heaven. What you say the Gods want, the Gods get. The priests in the temples have their own arts and ways - but they report to you ultimately, don't they." He restrained the urge to prod at the wizard with one toe. "When the oracles are unclear, they come to you. When the gods don't answer the individual priests, they come to you, because they know you have the answer. Even when the gods don't speak to you, you know what they would say, don't you. Whether they ever actually say it or not..."
The Sky Master shifted uncomfortably in his seat. The man ignored him, continuing his relentless circle. "Since the Second Emperor, you've been there, haven't you," he all but purred. "You and yours have shown us the way. You know the Gods better than any men since the Ancients first turned to the worship of Heaven. That knowledge is everything to you, isn't it? It's everything you know, everything you've ever known..."
"... yes, your Lordship..."
"This is commendable, Celestial Scholar. Such thoroughness of knowledge speaks well of your dedication, and of the dedication of all your Order."
Yang Wei dared to lift his head just a fraction, peering up in terrified hope.
"And yet," said the man very quietly, "such knowledge is not everything."
Yang Wei pressed his head to the floor again. The man turned to the Sky Master.
"Sky Master Wong, here," he said conversationally, "found a thing which was outside your knowledge. Not for it, and not against it, but utterly outside it. The way of Heaven is everything to you. It's all you know. So when the Sky Master found new knowledge..." He shook his head, and turned to face the wizards again. "You couldn't even encompass it, could you? You looked it in the eye and didn't know what was staring back at you."
"... no, your Lordship..."
"So you did the only thing you knew how." He stopped his pacing in front of Yang Wei. "You tried to destroy."
"Your Lordship!!"
The man held up a hand. "Oh, you didn't see it that way. You saw a thing that you didn't recognize, and you couldn't figure out a new way of looking at it, so you tried your best to bring it in line with your knowledge of Heaven and Earth. And if that wisdom said there was nothing outside itself, that meant you had to eradicate what lay outside it, because it had to be wrong. You really didn't have any other choice, did you, Celestial Scholar?"
Still hunched over the floor, Yang Wei shook his head.
The man snorted, and tapped his shoulder. "Oh, get up," he said. "You look like a recruit who's been caught raiding the ship's larder. I'm not going to kill you."
"... you're not?" Yang Wei came unsteadily to his feet, batting futilely at the dust on his knees and the sleeves of his robe in an effort to regain some measure of dignity.
"No," said the man, almost pleasantly. "I'm not. I'm going to give you a chance to prove yourselves."
"But sir!" It came from behind him. The man laughed, and returned to his seat.
"Oh, relax, Sky Master," he said. "It's the same chance I'm offering you."
Wong looked at Yang Wei. Both men looked to the Throne. "We're listening."
"Good," said the man on the Dragon Throne. "Here's the deal. At dawn tomorrow, you, Sky Master Wong, and you, Celestial Scholar Yang Wei, will meet on the exercise field behind the Palace of Auspicious Counsel. Each of you will bring one person with you, and this companion will go to join your opposite number - that means, Sky Master, someone other than your oldest boy, who I understand is at the age where he thinks nothing is finer than banging pots together and singing at the top of his lungs."
The Sky Master grinned. Laughter skittered around the hall. Even a few of the Seekers smiled at that.
"One companion," said the man on the Dragon Throne, "to be your witness. It has been some time since the Imperial Court has made an official tour of the five sacred mountains, and I find myself thinking that I really ought to go. I could do it by ship, I suppose, but so could any man. This is going to be impressive. I want each of you - and the companion your opposite number assigns you - to make the trip first. Bring me proof that you've been to each one, and a witness untampered with by magic or alchemy, who will swear that you have accomplished this deed even though you are undoubtedly his enemy." His gaze rested first on Wong, and then on Yang Wei. "The first one back with proofs and witness, safe and sound, will be the one to conduct the Imperial tour of the sacred mountains. Acceptable?"
Yang Wei kowtowed again, and said, "Yes, your Lordship." The Sky Master just tucked his right fist into his left hand and bowed. The man nodded. "Very well," he said. "You may go."
He knew the courtiers were already talking. Within minutes, they'd be out of the room and telling the others. They'd be spilling into the streets and spreading the news to everyone they knew, and by sundown the news would be all over Chang'an. That was as it should be.
People needed to know when the wind was about to change.
Oh, yeah. Today's pulp survival tip is #99: Sudden flashes of pain, sudden hearing of voices, or sudden flashbacks to things you don't remember doing in the first place should all be reported. Your companions have a right to know.
The man on the Dragon Throne rubbed at his face wearily with one hand. Gods, he'd known it was coming, but he hadn't expected this nonsense quite so soon... "All right," he said, dropping his hand to his lap. "I'm listening. Let's hear it. Why, exactly, did you take it upon yourselves to summon a river dragon to try and wreck Sky Master Wong's skysteeds?"
The Seeker of Heaven before him, a long-bearded man with the unfortunate name of Yang Wei, stepped forward in a rustle of silken robes. His companions, a delegation of similarly garbed Seekers from the Chang'an Hall of Divine Harmony, murmured softly. "Your... Lordship," the man began. The unfamiliar words clearly grated in his throat, and it was a moment before he could continue. "While no one disputes that these... things..."
"They have a name, wizard." The voice was low and dark, the words lazily spoken from the Sky Master's seat. Somehow, without actually violating the canons of court protocol, Wong managed to convey the impression that he was sprawling across the cushions like a dog in the afternoon sun. That braid of his spilling across half the seat and onto the floor didn't help much, either. Everything about Wong was an insult to someone like Yang Wei, reflected the man on the Dragon Throne. Wong would have to be careful. The Seekers of Heaven were upset enough already.
Yang Wei glared at the speaker and turned back to the Throne. "The skysteeds," he muttered, stumbling over the syllables, "are effective. No one can deny that. All the Ten Thousand Islands know how effective they were in Your Maj-"
"Ah?" The man on the Dragon Throne raised one hand, fixing the wizard with a Look.
"My apologies, your Lordship... er..." The red-garbed wizard looked around uncomfortably, but none of the crowd gathered in the Audience Hall spoke up. "In your Lordship's campaigns against the Ainu, during the days when you were Lord Admiral of the Fleet. We have seen this. We know how much they have done, and how much they can do."
The man nodded; Sky Master Wong grinned, a smile more reminiscent of monkeys than of men. A few of the court functionaries - young women, for the most part - whispered to each other, but otherwise there was silence in the gilded hall.
"The fact is, your - Lordship -" It was borderline cruelty to force the Seekers of Heaven to speak this way, the man on the Dragon Throne thought to himself. But, like everyone else in the Empire, they had to learn. "The fact is that these things are not natural. The Five Elements were never meant by Heaven to conspire so, let alone to ride the winds in this way. Such matters ought to be reserved for the Enlightened alone!" That drew murmurs from the wizards' companions, as well as from the court women; Sky Master Wong scowled, but said nothing. "This is why the Gods made it impossible for men to fly. Only those who are near to Heaven within ought to be able to draw near to Heaven without-"
"Idiot," muttered Sky Master Wong under his breath. The wizard and his companions turned to stare at him; the man stood up, stretching like a tiger roused from sleep. Sometimes it was easy to forget how tall he really was. Unlike the wizards, all of whom were wearing their best ceremonial dress, the Sky Master wore a long brown tunic simple as an archer's over a pair of coarse black trousers. "Your Lordship," Wong said, "may I speak?"
The man on the Dragon Throne nodded.
"The venerable wizard," drawled Wong, "says that what I do is unnatural, and a violation of the will of Heaven. I say he needs to look out his window sometime, and see just how unnatural it is. There's a reason I name the Steeds the way I do..."
"Explain, please." He'd heard this speech already, years ago, when he'd first reached flag rank. The court was another story.
Wong nodded. "My pleasure, your Lordship." He turned to face the wizards, his hands behind his back. "There is absolutely nothing unnatural about the Sky Steeds, Celestial Scholar Yang Wei. Nothing at all. Everything that I've made - every last thing - is in tune with the laws of Creation, and is as natural as taking a shit in the morning." The wizards winced; somewhere in the back of the Audience Hall, someone tittered. Wong grinned and spoke on. "And it works just as easily, too, there's nothing magical about any of it. The first skysteed I built was the Bamboo Raven. There's a reason for that. My wife Tinghui, as you might know, has something of a soft spot in her heart. Found a couple of birds that'd been blown off our roof by a lab explosion - you know how it is with alchemy..."
At that, one of the junior wizards laughed aloud. Yang Wei whirled about, staring at him with a furious gaze that promised dire things. The junior wizard ducked his head and fell to his knees-
"Stop that," said the man on the Dragon Throne sharply. The wizards, to a man, froze in place. "No one kowtows here unless they are kowtowing to me."
Another murmur, louder this time, ran around the Hall. There was a feel of satisfaction to it, he noted to himself. It wasn't official protocol, but it had an Imperial ring; it was the kind of thing the Fifth Emperor would have done. Sighing inwardly, he waved a hand at the half-kneeling wizard. "Make your apologies later," he ordered. "It's still the Sky Master's turn to speak."
Wong nodded. "Thank you, your Lordship," he said simply, unaffected by the mood of the Court. "Anyway. My wife found the birds, see. Most of them were dead. She brought back the corpses, and a live one, and we sat down to study them. Seemed like a good idea, seeing as how birds obviously know something we don't." He started to pace about the green marble floor at the foot of the Throne, hands briefly unclasped as he reached up to throw his braid back over his shoulder. "We found out a few things that way. One of them is that birds are mostly hollow, when you get right down to it. Where it counts, anyway - in the bones. Hollow and light as anything, which is why they break so easily in the kitchen. Another thing we found was that they all had the same wing shape, when it came right-" He stopped, looking over at the delegation of Seekers. "You have something to say?"
The wizards looked at each other, and then back at the Sky Master. Yang Wei shook his head in silence.
Wong grunted. "Not the long way," he continued, "and not in the outline. That's different from bird to bird. Gulls can't fly like falcons, owls can't fly like spittlebirds, that's all in the outline... but when you look at a wing straight on, it's the same shape, no matter who it's from." He sketched a shape in the air, a rounded half-oval of sorts, tailing down to a slender point at the rear. "Blow over the top hard enough, and the wind that passes through moves so quickly it pulls the birds upward. They make their own winds by flapping their wings- I had to do it another way." He shrugs. "Tinghui had the idea to do it by taking a ship's propeller and using it to pull the skysteed through the air instead of pushing a ship through the water. "
Yang Wei scowled. The man on the Dragon Throne remembered that the Seekers were none too happy about ships with engines, either, and cleared his throat. Wong looked up. "After that it was just a matter of getting the fuel right- Yes, your Lordship?"
"I think that's about enough, Sky Master. Please, sit down."
Wong nodded, easing himself respectfully into the chair. The wizards remained standing.
The man on the Dragon Throne sighed quietly, looking from the Seekers to the Sky Master. "Let me see if I understand this properly," he said, leaning forward and propping his elbows on the red lung dragons' heads. "You took bamboo and cloth and built yourself a bird, and then you took metal and wood alcohol-"
"And six years' worth of experimentation."
The man nodded. "Right. And built yourself a device capable of lifting a human being into the sky from a standing start. And you say this is natural?"
Wong shrugged, glancing over at the wizards. "More natural than what they do, anyway-"
"Your Lordship!" one of the wizards protested before anyone could stop him. "What we do, we do in compliance with every ancient principle laid down since before the Cataclysm and the Age of Tigers! Our art was begun in the days when everything was in accordance with Heaven and Earth alike!"
"Yes," said the man on the Dragon Throne very quietly. "So it was..."
He came to his feet, and the crowd in the Audience Hall gasped.
"That was then," he said grimly, striding across the green marble. "When all that we did was the will of the Gods, and the Five August Ones ruled the land as divine sages. When there was land to rule, instead of ten thousand islands. When there were gods who spoke to us, instead of sitting in silence while the Empire wandered in drunken circles waiting for them to deign to send another ruler. Your art was begun in a time when Heaven and Earth were one... but look around you." He gestured sharply, one hand swinging out to encompass the entirety of the Audience Hall. "The Ainu raid the outer islands and carry off more of our people as slaves every day. Qin Shihuangdi's Great Library was burnt to the ground and it took Sima Qian's entire life to assemble even a hundredth of the fragments of what was lost. And you? What have your arts done for our people?" He spun on one heel, staring at Yang Wei, whose eyes suddenly fixed on the floor.
"I am asking you a question," he said very softly. "What have your arts done for China?"
There was silence in the Hall, a silence so great that even a heartbeat could be heard. Eventually, his face drawn into a grimace, Yang Wei murmured something.
"I didn't hear that, Celestial Scholar."
Yang Wei raised his head defiantly. "We have found every Emperor since the Second," he says. "Successfully. We have brought them to their thrones and put them there in accordance with the signs and omens of Heaven."
The man nodded. "That is true," he said quietly.
Emboldened, Yang Wei continued. "We have guided the Imperial Council of Advisors during the times when there has been no Emperor abroad in the land. Like our brothers the Wu Lung, we have made it possible for Heaven's will to be known, and obeyed by the people. It has been our doing that the Empire has remained in Heaven's good graces, and not been allowed to fall to the Ainu, or worse..."
The man folded his arms across his chest, and gave the wizard a long, cool stare. "Really," he said quietly.
There was a space of perhaps two paces around Yang Wei. It had not been there before.
"The Ainu," murmured the man. "Yes. It's something of a miracle that the Empire has not been shattered by the Ainu."
In the slowly expanding space around him a white-faced Yang Wei turned, looking helplessly for the supporting proximity of his fellow wizards.
"Do you have something you want to say to me, Yang Wei?" the man said, even more quietly.
Silently, Yang Wei nodded. It was a tiny gesture, constricted by terror, but it was a nod nonetheless.
The man unfolded his arms, letting one hand drop to the hilt of his broadsword. "Then say it."
The wizard threw himself to the floor, banging his forehead repeatedly against the marble. "Ten thousand pardons, your Majesty!" he wailed. "I did not mean to give such insult! All the Empire knows how much you've done against our enemies-"
"First of all," said the man, very calmly, "you're using that word again."
Yang Wei froze, his head pressed to the floor.
"And secondly," said the man, starting to walk in a slow, casual circle around the wizard, "I'm not even upset about that. Not particularly, anyway. I know you didn't mean it like that..." His eyes rose to the other wizards, then returned to the huddling Yang Wei. "But what bothers me is the way you did mean it."
The court, to the last man and woman, held its breath.
"You bind us to Heaven's will. You. The Seekers of Heaven. What you say the Gods want, the Gods get. The priests in the temples have their own arts and ways - but they report to you ultimately, don't they." He restrained the urge to prod at the wizard with one toe. "When the oracles are unclear, they come to you. When the gods don't answer the individual priests, they come to you, because they know you have the answer. Even when the gods don't speak to you, you know what they would say, don't you. Whether they ever actually say it or not..."
The Sky Master shifted uncomfortably in his seat. The man ignored him, continuing his relentless circle. "Since the Second Emperor, you've been there, haven't you," he all but purred. "You and yours have shown us the way. You know the Gods better than any men since the Ancients first turned to the worship of Heaven. That knowledge is everything to you, isn't it? It's everything you know, everything you've ever known..."
"... yes, your Lordship..."
"This is commendable, Celestial Scholar. Such thoroughness of knowledge speaks well of your dedication, and of the dedication of all your Order."
Yang Wei dared to lift his head just a fraction, peering up in terrified hope.
"And yet," said the man very quietly, "such knowledge is not everything."
Yang Wei pressed his head to the floor again. The man turned to the Sky Master.
"Sky Master Wong, here," he said conversationally, "found a thing which was outside your knowledge. Not for it, and not against it, but utterly outside it. The way of Heaven is everything to you. It's all you know. So when the Sky Master found new knowledge..." He shook his head, and turned to face the wizards again. "You couldn't even encompass it, could you? You looked it in the eye and didn't know what was staring back at you."
"... no, your Lordship..."
"So you did the only thing you knew how." He stopped his pacing in front of Yang Wei. "You tried to destroy."
"Your Lordship!!"
The man held up a hand. "Oh, you didn't see it that way. You saw a thing that you didn't recognize, and you couldn't figure out a new way of looking at it, so you tried your best to bring it in line with your knowledge of Heaven and Earth. And if that wisdom said there was nothing outside itself, that meant you had to eradicate what lay outside it, because it had to be wrong. You really didn't have any other choice, did you, Celestial Scholar?"
Still hunched over the floor, Yang Wei shook his head.
The man snorted, and tapped his shoulder. "Oh, get up," he said. "You look like a recruit who's been caught raiding the ship's larder. I'm not going to kill you."
"... you're not?" Yang Wei came unsteadily to his feet, batting futilely at the dust on his knees and the sleeves of his robe in an effort to regain some measure of dignity.
"No," said the man, almost pleasantly. "I'm not. I'm going to give you a chance to prove yourselves."
"But sir!" It came from behind him. The man laughed, and returned to his seat.
"Oh, relax, Sky Master," he said. "It's the same chance I'm offering you."
Wong looked at Yang Wei. Both men looked to the Throne. "We're listening."
"Good," said the man on the Dragon Throne. "Here's the deal. At dawn tomorrow, you, Sky Master Wong, and you, Celestial Scholar Yang Wei, will meet on the exercise field behind the Palace of Auspicious Counsel. Each of you will bring one person with you, and this companion will go to join your opposite number - that means, Sky Master, someone other than your oldest boy, who I understand is at the age where he thinks nothing is finer than banging pots together and singing at the top of his lungs."
The Sky Master grinned. Laughter skittered around the hall. Even a few of the Seekers smiled at that.
"One companion," said the man on the Dragon Throne, "to be your witness. It has been some time since the Imperial Court has made an official tour of the five sacred mountains, and I find myself thinking that I really ought to go. I could do it by ship, I suppose, but so could any man. This is going to be impressive. I want each of you - and the companion your opposite number assigns you - to make the trip first. Bring me proof that you've been to each one, and a witness untampered with by magic or alchemy, who will swear that you have accomplished this deed even though you are undoubtedly his enemy." His gaze rested first on Wong, and then on Yang Wei. "The first one back with proofs and witness, safe and sound, will be the one to conduct the Imperial tour of the sacred mountains. Acceptable?"
Yang Wei kowtowed again, and said, "Yes, your Lordship." The Sky Master just tucked his right fist into his left hand and bowed. The man nodded. "Very well," he said. "You may go."
He knew the courtiers were already talking. Within minutes, they'd be out of the room and telling the others. They'd be spilling into the streets and spreading the news to everyone they knew, and by sundown the news would be all over Chang'an. That was as it should be.
People needed to know when the wind was about to change.
