Some lives have to be lived in small cages. Tam was sure the walls of his weren't all of others' making.
He chose to show the imperial banner at Liaontung. He was comfortable with that old sentinel of the east. And Liaontung was a long, long way from the focus of the Tervola's west-glaring obsession.
"I swear. Wu rubbed his hands in glee when Tran told him." Lang giggled. "Chin like to had a stroke. Feng sided with Wu. Watch Wu, Tam. I don't think he's your friend anymore."
"Never was," Tran growled. He still resented Tarn's having trusted Tervola expertise before his own.
"That's not fair, Tran. Wu is a paradox. Several men. One is my friend. But he isn't in control. Like me, Wu was cut from the wrong bolt. He's damned by his ancestry too. He has the Power. He yields to it. But he'd rather be Wu the Compassionate."
Tran eyed him uncertainly. The changed, more philosophi-cal, more empathetic Tam, tempered in the crucible of the flight from Baxendala, baffled him. Tran's image of himself as a man of action, immune to serious thought, became a separating gulf in these moments.
To defend his self-image Tran invariably introduced military business.
"The spring classes will graduate twenty thousand," he said, offering a thick report. He still hadn't learned to read well, but had recruited a trustworthy scribe. "Those are Feng's assign-ment recommendations. Weighted toward the eastern legions, but I can't find real fault. I'd say initial it."
No one could fault O Shing and his Tervola for reinforcing the most reliable legions first.
"Boring," Tam declared five pages in. "These reports can be handled at subordinate levels, Tran. Sometimes I think I'm being swamped just to distract me."
"You want to rule these wolves, you'd better know everything about them," Lang remarked.
"I know. Still, there's got to be a way to get time for things I want to do. Tran. Extract me a list of Tervola and Aspirants linked with legions being shorted. And one of Candidates I don't know personally. Lang, arrange for them to visit Liaontung. Maybe I can pick the men who get promoted."
"I like that," said Tran. "We can move the Chins out."
About Chin Tran had developed an obsession. He knew their former hunter remained a secret foe. He went to absurd lengths to make his case. Yet he could prove nothing.
O Shing already pursued a policy of favoritism in promotions. He was popular with the Aspirants. He became more so when he pushed the policy harder. The machinery of army and empire drifted to his control. His hidden enemies recognized the shift, could do little to halt it.
One thing Tam couldn't accomplish. He couldn't convince one Tervola to repudiate the need to avenge Baxendala.
It was a matter of the honor and reputation of an army unaccustomed to defeat.
Feng, in a rare, expansive mood, explained, "The legions had never been defeated. Invincibility was their most potent weapon. It won a hundred bloodless victories.
"They weren't defeated at Baxendala, either. We were. Their commanders. To our everlasting shame. Your Tran understood better than we did, not having had the shock of losing the Power to impair his reason. Our confusion, our panic, our irrational response-hell, our cowardice-killed thousands and stigma-tized the survivors."
A moment of raw emotion burned through when Feng declared, "We sacrificed the Imperial Standard, Lord!"
"While Baxendala remains unredeemed, while this Ragnar-son creature constitutes living proof that the tide of destiny can be stemmed, our enemies will resist when, otherwise, they'd yield. We're paying in blood.
"Lord, the legions are the bones of Shinsan. If we allow evenone to be broken, we subject the remainder, and the flesh itself, to a magnified hazard. In the long run, we risk less by pursuing revenge."
"I follow you," O Shing replied. Feng spoke for Feng, privately, but his was the opinion of his class. "In fact, I can't refute you."
Tran, who disagreed with the Tervola by reflex, supported them in this. Every Tervola who managed an audience had a scheme for requiting Baxendala. Stemming the tide devoured Tarn's time, making his days processions of boring sameness only infrequently relieved by change or intrigue.
Yet he built.
Five years and six days after the ignominy of Baxendala, Select Fu Piao-Chuong knelt and swore fealty to O Shing. Not to Shinsan, the Throne, or Council, but to an individual. His emperor assigned him an obscure post with a western legion. He bore, under seal, orders to other Aspirants in posts equally obscure.
The night-terrorist Hounds of Shadow struck within the week.
After a second week, Lord Wu, maskless, agitated, appealed, "Lord, what's happening?" He seemed baffled and hurt. "Great men are dying. Commanders of legions have been murdered. Manors and properties have been destroyed. Priests and civil servants have been beaten or killed. Our old followers from the days of hiding are inciting rebellion around the Mienming and Mahai. When we question a captured terrorist he invariably names an Aspirant as his commander. The Aspirant cites you as his authority."
"I'm not surprised."
"Lord! Why have you done this? It's suicide."
"I doubt it."
"Lord! You've truly attacked your Tervola?"
Lang and Tran were surprised too. They weren't privy to all of O Shing's secrets either. He was developing the byz.antine thought-set an emperor of Shinsan needed to survive.
"I deny attacking my Tervola, Lord Wu. You'll find no loyal names among those of the dead. The evidence against each was overwhelming. It's been accumulating for years. Years, Lord Wu. And I reserved judgment on a lot of names. I indicted no one because he had been an enemy in the past. Lord Chin lives. His sins are forgiven. The Hounds will pulldown only those who stand against me now."
"Yes, Lord." Wu had grown pale.
"It'll continue. Lord Wu. Until it's finished. Those who remain faithful have nothing to fear.
"My days of patience, of gentleness, of caution, have ended. I will be emperor. Unquestioned, unchallenged, unbeholden, the way my grandfather was. If the Council objects, let it prove one dead man wasn't my enemy. Till then the baying of the Hounds of Shadow will keep winding on the back trails of treachery. Let those with cause fear the sound of swift hooves."
Wu carefully bowed himself out.
"There goes a frightened man," Tran remarked. His smile was malicious.
"He has cause," Lang observed. "He's afraid his name will come up."
"It won't," said Tam. "If he's dirty, he's hidden it perfectly."
"Chin's your ringleader," Tran declared.
"Prove it."
"He's right," Lang agreed.
"Is he? Can I face the Council with that? Bring me evidence, Tran. Prove it's not just bitterness talking. Wait! Hear me out. I agree with you. I'm not asleep. But he looks as clean as Wu. He doesn't leave tracks. Intuition isn't proof."
Tran bowed slightly, angrily. "Then I'll get proof." He stalked out.
Tam did agree. Chin was a viper. But he was the second most powerful man in Shinsan. and logical successor to the empire. His purge would have to be sustained by iron-bound evidence presented at a perfectly timed moment.
Chin would resist. Potential allies had to be politically disarmed beforehand.
The Council, increasingly impatient with O Shing's delay in moving west, were growing cool. Some members would support any move to topple him.