“Yes.” Rule’s smile started as he saw where this was going.
“You didn’t know about collars and tags. You thought you could keep it, so you were sad for a full week after Dad found the owners and they took him home. If you’d known about collars and tags, you wouldn’t have counted on keeping that little dog. You’d have had a good time with it while it was there, and been fine when it left.”
Now Rule’s smile was easy. “You understand about tags and collars.”
Benedict nodded. “I do. The mantle itself—yeah, that felt good. But I don’t want the stuff that goes with it, so while we had a good time together, I’m glad to let it go back to its owner.”
He rose, gave their father a nod and a smile, then said to Rule, “I’m still not talking to you.”
With that, he left.
Rule stood, too, watching his big brother leave. “Sometimes I don’t understand him at all.”
“Just because he loves you doesn’t mean he wants to talk to you.”
Isen’s eyes were twinkling in his uncannily naked face. With his beard burned half off, he’d had to shave the other half—and complained about that way more than he had the burns on his arms and chest. But then, the burned skin would heal a lot faster than he could regrow his beard. Hair growth wasn’t affected by healing.
Rule thought he knew what his father meant. Benedict did love him, hadn’t wanted Rule to worry about him, and hadn’t gotten over his anger at Rule’s decision to marry. But he sighed. “Sometimes I get tired of my family’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy.”
Isen’s eyebrows climbed. “Now I’m mystified.”
“We don’t say things straight out.” Or ask things straight out, and why not? Why not just ask? “What are you planning to do about my marriage?”
“Ah.” Isen started to rub his beard, found bare face, and scowled. “All right. Straight out, then. You remember what I told you to do when you’re Rho and you’ve got a messy situation and you don’t have a clue what to do about it?”
Everything clicked in place. “Look mysterious and knowing and stall until I figure something out.”
“That’s right. I’ll tell you that I personally think it’s a mistake, you marrying. Any of us marrying. But you’ve said you think the Lady wants change.” He shrugged. “I don’t know. She hasn’t whispered in my ear—that’s for damned sure. But it’s possible. So I’m waiting to see how things shake out.”
Rule was suddenly awash with emotion. For a little while, he’d thought his father was dead. Isen’s heart had stopped for so long . . . but it had started again. “I’d like to take my father to dinner,” he said. “But he hardly ever leaves his place.”
Isen’s eyes twinkled. “Bit of a stick-in-the mud, is he? Maybe an agora—what’s that word? Agoraphobic.”
Rule nodded solemnly. “Something like that. If you should happen to see him—”
Isen hooted with laughter and grabbed Rule, hugging hard.
Rule hugged back, his eyes damp. “I love you, Dad.”
“Love you back.” And Isen slapped him on the back to prove it.
LILY’S mother had graciously granted a two-day reprieve on their lunch, but Wednesday rolled around—as it has a habit of doing—right on schedule. Resigned, Lily sat at a red-draped table in her uncle Chen’s restaurant with a menu, a glass of water, and—to the waiter’s clear disapproval—a cup of coffee.
It was five minutes after noon. Her mother was late. Her mother was never late. The atomic clock could be set by Julia Yu’s punctuality. Lily couldn’t decide whether to be worried or annoyed.
Maybe she’d had trouble finding parking. The place was packed. If . . . Oh, my.
A slim, upright figure escorted by a deferential hostess was making her way through the crowded tables toward Lily. She wore pristine white silk trousers and a tunic with a Mandarin collar. The tunic was the color-soaked red a 1940s movie star might have worn on her lips and nails. “I am joining you,” Grandmother announced as the hostess held the chair for her. “Your mother is delayed. She will be here soon.”
A dozen impulses and questions whirled through Lily. Did her mother even know Grandmother was joining them? Or was her mother late because Grandmother told her to be? Or had Grandmother persuaded her the actual time was twelve thirty, or . . . .
In the end, Lily smiled helplessly. “It’s good to see you, Grandmother. You look fantastic.”
“Red is a good color for me.” Grandmother waved the hostess away. “We will not order yet. You may bring me some tea. You are drinking coffee,” she informed Lily.
“Yes, I am.”
“Hmph. Li Qin sends her love. She is very glad to be home again. She wonders why you have not yet been to see her.”
Lily’s eyebrows rose. “She wonders that, Grandmother?”
“I assume she does. I do not wonder. I know. You feel shy with me.”
Lily’s mouth opened to deny that—and closed again. Because suddenly, unaccountably, she did feel shy, or something very like that.
Grandmother patted her hand and spoke softly. “You have just woken to your name. You do not understand it, but you know it. I am the only one you might ask, but you do not know what to ask.”
Wordless, Lily nodded.
The server set a small china pot on the table. Grandmother inspected it, sniffing the steam. “You have prepared it correctly, I think. Loose tea, no bags? Yes. Thank you. I will let it steep.”
Grandmother folded her hands on the table as the slightly flustered server departed. “I will tell you the secret of true names. We know them when we understand the secret about death—which is, of course, the secret about life. Which is not a secret at all.”
“But I—I don’t understand death. I remember it happening. I don’t understand it.”
“You mean you do not understand what comes after death. No more do I. This does not matter. A baby reaching for her mother’s breast does not know what comes after not-baby. She sees not-baby around her, but she does not truly see until she becomes not-baby herself.”
“You mean that death is a transition.”
“Silly word, transition. All words are silly when we speak of this, so mostly we do not, or we let silly people do the speaking. I like the Buddhists, who do not mind being silly. They speak of the fallacy of duality, the confusion of either-or thinking. These words are as close as any to what you and I know.”
Lily shook her head. “They aren’t my words. They don’t . . . they don’t touch what I know.”
“Lily. You know now that having been, you can never not-be. Just as I, having been dragon, can never not-be dragon. And while I was wholly dragon, I was also human, for I could not undo having been human. Living does not undo life. Death does not, either. Life and death are not either-or.”
Words that would have been gibberish to her last week unlocked everything now. “You mean it’s all real. It’s all true. Cullen said a true name comes from the part of us that doesn’t change, but he was wrong. Mostly wrong, anyway, because it’s all change, and it’s all true.”
“Yes. Now, stop carving up what you know with words. The pieces left from that carving do not make sense.” She took a moment to pour her tea. She inhaled, frowned faintly, and sipped anyway. “Sandra learns, but she does not yet have the art.”
Lily grinned suddenly, thinking of a limousine. Black, not white, because Grandmother disliked the white ones. “And having been a child, we can’t not-be a child.”
Grandmother’s eyes twinkled. “I do not know what you mean.” She took a sip of tea, shook her head, and set the cup down.