" Han Ch'in stared at the vial a moment, then back at Kuei Jen.
"You're like me," he said, after a while. "Oh, not the breasts. . ."
Both half-brothers laughed, relaxing with each other suddenly.
"I often wondered," Kuei Jen began, breaking the silence that had fell.
"Wondered?"
"What you were like. You see, I have known for a long time now. Father never told me, but I found out. I made it my business to find out. For a long time I thought I had lost you."
"And that worried you?"
Kuei Jen nodded and, as the baby burped, lifted it and placed it on his shoulder, patting its back gently, rhythmically. "I always wanted a brother. An elder brother. Someone to look up to, the way our father looked up to his brother. Someone to love."
Han Ch'in frowned, then looked away, disturbed by the rawness of that final word.
"Does that embarrass you, Han Ch'in? That I should want to love you?"
Han Ch'in looked back, then shrugged.
Kuei Jen laughed. "I'm sorry, brother. It is my hormones, or so they tell me. They make me ... emotioned."
Han Ch'in stared a moment longer, then laughed. "Why, I do believe my little brother is teasing me."
Kuei Jen smiled and nodded. "Even so, there is an element of truth in it. We were bred to be cold, you and I. To stifle our emotions. I have learned that that is wrong. I have learned ... well, to be more myself. To free the woman in me."
Han Ch'in laughed. "That I can see." Then, more seriously: "And if he dies?"
"Then you rule, elder brother. As is the way." Kuei Jen gestured toward the vial. "Take it and you need not fear this sickness."
"And if it is a poison?" Han Ch'in asked, narrowing his eyes.
Kuei Jen smiled sadly. "You have been living far too long in your mother's shadow, elder brother. I would not poison you. Not for all the kingdoms of the world, let alone this small domain. Here, give me it."
Han Ch'in leaned across and picked up the vial and handed it to him, watching as Kuei Jen cracked the tip of it and put it to his tongue.
He swallowed, then held out the vial, offering it to Han Ch'in. A finger's width of the dark solution had gone. "Now you. That is, if you really want to live."
Han Ch'in stared at his brother a moment longer, then took the vial and drained it at a gulp, setting it down beside the others.
"Good," Kuei Jen said, smiling, at ease again. "Now draw up a chair and sit with me. The night looks set to be a long one and we have much to talk about."
Night had fallen by the time Karr returned home. He had searched all afternoon for Heng Yu, but there was no sign of his old friend, and there were strong rumours that the ex-Chancellor was already dead, his throat cut, his body dumped in a back alley to be burned with the other corpses.
Stepping down from the cruiser, Karr felt heavy-hearted. He would have to break the news to Marie and Hannah, and the thought of that made his guts ache. He hated being the bearer of such news.
As he made his way across the dimly-lit yard, acknowledging the bows of his men, he wondered once again whether he should tell Marie of Jelka's offer; whether it wasn't best this once to call it a day and get out.
Twenty thousand dead. That was the latest figure. And more by the hour. If this kept up the city would be a morgue within a week.
Karr sighed and went inside, ducking beneath the lintel. The corridor was dark, but up ahead a light shone in the kitchen. He could hear Marie and the others there - the laughter of May and Beth. The thought of them raised his spirits, but only a little. They too would have to be told.
Coming out into the kitchen, he braced himself, knowing it would be the first thing they would ask, then stopped dead, staring across the room, open-mouthed. There, in a chair on the "far side of the big kitchen table, sat Heng Yu, a bowl of ch'a cupped between his hands as he talked to the lady of the house, Marie.
For a moment no one noticed Karr standing there. Then the conversation died, as first one then another saw him.
"Master Heng?" Karr said, still not one hundred per cent positive that this wasn't a delusion brought on by tiredness.
Heng looked at him and laughed. "I hear you have been looking for me, Gregor Karr."
Hearing that voice, Karr swore. "You bugger! I've been running about the city, breaking my balls trying to find you, and all the while . . ."
" . . .1 have been here." Heng smiled and shrugged with his hands. "Yes."
"Why, you ..."
Heng raised a hand. "Just a moment, Gregor. Try and see it from another viewpoint. If even you think I am dead, then is it not likely that our enemies will take it for the truth?"
Karr made to speak, then huffed.
Heng stood and, setting down his ch'a bowl, came around the table and stood before Karr, looking up into the big man's face.
"I am sorry to have played such a miserable trick on you, Gregor, but there was a need."
Marie laughed. "It's true, Gregor. You're such a bad actor. If you had known . . . well, they would have known for sure that Master Heng was still alive!"
Karr bristled momentarily, then, recognising the truth in what had been said, reached out and hugged Heng Yu to him, genuinely delighted that he was safe, the differing physical stature of the two men making it seem as though Karr were embracing a teenage son rather than an equal.
Karr stepped back. "You are forgiven, Master Heng. This once. But you must pay a penalty."
Heng Yu stared up at him. "A penalty?"
Karr grinned. "Yes." He looked to Marie. "Sweetheart, break out that bottle of Yunan double-strength brandy and pour Master Heng a glass."
"And that's a penalty?" Heng Yu asked, eyebrows raised.
"Yes," Karr said, mock sternly. "But you must drain the glass at a single go."
Marie, who had gone to the cupboard, now turned and looked at her husband. "And is Master Heng to drink alone?"
Karr laughed. "No . . . Pour everyone a glass. May and Beth too. Let us celebrate Master Heng"s safe homecoming. And toast the safe journey of our good friends Jelka and Mileja Ward."
They had climbed up beyond the earth's pull; now they were decelerating slowly, synchronising their path with that of the parked Luoyang where it waited, orbiting one hundred and fifteen thousand tt above Chung Kuo.
Opening her eyes, Jelka yawned, then, conscious that the restraining harness had slotted back into the chair, she stretched and turned, looking at Mileja.
Mileja was sleeping, her face angelic, a stray lock of her dark curls fallen over one cheek. Jelka smiled, then, reaching beneath her seat, pulled out the blanket and, breaking the wrapper, shook it out and tucked it over Mileja.
She turned, looking at the black square of the viewer in front of her, then reached out, touching its surface with her fingertips. At once a view of the planet below filled the tiny screen. Looking at it, Jelka sighed, knowing it was the last time she would see the planet of her birth. So peaceful it looked, so innocent, and yet thousands were dying by the moment down there.
The cities were burning. For the third time in her brief lifetime, the cities were burning. But this time, she knew, nothing would rise from the ashes.
She thought of Karr and felt sad. Maybe he'd come, after all. Maybe, when he saw how hopeless things were - how futile -he would change his mind.
She closed her eyes, thinking back over the day, seeing again the great basalt slab into which her father's image had been cut, and gave a little shiver, then reached out to blank the viewer.
Glancing at Mileja, she saw that the blanket had slipped down and went to tuck it back, then froze, her heart in her mouth. There, on her daughter's right arm, just above the wrist, the flesh was bruised. A golden, faintly glowing bruise.
The plague! She felt her whole body go cold. Aiya! Mileja has the plague!