“Do?”
“The gods help us!” He turned away, suddenly angry with the man; all of the frustration and disappointment he had been feeling these past twenty-four hours spilling from him. “Yes, Mister Harding. Advice?’ “But what can I say?”Egan turned back, his face dark. “You could start by apologising.”
Harding gave a laugh of disbelief. “Apologise? For what?” “For counselling war against the Californians, when war was clearly not the best of options.”
Harding shook his head, astonished. “But that was your decision!” “Mine?” Egan laughed. “And my Counsellors said nothing, I take it? When the matter was discussed, you did not rush to oppose such a course. Indeed, if I remember things correctly, you practically urged me to take action!” “We but supported you.”
“Exactly!”
“I still don’t see ...”
“Don’t seel” Egan walked back to the man and stood there, glaring at him openly now. “That”s precisely what I meant. You didn’t see. You didn’t anticipate events. And now we’re in the shit up to our necks!” He gave a great huff of exasperation. “You were my principal advisors, damn it! You should have known what was going on out there, known just how strong they were. But you didn’t Or if you did ...”
Harding’s answer was immediate. He met Egan’s anger with his own. “That’s totally unfair! You knew everything we knew! Everythingl We held nothing back Whatever intelligence we had, you were party to. If I had suspected for a moment...”
“Suspected what?”
Harding hesitated, and in that moment of hesitation Egan understood. He had known. In fact, come to think of it, Harding more than any of them had pushed him to declare war on the Californians.
“Get out”
Harding blinked. This time his shock was unfeigned. “What?” Egan pointed to the door from which Harding had come. “I said get out I do not wish to see you here again. As of this moment you are stripped of your rank!” Harding glared back at him a moment, then pulled the narrow band of iron from the index finger of his right hand and threw it down. A moment later the wine-red cloak slippedfrom his shoulders and fell to the floor. Drawing himself up straight, he gave a tight bow. “As you wish ... Master? Then, without another word, he turned and left the Hall.
Egan was sitting back on the throne when his wife, Li Kuei Jen came to him. They had not seen each other in three months and had barely spoken in all that time, but now, sensing that something was wrong, Li Yuan’s son - Egan’s one-time lover, now his surgically-adapted wife, and mother of his three children - paused at the foot of the steps, then slowly mounted them, his long, feminine clothes whispering on the stone.
Li Kuei Jen stood there a moment, facing his husband, studying him, noting the worry lines there on his brow which had once been so smooth, so handsome, then lay a hand gently on his neck. “Mark?”
Egan did not look up. “Hello stranger.”
Li Kuei Jen bent down, looking into his face. “Are you alright7” Egan smiled wearily. “I think so. But things are bad, Jenny. We’ve lost the West. And now I’ve alienated Harding.”
“Ah. I saw him leave. I wondered what had happened.”
“He betrayed me, Jenny.”
“Betrayed you?”
“Yes. He knew how strong the Californians were but never said. He urged us to make war against them. I suspect he may even have been in league with them.” “Maybe so. And yet the decision was yours.”
“An informed decision, or so I thought But my information was incorrect We were told they had four hundred thousand men at most, and those poorly armed. The truth ... well, we know the truth now.”
“Too late.”
“Oh, far too late.” Egan took a long breath, then. “We must prepare ourselves for trouble. When news of this gets out...”
Li Kuei Jen reached out and held his shoulder tightly. “You mean to let the people know?”
Egan laughed forlornly. “You think we can conceal something as big as this?””Oh, we must. For a short while, anyway. We need to buy ourselves time. Time to regroup our forces. To bring troops back to the capital from the south and west.”
“But how?”
“Call a meeting of the full Council straight away, and demand a full media black-out.”
“But the satellites ...”
“Jam the satellites. Shoot them down if you must. And lie. Give the people news of great victories in the south.”
“But there are rumours ...”
“Clamp down hard on the rumours. Use your secret police. Thaf s what they’re for. Hold a great banquet to celebrate the victory. And as for Harding ...” “What of him?”
“You must reinstate him.”
Egan stood, brushing his wife’s hand aside angrily. “Never!”
“You must He’s an important man.”
“He’s a traitor!”
“Maybe so. But right now you need him, to help hold things together.” But Egan wasn’t listening. His eyes flared with anger. ‘Til make sure he won’t talk. I’ll arrange an accident...”
Li Kuei Jen huffed impatiently. “For the gods’ sake listen to me, Mark! You need him. So go to him and apologise. Grovel if you must But get him back on your side.”
“I won’t.”
“You must Don’t you understand? With him at your back, you might just survive this crisis. Without him ... well, I’d give us all a cat in hell’s chance!” Egan turned back, staring at his bride, then, letting his head fall, he nodded.
“Okay. But it won’t be easy.”
“I never said it would. Oh, and one last thing “ “Yes?”
“You must bring my father home to Boston.”
“Your father?”
“Yes. If s time you had a proper advisor.”
BLOOD AND IRON
Stirring on his silken bed, Li yuan opened his eyes and looked up at the ornately-tiled ceiling overhead. The carriage was dark, the thick blinds drawn against the desert daylight. The motion of the monorail was smooth and soothing. At times it almost seemed that they were not moving at all, but floating, as in a dream. He looked across. His once-wife, Fei Yen, was sleeping in her chair, propped up, her mouth wide open, her pale, lined face framed by bright red pillows.
America. He was in exile in America, Land of a Thousand Wonders, as the natives liked to call it A hard, cold-hearted land. A land without ghosts, unless one counted the ghosts of the seven billion Han who had died here in the aftermath of the City’s collapse.
Suck is my fate, he thought; to be thirty thousand li from home and three thousand light-years from my heart’s content.
He let a sigh escape his lips, as quiet as an old man’s final breath, then turned his head, staring once more at the ceiling. It was not really that he minded the Americans, it was just that they had no humility, no sense of their place in the greater scheme of things. They were like children, delighting in their smallest achievement, and crowing like the farmyard rooster who had never heard of the Yellow Emperor who had once sat on his golden throne at the very centre of the world. Children. Squabbling children. Maybe so, but they were now the bosses here. And to be truthful, his own kind had been no better when they had been in charge.
They had not ruled wisely, and this was the result
Four months now he’d been travelling, starting in the northern capital, Boston, and progressing down through the great cities of Providence, Bridgeport, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, before moving on to the new enclaves of Charleston, Cincinnati and Louisville. From there he’d had taken the monorail south to the garrison at Nashville and on to the great urban sprawls of Birmingham, Memphis and Little Rock, finally arriving in the southern capital of Dallas three weeks back. Now he was heading south-west across the great desert of central Texas to the fortress-city of San Angelo.It was all his son-in-law Egan’s idea: to get “the old man”, as he called him, out from under his feet by organising a tour. “It’s time you saw something of this land,” Egan had said, as if seeing it would somehow satisfy, or at least abate, the dormant urge in Li Yuan to meddle in events.