Down a shallow flight of steps, and through a worn postern, Incomo arrived at the wing that jutted out of the hill toward the lake shore. While not as closely situated to the great hall as lesser quarters, the Lord of the Minwanabi’s chambers had an unobstructed view of the lake at sunset that made the walk worthwhile. Incomo clapped for servants and ordered his Lord’s private bath chamber made ready.
As the servants hurried off to assign slaves to heat the water, Incomo crossed back through the maze-like house to his own less sumptuous quarters. There, surrounded by screens painted with patterns of killwings and clouds, he cursed at his master’s orders to Tasaio. His bitterness must never be shown in public, that fate would send away the truly gifted son of the House and leave Minwanabi fortunes in the hands of . . . Incomo slammed his fists on a chest in a display more like his master than himself – the thoughts he entertained were unthinkable for a loyal servant, even in strictest privacy. Desio must somehow contrive to lead the Minwanabi out of this dilemma.
Incomo sank onto a cushion and clapped for his personal servant. ‘Fetch my writing desk and move it over to my contemplation mat,’ he commanded, rubbing his temples. ‘Then open the screen to admit the evening breeze, and depart.’
Alone once more, and confronted by his pens and his desk, the First Adviser thumbed a blank sheet of parchment and pondered how to compose his missive to Tasaio. While the man was ostensibly transferred to command of another Minwanabi garrison, Desio had effectively ordered banishment. The fortress in the Outpost Isles had only been established to protect Minwanabi shipping from piracy; and those waters had been cleared of such brigands for over a century and a half. The fort still stood due to the hidebound Tsurani reluctance to surrender any ground once taken. The Minwanabi manned that desolate, fogbound chunk of rock simply to prevent anyone else from supplanting them. Now one of the most gifted military minds in the Empire was being sent to the hinterlands to grow moss.
Disgusted by what he perceived as a waste, Incomo reminded himself that as the price of a grand failure went, life on that rock was light punishment. Had Lord Jingu remained alive to wear the Lord’s mantle, Tasaio would have answered for such disgrace with his head preserved in a jar of vinegar and red-bee honey. Setting brush and ink to parchment, the First Adviser sighed that so painful an order should be relegated to written correspondence. Tasaio surely deserved better. A slight word of personal regret would be appropriate; seasoned with the reverses of politics, Incomo knew better than to burn any bridge at his back. Fortune in the Great Game could turn all too quickly, and a man never knew where he might owe his loyalty in the future.
As the litter rounded the last bend in the road, Mara leaned out of the curtains with childish eagerness. The Tsurani bearers shouldered their off-balanced burden in stoic silence; they could sense their mistress’s excitement.
‘Nothing has changed,’ Mara said breathlessly. ‘The trees and the grass look so green.’ The wet season lushness of the landscape was a balm to the eye after years of barren desert. Over the final knoll, past the fences of the outermost needra fields, the well-kept estate spread across the land. Dead branches and brush shoots had been pruned back, and the grass under the hedges stood neatly clipped. Mara could see the advance scout waving from the top of the next rise. For an instant she worried: could some clever enemy have set an ambush to turn her homecoming to disaster? Had she, in her excitement, pushed her warriors and her scouts ahead too rapidly to ascertain the safety of the road? Then logic absolved her fear; she rode at the van of a triumphant army – more than one foe must join ranks in force to threaten her at her own borders.
A scout reported to the head of the column.
Mara pushed impatiently at the gauze hanging that separated her from the officers who marched beside her. ‘What news, Lujan?’
Her Force Commander flashed a smile, his teeth vividly white in his desert-tanned face. ‘Mistress, a reception!’
Mara smiled. Only now could she admit to anyone, most of all herself, just how desperately she had longed for home. The fanfares that had greeted her and Lord Xacatecas in llama and Jamar had been flattering, but even celebrations that heaped her with honours had proven taxing. Close to three years had passed since the orders to send her garrison in defence of the borders; too long a time in the life of a young son for a mother to be absent. Nights in Kevin’s arms and the rigours of battle by day were only a distraction from her ache to see Ayaki.