I did not participate in the initial infiltration of the city. Not only had I no desire to do so, I would have been worse than useless: a Scirling woman in the middle of a Yelangese city would have been extremely noticeable. Along with my fellow countrymen and the Draconeans, I lay in wait outside the city—which you need not think meant we were all huddling under bushes. One of the local magnates with an estate in the nearby countryside was a secret Khiam sympathizer, and he gave us shelter while Giat Jip-hau and his chosen companions went disguised into Tiongau, in search of the rest of their coterie.
As little as I wished to participate in another battle, waiting there was excruciating. Dorson spent the entire time pacing; he greatly disliked sitting idle while the Yelangese went about their work. But of course the presence of Scirling soldiers in Tiongau, even out of uniform, would only increase the chance of discovery. I did not pace, but I fretted all the same, spinning a hundred different scenarios in which we had to flee east on sudden notice, back to the shelter of the Sanctuary.
But disaster did not come. As is so often the case with such things, the waiting was lengthy, but the event itself brief. I shall not attempt to relate what I was not there to see; I will only say that once the fighting began, it lasted for scarcely two days. Pockets of resistance remained, but the Khiam Siu had overthrown the governor and taken possession of key locations around the city. Once those were secure, Thu reappeared with a bandage around one arm, and announced that Giat Jip-hau required our presence in the city.
I was not at my best when Tom and I arrived at the governor’s palace. Although the arrival of the caeliger and the subsequent juggling of forces in the Sanctuary had done a little to acclimate me to human company once more, I was wildly unprepared for a city full of my own species. The last time I had faced them in such quantities was in Kotranagar a year before, on my way through Vidwatha to Tser-nga. I wondered how the Draconeans would fare, surrounded by humans. I was very glad that, for reasons of security, they would not enter Tiongau until they could do so under cover of darkness.
The prospective emperor had laid claim to the governor’s own chambers. Austere for reasons of both personal inclination and political image, Giat Jip-hau had ordered the rooms stripped of much of their finery; what remained, however, was still more than elegant, with laquered screens and windows framing views of the gardens outside. I felt terribly out of place, even after my first proper bath in more than a year.
He wasted no time in making it clear why he had summoned us. “The governor of this place, like many of his rank, kept a menagerie, and in it there are dragons. I know the Draconeans trained those creatures in the Sanctuary for their own use—the mews. I want them to train the dragons here.”
Tom and I exchanged glances. His minute shrug said he deferred to my knowledge on the matter. I almost wished he hadn’t; none of my instinctive responses were at all polite. I managed to replace them with a question: “Train them to what end?”
“You rode a sea-serpent into battle in the Keongan islands,” Giat Jip-hau said. “The dragons here are large enough to bear a rider.”
I fear I gaped like a landed fish. Too many words wanted to come out of my mouth at once; they clogged my mind instead, leaving me with nothing. Tom stepped into the breach. “My lord, that is more like riding a wild mustang than a war-horse. The Keongans use the serpents in part because they have neither the firearms nor the artillery of a modern army; you do not suffer any such lack. Dragons would not be of much use to you as a weapon.”
Giat Jip-hau dismissed this with a small cut of his hand. “Their use as weapons is secondary at best. But if my enemies see my generals riding into battle upon dragons, the effect on their morale will be enormous.”
Insofar as it went, he was probably correct. That did not make the idea a good one, though. I found my tongue, and used it. “My lord, the Draconeans have spent centuries breeding the mews for their use, in much the same way that humans bred wolves into dogs. The fact that we can command hounds for our own benefit does not mean we can do the same with tigers; and I think it is fair to assume that the gap between mews and whatever dragons you have here is at least that large. If you had a decade to spend on this endeavour, it might be possible; but I presume your schedule is rather swifter than that.”
I should have stopped there. My mouth went on, though, without leave from my brain. “And even if it could be done, I think it should not.”
He fixed me with a steady gaze. “Explain.”
I thought of the rock-wyrms that had attacked the boyar’s men in the Vystrani Mountains, the fangfish that had savaged the Ikwunde, little Ascelin killing the Taisên agent in Qurrat and the sea-serpents thrashing in the waters around Keonga. But Giat Jip-hau would not be swayed by my qualms over my own past actions, nor by my newfound reluctance to see dragons killed for any reason other than sheer necessity. His care was for the future of his nation, not the well-being of a few beasts.
Instead I gave him a practical answer. “Battles are perilous things, my lord; you know that as well as I do. What omen would it be for your reign if these dragons were shot down in the field?”
“It would be the Taisên who shot them, and the Taisên upon whom the blame would fall.”
“Perhaps. But they have not used dragons in battle; their own ministers would argue that you are the one who brought them to that fate. Some would agree with you, and others with the Taisên. It is a great deal of effort for dubious benefit—especially when you might more profitably attempt to train them for another purpose.”
I spoke that last as if I had some plan in mind, held in reserve until that moment. In truth, it only took shape as I spoke; and even then, I hesitated to dignify it with the name of “plan.” But Giat Jip-hau listened with interest as I shared the beginnings of it, and he and Tom contributed elaborations and improvements, and before long, I was committed.
To my part, at least. “I must consult with the Draconeans before I can say anything for certain,” I reminded him.
“Then act swiftly,” he said. “One way or another, we do not have much time.”
TWENTY-ONE
Azure dragons—A blessing—The Khiam Siu rise up—The end of the rebellion—A letter—Returning home
The entire plan depended on the assistance of the Draconeans. They entered Tiongau in the small hours of the night, when only Khiam Siu patrolled the streets, and were smuggled into the palace through a servant entrance.
Even traversing the city at night was a shock to them. “I owe you an apology, Zabel,” Ruzt said when Tom and I met them, shortly after dawn. “You told us there were many humans in the world, but I never believed they could exist in such numbers. How many places like this are there?”