Sharon Shinn - Gateway

“I’m sorry. I truly am,” Daiyu said, but she could tell her voice sounded impatient, not contrite. “But, please. You have to let me know what happened to Kalen.”

“I can’t return here once I have left for the day. You know that. I do not have so privileged a place.”

Daiyu almost glowered at her. “ Aurora, I almost didn’t come back to Xiang’s house because I was so worried about Kalen. If you don’t let me know what has happened to him, I swear I will leave here tonight to find out for myself-and I won’tbe permitted back inside either.”

Aurora pressed her lips together. “Fine. Ombri or I will return and leave a message of some sort. A red scarf in the yard will mean that Kalen is hurt. A green scarf will mean that he is perfectly whole. I will braid them together if he is hurt but his injuries are not severe. We will leave one of the scarves in the garden below your window.”

Daiyu nodded. “And if he-if he is dead?”

“He’s not dead,” Aurora said sharply.

“If he is?”

“A black scarf. But he is not dead.”

“All right. Then go home. And come back as fast as you can.”

Daiyu had one hand on Aurora’s arm, pushing her toward the door, but Aurora did not budge. For such a delicate woman, she was surprisingly solid. “Don’t stay awake all night fretting over this,” Aurora said. “You must be at your best tomorrow. You must be rested and beautiful and charming and quick- witted. Everything we have schemed for succeeds or fails tomorrow night.”

“I know,” Daiyu said. “I will go to bed as soon as I see the scarf in the garden. As soon as I know if Kalen is all right.”

There was a long pause, while each of them had the same thought. Daiyu added in a whisper, “Don’t lie to me, Aurora. Don’t tell me he is alive if he is dead, just so I do my part.”

Aurora’s hair seemed to brighten in indignation. “That is something Chenglei would do, so I would not,” the blond woman said. “Whatever the truth is, I will give it to you. And in return, you must give us your best effort.”

“I will,” Daiyu said. “Now go, please, and quickly return.”

The next hour passed so slowly it was as if each minute were being etched in glass to be preserved for all posterity. Daiyu paced around her room, stopped long enough to brush out her hair and get herself ready for bed, and then took up the pacing again. Every five or ten minutes she paused at the window and stared out into the fenced yard, hoping to see a signal left behind by Aurora or Ombri. She had a feeling that even if she stood there and watched for the rest of the night, shewould not actually catch a glimpse of either servant of the gods creeping into the garden. She didn’t know why, but she believed they could make themselves invisible, if they chose; they could probably teleport or walk through walls or fly. Just because they hadn’t showed such powers to Daiyu didn’t mean they didn’t possess them.

It was well past midnight when she paused in her agitated circling to gaze out the window again. And there it was-a braided shawl of red and green, seemingly blown into the garden by a careless breeze. The colors would have been difficult to see except that Aurora had thoughtfully left the scarf within the circle of light that a street lamp threw into the yard. Red and green intertwined. Kalen was injured, but not critically.

Even as Daiyu felt a profound relief course through her muscles, leaving them jittery and loose, she wondered if Aurora was telling the truth. Aurora must have realized that any other flag would have sent Daiyu fleeing into the night, despite her promise-the news that Kalen was gravely wounded, the news that he was dead. Even a green scarf, the harbinger of good news, would have caused Daiyu to run from the house, because she had witnessed enough of Kalen’s beating to know that this signal would have been false.

Somehow Aurora had known to leave behind the only token that would make Daiyu keep her place.

XIANG STOOD BEFORE Daiyu and studied her like a predatory bird examining a potential meal. “Stand taller,” she commanded. “Throw your shoulders back-show off your bosom. Let me see you walk across the floor.”

Had she been doing this all over again, Daiyu thought, she would have spent more time practicing how to move in the ridiculously high heels that Xiang had commissioned to match the blue dress. She was surprised the shoes didn’t actually hurt, for they made her rather large feet look slim and graceful. But they were so perfectly constructed that they were quite comfortable except for the fact that she was sure she would fall off of them.

“Keep your eyes lowered until you have been addressed,” Xiang went on with her instructions, which had been repeated so many times already that Daiyu knew them by heart. “Never take your gloves off while you are dancing.”

That last injunction, at least, Daiyu was absolutely certain to obey. She clasped her hands together before her, and the blue cotton of the gloves was a perfect match for the dyed silk of her dress.

It was possibly the most beautiful item of clothing she’d ever owned, though it looked nothing like any dress she had ever worn. The top was made of layers of thick silk so heavy there was very little drape from the shoulders to the hips, though it had been cut so that it pinched in subtly at the waist. The sleeves were very straight and came all the way to her wrists; the square neckline was deep enough to show off the upper curve of her breasts. The saturated cornflower blue of the fabric was accented at the neckline and wrists with a wide border of brilliant embroidery in shades of pink and coral. Her black skirt-tight at the waist and falling all the way to the tops of those high-heeled shoes-flaunted a matching border at the hem.

Qiji gems glowed at her throat, her wrist, her ears, and her fingers, and tingled insistently against her skin. The dragon ring was a cool, familiar shape under the folds of the right-hand glove.

Her hair had been braided with so many ribbons that someone might have to look twice to be certain she wasn’t wearing a tapestry on her head.

“Come closer to me,” Xiang commanded. “Let me see when I can smell your perfume. Stop. There.” Xiang sniffed the air. “Yes. Perfect. Not a drop more.”

“No, Aunt.”

Xiang tilted her head and gave Daiyu one final survey. “I believe we are ready,” she said. “I don’t think we have forgotten a thing.”

Daiyu rested her hands flat against her skirt. Through the fabric of the gloves and the silk of the dress, she could feel the silver bracelet in her left pocket, the quartz stone in her right.

She had not forgotten anything either.

Xiang said, “Then it is time to go.”

Daiyu had not expected to sleep at all the previous night, but in fact the combined effects of panic, terror, and relief had put her out almost as soon as she finally sought her bed. She had still been asleep in the morning when Aurora came in with Xiang’s own personal dresser to help Daiyu begin the long process of getting ready. As soon as she was awake and coherent, Daiyu sent Aurora a sharp look of inquiry, and the other woman nodded. Kalenisfine.

Still, Daiyu hadn’t been entirely reassured until Aurora slipped her a note-which she had instantly realized could not have been faked. “I’m bruised and a little bloody, but no broken bones,” Kalen had written. “Don’t worry. Do what you’re supposed to do. If you remember, think of me every time you see a waterfall.”

He was safe, then. He was not dead. Daiyu would do what she had come to Jia to do, and then she would be gone.

If she could bring herself to leave Kalen behind.