Jade War

The Horn looked at Bero closely and curiously, as if he were a strange species of frog that had been discovered in the rain forest. Bero found the man’s gaze unnerving and began to think that maybe Mudt was right; maybe he should’ve kept his mouth shut the whole time. He’d heard rumors on the street that Nau Suen was so skilled in Perception that he could read minds. Which was stupid, everyone knew that was impossible, but nevertheless, Nau’s stare was so penetrating that Bero’s skin crawled.

The Horn said, “Ask another question and I’ll rip your tongue out. You’re a dog, a messenger, that’s all you are.” Nau leaned in close and spoke into Bero’s ear. “But you’re not lying. You actually do believe you’re wearing Kaul Lan’s jade. Which means that sooner or later, you’ll wish I’d done you the favor of killing you tonight.”

Nau straightened and turned away. “Let’s go,” he said. “Get these trucks out of here.” Several Green Bones combined their Strength to haul the lead vehicle upright, then Nau and his Green Bones got into the three trucks, taking the bin of jade scavenge with them. A few paused to roll the bodies of the pickers into the gully, one by one. With a rumbling spray of dirt, they drove off, leaving Bero and Mudt still kneeling by the road to wait for morning and make their way back down the mountain alone.

CHAPTER 24

The Inheritance

Shae walked from the Weather Man’s residence to the main house. Even though it was an hour before dawn, the lights were on in the kitchen. Kyanla was stirring a pot of hot cereal at the stove. Hilo sat at the table, cutting a nectarine into bite-sized pieces with a paring knife and putting them on a plastic food tray in front of Niko. The toddler pushed them around, depositing more of them on the floor than in his mouth. Hilo grumbled with weary patience.

Shae stood in the entry of the kitchen. Whenever she looked at Niko, she still felt a jolt—an echo of the shock on that evening three months ago when her brother had arrived back in Janloon with an exhausted two-year-old child in his arms. “Does he always wake up this early?” she asked.

“Pretty much,” her brother said, eating the rejected fruit pieces himself. “Since I had to be up early anyway, I thought I’d let Wen sleep in. She was up half the night with Ru.”

“We have to go,” Shae said.

Hilo wiped his hands on a napkin and got up, leaving Kyanla to take his vacated spot. The boy ignored the housekeeper’s attempts to reinterest him in breakfast and held his arms out to Shae to be picked up. “Auntie, auntie.”

“Not now, Niko,” Shae said, with a stab of guilt, as she placed a consoling kiss on the top of his head. Despite the shock of both his existence and his arrival, she’d loved the little boy almost at once. It was impossible not to see his resemblance to Lan, not to feel a mingled pang of sadness and joy every time he made an expression that reminded her of her dead brother. When Niko was fussy, clingy, and confused, when he began to follow her and tearfully hug her legs, she loved him all the more, wanted to comfort and protect him. She suspected he had taken such a strong liking to her because she was the one in the family most similar in appearance to Eyni.

A nondescript car and trusted driver were waiting for them at the front door. They couldn’t take Hilo’s Duchesse Priza or any of the family’s more recognizable vehicles. The two of them sat in silence as the car drove down dark streets.

Shae said, “What do we tell the clan about Niko?”

Hilo lit a cigarette and rolled down the window. “That he’s Lan’s son. That he was born overseas without our knowledge and brought back to Kekon after his mother died. What else do they need to know?”

“No one will believe it’s that simple.”

“Let them believe whatever they want,” Hilo said harshly. A tense silence swelled between them. Hilo turned his head to the window and blew out a stream of smoke. When he spoke again, the anger had gone out of his voice. “I know what you’re thinking, Shae, but it didn’t happen like that. I tried to work things out differently. You remember Eyni, what she was like.”

“She used to be Lan’s wife,” Shae said quietly. “She was Niko’s mother.”

Shae had not been close to Eyni, but they had been on cordial terms before Shae had left for Espenia. She struggled to even remember the woman clearly now, to describe her better in her own mind, so that when she knelt in the sanctum of the Temple of Divine Return and asked the gods to recognize her father and her grandfather and her eldest brother—all of them gone from this world to await the Return—she could pray consideration for her former sister-in-law as well. When she finished naming those who’d passed on, she pleaded forgiveness for her brother. What Hilo had done went against the Divine Virtues, but Lan’s son would be cared for and loved, she promised it on her soul. And hadn’t the family suffered enough already? Don’t punish us further, she begged.