Chung Kuo - The Marriage Of The Living Dark Part 9

"There's a ma.s.sive lake on the other side of it and a huge desalination plant."

"And food?"

Zelic laughed softly. "Thafs the beauty of it Ifs all self-contained." Li Yuan turned, looking to him. "Self-contained?" "You'll see, Chay Sha. But look ..." he pointed out to either side of the city itself. "You see those things that look like studs coming out of the ground?" Li Yuan turned, narrowing his eyes, then nodded. "Ah, yes. Now what are those?" "Guard towers. Every half-mile. They stretch from Odessa in the west to San Antonio in the south-east" "I see. And they're meant to keep your friends from the Southern Alliance out, neh?" "Thafs right, Chay Sha ..."

"In case they steal some of the sand you seem to have so much of, I presume." Zelic laughed. "There are plans, Chay Sha. Once funds are available, all of these lands will be opened up again for farming. Until then..." "Until then you put up guard towers to protect the sand from your neighbours, right?" "It is not quite so simple, Chay Sha." "No," Li Yuan said, relenting, deciding to bait the young man no more. "Nothing ever is."

BLOOD AND IRON.

Li Yuan looked back. The fortress had grown considerably in the past two minutes and he could now discern its details. It had to be five K wide at least and three, maybe four, li high. Twice as high as his own City had once been. But compact And surrounding it was desert. Mile after mile of empty desert Self-contained indeed. But he still could not see how it could possibly sustain a population of close-on half a million. The other cities he had seen had had vast growing areas surrounding them, tended by robot farming machinery, but this had nothing.

He frowned, then smoothed his beard thoughtfully. "How goes the war, Captain Zelic? Are you still winning?"

Zelic smiled. It had been a standing joke between them these last six weeks, ever since Zelic had joined their party at Wichita. Every evening there was news of some great victory or other on the media, and yet the war never ended, the enemy was never finally defeated.

"You know how it is, Chay Sha," Zelic answered, conscious that his every word was monitored. "We are one against three. Our enemies seek to grind us down." "But you are resilient," Li Yuan finished for him. "My cousin Wu Shih often remarked upon it when he was still alive."

Zelic bowed his head, embarra.s.sed by that explicit reference to the past, when the Han were Masters and the Americans their humble subjects. It was not often their conversation touched upon such matters, but when it did, as now, an area of awkwardness opened up between them.

Li Yuan turned back. The fortress-city was now directly ahead of them, dominating the landscape, the dark rail running directly into it. To their left the chain of guard towers was now less than a It away, a line of ma.s.sive concrete toadstools, their heavy armaments visible even from this distance.

And beyond them a thousand li of desert "Are there many encroachments?"

"Encroachments?" Zelic stepped across, then, seeing where Li Yuan was pointing, said, "Ah, raids, you mean?" He shrugged. "To be honest with you, Chay Sha, I don't know. But I shall ask, if you wish."'It would be interesting to know." "Then I shall find out for you. Incidentally, the Governor's name is ..."

"Rogers. Cal Rogers, neh?"

Zelic smiled again. Fine teeth he had. Regular and white, like a well-bred horse. "You are well-briefed, Chay Sha."

"There is little else to do, Captain. Unless one actually likes the sight of sand and sky."

"You are bored, Chay Sha?" Zelic asked, suddenly concerned. Caged, perhaps. Frustrated. Impotent, even, but bored? He laughed good-humouredly. "No, Captain Zelic. I am not bored. As I say, I keep myself busy, reading reports, watching your media channels, writing ..." Zelic, who had been looking down, now glanced up, a spark of genuine interest in his eyes. "Writing, Chay Sha?"

Li Yuan nodded. "I have begun a journal. A kind of... oh, what is the word for it?"

"A history?"

"Yes. But a history of myself. An autobiography. I find it soothes me."

"I see."

"I don't think you do, Captain. But never mind. I suppose you barely remember the world as it was."

"I'm afraid I don't remember it at all, Chay Sha. I am only twenty-six, you understand."

"Ah ..."

Then Zelic had been bom two years after City America had fallen. Two years after the death of his cousin Wu Shih. Li Yuan sighed heavily. How could it all have gone so quickly? How could such power, such strength, dissolve so rapidly and fade to nothingness?

It was a mystery. A mystery he strove to answer in his writing.

Ahead of them the great fortress had grown to fill the sky. As they pa.s.sed into its shadow the monorail began to brake, the slightest judder in the viewing carriage reminding Li Yuan of where he was physically. For a moment he had been back BLOOD AND IRON.

there, standing beside Wu Shih and Tsu Ma in Rio more than thirty years before, when he'd been Regent, talking and laughing; he and Tsu Ma standing there studying a delicate lavender bowl and talking of ancient craftsmanship. "Ingenious," he said softly as he took in the details of the approaching city, noting how the great gla.s.s exoskeleton curved outward from its foot for the first half li or so, until it stabilised and then curved inward. The tiny blisters of robot gun-emplacements studded that great upward sweep at regular intervals.

There were nine such fortresses, stretching from Laredo in the south, through San Antonio, San Angelo, Lubbock, Amar-illo, Las Vegas, Trinidad and Pueblo, up to Denver. Beyond those, to the south and west, was the unclaimed wilderness. It was his son-in-law Egan's ambition to reclaim that territory and reunify the great North American continent, but things had not gone well for him these past few years. The strain of isolating DeVore was telling. Like most aspiring Emperors, young Egan had been forced to face the fact that the more land one conquered, the more difficult it was to keep. Now he faced enemies not merely in Europe and the North-West, but from the South and West also. Indeed, the emergent power of New California was only one of several potential challenges to Egan's reign, and considering the strain on Egan's forces, one might have thought it politic to come to some agreement - even, perhaps, a treaty - with the Calif ornians, but Egan's response had been to escalate the conflict But so it was. So it had always beea War, endless war. As if mankind could not exist without it I am well out of it, he thought, watching as a great circle began to form in the solid gla.s.s wall directly ahead of them, dagger-like shards slowly folding inward, like the petals of some strange Antarctic plant. They swept in, following a steep curve around the inside of the city, great metallic stanchions flashing past them as they slowed to a halt "We are here, Chay Sha," Zelic announced, somewhat superfluously."Yes. And there's our welcoming party."

A small group of high-ranking soldiers and officials had gathered at the edge of an immense empty s.p.a.ce that was more like a great hall than a platform. They waited uncomfortably, talking among themselves. Seeing them, Li Yuan knew without being told that his visit here was no occasion for popular celebration.

But then, who could really blame them? For more than two centuries his kind - the Han - had kept them down. Now that they ran things, why should they treat their once-oppressors any better than they themselves had once been treated? No. They would be polite because Egan had ordered them to be polite. Beyond that they would offer nothing.

"Well, Captain Zelic," he said, steeling himself, reminding himself that, despite all, he was still a Son of Heaven, "let us go and meet our hosts. I would not wish to keep them waiting."

"So what do you want?"

Harding sat forward, smiling. "I want to make a deal."

Horton laughed. "You know I'm taping this?"

"It doesn't matter. A time comes when a man has to take sides. That moment arrived this afternoon."

"I don't understand ..."

"We've lost the West"

Horton sat back, shocked by the news. "But I thought..." "You thought we were winning. Yes, and so did many. But that b.a.s.t.a.r.d Egan has p.i.s.sed it all away. Three whole armies he's lost" "And he blames you, neh?"

Harding blinked. "What have you heard?"

"Nothing. I'm just guessing. What did he do? Shout and scream at you?"

Harding looked down. "He stripped me of my rank."

"So you're no longer Chancellor?"

"No."

"So who ...?"

"LiKueiJen."BLOOD AND IRON

Horton laughed. "He wouldn't dare! Why, half his court would abandon him!"

"I'm told he made the appointment immediately I left." Horton's face slowly changed. "Li Kuei Jen? That half-man!" Harding leaned forward, conspiratorially.

"Precisely. Now about this deal..."

"Captain Zelic?"

The young officer got up smartly from his chair and turned to face Li Yuan, surprised to find the Pang there in his room in the heart of the soldiers' quarters. "Chay Sha?"

"Are you busy, Captain?"

"Busy? No, I..."

Zelic glanced at the open journal on the table beside him. It was a large book with a thick, dark leather cover. Beside it, a quill pen rested in an ink pot From the dark, wet look of the handwriting on the left-hand page, he had interrupted Zelic in mid-flow. But what had he been writing? A report for his superiors? His personal thoughts on events? Or was Zelic, perhaps, of a literary turn of mind?

In another place and time he might have walked across the room and looked, but he knew better than to do so now. He was no longer in a position of power. Besides, he liked Zelic, and even if the man were reporting back his observations, that was his duty and he could not be blamed for it "You want something, Chay Sha?"

Li Yuan turned away, his golden eyes scanning the room, conscious of its spartan, military feel. "I hoped you might show me around the fortress. While we've time."

"Of course." Zelic gave a single nod, then, turning to close the journal, took his tunic from the back of his chair and slipped it on. "What would you like to see, Chay Sha? The trays?"

"We could begin there."

Zelic paused, alerted by something in Li Yuan's manner. "Chay Sha?' "I thought we might go outside, perhaps, and visit one of the guard posts. See the frontier."

"But Chay Sha, it would be most.. ."

"Irregular?'

Zelic nodded, then, in a much quieter voice, added, "Besides, I don't think we would get permission."

"And why is that?"

"They would say it was not safe, Chay Sha."

"And the real reason?"

"Security."

"Ah ..." Li Yuan smiled. So his guess had been right. Something was going on out here "The trays, then," he said, standing back to let Zelic move past him.

Yin Han Ch'in was eating his evening meal when his half-brother called on him at his modest quarters in the south of the t.i.ty. Sending his wife and children into another room, Han rose from the table, then asked his Steward to send his brother in.

"Well, brother," he asked, as Kuei Jen stepped into the spa.r.s.ely decorated room, "what brings you here so late in the day?"

Li Kuei Jen embraced his brother warmly. "The truth is, I need your help, Han."

"My help?" Han Ch'in laughed "Have you debts, little brother?"

"Only one. And that is to my husband."

Han Ch'in made a sour face. "We owe him everything, neh? He's been so generous, after all. These quarters, for instance..."

"Forget that We are to move into the castle, as his guests." "We?" Han Ch'in stared at him a moment, then, in a quieter voice: "What has happened, Kuei Jen? Has there been an attempted coup?" "No. But there might be, unless we intercede."

Han Ch'in laughed scornfully. "You think you and I can influence events? No. If anything, our intercession would only make things worse. These Americans hate us. They hate everything we stand for. Don't you understand that yet?" "I understand full well, yet we must try. We know things you and L Oh, and father, too. We know how to govern. How to ride the tiger. These things were bred in us. Are in our blood."

Han Ch'in sighed. "Things must be bad."BLOOD AND IRON "Bad enough. A million men dead, four million prisoner." "G.o.ds! When?"

"He returned from the battlefield earlier this afternoon. No one knows . . ." "Everyone knows. You can be sure of it How can you keep a thing like that a secret?"

"We can try. Egan has called a full meeting of his Advisory Council. They are sitting even as we speak. In the meantime he has called for a total media blackout"

"And you think they'll obey him?"

"He has given Colonel Chalker the job."

"Ah ..." Han Ch'in nodded thoughtfully. Chalker had a reputation for ruthlessness, and as newly-appointed head of Egan's Internal Security Force, he was not known for his restraint in carrying out orders. "Then your husband means to fight" "You thought he wouldn't?" Kuei Jen put out his hand and touched his brother's arm. "You thought him an excellent soldier once." "And a pig-headed, stubborn fool."

"You were friends."

Han Ch'in looked down. "Yes. But that is in the past The things he said to me ..."

"You must forgive him, Han."

"Forgive him? What, and lose face? Never!"

But Kuei Jen was insistent "You must. Think of your children, Han. Is your face worth their lives?"