Chapter 12
Once he was through the door, Sheiji looked around for Fa-Ying. The corridor was dark compared to the brightly lit room he had emerged from. There was no one in sight. Then he heard a whispered, “Sheiji!”
He looked toward the voice and could barely make out the shadowy figure of a man. “Fa-Ying?” he asked cautiously.
“Yes,” came the response. Fa-Ying motioned for Sheiji to step into the shadows. “What’s wrong?” Fa-Ying asked. “This is very dangerous, meeting here.”
“I know,” Sheiji whispered. “But I think they are plotting to kill me.”
“What! How do you know this?” asked Fa-Ying.
“After I refused to sign the document, Sui-Tsai spoke to his advisor in Thánh. He said, ‘By tomorrow evening, I will be rid of my chains.’ And Sudra replied, ‘of course.’ It was almost like they had a plan. I’m sure they are going to kill me,” Sheiji explained. “But I don’t know how.”
Fa-Ying frowned as he thought. “Who’s that little slave of yours?” he asked. “The new one with the pale skin.”
“You mean Rico?” asked Sheiji. “He is from Zuriel.”
“Yes, your brother gave him to you, didn’t he?”
“My brother Kano. But he doesn’t like Sui-Tsai any more than I do. He wouldn’t give me a slave that would try to hurt me,” said Sheiji.
“Still, I don’t trust him,” replied Fa-Ying. “He is too alert and he seems to care too much about you.”
“Since when has caring become a fault?” asked Sheiji.
“I mean, he seems to pay too much attention to what goes on around you,” replied Fa-Ying. “He is a spy, I’m sure of it.”
“Who were you talking to in there?” asked Sheiji.
“Some men who could become indispensible to us,” replied Fa-Ying. “Though the younger one…I don’t trust him to remain loyal. The older one is an Utonu, the highest rank of Obokan warriors. He knows how to remain loyal to one cause.”
“What are we to do about Sui-Tsai?” asked Sheiji.
“Yes, he said tomorrow night. He must act within the next 24 hours,” mused Fa-Ying. “Go back to your room. Eat nothing and drink nothing. Let no one into your room, not even your servants. I will try to bring you food when I can. If anyone says they bring something from me, do not listen to him! I will come myself or send Inon if I have anything for you.”
“What shall you tell Sui-Tsai?”
“I will tell him that you are not feeling well and have retired for the night,” replied Fa-Ying. “One more thing.” Fa-Ying untied his dagger from his belt. “Don’t hesitate to use it, Sheiji. Don’t even stop to question.”
Sheiji nodded and slipped the dagger into his belt. “What shall we do, though, Fa-Ying?”
“I have a plan. Just go and keep yourself safe. I’ll send Inon if I can.” Fa-Ying opened the door and slipped back into the party.
Sheiji started off toward his room, careful to keep to the shadows. He opened the door and two servants jumped to their feet from the corner where they sat gossiping.
“What is Vua’s request?” asked a tall, slender servant.
Sheiji clutched his stomach as if he were ill and moaned a bit. “Leave me, Tolu. I am ill.”
“I shall bring Vua some wine to sooth your stomach?” the servant asked.
“No,” Sheiji replied. “I wish only to go to bed. Leave me, both of you.”
The other servant left, but Tolu lingered, “Vua wishes a bit of plain rice, then?”
“NO! Just leave me!” Sheiji said.
Tolu drew a dagger concealed in his tunic and made a thrust at Sheiji. Smoothly, Sheiji drew his own dagger and deflected the thrust.
Tolu tried again and again Sheiji deflected it easily. Then it became a real swordfight.
“You are skilled for a servant, Tolu,” Sheiji grunted as pressed his dagger against Tolu’s, trying to force it from his hand.
“Perhaps I am more than a servant,” Tolu replied. He stepped back suddenly, making Sheiji stumble.
Sheiji caught himself and darted out of the way just in time to avoid a stab in the back. “Why are you doing this?”
“I’m a poor man, Vua,” Tolu answered. He smiled wickedly, “And there is good money in store for loyal assassins.”
Sheiji stepped back, pretending to be weary. Tolu rushed forward and Sheiji caught him in the stomach. Tolu sank to the floor with an agonizing scream, Sheiji’s dagger protruding from his stomach.
“I’m sorry, Tolu,” Sheiji whispered. How he hated killing. He stared gloomily at the dead body of his servant. He retrieved his dagger and cleaned it carefully. Then he dragged the body of Tolu and laid it gently outside the door. He closed the door and placed the heavy beam across it, locking himself in and everyone else out.
“Is this how it shall be to win back my throne?” he wondered aloud. “Killing, murdering, hiding behind locked doors?”
Sheiji stood at the window and gazed at the familiar layout of the city below. It was dark, but the moon was bright and Sheiji could make out the shapes of businesses and houses laid out in rows with roads running between them like a perfect grid. What was it like down there? Sheiji wondered. What would it be like to live with the city folk, out from under the eyes of servants and soldiers? What would it be like to never have to worry about poison or assassins or spies lurking around every corner? He could be so free down there among the city folk. Who would notice one more boy among the thousands that lived in Taiyunyi?
A knock came at the door, interrupting Sheiji’s thoughts. “Who’s there?”
“Is me, Vua,” came the accented reply. “Is Rico.”
“I do not need you right now, Rico,” Sheiji replied.
“Vua, is a dead here,” said Rico.
“A what?” asked Sheiji.
“A dead,” Rico repeated.
Sheiji opened the door a crack and peeked out. A pale-skinned boy about ten years old stood with a goblet of wine in his small hands.
“A dead,” Rico repeated, pointing to dead Tolu with his free hand.
“Oh, that,” said Sheiji slowly. “Yes, I know.”
“Much blood. Why?” asked Rico fearfully. “Who kill?”
Sheiji sighed. “What do you want, Rico?” he asked, evading his questions.
“I bring wine. You sick,” replied Rico.
“Who told you I was sick?” asked Sheiji suspiciously.
Rico stared silently into the cup.
“Rico!”
Rico remained silent.
Sheiji took him by the arm and pulled him gently inside. “Who told you I was sick, do you understand the question?”
Rico shook his head.
“How do you know I was sick?”
Rico began babbling rapidly in a foreign language. Sheiji stopped him and said, “Wait, I do not understand your language. Who told you I was sick and who told you to bring wine to me?”
“Fa-Ying,” Rico replied hesitantly.
“Then…then you would not mind tasting it for me?”
Rico turned whiter than he already was. The goblet of wine fell to the ground, spilling its contents on the floor. Rico began to cry and babble incoherently.
Sheiji let him cry for a time, but finally he said, “Rico, do you know how serious this is? Do you know the penalty for poisoning a king?”
Rico stopped crying and looked sorrowfully at Sheiji with his large brown eyes. He nodded a little and wiped his nose.
“But I shall let you plead your case. If you can persuade me of your innocence, I will let you go free,” offered Sheiji. “What have you to say for yourself?”
“He made me do it,” Rico mumbled in perfect Tekelonnese.
“Who?” asked Sheiji. Rico didn’t answer. “I don’t think I have to remind you that what you say will determine whether you live or die,” Sheiji added.
“The Prince Regent.”
“Sui-Tsai?” asked Sheiji.
Rico nodded. “He told me if I didn’
t obey him, he would tell all my secrets.”
“What secrets?” asked Sheiji.
Rico bit his lip. “I have many,” he replied. “Firstly, my name is not Rico.”
Sheiji raised his eyebrows in question.
“My true name is Korin,” Rico explained. “When my mother was a girl, she was kidnapped from her home in Osaku by pirates. She was sold as a slave in a country called Zuriel, far across the ocean.”
Korin paused and looked up. Sheiji nodded thoughtfully and motioned for him to continue. “After being sold several times, she became the property of a man named Bartolomé Gonzalo. He made her his wife and then I was born. He was not kind, though. He beat my mother and his other three wives. He would not let my mother teach me about her people or her language, Tekelonnese.”
“They speak Tekelonnese in Osaku?” asked Sheiji.
“Yes,” Korin replied. “Secretly my mother would speak to me in Tekelonnese, for she wanted me to learn it. Then when I was three years old, my mother ran away from her master. We journeyed all the way to Indigo Bay where we were going to catch a ship to take us back to Osaku. It was about a hundred miles from our master’s farm to the Bay, but we made it! We found some sailors who were willing to take us home.”
“Then what happened?” asked Sheiji, thoroughly absorbed with the story.
“They found us.”
“Your mother’s master?”
“The men he hired to find us. They were searching all the boats, apparently they had been doing this for weeks, looking for us,” explained Korin. “My mother saw them coming up the gang plank, but there was no time to escape. So she handed me to a young sailor who had pitied her. She asked him to keep me safe, for, she said, my light skin would blend in with the sailors.
“The sailor agreed to keep me safe on the voyage and if anyone asked, he would say I was his little son, on my first ocean voyage. So he held me tight and we watched as my mother walked to the side of the ship and jumped into the water, never to be seen again. She would rather die than be a slave.”
Korin gazed into space with tears in his eyes. When he continued, his voice was barely above a whisper. “We made it to Osaku. I had celebrated my fourth birthday on board, though I hadn’t known it. The sailor sent me to the palace in Osaku to learn and in exchange for my lessons I worked in the kitchens.
“I fled to Imatsuro after I was accused of poisoning Tuan, the King of Osaku—.”
“Why were you accused?” Sheiji gripped Korin’s shoulder. If this boy had already poisoned someone, it was likely he would do it again.
“Because I worked in the kitchens. It would be easy for me to slip something into the king’s food. But I didn’t do it! It was another who hoped I would be killed and all suspicions of him would die. So I came here and I found a job, doing what I knew best, working in the kitchens. And here I’ve been for three years,” Korin concluded.
“But how did you become a killer for Sui-Tsai?”
“I don’t know. Somehow, he found out who I was and he threatened to tell the authorities where I was hiding if I didn’t do what he told me. He gave me to Prince Kano and told him to give me as a gift to you, Vua. My job was to spy on you and report what you did and said. That was how Sui-Tsai knew you went out every night and caught you in the hall.”
“How did you know so much? Both Fa-Ying and I were ever so careful to make sure no one was around when we left,” wondered Sheiji.
“I am small,” Korin replied. “I can hide in places you would not have looked, because you were expecting a grown man. That is why, I think, Sui-Tsai chose me. But please do not kill me, Vua. And do not tell the authorities of Osaku where I am, please. If the real killer should ever discover that I am still alive, he will kill me. He thinks I am dead, so there’s no suspicion. But if he knows I am alive, he will kill me because I know who he is.”
“I shall pardon you, Korin, just this once. But if ever you try anything again, you will not find such mercy,” replied Sheiji. “Also, in exchange of your life, you must tell me who really killed King Tuan. The next time I call for you, you must tell me.”
“Thank you, Vua. Thank you,” Korin said over and over.
“You may leave now, Korin. And do not disturb me in the morning, for I am very tired.”
“Yes, Vua. I shall go now,” Korin bowed out of the room.
“Who was that?” asked Fa-Ying, sweeping into the room seconds later. “I told you not to let anyone in here, especially that boy!”
“Fa-Ying,” Sheiji sighed. “It’s fine.”
“And what is that body! A servant tried to attack you?”
“Yes, but I fought him off easily.”
“So that boy was ordered to bring you…poisoned wine,” Fa-Ying guessed, examining the mess on the ground.
“Correct, but it was only on the orders of Sui-Tsai. He told me his whole story and I believe him to be quite loyal.”
“To Sui-Tsai maybe,” muttered Fa-Ying.
“Do you think I would lay my life in the hands of one who is not loyal to us?” asked Sheiji.
Fa-Ying grunted and then said, “Do you remember our plan?”
Sheiji nodded and Fa-Ying continued, “You leave tonight. The first place you will stay is called the Inn of the Axe. A man, known as the Woodcutter, runs it. It is in a town called Miyazu. You must be far away from here by daybreak. I will try to keep anyone from discovering you for as long as possible in the morning. They all think you are ill. When dawn breaks, you must leave the road and travel only in the dense parts of the jungle. Should you get lost, or should anything go wrong, you must find the Genji River. It runs northwest all the way to Taukama, the capital city of Jiwu. Now bolt the door and we will go.”
“Bolt the door?” asked Sheiji. “How will we leave, through the window?”
“Exactly,” Fa-Ying replied. “It will take them a while to open a barred door. And for extra insurance, we’ll push the bed against it.”
They bolted the door and blocked it with Sheiji’s heavy bed. Then Fa-Ying pulled open the large shutters and stepped back. “You can climb down the vines,” he explained.
Sheiji went first and Fa-Ying followed. It was easy for the thin and nimble boy-king to scamper down the vine, though not quite so easy for the old advisor.
With two gentle thumps, they dropped from the vine onto the hard-packed earth below. Ever so silently, the two crept to the side gate. They didn’t even dare to whisper.