The Apothecay Diaries Book 2

Red Nails

The disgustingly multicolored roses stole the show at the garden party. Lakan looked at them vacantly. The musical performance had virtually lulled him to sleep; he was holding someone's cap with a ball of fuzz attached to it in his hand, and he didn't even know where he had gotten it.

Oh well, Lakan thought, and placed the cap next to him on the table. The official beside him greedily snatched it up and arranged it on his own head. He seemed to be looking reproachfully at Lakan, but the strategist didn't really know why. He decided to take out his monocle, polish it with a handkerchief, and then put it back on the other eye.

The roses were positioned in the very center of the banquet, as if to show off the poor taste of whoever had arranged them.

He was at a banquet; he remembered that much. Music furled around him and silk streamers waved. He was presented with a meal that was clearly the height of luxury, and he could smell wine everywhere.

It so happened that Lakan had never been very good at remembering things that didn't interest him. He recalled what had happened, but not the attendant emotions; he felt completely divorced from those.

Before he knew it, the proceedings were over, and two consorts, one dressed in black and the other in blue, were receiving roses from the Emperor matching the colors they wore. Lakan heard whispers around him indicating how beautiful the women were, but he wouldn't know. Whether people's faces were beautiful or ugly was something else he'd never had a connection to.

God, this was boring. Wasn't he here? Why go to all the trouble of provoking him if he wasn't even going to come?

He was left with no choice but to find someone else to tease. He could at least let off a little steam. He looked around: there were plenty of people still here.

He hated crowds.

Most people's faces just looked like Go stones to him. He could differentiate between men and women, for men's faces looked like black stones, and women's like white ones, but they all had nondescript, expressionless caricatures of faces on them. Some of the people he knew particularly well in the military had graduated to looking like Shogi tiles, but that was all. The grunts all look like pawns, and as their ranks went up they started to look like lances or knights, the game's more powerful pieces.

The job of a military commander was simple: to arrange the pieces where each was most suited. A place for everything and everything in its place; that was what won most battles. It wasn't difficult! That was all Lakan had to do, and his job was finished. He might be a talentless hack himself, but if he could distribute his pieces correctly, those around him would take care of his work. That was how Lakan felt about the matter, anyway.

Even that man whom everyone said was as beautiful as a celestial nymph—Lakan had to take their word for it. He couldn't tell. All he knew was that he had to find a gold general with a promoted silver in tow.

And finding people was something he was used to.

Argh, but his eyes hurt worse than usual today. The red stuck in them. Everyone had red pigment on the tips of their fingers.

This so-called "red polish" was supposed to be all the rage among the palace women these days. The red polish that he recalled, floating back from his memories, had never been so garish. It had been thinner, lighter. The red of balsam.

The word tugged on his heartstrings, reminding him of the name of a courtesan. Even as the thought floated through his mind, a diminutive palace woman appeared directly in his line of sight. She looked small and frail, but determined, like woodsorrel.