The Sack of the Summer Palace

The Dragon of the North

The second day started earlier than anyone liked, with a mixed corps of Demon Guard and Green Morning marksmen chasing rumors of a tiger sighted in the Courtyard of Worthy Toil. The absence of the predator was quickly enough ascertained, and not long after dawn the Mistress of House sent out a crew of maids armed with little gongs to clear a path from the main gates to the door of the keep. Slightly later in the morning, the outdoor cookery and the disbursal of "scraps" was repeated. At roughly the same time, a crowd could gradually be seen gathering to the north—this was the procession, organizing and preparing for its arrival later in the day.

As the afternoon approached, the amorphous group of bodies to the north began to form up, extending in a dark thread toward the Summer Palace. As it approached, the guards on the parapets soon spread news of great rhythmic thumps from the same direction, whose beat undergirded some deep chant-song whose words could not yet be discerned. The more well-seasoned maids and soldiers, in accord with the custom of the summer court, declined to speculate on what the thumps might be—for they were not gongs, nor yet war-drums, and yet they tinted the air with like authority and portent. 

Eventually a novice of the Green Morning procured a set of opera glasses and made an astonished report that no one would credit, save for seeing it themselves: The thumps were caused by the impact of great logs on the ground, hauled from huge wains and heaved eight at a time, in perfect unison, by men the size of bears—and landing, each set of eight, in a tight group, so that the efforts of the bear-men formed a wooden road. When the procession was fully en route, a larger corps of less immense men began lifting up the logs in the rear and rushing them back to the wains, so that the road moved with the procession toward the palace gates.

And there were things to see in the procession, to be sure: Bright banners, flashing spears and halberds, equerries on well-caparisoned steeds, and many figures shrouded in dull, voluminous robes. But for the riders at the very rear, each processer carried a large panel of painted canvas or light wood, and the procession was headed by a pair of riders hauling a wain. When the procession of the Amalgamated Loggers was close enough, the crash of a gong came, and at this two things happened: The palace gates were thrown open, and the processers, as one, held their painted panels to their sides or over their heads, while the riders in the van pulled a great rigging from under tarpaulins in the wains. The collective effect of these maneuvers was to turn the procession into a long dragon, with scales painted in black and white craquelure reminiscent of a white birch, and a craggy head fanged with broken branches. ("White birch symbolizes the union of the King's white and the North's wood," Aditi told a gaping Chesa, looking through one of the high windows in the keep. "Likewise the wooden teeth growing from the mountainous head, which subtly imitates the geometry of the Cradle Mountains that surround our capital.") 

As soon as the gate opened, the loggers (and, for all that they had assignments to complete, much of the palace staff) formed up around the path that had been cleared from gate to keep. The dragon's head looked up toward the battlements above the gate, its mouth opened, and a gong sounded. All eyes looked toward the battlements—where, having entered all but unnoticed, stood the King, flanked by Queen Charvi, the King’s Lama, Gregarious Lin, and the Iron Rhetorician.

The King allowed silence to fall for a long moment. His eyes were far away—but, Lin Ben thought, watching from a parapet across the courtyard, something in his carriage suggested pleasure at the feeling of being attended by the gathering, a much larger one than any that had graced the Summer Palace yet that year.

"Dragon of the North," the King uttered at last—his voice carrying easily to the far corners of the courtyard, borne by some minor but effective sorcery—"all men quail before your puissance. Why honor you my palace on this day?"

The dragon's jaws worked once again; the gong sounded again, twice.

The King turned to face the palace staff and the loggers' vanguard, all gathered in the courtyard or on the battlements or listening, as Aditi and Chesa did, from open windows of the keep. "The Dragon of the North comes promising boons," he intoned. "Describe them, Dragon, that my subjects may hear!"

The gong sounded three times as the dragon's jaws gaped.

"He will triple our wealth!"

Four times.

"Quadruple our happiness!"

Five.

"And bring five auspicious miracles! Dragon, is there any stipulation on these boons?"

The gong sounded six times, and through some trick of horsemanship, the dragon's head was made to rear up as it gaped.

The King's voice grew sober, though it still carried well. "The Dragon of the North asks one favor," he said. "We must fête the woodsmen of the North for their year of leal service. Shall we do this thing, my subjects?"

A vast shout of YES washed over the courtyard; Lin Ben could have sworn it vibrated the very walls.

"Then let the woodsmen come!"

At this, the dragon dissolved with a great rustle and rattle as the processers tucked their panels under their arms or strapped them to their backs once more, the cloth-and-wicker rigging that made the head transmuted by some trick of construction into a festive decorative frame for the wains in the lead, which (it could be seen from above) were stocked with beams of fine timber. A merry tune burst forth on dozens of heretofore hidden woodwinds, and the timber-wains continued leading the procession to the keep.