The Sack of the Summer Palace

Outside the royal suite

Lin Ben wheeled at a dead sprint into the hallway leading to the royal suite. As for the tableau before him—it is difficult to describe in words, for of course his perceptions of the various unusual and wrong elements was, at least to some extent, simultaneous, and he did not have much time to think. Yet his mind did grapple with the scene in some semblance of an order, and we will endeavor to reproduce it here.

His first perception was the absence of his two elder brothers from the flanks of the door. They were heaped, clammy and shivering, to one side, Gregarious Lin on top. A small end-table had been knocked over and now leaned on the strong but motionless leg of the Iron Rhetorician; a pewter tray lay bottom-up on the floor a few inches away from the faintly twitching fingers of Gregarious Lin, and a goblet rested in the cranny created between Gregarious' haunch and Iron's stomach, which cranny was quite soaked with wine.

Having digested this arguably peripheral aspect of the scene, he turned his eye and mind to what any observer would view as its central element—to wit, King Tenshing Panchama of Uä, framed by the doorframe of the suite. The King was looking about the hallway with much the same bemusement as Lin Ben, and Lin Ben noticed now several aspects of the King's demeanor that had either eluded him or else, perhaps, been absent or suppressed until that time: The rapid saccades of his eyes, the febrile flush of his skin, his sheer gangling height, the smile always hovering at the corners of his lips but never quite alighting. 

At last (and, we repeat, it did not take long) the King's eyes alit on the figure directly before him, and Lin Ben's followed. Although parallelism would dictate that we lavish a few overlong sentences on the description of this figure, we find that there is rather little to say; it was simply Aditi, the laundress, the key to the royal suite still in her hand.

It was at this point that Lin Ben's perceptions gave way to his chivalric impulse, and he said, heedless of consequence, "Leave her be, Your Grace."

Now the King did smile—and, Lin Ben saw, Aditi too; and it was not clear which was the more chilling. For Aditi's smile was hard with barbed amusement and not a little appraisal, as though she was weighing the merits of any number of responses to Lin Ben's presence, each more unpleasant than the last; but the King's smile was one Lin Ben could imagine bestowing on a spider when one was in a particularly benevolent mood, no warrant against the casual murder of the same creature at some later time. 

The King turned his gaze to Aditi. "The Eye was right," he said. "Skittering paws. You never were a laundress. You folded sheets like a dancer—rehearsed to perfection."

"It pleases the nobility to imagine that the ideal laundress would thus approach her trade," said Aditi, sketching a small abasement at the compliment. “One can easily finesse verisimilitude by showing what one's audience wishes to see. Your Grace, this Green Morning brother has already arrived; the rest of the relief guard is surely on its way."

"Eight Green Morning brothers? An amuse-bouche. I must have the recipe for that tea of yours."

"What you must have, Your Grace, is as long a head start as you can manage. I think you know you will not taste that tea again."

The King's face grew grave, the hovering smile flitting off for a more congenial bower. "I know it."

"Your Grace," Lin Ben broke in. "Please, return to your quarters. Doubtless this false laundress has dosed you with some wit-addling drug. I beg you, take no hasty action."

"The Green Morning," the King said, as he might speak of a wayward child. "Backward as always." He made an idle gesture; three shining lances of white light sprang from the palm of his hand. Lin Ben's vision seared with their onset, then went black.