Chapter 5

Day in, day out, Prior Fraise of Sheep Rocks was not a happy man. He ministered to the mortuary needs of the largest parish in Chixi Province, but his flock was spread over endless hills, inhabited more by sheep and goats than people. At least half of those people were semibarbaric nomads who dug pits in the ground and buried their dead whole, without caring in the least that their sparks might not yet have fully escaped and would need ritual help to ascend to the Fifth World. The few permanent settlements were mostly isolated ranches and mining camps. They did not bring their dead to Sheep Rocks; they expected the Order to go to them.

That morning, Fraise was in a particularly sour mood. Two nights ago, he had conducted a farewell for a wealthy rancher, but nothing had gone right. The cost of importing firewood into that blighted, eroded, deforested land had all but wiped out the Order’s profit. Fog Moon had lived up to its name, making the timber wet and obscuring the stars that should preside; without wind to help, few sparks had risen, making the mourners tearful and angry.

Worst of all, the discard had borne an unmistakable gunshot wound in the back of his head, and so had obviously been a casualty in one of the hill country’s age-old blood feuds. Yet his heir had ignored all hints that the Gray Brothers could help him obtain his revenge in return for a trifling fee. The stupid amateur would probably get himself killed instead. Admittedly, that would mean another ritual for the Order to organize, but an outing as well would have been much more profitable.

After a whole day on horseback in wind and rain, Fraise had returned to the monastery exhausted and frozen to find a letter awaiting him from the Chixi mother house in Meritorious Aspect. Almost certainly it was another warning that he was behind in his remittance. The financial Helpers there never seemed to understand that a large parish did not necessarily mean a large income; the abbess of a 300-ply house evidently had no idea of the problems of a 10-ply priory like Sheep Rocks. Some months, Fraise could barely feed his tiny community, as well as remit his dues to Chixi, let alone put anything aside to further his own career. He had inherited the priorship two years ago simply because nobody else wanted it. It had brought him no happiness or respect. The older initiates still kept forgetting and addressing him as “Brother Fraise” and the novice sisters were no more cooperative than before.

He had finished his morning tea and rice. The tray had been removed by the half-witted postulant, so he had no further excuse not to open the scroll. Yet still he dawdled. He was tempted to burn it unread.

The northeast corner of the roof was leaking again.

His room was probably the finest in all of Sheep Rocks, because the priory was the only stone building in the village, all others being crumbling wooden shacks. In summer, he had a pleasing little garden, tended by the two postulants and he owned a silk rug not too obviously faded. When the weather permitted, which it currently did not, he had a fine view of snowy mountains. Yet, by the standards of abbots or abbesses, these quarters ranked as a dog kennel. His shelves held a few small carvings of nephrite, which had belonged to his predecessor and which the ignorant might mistake for true jade, but no real collection. A man of worth always collected something: antique scrolls or porcelain or ivory, usually of some particular time or provenance. These he would display for visitors to praise while he expounded on their specific qualities. That was what gentlemen did.

The prospect that Fraise could ever amass enough wealth to buy himself a modest abbacy seemed as remote as the stars. He was doomed to remain rooted forever in these ghastly hills, and even that might be better than whatever the abbess of Meritorious Aspect was about to threaten him with.

Sad and apprehensive, he broke the seal and unrolled the scroll.

Dearest Brother, guard our words within your heart alone. We yearn urgently for a brother or male novice counted on these fingers: thumb, that he stand more than eight spans, less than nine …

Prior Fraise stopped, blinked, and went back up to the beginning again.

The characters still read the same and the calligraphy was very fine, very precise, not ambiguous at all. Eight spans? Very few men of the Gentle People were as tall as that. Fraise himself was not and he had never considered himself short. Nine-span giants were rare, even in Chixi.

Index, that he be of Outlandish stock and appearance.

That went without saying if he was more than eight spans tall.

Middle, that he was born in the Year of the Nightingale, or very near.

She was describing Novice Horse! No! Never! Fraise could not visualize himself trying to run Sheep Rocks without Horse. Horse was wonderful with the livestock. He could dig a bone pit in a third of the time anyone else took and he chopped more firewood than all three other novices together.

He ate more, too.

Fraise read on.

Ring, that he have a leaping heart. Pinky, that he be a skilled seemer.

Hmm. Horse was very good at seeming magic within the limits imposed by his size. But a leaping heart? If she meant ambition, well anyone with a leaping heart would not voluntarily hang around here in Sheep Rocks to rot, which was a cruel appraisal of Fraise himself. It was true that he was holding back on initiating Horse, although he hated to admit it even to himself, but that was not because he feared that the kid would gallop away over the hills to greener pastures. Horse was too amiable and easygoing to do anything so drastic. Fraise was delaying because Horse was far too valuable as a novice. An initiate brother was excused from the more menial tasks in the priory, and Horse did most of those all by himself. It would take three youths to replace him.

But if leaping heart meant dutiful, painstaking, and eager to please, then Horse qualified again.

If you cannot satisfy our need, Brother, let fire eat this paper and rain wash your memory.

This was a very good day for rain and a cozy, but expensive, fire.

If you have, in your care, the youth we seek, speak to none of this but bring him in haste, covertly, to the priory at Huarache, two days west of our house, and believe that our gratitude toward you will be without bounds. May your spark shine ever brighter in this and all higher worlds.

The characters swam on the page. She was telling him to name his own price! A conch of taels? A 50-ply abbacy? Let some other fool try to run this priory without Horse?

The prior rang his bell and when the buck-toothed postulant answered, Fraise told him to send in Novice Horse immediately.

He was tempted to leap up and pace the room as his excitement mounted, but that would imply a lack of tranquillity and dignity. Why had the request come to him, in this flyspeck hamlet? Just for secrecy? But there were many obscure houses closer to Meritorious Aspect, so he must assume that many identical letters had been dispatched. It could even be that the hunt had so far failed to find a youth fitting all those very specific requirements, so now they were beating the hinterlands.

It was going to be an imposture, obviously, possibly even an impersonation. Outlanders with enough money to hire an aide from the Order could only be nobility. Half the lowly cattlemen and horsemen of Chixi were of Outlandish stock and despised because of it, but ever since Falling Mountain had led his horde in from the Outlands three hundred years ago to overthrow the Tenth Dynasty, most of the aristocracy had been of Outlandish stock. Anyone sneering at them did so a long way behind their backs. Most noble families were well diluted by Gentle blood by now, but some retained their size and rocky features. Even the imperial … Fraise shied away from that treasonous idea. The Order would never risk that! But some young noble not too far from the throne was a possibility. The risk must be appalling, but just thinking about the potential rewards made his head spin. His share would certainly make him rich.

And Horse himself? Well, he might get discovered and suffer the death of a thousand cuts, but success would surely bring wealth beyond dreams.

Fraise sighed. He tried to be a meritorious person as the teachers defined that slippery term. He was aware that men had more faults than fleas, as the Humble Teacher wrote, and he tried to rise above his own. But the truth was that he was jealous of Novice Horse, of his never-failing cheerfulness, the way the novice sisters looked at him … Horse should have been initiated at least half a year ago, but who could possibly replace him?

The bead curtain jingled. Novice Horse put his head through at about knee height, touched it to the floor, and stopped. His close-cropped hair dripped rainwater on the floor.

“What are you doing, fool?” the abbot shouted.

“Honored Father … You said to come at once, but my feet are muddy.”

Fraise laughed in silence. Let Deputy Prior Evening Fade worry about the mud!

“Never mind that. Enter properly.”

Horse’s head withdrew, then he parted the beads and strode in. He must have been tending the horses, because he was soaking wet and coated to the knees in more than just mud. He wore only a breechclout, also muddy. He dropped to the floor and kowtowed. Suddenly, the room reeked of stable.

Moved by a sudden whim, Fraise strode over to the wardrobe chest and dug out a monk’s robe. “Stand up.”

Horse stood up, and up. He frowned uneasily, suspecting something wrong.

“How tall are you?”

“Eight spans and a hand, Father … perhaps a little more.” He sounded apologetic about it.

“When were you born?”

“In Lotus Moon in the Year of the Nightingale.”

They couldn’t ask any better fit than that.

The prior handed him the robe. “Put that on and make yourself seem respectable.”

Horse clearly guessed that something unusual was afoot, for his face was completely expressionless. He took the robe and walked over to the mirror in the corner. In about two minutes, he returned for his superior’s inspection, properly garbed—one shoulder covered, the other and both arms bare. His face had lost some of its heavy boniness and melted into the softer, reassuring features of the Gentle People that layfolk expected and would find more reassuring in times of bereavement. His head was now clean shaven, his arms no longer bulged so conspicuously with woodsman muscle, and although his feet were still grubby if Fraise deliberately stared at them, he would not have noticed them otherwise. In fact, he would not even have noticed that this humbly smiling young monk was damp.

Who could not be jealous of such perfection?

“Excellent!”

Horse bowed. “Your Reverence is gracious.”

“Merely truthful. I am”—Fraise omitted the probably he had been about to insert—“about to grant you your initiation. Let me try one more test. How are you at impersonation?”

The novice gave him a steady look. “I have had no training in that skill, Father.”

Clever answer. Seeming was the art of assuming a general type—putting on a monk’s robe and seeming to be a monk. Duplicating a particular individual was so impossibly difficult that novices were strictly forbidden to try it lest they become discouraged and lose confidence in their seeming. But there were tales of initiates who had been able to do it.

“But you have tried, in private.” Everyone did. No novice in the history of the Order had been able to resist trying.

“A little, Father.”

Fraise removed his prior’s headdress and held it out. “Be me.”

Still expressionless, the youth walked back to the mirror. This time, he needed longer and eventually Fraise went to stand beside him and provide his image as a model. Horse’s reflection stopped wavering, and then there were twins. Yes, he had very nearly achieved the impossible. No longer Outlandish, he was now one of the Gentle People; his face was the prior’s and their eyes were level; the great height and breadth had somehow disappeared, sedentary flab had replaced the remarkable musculature. The strain was obvious, though. Now sweat more than rain beaded his forehead, sinews corded his neck. The illusion was not perfect and not quite steady, but Fraise would never have believed that even this much was possible. It might well deceive anyone who did not know him—and it have been achieved with no preparatory study!

If the abbess of Meritorious Aspect did have an imposture in mind, she could ask for no better seemer than Horse.

“How long could you hold this?”

“Not long, Reverend Father.” He spoke through clenched teeth, as if in pain.

“Must I find out?”

“Forgive your errant servant, Father. One hour, maybe, but not two.”

“It is very well done.”

Fraise’s nearly double-bowed his head. “Your words fill me with joy and the hope that I may someday be worthy of your teaching.” Even the voice matched!

“You may return.”

With a whoof of relief, Horse inflated to his former size and shape. His hands were shaking as he returned the prior’s headdress.

“Very well done. There may—and I stress may—be a profitable first contract available for your naming. You and I are going on a journey. Change into traveling clothes, then saddle the two best horses. Tell no one. But first send Deputy Prior Evening Fade to me.”

The arrow flies!

The appalling realization that the mysterious summons might be a vicious practical joke did not occur to Fraise until he and Horse arrived at Huarache. That they arrived at all was no less than a miracle, and entirely due to Horse. Fraise would never have made it by himself or with a less resourceful companion. As the never-ending rain turned trails to swamps and brooks to torrents, Horse coaxed superhuman efforts out of the weary mounts. He took infinite pains to keep them healthy and more than once seemed to drag them across fords by his own brute strength.

Initiates who traveled were sure of hospitality at any House of Joyful Departure along their road, but there were few of those in northern Chixi. Inns were nonexistent. The only recourse was to beg for shelter, and for that they must seem to be other than what they were, for no man, neither prince nor peasant, would knowingly invite ill-omened Gray Helpers under his roof. In those cases, it was always Horse who charmed their way in, often volunteering to cut firewood to earn their board, even after a grueling day that had left Fraise half-dead with exhaustion. When anything special was available in the way of hospitality, it would be offered to Horse. If the luxury was only a spare bed mat, he of course yielded it to his superior. If more intimate pleasures were offered, then they were invariably offered to Horse, and those he did not refuse. Fraise was left to sleep alone and curse himself for his wicked jealousy.

The Humble Teacher said, To those who want least is the most given.

In the final week of their journey, Fog Moon gave way to Cold Moon. Rain stopped, skies cleared, and the world seemed to freeze solid instantly. They had to endure days of bone-cracking cold before they rode into Huarache.

Or rather into what had once been Huarache, for three quarters of the little town had vanished in a fire two years ago, according to a passing mule driver they asked for directions. The abbey had closed down; the Gray Helpers had gone, he said.

Despair froze Fraise’s bones even colder than the wind did. Who could have played such a trick upon him? Was he so despicable as to provoke such spite? And who in the world disliked Horse enough to hurt him also? The prior slumped in misery on his horse and wanted to howl.

Meanwhile, Horse had kept his horse walking and the other had followed.

“There it is, Father!” he said cheerfully.

“What?”

“The monastery! Smoking chimneys, see?”

True enough, the skinner had been wrong. The Order was still ministering to the few remaining inhabitants of charred Huarache.­ Sprawling and stone-built, the Huarache House of Joyful Departure stood up bold and strong amid the ruins to welcome its visitors with a delicious aroma of cooking. The community must be much reduced, for the frozen mud in the big courtyard indicated that traffic had been light before the frost came, but two brothers came running to answer the bell.

Fraise noticed them notice Horse and then exchange glances. He wondered what they were thinking: Here comes another one? Or perhaps it was, This looks like the right stuff at last? He was so travel-weary that he did not care much anymore.

The monastery was obviously designed for at least a 40-ply community, but the two brothers, Hawthorn and Western Mountain, seemed to be the only people around. One took the horses, and the other led the visitors to impressive guest quarters. There they could indulge in hot water, dry clothes, and thick fish soup. Life suddenly became worth living again. By then it was close to winter sunset, but the abbess sent word that she would receive Prior Fraise and Novice Horse whenever they were ready.

Knowing that they had arrived at their destination, Horse must surely be excited, but he was concealing his emotions admirably. He limited his display of emotion to a slight frown as he asked, “Where is everybody, Father? I thought 10-ply was the smallest house allowed?”

“I expect we will find out in good time,” Fraise said contentedly. The security was admirable. He was certain now that this house had been abandoned after the fire and had been opened up exclusively to interview and inspect the candidates called down from the hills by many copies of that cryptic summons. Whatever conspiracy was afoot was calling on remarkable resources, and that meant that it was aimed at a considerable pay-off.

Brother Hawthorn came to report that the abbess would now receive the reverend prior and his novice. Her name was not mentioned, but that was not unusual.

She wore the headdress of a high abbess, but she was not the abbess of Meritorious Aspect, whom Fraise had met a few times. Her room was spacious and completely barren of furniture except for one silk cushion and two rugs, equally spaced around a glowing charcoal brazier. She knelt on the cushion and gestured the visitors to take the rugs, so that the heat was divided evenly among the three of them. She was about forty, with sharp, hard features and an abrupt, uncouth manner. She wasted less than a dozen words on greetings and inquiries about their journey.

Fraise kept his replies equally laconic. He hoped he was managing to seem as inscrutable as Horse, but he had trouble keeping his heart rate down.

“So”—now she took notice of Horse, who kept his face lowered respectfully. Compared to her he seemed to fill half the room—“what did you bring me, Father?”

“What you asked for, Mother. Exactly in all respects.” Fraise returned the scroll before she could ask for it.

She unwound it enough to confirm that it was the genuine article, then laid it on the brazier to burn. “Stand up, Novice.” She had not been informed of Horse’s name, but that must be about to change anyway. “Turn around. Good. Down again, please. It hurts my neck to look at you when you are standing.”

Horse knelt again, smiling respectfully at the jest.

“What do you enjoy most in your duties for the Order?”

Fraise wished she had not asked that, because he knew what the answer was going to be and she would not like it if she had an outing in mind for him. It was very hard to imagine Horse ever hurting anybody.

His face lit up with enthusiasm. “Comforting people, Mother. I mean when the bereaved are weeping and full of sorrow and we can explain again about the spark rising up and they see the stars waiting for their loved ones and know that she or he will be reborn in a better world. They dry their tears, and I love that.”

The abbess did not comment. “Can you speak Palace Voice?”

“I have had almost no experience of it, Reverend Mother. Just the imperial tax gatherers, when they come around.”

“Try that one for me.”

“Peonies bleed against the green

A kite circles.

I open the gate. Children come running.”

The abbess winced. “That is terrible. You sound like the hill country bumpkin you are. What other voices can you do?”

Horse quoted a few more lines of poetry in Qiancheng dialect, which he had picked up from passing traders overnighting at the priory, and then in a southern jabber he had learned from Brother Wavelet.

“Better,” the abbess conceded. “Quite good, even. Have you advanced anyone yet?”

“No, Mother.”

“Would you, if your client requested it?”

Horse did not hesitate. “If my client’s interests required it, yes. Not if the request was motivated by spite or trivial dislike.”

“Why not?”

“Because it would bring an unnecessary risk of disclosure.”

That was the book answer. She nodded, and appeared to be thinking.

“The novice is a very good seemer,” Fraise volunteered. “He does remarkable impersonations.” He shrank back from her burning glare.

She said, “Neither will be necessary. As you said, you have delivered exactly what I requested. I did not stipulate an accent, because that can be taught and he seems to have a good ear.” She turned to Horse again. “If you can learn that, you will do very well for the contract I have in mind. It is not for me, though. I am not your client, who does not wish to reveal her name at the moment. I am authorized to speak for her. Release him to her, Prior.”

Fraise hesitated. “We have not discussed terms yet, Mother.” One could not extort fees from a high abbess as one could a client of the laity. Again, she scorched him with her dragon-fire look.

“They will be more than generous. Do you doubt me?”

He wilted. “Of course not. I appoint this monk to assist the client you presently represent, Mother. Name him.”

For the first time, she actually smiled. “My client directed that his name be Butterfly Sword.”

The new Butterfly Sword kowtowed, narrowly missing the brazier with his forehead. “My ears are honored to hear this name she grants me. I will serve her needs in all things and ahead of all other loyalties.”

“And you will be very greatly rewarded, Brother Butterfly Sword.” The abbess rang a silver bell. “We have a novice in this house who speaks excellent Palace Voice.” That could hardly be a coincidence. “You will make that your primary study, as a matter of extreme urgency.”

“I will work at it day and night, if that be permitted, Mother.”

“It may be,” the lady said with a smile that began by seeming cryptic but was understandable when the novice entered. She was petite and lovely. She carried a tea set, which she set down gracefully between Fraise and the abbess. She glanced at Horse—and then took a second look, the way all girls looked at Horse.

“Moth,” the lady said. “This is Brother Butterfly Sword. You are to teach him Palace Voice and palace ways. He says he is willing to study by day and by night.”

Quite unabashed, Horse was grinning, a shocking breach of decorum in a solemn naming ceremony.

Novice Moth grinned back, so they looked like a pair of naughty children.

Fraise felt the bite of jealousy again. He could guess what they would be studying tonight, and it would not be child’s play. They left together and his star pupil never looked back to say good-bye or thank you.

“A fine day’s work,” the abbess remarked, pouring tea. “I agree that you met my requirements exactly.” She passed him his bowl. “You should see some of the dwarfs and geriatrics who have been paraded through here. I was starting to get quite worried! What is his leash?”

“We have not yet settled on terms for this contract,” Fraise muttered desperately. Horse’s leash was the only hold he had left.

The abbess shrugged. “What do you want?”

He drew a deep breath.

If Horse was exactly what she had been looking for, he had lots of bargaining room. “A 100-ply abbacy.”

“Sorry. I don’t have one to offer.” She smiled at his anger. “I want you far away from here. You must have some idea by now of what is in the wind, Father, so you can guess why. I counteroffer with a 220-ply abbacy in Shiman. The climate down in Shiman is much more clement than Chixi’s, almost tropical. Interested?”

Fraise thought of all the novice sisters there would be in a 220-ply, all eager to please the abbot. He felt almost faint. And beaches, perhaps. “Then we have an agreement!”

“The boy’s leash?”

“Lines seventeen, seventy-one, and one twenty-four.”

The lady raised her cup in salute. “To your swift promotion, Father Abbot!”

“To your future prosperity, Mother Abbess!”

The tea was very bitter, but he was much too excited to—

Oh!

Oh, what a fool he had been. …