The Apothecary Diaries - Volume 6 - Chapter 6

Chapter 6: The La Clan (Part One)

Are we sure about this? Maomao thought as she sipped her tea. Familiarity could be a dangerous thing—it blunted your sense of danger.

“I suppose this counts as a warm welcome,” Lahan said, likewise sipping some tea.

A stony-faced man sat across the table from them, arms folded.

“Now, my dear brother...” Lahan said. If he was to be taken at his word, the man facing them was his older brother. He was of medium build, not too tall, his features more or less undistinguished, and that seemed to be all there was to him. Come to think of it, Lahan had said the eccentric strategist had adopted him, but he never said he didn’t have other siblings. Maomao had simply assumed.

Lahan had brought them to an estate not far from the boat landing—close enough to walk. Rikuson had gotten off the boat with them, but Lahan had given him an “I’m not so sure about bringing strangers along,” and he was now at an inn near the landing. Maomao thought he could just as well have continued home with Ah-Duo and Consort Lishu, but apparently that wasn’t in the cards.

As for the endlessly cheerful Kokuyou, he’d said he was going to find a carriage to take him to the capital. If fate decreed, they would meet again.

The house to which they had been going wasn’t in a town; it was plopped down somewhere off by itself. A reasonably sumptuous house it was, but it was just sitting out here in the countryside. Maybe some high official from the capital had been banished out here; it would have been humiliating for someone like that.

Is it really all right for us to just drop in somewhere like this?

Maomao could see what appeared to be crop fields all around. Small houses dotted the landscape in the distance beyond them, but they were too far apart to constitute a village. The crop growing in the fields was something Maomao didn’t see much of. It looked similar to bindweed, but bindweed was considered, well, a weed, because it rarely produced fruit. But this, whatever it was, had been planted over a large area.

Wonder what it could be.

Just as they were on their way to the house, they’d passed this man on the road. He’d given them a stricken look, then dragged them to a nearby shed, which was where they were now. As for the tea, the kettle had been right there, and they’d simply borrowed it. It hadn’t smelled funny, so it was probably safe. The tea tasted unusual, though, most likely something roasted. The place appeared to be a small workshop serving the fieldwork; the neatly arranged farm implements spoke to the owner’s meticulousness.

“Why are you here?!” the man demanded.

“Why? What, can’t your little brother come for a visit?” (It was Maomao’s suspicion that they were really here because Lahan had smelled money.) “Is Dad around? I’d like to talk to him.”

“Dad! You mean your fox-eyed ‘father’?”

“No, I mean Dad. My honored adoptive father is in the capital, for your information.”

Lahan’s brother fell silent—until he smacked the door with abandon. “Get out of here and go home! Now, before they find you!”

“You’re terrible. It’s been ages since you saw your little brother.”

“You’re not my father’s son anymore.”

The conversation sounded vaguely absurd. Maomao opened the lid of the teapot and looked inside to find not tea leaves, but roasted barley. Yes, she thought, impressed; that was one way to use it.

So Lahan nonchalantly sipped his drink while his brother raged and ordered him to go home. Maomao, meanwhile, inspected a vine lying in a corner of the small building. It appeared to be the same thing that was planted in the fields outside. The vine had been clipped off and put in a bucket. A good, hard look revealed what appeared to be roots—so they were planning to replant it?

The leaves really did resemble bindweed, but apparently it was something else. Maomao started going through the shelves. Something about the fields had her attention and wouldn’t let go. On the shelves she found nothing but buckets and rags, so she looked outside through the window. Although the little shed cast a shadow in that direction, she saw pots with young morning glories in them.

But it’s not a morning glory either.

There were lots of morning glories out behind the shed. Were they purely ornamental? Or perhaps the family made medicine from them? Morning glory seeds were known as qianniuzi, and were used as a laxative and diuretic. They could be quite toxic, though, and had to be dealt with carefully.

When Lahan’s brother saw Maomao peering out the window, he slammed it shut. “What are you doing?!”

“Nothing. Just curious about the morning glories.”

“Who the hell are you, anyway?”

A little late for that question.

“She’s my younger sister, dear brother.”

“I’m a complete stranger, sir.”

“Which is it?!” Lahan’s brother clenched his fists.

Maomao and Lahan looked at each other, then Maomao said, “He certainly is easy to get a rise out of.”

“Right? They don’t make many like him—he’ll actually throw out a comeback when you want one.”

“Stop it! I don’t understand a word either of you is saying!” Lahan’s brother stamped his feet. It really was fun to tweak him.

Lahan poured more tea from the teapot and offered it to the other man, who drank it down in a single gulp, then flung the cup away—the drink must have been really hot. Maomao went and retrieved the wooden drinking vessel.

“Excellent reaction. Inspiringly by the book,” she said.

“Right? You’d think the likes of him would be everywhere, but they’re surprisingly rare, his type.”

“Godthammit, I don’th underthand one word!” the brother exclaimed, his tongue popping out of his mouth.

Okay, enough fun at Brother’s expense. Time to get back to the subject.

“You seem to be intent on chasing us out. Might I ask why?” Maomao said. “I mean, I understand how you might despise this man for betraying his real family and joining up with that awful fox strategist.”

“You’ve got it all wrong, Little Sister.”

“She’s got it pretty much right, but that’s not the point.”

“Pretty much right, Brother?!” Lahan said, genuinely distressed. Had he really not realized?

His brother ignored him, looking at Maomao instead. “He calls you his little sister. You’re Lakan’s girl, then?”

Maomao replied with a truly dire look. Brother shivered and shrank back.

“Maomao, don’t look at my dear brother that way; you’ll give him a heart attack. I said, don’t!” Lahan sounded like he was talking to a child, and that only annoyed her more. She looked away from both of them and took another drink of tea.

Lahan’s brother sat down, his face drawn, and took a few deep breaths to steady himself. He opened his mouth, but Maomao glared at him. He put a hand to his forehead and chose his words carefully. “Look, it doesn’t really matter who you are—you should get out of here, as fast as you can. And if you are who Lahan claims you are, all the more reason.”

“I take it from your tone that this is no small matter,” Lahan said.

“If you understand that, then stop quibbling and go.”

Being treated like that, though, could only pique a person’s curiosity. Lahan’s spectacles flashed. “Brother, what has happened?”

“It’s safest if you don’t ask.”

“We just want to know what’s going on. Then we’ll be good and go home.”

“If I tell you, there will be no escape.”

“Brother,” talk like that is going to have exactly the opposite of the effect you want, Maomao thought.

As the conversation went on, Lahan kept trying to wheedle out the information he wanted. Eventually, Maomao suspected, he would get the truth. Except that the plot twisted first.

The door opened with a clatter, revealing an elderly man with a cane, a middle-aged woman, and several of what appeared to be servants.

“I thought I heard a ruckus out here,” the woman said, narrowing her eyes at Maomao and Lahan. Lahan’s brother went pale. “It’s been a long time, Lahan. Three years, if my memory’s not failing me?”

“It has indeed been a long while.” Lahan stepped forward and bowed deeply. “Mother. Grandfather.”

Mother... Grandfather... Maomao thought. In other words, these were the family who had been chased out of the capital. The old man was the picture of stubborn age, weathered around the eyes, his face set, his beard very long.

As for the woman, she had a lovely face, but her narrowed eyes made Maomao think of a predator. She looked like the woman from the Shi clan—Loulan’s mother. In short, she was intimidating. Her outfit was a bit, well, loud, and she wore a white bracelet around her wrist—maybe she hadn’t quite caught up with the current fashions yet.

“I see you’ve brought some scruffy little waif with you. Who’s this, your maid?” the woman said. It seemed to be practically obligatory for new acquaintances to ridicule Maomao, and she was used to it by now. She stayed quiet and kept her eyes on the ground.

“Oh, heavens, Mother. This is my little sister.”

“Laha—?!” Older Brother started to cry out, but slapped his hands over his mouth.

“Little sister... Lakan’s daughter, are you?” the old man interjected. Maomao continued to look at the ground, but her face contorted into a scowl.

There was one person there who looked at least as offended by the name as Maomao did, and it was Lahan’s mother. Maomao could even hear her grinding her teeth.

“Yes... Yes, that’s right,” Lahan volunteered. Even his brother had him fixed with a staggering glare. So this was why he’d been so intent on getting Lahan and Maomao out of there undiscovered. He hadn’t wanted his mother or grandfather to find them. In that much, Maomao agreed with him: it looked like life would have been easier if they’d never met these people.

The old man made a muffled sound; it confused Maomao for a second before she realized it seemed to be laughter.

“Ha ha ha ha. How did you hear about it?”

Lahan looked perplexed. “How did we...?”

What’s he talking about? Maomao wondered, wearing an expression of confusion similar to Lahan’s. The others didn’t seem to notice, perhaps because she and Lahan both had relatively minimal facial expressions.

Unconcerned, the old man continued: “If you’re here about Lakan, forget it. He’s an empty shell of a man. Didn’t even resist when we put him in confinement. He just keeps muttering to himself. Frankly, it’s unsettling.”

“Wait... Confinement?” Maomao and Lahan looked at each other.

Lahan’s brother put a hand to his brow and let out a long sigh.

“Grandfather, what in the world are you talking about?” Lahan asked.

“Oh, don’t play dumb. Your foster father may be an eccentric, but even you would start to suspect something when he didn’t come back for ten whole days. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”

Maomao didn’t understand exactly what was going on, but she understood that it sounded like a pain in the neck. And if this old man, Lahan’s grandfather, was to be believed, that freak was in confinement somewhere. Not that she could believe it.

“Erm, ten whole days doesn’t mean much to us, Grandfather. Maomao and I have both been away from the capital for more than a month now,” Lahan said, scratching the back of his neck.

The old man slowly turned to look at Maomao. “You’re kidding.”

Maomao brought out a small box from their luggage, which she opened to reveal a pot with a most unusual plant in it. It was the little cactus she’d received. “You won’t find these around here, at least not yet,” she said. They also had gooseberry jam and a few other things, but she figured a formless lump of food wouldn’t be as communicative. “We also have furs and silks,” she added.

Lahan’s mother and grandfather stared at the plant, the likes of which they’d never seen before. Yes, it was something that convincingly said “souvenir from the west.”

“You’re kidding,” Grandfather repeated.

“Why should we lie to you?” Lahan said. “We brought cigars too. Want some?” He, too, opened some of the luggage. Tobacco leaves were typically imported, and were quite a luxury item in the capital, but in the west, they could be had cheaply.

Mother and Grandfather looked at each other silently. At length, Grandfather swept one hand upward.

“Get ’em.”

The servants standing behind him advanced on Maomao and Lahan. They were shortly captured, still a little stupefied.

“How could this have happened? How could they lock me up? Me! I thought I was family.”

“I think you mean a traitor.”

“How rude!” Lahan said and sat down in a chair. They were indeed locked up, but in a fairly ordinary room. The furniture was old but sturdy, and the place was respectably clean. Maomao knew, because she’d run a finger along the shelves and windowsills looking for dust like a cruel mother-in-law, but hadn’t found any.

“Still...” Maomao said. There were a lot of mysteries here. If Lahan’s grandfather was to be believed, that freak was somewhere in this mansion, also under lock and key. He might be lackadaisical to a fault, but Maomao wasn’t sure he would have let himself be apprehended that easily.

“You think that old fart is telling the truth?” Maomao asked.

Lahan scratched at his tousled hair. “Can’t be sure he isn’t.”

“And the old guy?”

“Maomao... There’s something I haven’t told you,” Lahan said rather abruptly. “The courtesan he bought from the Verdigris House last year—she wasn’t in the best of health.”

“I imagine not.”

The woman had already looked as if she might die at any moment. And who should buy this expiring wisp of a courtesan but the eccentric strategist?

“That’s why my honored foster father didn’t come on this trip.”

Was that why Rikuson had been so insistent that Maomao should go to the strategist’s place? Maomao leaned on the windowsill. The window had wooden bars on it and didn’t appear to offer much chance of escape. Past the bars she could see farmers working in the fields. What in the world were they growing out there?

“Father rarely regarded people as, well, people. But after he welcomed that courtesan into his home, he changed dramatically. It was embarrassing to see, quite frankly.”

“Oh?”

“They would play Go and Shogi every day. Go more often, I suppose. Which was bad news when he had to go out to work. He would take a board diagram with him, and after he made a move, a messenger would be sent back to the house to put the stone on the board, then record the responding move and come back to court. Again and again.”

Yes, Maomao saw, that would indeed be annoying. She felt for the messenger.

“The messenger was always quite busy—right up until the turn of the year. After that, he found himself with more and more free time.”

“Whatever you think you’re getting at, it has nothing to do with me.” She didn’t believe the eccentric strategist would simply let himself be captured, carted off from a courtesan he felt so strongly about. In other words, it had simply been her time. She’d probably lasted longer than she would have if she’d been left to live out her days in the pleasure district. Perhaps it was that thought which enabled Maomao to seem so calm. To others, she might even have appeared cold—but when you were involved in medicine, you ended up being confronted with people dying on a regular basis. If you spent all your time weeping about it, you’d never get to the next patient.

Although there are some who shed tears every time, she thought. Some who, although they might do better just to get used to it, never did. Some who never learned to simply accept it. Some like her adoptive father. She thought it was inept, stupid; but that was exactly why she respected him so much.

“Nothing to do with you? Don’t be so bleak. If that courtesan did die, I don’t believe even my honored foster father could endure the shock.”

“And you think they used that opportunity to bring him here?”

It was a ridiculous idea. In spite of it all, the old freak was a high official. If he were to go missing for ten whole days, one could expect consternation from a lot more people than just his adopted son.

When Maomao voiced this objection, however, Lahan responded: “When he bought out his courtesan, he ended up taking off work for two weeks. And when he got back, there was still hardly any work waiting for him.”

He needs to earn his damn living!

Or everyone else needed to admit that they didn’t actually need him after all.

“The point is this: as long as everyone else is doing their jobs, then short of an outright crisis, they could probably continue to function for a good six months before anyone noticed he was gone.”

Honestly. Why doesn’t the Emperor just fire him?

Maomao started to worry that maybe the strategist had some sort of leverage over the ruler. Or maybe it was simply because the freak was so good at picking talented subordinates.

“Sounds a little half-assed to me. Are courtiers just a lazier, sloppier bunch than I thought?”

“All I can say to that is...well, he’s my father.”

Maomao heaved a sigh.

“If I had to guess, I would say Grandfather and the others have locked Father up in hopes of causing the family headship to appear vacant and thereby get it given to them,” Lahan said.

“Family politics aren’t really my thing. How do they decide who gets to be head of the clan?”

She’d heard that the old freak had stolen the family headship from Lahan’s grandfather, but she didn’t understand the specifics. Maybe there was some kind of paperwork involved, something that showed who owned what.

“Typically, among the named clans, there’s an object that’s passed down along with the name. Whoever possesses it is head of the clan, and they bring it with them when they present themselves at the palace. Obviously, of course, they aren’t at the palace every day—just on special occasions. Usually the heirloom would be kept somewhere safe. When the head of the family changes, the former head accompanies the new one when they formally greet the Emperor. I know they say Father ‘stole’ the family headship, but in reality that procedure was still observed.”

“How did he manage that?”

Judging by what she’d seen of Lahan’s grandfather, he didn’t seem like the type to give up his office quietly. Would he really have just politely gone with...well, you-know-who to see the Emperor?

“It was quite simple: Grandfather was forced out. He was never one for beautiful numbers, you see.”

“Let me guess—you found the proof.” She wondered if it would have been inappropriate to ask aloud how old he’d been at the time.

“What Grandfather was up to was...well, no more than petty, so he himself would be the only one punished. Grandfather said the revelation would tarnish the family name, but Father hardly cared about such things.”

So “Grandfather” was to be dragged down from his height, and he could choose either to do it as a criminal, or to surrender the headship—and it was none other than his grandson who had helped put him in that position. Beautiful numbers, indeed. Lahan had probably enjoyed helping the old freak, doing all that research.

“I suddenly understand why they don’t treat you like family around here.”

“I’m sorry? What an odd change of subject...”

And the man himself didn’t even see it! Yes, he was that freak’s nephew all right.

“Okay, but they’ve spent all this time living quietly out here in the boonies, right? Why would they decide to act now?”

“I can think of a few reasons they might.” Lahan started counting on his fingers. “One: public documents in this country are disposed of after ten years. Or I guess you could say they wear away; anything that isn’t extremely important just isn’t preserved carefully. The proof I found of the pocket change my grandfather stole would only mean anything if they could compare it to those papers.” He held up another finger. “Two: they might have found some sort of leverage over him, something they could threaten him and protect themselves with if need be. Though they’d be risking his wrath, of course.”

He turned toward Maomao, and she backed away from him uneasily. Of course, at the moment, the wrath would come not on account of Maomao, but the courtesan. “You think they could get information like that way out here?” she asked.

“Well, hold on. Let me finish,” Lahan said, and held up a third finger. “Three: someone gave them that information.”

Oh! The situation suddenly started to sound familiar. “You think that’s what’s happening here too?”

Here too: both the bandits who had attacked Consort Lishu and the story about the fortune-teller in the western capital had made her think of the “white” immortal. The MO was similar in both cases.

“I’m only floating a possibility. But one that can’t be ruled out.”

Yes, he was right. They couldn’t be sure about anything, but they should work on the assumption that it was possible. That, however, left Maomao with a question. “If all these incidents are related, then one thing bothers me.”

“What?”

She couldn’t shake the sense that the shadow of the White Lady hung over the succession of mysterious events lately, and several things about this one smelled of the same perpetrator. But she wondered: “We’ve had cases in both the east and the west that could seem to involve the immortal. Do you think she’s actually connected to them all somehow?” She would have to be extremely fleet-footed. “Even if we assume it’s not the Lady herself, but her agents, doing the work, information would seem to travel too quickly.”

“True...”

The fortune-teller in the western capital might have acted a lot like the White Lady, but how would she have heard of the half-sister of Consort Lishu, who was far away in the east? If they were sharing information, how were they doing it? The question remained unanswered.

“What if the White Lady had a coconspirator in the capital?” Lahan asked. Then she would be able to find out who would be traveling west.

“How do we explain the very existence of the fortune-teller, then? She was already there at least ten days ago.”

“That’s exactly it. It seems impossible,” Lahan groaned.

“Still...” Maomao murmured, gazing out the window.

“Still what?” Lahan asked.

“I can’t help wondering if they’re going to feed us,” she said, looking at the fields. The farmers were still working industriously.

Maomao’s fears turned out to be unfounded. They were given a meal, and it wasn’t bad. Decent ingredients—meat and fish. The fish was a little salty. The farther inland one went, the more frequently one encountered salted seafood. Fish in the capital was taken fresh from the sea and rushed to diners by swift horse, so one never saw pickled seafood there.

What turned out to be surprisingly tasty were the sesame buns. They were filled, not with sesame paste, but with crushed chestnuts or red beans or something. The filling was thick and sweet; maybe they’d used honey or syrup to give it that consistency.

No, wait. Is this...sweet potato? she wondered, chewing the food thoughtfully. That would make sense.

Even Maomao, who wasn’t a big fan of sweet treats, ate two of the buns; Lahan wolfed down no fewer than five of them.

“Look at you go. I’m almost impressed,” Maomao said.

“For your information, using one’s brain makes one crave sweet food,” Lahan replied, then stuffed another bun into his mouth.

“I wonder if the family here has a sweet tooth,” Maomao said.

Sweet potatoes were an unusual food item. Having lived in both the Verdigris House and the rear palace, Maomao had encountered them before, but they weren’t readily available in the marketplace. The rest of the ingredients involved in the meal were unremarkable—maybe the people here were particular about their filling.

“Not really. At least, I don’t recall them being that way. I mean, not that they hate sweets, either.”

“Hm.” Maomao sipped her post-meal tea. This time it didn’t taste of roasted barley, but of actual tea leaves. Then, grabbing onto a passing thought, she said, “I don’t think we’ve seen your dad yet. What’s going on with him?”

“Yes, what is he doing? I wanted to see him too,” Lahan said, licking the grease off his fingers as he spoke. It reminded Maomao of the fox-eyed strategist, and earned him a scowl. “Do you think this father of yours is caught up in all this?” she asked.

“Hmm. I doubt it. My foster father only asked that the clan head’s seat be vacated. Rumors have a way of spreading, though, and my grandfather was a proud man. He found he couldn’t stay in the capital any longer. Dad, he could have stayed there if he’d wanted. He just chose not to.”

“A fact your mother seems distinctly less than pleased about.”

Lahan smiled sardonically. “Yes, it was Grandfather who chose Mom. She and my foster father get along like oil and water.”

It would have been more surprising if they had been friends, really; Maomao pictured the arch woman and felt a pang of sympathy.

“I do wonder about the wisdom of putting us both in the same room. I hope they’ll at least give us separate places to sleep,” Maomao said.

“If they make us sleep in the same room, who cares? It’s not like anything’s going to happen.”

“You’ve got that right.”

That was all there was to say about it; they both looked at each other as if they couldn’t believe they were having this conversation.

“Speaking of which, have you and the Emperor’s younger brother—”

“I think I’ll get some shut-eye,” Maomao said, flopping over onto the bed beside her.

“Hey! Where am I going to sleep?”

“There’s a couch right there.”

“You should have more respect for your elders!”

“I thought you elders were supposed to dote on us kids.”

Lahan evidently had some issue with this arrangement, but Maomao didn’t let it bother her. Instead she lay in bed, trying to get the facts straight in her head.

Lahan and the eccentric strategist did appear to be giving the former head of the clan and his family enough money to live on—they had the resources to hire servants, after all, although perhaps not to update their furniture to the cutting edge of luxury or eat fancy food at every meal. It seemed like a sweet enough arrangement to Maomao, but someone who had once lived in the lap of luxury in the capital might well find it deeply degrading. The humiliation had festered over many long years, and now was on the point of explosion—but who had lit the fuse?

Maomao recalled the white bracelet Lahan’s mother had been wearing. She hadn’t gotten a very good look at it, but it had reminded her of the white, snakelike twist of rope. She hoped it wasn’t just a misunderstanding—but it brought back some bad memories.

That “immortal” sure is tenacious, Maomao thought. She was like a phantom; her traces seemed to be everywhere. It was almost enough to convince Maomao that she really did have the supernatural ability to be in many places at once.

Maomao fell asleep wishing someone would hurry up and catch the woman.

The next thing she knew, it was evening. She came out of the bedroom yawning to discover not only Lahan, but his nasty old grandfather. If it had been just Gramps, she might have body-slammed him and tried to escape, but she could see a servant behind him.

The old man’s face twisted when he saw Maomao. Maybe she still had bedhead? Or eye goobers? Maybe the pillow had left a mark on her cheek and he didn’t like it.

“We’re going,” Grandfather said, and left the room before Maomao could object. She and Lahan shared a look, but since the alternative to going was presumably just being locked up again, they went.

“It looks like you really are Lakan’s daughter,” Grandfather remarked, but Maomao didn’t say anything; there was no reason for her to respond to that. It gave away, though, that the family had been looking into matters while she’d been asleep. She wondered how they had managed that when she figured she hadn’t slept more than four hours.

“The man’s a complete half-wit,” Grandfather went on. “Whatever we do, whatever we say, he just mumbles to himself. Doesn’t even try to talk to us. But your name... Your name, at least, he remembers.”

Maomao stopped in her tracks. This conversation suggested something about who was going to be at their destination, and she didn’t like it.

“I know you’re not a big fan, but we’d better go. Arguing won’t get us anywhere right now,” Lahan said, and unfortunately, he was right. Maomao started walking again.

They were headed for a building on the edge of the estate, with big, round windows with bars on them. You could see right inside—meaning you could see the filthy, middle-aged man on the floor.

The man was lying on his back, his chin bedecked with messy stubble. The hair on his head hung loose behind him as if he’d swept it away in annoyance. A grimy bowl was on the floor beside him. Grains of rice were stuck to his clothes and fingers, as if he’d been eating with his hands instead of chopsticks.

“Father!” Lahan cried, rushing up to the bars. The sight of the man, obviously out of it, must have stirred something in him.

There did indeed appear to be something wrong with him. His mouth kept moving, forming silent words—he looked as if he were an addict going through withdrawal of some kind. Lahan had apparently had the same thought, for he turned to the elderly man. “Grandfather, I know you said Father wouldn’t listen to you, but you didn’t give him opium or something, did you?!”

“Hmph, I can’t speak to that. But I do want him to cough up the location of the heirloom.” The old man looked at Lahan imperiously. Then he spread his arms and said, “Anyway, I didn’t summon him. He summoned me, and I went to the capital for him. He was like this when I found him.”

Maomao actually agreed with him—this definitely wasn’t opium poisoning.

“There were no servants or anybody else at the house. Just him, the codger, bent over a Go board and muttering to himself.”

Grandfather alleged that he’d brought the strategist here on the grounds that there was no one else around.

No one? Maomao wondered. She looked at Lahan: that didn’t seem possible. “Did he have to fire all his servants or something because he was too deep in debt to pay them?”

“No, he retained a minimum of household help. He needed someone to do the cooking and cleaning, and to look after the patient.” Then, however, Lahan added: “Still... I figured this might happen.”

What was he referring to? Rather, who: he had to mean the courtesan the strategist had taken in last year. The servants might all be gone, but she would still be there—and the fox-eyed strategist wouldn’t have gone away and just left her at home. The fact that he was here and looking shell-shocked must mean that the courtesan had died.

He looked as if his very soul had fled his body—and yet, the body moved. He appeared to be facing something that could not be seen. He was sitting before someone who was no longer there.

“Can’t you do something for him, Maomao?” Lahan asked. Just for an instant, the eccentric strategist twitched, but then he resumed his relentless mumbled litany. He was in bad shape.

“You’re supposed to be what passes for his children. Don’t you have any idea where the family jewels might be?!” Grandpa demanded.

“I’m afraid you can yell all you want, sir, but...” Lahan said, shaking his head.

Maomao was more direct: “I have no idea.” She, too, shook her head.

“Then maybe you remember this!” The old man took a sheaf of papers from the folds of his robes. They were covered with numbers of some kind. “Lakan had this on him. This sort of thing is your specialty, Lahan. These numbers must reveal a hidden location or something!”

The old man was evidently under the impression that the numbers were some kind of code. Lahan took the paper and squinted at it. Maomao peeked over his shoulder.

They both saw what it was immediately. The paper had two numbers on it side by side, and there were dozens of pages.

They also knew that the sheaf didn’t contain the answer the old man was looking for—but under the circumstances, there was no reason to tell him that right away. Instead, they felt they needed to do something about the deflated freak. Frankly, Maomao would have been just as happy not to have anything to do with him, but sooner begun was sooner done.

“Do you have a Go board in this house?” she asked.

“The hell does that have to do with anything?!”

“Do you have one?” she repeated, not changing her tone. The old man clucked and called for a servant, who brought a Go board and stones.

They entered the strategist’s room. When the board was placed in front of him, his shoulders shivered. Maomao sat across from him, on the other side of the board. She took the black stones, while Lahan placed the white ones where the strategist could reach them.

Maomao picked up a black stone and placed it on the board, following the numbers written on the paper. In response, the freak took a white stone and set it on the board with a click.

She believed the papers were notes kept by the messenger while the strategist and his courtesan played Go. In addition to the two numbers, running numbers had been carefully inscribed along the upper right. Maomao simply played according to the numbers, and the strategist responded.

Maomao wasn’t a particularly good Go player. She knew that the opening part of the game involved something called joseki, sequences of moves that were largely set. Thus, she could expect the strategist to make the same moves he had in the actual game. She just kept turning the pages, playing, and turning the pages again, until she was down to the last three sheets.

Lahan, watching, cocked his head. “That was a bad move.” He was referring to the stone Maomao had just placed—but she’d played it exactly according to the paper.

The strategist narrowed his eyes for a moment and then, click, he made another move.

“Putting the stone there... It would have to be a sacrifice play. But why? Why would she do it that way?” Lahan muttered. Maomao didn’t know much about Go, but Lahan had some acquaintance with it. Whatever—she just kept playing the way the paper said.

When they reached the end of the paper, though, they were still in the middle game.

“No... You’d never make a mistake like that,” the monocled freak murmured. There were grains of rice stuck to his stubble, and Maomao had to fight down the urge to tell him to wash his damn face. “You know I would never miss it... So why?”

The strategist didn’t move to play the white stone in his hand; he just stared at the board.

After a silent moment, Maomao grumbled, “Maybe she was just sick of normal moves?” She didn’t know much about Go, but over the many, many years of its existence, common wisdom had been established: With such-and-such a board situation, this is how you should play. Then the other player would likewise respond in a particular way.

“It’s certainly true, you’d normally do this in this situation. Then the response is here, and then black moves here...” Monocle kept mumbling to himself, fretting with the white stone in his fingers—but then he seemed to come to some kind of realization. Click. The stone went on the board.

“But that...” Lahan said, his expression darkening. Apparently, it wasn’t a very good move either. Without the paper to guide her, Maomao no longer knew where to play, so instead she slid the bowl of black stones toward the strategist. He picked one up and clicked it down on the board.

Lahan, who obviously knew more about Go than Maomao did, folded his arms and watched. At first he looked skeptical, but one of the ensuing moves seemed to spark something in his mind, and his eyes widened.

“Hey! This is no time to sit around playing games!” Gramps burst out. “Hurry up and—”

“Hush,” Lahan said. “It’s just getting good.”

He watched the board with a studious expression. Getting good? The freak was playing himself! Then again, in his own mind, it seemed to be someone else holding the black stones. The color gradually returned to his formerly ghostly pallor.

The only sound was the click, click of stones on the board, move after move after move.

Finally the freak stopped. “We’re down to the endgame.” He set down his hand as if to indicate he was through playing. Then he squinted at the board. “The outcome is pretty well obvious. Including five and a half points komi, black wins by one and a half points.”

Lahan looked at the board too. “I’ll be. He’s right,” he said. Evidently he was just as quick at reading territory in Go as he was at every other kind of calculation.

The strategist pulled his knees to his chest and rested his chin on them. He rolled a Go stone across his fingers, still staring at the board. “I had to wonder. I just kept asking myself—how could you go before our last game was finished? You always hated to lose. I was sure you wouldn’t leave before it was over.” The words seemed to tumble out of his mouth. “And I wondered, why would you make a move like that one? It had to be a mistake, I was sure—even though I knew you would never make a mistake.”

He was talking to himself; what he was saying wasn’t directed at any of them. He was interrupted by the old man.

“Hey! Lakan! Where are the family jewels? I want that treasure, now!” He shoved Lahan aside and loomed in front of the eccentric strategist.

The strategist looked up at him balefully for a second and muttered, “You’re a rather noisy Go stone.” But then he clapped his hands and said, “Ah! Father, is that you?”

“‘Father, is that you?’ Pfah! Don’t you remember your own parent’s face?!”

It wasn’t a matter of remembering, though; the man simply couldn’t distinguish one face from another.

“Parent? Ah, yes... Yes, that reminds me...” He sounded completely out of it, but he took a cloth-wrapped package from his robe. “I’m afraid I’m telling you this rather, ahem, belatedly, but I’ve taken a wife.”

Inside the package was hair. About five sun in length, tied with a hair tie. Maomao knew whom it belonged to.

Grandfather turned beet red and aimed a blow of the cane in his hand at the strategist’s temple.

“Father!” Lahan cried, rushing up. Maomao took a handkerchief from the folds of her own robe. The cane had slid down the strategist’s temple, brushed his cheek, and wound up hitting his nose. He hadn’t taken a direct blow to the face, but his nose was still dripping blood.

“You’re always like this! You never listen to what I say, just babble about things that make no sense! And just when I think you’re completely self-absorbed... This! What is this?!” Gramps was pointing at the sheaf of papers. “Are you mocking me again?!”

“I’m not mocking you. This is why I called you.”

Maomao suspected that much, at least, was true. The man might make an ass of himself around court, but she had a sense that he hadn’t done the same thing with this old guy. Lahan’s grandfather had talked about the strategist summoning him—to think, this was the reason.

However, that was to speak from the strategist’s perspective. Sometimes people simply couldn’t understand each other, parent and child or no. The elderly man and the eccentric strategist were simply too different.

“Whatever. The jewels, man. Make with the jewels!” Gramps was in high dudgeon now. He grabbed his cane again—and a blade emerged from within it. It was a sword-cane. “You know what’ll happen to you if you hold out on me, right?”

The strategist looked up, but not at the blade. His eyes were fixed on something else. “Maomao? What are you doing here?”

So he had noticed her at last. Maybe he would never have been so pliant if he hadn’t. It just went to show how intent he had been on his game. “So you’ve come to see your daddy!”

“No.” Maomao wished he would focus on the situation they were in. Sensing danger, she moved to the wall.

“Ah, Maomao is here! Today, we must have a feast!” the strategist said, clutching the hair clipping. Then he turned the hand toward Maomao. “Won’t you say anything? Just a word, to your mother...” He looked at her with the strangest of expressions. With his haggard face and filthy beard, he suddenly looked many years older.

Normally, Maomao might have simply ignored him—but now, surprisingly, she dipped her head respectfully in the direction of the hair. No, she had nothing to say, but she could do that much.

“Don’t ignore me, dammit!” the infuriated old man bellowed, brandishing his sword-cane. Age had taken its toll on him, but he had been a soldier once, and he was still sturdier than they might have expected. Facing him were a strategist who was a soldier who left all the real work to his subordinates; a dyed-in-the-wool civil official whose weapon of choice was the abacus; and Maomao, who had no confidence that she would be of any help in a fight.

The three wusses scattered—and it was all they could do to escape the old man and his flailing cane. Servants stood behind Grandfather, but obviously weren’t going to help anyone. Maomao, seeking any kind of safety, hid behind a post.

Then, though, they heard a slow, calm voice. “Put that away; it’s dangerous. What if you actually hit somebody with it?”

Maomao looked to see the old man floating in midair, his legs kicking. He dangled from weathered hands that gripped his arms; holding him was a man with sun-darkened skin and a handkerchief around his neck. His clothes marked him out as a farmer—maybe the one Maomao had seen from the window of her room. He was tall, broad-shouldered, and very well built, but his eyes were gentle and serene.

“Hey, what are you doing?! Let me go!”

“Yes, yes. As soon as you give me that sword,” the burly farmer said, plucking the weapon away from the old man and putting it back in its cane. “When did you find the time to make this?” he murmured. The servants, rather than trying to help Grandfather, looked downright relieved to see the farmer.

Who’s this? Maomao thought, but her question was promptly answered.

“It’s been too long, Dad,” Lahan said, bowing his head.

“Ah, you look well. Despite the somewhat dire straits I found you in. That girl there—is that my niece?” The farmer tossed the sword cane to one of the servants, and his already gentle face softened even more. The man looked like a bear, yet his presence was warm, comforting.

“May I take that to be my little brother who’s just come in?” the eccentric strategist said, smiling.

“You may, although I might wish you would learn to know who I was one of these days,” Lahan’s father said, smiling sardonically.

He still hadn’t let go of the old man, who continued to kick. “I’m doing this for you, blast it! Don’t you want your birthright back?!”

“Me? Not particularly.”

“And you can live with that?! You weakling!”

“That’s right! You always were that way!” Suddenly Lahan’s mother was there. She didn’t seem to get along with the strategist very well; she must have heard the commotion and come to investigate. Lahan’s father looked disturbed to find himself confronted with another critic.

“What good would it do for me to inherit the family headship? A buffoon running the household could only embarrass everyone.”

His resigned tone only aggravated the old man and Lahan’s mother.

“You’d still be better than that jackass!” Gramps shouted.

The jackass in question was grinning stupidly at Maomao. It was supremely disgusting.

“Don’t you love our son? Don’t you want to see him inherit the headship?” Lahan’s mother pressed.

“But Lahan’s our son too,” the farmer protested. Apparently the son the woman was referring to was Lahan’s older brother, whom they’d met earlier. It seemed Lahan was considered a traitor and no longer her child.

The house appeared to be divided: some who had been following the old man’s orders until moments before were now looking at Lahan’s father, openly torn.

“What good would it do for me to inherit the headship at this point, anyway?” Lahan’s father said. “There’s no one to replace me, is there?” Then he added: “Besides, maybe no one would care if my dear brother Lakan didn’t come back, but I think Lahan would be missed.” His tone was placid, kind.

At that moment, a servant came running up. “Master! There’s a man named Rikuson here...”

Gramps and Mom both scowled at that. “S-So what?! Throw him out on his ear!”

“B-But sir, he’s got several other men who appear to be, uh, soldiers with him...”

“You know, I do seem to recall there being a garrison around here,” Lahan said as if it were just occurring to him. But it was a scripted line if Maomao had ever heard one.

“Damn! D-Did you count on that when you decided to come here?!”

“Oh, no, nothing of the sort. Although it seems it certainly didn’t hurt.”

His insouciant tone stoked Gramps’s anger; the old man pounded the wall with a wrinkled hand. “I’m surrounded by idiots! Incompetents! My whole family is an embarrassment!” Now he was stomping on the ground so hard it seemed like he might put a foot clear through the floor. “I’ve got one son who never has any idea who he’s talking to, and another who thinks he’s a farmer! Curse the womb that bore them both! I should’ve had another son—maybe that one would have come out right!”

The old man’s fury showed no sign of abating. His listeners refused to look at him; with what he was saying, even Lahan’s mother found her lip curling.

“And then there’s Luomen—never could use a sword, and then he got himself mutilated! Is there even one person worth my time around here?!”

Maomao was suddenly in motion. She darted out from behind the post, grabbing the bowl on the ground—the strategist’s leftover soup. The next moment, she was in front of Gramps, and then she dumped the rotten stuff all over the old man.

“What the hell are you doing?!” Gramps raged. He slapped Maomao with an open palm, leaving her cheek burning.

Maomao stumbled backward. “Maomao!” the strategist cried. He tried to catch her, but she dodged him deftly. The old man’s hand she hadn’t been able to avoid, but the strategist she could easily escape from.

“I just didn’t like your tone,” Maomao said in a quiet voice. It was the wrong thing to do, so if she got hit for it she would just have to live with it. But she had wanted to stop the old man from ridiculing her old man. “I won’t hear you say another word against my adoptive father. What I’m saying is, please shut up!”

“You mouthy little trollop! Just who do you think I am?”

Who? Maomao thought. In her opinion, it was the old man who didn’t understand who he was.

“Without that heirloom, you’re just a frail old man who doesn’t know how to have confidence in himself,” Maomao said with a smile. Her lip was split, but that was a minor detail.

The old man’s face went tight, and Lahan’s mother blanched as well.

“Forget the family name. Forget the headship. What have you done with your own two hands to be proud of?” Maomao asked.

“Listen to this scrawny whelp...”

The fact that he responded not with an actual reply, but with inarticulate cruelty, was answer enough. He’d coasted along on the family headship, committing a series of minor offenses. She didn’t know whether his failure to push into the territory of serious corruption was down to a genuine rational streak or simple cowardice.

Maomao had a few more things she would have liked to say to the old man, but then someone was standing between the two of them.

“I’m sorry, young lady, but please. That’s enough.” The owner of the kind voice was Lahan’s father, his eyebrows furrowed in concern. “I know you cherish your uncle, but please do remember that this man is my father.” His face, with its hint of sorrow, reminded her of her own old man, Luomen.

With an effort, she swallowed what she had been about to say.