I made a rude noise. “Yeah, it’s me. Lian couldn’t sneak out of the palace. She sent me to listen.”
Quan’s eyes narrowed as he took in the unspoken meaning behind my words. Lian still didn’t trust him, not yet. He ran his fingers through his hair and looked distracted, as though he were recalculating everything he’d intended to say. “Come with me,” he said slowly. “I can explain everything to you. I hope I can,” he added in an undertone.
“What does that mean?” I snapped.
He shot me a startled glance. “Oh, nothing to do with you. It’s all so complicated. Simple, but complicated. I—” He shook his head. “I’m sorry. I’m a bit . . . preoccupied today.”
Understatement of the year, I thought. “Tell me everything you think is important. Even if I don’t understand, Lian will. She’s the one who matters.”
“That is something we can agree on,” Quan murmured. “Very well. Here is what I’ve discovered over the past month . . .”
As we walked down the one alley, into another and aro
und the maze of lanes that made up this district, Quan told me a lot more than I had suspected. “It’s the emperor,” he said in a low voice. “Kaishan Zhu. He’s the one who wants to keep Princess Lian in Phoenix City.”
I whistled. “Are you sure about that?”
“Absolutely. I thought it was odd when he invited Lian into his court and gave her the finest rooms in the visitor’s wing. It was just a suspicion, however—from living so long at court myself. I didn’t say anything to Lian at the time, because I had nothing except suspicion. We were still . . . friends at the time. Just friends,” he said softly. Then louder, “I suppose I didn’t want to set doubt in her mind without cause. It would only have made her life at court more difficult. The emperor dislikes any sense of criticism, or even simple reserve, in subjects or guests alike.”
Once more his gaze turned abstracted, as if he were remembering his own days at court.
“Tell me about this plot,” I said. “And how you found out.”
Quan nodded. “The plot is simple. The reasons complicated. The emperor invited your princess to court to draw her into dependence. He wants to arrange a marriage between her and his youngest son. As for how I found out, I have second and third cousins employed in the palace. Some are guards. Some are minor functionaries. They pass me rumors from time to time.”
“But rumors—”
“—are watered by truth,” Quan said impatiently. “The truth is that the emperor wants to expand the empire. He’s spent his entire reign doing that. There used to be a dozen small principalities—city kingdoms like Lóng City—along the edges of the mountains. Most still call themselves kingdoms, but the truth—” Here Quan made a face as though he’d bitten a very green peach. “The truth is that those kingdoms have become fiefs to the Phoenix Empire. The emperor showers them with trade treaties, loans for building new roads, all kinds of favors. In return, he receives what he wants most. Their magic.”
I’d run out of whistles by this point. “Why does the emperor want so much magic?”
“It’s not what he wants, it’s what he needs. Desperately. Haven’t you noticed how much magic the empire requires?”
He babbled on about mega-kilowatt currents and the special transmitters used to funnel the magic flux around the empire. Most of the magic flowed into Phoenix City, but the emperor had plans to build vast dams and holding tanks, so he could replace the wind-and-magic trains with ones running on pure magic. He wanted to build a network of calcu-lors to span the continent, not just the empire.
It’s wrong, I thought. Wrong and dangerous. Magic is like rain. You can’t catch a storm cloud and squeeze it dry. Even if you could do that, you’d cause a drought.
That’s when cold washed over me. The emperor had already caused one drought—in Snow Thunder City. Maybe other kingdoms had promised all their magic flux to feed the Phoenix Empire’s demands.
“Now the stock markets are in danger,” Quan went on. “People thought they could make their fortunes buying futures in magic flux. And that is why he wants this marriage. Once he gains that, it doesn’t matter if Lian remains here or returns home. He will load her with advisors—his advisors—and rule through her. And by ruling Lóng City, he will rule its magic wells and currents.”
The part about buying futures didn’t make sense to me, but even an idiot like me could understand the reasons for taking over Lóng City. He won’t stop with us, I thought. Once he conquers Lóng City, he can take over the rest of the Seventy Kingdoms, one by one.
I shivered at the vision of the emperor’s minions scattered all over Lóng City like ticks on a dog. “What can we do?”
“We help Lian escape. I have a plan.”
I snorted. “It better be a good one. That palace is stuffed with watching and listening devices.”
“I know. I’m depending on you and Yún to help for that part. Once you’re outside the palace, certain friends of mine can get us outside the city. They . . . Let us say that they are familiar with certain unofficial routes under the walls.”
Smugglers. Okay, that sounded more like it.
“How and where and when?” I said.
“Tomorrow morning. Early. Tell Lian to pretend she’s visiting her advisors at the university. My friends and I will wait behind the kitchen quadrant, near the servant gate. Bring nothing extraordinary. No extra bags. I’ll make sure to provide anything she needs—clothes, gear, food.”
“What about money? We can smuggle that out.”