The reception—as it did every month—left Shangxiang exhausted and irritated. Zhong, her aide, waved away the cluster of servants who had accompanied them from the Throne Room. When the door closed behind them, his stiff, proper stance finally relaxed. "Here, Shang," Zhong said as he handed her a glass of cool water freshened with slices of yellow fruit. His use of her familiar name pleased her—in this place, where no one else could hear. "I know your throat is parched."
"And my rear is sore, as well," Shangxiang answered. She handed him her cane. "The cushion did nothing against that damned crystal."
"We can't have that, can we?" He chuckled. "I'll see that it's replaced with a more appropriate covering." He proffered the water again, and this time she took it. She let herself sink gratefully into one of the well-padded chairs in the private reception room. The windows were opened slightly though the air still held much of winter's nip, and the fire roaring in its hearth was welcome. Shangxiang sighed. "I'm sorry, Zhong. It's my duty and I shouldn't complain."
"You are the Huangdi," he told her. "You can do whatever you'd like."
She smiled at that. Zhong shu'Zhuge had been with her for the bulk of her five decades as Huangdi. Shangxiang might be Huangdi, but it was Zhong who scheduled her life and made certain that the days ran smoothly. Brought into her service as a page at age five, he had been simply Zhong Zhuge, with not even a lowly jin' before his family name, but he had shown his loyalty and intelligence and progressed over the years to his current position.
Then she had not been the "Peacemeaker" but the "Plaguebringer," who brought the Outer Lands into the Satellites by negotiation when she could, and with the Patrol, her armies, and simple brute force when she could not. She had been young then, energetic, and full of anger at the way her papaqin had been treated as Huangd. She had vowed that the wan'-and-shu' would never call her "weak," that the aristocracy of the Satellites would never call her "cowardly." None of them would ever call her "fool"... not and keep their lives.
"... Shangxiang?" Zhong was saying.
"I'm sorry," she told him. "You were saying?"
"I was asking if you wished to know the evening's appointments."
"Will it matter?" she asked, and they smiled at each other.
"The Goji Shiren is bringing his niece Luyu to meet you at dinner," Zhong told her. "I have asked the Huan to be there as well, so he might have a chance to talk with her."
"And will he attend?"
Zhong shrugged. "The Huan pleaded other commitments. But if you sent word to him..."
Shangxiang shook her head. "No. If my son can't be bothered to meet the women I suggest as good matches, then Yong will have to be satisfied when I choose a wife for him."
Zhong nodded, his face carefully neutral.
It was a full decade after her husband died that she finally took Zhong into her bed. The seduction was unplanned but seemed entirely natural. They had become more than servant and mistress over the years. In private, they had long been friends, and Zhong had no family of his own. "I can't ever offer you more," she told him that night. "I know," he'd answered, with that gentle lifting of his lips that she loved to see. "The Huangdi might need to use marriage as a tool. I understand. I do ..."
"... and also the planning committee for your Jubilee Celebration would like to go over their tentative arrangements with you to see if they meet your approval," Zhong was saying. "I've told them that you might have time tonight following your dinner with the Goji, but I can delay them until tomorrow if you'd like."
Shangxiang waved a hand. "No, that's fine. Let them come. I'll listen and nod my head as long as they haven't done anything enormously stupid."
Zhong nodded. He touched her shoulder softly, almost a caress. Even here, alone, he was careful of the boundaries between them. "Then I'll send word to the committee to be prepared. And ..." He stopped. Pressed his lips together. "There is a letter from Xiangi Luban, brought by private courier. I took the liberty of decoding it for you."
"Bring it here." She didn't ask what her niece, married to the impetuous Cao wan'Cao, the Xiang of Qinghai, had said; she could see from Zhong's suddenly-clouded face that it was not good news. She unfolded the paper Zhong handed her and read the underlined words. She shook her head and let the paper drop. "Thirty Mategician publicly executed in Haixi... An'Torii wan'Kang goes too far, and the Xiang encourages him. Does the Goji know?" she asked.
"I suspect the news will have reached him through his own sources," Zhong said. "I will draft a strongly-worded letter to Xiang wan'Cao from you. I'm sure the Goji will be doing the same for An'Torii wan'Kang."
"I'm certain of that," Shangxiang replied. "And I'm sure the families of the slain Mategician will be very pleased with a strongly worded letter."