Throne of Jade
Chapter 17

LAURENCE TWITCHED AWAY from the restless, pinching hands, first in one direction then the other: but there was no escape, either from them or from the dragging weight of the yellow robes, stiff with gold and green thread, and pulled down by the gemstone eyes of the dragons embroidered all over them. His shoulder ached abominably under the burden, even a week after the injury, and they would keep trying to move his arm to adjust the sleeves.
"Are you not ready yet?" Hammond said anxiously, putting his head into the room. He admonished the tailors in rapid-fire Chinese; and Laurence closed his mouth on an exclamation as one managed to poke him with a too-hasty needle.
"Surely we are not late; are we not expected at two o'clock?" Laurence asked, making the mistake of turning around to see a clock, and being shouted at from three directions for his pains.
"One is expected to be many hours early for any meeting with the Emperor, and in this case we must be more punctilious than less," Hammond said, sweeping his own blue robes out of the way as he pulled over a stool. "You are quite sure you remember the phrases, and their order?"
Laurence submitted to being drilled once more; it was at least good for distraction from his uncomfortable position. At last he was let go, one of the tailors following them halfway down the hall, making a last adjustment to the shoulders while Hammond tried to hurry him.
Young Prince Miankai's innocent testimony had quite damned Yongxing: the boy had been promised his own Celestial, and had been asked how he would like to be Emperor himself, though with no great details on how this was to be accomplished. Yongxing's whole party of supporters, men who like him believed all contact with the West ought to be severed, had been cast quite into disgrace, leaving Prince Mianning once more ascendant in the court: and as a result, further opposition to Hammond's proposal of adoption had collapsed. The Emperor had sent his edict approving the arrangements, and as this was to the Chinese the equivalent of commanding them done instantly, their progress now became as rapid as it had been creeping heretofore. Scarcely had the terms been settled than servants were swarming through their quarters in Mianning's palace, sweeping away all their possessions into boxes and bundles.
The Emperor had taken up residence now at his Summer Palace in the Yuanmingyuan Garden: half a day's journey from Peking by dragon, and thence they had been conveyed almost pell-mell. The vast granite courtyards of the Forbidden City had turned anvils under the punishing summer sun, which was muted in the Yuanmingyuan by the lush greenery and the expanses of carefully tended lakes; Laurence had found it little wonder the Emperor preferred this more comfortable estate.
Only Staunton had been granted permission to accompany Laurence and Hammond into the actual ceremony of adoption, but Riley and Granby led the other men as an escort: their numbers fleshed out substantially by guards and mandarins loaned by Prince Mianning to give Laurence what they considered a respectable number. As a party they left the elaborate complex where they had been housed, and began the journey to the audience hall where the Emperor would meet them. After an hour's walk, crossing some six streams and ponds, their guides pausing at regular intervals to point out to them particularly elegant features of the landscaped grounds, Laurence began to fear they had indeed not left in good time: but at last they came to the hall, and were led to the walled court to await the Emperor's pleasure.
The wait itself was interminable: slowly soaking the robes through with sweat as they sat in the hot, breathless courtyard. Cups of ices were brought to them, also many dishes of hot food, which Laurence had to force himself to sample; bowls of milk and tea; and presents: a large pearl on a golden chain, quite perfect, and some scrolls of Chinese literature, and for Temeraire a set of gold-and-silver talon-sheaths, such as his mother occasionally wore. Temeraire was alone among them unfazed by the heat; delighted, he put the talon-sheaths on at once and entertained himself by flashing them in the sunlight, while the rest of the party lay in an increasing stupor.
At last the mandarins came out again and with deep bows led Laurence within, followed by Hammond and Staunton, and Temeraire behind them. The audience chamber itself was open to the air, hung with graceful light draperies, the fragrance of peaches rising from a heaped bowl of golden fruit. There were no chairs but the dragon-couch at the back of the room, where a great male Celestial presently sprawled, and the simple but beautifully polished rosewood chair which held the Emperor.
He was a stocky, broad-jawed man, unlike the thin-faced and rather sallow Mianning, and with a small mustache squared off at the corners of his mouth, not yet touched with grey though he was nearing fifty. His clothes were very magnificent, in the brilliant yellow hue which they had seen nowhere else but on the private guard outside the palace, and he wore them entirely unconsciously; Laurence thought not even the King had looked so casually in state robes, on those few occasions when he had attended at court.
The Emperor was frowning, but thoughtful rather than displeased, and nodded expectantly as they came in; Mianning stood among many other dignitaries to either side of the throne, and inclined his head very slightly. Laurence took a deep breath and lowered himself carefully to both knees, listening to the mandarin hissing off the count to time each full genuflection. The floor was of polished wood covered with gorgeously woven rugs, and the act itself was not uncomfortable; he could just glimpse Hammond and Staunton following along behind him as he bowed each time to the floor.
Still it went against the grain, and Laurence was glad to rise at last with the formality met; thankfully the Emperor made no unwelcome gesture of condescension, but only ceased to frown: there was a general air of release from tension in the room. The Emperor now rose from his chair and led Laurence to the small altar on the eastern side of the hall. Laurence lit the stands of incense upon the altar and parroted the phrases which Hammond had so laboriously taught him, relieved to see Hammond's small nod: he had made no mistakes, then, or at least none unforgivable.
He had to genuflect once more, but this time before the altar, which Laurence was ashamed to acknowledge even to himself was easier by far to bear, though closer to real blasphemy; hurriedly, under his breath, he said a Lord's Prayer, and hoped that should make quite clear that he did not really mean to be breaking the commandment. Then the worst of the business was over: now Temeraire was called forward for the ceremony which would formally bind them as companions, and Laurence could make the required oaths with a light heart.
The Emperor had seated himself again to oversee the proceedings; now he nodded approvingly, and made a brief gesture to one of his attendants. At once a table was brought into the room, though without any chairs, and more of the cool ices served while the Emperor made inquiries to Laurence about his family, through Hammond's mediation. The Emperor was taken aback to learn that Laurence was himself unmarried and without children, and Laurence was forced to submit to being lectured on the subject at great length, quite seriously, and to agree that he had been neglecting his family duties. He did not mind very much: he was too happy not to have misspoken, and for the ordeal to be so nearly over.
Hammond himself was nearly pale with relief as they left, and had actually to stop and sit down upon a bench on their way to their quarters. A couple of servants brought him some water and fanned him until the color came back into his face and he could stagger on. "I congratulate you, sir," Staunton said, shaking Hammond's hand as they at last left him to lie down in his chamber. "I am not ashamed to say I would not have believed it possible."
"Thank you; thank you," Hammond could only repeat, deeply affected; he was nearly toppling over.
Hammond had won for them not only Laurence's formal entree into the Imperial family, but the grant of an estate in the Tartar city itself. It was not quite an official embassy, but as a practical matter it was much the same, as Hammond could now reside there indefinitely at Laurence's invitation. Even the kowtow had been dealt with to everyone's satisfaction: from the British point of view, Laurence had made the gesture not as a representative of the Crown, but as an adopted son, while the Chinese were content to have their proper forms met.
"We have already had several very friendly messages from the mandarins at Canton through the Imperial post, did Hammond tell you?" Staunton said to Laurence, as they stood together outside their own rooms. "The Emperor's gesture to remit all duties on British ships for the year will of course be a tremendous benefit to the Company, but in the long run this new mind-set amongst them will by far prove the more valuable. I suppose - " Staunton hesitated; his hand was already on the screen-frame, ready to go inside. "I suppose you could not find it consistent with your duty to stay? I need scarcely say that it would be of tremendous value to have you here, though of course I know how great our need for dragons is, back home."
Retiring at last, Laurence gladly exchanged his clothes for plain cotton robes, and went outside to join Temeraire in the fragrant shade of a bank of orange trees. Temeraire had a scroll laid out in his frame, but was gazing out across the nearby pond rather than reading. In view, a graceful nine-arched bridge crossed the pond, mirrored in black shadows against the water now dyed yellow-orange with the reflections of the late sunlight, the lotus flowers closing up for the night.
He turned his head and nudged Laurence in greeting. "I have been watching: there is Lien," he said, pointing with his nose across the water. The white dragon was crossing over the bridge, all alone except for a tall, dark-haired man in blue scholar-robes walking by her side, who looked somehow unusual; after a moment squinting, Laurence realized the man did not have a shaved forehead nor a queue. Midway Lien paused and turned to look at them: Laurence put a hand on Temeraire's neck, instinctively, in the face of that unblinking red gaze.
Temeraire snorted, and his ruff came up a little way, but she did not stay: her neck proudly straight and haughty, she turned away again and continued past, vanishing shortly among the trees. "I wonder what she will do now," Temeraire said.
Laurence wondered also; certainly she would not find another willing companion, when she had been held unlucky even before her late misfortunes. He had even heard several courtiers make remarks to the effect that she was responsible for Yongxing's fate; deeply cruel, if she had heard them, and still-less-forgiving opinion held that she ought to be banished entirely. "Perhaps she will go into some secluded breeding grounds."
"I do not think they have particular grounds set aside for breeding here," Temeraire said. "Mei and I did not have to - " Here he stopped, and if it were possible for a dragon to blush, he certainly would have undertaken it. "But perhaps I am wrong," he said hastily.
Laurence swallowed. "You have a great deal of affection for Mei."
"Oh, yes," Temeraire said, wistfully.
Laurence was silent; he picked up one of the hard little yellow fruits that had fallen unripe, and rolled it in his hands. "The Allegiance will sail with the next favorable tide, if the wind permits," he said finally, very low. "Would you prefer us to stay?" Seeing that he had surprised Temeraire, he added, "Hammond and Staunton tell me we could do a great deal of good for Britain's interests here. If you wish to remain, I will write to Lenton, and let him know we had better be stationed here."
"Oh," Temeraire said, and bent his head over the reading frame: he was not paying attention to the scroll, but only thinking. "You would rather go home, though, would you not?"
"I would be lying if I said otherwise," Laurence said heavily. "But I would rather see you happy; and I cannot think how I could make you so in England, now you have seen how dragons are treated here." The disloyalty nearly choked him; he could go no further.
"The dragons here are not all smarter than British dragons," Temeraire said. "There is no reason Maximus or Lily could not learn to read and write, or carry on some other kind of profession. It is not right that we are kept penned up like animals, and never taught anything but how to fight."
"No," Laurence said. "No, it is not." There was no possible answer to make, all his defense of British custom undone by the examples which he had seen before him in every corner of China. If some dragons went hungry, that was hardly a counter. He himself would gladly have starved sooner than give up his own liberty, and he would not insult Temeraire by mentioning it even as a sop.
They were silent together for a long space of time, while the servants came around to light the lamps; the quarter-moon rising hung mirrored in the pond, luminous silver, and Laurence idly threw pebbles into the water to break the reflection into gilt ripples. It was hard to imagine what he would do in China, himself, other than serve as a figurehead. He would have to learn the language somehow after all, at least spoken if not the script.
"No, Laurence, it will not do. I cannot stay here and enjoy myself, while back home they are still at war, and need me," Temeraire said finally. "And more than that, the dragons in England do not even know that there is any other way of doing things. I will miss Mei and Qian, but I could not be happy while I knew Maximus and Lily were still being treated so badly. It seems to me my duty to go back and arrange things better there."
Laurence did not know what to say. He had often chided Temeraire for revolutionary thoughts, a tendency to sedition, but only jokingly; it had never occurred to him Temeraire would ever make any such attempt deliberately, outright. Laurence had no idea what the official reaction would be, but he was certain it would not be taken calmly. "Temeraire, you cannot possibly - " he said, and stopped, the great blue eyes expectantly upon him.
"My dear," he said quietly, after a moment, "you put me to shame. Certainly we ought not be content to leave things as they are, now we know there is a better way."
"I thought you would agree," Temeraire said, in satisfaction. "Besides," he added, more prosaically, "my mother tells me that Celestials are not supposed to fight, at all, and only studying all the time does not sound very exciting. We had much better go home." He nodded, and looked back at his poetry. "Laurence," he said, "the ship's carpenter could make some more of these reading frames, could he not?"
"My dear, if it will make you happy he shall make you a dozen," Laurence said, and leaned against him, full of gratitude despite his concerns, to calculate by the moon when the tide should turn again for England and for home.
Selected extracts from
"A Brief Discourse upon the Oriental Breeds, with Reflections upon the Art of Draconic Husbandry"
Presented before the Royal Society, June 1801
by Sir Edward Howe, F.R.S.
THE "VAST UNTRAMMELED serpentine hordes" of the Orient are become a byword in the West, feared and admired at once, thanks in no small part to the well-known accounts of pilgrims from an earlier and more credulous era, which, while of inestimable value at the time of their publication in shedding light upon the perfect darkness which preceded them, to the modern scholar can hardly be of any use, suffering as they do from the regrettable exaggeration which was in earlier days the mode, either from sincere belief on the part of the author or the less innocent yet understandable desire to satisfy a broader audience, anticipatory of monsters and delights incalculable in any tales of the Orient.
A sadly inconsistent collection of reports has thus come forward to the present day, some no better than pure fiction and nearly all others distortions of the truth, which the reader would do better to discount wholesale than to trust in any particular. I will mention one illustrative example, the Sui-Riu of Japan, familiar to the student of draconic lore from the 1613 account of Captain John Saris, whose letters confidently described as fact its ability to summon up a thunderstorm out of a clear blue sky. This remarkable claim, which should thus arrogate the powers of Jove to a mortal creature, I will discredit from my own knowledge: I have seen one of the Sui-Riu and observed its very real capacity to swallow massive quantities of water and expel them in violent gusts, a gift which renders it inexpressibly valuable not only in battle, but in the protection of the wooden buildings of Japan from the dangers of fire. An unwary traveler caught in such a torrent might well imagine the skies to have opened up over his head with a thunderclap, but these deluges proceed quite unaccompanied by lightning or rain-cloud, are of some few moments' duration, and, needless to say, not supernatural in the least.
Such errors I will endeavor to avoid in my own turn, rather trusting to the plain facts, presented without excessive ornamentation, to suffice for my more knowledgeable audience...
We can without hesitation dismiss as ridiculous the estimate, commonly put forth, that in China one may find a dragon for every ten men: a count which, if it were remotely near the truth and our understanding of the human population not entirely mistaken, should certainly result in that great nation's being so wholly overrun by the beasts that the hapless traveler bringing us this intelligence should have had great difficulty in finding even a place to stand. The vivid picture drawn for us by Brother Mateo Ricci, of the temple gardens full of serpentine bodies one overlapping the other, which has so long dominated the Western imagination, is not a wholly false one; however, one must understand that among the Chinese, dragons live rather within the cities than without, their presence thus all the more palpable, and they furthermore move hither and yon with far greater freedom, so that the dragon seen in the market square in the afternoon will often be the same individual observed earlier in morning ablutions at the temple, and then again, some hours later, dining at the cattle-yards upon the city border.
For the size of the population as a whole, we have I am sorry to say no sources upon which I am prepared to rely. However, the letters of the late Father Michel Benoît, a Jesuit astronomer who served in the court of the Qianlong Emperor, report that, upon the occasion of the Emperor's birthday, two companies of their aerial corps were engaged to overfly the Summer Palace in performance of acrobatics; which he himself, in company with two other Jesuit clerks, then personally witnessed.
These companies, consisting of some dozen dragons apiece, are roughly equivalent to the largest of Western formations, and each assigned to one company of three hundred men. Twenty-five such companies form each of the eight banner divisions of the aerial armies of the Tartars, which would yield twenty-four hundred dragons acting in concert with sixty thousand men: already a more than respectable number, yet the number of companies has grown substantially since the founding of the dynasty, and the army is at present a good deal closer to twice the size. We may thus reliably conclude that there are some five thousand dragons in military service in China; a number at once plausible and extraordinary, which gives some small notion of the overall population.
The very grave difficulties inherent in the management of even so many as a hundred dragons together in any singular and protracted military operation are well known in the West, and greatly constrain for practical purposes the size of our own aerial corps. One cannot move herds of cattle so quickly as dragons, nor can dragons carry their food with them live. How the supply of so vast a number of dragons may be orchestrated plainly poses a problem of no small order; indeed, for this purpose the Chinese have established an entire Ministry of Draconic Affairs...
...it may be that the ancient Chinese practice of keeping their coins strung upon cords is due to the former necessity of providing a means of handling money to dragons; however, this is a relic of earlier times, and since at least the Tang Dynasty, the present system has been in place. The dragon is furnished, upon reaching maturity, with an individual hereditary mark, showing sire and dame as well as the dragon's own rank; this having being placed on record with the Ministry, all funds due to the dragon are then paid into the general treasury and disbursed again on reception of markers which the dragon gives to those merchants, primarily herdsmen, whom it chooses to patronize.
This would seem upon the face of it a system wholly unworkable; one may well imagine the results were a government to so administer the wages of its citizenry. However, it most curiously appears that it does not occur to the dragons to forge a false mark when making their purchases; they receive such a suggestion with surprise and profound disdain, even if hungry and short of funds. Perhaps one may consider this as evidence of a sort of innate honor existing among dragons, or in any event family pride; yet at the same time, they will without hesitation or any consciousness of shame seize any opportunity which offers of taking a beast from an unattended herd or stall and never consider leaving payment behind; this is not viewed by them as any form of theft, and indeed in such a case the guilty dragon may be found devouring his ill-gotten prey while sitting directly beside the pen from which it was seized, and ignoring with perfect ease the complaints of the unhappy herdsman who has returned too late to save his flock.
Themselves scrupulous in the use of their own marks, the dragons are also rarely made victims of any unscrupulous person who might think to rob them by submitting falsified markers to the Ministry. Being as a rule violently jealous of their wealth, dragons will at once on arriving in any settled place go to inquire as to the state of their accounts and scrutinize all expenses, and so quickly notice any unwarranted charge upon their funds or missing payment; and by all reports the well-known reactions of dragons to being robbed has no less force when that theft occurs in this manner indirectly and out of their view. Chinese law expressly waives any penalty for a dragon who kills a man proven guilty of such a theft; the ordinary sentence is indeed the exposure of the perpetrator to the dragon. Such a sentence of sure and violent death may seem to us a barbaric punishment, and yet I have been assured several times over by both master and dragon that this is the only means of consoling a dragon so abused and restoring it to calm.
This same necessity of placating the dragons has also ensured the steady continuance of the system over the course of better than a thousand years; any conquering dynasty made it nearly their first concern to stabilize the flow of funds, as one can well imagine the effects of a riot of angry dragons...
The soil of China is not naturally more arable than that of Europe; the vast necessary herds are rather supported through an ancient and neatly contrived scheme of husbandry whereby the herdsmen, having driven some portion of their flocks into the towns and cities to sate the hungry dragons, returning carry away with them great loads of the richly fermented night-soil collected in the dragon-middens of the town, to exchange with the farmers in their rural home districts. This practice of using dragon night-soil as fertilizer in addition to the manure of cattle, almost unknown here in the West due to the relative scarcity of dragons and the remoteness of their habitations, seems especially efficacious in renewing the fertility of the soil; why this should be so is a question as yet unanswered by modern science, and yet well-evidenced by the productivity of the Chinese husbandmen, whose farms, I am reliably informed, regularly produce a yield nearly an order of magnitude greater than our own...