Jade War

Children were completely honest and lived in the moment; they were demanding, but also easy to please, asking only for simple love and attention.

Jaya, at six months old, was not the fussiest of all Wen’s children. She would not stand to be put down in the carriage for even five minutes. Hilo joked that she would grow up to be even greener than her brothers, but Wen responded irritably that the ridiculous superstition existed only to prevent desperately frustrated mothers from smothering their most unmanageable children.

“Um, sure, okay. Just let me get dressed.” A rustle of movement. “You want to do something?”

Anden said, fiercely, “I want to fuck.”

A moment of silence passed. Cory said, “I’ll come get you.”

Those were at least two things, not one, Hilo felt like pointing out

Unlike her, he had not been awake all night worrying or praying; he’d been making military preparations. If Shae fell under Ayt’s sword, Hilo would not allow their enemies to leave the grounds alive. He would break the immutable law of the clean blade; he would take forbidden vengeance on her killer and plunge the clans, and the entire city, back into all-out war.

“You’ve insulted and slandered me enough. You’ve called me a poor granddaughter, an unfit Weather Man, unworthy of jade, a traitor, and a whore.”

She stopped; the heartbeat of silence that fell was blistering. “Ayt Madashi, Pillar of the Mountain, I offer you a clean blade.”

Look at Ayt Mada and how alone she is. We must never be like that.”

Kekon has no record of this man, other than a royal genealogy set down at the time with an unnamed reference to “a young prince, lost.”

Just because you’re not the Torch, or because you’re different from Lan-jen—let the gods recognize them—doesn’t mean you can’t be a strong Pillar, or an even better one. For myself, I can’t be the Horn that you were; I can only be my own sort.”

“A great day, Kaul-jen.”

“What a miserable day, to end a miserable month,” Hilo grumbled after dinner.