commoner, a bastard of low birth, was to lead them on a mission of revenge.
Li Tao turned the ring over in his palm. ‘As the Emperor commands.’
He slipped the ring on to his finger and lifted the scroll to search the characters. Men of title and rank. Some of them within the first order, closest to the Emperor. There were close to a hundred names.
‘The Empress was carrying my son.’ The Emperor’s voice faltered, but his next words were spoken with steel-cut clarity. ‘I intend to settle the debt in this lifetime.’
Li Tao nodded and rolled the edges of the scroll closed. There would be no stalking in the shadows this time. The Emperor had issued a public decree that these men were already dead. He simply needed to hunt them down and deal the final blow. The Emperor’s hands would remain clean.
Perhaps Li Ming had known what he was all along: a killer. A man with a knife.
The message came to him in the middle of the night. Li Tao was stationed in the fortress tower at Chengdu, overlooking the Jin River, and he’d been far from asleep. It was less than a day since he’d left Suyin in the hands of his enemy.
The walls of the Chengdu made it suitable for a siege. Throughout the province, he had regiments in reserve. Key points along the bank were fortified. His army was ready. But now there was another urgent message. Another clandestine meeting, but not with Gao.
Li Tao crossed the river with a small escort. They used lanterns to light their way in the darkness. A tent had been raised on the far side of the shore and was guarded by only a handful of soldiers. The camp was marked by torches. Everything had the mark of such haste that Li Tao suspected an ambush at first. He dismissed the possibility as he assessed the banner that flew over the meeting area.
He was surprised, he had to admit. Very surprised.
The soldiers at the entrance bowed and pulled the canvas aside to admit him. A table had been set up inside. The young man seated behind it looked more worn than he, if that was possible.
‘You are lucky my archers recognised the imperial insignia,’ Li Tao said. ‘You might have been shot on sight.’
‘I don’t believe that, given your reputation for discipline.’
He would have recognised Tai Yang from his voice and speech alone. The Emperor’s middle son had the characteristic high cheekbones and serious, deep-set eyes of the Shen family. When Li Tao had first encountered Shen Tai Yang, he’d received a commission in the Emperor’s LongWu Guard due to his name. It was an illustrious name to live up to.
Now he was a prince.
Tai Yang gestured for him to sit and poured a perfunctory cup of wine for each of them.
‘You are a difficult man to defend, Governor Li.’ The younger man drank his wine before setting the cup down with agitation.
That amused Li Tao, for reasons he didn’t understand. ‘I’ve heard a similar sentiment expressed recently.’
‘How many summons did my father send you?’
‘Three.’
‘You’re a bastard, Li.’
Tai Yang had picked up some fire in the year since Li Tao had last seen him. Shen’s middle son was known for maintaining a calm head in the worst of conditions.
‘Circumstances were not favourable for me in Changan, as the prince can understand.’
‘Drink your wine,’ Tai Yang muttered.
He complied. The small act of civility seemed to calm the younger Shen considerably.
Tai Yang smoothed a hand over the front of his robe to right himself. ‘Have you spoken to Gao?’
‘Tomorrow.’
Tai Yang let out a breath of relief. ‘I nearly killed that horse to get here in time. I told my father that you would never ally yourself with that old wolf. We believe there must be some reason for your actions, as questionable as they seem.’
‘Is that why you’ve been marching an army of thousands toward these borders?’
The prince tensed, then reached to pour more wine as a distraction. ‘If my father wanted to have you defeated, he would have sent one of my brothers.’
They faced off across the table, the threat wisping between them like fog, not yet solid and real. The Emperor’s two elder sons were formidable warlords in their own right. Their regional armies held the northern part of the empire. It was the combined forces of the Shen family that allowed them to emerge as the dominant power after Emperor Li had died without a successor. Rival warlords accused