Grand Steward Lŭ Lin1 Bá-Ăvan2 dismounted her small, two-wheeled carriage with the aid of her attendant, Sen Na.3 This carriage was for the Grand Steward’s personal use and conveyed her quickly across the Palace grounds. The Palace, after all, was very large, and she had a great many matters to manage. And she preferred, most of the time, to do so herself.
A woman of about fifty, Lŭ Lin had lived inside the Palace for almost twenty years. Almost half her life had been devoted to the service of the king. When King Mŭ So had been crowned and had named her Grand Steward, he had given her a small residence in the Palace and this small carriage. The residence had been a courtesy gift, one that it had become tradition for new kings to offer their Grand Steward. All past Grand Stewards, however, declined as they preferred to remain living in the estate of their House in the capital. The House bond, after all, was still somewhat more important than the prestige of a royal appointment to even the most ambitious. Over time the exchange itself had become a ceremonial formality; the king offered the residence and the Grand Steward declined, usually borrowing the words of previous Grand Stewards, indicating to the king and the court the legacy he had chosen to follow.
Lŭ Lin, however, had on that day bowed very low and accepted. The entire court was stunned and more than a few attempted to express open indignation, but were silenced by the king. Lŭ Lin offered no explanation to the court for her actions. In time, however, it became apparent that this Grand Steward would leave her own legacy.
In her position Lŭ Lin Ăvan managed the finances of the Palace, an area that had become woefully rife with corruption. In the first three years of her tenure she had all but eliminated the poisonous greed that had festered within the Palace walls for so many years. Of course, greed can never be completely destroyed, but after six ministers and thirty-four clerks of various ranks had been arrested, imprisoned, and stripped of their Housenames, greed hid for a time. She had also, in time, been given oversight of the Palace House, an unusual duty for the Grand Steward but one that had been arranged given the advanced age and diminished capacity of the current Palace Housemaster.
Some said that she would not have the power she had were it not for the support of the king’s Oak Hand, the Prime Minister, who was her brother-in-law. None, of course, said so to her face. Some, she knew, believed that she had the power to do anything she liked within the Palace, and indeed could control the king himself, if she so desired. But Lŭ Lin had no patience for such gossip, and if she ever found who had begun these whispers she would certainly have them flogged.
Standing on the paved stone Palace road, Lŭ Lin was distracted by how heavily the gray clouds hung in the morning sky. The autumn rains had already begun, it seemed, and likely would not stop until they turned to ice or snow. Every winter felt a little longer than the last. Which perhaps meant that she was finally starting to get old.
Sen Na spent some moments arranging her mistress’s clothing. The voluminous dark blue silk of Lŭ Lin’s golt had been creased somewhat in the long carriage ride from the front of the Palace to the Spring Gate, the entrance into the Courtyard of the Four Little Palaces. Sen Na would not be permitted to accompany Lŭ Lin through the gate and so wished to see to it that she had all that she required during their separation. Lŭ Lin was fond of Sen Na, an Ăvan girl of seventeen who had been serving her for six years, ever since Lŭ Lin’s aged maid had died. Sen Na’s parents had been killed that spring in a flood in her village in the Kí Len4 Mountains and as such the girl had needed a guardian from within their House. Lŭ Lin had been offered the position by her Housemaster in a rare face-to-face interaction.
According to the customs of their House, Lŭ Lin did go to pay her respects to him twice a year, but had never visited nor communicated with him outside those official occasions. The Grand Steward understood that her Ăvan Housemaster was sensitive to the distance she had chosen to keep from her House and had been worried that she would choose a new maid from among the Palace House. Assigning her guardianship of Sen Na had been his way of reminding the court that Lŭ Lin was Ăvan.
Sen Na had become very like a daughter to her. Especially because Lŭ Lin had never married and had no children of her own. The girl was timid, but honest. She was also meticulous and talented, excelling in both reading and writing, and had even begun to learn the tongues of Ôdenra and Brenigev. She had a good head but also a warm heart. And she was loyal, the trait Lŭ Lin valued above all others.
She waited while Sen Na smoothed the back of the skirts and then fastened a black cloak around her shoulders. Then she straightened the front of her wide black silk belt, the symbol of her office, the ends of which hung straight over the front of her golt skirts, embroidered all over with the Sona House’s hemlock and falcons. From the belt hung, on one side, a golden chain with a small round medallion bearing the mark of the Palace House, and on the other a large pendant carved from perfect white gíth, which was the official seal of the Palace’s Grand Steward. Sen Na arranged the gíth seal so it was facing forward and then stepped back, her hands crossed and her head bowed.
“Would you like an umbrella, my lady?”
Lŭ Lin shook her head with a smile. “There will be no need.”
The Grand Steward strode through the narrow Spring Gate and the Palace guards closed it behind her.
Beyond the Spring Gate, the Courtyard of the Four Little Palaces was a quiet and well-maintained corner of the Palace grounds that abutted a clutch of tall birch and maple trees. The path on which Lŭ Lin now walked led to a small round pavilion that was paved, like the path, with white stones. This pavilion’s roof served as a low tower from which the guards could watch the grounds without risk of seeing over the Four Little Palaces’ walls. Beneath the roof stood a small administrative building intended for the Grand Steward’s own personal use, as well as a small barracks for the bodyswords who had been assigned here as guards but who were never permitted to enter the palace of any of the Four Little Princes. This was a force of fifteen that rotated monthly.
One of these swords had met her as she entered the Spring Courtyard, bowed and greeted her, and then escorted her the rest of the way to the pavilion where four others stood upon the roof surveying the length and breadth of the Spring Courtyard.
Leading out from the pavilion in the direction of the four points of the compass were four similar white stone paths, each leading to one of the Little Palaces. The paths were named for the compass directions — north, south, east, and west — but their respective palaces were not so named. According to her own protocols, the palaces could never be named as they were meant to be interchangeable in every way.
As they reached the pavilion and stood under its low roof, the bodysword bowed again and remained there, awaiting dismissal or orders.
“Where is he?” she asked him.
The guard, who was a man of about forty with a long thin nose and narrow eyes rimmed in wrinkles, straightened until he was upright, nearly a head taller than Lŭ Lin. His shoulder-length brown hair had been tied back with leather cord, his leather armor was black as ink and the silver breastplate and vambraces with their green ornaments shone dully in the light of the clouded sun. “My lady,” he said. “We have placed him in the cell in the barracks’ basement.”
The Grand Steward nodded. This was in accordance with her orders. The Courtyard’s barracks only had one small cell in the basement which she had added to the design herself for just this situation. Although, this was only the second time the cell had been occupied in almost ten years.
“Has he said anything?” Her question was a test and she watched him carefully while he answered it.
“My lady, we have not gone to him since we placed him there. No one has seen or spoken to him since last night.”
Good. They had followed the protocols. She nodded and said, “Very well.”
The guard, who had begun to look nervous in a way that only the innocent can, relaxed a little. She turned and looked out at the little forest where the leaves of the birch trees had turned to brilliant yellow, as if blooming, while the maples swayed in the wind in a swirl of red, orange, and green.
“You do not wish to know—”
“No,” she answered sharply. “I understand that he left one palace and attempted to enter another. He is now locked away under our feet. I trust you have not written anything else in the report?”
He hesitated. The Palace House was well-trained, but their training usually called for detailed, full accountings of events, especially events that broke the Palace routine. He had begun to look nervous again.
“Whatever you’ve written,” she said, “burn it and start again. If you must, re-familiarize yourself with the protocols of the Spring Courtyard.”
He bowed deeply. The Palace House was, despite current arrangements, not officially within her jurisdiction. And though the Four Little Palaces were in her especial care, she would do well not to insult or offend the Palace House. What’s more, the guard’s instinct to make a full report would not have been wrong in any other circumstances.
She said to him, “Details, sir, are necessary elsewhere, but they are the enemy in this place.”
“Yes, my lady.”
“You are captain here?” she asked him.
“Yes, my lady. Until next week.”
“Please arrange for someone to escort me. I will be visiting each Little Palace today.”
“I will do so myself.” He bowed his head.
Lŭ Lin glanced at him. Just then the sky dimmed still more and rain began to fall. A gentle, sprinkling rain that made the cold air smell somehow of stone and moss.
The guard excused himself and returned seconds later with a waxed linen umbrella, black like his armor and his short soldier’s golt.
The first of the Little Palaces the Grand Steward visited was the one at the end of the east path. The rain was little more than a drizzle by the time they arrived at its Front Hall where they were greeted by the head of this prince’s bodyswords. He bowed and escorted Lŭ Lin inside. The guard with the umbrella remained outside the Front Hall. Lŭ Lin was pleased that she did not have to remind him of that. The outer door of the Front Hall closed and all sound quieted. Within this stoutly-built, windowless wooden structure, the outer world may as well not exist.
The main room of the Front Hall was narrow, as the majority of the wing’s space was taken up by living quarters for the guards and their own small personal space. On the opposite side of the room from the entrance was a series of green tiled steps leading up to a tiled platform where a line of guards stood on either side of the door that connected the Front Hall to the Little Palace. These guards — the prince’s bodyswords — all wore short green golts with black trim. But, like the guards in the pavilion, their leather armor was black and their breastplates silver, as was common throughout the Palace.
They regarded Lŭ Lin with careful severity. She, as the Grand Steward, was their superior, in a way. Though of course the prince of this Little Palace was their superior as well. Within the Courtyard of the Four Little Palaces the chain of command was complicated, but that couldn’t be helped. The king had been willing to tolerate any amount of complication if it would keep his son safe. As he saw it, the more complication the better. Lŭ Lin knew this and so carefully worked within the complexities and the unnavigable overlaps in rules and hierarchy as well as she was able.
The head of the prince’s bodyswords stood before her and bowed. His men followed suit. As long as the prince was not in the room, such was permitted. This captain was well-trained and experienced. She was familiar with him, even if she didn’t know his name.
“My lady Ăvan,” he said from his bow, “His Highness will appear shortly.”
Lŭ Lin tucked her hands into her sleeves as her fingers were growing cold in the chilly Front Hall. She said, “Very well.”
The men stood upright and silence built as they all waited. It was one of the many rules of the Four Little Palaces that their occupants ought to avoid speaking to outsiders for any length of time. The captain would not make pleasantries with the Grand Steward because despite her rank, she was still an outsider and no outsider was permitted beyond the Front Hall. Thus, they could not help but watch her carefully. It was their job, and she took no offense.
She turned from the captain and faced the door at the top of the stairs, the door through which the prince would come when he arrived.
All these protocols, the ordering of the Little Palaces down to the most minute detail, had, after all, been her own doing. She must take care to make no errors herself in following them. It had even been Lŭ Lin who have given this courtyard its name. It was she who had organized the finding of three other boys the same age and general appearance as king’s son, So Ga. The king, she remembered, had wanted to chose boys from among the palace House, the same House whose members were the maids, servants, even the royal bodyswords who now guarded this Front Hall — and all the Front Halls, as well as the pavilion. It was an elite House and so the Grand Steward advised against it, pointing out that the boys would then have ties and would potentially be recognizable. Moreover, those of the palace House would likely view such a potentially dangerous appointment as a punishment, which could anger the Palace House.
Instead she had gently suggested to the king, who had still been recovering from life-threatening injuries, that they find Houseless boys, with no families, no homes, no futures. The prospect of living like princes for the next several years had been enough to overshadow the potential danger of serving as the crown prince’s body doubles. All three who had been chosen had readily agreed.
Together with the king, the Grand Steward had organized the management of the Four Little Palaces. Many of their protocols had been her doing, but some were the king’s. He had never ceased to be anxious for the safety of his son. Even with the support of Lŭ Lin Ăvan, his most trusted minister, he was still constantly weighed down by worry. Managing the Little Palaces was all she could do to share His Majesty’s burden.
But now this had happened. And though the incident itself was not serious, it had caused a tremendous eruption in the king’s usual simmering paranoia.
She had been received in the night to the king’s private rooms and there had had to report the escape of the servant. Understandably, what had concerned the king most was that this servant had not been trying to escape the Spring Courtyard, but had been trying to enter one of the other palaces. When he had heard this, he had ordered her to stop speaking. He would hear no more. Pacing furiously across his floor – his limp made worse by his agitation – he had issued his condemnation of the servant there and then, which she had expected, but his added orders had surprised her.
Leaning very close to her, he had whispered in a voice that chilled her, “None may question or even speak to this servant, Grand Steward Ăvan. Not even you. Anyone who speaks to him is to be put to death along with him. Do you understand?”
Lŭ Lin had found this hasty and had desired to ask him to reconsider, but seeing the look of cold fury on his face, she had instead knelt and lowered her head to the ground saying, “Yes, Your Majesty.”
He did not have to tell her the rest. As the keeper of the Four Little Palaces it fell to her to speak to each of the Four Little Princes, to soothe them in the wake of this event, and to answer the many questions they would no doubt have. But today she would have no answers. She wondered how she would find the Four Little Princes. It had been almost a year since she had last spoken to any of them, and no doubt last night’s news would have come as a shock.
She did not have to wonder for long. Just then there came an echoing sound of metal from the other side of the large wooden wall at the top of the Front Hall’s tiled steps. When the guards opened the door and the prince stepped through, Lŭ Lin bowed deeply.
“Your Highness.”
Ly-uh LIN
Bay-EE-ah-van; “Bá” is taken from Lŭ Lin’s mother’s given name. This is the matrilineal prefix that is part of her formal name.
Sen-NAH
Kiy-LEN
This new character is so interesting. Can't wait to read more about her storyline.
I like how you don't portray these political figures like they're a bunch children, like in so many modern stories written these days. I did have one question though. Is there a reason Lŭ Lin is not reffered to as the "Grand Stewardess", but is instead referred to as the Grand Steward?