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She gestured at the now-empty area. ‘Were those your notorious captains?’
‘An interesting display you put on for them. If they were young and brash, one of them might consider putting a knife in my back to take possession of you.’
‘Like a trophy,’ she said with a sigh. ‘The August Emperor always boasted about your soldiers, how fierce and disciplined they were. How does a new army gain such a formidable reputation?’
He shrugged away her attempt at flattery. ‘Young men have something to prove.’
‘Perhaps their leader has something to prove?’
‘You can’t truly be interested in this.’
She tilted her head in what wasn’t an answer. When she turned away, he found himself following obligingly as she wandered toward the gorge. There must be a wisp of sorcery within her.
‘This house looks like it’s about to fall off the edge of the world.’ She peered into the misted depths.
‘The cliff provides a natural barrier. Easy to defend.’
‘Have you ever seen the bottom?’ She inched forwards until her toes touched against the emptiness beyond. A breeze stirred from the chasm.
‘Stand back,’ he cautioned. What he wanted to do was wrap an arm around her and drag her back to safety.
She took her time before complying. The silk of her gown rippled against him while he inhaled, then exhaled slowly. He hadn’t moved, yet his heart was pumping fast. She was playing with him. He was … he was letting her.
‘You know that bringing me here can be seen as an act of defiance.’ The words were a warning, but her tone was one that stroked his skin. ‘It would be best if you released me. What use could I be to you when you already have soldiers from the mountain to the sea?’
‘Where would you go?’ he asked. ‘Old Gao was looking for you. He expected you to be alone.’
She swallowed. ‘Gao again.’
‘Gao sent assassins after you that day.’ He stepped close, fighting the urge to touch her. ‘It’s not me you should be frightened of.’
‘You stopped them? Why?’
Why? He didn’t have to be a hero to want to save a lone woman from being destroyed senselessly.
‘I’m grateful, then. All this time, I thought that I … that you …’ She blinked up at him, looking confused and vulnerable.
‘I don’t want gratitude,’ he spat out. ‘All I want is answers.’
She flinched and the mask returned. Good. The seasoned courtesan was an easier adversary to deal with.
‘What have you done to make an enemy of Gao?’ he asked.
Her gaze became distant. ‘Perhaps I do know a few things about Governor Gao Shiming.’
Suyin didn’t know if it was the chasm at her back or Li Tao’s imposing presence that had her heart beating so wildly. He was fearsome to behold up close, with nothing and no one between them to shield her.
‘Everyone knows Gao wants that throne,’ she said.
He threw her a look of mild impatience. ‘I do not need to know what everyone knows, my lady.’
The strength of his face fascinated her. She had never seen anything like it. From his sun-darkened skin to the short crop of his hair, he looked nothing like the cultured ministers of the court. He was staring at her intently, willing her to reveal her secrets. There was an almost frightening beauty to his harsh features.
‘Should I write you a list? Recall every plot he’s orchestrated? Every man he’s sent to the executioner? Gao has built his influence over the reign of three emperors.’
‘Then what do you have that could possibly be a threat?’
She had to be careful. The secrets she kept were enough to cut her own throat. ‘Do men like you need a reason?’
He grew very quiet. ‘Men like me.’
He met her eyes with a look that took her breath. She had no answer. Li Tao had raised a strike force so fierce that no one dared to challenge him directly, not even Emperor Shen. But he had saved her life.
She would not play these men against each other. She had never used the art of secrets in that way. All she’d ever wanted was to stay alive. And, as single-minded as Li Tao was, she wasn’t even certain he could be manipulated.
‘Gao is cunning,’ he continued when she said nothing. ‘More clever than I. Probably cleverer than you. It could be that he planted you here, so conveniently in my hands.’
She’d had the same thought, but she denied it vehemently now. ‘Gao is nothing to me. We haven’t spoken in all these years.’
Her view of the house was suddenly blocked by the expanse of his shoulders. She tried to slip past, but the sharp drop of the gorge prevented her escape.
‘You have been trying to seduce me from the moment we met,’ he accused lightly.
‘That would be foolish.’ And dangerous.
‘No? Then why are you looking at me like that?’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
She had spent so many years presenting a face to the world. Beckoning glances and secret looks. Perhaps it had simply become a part of her.
He prowled a step closer and her mouth went dry. Every breath came with great effort. She shouldn’t have allowed herself to be cornered. A predatory glint lighted his eyes.
‘I might consider it.’ His voice was a low strum in her ear. ‘If the situation were different.’
Her cheeks flushed and she couldn’t deny the dark thrill uncoiling within her. But this wasn’t about desire. It was about control and Li Tao wielded it meticulously. She assessed the impenetrable fortress of a man before her.
‘I might consider it as well,’ she replied. ‘If you were not on the brink of death.’
His expression darkened. There was too much risk becoming involved with a man like Li Tao. A man who had no fear of consequences. His hand circled her arm as she attempted to move past him. His grip wasn’t forceful, but she couldn’t break free.
‘Is this all an act?’ he asked.
‘Yes. All of it.’ Her voice held steady, though her pulse jumped erratically.
She was used to being watched. Being admired no longer moved her, but Li Tao’s black gaze penetrated despite her defences. The heat from his hand seeped through the thin material of her robe. Everything about him overwhelmed her with quiet power: his commanding height, the hard shape of his mouth as he regarded her. With just the pressure of his fingers, he drew her closer.
She expected the descent of his mouth, but never would have anticipated the gentleness of the kiss. Her lips parted as his explored hers. His fingertips lifted to her cheek in an undemanding, but undeniably possessive caress. She nearly allowed her eyes to fall closed. She almost yielded against the heat and pressure and the slow stir of his mouth. Instead she dug her nails sharply into the flesh of her palms. She fastened her eyes on to his, permitting the kiss, but never surrendering.
He lifted his head a mere inch, hovering close. His breath caressed over her as if the kiss hadn’t yet ended. ‘All deception?’
‘I have been wooed by kings and poets, but you, only you, have ever touched my heart.’
She mocked him with a lover’s whisper, but he smiled in response.
‘I like the lie.’
The low roughness of his voice stroked down her spine. If she didn’t remain focused on his face, she would stumble helplessly into the abyss. Li Tao was an impossible man to read. His gaze smouldered with desire; the scant space between them grew laden with it. But there was something else in his eyes, insurmountable control and calculation.
‘With a face like this you must have had countless lovers.’
Surprisingly gentle fingers traced a line along her jaw and a fever rushed over her. She needed to free herself. He had her cornered in every way possible.
‘You are mistaken,’ she whispered. ‘I choose my lovers very carefully.’
‘I would never expect something for nothing. Especially not from you.’
‘From what I have heard, you’re not much for negotiation,’ she said.
‘Give me one night.’
Her retort caught in her throat. His suggestion, presented with such cutting clarity, shouldn’t have caused a flood of heat in her stomach or the trail of yearning that slipped between her legs like a slow curl of smoke.
Li Tao himself seemed troubled by the proposal. ‘You can’t be surprised,’ he taunted, but it came out hoarse, without his usual force behind it.
‘I already told you, I am not on offer.’
For the first time, her feminine instincts failed her. She should have turned this negotiation to her advantage; instead she wondered how Li Tao would feel crushed against her, skin to heated skin. His kiss wouldn’t be so controlled then.
But she knew what this was beneath the rise and fall of his chest, beneath the heat of his touch. It was only the desire of a powerful man pursuing an unattainable prize. The moment she gave him what he wanted, her appeal would fade.
He smiled faintly. ‘The answer is no, then.’
‘The answer is no.’
She brushed past, careful not to touch him. Her knees threatened to crumble with each step.
‘If I had not come for you, you would be dead,’ he reminded, catching up with her easily.
‘Li Tao.’ There was a misplaced intimacy in addressing him so directly. ‘I know very well you were not acting out of kindness. Now show me the rest of this prison since it appears I might be here for a while.’
He walked beside her with his hands clasped behind his back. To anyone observing, they might even appear companionable. Between him and Gao, she was caught between an old cunning tiger and a young fierce one.
Chapter Four
Luoyang—ad 73722 years earlier
The streets of Luoyang never slept. After the evening gong, the section gates would close, but the drinking and gambling within the wards would continue until dawn. All the harder to scratch out survival as a thief.
During the day, Tao could snatch a yam from a pedlar’s basket and push his way into the web of alleys behind the shopfronts. He would tuck himself into a dingy corner and devour it raw, chewing through the coarse skin. When he was waist-high and stick-thin, he could hazard such recklessness and suffer only a beating if caught. The welts toughened him until he grew numb to the sting of a bamboo switch. Now that he was older, the archers upon the city wall would simply put an arrow through him before he could shove through the crowd. He had no choice but to wait for night-time when darkness provided cover. But the city remained active and the guard patrols stayed ever vigilant.
The gambling halls and pleasure quarters stood as palaces of the gutter world and the lords who ran them were brutal men who could not be crossed. There was always business brewing in their shadows, jobs for someone who knew the alleys of Luoyang better than the rats.
Feng, the head of the eastern street gangs, held out a knife to him in the alley behind the drinking house. A slant of light from the back door illuminated their meeting and the smell of roasting meat drifted from the kitchen. The greasy, rich aroma nearly brought tears to his eyes.
‘Boy like you wouldn’t have a good knife.’ Feng’s smile revealed uneven, yellowed teeth. ‘Looks suspicious, if you’re caught.’
The weapon was rusted near the handle. Tao closed his hand around the hilt. He didn’t ask about the man Feng wanted killed. There was no need to know any more when he had decided this was the only way.
‘Be sure to hit the heart.’
Feng poked a bony finger against his ribcage and Tao swallowed his anger at the indignity. He was little more than skin and bone, his shoulders just beginning to broaden.
‘Follow through and shove the blade upwards,’ Feng said with a final vicious jab. ‘Even if you miss, he won’t survive for long.’
Tao hid the knife close to his side and gripped it so hard his fingers stiffened around it. The roughened hilt melded to the flesh of his palm. He didn’t have far to walk, only across the street into a dark corner where he could see the entrance to the drinking house. Laughter came from inside, floating down from the upper level where noblemen dined and whored, fat with food and wine. All he had to do was wait for the right one to come out.
His legs grew stiff with waiting. He dropped his shoulder against the mortared brick of the alley. Hour after hour, noblemen staggered out of the door, tripping over their ornate robes. Eventually, the laughter died down. The lanterns still glowed from the rafters, but the clink of cups had grown sparse.
The man wasn’t in there. Feng had given him only this one night to do this deed and the man wasn’t there. Or Tao had missed him in those moments when he had let his eyelids drop out of exhaustion. In desperation, he considered rushing the door and ploughing upstairs to find the man. How far would he get, an unwashed street urchin with his clothes worn threadbare?
Two men came stumbling through the beaded curtain over the entrance. Tao straightened and his palm started to sweat around the knife.
Two. He hadn’t anticipated that. Either of them could overpower him.
‘One more!’ The nobleman weaved back and forth in the blue robe that marked him as the target. ‘One more for the road.’
His companion laughed beside him and dragged him upright. ‘Not a drop left in the place, my friend.’
Now. He moved without taking the time to shake the stiffness from his limbs, without any thought as to how he would fight off both men. Only the companion saw Tao emerge on to the street. His expression sobered, but he didn’t call out for help. He merely straightened and stepped away.
Tao stalked forwards like a tiger, like an arrow. He didn’t look at the man’s face. He focused in on the point between his ribs where Feng had directed him. The knife lifted and he shoved the blade with all his strength, punching through cloth and flesh, never stopping. This was the only way.
Hot, thick blood washed over his hand, the copper stink of it like the butcher shop. The man made a grunting, gurgling noise. Only then did Tao glimpse his face. He wished he hadn’t. Rounded cheeks and weak chin with eyes wide in confusion. His careless drunkenness stopped cold.
The blade snapped and Tao staggered backwards, grasping only the hilt. He ran, shoving his way back into the shadows. At any moment, the outcry would rouse the city guards, and he would hear the twang of the archer’s bow. The arrow would enter his back and pierce through his heart like the rusty blade had pierced the nobleman’s chest.
It was the first time he had taken a life. He felt no joy in the killing, but he felt no remorse either. The truth was he felt nothing. None of the nervous exhilaration or hunger that came when snatching food from the marketplace.
He found Feng in another nest of alleyways at the designated spot. His decaying smile gleamed lurid in the dimness. Feng dropped three coins into Tao’s palm.
Somehow Tao’s feet took him back through the wards to the familiar hovel tucked in quieter streets. The sky was lightening in the stillness before the market gong. Auntie’s window lay open. The old woman trusted no harm would come to her. From the doorstep, he could hear her stirring a pot of rice for the morning meal. The heat from her stove clung sweet and warm around him.
He stared down at the coins in his hand, a wicked hint of silver stained red. He rubbed the coins clean against his sleeve and dropped them just inside the window before turning to go.
Present day—ad 759
The rhythm and pattern of the household was an easy one to find once Li Tao released her from confinement. The mansion was arranged neatly in a double courtyard. Each morning, several servants could be seen sweeping along the bays. The clip of the gardener’s shears sounded in the garden. The kitchen and all the meals were ruled over by a balding cook that everyone called ‘Cook’. A regiment of soldiers patrolled the perimeter, but rarely set foot in the house. If she watched from the windows, she could measure the day by their rounds.
