JUSTICE

Pilfering food.

Improper care of weapons.

Drunk during picket duty.

Flanked by two of his guards,

King Xau sat on a stool

in the camp’s practice area

on a freezing February morning,

heard the charges,

dispensed judgment.

(Hardly the Hall of Justice

where every case was considered

by five judges enthroned in gilded glory.

Xau had been there twice.

Hadn’t cared for the pomp,

but the verdicts dispassionate, well-reasoned,

so he had let the judges be.)

The fourth and final offender

was hauled in front of Xau:

a foot soldier solid as a tree trunk,

hands tied, head up, uncowed,

breath clouding in the chill air.

A lieutenant bowed twice to Xau.

“Soldier Tang punched a washerwoman,

breaking her nose. Six witnesses.”

A slight shifting of the assembled soldiers,

some two thousand men, then stillness,

so that Xau’s voice carried clearly,

“Soldier Tang, do you admit the charge?”

“Yes.” Tang stood at ease.

Any misgivings the man had hidden.

“Do you wish to add anything?”

“She said my jacket wasn’t ready.”

Bravado or defiance?

Either way, Xau doubted Tang

would be reformed by corporal punishment.

Xau’s voice iron,

“You will apologize to the washerwoman

and give her two months’ pay.”

“I’d sooner be flogged. Your Majesty.”

Tang bowed to the required degree.

“She’s only a washerwoman by day.

At night she’s a cheap whore.”

“Enough.” Xau did not turn his head,

did not look to Gan, the guard on his left,

Gan whose mother had been a harlot,

Gan who put himself in danger every day

to safeguard Xau.

A moment to master his distaste for Tang,

to say merely what was necessary.

“You are dismissed from the army.

You may not take any weapons.”

“But—Your Majesty—”

Tang looked around as if expecting support,

the assembled soldiers motionless,

though some (how many?) must sympathize.

Tang started again.

“Your Majesty—we’re in enemy territory—”

“As is the washerwoman.

As is every man and woman

who follows our army,

who washes clothes,

or cooks, or mends,

or helps the surgeons.”

Perhaps one chance in two that Tang

would make it back to Meqing.

Xau walked past Tang,

headed for his tent,

Gan at his left, Li at his right.

WINTER REAPING

The winter war barely begun

but Eirdre’s husband home.

Brought back like baggage.

Declan’s bloodied body frozen,

his beard ice-beaded.

Her warrior bard made mute.

A mark of Eirdre’s rank—

sister to Queen Fian herself—

that they’d carted Declan

across half the kingdom.

Most men buried or abandoned

in the fields where they died.

Fian came to comfort Eirdre,

bringing the old, bright tales,

the tales their mother had told,

of the time before kings,

before Horse Boy’s people

claimed the wolf country.

Fian came to strengthen Eirdre,

vowing vengeance,

bearing sweet bright lies:

that Declan died in glory,

died to free hill and river,

forest and wolf.

The winter too bitter

to grant Eirdre such solace;

the truth preserved by frost.

She washed Declan’s corpse.

The arrow had entered

his back, not his breast.