The boy called out, signaled left,

and all the horses swerved

in perfect unison.

Well enough,

but no test of what the boy

would face in war—

Xau insistent that he would command

his cavalry in person:

seventeen years old,

untried in battle.

The kind of courage

that led to the loss of armies.

Or kingdoms.

Tsung gave another signal.

Trumpets blared, drums boomed.

Guards ran toward the horses:

flapping long red banners,

tossing clods of dirt

at the king and his men.

Who rode as if they were alone,

as if they were eleven shadows

of a single faultless form,

the horses turning to Xau’s command

almost before Tsung saw the boy

giving the hand signals.

Tsung on the hilltop, stunned,

signaled a third time.

From a stand of trees

a troop of lightly-armored cavalry

charged full at the king.

Xau turned his men to meet them,

galloped headlong at his mock-enemy,

the two lines of horses

thundering toward each other.

Two hundred yards apart,

the cavalry troop stopped, mid-charge,

one man thrown from his horse,

so sudden their halt.

(Unplanned, unbidden, unaccountable.)

For a moment,

Xau and his ten men rode on in perfect order,

toward the baffled, confounded cavalry.

And then Xau called out,

gave the signal to end the exercise.

The boy dismounted clumsily,

sprinted over to the thrown man,

took off the man’s armor,

ran his hands along the man’s limbs

before helping him to his feet.

Tsung on the hilltop,

clapping and crying,

looking down at his king.

SHAZIA

This is not a discussion.

You will marry him.

Her father’s words haunted Shazia

as the covered chariot sped her

further and further from home.

What had she thought?

That her life would be different

than her sisters’?

The royal guards rode escort

without once speaking to her;

her brother drove the chariot

as if she were not there,

as if the wicker bench

behind him were empty.

She slept in fragments,

dreamt of warrior kings:

crowned, armored, their swords red.

Awake, she thought of two kings:

the one who was trading her away

and the one he was sending her to marry.

On the eighth day, the mountains.

The road climbed. The horses slowed.

Her brother ordered her from the chariot.

Crossing the clear bright ceiling

of the world, her father’s words,

her past, her future all folded small.

∗

King Xau met them in the foothills.

Younger than she, barely seventeen,

already he had the same assurance as her father.

He swept Shazia and her brother

inside the circle of his soldiers.

“They told us,” Xau said,

looking at her directly,

“that you speak our language.”

A gray-bearded man beside him

translated his words as he spoke.

Shazia raised her chin.

“Yes. I speak five languages fluently.”

“But your brother doesn’t?”

“He speaks only Ritan and Sumbrese.”

“Good. We are to be married tomorrow.

If you wish, it can be a paper marriage.

You may live near our sister

in a separate part of the palace.”