No probably about it, she thought. Lord Kuo was laying low somewhere, letting the thing take shape. She rose, took a pointer, tapped the map. “Somewhere in all this blank space he’s hidden his reserve army. In a few days he’ll drop a big hammer on the Matayangans.”

“How is Southern Army doing?”

She kept her opinion to herself. “You see the map. It’s maintaining the integrity of its lines. Against the odds, that’s all you could ask of any army. Just a minute.”

A messenger had appeared. She moved round to where she could catch snippets of his report. “Damn!” she said, though softly.

The table chief moved small, numbered black markers into a cluster at the map’s easternmost edge. He moved others to a riverbank two hundred miles behind the cluster.

“What’s all that?” the King asked.

She told the whole truth when she replied, “We’re not sure. Communications are muddled. Eastern Army is under attack.”

“Matayanga caught them with a surprise ally?”

“This started before the southern thing. It’s been on more than a week.”

“There’s a whole second war there?”

“Something awful is happening…” She controlled herself. Bragi might be an old friend, and an old fighting companion, but he wasn’t part of the family. One did not show one’s fears to the outside world. “Before he disappeared, Lord Kuo gave Eastern Army a new commander. Lord Ssu-ma Shih-ka’i. He’s an old peasant who came up the hard way. Goes way back. Very capable, and stubborn as hell.”

“Uhm.”

She sighed. Good. He wasn’t interested in the east.

“Any notion when you want to move?”

“Not before Lord Kuo comes out of hiding. I don’t want to jump in blind.”

“If we’re going to be a while, I’d better make arrangements for my people.” The King rose, grunting as he did so. Mist watched him go. He was feeling very tired, very old. She felt a moment of empathy. She, too, felt tired and old. And she’d feel much more so before this was done. The danger would mount by the minute, and every minute would increase the odds against the coup attempt remaining secret. “Wen-chin,” she murmured, “please don’t waste any time.”

The interminable wait became a deathwatch. The Matayangan attack went on and on and on, and still the time did not ripen. Tempers began to flare.

“Lord Kuo must have nerves of stone,” Mist opined to Lord Ch’ien. “I don’t think I could have held off this long.”

Lord Ch’ien tapped the map with the tip of his pointer, sketching the outline of the bloody stain of Matayangan advance. His hand quivered. The red sand thrust deep into Shinsan. Mist’s informants said the original Southern Army hardly existed anymore. Some hard-hit legions had been disbanded and their survivors distributed as replacements. There was a huge gap in the army’s line. Matayangans were pouring through.

Lord Ch’ien said, “My limit has been surpassed. Maybe that’s why Lord Kuo is in command.”