Chapter 12: Closed Gates

"The Phoenix Order lasts seven days," said Gao Shun, standing at the foot of the bed with his hands knotted.

"It is old law. When the sovereign is too ill to hold court, the Empress Dowager commands the guard and calls a regency council."

"And the Emperor is ill," said Su Ming.

"The Emperor shook for four hours last night, in front of a hundred servants who watched the lamps. The Imperial Physician has certified it."

Xiao Jue lay on the pillows with his eyes open and his lips grey.

Su Ming had a bruise the shape of four fingers on his forearm and had pulled his sleeve down over it.

He had slept an hour, with his hair still unpinned, and Gao Shun had the tact to look at the ceiling.

He could not stand.

He had tried, once, and his knee had folded, and Su Ming had caught him and put him back with a quiet word.

"A day," said the Emperor, in a hoarse whisper. "Give me a day to wash this out of my blood."

"I will walk in on my own feet."

"The council is called for noon," said Gao Shun. "She means to declare you unfit."

"Then she must not reach this bed."

"She holds the guard, Majesty. Six hundred men."

"She holds the guard outside the gates," said Su Ming.

Both men looked at him.

He was already standing, with the white jade seal in one hand and the other on the carved rail, and a thought forming slowly.

"Gao Shun. The Founder's code. The section on the sleeping hall."

"The code is in the library, Consort," said Gao Shun.

"Fetch it. Quickly."

The old eunuch ran.

He was back in a quarter hour, red-faced and gasping, with a thick book wrapped in yellow silk.

Su Ming turned the pages with his fingertips until he found it.

He read it twice, to be sure, and then he shut the book and breathed out.

"Chapter nine," he said. "After the coup of the fourth reign, the Founder's heirs wrote a rule."

"While the sovereign sleeps in the Inner Palace, no armed man may pass the six gates without the seal of the consort who holds it."

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