The Dragon Star (Realms of Shadow and Grace: Episodes 1-3 of 7)

THE THRONE - KAO-RHEE

"UNWISE."

The word rang and reverberated in the wood-paneled walls of the council chamber. Kao-Rhee watched from the far end of the long, well-polished poda wood table as High Tahn Tin-Tsu let the sound die before making his reply.

"How is patience unwise?"

Ten men sat around the table, the future zhan and his nine councilors. Nine to match the number of holy prophets. Kao-Rhee now wished he had limited the number to himself and Tigan Rhog-Kan. His thought had been to introduce the high tahn to the men charged with advising him when he assumed the ascendancy a few hours hence. He had intended the morning meeting to proceed into a discussion on state policy. He preferred, when possible, to limit such decisions to himself alone. Or at the least, present his desired course of action in private to the zhan. Tin-Tsu's brother had been largely interested in the prosecution of the war with the Tanshen Dominion, the purview of Tigan Rhog-Kan, and so left the majority of domestic matters in Kao-Rhee's hands, hands that had been carving the statue of state from the stone of adversity since before either brother's birth.

Tigan Rhog-Kan clenched his jaw, seeming to swallow his initial, preferred response before making one tinged with even more guttural tones than his previous utterance.

"What may seem like patience to you, my tahn, will be taken as weakness by our enemies and perceived as an opportunity for further action."

"We are not discussing our enemies meeting us on the battlefield; we are speaking of the people of our own dominion, my soon-to-be subjects, who have lost their way in darkness and need guidance to return to the path of light." High Tahn Tin-Tsu folded his hands on the table.

"If I may, my tahn." Kao-Rhee nodded toward the tigan. "I believe the tigan's concerns are valid. While they may be your subjects by sunset, these so-called pilgrims have abandoned the faith that governs our land and turned to some heretic vision that infects their dreams. Without the militias to curtail them, they will upset, and quite possibly overturn, the balance of the dominion."

"How weak is our argument for the path of Ni-Kam-Djen if we must enforce it with blades and the threat of death?" High Tahn Tin-Tsu stared across his fingertips at Kao-Rhee.

"I do not doubt, my tahn, that were you able to speak with them, you would convince them of their error and return them to the temples." Kao-Rhee always found a bit of flattery helped in persuading those reluctant to see things properly. "However, you cannot address them all, and they renounce their allegiance to the faith and the dominion with their actions."

"They are leaving for the Forbidden Realm, you mean." High Tahn Tin-Tsu nodded. "Then why not let them go?"

"Because we'll have no soldiers left to fight the djen-forsaken war." Tigan Rhog-Kan stirred uncomfortably in his seat. He appeared to remember protocol reluctantly. "My tahn."

The tigan took another breath before continuing. "The dream may have seemed harmless when it touched only a few and they fled in the night, but from the best count we have, three in ten may have the dream and that includes our armies. At present, fewer than one in ten follow the false prophet. However, if a third of our forces were to march off at sunset to follow that new demon star in the night sky, we'd all be slaughtered in the next invasion of those Tanshen heathen bastards."

"Yes. I see your concern." High Tahn Tin-Tsu looked at his hands. "What has the Tanshen response been to the dreams and the pilgrims?"

"The same as ours, my tahn," Kao-Rhee said.

Before he could amend his thought, one of the other councilmembers, the treasurer, Tafan-Lu, spoke. Fifty years old with a gray-black beard and an over-wide nose that matched his wide set eyes, he was the only ethnic tollith at the table. His grandfather immigrated north decades before the war, and while his ancestry still raised talk among the lesser tahns, Kao-Rhee had never had cause to question his loyalty, nor his financial acumen.