Heart and Soul by Sarah A. Hoyt Page A

Dragon Throne, so if the new emperor doesn’t make the boats fly again, they will be grounded, as they were at his father’s death.” She smiled. “But once he makes them fly—and I thank you for doing it for him, milady—then all the boats in all the clan holds will fly.”
    “Oh,” Jade said, and stepped into the boat, picking up an oar. Third Lady had an oar, too, but she sat near the rudder of the boat, ready to steer. As with the barge poles, they had to work the oars hard at first, until they’d gained enough altitude over the trees and the lights beneath, which indicated peasant cook fires. But soon they were flying through a night of such a deep blue that it seemed like nothing so much as Wusih silk, spun very even and deep, and Jade could lay aside the oar.
    Third Lady leaned on the rudder and steered with a practiced ease. Jade wanted to ask her if she often went out like this at night, but looking at the little triangular face in the moonlight, she thought that it wouldn’t be surprising if she did. It must be very hard on Third Lady to be imprisoned, a minor wife in a very formal household, and without even a child to take her attention and to keep her company. All alone, and with no distractions, she would be isolated in many ways, since most of the Dragon Clan, and even the Bear Clan, the Panda Clan and the Tiger Clan thought themselves by far superior to the Fox Clan. The foxes had a reputation throughout China as thieves, intriguers and tricksters, and where the peasants would shield a were-dragon, or even one of the other weres, they would only try to kill a discovered were-fox.
    Jade frowned slightly at Third Lady as it occurred to her that she was entrusting her life and her honor to a member of the Fox Clan. She was sure everyone in all of China would laugh at her if she came to misadventure thereby.
    Third Lady looked up, as though surprised at being so regarded, and Jade sighed. Because the other part of this was that she had known Third Lady for years, and she knew for a fact that she was the only one of Wen’s wives to truly care for him. “I was wondering,” she said to cover up her thoughts, “how difficult it was in the women’s boat for you, when you have no child and no particular vocation.”
    Third Lady blushed a little. “Oh. Oh,” she said, as if it had just occurred to her that anyone might pity her, and the idea struck her as odd. “But it is not difficult at all. I have your brother, my lord. Oh, I know,” she said, catching the look in Jade’s eye, “he is often lost in his dreams, but I sit by him and hold his hands or…or hold him. He permits me to do so. And I wonder, you know, with Zhang gone…” She was quiet again. “I would not wish to malign the minister…”
    “You may malign him as you wish,” Jade said, tartly. “He left the Dragon Boats against my will and went off to parts unknown. Probably to negotiate with the British, as you intimated earlier. It is perhaps not proof of treason, but it is close enough.”
    “Yes, but this I never had proof of…” Third Lady said. “But I always thought…well, you know, that perhaps he was the one supplying my lord with opium.”
    Jade sat up straighter. This connected with something in Zhang’s papers, a note about his receiving something from the English, something that was referred to only as “the packet.” Jade had imagined it to be one of the many trinkets that littered Zhang’s quarters, or perhaps strings of cash. But it might have been opium instead.
    “Why do you think that?” she asked, almost breathless with sudden suspicion. Her father had trusted Zhang implicitly and Zhang could have done almost anything behind the emperor’s back.
    Third Lady ducked her head. “It’s not that I think it,” she said. “Or not so much. It’s just that I’ve thought, you know, whom it might benefit to have your brother lost in a dream. And the only person I could think of was Zhang.”
    “Oh,” Jade