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“You are nothing alike,” he’d told the girl, and watched her face as it turned bright with false serenity, as might shine the moon on a night that was slow to draw aside its clouded veil.
“They really are nothing alike,” he said again later, to his mother who sat where he had sat; and so he paced where the girl had stood, and rid himself of little other than excess energy. The thought stuck in his mind like a burr in a horse’s mane.
“It’s true they look nothing alike,” his mother replied. “But since you believe you’re saying this for my benefit, am I so forgetful that you must repeat yourself?”
“That’s because I haven’t heard you agree with me, Mother. I’m not talking only about her looks.”
“Oh?” His mother remained maddeningly cool. Pusa had never failed to be glad for her deftness in dealing with the elders, but she was deft at frustrating him too. That comes from your temper, not my intent, she’d told him once. And as I only want what’s best for my child, surely you know what remains to be addressed. “She’s a sweet girl willing to keep me company. That delights me well enough.”
“Fine. She’s sly, though. I remember Sister wasn’t like—“
“After all this time,” she cut in, “with her gone—how truthful can memory be? We still have clan matters to discuss, so spare this heart the pain, if only for a moment.”
Then why do you ask for her? Pusa thought; but when he grimaced, he turned his face away so as not to let his mother see.
*
Once he learned about the existence of his sister’s daughter, Pusa found to his creeping vexation that she made for company one could never name dull.
“You called for me? … Uncle.”
Lili had said her father was an officer in the Sui army, but then how could such an air of presumption be gained? Officers still knew full well that they answered to those ranked higher. Yet Pusa suspected that Lili paid respects because the act of doing so was to her benefit, and not because the respects were his due. He could allow the impertinence, he supposed, since she wasn’t thoughtless about it. “Did the Han teach you to ask needless questions?” he said.
“I was taught that to call someone to your side is different than to order, or to demand, so this one only thought to ask for clarity,” said Lili, her oversweet politeness layered over a moment of pique.
This one? She certainly held her own with a parry disguised as humility. He could do no less in return than to own his authority. “I see no difference, as Elteber,” he replied, and made a show of leaning forward in his chair to send an unimpressed look her way. “As uncle, I find your request questionable. The princess of the Xueyantuo likes you enough that Yinan will think twice favorably about our joint plans with your presence, but battle tactics aren’t equal to the management of the old man’s trade. As Qin Gu’s niece, you’ve overseen his caravan well; but as the Elteber’s niece, you haven’t overseen battle.”
“I’m not rushing myself into the midst of a battlefield,” Lili said, with the shadow of a pout lingering at the corners of her mouth. “You’re being too fanciful, Uncle. As the Elteber’s niece, of course I would not.”
Now why, considered Pusa, had she been so forthcoming? She had agreed so promptly with his words that, overcome by suspicion, he couldn’t even be smug about it.
“But I learned a little from discussion at home in the past,” continued Lili, “so that and my presence as a reminder of friendship with the princess shouldn’t lack in worth.”
Pusa ignored the pit Lili had thoughtfully dug for him. If his mother heard that he had in any way impugned the worth of his sister’s daughter, he’d never hear the end of it. “I see there’s no question you were my sister’s only child,” he said. “If your father had a son, he wouldn’t have given up time to school you in the art of war.”
“... No.” Startlement appeared as a second’s frozen glint in Lili’s eyes. Uncertainty: it was a strange look on her. Pusa didn’t like it. “He wouldn’t have.”
“That’s no surprise,” he said. You assumed it was your due? Sister couldn’t afford to be so arrogant. (Neither should you, Mother had told him, disapproval writ large upon her face.) And yet he couldn’t be an ingrate to chance, which had granted him knowledge of his sister’s fate and her unruly offspring. Surprise, he decided, was preferred to uncertainty. “You know when we ride out to meet with him and join forces,” he told her, his words abrupt. “Be ready then, and dress in splendid attire.”
He watched her face as it turned bright with measured pleasure, as might shine the sun in morning—or so he’d name it, if only her hair had been like spun gold. “Uncle is gracious,” Lili said, and thus graced him with a tempered smile. “I won’t disappoint.”
Pusa looked at her who was looking at him, and wondered: had his sister been like her daughter?—so careful, so watchful, once upon a time?