When Shae had come back to Kekon from her years abroad, she’d done so reluctantly, doubtfully, still trying to avoid being drawn into the clan business. Niko demonstrated no such uncertainty. From the moment he’d set the talon knife to his own flesh, he hadn’t wavered from his decision to rise within the clan. Anden seemed to be the only one capable of getting him to relax on occasion, but Shae’s cousin had confided to her, with worry, “Sometimes, I’m not sure Niko thinks of himself anymore. That’s why no amount of work or humiliation bothers him.”
Studying the young man’s troubled expression, Shae’s heart ached. She wished Lan could see his son. She knew he would be proud, but perhaps sad as well. He would ask what Shae asked now. “Is this really what you want, Niko? Do you want to become the Pillar?”
Niko didn’t answer right away. “Aunt Shae,” he said at last, with quiet conviction, “while I was away from Kekon, I realized there are only two types of people in the world. It’s not Green Bones and non–Green Bones. It’s those who have power and those who don’t.”
Her nephew turned toward her with a distant gaze that made him seem as if he were standing on the other side of a wide valley. “Even with jade, we’re not guaranteed a place in that first group. If the clans stop defining the meaning of jade, then others will take that power from us. They’ll amplify all the worst parts and preserve none of the good.”
Shae gave a nod of silent understanding. Niko had put into words something she’d felt for a long time—a sense that she struggled not only against the Mountain and all the other enemies of the clan, but against something even larger and more inexorable.
Niko lowered his gaze to his hands. “I thought I could escape and find some other meaning in my life. But if the clan crumbles, either quickly or slowly, if it becomes as obsolete and irrelevant as people like Jim Sunto believe, then everything that made me, including my father’s murder and my mother’s execution, would be meaningless. Every drop of blood spilled, every sacrifice made, every child ever trained to wear jade as a Green Bone warrior of Kekon over centuries of history . . . That’s what the Pillar carries. That’s our power, and ours alone.” He looked back toward the school with a small, sad smile. “Ru tried so hard to tell me that I was a selfish fool to run away from it. He was right.”
Shae was filled with a nameless, foreboding fearfulness for her nephew. Niko was still young—too young, she thought, to be so clear-eyed and grim of character. Yet he’d already contemplated the legacy of the clan and the weight of leadership far more than Lan or Hilo or herself at his age. Shae and her brothers had grown up with the sentimental expectations that came from being the grandchildren of the Torch of Kekon, heirs to the clan following a generation of victory, peace, and national reconstruction. They had each, in their own way, been forced into their positions and done the best they could.
Niko had grown up with his eyes open to war and cruelty. He’d stepped away from everything he’d known to find an even more dark and tangled wilderness beyond, and his return was an unflinching choice, made without the sentimentality of love or honor. Shae thought, He is more like Ayt Mada than any of us.
At least Niko has us. People who loved him, who reminded him to be human.
The school bell rang and excited children began to pour out of the front doors. Shae got out of the car and stood by the bike racks. She waved when she saw Tia. Her daughter said goodbye to two of her friends and came jogging up, her backpack bouncing on her shoulders, the ears of her puppy-shaped knit hat swinging from side to side. Tia’s twelfth birthday was approaching and she’d been begging for a pet, a dog to finally replace poor old Koko, who’d died a few months after his master, too heartbroken to live.
“Ma,” Tia exclaimed. “Guess what? I got a part in the school play!” She looked over Shae’s shoulder and said, more shyly, “Hi, Niko.” Tia was always a bit reticent around her eldest cousin, who was fifteen years older than her.
“Hey, little cousin,” Niko said brightly. “I like your hat.” Tia smiled and relaxed, and they walked to the car, chatting, leaving Shae to follow a few paces behind, watching them.
CHAPTER
54
Master Plans
the twenty-sixth year, seventh month
Anden watched the news on television alongside Shae and most of the staff from the Weather Man’s office, all crowded into the main boardroom on the top floor of the clan’s Ship Street building. Even Woon Papidonwa and Hami Tumashon, who were both retired but who’d dedicated so many years of their lives to the clan, were in the room, chatting amicably in a way they never had when they’d been the Weather Man’s Shadow and the Master Luckbringer.