Threads 289 Construction 2

Ling Qi followed Wang Lian away from the work site, chatting about Hanyi and her tour and the work going on at the site. Wang Lian seemed tentatively approving. The woman seemed to approve of innovation as a general principle, so long as precautions were taken for safety.

Wang Lian led her to a small, mundane pavilion of wood and canvas under which there was a a table holding some refreshments. Wang Lian, somewhat against etiquette, poured her a cup of well watered wine as they sat down beside the table in a pair of camp chairs.

“If you don’t mind, Lady Wang, may I ask what you think of this summit?” Ling Qi asked, turning the conversation toward the real subject she had come here for.

“Hugely expensive and of dubious use if this business with the foreigners fails to work out,” Wang Lian replied. “But in the end, we’re getting our expansion without having to bankroll it ourselves. The Wang don’t oppose you, Baroness. Most would even be pleased to see you succeed.”

Ling Qi nodded, though she felt a twinge of discomfort as memories of the nightmare under the mountain came to the fore. She’d not often really thought of what was happening to the cloud nomads in these mountains as they pushed south. At the same time, it was hard even now to muster up sympathy. Even in Tonghou, the cloud tribes were the subject of dark stories told to children at night, and she remembered Elder Jiao’s test in the Sect, the memory of an entire city ripped apart by a vast wind funnel carrying people and stones and earth into the sky.

“Given the Wang clan’s project bringing the nomads into the fold, these peoples and their own project would seem less objectionable,” Ling Qi put forward.

Wang Lian grunted an agreement, swirling her own wine in the cup. “It’s just sensible, bringing the cloud nomads in. The Sect and the Duchess make a right mess of it. Too many children coming in, and not enough older members to care for them. I understand the rage, but they need to be offering surrender much sooner than they have.”

Ling Qi felt an unpleasant twinge at the implication. “Have you raised that objection?”

“I’ve sent it up. Don’t expect much. To most of the province, leaving any alive at all is a great mercy.” Wang Lian shrugged. “It’s hard to disagree. There’s not a person alive, down to the mortals, who have not lost someone to raiders in the south of the province, and the north remembers Ogodei and stories of devils in the sky and slaughtered cities.”

“But you do disagree?”

Wang Lian squinted at her for a moment. “It’s a waste. Most people just want to live. You get rabble rousers, but plant down a tribe and stick them on some pastures, and within a generation or two, they change to fit. They pay their taxes like anyone else. People like their habits. It’s just a matter of giving them new ones. Getting them off that awful cultivation of theirs is harder, but you stick with it and give ‘em the alternative, and that gets done too.”

“What is wrong with their cultivation? I’m not familiar.”

“They fuse their souls with beasts. It’s potent, mind you, but it’s bad for the young ones. Kills or cripples the talentless. Some would call that a benefit. They say it’s why they have more cultivators born and why they’re strong enough to stand against the Empire even with their low numbers and scattered tribes. Always a strain of that nonsense going around, but I don’t truck with that kind of thinking.”

Ling Qi forced herself to get back on track. “I understand. My apologies for the personal tangent. The primary question I’ve wanted to ask is Wang’s opinions on the negotiation itself. What is the most important objective the Wang clan would like established in any treaty?”

Wang Lian took a long drink from her wine. “Maps.”

“Maps?”

“Clear, unambiguous maps and lines of territory. What’s ours, and what’s theirs. No confusion. No uncertainty. Or, at least, attempt to minimize it anyway. The rest is too far off. Pretty words on paper. Hard agreement on what belongs to who without anybody needing to get killed every time a disagreement comes up is what you build civilization on. If these foreigners can be trusted to hold to that, maybe there really is something to this attempt.”

“I understand.” Honestly, Ling Qi thought, this was probably the most straightforward demand she could expect to hear. It was a little relieving.

Sixiang deflated such thoughts.

<You only say that now, but dickering over which pile of rocks is on which side of the line ain’t simple for you humans from what I understand,> Sixiang thought.

Exacting agreements on territory wouldn’t be easy, but it was at least straightforward.

Sixiang was dubious. <Suuuure it will be.>

Ling Qi coughed into her hand, her mind wandering back to the previous subject. Her thoughts were confused and conflicted. It was only the nightmare she had experienced with Xuan Shi which made her consider it at all. Should she try to do something about it? Could she do something about it?

<Would you be satisfied in not trying?> Sixiang asked her privately.

Ling Qi hummed to herself.

“You look as if you have something else to say, Baroness,” Wang Lian said.

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“Lady Wang,” Ling Qi began. “It’s my belief that the White Sky’s methods of integration may have some advantages, which would benefit us and your clan in particular to study.”

“Is that so?”

“From what I have observed, they have gained willing cooperation even in the first generation. They are stronger, and the tribes know this, but they have allowed them some freedom of movement. For example, they allow the integrated tribes to patrol the roads as their migration route and have allowed some intermarriage. Obviously, I won’t ask the latter, but you do have already integrated tribes which could…”

Wang Lian held up a hand. “I understand you mean well, Baroness, but I am not sure how much your advice is worth when you know so little of our methods.”