Deep as the Sky, Red as the Sea by Rita Chang-Eppig

Author:Rita Chang-Eppig
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Yan-Yan came to visit about a month after Ying-Shek was born. She gaped at the luxurious surroundings, running her hands over the brocade wall hangings and lacquered rosewood cabinets. Squatting, she knocked around a few of the porcelain figurines on display, rearranging them so that the two female figurines appeared to be talking to each other and the male figurine was facing the wall. Then for some reason, she picked one of the figurines up and sniffed it.

“Big Sis,” she said, wrinkling her nose and putting the figurine down, “you sure you can’t convince them to let you stay after the month is up? It’s nice here.”

“You could have had nice things too if you’d stayed with your husband,” Shek Yeung said.

“That’s different,” Yan-Yan said. “Can I see the baby?”

Shek Yeung called for the wet nurse, who bowed upon entering the room, the baby in a sling around her shoulders. The child was so thickly swaddled, Shek Yeung might have mistaken him for a bedroll if she’d just found him lying somewhere. Might even have tried to sit on him.

Yan-Yan squealed and bounced toward the wet nurse. “Ah, he’s already so big,” she said. “I want one.”

“Ahmad likes you,” Shek Yeung said.

“Not interested.”

“Binh?”

“Ew.”

“You know there’s only one way to get a baby, right?”

“I’ll just steal yours,” Yan-Yan said, smiling with all her teeth.

Shek Yeung sighed. In the months since Yan-Yan joined, Shek Yeung had grown quite fond of the girl, even more so now that the girl had helped her through the birth of Ying-Shek. But in so many ways Yan-Yan was still a child, the younger sister Shek Yeung always wanted but never got.

“Sometimes,” she said, searching for the words, “we have to do what we don’t want to get what we want. When I was your age, I couldn’t accept that everything comes with a price. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Yan-Yan went back to making faces at the baby, pretending not to hear.

One day, Shek Yeung thought, Heaven is going to punish the girl for her optimism. The gods did not suffer happy mortals because happy mortals didn’t need gods. Whatever happened to Yan-Yan, it was going to be unexpected and devastating. The thought made her sad. She liked Yan-Yan.

The wet nurse left. Yan-Yan sat down next to Shek Yeung. “So you’re coming back soon? Big Brother Cheung has been driving everyone mad. I think he’s lonely without you and Big Brother Cheng.”

“I doubt that.”

“It’s true! He’s always making us do training exercises. I hate the spear.”

“You knew you were going to have to fight when you joined.”

“But I’m no good at it! Besides, you recruited me to manage money.”

“There would be no money to manage if we were all dead. But I’ll talk to Cheung Po when I return. There are other important skills you could be mastering besides the spear.”

Yan-Yan beamed.

Shek Yeung knew she shouldn’t be coddling the girl, but it was also true that a well-run fleet needed much more than fighters. She liked having someone on board untainted by war, whose instinct was not violence.

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