The great families had fallen; bodies littered the roads and fields; but after twenty years of civil war fragile peace had begun to assert itself.
An iron authority of sorts had been established. New dynasties were being born, the soil fertile from the blood and bone of the old. Those who had once been enemies became allies. How else could it be so when everyone had once been foes.
Murders went unpunished. Terrible crimes were erased from the scrolls. No-one’s hands were clean. If there was to be justice no one would be spared punishment, so then no one could be punished. That had to be called justice now.
In the name of growing wheat in the fields and selling meat in the markets, the sins of yesterday had to be forgotten so that green shoots could sprout tomorrow. Amnesia was the god of this new age.
The proud houses of the recent past were dust. Their followers scattered to the winds. High names were chipped from statues to be replaced with words in praise of the living, phrases to succor those who needed it still.
In the Bamboo School they had rebuilt the training ground; patched up the walls; fresh faced recruits learned the prayers of supplication, the approved techniques of spear and shield, the songs of gratitude for the new Queen’s peace.
And down below, in the servants’ quarters, Shirrin and her two daughters lived modest lives, such as they were. Sweeping floors and cooking meals by day and then by night, in the chapel of their God, silently practicing the rituals and techniques of their style. The forbidden style, that turned children into warriors and nations into powder.