Tell me when the show begins.”
Which Kara did. The program ran to perfection, with a plodding but smiling Lord Ban-Ho Taron reaching the dais with minimal help exactly twenty minutes before the new year began. He was one hundred two years old, but Kara thought he could pass for ninety.
He leaned into a microphone and said with a wry smile:
“This is my eighty-sixth Sanhae, and nothing has changed.” He paused, as if for dramatic effect. “Good! As it should be.”
Polite applause followed for the same opening line Kara remembered from last year, and the year before that. She thought it interesting how most citizens of The Lagos identified as Modernists but seemed least interested in change.
Lord Taron launched into a string of toasts, his deep-fluted wine glass held high as he read from a screen chest-level. From time to time, he stumbled over words or butchered names – likely of people he’d known for decades – but he ended each toast with a sip and a grin.
Kara’s stomach turned as the moment neared. Her category – rising stars – would be last, according to Ya-Li. Was he so bold as to include her at the finale itself? In the final minute before Sanhae? Chi-Qua piped in with a warning.
“He’s taking too long. What happens if he isn’t done by Sanhae?”
Good question. Kara glanced at her hand-comm. Chi-Qua was right.
No one appeared on the dais to encourage him to improve his pacing.
Then again, who had the gil s to speak up to Lord Taron in public?
Just at the instant when Kara thought her plans might be swal owed up in the decaying coherence of an old man, the light of victory shined upon her. Ya-Li was wrong, or else he wanted Kara to be surprised.
Lord Taron announced the rising stars midway through his toasts.
Three peers, each a few years older, received due recognition.
And then …
“For her elegance, youthful tenacity, and spirit to drive our future
to unbounded potential,” Lord Taron said, “I salute the divine Miss Kara Syung, the newest visionary to join Nantou’s glorious team in Bio-Research and Engineering.”
His words were inviolate, though al of them were written by his great grandson. Her heart sprinted as Chi-Qua cheered in her ears and applause rose through the cavernous hal . Many glasses were raised at the table of Syung, and Kara’s eyes turned to her brothers.
Dae responded as expected. His jaw hung limp, as if someone kil ed his favorite pet before his eyes. He grabbed his glass but did not raise it. Lang hesitated, pivoted briefly to his brother, then back to Kara. His stare was ful . No hiding, no evasion. And much to Kara’s shock, no anger or resentment.
He nodded. She read his lips. Wel done. Then he raised his glass higher than al others at the table.
She thought his dismay would be a joyful part of her victory. This brother, who never apologized for threatening to kil the friend she loved as a sister, now congratulated her success. Most surprising?
She was relieved and moved her lips as wel . Thank you.
Her parents held out their glasses, which they shifted toward Kara, waiting for her to do the join. Al three clinked.
No outward anger. No condescending stares. Right.
Theater for the masses. They’d hold their explosion until later.
“I’m proud of you,” Chi-Qua shouted in her ear. “From the mouth of the man himself. You can book any path you wish.”
Thirty seconds before midnight, Lord Taron’s eighty-year-old son intervened and announced the toasts would conclude after the welcoming of the new year. In the awkward countdown, the microphone picked up the old man tel ing his son, “Sanhae begins when I say it does! Cudfrucker.”
Barely restrained laughter and wide-eyed shock blended with the final countdown as a holowindow appeared behind the dais featuring a live aerial view of the Port of Pinchon and huge numbers overlaying it al . 10. 9. 8. 7.
When the countdown ended, everyone in the hal rose and shouted in unison:
“Sanhae!”
“Sanhae!”
“Sanhae!”
Delirium took hold, as hugs, kisses, and cheers dominated while fireworks erupted from stations al along the Isthmus of the Redeemer.
The exultations continued nonstop for the next ten minutes, led on by triumphant blasts from The Lagos Unified Symphony.
Kara lost herself in the sheer joy of a victory she was certain would become legendary in the Syung family line. Anointed by Lord Taron; triumphant over the repeated blockades of her parents and brothers; intimidating to al who identified her as a new force rising through the ranks. She thought of the leverage tonight might buy, of how she’d push hard for an early end to the Baeks’ exile, and how she might no longer be left out of Father’s classified meetings with Lang and Dae.
It was a perfect victory. Too perfect.
At some level, Kara sensed it wasn’t going to be this clean cut. She remembered Chi-Qua’s warning during their picnic at Bongwoo Curl:
“You won’t win this for free.”
When the celebrating calmed and Lord Taron finished off the last of his toasts, most invited guests peeled away from their tables to mingle, some to go down one level for dancing. Kara’s father excused himself to have a few words with Lord Taron’s
