It was a relief to reach the temple. Mhara stepped out of the oppressive air of Heaven into a calm, white-plastered room: the little annex that he and Robin used as a portal. Robin—priestess, ghost, but still scientist—had come up with a spell that keyed the annex to her own soul, and Mhara's: nothing that could be stolen or used, but enough to deter anyone following either of them through, either to Heaven, or from it. It was sad, Mhara thought, to have to be so untrusting, but it was the way of things and he supported Robin's installation of the spell. He could see it now, taking the form of a thin gilt lattice, suspended in the air before him. He reached out a hand and the lattice was gone.
"Robin?" There was a lamp burning somewhere in the temple; he could feel its tranquil small presence and that of another, far more complex, being. He followed the sense of those two presences until he came to the main room of the temple, the shrine that lay at the end of the simple living quarters, just inside the main door.
This, too, was plastered white, and the shrine itself bore no image, only a lamp and a niche for a candle. Robin knelt in front of it with her back to him, solid enough in this soft light, although sometimes her form flickered a little, as if seen through clear water.
"Hello," Robin said, without looking round. "How did it go?"
Mhara sighed. "Tedious. I wish you could have been there."
"Well, I could have," she agreed. She had decided against attending the coronation. I'm not one for big state occasions, and anyway, I don't want to cramp your style. She'd felt it might be embarrassing for the new Emperor, having his dead human girlfriend showing up on the big day. "I'm sure your mother thought I'd have made a scene. Would you like some tea?" She motioned to a battered iron kettle that set on a table near the door. "I just made some oolong."
Mhara laughed, but he did not feel able to contradict her. "Thanks, I will." He went to the table and poured steaming green liquid into a bowl. "And Mother made a bit of a scene herself. Wanted me to wear the big state robes, and I thought—not my style. She's going to have to get used to that and she's going to have to get used to you, Robin. I've already explained to her that you're here to stay."
"I thought," Robin said, without turning her head, "that you might be up for some sort of political marriage."
"Robin—this isn't the Heaven of thousands of years ago, not anymore."
"Does Heaven know that?"
Mhara sipped tea. "I don't know. It will have to take it on board at some point. I'm up against a tradition like a juggernaut and I'm not going to be the one that gives in."
"No," Robin agreed. "I don't suppose you will." For the first time, she turned her head and looked at him. Robin thought, Mhara knew, that she had a very ordinary face: typical of the region, rather thin, with straight black brows, a long mouth. Mhara did not agree; it was not that he considered her beautiful, as that he did not really care. In Heaven, one was surrounded by the exquisite, a continual parade of glorious beauty that, after a while, became rather boring. He found Robin's neither-plain-nor-pretty features restful, after all that extraordinariness. Moreover death, and a more settled situation, had smoothed out the habitual lines and frowns of worry that she had worn when Mhara first encountered her, down in the laboratories of Jhai Tserai's corporation, and had lent a serenity to her face that made it more restful yet. Mhara enjoyed looking at her and did so now.
"The question of a political marriage will come up," Mhara said. "My mother will make sure of it—I'm certain she has half a dozen candidates in mind from various other Heavens. Angelic powers, devas, houris. It doesn't matter, Robin. Things have changed. Heaven is as subject to the march of time as anywhere else, we're a quarter of the way through the twenty-first century now, and I'm not subject to my mother's rule. This is a terrible thing to say but I don't even have much respect for her—she saw what my father was becoming and she didn't do anything to stop it."
"Well, we'll just have to wait and see what happens," Robin said. "It won't do much good for me to talk to your mother, but I suppose I can try if I have to."
"There is," Mhara remarked, "absolutely no point in winding her up."
Robin patted him on the shoulder. "Sometimes, going out with you is really surprisingly normal. You don't even look very Emperor-esque, if that's any comfort."
"Unfortunately, I am starting to feel some of its burdens." Mhara put the tea bowl down. Talk of his coronation had just reminded him of something. "Have you heard from Chen or Inari lately?"
"I saw them at the weekend. They brought those—" Robin pointed toward a spray of elegant white orchids in a vase "—I forgot to tell you. Coronation present."
"Was Inari's badger with them?"
Robin frowned, remembering. "I think so. Yes, it was. It went for a root in the flowerbed while we were having tea. I know it's sentient but I can't help thinking of it as a sort of dog. Or a teakettle, obviously."
"But you haven't seen or spoken to them since then?"
"No. Why?"
"I think," said Mhara, opening the door, "I'd better have a quick word with the detective inspector."
It was, he discovered, a beautiful evening. For once, the air above the sprawl of Singapore Three was clear, fading down into an intensity of sunset green. There was a brief flash of gold from the horizon, along the line of the sea, and Mhara felt the benediction of the sun as it slipped out of sight. He had a sudden, dizzying vision of it as a distant star, the little zip and flicker of the world as it orbited. Then it was gone and the lights of the city lay before him, peaceful in this liminal time of twilight in spite of the faint roar of traffic.
The temple, until so recently no more than a ruined shell, stood on a slight rise in an outlying suburb, backed by the wall of hills that rose in the north of the city. The view was pleasant from here; there were trees, and occasionally a rainy breath of mountain air. This, more than Heaven, had become home. Mhara was pleased to be back.
There were several ways of contacting Chen, but when on Earth, the new Emperor preferred to work with traditional methods. He clicked open the shell of his cellphone and dialed Chen's number. No reply. Mhara tried the houseboat and got an answerphone message. Well, it was a pleasant evening, not late, and if he recalled correctly, it was a Friday. Maybe Chen and Inari had gone out, and he would not blame them if they had. He left messages on both phones, just in case. The image of a badger's paw, disappearing, was still fresh in his mind, and more than any of the multitudinous horrors of the world glimpsed during his coronation, it filled him with an unaccountable unease.