Heart and Soul (13 page)

And then, from deep within the cave, from the dark shadow opposite the entrance, a woman emerged. She was middle-aged, and somewhat heavy, wearing a white robe of the simplest design and the heaviest silk. The long sleeves, the ends of which were cut in a deep V where the tips dragged on the floor of the cave, might have been more at home in a palace than in this raw cave. She emerged from the shadows as if they had birthed her, and knelt in a fluid movement, kowtowing once, twice, three times, and yet somehow managing to convey she was simply following a ritual and not, in any way, abasing herself.

“We are honored,” she said, still on her knees, looking up, “that the ladies of the Dragon Emperor have come to consult us. The Great Tortoise, the Sleeping Dragon, the Bird of the South, the Tiger of the West have awaited your arrival.” Without asking their permission, she rose. Her gown, somehow, remained immaculate—at least as much as Jade could see in the light of the braziers. “If you’ll do me the honor of following me,” she said, and walked into the shadows.

Jade and Third Lady followed, side by side. There was just the glimmer of white silk ahead of them, and everything around was the deepest gloom—so dark, so absolute, that Jade could not tell how near the stone walls were, or how constricted.

She had the impression that the walls were very near, indeed, that the passage they penetrated was very narrow, very low, leaving no more space than for her and Third Lady to advance side by side.

The woman guiding them was barefoot. They could see her feet glimmering beneath her gown every time she stepped forward. Smells of incense surrounded them. For a moment, it seemed to Jade that she heard low chanting.

She thought, from the way Third Lady shuffled her feet and from the glimmer of her frightened eyes in the dark, that her sister-in-law was desperate to shift, desperate to be a fox, smaller and more agile, more capable of defending herself or escaping these surroundings.

Jade wondered if Third Lady had been here before, or if perhaps this was just a place she’d heard about. She didn’t act like someone who was confident in these caves; but then again, Red Jade wondered how anyone could be confident in this shadow and gloom and this all-enveloping ritual.

Little by little, the passage widened, until they emerged into a chamber. Red and perfectly round, it was not just circular, for even the floor sloped gently to the center of the curve, where an immense brazier shone, brighter than any of its counterparts in the outside entrance hall. It illuminated the chamber sufficiently for them to see an old woman sitting by the brazier and, seemingly—Jade would swear to it—sipping from a cup of tea.

Third Lady sank to her knees and kowtowed, but Jade looked around her. On first entering, she’d thought the red glow from the walls was only the reflected color of the burning brazier. But now she realized the walls themselves were a deep, dark red, as though they’d been carved out of cinnabar.

And in niches, forming four points on the wall, were statues of giant animals: tortoise and bird, tiger and dragon.

The old lady set her teacup down on a little table next to her low stool and looked up. “You do not kowtow, Princess?” she asked, a cackle lurking just behind her high, defiant words.

Jade shook her head. Then, thinking the woman might not see her, she spoke. “No. I do not know where I am. And I do not kowtow to that which I do not know.”

The crone cackled. “You are in the belly of the dragon, girl, in the womb of the Earth. No, don’t try to show respect now. I know your kind. I was your kind once.” She got up and walked around Jade, slowly. She, too, was wearing a white robe of the best silk. It susurated with her movements and formed a counterpoint to the slap of her bare feet on the cave floor. She smelled of coriander and ginger. “Um…” she said at last. “Pity the strand of foreign magic in your power,” she said, at last. “Else you might have stayed here.”

Jade, who could think of nothing worse than staying in this place of shadows and glowing red lights, simply bowed, feeling strangely grateful for her mother’s magical inheritance.

The crone spared a look at Third Lady, still bowing, with her face resting on the floor. “Stand up, wife of the Dragon Throne,” she said, casually, as her bare feet slapped their way back to her low stool. There she sat, picking up a fan and fanning the coals. “What do you want?” she asked, with no ritual at all.

“To ask the verdict of the Great Tortoise,” Third Lady spoke, her voice trembling. “And the Mandate of Heaven.”

The crone cackled, and Jade wondered if she was mad. But, indeed, how could anyone live here and not be mad? She thought of her mother telling her once that most mystics, in all cultures, were mad. It was living too close to the supernatural, to the divine. The human mind, the human body, were not designed for it.

“Very pretty words,” the crone said. “And what did you want to ask the oracle, Princess?” Her eyes, black as carbuncles and suddenly very lucid, stared straight at Jade.

Jade found her hands clasping each other behind her back, and her voice answering exactly as though she were a little girl reciting her school lessons. “I want to know where Zhang has gone, and I want to know why. I want to make sure I’m not judging him unfairly, and that he has truly committed the offenses of which I suspect him. And I want to know how to steer around the intrigues about me and…and what I should do about the rubies and whether they are the salvation of my dynasty, or whether they hold the power of the world and must be returned to their shrine.”

“And you, Lady Precious Lotus?” the crone asked, turning to Third Lady.

“I want to know…” She cleared her throat, whether because her throat had constricted from the solemnity and the smoke or because she had lost her courage and must find it, Jade did not know. “I want to know how to save my lord husband, how to keep his madness, if it should come, from destroying the Dragon Boats. And how…” She lowered her face to look toward the ground, and her voice, too, sank, lower and lower. “And how to win his love.”

The crone nodded. She gestured toward the entrance from which Jade and Third Lady had emerged. A matron—either the same who had escorted Jade and Third Lady in, or another, Jade couldn’t tell—walked in carrying a huge, dark green tortoiseshell. A younger woman walked behind her, carrying something that looked like a small, very sharp knife.

The old woman set the tortoiseshell on the floor and started, laboriously, cutting characters on its dark surface. While she worked, she spoke in a low but resonant voice.

“Oh, Tortoise of the North, whose color is black, whose element is water, whose season is winter, listen to the question of the Lady Red Jade, the dragon, daughter of the dragon. Answer her on whether Minister Zhang is guilty as she believes.” The little wrinkled hand, which resembled nothing so much as a claw, moved rapidly, cutting characters that shone dully by the light of the brazier and looked to Jade oddly regular and beautiful, considering the circumstances of their carving.

“Oh, Tiger of the West,” the crone intoned, “whose color is white, whose element is metal, whose season is autumn, listen to the daughter of the Dragon Throne. She wishes to know whether the rubies of power will be her dynasty’s salvation or the world’s undoing.” The hand carved, and a sound like knife on bone echoed through the round red chamber.

“Oh, Bird of the South, who is born from your own ashes, whose color is red, whose element is fire, whose season is summer, listen to the Lady Red Jade, who would like to know, of your benevolence, which course to follow to stay clear of intrigues and conform with the Mandate of Heaven and the decrees of the Jade Emperor.” She finished writing, and then her eyes looked at Third Lady, standing now beside Jade.

“Oh, Dragon of the East, father of the Chinese, whose color is green, whose element is wood, whose season is spring. The Lady Precious Lotus, daughter of the Fox Clan, third wife of the true occupant of the Dragon Throne, Wen, the son of dragons, the grandson of dragons, your own child—she wishes to know how to preserve her husband from the doom his love of the dreaming smoke has brought upon him. She wants to know how to conquer his heart and how to secure him in his rule.”

Third Lady trembled, from head to toe, and her hands clutched at her gown. Red Jade asked herself if Wen was that important to his third wife, or if perhaps Third Lady needed the security and prestige of bearing the emperor’s child. For if she didn’t, what did she have? And if Wen died an early death, as such smoke-dreamers often did, what could she claim for herself? Her contract with the singsong troupe that had trained her had been bought out by Jade’s father. But this didn’t mean that she could now easily ply her trade as though she were a free woman. The skill they had given her, she had let become rusty; Jade was sure of it. How could it be otherwise, since she had spent no more time in plying her trade than now and then playing the lute for Wen when he felt a need for music? No, when Wen died, Third Lady would find herself sent back to her father’s house, once more the surplus daughter, and this time widowed and with yet less resources.

Jade managed to clear her mind in time to see the crone, displaying strength that Jade did not expect of her, lift the shell of the tortoise and drop it atop the brazier. For a moment, the brazier flared up in a most unnatural way, the flames enveloping the shell, so that Jade wondered if it had been greased before being thrown in.

A loud crack sounded, echoing in the room, bouncing off the cinnabar red walls. The crone reached in and lifted the tortoiseshell—seemingly unable to feel what must be a great heat emanating from it—now in two pieces. “Behold,” she said. “The verdict of the tortoise, the voice of the Jade Emperor. The decree of heaven.”

She laid the shell on the floor, and Jade saw that the pieces were jagged, the crack tending now more this way and now more that.

“Yes, Minister Zhang is guilty,” the crone said. “The Prince of the High Mountain is in a conspiracy against the Dragon Throne.” She frowned at the next crack. “As for the jewels, the verdict of heaven is that you must acquire them and that they are…” For the first time her voice hesitated and lost force. “Both. The salvation and power for your dynasty and, at the same time, precious and belonging to the whole world. So you must use them to restore your dynasty, but you must also restore them to their shrine. As for what you must do, my assistant,” she gestured toward the dark passage, “is signaling that she has received a communication from on high, and will tell you in a moment.”

She turned to Third Lady. “As for you, wife of the True Dragon, it is possible for you to bring your husband through this unscathed and to prevent his sickness from affecting the Dragon Boats. Your husband could be the first one in many generations to sit on the restored throne of his ancestors and to rule over all of China, and protect it from the turmoil ahead. In fact, the Jade Emperor decrees that he will. But to achieve this result, and your husband’s devotion, you must be braver than woman ever was, and you must take great risks. Are you willing, oh daughter of foxes, wife of the True Dragon?”

Third Lady nodded, once, her face so pale that even the red glow of the brazier could not lend it color.

“Well, then,” the crone said, and gestured toward her assistant, the same middle-aged woman as before, who now walked all the way to the brazier. “Give the ladies the decrees of heaven.”

The woman knelt and kowtowed, first to Jade, then to Third Lady. Facing Third Lady, she said, “Wife of the True Dragon. Third Lady of the Dragon Throne. Mother of future emperors. The Jade Emperor commands, and the Great Dragon speaks thus: The son of the dragon must be wakened, and only death shall waken him. The maiden who loves him shall take him where only the souls of those dead go. There you will free his soul from the underworld courts, where it is held captive by the capricious lawsuits of Minister Zhang and his ancestors. Once the soul is freed and reenters his body, the son of the dragon shall reacquire his strength and power. Go you to the underworld, Feng Du that they also call hell or Diyu, with your husband, and see Judge Bao, in the Office of Speedy Retribution.”

The woman bowed again, while Jade wondered what Third Lady made of all that. Only death could waken Wen? Were they truly suggesting she kill her husband? Jade hoped not, and she vowed to spend her way back to the Dragon Boats in persuading Third Lady this would not be a wise course at all.

But she had to stop thinking of this and turn instead to the middle-aged woman, who now rose on her knees and said, “As for you, daughter of dragons, find the man whose hair is like light on the ice, the man who made ships fly. He is in the tip of Africa, in the town they call Cape Town.” She handed Jade a crudely drawn map. “Minister Zhang is coming to get the jewel from him. This jewel you must keep from his traitorous hands. The jewels have the power to renew the world. Take the one you can get and waken the rivers, so that each dragon of the main rivers of China shall waken and testify in the council of dragons. Then take the two together. They can waken the sleeping great dragon. They can evict the ursurpers and sit the son of the dragon upon the Dragon Throne. This you must do, oh daughter of dragons. This you must fulfill. It is your destiny for which you were born. This is the decree of heaven.”

Having spoken, the matron fell forward, onto her face, giving less the impression of kowtowing as of having lost all power.

“You have your answer, daughter of dragons,” the crone said in a reedy voice. “You know what you must do. As do you,” she said, her voice softer, “Milady Precious Lotus. Go and act in accordance to the decrees of the Jade Emperor.”