Heart and Soul (25 page)

“But don’t get ideas,” another guard said. “At least you didn’t bring your bodies with you and therefore do not have the breath to poison the dead. I will believe that your crime was not willfully committed. So will His Honor, Lord Qin-Quang-Wang, I am sure. I’m sure you will get off very lightly, with barely more than a warning. Perhaps a century or so of torture, but nothing else.”

Precious Lotus glanced toward Wen, but Wen was looking very much like he usually appeared when stupefied with opium. His mouth was slightly open, his eyes vacant. Which meant, she thought, that it was up to her to think of a way out of this mess.

And meanwhile, the guards were dragging them past mirrors. In front of the mirrors, she now noticed, stood people—some dressed as kings and some as beggars. Kings or beggars, they all looked as though thun-derstruck—as if some great evil had befallen them, leaving them either stunned or sorrowful. Some were crying into their hands, and others were looking disbelievingly at the mirror.

Beside each of them, and around each of them, were more of the guards. Only, the more Precious Lotus stared at them, the more she was convinced that they were not, in fact, people. They looked, she realized, like the paper dolls burned at funeral ceremonies. Only, from what she’d been given to understand, those paper dolls were supposed to serve the individual deceased.

She had a momentary pang of annoyance, because how stupid could it be if those dolls she’d burned had come to serve as guards and escorts in the underworld, instead of helping her and Wen, as she had hoped?

“I thought,” she told the guards escorting them, witheringly, “that you were supposed to serve the whim of those people you were buried with.”

This got her a look that caused the head of the figure to turn around almost completely, creases on its neck and uniform showing that it was indeed all of one piece. “We were not buried. Or burned at a funeral,” it said. “We are here in service to the gods, as payment for tombs.”

Third Lady opened her mouth, then closed it again. She’d never heard of figures being burned as payment to the gods. Nine-colored silk, of course. Paper cash, of course. But never people. But then, Feng Du had accrued over millennia, possibly before people were very aware of it, and it probably included things and customs from the time that was not recorded anywhere. And it made a certain sense for the guards to be made of paper, if Feng Du got invaded by living humans now and then, and if the living humans could poison the dead with their breath. The paper figures would be immune to such poison.

“Also,” another of the figures said, “when those whom some of us were sent to serve move on, through the wheel of rebirth, we are conscripted into the force of Feng Du, for Feng Du must be kept orderly. It is the decree of heaven.”

What Precious Lotus couldn’t understand was why the decree of heaven didn’t allow her own figures, that she’d burned before she’d embarked on this journey, to serve her and Wen. Shouldn’t those figures belong to them?

If they didn’t, was it because they were living and therefore had no status in this strange land, or was it that their figures had originally been made for someone else, and had now joined that retinue?

The papery figures were dragging them toward a large mirror and Precious Lotus tried to make herself heard yet once more. “I protest,” she said. “We are not dead, and we have come here voluntarily, and at the behest of the Jade Emperor, to fulfill a decree of heaven. If I’m going to be punished with death and sent back through rebirth for obeying, what will this do to the filial virtues and the orders to obey authority throughout the worlds of the dead and the living alike?”

The paper creatures hesitated. They moved slightly, as if in a wind. One of them, who wore a golden uniform from which most of the paint had faded, turned to look at her. “But you have no proof,” he said. “No documents. Surely you must see that we can’t take the word of any living person who comes down here and starts claiming they came on orders. We must have proof.”

“I demand to see the Emperor Yu the Great,” Wen said then, his voice very loud and full of command. Lotus looked at him, feeling proud. After all, her husband rarely asserted himself, but he had doubtless realized that in this world of the dead, one must speak decisively to get anywhere.

“Yu?” a red-uniform paper-figure asked. “Why? What claim have you on the Great Yu, First Emperor of China?”

“I have the claim of a descendant,” Wen said. “Faithfully I have burned offerings to his spirit. I demand that you take me before him. We will be able to explain the situation to him.”

Confused as to why her husband was bringing up his most distant recorded ancestor, Precious Lotus jumped in. “We must see Judge Bao at the Office of Speedy Retribution. My husband’s soul is being held captive here, with no real cause. It is being detained on a frivolous lawsuit.”

“The courts of Feng Du don’t make mistakes.”

“It is not a mistake,” Third Lady said. “It is a frivolous lawsuit brought by an enemy, and it has kept my husband from his full inheritance for years now. I demand justice.”

“Me, also,” Wen said. “As you can see, I am transparent and not fully myself. And I believe that is due to my soul being held in captivity. The Jade Emperor wishes us to recover it.”

“He told us to see Judge Bao.”

“And my ancestor, Yu the Great, will vouch for us and look after us.”

It wasn’t until the paper figures had formed two groups, one on either side of them—though they kept a hold on them through a ridiculously extended set of arms—and were holding a whispered conference about the rights and wrongs of the case, that Third Lady had a chance to turn to her husband. “My lord, far be it from me to question your judgment,” she said softly.

“But…” he said, a sparkle of mischief in his eyes, as if he knew she would say that.

“But I think that we should try to see Judge Bao as speedily as possible. I cannot understand why you’d want to see Emperor Yu, or what good it will do.”

Wen gave her a fugitive smile. “Do you know how old that cave is, in which you performed the ritual to bring us to the underworld?”

She shook her head.

“Well, then,” he said. “I should tell you. That cave did not always belong to the Fox Clan. It was first used by Emperor Yu himself, who actually was a powerful sorcerer, as well as a were-dragon. When you gave me the potion, remember there was some time between your giving it to me and your drinking it and following me.”

“At first you thought I had killed you,” Third Lady said, resignedly.

“No. Why should I think that? I knew you always have my best interests at heart. I was alarmed, it is true, but only because I thought you’d made a mistake. It did not help that you were burning contracts and figures and paper cash and nine-colored silk. I thought you might, after all, have killed me by accident. And then I heard his voice.”

“His voice?”

“Emperor Yu’s. He said you only meant to bring me to the underworld so that you could ransom my soul. And he said that you were bringing servants and cash with you. Where are they, by the way?”

Third Lady shook her head. “Perhaps they allow the figures to serve only the dead.”

“Perhaps, but Emperor Yu didn’t seem to think that was the case,” Wen said. “And then he told me that we were supposed to come see him as soon as we got to the underworld, and he would do his best to steer us right.”

“But can we trust him?” she asked. “I mean, it was a long time ago, and while you might be his descendant, how many generations of father and son, one succeeding the other, are there between you and him? And though there is almost no written history about him, there is the legend of his taming the floods and saving all the people of China, the legend of how his wife, Nu, waited for him for seventeen years after their wedding night, the legend of his engineering feats and his absolute dedication to the people of China. He sounds like a dry stick, to tell the truth.”

“It is to be assumed that he was more than a bit of a rogue, since dynasty founders usually are,” Wen said, and again the odd sparkle of mischief shone at the back of his eyes. “But all the same, you must admit that no one here has our best interests at heart, and at least Yu is related to me by blood. If he will see me—”

“There is another reason for this,” Third Lady said, not even quite sure why she said it, or that she was going to say it till she did. “There is another reason you want to visit him.”

“Oh, yes,” Wen said, and looked at her, and his mouth pulled a little to the side, in a smile of pure amusement. “You see, he says he’s been keeping my palace in order for me, the palace I will again have, when I take over the Dragon Throne. I think it behooves me to inspect it.”

FRAGRANT STREAMS AND GOOD HARBOR

Though Nigel had traveled all over the world, he could
not help but feel his heart speed up at the sight of Hong Kong. To be seeing, finally, the city that formed Britain’s footprint on the very gateway of China made him almost dizzy. He’d never thought to see this land outside the pages of a book. And to be approaching it from dragon-back—let alone that the dragon was an angelically beautiful and exotic woman—added to the dream quality of it all.

They’d come from Cape Town in a single flight, and no matter how many times Nigel had flown all over the world, this one flight had been a new experience. Oh, more uncomfortable, in a way. In the voluminous coat and pants that Joe had lent him, with a muffler around his neck and head, he’d managed to not actually shiver. Still, it had felt like walking under a snowstorm. But also much, much freer, so that he could see the light on the ocean beneath, and observe all the little boats.

He’d steered Lady Jade away from carpetships as much as possible, knowing the havoc her magical field could wreak on those vehicles, and fully aware that the Royal Were-Hunters would be coming for them. Not to mention the fact that they were almost certainly being followed by whatever branch of the Secret Service continuing the hunt for the rubies.

So, seeing Hong Kong was a relief, not just because he could now dismount and be warm again, but also because they were at their destination. Hopefully here he could visit his parents’ friends and recover enough of his strength to continue the journey, and Jade could find the potion that would so utterly change his aspect that no one would be able to follow them by description.

He, who had thought himself now thoroughly dead to romanticism, he who had seen so many of the evils of colonial will imposed on natives, could not help but feel a swell of pride at this vision of Hong Kong, which only three quarters of a century ago had been a barren island infested by pirates, and which now flourished, its English buildings set amid terraces planted with Asian vegetation. Its port, facing China’s shore, allowed an intermingling of modern English boats and native craft. It was thronged with both great ocean liners—still used for most traffic, since carpetships bore only the goods that required timely arrival—and with junks, with their fat hulls, and their sails of matting or coarse cloth stretched on bamboo frames. On some of them, there was a great eye, painted on each side of the bow, a survivor of the ancient Chinese belief that the boat must see to get to the end of the journey.

There were also sampans—low craft that could range from fifteen to fifty feet long, with one end covered over and looking more than anything else like a giant Chinese slipper. In fact, they were often called slipper boats. He wondered if the “barges” that Jade spoke of weren’t in fact these slipper boats. They looked nothing like the junks that had attacked the carpetship, but then, if Nigel understood properly, the junks were the highly maneuverable craft that allowed the pirates to attack while their main fleet stayed well out of danger.