Heart and Soul (6 page)

“No one. I do only because my father told me of them. They come from Africa, the great land to the south, where it is said that the first humans who could work magic lived. There, they found these two rubies and bound to them all the power of the Earth. There are several legends about them, my father says, and one claims that the gods themselves gave humans this power so that they might bind magic to this world. In other worlds…” She shrugged, daintily, her gesture a reminder of her having learned dance in her early role as an entertainer. “In other worlds, men have no magic at all and must survive by their cunning alone. But here, because we had the jewels and the avatar in which they fitted, everyone was born with a little bit of magic, and some with a lot.”

“I know,” Jade said, impatiently. “Zhang told me that a king of the foreign-devil continent bound to himself and his descendants all the magic in Europe, using one of the rubies. And that recently, the Queen of England was looking for the other ruby to do likewise, because meanwhile, through inheritance alone, most of the population of Europe is descended from that one king.”

“Yes,” Third Lady said, with that slight recoil, as though of fear, that she showed when Jade—or anyone—seemed far more knowledgeable. “The men who searched for the ruby found it, but came face-to-face with the avatar, which told them that to use the ruby in such a way would split the world wide, to allow…to allow many more worlds to be birthed from this one, each with yet less magic than the last, till we were no more than a memory, a passing breeze in time and space. They recoiled from this, as they should, and their mission changed.

“One of them took the jewel and vowed to keep it free and unencumbered, until such a time as the other found the spent jewel and restored it. Then could the two jewels be returned to the avatar and—with the strength of those jewels—the avatar and the village that protects it could make itself invisible to evildoers once more.”

“And these are the jewels that Zhang wants?” Jade asked, feeling a cold drop of ice trickle down her spine. She had known Zhang was ambitious. Indeed, ambitious and jealous of herself and Wen for having been born in a position above himself. But she had not thought him madly reckless about his own safety or that of the world. “He wants jewels that, if used, will destroy all of the universe? Or…or re-create it in such a way that it amounts to destruction?”

“I don’t know,” Third Lady said miserably. “Prince Zhang…” She cleared her throat. “That is, I think he believes what he wants to and he…ignores the rest.”

Jade laughed, her high laughter quite out of keeping with the demeanor of women in the Dragon Boats. Her mother’s laughter, floating wildly in this alien atmosphere. “You mean that Prince Zhang would gladly damn the Earth and all on it, provided it allowed him to gratify his ambition and to obtain power.”

Third Lady blushed becomingly, a peach-colored haze on her flawless skin. She inclined her head but couldn’t bring herself to repeat what Jade had said. “I believe,” she said, “that he thinks we should not believe the words of foreign devils. Or perhaps the foreign devils with whom he is dealing haven’t told him the whole truth.”

“The foreign devils with whom…” Jade repeated, in shock.

Third Lady bowed, quickly, and straightened again. “That is what my father says. That Zhang has had discourse with foreign devils. While your father lay dying, and everyone at court was distracted and…and filled with other concerns, he took his dragon form, journeyed to India and tried to steal the one jewel that had been spent. He had talked with foreign devils, emissaries of the queen who rules the islands they call Britain. He arranged to give them the jewel. In exchange—” She stopped abruptly, spread her hands wide on her silk robes and bobbed a hasty bow. “In exchange, I know not what he wanted,” she said, quickly, contriving to make her loss of courage seem like a quick plunge into a still lake. “But I fear it was nothing good.”

Again, Jade allowed her laughter to ring out. “What he wanted is what he has always wanted, and it could not have been anything but to become the True Emperor of All Under Heaven. For you must know that he has always wished that he were my father’s son and heir.”

“Yes,” Third Lady said. “Yes, and that’s what scares me, my lady Jade, that he should want to displace my lord upon the throne and…and do him mischief.” She spoke the last softly.

“You mean kill him?” Jade said. “Doubt not that is what he intends.” She fell into her thoughts then, as though she had been plunged headfirst into a dark cave.

On the one hand there were Zhang’s words: that if they stole the jewels—or rather possessed themselves of them, since as lords of the Dragon Court they could be held to own the whole Earth—they would be able to reclaim the throne her ancestors had lost so long ago. Less important to Zhang, at least, but standing foremost in Jade’s mind, who had heard how weres were despised throughout the length and breadth of foreign lands, was the thought that if they recovered the Dragon Throne, they could change the lot of weres throughout the world.

For they were not despised in China alone. Even Jane Austen—who seemed to have a little more em pathy and understanding than her compatriots—had made a couple of were siblings, Mary and Henry Crawford, the villains in
Mansfield Park.

On the other hand, here was Third Lady’s information which, if true, would mean that the jewels were, in fact, like insidious and beautiful poison, and should not be acquired—could not long be kept from their avatar without destroying the world and all in it.

This was, she supposed, the type of decision her father had to make his whole life. And perhaps that explained his lack of warmth to his own son, and the way he held himself apart from everyone else in his court. She had no more on either side than the opinion of someone who should be a trusted member of the court. If she was inclined to prefer Third Lady’s opinion over Zhang’s it was only because she valued Third Lady over Zhang. It meant nothing. Particularly since Third Lady got her information from her father, whom Jade didn’t know at all.

Jade drummed her fingers atop the bookcase while she thought, but thought alone wasn’t going to solve this dilemma. On the one hand, if Zhang was right, it would be the one chance her dynasty had waited for over the millennia, to regain all their power and influence.

On the other hand, if Zhang was betraying his kind and his emperor and seeking only power for himself, and furthermore, if what Third Lady said about the jewels was right, then to let Zhang proceed could lead to the clan’s destruction.

From deep memory an image of her father came—his graying hair falling in a soft curtain to his shoulders, as he said, “In every great opportunity there is a great danger. Don’t turn down the opportunity because of the danger.”

She made a sound of frustration at her memory of her father. Third Lady looked up, startled.

“I will,” Jade said, “take it under advisement. I will think about what you’ve told me, and contrive a plan.” And to Third Lady’s fearful gaze, she added, “I will not ignore your worry. I…I, too, care a great deal for our lord, the True Emperor of All Under Heaven.”

Third Lady searched Jade’s face as if to determine the veracity of her words. At last she nodded, as though satisfied. “Very well,” she said, and bowed deeply. “I trust you, milady, to do what’s best for the Dragon Boats and their sovereign.”

“Of course,”Jade said, and watched her sister-in-law withdraw, closing the door behind her. Then Jade walked through her front room into her bedroom proper, where a big mahogany bed that had been her mother’s—though probably first captured from a carpetship—occupied almost all of the small cabin. The cabin was one of the exterior walls, with windows, and light bathed the bed and the bedspread.

Jade wanted nothing more than to lie down and shed the day—the grief of losing her father, her fears for Wen’s rule. But she knew if she lay down, she would not rest. Her maid, waiting by the bed, bowed deeply to her, and Jade nodded her approval of the woman’s coming to assist her out of the elaborate gown she’d worn for her father’s obsequies, as well as help her unroll her long black hair from the elaborate hair-style that held it up and away from her face.

She sat down, to allow her maid to unroll her hair from the little pillow around which it had been wound, while she tried to determine what to do. She could not allow Zhang to betray them, if such was what he intended.

But neither could she allow this opportunity to be lost because she was timorous.

At long last, as her maid hung up the heavy ceremonial robes and brought Jade one of the simpler shifts she was used to wearing, Jade thought—if not of a solution—of a way to keep an eye on things until she knew better what to do.

She must take part in the attack on the carpetship that carried the man who held the jewels. If the jewels were to be captured, she must be the one to hold them. Only then could she be sure that they wouldn’t be ill-used.

And once she held them, she would use her own magic to see how far they resonated with the world and whether it might be true that they held the universe. If not, then she would use them to restore her family fortunes. If so, then she would restore them to their shrine, and hope for a boon in return. In either case, she would do her best to keep them out of Zhang’s hands.

AN UNLIKELY ATTACK

“Steady as she goes, Mr. Jones,” Joseph Perigord, the
first mate aboard the
Indian Star,
told Nigel. And un-bent himself enough to smile dazzlingly at the carpetship flight magician.

Nigel nodded back, but didn’t smile. He knew that in the two weeks he’d been flying the
Indian Star
he’d impressed the first mate and steward of the crew.

He knew it because he’d accidentally heard Mr. Perigord tell the captain so.
Sober, clean and honest. Not like other flight magicians we’ve taken aboard,
he had said, while Nigel, waiting outside the captain’s office, clutching the day’s flight plans for approval, heard it through the slightly open door.

The first mate had gone on to suggest that they should do whatever it took to entice Nigel to stay aboard and continue flying for them. He’d talked about being weary of the constantly changing flight magicians, and most of them probably wanted criminals, too.

And though Nigel understood the man’s sentiments, he’d felt the slight warmth of the jewels in the flannel pouch at his midriff, beneath his clothing. Much as he hated to disappoint both captain and first mate, much as the
Indian Star
seemed like a proper ship and properly run, he would not be staying aboard. He must deliver the jewels to Africa, to the village that had, from time immemorial, protected the rubies.

A slight, reminiscent smile twisted his lips at the thought of again seeing Kitwana, the heir to the village’s chief, and Emily, who had once been Nigel’s wife and was now Kitwana’s. Then he all but sighed at the idea that he might never again find a wife. As far as polite society in England was concerned, he was a free man. Emily, having remained behind in her African village, would prefer—she said—to be thought dead by the family who hadn’t appreciated her, and the friends who would be shocked at her choice. As far as his conscience was concerned, he was a free man as well. His marriage to Emily had never been consummated, and what should have been conjugal love had turned out to be no more than his wish to protect her and her wish to escape her circumstances.

But to be free to marry and to marry again were two completely different things. He’d thought he loved Emily, but now he realized he’d never loved any woman at all. Developed fixations on them, surely. Admired them greatly, undoubtedly. But though he might turn to regard them as they passed, he didn’t think that any woman—not one, not even the courtesans that his brother, Carew, had insisted on introducing to his notice in Cambridge—had ever been indispensable to him. He wanted…he wanted that feeling he saw shine in Emily’s and Kitwana’s gaze when they looked at each other. He wanted the feeling that made his friend Peter look soft and gentle as he spoke of some Anglo-Indian beauty named Sofie.