Nine Gates (38 page)

“We realized that Gaheris had developed ‘issues’ with Albert one day when Gaheris arrived just as Albert and Shen were concluding an exercise that involved projecting oneself into a manifestation of the affiliate Branch. Since Gaheris was not yet the Rat, he couldn’t practice this, and while Shen finished with Albert, I set Gaheris to doing moving meditations…”

Brenda looked interested, but Pearl could see from how she glanced at the clock that she was aware of the lateness of the hour. Questions about “moving meditations” were obviously being filed away for another time.

“Albert and Shen finished. When they joined myself and Gaheris, Albert looked like one of those Pre-Raphaelite paintings of a knight concluding vigil over his armor: translucent, exhausted, and yet somehow transcendently powerful. Gaheris saw it, too, and I naively hoped this would inspire him to greater efforts in his own exercises. To that point, he’d been making the appropriate motions, but his focus was completely off.

“I forget what called Shen and me away just then. It might have been a phone call. Umeko might have been having trouble with the baby. For whatever reason, we both left, giving the boys the sort of general instructions that are all too easily ignored.

“We were drawn back by angry yelling from the classroom. Gaheris was shouting at Albert. ‘You’re not even a real Branch. You’re just a Cat. Just an afterthought. I don’t know why you think you’re so great. The only thing you have going for you is that you’re the third failure in a line of failures. Fourth, since that hotshot emperor we’ve all heard so much about couldn’t have been much if his subjects wanted to overthrow him and his own advisors wouldn’t stick by him.’”

“He didn’t!” Brenda gasped. Then almost immediately, “He did. That’s exactly the type of mean thing Dylan or Thomas would say. Hell, that I would have said when I was ten. That’s so mean, and so dumb. What did Albert do?”

“I don’t know what he would have done,” Pearl said, “because I came through the door right then and I didn’t feel like waiting to find out. I got them away from each other, into different rooms. Shen went to talk to Albert. I went to talk to Gaheris. We got them both calmed down, then set them to work. By the end of the day, they were talking pretty normally to each other, but I’m not sure that Albert ever forgot what Gaheris said.”

“Why?”

“Because while Albert had been a good student before, from that point on he obviously started trying very hard to be a good leader as well. You’ve been in student government, so you know that being a leader may sound glamorous, but it often means doing things you don’t want to do.”

Brenda nodded. “Staying later than everyone else, making sure things are locked up, making phone calls.”

“Keeping your temper when no one else is doing so, pretending to like talking to boring people, remembering that even one person is an audience. Neither First Cat nor Second Cat had been particularly responsible. One was a spoiled
brat, the other a dutiful donkey. Albert was the first Cat to start acting like an emperor of any sort.”

“And Dad?”

“First Gaheris tried to needle Albert. When that didn’t work, he decided to match him at his own game. That made life quieter for us all, but I don’t think Shen or I ever assumed that peace and tranquillity reigned in either of the boys’ hearts. Then adolescence complicated the picture.”

Brenda gasped. “Don’t tell me that they fell in love with the same girl.”

“I could only have wished,” Pearl said. “Instead, Albert fell in love with Gaheris.”

Pearl watched Brenda’s expression as it went from surprise, to shock, and settled on curiosity.

“Albert’s gay?” Brenda said. “But I thought he had kids.”

“He does,” Pearl agreed. “Two. A son and a daughter. They live with their mother, but their relationship with their father is relatively cordial. Their mother is far too aware of the advantages of Albert’s wealth and links to power and celebrity to alienate her children fully from their father.

“Albert’s own character stands him in good stead. His children know he is gay, but he keeps his liaisons discreet. He is also a devoted son, never stinting in anything that will make his mother more comfortable or content. Besides, being gay, especially in the Bay area, carries very little stigma anymore.”

“But my dad grew up in the Midwest,” Brenda said. “How did he feel about having a guy have a crush on him? For that matter, why did Albert get a crush on Dad of all people? From what you’ve said, it’s not like Dad was exactly nice to him.”

“I think that last was precisely the reason Albert developed his attachment. Just as his response to Gaheris’s accusing him of not being worthy of being emperor made him try to develop the qualities of a good ruler, so Gaheris’s rejection made him try to win him over. When they were eleven
and twelve, this simply took the form of trying to get Gaheris to accept him.”

“Surely Dad didn’t hold out,” Brenda said, her tone pleading. “I mean, he’s stubborn and he’s competitive, but he’s not mean.”

“Gaheris is not,” Pearl agreed. “Not in the least, and I think that for a few years he and Albert did become friends of a sort. Gaheris grew resigned to, if not exactly happy with, the fact that he wasn’t going to be able to do some of the things Albert could for a long time, but he worked very hard and caught up in other areas. It helped that they were both highly talented. Had they not been, the problems might have intensified. They are also not unalike in physical build. Both are on the shorter side of average, and rather slight. This meant that when they began training in physical arts, they could compete evenly.”

“Good thing Albert wasn’t built like Riprap,” Brenda said, “or Dad might never have gotten over it.”

“True,” Pearl agreed, “although Gaheris did have difficulties Albert did not. Albert is average or above average in height and build for a Chinese. Gaheris is rather on the small side for someone of German-Irish heritage.”

“Yeah,” Brenda said. “It’s a family joke that it looks like I’m going to be taller than Dad. I don’t think he always thinks it’s funny.”

“His pride in you is evident,” Pearl said. “I don’t think something as unimportant as height will make a difference.”

“But when Albert got a crush on Dad?” Brenda pressed. “That did?”

“It did. Young men are far more insecure about their sexual identities than young women. You must have noticed that.”

“I have, sort of, but I’ve got to say that I don’t think anyone has it exactly easy these days. I mean, when you were a girl, people didn’t even talk about homosexuality, except in whispers, right?”

“I grew up in the theater, in the movies,” Pearl said, “but, yes, even in that relatively relaxed atmosphere there were things that were known and accepted, but never, ever talked about. It’s different now. I thought it would be better.”

Brenda ran her hands over her admittedly less than well-endowed chest.

“I wish. It seems like half the girls in my dorm have decided that they’re gay, or at least bi. I’m not, but because I’m not stacked and loaded with curves, I’ve had lots of people assume I’m not interested in boys. I thought that living in a co-ed dorm would mean that I’d be worrying about the guys. It’s the girls…”

Brenda waved a hand as if the problem could be physically removed. “It’s not really a problem. All but the ones who are really confused themselves and think that they need to convince you to join them take a polite ‘no’ for an answer, but next year I’ll probably be in a different dorm and I sincerely hope that my new floor won’t be so sex-crazed.”

Pearl laughed. “Try being a woman who has remained single by choice into her seventies. One ‘tell-all’ biographer actually hired a detective to probe into my very routine romantic life.”

She glanced at the clock. “The hour is growing late, so let me finish. I think it was the summer the boys were fourteen and fifteen, that Albert took to mooning around after Gaheris. Gaheris wasn’t exactly quick to catch on, but when he did…”

Brenda winced. “You don’t need to tell me. You know, I don’t think I want to know. Well, I do want to know one thing.”

“What?”

“Did they get into a fight over it, or did Albert catch on and back off?”

Pearl considered. “A little of both. They were both getting training in various martial arts. A few of their training bouts… I don’t think Gaheris knew whether he wanted to throw Albert across the room or avoid touching him entirely.
Eventually, Albert caught on—I think Shen spoke with him—and realized that his interest in Gaheris was not only not returned, but was interfering with his ability to be emperor. With what I expect he thought was great nobility of spirit and self-sacrifice, Albert resigned himself to a broken heart.”

“Too weird,” Brenda said. “Poor Dad. Poor Albert.”

Pearl nodded, wondering if she should go on from there and talk about how Albert had reacted when Gaheris—who like any normal young man had been involved in a series of romances before he met Brenda’s mother—actually proposed to Keely. The matter had been complicated by more than old jealousy.

Was Brenda ready for all of that? Remembering those arguments, Pearl thought not, especially since she’d need to explain other things as well, and Brenda was rising to her feet, clearly satisfied.

“Thanks, Pearl. I’ll keep this to myself. If Nissa or Riprap asks me—well, Cats and Rats don’t really get along, do they?”

After Brenda had gone up to her room, Pearl poured herself a final cup of tea from the pot under the cozy on her desk. She thought back to the days when Gaheris Morris had proposed to Keely McAnally. For the first time in a long time, she found herself wondering about Keely. Perhaps, Albert had been right to oppose the marriage. Maybe his reaction to Gaheris’s intended had been born from wisdom and not from jealousy as everyone had thought at the time.

The matter bore thinking about, but not now. The day had been very long, and there was no promise that tomorrow would be any shorter.

The Double
Hour of the Ox found Honey Dream one of a select group that included her father, Pearl Bright, Shen Kung, and Albert Yu assembled in Pearl’s office for the purpose of attempting to contact the Exile Ox.

Although the Double Hour of the Ox was quite late—or quite early, depending on how one chose to view it—they had been present for at least another hour preceding the ceremony. Righteous Drum had insisted that even if modern Chinese-American custom did not insist on ritual purification, he thought such was wise, and since he was the only one of them with any but theoretical experience in such matters, no one had cared to argue.

Honey Dream smothered a yawn behind a hand that was permeated with the odor of incense. Although she had taken a long nap that afternoon, it had been a busy day.

That morning the physical training sessions had resumed. Once again, Nissa had declined to attend, but otherwise everyone was present. Deborah Van Bergenstein had assigned herself to teach Brenda and so Pearl Bright, with what Honey Dream was certain was malice glittering in her bright old eyes, had offered herself as Honey Dream’s partner.

As usual, Pearl’s weapon had been the sword Treaty, while Honey Dream’s was the snake-fang dagger that had come to her upon her ascension to the rank of Snake. Both weapons—and, more importantly, both combatants—were capable of casting spells as well as more usual cutting and stabbing. Moreover, unlike the three apprentices, Pearl was quite skilled in this, and had defeated Honey Dream once before.

Of course, I was distracted then
, Honey Dream thought, the memory making her face hot.
And had already done a great deal of magic that night.

But she would never articulate these thoughts. Righteous
Drum would tolerate a great deal from his much-beloved daughter, but excuses, never.

Following practice, Honey Dream had hoped to have some time alone with her associates from the Lands Born from Smoke and Sacrifice—especially with Flying Claw. Flying Claw, however, had opted for a quick shower and then to go to Pearl’s house with Riprap. The big man was the only soldier—Honey Dream refused to think of him as a warrior—among the natives, and seemed to have an inexhaustible fund of questions about the creatures they might encounter both in the vicinity of the Nine Yellow Springs—their next destination—and elsewhere in the guardian domains.

Had Brenda Morris looked smug as she climbed into the van and took the seat behind Flying Claw? Honey Dream couldn’t be sure, but she felt certain this was so.

Honey Dream
pulled herself from thought, for the tide of motion in the room had stilled. Albert Yu, dressed in an absolutely gorgeous shenyi embroidered not only with cats, but with all twelve animals of the zodiac, was solemnly rising from where he had knelt in front of Righteous Drum and Shen Kung for the elaborate blessings and protective invocations that were the final part of the purification ceremony.

“We have five minutes,” Pearl Bright said, glancing at the clock on her desk.

“I suggest we spend them in meditation,” Shen Kung said. He was also clad in an elaborately embroidered shenyi, the fabric golden yellow, the ornamental dragons bearing in their five-fingered claws various items that invoked luck, wealth, and long life. Something about the fit of the shoulders and sleeves indicated that the robe had been made when Shen was a younger man and stood both taller and straighter.

Honey Dream
felt a funny twinge in her gut, an ache of anticipated pain. She looked over at where her father stood, his own dragon robes hanging limp over his missing arm, wondering if someday he might seem as old and withered as Shen did. She thrust the thought from her as ill-omened.

Think of good things. Think of seeing Mother and the rest of the family. Think of seeing a true emperor elevated once more to the Jade Petal Throne, and of standing on the most honored dais, one of the Twelve.

She sunk her mind into the deep ch’i flow of meditation, and felt the five minutes pass both more slowly and more quickly than they should. A chiming sound brought her back into the present, focused and renewed.