The Firebird's Vengeance (15 page)

The boy gawped at the ring. “But you’re … you’re …”

“A guard of the women’s palace and very much out of uniform.” Mae Shan barged past the boy, setting Tsan Nu down as soon as they were inside. Two other boys sitting beside the clay stove scrambled to their feet. The blockhouse itself showed signs of its occupants’ hasty departure; bowls and cups waited on the table and the vague scent of cabbage hung in the air. An empty wine jar had fallen on its side. A helmet had dropped from its hook beside the door and lay on the floor like an abandoned turtle. All three of the boys looked guilty and Tsan Nu wondered if they had been discussing whether or not they should run away and where they should go if they did.

“It’s no good running away,” Tsan Nu said, although the smoke had made her throat sore. “You need to stay between the walls or the devils will come.”

The boy soldiers gaped at her. Before Tsan Nu could explain, Mae Shan squeezed her arm, a warning to keep quiet.

“What are your names?” Mae Shan asked the boys.

“Private Trainee Airic Bei,” said the gangly boy who had opened the door and threatened to fine her.

“Private Trainee Chen Hsuan,” said the stocky boy with wisps of hair trailing from his poorly braided queue.

“Private Trainee Kyun Biao,” said the last boy who stood nearest the stove and had a huge mole on his right cheek.

“Where is the rest of the garrison, Trainee Airic?” Mae Shan asked, mustering a brisk tone, but her disgust shone plain on her face. “Where are the men who left three boys on their own in the middle of an emergency?”

Airic remembered the deference due to rank, even when rank was half-dressed and female. He pulled his shoulders back. “They’ve gone to help keep order at the Temple of Mercy, ma’am.”

Of course. Curfew or no, the temples would be besieged with terrified petitioners, the temples of Szu Yi, Goddess of Mercy, more than any. Heaven itself only knew what the priests were saying about what should be done. Not all of them had the right kind of eyes either.

“Well, we won’t be seeing them for a while,” Mae Shan muttered. Then she raised her voice.

“Very well. Trainee Chen, the watch should not be neglected. You will take your turn. Trainee Kyun, this room is a mess. It will be cleaned at once. Trainee Airic.” She faced the boy who had threatened her with fining. “You will show me a private room where I may wait with my charge, then you will get some rest before relieving Trainee Chen on watch.”

Dazed by her sudden listing of orders, the boys did nothing but stare at her for a long moment. Then, however, they did as they had been trained to do and obeyed. Kyun began piling bowls and cups together. Chen vanished through the room’s inner door, probably to grab a spear or other weapon and mount the tower stairs. Airic turned smartly, leading Mae Shan and Tsan Nu through a second door into what Tsan Nu guessed were the barracks. There were rows of cots with lumpy mattresses and rough blankets, and two other doors. One led to a spartan room that had a real bed, and a rug on the floor and a few banked coals in the small stove. More importantly, it had a shuttered window through which the street might be observed.

As Mae Shan thanked Trainee Airic, Tsan Nu climbed up on the bed and threw open the shutters. To her disappointment, she found the window barred. She gripped the bars and twisted her head sideways, trying to see as much of the sky as she could.

“Mistress, come down.”

Tsan Nu ignored Mae Shan. Her heart was thundering so loudly, she barely heard anyway.

The army of devils had arrayed itself atop the roiling hills of smoke and ash. The chief of the devils waved his sword, sweeping it out to indicate the whole of the city, maybe the whole world. The demons cheered, waving their banners, pikes, hooks, and axes.

But they weren’t alone anymore. The smoke still rose in grey streamers and up those streamers swarmed the ghosts of the Heart.

Many of them were soldiers, like Mae Shan, dressed in their armor and carrying their weapons on their backs. Others were officers who rode up the smoke on their horses, their servants behind them carrying their banners. Some seemed hesitant, confused, looking about themselves indecisively, but when they saw the devils they rallied at once and went to stand beside their fellows. Lords and ladies rose up on cushions of smoke, their sleeves billowing around them. Last came the emperors, borne on their platforms looking still and stern.

The Chief Devil saw all this and threw back his head and laughed, the blast of his breath making the floating ash around him boil. His followers jeered, rattling their flags and weapons.

But the Heart’s ghosts ignored them and moved into their own ranks, each general taking charge of a company. The lords and ladies climbed the smoke hills and stood looking down, their hands folded. The emperors rose until they were the highest of all, their faces impassive and dignified.

This enraged the Chief Devil and he shouted and gestured madly to his followers. The lesser demons poured down the hills of smoke, brandishing their fearsome weapons. The ghosts of the Heart, though, did not hesitate. The officers gestured and called to their troops and charged the ranks of demons.

“Mistress, what do you see now?” asked Mae Shan, her voice tightening, with worry or impatience, Tsan Nu couldn’t tell.

“The imperial ghosts are fighting the devils,” she reported. “They’ve joined the battle. The Chief Devil is furious and he’s trying to reach the emperors, but they’re too high.” The noble ones lifted up their silk and bamboo fans, waving them in elegant patterns that Tsan Nu recognized from court dances. “The lords and ladies are raising the winds to clear the smoke so the demons won’t have anyplace to stand.”

Mae Shan blinked. “How goes the battle?”

Tsan Nu squinted up at the shifting sea of smoke and colors. “I can’t tell. I think it’s too soon to know.”

Mae Shan licked her lips. “Then leave it for now, mistress. Climb in the bed and warm yourself.”

As Mae Shan said those words, Tsan Nu felt how deeply tired she was. The air was cleaner in here, and it was easier to breathe and see, except her sore eyes were heavy with the need for sleep.

Tsan Nu crawled under the covers. The rough fabric scraped against her skin. She wanted a clean nightdress. She wanted to swim in the lake in the Sun Garden so she could wash the awful itching feeling out of her hair. She wanted to tell Yi Qin she was sorry and that she’d make her a real amulet as soon as she had some more ribbons.

She didn’t say any of this, because she couldn’t have any of these things and she knew that. She clutched her shoes to her chest. She wanted Father. But she wouldn’t be able to do any kind of working now. Not tired like this.

In the meantime, Mae Shan brought her a dipper of water from the bucket in the corner. She drank every drop and looked up to see Mae Shan kneeling in front of the stove.

“We will rest here and wait for news from the Heart.” Mae Shan scooped up a handful of tinder from the box and laid it gingerly over the coals. A yellow flame stretched up to lick at the twigs, and then another. Watching them and remembering all that had passed, Tsan Nu winced and pulled her knees up to her chin.

“There won’t be any news,” said Tsan Nu bluntly. “The Heart is gone.”

“The Nine Elders will have saved the emperor.” Mae Shan did not look at Tsan Nu. She just reached for a stick of kindling and cracked it in two to add to the stove. The fire burned innocently, as if it were no relation to the flames that had almost taken their lives, that had destroyed the palace of a thousand years.

“The Nine Elders are dead,” said Tsan Nu. Didn’t Mae Shan hear her? The devils would not be free if the Nine Elders were still alive. “So is the emperor.”

Mae Shan swallowed visibly. “You don’t know that, mistress.”

“I do know.” Tsan Nu raised her chin. “This is what I saw when Minister Xuan asked me to cast that horoscope. I tried to tell him to get everybody away, but he wouldn’t
listen
.” Raw, shrill frustration filled Tsan Nu’s voice. Master Liaozhai would have been furious. Was he up there now, fighting the devils? She hadn’t been able to see his face. “They should have listened.”

“Yes,” said Mae Shan, looking at the fire. “They should have.”

She closed the grate on the stove and stared at the formless glow it made of the fire inside. “You will tell me what you see, mistress? You will make me listen?”

“I’ll try,” said Tsan Nu in a small voice. Suddenly, she didn’t want to see anything. She didn’t want to know what was happening. She just wanted to hide her head under the covers and have morning come and be back in her bed with her maids bringing her breakfast and Master Liaozhai chiding her for being lazy.

She pressed her cheek against the pillow, tears leaking from the corners of her eyes. But sleep was heavier than sorrow and it soon took her mind down into darkness. Her last sight was Mae Shan sitting alone, lost in thought, her dagger in her hand.

Chapter Five

The spring morning dawned over Bayfield slow but blue. The puddles on the cobbled streets had thawed overnight and made miniature lakes to sparkle in the watery sunlight. The wind blew brisk and cold as Grace walked to the port, but it also held the fresh green smell that said winter was retreating at last.

Good as his word, Frank waited on the deck of his tug, a battered, square-sterned steamer named the
R. W. Currie
. His peaked knit cap had been pulled down over his ears until it almost touched the collar of his coat. His pipe, as battered as his boat, smoked in his mouth, the wind dragging the plume inland.

Finally. Today it would be over. She would finally be able to chase this voice from her head.

All winter it had haunted her. It ruled her dreams, showing her images of the shuttered and empty lighthouse, the frozen lake, and the bleak winter island. Sometimes it took her as she tried to work her trade, showing her images that might have come from fairy tales; fantastic palaces, kings and queens in their splendor, a bird of flame in a golden cage. Always, always, the same desperate voice called from the shadows, begging for help.

But never once did the owner of the voice show her its face. Not for all her searching with mind’s eye and gazing crystal could she see who called out to her.

She had not slept the night through in months. Exhaustion grew heavier and the unwelcome burden of it made her increasingly frantic. She must end this. She would do anything,
anything
if this voice, this ghost, whoever it was, would just go away and let her sleep.

Even cross the lake.

Grace hurried down the dock, ignoring the blatantly curious stare from Charlie Raney, the harbormaster’s assistant. Frank extended a hand to help her up over the side of the tug, looking her squarely in the eye. She had seen him once or twice in the street over the long winter. Each time he had asked how she was, and commented on the weather. She thought she had seen that he would like to say more, but he never did. Perhaps that much was just her imagination anyway. Her vision was obviously less clear than it had once been.

Now, though, she saw the question in his eyes quite clearly. “Are you sure?” he asked her silently. Her only answer was to step over the rail onto the deck. The boat rocked under her. Fear squeezed Grace’s heart. She swallowed hard. Frank thrust his hand into his pocket and stepped aside, curious, disquieted, and so obviously holding back his words that she was surprised he didn’t burst with what he wasn’t saying. Ashamed of her cowardice, Grace said nothing, but moved away into a sheltered spot behind the tiny wheelhouse. She felt his gaze rest heavily on her shoulders, as she laid her mittened hands on the rail and stared out at the lake and the chunks of ice that still floated on its restless, grey surface. The barrier and boundary of her world for so long.

At last, she heard Frank turn away. His boots thudded on the decking, making the little tug rock restlessly. Grace gripped the rail and for a moment thought she would be sick.

And we haven’t even left shore yet
. She closed her eyes.

The boiler was already stoked and the steam drifted overhead. A moment later the engine chugged into life, making the deck thrum, and they were away.

The Apostle Islands sprouted in a ragged cluster around the small peninsula that held Bayfield and a half-dozen other logging and fishing towns. Sand Island and Devil’s Island clung to the outer edge of the cluster. Grace had grown up with Ingrid, two other sisters, and two brothers on Sand Island. Mamma and Papa had passed on years ago. Leo still lived there with his family, fishing and doing a little farming and timbering. The others had left, making their way down to Milwaukee, or out to Chicago. She had heard nothing more of them, not for years.

The wind smelled of cold, water, and the coal and ash of the boiler. Her hands ached from clutching the rail. Fear weakened her knees and roiled in her stomach with each small bobble of the waves beneath the hull. Screams formed in her throat and she clenched her teeth against them.

Somewhere in the back of her mind, Grace recalled that in summer, the trip out to Sand Island could be pleasant enough. Lake Superior would be blue-grey under the sun and passing islands wore emerald crowns of trees on their red stone cliffs. This early in the spring, however, those crowns were evergreen and grey over slabs of blood red stone still splattered with the stubborn white ice. No other boats sailed past with crews to raise a hand or blow a whistle in greeting. It was only them, and the water. The shifting, deceiving curtain of water that hid the dead men, the ones who waited for warmth, who promised life, if only she came back, she must come back, come down, come drown …

Grace stuffed her hand into her mouth to stifle her shriek and reeled toward the stern. She tore open the door to the wheelhouse and staggered inside. The boiler’s warmth rolled over her, startling her and clearing her vision. She saw Frank stood at the wheel, guiding the tug with a strong but dexterous hand, chewing on his pipe stem.

Looking at her with a sympathy she’d never thought she’d see again from anyone.