Gateway

by Sharon Shinn

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  BOOKS BY SHARON SHINN

  The Samaria Novels

  Archangel

  Jovah’s Angel

  The Alleluia Files

  Angelica

  Angel-Seeker

  The Shape-Changer’s Wife

  Wraptin Crystal

  Heart of Gold

  Summers at Castle Auburn

  Jenna Starborn

  The Safe-Keeper’s Secret

  The Truth-Teller’s Tale

  The Dream-Maker’s Magic

  The Twelve Houses Novels

  Mystic and Rider

  The Thirteenth House

  Dark Moon Defender

  Reader and Raelynx

  Fortune and Fate

  General Winston’s Daughter

  Gateway

  VIKING

  Published by Penguin Group

  Penguin Group(USA) Inc.,345 Hudson Street,New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.

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  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:80 Strand,London WC2R0RL, England

  First published in 2009 by Viking, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  Text copyright © Sharon Shinn, 2009

  All rights reserved

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

  Shinn, Sharon.

  Gateway/ Sharon Shinn.

  p.cm.

  Summary: While passing through the Arch in St.Louis, a Chinese American teenager

  is transported to a parallel world where she is given a dangerous assignment.

  eISBN : 978-1-101-14883-9

  [1.Space and time—Fiction.2.Chinese Americans—Fiction.] I.Title.

  PZ7.S5572Gat 2009

  [Fic]—dc22

  2009014002

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above,no part of this

  publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system,or

  transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying,

  recording or otherwise),without the prior written permission of both the

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  http://us.penguingroup.com

  For Sydney Xiang Prow and Molly Yang Prow,

  who came to St. Louis from a far land.

  I hope your lives hold many adventures.

  —Sharon Shinn

  ONE

  DAIYU LOOKED OVER the assortment of jewelry at the old woman’s booth and didn’t see anything she liked. She’d spent nearly an hour wandering outdoors around the Arch grounds, investigating the stalls being set up for Fair Saint Louis, and she’d been so surprised to see a jewelry vendor among the food booths that she’d stopped to look over the merchandise. But now she wished she hadn’t. The necklaces were cheap, the summer heat was overwhelming, and in a minute she was going to be late getting back from lunch.

  “I’m sorry,” she said to the old woman standing on the other side of the rickety table. “I don’t think I’ll be buying anything today.”

  The vendor was so tiny, she had to look up at Daiyu, and Daiyu was the shortest girl in her class.The old woman was so old, even her wrinkles had wrinkles. But her black eyes were shrewd and calculating. “You like rings?” she asked, reaching for something under the table.

  Daiyu shrugged. “I usually don’t wear one.” In fact, she rarely wore anything except a watch, hoop earrings, and the necklace her parents had given her—a gold chain hung with a gold charm that spelled out her name in Chinese characters.

  “You’ll like this ring,” the old woman promised, bringing out a small box wrapped in red silk.

  She flipped open the lid to reveal a jet-black ring nestled in a snug slot of red velvet. The old woman teased it loose and held it out in her narrow palm, and Daiyu bent closer to see. It was a single piece of stone carved in the shape of a dragon, head thrown back, talons extended, tail whipping around to touch its nose. Daiyu had a sudden, intense, and most uncharacteristic impulse to snatch it up and then go running from the fairgrounds.

  “Try it on,” the old woman urged.

  Why not? Daiyu picked it up and slid it onto the ring finger of her right hand. Smooth and cool as glass against her skin,the ring was a perfect fit.

  “Do you like it?” the vendor asked.

  “I do,” Daiyu said, holding her hand up to get a better look. Her spread fingers seemed perfectly framed in the elegant chrome curve of the looming Arch. “It’s beautiful.”

  “Very reasonable,” the old woman said. “Twenty dollars.”

  Daiyu had expected to hear that it was a hundred dollars, so that was reasonable indeed. Maybe the ring was glass after all, though the material looked so dense that she’d just assumed it was carved out of some semiprecious stone. “I’m saving all my money for college,” Daiyu said, feeling a surprising sense of reluctance as she pulled off the ring, “so I really can’t.”

  “Fifteen dollars,” the old woman said.

  Daiyu smiled. “I don’t even have five on me.”

  “I could wait,” the woman offered. “Will you come back tomorrow?”

  Daiyu hesitated. “Maybe,” she said. “But—you shouldn’t hold it for me. I don’t think I can buy it.”

  The woman’s bright eyes looked pleading; her voice took on a tone of urgency. “But it’s black jade,” she said. “It’s meant for you.”

  Daiyu felt a little chill go down her back, despite the relentless heat. “Why do you think it’s meant for me?”

  The woman pointed at her. “Daiyu. That’s your name,” she said. “It means black jade.”

  Daiyu put her finger up to the boatneck collar of her sleeveless shirt, but the gold pendant with the Chinese characters was still tucked safely inside, against her skin. Maybe it had slipped free while she was leaning over the booth. Otherwise, how could the old woman know her name? “It’s beautiful,” she repea
ted, “but I really can’t buy it.”

  “Come back tomorrow. I’ll be here waiting.”

  A car sounded an irritable horn as traffic on Memorial Drive snarled up, and Daiyu quickly glanced at her watch. She was officially late. “I’ve got to go,” she said by way of apology and farewell. Taking off at a half run across the fairgrounds, she left behind the Arch standing guard over the Mississippi River and the mayhem of the merchants setting up their booths. She looked back once to find the vendor was watching her. The old woman’s face was fierce, and even from a distance her eyes seemed to burn. Her fingers were balled into fists. Daiyu couldn’t tell from this far away whether the ring was still lying on the rough counter or if the old woman was clutching it in her hand as if protecting it from the sight of any other curious visitors who might wander past.

  The rest of the afternoon dragged by. Until this week, Daiyu had been kept pretty busy during her summer internship at the Executive Edge Employment Agency, but there wasn’t much to do on this Friday before the Fourth of July holiday.

  “Are you as bored as I am?” Isabel demanded at around four in the afternoon as she came stalking out of her office. Isabel, who owned the agency, was at all, thin, intense woman of uncertain age and immense energy. When Isabel got worked up over some cause or another, Daiyu sometimes thought her soul might vibrate right out of her body. “You’re always so calm that it’s hard to tell.”

  Daiyu laughed. “There isn’t much for me to do right now,” she admitted.

  “Then let’s just beat the traffic and go on home,” Isabel said. “Are you coming down for the fair over the weekend?”

  “Probably.”

  “I’ll be at the voter-registration booth, if you want to drop by and say hello.” Isabel was passionate about politics and always trying to interest Daiyu in attending some rally or debate. She’d already made Daiyu swear that she would register to vote the minute she turned eighteen.

  “I don’t know,” Daiyu said vaguely as she gathered up her purse. “Maybe.”

  They rode together down the elevator of the Metropolitan Square Building, into the grand foyer with its huge murals of St. Louis history, then Isabel waved good-bye and headed for the garage. Daiyu made her way back out into the stifling heat to await the Soulard bus. Traffic was already clogging the roads, and horns were sounding up and down Olive Street. Naturally, the bus that arrived ten minutes later was not air-conditioned.

  Daiyu sighed and slipped into an empty seat, feeling the vinyl stick to the bare skin on the back of her arms. She pried open a window, hoping for a little fresh air, and watched the crowds filing in for the night’s baseball game at Busch Stadium. Everyone was dressed in red in honor of the Cardinals; red birds adorned everything at the stadium from flags to awnings to electronic signs. Fredbird, the Cardinals’ mascot, capered on the sidewalk and posed for pictures with kids. The bus inched on by.

  Traffic cleared once they were in the historic district of Soulard, and Daiyu got off the bus to walk the last few blocks home. This particular street was a little more rundown than the one in Lafayette Square where Daiyu and her parents had lived last year. A few of the old redbrick buildings had been lovingly restored, and some of the tiny front lawns had been carefully reseeded, but more often than not the townhouses looked bedraggled, unkempt, like an old homeless woman with an interesting history but a perilous future.

  Daiyu pushed open the door to their new place and instantly inhaled the scents of paint and turpentine. She heard the whine of a saw coming from upstairs and then the thump that meant someone had dropped a tool.

  “Dad! I’m home!” she called from the foot of the steps. “Do you want me to make dinner?”

  “That would be great!” he called back. “Make enough for three.”

  The kitchen was cramped and falling into disrepair, and it was always a challenge trying to maneuver around the piles of lumber and stacks of paint cans that her father seemed to think were best stored right inside the back door. Still, Daiyu was rarely bothered by turmoil or disorder; her father said her ability to function even in the midst of chaos was her single most valuable personal skill. Within forty-five minutes she had cooked the meal, set the table, and stored some of the paint cans in a more convenient spot.

  “Dinner’s ready,” she announced, and two men tramped down the stairs to join her in the dining room.

  Her father had to bend way down to kiss her on the cheek. He was a good six feet three inches, lanky and loose limbed, with hair as black as hers but eyes so blue people always remarked on the color the first time they met him.“Honey, this is Edward,” he said, introducing his companion.

  “Hi, Edward,” she said. “I hope you like pasta.”

  Edward smiled. He was missing a few of his teeth, and his skin was bad, but his hair was washed, his clothes were clean, and he’d shaved that morning, so he looked pretty good compared to many of her father’s itinerant workers. Her father hired a lot of them from local homeless shelters or work-release programs, but he’d also been known to pull to the side of the road when he saw someone holding up a sign proclaiming WILL WORK FOR FOOD. Daiyu couldn’t remember a holiday or a renovation project during which her family hadn’t been offering hospitality to some stranger down on his luck.

  “I like pretty much anything someone is willing to put on the table in front of me,” Edward said.

  “How much did you get done today?” Daiyu asked as they sat down and began dishing out the food.

  “Put up the crown molding in that third-story bedroom,” her father answered. “Edward’s exceptionally handy with a saw.”

  “Used to be a carpenter,” Edward said.

  “How about you, honey?” her father asked. “Did you have a good day?”

  “Kind of slow at work, but I walked around the Arch grounds at lunch. It’s almost all set up for the fair. Are we going tomorrow?”

  He looked briefly dismayed. “I can’t! I promised Jordan I’d be at church all day tomorrow working on the new addition.” He glanced at Edward. “You could come help out, if you like. No money in it, but you’ll get lunch and dinner.”

  “I’ll take you up on that,” Edward said.

  Her father looked back at Daiyu. “We could go Sunday.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t care. If I feel like it, I’ll head down tomorrow afternoon by myself.”

  Daiyu was serving Oreos for dessert when Mom called, and Dad took the cordless phone upstairs to have a private conversation. Edward dunked his cookie in his coffee and gave Daiyu an appraising look.

  “Are you one of those Chinese babies?” he asked.

  She smiled. “I’m hardly a baby anymore, but yes, my parents adopted me from China when I was six months old.”

  “You think you might go back to China someday?”

  “I’d like to,” she said. “Maybe after I’m out of college. At least once in my life I’d like to travel someplace exotic. The farther away, the better.”

  Edward helped her clear the table, but they weren’t quite done with the dishes when her father came back downstairs and handed her the phone. Daiyu carried it halfway up the stairs and sat down on one of the worn-out risers.

  “Hi, Mom,” she said. “How’s Gramma?”

  “Pretty good,” replied her mother. “She’s getting stronger and less cranky every day.”

  Gramma had had hip-replacement surgery, and Daiyu’s mother was out in California for the summer overseeing the recovery.

  “Well, tell her she has to get well enough to climb steps, because she has to come visit us and there’s no bathroom on the bottom floor. Or tell her if she doesn’t want to climb the steps, we’ll just have to get her a bucket.”

  Her mother laughed, and Daiyu imagined her face lighting up in amusement. Her mother was a calm, big-boned woman with wide brown eyes, thick brown hair, and an inexhaustible sense of humor, and amusement was her most common expression.

  “Hey, I made do with a bucket when your dad and I we
re first dating and he was fixing up that dreadful place on Jamieson. I always told him he only married me because I had a functional toilet.”

  They talked for another fifteen minutes before hanging up. Her father had already left to take Edward home—or, more likely, to one of the shelters downtown—so Daiyu finished up the dishes and then headed up to her room. It was long and narrow, with high ceilings and leaded glass windows, and once it was restored it would be a beautiful space, she thought. But right now the paint was peeling, the floor was in bad enough shape that she’d gotten splinters twice, and there was a faint scent of mildew. She knew that within a year, it would be airy and charming and full of light. That’s when they’d sell the place and look for a new project to renovate.

  She spent the next couple of hours talking on her cell phone and sending text messages. Three of her close friends were out of town for the holiday, and the other two didn’t want to go to Fair Saint Louis. Fine. Daiyu decided she wouldn’t go either. No reason to revisit the jewelry booth. No reason to look at the jade ring again and then realize she didn’t want it. Because she really didn’t. She told herself she couldn’t even remember how it had felt on her hand.

  TWO

  DAIYU WAS STILL in bed the next morning when Isabel called her cell phone. “What’s going on?” she asked in a sleepy voice.

  “Would you be willing to work for a few hours this afternoon? There’s a career fair at the Fox Theatre today. I’m going to give a presentation and hand out fliers. My daughter was supposed to help me out but she’s got the flu. I’ll pay you thirty dollars for the afternoon.”

  “They do career fairs at the Fox?” Daiyu said, pulling herself out of bed and hunting through her closet. She didn’t have too many outfits that qualified as professional, and most of them had already been worn this week. “That seems weird.”

  “It’s some special event for a women’s networking group. After the presentations, there will be a concert, I believe, but we won’t stay for that. Would you be willing to help me out?”