Portal of a Thousand Worlds

by Duncan, Dave

  “When do I get to go home?” demanded Mercy, the archer who had been borrowed from a house somewhere downriver from Cherish. “I’m about due to become a father.”

  “I suggest you don’t go into labor until we get some news,” Silky said. “Have you noticed the lack of caravans? We’re almost into Lotus Moon and there hasn’t been a sign of them on the Wilderness Road. The earthquake must have closed passes in the mountains—that I can understand. But why have we seen none heading west? No horses in Cherish, or no docks, or is the Jade River no longer navigable?”

  They wouldn’t know the answer until they completed the trail down the hill.

  Chapter 10

  Fair Visions had joined the Bamboo Banner after the Heaven-sent triumph at Spires and had regretted that decision almost immediately. Now, a couple of months later, he cursed the day.

  Fair Visions had not been so named by his late father, who had been a hardworking carpenter. Fair Visions had nothing against carpentry as such; it was the hardworking part he disliked. He would have preferred to be an artist, but a profession so respected was not available to sons of an artisans. As a compromise, he had taught himself to sketch imaginary buildings faithful to all the essential precepts of ancestral and astrological design. Under his new and more auspicious name, he had taken up the career of itinerant house builder—itinerant because after contracting to build magnificent dream homes, he would itinerate with the down payments. Of necessity, he had become a skilled horseman, too.

  His father had never mentioned that his younger brother had been born some seventy years before him, which was one of the strange beliefs held by Bamboo’s followers. Nor had he ever mentioned that the family had imperial blood in its veins, which seemed odd now, when his younger brother was claiming descent from Emperors of the tenth dynasty. Fair Visions did not argue such points with Uncle Bamboo.

  He did not argue anything with Bamboo, and that explained why he was currently out on patrol. The company of an armed escort would be flattering if it meant that he was valued, but it might indicate that he wasn’t trusted. Although, in the beginning, the Bamboo Banner had traveled only on human feet and been armed with staves, it had collected some horses and real weapons as it prospered. Fair Visions had expected to find a troop of cavalry waiting outside his billet that morning. Instead, he faced a cadre of a dozen boys led by a juvenile monster named Silent. They carried staves and wore only cotton trousers and headbands—not even sunhats or shoes. They stood in lines without speaking, chewing their yang cud.

  Of course, Fair Visions did not realize right away that Silent was a monster. He looked like a fat-free adolescent tangle of hemp cords painted the color of badly weathered skin. His head stuck out forward over a hollow chest, as if to emphasize the worst case of overbite in the Good Land.

  Fair Visions was not impressed. “I will be riding a horse.”

  Spittle splashed insolently close to his feet. “We can outrun a horse.”

  “I will be taking a spare with me.”

  “We can outrun two horses.” His cadre all grinned agreement.

  Fair Visions could do nothing then except stroll over to the army’s stables to collect the mounts he had picked out yesterday. So began the nightmare.

  His mission had sounded simple. The closer the Bamboo Banner came to Jingyan Province, the worse the earthquake damage it saw. At Spires, part of the city wall had fallen to give the Banner its greatest triumph so far, but much of the city itself had survived. Here, whole villages had collapsed. Bridges were down, roads often impassable, and food had become desperately hard to find. Had Heaven sent a miracle victory, or an impossible roadblock?

  In the baking heat of Lotus Moon, even water was a problem, with most streams fouled by corpses or animal carcasses. Bamboo needed to know what lay ahead. Should the revolution continue northward on a direct line to Heart of the World, or should it detour to east or west? And if so, which?

  Fair Visions rode out at a trot, planning to convince Silent that he must acquire horses, either by going back for them, or otherwise. But Silent convinced Fair Visions. His men did do better than the horses; the horses needed to rest first. Fair Visions called for a break in the early-morning shadows of a ruined toll house, and proceeded to inspect his mounts for foot or saddle troubles. Silent kept his men running on the spot.

  Fair Visions grinned at one of the toughest-looking. “He works you this hard all the time?”

  The man did not answer, just stared at him and kept moving.

  Fair Visions addressed another, with the same result.

  “I beat any man who speaks in my cadre,” Silent explained smugly. “Only women chatter all the time.”

  After that, things just got worse. When Fair Visions pointed out, some hours later, that Silent had set out leading a dozen men and now only had ten, he was told that this was defeatist talk and Silent would kill him if he spoke that way.

  “My blue headband means that I am a member of the Supreme Leader’s Council.”

  “I know, but I will still kill you.”

  By then, Fair Visions almost believed him. The lout’s treatment of his own men was brutal. At the end of a solid day’s running, the cadre came to an inhabited village. Silent promptly had them put on a gymnastic display for the inhabitants. When a crowd gathered, he harangued them about the need to overthrow the she-dragon who had purloined the Golden Throne and brought the wrath of Heaven down on the Good Land. They, of course, could now help by providing food for the visitors. Two men tried to argue and were promptly clubbed down.

  Silent was a sadistic maniac and was doing everything he could to make his men as crazy as himself. They laughed as they competed in brutality to prove to their friends that they were not weak. Any peasant who talked back or failed to show respect was savagely beaten. Recruiting had been suspended because the revolution could barely feed the men it already had, so the villagers who wanted to join were told to organize on their own and await Bamboo’s summons.

  Because he had not undergone the murderous training that other patriots endured and had not been forcibly addicted to yang, Fair Visions might be the only completely sane man in the entire revolutionary horde his uncle had created. During the next few days, he often considered making a break for freedom, and was always deterred by a conviction that Silent would run him down and kill him. Whether or not Silent had been sent along as his jailer, not his guardian, that was certainly how he saw himself.

  After a week, Fair Visions led Silent and his surviving followers back to headquarters to report. Even finding Bamboo was tricky. He had been forced to split the Banner into a dozen armies so it could spread out widely enough to gather sufficient food. Eventually, Fair Visions 3’s men encountered foraging parties and followed their directions back to the source. Now he could see a band of patriots walking along the skyline. He was getting close.

  His way led up a valley of nightmare. The hills themselves had never been fertile enough for farming, but small villages had sprung up along the river itself, and their people had grown rice on the flats and in carefully terraced paddies on the lower slopes. The violence of the earthquake had shattered most of those, destroying the work of centuries, burying houses under mud slides or drowning them in temporary lakes. The road was close to impassable, requiring innumerable detours. Here and there, Fair Visions saw signs that people had begun to rebuild their homes only to be driven away—by hunger, disease, or perhaps just fear of the Bamboo Banner, which was preying on the corpse of the Good Land like some gigantic vulture.

  Bamboo would not be pleased to hear that comparison. Bamboo was a very strange man to be a revolutionary. A mystic and dreamer, yes. Not a soldier, not a scholar. He was fifty-two years old and had been a potter until three or four years ago. He had no children living, so his plans to found a dynasty would require much hard work in the imperial harem when he had won and staffed it. One asset h
e did not appreciate fully was a nephew willing to help with the dynastic part of the job.

  As was his custom, Bamboo had appropriated the best accommodation for his own use. In this case, it was a sprawling ranch complex that had incurred little damage, probably because it was built on rock under the thin upland soil—almost every building sited on a river flat had collapsed. He was holding court in a gazebo whose massive tiled roof was supported at the corners by wooden columns. The columns had shifted on their bases, but they and the roof had moved as a unit and were still intact. Low stone walls between the posts had suffered more, but enough remained to give an impression of privacy. The view was memorable and the cool shade a joy. There were insects. As some teacher must have said, You can have flies without horses, but not horses without flies.

  Seven men sat there. Six were on cushions and Bamboo had a chair, no doubt the grandest that could be found. He was a heavy man, little of him being muscle, with dense eyebrows and a receding hairline. He had massive hands and wrists, but his eyes were what you noticed—the eyes of a man who sees visions and believes them ahead of other people’s reality. How an aging widowed potter could have dreamed up such a madhouse as the Bamboo Banner defied explanation. He was no scholar, yet he could spout astrologers’ jargon when he chose and always seemed to believe what he was saying, no matter how like a singing fish it might sound.

  When not prophesying or commanding, he came across as rather stupid. Only in the last few weeks had he accepted that a would-be Emperor needed advisers, and so he had begun assembling a council. It spent a lot more time listening than advising, and its membership was in constant flux. Disagreeing with the chairman was a life-threatening act.

  Fair Visions stopped at the entrance and waited to be recognized. Of those present, all intent on their leader’s words, he knew White Pine, long past whatever his best had been, but having genuine military experience; Alabaster, who had not revealed his history but was probably a defrocked mandarin on the run from imperial justice; and Bright Shadow, the Bamboo Banner’s quartermaster, a former tea merchant. He and Fair Visions had summed each other up at first glance, and neither would ever trust the other to guard an empty piss pot. The other three were strangers.

  “. . . the Red Eye enters the House of the Scroll,” Bamboo said. “And the Slow One will yet loiter in the House of the Sea Dragon. That means death, of course. Then will be the time to strike! Then Heaven will deliver our foes bound at our feet.”

  Six heads nodded eagerly.

  “Early in the Year of the Firebird, you think, Majesty?” asked White Pine.

  “I know!”

  “Know, of course. Know! We will have to think about warm clothing as we move north.” The old man looked meaningfully at fat, greasy Bright Shadow, who rubbed his fat, greasy hands.

  “Just give them more yang,” Bamboo said. “Patriots do not feel the cold.”

  Fair Visions suppressed a shiver. He had no idea where and how his uncle had acquired the enormous quantities of yang he had used to habituate so many thousand men. Heaven alone knew what would happen when the supply ran out and they all went berserk. The patriots believed they were invincible, but Fair Visions had seen far too many dead ones to believe that. He had no faith that a change of backside on the golden throne would improve anything for anyone except the owner of that anatomy. Any day now, the Imperial Army would appear in their path and slice the Bamboo Banner off the face of the earth like an ugly wart.

  So why was he here? Because even a remote chance of being nephew and heir presumptive to the Son of the Sun was worth a throw, even a gamble as insane as this one.

  He realized that the council was being dismissed and he was being beckoned. He walked forward and bowed low—Bamboo was not demanding the kowtow yet. That would come.

  “You are welcome back, nephew.”

  “It is a joy to be back, thank you, Bamboo.”

  Bamboo gestured for him to sit. Of the others, only old White Pine had remained. Fair Visions was perhaps being encouraged to believe that he was part of an innermost council, but any such assumption would be dangerous until it had been spoken before witnesses. Their leader had not started handing out political titles yet.

  “So what can you tell us, nephew?”

  “You would weep, Bamboo. Disaster everywhere we went. We headed north at first, trying to follow the road to Wedlock, which stands at the junction of the Jade and Golden Rivers. I should say ‘stood’ not ‘stands.’ We did not reach it, but all accounts agree that it received more damage than anywhere. Wedlock itself was swallowed up by the earth. The Golden River flowed backward and by nightfall there was no trace of the old city above water. We were told that the lake continues to grow, but mandarins are warning that it will soon cut through the barrier and return to its lower course with great fury.”

  Fair Visions waited for comment, but Bamboo just sat very still, obsidian eyes never leaving his informer’s face. That was a trick of his, flattering to the speaker and hinting at great wisdom, but there might be nothing at all happening inside that big head.

  “We turned west and everywhere saw disaster, hunger, and, yes, sorrow. There is great anger against the usurping sow in Heart of the World, she who has brought this trouble upon the Good Land. Had we been permitted to recruit, we could have brought you a thousand eager young warriors, all breathing fire. If the weather continues to favor the farmers, some may yet harvest a good crop and fend off starvation, but not all, not everywhere.”

  Still no response.

  “If you do me the honor of wanting my humble opinion, the way northeastward seems closed, for this year and perhaps next year also. To go near Wedlock would be … would seem to my ignorant self to be folly. To pass it on the east means crossing the Golden River. If the predicted flood occurs, it will leave no bridges or boats or shelter, only a desert of mud. Um …” The deluge would be as disastrous as the quake itself. Again Fair Visions wondered if these might be a sign from Heaven that Bamboo Banner should not proceed at all, for had not the Desert Teacher taught that omens, like coins, always had two sides? But even to hint at that might result in Fair Visions being assigned to weapons training, as the target. So the least unfavorable option must be the best. “Bamboo, if you ask me, I would say that you should veer westward, across Jingyan and Shashi. The army may grumble if you give it more horse or sheep flesh than rice, but the hills seem to have suffered less than the plains. This concludes my report.”

  Bamboo nodded and glanced to White Pine.

  The old man smiled, showing a few lonely teeth protruding from shrunken gums. “History tells us of many complaints that have arisen in the south and headed north. The Emperors have always sent their armies south along the Grand Canal, for it is by far the fastest way to come. Then they move inland up the Golden River, to cross the rebels’ path and cut them off. Will Heaven so bless your cause, Noble Bamboo, as to destroy the army with this flood your nephew foresees?”

  “No,” Bamboo said. “I just told you, old man. For your benefit, nephew, since you arrived late, I repeat that I have consulted the stars and I have cast the bones, and they agree in every respect. I have already decreed that we will proceed into Shashi Province. There we will meet the army of the she-dragon and destroy it utterly. There the Portal of Worlds will open to acclaim a new dynasty. So it is written.”

  Crazier than a five-legged camel.

  Chapter 11

  The Firstborn had planned to travel southeastward across Wanrong, roughly paralleling the course of the Golden River, but not going close to it until he reached Wedlock. For several weeks after leaving Lady Cataract’s palace, this is what he did.

  Despite the lady’s grand plans, her expedition did not travel as fast as the Firstborn had done when he rode a donkey and his two disciples walked. Her retinue had swelled from an estimated dozen people to twenty-two, because she needed two teams of bearers for her li
tter and had forgotten to count in a cook, hostlers, and wagon drivers. Unless horses were given many hours a day to graze, they needed huge amounts of grain and hay, which meant more wagons, and wagons needed guards.

  Shard Gingko expected the Firstborn to grow impatient at their lack of progress, but he did not seem to mind. The old man was reluctant to complain to the Firstborn, but one evening, as he was watching the servants pitching camp, he grumbled to Mouse that they had achieved nothing since morning except cross a single wide valley. Mouse looked down at him with a gentle smile obviously modeled on the Firstborn’s. Even when Shard stood as straight as he could, Mouse was the taller now.

  “There is plenty of time, Master.”

  “There is? Time for what?”

  “Time for him to reach the Portal of Worlds before it opens.”

  Shard felt a jolt of what he ashamedly decided might be nothing more than jealousy. “The Urfather has told you this is what he plans?”

  Mouse shook his head and looked puzzled. “No. No, he hasn’t. But somehow I feel sure that this is what he plans. He expects to meet the Bamboo Banner at the Portal of Worlds.”

  “The Desert Teacher said, Knowledge not based on learning is built upon quicksand.”

  “I thank you for this wisdom, Master.”

  “Can you write it?”

  “All except quicksand, Master.”

  “The character for quicksand is water followed by sand. Write out that maxim in your fairest hand and show me.”

  The following day, as the cavalcade approached a village, four men came out to meet them, three carrying clubs and one an ancient musket. They lined up across the road, obviously hostile. The Firstborn slid off his horse, handed the reins up to Mouse on his, and hobbled forward to speak with them. They recognized him. One knelt, but the others stood their ground, looking uneasy. By then, Shard had also dismounted and caught up.