by CK Dawn
Around her, the Ankiran refugees broke out into laughter.
One woman clapped her hands. “She is hungry!”
“Your…Excellency, you can’t afford to feed her,” one of the men said.
Prince Hardeep laughed. “Not with what is left in the national treasury, no.”
I paused on a bite. Ankira was bankrupted because of Cathay’s avarice, which I put on full display now. Perhaps my dress was paid for on the backs of the Ankirans.
He placed a hand between my shoulder blades. “The way you are eating, you might deplete your own country’s treasury.”
Blood burned in my cheeks.
“A song!” Hardeep rose from his seat and beckoned one of the middle-aged men. “Bring me a sitar.”
The man disappeared into one of the houses and brought out what resembled a long lute with a bulbous resonator. It had so many strings, including several that did not seem reachable by the player. Hardeep received it in two hands.
Beaming, he started picking at the strings. The sitar whined in high-pitched shifts, with the lower strings echoing the main refrain with harmonic resonance. Some of the other men began beating on the table with their hands as the pace picked up, bobbing their heads to the rhythm.
Upbeat, the song spoke to my soul, and it was all I could do to keep from standing and dancing.
“The drumming refrain is called a tala,” one woman told me.
Blue eyes locked on mine, Hardeep began to sing. His low voice, rich like the chai, sent my belly fluttering in a storm of butterflies.
Ankira, my home.
Land of rich soil and verdant valleys,
Home of the gods on earth.
Warmth of the heart
My heart yearns for my homeland.
The others joined in, their voices rising as one. The resonance surged inside of me, coiling just as it had in the Hall of Pure Melody. Prince Hardeep flashed a smile, beckoning me to join in.
I dropped my gaze to the street, shaking my head. The sentiment, I understood, and yet, it was my country that helped oppress his. How could I let my voice meld with theirs?
Their song came to a slow, melancholy end, and the sitar trailed off into a somber hum. These people missed their homeland, wanted to return, wanted to be free.
Hardeep sighed. “It is getting late. We must get you back before anyone realizes you are gone.”
The power of music, flourishing in me as the Ankirans had sung, still spiraled throughout my core. It tingled in my fingers and toes, and I aligned my body. “No. Let’s test out the lute.”
“No,” Hardeep said. “No, I have already caused you too much trouble.”
“I want to. For you. For your people.” I studied my feet. “For myself.”
His eyes searched mine, rocking back and forth in mesmerizing sweeps. “Are you sure? Please, don’t feel obligated just because a bunch of old men sang for you.”
I nodded with heartfelt passion. “Yes. Yes. It is in my power to do so, and I shall.”
Prince Hardeep looked from me to his people. “Her voice holds the key to our salvation!”
The men and women broke into a cheer, a genuine appreciation that no one in the court had ever shown me.
Beaming, Hardeep took my hand. “Let’s go. Somewhere acoustically perfect.”
Heat mingling into the echo of the song, I rose. Thanks to the trip the archives, I knew just the place. “The Temple of Heaven.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure?”
Was I? To enter the sacred grounds without a blessing from its priests invited a death sentence. I searched his eyes again.
Yes. Better to die than to give up on the magic of Dragon Songs when I was so close. I took his hand and nodded.
The Ankirans all pressed their hands together and bowed their heads as Hardeep led me down a street. Headed south, according to iridescent moon’s position.
After a few blocks, he stopped. His head swept from left to right and back, pausing at an empty wooden produce stand outside a shuttered green grocer.
“What is it?” Hand on my dagger, I peered through the dark at the stand.
He pulled me closer. “Our friends from before. They must have tracked us back here.” He stomped a foot on the street, sending vibrations rippling out. After a second, he said, “Only two this time, one behind the stand, and one there.” He twisted behind me and swept a sword out of its scabbard. Wood shattered with a loud crack.
He spun around to my front. Metal clinked against sword, and then clattered on the ground. The dark outline was shaped like a star. I squatted down to pick it up. Pain bit into my fingers as a sharp edge cut me.
“Stay down,” Hardeep said. His blade whizzed, again cutting projectiles out of the air with clanks and thuds. As he moved, the silk bag containing the Dragon Scale Lute slipped from his shoulders. It hit the ground with a discordant groan, like the keen of a murderous beast in its death throes.
The villains stared at the bag, wide-eyed.
Fear crawled up my spine. I shuddered at the sound. Though if it did that to me, if it scared a dragon away, maybe… I reached for the bag and fumbled with the drawstrings. Pain bit where the star had cut my thumb. Still, I managed to fish the lute out.
I rose from my low squat to a level horse stance, similar to the one Doctor Wu taught for breathing exercises. Thighs parallel to the ground, spine straight, I cradled the lute and plucked one of the treble strings.
A sound like a widow mourning her dead husband wailed from the lute, twisting in my core and then resonating into my limbs. Unlike my first attempt, it was louder. The barrage of attacks stopped and the two large men in the shadows lowered their weapons.
I strummed across all the strings. The dissonance of high and low pitches must have sounded like the chorus of souls tormented by Yanluo in the pits of hell. The would-be assassins dropped their weapons. One’s crossbow crashed onto the pavestones, sending a loaded bolt soaring toward us.
With a low mutter, Hardeep jerked back, his hip jarring into my head and knocking me back.
Pain flared in my temples and white flashed in my field of vision. Just when the alcohol had begun to clear. I blinked away the cobwebs.
Hardeep knelt beside me, his brows furrowed. “Are you all right?”
Was I? My head ached, my thumb stung. My chest hurt from the lute’s echo in my heart. I gawked at the thin line of blood on my thumb.
Tearing a strip of cloth from his shirt, he wrapped the wound. Tight and firm. He helped me to my feet with a chuckle. “You must be lucky, to survive two attacks with just a small cut on your thumb.”
It didn’t seem lucky, nor a laughing matter. I pouted.
His smile flattened. He turned to the side and pointed. “We are here.”
Already? And where had our attackers gone? I looked at him, and then followed his gesture. An eight-tiered stupa, its colors indistinct in the night, towered above white stone walls. Two soldiers in ceremonial robes and breastplates flanked the metal gates.
There was only one place in Huajing like this: the Temple of Heaven, which housed a chunk from a fallen star, brought to Cathay by the Wang Dynasty Founder at the bidding of the gods. And if the story from the geomancy book we’d found in the archives was true, it was built over the spot where the elf angel Aralas revealed himself to Yanyan, the mother of musical magic.
My pulse quickened. There was one last chance to leave before risking a capital offense.
Twelve
Foreboding Melodies
Whether the low buzz was in my head, echoed in the Dragon Scale Lute’s strings, or emanated from the Temple of Heaven, I couldn’t tell. My spatial relations and sense of direction must have sunk to the bottom of Sun-Moon Lake. We couldn’t have possibly reached the Temple of Heaven, in Huajing’s south.
Maybe Kai-Long and I had ridden in the palanquin farther than I thought; or Hardeep and I had just run a lot faster and longer than my drunken, jarred brain could register. I shook my head i
n hopes a clear thought would surface. No such luck, and no point in sounding like a fool.
Still, an inner voice that sounded suspiciously like my brother’s soon-to-be bride reminded me: entry into the sacred grounds without a blessing was far worse than wandering the palace without permission or gallivanting through the city. It invited a death sentence. For Hardeep. Maybe even for me.
I edged back a step and studied my prince.
Staring at the Temple of Heaven’s eight-tiered stupa tower, his head bobbed in a rhythmic beat, as if listening to a song in his head.
He was so brave. My heart swelled in my chest. I could be the same. The chance to save an embattled nation and revive a lost art was worth risking death. With one hand on Tian’s pebble, I pointed at the walls. “How do we get past the guards?”
Prince Hardeep flashed a conspiratorial smile. “We’ll climb over the walls.”
I covered my mouth. He’d probably never worn a dress. Not to mention, “Patrols walk around the perimeter at regular intervals. It will be impossible to get over the walls without being seen.”
His eyes strayed to the lute, still in my hands.
How could he even suggest it? Using it on thugs was one thing, but on loyal soldiers… Shaking my head, I thrust the instrument into its bag and offered it to him.
A hint of a frown formed on his lips. “All right, I have an idea.”
“What?”
“Trust me.” He grinned. “Everything has worked so far.”
Getting ambushed twice didn’t seem to be part of any successful endeavor. Still, we’d gotten out of it with little more than a cut on my thumb. Not to mention I’d escaped the palace, itself a difficult proposition. “All right.”
With his always-charming smile, he squeezed my hand and crept toward the Temple of Heaven’s walls. As I’d told him, guards in ceremonial breastplates and armed with broadswords circled the perimeter, always within line of sight of each other.
Again, he mumbled under his breath in sounds so foul, they could only be a curse. Not like I hadn’t warned him.
Serendipitously, both guards stopped in place and turned away from us. Had they heard something?
Hardeep tugged me forward to the wall. At the base, he cupped his hands together. “Your foot,” he mouthed.
I stared at his hands, forming a makeshift stirrup. How unladylike. An unexpected grin tugged at my lips. It was like being a child with Tian again, far more fun than having tea with a dumpy general who only wanted me for a trophy.
I stepped into his hands, and he lifted me up, all the way to his shoulders. At that height, my hands just barely reached the top. Head spinning, I hopped and pushed my weight up to perch on the wall. Skirts and propriety be damned, I swung a leg over.
Below, the stone wall circled in an ellipse, with the stupa sitting on a three-tiered white marble base at one focus. An identical base stood at the other focus, with walls partially formed by dragon bones. Brittle leaves scattered across the empty grounds, unswept since Father’s visit during the last Spring Festival.
“Your hand!” Hardeep hissed from the outside.
Right, Hardeep. Shaking my foggy head, I leaned back and extended a hand.
Hardeep backed up, and then bolted into a quick run and jump. He caught my hand, his weight nearly dragging me back down to the ground. Luckily, his other hand slapped up on top of the wall. Leaning back, I pulled him to the top. The yanking burned my arm and shoulder muscles. Heavens, he was heavier than he appeared. Down below, the guard was just then looking forward again.
Safe! Hopefully, our run of luck tonight would continue. I swung my other leg over and shimmied down to the marble ground. Hardeep leaped down after me, landing with nary a sound.
“Now what?” I scanned the compound, which I’d never seen from the inside. In just a few days, on the New Year, Father would come here for his annual prayers to the gods. How beautiful his voice always sounded, audible from almost anywhere in the city.
Hardeep pressed up against the wall. “Any guards? Priests?”
“No, the temple remains empty until just a day or so before the New Year, when priests from the Jianguo Shrine sweep it and prepare for the Emperor’s visit.”
“Well, then.” Walking toward the marble base at the near focus, he unshouldered the silk brocade bag and opened it. “According to your archives, this is where Aralas revealed himself to Yanyan.”
I nodded, but, in retrospect, coming here just because of a chance meeting a thousand years before didn’t make as much sense now as it had earlier in the day. So the elf angel had met the mother of Dragon Songs here. It wasn’t as if he’d taught her here…unless he had? “Now what?”
Up a few steps, we arrived at the top of the base’s three tiers. Hardeep stepped in the direct center and closed his eyes. “Our legends say Aralas met his Ayuri lover Vanya on Shakti’s Hill in what is now Palimur City. It was there that martial magic flared in her.” He offered the lute.
I received it in two hands. “Our magic calligraphers, painters, and other artisans do not have to visit holy sites to gain their power. It just takes dedicated practice over many years.”
“I see.” He scanned the surroundings, his gaze pausing briefly at the top of the stupa. “There is something special about this place. Perhaps if you played, we might discover something?”
I shrugged. We had nothing to lose, except maybe some sleep from the haunting melody of the lute.
He scooted off the center spot and gestured to it with an open hand. “A beautiful performer like you will need a stage.”
Beaming at his compliment, I stepped onto it. The ever-present hum echoed louder in my ears.
“Don’t let any other sound distract you,” he said. “Concentrate only on the lute. Maybe try that posture from before.”
I lowered myself into a horse stance and gripped the marble with my toes, then looked up at him expectantly. “I don’t know the sounds this instrument makes.”
“You are so talented, I’m sure you will figure it out quickly.” He tapped his chin with a finger, again invoking the image of my childhood friend, Tian. So cute. And reassuring. “Now, where in this compound does the Emperor go to say his annual prayers?”
With an open hand, I gestured toward the stupa.
“I am going to take a look. From the shape of the ellipse, I would wager the sound is strongest there.”
Inside the stupa was sacred territory, where the fallen star was kept. Only a select few were ever allowed to visit. If a foreigner entered, there was no telling what would happen. Perhaps another Hellstorm. I shook my head. “You mustn’t.”
He searched my eyes. His gaze was mesmerizing in the way it seemed to explore my soul. So beautiful!
But no, we’d done too many things I shouldn’t have today, culminating in the chance at a death sentence, and this would be a monumental mistake. The consequences would be borne not by me, but perhaps the entire nation. I broke eye contact and stared at the ground.
“Very well,” he said. “I do want to get closer and admire the architecture. I promise I won’t enter.” His smile was reassuring. Of course he wouldn’t do something against my wishes; he had yielded to my will time and time again.
Or would he? We’d already committed capital crimes. As he walked across the compound, I tentatively tried a string while pressing a fret. Though I kept the pluck light, its eerie moan came out loud. Even Hardeep turned his head, his irises reflecting the blue Eye of Guanyin in the heavens above.
Several more plucks reverberated louder than they should, given the amount of force I used. The descending heptatonic scales all made logical sense, and even if each note seemed to evoke the feeling of an emperor’s betrayal, a queen’s execution, or the outbreak of a plague, the sound was tonally perfect and frighteningly beautiful. No wonder that in the hands of an elf, it could compel a dragon to flee.
I experimented with chords and descending scales. Confident I could play, I increased the force of my plu
cks and strums, improvising an Arkothi marching song I’d once heard. The vibrations fluttered and twirled in my core, spreading through my arms and legs.
Outside the walls, dogs howled and birds cawed. I picked up the tempo, weaving bass and treble notes into a web of harmony. My entire body tingled, my insides wriggling like the Guardian Dragon of Cathay chasing after his Flaming Pearl. The power from earlier in the day, which had felt like an ocean dripping from a hole in a wall when I played Yanyan’s pipa, now trickled through me.
If Yanyan’s pipa made me feel beautiful, the Dragon Scale Lute transformed me into the embodiment of might and power. What would Hardeep think? I looked up.
He stood, pressing his back against the doors to the stupa, his expression one of awe…or perhaps, like me, exultation? We were here, together. He’d brought me and the lute. Without him, this feeling wouldn’t now be resonating in my chest, urging me to sing.
Behind me, the gates to the temple grounds rattled. From my music? Or maybe someone trying to get in? I started to turn my head.
Don’t look back! Hardeep mouthed, or maybe spoke. No matter how, his message rang clear. The power is within you! Sing!
Yes, sing! No, someone was there, ready to expose this latest, worst transgression. Some of my fingers sped up while others slowed. The lute’s song wobbled into a staccato, along with the vibrations inside me. My heart thumped at irregular beats. The crushing pain felt as if a phoenix from the imperial aviary sat on my chest.
Everything blurred, bleeding into greys and blacks until darkness and silence overtook my senses.
Thirteen
Aftermath
Metal tinkled and chimed as my head bobbled on a cold, hard floor. My body lurched. Something dug into the back of my head, over and over again. My hairpins.
“Your Highness,” a female voice called. “Wake up.”
A jolt of pain flared in the divot under my nose. My eyes fluttered open. Above me, the star-studded night sky came into focus as I blinked.
Luminous blue eyes encroached into my field of vision. Hardeep…no, a woman. Barely-visible lines of wisdom framed a familiar, matronly face. Pulled up into a tight, austere coil, her long silver hair seemed to have a faint bluish tinge to it, perhaps reflected from her eyes.
