by Van Hoang
Fly on the back of a dragon? For a moment, she was tempted. Or maybe she could reach out, just to touch his feathers, to see if a dragon was really there.
“The Monkey King promised to make me normal,” she said. “It’s what I want.”
Kha peered at her through the eye on the right side of his face. “You’ll never be normal, Thom.”
Her throat ached, like she’d been punched there. The Monkey King hissed, baring his teeth.
“And you call yourself a guardian?” He flew away, but Kha followed. “Leave us alone, snake!”
“Thom,” Kha shouted, but the Monkey King flew faster, so fast that she couldn’t hear whatever else Kha said over the roar of the wind. Her eyes watered until she couldn’t see him anymore. She buried her face in the Monkey King’s neck and hung on.
23
THE GATE OF THE HEAVENS was not a gate, but a temple, its red roof curving and sharpening into points that pierced the plush white clouds. The building was decorated in gold carvings that pulsed with light. Thom stood next to the Monkey King, her heart pounding. This was it. The Gate. A way into paradise. A heavy building that sat on a field of white mist, floating impossibly in the sky.
It was bigger than her school, from what she could see. The entrance itself was ten times the size of the school’s entrance, the doors red and smooth.
“This is what you’re going to do,” the Monkey King said, pulling her into a puff of clouds.
That was another thing. They were walking on clouds.
At first, when the Monkey King had set her down, she’d clung on, refusing to let go. She was sure she would sink right through. He could fly—but she would fall to her death. But he made her let go, and to her surprise, her feet had found solidness beneath the mist. It was soft, sort of like stepping on sand, her foot sinking into it, but it held.
“You will go through those doors and meet with the Gatekeeper, Xuan-Ling. Tell him you are a Lotus Student, freshly appointed, and that you must speak to the Lotus Master.”
In her imagination, Thom had seen herself sneaking in and out of a building—an armory—taking the Monkey King’s cudgel, and sneaking back out. She hadn’t realized she’d have to talk to people, to lie. She’d never been good at lying, especially to grown-ups. Especially not elders—she couldn’t disobey them. The thought made her mouth dry.
“Then once he brings you to the Academy, you get your robes and go to the Jade Palace, and find the armory. It’s in the basement, three floors down—”
“But where is the Jade Palace?”
He giggled. “It’s the tallest temple on the highest cloud. Trust me, you will know it when you see it.”
The plan seemed more complicated the more she pictured herself going through the steps. People would notice her—they always stared. They would stop her, question everything.
“Won’t they ask why I’m going to the armory?”
“If anyone stops you, tell them you’re on an errand for the Lotus Master. They’re all afraid of him.”
“Why?” If everyone was afraid of the Lotus Master, then Thom certainly should be.
He waved a hand. “He’s nothing but an old man—don’t worry about him. Listen. Basement of the Jade Palace, the armory. You will sneak in, find my cudgel, and get back out. But remember, the staff is very heavy.”
“Seventeen thousand pounds.” She nodded, then stopped. “You’re the only one who can wield it because it’s so heavy.”
“You are strong enough to carry it. Don’t worry. You picked up a truck, and it’s … almost as heavy as the cudgel. I know you can do this.”
Thom wasn’t as sure, though. The whole scheme was much more complicated than she’d imagined. She’d thought it would have been like sneaking candy out from a store, not Ocean’s Eleven–level thievery. “How big is the staff? In the legends, in your … stories … sometimes it’s as tall as a building and sometimes it’s as small as a pin.”
“I don’t remember.”
“Don’t remember? This is important. How am I supposed to carry it out if it’s bigger than me?”
“It’ll be the same weight no matter what size it is.”
“Wukong.”
“I don’t remember, all right? I don’t know anything about why I was in that temple or who took my staff from me.”
Thom narrowed her eyes. “I don’t like this plan. I want to go home.”
“No, no—listen.” The desperation in his voice surprised them both. Desperate was not a word that could be used to describe the Monkey King. He was calm, cool, collected, full of giggles and tricks. He cleared his throat, blinked rapidly, and manipulated his expression into its usual carefree mischievousness. “You want me to take your power away, don’t you? Make you normal?”
Yes, more than anything, she wanted that, and the fact that she could have it, so close if only she could do this one small thing, made her dizzy. She nodded.
“Then you’ll have to get my cudgel.”
She took several deep breaths, but that still wasn’t enough to calm her nerves. She couldn’t go home yet. The Gate was right there. The heavens … somewhere beyond. And the idea of seeing it all, seeing immortals and fairies and the Jade Palace …
“I’ll tell you a secret,” the Monkey King said in a whisper even though they were the only ones in a sea of clouds. “Something no one knows. Not my brothers. Not Shing-Rhe. Not even Concao, my closest friend.”
A thrill ran through her. The Monkey King trusted her enough to tell her something no one else knew. “What is it?”
He beckoned for her to lean closer. “The cudgel is not that difficult to control. All you have to do is ask it to change sizes, and it will.”
Whatever she’d been expecting him to say, that wasn’t it. “Ask it? Like a spell, you mean. Like in Harry Potter?”
“No, not a spell. Just ask it, like you would an old friend. Its name is Ruyi Jingu Bang.”
“It has a name?”
“Of course it does. All magical things do. But no one remembers, which is why it doesn’t listen to anyone but me. And you, now that you know its secret.” He paused, his brown eyes warm and sincere. “You’ll keep my secret, won’t you?”
Thom had spent enough time with the Monkey King by now that she was starting to be able to distinguish between moments when he was being honest and when he was playing games. There was something in his eyes—that twinkle when he was his usual playful self, and a deep earnestness when he was being genuine, a depth like you could drown yourself in the darkness of his pupils.
She trusted him.
Kind of.
No, of course she trusted him. He was her friend; he had taught her to control her power—or tried to anyway—and now he understood why she didn’t want it. He was the only one willing to help her, the only one who could help her.
“You must promise, Thom.”
“Okay, yeah, I promise to keep your secret.”
“And you’ll go?” His eyes were like puppy eyes, turned down at the corners, a little wet and shiny with tears. A monkeyish sound echoed from his throat, like a whimper. Begging.
Thom took a deep breath. She turned toward the Gate.
“Wait,” he said. Then he plucked out a hair from the top of his head and held it out to her. “For luck.”
* * *
She leaned back to look up at the Gate, which was at least fifty feet tall, its red surface engraved with gold etchings. No handles jutted out from the surface; there was no obvious place to knock or get in. She glanced around her, but the Monkey King was gone, or at least, not visible. Since he wasn’t allowed in the heavens, he probably couldn’t even go near the Gate.
Thom raised a hand to the Gate and pressed her palm against the glistening surface. It was warm, and to her surprise, it shifted as soon as she touched it. There was no shudder, just a silent movement, a swirl of mist as the Gate moved inward, across the cloud where the temple sat.
Mist clouded her vision. She should have been
scared, not being able to see what was inside, but all she felt was a sort of nervousness, and not even the bad kind, but like the kind she’d had right before she’d stepped through the entrance of Splash Mountain. Excitement.
She crossed the giant threshold. The fog swallowed her. Beneath her, the ground solidified. She no longer walked on clouds but on marble, and yet her footsteps were silent. When she stomped her foot to see if it would make a sound, the surface swallowed the noise.
She walked. And walked and walked. How much time had gone by? How far had she gone?
Thom stopped, and her mind cleared. She blinked and shook her head, trying to see through the mist. Objects, faint outlines of statues on pedestals, pillars of gold marble. At one end, an archway.
She started toward it, but the clouds moved in, the fog swirling until her head was thick with it, like she’d breathed in poison.
“Hello?” she called out. If this was the Gate of the Heavens, shouldn’t there be guards? The Monkey King had said there’d be a Gatekeeper. “Is anyone there? Guards?” She lowered her voice back to normal. “Immortals? Monsters?”
“There are no monsters here.”
Thom jumped, spinning around and around and throwing up her hands defensively, automatically. Nothing but mist. The voice sounded like several men had spoken at the same time.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“It is more important that I ask you that question. You are, after all, the intruder here.”
Thom stopped spinning, stopped trying to look for him—them. The mist made her dizzy; trying to see through it made it worse. “My name is Thom Ngho and I … I’m a Lotus Student.” What else had the Monkey King said? “I need to … to see the Lotus Master.”
The voice didn’t respond for so long Thom thought whoever it belonged to had abandoned her.
Then the mist cleared, enough so she could make out a long hallway, the archway she’d seen before at the end of it, and a tall figure walking toward her.
It was a soldier, armored from head to toe in gold and purple plating—royal colors. On his head was a funny-looking helmet, not really a hat but a round black knob that perched on the crown of his head, with long feathers sprouting from it, swaying like a peacock.
“A Lotus Student?” His voice no longer sounded like several people at once, but she knew it had been him. “You?” He looked her up and down and walked around her. Thom started to turn back, but he tsked, so she stayed still, subjecting herself to his inspection. Whatever he saw must have been extremely disappointing, judging from the scrunch of his nose.
“Please.” She tried to sound polite, not desperate. “Can you take me to the Lotus Academy?” Find some robes, the Monkey King had said. Pretend to be a student. Sneak into the Jade Palace. Find the armory, steal the staff, and hightail it out of there. Easy.
She could do it. Step one, trick the Gatekeeper.
“It is not my job to take you anywhere except through the Judgment Veil, and to banish you should your soul be deemed unworthy of entering the heavens.”
What on earth did that mean? The Monkey King hadn’t said anything about a Judgment Veil.
“Follow.” He turned toward the archway. Everywhere he stepped, the mist cleared and closed in behind him. When he became a faint outline, Thom lurched forward, jogging to catch up.
“Whoa,” she breathed when they stopped before the archway. It was a work of pure, solid white gold, with flowers etched into the surface and words written in ancient characters she didn’t understand.
In the archway itself, the fog grew thicker and shimmered with some sort of magic. Colors danced on the surface of tiny water droplets, but she could see it only if she unfocused her eyes or turned slightly away.
“This is the Judgment Veil,” the Gatekeeper said. “You will pass through it, and if you are found worthy, you will enter the heavens.”
“And if I’m not?”
“You will be sent to the hells,” he answered in an annoyed tone, as if the answer were obvious.
Thom’s eyes widened. The Monkey King had said nothing about that. Her palms were sweating. She couldn’t go to the hells. For one thing, she was still alive, and for another, Ma would kill her. She still had to graduate from middle school and high school, take the SATs, and become a doctor, lawyer, or engineer. Her whole life was ahead of her.
She took a step back, but the Gatekeeper stood behind her, and his face, while mostly unreadable, let her know that it was too late now. If she ran, he would catch her and figure out that she was up to something.
“Go,” he said.
She stepped forward. Was she worthy of entering the heavens? Was her soul pure enough? It was like the days before Christmas all over again, her mom taunting her with the question of whether she’d been naughty or nice, even though they both knew Thom was just going to get a bunch of socks and lots of books.
Was she good enough to enter the heavens? What did that even mean anyway? Good enough.
And then she was under the Veil.
A cold but gentle cascade of water splashed over her. Each particle of magic dusted over her skin like droplets of rain rolling down a glass window.
It wasn’t unpleasant, but her breath caught, and she gasped for air. In first grade, before she’d developed her strength, she’d been punched in the stomach by a mean boy—and this felt something like that. Not pain but absence: an absence of air, of life, of thought, until her entire body was focused on being awake, on being here, on being, on not not-being, on staying, staying, please let her stay—
And then air filled her lungs, and the sensation was gone. She fell to her knees, sinking into the mist.
“You,” a voice said, making her jump. The mist had cleared, and Kha stood over her, in human form, nostrils flaring. “Are in so much trouble.”
24
“I NEED TO GO TO the Lotus Academy,” she said, getting to her feet. “Can you show me the way?”
Kha’s mouth opened. He had trouble finding a response, and Thom didn’t blame him. She was surprised by her own brazenness, but she didn’t have much time. She didn’t know how long she had in the heavens—a day, maybe two.
“If you think for one second,” he said, “that I’m going to help the Monkey King—”
“You’re not helping him. You’re helping me.”
“No. No way. You’re coming with me.” He grabbed her hand, but she yanked free, sending him bouncing across the fluffy cloud.
“Oh, oops, sorry!” Thom said, scrambling to help him up.
But just as she reached out to him, he started to change shape. His skin took on a shimmer, the same glow she’d mistaken for makeup before, spreading over his cheeks, down his neck, and along his hands. His body stretched, his legs elongating and merging into one serpentine limb, his mouth forming a snout with long blue whiskers, and his skin turning into shiny scales all along his body. Fully grown in his dragon form, his body twice as thick as before, stretching at least ten feet long. Light reflected off his scales, which were white at first glance, but shimmered like mother-of-pearl as he moved closer. Thom was so transfixed by his beauty that she didn’t realize he was wrapping his serpentine body around her like a snake around a mouse.
“What are you doing?” she demanded. Heat blossomed over her torso, where he touched her. Sweat broke across her nose.
“I’m taking you to my father. He’ll know what to do.”
“No.” She nudged at his coils, but he was stronger as a dragon than she’d expected, and the multiple layers of muscle formed a wall that was closing in, tighter and tighter. “No … Kha … stop … I … don’t have time for this.”
He didn’t stop until he was wrapped around her in a snug fit.
“Let me go before I really hurt you,” she warned.
He huffed, smoke trailing out of his nose. “You’re strong, but you’re not fireproof.”
Her skin was now so hot it felt like she was developing a fever.
Something caugh
t her eye in the distance. At first, she couldn’t make out the shapes until they came closer. Soldiers, some on foot and some on the backs of flying horses the size of elephants.
Were these the horses the Monkey King had been put in charge of? They were huge! The sun reflected off their jade helmets and golden saddles as they galloped in the air, heading straight for her and Kha.
Kha saw them, too, and swept toward them, dragging Thom within his coils.
She panicked and shoved harder at him, and this time, he winced, unwinding just a little. She sucked in a breath and, with enough space now, kicked. Kha cried out and uncoiled entirely, and she used the moment to drag herself out of his grip.
And straight off the cloud.
Someone was screaming. It was her. She flailed her arms, as if that would stop her fall. Above her, sky. Below her, endless mist.
“Why are you screaming?” Kha’s voice cut in.
“I’m falling!”
“No, you’re not.”
She looked over her shoulder, to prove her point, and discovered that he was right. He peered at her from the cloud she’d just fallen off, which was actually right above her still.
She was floating. “Why aren’t I falling?”
“This is the heavens. That’s not a thing here.”
“So I can…” Thom did an awkward frog kick and glided forward, sort of like swimming. “I can fly,” she said. She looked up and saw the Jade Palace, covered in jewels, the tallest building on the highest cloud. A glow appeared around the palace, as if its jewels were illuminated from the inside. If she could just make it up there.
“Oh, no, you don’t.” Kha zipped toward her so fast she reacted out of instinct and swung her fist, hitting him in the side of his dragon head.
“Ouch!” she shrieked, shaking out her scalded hand. His scales were burning hot, like a car door handle that had been parked all day in the sun. He jerked to the side, blinking slowly. She used the moment to swim-fly away and found that when she focused on an object in the distance, she seemed to go faster. But the Jade Soldiers were getting closer, and it was only a matter of time before Kha caught up with her.
