by Kylie Chan
Simone took a running leap and dived straight over the spa into the pool. She travelled underwater to the far end, kicked off without surfacing and swam underwater back to us. She surfaced, floated out of the pool, dried her clothes and landed lightly on the polished timber floor. She took a deep breath. ‘Okay, where are our bedrooms?’
The Phoenix gestured down a corridor. ‘Your bedroom is this way, miss.’
Simone gasped when she saw the room. It had its own pavilion, with a king-sized bed covered in plush cushions, floor-to-ceiling glass on three sides, and high courtyard walls two metres from the glass to give the room privacy. The entire area was surrounded by a blue wading pool, the water only half a metre deep; a pair of plastic chairs sat in the pool on either side of a table holding a decorative flower arrangement. Simone appeared to be contemplating diving into this water as well, then changed her mind. She turned back to the Phoenix. ‘Is this because your family stays here?’
The Phoenix nodded. ‘They can’t set fire to the neighbourhood when they’re surrounded by water like this.’
‘Good idea, I suppose,’ Simone said.
The bathroom was larger than the bedroom, with a door leading to a spa-sized outside bath.
A kind-faced man in the all-white of house staff appeared and clasped his hands in the Thai greeting.
‘This is Kwan,’ the Phoenix said. ‘He is your personal staff here. He will cook your breakfast to your liking. If you want a massage, just tell him.’ She gestured towards Kwan and he gave Simone a mobile phone. ‘Press redial and he’ll be here for you. There are a couple of bikes out the front for transport, and the beach is about five minutes down that way,’ she said, pointing. ‘The resort has several restaurants, and it’s part of a multi-resort complex as well. If you like, Kwan will take you in the boat across the lagoon to eat at the other hotels in the complex. If you want to go shopping or anything, Patong Beach is about twenty minutes away.’ She spread her arms and the red silk of her outfit shimmered. ‘Enjoy.’
Simone threw herself into the Phoenix’s arms and hugged her. ‘Thanks, Auntie Zhu.’ She pulled back and greeted the Phoenix the Thai way. ‘And sawatdee.’
‘Take some time to settle in,’ the Phoenix said. She turned to me. ‘Emma, a quick word before I leave you to it?’
I followed her back to the villa’s main area. ‘Just a word of caution,’ she said. ‘This is a tourist place in one of the world’s poorer nations. We do have some difficulty with maintenance of the resort as trained and capable technicians are hard to find. There is crime here, also some underworld activity. I do not interfere — it is not my place as a Celestial unless demons are involved — but be aware that there is a criminal element and they will try to rip you off if you go into town.’
She saw my face and smiled. ‘It’s not that bad. You and Simone can go into Patong and have a wonderful time and not realise any of it exists. It is a pain in the neck for me, however. Just avoid the bars — not that I think I need to tell you this — and be aware of pickpockets, thieves and rip-off artists who will see you as wealthy tourists and try to take advantage of you. Take Kwan with you; he is a senior member of my demon staff and well-known around town.’
‘Thanks, Phoenix,’ I said. ‘Um … you’ve shown us Simone’s bedroom; what about Leo and me?’
‘One of you will have to sleep on the daybed in the living room, it converts into a third bedroom. The other can take the second floating bedroom, identical to Simone’s, on the other side of the villa.’
‘By precedence rules, the Immortal Lord Leo should take the other bedroom,’ I said.
‘Yes, and good luck trying to make him,’ the Phoenix said. She nodded to Kwan. ‘Make it so.’
Kwan nodded and headed towards the living room area.
She raised her voice and called to Simone. ‘I’m coming back tomorrow and you and I are going to spar, young lady. I want to see how you’ve progressed.’
‘We’re going to the spa? Can I have a manicure and pedicure?’ Simone called back.
‘No, spar! With weapons!’
Simone poked her head around the wall. ‘I know, I heard you,’ she said cheekily. ‘But afterwards book me into the spa, I want everything.’
‘You are spoilt,’ I said.
She threw her arms up in the air and jumped. ‘I know, and I love it!’ She ran back into her bedroom.
‘There are DVDs, books and games in the central atrium,’ the Phoenix said. ‘Kwan will take good care of you; he’s probably lighting the incense and essential oils right now.’ She shrugged. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’
I sighed and looked around. ‘I think this is exactly what Simone needs — some time away from everything, with a large amount of water around her.’ I took the Phoenix’s hand. ‘Thanks, Zhu Que.’
She nodded. ‘You are most welcome.’ She disappeared.
The next morning I found Simone asleep in the bottom of her wading pool still in her pyjamas. Kwan came and made breakfast for us, leaving Simone’s under a serving cover. She slept until lunchtime, shaded from the sun by the courtyard walls.
Leo spent most of the morning doing physical therapy in the pool, trying to make his legs work without using his Celestial skills. In the end he gave up, pulled himself into the spa, turned it on and dozed in the warm bubbles.
Michael had stored the records we’d accessed in the Archives on five or six DVDs and I spent the morning running through them on my laptop, looking for something about my nature. The Archivist had also given me a login and password for the Archive reserves, and I occasionally followed a lead into the main library only to reach a dead end. There was absolutely nothing about the first European settlers in Australia. On Australia itself there was minimal information. There were a few minor mentions of Rainbow Serpents as holding similar characteristics to dragons with their weather and water skills, and some vague references to spirits that existed in the south. I’d learnt more about traditional Australian mythology in primary school. The Asian Shen seemed completely uninterested in the activities of Shen in the other Corners of the World, and it was disturbing to think about the demons making hybrids from the different Centres without the Shen doing much to stop them.
I cross-indexed the town that I had recurring dreams about: it sat on top of a hill, had traditional European-style, thatch-roofed cottages surrounded by low stone walls, hedges and flowering gardens; the other hills around it were steep and the valleys below it were invisible. The landscape reminded me of Wudang Mountain, but the curves were much softer and there was more grass and not as much rock. The cross-index search gave me the same information I’d found on the internet: Wales, Ireland, Spain, Italy. I needed to make another trip to Europe, and this time not indulge Simone by spending the whole time shopping in London, Paris and Milan.
I hadn’t mentioned to the Archivist my dream where I was climbing the hill as a snake, the knowledge that there was fresh blood at the top driving me on with a raw hunger. It sounded too much like a Druidic sacrifice ritual, which was very disturbing. Druids had been nature-loving tree-huggers, yes; but they’d also disembowelled people and used their own intestines to tie them, still alive, as sacrifices to the trees they worshipped.
I looked up the Serpent Concubine and watched with horror as the information came up. Well, thank you very much, Miss Concubine. Here I was, trying my best to give Celestial snakes a better reputation, and she’d done the exact opposite. She had been a harsh and merciless mistress, jealous of the Dark Lord and paranoid to the point of schizophrenia. She had beaten her maids, had many of the household demons executed for minor misdemeanours, and the final straw was when she’d eaten a couple of human staff who had gone to her to beg for more rest time as they were working seven days a week.
The Dark Lord hadn’t been aware of all this as he’d spent most of his time on Wudangshan and trying to deal with the falling Qing dynasty and the Boxer Rebellion — they’d worshipped him and he’d been desperately trying to se
ver his connection with it — and she had been left to sink deeper into loneliness, paranoia and insanity. He’d returned from Wudangshan after the Northern Council had intervened and had her incarcerated for the crime of eating the humans, and he had removed her head himself. After her execution he had her pavilion locked up and his visits to the Northern Heavens became more sporadic; he really only went there when there were serious cases to hear or the energy was low.
The case of the Serpent Concubine was cross-indexed with several similar cases of jealous, power-hungry or just plain insane consorts and concubines on the Celestial Plane. The Phoenix had changed to female after a similar situation had occurred to her male form: two of her wives had fought a duel and killed each other while one of them was pregnant. The Tiger had executed more than twenty of his own wives over the years for jealous palace intrigue. The Dragon hadn’t reported any cases to the Celestial administration, despite records of his concubines being executed for ‘crimes against Heaven’. I sat looking at the screen, trying to decide whether the fact that many of the other mad concubines had been raised human made the Serpent Concubine any less responsible for her crimes. I decided that it didn’t. Damn, I had a lot of PR work ahead of me.
Simone came out of her bathroom, towelling her hair. ‘Is there any food? I’m starving.’
I gestured towards the trolley. ‘Kwan made you a full English breakfast complete with three different types of muffin, tropical fruit, and scrambled eggs just the way you like them. The whole thing is probably a gluggy mess by now.’
She lifted the cover and wrinkled her nose. ‘You’re right.’ She grabbed a muffin and threw herself onto the couch while she munched on it. ‘Leo’s asleep in the spa.’ She looked over to see what I was doing and I quickly switched back to the European data. ‘Working again, Emma? Give it up.’
She went to find the tea-making facilities, shuffling through the different types of tea and putting the kettle on. ‘So what are we doing this morning?’
‘It’s already past midday,’ I said. ‘We can have some lunch if you like, then the Phoenix said she wanted to see you.’
‘What were you going to eat if I was still asleep?’ she said.
‘I was about to call Kwan and see what we could get delivered.’
‘Well, that’s not good enough,’ Simone said. She leaned towards the outer doors so that Leo could hear her. ‘What I really want is a big thick hamburger with lashings of melted cheese and bacon. I wonder if the café makes them.’
Leo turned to look at us and grinned. ‘They sure do, and I was just thinking the same thing.’
‘Let’s go!’ Simone said, dropping the teabags.
Leo changed into a black lion and pulled himself out of the spa, treading carefully across the stepping stones back to the villa. He stopped and shook himself, the water cascading everywhere. ‘Let me have a quick shower and find some shoes.’
‘No taking all day!’ Simone said, wagging her finger at him with mock severity.
‘That’s good coming from you, Miss Sleep-All-Day,’ he said.
She tossed back her damp, honey-coloured hair. ‘I’m a teenager. I’m allowed.’
He grinned his lion grin. ‘I suppose you are.’ He walked into the main bathroom and closed the door behind him with his nose.
‘Find anything?’ Simone said, sitting next to me to finish the muffin.
‘Nothing at all. I need to make another trip to Europe,’ I said.
Simone jiggled with glee. ‘Yay, shopping!’
‘Not for shopping.’
‘There’s always time for shopping.’
The villa phone rang and I answered it. It was the Phoenix. ‘Emma, Kwan tells me that Sleeping Beauty is awake. Have you eaten?’
‘Not yet,’ I said. ‘We’re going on a hamburger hunt as soon as Leo is in a form that won’t scare the other tourists.’
‘Emma,’ Simone said patiently, ‘in human form he’s six five, black and ugly as the devil. I really think his lion form is less scary.’
‘She has a point,’ Leo said, coming out of the bathroom in his wheelchair, wearing a designer polo shirt, trim pleated slacks and expensive loafers.
‘Well, after you guys have hunted down and devoured the poor innocent hamburgers, could you meet me at the front of the resort?’ the Phoenix said. ‘I was serious about sparring with Simone.’
‘Will do,’ I said, and hung up. ‘You heard, Simone?’
Simone grimaced. ‘I know what she’s going to say.’
‘That you’re the only human daughter of the God of Martial Arts and the most talented practitioner on any Plane?’ Leo said.
‘More like I need to go to Celestial High and learn properly,’ Simone said, resigned. ‘The Masters and the Tiger are always telling me how bad I am.’
‘Well, it doesn’t matter now because you’re going to CH anyway,’ I said. I rose. ‘Open season on hamburgers. Let’s get us a bag of ’em, pardners.’
‘Oh wow, you are so lame sometimes, Emma, it hurts.’
I bowed slightly to her. ‘I thank you, madam.’
‘More like mortal wounds,’ Leo said, and wheeled himself to the door. ‘Let’s go, I’m starving. Sitting in that spa all morning was damn hard work.’
We ate in the hotel’s café overlooking the main resort pool. Service was immaculate, right down to the tedious water-glass-and-napkin ceremony. The hamburgers were enormous and exactly the way Simone and Leo liked them, smothered in melted cheese and aioli and served with thick-cut French fries. I had a vegetarian omelette; I needed to watch my weight while I wasn’t working out as heavily as I did back home. If I wasn’t careful I could balloon out in only a week of slacking.
Leo and I shared a plunger of coffee, and Simone had a huge iced lemon tea.
‘I don’t know how you can drink something hot,’ she said. ‘It’s so warm and humid here, it’s like the middle of summer back home.’
‘You get used to drinking hot drinks in hot weather,’ I said.
‘Especially when you need your caffeine hit,’ Leo added.
After we’d let the food settle, the Phoenix met us at the front of the resort in a golf buggy, wearing a pair of red shorts and a yellow polo shirt. She took us around the lagoon and past the resort’s private beach. The two-hundred-metre strip of pristine white sand had teak deckchairs with umbrellas and side tables laid out in rows, the clear water of the Andaman Sea glittering in front of them.
‘No waves, clear water, I’m going in later,’ Simone said with enthusiasm. ‘What are the currents like around here?’
‘I have no idea,’ the Phoenix said. ‘I don’t like the water, I don’t go in.’
‘You don’t swim at all?’ Simone said, curious.
‘Not if I can help it,’ she said.
‘You’re not a bird, you’re a cat,’ Simone said.
‘The cat loves his water. I just … It doesn’t do anything for me,’ the Phoenix said. ‘On the other hand, take me back home to my volcano in Bali, let me swim in the lava and I’m a happy chicken.’
Simone stifled a laugh. ‘Roast chicken.’
The Phoenix laughed as well. ‘I suppose so.’
After the beach we came to what was obviously the maintenance area of the resort. The buildings were ugly and utilitarian, with ride-on mowers, workbenches and racks of tools under open-sided workshops with plain colourbond roofs. We stopped outside a large barn-type building, about fifty metres long and twenty wide and two storeys high. It had no windows, just a large roller door at the front, which was open.
Inside, the bare interior walls were swathed in silver insulation sheeting and the floor was plain concrete. Large ceiling fans turned above us, not so much cooling as moving the hot, humid air around. I wondered what the building was for, then saw the weapons racks at the far end and the burn marks all over the walls and floor. The insulation sheeting was dull and greenish-grey for the first four metres up from the floor, then the other two metres to the ceiling were
as shiny as new.
‘I see the burn marks, but did someone flood this building as well?’ I said.
‘Oh, the staining — that’s from the tsunami,’ the Phoenix said.
Simone stopped and stared at the walls. ‘Oh my … Oh.’ She rested her hand against the wall. ‘So much water, so many fragile people …’
The Phoenix put her arm around Simone’s shoulder. ‘Nothing you could do about it, Simone. Do not for a minute blame yourself for this. Things like this happen anyway, that is the way nature is, and he is nature when it comes to things like this. So put it aside for now and spar with me.’ She squeezed Simone. ‘You are not responsible.’
Is she saying what I think she’s saying? Leo said into my head.
I nodded.
Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea bringing Simone here then. If we go into town, there’ll still be reminders of the people that died.
I tapped the stone.
What? I was sleeping! it said.
Tell Leo: I think John would want Simone to see what she’s capable of when she uses her water power, and how important the training is to help her to control it.
How many people did he kill with this thing? Leo said.
I don’t know.
Over 200,000, the stone said.
‘Choose a weapon,’ the Phoenix said, indicating the racks at the end of the building. ‘Or call your own.’
Simone held her hand out and Dark Heavens appeared in it.
‘Ah, the Xuan Tian itself, the Dark Lord’s most simple and elegant weapon,’ the Phoenix said. ‘No elaboration, minimal enhancements, a perfectly forged demon killer, the essence of simplicity and deadliness.’ She nodded once. ‘I am honoured that you choose to wield it here.’
