Her hope was to provide gainful employment for her pirates so that she could take a ship and, with their backing, return to Beijing to seek out her number one son. Becoming head of this vast consortium of water folk had not figured in her plans. But the time had come. She couldn’t be everyone’s protector. The pirates could do as they liked. She was sailing north.
“Li,” Po said. “If we turn away now, our people will die at the hands of that turn-coat.”
“Mo Kuan-fu works for the Tay-son brothers. He has turned my efforts into a racket. When I made this agreement with the fishermen, I fully intended to protect them. No one can win. I’m tired, Po. I want out. I want my son. And I want to find Quan. Too much time has passed. They won’t even recognize me.”
“They’ll recognize you, stepsister. You haven’t changed. You are still a golden lotus flower, the plum in the golden vase. At the sight of you, fish forget how to swim and sink to the bottom of their ponds. Your beauty entices birds to drop from the sky in mid-flight, and the moon itself shies away from the very luminosity of your skin. In fact, my dear one, you have a face to put all flowers to shame.”
Po was smiling and Li’s lips curled out of their scowl. “Such a poet, and as usual, flattery will get you everywhere.” She sighed. “But what am I to do? I promised Madam Choi to lead her people. But Po, are they my people? My heart bleeds for sight of my little boy.”
“What are you suggesting?”
“My scheme to give the water people a legitimate claim on the high seas has failed. They’ve returned to piracy and worse, they are fighting among each other. I need silver, Po. It is the only way to retrieve my boy. I will offer the Emperor or whoever has possession of my son, more silver than they can imagine.”
“What makes you think the Emperor has Wu?”
“He is His Majesty’s grandson; the palace is the logical place he’d be taken. The Emperor needs silver to pay his armies to protect the wall and to fight the invaders. I’m hoping he will trade.”
“It may already be too late for that. There’ve been rumours among the fishermen that things bode ill for the Forbidden City.”
“What do they say? Do they know of a small boy living at court?”
Po shook his head. “Nothing like that. Only that the border towns are besieged by barbarians.”
“Then my boy’s in danger. We must raid the next merchant junk we meet. I can’t wait any longer. All those who will come with me, must come.”
News had arrived from her squadrons that a cargo vessel would leave Nanjing, and reach the open sea in a week. The Jade Monkey was a one hundred and thirty ton, fourteen cannon, oceangoing merchant junk laden with cooking oil, cardamom, soybeans, bamboo and livestock, and was reputed to have a fresh shipload of silver. Li put her plan into motion, and sent scouts to shore to survey the port. Many of her men were already situated in critical locales. This had been part of her system for the protection of the fishing fleets, but now that the project had failed, she intended to use those men to infiltrate the Jade Monkey. Once everyone was in place, they would wait until the merchant junk reached the open sea. Then they would attack, but they would only take silver.
The week passed. It was too easy. Li had planted herself amongst the crew, serving at the last minute as ship’s boy. The supper hour was on, the decks quiet. The lanterns aboard ship were alight emitting haloes in the fine mist, while clots of lazy sailors slurped noodles and dried fish, their chopsticks clicking against wooden bowls. Only one man seemed aware of her movements, a rough-looking seaman with a cap shading silver-tinted eyes. She lowered her chin, finished serving them, and walked to the rail.
Po moved up beside her, and she signalled her men to be ready. Several boats skirted an island in silent approach. With luck, the captain of the Jade Monkey would not see them. In any event, Li was ready with thirty pirates in position. A soft thumping sound reached her ears. Li jumped off the bridge, landing on the lower deck, and sidled to the gunwale to look down. A pirate clung to the side of the junk. Li nodded and a knife left the pirate’s hand and landed in hers, hilt first. As he scrambled over the rails, he tossed Po a sabre and Li a musket. Suddenly there came a hellish pounding of gongs. The merchant sailors sprang to their feet amidst flying noodles and salted fish as pirates came scrabbling over the gunwales.
Just when Li thought the prize of silver was hers, a massive shadow fell over the deck.
“Vagabonds, sea wolves, marauders! Surrender and no one will be hurt.”
Li fired her musket at the voice.
“So, that is how it’s to be?”
A tremendous boom resounded in the air and seawater geysered from a cannonball onto the deck. Li glared at the hull of the intruder, an Imperial warship with the emblem of the White Tiger. A split second was all it took for Li to grasp what this meant. Her husband, Admiral Fong, had found her.
The warship shot five more iron cannonballs and sunk all eight of her serpent boats. A pirate raced to portside tossing his pike to the deck. Li lunged after him, grabbed him by the arm. “You would flee, coward?”
“We can’t win,” the man garbled in his own saliva.
“We won’t win if you go running and squawking like a hen.”
“LI.” She looked up at the stern sound of the voice. The sailor who caught her glare was broad-shouldered, wiry of build and steely-eyed. He was outfitted like her in seaman’s clothes, but a shadow obscured his mouth and chin, moonlight glancing off his nose, tinting his eyes with silver.
Li gaped. The face—what she divined of it, namely the silvery eyes—was familiar. She dropped the pirate and he scuttled away.
“We have rounded up all of your men. Those that still live. Give yourself up without a fight and your life will be spared.”
She went for her musket, but the steely-eyed man deflected it out of her hand. She summoned the Ghostfire to play with his vision, twirled behind him.
“Who are you?” she demanded, pressing her knife into his throat. With her free hand, she relieved him of his sabre.
“Li. Give yourself up. You can’t win.”
“How do you know my name?”
“Because you know mine.”
The Ghostfire dispersed. Li swung the man to face her.
“Tell your men to surrender in the name of the Emperor or I will kill you.” She recognized the voice that roared above her head.
When she looked up she saw a black banner with a white feline. Li turned, spat, her eyes ablaze with recognition and fury. “So, Quan. You would throw me to the tiger?”
The silver eyes, confronting her, lowered. He aimed a finger at a bleeding pirate who lay splayed at their feet. Quan rolled him over with his boot and Li gasped.
“NO!” she wailed. “No, no, no. Po. It can’t be!”
“He’s dead, and I have to take you in or you’ll be dead, too.” He glanced over his shoulder at Fong who watched from the bridge.
Then movement came from the water below. In the name of Xiang Gong, what are those three doing here? She waved them away. “Flee, sisters! Save yourselves!”
Quan seized her by the arm and slung her into the bear hug of one of Fong’s men. Then dropped down into the sampan. The backwash from a cannonball had nearly sunk them. Li kicked and screamed, fighting off the sailor who confined her. But the girls were aboard the merchant ship now, snarling at their steely-eyed keeper.
“String those rogues on the yardarm!” Admiral Fong snapped from the warship. Quan dragged the girls to one of the Jade Monkey’s rowboats, lowered it to the sea and ordered them to board. He set the boat loose, and watched it drift away.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
The White Tiger’s Revenge
Sailors bound Li’s wrists and ankles, and passed her hand over foot to the men on the warship. Fong hollered from the bridge that she should be thrown into the hold, before glaring at Quan. “I will deal with you later. See to it that my orders are carried out—and this time do not defy me.”
Quan ov
ersaw Li’s transfer to the hold. She perched at its brink still able to stand despite her bonds. Barefoot, she wore the dark trousers, purple sash and white tunic of the common seaman. How could those merchant fools have mistaken her for a boy? But then memory slapped him hard for she had duped him once, too. She glared at him, teeth naked.
“Turn so that I may cut your bonds,” Quan ordered.
“Traitor,” she said, eyes brilliant.
The moment her hands were freed, she sprang at him and almost tore out his eyes, if not for the sailors who intervened. He signalled for her release and bent his gaze to the hollow of her throat where hung a circlet of jade. Shielding her from the sight of the men, he lifted it, recognizing the insignia on the gold clasp. It belonged to the Imperial house, and he swiftly tucked it into her collar.
“What has become of you, Li?” His voice was a low whisper. “What have I done? For I feel responsible for abandoning you to this piratical fate.” She jerked her head from his fingers, and his brow knit. He touched a loose strand of her silky hair. “Tell me what happened out there. What was that mist that cloaked you in lights?”
She was silent at first. “You know of the Ghostfire,” she said woodenly, as though she accused him of denying it.
He nodded, still keeping his voice low, although the men were out of earshot. “Indeed I have heard of it.”
“You have seen it!” she snapped.
He paused as a memory tore at his heart. Li with her arms around his neck, kicking her feet to stay afloat in a beautiful blue-green pool, the sun setting. Blue shadows had sprung up around the periphery, and the rainbow mist sparked like coloured lanterns in the dusk. Quan had noticed the mysterious nightlights just before he had given Li his jade spear.
“So, Master Yun was right. You have grown in more ways than I fear to imagine. Why did you not escape when you could? The men were blinded, as was I. You were invisible.”
Again she looked like she would gouge out his eyes, but she refrained. Her own turned upward as footsteps came from behind him, and Admiral Fong’s voice roared, “Why is that treasonous harridan still standing here?”
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It had not been her intent to ever see him again. Admiral Fong shot back an angry look and sent his men far from earshot. Standing before her, one hand behind his back, Li acknowledged that he was her husband. She remembered him well. Neither an ugly man, nor a pretty one, he wore the official uniform of his rank—grey tunic and coat with double-eyed peacock feathers—looking every inch the admiral.
Li positioned her slim hands on her hips, seething with suppressed rage. “Drop to your knees!” Fong ordered, exposing the whip that was hidden at his back.
She knew the bite of his favourite tool, and since that time when he had used it on her, she had felt the sting of worse. Spreading herself like she was skirted, she dipped to one knee. His whip hand moved, but Li raised her chin and lashed out. “You know that is useless Fong, I refuse to bend to your will.”
His hand snapped, and the whip landed on her arm. The tail scored her throat, sending agony from her arm to her ear. Blood seeped through her sleeve. Li squeezed back the tears, the torture remarkably bearable. Out of the edges of her vision she saw Quan flinch.
“Do not talk back to me again. You are my wife. And I will flog you until you drop to your knees.”
A light rain began to fall, mingling salt with blood, spreading a pink stain down the front of her tunic. She rose, no longer scornful of him, and now, not even conscious of the pain. “You are right. I have betrayed you. But I did so only because you betrayed me first. You went back on your word to help me search for my son.”
“Your son is in my cabin, where you should have been these many moons.” Li’s heart fluttered, for as far as she was concerned, the spawn of Admiral Fong was not hers.
His eyes dropped to the jade circlet that had reappeared at the hollow of her throat. He lifted it by its gold chain. “You once asked me if I dared flog a princess of the Imperial Court. Well, my answer has not changed. You will fetch a pretty sum. I trust His Majesty’s generous bounty on your head still stands. You will be executed. And since there is no stipulation as to the condition of your body when I return it to him, you will be punished for desertion.
%%%
Every fibre of Quan’s being begged to seize that whip and use it on its master. But too many men watched. Li was extraordinary despite her obvious agony. His eyes moved up and down, taking in every feature of her face and body, each curve of flesh and fold of tunic, as it was plastered to her skin by the rain. He lowered his sight to the insignia tattooed on the back of Fong’s hand, looked up to see the Manchurian’s gaze burrowing into his. Did he suspect? Did he know Quan’s true intentions? The hand was turned backside to Li, and held in front of her face. “Do not forget who you are dealing with,” Fong said.
At once Quan realized what the tattoo reminded him of. Tao’s inked emblem of the Taijitu. Even as he stood spellbound, the tiger transmuted into two images. Did his eyes play tricks on him? The White Tigress and the Jade Dragon transfigured into the backward S of black and white.
Quan blinked, snapped alert to see Li watching him. Her gaze wavered, and lifted to the admiral. Rain pelted her face, and she crumpled to her knees. She extended her fingers to his tattooed hand, which he gave her, his eyes wary. The tiger’s head was half turned, its shoulders low and sloped.
The man was powerful. Did she still think he would help her? Rumours ran riot about the voyages of the White Tiger. For nearly a decade, the people had sung the praises of a foreigner who had ingratiated himself with the Ming emperor. He had sworn allegiance to the Chinese Empire and denounced his Manchurian roots. His commissions took him far, beyond the Indian Ocean. And while the White Tiger explored these virgin lands, the pirates ransacked the coastal villages and waylaid unwary merchant junks. It was Quan who had stopped the pirates, not Fong.
“I wish to be your wife again,” Li said with respect.
The admiral nodded, pleased, but not wholly convinced. Li bowed. Quan squinted at her.
“You are a most powerful man,” Li said. “You have the respect of His Majesty himself. He’ll do anything you ask because you have made him famous in the world beyond. With this power, you can help me to save my firstborn. I know you didn’t deliberately go back on your word. I know when you can spare the time you will help me.”
Hogwash. His Majesty was dead. Of course, neither of them knew this.
Quan could barely hold his tongue. He was Wu’s father. Why was Li turning to Fong for help? Did she truly not know that he was here to rescue her? Or perhaps she didn’t want to be rescued. She had spat in his face, but that was only because she supposed him to be in league with her husband.
“Good. I almost believe you. I originally intended to kill you myself—after appropriate torture. But I am a fair man. I will wait to cast judgement. After all, you are the mother of my son. Go to my cabin. Young Lao is there with his nurse. He needs you. As for you—” Fong turned his attention to Quan, then to the shadows where his men waited. “String him up on the yardarm.”
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Quan shoved his boot at the first seaman who assailed him, and elbowed the second with an upward jab. Fong flicked his whip and struck Quan full across the chest, collapsing him onto the deck. With that same act, Quan’s leg thrust out, striking a sailor—who happened to be the hateful Fat Mong. With tremendous force his hideous yellow hide crashed down.
Fat Mong, red-faced and crawling to his knees, raised a dagger. “Admiral, shall I kill him?”
Quan moaned under his breath, eyes squeezed shut, before he flipped himself to his feet, kicking the dagger out of the outraged, petty officer’s grip, decking him again. Five more sailors rushed him and forced him flat on his stomach.
“What did this man do?” Li demanded.
“He is a traitor. Now leave us or you will suffer the same fate.” Fong ordered two men to escort her to his quarters.
Aft
er that adrenaline-filled reflex, his body had time to register pain. His head slumped as he consumed every word that transpired, and his body hung limp in the arms of his captors. Quan forced himself to relax; everything must go slack to convince them of his compliance. His sailor’s tunic had taken the brunt of the lash and was ripped across the chest, his ribs ached, and blood leaked from where the whip had torn into flesh. His chest was so badly bruised that pain jabbed every time he breathed.
The admiral’s men dragged him to an upright position. Quan backhanded his mouth to wipe away his own spittle, the movement stinging his cut flesh. Fong kicked him in the gut. “Seaman, strip him and hang him up.” The yardarm was a bamboo spar the length of five men. The sailors dragged Quan, half-naked, up the mizzenmast and strapped his wrists to the boom. His ankles hung free, his body supported by nothing. “All right, now leave us…I said, GO.”
The sailors fled at Fong’s command, their footsteps resounding like drums on the wooden planks. It stopped raining and on the horizon a red gleam appeared. Quan’s wrists and shoulders burned, but he knew the pain was nothing compared to what the admiral plotted.
“By tomorrow, you will want to talk. Or you can tell me now. What is your relationship with my wife?”
“I have no relationship with her,” Quan gasped out hoarsely.
“I don’t believe you.”
Fong left him in the brightening dark, low light bleeding from the very edges of the world. The agony from hanging, and the raw skin around his wrists made it impossible to sleep. Yet sleep he must, to gain strength—at least until the first sharp blades of the sun began to fry him. Even now, daggers of pain seared into his flesh from his wrists, and along his spine into his legs. The copper scent of his own blood grew rank. But it was not the longest night he had ever endured. The thirst he had been dying to slake was forgotten as the welt began to fester, growing more swollen hour by hour.
%%%
Li combed out her hair until it shone like newly poured ink, letting the locks fall over the red dress that now covered her bandaged wound. Her slippers were of black silk and fortunately were only slightly snug. All of these garments were familiar and she could barely keep her stomach from revolting.
The Pirate Empress Page 59
