by Alyc Helms
“If he doesn’t love me, if he’s just using me, then what makes you think it would even matter to him?”
“Honor, Missy. There’s nothing he prizes more.” He turned to face me. I shrank back against the curve of the wall. “I think you’re different. Honor is something that’s useful to you, but also negotiable. Malleable. That’s what I’m betting on – that you value your child more than some misguided sense of honor.”
“You’re wrong,” I whispered, but my voice wavered. I swallowed and tried to strengthen it. “I’ll never give you Jian Huo’s pearls.”
“I think you’ll reconsider. You really have no choice.”
“No. You don’t get it. You pegged me when you delivered your manifesto.” I straightened, my face inches from his. “The ends don’t justify the means. Not ever. How and why you do something is as important as what you’re trying to do. That conviction is what Jian Huo and I have in common. It’s why your manifesto is crap. It’s why your claim that Jian Huo used me is crap. And it’s why I won’t ever give you my pearls. Now stop fucking with me and let me put my daughter to bed.”
He pulled back, but no flash of amusement or irritation crossed his features. He’d dropped the pretense that I was anything but a tool to him. I wasn’t worth getting worked up over. That was fine by me. We both were at our end-games, and my strategy was too complicated to muddle with emotions.
Lung Di pocketed the glass. “Very well. You may have your hour. Follow me.”
He led me through more serpentine corridors until I was lost. The symbolism was clear: he held my daughter trapped in his coils. Another set of black-lacquered doors opened onto the Barbie palace. Mei Shen sat on a chair next to an empty cricket cage, feet kicking as they dangled. The nurse was nowhere to be seen.
“An hour.” Lung Di said. Before he could grow suspicious, I entered and shut the door in his face.
Given my previous encounter with the nurse’s work, her changeling was better than I’d expected. It was too quiet by half, but the questions it did ask were intelligent, more like things my daughter would say. Perhaps spending so much time with the original had helped the nurse to improve the quality of the doppelgänger.
I went through the motions of putting my false daughter to bed, lingering over the experience not because I enjoyed it, but because I had no doubt I was being watched. I needed to give the nurse as good a chance as possible to spirit Mei Shen away.
I was singing an old sea shanty to the sleeping changeling when Lung Di returned for me. I left without too much fuss, playing off that I didn’t want to wake my sleeping daughter. We were both quiet as Lung Di escorted me back to my own rooms. We stopped before the doors.
“There are no more moves for you to make.” His words made me pause on the threshold. “It is time to bargain in earnest.”
I shook my head, and there was little artifice to the weary droop of my shoulders. “In the morning. Then I’ll be ready to bargain.”
“Putting it off will not make the outcome any different. Only more painful.”
He sounded almost sympathetic. I ignored him. “I’ll see you in the morning,” I said and shut the door.
Leaning back against the closed doors, I took a deep breath. The only light in the room came from above the wet bar. Everywhere else was deep in shadow. I scanned the rest of the room, but there was no sign of Templeton. He’d done what I’d asked and vacated. I was relieved, but also saddened. Who knew if I would ever see him again?
I did one last sweep of the rooms – hotel habits die hard – then took a deep breath and stepped into shadow.
The terrain on the other side was like no shadow landscape I’d ever entered. The ground was slick and black: featureless. It fell away from beneath my feet, and no horizon marked where it bled into the black sky. I looked up and then couldn’t look away. Void yawned above me: a gaping crack in reality that reached down to brush at me with oily, black tentacles. Nine shining threads, strained near-to-breaking, were all that held the wound closed. Nine threads. Nine Guardians. They were stretched thin with weakness, so inadequate against the void that pulsed to break through. I shied away from the questing polyps that had made it past their guard, swaying with vertigo. The world spun into a mad twist of laughter. I collapsed to my knees and scrabbled at the slick ground, seeking some kind of secure purchase. The void pulled at me, stretching me like taffy into a shape no human was ever meant to take. I sobbed, or maybe I laughed. Or screamed. There was no difference here. They were sounds in a place of not-sound.
Oh, God. What had I done in coming here?
My wail was answered by a soft chittering. Underneath that, the scrabbling of claws.
“Help me,” I whisper-screamed. The chittering grew louder. I shut my eyes. I didn’t want to see what was making that noise. The blackness behind my lids, comfortable and known, helped anchor me. I recalled why I was in this place, what I needed to do.
In the name of Templeton, lieutenant in service to the Conclave of Shadow, I command you to come to my aid.
Had I spoken? Through the madness, I couldn’t be sure. Perhaps it was all in my head – fifteen years living a fever dream of dragon-lovers and ancient gods; thirty-odd years of an insignificant life, a monkey trying to make sense of the cosmos. Might as well hand me a typewriter and ask me to write the works of Shakespeare. Life’s but a walking shadow. Perhaps the Judeo-Christians had the right of it: to hear the Logos, to look into the face of God, was to invite madness. But if the void was God, then why lock it away from us? The tentacles of darkness tugged at me, urged me to reach out and pluck away the threads that strained to hold the wound closed. Guardians? What were they guarding against? The void that strained against them whispered of the completion of annihilation, a return to the primordial womb before the Big Bang of creation. Not Guardians. Wardens, and Creation was our prison. They kept us from reuniting with God.
Something closed around me, caught my reaching hands and drew me back from the wound in the void. I fought against it, but I was stretched too thin between Self and Otherness. Resistance was futile. I couldn’t recall why that was funny, but I laughed, and the thing pulling me back caught hold of that laughter, wrapped me up in it, used it to give me shape and voice. It named me… Missy… in a dozen chitters that were all echoes of Templeton’s voice
I felt cold, slick ground beneath my cheek, like obsidian. The chittering around me grew louder, blocking out all other sounds. I cracked an eye. Shadow-shapes darted around and above me – a plague of Templetons. They blotted out the void, the landscape, everything. The shadows nudged under me, forcing me at first to my hands and knees, and then into a low crouch. Above me, the void strained against its cage and called to me, its daughter, to free it. Only I could do it. I swallowed and kept my eyes focused on the ground as I ran.
A few of the shadows darted forward a short distance, then back to me. I stumbled in the direction indicated, and soon we were making our halting way across the obsidian-dark landscape. After an eternity, they stopped, milling about my feet as if they could go no further. In normal circumstances, I would have shown more gratitude, but I couldn’t wait to be quit of this place. Lighting a crimson sparkler, I fled the void.
Sight, sound, and sanity returned in an overwhelming rush. I fell to my knees again, dry-heaving. The cave entrance turned to brick maybe ten yards ahead of me. Beyond that, the lights of nighttime Shanghai flashed so brightly after the never-ending nothingness of the voidlands that it set my eyes to tearing.
“Mother? Mother, are you all right?” Mei Shen crouched at my side. I gulped the thick air in deep breaths and struggled to get my stomach under control. I was still trembling as I sat back and looked into my daughter’s face. I sensed movement to my right, and then the nurse stepped into my line of sight. She stood between us and the light beyond the cave’s mouth. Her shadow stretched out toward me, and I flinched away before I realized that it was just a shadow.
“You are either very brave or very s
tupid,” she observed.
“A little of column A, and a little of column B,” I muttered, rising to my feet. Mei Shen steadied me, stronger than she had any right to be. I spared a moment to check her over, but I had no doubt it was my daughter. I spared the nurse a nod of gratitude.
“I thank you for what you’ve done. It will go far to ensuring that Lung Huang does not seek vengeance against you for the wrong you did him.”
“Hmph. The combs’ll see to that,” she grunted. She smoothed her matted thatch of hair, where two ornaments of jade now gleamed, and then hitched at a tangle of strings slung over her shoulder, my Docs dangling from them. “And I know a few places where these’ll fetch a pretty price. Places a world away from here. Figure it’ll be healthier for me to leave China for a while. If you see your rat again, give him my thanks. Few’re willing to deal with the likes of me, much less deal fair.” With a nod, she spat over her left shoulder, spun three times widdershins, and disappeared in a fall of autumn leaves.
“Oooh. Mother. Can you teach me to do that?” Mei Shen asked.
“Later,” I promised, distracted by a building rumble beneath our feet. “We need to get out of here. Now. Run, Mei Shen.”
We started forward. The rumbling grew with every step. Mei Shen’s legs were too short to keep up, so I scooped her up and booked toward the mouth of the cave. The walls smoothed from stone to smoke-blackened brick. Little crumbles of masonry rained down on us as the tunnel collapsed in our wake. I ducked and rolled, shielding Mei Shen with my body. Indiana Jones would have been proud.
Coughing, I raised my head and squinted against the cloud raised by the rubble. Still a few paces to go until we were free, and a few more across the alleyway to the fox temple gardens. I struggled upright and carried my daughter those last few feet.
As I passed through the archway and into the flashing neon of the Puxi at night, Mei Shen tumbled from my grasp as though yanked by invisible strings. I turned to grab her up again. Lung Di stood amid the rubble of the cave, an affable smirk on his face. From the temple across the alleyway came a roar like thunder.
“Mei Shen, hurry,” I said, trying to pull her across.
“I… I can’t.” She strained forward, but it was as if some invisible force held her back. For the first time, I saw fear in her eyes. “Mother, I can’t!”
I stopped tugging, kneeling and calming her with a few hushed words. Lung Di approached, stopping an arm’s reach away from us. A rush of warm air at my back blew my hair and Mei Shen’s into tangles. I spared a quick glance over my shoulder. Jian Huo had already reverted to human form, and he looked none-too-pleased. I returned his glower. If he’d been honest with me, we might not be in this mess.
If he’d been honest with me, my children might not exist.
Mian Zi spotted Mei Shen and clambered down from his father’s arms with a glad cry, but Jian Huo held him back from rushing to greet us.
“She can’t leave, you know.” Lung Di’s words called my attention back to him. “She has been in my realm. Once a mortal creature has entered, they may not leave save by my will.”
“I left.”
“I allowed it.” He spread his hands. “Marvel at my generosity. Still, it was quite amusing, watching you go through all your machinations. Did you really think you had me fooled, even for a second?”
“Let her go, you bastard,” I whispered.
“Now, Missy. We both know what I want in exchange for that.” He reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a strand of pearls. Their nacre gleamed dim and familiar. I stiffened, and behind me I heard Jian Huo growl.
“How did you get those?” I demanded.
“Your rat. You should never have left him to guard them while you put your fake daughter to bed. He was quite happy to trade them in exchange for his little trinkets.”
Mei Shen pushed again at the barrier that held her back from family and home, whimpering when it did no good. I shifted beside her so that I could see Jian Huo as well as Lung Di. Standing beside his father, Mian Zi looked just as miserable and frightened as Mei Shen. My children and I, caught in a war between two gods
Time for some magic.
“All right.” My shoulders slumped. “You win. You can have them. Just let Mei Shen go.”
Jian Huo jerked, and a defeated shudder ran through his entire body, but I only had eyes for my nemesis. Lung Di smiled a slow, malicious smile.
“Of course,” he said. “She is of little interest to me until she grows up. At the moment, I much prefer this prize.”
“So, she is free to go as she pleases? In exchange for those?” I nodded to the pearls in his hand, holding my breath. He stroked them lightly, possessively. I tried not to let my anxiety show.
He paused, seeming to consider the pearls, but he was enjoying everyone’s distress too much to really look at them. His eyes passed over the jewels in his hand to meet mine.
“In exchange for these? She is.” He looked beyond me. I followed his gaze to Jian Huo. I had never seen my lover look so… I couldn’t find a word to encompass all the emotions – anger, betrayal, disgust, despair. Everything that I’d felt on hearing Lung Di’s revelations. I wanted to take it back, to go back to a time when I didn’t know I was being tricked, but it was too late for that.
Mei Shen hurtled past the invisible ward with a cry of “Father!”, and all the hatred on Jian Huo’s face drained away as he bent to catch her in his arms. Mian Zi was swept up too. I couldn’t swallow past the tightness in my throat, to be on the outside of the family I’d worked so hard to bring back together. If I could just survive the next few minutes, then maybe Jian Huo would listen long enough for me to explain, maybe he’d have a good explanation for me. Maybe everything didn’t have to be broken.
“What a happy sight.” Lung Di crept up beside me. I hadn’t thought skin could crawl, but mine gave a good approximation. I stepped away, and I imagine the look I gave him was similar to the one Jian Huo had given me, minus the betrayal. I’d always known what Lung Di was. He’d only acted true to form.
“I thought you said you wouldn’t take those by force or guile.” I nodded to the string in his hand.
“And so I didn’t. They were yours. Your rat had no right to give them up. It doesn’t matter who held them. They were still yours until you gave them to me.” He laughed his own triumph. “Instead, you bargained for your daughter, thinking you had nothing to lose. Such a shame. If only you had known better… were a little more patient. If only you belonged to this world, you might never have lost my brother’s love.” He twined the pearls around his fingers, and again I held my breath. Nothing happened. I felt a moment’s panic that I had been too clever for my own good, but I stifled it. My plan had worked. Please, let my plan have worked.
Jian Huo shifted to dragon form and bundled the children close. I had hoped for better circumstances to reveal everything – something more conducive to me not dying – but if I didn’t act now, I might never see my family again.
“Wait!” I lunged for him, hoping also to put some distance between myself and Lung Di before I said anything more. Jian Huo ignored me, and the dragon at my side caught me by the arm before I could escape.
“Let it go, Missy. You’ve ceded his love to me. His pride is all he has left.”
“No. Jian Huo!” I called again. I yanked my arm, but Lung Di held fast. I hoped that bruises were the only injuries I’d have suffered come tomorrow. “I never gave him your pearls. I swear!”
“I already told you–” Lung Di began, but then Jian Huo swung his head around and stalked toward us, the twins still cradled in his grasp. A face full of draconic ire was thrust at me. His head was as tall as my whole body. I shied back a step, but Lung Di’s grip kept me from retreating further.
“It doesn’t matter, does it? Your intentions mean nothing, Melissa Masters. He has them now. I gave you the most precious gift I had to give, and because you could not trust in me, you squandered it. My siblings were right. You are
not worthy to be my bride.” His head drooped and he turned away. In his claws, Mei Shen and Mian Zi huddled wide-eyed and silent. “I suppose, at the very least, I owe you my thanks for rescuing my daughter.”
Oh no. He did not get to make me the bad guy. “Will you listen?” I reached for him. The muscles of his hind quarters bunched as he prepared to launch into the sky. “They’re not your pearls, you self-righteous lizard!” I shouted. “They’re fakes!”
Jian Huo’s head whipped around again. Before I could decipher the look on his face, Lung Di laughed.
“Really? Fakes? How stupid do you think I am?” Lung Di demanded.
“That’s a rhetorical question, right?” I asked, anger turning me into a smartass. He growled and shook me by the arm he still held. He thrust the pearls into my face.
“These are real. I can taste the magic on them. Your rat gave them to me in exchange for his precious baubles, and you yielded them for a pittance.”
“Mei Shen isn’t a pittance, and Templeton did exactly what he was supposed to do. Sure, those are real, as far as that goes, but they’re not Jian Huo’s pearls. You’ve been had.”
Lung Di sneered, but before he could respond, we were interrupted.
“She speaks truth.”
A warm wind washed up the alleyway, smelling of spring rain. The lights of Shanghai dimmed until there was only the deepness of night, the cold stars in a clear sky, and the rabbit-filled moon. The speaker picked her way over the rough pavement on a beam of silver moonlight, snowdrops and mossy green turf sprouting and spreading wherever she stepped. I shook my head, sure that I could hear the sound of crickets chirping.
The qilin was strange and wild and beautiful, but that was where her resemblance to the beast of western legend ended. Her head was more reptilian than equine, and her sinuous viridian body was smooth and hairless, wreathed in blue-green flame. She looked more like a slender, long-legged dragon than she did a horse. The unicorn comparison had to be based on the two corkscrew-spiraled horns that crowned her brow. The exterior of each horn was roughened and black like the outside of a mussel, but the insides shone violet-blue with nacre. A strand of pearls twined around one horn, glowing with a reflected sheen.
