The Shifu Cloth (The Chronicles of Eirie 4)

by Prue Batten

  ‘It could be done…we could be through the Han Gate in the Great Wall in three or four hours if we kept a steady pace. And well into the Goti by dark.’

  ‘Do you know the way down the mountains?’

  ‘No, but I have maps – many of them.’ He laughed again. ‘Of course I have maps.’

  He was silent then and she allowed him to sit. His had been a momentous decision and she was surprised with his next words.

  ‘We must go today. Early. Before I begin to realise the wrongfulness of my decision and we must be gone long before they realise the Son has left. They will send an army…’

  She took a breath to contain her excitement as he continued.

  ‘It will be our last free day before the wedding preparations begin. We have little time. Ibo, go to your apartments, and pack very little. We must depart here as ourselves, but between the Small Wall and the Great Wall we must change into merchant clothing and you must dress as a man. No woman has ever left the Han. I shall find some appropriate apparel and I shall collect you from your apartment in two hours. Try and rest.’

  ‘The letter, Ming Xao?’

  ‘I shall write it. It is I who runs away.’

  ‘You’re not running away. You are seeking better knowledge in order to lift the Han to its rightful position as one of the five provinces of Eirie.’

  *

  Isabella couldn’t sleep.

  Her maid sat inside the door waiting for her, but she waved the woman away. The woman grouched in the sharp Han dialect, but hustled over to the doors. A lesser noble herself, characterised by her black silk robes, she cast a look at Isabella, running a dismissive eye over her. Before she had time to make a cutting comment, for she was an opinionated elder, Isabella shut the door in her face and walked to her cupboards to sort through the folded garments until she found something suited to her purpose. She looked around the room to see if there was anything she should wish to take, some memory, and her eyes settled on the remnant of copper silk by her bed, the piece of shifu that had started the whole escape plan.

  She folded it, tucking it into her warm underwear, aware the mountains would be freezing at night. She stripped off her imperial robes, folding them neatly and placing them aside for the wayward maid-servant to deal with, then dressed in a dark grey padded tunic and trousers. If it had not been for the subtle embroidery on the cuff, it would have been hard to tell she was a member of the Imperial family and she hoped that attention would drift away from her at the first Han Gate.

  At her dressing table, she unwound her hair from its elaborate twists and brushed it, catching it and then coiling it into a plain bun. Her gaze settled on two ivory hairpins and she thrust them through her coils, for they were intricately carved and would suit her mother.

  Sleep would never come and her thoughts rushed through the audacious journey, to stepping across the bridge that never was and passing through the second wall. Further then, to the descent from the Goti Range and onto the plains, wherever the plains were.

  Nicholas, did you get my message? Did the shifu find you? Can you find us?

  ‘You think of your family, Isabella?’

  Isabella jumped.

  ‘Kitsune…’

  ‘It happens then.’

  ‘This is what you meant? Aine! What if it hadn’t gone the way it has?’

  ‘But it has, Isabella. Sometimes the sheer weight of differences forces a decision to be made, forces people to act in certain ways. Your speech to Ming Xao was timely and even if I do say, quite subtle for one such as you. You played the winning hand with great skill.’

  ‘You make me sound unutterably selfish.’

  ‘I think you have been for a long time. You have been the centre of everyone’s world. Now you are not and have had to struggle. It teaches lessons in humility. Ming Xao is a humble man unaffected by position or possession and can teach you much.’

  ‘He is a good man. He deserves to find what he’s looking for. It’s rare to find someone so eager for knowledge. So I believe anyway.’

  The Fox Lady gave a small laugh.

  ‘You see, Isabella? You offer mature observation. I am pleased.’

  ‘You so often chastise me, Fox Lady.’

  Isabella glanced at the startlingly white woman.

  ‘I speak as I find, Isabella. Or perhaps I should say, ‘found’ because I think you are changing, growing, seeing beyond yourself. Maybe you begin to appreciate the beauty of the Han at last; their embroideries, their food, their calligraphy…their maps.’

  She looked sideways at Isabella as she said this last and Isabella nodded.

  ‘Their maps are astonishingly clear and unambiguous…’

  ‘Indeed. And shall be of help to you when you begin your journey. The Han strive for an excellence in all things. Granted, they make mistakes, brutal ones. I have cause to know. But sadly, brutality often comes because of ignorance and fear. It is hoped that by seeking knowledge outside, Ming Xao can open his own land to broader philosophies and moralities. And you, Isabella, are instrumental in this.

  ‘Shall we succeed in an unimpeded departure?’

  Isabella remembered the fearsome male guard with the torn-off ear at the Small Wall.

  ‘Perhaps, perhaps not. This is a country that has protected itself from interlopers for hundreds of years. They may not let Ming Xao leave easily. Be on your guard, Isabella.’

  ‘Shall you come to me again, Kitsune?’

  She had grown to respect this strange woman with the amber eyes and the plain-speaking manner. She had anchored Isabella to hope when she had thought there was none.

  ‘Perhaps, perhaps not. You and Ming Xao must rely on each other’s strengths.’

  ‘Kitsune?’

  Isabella placed her hand on the soft nap of the woman’s sleeve.

  ‘Yes, Ibo?’

  ‘Thank you.’

  The Fox Lady betrayed no expression one way or the other in acknowledgement of Isabella’s gratitude and faded away, a soft yip clipping into the night silence.

  *

  Isabella walked around the room, touching, observing, filled with such heightened energy she knew any sleep was a distant companion.

  But I need to rest, I need to be fresh, to have my wits about me.

  She lay on the bed, stretched out on the quilted covers, her ankles crossed tightly, her hands clasped on her stomach, trying to think back on bedtime stories that had bought her comfort as a child.

  There was one she loved – she could hear Ebba’s voice as she recalled it, Gallivant chiming in with witticisms and corrections if the story so much as moved a hair’s breadth away from its wellworn path. The warmth of such memories crept in and her ankles loosened, her hands becoming less knotted. She began to tell herself the story – just a whisper, but word for word as it was told to her so long ago…

  *

  ‘In the Barrow Hills, amongst the watery bowls they call the Great Lakes, there is a favoured spot of the black swans. They are known to fly in, to float, to feed, to commune with each other and then to fly away. But what is kept secret because of its eldritch nature, is that the swans are actually beautiful maids.

  They fly in at night during a full moon, settling on the water with subtle grace, shaking their wings and folding them back and then swimming toward the shore. As they reach the shallows, their legs transform to lithe shapely calves and thighs. Feathery bodies lengthen, shape-changing to beauteous women with midnight hair and lips as red as blood, eyes as dark as death and skin the tint of ivory silk. The feathered plumage slides down the arms, to lie as a perfect wrap, looped from arm to arm and glistening in the exceptional light of the moon.

  This is something rarely seen by mortals, for mortals are aware of the power of Others and know that to watch a Swan Maid is to invite an unforgiving fate.

  But this was something a shepherd failed to remember when he went searching for a lost ewe and lamb on the edge of the lake they called Swan Lake.

  Tired,
dispirited, the shepherd, a handsome young man, sat to rest, laying his crook by his side. Sheltered by the heavy foliage of a lilac bush, his eyes drifted down. Much later, when the moon had risen, some strange breeze, perhaps a welkin wind, slid over his cheek and woke him. He lay very still, hearing the soft humming of a melody that enticed and enchanted.

  With great care, he sat up and peeked through the leaves of the shrub, to see a Swan Maid removing her feathered cloak and laying it on the ground close by the shepherd. Turning, she moved in her clinging black gown back to the water, walked in and then floated, her arms stretched out like a star.

  The shepherd was overcome by her beauty. He had never beheld anyone so flawless and his heart beat strongly as he watched her. He became infatuated, wanted to touch her and to hold her. He recalled hearing a story in the village about selkies, that if a fisherman could hide the skin of a selkie when she shape-changed, then the selkie woman would be unable to change back to her original form, and he could make her his fisherwife.

  The shepherd wondered if owning the feathered cloak of the swan would be the same. And so he slid his crook out with great care, hooking the garment and drawing it back under the lilac. He ran his fingers over the silky feathers, sucking in his breath at its inky beauty. Rolling it up, he withdrew with immense quiet, into the surrounding forest, finding a hollow log and placing the cloak deep inside.

  Then he walked back to the lake, confident, unafraid of any magick the Swan Maid might try to employ. She heard him coming, his feet cracking twigs and she ran to the shore, frantically searching for her cloak, crying ‘No, no!’

  Finally she turned and faced the shepherd.

  ‘Cruel mortal. Thou hast stolen my cloak and hidden it.’

  ‘I have.’ He took her hands in his. They were cold but he didn’t care. He pulled off his own jacket and wrapped it around her. ‘But have no fear, Swan Maid. I would not hurt you. I am overcome by your beauty and would ask you to be my wife.’

  ‘Swan Maid has no choice. Stealer of cloak is stealer of Swan Maid’s life. She is obliged to live with thee for as long as thou wishes to keep her cloak hidden.’

  And suddenly Belle stopped telling herself the story, not caring of the end, sitting bolt upright. She ran to the door and grabbed her boots, checking inside for the shifu square and pulling them on.

  ‘Never,’ she hissed to the room at large. ‘Never shall the Han have such a hold on me. There are only two things of mine here – my boots and the shifu fragment. If I have them with me, nothing can tie me to the Han the way the Swan Maid was tied to the shepherd. Nothing, I swear!’

  Chapter Eighteen

  Nicholas

  ‘I reckon,’ Poli looked at the fast sinking sun, ‘that we are sixty or more leagues nor’ nor’ west of Veniche. And I can tell you, my rear won’t be a pretty sight. I’m not used to riding horses day in, day out. Let alone riding at pace.’ He lifted himself in his stirrups and rubbed gingerly at his buttocks. His horse, one of a pair they had purchased when they had left Veniche, stood with its head hanging, a fetlock resting, one hip higher than the other. ‘Nicholas, I think we have to rest. Else we shall never reach the Goti Range.

  Nicholas examined the approaching horizon. The Goti Range snarled with razor sharp teeth against the complexion of the sky. Mist shrouded the highest points but the visible lower peaks had a dusting of snow like an old lady’s shawl. He found himself in awe of the heights and wondered if they would have to climb through the range to find this ambiguous ‘North by northwest.’

  ‘You’re thinking the same as me. It’s almost impassable.’ Poli arched a leg over the cantle of the saddle and slid to the ground with a groan.

  Nico nodded.

  Impassable.

  ‘And,’ Poli unlatched his girth and pulled the saddle off the horse, ‘do you wonder if we have to pass over the top?’

  Nicholas nodded again and dismounted, following Poli’s example. He laid the saddle on the ground and pulled a twist of grasses with which he wiped the sweat marks on the horse’s back and flank. But his hand slowed as he once again eyed the range.

  ‘Nicholas, come look.’

  Poli sat himself on a boulder and unfolded the marked page in the map book.

  ‘You see,’ Poli’s finger began to trace. ‘I think this is where we are. It’s hard to judge because we’re following no known path. But if I read the stars and the sun right, and I’m a sailor after all, I think we are indeed here.’

  He tapped the folds.

  Nicholas reached into his jacket for a scrap of the papers that he had taught himself to carry, pulling a piece of charcoal with it.

  ‘Only one way over range. Celestine Stair.’

  ‘True enough,’ agreed Poli. ‘But I think there may be another.’

  Nicholas waited. He and Poli were developing a curious give and take in their conversations, as if Poli was almost reading his mind.

  I know what you will say and my heart shrivels.

  ‘Your face says it all, Nico,’ Poli bent to the map and pointed with his finger.

  ‘We cannot.’ Nicholas wrote.

  ‘It would save days, maybe weeks. Are you game?’

  Poli’s finger still marked the spot and Nicholas noticed the scars and sun damage from a life at sea. He had reason to feel the callouses in days past and would not mindfully wish to again. Besides, he and Poli seemed to be forming a partnership. He twisted his lips.

  ‘You’re not?’ Poli seemed put out.

  Nicholas scrawled.

  ‘Foolhardy...’

  ‘Oh come on, Nico…’

  ‘Agree we should take risk. Still foolhardy.’

  Stories of death, ghouls and tormented souls snaked through Nicholas’s thoughts.

  No man in their right mind…

  He placed his own finger on the name that glared from the map like a warning: the Vale of Kush.

  ‘Unknown danger, avoided like the plague by all. It’s a piece of cake,’ Poli grinned.

  Nicholas shook his head resignedly, but with a smile. Under any other circumstances, life with this man would be a riot, he was sure. But right now there was too much at stake. He wrote: ‘Isabella relies. Can’t be hurt. Or killed.’

  ‘Aine, man. I’ve no intention of doing either.’

  ‘Remember moonbridge?’

  ‘I’m not likely to forget.’ Poli pushed the note aside and studied the map. ‘Two days to get to the foothills of the range, Nicholas. Two days to climb to the Vale of Kush. After that there is nothing on the map. We just have to keep north by northwest until we run into something.’

  *

  Poli fell asleep quickly, leaving Nicholas to toss and turn under his blanket by the fire.

  The Vale of Kush. It unnerved him. He wondered why the thought of the place didn’t keep Poli awake, mere mortal that he was. He longed to talk in detail with the man, to continue building the bridge between them, the kind of edifice that would stand firm against whatever they might face.

  He frowned at the glowing coals of the fire.

  But then, we stood firm on the moonbridge. I had his back and then, on the isle, he had mine.

  He watched the sleeping man, studying him as he had once before.

  Why such friendship, Poli? Because of the way my father cared for you and your mother?

  He reached into his jacket and felt for the folded packet his father had slipped into his pocket on the island. Drawing it out, he fingered the paper, fine paper that folded neatly. He could see black loops through the grain, his father’s writing, and the urge to see his father’s hand was too strong. Glancing at Poli, he eased his finger under the knob of wax and unfolded the letter. He stood and walked to the other side of the fire, away from the sleeping man.

  My father has magicked a letter for Poli. Not for me, but for the man whom I am befriending…

  ‘My dear Gio,

  For all of my days I have wondered at your life and now I can see that the small things I sent your way o
n our day of parting have been helpful in growing you into the man that you are. If that is so, it makes a miniscule reparation for the role I played in your loss aboard the Pourpoint.’

  How so, thought Nicholas. What did my father do that required the gifting of largesse to a child?

  ‘I would be less than the father of my own son if I did not explain. Let me say at the outset that I recognised a young boy’s fear and trepidation in you as you worked on that ship. But I watched you attempt to be valiant and stalwart. It was admirable in one so young.’

  Nicholas scanned the close-writ words, an acidic feeling in his belly. He thought it was jealousy, but as intuition grew stronger, he dreaded something far worse.

  ‘Your father was an innocent bystander in a game of malintent that I played with the Captain. Your father’s kitbag was the place I unknowingly chose to hide a jewelled pin that I told the Captain was stolen. The fact that the Captain chose to keelhaul your father for a theft he did not commit will ever be my awful shame.’

  Nicholas gasped and looked quickly toward Poli. The man coughed and rolled a little in his blanket, but stayed asleep.

  Keelhauled!

  He swore under his breath.

  ‘I mesmered the ropes so that your father might swim free, but when he was pulled onto the deck from the water, I saw he’d been fatally mauled by a merrow. I knew instantly that whatever I did, I would never be able to make sufficient reparation for this man’s life. A merrow might have slit his belly but I caused it. When he lay on the decks, he told me he was innocent of any crime. He asked me, begged me to think of ‘the boy’. Only later, after he was gone, did I find out you were ‘the boy’. He was dying in immeasurable mortal pain, as you saw, Aine forbid, and so I offered him what little kindness I could.

  I mesmered his final path.

  I don’t ask for your forgiveness or your understanding. What I did with that pin deserves none. And in any case, it would be impossible. But I don’t regret mesmering your father’s quick passing. I owed him that.