by Liz Williams
There. It was lit by its own light, to Seijin’s otherworldly vision, standing on a slight rise before the roar and tumult of the city. Such a small place, humble, unassuming. It was clear why the Dowager Empress held such objections. Seijin, on the other hand, rather admired this approach; it was certainly to be respected. But a contract was a contract, after all, and Seijin permitted only the occasional sensation of personal sentiments.
Shortly before the temple came within stepping distance, female self gave Seijin an anxious nudge and, with a nod, Seijin acquiesced. A woman stepped from the air, middle-aged, hard-faced, and weary. She’d had hopes, once, of an education and children, but prostitution and drugs had taken care of all that long ago. She’d managed to go straight, however, and she had an offering, in thanks: a small bunch of golden leaves. Seijin, all selves, retreated a short way behind her eyes and watched as the temple drew close.
Very modest, in fact, and recently restored. Interesting.
A knock on the door—tentative, as if unsure of admission, although there was a lamp burning in the window of what was evidently the main hall. It was a moment before the door opened and Seijin braced a little, reaffirming the disguise. It was to be hoped that this would not be too easy; there was no satisfaction in that.
“Good evening?” Not the new Emperor, of course—but who knew? He seemed the type who might very well answer his own front door. Instead, a young woman stood there, dressed in a monk’s gray tunic and loose white trousers.
Why, my dear, Seijin thought. You’re dead. Even more interesting.
She was not an obvious ghost; Seijin wondered whether a human would even be able to tell. A slight transparency about the face was the giveaway, but she seemed solid enough in the world, able to open doors, for a start.
“Hello,” Seijin stammered, looking down. “I brought a gift—that is to say, I have an offering, I wanted to give thanks—”
“Of course.” Very professional, but they must get all sorts here. “Would you like to come in? The temple is open and you can stay as long as you need to. If you would like me to pray with you, please ask.”
“Thank you,” Seijin whispered. “You’re very kind.”
Heaven hit as soon as Seijin walked through the door. It had not been like this in the temple of the former Emperor and, somehow, he did not think that place had ever possessed this luminous quality—not the overcontrolled atmosphere of Heaven as it currently was, which made it such an irksome place to be, but a wild, sweet, strong sense, like mountain water.
Well, well, Seijin thought. You really are Emperor, aren’t you? A strange sensation, stealing over the mind and the heart, something not felt for many years, that Seijin, stepping into the main hall of the temple with its lit lamp and single spray of orchids, was astounded to recognize as awe.
I have stood in the multitudinous presence of deity, and been merely bored.
And with that, was not a small degree of fear.
But it soon became apparent that fear was neither an appropriate emotion, nor—given Seijin’s disguise—a useless one. With female self nervously prompting, Seijin sank to knees on the polished wooden boards before the little shrine, head bowed.
“Please—madam, would you pray with me?”
“Of course,” the spectral priestess said. “And call me Robin.”
It seemed that Robin was alone in the building, but Seijin felt that the ability to tell for certain had been lost. Confidence had fled on stepping into the temple and that in itself was exciting, if a worry. Impossible to remember how long it had been since a target had appeared who was worth all that training, all that pain. Perhaps, Seijin now reflected behind borrowed eyes, only a god would ever have done.
A stolen glance at Robin revealed the priestess kneeling trustingly beside Seijin, head bowed. Of course, with all that power at her disposal, she would have little reason to fear anything mortal, and besides, she was already dead. She must have been given special dispensation to remain here on Earth and Seijin marveled at the work that had been done; she was so little distance from fully human. It was only when one reached out, listened for breath or the tick of the heart and found absence, that one realized the truth of her nature.
And there was no way of knowing how much, in turn, the dead priestess might be able to detect. Seijin cast concerns deeper, burying them in the inner recesses of the mind, the gaps between male and female self so deep that they could have lain in the caverns underneath Shadow Pavilion, and concentrated upon prayer.
18
There were eight of them and they were sisters. Badger knew this because they all had the same smell, and he thought they looked similar, but that was always difficult to tell. Apart from Mistress, Husband, and a handful of others, badger found humanoid beings hard to tell apart. They stood in the middle of the echoing hall, the translucent crimson draperies billowing between the columns, drifting on the cardamom wind. Slowly, flames emerged from the air, floating amongst the draperies and burning with a soft, clear fire.
One of the demons threw back her head and gave a snarling cry. The women’s garments sank to the floor, melting into pools of the same soft fire, and vanishing. The badger watched, impassive. Slowly, not keeping pace with one another, the women began to change: stripes appearing across thighs and haunches, faces elongating into wide-whiskered muzzles. Only the eyes remained the same, golden and fierce, mirroring fire.
It would not be wise, badger thought, to make a run for it now. He thought of the antelope glimpsed in the garden below: courtiers, or dinner? Wisest to keep silent and still, wisest to wait. And see, something new was happening.
He came out of the air, gradually solidifying just as the flames had done, and at first, the badger thought he was a flame. Scarlet and gold, with a single black thread running through it all, the colors of hibiscus, of roses, of sunset. Then all these colors merged, resolving into a slender man in a fire-colored tunic and trousers, with gilt bells around one ankle, a long column of black hair, and eyes that were also the shade of night, with a golden circlet around each iris, like an eclipse.
He was smiling.
“Girls, girls, there’s really no need—and who is this?” The eclipse-eyes turned to the badger. There was a sudden, crushing weight, as though the sun had fallen. Ah, the badger thought, with chagrin. Not just a demon, then. A little bit more than that.
“Prince Agni, this is one of the things that was taken through. A creature of earth, from China, but not of Earth.” The voice, emanating from a tigress’ throat, was entirely human, with no trace of a growl. “From their Hell, you see.”
“But this is a beast,” the tiger prince said. He held out a faintly striped hand and the badger cowered back at the heat that blasted from it. No chance of a quick bite here, then. “I was expecting something in the form of a man.” A soft voice, but something in it spoke to the badger of fire and it seemed that the tigresses recognized this also, for there was the shuffling and rustling of discomfited cats.
“That person, also, was taken, do not worry, our hireling did not fail us.”
“Ah, I see. My apologies, ladies. I should have made more certain of my facts.” But the tigresses said nothing, nor would they have done so, badger realized, even if they had been chastised. There was only one power in this room. “Where is he?”
“In the dungeon, Lord Prince.”
“Good. I’ll pay him a visit a little later.”
Badger’s ears remained pricked throughout this conversation: someone else had been taken, then. Who? Zhu Irzh? He had been closest to the location when the badger had been snatched. “As for the animal—keep it leashed. Perhaps we might hunt it a little later; I understand they are carnivores.” He turned back to the badger. “What do you say, creature of earth? Can you hunt more than beetles?”
“I have hunted men,” the badger replied.
An elegant eyebrow rose. “Have you, now? Then perhaps you will have the chance to do so again.” A sharper glance. “This
is not your only aspect, is it?”
“No.” Badger was what he was, no point in denying it. But it was slightly embarrassing, all the same.
“Perhaps you would like to change for us? Come, ladies, keep our guest company.”
Eight tiger-skin rugs decorated the floor and pooled into flame, each with a naked girl arising from it.
“Oh, all right then,” the badger growled. Moments later, a battered iron teakettle sat rocking on the marble floor. At least, the badger reflected sullenly, his hearing was not quite so keen in this particular form. It cut down the tinkling laughter and cries of “How sweet!” But only by a little.
The thing about old teakettles, even ones with a collar and leash, is that people forget they are there. Badger was carried with some ceremony, and not a little caution, on a cushion into an adjoining room where the tea setting was kept, and placed amongst cups of porcelain and jade. The end of the chain was tied tightly to an iron ring set into the wall.
“There.” The tigress who had carried him in bent down to speak to him. “I don’t know what you can do in this form. Spit, maybe? We’ll have to put you on the stove a little later and see what happens to you then. But for now, this will be your place.”
Badger was used to being a teakettle for long periods. It was restful, though he could have done without the collar. The demon went away after that and badger passed into what counted as sleep, but he woke as soon as he heard voices, coming from just outside the kitchen annex. The voices were hushed and conspiratorial, and those sorts of conversations were always worth listening to.
“Does he know where she is?”
“He trusts me to keep him informed.”
“And have you?”
“Of course not. Don’t be stupid. You know perfectly well what we agreed to do. But there’s a problem. She nearly came back.”
“What? When?” There was real panic in the voice.
“Last night. You were with Agni, otherwise you’d have noticed.”
“Yes, it was my turn. At least, I swapped with Urushi because she had a headache and—”
“Aruth, don’t go on, that doesn’t matter. Anyway, we were all in the main hall and suddenly she was almost here, you could see her. Just her outline, but I thought the little bitch was going to manifest completely. Urushi dropped a glass.”
“But what does it mean? Has she decided to come home?”
“You really are quite dim sometimes, Aruth. You know perfectly well that we took steps to stop that happening and the only person who could have countermanded that is Agni. And Agni doesn’t know. No, what it means is that the humans who took her have got tired of her and are trying to send her back. They nearly succeeded, even despite our measures. And that worries me.”
“If she does come home—”
“She won’t be pleased. More to the point, neither will Agni.”
“We should never have done it.” This voice—younger, more timid (for a tigress)—had a definite prey-on-the-run quality, to badger’s ears. “If Agni finds out—”
“Yes. Well. We’re just going to have to make sure that doesn’t happen.” There was a note in this voice, badger mused, that did not sound at all like prey, more than a hint of a growl.
Silence, a meditative kind of pause, and then footsteps, retreating. Interesting, badger thought. It wasn’t the first time he’d been able to use overheard information to his own advantage. And somehow, he did not think it would be the last.
19
“Sorry,” Go stammered. “I—must have freaked out there for a minute.”
Jhai Tserai looked at him curiously. “What’s he talking about? Who are you?” Then she smiled. Not many people could resist Jhai’s smile, Chen thought, even when they knew she was trying to pull something. That demon-glamour … It didn’t hurt that Jhai was beautiful, and (currently) wearing a silk jacket of silver-shot purple that outlined a modest, but appealing, cleavage.
Go was clearly smitten, even after a rough night. Chen wondered whether he would, on reflection, recognize Jhai for what she was: he must be one of the few people in the city to have wittingly encountered a tiger demon before, and Go might be reckless, but he wasn’t entirely stupid. “My name’s Pauleng Go,” the young man said. “I write for the movies.”
“Really? Which ones?”
Go named a few.
“Oh, I loved the first one. I thought it had a really interesting undercurrent of post-modernism and combined with the background of—”
“Maybe,” Chen said mildly, “we could save the film reviews until later? We have a bit of a problem here, Jhai.”
“Sorry, Detective. You must be wondering what the hell I’m doing here at this hour of the morning.”
“Yes, since you ask.”
“I just got back from Beijing; I was going to pick up Zhu Irzh. He said he was coming off shift first thing.”
Chen sighed. “Mr Go, would you excuse us for a moment?” He ushered Jhai through the door, then went on, “He would have been, but he’s gone missing.”
“What?”
Chen explained.
“Oh, great,” Jhai said. “I know this is trivial, but I wanted him to come and look at wedding dresses with me.”
Wherever Zhu Irzh might be, Chen thought, he might be considered to have got off lightly.
“Zhu Irzh isn’t the only one to go astray. Inari’s badger’s AWOL as well—the two are almost certainly connected.”
“Do you think this is anything to do with me?” Jhai asked.
Jhai’s habit of assuming that the world revolved around her was less arrogance than pragmatism: it frequently did. “It’s a distinct possibility,” Chen said. “Ever since your engagement was announced, Zhu Irzh’s public profile has been prominent. Frankly, I wouldn’t rule out kidnapping.”
At least she wasn’t the hysterical type. Jhai’s eyes narrowed in an expression that Chen had come to know well, and she caught her bottom lip between her teeth.
“I can’t just go home and sit there, after this. Is there anything I can do? Miss Qi’s not here, unfortunately—visiting family back in Heaven.”
A pity, Chen thought. Jhai’s Celestial bodyguard would have come in handy right now.
“I doubt you’d just sit, Jhai. You have a company to run, after all. But put your own security on it—it can’t hurt. We’re overstretched.”
“All right. But I don’t want to get under your feet, Chen.”
Oddly enough, Chen thought he could trust her not to. He said so. Then he added, “Could you come in here a moment? I don’t want—” he gestured toward the interrogation room.
“Sure.” Chen led her into one of the other empty rooms.
“That young man in there. I wasn’t interrogating him, as such. He’s in there to keep him safe. He says there’s a tiger demon after him.”
He had the pleasure of seeing Jhai look genuinely startled.
“Two shocks in five minutes, Chen. I don’t know how you manage to stay so calm.”
“Inside, I’m like Munch’s Scream. Get ready for another one. That film you liked so much? This girl starred in it.”
“You’re joking. Lara Chowdijharee’s a tigress? I knew there was a reason I identified with the protagonist.”
“The thing is,” Chen said, “do you actually know her?”
“The surname’s assumed, obviously. But—yeah, I do. Didn’t recognize her on film, though—I’ve only ever met her in her more demonic aspect, and on screen and under make-up … This lot are all my distant cousins, you see. Mother left Hell—our Hell—under a bit of a cloud. Fell in love with someone. A young lady. A very rich young lady, whose father owned a small pharmaceutical corporation, among other things. Had me by artificial means. Grand-dad, if one can call him that, died, and one of the things that got passed over to Mother was the pharmaceutical side of things—that’s where Paugeng comes from.”
“And of course your mother never returned to Hell.”
“No reason t
o. Besides, our side of the family comes from Kerala—there’s a long history of matriarchy in the region. Go-ahead women are nothing new there, but in other bits of India and Hell, things are rather more backward. Mother never really took to Hell. Thinks it’s a bit—well, a bit Bollywood, I suppose.”
“But this demon—Lara—she’s a relation?”
“A cousin. She’s one of nine sisters who live in a palace called the Hunting Lodge. It’s in a region of Hell ruled by my cousin—another cousin—called Agni, who’s really more of a demigod than a demon. Father was a fire deity. Great combination genetically, with all that tiger blood. Nice enough bloke, actually. Bit smarmy. He’s been up here a couple of times. Can’t say the same for Lara, which is probably why she’s never looked me up.”
“You don’t get along?”
“I’m okay with strong women,” Jhai said. “Which may surprise you. I respect them. But Lara’s just a bitch and she’s also really quite thick.”
“Oh dear,” Chen said, inadequately. “Go thinks she’s actually unstable.”
“It wouldn’t surprise me. But all of them are a bit nuts. Agni’s the sanest of them and even he’s had his moments. What’s Lara doing here?”
Jhai wouldn’t be winning any Least Psychotic awards any time soon, Chen thought, but he kept that to himself.
“Go summoned her up,” he explained. “Thought it was a good idea.”
“Jesus.”
“He’s now realized the error of his ways, I think. Tried to send her back where she came from and it didn’t work—he admits he’s no expert in magic. She killed his business partner and burned his house down.”
“Yeah, that sounds like Lara. What are you going to do about this, Chen? Try and find her, or what?”
“I have rather a lot on my plate,” Chen said. “I know this is a substantial favor, but I was wondering if you could take charge of Mr Go? At least keep him safe.”
“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Jhai remarked, “but Paugeng’s got quite a number of secure units. He’ll be safe enough with us and even if Lara shows up, I might be able to talk her out of doing anything too violent. I wouldn’t count on it, though. But you can’t keep him here. She comes from the Hunting Lodge, remember? There’s a reason for that name. Good sense of smell, that side of the family. And if she shows up here and there’s resistance, she’s likely to do a lot of collateral damage. Paugeng’s safer.”
