by Unknown
It was the sudden stilling of the nightbirds that alerted Siri. She sat up straighter in her perch, the clarity of madness empowering her vision as she pierced the darkness along the river. She caught motion in the rushes, not far beyond the end of the very branch she sat upon. She stood silently, eyes riveted upon the rustling of the tall reeds as something long moved through them. Sure hands unhooked the maces from her belt, leather straps secure around her wrists lest they slip. Either whatever approached the village from the water hadn’t noticed her, or it didn’t perceive her as a threat, as it continued on its way unabated. “Mahrut, let your rage be my rage. Let your madness guide my hand,” she whispered.
With swift, dancer’s steps, Siri raced down the tree branch. She felt it bend beneath her slight weight as she approached the end, her path narrowing with each step. She sprang, twisting as she sailed through the air to land near the head of the creature, facing back the way she had come. A serpent head—wide enough to swallow a pig whole—rose from the riverside reeds to meet her. The river masked the true size of the scaly threat, but Siri had seen many river snakes in her travels. This one was the mother of all of them if the head were any indication. At a guess, she figured it to be longer than a dozen men laid end to end. “What hell have you escaped from, demon?”
She hadn’t really expected a response. But her life had a way of defying expectations. As a child of the Inside-Out God, she had learned to adapt.
The serpent’s tongue tasted the air, two sets of eyelids blinking an assessment; a warning. “Thisssss village is mine, priesssssssst! Itssssssss people are my tribute!”
There were only a few guidelines given to the traveling priests that were the same, regardless of which god they served. Among the first was this: if you encounter a beast which speaks, kill it without hesitation. The world which had come before this had been destroyed by gods long-banished, and there was always the fear that they would return to destroy the world anew, wearing the bodies of beasts like they did in the before times.
Siri’s right arm swung powerfully, seeking to crush the skull of this threat before it could strike, but her target was no longer there. The massive jaw was already in motion, and struck at her leg as she shifted. The teeth were small, but the jaw crushed with the might of a falling mountain. She cried out as she felt the bone in her shin creak near to breaking. She brought both maces to bear on the jaw of her attacker, and it was enough to win her release but nothing else.
Siri limped back several steps to reassess the situation. Every time she put her full weight on the injured leg, a jolt of searing pain shot through her body, daring her to cry out.
The serpent heaved its muscular length from the water to mass on the shore beneath the swaying head, easily halving the distance between it and Siri. Timeless yellow eyes surveyed Siri from far above her head, well out of reach of her maces. Muddy brown scales flecked with gold glistened in the starlight. “Sssssstand asssssside and you ssssssshal be ssssssspared. Oposssssssse me and your ssssssssskin sssssssshal decorate my nessssssst.”
“I am a delicate little flower,” she replied, shifting back and to the side while the massive head followed her every motion, “but I am no one’s decoration. This village is under the protection of Mahrut. It is you who should withdraw before you taste the rage of the Inside-Out God.”
The demon serpent lunged through the sultry night air. Instinctively favoring the healthy leg, Siri reacted like a dancer, and spun to the side as the powerful jaw dug a furrow in the turf where she had stood only moments before.
Siri gave herself over to the motion, surrendered to the dance as she continued to spin. The steps of a dance used to welcome back the moon flowed through her body unbidden. Arms crossed above her head, swept down and across her body, connected with the nose of the serpent as it took another swipe at her. Siri never noticed.
Mahrut moved through her, pounding through her veins, thundering in her head. She was a road and Mahrut traveled her, rode her madness, channeled rage from her every sinew. The demon serpent swung his head left, then right, unable to predict the priest’s movements as twinned maces fell like thunder, striking scales from his body with every blow.
Hundreds upon hundreds of pounds of murderous muscle coiled from the water, tried to encircle Siri, tried in vain to contain her movements. But every contact sent her spinning in another direction, unpredictable as a flower on storm-tossed seas. Just when her capture seemed inevitable, muscular coils encircling her in a tightening grip, she managed to slip the grasp by running up the body of the serpent. It was like trying to grab a handful of water. The demon serpent became so obsessed with predicting her next step that he failed to realize how close she had gotten to his head.
As Siri danced upon the shifting coils of the enemy beneath her feet, she became distantly aware of the rage of the Inside-Out God moving through her, massing in the base of her spine. Power surged through her as she took two, swift steps up the scaly length of her foe. Maces held wide swung inward like the jaws of an iron trap, crushing the serpent’s head where they met in the middle.
Suddenly free of Mahrut’s presence, Siri was pitched to the soft mud of the riverbank with the serpent’s death throes. The thrashing body destroyed a pair of canoes on the shore, hers included, before it finally came to rest. Siri was distantly aware that she had underestimated the length of the beast by the length of two villagers at least.
Around the village, shutters were thrown wide, doors cracked open to spill flickering light upon the dusty streets. Siri took a moment to catch her breath as the bravest among the farmers and fishermen made a careful approach. She stood and returned the maces to her belt. Without a word, she slid into the waters of the river and vanished beneath the languid waters before anyone could think to stop her.
She was oblivious to the nervous chatter that started up on the riverbank. She was listening to another voice, the whisper of Mahrut and the sibilant threat of a giant serpent. A nest, it has said. And a nest might mean more danger in the future.
Though her lungs burned for air, she trusted Mahrut to show her the way. Just as Siri felt she could hold her breath no more, her head broke the surface in a muddy cave somewhere on the river’s far bank. She held the symbol of Mahrut aloft, muttering a short prayer to him in gasping breaths, and the copper pendant glowed with a red light. In a hollow of mud and discarded snake skins, she found dozens of smooth, black stones. No, Mahrut told her, eggs. The cave was spacious, but not spacious enough to hold more than one of the giant serpents, and of that she was thankful. She only distantly remembered defeating the first demon and doubted she could do the same again if she had to, and certainly not in this confined space.
Once her breath had been regained, Siri methodically smashed each of the eggs, killing their half-formed cargo. There was nothing else keeping her there. She took a deep breath and swam back for the shore.
When her head broke the surface, she could hear the voices coming from the village. The awestruck farmers were already spinning tale about the madwoman who had saved their village from the demon, while others argued that it was merely a large snake and nothing more. There was even one loud boast from a voice that had barely broken into manhood that claimed that he could have done the same had he but known it was a serpent. As she made her way quietly to shore under the cover of darkness, more and more the talk turned to how long the strange priest had been gone beneath the river’s waters. With a conflicted mix of gratitude and regret, they sounded ready to consign her body to the river, the final victim of the great evil that plagued their small community.
“It takes more than a river to kill Siri Viraj, wielder of the snake-hammers!” she shouted, wading from the shallows just downstream from the clump of villagers.
A cry of surprise went up from those of weaker constitution, and Siri was pleased to hear that one of those was the boaster from earlier.
“It had a nest,” she said wearily as she shook poured water from her copper helm. �
�She,” Siri corrected herself, “she had a nest. Your village should be safe now.”
The village elder emerged from the crowd, his wife hugging him closely, huge eyes peering from behind his shoulder. “You have done a great service to our village,” he said. “If there is any way we can repay Mahrut or his servant…” he let his voice trail off. He had already told her about the village’s lack of wealth. There was a nervous smile on his face as if he pondered if there were rewards beyond riches that he had not considered.
Siri licked river water from her upper lip. She looked past the villagers to the corpse of the giant serpent. Demon or not, her twinned maces had not slain anything that grand before. Its blood had blessed her weapons, baptized them in violence and madness. Mahrut whispered in her ear, and she smiled. “Does anyone in your village know leatherwork?”
A broad-shouldered young man stepped from the crowd, nodding in acknowledgement.
“Cure some of the leather from your demon,” she commanded. “Wrapped around the hafts of my weapons, they shall serve as a warning to all those who cross the path of Mahrut.”
She passed the maces over to the tanner. The village was safe for the now, at least. When she left the village, she would be outfitted with weapons befitting a demon slaying priest of the Inside-Out God. Until then, there would be lazy afternoons, simple curries, and if she was very fortunate, dancing.
Storm over Taktsang
by Catherine Soto
I am pleased to have another story of Lin Mei, her brother Biao Mei, and their cats. Shadow and Twilight have grown from the helpless kittens Lin Mei found into useful partners in her adventures. Given her periodic errands for the Emperor’s Intelligence service, Lin Mei does lead an adventurous life.
Catherine Soto sold her first story to SWORD & SORCERESS 21, and she has been writing about Lin Mei and her brother ever since. When not writing or at the obligatory day job, Catherine hangs out at the Asian Art Museum or explores sushi bars, although this year she’s been spending more time at the public library. She’s also working on a novel about her characters. There’s a Kindle book called THE TEMPLE CATS, which is a collection of her first five stories (from SWORD & SORCERESS 21-25), so she at least has a start on it.
****
“We have seen worse,” Biao Mei said. There was a moment of silence as Narrayam Dorjhe looked at him.
“I am sure you have,” he replied quietly. Lin Mei sat very still, watching closely. The lama turned his gaze to her.
“And do you have anything to add?” he asked. She shook her head ever so slightly.
“No, Rimpoche,” she replied, using the honorific carefully. “I do not.” He looked at her for a moment, his eyes seemingly looking at some dark interior in her soul.
“I’m sure the experience must have been upsetting to you,” he commented. Was there a hint of mockery in his words? Lin Mei chose her words carefully.
“The sight would have upset the most hardened of souls,” she replied. There was another moment of silence as Narrayam seemingly weighed her words.
“Of course,” he said. “It was rather unsettling for all concerned.” He stopped to take sip of tea. “Thank you for taking the time to talk to an old man,” he said, setting the tiny teacup down. “You may go now.”
They made their bows and left quietly, emerging into the shadows of the mountain looming above the temple complex.
“That was not so bad,” Biao said.
“No,” Lin Mei agreed, eyeing the forested heights. “It was not.” Nearby, too nearby in Lin Mei’s opinion, young monks were washing away the blood stains on the cobblestones. What remained of the dead monk had been taken away by the rogyapas, the body-breakers, who had taken his earthly form away to the upper reaches of the mountain, there to be dismembered and left for the elements and the carrion birds. From the main temple they could hear the sonorous droning of the monks, as the lengthy and complex funerary rituals designed to cleanse the temple complex of the defilement of death had already begun.
“I wonder why the tiger did not take the body with him,” Biao mused.
“I do also,” Lin Mei said quietly, eyeing the scene. “The wall is not that high. It would have been easy for a tiger to leap over, even carrying a man.” On the wall was a single paw print, in the dead monk’s blood, where the large cat had scrambled over. Lin Mei’s eyes narrowed as she saw the print. “Let us go see to the cats,” she said, striding off. Biao Mei shrugged and followed.
Shadow and Twilight were sleeping on a mat on the corner of the quarters they had been given. That was good news at least. They had been tense and nervous all night long, prowling the confines of the room. Lin Mei had probed their senses, using the bond she had developed with them. She had sensed danger, malevolent and violent, just outside the building which housed them. And in the morning, just as the droning of the conch shells called the monks to their morning meditations, the body of Kalsang Rampa had been found. Lin Mei and her brother had heard the commotion and run outside to investigate. As caravan guards they had seen more than their share of bloody scenes, and so had been called by the Abbot, Narrayam Dorjhe, to give both their testimony, and experienced opinions.
“You should attend the purification ceremony,” Lin Mei observed. “It will make the monks feel better.” Biao Mei nodded.
“Good idea. And you will go for a walk?”
Lin Mei smiled. “It’s a cool morning. It’s just right for some fresh air.” She was skilled at teasing out truth from gossip. Also, as a young woman, she would not be welcome within the sacred temple confines of the monastery.
Breakfast was a mixture of tea, toasted barley flour, salt, and butter, all churned to froth in a wooden container. Lin Mei smiled wistfully as she considered the horror with which her mother would have reacted to such a barbarian repast. But she and her brother had been long out of the Empire. And even longer from their parent’s home. She shut down that line of thought abruptly. She had other things to do.
Outside the monks had finished their gruesome task. The alleys between the buildings were empty. Well enough, with almost everyone at the ceremonies she could conduct her investigation without interruption.
She eyed the wall. It was high enough to provide difficulty for a man trying to climb it, but she had once seen a tiger vault over a similar wall while carrying a young water buffalo. Above and beyond the walls she could see the steep face of the mountain, dotted by scraggly evergreens that had taken root in the cracks in the rock. It would be a hard climb even for a tiger.
She eyed the narrow alley where the monk had been killed. It was paved with rounded cobblestones still wet from the night’s rain as well as the efforts of the monks. On an impulse she walked down to the small building where Kalsang Rampa had labored copying sacred manuscripts. The door was unlocked and she pushed it open to find an aged monk going over yellowed scrolls.
“May the Enlightened One’s understanding light your path,” he greeted as she came in. “How may I assist you?” Lin Mei made a bow.
“I am Lin Mei. I express my sorrow at the loss of your fellow monk,” she said. “I only met him yesterday for a short while, but I found him to be kind and gentle.”
“That he was,” the old man agreed. “I am Kunchen Lobsang. Would you please sit?” he asked, pointing to a yak-hair mat. She sank to the mat as he turned to lift a pot of hot water from some coals in a small hearth. “May I offer some tea?” he asked.
“That would be most kind,” she replied. It would have been impolite to refuse. In moments she was holding a hot mug of black tea flavored with butter and salt. She waited for her host to drink first before taking a polite three sips.
“It is very sad that such a learned monk would be taken by a beast,” she ventured.
“All is impermanent,” he replied. “Even the mountains will weather away in time. Still, it is sad.” He took another sip of tea.
“It was fortunate that he was able to finish copying the manuscripts for the Daci’en mo
nastery,” he added. Lin Mei put a properly sorrowful expression on her face and bowed low in acknowledgement. It also hid her face while her mind raced. She was certain it had not been an idle remark. But what did he know?
“I am certain the monks at Daci’en will be most pleased,” she said. “I am also certain they will be equally sorrowful at the news of his passing.” She did not add that she and her brother had no intention of returning to the Empire any time soon.
“Daci’en has a great collection of sacred texts. It is well-known to be favored by the Son of Heaven,” the old man said.
“It does,” Lin Mei agreed. Where was this going?
“The death of Kalsang Rampa is a great loss,” the old man went on. “Not only was he an industrious copier of sacred texts, but his knowledge of languages, such as the Hind and Tifun tongues, made him even more valuable as a bridge between the kingdoms of this land.”
“I was unaware of his accomplishments,” Lin Mei responded. She knew this already. And the old man was sure to know that. Abruptly she drank the last of her tea in one long sip.
“I am thankful for the refreshment,” she said, bowing her head low to the mat. He bowed low in return, a generous act from one such as him. With a few more pleasantries she left.
Outside, in the cool air of the mountains, her mind raced. Years of service in the Empire’s Intelligence arm had made her sensitive to the slightest hints of intrigue. She wondered if she was making too much of an old man’s ramblings, but dismissed the idea. Kunchen Lobsang was still alert and keen of mind. His had been no idle words.
On impulse she walked to the gate. The monastery was on a ledge that narrowed at both ends. Here it was just wide enough for the gate. There were no guards to stop her, and she wandered out on the path leading down to the plain stretching out far below. Here, where the mountains met the steppes, was the strategic Ang-Xi Corridor, only four day’s ride across at this point. Beyond were the nomad lands. The mountain behind her was only the first ridge of the vast ranges that separated the steppes from the rich land of Hind to the South.
