Then, for the first time, it looked directly at Admiral Zheng with awareness of its surroundings. Zheng He had always felt himself an excellent judge of men; now he found himself attempting to perceive the nature of this very strange creature, so different from a man yet also at variance from his conception of a dragon.
Zheng He's voice, even after all these years, trembled a bit as he spoke to me of the dragon's discerning gaze. He told me of the intelligence he saw in those eyes, and the gentleness. Others might think the dragon a beast; he rejected that. He realized he stood before a creature that might legitimately consider itself a near equal to a man.
That realization, he said, represented for him the dragon's most frightening aspect.
* * * *
At this point in Zheng He's tale, I told him that I did not mind him mocking my trusting nature, but that he did not have to continue his jest. He knows I believe in such things as ghosts and vampires, and I declared myself willing to believe in dragons, as well. But I knew he did not believe in such things.
Admiral Zheng laughed and insisted upon the truth of every word. “But I did not wish this tale told before I wanted it told."
"What makes this that time?” I asked.
"Let me tell more,” Zheng He said. “Then you will realize on your own."
* * * *
Zheng He decided he should set aside his status as commander in chief of the treasure fleet and adopt that of ambassador. As the doctors watched in wonderment, Zheng He spread his arms wide and bade the dragon greetings: he spoke in praise of its wisdom and strength and inquired as to any service he might provide, perhaps a particular herb or a soothing tea. Then he lowered his hands and bowed his head slightly.
The dragon, of course, showed no sign of understanding Zheng He's speech. He chose this time, however, to utter another low moan. The doctors, as one, took several steps backward; the archers raised their bows a bit higher.
Zheng He raised a hand waist high to indicate that the bowmen should relax their stance. Zheng He did not know whether the dragon's moans represented an exclamation of pain or an attempt at communication. He must know more. And another thought occurred to him—he had spent this voyage demonstrating Chinese might to the barbarian countries of the Western Ocean. Here sat yet another opportunity to show that might, this time to a supernatural creature!
First, he must make sure the dragon survived. He commanded the doctors: “Fetch fresh water for the dragon! Then, offer it as wide a range of food as you can, whatever your judgment tells you a dragon might find appropriate—pork and fishes, turnips and mushrooms, apples and plums. We must hope the same foods that nourish us provide it with sustenance, as well."
The doctors began to leave, but Zheng He stopped them all with a raised hand. “Then, once you have fed the dragon, you may conduct the interviews and examinations you spoke of."
One protested, “How may we conduct such an interview when the dragon cannot speak to us?"
"Think of him as you would a patient too injured to speak. Also, you mentioned the six pulses and the tongue as providing clues. I trust you possess other ways, as well, to convince a patient's body to give up its secrets. I suggest you employ them."
Admiral Zheng watched for a few moments as the doctors scurried about the hold for provisions appropriate for a dragon. Then he returned his attention to the creature itself, which continued to sit and stare and utter the occasional moan. Zheng He felt for the creature, as he realized it had no way of knowing whether it had found itself among friends or enemies. It may believe, he thought, that I intend to impress it as part of the crew, or that I consider it a mere beast and wish to discover whether its flesh would constitute a delicacy! But a beast doesn't possess the dragon's obvious intelligence. I suspect we could even teach it civilized speech.
Such a possibility heartens me. After all, it requires a certain intelligence for the creature to understand it must acknowledge my sovereignty over it.
I will demand that most precious treasure of all for the sake of the emperor!
* * * *
Zheng He watched as two of the doctors, using all their strength, scooted a large barrel of water toward the dragon. It apparently understood the nature of the offering immediately, as its powerful arms easily lifted the container to its mouth. It drank about half the water and placed the barrel next to it. One of the doctors approached the barrel as if to retrieve it, and the dragon emitted a loud hissing sound. “I will admit,” Zheng He told me all these years later, “that my bowels stirred when I heard that sound, because I believed it certain that flames would engulf the doctor and perhaps all of us within seconds."
Yet still the doctor stood, and not even a hint of smoke appeared from the dragon's mouth. All the same, the doctor backed away from the creature.
Of all the foods the doctors offered up, the dragon accepted only various fishes and apples. It did not try to stand for the better part of a day. Zheng He made sure only he and the archers attended as the dragon lifted itself up on two arms, then one, then rose on wobbly legs. “Surely no man has ever stood next to such a formidable creature,” Zheng He told me. “Certainly no creature as intimidating, indeed frightening, as the dragon."
Now the dragon looked around, as if searching for something familiar. Then its gaze caught a shaft of light from a porthole just over his head. It turned slowly, took the several steps it required to stand in the light, and slowly spread its thin, translucent wings.
Zheng He saw that the span of the dragon's wings amounted to a distance barely longer than the dragon's height. How, he wondered, can such small wings support this creature in flight? But, he reasoned, perhaps this baby dragon's wings will grow larger in time.
The dragon stood at such an angle as to receive the light over as much of the area of its wings as possible. The admiral felt his own body grow chilled at the thought that the dragon might accept the warm rays of the sun to power a previously dormant fire-breathing capability.
But after a few minutes, the dragon folded its wings, returned to its previous position, and sat again. It did not breathe fire. It did not appear to provide any threat at all.
Zheng He decided his determination to assert himself over this creature could not flag. He stood straight and tall, spread his arms wide, then clapped his hands against his breast. “Zheng He. Zheng He.” Then he reached his arms toward the dragon, bidding it to say its name, if it had one.
Another grunt from the dragon, but this one came out more quietly, more like that of a man wondering how to interpret something than of a creature in pain. The dragon tilted its head much as a curious dog might, then placed its hands on its own chest and said, in a deep but clear voice, “Merabor. Merabor."
Zheng He felt as if his heart would burst from his chest.
* * * *
In the days afterward, the dragon, Merabor, astonished Zheng He with his healing abilities. The doctors’ interviews and examinations proved unnecessary. Perhaps, he reasoned, the dragon had only needed food and water. But another aspect of the creature suggested itself—its apparent need to stand in the sun several times a day. Upon those occasions Merabor seemed renewed, as if the sun provided nourishment food and water could not.
The “egg” also impressed him—after Merabor's exit, it had closed itself up sufficiently that neither Admiral Zheng nor anyone else could perceive that an exit ever existed. He ordered it stored in the hold, but far from the dragon.
Zheng He felt, however, that Merabor's greatest accomplishment remained his swift learning of the rudiments of the Chinese language. “His,” not “its,” for the dragon informed Zheng He of its maleness early on. The admiral asked whether Merabor had spoken with people before. The dragon insisted he had not, which the admiral found at best confusing and at worst suspicious. How had it learned civilized speech so quickly?
Admiral Zheng also maintained his fascination with the dragon's clothing. Whoever created it did not appear to have sewn or woven it in any fami
liar manner. To the unaided eye Merabor's long tunic appeared to encompass a single unbroken piece of cloth. Its sleeves and its neck and wing holes did not even end in hems, nor did the very bottom of the garment; the material simply ended, yet showed no sign of fraying. Zheng He asked Merabor if he may touch the tunic, and the dragon relented easily. The admiral slid his fingers over the tunic, and he gasped as the cloth imparted a minor shock similar to static electricity; the shock did not cease, however, but continued as Zheng He rubbed the cloth between thumb and forefinger. Its texture felt similar to silk, but he could not perceive threads, no matter how fine. Yet the cloth seemed to possess the strength and elasticity of leather without the accustomed thickness.
Zheng He realized his fingers still fondled Merabor's tunic and he released it, wondering at the reluctance he felt as he did so. “It felt as if it holds the spark of life itself!” Zheng He muttered. But the admiral set this idea aside as unworthy of someone of his logical nature.
Zheng He tried to decide what kind of dragon Merabor represented. He knew none that wore clothing, for instance. The admiral stood before Merabor one day as the dragon sat and ate. He'd dismissed the archers earlier, feeling that he could trust the dragon—also, that if Merabor truly wished to burn them all and destroy his flagship in the process, likely the archers could not prevent it.
Zheng He told Merabor he believed him less logical than the Wood Dragon, nor as competitive as the Fire Dragon—not as diplomatic as the Earth Dragon, nor as ruthless as the Metal Dragon. “I believe you represent a Water Dragon,” the admiral said. “You seem less selfish, more inhibited. You appear more able to accept defeat."
Merabor tossed two apples into his mouth as a man might a couple of cherries, and ate them in two gulps. He replied in his deep yet halting voice, “Not ... defeated. Not ... dragon."
"Not ... a dragon?” Zheng He asked.
Merabor placed his hands on his chest as he had when he'd first said his name. “Oldavar. Oldavar. Name of my people."
Zheng He couldn't hide his confusion. “You mean, perhaps, your tribe? Do dragons organize themselves into tribes?"
Merabor tilted his head, doglike, once more. “No understand.” Hands on chest again. “Oldavar. Only Oldavar."
"Ah!” Zheng He said, nodding his understanding. “'Oldavar’ means ‘dragon’ in your tongue."
Merabor stopped with another pair of apples midway to his mouth. “No dragon. Oldavar."
Zheng He folded his arms on his chest and frowned. How, he wondered, can a dragon sit there before me and call himself something else? I might as well refer to myself as something other than a man. “A more vexing creature may not exist,” he told Merabor. “How might I learn more about you?” He reasoned that for the dragon to acknowledge the emperor's sovereignty over him, he must understand the true nature of his ruler. But to do that, Zheng He must first understand the dragon. The gift, he reasoned, must match the one who receives it.
A moment's thought, and the admiral had his answer: “All things in life express themselves through opposite principles—yin and yang. In order for me to learn more about you, you must learn more about me. Such an opportunity approaches."
Merabor's eyes spoke of an intelligence that sometimes intimidated even Zheng He. The dragon rumbled, “How may I learn more?"
"I have remembered a more vexing creature than you. Someone who may indeed provide you a better understanding of men. You must witness my encounter with the pirate, Chen Zuyi."
* * * *
Days later, the treasure fleet approached Palembang, in Sumatra, where many Chinese merchants and their families lived. Chen Zuyi had taken control of the city and begun raiding ships in the Strait of Malacca.
This pirate did indeed vex Admiral Zheng, and he had grown determined to root out this menace. First, however, he must gather information about the pirate's intentions.
Zheng He wanted Merabor to witness as much as possible of his encounter with Chen and with his own informant, the merchant Shi Jinqing. However, he knew he dared not display the dragon before men who did not serve him as crewmembers. He could order his own men to remain silent about Merabor, knowing that some would speak of him anyway. He could address that problem by punishing severely the men who spoke, while dispatching senior officers to discredit their words.
But the admiral could not effectively silence or discredit those who lived ashore, at least not after the treasure fleet departed.
So Zheng He, under cover of darkness the night before his meeting with each man, instructed trusted members of his crew to clear the path from the hold to an upper deck where the meeting would take place. The admiral escorted Merabor to a small alcove adjacent to the meeting room and secreted him there.
Merabor grumbled about the cramped surroundings, but Zheng He promised him the first meeting, with the pirate himself, Chen Zuyi, would take place in less than an hour, at first light. “You will learn much about how men deal with one another,” he told the dragon. “Then you shall learn about how men deal with pirates."
Merabor gave another grumbling response, which Admiral Zheng interpreted as the dragon conceding the point. “I realize you will not understand much of what you hear,” the admiral said. “I will explain more afterward. I will also allow you a lengthy time outside on my observation deck to bask in the sun."
"Then I wait eagerly,” Merabor said.
Satisfied with the dragon's response and with himself, Zheng He started sternward toward his quarters, but a crewman ran up to him, bowed, and pointed excitedly at the ocean's waters just to one side of the treasure ship's wake. The dim rays of the sun shone obliquely on the calm waters, but just enough that Zheng He made out a dark shape beneath the surface—a shape familiar enough that a sense of wonder and awe gripped him.
The shape of the dragon's mother.
And it moved, pacing this very ship.
Zheng He's first instinct told him to rush back to Merabor and demand to know how the dragon mother had survived and whether she meant his ship harm. But as he admonished the crewman who'd warned him of this possible danger to speak of it to no one else, then dismissed him, a second thought came to him.
He reasoned that Merabor either did not want him to know of his mother's survival or did not know of it himself. Either way, Zheng He possessed knowledge the dragon did not—and knowledge often represented advantage.
The admiral continued toward his quarters, consciously refusing to glance again at the dark shape.
* * * *
When Admiral Zheng's flagship docked in the Old Harbor in Palembang, he sent a messenger to Chen Zuyi and his associates, requiring them to submit to his sovereignty.
Zheng He believed the pirate would attempt either an attack or an escape upon this summons. To his surprise, however, Chen Zuyi soon appeared at the Old Harbor to speak with him directly. The pirate came aboard Zheng He's flagship and allowed the admiral's men to direct him to the meeting room. Chen Zuyi bowed deeply and spoke quietly but confidently: “I have appeared as you requested, Admiral."
"So you have,” Zheng He said. He offered the pirate nothing, neither food nor drink nor an offer to sit. “Do you then submit to me?"
Chen Zuyi bowed again. “I have no other choice before such powers as you command."
Zheng He thought of the dragon deep within this very ship. Soon I may have many other powers, he thought. But none to boast of just yet. “Prepare your men,” he told Chen Zuyi. “Your days of piracy end here."
The man left, having seemingly acknowledged and accepted Zheng He's sovereignty. If only, he thought, the dragon would accept such so easily. He considered canceling his appointment with his informant, Shi Jinqing, but decided the proper political course meant hearing whatever he might have to say.
First, however, the admiral stepped into the alcove adjacent the meeting room and looked in on Merabor. The dragon still stood silently. Zheng He asked, “Did you gain any insight into people as you listened?"
Merabor
's voice rumbled even lower than usual in such close quarters. “You would kill him. The ... pirate."
Zheng He displayed his best diplomatic smile. “If he refused to acknowledge my powers and sovereignty, of course I would."
"The pirate ... barbarian?"
Admiral Zheng's smile widened into a natural one. “Yes, I consider the pirate a barbarian."
Merabor aimed that piercing gaze at the admiral. “Zheng He ... barbarian?"
Admiral Zheng told me, these many years later, that he would have personally beaten a man who said such a thing to him. But the admiral knew he must force down his anger—how could a dragon know what made a man a barbarian? He also admitted that part of him remained concerned regarding the dragon's potential powers, which he feared might lay dormant, awaiting Merabor's full recovery. He told the dragon, tersely, “I do not consider myself a barbarian. You should never utter such words again."
Zheng He expected an apology, but Merabor simply stood mutely once more. He could not help but wonder whether that stance expressed the dragon's own anger or whether he did not have the words allowing him to respond.
The admiral chose to believe the latter and went back into the larger room to await his informant's arrival.
* * * *
Shi Jinqing bowed deeply, respectfully, as befitted his status aboard Zheng He's flagship. The admiral, in turn, respected Shi Jinqing's counsel and greeted him warmly. Servants surrounded them both and provided soft pillows for them to sit upon, hot tea to sip, and fresh fruits to eat. Zheng He wasted little time in preliminaries, asking Shi Jinqing, “What do you know of Chen Zuyi's intentions?"
Shi Jinqing took a long sip of tea and said, “The pirate came here to speak with you, did he not?"
"He did."
"And pledged he would submit to you?"
"He did."
"He lies. He intends to attack you here in the strait by bringing his forces quickly from the river channels where they wait. But I know how you may best deploy your great forces to prevent such an attack."
Analog SFF, January-February 2009 Page 10
