Silver Phoenix

by Cindy Pon

  The dragon began descending through the bank of ominous clouds. The air turned cold and dank, and she shivered. After a long moment, they emerged below the clouds, and she saw a jagged mountain. It appeared to drift in midair, composed only of rocks the color of tar. She had never seen a black mountain peak before—devoid of any living thing.

  The Lady in White lived on this barren pile of sawtoothed rock? Where was her palace? Not even a small hut graced the summit. Her stomach knotted with anxiety, and she leaned back into Li Rong, seeking comfort. His grip around her waist tightened just a fraction, as if he sensed her fear—or felt his own. The warmth of his hands calmed her, and she smiled, grateful for his company.

  Picking up speed, the dragon flew to the flat peak, the only even terrain on the entire mountain, and landed with a gentle glide. Ai Ling climbed off its back and stroked its sleek side in gratitude.

  Chen Yong and Li Rong dismounted. The dragon bowed its head low before leaping into the air and disappearing within the dark clouds. They were silent for a moment, their faces turned to the sky. Ai Ling wrapped her arms around herself. She wished the dragon had stayed.

  “Where’s this Lady we seek?” Li Rong said aloud what they all wondered. The air was damp with drizzle, and it was difficult to gauge the time of day.

  “Look there,” Chen Yong said, pointing, his body tense.

  Ai Ling followed his gaze and saw that the light mist that swirled about seemed to leave a wide circular space empty before them. She squinted; something wavered, a sheen of white. She blinked, and the illusion was lost.

  “I can’t see anything,” Li Rong said.

  “There’s something here, hidden from view,” Chen Yong said.

  Ai Ling walked toward the empty space, through the mist spiraling at its edges. A wall shimmered again, rounded and smooth like that of a tower, reflecting her image. She paused, stunned. Her figure warped and vanished. She reached out and walked to where she had seen her image. Her fingers touched cold, smooth stone.

  “Ai Ling!” Chen Yong’s voice was tight with warning.

  She jerked her hand back. Clear crystal crackled where she had touched. The cracks spread like fissured ice, thrusting upward and around, until a giant tower glimmered before them. The tower’s thick quartz wall was both clear and milky, revealing nothing within.

  She turned back to her friends, lightheaded from fright. Li Rong let out a long whistle.

  “I see no way to enter,” Chen Yong said.

  He withdrew his sword and began to walk the circumference. Ai Ling pressed a hand to her breast as he disappeared around the curve of the shimmering tower. She drew a long breath when he reappeared from the other side, after too many heartbeats.

  “I counted nearly three hundred strides. I saw no windows or doors, no way of entering the tower.”

  “I don’t understand,” Ai Ling said.

  She laid tentative fingers on the sleek wall again. And the next moment, a surge of cold rushed from her fingertips through her entire body; everything flickered, and she was within the tower.

  The stench assaulted her. A monster loomed over Ai Ling, the smell of death pluming from its gaping mouth. She fought to remain standing, not to crouch and heave the contents of her stomach. The thing turned its sunken eye on her, black and circular, like a wound in its head. Fetid arms hung to the ground and ended in sharp black claws.

  She realized then that it was composed of corpses—arms and legs jutted from the top of its head instead of hair. Its naked mass was formed of human torsos, more limbs, and worse, heads and sagging faces. Some of the eyes were so decomposed only empty sockets peered from a putrefied skull. Ai Ling barely reached its knee, which bulged with human spines and sharp shoulder blades.

  The monster lurched and turned to face her fully. She tried to step back, but her limbs failed; tried to scream, but found no voice.

  Chen Yong materialized facing her, right below the thing, his sword gripped in one hand.

  “Behind you!” Her voice sounded muted, her need to warn him dislodging the words from her clenched throat.

  He bounded to her side in an instant, his face distorted by the stench that assailed him. “Mother of the heavens,” Chen Yong breathed when he saw the monster.

  Li Rong appeared on the opposite side of the tower. He drew his sword and looked at Chen Yong and Ai Ling with wide-eyed terror. The monster took no notice, his eye boring down at her and Chen Yong. It dragged its black claws on the crystalline floor, making a horrific screeching noise. Ai Ling saw that the stone floor was etched with deep grooves.

  “Stand back!” Chen Yong yelled. He vaulted forward, slashing his sword into the monster, cutting through a face and torso with flaccid breasts. The beast roared, a deep boom, and its cadaverous arm swept down like falling timber, but Chen Yong had already twisted away. They now formed a triangle around the beast.

  Ai Ling stepped back, her knees shaking. A familiar warmth gathered against her breast, and she looked down to see the glowing jade pendant. It flickered, grew hot, and a white blaze enveloped the monster. Please let it kill the thing.

  The monster continued its attack, oblivious to the bright light surrounding its body. The heat around her throat cooled. She looked down. The pendant had dimmed; the intense glow faded from around the monster. Ai Ling’s heart dropped to the hollows of her stomach. How could it fail her now, when she needed its powers the most? She reached for the dagger tied to her waist and pulled it from the sheath, gripping the hilt too tight. She wanted to throw it but didn’t trust her aim.

  Li Rong crept up behind the monster. He slashed a trunk-like leg with his sword. The beast roared again and turned toward him.

  Chen Yong sprang, leapt off one decomposed heel, and stabbed the back of a thigh. He let the blade sink in, and he dangled like an acrobat from the hilt. The monster thrashed and lurched toward Ai Ling. She managed a small step backward, her entire body trembling. Chen Yong landed light on his feet, like a feline.

  The beast blinked its black eye once, and in the next moment, she was behind the monster, where Li Rong had stood. They had switched places. She saw Li Rong where she had been. His eyebrows climbed so high from shock they nearly met his hairline.

  “Its eye, it blinked…,” Ai Ling said, knowing she made little sense.

  “Curses on the Devil’s daughter,” Chen Yong said.

  Li Rong stood in a fighting stance before the beast, legs wide, both hands gripping his raised sword.

  The beast thrust its claws at Li Rong. His blade met one with a resonating clang. He rushed forward and between the sweeping arms. He plunged his blade into its pale shin, then sprinted back to the side of the tower opposite Chen Yong and Ai Ling.

  “Ai Ling, touch the wall!” Chen Yong shouted, his voice sounding too far away.

  She laid both hands on the stone, and her fingers tingled with cold—but that was all. They were trapped.

  The beast had turned its eye back to Chen Yong and her. Chen Yong jumped away from Ai Ling, making himself the target by brandishing his sword. The monster stomped after him. Cornered, Chen Yong attempted to dodge the creature’s claws as he slashed.

  “Watch out!” Li Rong shouted. He ran toward the back of the monster, his sword extended.

  Chen Yong crouched low against the wall as the creature lifted its arm high, ready to strike. It blinked its sunken eye once. The hunkered figure of Chen Yong vanished, to be replaced by Li Rong, upright, exposed, with his sword raised. Frantic, he lunged forward.

  The monster’s sharp claws crushed down, puncturing Li Rong through his chest. Li Rong’s dark eyes widened with shock, and his mouth slackened. Then his head lolled forward, and his sword clattered to the scarred stone floor.

  Ai Ling screamed.

  “Little brother!” Chen Yong roared.

  Chen Yong attacked the back of the beast in a fury. Over and over he raised his powerful arms and hacked at its dead flesh. Ai Ling watched, helpless, as the monster turned toward Che
n Yong. Li Rong slumped over, almost as if he were resting in the monster’s palm.

  Ai Ling threw a searching cord out to Li Rong but could grasp hold of nothing to anchor herself. Utter rage erupted within her as she ran after the beast. It lunged toward Chen Yong, not bothering to shake Li Rong from one hand as it thrust with the other.

  Ai Ling stabbed her dagger at a rotting ankle, an elbow sprouted from the wound. The hilt glowed bright blue beneath her fingers, shockingly cold to the touch. She withdrew the blade and plunged again as deep as she could in its thick calf, but the monster continued to lumber forward. Desperate, she placed one hand on the creature and leaped inside. There was no spirit, merely a deep pit of furor.

  She saw Chen Yong through its eyes. His features hazed, his body was outlined in a blurred red. The need to seek and kill overwhelmed her. Then to absorb. The beast flicked one hand in impatience, flinging Li Rong’s body across the tower. Kill. Absorb. Grow. They were not spoken words, but amorphous images forming ideas. The thoughts thudded with each beat of its booming heart. That was how she found it. A large lump composed of dead hearts, drumming an inhuman rhythm.

  Her spirit surged. She concentrated on the immense cadaverous heart, focused her grief and ire. What she could heal, she could also destroy. Her spirit whirled around it in a frenzy.

  The heart erupted and splattered.

  The beast howled once before it fell to its knees. It toppled, nearly pinning Chen Yong beneath its rotten bulk. She snapped back into her own body, woozy, her head bent over the cold floor, her trembling hands barely able to hold herself up.

  Strong arms pulled Ai Ling to her feet. “Are you all right?” Chen Yong asked. He took her dagger, still clutched in one hand, and sheathed it for her.

  She shook her head. “Li Rong…”

  She crumpled against him, and he held her. Frustrated by her own weakness, she shoved herself from him and staggered toward Li Rong. He lay like a broken puppet, arms flung out, legs askew. Blood had pooled around him. His eyes were closed, his face ashen and taut.

  She laid her hands on him, above where the claw had gored his sternum. The wound was ragged, wider than her palm. She tried to enter his body but could find nothing to grasp. Tears blinded her, spilled hot against her cheeks. But then she felt it—something was still there—barely clinging, just about to let go. She lunged for it with her own spirit, seized it, and began to move across his wounds. There was nothing to see or feel. Just this wisp she clung to, refused to release.

  From a distance, as if watching from above, she saw her own limbs start to shake. Sweat beaded at her temples, but she felt ice cold within, frozen and empty.

  Li Rong’s eyelids fluttered, revealing unseeing orbs beneath. An unnatural grunt escaped from between his pale lips, and then the jaws clenched. Even as she held on to the thin thread of his spirit, she could not truly enter his being.

  She felt a touch on her wrist and saw Chen Yong crouched beside her. “Ai Ling. Don’t.”

  She snatched her hand away as if scalded, and lost the grip she had on Li Rong. The wisp flitted off, slipped into the ether.

  Li Rong was dead.

  Black circles burst across her blurred vision. She stumbled away and slumped to the floor, not caring that the corpse of the monster was but a few arms’ lengths away. Sobs shook her. She lifted her head, and through the haze, saw Chen Yong crouched over his brother, holding one slack hand in both of his.

  The Immortals didn’t care, she thought, the bitterness rising like bile in her throat. They sent us here. They knew this would happen. They let this happen.

  She felt a light touch on her shoulder and jumped. A warmth zinged through her, easing her. The scent of honeysuckle filled her nose. She turned to find that the corpse of the decaying monster had vanished. A woman stood in its place.

  “You have freed me,” the woman said.

  The Lady in White.

  Ai Ling scrambled to her feet. “My friend died. He—he was gored.” The tears came again, and she put her face in her hands. She felt the Lady stroke her hair. Something her mother used to do. The Lady lifted her chin with soothing fingers and touched the wetness on her cheeks. The tears dropped like glass into her palm.

  “The Goddess of Records gave you a vial,” the woman said.

  How did she know? Distrust mingled with the anger and grief, making her stomach clench. Ai Ling pulled the small vial from the hidden pocket within her tunic. The Lady in White carefully put the tears in the vial; they clinked like diamonds as they dropped.

  “Consume them when you need strength. You will know when.”

  Ai Ling nodded, not understanding and not caring. She turned and saw Chen Yong still with his brother, but looking toward her and the Lady.

  “Can you bring Li Rong back?” Ai Ling asked.

  She inclined her head. “The dead should stay dead,” she said.

  The Lady gazed down at her. She was as tall as the Goddess of Records. Her smooth porcelain skin made the jet black brows that much more dramatic. She wore her raven hair in two braids, looped on either side, with clear crystal jewels woven through the locks. A gossamer gown floated about her like a cloud, pale and white, revealing shimmers of blue with each graceful movement.

  “But it was my fault.” Ai Ling wiped her nose with the back of her hand. “And she knew! The Goddess knew he would die, and she sent us here. Without warning—without…” She scrubbed the tears from her cheeks, hiccupping.

  “Li Rong chose his own course in life,” the Lady said.

  Ai Ling turned toward Chen Yong, helplessness and grief smothering her breath. He was bent over Li Rong again. She walked to them, the true friends she had made on this journey. She put a hand on Chen Yong’s shoulder, but he did not turn to look at her. He blamed her. She was certain of it.

  “We can’t take him with us. We need to give him a proper funeral.” Chen Yong whispered, his face still turned to his brother.

  “We need wood to make a pyre. There’s nothing here,” Ai Ling said.

  “I can help,” the Lady in White said.

  Chen Yong rose to his feet. “Thank you.”

  “I will need your strength, young man.” She glided through the tower wall.

  “Will you prepare him?” Chen Yong finally asked, his voice low and hoarse.

  The tears rushed into her eyes and stung her nostrils once more. He approached the smooth fissured wall, placed a hesitant hand on it. And vanished.

  Ai Ling crouched over Li Rong’s body. She slammed her fists against the cold stone floor until her hands bled. Why did the gods allow evil men to live, and care nothing for the innocent? She could not believe he was gone, despite the pool of dark blood fanning beneath him. She reached out and stroked his face and smoothed his hair, intimate acts that she would never have dared were he still alive.

  Finally she reached for his knapsack and searched through it, feeling intrusive. She selected his best tunic. It was made of gray silk with simple gold embroidering along the collar and sleeve edges. She unhooked his buttons with trembling fingers, lifting him to pull off his sleeves, cradling his head as she lay him back down. Sweat stung her eyes, and she swiped a bloodied hand across her face.

  His wound exposed, Ai Ling saw the startling white of jagged rib bones and his shattered sternum. Nestled within, something glistened. His heart. Hope surged to her throat. She could still bring him back. The Calling Ritual from The Book of the Dead. She could try. She had to try.

  “Forgive me, Li Rong. I will make it right again.”

  She had to try.

  Ai Ling freed her dagger and reached into Li Rong’s gaping wound. Sharp bones scratched her arm. His heart was still warm, wet. Ai Ling felt removed from herself. She could not think about what she was doing. There was no choice. She had no choice.

  The heart shifted but would not pull free. She grasped it, took the dagger and made one cut. The hilt glowed blue, became as cold as ice. Ai Ling lifted the heart free. It was the size of her
fist and lay like a sacrificial offering in her shaking hand. She needed to preserve it—one month to bring him back, with her own blood. Most other components were common. But the empress root was banned. She would find it. She would not fail Li Rong.

  Ai Ling closed her eyes, forcing her mind to see the page, to remember the words. She muttered them in a low voice, verses she didn’t understand. The heart turned ice cold, felt like heavy glass in her hand. She opened her eyes. It glowed slightly, but her blessed dagger had turned a dull black. Ai Ling frowned, sheathed the blade. She grabbed one of Li Rong’s cotton tunics and wrapped the heart carefully within its folds, then tucked the bundle in her knapsack.

  Ai Ling poured water from her flask over her bloodied forearm and hands, watched it slide in red rivulets onto the ice white floor. She licked her cracked lips, tasting the salty mucus that ran from her nose, and wiped her face with a dampened rag cloth. She gently dressed Li Rong’s body, pulling the tunic over his head, holding his hand to guide the sleeves. After he was clothed, she wiped his face clean with tender care. She did the same with his hands.

  His wound had already stained the new tunic, like a crimson flower blooming across his chest. But at least he would not be sent into the next world in the tunic he was slain in.

  Chen Yong and the Lady appeared again within the tower, emerging like apparitions from the crystalline walls. “Thank you,” Chen Yong said simply.

  Ai Ling could not look at him. She was out of breath and clutched her knapsack with tight fists. Chen Yong kneeled down and cradled his brother as if he were a child. His eyes were swollen and his nostrils red, but he no longer wept.

  “The body will transport through the wall with you,” said the Lady.

  Ai Ling walked to the gleaming wall and placed two timid fingertips on it. The tingling cold rushed through her, and she was outside on the black peak once more.