Paper Mage

by Leah R. Cutter

  The man with power looked over his shoulder at Gi Tang.

  “I do see the lust in his eyes,” he said. “But,” he added, turning back to Xiao Yen, “I still think you stole something from me.”

  Xiao Yen waited. He obviously wanted her to ask what she’d stolen. Gan Ou had played that game. Xiao Yen had learned how to not respond. She took a deep breath, willing herself to be calm, and even smile at the man challenging her. She drew strength from the ensuing silence.

  The man didn’t seem disconcerted by the silence either. After a while, he bowed his head to her, as if in defeat, gave her a crooked smile, and said, “You’ve stolen Bei Xi. You turned her into a snake.”

  Xiao Yen laughed as if she had no fear and replied, “How could I turn someone into a snake? That would take a great magician. I am small and powerless. You’re talking nonsense. Take me to Lord Vakhtang.”

  The man in front of her said something over his shoulder, in the soldiers’ language. The men behind her laughed. Then he turned back to her and said, “I am Lord Vakhtang.”

  “Excuse me, my lord. I didn’t recog—”

  Vakhtang held up one hand to stop her. He pulled on his long beard hairs, considering. Then he raised his head and sniffed the air between them. “You have a delicious strength,” he said. “I was told that Bei Xi traveled with a woman who practiced magic.”

  Xiao Yen tried to turn her fear into anger. She spat on the ground near Vakhtang’s feet and took a step forward. “Do I look like a grave-robbing Taoist?” she asked. She held up one hand, sleeve drooping. With the other hand, she pulled back the material, revealing her polished fingernails. “Do these nails look like they muck around with dyes and potions all day, searching for immortality?”

  “No,” Vakhtang replied. “But they might be the hands of someone who works with paper and string.” He grabbed her wrists and caught them together with just one hand. Then he held her arms up and delved into her left sleeve.

  Xiao Yen twisted and cried, “Let me go! How dare you touch me!”

  From inside the deep corner of her left sleeve he pulled out a knotted piece of cord. He held it up before her eyes, dangling it like a hangman’s noose.

  Xiao Yen said desperately, “That isn’t mine! Gi Tang placed that in my sleeve!”

  Vakhtang looked at the string, rubbing the amulet-sized knot between his fingers. He wrapped his hands around it, then closed his eyes. When he opened his hands, the illusion melted from the knot.

  Xiao Yen swallowed with dread. It took strong magic to return something to its natural state. Master Wei could do it, of course, but she couldn’t.

  “Strip her,” Vakhtang said in her language, stepping back and folding his arms over his chest. The men didn’t need the words translated.

  Xiao Yen lifted her head and tried to catch Vakhtang’s eye, but she couldn’t see over the shoulders of the guards surrounding her. She wanted to stare at him, have an anchor outside of herself, a physical thing on which to focus her anger.

  The man with the knife came forward. He held the blade against her cheek, like a lover’s hand. Xiao Yen closed her eyes. Her stomach dropped. She felt nauseous. The cold metal knife rested on the side of her neck, branding her with fear. The hard back of the knife pressed against her collarbone, then abruptly disappeared. The first frog of her outer garment snapped off. The men laughed, making a game of catching the flying buttons as they fell.

  Xiao Yen shivered once, violently, as her robe was torn from her, exposing her breasts and thin waist. The men around her laughed, making jokes about her anatomy. Xiao Yen was glad she couldn’t understand their language very well. No one had seen her this undressed, not even her mother, since she had been a little girl. Hands touched her, stroked her back, her sides, tweaked her nipples, making her jump, which made the men laugh more. She flinched with each touch.

  Though Xiao Yen took short breaths, and her sides trembled, her arms were still. She sent whatever peace she could find, whatever part of her mind that wasn’t screaming with fear, embarrassment, and rage into her fingers, her clever fingers, which would save her, get her revenge, later, if they could.

  The cold knife rested against her belly, then slid down, beneath the waist of her pants. She sucked in her breath so the tip of the knife wouldn’t cut her. Xiao Yen was jerked forward as the man with the knife tried to cut through the ties around her waist. She heard someone cursing, harsh and guttural. Xiao Yen shivered at the menace in his voice. He would just as soon cut her as cut the pants. While he sawed at the strong cord, someone said something in her language: “Be careful. When she’s presented to me, she must be in one piece, still complete.”

  Xiao Yen’s eyes snapped open. She would get another chance at Vakhtang? He stood behind the guards, his face visible between their shoulders. Xiao Yen stared at him, her hatred fanning to life, her fear and her revulsion of taking another’s life forgotten. If she could change herself into a tiger, she’d leap over the other men and claw his throat out in an instant.

  “You will get your wish, little mage, and be presented before me, though not in the fashion you had imagined. I like virgins. And I desire your strength. But first, we have to temper your will, encourage you to obey.”

  The fear returned, dropping like a weight against Xiao Yen. Even if she had wings, she was so heavy now she couldn’t fly away. Vakhtang barked some orders to the guards, then turned. Xiao Yen closed her eyes again. She was naked, embarrassed, cold. She didn’t know where her aunt was, if she was in some prison; what had happened to Ehran; or what they were doing with Udo.

  She shivered, striving to ignore the hands touching her, desecrating her.

  The worst was yet to come.

  Xiao Yen had never seen a man’s bone flute before, let alone had one shoved into her face, her mouth. She gagged, wanting to vomit, to force the men away. She bit down without thinking. The man withdrew and struck Xiao Yen across her cheek. Her vision darkened and blurred. She tasted blood in her mouth. No one had ever hit her like that before.

  She couldn’t help herself. She started crying. Her tears shamed her as much as her nakedness.

  A man shoved her arm up behind her back. Another forced her mouth open.

  Xiao Yen tried to hang on, to exist without feeling. Then someone probed her back passage. Xiao Yen fled deep inside herself. She found her silence running through her like a sluggish river, clawed her way into it, and endured what she had to, kneeling on the cold dirt between the two courtyards. She stayed in her silence, a deeply buried seed, unconscious in a moving tide of filth. She no longer heard the men’s jeers. She clung to herself, her core, and kept it apart from the atrocities being performed on her body. It was little consolation that her maidenhood wasn’t being violated.

  After a time she would never be able to measure, she heard, but did not hear, high-pitched scoldings coming from behind the wall of soldiers. She saw, but did not see, a young woman with bright red lips, dressed in a flimsy, emerald-colored robe that was improperly tied, who hit the soldiers with her folded fan. She felt, but did not feel, a woman with white braids, wearing a long silver robe, touch her arm and tug her to her feet. She heard, but didn’t hear, the giggles and squeals of other women as she was led into one of the buildings at the back of the courtyard.

  Many candles burned in the room, but Xiao Yen shied away from the light. Four women, dressed in bright indoor robes in all the colors of the rainbow, led her farther inside. A large copper tub, filled with warm water, waited on a cold tile floor.

  First, the women bathed her standing up, outside of the tub, washing the dirt away from her knees, her palms, and back, soaping her and pouring warm water over her. They brought her a bucket that she vomited into. Then they led her to the tub, made her sit down, and scrubbed her all over, as if they knew how she felt.

  Xiao Yen didn’t try to understand what the women said to her. She let their words run together, like in a song. Maybe they were singing to her. She couldn’t tell. The
women ran their hands over her body while they washed her, as if trying to erase the pressure of those other hands. They brought her a musty-smelling tea, and held her head while she vomited again and again.

  When Xiao Yen’s fingertips were as wrinkled as an old farmer’s face, the women dried her in a soft chamois cloth, wrapped her in a blanket, and led her to a bed. They directed Xiao Yen to lie down. Then a woman lay down on either side of her. They held her between them. At first, Xiao Yen squirmed and pushed them away. She didn’t want anyone touching her. The women wouldn’t go, or leave her alone.

  Xiao Yen fled deeper into herself, building up her silence like thick walls. She didn’t realize she was crying until she felt a tear fall off her nose and splash onto the pillow. She stayed detached, letting her eyes cry the tears she couldn’t allow herself to feel. The women on either side of her didn’t say anything, just held her and rocked her. Finally, she slept.

  The women tried to interest Xiao Yen in the robes they chose for her, the food they brought to her, the music they played for her. Xiao Yen stayed locked in a small kernel, deeply buried in the pit of her belly. Her walls of silence were many li thick. She didn’t count the days she stayed there, how many times the women bathed her, fed her, or dressed her. It could have been as few as three, or as many as all the days of her life.

  She dreamed once of being a small girl in the Garden of Sweet Scents. She smelled the flowers and the incense, felt the warm sun on her skin, heard her cousins playing in the family courtyard. Then Wang Tie-Tie came and demanded that Xiao Yen tell a story. Xiao Yen tried, but every story she told disappointed Wang Tie-Tie. No matter what Xiao Yen said, Wang Tie-Tie said it wasn’t good enough, she wasn’t good enough.

  One afternoon, the women seemed agitated, like a flock of cranes about to migrate. They vibrated in their brilliant colors. The women explained to Xiao Yen that she was to be presented to Vakhtang. At this news, Xiao Yen felt a heavy weight press down upon her walls. She didn’t let herself be bothered by it though. It was just one more thing to ignore.

  Then the older woman with the white hair, braided like a crown, touched Xiao Yen’s cheek, and said that she hoped Xiao Yen would come back from her evening, and stay with them.

  Xiao Yen managed to chip a tiny crack through her silence and said, “I would like that too.” Her voice was hoarse from disuse. She would like to be friends with this woman. Xiao Yen was certain this woman had been kind to her through the countless days. Thinking about being friends with her was easier than not thinking about what would happen that evening.

  The woman with the white hair turned to two of the other women and argued with them for a moment. Xiao Yen didn’t understand, didn’t want to understand. She thought maybe she heard “Jhr Bei,” but decided she was wrong.

  The older woman won the argument and made Xiao Yen follow her. She led Xiao Yen to a small closet, holding buckets and brooms. The old woman had Xiao Yen stand in front of her. Both of them could barely fit. The woman rested her hands on Xiao Yen’s head, then looked skyward for a while, lips mumbling. It slowly occurred to Xiao Yen that the woman was praying for her.

  When the woman finished, she took Xiao Yen’s right hand in her own, and made her reach out and touch the wall. A vague outline of a woman resting on a snake tail was sketched there. Xiao Yen opened her mouth to ask, but the older woman shook her head. Xiao Yen let the silence close back down around her.

  The woman with the braids led Xiao Yen to a side room. Only two items filled the room: a low bench heaped with pillows, and an elegant wooden dressing table. Xiao Yen sat and looked straight ahead as different women applied makeup, eyeliner, rouge, and color for her lips. She traced the pattern of leaping fish edging the top of the table, losing herself in the design. The women continued to be gentle with her, flitting around the room like butterflies.

  One woman came up from behind, took Xiao Yen’s hair down, and began brushing it. Xiao Yen closed her eyes and let herself enjoy the sensual strokes. She would like to be friends with these women, if she survived her night with Vakhtang. Maybe, they could help her recover. She took a deep breath, her first in uncountable days. She let the air fill her belly, then expand upward, loosing her ribs. It felt good. She concentrated on her next breath, when the woman who had been brushing her hair, twisted it, pulling it sharply. Xiao Yen didn’t open her eyes, but tried to breathe again. Then the woman behind her jabbed a hairpin into her hair, hard enough that it scraped Xiao Yen’s scalp.

  Xiao Yen opened her eyes and looked in the mirror.

  Bei Xi stood behind her, holding a second, very familiar, hairpin in her hand.

  Hope flared through Xiao Yen, like fire blossoming across dry prairie grass. Her legs twitched. Her fingers tingled as they came alive, all the knowledge of her years of study flooding back into them. The water she hid her full consciousness under drained away. She half turned to Bei Xi, to ask her how she’d gotten there, how she’d gotten the hairpin, what they needed to do now.

  Bei Xi lifted a single finger to her lips, asking for Xiao Yen’s silence.

  Xiao Yen made herself turn back around, keeping her movements languid. Bei Xi didn’t want to be recognized, not yet. Xiao Yen still had to deal with Vakhtang by herself. A rush of vengeance swept through her.

  She didn’t feel the second hairpin going into her hair, but she felt the weight on her head. She looked in the mirror again. Bei Xi was gone. Xiao Yen nodded to herself, opened her eyes wide, and looked around the room. She yawned and stretched, as if she’d just come awake after a long sleep.

  Then she began to plan.

  * * *

  Xiao Yen walked through the southern gate of Bao Fang as the early morning bells rang in the hour of the Dragon. The air still held a little of the evening cool, but the sun would soon bake it away. A man selling sweet steamed buns—Xiao Yen’s favorite—called to her, but she hurried past. She didn’t want to be late.

  No one greeted her at the gate to her family’s compound. They hadn’t been expecting her. It was only by luck that she’d been able to come. In the competition for the privilege of going home, Fat Fang had won just the day before, and would be home for three days. However, during the night, most of the students had come down with a stomach sickness. Master Wei had canceled all classes.

  Xiao Yen did, but didn’t, want to go home that day. On the one hand, it was Wang Tie-Tie’s birthday. The entire family, as well as many guests, would be there. Xiao Yen should be there too. On the other hand, Xiao Yen needed more time to study. There was always too much to do at school. Besides her own studies into the essence of nature and its creatures, she now had younger students to whom she taught basic folding. Plus, Xiao Yen feared the inevitable fight that she’d have with her mother.

  The off-white tiles in the Yard of Greeting glittered. Old Gardener had sprinkled water mixed with oil around the courtyard. The quiet seeped into Xiao Yen’s skin. She stood for a moment, admiring the solid nature of the Hall of Politeness. The dark wood, the shape of the building, made it seem like a hill, placed there by the King of Heaven, immovable, immutable. Xiao Yen wanted to stay and listen to the brass bells under the eaves tell their secrets, but she had other duties.

  She stepped through the round moon gateway separating the formal courtyard from the family courtyard. Chaos reigned there. Servants hurried from one end to the other, carrying food and platters from the kitchen storage areas to the Garden of Sweet Scents. They also carried pillows, small tables, and trays loaded with wrapped packages from the storage rooms. Xiao Yen heard her mother yelling at one of the servants, then saw the woman scurrying out with an outfit, obviously the wrong one.

  Xiao Yen slipped out of the courtyard into her old room. A pristine cover lay across her bed, three new candles sat in the holder on the windowsill. No one stayed in the room now. Gan Ou lived with her new husband. She’d already birthed one feisty son and was expecting her second child. Xiao Yen’s cousin, Wang Tie-Tie’s youngest son, had recently had a ba
by girl, who might inherit the room when the girl grew older. For now, it was saved for Xiao Yen on her infrequent visits.

  Xiao Yen opened the dresser and pulled out a jacket her mother had given her on New Year’s Day. It was made out of silk dyed the same orange as a setting sun in autumn, with golden bamboo circles sewn on it. Bamboo represented youth because toys were often made from it. It simultaneously represented old age, as the tree was an evergreen. It was the perfect symbol for a gift from a mother to her youngest child. Xiao Yen also liked it because paper was often made from bamboo, though she was certain her mother hadn’t thought of that when she’d had the jacket made.

  Xiao Yen slipped out of her school clothes, a simple dark blue jacket with no embroidery, into the other jacket. It fit tightly across her chest when she buttoned it, and when she held her arms straight out in front of her, the jacket pulled across her back and the sleeves slid up to the middle of her forearms.

  Xiao Yen sighed, hoping she could hide from Fu Be Be how small the jacket had grown in half a year’s time. Her mother thought her daughter’s muscles unseemly, and had commented more than once that Xiao Yen resembled one of the boys who carried buckets of water from the city well to the shops and temples. Xiao Yen rolled her shoulders. She had to be strong to do her magic, to hold her hands out in front of her and fold for hours, her arms weaving, graceful, supporting nimble fingers. She liked the way her muscles felt when she rubbed her hands over them. She resolved to keep her arms close to her chest, folded, and to try to not reach for anything.

  Xiao Yen took a deep breath, catching at the silence Master Wei had shown her, the one that lived deep inside her. She glimpsed her quiet place—the river, the bright sunlight, the verdant pines. She had an impulse to wrap it around her like armor. She laughed at herself. What was she protecting herself from? She was with her family. She should feel happy and safe.