Snake Agent

by Liz Williams

  “And no chance of you getting in anywhere?” Chen asked the badger, frivolously. The badger raised a clawed hind foot and scratched its ear with vigor, not deigning to reply. Beside them, Zhu Irzh became suddenly tense. His fingers reached for Chen’s arm, drew him abruptly back into the shadows below the plinth.

  “What?”

  “Look,” the demon hissed.

  “I don’t see anything.”

  “There—crossing the far edge of the square,” Zhu Irzh whispered urgently into his ear. Chen peered obediently in the direction indicated, but his weaker human eyes could still see nothing. Then a beam of Hell-light fell through the breaking clouds. Chen could not refrain from a gasp of astonishment. The thing that was now crossing the square was more than familiar. Recently, he had spent several hours cooped up in the back of it, and even as he watched, the pungent odor of blood seemed to drift across the square. It was the delivery dray of Tso’s Blood Emporium, drawn by the sinuous, lumbering ch’i lin. It trundled across the flagstones and turned the corner so that it was lost to sight around the back of the Ministry.

  “Quick,” the demon snapped. “Follow me.”

  Before Chen could stop him, Zhu Irzh was running across the square. Cursing, Chen followed, the badger at his heels. The iron spire of the Ministry of War seemed to swing around, aimed directly at his retreating back. From the corner of his eye, he glimpsed the ornate and roseate portals of the Ministry of Lust, with red pagoda towers carved in a sequence of disconcertingly genital images. Anyone who happened to glance from any one of those towers, from Lust, Epidemics or War, could hardly fail to notice the three fleeing figures: the square was immense, and exposed.

  Chen desperately thrust all thoughts of their vulnerability to the innermost pit of his mind. Ahead, he saw that Zhu Irzh, with youth, longer legs, and a demon’s speed, had already reached the far side of the square and was sprinting around the side of the Ministry. His chest heaving, Chen followed, and shivered as he passed within the purview of the Ministry. It was almost as though the building itself were conscious: a vast, malign bulk that could at any moment turn and crush him. Zhu Irzh was standing with his back flat against the wall of the steps that led up to the Ministry; as Chen panted to a halt, he reached out a warning hand and drew Chen to his side.

  “See what they’re doing?” he whispered. Cautiously, Chen peered past the demon. The dray had been parked at an angle to the flank of the building, so that they were temporarily, and mercifully, concealed from view. The ch’i lin stood blinkered in its shafts, impatiently clawing at the ground. Behind the dray, Chen could see two pairs of feet: one inverted, and one not. The non-inverted feet wore a stylish pair of curled slippers: not quite Tso’s style, Chen thought, but it was hard to tell. The thunderous noise of barrels being unloaded from the dray ricocheted across the early-morning silence of the square.

  “What are they doing?” Zhu Irzh asked, in an undertone.

  “At a guess, unloading the morning’s consignment of blood,” Chen murmured.

  “That’s what the dray’s carrying, is it? How do you know?”

  “Because the company that the dray comes from used to belong to my brother-in-law,” Chen told him. The demon’s elegant eyebrows rose.

  “Tso’s? Yes, I remember you telling me. But Tso’s blood isn’t cheap—as far as I know, the Ministry tends to use low-grade blood for experimentation.” He paused. “Perhaps they’re having a party.”

  “That I doubt. However, they almost certainly will be having a party if we don’t get in there and stop them from creating their cursed plague.”

  The demon gave him an uneasy glance. “So what do you suggest?”

  Chen nodded towards the dray. “Hiding in one of the barrels.”

  “You’re joking.” Zhu Irzh peered anxiously into Chen’s face, and discerned truth. “Oh,” he murmured. “You’re not.”

  “I’m afraid it may require the ultimate sacrifice of yet more of your garments,” Chen added. “But it is for a good cause.”

  “I suppose so,” Zhu Irzh muttered, and gave an involuntary shiver.

  “I thought demons liked blood?” Chen said.

  “It’s the same kind of thing as humans liking chocolate. Most do, but some don’t and anyway, too much of it makes you sick. It doesn’t agree with me. It gives me migraines.”

  “Keep your mouth closed then,” Chen instructed unsym­pathetically, and headed stealthily in the direction of the dray.

  As they had stood and watched, the morning light had crept further along the square. Glancing over his shoulder, Chen could see the metal spire of the Ministry of War catching the light, and sending fragmented refractions from the ch’i mirrors placed along its upper struts into the turbulent skies of Hell. The Ministry of Epidemics, however, stood in a black block of shadow, and Chen could no longer see the pinnacle of the ziggurat, which was wreathed in cloud. Followed closely by Zhu Irzh, and with the badger prowling at his heels, he sidled around the wall and waited. The two pairs of feet were, in their respective fashions, facing the back of the dray. The front stood unguarded, except for the restless presence of the ch’i lin. Chen heard a grunt of effort; the tailgate of the dray rattled as yet another barrel was unloaded, and the feet shuffled towards a gaping dark space in the ground. Clearly, this was some kind of cellar, into which the barrels were being unloaded.

  Something plucked at Chen’s ankle. He looked down to meet the lambent gaze of the badger.

  “This is something I can do,” the badger murmured, so low that the words were almost lost in the rumbling of the barrels. “I will distract them. You go. There.” Its narrow head swung in the direction of the hole in the ground.

  Into Chen’s ear, Zhu Irzh murmured, “It’s better than a barrel. Believe me.”

  Chen was inclined to agree, and in any case, there was little time for debate.

  “All right,” he said, and gave the badger’s sleek side a nudge with his foot. “You go.”

  With Chen and the demon behind, the badger slunk around the side of the dray. Chen peered through a slit, and saw one short, squat demon and one tall, thin one. The latter’s carefully coiffed hair was dangling about his face, which was an unbecoming shade of puce. He was saying bitterly, “—miserable little bastard’s probably sleeping off a hangover somewhere. Disappeared, indeed! I don’t believe a word of it.” With an evident effort, he slung the barrel into the hole with the aid of his companion, and wiped a sticky brow.

  The squat demon mumbled, “I told you, Lord. I haven’t seen him since yesterday morning. I even rang Tso’s house, but his landlady said she hadn’t seen him either.”

  “House? Ha! Tso clings to squalor like a beetle to shit; he lives in some repulsive room in a squalid guest house on the Liu Ho Road. They wouldn’t notice if he rotted right under their noses.”

  Zhu Irzh nudged Chen. “Looks like your relative’s gone missing,” he whispered. Chen nodded.

  “—would be now, of course, that my so-called staff decides to run out on me,” lamented the tall, thin demon. “I am simply not used to this manner of degrading physical labor. I—” But at that point the badger shot out from beneath the wheels of the dray and bit him sharply in one back turned ankle. The tall demon emitted a spectacular hoot and whirled to face the dray. The squat demon struck out at the badger and missed. The tall person teetered on the edge of the hole, leaning at a bizarrely steep angle above the gaping space before abruptly righting himself. The badger wove smartly around his ankles, with a further nip for good measure, and raced away down the side of the Ministry. Uttering shrill cries of wrath, the demons turned in pursuit, trailing sparks of fury behind them.

  “Now,” Chen said, but Zhu Irzh needed no encouragement. He ducked behind the tailgate of the dray and slid down the hole like an eel. Chen heard a faint, startled cry from below, a thud, and then silence. Swiftly, he lowered himself down through the hole only to find himself standing on a narrow, rickety scaffold. Zhu Irzh loomed beside him in
the darkness, and at his feet lay a stocky, still form. From the pits beneath came the overpowering odor of stale blood.

  “There’s no one else down here,” Zhu Irzh said. He pointed towards the far end of the platform where a spout protruded over the edge. “That’s where the blood goes.”

  Chen prodded the unconscious demon with his foot and rolled it over. Rather to his surprise, the demon was female: a stout form with a long, black tongue that now lolled between slack lips. Her face had the squashed, sat-upon look of a prize Pekinese.

  “Lower caste,” Zhu Irzh murmured. “Maybe even lower level.” Before Chen could stop him, he inserted the toe of his boot beneath the demon’s prone form and shoved her over the edge. She disappeared into the darkness without a sound; moments later, there came a distant thump.

  “Zhu Irzh,” Chen said, pained. The demon looked round, surprised.

  “What? No need to be squeamish, Detective Inspector. She can’t die, can she, not really?”

  “That’s not the point,” Chen murmured. “Neither can you, but you still didn’t want to end up in the lower levels.” However, he did not feel it appropriate to begin lecturing Zhu Irzh on moral conduct at this particular juncture. “Those two will be back in a minute. I suggest we start exploring.”

  Zhu Irzh swung himself over the edge of the platform and hung there for a moment like a large, black dragonfly, eyes glittering in the faint glow of light from above. Then he was gone, sliding with agility down the fragile mesh of poles. Chen, sighing, followed. He had no great head for heights, and he’d never been especially good at climbing. He put one hand after another, methodically searching for footholds, descending further and further until at last Zhu Irzh put out a steadying hand and Chen found himself standing on solid ground.

  “You know,” the demon murmured into his ear, “I’ll be really hacked off if we find out this delivery has nothing to do with Epidemics after all and we’re in the Ministry of War’s cellar.”

  Chen grinned into the darkness. “In that case, better hope it’s the Ministry of Lust.”

  “Mmm,” the demon remarked rather languidly. “It’s been much too long since I paid them a visit—ah well.”

  “Don’t worry,” Chen whispered, thinking grimly of Tso and the blood-dray. “This concerns Epidemics, no mistake about that … Do you have any idea where this leads to, in relation to the street?”

  The demon wheeled around, gazing into the darkness. “We came down more or less directly, so if we can find a passage leading there—” he pointed “—we should actually have a reasonable chance of ending up in the Ministry’s basement.”

  “All right. Let’s get going then.”

  “What about your furry friend?” Zhu Irzh asked.

  Chen frowned. “The badger will have to look after itself, I’m afraid. It knows where we’ve gone, anyway.” Stepping past Zhu Irzh, he began to make his way through the dark cellar.

  The place in which they stood seemed enormous, and there was little light; only a faint gray gleam from above. Chen was obliged to rely on Zhu Irzh’s superior eyesight rather more than he liked, but it couldn’t be helped. Occasionally, they stopped and listened, but there was no sound from the shadows. The demon came to an abrupt halt.

  “What is it?” Chen whispered.

  “There’s a door.”

  A muffled rattling ensued, presumably as Zhu Irzh tried the latch.

  “Is it locked?”

  “Seems to be … I don’t want to take any chances, not with this Ministry … Stand back.”

  Obediently, Chen slipped back against the wall. There was a sudden glow. Zhu Irzh’s face manifested briefly in the darkness, lit from below by a gleam of rosy fire; it made him look more demoniacal than Chen had ever seen him. The glow was emanating from the demon’s own rosary, which he wore in an insouciant loop around his wrist.

  “Now …” Zhu Irzh murmured. “If I can just remember …” He drew a sharp talon across the palm of his hand, marking a character in blood. Intriguing, thought Chen, noting the parallels in technique. Zhu Irzh held up his palm to face the doorway and there was a kind of flash of sound; a synesthetic disturbance that made Chen reflexively blink. In that split second, the demon had leaped backwards, covering his face with his sleeve. A cloud of myriad motes, like sparkling dust, swirled forth from the open doorway and rose upwards in a swarm. But the fleeting, protective spell by which Zhu Irzh had opened the door continued to hold. One by one, the little lights faded and died, to drift like the ghosts of moths down towards the floor.

  “Disease,” murmured Zhu Irzh, in response to Chen’s unspoken question. “Don’t know which.”

  “There are bound to be other traps,” Chen said. “Best go carefully.”

  He heard the demon sigh. “That means I go first, then. Otherwise you’ll be stumbling about like a bat in a bottle. Have you ever considered laser surgery?”

  Chen laughed. “I’d need pretty powerful eye surgery to enjoy eyesight like yours. Very well, then. Lead on.”

  The doorway led into a sequence of other passages. Chen tried hard to keep his sense of direction, but it was soon lost, and he was once more compelled to rely upon Zhu Irzh’s surer instinct. If only he had a working compass … but direction was maliciously unstable in Hell. At least the disease-impregnated­ doorway seemed to indicate that they’d broken into the right Ministry, but it was entirely feasible that the door had been trapped in some other way, probably with an alarm. He thought uneasily of the Blood Emporium employees: What would they do, when they returned from chasing, and hopefully not catching, the badger-teakettle? Would they finish unloading the dray? Presumably. What would they do when they found their female helper missing? Probably they would investigate … it all made Chen wonder exactly how much time he and Zhu Irzh had before some kind of security alert was sounded. Hell was a notoriously incompetent and chaotic place, and this was to their advantage, but the Ministry of Epidemics had already demonstrated the capacity to act swiftly and effectively when the need arose, and Chen was certain that the stakes were sufficiently desperate for the Ministry to take maximum measures. One only had to think of the gift-wrapped mansion of the First Lord of Banking to be certain of that. He wondered what had happened to Tang.

  Even as these thoughts were revolving around Chen’s mind, there came the sound of tramping feet from an area off to the left. Zhu Irzh grasped his arm and hauled him back against the wall. Holding his breath, and hoping that he didn’t stink too betrayingly of humanity, Chen listened as what sounded like an entire battalion pounded past the top of the passage. He recalled the sight of the Imperial troops with a sinking heart. Cautiously, Zhu Irzh moved forward. Chen touched his arm.

  “What about ventilation shafts?” he murmured.

  “It’s a possibility. But I only got away with it before because they weren’t expecting anyone to be crawling around in one. Now that they’re on the lookout, it would occur even to some low-level bureaucrat that the shafts might be a good place to check.” He paused. “Although I’m not sure we really have a choice.”

  “The shafts would be too easy to flush out—with gas, with disease. I think we may have to take our chances down here in the tunnels.”

  Warily, they moved on. They saw no more patrols for a while, though the sound of movement came from the surrounding passages. Eventually they came out into a narrow hallway, at the end of which was an antiquated lift. Illumination came from dim, pale lamps in the form of gargoyles. Chen and the demon looked at one another.

  “We can’t risk it,” Chen said. “Better find the stairs.”

  Zhu Irzh nodded.

  “Agreed. Pity, though. My feet are beginning to hurt.”

  The sound of footsteps behind them was suddenly loud. A voice was crying out orders in the thin, stifled dialect of the Imperial Court, which Chen had difficulty understanding. He glanced around. There was nowhere to hide. The demon sprang forwards and pounded the buttons of the lift. After a heart stopping pause, the
door slid open, and Chen and Zhu Irzh stumbled inside. A hasty glance at the panel confirmed that the lift would carry them to the twenty-third level. Zhu Irzh slammed the top button and the lift shot upwards. The demon turned to Chen and whispered, “What if they flood the shaft? You’re the healer. Do you have any protections against disease?”

  Chen shook his head.

  “Not enough. But why should they? They don’t know it’s us, do they? There’s no evidence of any surveillance equipment in here.” Not for the first time, he called down a sardonic blessing upon the divisiveness, lack of co-operation, and internecine bickering that had caused Hell’s modernization program to grind to a halt, leaving its technologies at the level of the twentieth-century Soviet bloc, apart from the odd high-tech lab. Not unlike China, really. Comparisons were always invidious. The lift rumbled upwards, each button faintly smoldered as they passed the relevant floor. Once, the lift lurched to a brief stop, and Chen flattened himself against the wall, bracing himself for confrontation, but the mechanism merely gave a dismal creak and the lift trundled on. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the lift ground to a halt and the doors opened.

  49

  When he saw the person who was standing before him, Tso wondered despairingly why he’d ever considered himself to be a person of consequence. A pair of reversed feet was nothing compared to such splendor, such elevation. Admittedly, the eminent person did appear to be in an advanced state of decay, but that did nothing to lessen the aura of the Imperial Presence that hung about him in a palpable miasma. The thought if you could bottle that crossed Tso’s mind, and was instantly quelled by the more conservative part of his personality as being irredeemably irreverent. The personage’s clothes were impressive enough: a thick mantle of human hair, as soft and blond as corn silk, hung over a cloak of pink and living flesh. Tso could have counted every tiny capillary and vein that meandered across the cloak, like rivers across the surface of a map.

  “Do you know who I am?” the personage asked, in a voice that made the air ring. Tso’s own voice, in comparison, was barely audible even to his own ears. “Eminence, I—please don’t hold this unworthy person’s ignorance against him, but—”