We couldn’t make out what exactly he was chanting. Growing impatient, Kai cried out, “Old man, aren’t you done yet?”
Asat Amat’s eyes blinked open, and he smiled. “Old Hu will show us the way,” he said. As he spoke, he pulled out a five-cent coin and showed it to everyone. This was his augury: heads we continued, tails we turned back. He invited Professor Chen to toss it into the air.
We looked at each other, uncertain whether to laugh or cry. The professor flipped the coin high in the air, and we all looked up to see it glitter in the sun, then plummet down to land perfectly upright, wedged in the sand.
This was a one-in-a-million chance. Asat Amat shook his head again and again, despair filling his face. He’d forgotten we were in the Black Desert, a place abandoned by Old Hu, and therefore couldn’t look to him for direction.
As we were scratching our heads at this mystery, Julie suddenly exclaimed, “Hang on, isn’t that Zaklaman over there?”
In the empty vastness of the desert, your view is unobstructed for hundreds of miles. Looking where Julie was pointing, past the coin and all the way to the horizon, we saw a faint black line, too distant to say what it was.
We hurriedly pulled out our binoculars and focused on what turned out to be a dark mountain ridge, lying like a black dragon across the desert sands. There was a gap right in its center—a mountain pass, exactly where the British explorer’s notebook had said it would be.
A year ago, Julie’s father had led an expedition to find Jingjue City, using these same clues. Had they seen this mystic mountain too? If they made it all the way there, what did they find? What could have prevented them from returning?
These thoughts sent a shiver through me, despite the blazing heat, but the fears were quickly doused by a rush of excitement. We’d risked everything on this long journey, and here at long last was the entrance to the ancient kingdom of Jingjue.
On the other hand, Asat Amat had warned that the Black Desert was a place of illusions, where mirages frequently lured people to their deaths. Could it be that these mountains weren’t real?
Running the possibilities through my mind, I decided it was unlikely. Desert mirages were caused by the bending of light, and they usually presented scenarios that couldn’t exist in this environment. More than one person had mentioned this black mountain ridge, so it was likely to be the real thing.
Seeing as Jingjue City wasn’t too far away, as soon as darkness fell, we’d be able to set out toward it. We didn’t have much information to go on, and most of what we did have was conjecture and legend. The only reliable piece of evidence was a blurry black-and-white photograph, which didn’t help much. Whether we’d be able to find this place, or if it even existed, was still uncertain.
Still, as soon as the sun began to dip, we set off for the Zaklaman Mountains. Fixing our eyes on the target, we trotted along for more than half the night before reaching the mountain pass. The moonlight poured down like water, making the desert look like a vast ocean, and rising from that sea of sand was the twin black masses of the Zaklaman, an arresting sight.
We’d called them mountains, but it seemed more accurate to say they were two enormous slabs of black stone. At their highest points, they were dozens of miles tall, leaving a trail of shorter hills, a spine running down into the sand, most of it lying beneath the surface. Underground was also where these two huge bodies were joined. This pass was just a small crack in a gigantic piece of rock.
The black rock contained magnetic elements. Not overwhelmingly strong, but enough to affect our instruments, and as we started to climb, we felt all the metallic items we were carrying slowly grow heavier.
The dark stone didn’t reflect any of the moon’s light, leaving the mountain pass pitch-dark. Apart from the unconscious Little Ye, we all scrambled down from our camels. I reminded everyone to keep their eyes open wide. We were traveling into the demon’s mouth and needed to be on our guard.
Asat Amat and I led the way, with Kai and Chu Jian bringing up the rear. Julie and the others formed a column in the middle, making sure Little Ye was all right. We slowly made our way into the valley.
In ancient times, people called this place a spirit hill. Legend had it that two sages were buried here. That was probably just myth, but from the feng shui point of view, this was a very strong position, conquering everything around it, the black mountain ridge dominating the landscape. It would hardly be surprising if it turned out the Jingjue queen lay behind this powerful edifice.
After the moon crossed the center of the sky, the canyon, which ran north-south, grew even more inky black. We felt our way forward, growing more and more uneasy, beginning to doubt that the fabled Jingjue City really stood on the other side, our fears for Little Ye’s condition growing. We’d been treating her dehydration with large quantities of salted water, but if we didn’t find a water source within three days, she was doomed.
Our watches had all stopped working long ago, making it impossible to say how long we’d been walking. My instincts told me the sun would rise soon. The camels’ breathing was growing ragged, and something seemed to be unsettling them.
Asat Amat blew his whistle and cooed at them, trying every trick he knew to calm his herd down. These were all strapping males, chosen for their resilience, and even after so many days in the desert, this was the first time we’d seen them in such distress.
These alarming noises in the already-terrifying darkness filled our hearts with terror. Julie worried that Little Ye would be flung from her perch and asked Hao Aiguo to help carry her instead.
I called Kai over and told him to do his bit and give Little Ye a piggyback ride. This valley felt like a place we shouldn’t linger in, and we needed to get through it as quickly as possible. Kai certainly didn’t object to having a pretty girl on his back, and it was no hardship to him at all, given how thin she was.
We tried to hurry ahead, but no matter how Asat Amat urged them, the camels simply refused to take one more step. Asat Amat began to suspect demons at work, then changed his mind and said it must be Old Hu himself blocking our way and we should turn back immediately.
The end of the valley was not far off, and we’d surely have faced a revolt if we told the group to turn around. Julie said to me, “Maybe there really is something up ahead spooking the camels. Let’s shed some light on the matter before making any decisions.”
That made sense. I pulled out a flare, activated it, and flung it directly in front of us so it illuminated the next little stretch of the valley. Nothing unexpected—dull black stone on either side, yellow sand beneath our feet.
Walking forward, I threw a second flare. In its gleam, I saw a figure in the distance. Hurrying over, we found someone in white robes, a cloth wrapped around his head, a bundle on his back. He sat on the ground, unmoving. It was a corpse.
We were all stunned. There was nothing strange about encountering dead people in the desert, but something about this body was different. His face was covered, except for his eyes, which were open wide and glaring up at the sky.
He had died recently, maybe just a few days ago. His exposed skin was only a little dried out, but the strange thing was that it had a green tinge to it, though the lingering light of the flare tinted it blue.
Several people wanted to go over to him, but I held them back. It wasn’t clear how he’d died, and until we knew that, it might be dangerous to get too close. Then Chu Jian shouted, “Look, another one!”
My scalp tingled. Two corpses so close to each other. Could there be more? I flung out a few more flares, illuminating our surroundings, and sure enough, there were a total of four bodies, some upright and some on the ground, all dressed alike and all with wide-open eyes, as if in fear. Scattered on the ground were a few AK-47s and rucksacks.
I pulled out my shovel in case I needed to defend myself, and went over to inspect each item. The guns were loaded. I knew Xinjiang poachers sometimes used foreign-made Remingtons or Type 56 assault rifles, but Russia
n-manufactured AK-47s? Could these be the grave robbers who’d blown a hole in the stone wall of the tomb?
Nudging open one of the rucksacks, I found it stuffed with military-grade dynamite, covered in Cyrillic words. It was perfectly normal for these bandits to have smuggled explosives. What I didn’t understand was how they’d come to die here in the desert, armed to the teeth as they were.
With the barrel of my rifle, I carefully lifted the scarf of the corpse closest to me. His mouth was open wide, as if he’d died screaming. I didn’t want to look any closer. No matter what had happened, the most important thing was to leave this valley-grave as quickly as possible. Grabbing the rucksack of explosives, which might come in useful later, I turned to tell everyone to get moving.
Before I could speak, Hao Aiguo was striding over. “It doesn’t matter whether or not these people are tomb robbers. We can’t leave them out in the open,” he said. “Let’s bring them with us and bury them beyond the valley.” He made his way to the corpse.
This wasn’t good. “Get away from him, you idiot!” I snapped. “You don’t know—”
But it was too late. All of a sudden, a snake burst out of the corpse’s mouth. It was about twelve inches long, covered in glittering scales, with a fleshy black hood around its head. This all happened in a flash, and before we knew it, it had launched itself straight at Hao Aiguo’s face.
Hao Aiguo’s eyesight was poor, but even if he’d been able to see clearly, there would have been no time to react. In the flickering light of the flare, I made my move out of pure instinct. The shovel in my hand sliced through the air, cutting the snake clean in half.
Shaken, Aiguo sat down hard on the ground, his whole body trembling. He managed to smile. “That was close. I almost—”
Before he could finish his sentence, the severed snake head began thrashing, and like an arrow from a bow, it shot up and bit Hao Aiguo in the neck. Having thought the bisected snake was dead, I’d let down my guard. Once again, my shovel sprang up, but too late this time.
Hao Aiguo’s face froze, and a gurgling sound came from his throat. He was trying to speak, but already his skin was turning dull green. Then he stopped moving altogether, sitting very still where he was. I went a little closer. He was dead.
All this happened in an instant. The professor fainted to the ground. Before I even had time to feel sorrow or shock for Aiguo’s passing, something cool touched the side of my neck. Turning my head, I saw that a similar snake had climbed up to my shoulder without my noticing and was sticking out its forked tongue, the coiled muscle of its body tensing back, ready to strike. At this range, and knowing how quickly these creatures moved, I couldn’t avoid it.
In our whole group, only Kai was a good shot, and right now his arms were carrying Little Ye rather than a gun. A basin of cold water seemed to splash over my heart. I was going to die this very minute, not even living long enough to see the sun rise.
As the snake reared up, I knew I was doomed. Soon its head would dart forward, and its teeth would pump its prey—me—full of venom. My neck and face were completely exposed, with nowhere to hide. There was nothing I could do.
Just as I was closing my eyes and preparing to meet my fate, I heard a loud click and saw a blinding flash of light. The inky gloom of the canyon was suddenly lit up as bright as day, and the snake, already halfway to my neck, was so dazzled by this unexpected brilliance that it slipped from my shoulder.
This can’t have taken more than a second. Before the snake hit the ground, I was already swinging my shovel, smashing its head flat. A viscous black fluid oozed from its skull, and I quickly jumped back to avoid getting it on my feet. I knew how lucky I was. By the looks of it, this venom acted swiftly, spreading lethally through your bloodstream within an instant of being bitten.
Looking up for the source of the miraculous light, I saw Julie’s camera. It was always by her side—she’d been documenting our entire journey, step by step. I’d never thought it would save my life, but her quick reaction managed to prevent my death. Otherwise I’d now be off to see Old Hu.
There was no time to thank her, though. For all we knew, this valley could be a giant nest of these snakes. Waving urgently, I signaled to everyone to get moving. Anything that needed to be said could wait till we were out of this accursed place.
The camels seemed to sense that the immediate threat was gone and were calmer than before. Chu Jian and the rest picked up Hao Aiguo’s body, as well as the unconscious Little Ye and Professor Chen, and loaded them all onto our mounts.
Asat Amat whistled to lead the camels forward, and by the dim light of the remaining flares and flashlights, we made our way out of the Zaklaman valley as quickly as humanly possible.
We didn’t stop moving until we’d reached the open land at the end of the passageway. Now we could finally lay Hao Aiguo to rest. The sun hadn’t risen yet, and the moon and stars were nowhere to be seen. They say it’s darkest before the dawn. Aiguo’s face was frozen in a rictus of fear, his eyes wide behind his glasses. Beneath our flashlights, his greenish skin looked peculiar, adding to the tragedy of the moment.
A cold wind gusted through the valley, hitting us hard and jolting the professor awake. Remembering what had happened, he struggled over to Aiguo’s corpse and flung himself on it, weeping too hard to speak. I helped him up and tried to say something comforting, but the words died in my mouth.
I’d known Hao Aiguo for almost a month, and had come to enjoy jokingly calling him “that old fossil.” I appreciated his fast-talking, quick-thinking personality, and now, all of a sudden I couldn’t even deal with my own grief.
The others were quietly shedding tears. All of a sudden, a fissure appeared in the sky, something dark and red pouring from it. The sun was finally showing itself. Our heads turned in unison, and we stared at the east.
The light slowly turned the color of roses, then blood, before shattering into a million gilded beams. The arc of the sun appeared, and in that instant, the endless desert melted into pure gold, straight from the imperial furnaces.
And there it was, set in this gleaming expanse: a magnificent city displaying itself before us. Countless broken walls and fallen ramparts, buildings of wood and brick, and numerous towers rising into the air, the most prominent of which was of black stone, now tilting to one side, quietly slumping in the very center of the citadel.
Every detail of this was exactly the same as in Julie’s black-and-white photograph. Even after two thousand years, the ruins of Jingjue City remained where they’d always been, in the deepest reaches of the desert.
Back in the day, Jingjue had been home to between fifty and sixty thousand people. Other ancient kingdoms, such as Kroraina, even at their height, never supported more than twenty thousand, plus an army of three thousand or so.
The city was in poor repair now. After its millennia-long abandonment, it was hard to tell whether some portions were sand dunes or battlements, and most of its towers were weathered, if not fallen. Even so, it was still possible to imagine what a splendid sight this must have been in its heyday.
His arm around Hao Aiguo’s shoulders, the professor pointed shakily at Jingjue City. “Look, over there,” he said in a hoarse voice. “Haven’t you always wanted to see that mystic place? Open your eyes; it’s just ahead. We’ve reached it at last.”
I felt something twist inside me. Had the old man lost his mind from sadness? Walking over quickly, I pulled him away from the corpse. “Professor, Hao Aiguo has left us,” I said softly. “Let him rest in peace. It’s a shame he didn’t make it to Jingjue—you’ll have to complete our mission for his sake. Please, sir, pull yourself together.”
Julie and the students came over to comfort him too, and I handed the professor over to them. Turning to Julie, my heart full of gratitude, I said, “You saved my life. I won’t say thank you; just consider that I now owe you a life in return. Oh, and a deal is a deal. Jingjue’s up ahead, so that’s twenty thousand American dollars I’m due.”
At the mention of money, Kai hurried over. “That’s twenty thousand each, forty thousand all together,” he specified breathlessly. “In cash, please.”
Julie rolled her eyes at us. “Take it easy, both of you,” she said through clenched teeth. “I’ll be sure to get all the money to you as soon as we get home, not one penny less.”
It hit me that I’d been tactless to mention money at that moment, but my mind was jumbled after recent events, and the words just popped out of my mouth. Trying to pull the conversation around, I stammered the only thing I could think to say: “This…city…It’s quite big….”
Julie glared at me. “Over the last few days, I’ve seen that the two of you are extraordinarily talented, with an impressive amount of experience,” she said. “I never expected you to be so mercenary. I guess my first impression was wrong. I only have one piece of advice for you both: remember, there are things in this world even more valuable than cash.”
I had nothing to say to that. But Kai did. “My dear Miss Yang, you live beneath the Stars and Stripes in the United States of America. Your father was some Wall Street big shot, and I’m guessing you’ve never gone hungry. You’ve never had to worry where your next meal was coming from. So you don’t understand anything about our lives, the circumstances we grew up in, and you don’t have the right to judge us. And don’t bother telling us how to live. Poor people don’t live, we only survive. If you don’t like what I’m saying, just pretend you didn’t hear. We’ve brought you to Jingjue City, as per our contract, and now we’re awaiting further instructions.”
Kai had started out his speech all puffed up with righteous indignation, but by the last sentence he seemed to have remembered that Julie was our employer and abruptly switched to a more servile tone.
I found my voice. “Julie, about Mr. Hao…I did my best. I’m really sorry that wasn’t enough.”
The City of Sand Page 9
