“Let’s not worry too much about all that. Are you injured?” I said to Kai. “Let’s carry Gold Tooth out of here, and fast. There might still be spiders alive.”
“It’s a shame to go now,” said Kai. “Why not wait till the fire dies down, then find a way to get that urn out? If we can get it to Beijing, it’ll probably fetch enough to buy us a house each.” He turned to Gold Tooth. “How are you doing? Better now?”
Gold Tooth was still in shock, dazed from fright and from being hit on the head. He stared into the flames, and Kai had to nudge him a couple of times to get an answer. “Ah, Kai, Tianyi, so the three of us…meet again in hell.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Kai said, shaking him. “We’re not dead. And I have more good news for you—we’re rich! See that bronze urn? Wait, is it getting scorched?” He made to go have a closer look.
From where I was lying on the ground, I yelled, “Stop! Leave it be! There’s no way we could bring it back, anyway.”
Kai had dollar signs in his eyes and wasn’t about to listen to me, but the fire was too hot to get any closer, and he reluctantly had to retreat. As he stepped backward, he slipped on the dried husk of one of the spiders’ victims, tumbling right on top of it.
Bold as Kai was, he still got scared out of his wits, shoving the corpse away with both hands as he struggled to his feet. As his fingers brushed the corpse’s neck, they picked something up. He took a closer look—it was the claw of some animal, glistening in the firelight, translucent black, a gold wire threaded through it.
Kai held it up. “Tianyi, isn’t this a gold-hunting charm?” He crouched down and ran his hands over the hollowed-out corpse. “Ah, and there’s something else here.”
He found a cloth bag, opened it, and placed the items inside on the ground one by one.
“Wait! Toss that charm over,” I called to him.
He did as I asked, busily looking through the rest of his loot. I held the charm in my palm and studied it. It was sharp at one end and perfectly rounded on the other, the characters “mojin,” meaning “gold hunting,” inscribed on it in ancient script. Little chills shot through my hand as I looked at it. This was the real thing.
A genuine gold-hunting amulet, made from the sharpest of a pangolin’s claws, had to be soaked in Sichuan paraffin for forty-nine days, then buried a hundred meters beneath a Dragon Tower for eight hundred days, in order to absorb the energy of the meridian. Only then was it fit to be inscribed with these characters. I’d only seen the real thing once—in Julie Yang’s possession.
So was this the corpse of the gold hunter who built Fish Bone Temple and dug the tunnel we’d come here by? Had he gotten trapped in the ghost grave, worked out that he had to kill the creature he’d brought with him, but gotten ambushed by the spiders on his retreat? He was by himself, unlike us, and would have easily been defeated. It was sad to think of him dying here all by himself.
Kai came over with his treasure. “Look at all this, Tianyi—it’s from the dead body.”
I took the items from him and studied them carefully. Among the jumble of objects were seven or eight candles and two wadded-up paper lanterns. These were more valuable right now than any treasure—my lighter was our sole source of light. I told Kai to hang on to them carefully; they were our only hope for getting out of this place alive.
The sack also contained old-fashioned batteries, but no flashlight, and three little red pills. I blinked. Could these be the secret medicine made by the order of gold hunters back in the day? Generations of gold hunters had relied on these to ward off the effects of corpse breath—the toxic fumes given off by dead bodies. Modern gas masks protected our eyes, whereas my predecessors wouldn’t have been so lucky. If a coffin was sealed tightly, the corpse breath would accumulate inside, and if it entered any of your orifices, you’d be in trouble. There were other methods of dealing with this—cutting vents in the coffin, sending large birds ahead to test the air—but the main defense had been these scarlet pills, made according to a secret formula, now lost to us, which held antitoxin properties.
There were a few other things in the sack: a basic compass and a chunk of saltpeter—also known as “northern pearl”—which could revive you with its strong aroma if you started feeling faint.
Last of all, there was a coil of thin steel wire at the bottom of the sack, along with a three-inch knife, a small bottle of Yunnan white medicine, and something I was thoroughly familiar with: a black donkey hoof with a string attached, used to prevent corpses from transforming.
“Are these things worth any money?” Kai asked.
I shook my head. “No, but we’ll be able to make use of them. Looking at what’s in this sack, I can imagine what it must have been like to be a gold hunter all that time ago. It’s a shame my predecessor died here. Now that we’ve found him, I think we should give him a proper cremation, and hopefully his spirit will be freed and watch over us so we can get out safely. We’ll burn his things along with him.”
“Fine,” said Kai. “I’ll burn his corpse now. We killed the giant spiders, so we’ve avenged him. I reckon that means it’s fine to take his stuff as a reward. I might be able to sell some of it at the market.”
“All right,” I said, “but don’t expect to fetch a lot of money. I’m taking the mojin amulet, though. Don’t think there’s anything worth keeping in the rest, and those pills are probably past their expiration date.”
Kai lost interest as soon as he heard there was nothing valuable. He wandered off with the sack in one hand and the body under the other arm. He got as close to the burning nest as he could, then flung the gold hunter and his possessions in.
I stretched my neck, aching from my cuts and bruises, though my limbs felt more mobile. I nudged Gold Tooth and asked if he was able to walk yet. He nodded blearily, though when he moved his jaw, he winced from the pain.
We huddled to come up with a plan to get out. We’d been dragged in such a zigzag by the spider that we had no idea where we might be. The local people had said this entire mountain was a network of limestone caves, but when we looked around, the walls were of compacted yellow earth, dry and friable. It seemed this landscape was composed of many different materials.
So the folklore was wrong. All the people who had disappeared from these parts, the goat herders and their flocks, hadn’t fallen into deep caves as we’d been told. They were probably among the dried-out husks in this cavern.
We now had no clothes or food, and every minute we delayed increased the difficulty we’d face getting out. This Western Zhou urn was the sort commissioned to commemorate important events. Or else it was used in ancestor worship. Could the occupant of this tomb have been a devotee to the cult of human-faced spiders, and so insisted on being buried here? The human sacrifices would have been left by his descendants in his honor. Then, when the regime changed and the food stopped coming, the spiders would have started trapping prey again.
The fire was starting to weaken, and in the guttering light, we could see a dozen or so cave entrances surrounding us. We had to choose a way out—but which one? No time to think about it. Before more spiders could show up, we walked through the nearest exit.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
I told Kai to light a candle, and when we got to the next cave, we set it down at the entrance.
I watched as the flame rose straight up. “This is a dead end; the air isn’t moving,” I said. “Let’s try the next one.”
Gold Tooth and I started to leave, but Kai stayed put. “Aren’t you coming?” I called.
He was pointing at the entrance. “Tianyi, smell. What’s that? It’s so strange.”
“It’s probably spider poop. Don’t breathe too hard. It might be poisonous.”
“No, come here! It’s sweet, like, um, chocolate or something.”
Chocolate? My stomach started rumbling at the word. How could th
ere be chocolate deep beneath a mountain? I was too hungry to work it out. Gold Tooth, half-dead as he was, perked up and started tottering toward the cave entrance.
I sniffed. Nothing. “You’re crazy,” I said to Kai. “All I smell is burning.”
“Get closer. It’s strongest at the entrance. Thick and sweet. Maybe there’s a cocoa tree?”
Now Gold Tooth nodded. “Yes, I smell it too, chocolate. Tianyi, it’s coming from the cave.”
I took a couple of steps forward, and at the entrance I also detected the most marvelous scent, sweet and milky. It filled my brain and made my injuries stop hurting at once. My sore muscles relaxed, leaving me soft and comfortable. “It’s wonderful,” I murmured. “Almost celestial.”
We couldn’t wait any longer and hurried into the dark cave with our candle. It was narrow, only two meters high, and maybe three or four wide. The rocks here were strangely shaped, twisted and gnarled like tree roots.
Kai darted ahead and sniffed vigorously, trying to find the source of the aroma. Suddenly, he pointed at a rock. “It’s coming from there.” He licked his lips, as if he’d have liked to take a bite out of it.
I put the candle next to the rock, and we studied it. Like a tree trunk, it was yellowish-brown and looked as if it was covered in a layer of gum. The few portions that stuck out were translucent, and its surface was covered in an irregular pattern. When the candlelight touched it, the lines seemed to grow fluid and move a little.
Kai couldn’t help reaching out to touch it. Then he brought his finger up to his nose. “Hey, it’s turned my finger into chocolate—smell it! Do you think we can eat it?”
I’d never seen anything like this. “Wait! Careful, Kai. Don’t lick it.”
Gold Tooth suddenly jerked to life. “Tianyi, this is our lucky day! Don’t you think this might be fragrant jade?”
“What?” Kai gaped. “What’s that?”
“It’s a treasure, that’s what! Fragrant jade, also known as golden jade.”
“I’ve heard the name,” I said. “So this is what it looks like? It’s certainly fragrant, but why jade?”
Either this stone had miraculous healing powers or Gold Tooth was revived by the prospect of riches. Either way, he was positively animated as he said, “Some reverse dippers have found this in ancient tombs—it’s an imperial treasure that was first discovered during the Qin or Han dynasties. Most people never got to see it, so no one really knew about it. Its smell is stronger in dry conditions. I had a little piece once, sold to me by a reverse dipper, but it was just a chip, nothing like this.”
“How much would this be worth?” Kai asked.
“Large pieces of fragrant jade are very valuable. The outer skin is a much sought-after component in medicines. A chunk this size—and this looks like pretty good quality—would bring in enough to buy an imported car.”
“We’re not far from the temple with the bronze urn,” I said. “Could this also be an offering of some sort?”
Gold Tooth considered. “I don’t think so. It’s in its natural state. If the skin hadn’t been ripped, we wouldn’t even have smelled it. This cave doesn’t show any sign of having been disturbed—all these other rocks are probably natural formations too.”
“If this doesn’t belong to anyone,” I said, “then we might as well take it. Funny how things work out. We had the bad luck of finding two empty graves, coming away without a single bit of treasure, and then this falls into our laps. At least this won’t be a wasted trip.”
Kai, who’d been waiting for me to give the go-ahead, immediately bent down to pick up the rock. Gold Tooth hastily stopped him. “Don’t touch it like that. You need to wrap it in something first. If only we had a piece of cloth.”
I looked at us—Kai and I were in our underpants, and the only spare bit of fabric we had between us was Gold Tooth’s ragged shirt. We had to keep moving—there weren’t many candles left, and our lack of food would soon become a real problem. No time to hang around and investigate the other rocks.
Noticing that the candle I held was halfway gone, I put it into one of the paper lanterns and told Gold Tooth to take off his shirt and wrap the rock in it. With Kai carrying the valuable burden, we hurried out of the cave.
Back in the main cavern, the bronze urn was nowhere to be seen, though there were little metallic glints in the embers like stars in the night sky.
Once again, it was too dark to see what was around us. “Just because no other spiders have appeared doesn’t mean they’re all dead,” I said. “We need to leave right now.”
Trying to reconstruct our route as best we could from memory, we felt our way along the wall until we came to a cave that seemed to be heading in the right direction. Again I told Kai and Gold Tooth to hold their breaths, took the candle out of the lantern, and placed it at the entrance.
The little flame immediately swayed in the opposite direction. I put the candle back in the lantern and felt with my hand. I couldn’t sense much of an air current, but the flame’s movement meant that it wasn’t a dead end, even if it didn’t link directly to the outside. Could this be the path by which the spiders reached the surface to hunt for prey? We had to give it a try.
Holding up the lantern, I led the way. Kai and Gold Tooth followed, carrying the fragrant jade between them. We burrowed through this cave, and maybe because of that magical aroma, we felt full of energy and clearheaded, despite still being absolutely ravenous. We were bringing a valuable object home with us, and as long as we managed to get out, we’d have ample cause to celebrate.
This cavern was long and twisty, its ceiling rising and dipping, so narrow we had to go single file. Farther back, it started sloping upward at a forty-five-degree angle.
I climbed along until I felt a piercing gust of cold wind. It covered me with goose bumps. We were nearly outside. I shouted at the others to hurry as I saw a burst of light up ahead. There was a hole in the soil above. I stuck my head out and climbed to the surface. Back in the outside world!
Just as I was rejoicing, Kai popped his head aboveground and abruptly yelled, “Tianyi! Your back…there’s a face on your back!”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Kai’s words fell on me like a bucket of ice water.
I twisted around but couldn’t see my own back. “What are you talking about?” I shouted. “What face?”
Kai hoisted Gold Tooth out of the hole and they both gaped at me. “Tell him, Gold Tooth! Tell him he’s got a face on his back. It’s the truth.”
Gold Tooth set down the fragrant jade. He rubbed his eyes, which were still bleary from being in the dark so long. “Between your shoulder blades, about the size of a palm, Tianyi. It’s a bit like a birthmark—not very clear, but it’s a face…or maybe an eye.”
“What? I have an eye on my back?” My head felt like it was going to explode. I reached between my shoulder blades but couldn’t feel anything on my skin. I urged Gold Tooth to describe in more detail what he saw, whether a face or an eye.
“It’s round and dark red, not very clear—you have to look closely. Circles within circles, like the pupil of an eye. Yes, I should have said eyeball. It’s not the whole eye—there are no eyelids or lashes.”
“But, Kai, didn’t you say it looked like a face? Why is Gold Tooth saying it’s an eye?”
Kai stood behind me again. “I guess I was still thinking of those markings on the spiders, and then I looked at your back and thought it was the same. Actually, it reminds me of those eyes we saw back in the Taklimakan Desert.”
I was starting to panic. This definitely wasn’t a birthmark. I’d have known about it.
Then I heard Gold Tooth yelp. “Kai, there’s one on your back too,” he said. “Quick, look at my back—do I have one?”
I got them both to turn around. On Kai’s left shoulder blade was a crimson spot the exact color of a birthmar
k, its lines blurry, about the size of a palm—and yes, shaped like an eyeball, though it was hard to be completely sure. The dark red blotch, like a bruise, was particularly striking in the setting sunlight.
Gold Tooth’s back, by contrast, was smooth and unblemished, apart from where he’d been scraped by the rocks. “You’re fine,” I told him.
Meanwhile, Kai and I stared at each other in alarm. This couldn’t be a coincidence. If we were the only two affected, it was likely the result of our last trip to the ghost-hole in Xinjiang. Had Julie Yang and Professor Chen come away with a curse too?
I tried to think. I’d seen Kai take off his shirt a couple of days ago, when he’d gotten drenched from the Yellow River. The mark hadn’t been there then. So had it just appeared—could the Dragon Ridge tombs have been the cause? But then why didn’t Gold Tooth have one as well?
“Don’t worry too much, Tianyi,” Kai said calmly. “It’s no big deal. It doesn’t hurt and doesn’t itch. Give yours a good scrub next time you have a shower, and maybe it’ll just wipe off. We have the fragrant jade, anyway. So glad we got something. Where do you think we are? It looks familiar.”
I’d been too distracted by the strange marks on our backs to look at our surroundings. Now I looked up and couldn’t help laughing. “After all that walking,” I said, “we must have gone in one big circle. We’re pretty much back where we started.”
Earlier that day, I’d walked away from Fish Bone Temple to get a better look at the feng shui and stepped onto a crust of earth that crumbed away to reveal a hidden cavern; it was this opening that we’d just climbed out of. Quite a coincidence.
All our possessions were still at Fish Bone Temple, just ahead of us. We hurried over there—we needed to get dressed before it got cold.
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