Snow in the Year of the Dragon

by H. Leighton Dickson

  Dogs too, if she remembered correctly. Things could get complicated very quickly, but then again, they had been together for weeks now and no one had killed over the lack of food.

  Life, she thought to herself. Like hope, life endured all things.

  “Wait,” she said and the bears turned.

  She squeezed the young one in her arms before lowering him to the ground.

  She reached into her pocket, pulled out the tiny clay pot. She stared at it for a long moment before stabbing the cork stopper with a fine black claw. It opened and she knelt to empty the golden contents onto the soil. It glistened for a moment then disappeared into the loam.

  She smiled and scooped the young bear back into her arms.

  ***

  “I don’t want to hear it, Seven,” said Ward.

  “Sorry,” he said. “But it’s true.”

  She turned to look at him, eyes narrowed and wary. He’d found her and Sengupta in the units next to his, groggy and disoriented but awake and, more than that, alive. He realized that nothing could have made him happier than to see that ugly goggled cap on that sardonic, scrappy head.

  They had spent hours moving through the Wheels, assisting sleepers in the ritual of waking and making sure the process was on track. There were five Ezekiel Wheels, each holding roughly two hundred sleeper units, but only one hundred and twenty subs. That meant that, not counting the ambiguous First Line, there were only six hundred and twenty five subs left from the original two thousand. Fortunately, they all knew the drill and needed little help waking from their millennia-long stasis. The sleep units themselves were equipped with radiant heat, protein squares, nutrogel packs and hydrolyte bands. The subs knew to remain in their units until they were strong enough to stand. Sengupta had proven invaluable then, forming care teams to help with disorientation, dehydration and chills. Slowly, surely, Sandman 3 was waking up.

  “Did you have a wire?” Solomon asked. “At all, any time?”

  “I thought I did,” said Ward.

  “And do you have one now?”

  She growled.

  “Dreamtime,” he said. “Is not a place. It’s a state of mind.”

  “How?”

  “I have no idea,” he said. “But Reedy is not your average super.”

  “Do they have Kuri? I spent weeks fighting Kuri. Where? In my sleep? Do they have dillies and roos and scorpions the size of dogs, or are those just figments as well?”

  He shrugged.

  “Dell is still dead.”

  She growled again and he was reminded of Ursa and her lashing tail.

  They stood now in a central hub connecting the Wheels with the ground platform hydraulift, staring through weathered plex across the plain. Easily a two-kilometer stretch of scrub, sand, and witchetty bushes, SuperPit Sandfield SleepLab 3 gleamed along the plain like a red and white ribbon. In the distance, they could see the lorries, zippers, towering mechs and the out-building slabs of the base.

  “Can you call the Griffen?” he asked.

  “Not if Reedy is still in control.”

  “What about the First Line? Your friends Duck and Mag and the rest.”

  It was her turn to shrug now.

  “Are they even real?”

  “I think they are. Same way you were in my Dreamtime and I was in yours.”

  “Porque the hell—”

  “I have no idea, but we need them if we stand a chance at claiming this base.”

  She reached up to pinch the wire.

  “Duck? Duck, this is Damaris Ward. Can you hear me?”

  Nothing.

  “Duck? Mag? Ben? Dance? Anyone?”

  Nothing.

  She grunted and put her hands on her hips, cast her dark eyes across the red.

  “In any of your Dreamtimes,” she began. “Did you ever actually see a dillie?”

  “Me? Nope. You?”

  “Never.” He knew what she was thinking, didn’t need to be plugged into her wire to know. She slid her eyes his way. “Do we run?”

  “Sprint two kilometers across red scrub desert toward a potentially hostile enemy base and pray we don’t get eaten by subterranean sand crocodiles along the way?”

  “Yuh.”

  “If I win, you have to take off that god-awful cap.”

  “Not gonna happen. When I win…”

  He could have sworn there was a grin. A wrinkle beneath an eye, at least.

  “When I win, I shave your head.”

  “I hate you.”

  “I’ll give you a head start.”

  Together, they stepped into the hydraulift and the double hatch doors slammed shut with a clang. The walls were old, pitted and utterly devoid of windows.

  “This is worse than a cryounit,” he grumbled.

  “Ground level,” said Ward. “Secure all doors.”

  The lift shuddered and dropped like a stone, plummeting the short distance before lurching to a halt. His stomach lurched with it, and he leaned against the wall for support.

  “You’re sure about this?” she asked.

  “I sure as hell don’t want to stay here and wait for Reedy to figure us out.”

  Ward grunted.

  “Here goes.”

  She reached over to hit the ArcEye and with a hiss, the hatch door split open on warm air, red sand and a band of Kuri dressed in black.

  ***

  Ursa stood between the seven suits of armour, arms folded across her chest. The metal was gold, the leather thick and embossed with dragons and lotus. The padding on both doh and osedeh were not so thick to stop the blow from a sword, but would surely stop a dagger or shir’khin or needle. And for the Bushona Geisha, that would be enough.

  Two leopards stood behind her. They looked like twins.

  “And finally,” said One. “The obi is colour-coded. Plum obi for the plum Geisha…”

  “Jade obi for the Jade,” said Two. “And so on.”

  “And so on,” said One. “We will begin work immediately on customizing the armour.”

  “Yes, yes,” said Two. “Your request was rushed, so we have done our best with what we have in the armoury.”

  “There is not much call for female armour nowadays.”

  “But we knew,” said Two. “That once we had a female sham’Rai, things would change.”

  “The Way of Things can change,” said One.

  “Indeed, it can,” said Two.

  And together they bowed.

  “Ah, there you are, sham’Rai-dala,” came a voice as Chancellor Ho swept into the room. “Forgive the intrusion, esteemed Masters, but I need to speak with the Empress’ sham’Rai.”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” they said together. And they smiled.

  “Alone,” said Ho.

  Ursa lashed her tail, turned to the leopards.

  “This is acceptable,” she said. “I will have the Bushona Geisha report for fittings at once.”

  The pair bowed once more and quickly left the room. Ho flowed like water towards her, his blue robes rippling across the floor. He paused to study the uniforms, ran white fingers along the leather.

  “Are you planning for an increase in our stable of sham’Rai, sham’Rai-dala?”

  “The Bushona Geisha are useless,” she growled.

  “Women in armour,” he purred. “The Golden Lion is bestowing more miracles upon us, it seems.”

  Her fingers curled into her fists.

  “Has there been a falcon from Agara’tha?”

  “There has.”

  And he moved into the semicircle of armour as if polishing the gold with his eyes.

  “And?”

  “He has not arrived.”

  She frowned.

  “Where is he?”

  “No one knows, sham’Rai-dala.” He turned his face towards her. “Do you?”

  “If you, or anyone in this Palace, has harmed him—”

  “You will do what? Kill us?”

  She leaned in.

  “Before you can
blink an eye.”

  “That is treason.”

  “No one will know.”

  “I have drafted a letter to be opened upon my untimely death.” He smiled. “Everyone will know.”

  He stepped back, slipped his hands into his wide sleeves.

  “Shall we end these idle games, sham’Rai-dala? The dispatch said that he had not arrived at Agara’tha, and that a party had been sent to search the road for a sign. Four panthers, a mongrel and an Imperial palanquin should not be hard to find.”

  I will not stay in the palanquin long, he had said and she cursed his stubbornness and pride.

  “Have them check the inns along the way,” she said.

  “Why?”

  “Also, have them notify me if and when the panthers report back to the Palace.”

  “Oh, so you are Shogun-General, now?”

  “Does that frighten you, little man?”

  He frowned at her, causing the lush fur of his face to pinch and pucker.

  “I have noticed,” he began, “that the Palace was a far more peaceful place before you and your husband arrived.”

  Just one shir’khin.

  She whirled and stomped out the door, heels echoing like barking dogs behind her.

  ***

  The incense was killing him.

  No, he realized. It was the arrows.

  I believe in sky and earth

  So many arrows and it was hard to breathe. The pain had dulled, however, and the cold had descended like a blanket of snow.

  He opened his eyes.

  in blood and birth

  He turned his face to watch her, rocking and humming over a circle of candles. Wrapped in black linen, Kylan slept at her knees, eyelashes dark against his soft cheek. Rani was glad to have seen him one last time, this little one whom he’d carried and tended and come to love. It was strange then when the witch held up a tiny dagger, pressed its point into the pad of her palm. Blood sprang up, glistening and bright, and she held it over the face of her baby, dripped onto his young forehead once, twice, three times.

  Kylan, one he’d protect with his life

  The witch turned her golden eyes on him.

  in war and strife

  “I am not a good woman, Jalair Naranbataar, but…”

  She paused and blinked slowly before continuing.

  “But you have always known this.”

  The first time he’d seen her, the golden eyes and the shadows, he’d known this. He’d been riddled with enemy arrows then too. She had saved him.

  “I have made terrible bargains with dark forces. I have cheated Dharma and stolen the souls of men.”

  She could save him.

  in moon and life

  His heart was heavy, slowing. He could feel it pounding in his throat, suffocating him with every beat.

  “I would lie if I said I could not save you.”

  and you

  He was tired.

  She shifted on her hip, raised her hand over his face. Blood splashed onto his forehead, rolled down into the corners of his eyes. His lids were too heavy. He could not blink and everything grew red.

  “I would also lie if I said I did not want to.”

  The tent was slipping

  She cupped his face in her long, strong hands.

  “But my son is dead and I want him back.”

  The woman was slipping

  He didn’t understand. Her words were slurred, her golden eyes blurred because of the blood. The baby had a blue eye

  “So I make a trade with Dharma…”

  the baby was dead

  She leaned in as if to kiss him, and he felt the last of his breath leaving his body.

  His sister had a blue eye

  “You, Jalair Naranbataar, Grandson of the Blue Wolf, will go to glory, while I…”

  The world was slipping

  and you

  Setse

  “…I go to hell…”

  I believe

  Kylan

  slipping away in a whisper of black silk and incense

  believe

  ***

  Death, death, everywhere death

  Setse swept her eyes over the children, sleeping in weary mounds beneath the frescos and the pillars. aSiffh had returned with them all, unscathed but exhausted, and the remaining villagers had helped carry them up the many snowy steps to the red temple. Even the Uürekh, Ma’ar and Nüür, had helped, leading them all to the holy place, where Chiing had stoked the fire and allowed them to rest. She dared not hope that this might be home. Hope had always defined her. She did not know who she would be without it but, now, hope had been torn from her breast like an annoying burr.

  They had not found Shar.

  Tonight on the mountain, she had felt the familiar paralysis of Oracle sight. So strong she had all but buckled under its crushing weight, almost surrendered to its cold, terrifying depths. Flashes of Shar in the night, his fall from high places, his murder at the hands of the Legion, his collapse under the Eyes of Jia’Khan. All his deaths, she had seen, and now tonight, bones. Bones and Needle and Storm. Fragmented and raw, she could make no sense of it, only a deep empty wind that left her hollow and swept her marrow bare.

  The fire crackled and danced and she watched the sparks rise in the dark room. Rise like life from a dying animal. She had witnessed it often, wished to follow it to the stars to see where it went. Life and death and armies and Oracles. Wick and flame and candle and incense. She bowed her head as a second wave rolled over her, braced herself for the inevitable shroud of killing, Oracle sight.

  Rani

  Rise above it, Shaar had said. Observe, do not partake.

  Rani

  Candle and witch, baby and flame. A sparkling tent in a city of shifting glass. Army and cat and monkey and dog and Rani, floating up like the sparks of a fire

  Rani

  Necromancy and trade, death for life, love for love and she gasped as she understood, blinked away the crippling wave, opened her mind to the flashes of sight

  Rani help her

  You are stronger, Shar had said. She was strong, she knew this. Bad things happened but she would be stronger. She owed it to Sev the Strong, the girl with the heart of a mountain.

  Ponies and maiden, walls and gates and arrows and monkeys

  She owed it to Rani, her brother who had loved more than he had lived

  Pride, pride, aid to the Khargan, service to the kingdoms, saviour of the Nine Thousand

  Her throat grew tight but she rode the wave, would not surrender to its anguish and despair.

  Rani was dying.

  Protector of the helpless, the defenceless, the young

  Rani, her brother, her life, her heart.

  The wave ebbed, leaving pebbles of hope and memory in its wake.

  She breathed in, as he had taught her, breathed out. In and out like a cleansing breeze.

  She had done it.

  She had helped.

  She opened her eyes, wiped the tears streaming down her cheeks.

  Young Balmataar sat, back against a black pillar, braiding fine bones onto the stick with hair and sinew. He was smiling to himself but would not meet her eyes. The udgan next, snoring in a pile of skins and furs. Zorig had died but she had survived. Setse shook her head. Life was hard for Oracles. Death was harder.

  Through the fire, she could see the alpha of Khumul watching her. She should have hated him. Instead, she felt nothing.

  “I am going to find Shar,” she said.

  “The yellow cat?”

  She nodded.

  “I will help.”

  They rose to their feet. The men of Khumul looked up wearily, blinking the sleep and dried blood from their eyes. Tuuv raised a hand and they lowered their heads, asleep before they hit the stone.

  Maybe, life was hard for everyone.

  Suddenly, Balm was there, bonestick in hand.

  “I’ll come too.”

  Whispers and lies, darkness and shadow. She would ki
ll him with the dagger once the children could not see.

  She turned her back and together, the three made their way to the stair.

  ***

  Kuri.

  Solomon scrambled away from the hatch as Ward swung her heliad onto her shoulder.

  The Kuri did not move.

  At their heels, a scorpion the size of a calf, tail bobbing, mandibles clicking, but the Kuri did not move.

  “Get back,” Ward snarled. “Or I’ll cut you all in half, right where you stand!”

  Still, they did not move and Solomon tried to rein in his racing heart. Six creatures, wrapped in black linen, reminding him of Bedouin desert dwellers. They stood on two legs like humans. Two legs, dog faces, tails like scorpions.

  “I said get back!”

  And she waved the heliad across their middles, emphasizing the point.

  “Wait,” said Solomon, and he stepped away from the walls, held up his hands.

  “Don’t, Seven.”

  “I have nothing,” he said, turning his hands over to show the lack of weapon. “You have nothing.”

  “Do you not remember Dell?” Ward snapped.

  “I’ll always remember Dell,” he said. “Do you remember Kerris and Fallon?”

  Ward swore in a language he didn’t understand.

  He stepped forward again. Four of the Kuri stepped back, leaving the middle pair in the front. A male and a female, he gathered from their shapes and sizes, with faces very much like dogs, but also a little like insects. The pair held out their hands, turned them over and over as he had done. No weapons, no staffs or clubs or blasters or rifles. No swords or spears or daggers or anything that he might consider deadly, save the blunted claws at the ends of linen-wrapped fingers.