Transmuted

by Karina Cooper

  Though I gave him a hard look at the use of “your man,” I did not see within his expression that same scorn that he’d shown prior. Possession might still ride him, as it would any creature of instinct, but in this, he seemed rather more focused on the events within that red circle.

  Zhànzhàn pushed the fingertips of both hands against other parts of Ashmore’s body, as though seeking for a pulse; though she would find none below the navel or between the brows.

  Whatever she did find, however, it seemed to please her.

  “What is she doing?” I pressed.

  Zhànzhàn spoke without looking up. “You may say.”

  Hawke bristled at my back. Without thinking too much of it, I leaned against his chest.

  Perhaps it helped.

  Perhaps having me to frame within the embrace of his long arms gave him something other to consider. Though the tension of his body did not leave him, his tone lowered. “She is proficient, like her brother, in Chinese alchemy.”

  “That much I assumed,” I began, but he encircled a wide hand around my throat in loose warning.

  “Chinese alchemy is different from western, and from most sorcery,” he murmured in my ear. Zhànzhàn lit the candles with a simple flame. Within moments, a drifting smoke filled the air—not opium, as I feared upon the first breath, but something spicy in nature.

  Something similar to that what I smelled upon Hawke’s skin.

  “I see only four points,” I noted.

  “From clockwise of her position,” he murmured, “they are wood, fire, metal and water. The fifth is the center, represented by the smoke, as—”

  “Aether?” I hazarded.

  “Earth,” he corrected, and his thumb bit into the soft curve just under my jaw. “Do not assume that all alchemy transcends east and west.”

  I winced, as I had assumed just so. “Then what of quintessence?”

  Zhànzhàn did not allow him a reply. As the smoke drifted over the odd circle, flitting about the straining, ragged shape of my tutor’s breath, she said, “Only the western man would fail to understand the wŭ xíng so completely.”

  What arrogance.

  My chin rose, but this only allowed Hawke greater purchase to contain my ire in one warning hand. I swallowed hard enough that his grip eased; only a fraction. He did me no harm, but such was his confidence of my submission that it was enough.

  “The Five Phases,” Hawke said in my ear, “are wholly different from the five elements taught you. Unlearn what you know.”

  “Again?” My sardonicism did not last. “How will you cure this poison?”

  Zhànzhàn touched her lips with one finger, then drew it out into a straight line. “This humble practitioner,” she said with no such humility in her tone, “can induce wàidān. However his nèidān shù is wholly his own to master.”

  “External medicine,” Hawke translated without my asking, “versus his own internal alchemical process.”

  This much, I understood. “She can apply the salve, but he must will it to work, then.”

  “More or less.” Surprising me, his thumb caressed my jaw in tender accord. “He will mend. Watch.”

  I did. Though it might be unfair to Zhànzhàn’s efforts, I watched her as carefully as a cat did the movements of a mouse—one wrong motion, and I would have her hide in one bite. Hawke or no.

  Yet, she did not move. Only smoke, rising from the candles in gray vapor, wafted through the room.

  Hawke’s heart beat solidly against my back, a counter rhythm to the silence the Chinese art unfolding before me yielded. I found myself clenching one hand in the folds of his shirt behind me; a fist made in hope and in fear.

  I had long grown past the immediate desire to dismiss such things out of hand, but my rational brain labored to make sense of that what the Chinese alchemy undertook.

  Healing Ashmore, removing from within him the poison that had murdered the young collector, seemed a matter of science, and here the girl promised art.

  For a long time, longer than I feared I would have handled without Hawke’s steady patience behind me, only Ashmore’s struggled rasp of breath broke through the meditative state we all fell under.

  Then, without a sound, she stirred. A simple gesture of an arm, the dip of what seemed to be courtesy though I couldn’t be certain. She brought to her lips a small flask of cinnabar, carved so ornately that I could not make out the details at this distance, and poured whatever was within it into her mouth.

  Breath held in anticipation, I watched her place a hand against my tutor’s shoulder—and with a startled sound locked behind the sudden curve of Hawke’s hand at my mouth, Zhànzhàn covered Ashmore’s pallid lips with her own.

  A kiss?

  No. Not entirely—and not without motive.

  The taste of Hawke’s palm against my lips only served to heighten the sudden memory that assailed me; of Hawke, cradling me very similarly, save he sat upon the floor to do it. Of his lips covering mine, his tongue pushing a bit of Turkish resin deep into my mouth at a time when I collapsed for the want of it. The bitter flavors mingled with the taste of the ringmaster I had unwittingly loved even then.

  The shudder that gripped me was equal parts raw need and remembered fear.

  His hand slipped from my mouth, to once more curve about my throat, and that it made me feel secure—protected—was a thing I could no longer pretend did not exist.

  Simply by standing nearby, by touching me, he surrounded me; held me upright and bolstered me, all without a single word.

  If he felt possessive at all in that moment, I would not begrudge him. I would, in fact, welcome it.

  I squeezed my eyes shut, my fingers tight at his wrist as though afraid he’d withdraw if they loosened. When I opened them again, a spilled trail of liquid gleamed oddly silver from the corner of my tutor’s mouth.

  Zhànzhàn rose again, not a hint of untowardness in her demeanor. Neither flushed cheeks nor startled breath marked her as she passed her hands once more over that space below Ashmore’s navel.

  Such grace filled her movements, such economy of motion and yet liquid suppleness, that envy filled me. I suspected that should she ever deign to serve tea in Fanny’s parlor, my companion would have no corrections to offer.

  Hawke’s breath stirred the curls at my temple. “Now the result.”

  “Hardly scientific, is it?” I whispered.

  His chuckle, low and rolling with the rasp I associated with the beast within him, sent warm fingers over my skin.

  Zhànzhàn folded her hands crosswise over whatever spot she searched for at her patient’s abdomen. I saw no change in him, no light nor color and heard no sound, yet she apparently gauged a moment correct.

  Without word or Trump or any such indication, she straightened her shoulders and pushed down hard, sharp upon his flesh.

  The smoke’s drift stilled. It hung, heavy and suddenly thick.

  Again, she pushed. Hard enough to bruise, if I were any judge.

  A prickle danced over my skin. The fine hairs upon my nape lifted, and gooseflesh rippled down my arms.

  The smoke from the candles streamed towards the circle. It gathered and thickened, filled the whole to the seam of red drawn upon the floor. Slowly, as though my tutor pulled it through his skin, it faded into nothing.

  Silence reigned.

  I opened my mouth, butHawke’s arm tightened upon me in warning.

  Glass cracked. A short, sharp sound that jarred us all.

  So concerned was I with my tutor’s well-being that I had neglected to watch the tools of Chinese alchemy at work. Frowning, I squinted at the four items laid out around Ashmore’s still form.

  Black had formed upon the mirror’s silver face. A fracture split down the middle.

  Surely I did not imagine it.

  Zhànzhàn remained still and calm as the other items—the soap and the bowl of milk— slowly corrupted with whatever essence blackened them all. The candles burned low, much quicker tha
n they should.

  No more smoke flared from the wick.

  A correlation occurred to me. “Is that the poison?”

  “Not as such,” Hawke replied, and added, “I will explain later.”

  It was the best I’d get—and likely with less metaphor than my tutor was prone to deliver. For some minutes after, I watched in silent wonder as the items frothed and bubbled, and the pallor fled Ashmore’s skin.

  His breathing improved.

  At his side, Zhànzhàn eased out a slow,calming breath. “It is done.”

  And now I owed the Veil—or half thereof—a further debt.

  For the life of my friend, I would not begrudge the girl her merit. “Thank you,” I said, uncertain what else to offer.

  She turned her dark eyes to me in solemn regard. “We must converse.”

  “Yes,” Hawke said behind me, no longer eager for quiet. “We must.”

  We stepped into the parlor Piers had plucked me from prior, but the earl had no more graced us with a lifted glass of amber liquid than Hawke had wrapped one hand around Zhànzhàn’s slender throat and pushed her, unresisting, against the doorframe.

  Caught in an aborted attempt to sit, I staggered in place and snapped, “Hawke!”

  “Oh, for God’s sake,” Piers said, already slurring and utterly unmotivated to rise, “be quiet. The house issleeping.”

  Hawke did not need to raise his voice in order to dictate menace. “Speak the truth,” he said, fingers white around her neck. “Not the bits you offered, but all of it.”

  Though a mottling grew in the girl’s cheeks, she was inhumanly calm. As though she knew herself the master despite Hawke’s violent assault.

  Her gaze sought me, hovering awkwardly in undecided inaction. “Ask him to release me,” she said, though it strained. “And I shall speak.”

  “You will speak—”

  I interrupted Hawke’s snarl with a soft, “Please.”

  His eyes pinned upon me, always indicative of his mood when he no longer maintained the capability to mask it in stone. They blazed now in a determination unguided by anger. Only resolve could flare so cold.

  A resolve that I threatened.

  “Devil take it,” he spat, and let her go.

  She lifted a hand to her neck. “You are much less patient, wūshì.”

  “Whose fault is that?” I asked of her. Then, sharp as blades, “Do not get ahead of yourself, Veil. I am grateful for your skill, but let’s not forget just why things are as they are.”

  This she allowed with an inclination of her head.

  Muttering, Piers lumbered to his feet and managed to find his way to the sideboard for another drink. He did not offer to pour for anyone else, nor did we avail ourselves.

  For all his proclivities, even soused, Piers understood more than he let on.

  That he did not comment upon the fracture faintly seaming the mantel was gracious.

  Because he had been dragged into this confidence, like it or not, I allowed him to stay without comment. “Speak,” I said as Zhànzhàn claimed for herself a chair.

  “Begin with the poison,” Hawke added, choosing again to stand behind me. One hand braced upon the sofa’s high back, but I did not fear for the sturdiness of the wood. His knuckles had not whitened in strain.

  Perhaps the key to his patience was cooperation.

  I’d consider this in the future. If I were so inclined.

  With my tutor no longer hovering in death’s door, I felt lighter—much more relieved. Hawke seemed to share a measure of this. For all he had threatened the girl, I had seen him do worse on a whim.

  She tucked her hands into the sleeves of her tunic. “The poison is a deadly one,” she began. I knew that much, but allowed her the preamble. “The black feathers speak of death delivered immediately.”

  “And red?” I asked.

  “Less deadly, meant for sleep.”

  So the collectors had been given poison meant to induce unconsciousness, but the bearer of the black darts had meant to instill death. Why?

  I frowned. “Are they your brother’s?”

  “They are ours,” she acknowledged, “but for that reason, I am able to…” A phrase, longer than a word.

  Hawke did not bother mincing any of his own. “Transmute the poison.”

  That was a word I understood. I tipped my head at him. “How so?”

  There, a glint of impatience. Despite it, he obliged me. “By the flow of the Five Phases, she was able to transmute the poison into water within his body. He was strong enough to facilitate the process, but the corrupt qìhad to be channeled elsewhere.”

  “Thus the items.”

  “Correct,” Zhànzhàn said.

  There was fundamentally more here than met the eye, but I was not inclined to sit through an entire lecture of eastern practices of alchemy. I frowned thoughtfully. “The silver concoction. Was it mercury?”

  “Among other things,” she said. “Western alchemy teaches that transmutation is a thing that occurs outside the body. True alchemy—”

  “Allows for transmutation within, exoteric and esoteric,” I finished, earning a raise of her wispy eyebrows and a measure of approval.

  I cared nothing for it.

  “Yes,” she confirmed. “But we are beside the point. Should you choose to compare knowledge another time,” she added with a faint, knowing smile, “I shall be more than pleased to do so.”

  I had no doubt at all that she hoped still to learn the secrets of my father’s alchemical serums—secrets that I now knew had been forced upon him by my mother. I returned her smile stiffly. “I think not.”

  “Then we turn to my brother,” she said, as though it mattered not at all. “The truth is that he does not simply want to create an army.”

  “Do tell,” I said dryly, somehow not at all surprised. Or perhaps just weary of the whole situation.

  “I have said,” she continued calmly, “that he wishes to make of himself the Yellow Dragon. Please pay attention to the following.” Her hand sketched an imaginary circle in the air. “Each direction correlates with an element, a phase and a heavenly creature.”

  I had not gone through all of this for nothing. Half turning in my seat, I braced an arm against the back of the sofa and frowned up at Hawke. “Are we back to that tiger and dragon business?”

  “Worse,” he said, low tones.

  I sighed. Bloody metaphors. “How could it possibly be any worse?”

  “Because as in all things,” Hawke said flatly, “there is power in such business, especially in herbusiness.”

  “I’ll, eh…” Glass clinked, and Piers frowned at his unwittingly empty glass. “I’ll have another, then, shall I?”

  “As will I,” I said, and he waved a hand of acknowledgement without turning away from the sideboard.

  “The Yellow Dragon occupies the center, as harmony,” Zhànzhàn said, ignoring the offer. Her hand eased to the right. “The Azure Dragon.” Then lower. “The Vermillion Bird.” To the west. “The White Tiger.” And then at the top, a full circle. “The Black Tortoise.”

  “This is a great deal of metaphor, isn’t it?” I asked.

  She responded not at all to my sarcastic sigh. “Despite my brother’s wishes, the Yellow Dragon must never stand alone,” Zhànzhàn said firmly. “To do so is to shed the balance.”

  That made no sense to me. “Why would he want to shed the balance?”

  “Zhànzhàn,” Hawke growled. Another warning.

  I did not, I noted with a great deal of self-deprecation, like the feel of her given name on his lips.

  She blinked. “Immortality.” Her mouth flitted up into the briefest of smiles. “To what other purpose is the purification of self?”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  The Chinese practices of alchemy were both the same and different than the ones Ashmore taught me. Metaphor still reigned supreme, but unlike the precepts I knew, there was precious little science behind it.

  Too much
mysticism filled the eastern philosophies for me to understand with any clarity. All I could say for certain was that whatever Zhànzhàn had done, it had saved Ashmore’s life.

  Before she left our company, to be escorted by an extremely irritable Hawke, she pressed upon me a last word. “Matters of immortality transcend any single definition.” Her gaze held mine without kindness nor concern; she simply existed, and in that existence, she felt herself superior.

  I gave as good as I got. “Your brother is in for a rude awakening.”

  “It is that awakening,” she replied, “that you should fear most.”

  She left before I had answer to give her.

  Hawke caught my chin in hand and tipped my face up for a kiss that bruised. “Do not,” he said, his lips brushing mine, “be rash.”

  I expected nothing less.

  I allowed him nothing more. “I promise nothing.”

  “Ask of me to stay,” he said, low and dark, “and I will.”

  Thatsurprised me. My eyebrows lifted, eyes widening. “What of your prisoner?”

  I could all but read his irritation, his frustration with the way things were. Unable to answer, knowing that any he gave would not salve either his pride or mine, he growled, “Say that you will return to me.”

  The sheer mandate of it rankled.

  As if he knew, as though he could pierce my fragile flesh with the devilish glint in his eyes, he pressed upon me another kiss and turned away.

  Although I watched them depart, it was the eerily forthright stare of the girl he escorted that looked back at me.

  Would I have promised?

  Could I have demanded he remain?

  I returned to Ashmore’s bedchamber, intent upon keeping watch, and found Piers already present. He had quite lost his head on drink, and now snored in a chair beside my tutor’s bedridden form.

  A maid tapped on the door, her eyes sleepy and haggard from it. Guilt touched me. “Did we keep you?” I asked, whispering my concern.

  “Oh, no, my lady,” she said, bobbing into a curtsy. A lie, and well I knew it. “His lordship said to take you to your room.”