Maude turned to Amadia. “Any ideas, from trying to translate those tablets, where Alexandria might have sent them to do this ritual?”
But the African Daughter was gone.
Maude turned to look for her and found herself in a different alley than where she had been a second before. The stars overhead were different than those of the Sahara.
She heard a tinny piano playing not too far away and she recognized the song; it was “Good-bye, Liza Jane.” Maude took a few tentative steps toward the mouth of the alley. She heard the whinny of a horse and the clatter of a wagon behind it. Distant voices of men, laughing, coughing, sounded strangely familiar to her. Maude walked up to the street corner and immediately knew where she was. She was on Geary Street, a winding narrow street in the heart of Golgotha’s Chinese community, known collectively, and derogatorily, as Johnny Town. There was a butcher shop on the right side of the corner with a row of decapitated and plucked ducks in the dark window, next to a slate sign with a row of Chinese hanzi that announced the shop was closed.
“Miss Stapleton,” a familiar voice called out to her from her left, “what are you doing here?” The Chinese man was old with a snow white beard that fell to below his waist. He wore a silk brocade robe of brilliant emerald, and his eyes were dark like a moonless night. His name was Ch’eng Huang and he was the undisputed master of the notorious Green Ribbon Tong, and lord of Johnny Town.
“I’m … I’m not entirely sure,” Maude said. “I was … someplace else, and now … I’m home.” Maude realized she was still wearing Gran’s blouse, breeches, boots and coat. She was dressed as a buccaneer on the high seas. She had a revolver at her hip and sword too. No one in Golgotha had ever seen her in anything but the garb of a matronly mother, widow and laundress. Huang seemed unsurprised. Maude couldn’t recall ever seeing the man surprised by anything.
“I see,” Huang said, “I am very aware of every inch of my little domain. I felt a very old door open and it appears you passed through it. I have to check on such matters; often what comes through is far less charming.”
“I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage, sir,” Maude said.
“I doubt you are often disadvantaged, madame,” he said. “Some of Golgotha’s streets lead to faraway places, other cities, other worlds,” Huang said. He closed his eyes and raised his head as if he were trying to hear a sound, or catch a scent. He cocked his head to the side. “Carcosa,” he whispered. “Carcosa is a very dangerous place, Miss Stapleton,” he said, his eyes still closed, “even for someone of your … talents.”
“Constance is there,” Maude said. “In terrible danger. I was trying to find her, but I got separated from my friend, my guide.”
“I have some … small experience with cities,” Huang said. “Go back the way you came. Take the third left, and as you do so close your eyes and whisper your daughter’s name. Make sure your next step is with your right foot. That may help you.”
“Thank you,” Maude said and paused. “Is everyone well?”
“As well as one can be in Golgotha,” the old man said. “Some running about and shouting currently having to do with something called a Si-Te-Cah? Apparently some local legend about giant pale-skinned, red-haired cannibal wild men, or some such.”
“Again with the cannibals,” Maude sighed.
“I’m confident Sheriff Highfather and his deputies will have the situation well in hand by the time you return,” Huang said with a slit of a smile. “I wish you luck with your daughter, huān jù yī táng.”
“Xièxiè,” Maude replied and bowed.
The old man slipped one hand from the folds of his sleeve. He held one of the tong’s hatchets, with a green ribbon fastened to the base of the handle. Huang held the weapon close to his face and whispered something to it, “Zhēnzhèng de fēi bìng shā sǐ rènhé dírén.” He offered it to Maude. “To help you on your journey.”
She took the hatchet and noticed that now a line of hanzi flowed down the green ribbon. Maude cocked an eyebrow.
“A prayer for your victory,” Huang said. “Best to be on your way, the doors are closing, things are in motion.”
“Again, thank you,” Maude said, slipping the hatchet in the back of her belt. Ch’eng Huang bowed. She turned and raced off the way she had come.
“Cháng’é kěnéng huì yǐndǎo nǐ, tā de chuán, yuèliàng, Daughter,” Huang said to the empty alleyway.
* * *
Maude saw Constance in her mind, laughing as they sat on a blanket after a long day of training in the desert outside Golgotha. She whispered her daughter’s name and took a step with her right foot, eyes closed. She felt something loose, like gravel, crunch under her boots. She opened her eyes and was in a vast arena, beneath the baleful eye of the full moon. Under her feet was sand and a fine gritty dust and tiny rubies, flashing in the moonlight. Ahead of her was a large statue of a woman made of gold and precious stones. Something about the statue seemed very familiar to her, and its jeweled stare seemed alive, accusing.
About fifty yards away was Constance. She lay on a large silver disc covered in tiny symbols, a raised part of the center of the floor of the arena that had been cleared away, directly before the statue’s gaze. Maude instantly knew what the silver circle was. Kneeling beside Constance, holding up one of the girl’s arms, was a Chinese woman dressed in black loose-fitting pants and a collarless tunic with brocade white buttons—the same simple garb many of the Chinese in Golgotha wore. She held a bloody knife over Constance.
“Get away from her,” Maude shouted, “now!” The woman lowered Constance’s arm gently, palm down onto the silver seal, and as she did so, Maude could see dark blood pouring from the long vertical slit in her daughter’s arm. The woman reached for Constance’s other arm.
“Please,” Ya said, “do not interfere, this must be done. I am truly sorry for your loss. When it is done, you may slay me if you feel that is appropriate, I will put up no defense, but the Grail must be renewed.”
The city shivered and the air in the arena wavered and distorted as the damned city’s reality battled with the world outside.
“Constance is not the Grail,” Maude shouted out. “The prophecy is not as Alexandria said. You won’t save the Daughters by doing this, you may be damning us all instead!”
Maude drew Gran’s machete and ran toward Constance and her accoster. She shifted the blood within her, her breath fueling the changes to her nerves, her senses, making them inhuman in their clarity, their reaction. “You’ve all been lied to,” Maude said. “Last time I say it: get away from her.”
“Mother,” Constance muttered, her words slurring as the blood emptied from her and she felt herself slipping deeper into sleep, even as time and distance churned all around them, “no.” She tried to turn her head to look at the golden statue, but it was too much effort. “She doesn’t understand,” Constance mumbled to the golden woman.
Ya ignored the girl’s mumbling as she passed out. She took the knife and lowered it to open the vein in Constance’s other arm. There was a boom and an angry whine as the knife was shot from her hand, tumbling and disappearing into the sand. Ya rubbed her hand, glaring, and scanned about for the sniper. Three dark shapes flew from her hand at dizzying speed and force. They disappeared into the darkness. There was a distant clatter.
“Nice try,” Amadia’s voice called out, echoing throughout the arena. “But you’re getting slow in your old age, Ya.”
Maude was almost to Constance and Ya when the others made their move. The distortion in the air, crashing throughout the chamber, made it harder to detect them coming. The bigger one, the blonde named Inna, was to her front, blocking her path to Constance. The smaller one, the girl who had controlled the butterflies in Charleston, was to Maude’s back. Maude drew Gran’s sword.
Inna spun the heavy spear, twirling it like a pinwheel, the silver point flashing in the moonlight, seemingly everywhere. “Stapleton,” Inna said, “I know this is difficult but it must
be done. There is no other way.”
“You crippled my father and stole my daughter,” Maude said. “This isn’t difficult at all.”
Maude swung her machete high and Inna parried the blade with the silver tip of the spear. Maude snapped out a kick as the two weapons locked in parry and caught Inna in the side. The Russian grunted and advanced with a lunge from the spear. Maude parried and drove the spear aside, creating an opening for her to throw an uppercut. Inna was ready for it, though, and side-stepped the punch, driving an elbow into Maude’s chin and sending her back a few steps.
Inna advanced, the spear spinning again, a blurring wheel before her. Maude’s eyes flickered between the spinning staff and the placement of Inna’s feet, waiting. Maude’s free hand shot out with a half-fist punch and the staff snapped in two with a crack. Inna reacted instantly, just as Maude would have, twirling and catching the two pieces of the staff, wielding them as fighting sticks, one in each hand. Maude’s follow-up swing, low with the machete at Inna’s stomach, was parried, barely, by one of the pieces of broken staff.
From behind her, Maude felt the air pressure coming at her lower spine like a freight train. There was nowhere to go but up, and perhaps not enough time. She jumped straight up, and twisted behind Itzel, at the arc of the jump, even as the diminutive Daughter’s nerve strike grazed Maude’s back as she flew up and over. Maude felt pressure and fire run along her spine, but she had managed to avoid the worst of it.
Maude dropped behind Itzel, but one of her legs, slightly numbed by the nerve attack, almost gave out and she slipped. That lost second was what Maude had planned to use to counterattack, but it was gone. Itzel was a frenetic blur. She spun with a snarl, and gestured at Maude. A swarm of jagged, razor sharp obsidian pieces, torn from Itzel’s necklace, thrummed toward Maude’s face.
Maude leaned back at the waist, feeling the damaged nerves protesting, and flashed a reaping knife-hand at Itzel’s thigh as the throwing stones passed less than an inch from her face. Maude’s chop connected and Itzel staggered back, bracing with her other leg to avoid falling. At the same instant that Maude’s blow connected with Itzel, Inna swept Maude’s slightly numb leg, and Maude, already bent backward to avoid the knives, felt pain blossom out of the tingling numbness and felt gravity grabbing her and smashing her to the ground on her back.
“Stay down,” Inna said to Maude, raising her foot to crush her if she tried to move. Maude noticed the tiny rubies beside her. The recognition was almost instantaneous—the floor was covered with the same blood stones as had been hidden in the back of Gran’s African tablet at Grande Folly. The same as the blood stone that she had taken with the hallucinogenic drug. She looked up at the Russian standing threateningly over her.
“There is a way to renew the Grail here, Inna! Please, listen to me!”
The Russian shook her head. “This place is playing with your mind, Stapleton,” Inna said. “There is no other way. I understand your loss, but…”
“Do you?” Maude asked. “What if it was your child, Inna?” Maude said. “Your girl? According to Amadia, you lost your mind when my father shot her, nearly killed him. What would you be doing if she was the one lying up there, bleeding out for the goddamned greater good?” Inna paused, and it was all the opening Maude needed. Maude spun to sweep Inna’s leg, to use her fall to pull herself up to her feet. She never made it that far. Itzel drove her foot down in a powerful heel-strike at Maude’s face. Maude snapped backward, stuporous, from the force of the kick.
“It must be done,” Itzel said. Inna was not sure if she was speaking to Maude, to her, or to herself.
Ya had vanished into the shadows, and Amadia was carefully trying to move closer to Maude and Constance without being detected. The African Daughter had made her way down off the wall and was edging along the fringes of the arena. The city was shaking again, and the very air inside the arena boiled and warped as actuality was challenged.
A shadow tore itself loose and Ya drove a series of shattering flying kicks at Amadia’s face. Amadia countered each one and grabbed Ya’s leg, swinging her into the bone wall of the arena as Ya connected with a clumsy but effective kick to the side of Amadia’s head. Both Daughters fell to the ground.
“You may as well stop,” Ya said, struggling to her feet, “The girl is doing her part…”
“You mean dying, don’t you?” Amadia got up and rubbed her swollen jaw.
“She is sacrificing herself with honor and dignity,” Ya said. “I understand Stapleton being irrational about it, but you, you simply wish to spread more chaos and disorder. You rebel for the sake of rebellion, Oya.” Ya slipped into a Ma Bu stance. “What a poor teacher Raashida was to you, to never teach you of service or honor.”
Amadia took a Xu Bu stance, with her hand extended for a leopard paw strike. “And you, Leng Ya, were always taught to be the good, obedient pupil, to never question authority, to follow it blindly, like a good lapdog, to preserve order and harmony, even when it was the order of a tyrant, and the harmony of slavery. That’s probably why it’s so easy for Alexandria to manipulate your mind and send you off to murder a child for a non-existent ritual!”
“You lie!” Ya almost shouted, her eyes darkening. “You ruin everything, question everything. You are smug in your moral superiority. You’d make an awful soldier and you’d get those under your command killed. You have already demonstrated as much to me! I will enjoy breaking your bones, and leaving you here to die for your ignorance!”
“So much for honor and duty,” Amadia said. “Come at me. Let me introduce you to what my iya taught me.”
The two Daughters launched at each other, screaming in rage. Thoughts of stopping or completing the ritual were lost. The two struck each other again and again, as the city teetered and shook around them; the leopard and the crane, tearing, savagely striking, clawing, leaping, tumbling. Ya and Amadia warred while time and space burned about them.
Lesya knelt beside Constance and stroked her cheek. The girl’s blood ran over the silver of the capstone and began to pool. Constance’s eyes fluttered open. It was so hard to stay awake. “I’m sorry … everyone is fighting,” Constance said to her friend. “I really do understand what she is trying to do. She … she told me in my dream, when he’s been too preoccupied and couldn’t hear what she was whispering to me in my blood. This has to be, it’s the only way to stop him. It had to be me. My blood was the only one that could open the seal…”
“Constance, try to stay awake!” Lesya shook her friend. “I’ll get you some help!” Constance looked down at her lifeblood draining into the tiny scratches covering the silver well cap, then up to her friend. A sudden realization, like a person shocked to wakefulness and realizing they had overslept, came to Constance’s face as the city buckled. A mournful wail began above and sand began to swirl in clouds in the open sky above them. A sandstorm was brewing, a big one.
“Lesya!” Constance struggled to sit up, grabbing her friend with her uncut arm. “I’m so sorry! You have to get out of here, you have to get out of here right now! Run!”
There was a metallic groan behind Lesya. The silver well cover began to slide to one side, the two girls on top of it. There was a whoosh of stale, ancient air as the well at the center of the room opened. On the silver disc, Constance’s blood was pooling, moving counter to the laws of gravity and motion. The blood began to rise into a dark, wet column.
Maude became aware of her surroundings again, shaking off the effects of Itzel’s kick. She was on her back, with Inna and Itzel still standing above her. She was fairly certain she could take one of the Daughters in a fair fight, but not both at once; they’d each had a lifetime of training and experiences to match her own. She became aware of the sounds of Amadia and Ya battling across the arena, and she heard the desert’s scream as it protested Carcosa existing in its womb. Constance? Was she already dead, dying? Terrified? She cleared her mind and let her training take over.
“Stay down,” Inna said to he
r. “Please, this is hard enough as it is.”
Maude thought of trying to convince her, reason with her, but she didn’t have the time. She knew, firsthand, how subtle and powerful Alexandria’s manipulations could be. If not for the Record’s help, she would be Alexandria’s pawn as well. The thoughts came to her now that her head was cleared: the Record, the blood stone. The Mother’s blood, it was the only way.
Maude groaned and closed one of her hands around a handful of the desert sand, bone dust and tiny rubies.
“Do not try to blind us with that,” Itzel said. “I have no desire to hurt you again, Maude.”
“I won’t,” Maude said, rising up a little. “It’s not for you.” She raised her hand to her mouth and stuffed as many of the rubies in as she could, ignoring the desert’s sand and the dust of long dead warriors that came with it. The rubies were cold and hard in her mouth, like the one at Grande Folly had been; then they dissolved, melted and in their place was perfect scarlet pain, endless power infusing her, filling her with infinite voices, a crimson chorus that made one powerful, guiding voice. Her voice, the Mother.
This was far more blood than the tiny bead at Grande Folly that had introduced her to the Record, more blood than her drink from the now-empty flask, hanging about her neck. There was an intelligence within the blood, generations of intelligence, generations of Daughters, stretching back into the dim eons, stretching back to Her, to the one who knew the secrets of the beginning, all of the beginnings; the one who refused to bow, the outcast who defied all the myriad creators in their heavenly tyrannies. The first human to stand on her own.
The Mother’s blood consumed Maude, as Maude had consumed it. She became the Record, she became the Mother. The awareness of what was coming was too horrible to contemplate. The plan made perfect sense, and in the grand scheme it must be done or the future of humanity, of all life everywhere, would be swept away into oblivion. But the tiny single light in the glowing constellation of the Record that was Maude Stapleton could not, would not let it be. The price was too high.
The Queen of Swords Page 39