The Jade Spindle

by Alice Major

  Joss stifled a giggle at the look of alarm on the boy’s face as he watched his master’s retreating back. “Oh, don’t worry. We’ll stay put for you,” she said. “Although food would be nice.”

  “He didn’t seem very glad to see you,” said Alasdair, who was also watching the potter as he left.

  Chuan shrugged. “I didn’t expect him to. He has a position to keep up. And he has no sons, so he must take apprentices. Daughters are only a cost—a dowry to find when they marry.”

  They settled down for another lengthy wait under the fruit trees. The boy moved in and out of the house, preparing food. He moved warily and raised his fingers in the sign for protection whenever he caught one of the foreigners looking at him.

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake, I won’t bite,” said Joss at one point. The apprentice looked more alarmed than ever and scuttled off.

  The light node faded its gold light to paler silver. For a while, they stood under the awning of the shop, watching the street fill up with people as they returned from the market, carting back unsold pots and baskets. Then the streets emptied as the supper hour came and went. Finally, a small cavalcade appeared at the corner of the lane, with Chuan’s father hurrying on ahead.

  Someone of great importance was being carried in a square-framed chair hoisted on the shoulders of six bearers. Joss and the others withdrew into the courtyard again to wait while the Count of Religious Affairs was assisted out of the chair and ushered respectfully through the shop.

  “Looks like he’s been sucking lemons,” Joss murmured to her brother.

  The Count had a small mouth, pursed like a small leather bag drawn tight by a drawstring. He had a sparse beard that grew down his cheeks, and his clothes were a stiff, dull black. He dusted his sleeve carefully and looked around the courtyard with distaste until he saw the group clustered by the shed.

  “Come here,” he ordered in a shrill voice.

  Chuan stepped forward reluctantly. Joss and the others followed after a moment’s hesitation.

  “Not so close! Not so close!” The Count shrank back slightly and flapped a handkerchief at them. “You.” He motioned at Chuan who stepped forward again.

  “You had no right to come back. An act of great disobedience, great disrespect, great shame for your family.” Behind them, Chuan’s father shifted uncomfortably and sighed.

  “You.” The Count gestured towards Joss this time. She put her shoulders back and stepped forward with an air of defiance. The Count took her chin in his hand, using the handkerchief to protect his fingers as if he were afraid of catching some rare disease. Then, as the potter had done, he studied her face carefully, squinting into her blue eyes.

  “Not the White Ti,” he said. “But a barbarian, certainly. Where are you from?”

  “We are not barbarians,” she flashed back.

  The Count grunted in disbelief. “Why are you here?”

  It was Chuan who answered. “The Lady left the garden. They arrived. There is something going wrong.”

  The Count ignored her and asked Joss another question. “Are there many like you?”

  “Yes. Thousands and thousands and thousands. Millions.”

  This gave him pause. He dusted his fingers again, doubtfully. “So many?”

  “Yes,” said Alasdair and Ariel in unison. He looked at them crossly.

  “I should turn you over to the Director of Criminals.”

  “You’ll be sorry,” Joss said sourly.

  “We need help to restore the Lady. And get ourselves away. Before anyone comes after us,” Alasdair said cunningly. “We need someone with great knowledge. Surely you are the right person to come to.”

  Joss looked faintly disgusted by this flattery. The Count paced a little way along the courtyard, as if uncertain.

  “Thousands,” he said to himself. “Perhaps the king should know. He would prefer to know.” His voice grew louder and more self-important again. “I will be attending the palace tomorrow. I am frequently in the palace. I will consult the king. Personally.”

  He turned to Chuan’s father. “Keep them here until I send for them.” The potter bowed low in response.

  The Count got stiffly back into the chair, like a paper doll afraid it would crease if it bent too much in the middle. The bearers picked up the chair again and carried him off. Chuan’s father sat down heavily on a bench.

  “The king,” he said, looking sadly at his daughter. “I hope you have not ruined me.”

  The next pulse glowed and faded without any summons from the Count. Finally, while they were eating the first meal of the following pulse again, a messenger came panting down the Street of the Potters.

  “You are to bring them to the palace now,” he told Chuan’s father.

  “As if we were a load of pots,” Joss muttered in Alasdair’s ear.

  “All of them?” asked Guang-shi. “Even my daughter?”

  “All of them.”

  They crammed the rest of the meal into their mouths and started off. Where the streets of the artisans’ quarter had been almost empty when they arrived, now they were crowded and busy. Every workshop was occupied and sounds rang out from each—tapping hammers, clacking shuttles, hissing fires. Chuan’s father led the way, walking quickly. People would call out to him as he passed, then falter and fall silent when they saw the strangers following in his wake. He would acknowledge the greetings with no more than a brief gesture as he hurried on.

  At last, they left the artisans’ quarter behind, crossing a wide avenue into another section of the capital. Here, high walls enclosed large courtyards lined with low buildings. Joss tried to peep through the gateways as they passed and caught occasional glimpses—a man reading a scroll at a desk square in the middle of a courtyard; another man in long green robes walking slowly with a bundle of scrolls in his arms.

  “The scribes and administrators work in this district,” Chuan murmured to Joss, who nodded briefly and breathlessly in reply.

  Finally, another, still-higher wall loomed up in front of them. In the centre was a gate, capped by a pointed red roof that swept up at the eaves. This was clearly one of the taller buildings at the centre of the city they had seen when they first looked down on it. They came to a halt while Chuan’s father spoke briefly to a guard, who nodded and waved them through.

  They found themselves in yet another courtyard, but larger and with higher walls than any they had seen so far. The walls were lined with low stone buildings. The door of the nearest one stood open, revealing a line of large round pots the size of barrels. The centre of the square was simply beaten earth, and dozens of people were scattered in little groups haggling among themselves. At a line of tables, four people who seemed to be officials were sitting with ink bottles, brushes and scrolls of heavy canvas.

  “. . . the best oil . . .” Alasdair heard someone in the nearest group sputter. “It comes from . . .”

  He didn’t hear from where. Another man in the same group caught sight of the foreigners and tugged at the speaker’s arm to point them out. The entire group turned to stare, mouths open.

  Joss ignored them, turning around as if unimpressed. “Doesn’t look much like a palace to me,” she said in a clear voice. “Where’s the king?”

  “This is only the Court of the Storerooms,” Chuan replied. “I expect we will be taken through the Gate of the Pheasant. Over there.”

  She pointed across the courtyard to a second gate, directly opposite the one they had come in. It was shut with a tall, ornate door. At first, Joss thought it was made of wrought iron, but when she looked again she realized it was made from something like bamboo. Only it was so dark as to seem black. The wrist-thick stalks were curved and cleverly lashed together in the shape of a bird with a long, trailing tail. Through the open spaces of the design, they could see another courtyard.

  Chuan’s father left them
standing in a group and went to talk to a second guard standing near the pheasant gate. There was a long conversation between them before the guard called through the gate to a third man on the inside. This man disappeared into the far courtyard while they all waited, the target of curious glances and open stares. Chuan’s father remained by the guard, almost as if he didn’t want to be seen with his daughter and her strange companions.

  Time dragged on. Joss and Alasdair wandered around the courtyard looking into the open doors, while Ariel leaned wearily against the wall. Finally, the third guard came back with another man who stared at them through the gate, then ordered the guard to let them through. Inside the second court, the newcomer scanned them quickly, then said grimly, “Wait here.” He strode off again.

  “Wait!” Joss said indignantly. “What does he think we’ve been doing?”

  Eventually, the Pheasant Gate was swung open to admit them to the inner courtyard, was enormous and serene. Ahead of them, in the centre, three buildings stood side by side. Each had a red-painted roof with swept-up eaves like the main gate and a flight of shallow steps leading up to its walls. They weren’t buildings in the usual sense of the word. The walls were simply rows of square columns with folding screens between them.

  “Is that where the king lives?” asked Alasdair.

  “No, his private dwellings are in the Third Courtyard beyond,” answered Chuan. “We would never be allowed in there.”

  “So what are these buildings?”

  “In the centre, the Pavilion of Internal Audiences. On the left, the Temple of the God of the Soil. That’s where they held the ceremony to name P’eng and me daughters of the garden.”

  “And on the right?”

  “The Temple of the Ancestors.” Chuan’s voice was curiously subdued, and she stopped Joss from wandering off on a tour of exploration by grabbing her arm. “No, stay here.”

  “Were you here often?” Alasdair continued to ask questions.

  “Just that one time. This is a place for noble people. Not for us.”

  Joss sniffed democratically and derisively in response.

  The tedious waiting stretched out. Since Chuan was unwilling to talk, Alasdair struck up a conversation with the guard, who was young and seemed rather bored himself. “What are we waiting for?”

  “The king wants to see you for himself.”

  “So why don’t they just take us in to see him?”

  “They’re busy with the ceremony.”

  “What ceremony?”

  “The spring ceremony of music.”

  Alasdair and Joss looked at him blankly. “What’s that,” asked Joss.

  The guard looked at Chuan in amazement. “They are from somewhere else,” she said shortly. “Their ceremonies are different.” The guard looked as though this was beyond his ability to imagine.

  “So what’s the ceremony of music like?” Joss asked.

  Chuan shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. Only the nobles take part. We only know there is one in the spring and one in the autumn, to please the ancestors. The king must carry them out carefully or the ancestors will not be in harmony with the planting and the harvest.”

  “I’ve seen it,” said the guard proudly. “The king shoots off arrows in time to music.”

  Joss was becoming more conscious of hunger than curiosity. “I hope they hurry up shooting then,” she said.

  Finally, the Count of Religious Affairs came bustling down the steps of the centre building, “like a penguin trying to look dignified,” Joss thought.

  “Follow me,” he ordered and led them up the steps into the Pavilion of Internal Audiences.

  To their surprise, the huge area under the roof was empty and the Count kept hurrying straight through the building and out the far side. They followed him across the courtyard to the third gate that led to the innermost area of the palace. Chuan’s face was solemn with awe as the Count commanded yet another guard to open up and let them pass. Just inside the gate, he curtly ordered them to stay in the shelter of a small building and hurried off.

  They now found themselves in the biggest courtyard so far. Against each of the four walls stood one principal building, red-roofed and reached by a flight of shallow steps. Each of these major buildings was flanked by other, smaller ones. The centre of the courtyard was a wide arena tiled in flat stones. This square was filled by a flutter of people in fantastically coloured clothes. Joss was aware in a confused way of long, stiffly embroidered sleeves like sheets of coloured paper.

  Most of the audience was crowded down the left-hand side of the courtyard, watching the centre. Here, a line of perhaps a dozen figures stood with their backs towards Joss and the others. All the figures were dressed in the same tawny brown except for the one on the far right, who wore a robe of leaf-green cloth. Each figure held a light bow in his right hand.

  At the far left of the line, the Count of Religious Affairs appeared in his stiff black robe, like a crow. He raised his arm and held it high until the chattering voices fell silent. A harsh note of music blared out—more a honk than anything else. Joss craned her neck to see where it came from and finally spotted the musician. He was one of five clustered near their end of the court, each of whom held a long, straight instrument that appeared to be little more than a length of bamboo.

  At the sound of that first sonorous blare, the bowmen lifted their bows. At a second note, the archer on the far left fitted an arrow to his bow. The musicians played a pattern of notes on on each of the bamboo horns, and on the last note the archer let fly his arrow into a target at the far end of the court. As he let loose the bowstring, the next archer fitted an arrow to his own bow. Over and over, this was repeated until only the figure in green was left with an unshot arrow. The music changed, the musicians rose to a crescendo of honks and then stopped abruptly. The man in green let his bowstring twang, and in the breathless silence that followed, the thunk of the arrow was easily heard as it found the centre of the target. All the archers raised their arms in a single motion, holding their bows above their heads for a moment, then turned and bowed to the man in green. At that point, a low congratulatory murmur spread through the audience. A few individual voices rose briefly above the hum.

  “Well done, well done ...”

  “Not a single false flight.”

  “ ... Lord of the Soil ... pleased”

  Joss heard the Count’s high voice float clear of the noise for a moment. “... an excellent omen for the rest of the ceremonies.”

  Chattering but sedate, the audience began to break ranks. A number of them began walking slowly through the gate. Few noticed the group standing beside it. Those few who did looked mildly puzzled. One tall, stately woman did happen to catch Ariel’s eye, checked her step and gazed piercingly at her for a moment before her attention was claimed by a smaller woman walking at her side. Gradually the courtyard emptied until only a few knots of people stood talking. The man in green had disappeared into the principal building on the right side of the courtyard, followed formally by a small procession that included a couple of the tawny-robed archers.

  Finally, the Count’s gaze fell on Joss and the others. He touched the sleeve of one of the archers who was standing in his group and the two men made their way across the courtyard. As they got closer, Ariel could see that the second man was the one who had already come to look at them through the first gate.

  He was a tall, squarely built man and his squareness was emphasized by the stiff quilted jacket he wore over his robes. The squareness was re-emphasized in the lines of his face. His cheeks were clean-shaven, but his beard and moustache made a well-defined “T”—the moustache a straight line the exact width of his wide upper lip and the beard a short, vertical brush stroke down the centre of his chin. The corners of his mouth were tucked into self-contained creases. It was a handsome face, but not one that would smile easily, Ariel th
ought. He carried his ceremonial bow lightly, as though he were well accustomed to carrying real weapons.

  He looked them over carefully while the Count repeated the story they had told him before. After the Count finished speaking, there was a brief silence while the tawny lord considered.

  “The Lady disappeared, but you were not concerned. This has happened often before.”

  Chuan nodded. The Count broke in, “Yes quite ordinary. You should not have come away.”

  The other man silenced him with a look, then asked “And at about the same time, your sister saw Yao-chi’s thread unravel and the sky shiver.”

  “She saw it. Yes.”

  The Count piped up again. “If she saw it, she should have been the one to come.”

  Chuan ignored him and addressed herself directly to the other man. “Li-Tsai saw it too.”

  “And after this, these strangers arrived. Some pulses after.”

  “Five pulses.”

  The tawny lord turned his attention to the others. Motioning Joss and Alasdair to stand together, he compared their faces carefully, looking first into Alasdair’s brown eyes and then into Joss’s blue ones. He fingered the metal buttons on Alasdair’s denim jacket.

  “And you say you come from somewhere else, a different world.” He looked at Ariel narrowly.

  She nodded sadly. “I didn’t want to believe it at first, that it was a whole different world. But it is.”

  He asked a few searching questions about how their world was different, and then surveyed them again in silence. Then he said, with the suspicion of a sigh in his voice, “The king will have to see this. Have them wait here until the ceremonies are over.”

  Joss groaned aloud as he turned away. “Wait! Again!” she muttered. “We could starve around here.” Ariel thought she saw the corners of the tawny lord’s mouth quiver.

  “See they get fed,” he flung over his shoulder to the Count before striding away.

  A blast of horns from the building where the man in green had disappeared caught the Count’s attention. He muttered something under his breath and hurried off in the direction of the music, pausing only to grab a servant by the sleeve and give him some rapid orders. The remaining knots of people also began to walk more purposefully to the same building. Finally the enormous square lay entirely deserted.