“And number five,” Madam Choi said. “If a pirate rapes a woman, he will be put to death. If sex is consensual, the man will be beheaded and the woman cast overboard with a weight attached to her legs.” Madam Choi turned her stern glare to Ching. “Finally, women captives are to be released. The most beautiful may be kept for wives and concubines, and the ugliest returned to shore. The rest are to be ransomed. Pirate men must be faithful to their wives. Are we agreed?”
Ching nodded, and rose. “Now, I go to choose my wife.”
%%%
Madam Choi called the pirate captains to meet at the opium den on shore. She arrived dressed in the garb of a supreme pirate chief. On her silk tunic was a tapestry of dragons in azure, purple and red, accented with bits of jade and ivory stitched with braided silver-gold thread. Li had seen this uniform once before, when she accidentally found it among Madam Choi’s things, and she had wondered then why the impoverished sea gypsy had not sold the splendid garment to feed her family. Now she understood: Madam Choi’s entrance was an unmistakable message to the pirates present.
The costume was her late husband’s official uniform, a uniform the pirate widow had dared not wear until she was certain of her leadership. On her head was Choi’s war helmet and in her sash were his swords. Each member of each squadron sliced his finger and vowed to keep to the code, and as the blood spilled from the voluntary wounds, every drop was collected and stoppered in a ceramic jar. The half-filled jar of blood was kept with the code in Madam Choi’s cabin.
Li was put in charge of piloting the ferryboat. She had spent half her life pretending to be a boy—so masquerading as the incompetent skipper of a ferryboat was easy.
The Say Leng was making her return journey tonight. Madam Choi organized a fleet of five hundred to assail her. The pirates knew that the merchant junk had two hundred men aboard her; they were taking no chances. Madam Choi left Number’s Four and Five Daughters to babysit Wu.
“Stay away from Esen,” Li ordered her son as she prepared for the mission. “Do not, under any circumstances, go near him.”
Li donned her garb of ferryboat skipper and took her boat between the shore and the outer islands, and this time there was no green paint and white fuzzy bamboo flowers. No rat’s blood. Zhu joined as her first mate, and the passengers of the ferryboat were made up of five pirates in peasant disguises.
The merchant junk was following the coastline. Li knew they would be on the lookout for pirates; she must move slow and carefully, so as not to risk her crew’s lives.
“What are you doing?” Zhu demanded, when he saw that they were going offcourse. “Where did you learn to handle a ferryboat or any boat at all?” He paused for a breath, realized the folly of her intentions. “From Madam Choi? It’s a wonder that woman hasn’t killed all of us already.”
“If you’re going to hinder me Zhu, go below,” Li said. “Better yet, make yourself useful.”
Zhu slapped a meaty hand on hers, threatening to take the helm. “What’s your plan? If it is what I think it is, it’s a bad plan.”
Li ripped her fingers out from under his and glared at him. “Why did you bother to stay? Why did you promise Madam Choi that you would serve her if you’re only going to get in the way? Now move. I have work to do.”
“I promised Quan that when I found you again, I would keep you safe. I fear I am failing.”
Li was silent.
“He loves you still.”
“Then where is he? Why send you in his place when he could come himself?” She followed his gaze to his right hand. “Where is your gemstone?”
“I left it on the junk for safekeeping.”
“That was probably a good idea. The pirates keep eyeing it. It has great value. And they don’t like you. In the heat of the raid, they would probably slice off your hand and not think twice about it.” She paused as something occurred to her. “But the gemstone’s value isn’t monetary, is it, Zhu? Why do you and Madam Choi keep staring at it? Even Tao mentioned it.”
“It has the power of seeing. But since I joined this pirate’s brigade, it has closed its eye to me. I cannot see what battles Chi Quan is fighting, and what keeps him on the frontier.”
Li glanced to the open sea. The scalp beneath her topknot prickled. She wanted to ask more about the gemstone, but now was not the time. “Stand down, Zhu. And brace yourself.”
Her years of training with Master Yun and the work on the border walls had sharpened her reflexes; she threw the helm to the right and aimed the ferryboat into the reef. She ordered her crew to light lanterns and send the SOS signal just as the ferryboat scuttled in the channel. They hit rock, and water bled into the hull.
“Are you crazy?” Zhu shouted as they started to sink.
Moonlight blinked from behind a cloud, and movement among the lanterns aboard the merchant ship told her the Say Leng’s watchmen had sighted the scuttled ferryboat. The junk rocked against the tide, pressing staunchly toward them. Li sought the dagger in her boot and the sabre at her hip, before squinting beyond the black sea to where the others waited in the island coves.
%%%
Esen woke up to blackness. He heard the sound of female voices: captives, not the girl children of the junk. His throat hurt and his eyes were sticky. What had that little brat done to him? A four-year-old had stabbed him in the throat, incapacitating him instantly, and only because he had been unprepared. He scrutinized his dark prison. Where was he? From the sound of the water sloshing against the hull, he figured he was in the hold of the junk. Had the pirates gone on another raid? The thump of footfalls sounded overhead, and a small shadow appeared at the overhead grate. Someone squatted with a lantern and a child’s face peered down at him. So, the little warrior had come to gloat.
Esen tried to speak, and choked from pain, swallowed, relaxed his throat muscles and crooked a finger, beckoning the boy closer.
“So, you are awake, barbarian,” Wu said.
“I need water,” Esen answered.
“Ma-ma says I am not to go near you.”
“You don’t have to come near me. Just get one of the girls to fetch me a drink.” Wu’s bright black eyes stared at him; then he rose.
When the water arrived, Wu dropped the water-filled bladder between the grate’s iron bars. So much for trying to grab the little guy’s hand and break his arm. For a teacup-sized imp, he was smart. And though he may be smart, he was little more than a baby.
A glint caused by the lantern light caught Esen’s eye, and he saw that the boy was wearing a large gemstone, mounted on a gold band, looped to a thick string around his neck.
“What have you got there little one,” he whispered, and reached out, tried to rise and Wu leaped back. “Give that gemstone to me. It is dangerous in the hands of a small boy.”
Wu refused, covered the gemstone with his fingers and rubbed it back and forth. “It belongs to the warrior monk, He Zhu. You cannot have it!” As he spoke these words, he dropped the Tiger’s Eye as though it burned. Unfortunately for Esen, it didn’t fall far. It still dangled on the piece of string tied around the boy’s neck. But the gemstone stirred. It’s saffron brown colours moved and swirled, and suddenly an image grew out of the stone.
A young warrior in Mongol dress stood outside a felt tent, his falconer-gloved hand raised high. Esen could barely keep his eyes from forcing their way out of their sockets. Hundreds of thousands of horsemen hailed the great falconer before he turned to take the hand of a beautiful, black-haired woman in a snowy gown. Her feral eyes flashed above scarlet lips, and he recognized Jasmine. The warrior who had taken her hand as though he possessed her was none other than Altan.
The size of Wu’s eyes rivalled Esen’s own, so round were they with astonishment. He reached out to touch the vision, and Esen snatched at the gemstone through the grate of the hold, but the boy jerked out of reach. As he did so, the vision vanished.
“Bring it back! Bring back the vision. I must see what my baby brother is up to!”
<
br /> Wu stared at Esen, dumbfounded, still dazed by what had happened.
“He Zhu will be angry with me,” Wu said, clutching the gemstone in his babyish fist. “I must put it back.” He ran as though a ghost was after him, no more than a terrified little boy.
Esen reached up. He must get that stone. Altan planned to usurp him did he? Jasmine had betrayed him, abandoned him. The prophecy was wrong: it was not the son of Lotus Lily that was a danger to him; it was his own brother.
Esen coughed, sputtered, pretended to be dying, and called to the girls above in a rasping, helpless voice. There was a reason he had been allowed to live, a reason why the pirate woman had healed his wound. They wanted him alive and so the girls who were left as his keepers were obligated to come to his aid.
“What do you want?” Number Four Daughter demanded. “We gave you water. Why haven’t you drunk it? I can see the water bladder on the floor by your feet.”
“Help me,” Esen said. “The air in here is unbreathable. I’m bleeding again. I will die.”
Number Four Daughter tipped her lit lantern toward him, causing the yellow flame within to flicker. It was dark in the hold and he covered the wound with his hand to mask the bandage.
“Your mother, the captain of this junk, will be angry if you let me die.”
“I can’t come down there,” she said. “None of us can lift the iron grate.”
Esen rose unsteadily to his feet. He had to make this look good to convince the girl of his feebleness, and shoved a hand against the grate. It was too heavy for one man to lift from this angle and impossible for a child or even three.
“Call one of the captive women,” he said. “I can hear their voices.”
“They are bound hand and foot. They cannot come.”
“Untie them.”
The girl shook her head.
“Then I will die.” For emphasis, Esen sank to a prostrate pose. With the lantern poised under her chin, the girl’s features were distorted, and she looked worried.
The look soon vanished because the girl was almost as ruthless as her mother, even though she was only eight years old. “I guess that can’t be helped.”
She left, abandoning him to his prison. He rose again and peered into the night sky; the stars shivered. He heard the women talking again. They were not far from him. If only he had the full volume of his voice. He tried to shout. His voice came out gruff and painfully raspy. He rattled a silver ring he wore on his finger against the iron grate.
Finally, he heard a thump and a dragging sound. This continued for a few minutes, before a woman’s head appeared over the grate. “Are you a prisoner like us?” she asked.
“Yes.” He kept his face in shadow so that she couldn’t see that he wasn’t Chinese. “I can’t speak loudly because those rogues have sliced my throat.”
“The beasts,” she said. “They’re forcing me to marry one of their captains.”
“You needn’t suffer that fate. If you help me get out of here, I will rescue you all. How many are you?”
“Four women and two children. A girl and a boy.”
Good enough, he thought. The strength of six people and himself should be able to lift this iron grate sufficiently for him to slide it aside. “Are your hands free?”
“No, but the children’s are.”
“Good. Tell them to find something to lever this grate with—a pole, a trident. Anything the pirates have left behind.”
The captive children found a broken halberd and with that, and the help of the other women who managed to drag themselves to the hold and climb to their feet, they adequately pried the grate free so that Esen could use his brute strength and shove it away. He was amazed at what these women could do when spurred. Despite having their hands bound in front of them and their crippled feet shackled at the ankles, collectively they were able to generate sufficient leverage.
Esen leaped up and hoisted himself out of the hold, ignoring the pleas of the women who had rescued him and were now begging for him to untie them. Instead, he threatened them with the sharp, broken end of the halberd, and ordered them to squat on the deck; and then he tore the skirts of two of the women and used the strips of cloth to bind the children’s hands and feet, before he shoved them down into the hold, followed by their protesting mothers. Afterward, he went in search of Wu and the Tiger’s Eye.
%%%
The Say Leng hove to and stayed just outside the reef. A watchman hailed them through a blow horn, and Li responded by requesting their help. All was quiet for a while, then activity started on the merchant junk: lanterns were lit and seamen prepared to toss grappling hooks to the ferryboat. When they saw that it was too badly damaged to be towed, they changed tactics and prepared to lower lifeboats instead.
“How many!” the captain of the Say Leng shouted.
“Thirty passengers,” Li lied. “And five crew!”
She turned to He Zhu raised her dagger to his throat, and his eyes widened in surprise. “If you cannot be loyal to Madam Choi, then I will have to tie you up.” She loosened the sash from her waist to show that she meant every word she said.
He grabbed her wrist and would have shaken the blade from her hand, had she not tripped him onto the floor, her foot swinging out from under him before she stomped it onto his chest.
“You have learned much of fighting since I saw you last,” Zhu gasped.
Li grasped the dagger firmly in her fist, her foot pressing near his throat. “Working on the wall at the frontier was a good teacher. Swear, Zhu, on the life of Chi Quan’s son, that you will not betray Madam Choi.”
He swallowed, his voice cracking. “I swore it once to her. And I swear again to you. I will not betray her.”
She hesitated, removed her foot from his chest and extended her hand. He took it and pulled himself up. Li shot him one last look and went to the rail while Zhu followed, slapping salt and grime from his tunic.
A number of serpent boats were gliding over the waves toward the merchant junk, and the captain of the Say Leng, too busy sending a rescue mission to the scuttled ferryboat, failed to see them.
A soft sloshing sound came from the side of the ferryboat, and Li moved to the rail and looked down. At first she saw nothing, only darkness. Then a man scaled the hull to the top and scanned the deck, a strange, puzzled expression on his face. “Where are all your passengers?”
Before he could blink, Li drew her dagger on him and ordered him aboard. One other rowboat followed, and under knifepoint, she ordered that sailor to board as well. Across the reef, the merchant junk was flooded with pirates armed with tridents and sabres, and Li turned to He Zhu. “Tie up these men.”
“The ferryboat is sinking!” he objected.
Yes, the deck was slowly taking on water. So let it sink. Zhu glowered an accusation. Had she become a murderer as well as a pirate? No. The wild-eyed look of the two captured merchant sailors changed her mind. “All right then,” she said. “They come with us. But bind their hands.”
%%%
Where was the little Chinese brat? He must find that gemstone. It had powers beyond his most ambitious dreams. Even Jasmine did not own a jewel such as this.
Esen crept to the hatch where he could hear the sighs of sleeping children. If any of these pirate spawn gave him trouble he would show no mercy. He looked to the floor where three bundles lay, and the moonlight painted their faces with silver—while the eyes of one glinted. He slapped a hand over the boy’s mouth, and whispered, “If you wake the girls, I will kill them with my bare hands.” He slowly removed his hand from Wu’s lips, which were trembling. “Get out of your bed and come with me.”
Wu left his tatty sleeping furs, and followed out of the hatchway and onto the moonlit deck. Esen quietly shut the hatch, and when he reached the ship’s hold he stopped. The captive women that had rescued him were cowering at the bottom, eyes bright with fear, the grate casting crisscross shadows on their faces—securely trapped. He squatted so that he was at the level
of the little boy. “Give me the gemstone.”
“I don’t have it. I returned it to Lieutenant He Zhu’s mantle where I found it.”
He grabbed Wu’s wrist, and the little boy squeaked. “Show me,” Esen rasped.
The gemstone lay inside a hidden pocket of Lieutenant He Zhu’s mantle, which was folded under a bench inside Madam Choi’s cabin. The golden band on which the stone was set was looped to a strong piece of string. Esen scooped up the gemstone and took it outside. He had almost forgotten about the boy until he saw him, out of the corner of his eye, run to the hatchway where the pirate girls slept. Two flying leaps with his stout legs brought him to the hatch, and he looped the string with the gemstone over his head and hoisted Wu by the collar. “Oh, no you don’t. I still owe you for this!” He jabbed a thumb at his bandaged throat.
Esen tore a strip of cloth from the boy’s ratty shirt and tied his hands together in front of him. From now until they reached the Forbidden City, the brat would be his constant companion.
It was two hours before dawn. They must get off this boat. It was anchored in a cove, not far from shore. How long had he been unconscious, drugged by the pirate witchdoctor? Certainly, they were no longer in the land of the dead bamboo. He shaded his eyes to judge the distance to shore, searched the sky, and then lowered his gaze. The landscape was familiar: a tree-lined escarpment overlooked the shallow beach. He tucked the boy under his arm and dropped down into one of the rafts that were fastened to the junk. He released the rope and poled the raft away.
Negotiating the black sea by sight alone hurt his eyes, and he squeezed back the burning tears, tasting the salt on his lips. The air was raw. Breathing the biting wind cut into his injured throat like a sharp knife, and he swallowed with renewed pain. On the far shore, he recognized the jungle, and somewhere among the trees was the path that led to the lagoon. Could the magic that had occurred there happen again?
The Pirate Empress Page 25