by JC Kang
“You’re welcome.” With a smug smile, Xu Zhan examined his weapon.
Perhaps thanks were in order, but he didn’t need to know that. Jie harrumphed. “I had everything under control.”
Lip curled, he sheathed his blade. “Instead of risking yourself, you should’ve let soldiers take care of them.”
“I did take care of one, and wounded the other enough to make him easy to apprehend. Not kill.”
Xu Zhan cocked his head. “Was that you? I thought the other one got hit by friendly fire.”
Right, the Moquan and their weapons were secrets that not even the imperial guard knew of. For all he knew, she was just some kind of investigator. It had to stay that way, even at the cost of a bruised ego. She bent over the corpse, technically not face-down given his decapitation, and retrieved the biao with a deft swipe. “Since this one won’t talk, I’ll see if the other one is beyond interrogation.”
Ignoring Xu Zhan’s smug face, she hurried over to the one she’d hit. Blond—blond?—locks of hair spilled out from his hooded mask. He lay on his side, chest heaving with labored breaths. Two of her biao had dug deep, likely puncturing both lungs. He wouldn’t be answering any questions either.
She retrieved her throwing stars and went over to help survivors. They were all bronze-skinned Ayuri, likely Ankirans since this was their domicile. No, definitely Ankiran. The husband and wife she’d seen disembarking from the Wild Orchid that morning lay among the dozens of dead and mortally wounded. Jie’s gut twisted. The cold-blooded murderers hadn’t even spared women or children. And why? Nothing like this had ever happened in Huajing.
She followed the sound of whimpering and the stench of voided bowels. Three boys, maybe ten to twelve years of age, huddled under a table, tears in their eyes. At first glance, they appeared to be the only survivors. They must’ve had enough sense to hide just as the massacre began.
Poor boys, to have witnessed something so horrible. Still, they might have valuable information. She knelt down and pointed over at Ma Jun, still magically disguised as the princess. Using her halting Ayuri, she asked, “Was she here earlier?”
One of the boys nodded. “But she wore a different dress.”
An observant one…perhaps worthy of training. “How long ago?”
He looked up at Caiyue, now waxing past its fourth crescent. “Maybe an hour?”
The trail would be getting colder. “Was she with someone?”
His voice trembled. “The noble.”
“Where did they go?”
The boy pointed south, back in the direction she’d come.
“Look at this.” Ma Jun held up the murderer’s straight broadsword. “I’ve never seen a weapon like this.”
Jie had. It was Moquan. Just like the throwing star she’d retrieved. And the men wore close-fitting but mobile utility suits. If the clan were helping enemies of the Tianzi… Certainly, Master Yan would have said something.
She swiped it from his hands before he could share the evidence with others. “You’ll ruin the disguise.”
Something was afoot, but now wasn’t the time to think it through. The watch needed to be called, and a princess needed to be found.
A keening wail filled the night. The dreadful sound sent a spear of ice down Jie’s spine.
CHAPTER 21
Foreboding Melodies
Whether the low buzz was in her head, echoed in the Dragon Scale Lute’s strings, or emanated from the Temple of Heaven, Kaiya couldn’t tell. Her spatial relations and sense of direction must have sunk to the bottom of Sun-Moon Lake. They couldn’t have possibly reached the Temple of Heaven, in Huajing’s south.
Maybe she and Kai-Long had ridden the palanquin farther than she thought; or she and Hardeep had just run a lot faster and longer than her drunken, jarred brain could register. She shook her head in hopes a clear thought would surface. No such luck, and no point in sounding like a fool.
Still, an inner voice that sounded suspiciously like her brother’s soon-to-be bride reminded her: entry into the sacred grounds without a blessing was far worse than wandering the palace without permission or gallivanting through the city. It invited a death sentence. Maybe even for her.
She edged back a step and studied Prince Hardeep.
Staring at the Temple of Heaven’s eight-tiered stupa tower, his head bobbed in a rhythmic beat, as if listening to a song in his head.
He was brave. Her heart swelled in her chest. The chance to save an embattled nation and revive a lost art was worth risking death. With one hand on Tian’s pebble, she pointed at the walls. “How do we get past the guards?”
Prince Hardeep flashed a conspiratorial smile. “We’ll climb over the walls.”
She covered her mouth. He’d probably never worn a dress. Not to mention, “Patrols walk around the perimeter at regular intervals. It will be impossible to get over the walls without being seen.”
His eyes strayed to the lute, still in her hands.
How could he even suggest it? Using it on thugs was one thing, but on loyal soldiers… Shaking her head, she thrust the instrument into its bag and offered it to him.
A hint of a frown formed on his lips. “All right, I have an idea.”
“What?”
“Trust me.” He grinned. “Everything has worked so far.”
Getting ambushed twice didn’t seem to be part of any successful endeavor. Still, they had gotten out of it with little more than a cut on her thumb. Not to mention they had escaped the palace, itself a difficult proposition. “All right.”
With his always-charming smile, he squeezed her hand and crept toward the Temple of Heaven’s walls. As she had told him, guards in ceremonial breastplates and armed with broadswords circled the perimeter, always within line of sight of each other.
Again, he mumbled under his breath in sounds so foul, it could only be a curse. Not like she hadn’t warned him. Serendipitously, both guards stopped in place and turned away from them. Had they heard something?
Hardeep tugged her forward to the wall. At the base, he cupped his hands together. “Your foot,” he mouthed.
Kaiya stared at his hands, forming a makeshift stirrup. How unladylike. An unexpected grin tugged at her lips. It was like being a child with Tian again, far more fun than having tea with a dumpy general who only wanted her for a trophy.
She stepped into his hands, and he lifted her up, all the way to his shoulders. At that height, her hands just barely reached the top. Head spinning, she hopped and pushed her weight up to the top. Skirts and propriety be damned, she swung a leg over.
Below, the stone wall circled in an ellipse, with the stupa sitting on a three-tiered white marble base at one focus. An identical base stood at the other focus, with walls partially formed by dragon bones. Brittle leaves scattered across the empty grounds, unswept since Father’s visit during the last Spring Festival.
“Your hand!” Hardeep hissed from the outside.
Right, Hardeep. Shaking her foggy head, she leaned back and extended a hand.
Hardeep backed up, and then bolted into a quick run and jump. He caught her hand, his weight nearly dragging her back down to the ground. Luckily, his other hand slapped up on top of the wall. Leaning back, she pulled him to the top. The yanking burned her arm and shoulder muscles. Heavens, he was heavier than he appeared. Down below, the guard was just then looking forward again.
Safe! Hopefully, their run of luck tonight would continue. She swung her other leg over and shimmied down to the marble ground. Hardeep leaped down after her, landing with nary a sound.
“Now what?” She scanned the compound, which she’d never seen from the inside. In just a few days, on the New Year, Father would come here for his annual prayers to the gods. How beautiful his voice always sounded, audible from almost anywhere in the city.
Hardeep pressed up against the wall. “Any guards? Priests?”
“No, the temple remains empty until just a day or so before the New Year, when priests from the Jiang
uo Shrine sweep it and prepare for the emperor’s visit.”
“Well, then.” Walking toward the marble base at the near focus, he unshouldered the silk brocade bag and opened it. “According to your archives, this is where Aralas revealed himself to Yanyan.”
Kaiya nodded, but, in retrospect, coming here just because of a chance meeting a thousand years before didn’t make as much sense now as it had earlier in the day. So the elf angel had met the mother of Dragon Songs here. It wasn’t as if he’d taught her here…unless he had? “Now what?”
Up a few steps, they arrived at the top of the base’s three tiers. Hardeep stepped in the direct center and closed his eyes. “Our legends say Aralas met his Ayuri lover Shivani on Shakti’s Hill in what is now Palimur City. It was there that martial magic flared in her.” He offered the lute.
Kaiya received it in two hands. “Our magic calligraphers, painters, and other artisans do not have to visit holy sites to gain their power. It just takes dedicated practice over many years.”
“I see.” He scanned the surroundings, his gaze pausing briefly at the top of the stupa. “There is something special about this place. Perhaps if you played, we might discover something?”
She shrugged. They had nothing to lose, except maybe some sleep from the haunting melody of the lute.
He scooted off the center spot and gestured to it with an open hand. “A beautiful performer like you will need a stage.”
Beaming at his compliment, she stepped onto it. The ever-present hum echoed louder in her ears.
“Don’t let any other sound distract you,” he said. “Concentrate only on the lute. Maybe try that posture from before.”
She lowered herself into a horse stance and gripped the marble with her toes, then looked up at him expectantly. “I don’t know the sounds this instrument makes.”
“You are so talented, I’m sure you will figure it out quickly.” He tapped his chin with a finger, again invoking the image of her childhood friend, Tian. So cute. And reassuring. “Now, where in this compound does the emperor go to say his annual prayers?”
With an open hand, Kaiya gestured toward the stupa.
“I am going to take a look. From the shape of the ellipse, I would wager the sound is strongest there.”
Inside the stupa was sacred territory, where the fallen star was kept. Only a select few were ever allowed to visit. If a foreigner entered, no telling what would happen. Perhaps another Hellstorm. She shook her head. “You mustn’t.”
He searched her eyes. His gaze was mesmerizing in the way it seemed to explore her soul.
But no, they had done too many things she shouldn’t have today, culminating in the chance at a death sentence, and this would be a monumental mistake. The consequences would be borne not by her, but perhaps the entire nation. She broke eye contact and stared at the ground.
“Very well,” he said. “I do want to get closer and admire the architecture. I promise I won’t enter.” His smile was reassuring. Of course he wouldn’t do something against her wishes; he had yielded to her will time and time again.
Or would he? They’d already committed capital crimes. As he walked across the compound, she tentatively tried a string while pressing a fret. Though she kept the pluck light, its eerie moan came out loud. Even Hardeep turned his head, his irises reflecting the blue Eye of Guanyin in the heavens above.
Several more plucks reverberated louder than they should, given the amount of force she used. The descending heptatonic scales all made logical sense, and even if each note seemed to evoke the feeling of an emperor’s betrayal, a queen’s execution, or the outbreak of a plague, the sound was tonally perfect and frighteningly beautiful. No wonder that in the hands of an elf, it could compel a dragon to flee.
She experimented with chords and descending scales. Confident she could play, she increased the force of her plucks and strums, improvising an Arkothi marching song she’d once heard. The vibrations fluttered and twirled in her core, spreading through her arms and legs.
Outside the walls, dogs howled and birds cawed. She picked up the tempo, weaving bass and treble notes into a web of harmony. Her entire body tingled, her insides wriggling like the Guardian Dragon of Hua chasing after his Flaming Pearl. The power from earlier in the day, which had felt like an ocean dripping from a hole in a wall when she played Yanyan’s pipa, now trickled through her.
If Yanyan’s pipa made her beautiful, the Dragon Scale Lute transformed her into the embodiment of might and power. What would Hardeep think? She looked up.
He stood, pressing his back against the doors to the stupa, his expression one of awe…or perhaps, like her, exultation? They were here, together. He’d brought her and the lute. Without him, this feeling wouldn’t now be resonating in her chest, urging her to sing.
Behind her, the gates to the temple grounds rattled. From her music? Or maybe someone trying to get in? She started to turn her head.
Don’t look back! Hardeep mouthed, or maybe spoke. No matter how, his message rang clear. The power is within you! Sing!
Yes, sing! No, someone was there, ready to expose this latest, worst transgression. Some of her fingers sped up while others slowed. The lute’s song wobbled into a staccato, along with the vibrations inside her. Her heart thumped at irregular beats. The crushing pain felt as if a phoenix from the imperial aviary sat on her chest.
Everything blurred, bleeding into greys and blacks until darkness and silence overtook her senses.
CHAPTER 22
Aftermath
Metal tinkled and chimed as Kaiya’s head bobbled on a cold, hard floor. Her body lurched. Something dug into the back of her head, over and over again. Her hairpins.
“Dian-xia,” a female voice called. “Wake up.”
A jolt of pain flared in the divot under Kaiya’s nose. Her eyes fluttered open. Above her, the star-studded night sky came into focus as she blinked.
Luminous blue eyes encroached into her field of vision. Hardeep…no, a woman. Barely-visible lines of wisdom framed a familiar, matronly face. Pulled up into a tight, austere coil, her long silver hair seemed to have a faint bluish tinge to it, perhaps reflected from her eyes.
Those eyes. Pale blue like the moon Guanyin’s Eye itself, unique in a Hua woman. Their depth and serenity evoked a soothing calm rivaling Sun-Moon Lake on the clearest of days. Kaiya loved those eyes as she adored the Daoist master to whom they belonged.
Struggling to sit up, Kaiya coughed a few times before finding words. “Doctor Wu. What are you doing here?”
“An awe-inspiring song pulsated through the city, coming from the Temple of Heaven,” said the ancient woman— nobody knew her actual age, though some speculated her longevity rivaled that of a dwarf or even an elf. As a master of an art that sought the secret to immortality, she didn’t look particularly old. That, despite the fact she eschewed the pearl creams and other make-up that most Hua women used as the passing years magnified the effect of gravity. “The question is what are you doing here?”
What was she doing here? Playing enchanted musical instruments in the middle of a forbidden area, with a foreign prince.
Foreign prince!
Hardeep must’ve been nearby. Kaiya scanned the surroundings. They were outside the gates of the temple compound. There was no sign of him or the Dragon Scale Lute, only a man whose blue-and-gold robes marked him as the Jianguo Shrine’s high priest. He craned over her while several other priests huddled beyond, whispering among themselves as their judgmental stares fell on her. How mortifying.
One of the priests ran past, probably headed for the palace to report to Father. Once he learned about her sneaking out and entering the Temple of Heaven, on top of disobeying his initial order to send Prince Hardeep away…
She looked around again. “Where is Prince Hardeep?”
“Who?” Doctor Wu raised a perfectly sculpted eyebrow. She turned to the growing crowd of murmuring men. “Who is Prince Hardeep?”
The most charming and handso
me man she’d ever seen. The only one who ever truly knew her. “A foreign supplicant to the Tianzi.”
“Where is he now?” General Zheng, Commander of the Imperial Guard, shouldered his way to the front, several imperial guards in tow. The other men bowed and made way. He beckoned the hall steward and her guards. “Was he alone with the princess? Here?”
Kaiya’s stomach churned. When the truth came out, Prince Hardeep would lose his head, foreign dignitary or not.
The priests all exchanged glances. Apparently, Hardeep had escaped without anyone seeing him. Which meant she had fainted, and he had just left her there.
To get help. He must have risked his life to get help. And he was safe.
General Zheng turned back to the priests. “Where is Prince Hardeep now?”
The men all looked among themselves, shrugging.
“I…I am not sure.” The high priest squinted and blinked like a child testing new spectacles.
The general pointed to three imperial guards. “Go find the foreigner.”
Kaiya twirled a loose lock of her hair. Maybe Prince Hardeep had just abandoned her to save his own skin. And like some silly daydream, she’d believed music made her beautiful in his eyes. How gullible she’d been. Breaking rules, acting like a love-struck fool. And now, possibly getting servants and Cousin Kai-Long executed. Her, too. Cold seeped into her hands, and her vision faded at the edges.
“Steady, Dian-xia.” Doctor Wu placed one hand on Kaiya’s back, the other on her wrist, feeling her pulse. Her eyebrows clashed together like charging goats. “Show me your tongue.”
Kaiya glanced up at a different kind of audience than she was accustomed to. How embarrassing. Heat flared in her cheeks.
Doctor Wu swept an imperious gaze over the assembled men. “Turn around.”
Like a temple’s revolving storm door shutters, the men spun and snapped into place. Jaw tight, General Zheng nodded and turned around as well.