Jade Man's Skin

by Daniel Fox

  And not go directly back to the temple and her daughters, no; but walk through the forest and bless all the gods for a peasant childhood, before her man Tojo found her and took her to Santung. She knew at least some of the leaves that could be eaten, some of the roots and mushrooms. She had found a whole grove of bamboo, where fresh shoots could be cut almost daily. They got by, her and her daughters.

  Still, nothing stopped her worrying. She worried most about the hospitality of the goddess: sure the old fisherman had not meant for them to stay and stay. Every day, she thought she should speak to the women on the road, see if she could beg a roof in exchange for work. Shola could work too, carry water and scrub floors; even Jin could be induced to simple chores. The temple could not have been so clean for a generation.

  Today, perhaps, she would find the courage to ask. Why was it so hard to ask for shelter, where it was so easy to ask for food?

  Because food is a meal, her own sour voice replied to her, where shelter is a commitment. Giving out is easy; taking in is hard. Trusting is hard. Promising another meal tomorrow, that’s hard too, when you might need it for yourself.

  Even so. It had to be done, she had to ask.

  Maybe today, this time.

  Here came a woman on her own, a rare sight on the road. Now would be the time. If the woman wasn’t too scared by the sudden eruption of a lean and desperate figure from the trees’ shadow, begging, clutching at her …

  Not to beg, then, not to clutch.

  Ma Lin had washed her dress last night, and bound up her hair in a cloth this morning. She looked as respectable as a woman could, who had only this to wear and only cold water to wash in.

  She walked out of the forest as she might have walked from one stall to another in a street market at home, when she had a home, when there were markets in the street and a little money, time to spend and things to buy. Almost idly, more interested than purposeful, and not quite directly toward the woman as she came: just heading for that point where the two of them must meet if they both only kept going at the same pace.

  The woman might have faltered, but only briefly. Ma Lin was deliberately not staring, barely looking at all, only from the corner of her eye. Also she was trying to look harmless but healthy, fit to work but not intimidating, which was a difficult trick to bring off.

  They did arrive more or less at the same place, more or less at the same time. In fact the woman on the road was first and might have scuttled on if she were nervous, but chose not to, chose to wait.

  And then was first to speak, made Ma Lin nervous; said, “I have been looking for you.”

  Ma Lin might have run then. If it had been a man, certainly she would: hopelessly, pointlessly, but still she would have run. Like a desperate bird, away from the nest: down the road, perhaps, or across the road and over the ditch and into the abandoned paddy.

  But this was a woman in her middle years, and they were neither of them built for wild chases. Ma Lin stood very still and said, “You do not know me.”

  The woman didn’t blink. “I think you are the priestess at the temple.” And then, in the face of Ma Lin’s stupefied silence, “Did you think we don’t talk to each other, hereabouts? Or listen to our husbands either? A woman alone, always seen on this road, asking for alms … This is our country, we know who comes and goes. And why. We do not trouble you at the Lady Li’s house, we who left it neglected for so long; but you have come there with your children—we know!—and we are glad. Here, I brought you this.”

  This was a basket of woven bamboo, heavy with fresh noodles, in a sacking bag that held a pair of cabbages and garlic too. Ma Lin said nothing. But she took the bag.

  The woman said, “Come here in the mornings and there will always be one of us who comes to you with something. For you, and for the Lady.”

  She meant a gift to you is a gift to the Li-goddess, which was an appalling suggestion, but Ma Lin’s tongue cleaved to the roof of her mouth; all she had was a vision of her hungry daughters, and a way to see them satisfied. If that meant an equal balance with terror, what an outraged goddess might choose to do—well, let it fall on her and her alone. She could pray for that, at least.

  She could not speak but she nodded, and turned and walked away into the trees.

  NO FORAGING today. She had food, unexpectedly; more, she had security, a promise she could believe in.

  If there was a price to pay, she could confront that. When she must.

  She wanted to be with her daughters.

  Straight through the forest, then, with not a thought to confusing her trail. The women knew where she was. It was odd, perhaps, but that made her feel more protected than exposed.

  Her shame was great, but she was trapped now, seized by generosity. She could see her daughters fed, and all she had to do was play the priestess. How could she walk away, how could she walk her daughters away from what they most needed?

  The goddess would … simply have to endure it.

  Ma Lin wanted to be with her daughters.

  Urgently.

  THROUGH THE forest and on, her thoughts as broken as the ground she scrambled over, her anxieties shifting like the thin stony soil beneath her feet, every step exposing another, deeper worry.

  And so over the last rise and here was the headland, with the creek below and the strait beyond; and here was the temple, with its feet settled into a hollow and its roof standing proud and clear, the paintwork blistered and faded but the dragons at the sweeping upturned gables still glowering protectively over the building, while those on the ridge stared out to sea.

  They had the best view, but the temple steps offered a good second best, and there she found her daughters, neither one of them empty-handed. Shola was talking cheerfully as usual as she washed seaweed in a bowl before laying it out to dry on a stone in the sun, and as usual she might as well have been talking to herself. Perhaps she was: she was a sensible girl, and had likely long since given up on any hope of an answer.

  Jin was washing too. Perhaps she liked to ape her younger sister. She had another bowl of water, and a line of idols taken from the temple and set orderly along the topmost step. One by one, she was meticulously bathing them, as though she were a little, little girl and playing dolls.

  seven

  Mei Feng was laughing at him.

  She kept her face as still as a painted silent statue and not a muscle in her body was moving except that her eyes went from one to another politely as they spoke; and yet, he knew, inside she was laughing. Hugging her sides, rolling on the floor, breathless with the pain of so much pleasure.

  The emperor was amused, perhaps, but fascinated more. He watched them as eagerly as he might have watched the sparring of a pair of fighting crickets.

  A pair of fighting crickets with Yu Shan between them, slashed and slashed.

  He had not thought, ever, to find himself here and like this.

  These were the high hills of his home, and still he had not thought. Settled on the margins of clan territory with no thought of mining now, with other things entirely on his mind—and with someone else entirely in his bed—he had not once stopped to think about his clan-cousin, except as a regret left far behind.

  Even when the young of other clans started to filter into the valley: even then, he had not thought.

  But of course she had come, what did she have to keep her in his absence? A promise broken, a heart as empty as the slopes they tried to mine. Likely she would have come anyway, just for the adventure of it. When she heard that he was here, with the emperor—

  Well. She had come.

  And had found him, but found Jiao first. And it was all very bad indeed, and no amount of jade in his blood could save him from their barbed tongues as he sat between the two of them, as they slashed and slashed.

  Deferentially, because their chief audience was after all the emperor.

  Deferential fighting crickets, yes.

  Even their silences were vicious, and apparently entertaining.
Mei Feng’s eyes were dancing with delight, stepping lightly.

  Yu Shan himself hadn’t spoken for a while. What could he say? Everything was true, and impossible, and appalling.

  At last he stirred, he shifted, he stood.

  Mei Feng arched an eyebrow, just the one.

  Height gave him air, a little, enough to breathe; enough to speak, a little.

  He said, “Majesty …”

  And faltered, under the combined weight of so much cynical amusement. Even the women in question, he thought, even Jiao and Siew Ren were enjoying this, beneath their steel edges.

  He took another breath, and tried again.

  “Majesty, you wanted Guangli the jade carver fetched here from Taishu-port. Someone should go to fetch him. With your permission …?”

  “Not you,” the emperor said briskly, immediately. “We want him, yes—but we want you too. You know these mountains; we want you all the more. We want you to show them to us.” Whether we meant the throne or Mei Feng and I, it was impossible to tell. In any case, it was a distinction without a difference. The two were inseparable, by imperial decree. Perhaps the three of them were inseparable now; certainly the emperor showed no signs of letting Yu Shan go.

  Instead he said, “Jiao shall fetch the jade carver. She knows the man, and can protect him on the road. And help him with his tools, and—”

  “I am no man’s donkey!” Jiao burst out.

  Interrupting the emperor: who scowled and said, “You are my donkey, if I choose.”

  Jiao’s eyes rolled in her head, but her tongue was not so loose; she said, “Of course, majesty—but not Guangli’s, not now. Please. I want—”

  It was the emperor’s turn to interrupt her, seemingly. “What I want,” he said testily, “I want my jade carver fetched here, whether he wants to come or no; and I want to see the mines where the stone is dug. And I want you, Yu Shan, to show them to me, because you know them well; you can show me your own family’s mine, yes. And your cousin Siew Ren is the same clan, she knows that valley too, she can come with us,” and he glowered deliberately at Jiao as he said that, daring her to protest again, “while you, Jiao, go to Taishu-port and bring your friend Guangli.”

  It all made perfect sense, and it pleased none of them except perhaps Siew Ren, who produced an acid smile and, “Thank you, majesty. I will be happy to show you my home. And to remind Yu Shan of where he comes from.”

  “What he left behind,” Jiao observed.

  “In order to bring a great gift to the emperor. Which you tried to steal. But now the emperor has come to us, and has taken Yu Shan into his service, his personal service, and …”

  And Siew Ren sounded so smug, Yu Shan was flinching already, even before Jiao said, “Indeed. If the emperor wants him, of course the emperor must have him. And if Yu Shan wants to be taken into the emperor’s most intimate service, to join the ranks of those few, too few that his majesty was able to bring with him, then he knows just what needs to be done, and I will be happy to oblige …”

  Her hand caressed the tao at her side, though even she didn’t quite dare to draw a blade in the imperial presence; her eyes lingered purposefully, affectionately on Yu Shan’s groin.

  And there was a smothered choking sound, which was Mei Feng desperately trying not to howl with laughter; and the emperor had his good cheer back, apparently. “Even you, Jiao, might find yourself too slow and your blade not sharp enough to, ah, geld Yu Shan against his will. Or mine.”

  She snorted. “I was fast enough to catch him in the forest, majesty. And he was wise enough to stand very quiet, against my blade.”

  “Yes, but he has grown since then. Learned more. And so have I. It would be interesting—but no. Thank you, Jiao, don’t trouble yourself.”

  “No trouble, majesty; it would be a pleasure. And it might stop people fussing back at the palace, that you weren’t properly served out here …?”

  The emperor’s lips twitched into a smile. People meant his mother, largely, as he knew. She was one of the reasons why he kept refusing to go back. The ubiquitous eunuchs were perhaps another.

  He said, “Nevertheless, we will retain Yu Shan as he is, I think, intact. And we will see you again when you have fetched Guangli and settled him in.”

  Thin-lipped and distrustful, she said, “Of course, majesty,” though it was Yu Shan she was looking at, him she was absolutely not speaking to. She didn’t so much as glance again at Siew Ren.

  And then she was gone, suddenly and unacceptably: she who had been his shadow and his shelter for all these many weeks, the sharp heart of this new life he was building, steel to his stone.

  Gone, and he wanted to go running after her, and could not: because there was his emperor who had forbidden it, and Mei Feng who would laugh aloud at last if he dared to do it anyway. And …

  Gone, and here instead was his clan-cousin, who had been safely tucked away—he’d thought—in his previous life, to be mourned over and cherished in memory and not considered here. Not ever to be imagined in the same place as the emperor, under his interested eye.

  Let alone Jiao’s.

  But Jiao was gone and Siew Ren was indeed here, small and dark and still a delight to him, despite Jiao and despite her own glowering temper. Still a slender reed with so much hidden strength in her; even in that she was the opposite to Jiao, who wore all her strength and experience openly on her skin, in her raking muscles and her scars.

  He couldn’t look at Siew Ren now, seemingly, without thinking of Jiao. It used to be the other way around.

  He found it hard to look at Siew Ren at all, when she had such fierce contempt on her face. He turned to the emperor for help, which would have been unthinkable a month ago, would have appalled the whole court today if they could have seen it; but nobody could be formal here, there was no kowtowing and the emperor’s face was something you might dare to look upon, even something you might look to as one young man might simply look to another when he needed to.

  “If we left now,” the emperor said, “could we be at your home before nightfall?”

  “Of course, majesty.” He was emperor; if he wanted it, it could happen.

  Mei Feng snorted. “What, you can push mountains aside and fold inconvenient distance together, can you? Or does he have to do that himself?”

  “It’s close enough to walk in a few hours; and nobody will prevent us.” Ordinarily, one clan member trying to sneak through other clans’ valleys? That wasn’t simply slow, that was suicidal. But these were not ordinary times; Siew Ren and others had come here untroubled. And besides, he was emperor. Who would trouble him?

  Yu Shan would sooner have had Jiao on his other side, even so. Lacking her, he was still sure he could bring the emperor safely through to his own valley.

  And what then, introduce him to the family? Mother, Father, this is the emperor, he wants to see our mine …?

  Apparently so, yes. The emperor was on his feet and ready to go. Mei Feng gripped his wrist two-handed and hauled herself to her feet against the imperial solidity, grinned at him in celebration of the impertinence then looked at Yu Shan with more of a scowl, as though he could and should have been more discouraging.

  Indeed, she said so, more or less. “We need to arrange things here, choose people to come with us, sort out what we need to take …”

  “Why?” The emperor looked honestly bewildered. “People here will be fine without us, they can do what they normally do, which has little to do with us. We can go with Yu Shan and Siew Ren, we don’t need anyone else; and what do we need to take? A change of clothes, for when we get wet. No more.”

  “Little to do with us? Chien Hua, all those people out there are here to protect you, no reason else. What they normally do is train themselves and one another for that purpose, while they watch the ridges and the forest and the river, while they risk their lives to be sure that assassins aren’t sneaking up on you again. And what, you want to shrug that off and leave them all behind, go wandering of
f into the hills with just a handful of us?”

  The emperor thought about it briefly, and nodded. Emphatically. “Yes, I do. They can carry on training without us; Jiao’s the only one they’ll miss. And we’ll only be gone a night or two. I don’t want to march with an army, Mei Feng. I want to walk with my friends.”

  He was acquiring a taste for freedom, Yu Shan thought. The farther he came from the court, the fewer restrictions there were on him—and the fewer people there were around him, the more he wanted to cut loose altogether.

  Probably, they should not let him; but probably they could not prevent him.

  There was a compromise, of course, and Mei Feng found it. Not an army, but he consented to half a dozen guards, a mix of imperial soldiers and clansfolk. And with that many backs to carry, of course, they could take more than a simple change of clothes …

  By the time the expedition was organized to her satisfaction, it was almost too late to set out—which might have been her plan, but if so it was frustrated by the emperor’s impatience and the abilities of jade.

  “Night comes early in the mountains,” Mei Feng urged.

  “Yu Shan and I can see as well in the dark as we can in daylight. All these mountain people have cats’ eyes.”

  “I don’t.”

  “You,” the emperor murmured, “have been sharing my bed, lying skin on skin with me; and holding my hand when I am wearing my rings; and rubbing up against jade a hundred ways, a hundred times a day. I think I could leave you in a cave in the middle of the mountains, the middle of the night, and you would see well enough to read, if you could read. You find your way around our hut without a lamp, without a hesitation.”

  She shook her head. “There are so many gaps in the walls, the moonlight floods in, that’s all.”

  “Stupid,” he said, slipping a tender arm around her. “New moon, barely a sliver yet, and it’s been all cloud the last three nights. Your eyes are changing. Everyone’s changing, just from being here and mixing with the clans. You most of all, though. Being here and mixing with me …”