Grantville Gazette 45 gg-45

by Paula Goodlett

  Four men in suits stood beside a metal surgical table where Yao's small form lay prone. Two were the men who had kidnapped him.

  Wires and tubes led from Yao's body into a bank of machinery and from there lines of pure scarlet energy lanced into the beating garnet.

  Bai Wei sucked in a breath. "So that's the answer. They're stealing spirit life-energy to feed that. thing." Her hand squeezed hard into Jin's wrist. "Wait here," she breathed, so low Jin could hardly hear her. "If I can do this alone, then let me."

  Auntie didn't wait for a response. She picked up a stone from the cavern floor and raced forward. With a howl, she launched it. The rock crashed into the machinery. Sparks geysered in a sizzling shower. The men turned away from Yao and found Auntie Bai Wei nearly on them. She fell among them in a dizzying whirl of kicks and punches. Two men slumped to the ground and lay there motionless. The others quickly realized their danger and dropped low, sliding to either side of Bai Wei.

  Jin grasped her lock pick and inched forward. The nearest man had his back to her. Moving soundlessly, she advanced when Bai Wei feinted towards him, keeping him distracted, before spinning to keep an eye on her other opponent.

  Yao shrieked again, the sound echoing off the cavern's high ceiling.

  Distracted, Jin stumbled over an upthrust of rock. A cry leapt from her lips before she could pull it back.

  The man turned and advanced. His eyes glowed as red as the garnet.

  Jin regained her balance and held the lock pick on its knife handle in front of her, trying to mimic Bai Wei's fighting stance. "You want me?" she cried. "Come and get me!"

  He lunged, swinging with powerful blows. Jin ducked low and stabbed up with the pick. It gouged into his gut with a sickening squelch. Lurching to the side, he wrenched away and Jin lost her grip on the pick. He staggered back, the makeshift weapon protruding from his belly.

  His hand wrapped around it and he pulled it free, wiping it clean on his immaculate suit pants. Jin stumbled away. What kind of monster was this? His wound didn't so much as slow his advance, and now he brandished her own weapon against her.

  The man feinted with a punch. Jin tried to dodge, but she was too slow. The pick sank into her shoulder in a burning blossom of pain. Once more he plunged it downward, aiming for her throat. She spun away, but tripped over her own feet and fell forward to the ground. She rolled to her back, trembling.

  "Get up, little girl," the man goaded, ignoring the blood staining his shirt.

  Jin staggered to her feet.

  "Go ahead," he said, a maniacal look in his ruby-red eyes. "Hit me."

  Her left shoulder throbbed so badly, she could hardly think for the pain. Gritting her teeth, she drew back her right arm and swung for his jaw. He danced away, laughing, until he gave a sudden grunt and collapsed, twitching, to the ground.

  Auntie Bai Wei stood behind him, breathing hard, a bloodied stone in her fist. "Go," she gasped. "Get your brother."

  Jin lurched towards Yao. Tremors shook the cavern, and the light flared bright. She flexed her knees and kept moving until she reached her brother's side.

  Yao stared up at her, tears pooled in the corners of his eyes. She knew he hated when she saw him cry, so she pretended not to see. Thick, red fluid pulsed through the tubes inserted under his skin. Jin hesitated to touch them. The wires were a different matter. Sharp-toothed clamps pinched his skin, leaving bloody welts.

  Hands shaking, Jin released the first clamp. The garnet howled.

  Jin ignored it, tearing Yao free from the wires. Auntie Bai Wei appeared at her side and joined in. In a matter of moments, all the wires with their vicious clamps lay in a tangled pile on the ground.

  Jin looked over at Bai Wei. "What do we do now?"

  What would her mother have said? How poor a guardian she was to have left Yao alone and unprotected? How Jin's thieving ways had brought this horror down on them?

  Jin felt it keenly. If she could replace him on that slab, sticking each tube into her own flesh, would it save him? She made up her mind to try.

  She reached for the first tube. The garnet's pulsing rush went silent, and the cavern sank into a blackness so deep Jin couldn't even see Yao, less than a hands-breadth away. She froze.

  "That can't be good," Auntie Bai Wei said.

  With a crash and groan, the garnet ruptured, searing ruby light flaring from the eggshell crack that formed along its side. Blood-red shards splintered and fell in a staccato rain. A monstrous spirit stepped free, swelling when it left the stone's confines, until its head nearly touched the ceiling. Scales armored the creature's muscular body. Long, curving talons scraped the cave floor. A powerful stench of sulfur surged forth from the shattered garnet.

  In the broken stone's dim glow, Yao spasmed, nearly throwing himself off the table. Auntie Bai Wei lunged forward, pinning him beneath her.

  Jin stared up at the towering beast, momentarily frozen. Then its red eyes focused on Yao and it advanced, clawed hands outstretched. Jin's heart stuttered. Adrenaline surged through her limbs. Only a small part of her mind registered the guardian's searing heat as she shouted and threw the jade figurine towards the monster with her good arm.

  The radiant lion burst free in a rush of amber brilliance that made Jin look away. Its roar rattled her teeth. She clenched her jaw and forced her eyes forward. Landing on broad red paws between Yao and the spirit-it had to be a spirit, if the guardian could challenge it-the lion shook its heavy mane and bared its teeth.

  "Jin, help me," Auntie Bai Wei called in a low voice, just audible over the guardian's growl.

  The monstrous spirit stepped closer, and the lion lunged forward, its muzzle curling with a warning snarl.

  "Jin!"

  She didn't want to look away. What if the guardian wasn't enough? Could she fight? Her injured shoulder ached bone-deep, the pain blurred beneath a curtain of terrified energy. Jin felt helpless. Useless. What could she, a cannery girl and a thief, hope to do?

  But Bai Wei was calling and maybe, even if she couldn't fight a spirit, maybe she could help Auntie. She dragged her gaze away from the confrontation.

  Yao had stopped moving. The tubes lay flaccid. Empty.

  Auntie Bai Wei shook Yao's shoulders. "He's not breathing," she said. With her powerful hand, she grasped his wrist. After a moment, she squeezed her eyes shut. "No pulse."

  Jin shook her head and moved forward with stuttering steps. He couldn't be dead. Couldn't leave her alone with nothing but failure and regret.

  Auntie Bai Wei began chest compressions, hard and fast. Yao's still form was so small, surely she must break his ribs, but if it saved him, Jin would willingly pay her any price. If only he would live. If his lungs would fill, his blood would flow.

  "Auntie!" Jin grasped the nearest tube. "There's nothing in here."

  Continuing her work, Bai Wei glanced over. "The demon wasn't stealing his blood, girl. It was stealing his spirit guest. Yao's been a host for so long, his body doesn't know how to live without it."

  "Then he can't be saved?" Anger and fear battled for dominance, but both agreed on one thing. If the tubes had done their work, then they were nothing but a blight, desecrating her brother's corpse. In a haze of rage, Jin tore them free, ignoring the blood that seeped from each empty wound.

  When the last tube curled to the ground, a shriek like a thousand fingernails down a thousand blackboards echoed through the cave. Jin fell to her knees, fists pressed against her ears. She turned back towards the battling spirits.

  The demon closed its heavy jaws and the wail vanished. It crouched down, muscles bunching as it prepared to leap.

  With a swirl of amber, the lion vanished.

  The jade figurine lay on its side, tiny and dull. The guardian was gone. In the face of the demon's power, it had fled. Was this the spirit that Liu had put such faith in? That Auntie Bai Wei knew by reputation and name? A coward?

  Jin's lock pick was gone, lost in the earlier fight. Her hand closed around a garnet splinter a
s long as her forearm, and she staggered to her feet.

  "Stay back!" She insinuated herself between the demon and her brother. "He's mine."

  Baleful red eyes looked down at her and Jin thought she caught a glimmer of amusement. Then, the powerful muscles flexed and the demon soared towards her.

  Jin lunged, felt the garnet shard pierce scaly skin and delve into the demon's warm, wet innards. Its bulk carried it forward and she landed on her back, caught beneath it. She struggled to draw in air.

  It reared back and Jin could breathe again. The shard went with it, pulsing from red to black to red again. Once more, the demon turned its attention onto Jin. It reached back, talons outstretched, ready to slash at her exposed throat.

  A small form stepped past her prone body, hand raised in a gesture of warding. Amber light streamed from him, nearly blinding. "You are banished," he said with Yao's voice.

  Jin blinked and shook her head. Impossible. She crab-shuffled backwards until she collided with Auntie Bai Wei's legs.

  "You are banished," the boy repeated, his voice now tinged with a deep, rumbling resonance beneath the young-man soprano.

  The demon retreated, the arm that had been ready to kill her now shielding its eyes.

  Auntie Bai Wei hoisted Jin up and pulled her close, which was good. She didn't think she could have stood without support.

  As the boy-Yao? — advanced, the demon shrank, hissing and spitting, until it was no larger than Bai Wei. The garnet shard burst free and clattered to the floor. Its pulsing light faded and died.

  The boy placed his blazing hand flat on the demon's chest and said, a third time, "You are banished."

  With a wail that vanished into silence, the demon sank down, down, down, until it was the size of a beetle. The radiant boy knelt and picked up the toppled figurine and held it in his palm. Muttering words in a language Jin didn't know, he extended it towards the tiny demon. It tried to run, but the figurine pulled it in, subsuming it into its stone heart until there was nothing left but the jade lion, a crimson heart now pulsing in its depths.

  Yao rose, his brilliant aura fading, and turned to face Jin and Auntie Bai Wei. And it wasYao-raw wounds where the clamps had grasped him and Jin had wrenched the tubes free erased any doubt-but behind his black eyes a new awareness looked out at them.

  Jin felt an overwhelming sense of power and protection under her brother's gaze. She straightened, trying to stand under her own strength. "Yao?"

  He smiled, a broad, encompassing smile that Jin hadn't seen since their mother died. "When you broke my connection to the stone heart, you freed me. My spirit guest was gone, but now another could take its place without fear of being consumed by the demon."

  Yao extended his hand where the jade lion rested. "This one should not be left like this. It will find a new host, given the chance."

  Jin reached for it-hesitated-then snatched it up by the tip of its tail. It felt foul. A shudder ran down her spine. "What would happen if it broke?"

  "The spirit within dies with its host."

  Jade was strong, but it could be broken, Jin remembered. She dashed the lion to the ground with all that remained of her strength. It shattered into pieces on the stone floor.

  A tremor shook the cavern. The metal table shuddered, then toppled. Jin clung to Auntie Bai Wei. Her head swam. From the corner of her eye she saw her left shoulder. Blood saturated the jacket and her shirt, seeping down to stain her jeans. So much blood.

  "Follow me, Bai Wei," Yao ordered.

  It didn't seem strange to Jin that he would know her name. After all, she had known the guardian.

  Jin tried to stumble along over the quaking ground, but couldn't keep her feet. Bai Wei hoisted Jin over her broad shoulder and chased after Yao. Jin tried to protest, but her head kept knocking against Auntie's back and the shoulder digging into her stomach gave her no room to breathe, and besides, she was so very tired.

  Images swam by in fits and starts. Into the stairwell. Bai Wei's labored breathing. No lights. Shouldn't there have been lights? Up and up and into the cellblocks. Yao melting locks. More quakes. So many people, all following her little brother like he was some sort of promised savior. Boy, boy, plays with toys.

  Walls crumbling. Yao's powerful radiance deflecting the stones. The smell of the river. Nothing.

  Jin woke to the strong scent of chili sauce. Her eyes flew open. She was in Auntie Bai Wei's shop.

  Yao sat beside her, shoveling noodles into his mouth. Seeing she was awake, he picked up an extra bowl that sat on the carved box beside him. "Want some?"

  Her mouth watered and her stomach gave a growl that felt nearly as loud as the lion's roar. She pushed herself into a sitting position. Her shoulder protested, but didn't give out. Heavy bandages wrapped it, underneath an embroidered silk robe. "Please," she replied.

  She didn't know what to say to him. Her little brother, the mouse, was the boy she knew. Who this boy-this little lion-would be, was a mystery.

  She accepted the bowl and took a cautious bite. It had been so long since anything other than nutrition bars or cannery remains had touched her tongue the chili sauce felt like fireworks and flame. Tears welled in her eyes, not from pain, but from the simple relief of being cared for. For once, not shouldering the weight of expectation and guilt.

  The little dog-faced spirit who had given back her hat not so very long ago capered up and down the nearest shelf, dodging trinkets and bric-a-brac, peering over with curious eyes. Liu sat, poised and dainty, at Yao's side.

  Jin heard Auntie Bai Wei coming before she saw her. Although there was weariness in her face, she looked happier than Jin could ever remember seeing her. She stood straighter, as if a yoke that burdened her had been lifted.

  Auntie looked Jin up and down. "You're looking better."

  Jin ducked her head. "Because of you," she said. "Thank you."

  "Don't thank me. I'm in your debt for as long as you live. If you hadn't found the guardian when you did, every one of those souls in the prison would have been lost to feed the demon. My spirit refuge would have been destroyed, and all of my companions killed. You saved them, Jin."

  "And me with them," Yao added.

  "I did nothing but what I had to do," she said, looking over her steaming noodle bowl at her brother, "to fulfill my promise to Mother." She shook her head. "I was never good enough on my own. What a poor guardian I've been."

  Yao handed his bowl to Liu, who took it without difficulty, despite it being nearly a fourth of her size. He dropped to one knee beside Jin. "You've been the best guardian I could have asked for, but now it's my turn. Auntie Bai Wei has offered to pay my entry to the tech school. I'll thrive there, and when I'm out, we'll never be in want again."

  Jin looked over at Auntie Bai Wei. Suspicious moisture clung to the corners of the shopkeeper's eyes.

  "You'd do that?" Jin asked.

  "As I said, I'm in your debt." Bai Wei shrugged. "Besides I've grown fond of you, my little scamp. Now finish your noodles." She turned away before rubbing her eyes with the back of her hand. "You've got to build up your strength."

  Jin bit her lip to keep from crying. Despite the pain, she felt lighter than air. She speared the noodles with her chopsticks and took another bite of paradise.

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  Paula Goodlett

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