by Sarah Zettel
The maid stared at her, the light of the blaze reflecting in her frightened eyes. She gathered up the hems of her heavy sleeping robes and bolted again, vaulting over the screen her fellow servant had knocked down, and was out in the garden without pause for anything but her own escape.
Mae Shan gaped for a second, not believing such abandonment of duty. But then, she heard another sleepy, small voice.
“Min Lao? Mae Shan?”
Mae Shan raced back to the inner chamber. She crossed the room in three strides to stand beside the carved bed that was much too large for its tiny occupant. Tsan Nu sat up. The child pushed her waving hair out of her round, pale eyes and blinked up at her bodyguard.
“There’s a fire, mistress. Come to me.” She held out her arms.
Tsan Nu stared at her for a moment, but instead of running to her guard, she dove under the bed. Mae Shan gawped for a moment and then heaved the bed to one side, exposing the startled child clutching a pair of black slippers.
Mae Shan did not give the child a chance to speak another word. She snatched a coverlet up with one hand and Tsan Nu with the other, wrapped the one over the other, and threw the squirming bundle over her shoulder. She sprinted past the toppled screens out into the Moon Garden.
The flames were not here yet, but the heat was. It played across Mae Shan’s skin like the flickering lights. Smoke wisps drifted through the air like the morning fog, rasping against her throat and lungs and drawing tears from her blinking eyes. The willows swayed in the unnatural wind, as if trying to pull away from the heat.
Tsan Nu’s faithless maids had reached the inner southern wall, the only wall not crowned in flame. They beat upon the wooden door, struggling futilely with the bar and lock. The younger of the two cried up at the silhouettes that raced or struggled past on the stone road formed by the tops of the doubled outer walls. No one paused. No one shouted down, although they called out to each other, their voices making no more sense than the constant roar of the flames.
Disgust joined fear and anger inside Mae Shan. More voices screamed overhead, urging her to look up. She ignored them. She could not afford to look back now. She could not be frozen in her tracks. Her whole duty was to see the wriggling child in her arms safely out of this disaster. All else came later.
She strode to the edge of the nearest round pond. A soft and heavy thing hit the ground behind her, and another. The maids wailed to all the gods in Heaven. Unseen women shrieked and screamed. One might be Wei Lin, Mae Shan’s beautiful, laughing, loyal sister. She closed her ears even as her heart cracked open.
“Hold your breath!” she shouted, and she dropped Tsan Nu into the water. The girl screeched, coughed, and sputtered, but Mae Shan paid no attention. She dragged the dripping child and sodden coverlet back into her arms and ran for the southern wall.
“What’s happening?” screeched Tsan Nu, beating at the cover with her free hand. The other hand still clutched her shoes. “Mae Shan, what’s happening?”
“Hold still!” snapped Mae Shan in reply, not caring at the moment what her young charge thought, as long as she obeyed. If she struggled too hard, she’d slow down their escape, and any delay could mean a blocked exit, or a lost chance.
Get through the Sun Garden. Make for the Heart’s courtyard. All stone. Nothing to burn. No way to spread the fire.
The two maids still beat upon the wall’s locked door. Mae Shan thrust a hand into her shirt to bring out the bundle of keys she wore next to her private purse. She found the right key by touch and thrust it into the hands of the older maid.
“Open that door!”
Startled, the woman shoved the key into the door’s black iron lock and turned it.
Where are the Nine Elders? Where is the rain they can bring?
“Put me down!” cried Tsan Nu, fighting her way free of the soggy coverlet. “Mae Shan, what’s happening?” Then, her pale eyes saw the fire leaping over the top of the walls, and her mouth hung wide open and silent.
“Hurry!” screamed the younger maid, beating her soft fists against her older compatriot’s back. “Hurry!”
Mae Shan did not slap the foolish maid, although she wanted to with all her heart. Instead, as the lock snapped open, Mae Shan shoved the bar aside with her free hand, throwing open the door to the causeway between the walls.
Each palace in the Heart of the World was surrounded by three walls. There was an inner wall, then a stone causeway for carts and foot traffic, and then a doubled outer wall, which held the garrisons and basements within it and the soldier’s way above. At a glance, Mae Shan saw a dozen shadows, fleeing down the causeway, outlined in flame. Behind the shadows, a section of inner wall had crumbled, allowing the fire to claw its way out. To the left, the way she had hoped to run, she saw a tree blazing above the inner wall, already teetering and ready to fall.
The younger maid saw none of this. She just squeezed past Mae Shan fleeing into the oven-hot night that lay between the inner and outer walls.
Mae Shan found she had been expecting that. “You will come with your mistress,” she ordered the remaining servant. “Try to run like that and …”
A new noise sounded overhead — an inhuman scream that reached over even the devouring flames and crumbling stone. Mae Shan looked up without thinking, and did the one thing she had determined she would not do. She froze.
She had never seen the Phoenix in real life, and never expected to. She had never imagined she would with her own eyes see its arching neck and the trailing feathers that were streamers of flame like the ones that reached over the walls. She had never thought to hear it scream in triumph over the tower of Ah Min’s Spear as that tower cracked, so slowly, so terribly slowly, and began to fall. She had never thought she would stand and stare while heat seared her eyes and lungs as its wings curved over the whole world, claiming the night and the burning Heart of the World for its own.
Beside her, the older maid gaped like the child in Mae Shan’s arms. As slowly as the golden tower had, the woman crumpled and fell to her knees. She stared up at the sacred guardian as it wheeled in the sky, its great tail blazing behind it, blotting out moon and stars.
Finally, the woman bowed, pressing her head against the ground. Her prayers poured out of her becoming a babble of noise.
Mae Shan wanted to drop down beside her. Running suddenly seemed a sacrilege. The Phoenix soared overhead — one of the immortal guardians, the protectors and avengers of Hung-Tse, a gift from the gods to ensure the final security of those who lived at the center of the world. Surely if the Phoenix was here, so too were the gods, and if they declared that the Heart should die, she should throw herself prayerfully into the flames.
“It came. I told them it would come.” Tsan Nu huddled underneath her sodden coverlet, whimpering with nothing but a child’s fear. Mae Shan tore her eyes from the beautiful, terrible sight overhead. She had her duty. No matter what, she had her duty, and if she was to die tonight, she would die acting correctly. “There won’t be any tomorrow. I saw it.”
“Come on!” Mae Shan shouted to the maid, tearing the bundle of keys from the servant’s hands. But the maid just screamed and yanked herself away. Weeping, she knocked her head against the ground and continued with her wailing, babbling prayers.
Mae Shan clutched Tsan Nu tightly to her chest to protect her from the pull of the fleeing crowd. There was no room to retreat now. The surge of the crowd was too strong. Not daring to press back against the inner wall, Mae Shan held still, drew the rapidly drying coverlet over Tsan Nu’s head. The girl pressed her face close against Mae Shan’s shoulder. Servants and nobles, free and slave, jostled together, indistinguishable, partially clothed, smudged with soot, and reddened with fear, tears, and burns. All made for the Heart of the World and the broad stone court with its gate to the outside world. None seemed to see the tree teetering overhead.
Mae Shan did not look up. She did not want to see, did not want to think about what flew overhead. She did not want to see h
er death, and the death of the child in her arms, in the holy beauty of the Phoenix.
Ahead, the ancient tree gave over to the flames, and tipped slowly down to the lower causeway. Those who saw screamed and tried to reverse their panicked flight, only to plow into those who rushed up behind them. The burning branches crashed down, and the screams Mae Shan had thought could grow no louder redoubled. Now the crowd ran back, reversing its current in its desperation to get away from the sudden deadly barrier.
Now she could move with the river of bodies. Holding Tsan Nu tight against her chest, Mae Shan ran, keeping her eyes on the way ahead, blessing her height and long legs. In places, the fire had breached the inner walls, leaving piles of stone on the lower causeway to be licked by flames overflowing from the gardens.
Sweat poured down Mae Shan’s face and neck. Bodies jostled her on all sides. Terrified eyes flashed in the firelight. She recognized no one. She forced herself to keep her own eyes on the way in front of her. Even if one of these was Wei Lin, Mae Shan would not see her, not disguised in soot and shadows as she surely would be. To look for her sister’s face would be to waste time, to lay aside duty, to die, and to kill Tsan Nu.
Oh, my sister. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.
Finally, she spied a knot of people pounding against the outer wall. She could not hear their fists and bodies hitting the surface, but she knew they must be in front of one of the soldiers’ access doors, all of which were kept locked. The Phoenix’s fire came so fast there would have been no time to open them. Or maybe they were meant as sacrifices to appease the guardian’s anger.
Members of the guard raced by on the soldier’s road atop the outer walls, seemingly oblivious to what went on below.
“Let me through!” Mae Shan bellowed, wading into the thick crowd of bodies. “I’ve got a key! I’ve got a key!”
They heard and had enough control left to do as she said. Mae Shan shouldered her way to the iron-banded door. She thrust her key in the lock, turned it, and this time, made sure she blocked the whole way with her body.
She meant to duck through with Tsan Nu, and to shut the door behind her. To leave it open, even for a moment, was to let the flood into the garrison space inside the walls, clogging it up, possibly clogging it shut. Her duty was Tsan Nu. She had none to these who surrounded her now. Not even her own sister. She couldn’t hesitate now. She didn’t even know if she could get Tsan Nu out, not with the Phoenix blazing overhead and calling down the doom of the Heart of the World. She couldn’t risk trying to save anyone else. Not even Wei Lin.
And still, she cried out, “Quickly! Follow me!” She flung the door wide open and plunged into the stifling darkness inside the doubled wall.
At least part of the crowd was able to obey. Their cries echoed off the vaulted stone that encased the garrison as they swarmed after Mae Shan. She did not look back. Those who could think to follow would follow.
Mae Shan’s flame-dazzled eyes adjusted rapidly to the darkness. The only light came from the flicker of the fire through the arrow slits and the copper lanterns spaced evenly down the sandstone walls. None of the doors they barreled past was guarded. All the sentries had been called up and out, to do what could be done. She could hear their boots pounding as they ran past on the soldier’s way overhead. Sweat dripped into Mae Shan’s eyes and her lungs felt like withered leaves, but she did not slow down. She tried not to be grateful that the realization of what had brought the fire had left Tsan Nu silent and still in her arms, a burden to be carried, nothing more. She tried to compose her mind to prayer and duty. She tried not to let her thoughts veer back to lost Wei Lin, to those who still filled the causeway outside, or even to the crying strangers who ran beside her. But some of those found the ladders to the soldier’s way and swarmed up them.
“No!” shouted Mae Shan to whoever would, or could, listen. “With me!”
Some listened, some did not, and she heard their cries change again as they threw open the hatches and found fire, or soldiers who flung them down to the dirt, leaving them unable to rise and run; leaving Mae Shan unable to do anything but pray the walls would hold to keep them safe from the flames.
But who will answer those prayers when the gods’ servant is the one who brought the fire?
The garrison held hatches in the floor as well as in the roof. As Mae Shan hoped, one had been thrown open by some guard or soldier whose haste did not permit them to close it behind them. She set Tsan Nu on her feet and stripped off the coverlet that was now dry as if she had never doused it.
“Climb down,” she ordered. Tsan Nu, mute and serious in her fear, stuffed the slippers she still carried into her sash and obeyed. Mae Shan’s hand closed on her knife as she faced what was left of the crowd surging up behind her. If one of them tried to push their way down before Tsan Nu …
But none did. They halted, huddling together, waiting for her orders. In the dim light, she could not even tell which were men and which were women.
“Keep up as best you can.” Mae Shan let go of the knife without drawing it. Instead, she snatched one of the copper lanterns off its chain and followed Tsan Nu down the ladder.
The next level down was below the heat and the smoke. Mae Shan dragged in a great breath of dank, foul air as if it were the rarest incense. There was no light except for the lantern she carried. She grabbed Tsan Nu’s hand and strode forward.
Down here were the cells. She could hear the prisoners moaning and calling out behind the heavily barred doors. No one had come to let them out, and no one would. Maybe they would be safe, but how long would it be before some survivor remembered they were down here? She could do nothing. She had no keys for these doors, no way to quickly fling aside their bars.
Gods help me. Gods help me to my duty and stop my ears, and Tsan Nu’s. Don’t let this child realize what’s happening.
Mae Shan broke again into a run. Tsan Nu whimpered as she was dragged along, but Mae Shan did not slow down.
The floor down here was lined with flagstone. An open drain, dry now, ran down the center of the corridor. That was their guide, and Mae Shan followed it like a lifeline. Harsh breath, coughs, and the sound of soft shoes and bare feet on stone followed behind.
At last, the corridor dead-ended at a wall of blank stone. The drain itself continued through a metal grating, heading into darkness.
“Now, Mistress Tsan Nu,” said Mae Shan between gasps for air that were echoed a dozen times by those who had managed to follow. “A spell blocks this grate and keeps anyone from cracking it open. This is our way out. Can you break it?”
The girl’s chin trembled in the pale lantern light, but she knelt down by the grating. Mae Shan held the lantern over her so she could get a good look at the riveted metal. Either the girl could find a way, or they waited here for the fire overhead to burn out, taking their chances with the other prisoners.
“I’ll need your knife,” Tsan Nu said, her voice sounding small and tired. “And something to tie knots in.”
Mae Shan undid her sash, handing it and the knife to Tsan Nu. Although she did not want to, she faced their followers. Any one of them might try to run forward and shake the girl because she did not work fast enough, or they might try to tear at the grating. They were the immediate danger, and because she had brought them down here, they were her responsibility.
Now that she had a moment, Mae Shan found she could begin to make out some details among them. There was a tiny old woman with ash-grey hair. There was a burly man with a thin line of beard staring at the grating and clearly wondering if he could make it through. There was a willow wand of a girl, and a boy who looked to be all of a year older than Tsan Nu.
Overhead, something groaned and crumbled to the ground. Mae Shan kept looking at her followers. The doubled walls were starting to fall up there. The fire was starting to find its way inside to the garrisons. When the crowd before her realized that, they might panic. She had to be ready for them, any of them, all of them.
She had
given Tsan Nu her knife, and they had all seen her do it.
Mae Shan did not look down to see what the girl was doing. She heard Tsan Nu’s voice rising and falling, but did not understand one word. Tsan Nu spoke the spell language, learned from her masters who were up there now, if they had not succumbed to the flames. If they had not fled.
She will be able to do this. She saw the Phoenix coming when no one else did. If she can draw out the future, she can open the grate on a drain.
“It’s ready,” said Tsan Nu. Was it wishful thinking, or did her voice sound more firm?
“Thank you, mistress,” Mae Shan said, hoping her own voice sounded quietly confident. “If you are willing, it would be good for you to continue now.”
Mae Shan permitted her gaze to flicker down. Tsan Nu’s pale eyes were wide as they looked up, but her trembling had stopped. She had slashed Mae Shan’s sash into five strips. Into each strip she had tied four knots, and with a final knot she had tied them all together. Mae Shan knew just enough to know that this was how Tsan Nu had drawn up and shaped the magics she commanded. Now, she had to release them to work.
With a swift, practiced movement, Mae Shan slit that final knot. The strips of cloth fell separately to the stones. Another low rumble sounded overhead. Mae Shan’s nose caught the distant scent of smoke. Someone among the other escapees whimpered.
Metal twanged sharply. Tsan Nu darted behind Mae Shan as the grating snapped, its rails falling away from the stone as the cloth strips had fallen away from each other.
Mae Shan did not waste time gaping. After the sight of the Phoenix, this was a small miracle indeed.
“I’ll go in first,” she said. “With luck I’ll be able to keep the lantern lit on the way. Mistress, you must follow behind with your hands on my heels. You others …” She lifted the lantern to the small crowd.
They said nothing, but they understood. They had to follow, one at a time, as best they could. They held their places, though, and Mae Shan silently blessed them for it.