Dragonkeeper

by Carole Wilkinson

  Ping didn’t move from the bed for three days. She didn’t sleep much, but she couldn’t think of a good enough reason to get up. Whenever she did doze, she dreamt about the dragon stone. She woke with the keening sounds she had heard at Wucheng ringing in her ears.

  She didn’t eat, and when one of the servants came to wash her and comb her hair, she pulled Hua from beneath the sheets. The servant ran from the room screaming.

  The Emperor came to visit her every day. He sent musicians and performing monkeys to try and cheer her up. He had servants carry her into the garden. She showed no interest in anything.

  “You have frightened the servants,” Liu Che said when he came to visit Ping on the third day. “The servant girl who was supposed to care for you refuses to come into your room. She says you are a sorceress. Something about a rat in your bed.”

  Liu Che started as Ping pulled the rat from beneath the sheets. “This is Hua,” she said.

  Liu Che smiled as he watched her tickle the rat’s stomach. “Do you make a habit of befriending pests?”

  “Only this one,” Ping replied.

  The Emperor sat on the end of her bed and gingerly stroked the rat.

  “Ping, I am leaving for Tai Shan tomorrow,” he told her. “My shamans say that it will soon be the most auspicious day to climb its peak and seek the blessing of Heaven.”

  Ping didn’t say anything.

  “I want you to come with me,” Liu Che said. “Tai Shan is beautiful, so I’m told. Perhaps the sight of it will cheer you up.” The Emperor thought for a moment. “You can bring your rat.”

  Ping didn’t object. There was no point in arguing with the Emperor.

  It wasn’t far to Tai Shan, a little over one hundred li, but the Emperor didn’t have to walk there. He wasn’t going alone either. A whole caravan of people were accompanying him. Four men carried him in a sedan chair made of polished ebony decorated with a fine design of swirling clouds, painted in silver and pale purple and inlaid with mother-of-pearl. Embroidered hangings hid the Emperor from view. The Grand Counsellor, the ministers and the shaman who would conduct the ceremony all travelled in carriages. A small army of porters carried the imperial baggage (including food, cooking equipment, boxes of robes, a portable bed, a tent) suspended from both ends of poles carried over their shoulders. There were also imperial guards, servants and a cook. At the rear were ten and five goats which were to be sacrificed. They were attended by two scruffy boys.

  When the Emperor insisted that she travel in one of the carriages with the ministers, Ping didn’t object. She didn’t have the energy to walk. She watched the flat fields pass by with little interest. The carriage bumped over the rough country roads making it impossible to sleep through the journey. The ministers didn’t speak to her. She was left to her own thoughts, constantly going over the previous weeks events and wishing she had done things differently.

  As the imperial caravan lumbered through the countryside, peasants in the fields dropped their hoes and abandoned their ploughs. They fell on their faces as their Emperor passed. When the caravan stopped for the night, their camp was bright with lamps and noisy with activity. When they started off again in the morning, they left behind flattened crops, discarded fish bones, fruit peel and ox droppings. Ping remembered how easy it had been to travel with the dragon. How little baggage they had. How swiftly they’d moved through the countryside. How few people had noticed their passing. When the caravan stopped at the end of the second day, Ping climbed down from the carriage. To the north, south and west, the countryside stretched out flat and featureless, but to the east it was different. To the east a mountain rose abruptly from the plain in a series of sheer grey cliffs. Its craggy peaks disappeared into clouds. The only vegetation was pine trees clinging to the mountainside in pockets of earth caught in cracks or crevices. The trees were small and twisted as they grew towards the sun. The mountain was majestic and strangely familiar. An image of Huangling suddenly flashed into Ping’s mind. It wasn’t that magnificent Tai Shan reminded her of the bleak slopes of the mountain that used to be her home. There was no comparison. What Ping remembered was a circle of lamplight in the darkness. One of the paintings that she had seen on the walls of Huangling Palace had been of this very mountain. She had thought that such a steep and beautiful mountain only existed in the imagination of painters.

  Ping had had no interest in where they were going until then, but now that she could see the sacred slopes of Tai Shan, she felt differently. She pulled Hua out to show him.

  “Look, Hua,” she said. “That’s Tai Shan and we’re going to climb it.”

  The next morning she didn’t travel in the carriage. She walked alongside the Emperor’s sedan chair. She kept her eyes on the mountain, watching as it grew larger and more imposing as they approached.

  “Tai Shan is one of the five sacred mountains of my empire,” Liu Che told her when they stopped for the midday meal. “It reaches almost to Heaven. It is the place where each Emperor goes to speak to his heavenly ancestors and seek blessings for a long and successful reign.”

  The Emperor chatted cheerfully as he ate, but Ping noticed that he’d bitten the skin around his thumbnails until it bled.

  The caravan reached the foot of Tai Shan that evening. The porters put up the imperial tent. Liu Che’s personal servants unpacked tables, the imperial bed, carpets and cushions to furnish the tent. The cook unloaded stoves and cooking pots and began to conjure an imperial meal from baskets and boxes. The Emperor came over to Ping.

  “We will rest here tomorrow,” he said. “Then in the evening we will begin our ascent of the mountain.”

  “Why don’t you climb during the day, Liu Che?” asked Ping. “I’m sure it would be much easier.”

  “If we climb during the night, we will arrive at Jade Emperor Summit at dawn. That is the most favourable time to address Heaven and my honoured ancestors. Only myself, the shaman, Counsellor Tian and a few attendants will be making the climb. You can stay at the camp, Ping.”

  “I would like to climb with you if I may, your imperial majesty.”

  “Only I am permitted to stand on Jade Emperor Summit,” Liu Che told her. “But you can climb with me to the South Gate, if you wish.”

  “Thank you, your imperial majesty.”

  Liu Che looked at her. “Are you sure you are up to such a difficult climb, Ping?”

  “I’m sure. I’m feeling much better.”

  They ate bear paw soup, roasted crane with plum sauce, pickled fish and red lentils, followed by slices of orange, dried peaches and hazelnuts. It was the Emperor’s last meal before he ascended the mountain. He would have to fast all the next day.

  ”Once I have made the sacrifice to Heaven,” the Emperor said. “I will consult my ministers and think about what we must do to recapture my dragon.”

  Ping didn’t say anything. Danzi may have chosen to leave her behind, but he was free. She knew that she wouldn’t be helping the Emperor catch the dragon.

  The next day seemed twice as long as any other day. Ping was impatient to start the climb. Everyone else was busily preparing for the ascent, but she had nothing to do to pass the time. She watched the goatherd boys play among their charges, throwing a leather ball over the beasts’ backs, chasing each other around their legs. Their cheerfulness was infectious. Ping couldn’t help but smile. She didn’t know why, but the thought of climbing Tai Shan made her feel happier than she had since the dragon had left.

  That afternoon, Liu Che went into his tent with the shaman to perform a cleansing ceremony. Ping, the Grand Counsellor and the attendants ate a small meal by imperial standards, but it was still lavish compared to the simple meals that she and Danzi had eaten when they were travelling. There had been days when they had gone hungry because they could find nothing to eat. She smiled to herself when she remembered how pleased Danzi had been whenever he could catch a swallow to roast over a fire. She had developed quite a taste for swallow herself. The imperial food was
very nice, but she would have given anything to be sitting with Danzi by a small fire after a long day’s walk, with nothing to eat but nuts and berries.

  Ping fed Hua as much as he would eat, so that he would sleep through the climb and not get restless.

  After the meal, just as she was starting to get sleepy, one of the ministers banged a gong to let everyone know that the Emperor was about to start his journey up Tai Shan. The party making the ascent was much smaller. As well as Counsellor Tian, the shaman, two imperial guards and a servant, the goatherds were also going to drive the sacrificial goats up the mountain.

  Liu Che came out of his tent dressed in a beautiful gown made of black satin, embroidered with silver thread and with precious stones sewn into it.

  “Are you going to climb the mountain with me, Ping?” he asked.

  “I’d like to, your imperial majesty.”

  “It will take all night. Are you sure you have the strength?”

  “I’m sure.”

  The Emperor had to fast until morning, but the cook packed millet cakes for those who were accompanying him up the mountain. An imperial guard led the way with a blazing torch. The shaman followed. Ping was expecting Liu Che to climb back into his sedan chair, but he didn’t. He started to walk up the slope.

  ”Walk with me, Ping,” he said.

  Counsellor Tian glared at her, but Ping did as the Emperor asked. The Grand Counsellor took his place behind Liu Che, followed by the servant. Behind him were the goats and the boys herding them. At the rear was another imperial guard with a torch.

  The climb was easy at first. Ping had nothing to carry and the mountain began with a gentle slope. The moon was up. As they passed beneath a painted gateway, Ping could make out carvings of dragons and qilin.

  “That’s the Journey’s Beginning Gate,” said Liu Che.

  “Have you been here before, Liu Che?” Ping asked.

  “No,” the Emperor replied, “but my ministers have told me of the stages of the journey. Next we will come to the Cypress Tunnel.”

  Sure enough, after walking for half an hour, the moon suddenly disappeared behind a dark mass. Ping could make out tree trunks on either side of the path. The dark branches of the trees reached up and met over the path, interlacing with each other and forming a living tunnel. When they came out of the other side of the Cypress Tunnel, the path grew steeper. The goats behind her were complaining about the climb. The boys smacked them on their rumps to keep them moving and called the beasts rude names. The shaman started to sing a low chant. Before long, everyone was placing their feet one in front of the other to the rhythm of the chant. Then the earth path stopped and Ping felt the rock of the mountain beneath her feet. She stumbled as her foot struck a step. She looked up and the moonlight lit up their path before them. It was made up of hundreds of steps, carved into the rock of Tai Shan. The flight of steps reached up the mountain as far as the weak moonlight allowed her to see.

  “How many steps are there?” she asked.

  “Seven thousand,” replied Liu Che.

  The Emperor sounded weary. He’d had no food all day. Ping thought that she had better keep her questions to herself and let the Emperor concentrate on climbing. The steps were too narrow for her to walk alongside him now, so she fell in step behind him.

  Ping started to count the steps as she climbed. She got up to three hundreds, five tens and six and then lost count. She started again, but the rhythm of the shaman’s chant made her sleepy. She closed her eyes, climbing one step with each beat of the chant. Ping wondered if it was possible to sleep and walk at the same time. Then she woke from a dream where Master Lan was shouting at her to get up. She realised she was lying sprawled on the steps. She had dozed for a moment and fallen. The goatherds were shouting at her to keep moving because she was holding up the goats. Ping hurried to catch up with the rest of the procession.

  It was another hour at least before Counsellor Tian called a halt and they were able to rest for a few minutes. She ate a millet cake and drank from a mountain stream. Liu Che sat in silence.

  They walked on for several more hours. On a night march such as this, there were no magnificent views to reward the climbers. All that Ping could see were the black shapes of rocks by the side of the path, occasional twisted pine trees and the endless steps stretching just in front of her. They passed under another carved gateway.

  “Are we getting close to the top of the mountain?” Ping asked Counsellor Tian.

  He shook his head and pointed to the archway. “This is called the Halfway to Heaven Gate.”

  Ping’s feet felt as if they were made of stone. The muscles in her calves were aching. She was so tired, she just wanted to lie down by the side of the path, even though the night had turned cold. She wasn’t important to the ceremony. No one would notice if she wasn’t there. But she didn’t want to let Liu Che down by leaving him to climb on without her company. Though the peak of Tai Shan was visible as nothing more than a black starless shape against the night sky, she could feel it pulling her upwards. The image of the towering mountain that she had seen during the day was still visible when she closed her eyes. She had to climb the mountain.

  The next hours were a blur. The steps became as steep as a ladder. The path twisted and turned. Ping concentrated on placing one foot painfully in front of the other and was aware of nothing else. She lost sight of the guard with the torch and the dark figure of Liu Che. Then the steps stopped and the path became a gentle slope. It was as good as a rest after so many hours of climbing steps. A sudden breeze blew across the path. Ping could make out the track in front of her, defined by small white pebbles which reflected in the pale moonlight, but both sides of the path were pitch black. She had just been able to see the rocks on either side when she was climbing the steps. Now the surrounding darkness had an endless, airy quality. The wind came up from below, billowing her gown. She sensed that there was a steep drop on either side and was glad she couldn’t see. The goats had stopped some way behind her, bleating plaintively. They didn’t want to cross the path.

  Counsellor Tian turned back to hurry the boys along. “Get those animals across Cloud Bridge before the moon is hidden by cloud,” he shouted.

  Ping stepped onto the narrow bridge. She focused on the bright pebbles which marked out the way as clearly as if it were lit by thousands of tiny lamps. Then the moon disappeared behind cloud and the pebble lamps went out. Ping stopped in the middle of the bridge. There was nothing but blackness ahead. She turned to see if the others were behind her, but the rear torchbearer was also out of sight, still climbing up the last of the steps. Ping could see no one. She was alone on the narrow path with blackness all around her, the chill wind rushing under her gown. The ground was far below on either side.

  She turned back but lost her bearings. She wasn’t sure which way to walk. If she stepped the wrong way she would plunge off the mountain. The wind whining through rocks drowned out the boys’ voices and the bleating of the goats.

  She called out but the wind caught her frail voice as soon as it left her mouth and carried it away into the darkness. Her heart pounded louder and louder in her ears until its beat drowned out the roar of the wind. Ping’s legs trembled—from cold, from fatigue and from fear.

  A few days before, when the dragon had left her, she wouldn’t have cared if she’d plunged to her death from a mountain. But she knew now she didn’t want to die. She felt a new strength fill her. She didn’t draw it from the darkness around her. It came from within. She remembered what Danzi had said about her having second sight. Instead of peering into the darkness to find her way, she closed her eyes. The path was clearer. She still couldn’t see it, but she felt its solid rockiness. She took a tentative step and then another. Then she walked forward confidently, her eyes shut tight, until she felt the wind die and the weight of the rock rise up on either side of the path again.

  She opened her eyes. The moon came out from behind the clouds. The moonlit pebbles outlined the pat
h behind her. If she’d waited a few more minutes she would have been able to see the path clearly, but she was glad she had crossed Cloud Bridge in the darkness. The young goatherds enticed the goats over one at a time, no longer striking them with their sticks and calling them names, instead coaxing in soft murmurs.

  The steps started again, curving this way and that with the contours of the mountain. They became so steep that there was a rope looped through iron rings in the rock alongside the path to help climbers. As she pulled herself hand over hand up the steep steps, Ping wondered how the goatherd boys would get the goats up there.

  At last she noticed that the blackness was fading to grey. The sky had the faintest pink tinge. The steps ended suddenly and the path levelled out as it crossed flat grassland. Another carved gateway arched over the path.

  “We’ve reached the South Gate to Heaven,” Counsellor Tian announced with relief.

  A small stream wound its way across the grassland and cascaded over the edge of the mountain. In the dim light Ping could see the shaman strapping a slender dagger around his waist. She could just make out Liu Che in his black robes preparing for the final part of the journey. Ahead was one last flight of steps.

  For this last stretch of his journey, the young Emperor would be accompanied only by the shaman, the goats and their herders. The beasts crowded up on the path behind them. The goatherds shivered in the pre-dawn air. Their faces were pale, frightened. One was crying. Counsellor Tian gave the boys something to drink. Ping was surprised to see the Grand Counsellor being kind to the goatherds. He didn’t offer the cup to Ping. The drink seemed to calm the boys. Then the Grand Counsellor stripped off their rough, greasy jackets and trousers, and replaced them with short black tunics.