by Linda Talbot
gibber and screech.
Turvy pokes a finger through her cage. She does not peck him but whispers in a voice soft as silk, “I am Feng Huang, the phoenix, little boy. Free me and take me with you, away from these bickering birds. They’ll pull out my feathers and peck me to death. They are ancient but not magical like me. I was left by legend to bring peace and prosperity.”
Feng Huang the phoenix, freed by Topsy and Turvy
“Something rare, beautiful and rescued from danger,” thinks Topsy. “She’ll do.”
The twins open the cages and the strange birds hop, flop and flutter out, to perch on the branches and peck the impossible fruit. Feathers are still flying as Turvy opens the door of the phoenix’s cage. Daintily she steps out, sweeps her long feathers into a shower of shimmering colours and springs onto Topsy’s shoulder.
Topsy, Turvy and Feng Huang leave behind the noisy birds and the empty golden cages and climb on up Viana’s hair. Suddenly the hair heaps into misty brown mountains, rising in steep peaks or lying like animals with long backs and massive, motionless heads.
“This is China, where I was born,” says the phoenix. “Come with me.” She flutters, her plumage streaming, along a narrow mountain path between hard rock walls. Topsy and Turvy follow, wrapped in mist like a moist blanket.
Suddenly in their path stands a vast carved entrance to a passage, disappearing in darkness underground. The phoenix has already flown inside; her feathers glowing like a torch in the blackness.
The twins follow, deeper and darker, until it grows cold.
“We must be near the middle of the Earth,” says Turvy. Was this what Zazhak meant by Other Worlds?
The passage opens into a great rocky room. A low moan eerily echoes from one end steeped in shadows.
Gradually in the gloom, the twins see a glimmer of green and gold encasing a motionless figure laid out flat. In the darkness too gleam heaped objects of jade and bronze with silks and huge painted pots.
“This is the tomb of Prince Liu Sheng,” whispers Feng Huang. “He was buried with his treasures more than two thousand years ago. He is wearing a suit of many jade pieces sewn together with gold thread.”
“Why?” asks Topsy, thinking a pine coffin would have done as well.
“So he will not rot my dear,” replies Feng Huang flatly. “Now he wants to be freed.” The moans increase.
“I shall try to free him with my beak,” she says, “Although with so many pieces of jade to peck through, I shall have to muster a great deal of magic.”
The Prince Liu Sheng
She hops onto Liu Sheng’s head, as very slowly, he raises one green arm.
“Patience, my man. This will take time and you realise you will have no empire to rule when you are released.”
The moans cease and Feng Huang begins to peck, pulling out pieces of gold thread which she drops among the precious objects. While she works, Topsy drapes herself in a long piece of coloured silk and Turvy clambers onto the back of a bronze horse.
At last Feng Huang gives a high screech and from the broken bits of jade that fly in all directions, Liu Sheng rises, his moon-like face gleaming. He blinks, bewildered, wondering where he is. Stiffly he moves his arms and legs and wobbles among his treasures towards the twins.
As though remembering he is a prince, he wraps himself in a length of fine silk and sits silently on a bronze box.
“Come, you can help us find the Tokhashi,” says Feng Huang, “These tired twins will never manage on their own.”
Topsy, Turvy and Liu Sheng stumble from among the treasures into the dark passage. A horse’s hooves echo behind them.
“Aha! That’s Ch’Eng,” says Liu, his voice dry with disuse. “He was my finest horse and was buried alive with me.”
The twins shudder. But the sound of hooves grows no nearer. They are ghost hooves that will echo for ever from the past and will never catch up with the present...unless the Tokhashi is tamed. Then Ch’Eng will be freed from the web of time.
Now angry voices and more horses’ hooves drift from the dark, rapidly coming closer.
“The warriors!” gasps Liu Sheng. “They were buried long before me with China’s first emperor. But they pursue anyone who dares disturb a tomb.”
With the twins and Feng Huang, he stumbles stiffly into the daylight. Turvy emerges last, his shoes slipping off as usual, and close behind him, appears a fierce clay warrior with a horse which he hurriedly mounts. Others jostle behind, shouting at Liu Sheng who, clad in his piece of silk, flaps like another rare bird, behind Feng Huang.
She needs no magic. She motions the twins and Liu Sheng to crouch by the rocks. The warriors and horses charge on, unable to stop as she leads them to the edge of a precipice dropping thousands of feet to the valley floor.
With shrieks of horror and neighs of alarm, they stream over. On they pour, out of darkness into death, to lie like a pile of broken pots below.
Once more, the twins with Feng Huang and Liu Sheng, pursue the mountain path, through rough rocks with cruel or comic faces; their necks below, strung with silver chains of water.
Then among them, one mountain gleams greenly like a huge mass of unmelted ice. As they climb closer, they see tiny figures, swarming like ants with hammers, ropes and wood.
“The Jade Mountain!” sighs Liu Sheng. “They are building dams. Beware the water!”
The next moment there is a roar of wild water and as the twins look backwards, a rushing river flows at then with a WHOOSH, carrying all kinds of objects it has collected on its mad course; shoes bouncing like coloured boats, bobbing pots, broken jugs.
“The Great Flood!” cries Liu Sheng, while Feng Huang flutters anxiously above the tossing torrent. The twins are pitched forward with the force of water and Liu Sheng’s silk wrap is drenched and almost snatched away.
Turvy is hit on the head by a pot with one handle. Topsy tries to swim but the water is too rough. At last they land on an icy ledge, the phoenix perching above, her feathers of four colours drenched and drooping.
They are on the Jade Mountain, built in memory of Yu the Great, who toiled for nine years to save China from the Flood.
A huge wave rises and round the bend tilts a great palace, its golden walls winking in the sun, now lying in pale pools on the mountain. The twins and Liu Sheng are pitched in through the open door, while Feng Huang flutters onto the curved roof. Inside, seated on a fine chair, is a girl in clothes of many colours, the tears rolling as fast as the flood waters, down her face.
“Have you come to throw me to the River God?” she sobs.
“No, we shall rescue you,” says Liu Sheng. She is a young bride the emperor wants to drown, to please the River God, so the Flood will cease.
Topsy remembers Viana’s words, “Something beautiful, something rare, rescued from great danger.” Already they have rescued the phoenix. A beautiful bride should tame the Tokhashi in no time.
Pots, boxes and furniture roll round the floor as the palace pitches forward. “If we survive this Flood, you can help us find the Tokhashi,” says Topsy, “What’s your name?”
“Yung t’ai. I’ve just been married but my husband was swept away in the water.” As Topsy stands by Yung t’ai, she sees her tears have turned to pearls and catches them one by one.
Yung ‘tai, the princess, whose tears turned to pearls of wisdom
Feng Huang sweeps through the door and says, “Ah. The pearls of wisdom. They will help if all else fails.”
Topsy, now very tired, clutches them tightly. The palace lurches downstream and Turvy is hit again, this time on the shin by a bouncing bowl. The twins wonder if they will find the odds and ends that Zazhak promised they would eat in the Other Worlds and sink sadly onto a carpet which is about to slide across the floor.
Feng Huang shakes her wet feathers and laughing, says, “The River God is livid. He cannot drown Yung t’ai and he’s carrying us towards the Cave of the Tokhashi. So hold tight and close the door.”
They heave the go
lden door shut and listen to the roar of the water outside. A deep voice gurgles under the floor. “Yung t’ai, Yung t’ai!”
“The River God!” gasps Turvy.
Suddenly, with a clatter, the palace halts and the door swings open. Gingerly, Turvy peers out. The mountains are bathed in sunshine. The water laps gently at the door. The flood of the River God has been dried to a muddy trickle by the sun.
The twins step outside onto a warm rock. Liu Sheng follows, blinking in the bright light after so many years in a tomb. Yung t’ai tiptoes out in her embroidered slippers and Feng Huang spreads the fine fan of her wing feathers.
“So where is the Cave of the Tokhashi?” asks Turvy. With a rumble, the rocks vanish and the tangle of Viana’s hair reappears.
“Oooh!” shouts Yung t’ai, clinging hard to a swinging strand.
“Ow!” yells Liu Sheng, twisting one foot in an unprincely way round another. The twins spin and grab handfuls of hair. Only Feng Huang perches peacefully above.
There is a light wind like a woman laughing.
“That’s probably Viana,” says Topsy, trying again to eat some shimmering fruit. But it simply slips from her hands.
Suddenly a loud trumpeting echoes from above. Everyone looks up to see an elephant, his grey skin brightly painted with flowers, swinging by his trunk which is twisted in a large knot.
“Viana, take us away from here!” cries Topsy, fearing the elephant will fall. The wind lightly lifts the hair once more. Then it vanishes and everyone is standing