Century #4: Dragon of Seas

by Pierdomenico Baccalario

  “These are just … Chinese shadows,” the boy continues. “The objects … the offerings to the Sea Dragon … Look!”

  Sheng steps over to the first hole in the floor. He measures it with his eye and says, “Imagine slipping the Star of Stone into one of these holes.”

  “Okay … What then?”

  Sheng smiles. “Next, fill it with paper and light a fire inside it.” He looks overhead. “See that ugly mask on the ceiling?”

  “Keep going.…”

  “It looks like it was designed to hold a rope. Tie a rope to its beak and hang the Ring of Fire over the flame. The mirror reflects the light … in this direction.”

  Now Sheng is standing in the space between the statues of Isis and Mithra.

  “Look at Isis. She’s holding out her arm. Let’s imagine the other statue doing the same thing. Like they’re holding something up. Hang the Veil of Isis between them and what do you get?”

  “A curtain,” Ermete replies. Then he exclaims, “No! You’ve made a projection! The light from the fire passes over the dragon, then onto the curtain … and it hits that wall with the blue mosaic, casting …”

  “A Chinese shadow play,” Sheng concludes.

  Ermete studies the blue-tiled wall and guesses the final piece in the puzzle. “That wall isn’t a wall … it’s the sea!”

  “Exactly,” Sheng says, nodding. “And I’m convinced that the letters on the Veil of Isis combined with the dragon’s shadow cast a projection on the sea that’ll show us how to find …”

  “The island.”

  A long silence follows as the two let the importance of their discovery sink in.

  Suddenly, a burst of applause fills the room. The cruel, mocking noise echoes through the ice-cold underground level.

  Ermete and Sheng look up and see a man smirking at them from above.

  It’s Heremit Devil.

  “Nice work,” the man hisses, still applauding. “Excellent work.”

  Then he adds sadistically, “And welcome to my home.”

  HEREMIT DEVIL SLOWLY DESCENDS A STAIRCASE CARVED INTO THE dark side of the underground hall. As he does, he says, “Excellent, young man. A remarkable job, truly …”

  Behind him appears the Chinese man with the shaved head, the one Sheng and Ermete saw at the Grand Hyatt. And he isn’t alone: he’s leading a team of security men dressed in black.

  When Heremit reaches them, he still has a faint smile on his face. “I can finally put a face to a name, Sheng,” he hisses, keeping a certain distance from the two of them. “If you only knew how long I’ve been looking for you! I couldn’t find out what your name was. It was a well-kept secret, it seems.”

  “Let us go, Mr. Devil,” Sheng replies, a tinge of disappointment in his voice, “and I promise you’ll never hear my name again!”

  “Does that go for your friends as well?”

  Heremit Devil gestures to his men, who lead Harvey, Elettra and Mistral down the stairs, bound and gagged. Next, they bring Jacob Mahler, who’s unconscious.

  “What did you do to them?” Sheng says, almost shouting, when he sees his friends staggering down the stairs.

  Harvey’s ears are filled with softened wax. Mistral’s mouth is bound so she can’t move her lips. Elettra is bundled up in a complex outfit of blue bindings that make it almost impossible for her to walk.

  Heremit Devil waits until they’re beside him and then explains, “What did I do to them? Nothing. I defended myself, that’s all. Your American friend said he could hear strange voices, so I thought I’d spare him that. I think it’s best to keep the pretty French girl from singing, given that she has the unpleasant habit of attracting horrible insects with her voice. As for your electrifying friend from Rome, I decided to contain her vitality with a dress made of polyester and porcelain.”

  “You turned her into a capacitor!” Ermete exclaims, realizing Elettra has been electrically isolated.

  Heremit Devil shoots him a piercing glare. “You never keep quiet, do you, Mr. De Panfilis?”

  Ermete stares at Jacob Mahler, who’s been dumped to the ground at their feet and lies there, unconscious. But Heremit Devil doesn’t offer a word of explanation about the killer. He turns to look at Sheng again and continues. “Your friends tried to attack me, Sheng. But as you can see, their attack failed. I am very angry with them. But with you … things are different. You’ve given me the best-possible explanation of how this Dragon Hall works. The archeologist studied it for years, inch by inch. A waste of time. While you, young man, understood everything there was to understand in minutes.”

  Sheng looks at his friends and clenches his teeth, unsure what to do.

  Heremit Devil slowly takes off his glasses. “And it’s strange, indeed, given that you shouldn’t even be here. Given that you aren’t one of the four … chosen ones.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Heremit looks back and gestures to Nik Knife, who rips the gag off Elettra’s mouth.

  “Don’t believe him!” the girl shouts instantly. “Don’t believe a single word he tells you!”

  “Go on,” Heremit Devil invites her. “Why don’t you explain to Sheng that the real chosen one was replaced at the last minute?”

  Sheng’s lip starts to tremble. “Who told you that?”

  “He’s lying!” Elettra shouts again. “He’s lying! You were chosen, just like we were!”

  “The chosen one from Shanghai was a boy called Hi-Nau,” Heremit Devil says coldly. “A boy with extraordinary powers. A boy who could see things others couldn’t even imagine. He saw other people’s dreams walking around like real people. But Hi-Nau was a tormented child. Because the dreams he saw during the day were often terrible. But the dreams kept on speaking to him, and they were terrible because they were his father’s dreams. And so one day Hi-Nau went to his father and asked him why he had dreams like that, asked him if he really was a person who killed other people.”

  Sheng stays silent, as if petrified.

  “And the father answered yes, he was a man who killed other people. And that was how the father lost him.” Heremit Devil whirls around to stare at the black dragon that’s ready to leap out at the blue mosaic wall. “Hi-Nau discovered this place. He dreamed of it the night before he died and called it the Magi Hall. He was eight years old.”

  An icy silence descends on the Magi Hall. The only sound is the air conditioner, which continues to pump freezing-cold air into the underground level.

  “Hi-Nau was my son,” Heremit Devil concludes, after a seemingly endless pause. “And he didn’t make it. He’d always been very ill, but I always believed that somehow he would live longer. I thought his ‘power’ would save him. Instead, it consumed him. He died in his sleep on the second-to-top floor of this building, at the end of the hallway he’d covered with drawings. He was still wearing his favorite shirt. When it happened, I was on the top floor, where I conducted my business. A place I’ve rarely returned to.” The hermit devil clasps his hands together so tightly that his knuckles turn pale. “Ever since that night, I’ve wanted to understand what was hidden down here below the building. What this room meant. And why my son had the gift of seeing those things. The gift that made me lose him forever.”

  “Number eighty-nine,” Sheng says.

  Heremit Devil spins around. “What?”

  “Your son’s favorite shirt had the number eighty-nine on it.”

  “How do you—”

  “He was the one who led me here. I can see him. I see other people’s dreams, too. And you dream about him every night.”

  Heremit Devil stares at Sheng with tiger eyes, his fists clenched. Then he walks away.

  He orders his men to bind and gag both the boy and Ermete. And to bring him the objects that are on his desk.

  It’s time to awaken the dragon.

  They place the Star of Stone in the fourth of the seven visible holes in the floor of the hall. They fill it with paper soaked in alcohol and set fire to
it. They hang the Ring of Fire over the Star. Spread out in front of the lapis lazuli wall, the Veil of Isis casts a series of dotted lines and golden shadows that, combined with others present on the wall, form a coastline and an immediately legible sentence.

  Now enlarged on the mosaic, the Veil of Isis is both a map of time and a geographical chart. The writing indicates the year, month and date on which Penglang Island will emerge from the waters of the ocean. The gold line along its lower edge is the coastline. And the dragon’s shadow seems to start from there to reach a specific point: the location of the Pearl of the Sea.

  All of this is discovered little by little by Heremit Devil’s team. The kids watch, impassive, as his men proceed to translate the calendar and calculate the island’s exact position. Ermete watches their every step, moving his lips as if he was taking part, too. Sitting off to the side in grim silence, Heremit Devil waits. His stony stare is broken only by an uncontrollable tic in his left eye. His one concern is that someone might hear his heart pounding furiously.

  In the end, when the code is broken, they put out the fire, cover the mirror, drape the veil over the statue of Isis like a gown, remove the pearl from the dragon’s shoulder blades. Then the four objects are handed to Heremit Devil.

  Nik Knife gives him his report. “According to our calculations, sir, the island should already be visible. It is four hundred and eighty kilometers north by northeast of here. If I leave now, I can reach it in under two hours.”

  The tic in Heremit Devil’s left eye grows stronger. “Have the helicopter prepared.”

  Nik Knife makes a little bow and turns to walk away.

  Heremit Devil clenches his teeth before he manages to add, “Have them prepare a place for me as well.”

  Nik Knife hesitates. He thinks he heard wrong. Since he started working for Heremit Devil, the man hasn’t left the building once.

  But it’s only a matter of an instant. “Very well, sir,” he murmurs, disappearing into the shadows.

  FANTASTIC, JUST FANTASTIC, ERMETE THINKS AN HOUR LATER. Exactly the kind of fate I always imagined.

  He jabs his tongue against the tape that seals his mouth shut, feels the glue that’s saturated his lips. He looks around. He’s tied to the wall of the rainwater reservoir that he and Sheng passed through only a few hours ago. Overhead, he sees the gray light of the sky over Shanghai dripping down into the reservoir through the manholes. Below, the level of the murky water rises steadily, with streams of water pouring into it from the many ducts.

  He tries to wriggle free from his ropes, but it’s no use. Heremit Devil’s men did an excellent job. His hands, arms and shoulders are tightly bound to the iron rings on the cement wall, leaving him no chance of moving. The coil upon coil of rope wound around him look like a silk cocoon. But he isn’t destined to turn into a butterfly. His end will be that of a drowned rat. With the dirty water slowly rising at his feet.

  The engineer senses a movement beside him. He cranes his head to look.

  Jacob Mahler is tied up to his right, but the man isn’t moving. He has the swollen face of someone who’s been beaten to a pulp. His head is slumped down onto his shoulder and his body is limp in the harness of ropes and tape.

  To Ermete’s left is the giant Mademoiselle Cybel. A network of ropes twice as thick as his own are keeping her suspended over the surface of the water.

  The woman still wears the same dress she had on when she walked out of Heremit Devil’s office. She’s the one who’s been squirming, trying to break free, for almost half an hour now. It’s like watching an elephant writhe around in a whale net.

  There are better chances of the whole cement wall collapsing, Ermete thinks, than this woman managing to get out of those ropes.

  He looks up at the manholes again. If only he could call out for help!

  Cascades of murky water are crashing down around him. If it keeps raining this hard, Jacob will be submerged in the water in under an hour. Then it’ll be Ermete’s turn. And, finally, Mademoiselle Cybel’s. Otherwise they’ll die more slowly, from hunger and thirst.

  The engineer continues to jab his tongue against the tape in useless attempts to get it off his mouth.

  Then the reservoir walls begin to tremble and he stops.

  They’re leaving, thinks Ermete.

  A massive shadow swoops over the manholes, the shadow of a Sikorsky S-61, a medium/heavy-lift naval rescue chopper. Ermete has used it dozens of times in his role-playing games with friends. Eight tons of warfare helicopter with twin General Electric T58-GE10 turbines, five-blade main rotor, 16.69 meters long and 5.13 meters high, a 1,000-kilometer range with a top speed of 267 kilometers per hour.

  The Sea King.

  The roar of the Sikorsky soon fades away and silence returns to the reservoir. Ermete senses more movement beside him, this time accompanied by the sound of flesh moving. Amazingly, Mademoiselle Cybel has managed to free her massive right leg from the ropes. And now she’s continuing her movements of friction and traction, trying to free her other leg.

  A lingering death, Ermete thinks.

  That’s all it is.

  Then, unexpectedly, something hits the engineer. Mademoiselle Cybel’s foot has struck him full in the face. The woman’s head is turned in his direction and she’s moving her eyes as if trying to communicate with him.

  Cybel kicks him and rolls her eyes again. Ermete can’t understand what she’s trying to do.

  She waves her foot with long, purple-polished toenails in front of his nose and a second later runs her toes over the ropes that are keeping her trapped.

  Ermete soon starts to get it. Sharp toenails … Mademoiselle Cybel wants to use them to get the tape off his mouth so he can call for help through the manholes!

  A ridiculous, exhausting, crazy plan. But maybe their only chance of getting out of there alive. Ermete nods. Then he stretches his neck out toward the woman and lets himself be struck by another massive kick, which knocks his head back against the cement wall.

  This time, he feels the inside of his lip sting. He jabs his tongue against the tape and has the sensation his gag might have moved a fraction of an inch.

  He stretches out his neck.

  Again.

  And again.

  Meanwhile, the water below him continues to rise.

  Nik Knife is at the controls of the Sikorsky S-61. The copilot is seated next to him, checking the instruments.

  Behind them, in a black leather seat, an expressionless Heremit Devil wears a dark gray life vest over his impeccable Korean jacket. The man is rigidly clutching a handle, a seat belt strapped over his chest. All that’s seen through the windows is the flat expanse of the ocean. A shimmering slab of slate. Gray everywhere, except for the long crests of the waves.

  “Fog at twelve-six-six,” Nik Knife says into his microphone, which is connected to the copilot’s headphones.

  The noise on board and the vibrations of the bulkheads prevent any other communication. The knife thrower slows down the engine and descends. Now, under the helicopter’s belly, the uniform expanse of the waves becomes crystal-clear, revealing the shimmering backs of schools of silvery fish. A breathtaking sight that whizzes by at 212 kilometers an hour before Sheng, Harvey, Elettra and Mistral’s eyes.

  The four kids are sitting one beside the other, like parachutists ready to jump. They don’t know what’s going to become of them. And they don’t know what’s become of Ermete.

  “I’m sorry,” Sheng told the others when they were pushed on board.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” Harvey told him.

  The American boy looked at the two gagged girls. Elettra, in her insulating straitjacket, and Mistral, who had a long scratch on her neck. Signs of a pointless struggle.

  We were outnumbered, he told himself. In his mind’s eye, he could still see the top floor of the building, with gusts of rain and wind coming in through the shattered windows. The distant sounds from the street. The shouts of the service staff. The electric
al circuits shorting out, letting off bursts of sparks. The elevators coming to a halt. The printers spewing out tons of paper, the hot tubs going berserk, the electric furnaces overheating. And insects everywhere, in their eyes, in their ears, in every room. Hopeless.

  Totally hopeless.

  “I should’ve been there, too,” Sheng murmured, letting them strap a seat belt on him.

  “Nobody should’ve been there,” Harvey replied as the helicopter climbed into the air and left Shanghai behind it.

  The sea disappears from sight as the helicopter flies into a thick bank of fog. The emergency lights go on. And there’s nothing more to be seen.

  “Slow down,” Nik Knife says into the microphone. “Let’s descend twenty meters.” As they zoom along, the shuddering, whirling turbines rip the fog to shreds.

  Heremit Devil stares straight ahead. Then he looks at the four chosen ones, his eyes lingering on Sheng, as if he wants to ask him something.

  But he doesn’t.

  * * *

  “I see it. One o’clock,” Nik Knife says half an hour later. He points at a flashing green blip that has just appeared on the radar. All around them, fog. Thick, dense, mysterious fog. “Twelve kilometers. Approaching. Ten.”

  Heremit Devil leans forward to rest his hand on the pilot’s seat. “How big is it?” he asks.

  “It looks like an atoll. Seven, eight hundred meters in diameter at most. We will begin to descend.”

  The Sikorsky’s nose dips forward and the helicopter drops down almost to sea level. Looking outside, Sheng has the sensation he can almost hear the waves churning. The fog thins out and offers a trace of visibility. It’s like an empty gap between two walls: gray fog above, dark water below.

  “There,” Nik Knife says, pointing to the right.

  Far off on the horizon, the fog thickens into a storm. A gray curtain indicates the line of the rain, which seems to hide everything else from sight. Sudden bolts of lightning streak from the sky to crash down into the sea. And in the middle of that raging sea, between heaven and earth, the darker line of an island.

  Penglang.