Paper Mage

by Leah R. Cutter

  Xiao Yen’s tent, provided for her by her foreign patrons, was made of black oiled leather. It was long enough for Xiao Yen to lie down and be covered. A padded comforter covered the floor of the tent. The apex of the tent was high enough for her to sit upright. After Udo placed her bags inside, Xiao Yen sank down, glad to sit on ground that didn’t move.

  Udo yelled again at his brother. Why couldn’t they address each other in normal tones? Ehran came over to where Udo stood. Xiao Yen decided that, in dim light, he might pass for a wealthy merchant from her land, the Middle Kingdom. He wasn’t as tall as Udo. Ehran also weighed more. He carried his extra weight around his belly. His beard grew out of his chin, thin and black. He let his black hair hang loose around his shoulders. His skin was darker than Udo’s, and his features were much wider. His nose spread across his face like it had melted. Only his round eyes ruined the illusion.

  Ehran spoke rapidly to Udo, gesturing at Xiao Yen. She caught the word “protection.” She stifled a groan and wished the earth would open up and swallow her whole. All she wanted to do was to sleep. How could riding a horse all day make her so tired? Her legs ached at the thought of getting up, but she knew she must. She needed to set up the defenses for the camp that night.

  She reached up to touch her luck. When her fingers closed upon the empty space around her neck she nearly growled. She had no luck. She rubbed the back of her left hand. The faint scar there held no magic. As she flexed her fingers she remembered the willow branch her mother had given her. Where was it?

  She looked under her bags. The branch wasn’t there. She remembered holding the branch when she’d been on her horse, letting it cry the tears she couldn’t. Then she’d dropped it when Udo had put her bags on the ground. Xiao Yen got out of her tent and stood up. The edges of her vision dimmed. Xiao Yen closed her eyes and took three deep breaths to steady herself.

  She opened her eyes in time to see the trail guide throw her willow branch on the cooking fire.

  Xiao Yen wanted to turn around and crawl back into her tent, pull her comforter over her head, and never get up again. The green willow wood sizzled and crackled on the fire. Any hope that things would be better after she left Bao Fang also went up in smoke.

  Udo said something from behind her. Xiao Yen acquiesced without fully understanding what he asked. It was time for her to do her duty, in front of these strangers, luck or no. Master Wei had said she had skill as well as luck. She hoped he was right.

  She followed Udo around the edges of the camp, memorizing landmarks. Then she went to her tent. Her special bag was there, made of stiff oiled leather, the sides supported with straight pieces of wood, so that the paper she carried wouldn’t get wet or be crushed. She sent another quick prayer of thanks to Master Wei for such a thoughtful parting gift. She reverently pulled out a sheet of paper and put her bag over her shoulder. Then she walked to the southern edge of the camp, the one closest to her home.

  Xiao Yen sat on the cold ground with the paper in her lap. She breathed deeply, pulling her breath down past her fast-beating heart into her center where she imagined a pebble tumbling over and over. She concentrated on the revolving rock. She filled herself with the sound of the night wind pulling at the winter leaves and the scent of the spring hidden in the thawing ground. The image of a silver river came to Xiao Yen, the place where she felt most comfortable, her still place, the home of her quiet.

  Calmer now, Xiao Yen bowed three times to the west, the direction of Xian and the Emperor, touching her forehead on the cold earth each time. Then she lifted her hands and prayed to Zhang Gua Lao, the immortal. When she finished, she raised her arms, glad to see they were as steady and as motionless as the arms of a carved Buddha.

  She picked up the piece of paper and made her first two folds, mountain-folds, bringing the lower corners to the back of the paper, close to the middle. Then she valley-folded the top layer only, creasing the paper from the lower edge to just past the center. She made a valley-fold of the small remaining square, pulling the fold between her nails so it was sharp. Then she unfolded the paper and looked at the resulting lines. They were crisp, well defined, like the trimmed edges of a wooden fan. Pleased, she folded more.

  When she finished, her creation wasn’t much bigger than her outstretched hand, but its legs were solid, its ears large, and its tail supple. Even the two fangs looked sharp. Xiao Yen was happy with her tiger. She was also relieved her first try had worked, that she didn’t have to make a second attempt in front of her new employers. She put her beast on the ground where she had previously touched her forehead. Still feeling the folds in her fingers, she closed her eyes and let the tiger grow larger and larger in her mind. She imagined its soft fur rippling as it paced, its whiskers bobbing, its paws as big as her thigh, ready to rend any strangers to pieces.

  The collective gasp behind her told her she’d succeeded. She opened her eyes to a golden tiger glow. A surety and wildness filled its eyes. Xiao Yen didn’t know she possessed or could have imparted such emotion.

  Holding her tiger’s gaze, Xiao Yen let the path around their camp, a series of landmarks she had memorized earlier, saturate her vision. The first landmark was just north of the tents: a little bush, buds only, no leaves; next was a thin sapling with more white than gray in its trunk; and then a small rock with brown veins on the right and a hollow in a tree on the left. She thought about every spot she’d chosen around the border of their camp in sequence, visualizing the unique aspects of each. When she thought of the last marker, finishing the circle around their camp, the tiger, with a sudden jump, sprang to its duty. It would patrol from one place to the next, protecting their camp with its presence as it prowled the perimeter for the entire night.

  Xiao Yen pulled five candles out of her bag. She placed them at the five compass points around the paper figure still on the ground: north, south, east, west, and center. Then she stood to fetch a small branch from the fire with which to light the candles.

  Udo, Ehran, Bei Xi, and her guard stood in a line behind her. Udo asked something in a choked tone. Bei Xi translated.

  “How long . . . ?”

  “Until the sun comes up,” Xiao Yen replied, indicating with her hand, palm raised.

  Ehran asked something, his voice a little more normal than his brother’s. Ehran didn’t look up as he asked the question. His gaze stayed focused on his fingers, fiddling with the knife hilt sticking out from his belt.

  Bei Xi translated. “Will it stay outside the camp?”

  “Outside, yes. It will follow the path I made.”

  “Is it dangerous?” Udo asked, his voice now under his control again.

  Finally a question that Xiao Yen could answer without translation. “To others, if they see it. It can kill,” Xiao Yen lied. Xiao Yen’s teacher, Master Wei, could create a deadly tiger, but Xiao Yen didn’t have the wisdom or understanding yet.

  Bei Xi smiled. “Ay! We’re lucky to have you with us.”

  Lucky? Was she lucky to be here, so far away from her family and everything she’d ever known? She’d lost her luck, maybe forever. With her luck gone, how could she gain enough merit to win Wang Tie-Tie an immortal peach? Xiao Yen was certain she was the unluckiest girl in the world.

  * * *

  Xiao Yen yawned loudly, knowing it was disrespectful, hoping Mama would notice her boredom just the same. Instead, Gan Ou, her sister, hissed at her. Gan Ou was older, almost ten. She was supposed to take care of Xiao Yen, baby-sit her seven-year-old sister, but all she did was tease Xiao Yen and pull her hair when they were alone. In front of Mama, Gan Ou pretended to be the best daughter.

  Xiao Yen raised her hands again and tried to pray. She was so tired of praying. She was sorry Papa and her three older brothers had gone to the Heavenly Pavilion, but hadn’t they always been gone anyway? Working or traveling or trading? And how would praying to Jing Long, the dragon at the bottom of the well in the center of the city, help them at the bottom of the river Quang? Xiao Yen had hoped the
y’d go to the altar next to the river to pray that day, but Mama had taken them to the White Temple instead.

  The priest that morning had talked to Mama about the dragon being the symbol of change. He’d told the story of how the dragon rose out of the water in the spring to bring the summer rains. Mama had only thanked him and told her daughters to continue to pray for the change to stop, or reverse itself.

  The candles on either side of the altar flickered. Xiao Yen followed the smoke rising to the ceiling. The aqua and scarlet scales of the dragon painted on the wall shimmered, and its white belly looked hard. It played with a pearl as it rose through the clouds. Xiao Yen imagined riding the dragon, floating through the sky, her hair blown back like the dragon’s golden whiskers. Its back would feel solid and warm under her legs, like a sunny rock near the river. They would spiral up and up, above the clouds, into the sky where the blue was so pure and thick it would be like swimming.

  Mama put her hands on the ground and touched her forehead to the earth. Xiao Yen watched out of the corner of her eye, hopeful. Was Mama finished? Xiao Yen sighed again when Mama sat back, still absorbed in prayer. It gave her an idea though.

  Xiao Yen put her hands on the ground and lowered her head, like her mother had. Then she pushed with her hands, scooting backward. She did this three times, until she was behind her mother and her sister.

  She stood up, holding her breath in case Mama or her sister noticed. Her legs wobbled. Mama still prayed. Gan Ou still pretended to pray. The candlelit dragon flew above them, out of the shadows, toward the light. A bubble of excitement filled Xiao Yen’s chest. The strain of being quiet for so long expanded inside her, racing down her arms and legs to her fingers and toes, tingling. The tension stretched tighter and tighter until it snapped. She spun and ran into the sunlit courtyard.

  It felt so good to run, to move freely. The warm sunlight on Xiao Yen’s head and back soothed her. She watched the ground as she ran. Chalk was mixed in with the stone in the courtyard, and if she stamped hard enough, sometimes tiny clouds of white powder rose from her feet. She slowed as she approached the spirit wall in front of the gate on the far side of the temple complex, tapped a hinge on the gate, then took off again. She decided to run the full length of the courtyard five times, once for each of the five compass points.

  To the right of the courtyard stood a large Buddhist temple. Round pillars held up the blue-tiled sloped roof. The Buddha sat cross-legged with one hand on his knee, three fingers pointing toward the ground, summoning the earth goddess Ma Tou to witness his enlightenment. The wooden shutters along the sides of the temple had been taken down so the monks could sit in their alcoves and fill the courtyard with their chanted prayers.

  Xiao Yen had reached Jing Long’s temple and was going back toward the gate when a pair of feet and a brilliant flash of saffron appeared before her. Xiao Yen squealed and lurched to the side, landing on her shoulder.

  When she looked up, kind brown eyes smiled at her over a silver tray. Xiao Yen stammered and used the most formal phrases she knew to address the monk.

  “Excuse me, honorable sir.”

  “Are you hurt?”

  “No,” Xiao Yen replied as she stood up. She tried to stand very tall, but she still couldn’t see what the monk carried on his tray.

  “You were lucky you didn’t run into me and spoil all my hard work.”

  Xiao Yen felt comforted by his words. Everyone told her she was lucky. She reached up and touched the gold amulet hanging around her neck. Wang Tie-Tie had given it to her forty days after she’d been born, as part of her naming ceremony. It brought her luck. It had a stylized dragon claw on one side, representing the year of her birth, and the character for luck, Fù, on the other. Fu was also her family name, but it had a different character, and meant “teacher.”

  “Would you like to see?” the monk asked.

  “Please,” Xiao Yen replied.

  The monk bent at the waist and lowered the silver tray to Xiao Yen’s eye level. A delicate tree grew out of the center, strung out of tiny white jasmine blossoms. Eight yellow-gold peaches rested on the tray, circling the tree, attached to the branches with intricate knots. The sweet scent made Xiao Yen smile.

  “Do you know who this is for?” the monk asked.

  Xiao Yen replied more casually, “Yes, it’s for Old Zhang and the other immortals.”

  The monk raised his eyebrows. “I’m glad you’re so familiar with them.”

  Xiao Yen thought the monk was making fun of her, but she wasn’t sure, so she spoke more formally again. “My aunt, Wang Kong-Jing, admires the immortal Zhang Gua Lao. She often tells me stories about him and his paper mule.”

  “Does your auntie tell good stories?” the monk asked as he straightened up.

  “They’re very good stories,” Xiao Yen replied.

  “It’s good you listen to your Tie-Tie,” the monk said. “You might want to go see her now, and not run around the courtyard.”

  Xiao Yen’s cheeks grew hot as she blushed. The monk walked toward the main temple, where the big Buddha sat. Xiao Yen didn’t want to go back inside. She sighed and looked around the courtyard. Emerald green ivy covered the northern wall with leaves as large as her hand, Xiao Yen walked along the wall, dragging her fingers through them. They bounced when she tapped them. It made her laugh. She sat down to watch them.

  On the ground, in the warm sunshine, she couldn’t feel any wind. There must have been some though, because the ivy leaves sometimes moved in circles or bounced up and down. The wall behind the ivy was made of mud bricks painted over with white plaster. Something shiny had gotten mixed in with the plaster. When the leaves bounced out of the way and the sun touched the wall, it glittered. Xiao Yen laughed again.

  “What are you laughing at?” asked someone from behind her. She didn’t like the voice. It sounded like a grown-up version of her sister. Gan Ou sometimes pretended to be interested in what Xiao Yen was doing just so she could ridicule Xiao Yen.

  Xiao Yen turned to see where the voice came from. A man stood behind her. He was old, maybe as old as Wang Tie-Tie, the oldest person Xiao Yen knew. Though his skin was smooth and few wrinkles gathered around his mouth, his eyes told her he’d seen ten thousand sunsets. His lips were thin and his nose hooked on the end like a hawk’s beak. His eyebrows, still thick and black, flew across his forehead like raven’s wings. His neck was as long and skinny as a crane’s. He wore black shoes, black pants bound around his ankles with black and silver wrappings, and a long black jacket that had a pattern of dancing cranes on it.

  “You laugh? Why?” he asked again.

  The simple language astonished Xiao Yen. Did he think she was like Chu Long Yi’s baby, who’d been three years old before he’d learned to crawl? She’d show him. She turned and pointed to the wall, addressing him directly, like an equal, instead of as an elder.

  “I’m watching the glass-colored salamanders. See? There goes one!” she said, her finger following the path of the wind. “It’s racing another one under the ivy leaves. That’s what sparkles in the sun. And see there?” She pointed to a leaf bobbing up and down. “There’s one sitting under that leaf. It has its three tails spread across the wall. It’s tickling the stem, telling the leaf to grow. Its fingers are long and jointed, like bamboo. See?” Xiao Yen laughed again at the picture in her head.

  The old man stared at Xiao Yen as if she had glass salamanders climbing all over her, and he was a bird that ate such things. “Might I have the honor of knowing your name?” he asked, very formally.

  “My family name is Fu, my formal name is Xi Wén, but everyone calls me Xiao Yen.”

  “ ‘Xiao’ as in little?” the man asked.

  “Yes,” Xiao Yen said. “And ‘Yen’ is the bird, the little brown one, that Wang Tie-Tie tells me stories about, that would die before it stole food.”

  “A sparrow,” the man said.

  “Correct,” Xiao Yen replied.

  The man bowed his head to her. �
�My surname is Wei. I am opening a school here, the Dancing Crane Defense school.”

  Xiao Yen bowed in return, not sure what he meant.

  “I hope my improper daughter hasn’t been disturbing you.”

  Xiao Yen hadn’t heard any footsteps, but her mother now stood behind her. Hastily Xiao Yen stood up. What had she been thinking, talking with such familiarity to a stranger? An older person at that? Wang Tie-Tie would speak strictly to her for an hour or more when she found out.

  “No, she’s been politeness itself,” the old man replied.

  Gan Ou shot Xiao Yen a look that implied the improbability of that.

  “I’m here to ask the priests for blessings for my new school. Might I have the honor of calling upon your household after we’re finished, gracious Lady Fu?”

  Fu Be Be replied, “You may. Now please excuse us, honorable sir. We must be going.”

  The old man bowed low as they passed. When Xiao Yen looked back, he was still watching her with that hungry look, even though a monk had come up to him and was trying to lead him toward the main temple.

  “My turn!” Xiao Yen called. She turned her back to her two cousins and threw the ball over her head. It landed in the dirt with a solid thunk, the grain inside the sewn-leather bag giving it extra weight. It bounced once, then rolled a little.

  Xiao Yen turned around and urged the ball to roll more with her hands. However, the ball was a plain ball, not magic like the one in the story of Princess Lu: it wouldn’t go wherever its owner wished. It stopped moving five paces away from the line drawn in the dirt.

  “Drat,” Xiao Yen said. The ball had to be within one pace for her to win.

  Ling-Ling, her older cousin, laughed and said, “Now it’s my turn to tell you what to do.” She walked to where Xiao Yen stood.