Steel Crow Saga

by Paul Krueger

  “But the magistrate oversaw this case personally,” Warden Qu said. The man himself looked deeply uncomfortable where he stood. “The evidence presented a clear case for Lee Yeon-Ji’s guilt in this despicable criminal enterprise.”

  “Yes, well, that’s our infallible justice system for you,” said the inspector airily. “It finds the guilty party each time, and sentences them justly. Why, you could say the only way our justice system would ever fail someone would be if one of our own magistrates were to commit a crime, pin it on a convenient innocent, and then handle the case personally to ensure things went his way. But,” she added as her smile suddenly gained an edge, “that wouldn’t be possible, would it?”

  She took a step up onto the scaffold, toward the magistrate. He yelped a little and visibly shrank from her. “If something like that were to happen,” the inspector said with theatrical thoughtfulness, “it would almost certainly attract the attention of…well, of the Li-Quan, I suppose. Don’t you agree, Magist—oh look, he’s running.”

  Magistrate How had leapt off the scaffolding and immediately taken off at a clumsy dash. “Open the gate!” he shrieked to the attending guards. He didn’t seem terribly athletic to begin with, but his ceremonial robes were laden down with rainwater, and that definitely wasn’t helping him. “Open the gate and get me away from this corrupt, raving, clearly insane—”

  The guards milled around in confusion. The warden sputtered like a cheap Dahali motorbike. Even the executioner seemed to be at a loss for what to do next. Only two people were calm: Lee and the inspector.

  Lee nodded to his retreating figure. “Looks like he’s getting away.”

  The inspector’s smile was as lopsided as her hat. “I would dispute your observation.” She brought her fingers to her mouth and whistled. It was high and piercing, and Lee marveled such a loud noise could come from someone so small. She frowned. What was this woman thinking—that the magistrate would just turn around at the noise and come back like a dog?

  But just before the magistrate could make it to the gate, the tiles in front of his feet exploded up from the ground. The warden gave a high-pitched squeal as a spray of dirt and water blew him off his feet. And into sight scurried a rat-shade the size of a large dog, or even a small pony. Its fur looked to be bright white, though at the moment it was matted with brown mud. In the gloom, one eye glinted pink, like a chunk of tourmaline set in its skull. In the other, a plain white eye bore a black pactmark: a square divided into quarters, like a windowpane.

  But of course, the real eye-catchers were its large yellow teeth.

  “Bring him here, Kou!” the inspector said as calmly as if she were directing laborers hanging a painting. In reply, the rat-shade lunged straight for the screaming magistrate, clamped its jaws around his leg, and scurried back toward the gibbet.

  Lee noted that the rat-shade was not particularly delicate about how it dragged the magistrate across the courtyard’s stony floor.

  “This is an insult!” the magistrate howled. He pointed a narrow finger at the inspector. “I challenge you to gui juedou for my freedom!”

  The woman grinned. Lee got the impression she’d been hoping he’d say that. And for a moment, Lee thought she was about to witness an impromptu honor duel.

  But then the inspector said, “The rite of gui juedou is forfeit when an agent of the Li-Quan gets involved. But challenge me anyway, and be twice humiliated in the doing. Now do me the courtesy of being quiet, or I shall have Kou ensure your silence myself.”

  The magistrate shut up.

  “Warden Qu,” the inspector said, reaching into her coat again. She pulled out a thick envelope and tossed it to the warden. But the throw was clumsy, and the envelope landed in a puddle well short of the warden. The inspector kept her voice smooth and even, but Lee didn’t miss the color that crept up to her eartips. “In here, you’ll find irrefutable proof that Magistrate How is an organ smuggler and salesman. That should be enough to free Madam Lee.”

  Qu picked up the envelope, blinking numbly at it. “In a sense, yes,” she said faintly. “But there’s due process to go through, and a magistrate would need to sign off on it. I could dial up the neighboring magistrate, but it would take at least two days to get release papers to them, and another two days for those papers to return with their signature.”

  Lee thought about it for a moment, then said, “You don’t need their signature to release me,” she said. She eyed the inspector carefully, wondering if she had the right measure of the woman. Then she rolled the dice and continued: “You see, I’m an agent of the Li-Quan.”

  It took half a second for the inspector’s surprise to bleed into a mischievous smile.

  The warden already looked flustered enough. Now she seemed all but beside herself. “What?” she said, her head snapping up to her prisoner. “No, you’re not! You’re…you’re…”

  “Jeongsonese?” said the inspector. “Very observant of you, Warden. Who better to travel around Shang, conducting, ah, business for the throne, than someone the world will go out of its way to overlook?”

  Lee didn’t smile, but it was a very near thing.

  “The fact is, Lee Yeon-Ji is one of the Li-Quan’s finest agents both in spite of and because of her heritage, and the one I’m proud to call my partner. I had her embedded here for a long-term sting operation meant to entrap our illustrious former magistrate over there.” The inspector gestured toward How, who was screaming and squirming ineffectually as he tried to escape the rat-shade waiting patiently for a command.

  Warden Qu’s mouth worked up and down furiously. “I—but this—if this is true, why didn’t you say anything?”

  “And break my cover?” Lee said. “No. I couldn’t. Not until I had How right where we wanted him.”

  Qu looked both furious and horrified. “You were about to be hanged.”

  “And did I ever look rattled to you?” said Lee.

  “Of course she didn’t,” the inspector said pleasantly. “Because she knew her partner was about to ride in and close this case for good. Now, if you’d be so kind as to send some of your guards to collect my partner’s personal effects, we’ll be on our way…”

  Lee shook her head. “Not just yet.”

  The warden and the inspector both turned to look at her: Qu with exasperation, the newcomer with amusement.

  Lee pointed down at Magistrate How, crushed as he was under the weight of a giant rat. “That bastard owes me six hundred yuan.”

  * * *

  —

  “You’re quite fun,” the inspector said once they were alone. Specifically, they were in the back of a car that had been waiting for them outside the gates of the Kennel, with a glass partition between them and the driver. “Quick on your feet, too.” She reached into the folds of her coat and produced a large wooden pipe, which she sparked with a slender silver lighter. She leaned back in her seat, sighing smoke. “Your file didn’t do you justice.”

  Lee supposed she was flattered to learn she had a file at all. She sprawled out, luxuriating in her old clothes: a fitted black dress with half sleeves and a surprising number of pockets, and tall, chapped black boots that began where her hem ended. After a few days in ill-fitting prison robes, it was nice to be in something practical again. “I’m just curious,” she said. “I like to do things and see what happens.”

  The lighter flame danced in the inspector’s one visible eye. “Like a cat pushing a glass off a table.”

  “I guess. More of a dog person, myself,” said Lee. “So, what can I do for you…Princess?”

  To her credit, the inspector didn’t react, save to snuff out her lighter. “I fear you have the wrong idea of me, Lee. The Li-Quan serves the royal family. We’re not part of it.”

  “The Li-Quan on the whole’s not,” Lee said, “but you are.”

  “You saw my shade mere moments ago,
” the inspector said. “Members of the royal family exclusively pact with white cranes, a class of creature to which Kou could hardly claim kinship.”

  “I saw him. He was white enough. Every cop I ever met goes out of their way to look respectable. You look like your mother’s clothes trunk ate you and shat you back out. But you’re not a fashion victim, because you’ve still got boots that’re good for walking and running. To me, that all means you don’t mind your authority being questionable, because you’ve got something other than just your badge to fall back on if you really need.”

  “Like my badge?”

  “Give me an afternoon, an awl, and an old tin can, and I’d come up with a badge,” Lee said. “Whatever you’re leaning on, it’s something you can’t forget in your other coat.”

  The inspector chuckled. “That theory has an awful lot of guesswork.”

  “If it leads me to the right place,” said Lee, “does it really matter?”

  “I suppose not.” She removed her hat, allowing her hair to fall freely around her face. Lee was struck by how young this girl was. She herself was barely twenty-one years old, and this girl was perhaps two years behind her. “You have the honor of addressing…” She sighed and rolled her right eye, as a stray bang had fallen to cover her left. “…Shang Xiulan, Twenty-Eighth Princess, the…” She sighed again, and shuddered. “…Lady of Moonlight.”

  Now it was Lee’s turn not to react. “Twenty-Eighth Princess” meant she was twenty-eighth in line for the throne, and likely the daughter of one of the less favored Crane Wives. But a lesser princess was still a princess. She guessed a bow was probably in order, so she inclined her head. “Your Majesty,” she said. She didn’t remember if that was the proper form of address for royals. She’d never really encountered one in the wild before.

  “Oh, enough with that,” said Xiulan with an irritated wave. “Do you have any idea how hard it would be for me to operate if everyone was bowing and scraping after me everywhere I went? Just call me Xiulan.”

  “I guess I should,” Lee said. She held up a fifty-yuan note to the light, mostly to give her restless hands something to do. “Seeing how we’re partners.”

  Xiulan laughed. “That was a fun little bit of theater, wasn’t it? The look on her face…”

  “Yeah, I hope all the stress gives her an ulcer or something,” said Lee. “But that does bring me back to my first question: What does a fancy-pants Daughter of the Crane who can’t throw want with a gutter dog like me?”

  “I have many ambitions and goals,” said Xiulan, bristling slightly. “Throwing things has never been essential to their accomplishment. Simply put: I need to find somebody. Specifically, Iron Prince Jimuro of the former Tomodanese Empire, son of the late Steel Lord Yoshiko and heir to the throne.”

  Lee raised an eyebrow. “He’s still locked up in Sanbu, isn’t he? Case closed. Who do I bill?”

  “He was. He’s due to be moved back to Tomoda, so he can ascend the throne at Hagane and negotiate a future on behalf of his beleaguered and defeated people.” Xiulan cocked her head curiously. “How does that make you feel?”

  Lee shrugged. “I’ve got no love for the Tomodanese, but I doubt it’ll improve my lot in life much whether his ass polishes the throne or not.”

  “I, too, harbor some animosity for the Tomodanese,” said Xiulan. “But let me then ask: How do you feel about the House of Shang?”

  Lee’s expression darkened. She eyed her new companion carefully.

  Xiulan seemed to understand. “You have my word as a princess that you can speak freely without fear of reprisal or repercussion.”

  “You don’t survive a life like mine if you haven’t got a fear of repercussions,” Lee said. “But fine, since you asked nicely: You’re a bunch of inbred fucks who’ve beaten down my country so badly it’ll never be able to stand on its own again, and kicked my people so much that even if you gave us our country back, we wouldn’t know what to do with it anymore. Going from you, to the Tomodanese, and then back to you…it’s like we’re that pipe of yours, getting passed around. You light us on fire, and then you suck everything valuable out of us. Doesn’t matter whose lips and lungs are doing the sucking.” She thought a moment, then added: “…Your Majesty.”

  Xiulan blinked.

  “Well,” she said after a second, “I suppose that wasn’t…” She swallowed. “…unwarranted.” She took another pull from her pipe. “My father is an old man whose health was sapped by the long war for our freedom. All his eligible successors are quite young. Whomever he chooses as First Princess or Prince would be the chief architect of a reborn Shang. Every one of his children knows this, and they’re all vying to be repositioned in first.”

  “I see,” Lee said. “So you think you should be number one, do you? And you want me to help you find Iron Prince Jimuro before he gets to Hagane and ascends?”

  Xiulan didn’t even shrug the accusation off, and Lee found herself charmed by how unabashed the other woman was. “I would be an excellent ruler. Why do you think I joined a law enforcement agency instead of sitting in a palace all day and having plum cakes gently lowered into my mouth?”

  “Probably ’cause you’re dead stupid,” Lee said. By the time she realized what a daft thing that was to say to a princess, it was already too late.

  Xiulan’s demeanor remained pleasant, but now a thin layer of frost had formed over it. “Careful, Lee Yeon-Ji,” she said, her gaze fixed as she took a long pull from her pipe. “I enjoy you, but proceed with caution.”

  Lee had mouthed off to magistrates, wardens, and crime bosses aplenty. She’d figured royalty was just like the rest, except they had fancy chairs. But this princess had made her hair stand on end in a way no one else ever had. She shut her trap.

  After a moment’s silence, Xiulan continued: “A Sanbuna fleet set sail from Lisan City last week, and its flagship was widely reported to be carrying Iron Prince Jimuro aboard. My sister, Second Princess Ruomei, has hired a fleet of her own to meet it on its way and ensure Jimuro never makes it home. Her success would undoubtedly ensure her ascension to the throne, which would be…” She pulled a face. “I wouldn’t care for such an eventuality, and you wouldn’t, either.”

  It sounded to Lee like Xiulan had come to the wrong place, and she was about to point that out. But then she caught the princess’s wording: “widely reported to be carrying.” “You don’t think he’s there.”

  Just like that, the frost melted. “I think General Erega is far too cunning to play such a delicate matter so broadly,” Xiulan said excitedly. She looked like she’d been dying to have someone to talk about this with. “I think all our attention is being carefully diverted elsewhere so the prince can be moved secretly and safely.”

  Lee frowned. “Why bother with all that?”

  “As admirable a figure as the Typhoon General is, her newborn republic is built on quicksand,” Xiulan said. “It lacks the long, proud history that makes the Shang dynasty strong. The Li-Quan’s informants within the republic tell me all her advisers and underlings are constantly undercutting one another and leaking information to the Sanbuna press. If a foreign power didn’t step up to eliminate the Iron Prince, it’s likely one of those untrustworthy subordinates might take matters into their own hands. Hence: a covert operation with minimal logistical support…but minimal oversight.”

  “Doesn’t sound like much of an operation,” Lee sniffed. “More like a big, fat gamble.”

  “To be fair, I too am, ah, playing the odds here,” Xiulan said delicately. “The Li-Quan’s information has its limits. But what data points we do possess, I’ve studied quite closely. I’ve applied similar scrutiny to General Erega, for that matter. My conclusion: One does not overthrow an entire empire by pursuing the first, most obvious course of action when the eyes of the world are upon you.”

  Lee frowned a little. That wasn’t the mo
st encouraging thing to hear. “I’m guessing you don’t want your sister to find him first,” she said. “So why not just let General Erega do her thing? She gets the prince to Tomoda, he takes the throne, and your sister doesn’t look any better for it.”

  “I will not put the future of Shang in the hands of the Republic of Sanbu,” said Xiulan. “Shang should determine Shang’s future, and Shang alone. It’s my wish to find and capture Iron Prince Jimuro personally, and present him to my father as a diplomatic puppet. And when he allows me to ascend to the rank of First Princess as my reward, I will be free to, among other things, begin paying restitution to Jeongson and its people.”

  Lee’s eyebrows rose. She’d never been much of a nationalist—a rather natural side effect of never having a nation to call her own. But assuming this wasn’t just some birdshit the Shang were shoveling, a lot of opportunities had just opened up.

  Still, life had taught her many times over that desperation was never the way to get what you wanted.

  “So, what’s all this got to do with me, then?” Lee said. “You want me to find him for you? Finding Lefty was one thing, but I knew Lefty. This Iron Prince, I know about as well as I know you.”

  Xiulan didn’t seem daunted by this. “Prior to all this business, you and your confederate Lefty were responsible for the ransacking of Daito Arishima’s estate in the province of Guakong, were you not?”

  Lee folded her arms over her chest. “Prove it.”

  “Rest assured that I could if I truly needed to, or I wouldn’t have gone to the effort of seeking you out.” She puffed again on her pipe. “A fact of which you may not be aware is that the late Steel Lord took great pains to conceal the appearances of her children, as they were both serving in the Tomodanese military. Photographs of the Iron Prince and Princess were strictly forbidden, save for ones the Li-Quan knows to have been gifted to close friends of the Mountain Throne…”