Five Kingdoms (23 page)

Turning his palm up, Han Quan fixed his gaze onto the small stone, and began to realize just how easy it would be. So simple.

Yes, Xu Liang. Hurry back. Your destiny awaits.

Of Gods and Long-Tailed Birds

S
ensations to the
body, to the mind, and to the spirit occurred too quickly to comprehend beyond their most basic nature. There was fire, surrounding Ma Shou and pursuing him to the edge of ground that gave way to flight that was actually falling. Ma Shou tumbled through the world, unsure whether or not he was leaving it. He did not feel the river, until he was transferred from its grip to one more centered.

The sure fist of a man dragged him through current and over stone. He felt only movement for a span that could have been eons, or mere moments. The pain burst into being, like a popped sack of grain when he was dropped upon the earth with neither caution nor ceremony. Every limb ached with exhaustion and with strain, reminding him that he had been forced to run from his own fire. Somehow, it had been reversed onto him. He recalled the finest curtain of dust glinting in the sunlight, caught in his vision in the moments he was casting his spell. Somehow, that dust had acted as an invisible net…or a wall, catching his fire and turning it back toward him. He suspected Han Quan. The elder mystic must have nested an enchantment onto him, one that was triggered either by time, or perhaps by a certain set of words. Of course, it would only have been prudent of the ancient to suspect betrayal. Ma Shou knew well of himself, that he was not to be trusted. It had been his own misfortune and lack of observation to assume that Xiadao Lu had been the measure Han Quan had taken to keep him loyal to their bargain. He was wrong to assume that, and to assume that Xiadao Lu’s death had established him any measure of distance from their pact, or freedom from the geomancer.

Surely, he had been freed by the fire being turned on him. And if not, he felt that he might die soon and that in such a venture, not even Han Quan could pursue. The only beast to chase him into the Infernal Regions would be his own failure. He lay still, pain undulating through him like the swoon of a calmer river than the Tunghui, but it was in those lazier tolls that Ma Shou felt every curve of agony as it lifted from the general course of discomfort and fell back in, creating fresh waves of suffering. What he did not notice for some time was that the currents were slowing even more. He might have been losing feeling before death, except that after a while, he only felt tired.

He opened his eyes slowly to the gray blue of early evening. His body—whether dying or surviving—lay on the hillside where the battle with Xu Liang had taken place. Blades of grass drifted gently in his vision, the path of which eventually brought him to a large bird several paces away. It shifted about on the earth, its plumage a mix of sable and silver beneath the fading light of day. It stood hunched for a time, like an old man crouched over a meal. It was then that it occurred to Ma Shou that its meal was very likely Zhen Yu.

It was an indignity, even to a pirate. Ma Shou knew, however, that it was the fate of the nefarious and the iniquitous. To bury such a fiend honorably—one who had served no honor to anyone, not even himself in life—was to offend the ancient gods. Upon dying, the fate of the condemned was to provide for the world they had operated against, by feeding its creatures. Ma Shou hoped that he would finish dying before those creatures came for him.

The vulture outstretched its wings, raising its sleekly shaped head, turning it at an obscene angle upon its overlong neck. And then it drew back into itself, stepping sideways in the process, revealing the forms it had been blocking. It was that of Zhen Yu, yes, but also of another figure that was hovering over the pirate’s body. The third figure was not a bird, though for all the raw grace the individual imbued, it might well have been after all. Fleeting notions of Xu Liang raced across Ma Shou’s poorly anchored consciousness, but they were quickly dismissed. Whoever the stranger was, they were not the Imperial Mystic. The beauty of them was even finer, like a carving of the visage of a god or a goddess. The shape of the face was the long, sorrowful curve and splendorous etching of lovely features that could only be compared to depictions of the spirits of the clouds. The skin was as white as a pearl, though lacking the same luster. Rather, it glowed in a duller sense, like the luminaries committed to the air during the Fete of Long Nights. The hour in the sky marked the beginning of the release of the luminaries during such festivals, so then maybe, Ma Shou thought…this was the spirit of night.

He watched for a time while the stranger lingered near Zhen Yu. Long hair, a truer shade even than the purest child of Sheng Fan, fell around their robed form, laying strands of shadow down upon layers of pale green and silver-white. While Ma Shou observed the beauty, he began to see a connection to the patient and not entirely ugly creature loitering near. It was an intimacy, like an invisible cord that tethered one to the other, as delicately and yet as surely as their mutual connection to the death that lay on the ground between them. Ma Shou felt both morbid and reverent, observing what may have been both god and beast come for a man who had perished in disgrace.

“He’s awake,” someone said suddenly. The voice was sober and close by, drawing Ma Shou back to a reality that was filled with a thousand pains. The darkly colored boot of a body standing nearer to him than he’d realized came into his view before he closed his eyes. He drifted off, no longer certain that he was either dying or in the presence of a god.

The company entered
the Kingdom of Ji with no further incident. Again, Xu Liang was reminded of the peace and safety of Sheng Fan. The conflict in the south had not spread, nor it seemed had any fear that might incite unrest. The endeavors of Xiadao Lu and Ma Shou had been specific and isolated. Though what seemed to be comforted him, Xu Liang recalled the warning Xiang Wu had offered. His birth father had claimed that the insecurity lay not in the Empire’s greater reaches, but within the heart of Sheng Fan itself. If only he could omit the last hours of his journey and know sooner whether or not that was true. Of course, he could not, and by nightfall on the ninth day of their travel since leaving Dhong Castle, Xu Liang found himself unable to rest. He sat upright and attempted to meditate instead.

He had not dared such a venture of spirit since Vilciel. In part, he had been cautious of the dream realm that seemed to surround him, an ephemeral space through which he seemed unable to find his way. He also knew that extending his spirit away from his body posed a new threat, one of greater physical weakness. He was uncertain whether it was the former concern or the latter which ultimately led him to failure.

Xu Liang opened his eyes, tears of frustration rimming them.

“Xu Liang.”

It was Shirisae. As she had in Willenthurn, the lady elf waited for everyone else to sleep and then made her way across their slumbering forms to approach him.

“Are you not able to sleep?” Shirisae asked him.

“I have not slept much in several months,” Xu Liang replied.

“My mother spoke to me of your ability to travel as humans cannot,” Shirisae said.

“As humans can,” Xu Liang corrected. “Else I would not have done so.”

Though it was not his intention to instill humor, the Phoenix Elf smiled. “You are human, aren’t you?”

“The men of Sheng Fan are indeed men.”

Shirisae raised her fingertips to his face, hesitating, perhaps so that he might withdraw, though he did not. Her action was not sudden enough to alarm or threaten pain against skin that had been far too sensitive, for too long. There was not much test to the contact initiated by the elf. She merely touched the moisture at the corner of his eye, then withdrew. The gesture was felt far deeper than the touch.

“I’ve seen you travel outside of your body,” Shirisae said quietly. “I’m sure that Alere has as well.”

He was not surprised by her statement. “Elves appear to have a unique sight.”

“Yes, but the young among us do not always have good insight. I am not young like the hunter, but I am barely more than a century to my mother’s nine.”

Xu Liang was aware of the longer-lived groups in Dryth, even before his meeting of the elves who had joined his company. He had not stopped to fully consider it. It wasn’t that he had to consider the many years an elf might live—there were members of his own culture who had lived to what even an elf might admit to be ancient—it was the stay of their youth that ensnared his mind. Shirisae appeared not more than five years the elder of his empress, who had not even seen twenty years of life. The elf was senior in years to both of Xu Liang’s fathers, and she appeared younger than Xu Liang himself. They were beyond weathering…perhaps some might say they were beyond suffering. Except Xu Liang knew that they were not. Their beauty might have been untouchable, but neither their hearts nor their souls were invulnerable. Elves could die, as Alere had expressed through his sorrow and fear over the kin that he had lost…in his suffering.

“Forgive me my curiosity,” Shirisae eventually said. She shifted to seat herself more comfortably in front of him, over crouching. “I confess that when my brother and I first encountered your company, I overlooked you. My brother did not, nor did my mother. I was preoccupied with things I believed the Phoenix had related to me. It made me headstrong, and neglectful.”

“I believe that it is your mother’s faith in you that inspired her to allow both you and the Storm Blade to come to Sheng Fan.”

“Yes,” Shirisae admitted. She added unexpectedly, “And her faith in you.”

Xu Liang accepted the commend with a slight bow of his head. “We spoke of the roles of individuals against the chaos that rises in my homeland, and which might have already risen in yours.”

Shirisae watched him, the pride in her golden eyes having gone nowhere, though she held her words for a pause that mirrored the previous hesitation of her touch. At length, she said, “The Phoenix has chosen you.”

The words drew a frown to Xu Liang’s mouth that he could not withhold. He replied, “It has chosen to return life to me, so that it might take it from me again. I am at its mercy.”

Shirisae shook her head. “No, Xu Liang. The Phoenix will lead you to glory. When a fire that has gone out is reignited, it burns brighter than it ever did.”

Ma Shou awoke
feeling very much alive. He held onto pain, still, which was the first indication to him that he had not died. The suffering, however, was not significant. Lying upon a pallet, surrounded by the sounds of frogs and the fluttering material of a tent, he felt assured that he was no one’s prisoner. There were no binds inhibiting his movement, only the lingering lethargy of having been wounded and spent, nearly to his end.

He sat up slowly, discerning the shapes of a minimal amount of equipment or supplies in the darkness. His body was bare to his waist and when he ran his hands over his arms, he felt the rough texture of scarring. A part of him felt immediately reviled and afraid of what he might have looked like, but vanity was not a coveted possession of his. If he must trade it, in order to survive, then so be it. Damage could heal over time, and it was not requirement that one be beautiful in order to advance in Sheng Fan. His reputation would be the greater injury to his ambition now, though perhaps his near death had been a boon for that reason. No one would recognize him with scars and…