Gao thought for a moment. ‘No, my Lord,’ he said. ‘I do not remember your face, or mine, or my brother’s... Does it matter?’
‘No. But I am curious as to why we do not remember these things.’ He fell silent again, then: ‘Bring Jiang before me.’
Gao bowed and backed out of the room.
The ferryman had brought Jiang to the small town where the junk was now moored. Gao had been waiting for him on the jetty with an armed escort of armoured warriors. Jiang vaguely remembered passing through the town a few times before.
He had tried to hide the fact that he was limping from Gao, and the pain from himself, but Gao had known immediately that he had been injured. By the time they reached the monastery Jiang had told him the whole story. He didn’t want to, but he knew he couldn’t hide his swollen foot for long.
Gao had gone into the monastery first leaving Jiang with the guards. He hadn’t given the guards any orders, but Jiang suspected that he and they both knew they were there to keep him where he was. He shivered.
After a few minutes Gao had returned and led him into the monastery, and along dark, unlit corridors to the large hall where the monks used to pray to their now-gone Buddha statue.
The abbot was sitting on a throne on the dais that had supported the Buddha. His face was as calm and impassive as that of any of the four life-sized statues that were the hall’s only current decoration. Pale, sweating musicians twanged strings and tapped drums in a discordant excuse for barbaric music, the likes of which Jiang had never heard before.
‘You know who I am, Jiang. Do you know what I looked like?’ the abbot asked.
The question took Jiang by surprise. ‘Like a living god, my Lord,’ he said promptly. ‘Athletic, powerful, handsome. As the emperor of all China should be.’
The abbot’s expression didn’t change, but his tone did.
Jiang felt a stab at his heart. It wasn’t fear or horror, but the certainty that he was doomed.
‘I do not remember my face, but I do know how to tell when someone is telling me what they think I want to hear, instead of the truth that I asked for.’ The abbot stepped down from the dais and paced around Jiang, who didn’t dare move.
‘Do you lie to me often?’ he asked conversationally.
‘My Lord?’
The abbot paused and looked at Jiang with intolerable calm. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t think such a simple question would confuse an intelligent man so. Are you in the habit of lying to me, Jiang?’
‘No, my Lord!’
‘How can I believe that? How can I believe you?’
‘My Lord, I am your faithful servant, pledged to serve and please you -’
‘Yet you lie to me when I ask you what I looked like .You lied to me when you said you would kill the traveller.’
‘My Lord, I had truth in my heart
‘You had cowardice in your heart!’ the abbot roared in Jiang’s ear.
Jiang almost stumbled at the shout.
‘Cowardice and incompetence!’ the abbot spat. ‘Do you serve me by sparing my enemies? Do you please me by trying to make a fool of me with your words? Your only pledge is to keeping your own head on your shoulders. You say whatever it will take to deflect the anger you fear from me.’
‘My Lord -’
‘More accurately,’ the abbot continued, as he stopped in front of Jiang, you tried to do what you thought would make me not kill you. But, you are as incompetent in that as you are in doing my bidding.’
Jiang recoiled as the abbot’s eyes began to glow with a fiery light that beamed from his eyes as if they were lanterns. The abbot’s lips parted and the same glow was released from between them.
A hard wall pressed against Jiang’s back, and he realised with a shudder of terror that he couldn’t get any further away from the demonic figure that approached him.
‘You are weak,’ a voice said, though the abbot’s lips didn’t blot out the light and Jiang wasn’t even sure it was the abbot’s voice. It echoed, and seemed to come from everywhere. ‘Weak. Coward. You are not fit to be a Han.’
Jiang sidled along the wall, reaching out with his hand to feel the corner that led into the corridor. His fingers curled around the edge and he knew he could make a run for it.
The abbot, still a few feet away, raised an empty hand, his palm towards Jiang. ‘You must be punished for the treachery of incompetence.’
Jiang grabbed the corner and pulled himself round it, the pull giving him a bit of extra speed as he started to run. The abbot was older and overweight; no match for Jiang’s sprinting.
The abbot didn’t move. He merely smiled.
With an explosive report of displaced air, a lightning flash connected his palm with Jiang’s back.
Jiang’s shirt caught fire even as he was blasted headlong through the door. He crashed to the ground and the skin across his shoulder blades blackened and cracked, flames from his burning shirt climbing up his queue towards his scalp. A couple of nearby men, who were scrubbing the floor, snatched up their buckets of soapy water and ran to douse him. Soaked, he remained face down, only the moan of a deeply damaged animal escaping his lips.
Pain drowned out his senses, blotting out the abbot’s approach until he stood over Jiang’s head. The abbot’s hand stretched out again and Jiang’s heart raced. Terror of the pain, and of oblivion, washed through him. The former was stronger, and the only thought he could muster was that if death would end the pain it would be welcome.
The abbot winced, an eyelid fluttering. His hand stiffened into a claw, then curled into a shaking fist. As it did darkness returned to his eyes. ‘Leave him to the fates,’ he told the men around him. Then he turned on his heel and was gone.
Jiang writhed alone in a pain that was more exquisite than he had ever imagined could possibly exist - but, mercifully, not for long.
There was a lot of hugging and thanking and feasting and drinking that night. It was the night Kei-Ying returned to Po Chi Lam and was reunited with Fei-Hung. Fei-Hung and Cheng had immediately arranged what, for want of a better word, Ian would call a party.
Though there was much to celebrate, Kei-Ying and Cheng also wanted to get down to business. Kei-Ying managed to corner the Doctor and his companions at last, and drew them aside to talk with Cheng. He quickly outlined the fears he and Cheng, and Chesterton and Logan had about the Black Flag and Jiang, and Cheng told them about the abbot.
He was telling his story for what felt like the third or fourth time in a day. It felt good, getting it off his chest, and he was beginning to enjoy the catharsis, though he suspected this would wear off when he sobered up.
‘The last raid I did, when I was a bandit, was against a caravan to Sui Lim. Myself and nine others - you’ve met Pang, he was one of them.’ The Doctor nodded as Cheng continued. ‘We stole money, jewels, religious trinkets and then there was a storm, so we took shelter in a cave. Three Shaolin monks - martial monks - caught up with us there.
They beat the crap out of all of us.’
‘And, young man?’
‘And... then something strange happened. I can’t explain it.’
‘Try.’
‘Whatever it was happened to the three monks. There was this light, inside the cave, and it distracted them from tying us up. Then...’ Cheng shivered at the memory. ‘Then their eyes glowed. I don’t mean like a cat’s do, but like a powerful lantern does. I’ve never seen anything so unnatural, and I never want to again.’
‘Then?’
‘Then we escaped, left them there and hoped never to see them again. And I didn’t. Until now. They’re the three new Black Flag people. At least they claim to be. This abbot is almost certainly the one who wanted Jiang to kill you -
luckily he overestimated Jiang’s brains, which is easy enough.’
‘I see. And you say he also has other plans?’
‘He has this obsession with getting hold of astrologers and astronomers, and killing off anyone else who is a scientist or teacher.’ Cheng glanced at Kei-Ying. ‘That explains a lot.’
Barbara had been listening to Cheng’s tale, and was becoming more worried as it went on. She gnawed on a knuckle, then realised what she was doing and looked at her hand as if she’d never seen it before.
‘I wonder...’ the Doctor said. He wasn’t looking at anyone in particular, so Barbara assumed he was thinking out loud.
‘I have a feeling...’
‘“By the pricking of my thumbs,”‘ Barbara quoted, ‘“something wicked this way comes.”‘
‘Yes, my dear! Exactly. There was something about the feel of the TARDIS’s landing…’
‘It felt pretty normal to me,’ Ian said.
‘But you’re not connected to the Ship the way Susan and I -
the way I am. The tiny vibration of the controls under my fingers...’ The Doctor pointed to Barbara. ‘And then your experience, so close to where the Ship landed. And now Mr Cheng’s tale. These things all form a pattern,’ he opined darkly, ‘and I wonder about it, and how it fits in.’
‘Fits in with what?’
‘With human history, Chessington!’ He shook his head and stomped off, muttering to himself.
‘Chinese his-Chinese politics,’ Barbara corrected herself, isn’t really my speciality, but surely someone like this abbot would have been a globally known figure. But I can’t think of anyone who fits his description. Certainly not from the 1860s.’
‘There are many warlords in China,’ Kei-Ying told her.
‘Being head of an army is almost normal for some people.’
The Doctor returned, studying a small fruit. ‘Mr Cheng?’
‘Yes?’
‘Might I ask what sort of night it was when you first met this, er - abbot?’
‘It was the seventh full moon, just as it is now. There was a storm for part of the night, but it was finished by the time we came out of the cave.’
‘I thought as much. Master Wong, do you know anywhere I might be able to get hold of a telescope?’
Kei-Ying nodded, wearing a puzzled frown. ‘Of what size?’
‘The largest possible. And I shall also require a place from which to observe with it. Somewhere as high up as possible.’
‘The tower,’ Vicki suggested. ‘It was at least four or five storeys high. It should be an ideal observation platform.’
‘That’s Zhenhailou,’ Kei-Ying said, in an aside from pondering the Doctor’s request for a telescope. ‘The British use it as a watchtower.’
‘A capital suggestion. A telescope in Zhenhailou. ‘The Doctor snapped his fingers and looked pleased with himself.
‘If, that is, the captain or the major can be persuaded to let us borrow the tower.’
‘I think Major Chesterton and I have an understanding for the moment,’ Kei-Ying said. ‘In fact, that would solve both your problems as the British have a large telescope there, built by their navy.’
‘Excellent. Then there’s no time to waste.’ The Doctor lifted a panama hat from a hat stand near the door.
‘I shall go at once.’
Kei-Ying followed the Doctor out to the gate. ‘Do you want me to come with you?’
The Doctor smiled. ‘That’s very kind of you, Master Wong, but I think I’m right in thinking that you’ve seen enough of Xamian for just now, hmm?’
Kei-Ying couldn’t deny it. In fact, he’d be perfectly happy if the island and its fortress sank into the river and were never seen again. At the same time, it was his country, his city, his friends, and he wanted to do his best for them all.
‘Perhaps Ian -’
‘No!’ The Doctor looked as if someone had suggested he drink poison. ‘The two Chestertons must not meet. Not ever, do you understand me?’
Kei-Ying stepped back under the force of the Doctor’s insistence. ‘I understand, but... why?’
I cannot explain in a way you would understand, Master Wong. Suffice it to say that their meeting would be dangerous beyond your imagination. For both of them, and for this city.’
Zhenhailou wasn’t anything like as large as Xamian. Sitting atop a low hill overlooking the city, it was a five-storey tower manned by a platoon of soldiers and defended by a couple of cannon.
The wall around the grounds was no higher than the one around Po Chi Lam, and Sergeant Major Anderson thought it was probably more for show than to keep out any invading hordes. He was at the gate to the small compound, explaining the new visitors to the sergeant in charge. ‘The major has decided tae give these civilians the run o’ the place, but dinnae harass them too much; they’re actually doing us some good.’
‘Even the Chinks?’
Anderson shrugged. ‘You never know.’
The sergeant, a gruff, balding Yorkshireman, looked suspiciously at the newcomers. The Doctor was staring at the stars with an expression of barely controlled impatience. Ian and Fei-Hung were carrying a tripod between them, and the giant Pang was effortlessly supporting a large, long crate on his shoulder.
‘What the hell are they supposed to be doing?’
‘Looking through a telescope. A big one, borrowed from the navy, in that crate.’
The sergeant’s mouth crooked up at one end. ‘You could see the back rooms of the White Tigers from here with one of them things.’
‘That’s as may be,’ Anderson snapped, making a mental note always to close the curtains on future visits there, ‘but this lot are looking at the stars and the moon. Chesterton seems to think -’
‘Yes, and what’s he doing here?’ The sergeant indicated Ian.