Beneath an Opal Moon (12 page)

Moichi turned back to the stage and found the woman staring at him. And now he knew the content of her message.

“Twenty-five hundred taels!” Moichi bawled, to make certain all could hear him.

“What!” Kossori caught his arm. “What are you about? Are you mad? You don't have that kind of—”

“Twenty-seven hundred!”

Moichi did not have to turn around to know the voice of the hooded man. He was closer now, edging toward where they stood, hard by the stage.

“Three thousand!” Moichi called.

“Thirty-one hundred!” Then, in a lower tone, “You disgusting slime, if you make another bid, I'll—”

“Hey, you—!” Kossori had turned around to confront the tall man.

While Moichi called out, “Thirty-five hundred taels!”

There was movement behind him, as the hooded man fought the throng to get to him, hissing, “I warned you—Now—out of my way, scum!”

But now it did not matter because Moichi had given the woman on stage enough time. She had slipped her bonds and, in a flash, had torn the dirk from her captor's sash, having used the scuffle in the crowd as a distraction.

Without a moment's hesitation, she plunged the full length of the curving blade into the man's flesh, slipping it deftly between the third and fourth ribs on his right side.

There was so much noise now that Moichi could not hear his cry but he was already moving. “Come on!” he called to Kossori and, aware that the other was following him, he leapt upward, found a shoulder in the now densely packed crowd to launch him onto the stage.

So stunned was Mao-Mao-shan at this unseemly and singular conduct that he failed to react to Moichi's presence until it was far too late. Moichi hooked a boot behind the huge man's ankle and pulled. Mao-Mao-shan went down like the side of a house.

Moichi put his arm protectively around the woman's bare waist, feeling her warmth. Kossori was with him and as they made for the opening in the tent's wall, he glanced out into the crowd. There his gaze alighted on the tall man who was flinging people from him as he made his way toward the stage. He was bellowing something that Moichi could not make out for the din. He had expected to see a sword in the man's hand by now or, at the least, some other weapon but the hooded man's hands were empty.

Then they were through the wall and into one of the smaller, dimly lit satellite tents. This one, obviously, was where they held the souls to be bought, because it was filled with young men and women, all handsome, all perfect, ready to be possessed, as Mao-Mao-shan would say.

The trio ran through this milling bunch, who stared at them blankly, murmuring to each other. Outside, the night was cool. Some of the torches surmounting the ring of carven pilasters had guttered and gone out and Moichi led them across the ruins of Ebb Tide Square, toward a darkened section of the perimeter.

He found the alley and they fled down this ebon path, the sounds of their boot soles beating back for the moment the clatter of the pursuit. Moichi was certain who would be leading that pursuit and it was not Mao-Mao-shan.

“This is madness!” Kossori panted as they ran. “How could you have—?”

“Save your breath, my friend,” Moichi said. “What is done is done.” They were coming up on Blue Illusion Way and Moichi knew that they were going to need some of that in order to escape the man in the black hood. Sounds echoed back at them in the narrow alley as the men from the Sha-rida entered it. “Anyway, I doubt you would have allowed her to be sold to death, knowing she was being held prisoner.”

“All right, all right.” Kossori brought them up sharply as they entered the wide street of shops. “There's little time, so a debate is inappropriate now.” Echoes behind them, gaining rapidly. “Take the girl right. One block then take a sharp left. You'll know how to get home from there.”

“But what about you?” Breath hot in his lungs; shouts from behind them in the blackness of the alley. At least they had stopped out of the line of sight of their pursuers.

“Never mind me.” Kossori waggled a hand in the air. “I will decoy them. Now go. Quickly. For this to succeed, they must believe you and the girl are in front of me.”

“But—”

“Go on now. Go on! In a moment it will be too late and we shall all be caught like fish in a net. Off with you now.”

Moichi grasped the woman's hand, hurling them both down Blue Illusion Way, aptly named, he hoped. At the corner, he resisted the temptation to look back, rushed them both into the concealing shadows of the cross street. Looking up, as they ran on, he found he indeed did know which way to go and, orienting, he pushed them onward down black back alleys with the squealing rats leaping from their path, along brightly lit streets and across tree-shadowed squares. Until, at length, they broke out onto the Nanking and Moichi hailed a passing ricksha. He was obliged to shout twice, for the sleepy female kubaru appeared not to hear him at first. He launched the woman unceremoniously into the covered section, leapt beside her and gave the street address of his harttin. As they began to move, he slipped off his cloak, covering the shivering woman and her magnificent nakedness.

They jounced along into the night.

“Aufeya.”

He watched the play of muscles beneath the silk; the strength of her thighs, the tautness of her buttocks.

“A pretty name.”

She turned to face him, watchful yet totally unafraid. Like some great mythical feline she was filled with a dynamic animalism.

“What are you looking at?” she demanded. “Have you never seen a woman before?”

Moichi went across the long room to the desk, poured them both wine. He turned, holding one cup out to her. Her eyes never left his; she made no move. He shrugged, put the cup down, sipped at his.

“Have you—?”

“I will answer no question,” she cut him off. “Do not be so foolish as to think that because of what happened back there, I owe you anything.”

He went back, near her, sweeping aside the closed jalousies so that the bund, quiet at this early hour, and the peaceful harbor beyond, were exposed. It was still quite dark, dawn some time away yet, but small lit lanterns swung from spars like indecisive fireflies, dispersing the blackness here and there.

“If you had waited until I had finished,” he told her, “you would have known that I asked no question. I was about to say, have you ever seen anything more beautiful?”

Slowly, almost reluctantly, as if she half expected it to be some kind of ruse, she turned her head away from him, gazing out at the harttin's view.

Moichi passed her, stepping out onto the veranda and, a moment later, Aufeya followed.

The air was very clear and even the minute sounds of the night carried, the faces of the long line of harttin acting as a sounding board. He could hear the click-click of dice being thrown; the creaking of ships' fittings and, a long way off, the vague singsong of a kubaru's worksong. Closer at hand he could discern the patter of liquid as someone, undoubtedly too full of liquor, urinated against the side of the building.

“What is a—harttin?” Aufeya asked.

“It is the Sha'angh'sei term for a trading warehouse. All the wealthy hongs have harttin in which to store their produce as it is off-loaded from incoming ships or awaiting exportation.”

“And this is your harttin?”

“No. It belongs to Llowan, the bundsman of Sha'angh'sei.”

“Then what are you doing here?”

“Waiting.” He went to the outer railing, leaned his forearms upon it. Masts rose blackly before him, combining with crosstrees and furled shrouds, taut ratlines and rigging, to give the scene a surreal geometric overlay.

Aufeya took two steps toward him, paused, like a doe scenting water but unsure of what might lurk within the foliage lining its bank. “Waiting for what?”

“For a ship,
querhida
.” He saw her stiffen, staring at him, but she was silent. “A ship to sail home to Iskael.”

“Are you—? You are a captain, or what?”

“A captain?” He smiled. “No, I am a navigator.” He turned away, his thoughts seemingly far away over the breast of the sea.

She regarded him for a time, her cobalt eyes as black as coal. He did not see it, but she trembled ever so slightly, her head shaking, and she slipped her hands into the crooks of her arms, folding them just below her high firm breasts as if trying to hold herself together. The terror had come upon her again just after the storm had driven her small lorcha off-course and into port. It was a rugged craft but built expressly for sailing along the coast; it was not an oceangoing vessel and thus could not withstand a fierce gale without the protection of a harbor in which to ride it out.

She was dismayed to find that they had come upon Sha'angh'sei. A horrendous mistake but unavoidable now. Beyond the port's limits the storm still raged; they had had no choice but to stay until the gale moved on or spent itself here.

The storm had divested them of some sorely needed supplies and she had gone ashore to restock. That was when the man in the black cloak had found her. Terrified, she had run from him—and straight into the arms of Mao-Mao-shan. Thus she had been taken for the Sha-rida. It was but a clever ploy, she knew. In Sha'angh'sei, the open place where nothing could be hidden, the man in the black cloak could not seize her directly without incurring repercussions he could ill afford. Thus he had made a deal with Mao-Mao-shan. She had seen them talking, knowing that the man in the black cloak was paying for her in advance. Her auction at the Sha-rida that night would be a sham for she had already been sold. Then had come the intervention of this man and his friend. Fortuitous to say the least. But was it? She knew the deviousness of the man in the black cloak all too well. Was this but another ruse of his? She would, of course, be more inclined to talk to a friendly face. How could she be certain? She shivered again, involuntarily, as she thought of the man in the black cloak and his vengeance. Dihos, what a fool she had been! But now the end had come. No, she told herself sternly, not the end.
An
end. What that would be was still in doubt and she was going to do her best to see that she had, at least, some say in its formation.

“You said you are from a land called Iskael,” she said so abruptly that he turned his head toward her. “Tell me about it. Where is it, for instance?”

“Far to the south,” Moichi said. “Farther even than Ama-no-mori.”

She snorted derisively. “Ama-no-mori is but legend.”

He shook his head. “Have you never heard of the Dai-San?”

“Of course, everyone has.”

“He is my bond-brother and he lives there now.” He raised a hand as if brushing an insect out of the air. “But that is of no matter. Iskael is a land of hot sun filled with rolling deserts and rich orchards and the highest mountains in the world, dominated by one peak, taller than all the others. It is said, in the sacred tablets of my people, that this mountain was made by the hand of God.”

“Your people believe in one God?”

“Yes,
querhida
.”

She stiffened and backed away. “You said it again.” Her voice was a tightly coiled whisper. “You are playing with me. You knew all along.” She was backed against the far railing, her hands gripping the wooden rim with such force that her knuckles were blue-white. “You work for him.”

He heard the near-hysteria in her voice now, knew she was on the edge, stupidly took a step toward her. “No, I promise I—”

“I will die first,” she cried, and, whirling, launched herself over the railing.

Moichi leapt, wrapping his arms about her legs while she was in midair. Her forward momentum carried him into the railing, the top bar slamming into his stomach so that he bent over, the air rushing out of him. He almost lost her then but he gathered his strength and hauled her in, back onto the safety of the veranda. But he was off-balance and still somewhat out of breath and her planted heel on the back of his instep caught him by surprise. He lurched backward with her on top of him, felt her slim elbow drive powerfully into his side.

She fell on him, twisting, trying to get leverage and now he knew that words were useless. The heel of her hand smashed against his shoulder but it opened her up and his right hand shot upward, straight as a lance, the blow to her cheek stunning her so that she fell limply at his side, mouth hanging open, eyes glazed, and by the time she recovered he had made certain she was a captive audience.

“Listen to me, Aufeya,” he said calmly as she began to struggle. “Listen to me and I will let you up.”

“I make no bargains with my enemies.” Her eyes were on fire and if looks could kill, he would be a charred corpse.

He slapped her across the face. “Will you stop for a moment!”

She stuck her neck out, tried to bite him. “Get away from me!” she screamed. “Get away! I will listen to none of your lies! Your tongue is like honey but I know who pays you—!”

Exasperated, without thinking, he leaned forward, putting his mouth over hers. But what had begun as a means of shutting her up soon changed. He felt her lips, cool and moist, under his and there was a slight taste like cinnamon, tart and sweet at the same time, as if she had just eaten a ripe apple. And he felt the same kind of current pass through him that he had experienced when her gaze had first struck in the Sha-rida.

Perhaps she felt it too, for her eyes flew open watching him, several expressions darting across her features. “What—what are you doing?” she whispered in a husky voice when he pulled his lips away.

Moichi cleared his throat, unconsciously relaxed his grip. “I meant only to silence y—” He began to move but she already held one of his own dirks at his throat. He lay perfectly still, feeling intensely her body lying half atop his, her heat in proximity, the heavy heaving of her breasts so close beneath the thin layer of silk. There had not been sufficient exertion, and, looking into her eyes, catching a hint of the struggle there, he knew that she too had felt the certain magnetism.