Beneath an Opal Moon (8 page)

The room was lined all in bamboo, split lengthwise and lacquered clear so that it gleamed in the low light emanating from the constellation of small oil lamps scattered about on low tables and mantelpieces. Above, the skylight had been drawn back revealing the icy brilliance of the glittering stars, remote, seemingly as hard as diamonds. The moon was in another quarter, unseen.

The man who sat facing them was so enormous that he seemed to overflow the bamboo chair, despite the fact that it was so outsized that it was obvious it had been constructed to order. He wore saffron silk pants from which, it appeared, an entire tent might have been woven and a short wrapped jacket with wide sleeves, also saffron silk, quilted and low cut in front so that much of his chest was exposed. Against the naked flesh, dangling like a second heart, was an enormous tourmaline which moved as he moved.

Yet when one looked at this man, one saw first his face, which was etched with the hard cruel lines that only a lifetime of constant guerrilla warfare can cause. It was a face, flat and circular as a moon, of a power as ancient as the delta upon which the nexus of the city was built. Du-Sing, tai-pan of the Ching Pang, the Greens of Sha'angh'sei, belonged to the earth and it, it was said, to him.

“Gentlemen.” A voice like distant thunder, as tactile as it was aural. “Tea?”

Moichi nodded silently while Kossori looked on, still as a statue.

Du-Sing's eyes moved minutely and a young man in black cotton leggings and quilted jacket sprang into motion, filling cups standing on an ornate silver tray on a table along one wall of the room. Moichi accepted his cup but Kossori ignored his. There was nothing Moichi could do about this. He sipped at the hot liquid.

Du-Sing waited until he had taken that first drink before saying, “We worked well together, once upon a time.” He meant during the Kai-feng, when all men were joined as if from one family. “But that was a long time ago.” The tai-pan had left just a long enough pause between the two statements to give the latter one an ominous note. “You are remembered with great fondness from that time by the Ching Pang, Moichi Annai-Nin.” He sighed and it was like a dam about to burst, a sound of timbers cracking. “That is why I am showing you this courtesy instead of having you executed.” He snapped his fingers and the young man in black leapt to his side, put a cup of hot tea into his hand. It was lost inside that great fist. He drained the cup in one swallow. “And how is the Dai-San, Moichi Annai-Nin?”

“He is well, Du-Sing.”

“Good. Good.”

The tai-pan had made his point.

“Why was I attacked this morning by Ching Pang?” Moichi asked. “As you yourself said, I am no enemy of yours.”

“Yes.” Du-Sing lifted a fat finger. “I had thought you a friend of the Ching Pang. Yet you traveled in the company of a Hung Pang spy.”

“He was a messenger sent by the Regent to fetch me to the Seifu-ke. That is all.”

“Is it?” One eyebrow was raised interrogatively. “We shall find out. Presently.” He peered at Moichi over the rim of the delicate porcelain teacup, etched with gilt butterflies, almost as if he were a demure girl on her first date. “I have had a talk with the Regent. A long talk. And he has agreed to dismiss all Hung Pang from his service.”

“He has?” This did not sound at all like something Aerent would willingly accede to.

“Do you doubt the words of a tai-pan?” For a moment his eyes blazed within their folds of fat. Then the light seemed abruptly extinguished and a thin smile played about the thick lips; it did not reach any further. “But no, of course not. You would not be so discourteous, would you, Moichi Annai-Nin? No, you have too many highly placed friends in Sha'angh'sei not to see the supreme folly of such a course, hmm?” He signaled silently for more tea, got it.

“Can we get on with this,” Kossori said, and, alarmed, Moichi gripped his arm.

“What was that?” Du-Sing raised one eyebrow. “What was that?” He reminded Moichi of a great stage actor; what was real and what was being put on for his benefit?

The tai-pan took the cup from his lips, swung it from in front of his face. “Mmm, I see that your friend is somewhat more ignorant of the social graces than are you, Moichi Annai-Nin. So be it, then. I shall come to the point directly. I had been circling it only because it causes me much pain.” He put a great paw over his heart and now for the first time he rose up. “It is my son, my youngest son, Omojiru, murdered at the hands of the Hung Pang. This is an unforgivable affront. Even your barbarian friend must be well aware of this, eh, Moichi Annai-Nin. I have no doubt that
you
are.” Now there was real fire behind his eyes and abruptly his face was transformed into a visage as awesome as that of some avenging god. He took one trembling step toward them and Moichi felt Kossori tensing again; prayed that his friend would make no move for, though he had seen no sign of guards since they entered the tai-pan's inner sanctum, he entertained no illusions that they were alone here with Du-Sing.
Koppo
or no, if Kossori made any threatening move they would both die within instants.

“It is
my
son who is dead, Moichi Annai-Nin!” Du-Sing bellowed. “The seed of
my
loins. It is I and my family; it is the Ching Pang who grieve for him now. What right have you to interfere in a matter that does not concern you?”

“But you are inaccurate, Du-Sing. If I may point out, I am already involved through the intervention of your own family, as you put it. The Ching Pang attempted to kill me this morning. I do not take kindly to such a threat. You cannot blame me for those deaths. I have every right to defend myself. I meant them no harm.”

“Yet your companion was a known Hung Pang spy.”

“He was a messenger for the Regent.”

“Worse still!” the tai-pan cried. “By the gods, Moichi Annai-Nin, the Ching Pang owe you no apology! The Hung Pang work against us constantly. War is war. But now they have gone too far. To coldly murder Omojiru—”

“There is good reason to believe that the Hung Pang were not involved in your son's death, Du-Sing. We have—”

“Silence!” roared the tai-pan. “What do you, an Iskamen, know of the Hung Pang? Or the Ching Pang? Only your friendship with the Dai-San stands between you and execution now. Omojiru's death is our business and ours alone. Do I make myself clear?”

“Eminently clear,” Moichi said.

“We are avenging that death even as we speak. That is all you need to know.” He clapped his hands once. “Chei will see you out.” Without another word, he swept from the room, moving with astonishing grace for one of his enormous bulk.

“I would as soon break his fat neck as look at him,” Kossori said as soon as they were out on Black Fox Lane. Moichi shushed him and they turned right, walking down the wide thoroughfare. Without looking back, he knew that the eyes of the Ching Pang were following their progress. He kept their pace to a saunter even though he was anxious to quit this area of the city, a Ching Pang stronghold. One could trust no one here for they were all—shopkeepers and streetwalkers, priests and moneylenders alike—in the employ of the Greens.

“Gods,” Kossori continued. “I can see no reason at all to have put up with that pretentious windbag's pious sermon.”

Moichi glanced at him, a smile playing along his lips. “That pretentious windbag, as you so eloquently put it, could have dismembered us at any moment he chose. There must have been at least fifty Ching Pang waiting with weapons drawn behind the four doors to that room.”

“Huh!” was all that Kossori said, but Moichi knew that he was properly impressed. “So I take it you'll stop this investigation then.”

“What gives you that idea?” Moichi said.

“Oh, well, I don't know. Maybe the great Hottentot's ominous words back there had a bit to do with it. Otherwise, I can't imagine where I could get such a farfetched idea.” He snorted.

Moichi threw his head back and laughed, clapping his friend on his broad back. “I would not worry overmuch about Du-Sing, Kossori.”

“Oh yes, now you'll tell me that his bark is worse than his bite, I suppose.” His voice was heavy with sarcasm.

“No, no. Not at all. I just have to be more careful in my movements, that's all. Anyway, I may not be here too much longer. Tomorrow morning, I trust, Aerent will have the information I need on this land, Kintai, and—”

“You mean to go there!” Kossori exploded.

“Yes, I guess I do at that. I think we have reached a dead end in Sha'angh'sei. If we are ever to find out why those two were murdered, Kintai will be the place to begin. Want to come along?”

“Me?” Kossori laughed. “Gods, no! I have no taste for that sort of thing.”

“At least take some time to think about it. I am not apt to depart for several days yet.”

“All right. If it'll make you happy. But, I warn you, the result'll be the same.” He rubbed his hands together. “Now what say we forget all about this mystery of yours and spend some time at Saitō-gÅ«shi.”

Moichi laughed. “That certainly sounds relaxing.”

Kossori guffawed leeringly. “Gods, I hope not!”

It was an ornate, three-story structure of glossy black and vermilion lacquered wood, reachable only across the exaggerated arc of a bridge that spanned the narrow but quite deep moat which completely surrounded the building. It had been constructed on a piece of land originally quite near the sea but during the time of the idai na nami—this great storm's wave was said to have reached so high that it blotted out the sun—who knows how long ago, the sea had broken through, sailing across the land with such titanic force that it literally gouged away the land, forming two channels which became the basis for the present moat. How Saitō-gūshi had been spared from the devastation wreaked elsewhere by the idai na nami was still a matter of much conjecture within Sha'angh'sei. However, Onna, who owned Saitō-gūshi, was often heard to say that it was because she and her women were favorites of the Kay-Iro De and had thus been spared. Many said that this must be so because, without fail, Saitō-gūshi was closed one night a week so that its inhabitants could make the pilgrimage across the city into the heart of the kubaru old quarter to attend services at the temple named after Sha'angh'sei's legendary protectress.

Indeed, the aura of the serpentine goddess could be felt as soon as one set foot upon the bridge whose metal railings were shaped into her likeness and, set within the arched wooden floor, was a golden bas-relief sculpture of the Kay-Iro De. These manifestations of the supernatural combined with the high semicircular structure of the bridge itself to give one the feeling that one was passing through some invisible barrier, leaving the real world behind, entering some fantastic mythological kingdom where anything was possible.

This, Moichi knew by direct experience, was far more true than any novice to these high portals could ever imagine. For within Saitō-gūshi's walls reposed the most sumptuous array of women gathered since the demise of Tenchō.

The doors were of beaten brass, bound with a rock-hard mirrorlike substance. They opened inward, as did those of a heavily fortified citadel, and, indeed, the thickness of these doors would do any wartime fortress proud.

Yet inside it was warm and comfortable. Off the long vestibule, all visitors were divested of their street clothes no matter how rich and elegant. They were hung with infinite care in tiny cubicles by faithful attendant children and the visitors led off to be bathed. Then they all donned the silken robes of the house. Thus did Onna make it plain to all who entered her portals that they were under her rule no matter their standing in the community outside. Here, Onna's voice was law and, in the time she had been running Saitō-gūshi, it had not once been questioned.

Bathed and newly-robed, Moichi and Kossori were led from the baths back into the vestibule. The floor here was bare wood, highly polished. The walls, too, were bare. But as they passed through a doorway that was almost a true circle, save for the break at the bottom where the floor intruded, they came upon the true world of Saitō-gūshi. Here all the floors were covered by deep-pile scarlet carpeting. Within the small rooms, which appeared to go on forever, all the low tables, round trays, eating and drinking implements were of solid gold. The cool dim hallways between these rooms invariably had ebony ceilings and fragrant cedar walls. And other rooms, somewhat larger, were divided by delicate ebony railings, sculpted into scrollwork. There was even a miniature Canton temple in one far corner of the sprawling, spiraling structure so that patrons who were so inclined would not pass up a visit here for the sake of a
missa
or the spate of holy days which came in the spring and the high summer.

A woman in a pink silk robe with white carnations embroidered across it met them just over the threshold. She was slightly plump, making her seem the fleshly embodiment of the maternal symbol. Her face was painted white, her lips a bright scarlet. Her teeth, Moichi knew, were white and sparkling—as were those of all her women—which was in direct contrast to the free-lance prostitutes of the city's streets, who were required to lacquer their teeth black. The woman bowed to them, smiling. Her black glossy hair swirled in an intricate pattern about her head. Stuck through it were a pair of ivory pins perhaps half a meter long. She had dark laughing eyes and her chubby pale hands never seemed to be at rest but fluttered in the air about her, semaphoring enigmatic messages. She was always gay and excited as if she were the mother of the bride on her day of matrimony.

She leaned forward, kissing them delightedly on the cheek.

“So nice to see you again, boys.” She pointed a finger at Kossori. “But you, sweet. I see you've lost some weight. Well, we'll have you fattened up by the time you leave here.” Her voice had the tenor of a fine musical instrument played by a virtuoso, so pleasing to the ear that one had to strain to remember that it had taken her eleven years of intensive training to acquire it.