DAC 3 Precious Dragon (33 page)

"Chen!" the demon panted. "Fuck off!"

"What?"

"Go away. It's me it's after! Get clear and I'll try and draw it off."

"How in the world do you know that?"

"Because I can feel it in my head. It's like it's moved into my mind. Go away." Zhu Irzh veered off to the right, charging toward the wall of the nuclear plant. Chen risked a glance over his shoulder and saw that, horribly, the demon was right: the kuei was coming in a scuttling rush across the sand, aiming its blood-eyed, pincered head directly at Zhu Irzh. Slightly ahead of Chen, Jhai had noticed the same thing.

"Zhu Irzh! Watch your back!" She stumbled as she spoke and Chen caught her arm. "Shit, why is it going for him?"

"I don't know." They were almost at the fence of the compound. Above, Chen was dimly aware of demons congregating along a walkway and clustering on the observation turret at the corner. Then, amazingly, someone called his name.

"Detective Chen!"

Chen looked up and saw a thin, small shade. A boy, perhaps sixteen years old, gesturing wildly.

"Detective! It's me! It's Pin H'siao!"

The boy from the Opera. Chen felt a surge of dismay. So the boy was dead—except, wait, no, he wasn't. The faint spirit carried an unmistakable sense about him, not a smell, not a color, but something in between that tugged at the remnants of Chen's magical abilities and spoke to him of life.

"Pin!"

The boy was shouting something to his fellow demons.

"Open the gate! Open the gate!"

A rusty metal gate swung open. Zhu Irzh, however, was running in the opposite direction along the compound fence. The kuei ducked its head and snapped at him, taking out a chunk of fence. It reared back, fragments of metal trailing from its pincers. Chen shoved Jhai and Qi ahead of him into the compound; he seriously doubted whether they were any safer there, but it gave the illusion of sanctuary, at least. Out of the corner of his eye he saw a tall, dark shape swarm up and over the fence: it was Zhu Irzh, as the kuei leaned back for a second snap.

Chen turned. Someone was shouting through a loudhailer, but in a language that Chen did not understand. Then he saw the tank, with the howdah containing the Minister of War, thrust through to the compound in a flurry of sand, and then Chen realized that it was the Minister who was doing the shouting.

Zhu Irzh was nowhere to be seen. The kuei appeared to think better of its attack. It remained, half-raised, swaying menacingly to and fro.

"Stay there," Chen said to Jhai and Qi. Jhai started to ask where he was going, but Chen did not give her time to finish. "Wait there!" he shouted to the shade of Pin H'siao, and ran off behind the sheds in the direction of Zhu Irzh.

The demon seemed to have disappeared completely. Chen scouted around the sheds and saw a series of boot prints in the dust. He was not entirely sure that they belonged to Zhu Irzh, but lacking any other clue, he followed them. They led him under a flapping tarpaulin into a building that looked like a storeroom: metal containers were stacked against the far wall. Chen stopped and listened. He could hear voices coming from behind the containers—no, a single voice, unknown and whispering, and then Zhu Irzh saying loudly, "Where are you?"

"Zhu Irzh?" Chen called.

"Over here!"

Chen went cautiously around the side of the containers—it was not unknown for demonic predators to mimic someone's voice—and discovered Zhu Irzh standing in the middle of an empty space, apparently having a conversation with himself.

"The fucking thing came straight after me! What was I supposed to do?"—and then—"Well, I didn't know that."

Then he turned and saw Chen.

"Chen, meet my granddad."

"What? I thought your grandfather was dead—or whatever. Isn't that his heart you've got there?"

"You know I told you he was dispatched to the lowest level after attempting a coup against the Emperor and had his heart removed." Zhu Irzh explained. "And now we're here and so is he. He's come in search of his heart. But I can't see the old bastard."

"Oddly enough," Chen told him, "now, I can."

Pin squeezed into a small hole by the stanchion on the observation platform, trying to keep out of sight of the kuei, which paced on its many legs just beyond the perimeter fence of the compound. He had a feeling that this was useless, that it would know he was there even if it could not see him—but he just didn't want to draw attention to himself.

Then there came a shout from the other side of the fence, across the ranks of troops. "Look!"

If Pin had still possessed a heart, it would have stopped, for over the mountains was coming another kuei. It was far larger than the one just beyond the fence, or even the kuei that Pin had watched doing battle with the dragons in the skies. Its length must have been close to half a mile and it carried something on its back.

A demon by Pin's side nudged him and whispered, "That's the oldest, that is! With the Emperor."

"The Emperor?" Pin said.

"The Emperor of Hell!"

The kuei was moving with the speed of an express train and now Pin could see that an awning was mounted upon its back, like the howdah in which the Minister of War was seated. Inside it, sat something hunched and wizened and old—Pin did not understand how he knew this, because the kuei was still some distance away—but it was as though the being sent an aura of age ahead of it, making the air stale. If this part of Hell had contained any plants, Pin thought, they would have withered. He glanced at the demons around him and they seemed to have aged, too. A hissing rustle passed through the troops below: He is coming, the Emperor is coming.

And not only the Emperor. A great shadow passed over the valley. He looked up and saw that the sky had been blotted out by something huge and bronze-green and glistening. A dragon, but a dragon as large as the kuei that bore the Emperor. The troops grew still and hushed. The dragon flew on.

The shade of Zhu Irzh's grandfather was standing in the corner of the room. Dust motes spiraled through him and the wall was clearly visible on the other side, but to Chen, at least, he was still reasonably visible: an elderly demon, very similar to Zhu Irzh in countenance, but with a pencil moustache and an even shiftier expression.

"How do you know it's Grand-dad?" Zhu Irzh asked, apparently still unable to see his departed relative.

"The gaping hole in his ribcage is a bit of a giveaway," Chen said.

"Ah."

"Who are you?" the spirit said in a subvocal rasp.

"My name is Chen. I am a friend of your grandson."

"My grandson has my heart," the spirit said.

"He took the heart from your daughter," Chen told the spirit.

The spirit turned and, invisibly, spat. "My daughter! She never did know anything about magic. Do you know what it's like to exist down here, day after year after day, knowing that your essence is still in the worlds above, frozen and misused?"

"You're going to have to explain to me this business about your heart," Chen said, casting an uneasy glance back toward the compound. There seemed to be some kind of conflict going on; he could hear shouts. "It's not a piece of human magic."

"Do you know why my heart was taken from me?" the spirit asked.

"I thought it was to keep you down here," Zhu Irzh said.

"Not only that. I defied the Emperor of Hell," the spirit said. "I sought to lead a rebellion against him."

"Yes, I know that bit. For any particular reason?"

The spirit spat again. This time, the spittle sizzled into the dust and left a small smoking hole in the floor. "All he cared about was the Ministry of Lust: its pleasures, its intrigues. Hell rarely saw him. He spent most of his time inside the Ministry."

"It's the same Emperor," the demon said. "He's not changed much. The Ministries run things. Except, by the way, Lust's gone, for the moment. Long story."

"I have the means to destroy the Emperor," the old spirit said. "My daughter knows this: she seeks to overthrow the Emperor in turn. But she does not know what the means is. So she has kept my heart, trying to summon me from these levels, always failing."

"What, you mean Mum's been trying to bring you back? Not keep you here?"

"Did you prompt Zhu Irzh to ask for the heart at that dinner?" Chen asked. Zhu Irzh started to say something, but then stopped.

"I did. I knew he could succeed where my daughter has not. Tell him to put the heart down," the spirit stated.

"I don't think so," Zhu Irzh retorted. "Sorry, Grandpa, but I don't think you can be trusted."

The spirit hissed in frustration. "If I am reunited with my heart," the spirit said, "then I will have the power to defeat the Emperor. I was granted that power during the rebellion, but the spell was on the condition that the power would last as long as my heart continued to beat in my body. During the rebellion itself, I was captured by the Emperor's forces and my heart was torn out. I was cast down here, but my heart was stolen by a person loyal to me and returned to my family."

"Defeating the Emperor isn't really the issue," Zhu Irzh said. "Given that we're under attack by Heaven."

"If I had succeeded during the first rebellion," the spirit said, "Heaven would not now be in a position to attack us. The Emperor of Hell is weak, and he must be removed."

"I think that might be about to happen anyway," Zhu Irzh said.

"Grandmother," the dragon said. "I will have to put you down."

Mrs Pa looked at the landscape beneath her, unfolding at speed. She should be blown about all over the place, yet the high airs of Hell were windless and still, as if Precious Dragon flew through a vacuum.

"I don't have a parachute," she said.

She thought she felt the dragon smile. "You won't need one."

He veered upward, coiling through the yellow clouds. Far ahead, Mrs Pa saw a platform.

"What's that?" she asked.

"You'll be safe there," Precious Dragon said. As he flew alongside, Mrs Pa saw that the platform was large, and that people were standing on it, holding parasols. They wore red and gold; they were women with quiet, grave faces. Several of them ran forward to take her hands and pull her onto the platform.

"I will see you soon, Grandmother," the dragon said. The gleaming back curved as the dragon dived.

"Be careful!" Mrs Pa shouted over the edge of the platform, and his voice came back, faint now:

"I will!"

Pin watched in horror as the kuei on which the Emperor rode rose up from the ground, its legs writhing. It rose up and up until its hindquarters left the ground and it was airborne. It shot past the great bronze-green dragon with a snap of its pincers. The dragon coiled away, but just a little too late: a pincer tore open a strip along its flank and sent boiling green blood spattering over the assembled troops below. A cheer went up, even from those who'd been scalded. But the dragon was turning. It roared down out of the sky, coming so close over the observation tower that everyone standing on it ducked, and struck the kuei a glancing blow. The kuei spun, momentarily out of control, and the end of its spiny tail flicked the observation tower. It was as though the tower had been struck with a giant hammer. It did not collapse, but reverberated, catapulting everyone who stood on it either down into the compound or out among the troops.

Pin, light spirit that he was, floated down like a leaf and landed on the hood of a tank.

"Off there!" shouted a voice from within. Pin scrambled down. Above, both kuei and dragon had surged off toward the mountains, readying themselves for another battle. Pin backed away from the tank.

"You're familiar!" a voice said. Pin turned and saw a pair of golden eyes in a severe and beautiful face.

"Jhai Tserai! I mean—I'm sorry, madam, I—"

"Jhai will do," she said. "Under the circumstances." She frowned. "You came to one of my parties."

"You've got a good memory," Pin said.

Jhai smiled. "Oh, I remember people. It's often useful. I'm looking for someone. A demon, the man you met at my party. Have you seen him?"

"Yes, he's here. I saw him in the compound. He was running toward the reactor."

Jhai exchanged glances with her companion who looked, Pin thought, too ethereal and pale to be a denizen of Hell. "What's he up to?" Jhai said aloud. But Pin did not know.

The ethereal person—surely she could not be a Celestial?—was looking up.

"That's the King of dragons!" she said. "Wherever did he come from?"

"From Heaven, I assume," Jhai said.

"No, he could not have done so. That's the whole point. He was exiled from Heaven."

Jhai frowned again. "Exiled?"

"Yes. I never found out why. I just heard rumors that there had been a terrible argument between Cloud Kingdom and the Celestial Palace, and that the Dragon King had been sent away, or had chosen to leave."

"He might have been sent into exile," Jhai said, shading her eyes with her hand as she stared into the skies, "but it looks as though he's come back."

Embar Dea watched as the King of the dragons, the lost and exiled lord, snaked through the dusts of Hell's skies. He was directly beneath her now, with the great kuei that carried the Emperor streaking toward him. Our king will prevail, Embar Dea thought. He has to. Then the kuei gave a hissing whistle that scraped across her hearing and more kuei poured down out of the sky. A cry of protest rose up from a dozen dragon throats—this was ancient law, now violated, but who says Hell has to play fair? Embar Dea thought bitterly.

The kuei fell in a writhing knot upon the bronze-green shape of the Dragon King. Embar Dea watched as he twisted and bucked through the air, trying to shake off the pincered forms, but as he did so, his jaws gaped in pain and the pearl that gave him his power shot out from his mouth.

In horror, Embar Dea watched the pearl as it fell; hurtling down through the grimy airs of Hell like a round, white grenade. An Imperial dragon would not last long without it and the kuei knew this, too, for they dived, racing after the descending pearl. Embar Dea's gasp sent a shiver through the clouds but she could not take on the kuei, so many of them all at once.