Fox and Phoenix (5 page)

“You're late,” Yún said. “And I thought you had homework.”

I was still scared about Lian and wanted to yell that my homework was none of Yún's business. But Yún looked cranky and tired, so I swallowed hard and shook my head. “Sorry. Any new business?”

“Two astrology readings and one Elixir of Eternal Happiness.” She shuddered. “I don't know why anyone would order something that nasty.”

The Elixir of Eternal Happiness was our shop's best-selling product, brewed from licorice, black pepper, and fermented rice—plus whatever magic kick Mā mī added that week. Like Yún said, it was nasty stuff.

“People are strange, that's all I know,” I said. “Is my mother back yet?”

Yún frowned. “No. She said something about visiting the herb markets. Here.” She handed me a sheaf of papers. “Tell your mother I finished the inventory. Here's what we need for restocking. I've marked the items we can buy in the city markets. The rest we need to order special from merchants up north or from the Phoenix Empire.”

I scanned the top sheet. Lots of items had checkmarks, but lots more had none. “We need all that?”

Yún rolled her eyes. “What do you think? I have better things to do than make these things up.”

“It was just a question.”

“So nicely asked, too. By the way, I hope you had fun with Gan and Jing-mei and Danzu. Thank you so
very
much for inviting me.”

“You were
busy
.”

“And no one can ever change their plans to later.”

“They might if you—”

I stopped myself before I said anything truly unforgive-able. Yún still carried her knife from our gang days, and she knew how to use it. Besides, her eyes were shining. If she didn't stab me, she might start crying.

We both glared at each other instead.

“I have to get home,” Yún said. “Auntie needs me.”

She stomped out the front door. I threw the bolts and flipped the sign around to CLOSED. BACK SOON. Mā mī would peel the skin from my butt for closing early, but it wasn't as though clients were banging on our door. A part of me wondered why she needed so many new magical ingredients, but my head hurt too much to think about it.

With a sigh, I shooed Hsin from her perch and pulled out the account books. They made a huge boring heap on the counter.
But I promised,
I told myself.

You didn't promise,
Chen said.
She ordered you to.

Where have you been?
I asked.

Chen, being cryptic again. I set about sorting through our students' accounts. By the time I finished with them, my brain would start working more clearly. Maybe.

Once I settled into the routine of checking numbers, the hours slid past like oil. Yún had turned the radio station to something dull and meditative, which suited me just fine. Once or twice, someone rapped at the front door, then cursed loudly when an invisible pig poked his snout into their backs.

When I couldn't read the numbers anymore, I switched on the wall lamps. Brown shadows spilled away from the light. Outside, the skies were violet and shading into gray. A few stars speckled the clear skies of early autumn, but I noticed a fringe of clouds by the horizons. Soon the rains would start.

Very slowly, my brain clicked over a few key thoughts.

Once the sun set, and twilight poured over the horizon, the royal guards released the watch-demons of Lóng City to patrol the streets. They were better than any human sentries, and twice as dangerous. Only the bravest thieves dared to venture out after dark. Most of them didn't survive. Yún and I had once, along with Princess Lian, but that was a different story.

I poked my head into the kitchen. “Mā mÄ«?”

No one there.

My heart thumping double-time, I ran up the stairs to the second floor, where my mother had a private workroom. No one answered my knock. I pressed the latch down, sure it would be locked.

It wasn't. The door swung open onto a dark and empty room.

All Mā mī's dire warnings echoed through my brain as I stepped inside.
No trespassing, Kai-my-son. Unless you like a three-year itch.

No itch. No spells at all, so far as I could tell. Just a shadow-dark room made strange with abandoned vials and beakers and the white-dusted coals of a dying fire. That pricked my curiosity. Why did Mā mī need a fire so early in autumn? I lit a candle and scanned for more clues.

The vials were all empty. The beakers were coated with a thin silvery residue that emanated magic, both potential and unleashed. Now I knew where all those special ingredients had gone. Dozens of empty boxes and canisters and stoppered vials littered her desk. Among them, I found stacks of scribbled sheets and astrology readings, but none of them made sense.

By now I was scared. Sure, my mā mī was stronger and fiercer than any human I'd known. Maybe even fiercer than a watch-demon or two. But never, ever, had she failed to come home at night, without leaving word.

I hurried from the workroom, across the landing, to her small bedroom. It was empty, too.

A nudge at my arm recalled me. The griffin hovered in midair, its golden wings glittering in the faint light from the hallway. When it saw it had my attention, it leapt on my shoulder.

“How did you get up here?” I asked.

It gave an odd keening sound and butted my head.

“Go on. You're dead.”

The griffin nibbled at my ear. Just as you might expect for a pet chosen by my mother, it was not gentle.

“Ow! Okay, not quite dead.”

It butted me again and keened. Cautiously, I scratched the griffin behind its ears. It gave a rough trill that sounded like a purr.

“What's the matter?” I said. “You miss her?”

The griffin tucked itself under my ear, its tail curled around my neck. Its feathers were cold and stiff, its tiny paws hot. I could feel its nervous heartbeat against my skin. For a dead thing, it was acting very much alive.

“It's okay,” I whispered to the griffin. “She's just visiting a friend. She'll be back tomorrow.”

I could only hope I wasn't lying.

M
ONSTERS SWARMED THROUGH MY DREAMS THAT night, making me twitch and shiver and sometimes bolt upright, positive that something was eating the flesh from my bones. Each time I woke up, I heard the whispery tolling of the temple bells. Softer still came an eerie, slithering noise, like fine, metallic chains being drawn over stones—the watch-demons making their rounds.

I had finally fallen into a blank, dreamless sleep when Old Man Kang's rooster sang out its morning cry. I buried my head under my pillow and groaned. The next minute, a weight thudded onto my back, driving the breath from my body. Four sharp points dug into my back.

Chen jabbed me underneath my right arm—hard.

I yelped and twitched away. “Stop that! I'm not in the mood for any jokes.”

A sharp jab in the sole of my left foot jerked me awake.

I threw off my bedclothes and sat up.

Chen crouched in the far corner of my bedroom, between the open door and my washstand. His spines were slanted back, his bristles, too, and he had an odd expression on his piggy face—as though he wanted to laugh but didn't know how, and besides he wasn't really in the mood. When he caught my eye, he tilted his head and stared pointedly at the foot of my bed.

There sat the griffin, chewing holes in the blanket.

“You,” I growled. “Look, I told you—she's not here.”

It shot me a disbelieving glare, then fastened its beak on a loose thread and yanked.

“Stop that!” I tried shooing it away.

It snapped at me and hissed. I flung my pillow. With a shrill cry, the griffin launched into flight, scattering feathers and dander and bits of blanket all over the room. It circled twice around, just missing my head, then soared out the open door.

I swiped the feathers and dirt from my face. My head felt thick, and my mouth tasted like old vinegar. My room smelled musty. I couldn't tell if that was the griffin or the clothes I'd dropped on the floor yesterday, before dropping myself into bed.

You look awful,
Chen remarked.

Yeah, and I
feel
awful.
I stumbled from the bed to my washbasin and splashed water over my head. Rinsed my mouth and spat out dust and feathers. I wondered if the griffin had been swimming in my washbasin. On second thought, I didn't want to know.

Is she back?
I whispered to Chen.

Gone.
Then he added,
I checked everywhere. Nuó is gone, too.

Nuó was Mā mī's companion spirit, a smoke-gray mountain cat. Nuó scared me even more than Mā mī did. She scared Chen, too. That Chen had deliberately gone looking for her meant he was truly worried by Mā mī's disappearance.

I pulled on last night's shirt and trousers and pounded down to Mā mī's bedroom. It was empty, of course. I'd known it would be, but scanning the room, swept clean just yesterday, and the blankets neatly tucked around the bed, I felt a pain tugging at my gut.

I swallowed hard. Chen made soft snuffling noises in my ear, as though I were a baby piglet that needed comforting.

Go away,
I said.
I'm fine.

I checked the workroom again. No change there either.

In the kitchen, the sight of last night's dirty dishes (one plate, one teacup, not two) checked me harder than my mother's deserted workroom or bedroom. I spun around, ready to run and run until fright and anger bled away.

Chen blocked my path.

Eat first,
he said.
Then we make plans.

He lowered his head and presented his tusks.
You will be.

With Chen prodding and poking me along, I stacked the dirty dishes in the wash basin and filled the teakettle from the courtyard well. While I waited for that to boil, I fed the shop cats and cleaned out their sandboxes. The sun was well up before I finished. I brewed a full pot of tea and chewed on some leftover dried fish cakes from the pantry. There wasn't much else. Other than a few more packets of salted fish, our pantry was nearly empty. I'd have to visit the farmer's markets soon, however, or I'd be eating dust.

(Only if my mother doesn't come back.)

(She will.)

(But when?)

A small hard skull butted my hand. The griffin.

The flat stone eyes gleamed black, and its metallic feathers glittered in the thin yellow light. When it saw it had my attention, it opened its beak and keened. All the cats scattered at the noise.

“You can't be hungry,” I said.

With a quick dart, it nipped my thumb.

“Ow!” I sucked at the bite and tasted blood. Were there such things as vampire griffins?

The griffin keened again. I tossed a spare fish cake in its direction. It pounced and tore the cake into bits with its beak. Being dead and stuffed didn't seem to stop it from wanting meals. Or attention or comfort, I mentally added, when it butted my hand again, demanding a scratch behind its feathered ears. I wondered what kind of magic Mā mī had worked upon it.

Thinking of my mother made my stomach churn. I tossed the griffin my last fish cake and bolted up the stairs to my room. There I picked up the leather scroll case with my special certificate, proclaiming me to be a prince of the streets. On second thought, I stopped long enough to scribble down a note for Yún, explaining that Mā mī had cancelled our classes for the day. She and I would be at the special import markets to order the exotic goods from Yún's list. Yún was to spend her free hours alone in the nearest temple, practicing meditation.

A faint odor warned me that Chen watched over my shoulder.

You should tell Yún,
he said.
Or she'll worry.

Easy for him to say. Yún would only have questions. So did I. I wanted to ask mine first.

I galloped back down the stairs and flipped around the sign that said CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE. PRESS RED BUTTON TO LEAVE A VOICE MESSAGE FOR EMERGENCIES. Then I locked all the doors and windows, dumped the new dirty dishes into the washbasin, and poured the remaining hot water over them. Outside, I sealed Yún's message into an envelope labeled YÚN: READ ME and stuffed it into a crack where she would find it.

Make another sweep for Nuó,
I told Chen.

Where are you going?
Chen's tone sounded more anxious than usual.

 

 

 

“PLEASE LET YOUR Highness be assured we shall exert ourselves mightily . . .”

The bland young officer sitting across from me was using all the pretty phrases he must have learned in bureaucrat school. More, I thought, because I'd come waving around my special certificate. In spite of the official seals, and the fancy wires and circuits embedded in the scroll's leather container, the business of me being a prince was all a big ugly lie, and we both knew it, but the young man was good at his job, so he didn't say anything.