Gunpowder Alchemy (10 page)

It was said monks would sometimes meditate watching drops of rain as they fell from leaves, the pattern providing a focal point. Yang stared at each drip from the distiller now as if similarly searching for answers.

I returned the current batch of samples to the tray and carried it back to the storeroom. After working side by side, Yang and I had eased into a comfortable routine. He was a different person in his laboratory. He was focused; less angry. I have to admit, the work chased away my sense of desolation as well. Even if Yang was delusional, it was calming to be able to search for an answer. For any answer.

All of the drawers in the far corner were labeled according to region rather than with a compound name. I began to place the present samples back into the Annam drawer and couldn't help scanning the entire cabinet. The highest of the drawers were just above my head, but I could still read the names painted onto them.

I was shocked to see how far Yang had traveled to procure his collection: Goryeo, Japan, Formosa.

There must have been hundreds of samples in here, maybe close to a thousand. Had he truly been tracing trade routes through the seas, going from one seedy port to another, collecting opium? He was convinced that the shipments smuggled into our ports had been tainted.

It seemed farfetched, but Yang was a scientist. He wouldn't make such a bold statement without evidence. What exactly had he seen to give him this impression? Had someone mixed the opium with some other more potent chemical?

I had to stand on my toes to return the control sample contained in a plain white jar. Finally, I managed to nudge the jar into its drawer with my fingertips, but lost my balance as I started to come back down. Out of reflex, I grabbed onto one of the drawers, which I inadvertently dragged open as I tried to regain my footing.

The clink of the glass inside turned my attention to the contents of the drawer. Nestled inside the long drawer were twenty slender vials sealed with wax. Each one contained a dark liquid that appeared to be blood.

If I was starting to become complacent at sea, the next day served to remind me that it was far from an idyllic existence. I showed up in the laboratory as I had done for the last few days only to find all the equipment had been stowed away. Up on deck, I saw the reason why in the churn of gray clouds overhead.

Even if I hadn't been able to interpret the skies, I would have known something was wrong immediately from the demeanor of the crew. Everyone was quieter than usual with heads down to focus on their duties.

Yang and I found each other at the same time. He came toward me while I wrapped my arms around myself. The air had become much colder than I was accustomed to, and I had nothing but my thin mandarin jacket, which was meant for the summer months. The gentle morning breeze had been replaced by an angry gust that whipped my hair against my face.

“You should be below deck,
mèimèi
,” Yang said, touching a hand to the small of my back.

His tone was gentle, but I sensed it was to not alarm me. Drops of rain splashed against my cheek as he directed me back toward the stairs. I noticed one of the crewmen securing a length of thick rope around one of the masts. As I went with Yang back down below deck, I could see the sailors with their heads tilted up to stare at the gathering darkness above.

We returned to Yang's private cabin where he opened the door for me. “Have you eaten?” he asked, as if there weren't more important matters for him to concern himself with.

“A storm is coming.”

“Commonplace for life at sea,” he said dismissively, but I knew his expressions well enough after working in close quarters with him.

“It's going to be a bad one?” I asked.

“One can never tell. But they can build quickly.”

I knew he had to return to his crew, so I didn't burden him with more questions. Obediently, I latched the window to keep the rain from getting in and settled in behind the desk. I chose a book of fantastic tales to try to distract myself, but I had barely begun the first one when the crash of thunder made me jump.

My heart was beating so hard that each throb was painful. The floor of the cabin lurched beneath me. Never had I been more aware that I was floating in a contraption of wood upon a vast ocean.

Within minutes, a knock came on the door. It was Little Jie. He had brought food on a tray, but I doubted my stomach would allow me to eat the way the waves were tossing the ship about.

“Miss, don't be scared!” he piped up, though the pitch of his voice told me he was far from calm.

He set the food down and stayed in the cabin with me, which I was grateful for. “Have you been through a storm like this before?” I asked.

The rumble of thunder interrupted his reply. With a yelp, he edged closer to me. “No, miss. I only came aboard in Canton, just like you. What are you reading?”

We moved to the sleeping berth where we could huddle beside each other, and, despite the flicker of the lantern as it swayed with the ship, I started reading. The first story I turned to was one about a fox demon seducing a scholar. I quickly found another story, one more suitable for a young boy. Jie made no remark. He just pressed closer, listening intently to every word as I began to read a ghost story. I was reminded of my younger brother Tian as Little Jie laid his head against my arm.

I wanted to curse the string of mishaps that had brought me onto this ship. If I hadn't gone to Changsha that day, I would still be home in our village. I didn't know what deities I needed to pray to, but I couldn't end here, swallowed by the sea.

I forced myself to turn the page, reading about a young man who was unknowingly haunted by the ghost of a maiden he had once fancied. Words came out of my mouth, but they had no real meaning. I was listening to the crash of the waves and the crack of thunder. The sear of lightning across the sky could be seen as a glow through the shutters.

“Why did the exorcist have to get rid of the ghost?” Jie was asking. He stared up at me, his eyes looking even larger set against his thin face. “Why couldn't they just let her stay near her family? She wasn't scaring anyone.”

“I don't know,” I said, wondering about the sadness of only being able to see your loved ones as a ghost. Would my spirit be able to find its way across the waves back to our village?

I had spent too much time aboard this ship, wooed by Yang's cause and slipping into a routine. How had I forgotten why I'd come in the first place?

I vowed that if I survived this day, I would do everything I could to get off this ship and return home to my family, as flesh and blood and not as a wispy ghost caught between worlds. I put my arm around Little Jie, who reminded me so much of my brother that my heart ached.

Another rumble momentarily drowned out the patter of rain outside, but it wasn't thunder this time. The low sound vibrated the floor beneath our feet.

The gunpowder engine was firing up down in the hold. Despite the winds that battered the hull of the ship, it began to gain in speed. Was it possible to outsail a storm?

“Let's find another story,” I said, sifting through the pages of the book. The boy Jie was looking up at me expectantly, and he seemed calmer when I read to him. It certainly calmed me.

I had just begun a story titled “The Tiger Guest” when a huge boom rattled the walls. Immediately after, I heard a sound that I could only describe as a ragged cough from an iron throat.

Jie clutched onto my arm. “What was that?”

The ship had ceased its forward movement and once more lurched on the waves. “The engine,” I muttered, shoving the book aside and launching toward the door.

If the gunpowder engine had exploded, it could have taken a large part of the hull with it. Water could be flooding the hold at this very moment.

With my heart in my throat, I bemoaned the fact that I couldn't swim, but that hardly mattered. We were out in open water with a storm bearing down on us. This junk was life itself.

I had never been to the engine room, but I knew it was located to the rear of the ship. I stumbled through the hallway, navigating by lantern light.

As we neared the hatch to the engine room, I could smell the sulfurous stench of gunpowder. Yang appeared then as well, rushing down the ladder from the upper deck. He spared me only a glance before reaching for the hatch. His hair was slick with rain and his coat drenched.

A trail of smoke poured out from the opening as Yang disappeared. Grabbing one of the hanging lanterns, I went to peer down the passageway. The haze of smoke was thin, which I hoped was a good sign. Taking a deep breath, I eased myself down the ladder after Yang.

The corridor below was a narrow one. There were two chambers separated by a large iron cauldron. I chose the one where an orange light glowed through the crack at the bottom of the door. Tentatively, I pushed the door open and caught the middle of a conversation.

“I told him a hundred times,” a gruff voice chided, the sound muffled behind a face mask. “The boy overloaded the cylinder. He gets overexcited.”

The speaker was a stocky man wearing a leather apron and heavy gloves who stood half a head shorter than Yang. His face was darkened with soot, and the hair in his queue was noticeably gray. Behind him, a young boy of about fourteen years who was similarly clad and covered in soot apologized profusely.

Yang addressed the engineer. “Save the explanations, Liu. We need this running immediately.”

It was the first time I had seen a working gunpowder engine. Whereas the junk was built of wood, its heart was steel, and intricately fashioned. The size of the engine was remarkably small, and the bulk of the chamber was taken up by cogs and moorings that connected the contraption to the rest of the ship. Black smoke billowed out of one of the cylinders now. I coughed at the grittiness in the air.

Both the men turned at the same time. The elderly man spoke first. “Is that—”

“Stay focused,” Yang cut in, turning back to the engineer and his apprentice. “How fast can you get this engine working again? Without it, this storm will tear us apart.”

As if to emphasize his point, the vessel suddenly rose, then dropped, leaving a sick, falling feeling in the pit of my stomach. I steadied myself against the doorway. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

Engineer Liu ignored me to bark at his apprentice. “Bring water! We need to cool the chamber enough for me to check the pistons.”

I followed the boy as he scurried outside. I found two buckets against the wall while the boy lifted the lid off the iron caldron I had passed outside the engine room. It was used to store water. I remembered similar ones in every courtyard of the Ministry building, so that fires could be immediately controlled.

I thrust one of the buckets into the apprentice's hands before dipping mine into the cauldron. Water sloshed over the side in my haste and I rushed back into the engine room.

Engineer Liu was busy closing off a series of valves and gaskets. “Pour the water into that funnel there.”

He pointed toward a receptacle high above my head, and Yang lifted the bucket from my hands before I could comply. Stepping onto a small ladder, he tilted the water over the funnel. I followed the network of pipes that snaked out from it, presumably carrying water to cool critical parts of the machine without contaminating them.

“If you bring the engine all the way down, it will take too long to power up again.” Despite Yang's protest, he took the second bucket from the apprentice and tipped it in without argument.

“You worry about keeping this ship afloat, I'll worry about this beast!” Liu snapped.

I ran back out to scoop more water with the boy immediately on my heels. We repeated the process two more times before Engineer Liu chased Yang and me out of the room.

“Away with you. I need to concentrate.”

Yang took me by the arm. He spared one tense glance back into the engine room before directing me up the ladder.

“We should get some air. Even with the ventilation shafts, it gets difficult to breathe in there.”

Back up in the lower deck, I could tell that the storm had become worse. The commotion in the engine room had drowned out the roar of thunder and the crash of the waves. Most of the crew were gathered in the galley area and around the berths. A group of them had started a game of dice, likely to distract themselves just as I had with my strange tales. Conversations continued in a quiet murmur.

“There's nothing to do but wait it out until Liu fixes whatever he needs to fix.”

I could tell Yang wasn't happy with that. He led me back to his cabin while Little Jie trailed behind us. “Did the engine explode?” the boy asked. “Is the ship on fire?”

Though the urchin had directed his questions to me, Yang took the liberty of answering. “No. And no. There was a miscalculation in the amount of gunpowder. One of the cylinders has been damaged, that is all.”

Jie stared at him wide-eyed, not comprehending.

“Everything will be fine,” Yang concluded, leaving it at that.

We had reached the captain's quarters, and Yang removed his coat to place it onto the hook. His shirt beneath it was only in a slightly better state. He combed a hand through his hair to push it away from his eyes. I would never become accustomed to how short it was.

“All these days aboard the ship and I've never seen Liu or his apprentice before,” I remarked.

“Engines are complicated things requiring constant maintenance and care. One does not become an engineer without preferring seclusion.”

I thought of the spider's web of pipes and gaskets in the engine room and the shelves full of spare parts kept on hand. With heat stressing the metal and soot griming the gears, the machine would have to be cleaned and calibrated.

There had always been a divide between the scientists and the engineers in the Ministry. Yang showed a typical scientist's wariness toward moving parts. In terms of rank, the scientists had also held themselves superior to the tinkerers who got their hands dirty working machinery. Scientists were more closely aligned to the illustrious scholars where engineers were akin to laborers.

At that moment, the ship lurched violently. Yang reached out to steady me as I stumbled, and I might have hung onto him longer than was proper. I was frightened, truly frightened that I would end up below these waters forever.

“How long do storms last?” I asked shakily.

A crooked smile flitted across his lips, which told me the silliness of my question, but Yang banished it immediately. “My ship has handled much worse,” he assured gently.

“But you told Engineer Liu this storm would tear the ship apart.”

“I was exaggerating to push him along.”

“Or lying now to make me feel better,” I argued.

“
Mèimèi
,” he said quietly, in such a way that the words sounded entirely different; as if they'd never been spoken before.

My heart beat faster. I was standing closer to him than I was supposed to; staring at him longer than I should have been.

The moment was broken when I felt a tug on my hand. “Miss, the engine is running again,” Little Jie said.

I could feel the purr of it down below; not yet the full roar as it was at full power, but building slowly.

“There.” Yang ran his fingertip playfully down the bridge of my nose, grinning as if we were out of danger, though we were far from it. “Now let us escape this demon of a storm and find the sun again.”

***

We did see the sun again, as Yang promised. On the day I saw the first ray of light break through the clouds, I stayed up on the main deck for hours. Everyone's spirits seemed high, and the crewmen greeted me in a more familial manner.

“The air after a storm always feels fresher,” Headman Zhou told me. “The sun warmer.”

Zhou was Yang's second-in-command, a surprisingly affable man whose beard was just starting to gray. Despite his seemingly mild demeanor, he was unquestionably strict in enforcing the rules of the ship.