DAC 3 Precious Dragon (11 page)

And then they were at the sinister black warehouse that housed the Night Harbor.

The clerk barely registered Chen's passport, which he gloomily regarded as a sign of how often he had now passed into Hell. And that was just through official channels. Zhu Irzh was waved into the antechamber with a mere gesture of the clerk's hand; he looked pardonably smug, but then in Zhu Irzh's case, immigration didn't really apply.

The processing of Miss Qi's details, however, proved to be another matter. Chen and the demon waited for half an hour in the antechamber before the Celestial reappeared. Zhu Irzh was uncharacteristically lost in thought, so Chen picked up a glossy magazine and flicked through it, finding it filled with celebrities whom he did not recognize and eulogies over movie stars of whom he had never heard. Still, he had to admit that this was a vast improvement over his previous expeditions through the Night Harbor, most of which had involved extreme discomfort and hazard. Now, they were being treated almost with respect: he supposed this was a function of traveling first class.

He was starting to become slightly concerned about Miss Qi when she came through the door, looking ruffled.

"I'm so sorry," she explained. "There was some problem with my papers—I can't think what could have gone awry. Our clerk was most careful."

"I very much doubt that there was any fault on the part of your clerk," Chen said. "I suspect they give any Celestial who ventures here a hard time. Except possibly Kuan Yin. But then, she is a goddess."

"And she has her own boat," Miss Qi pointed out, sitting down beside him. "Detective Chen, I can't help being worried. If it's like this in the Night Harbor, when we are still technically on Earth, then how will I be treated in Hell itself?"

Chen wanted to reassure her, but it was a question that was also preoccupying him somewhat. "How did you find your entry onto Earth?" he asked, stalling. Miss Qi's reply confirmed his fears.

"Why, it was a simple, pleasant matter. I merely stepped through into our version of a Celestial temple, and the next moment, I was in its Earthly counterpart. They were very kind to me—they brought me tea before contacting the police station."

"Well, the temple monks must have been very pleased that a Celestial being had graced them with her presence," Chen said. "But I'm afraid you're right. Hell will be a different proposition—to some extent, to Zhu Irzh and myself as well. We'll look after you to the best of our ability. And we are honored guests." Well, guests, anyway.

"That didn't seem to make too much difference to that clerk," Miss Qi said. "He practically interrogated me."

"From what I saw last night, you don't need much help."

Miss Qi looked down at her hands. "I know a few things."

"Oh, come on," Zhu Irzh said. "You're a Celestial warrior, aren't you?"

"Well, yes. I am."

"So why are you pretending to be this helpless little thing?"

"It is important to be humble and modest," Miss Qi said, reprovingly.

Zhu Irzh looked as though he didn't even know what she meant. Chen said, "So, did they tell you what was happening?"

"Yes, although I had to ask the clerk several times. He said that we had to wait here until boarding was called."

Chen looked around. "There don't seem to be many other passengers," he started to say, but then he realized that this wasn't true. The antechamber in which they sat, which had previously appeared empty, was now filled with people: some apparently human, some very definitely not. Close to Chen and his companions sat two individuals, wearing full armor with war bonnets, the dress of ancient China. Beneath the helms, however, they had the faces of boar: fierce tusks and black bristles, with little black eyes like seeds. They were both staring at Miss Qi with a kind of avidity. Chen felt his heart sink; the last thing they needed was to attract attention to the Celestial, but it seemed that this was going to be inevitable. He couldn't tell whether they were aware that she was a warrior or not; nor which option was preferable.

At that moment, however, the reverberation of a gong sounded throughout the antechamber and a disembodied voice said, "Boarding for tonight's passage to Hell will commence shortly. Please have all documentation readily available."

"Here we go," Chen said. "Good." He wanted to get this trip over and done with, but then, he could have said the same about any visit to Hell. Miss Qi looked frankly alarmed and Zhu Irzh said moodily, "With my luck, my mother will be waiting on the damn dock."

Chen had forgotten about the demon's family celebrations. "I'm sure she'll be too busy."

Members of the crowd were starting to stand, and a milling throng, too disorderly to be termed a queue, was forming around a desk at the far end of the room. Chen, Zhu Irzh, and Miss Qi joined the back of the crowd and waited their turn. People were staring at them; Chen could feel it. He observed them covertly, a policeman's tricks, noting who was human and who was not. Two of the men he recognized, but he did not immediately remember where he knew them from. Then, just as they were approaching the bored, black-clawed clerk at the boarding desk, he realized. He had seen the men at the party at Paugeng the other night, the party at which the girl had gone missing.

Interesting. Chen did not believe in coincidences. He might not sense the puppetmaster hand of the gods, but that did not mean that it wasn't there. He nudged Zhu Irzh, knowing that the demon would have too much sense not to look at once. Sure enough, Zhu Irzh ignored him, but a moment later, cast a casual glance around. His gaze lingered fleetingly on the two men: human, middle-aged, conservatively dressed, and with very little to distinguish them from any other businessman in Singapore Three.

Once they had passed through the gate, Chen leaned over and whispered, "What do you think?"

"They were at Paugeng," the demon breathed back. "I don't know who they are. Jhai will know, though."

"Jhai's not here."

"I'll call her later."

Slowly, they were shuffled onto a platform, dim-lit by wall sconces.

"I've never traveled to Hell by train before," Chen said.

"I didn't know you could." Miss Qi seemed impressed. She looked around at the towering black marble walls, shot with silver; at the gleaming rails on the track beneath.

Zhu Irzh snorted. "Of course we have trains. Who do you think runs most of the world's railway services?"

Moments later, the train itself appeared, startling Chen with its speed and appearance. It was bullet-shaped, black and silver like the station, but metal and coruscated with magnificent ornamentation. Its engine was encased in the head of a centipede: of a kuei, and the name on its side read STORM LORD.

"Wow," Chen remarked. "It's certainly baroque."

Zhu Irzh radiated a faint national pride. "We're a high-tech society, Chen. So many new developments originate in Hell." He touched a frond of silver leaf and a door slid open. "After you."

Chen stepped inside to find a comfortable, black-velvet interior: seats that were practically armchairs, and small fixed tables. There was more than a nod to Art Nouveau. "This is certainly an improvement on the boat, that time. Or having to go through Bad Dog Village."

"I'll say." Zhu Irzh was fervent in his agreement. "I might be from Hell but the Night Harbor is bloody tedious." He selected one of the seats. "I could get used to traveling in style."

The train did not remain long in the station. There was a rushing, gliding sensation beneath Chen's feet and the train pulled out. Chen, feeling like a child, pressed his face to the window but little was visible beyond it: a gleam of sea; a bulk of shadow, that could have been the mountains through which he had traversed with Zhu Irzh and various other folk, in which Bad Dog Village lay. Then the train was shooting through rocky gorges, lit high above with flickering lights, and across vast plains and fields in which nightmare crops were growing. Zhu Irzh leaned back against the seat and closed his eyes, sleeping with that frozen quality Chen had come to associate with him. But Miss Qi appeared as interested as Chen himself, and looked out of her own side of the window, her expression wary.

"It's not like Heaven, is it?" said Chen.

Miss Qi shook her head. "Oh no. Not at all. Is it always so dark?"

"Not quite. Hell has its own cycles of night and day, but it never gets very light."

"Just as Heaven never becomes very dark," Miss Qi mused. "It is like the essence of Tao, a balance."

"In that case, the balancing point is Earth," Chen said. "Yet I wouldn't describe Earth as a balanced place."

"I see Earth as being the place where the dynamic of balance is worked out," Miss Qi said. "And so it is always in flux, never static, always changing. Again like the Tao. Change around a still center."

"An interesting philosophy," Chen said. "When I last had dealings with Heaven, however, there was a move to withdraw from Earth, from humankind. Some of the Celestials disagreed: the Emperor's son Mhara, Kuan Yin. Do you know anything more of this policy?"

Miss Qi's pale face looked troubled. "I am no politician," she said. "But it is an argument that has raged—politely, of course—in Heaven for many years. I would hope that we would not withdraw. I feel we have a duty to Earth; it was formed alongside Heaven, after all. I think it would be a dereliction of our duty to abandon it."

"I hope Heaven comes to feel as you do," Chen said.

"Maybe it will. But you know, because of what we are, we cannot afford to become divided amongst ourselves. So we will believe what the Emperor decides for us."

"You mean you will choose to believe it," Chen said, seeking clarification.

"No, I mean that there is no choice. Once the Emperor has decreed it, we will simply believe, because we are all one."

"I didn't realize Heaven was so united," Chen said.

"That is what makes it Heaven." Miss Qi was very earnest.

If that was the case—and as a Celestial, Miss Qi would not lie—Chen was given yet another reason to be uneasy about the nature of things in the Heavenly regions. On this account, one might infer that Heaven was the ultimate dictatorship, an insect hive with all faces turned radiantly toward the Emperor. But of course, that was exactly why Heaven had survived in this form for so long. Chen wondered whether the Emperor's son, now partly resident on Earth, was subject to this policy, or whether he was permitted to have a degree of independent thought. That the Emperor's decrees were essentially benign, Chen had no doubt; the fact that debate was allowed at all was a positive sign.

But unease remained. And with it came an even more personal and disturbing thought, one that had been troubling Chen for the last few years. He was not immortal. He was a human man, in his forties and therefore middle-aged, with not all that long remaining to him even if he lived out a natural span and didn't succumb to some peril of the job (as seemed all too likely, on occasion). When he died, as a devoted servant of the Goddess Kuan Yin, Most Merciful and Compassionate, he might reasonably expect to enter Heaven himself. Okay, he'd married a demon. His right-hand man was from Hell. On a previous, unfortunate occasion, he'd used the goddess' sacred image as a battering ram. Good thing she was Merciful and Compassionate, really.

But did he actually want to go to Heaven? Even if he was reincarnated later, as usually happened? Chen was not arrogant enough to consider himself enlightened: he was a policeman, not a monk. He muddled along, but he didn't have much time to spend in contemplation and meditation, purifying his soul in preparation for removal from the wheel of karma. His meditational practice usually took place during a snatched ten minutes in the precinct locker room, not a harmonious hour in the local temple. So even if he did end up in Heaven, he was unlikely to remain there for all that long and then he'd be hauled back down to Earth, a baby again. At least it would give him a chance to get some sleep.

And then there was the central issue in all this.

Inari.

He couldn't take her to Heaven. Even if Kuan Yin swung some massive dispensation and allowed it, Chen did not think the denizens of the Celestial Realms would take kindly to a demon in their midst. Oh, he doubted that anything would be said. If anything, the Celestials would probably be too kind, and that sort of patronage would eventually grate, even on one so self-effacing as Inari. It would certainly grate on Chen. Impossible to explain that Inari—so gentle, so kind—was really in the wrong place to start with; she would have been so much more suited as a child of a family of Heaven.

And when he was reincarnated, what would happen to Inari? This was the thing that really made Chen's heart beat slow and coldly. He would be gone, and it was improbable in the extreme that Heaven would allow her to stay. That would throw Inari back onto the highly dubious mercy of her family. They might even try to marry her off again, to the same vile personage from the Ministry of Epidemics that had led Chen to have to rescue her from Hell in the first place. Back to square one. He could think of only two choices: placing her under the protection of Kuan Yin, perhaps as a temple priestess or, at the least, a handmaiden, or placing her under the protection of Zhu Irzh.

Strangely, Chen thought that Zhu Irzh would rise to this particular challenge. He treated Inari as a younger sister these days, although Chen was fairly sure that he had at one point entertained a rather more romantic interest in her. But now there was Jhai, and Inari had become part of Zhu Irzh's adopted family.

At least there were choices. Also, Chen didn't want to make the mistake of treating Inari like a child; she might have equally viable ideas about her own future that simply hadn't occurred to him.

He stared out of the window and realized that the sky was lightening to an uncomfortable rosy red and that the train was coming into the outskirts of a city, presumably the sprawling metropolis that was Hell's counterpart to Singapore Three. Chen looked out onto rows of slums, weed-infested backyards in which the occasional hungry ghost could be glimpsed, narrow streets filled with litter and overlooked by towering tenement blocks. The train shot past a gap in the houses, a strip of black grass on which a rail-thin, red-eyed cow grazed. Chen thought of Senditreya, mad goddess of geomancy, who had recently been transformed into her bovine avatar and confined to Hell. He doubted she'd be happier as a cow. But frankly, who cared?