Spirit Hunter (9 page)

I gaze out at the empty courtyard again, breathless with loneliness.
Oh, where am I?
What is this place?
If I crane my neck and lean out of the window, I can see a shining bronze bowl standing on a stone table. Beyond it, I catch a glimpse of a chamber with large doors opening out into the courtyard, but I cannot make out what lies within.

Oh, wolf, please come. If ever I needed a guide, it is now.
But my wolf is gone, and the loneliness cuts at my heart like an iron knife. Why did he leave me? Was it the lie I told? Was it my secret longing for a boy? Boys are forbidden to me – and I knew it.

There is a low, soft creak as the door behind me swings open. I whirl around. A woman stands in the doorway beside a man with a scarred face. The little girl is hiding behind them. The scarred man and the woman are hairless, heads shaved bald as pebbles. They have no spirit-horses, either; their souls are shut tight within their bodies. Clad in the same dusty black robes as the girl, they both smile at me. How did they come so silently? I heard no footsteps, no talk, not even the soft hiss of three people breathing.

The man and the woman speak but I do not understand the words. Their voices are gentle, calm.

“Let me go!” I shout. “What do you want from me?”

They turn to the little girl huddling behind them. The scar-faced man takes her hand, which seems to give her the courage to step forward. The woman has an odd, hunted look about her, as if her mind is elsewhere, reliving something she would rather forget. Through my fear, I find myself wondering what is the matter with her.

“My name is Eighth Daughter,” the little girl says, in strangely accented Horse Tribe. “This is Autumn Moon and Red Falcon. You have come to the temple of the Shaolin. The Empress wishes us to add barbarians to our number, and you were chosen. If you please her, you shall join us here.” Suddenly the girl smiles. One of her front two teeth is missing. She cannot be more than seven years old. “And anyhow, I have always wanted another girl to play with, so I am glad.”

I stare at her as the truth hits me: I have been taken to the Empire. I am a prisoner of the T ’ang.

And what did she mean by,
If you please her?

I
sit in the pool of warm water, watching steam rise up and float out of the window. Mama spoke often of the bath-houses in Constantinople, and told me many times they were the only part of that city she missed. Now I know why. Every knot of pain is soothed by the heat, and I ache each day after stretching, lunging and balancing in the courtyard with Eighth Daughter, following her every move. It is as if we are learning the steps to a T ’ang dance.

What is the meaning of this?
I ask.
What are we doing?

Autumn Moon says you must be strong,
Eighth Daughter always replies.
There is no use in following the Way with your mind if your body is weak.

I have tried telling her I don’t understand, but Eighth Daughter just shrugs and smiles. Although it is true that I am no longer so weak; my body feels stronger and looser.

A tear slides down my face, down my neck, merging with the bath water. I am so far from home. What is Baba doing now? Was he wounded? Is he safe? Each night I try again to fly to the World Above, seeking answers, but still I cannot shake free from my body. My wolf-guide is gone; the World Above is closed to me, as if a great rock has been rolled across a mountain path. Am I no longer a shaman at all? I am wracked by fear, pestering myself with unanswerable questions, but I cannot find calm.

The door swings open and Eighth Daughter comes into the bath-house with Autumn Moon, who is holding a pile of black cloth.

“Autumn Moon says you must come with her,” Eighth Daughter tells me. She does not smile, this time. “You must come now.”

Autumn Moon simply nods and shakes out her bundle: a black tunic and a pair of black trousers. She still wears that haunted, hunted look, as if her thoughts are half elsewhere. I wish she were not a wall-dweller, for then I could see her spirit-horse.

Once I am out of the water, dried and dressed, Autumn Moon bows low and speaks quietly.

“Autumn Moon says she is dearly sorry,” Eighth Daughter tells me. “But she must bind your hands and your eyes.”

“No!” I cry, but I have no time even to panic before my hands are tied together: Autumn Moon moves faster than a striking snake. A strip of black silk covers my eyes, and I feel her tying it firmly at the back of my head, taking care not to tug at my hair. I am sightless.

*  *  *

Autumn Moon has taken me outside. We have been walking a while now. It’s a cool day: I feel mist beading on my skin, rough ground underfoot. Ah, but it’s good to feel the earth under my feet again. No matter what happens, I stand on the broad back of Mother Earth, and Great Father Sky looks down on me once more.
See me, protect me.
I hear running water, birdsong. I smell the soft richness of flowers, too – strange. How can that be? The time for flowers is long gone: the steppe will be summer-dry by now, a vast plain of swaying, gold-dipped grass, the flowers all gone till next spring. But I am in the Empire, and perhaps the T ’ang have magic to make plants grow when they should not.

We cross the water – it gurgles and rushes right beneath us – and I’m walking on something hewn of wood, worn smooth by countless feet. Still I catch that wall-dwelling stink – not so strong but lingering all the same: wood-smoke, dung, piss, strange spices, charring meat.

Autumn Moon quickens her step. We’re growing near another wall-dwelling, another set of doors. I smell the press of folks’ bodies, their breath, their oiled, scented skin, their sour sweat. How sickening these wall-dwellers are, huddling together in such a way; they are not like my kind, fresh and free, living under the sky beneath deerskin and larch-poles. Odd: now I’m blinded, my hearing’s grown sharper still, I’m sure of it. I hear the soft rushing sound of many people breathing, the drumming of their hearts. How many? More than I can count on two hands. Some of them breathe quick and shallow, their hearts beating fast: they are afraid, or all a-thrill. What do they wait for?

I may be blind but every shred of my body is ready to move at the drop of a stone, even though my hands are bound.

We draw closer to the stink of gathered wall-dwellers. I hear a creak; a breeze rushes past my face as unseen guards open unseen doors.

Countless eyes are watching me: it’s like a prickling rush of heat washing over my skin. My hands are released from the silk binding. I’m free, standing alone. I move to tear the blindfold from my eyes.

“There will be knives. There will be arrows. If you take off the blindfold, you will die.” It is him. My captor. I would know that voice anywhere; it haunts my every dream. He speaks to me in a soft, low whisper. Furious hot hatred seethes in my belly. “Keep your eyes covered and she may let you live. Now listen.” He steps away, and so does Autumn Moon; I no longer feel the heat of her body close to me.

Listen to what?
I long to rip off the blindfold but I dare not. What fate has Autumn Moon delivered me to? She seems so gentle, so kind. But she is haunted: her eyes are always shadowed by a wrong she cannot forget—

The chamber rings with quiet. Still all I hear are folks’ heartbeats, the slight squeak as someone shifts in his place on a stool, the soft rustle of silken cloth, birds calling to one another outside, the water’s song.

It is a woman who speaks. Her voice is low, smooth. I don’t understand the words but I hear the thrill in her tone, mixed with scorn. From the sound of it, she sits at the far end of this chamber, right in front of me—

Wait? What’s that?

It’s the creak of drawn bowstrings. I’d know it anywhere.

They are going to fire at me—

The air hisses with arrows: one stirs up the air a finger’s width from my left cheek. I drop to the ground, crouching like a cat ready to leap. The quiet’s gone: I hear cheering, jeering, clapping, arrowheads landing with soft thuds on carpeted floor. What to do? I’m free to go anywhere; I am not bound – it’s only that I can see nothing.

I swear everything’s quieter to my left. Fewer arrows? But if I move, will they aim right at me? What manner of game is this, anyhow? No choice but to try: I can’t stay here with arrows whistling past. I clear my mind; I think of nothing. I can’t see you now; perhaps you can’t see me, either, whoever you are. I am not here. Don’t look this way. I run, still half-crouched and flatten myself against a wall. Cheering – they’re cheering, calling out.

The unknown woman calls out another command. I hear no more whistling arrows, no more bowstrings twanging.
What am I going to do? What deadly game is this?

Think of nothing: be not here.

I reach out and feel something like a smooth tree trunk stretching up beside me. Is it to hold up the roof, like a tent-pole? I can climb a tree: I can climb this, surely. I run my hands up and down the slippery wood: it’ll be hard, and I have not half my old strength, despite the care of Eighth Daughter. But what choice is there?

Silk-blinded, alive with fear, I leap, catching the pole. Bracing myself against the wall, I scramble upwards, upwards. I am with Shemi once more, climbing the mulberries at the lake’s edge, moving so clumsily he would laugh if he were really with me. Tears soak the blindfold. I will never climb trees with Shemi again. My right shoulder is a knot of pain. Still no arrows.

You can’t see me: I’m not here.

I don’t care what anyone says, I’m taking off this blindfold. But I daren’t, not yet; what if someone catches a glimpse of fluttering black cloth? Higher, higher. The breath rasps in my chest. Surely they can all hear my heartbeat? It sounds like rolling thunder.
I must get away from this place: these people are crazed—

What’s that?
I hear a high, singing note – cold iron slicing through the air. A dull thud in the wall just a hand span away from my face. I reach out and grasp metal. Knives. They are throwing iron knives.
What’s this?
My head’s struck something hard above.
The roof? No
. It’s another of these thick wooden poles, like the one I’m climbing, but this one stretches out across open space. Reaching upwards with one hand, then another, I take hold of it. For a moment I’m hanging here like a bat in a cave. The air shifts near my face, and again I hear the bright hum of a flying knife: it stirs up a breeze as it passes my cheek. One of the T ’ang can see me.

Think of nothing; think of nothing. It is just the same as travelling to the World Above with Shaman Tulan. It is just the same as hiding. You have done this many times.

I swing my legs up and grapple with the beam, clinging on with both knees. Now I’m hanging underneath like a dead deer carried out of the forest on a larch-pole.
Mother Earth, this hurts.
I’ve grown so weak; it’s only the force of my rage and grief that keeps me moving. Who do these people think they are? I feel the weight of my damp braids dangling, pulling slightly at my scalp. There’s shouting now, and the long hiss of another knife as it slices through the air, a finger’s width away from my arm.
They can see me; they can see me.
I swing myself up so I’m sitting on the beam. Enough of this blindness; I don’t care what happens. I snatch at the silk band, tugging hard – it won’t come; I pull harder, digging my fingers into the knot at the back—

I’m hit – a lightning flash of pain behind my left ear. There’s a clatter as the knife strikes the wooden floor below, missing a rug. The band comes away from my eyes, flutters to the ground like a dead black butterfly; the first thing I see is dark blood in the palm of my hand, my blood.

Sitting up, I look down on the chamber below and glimpse men and women dressed in bright silk robes. A handful of black-clad folk with their faces masked by black silk prowl among them like cats, knives in their hands—

The Shaolin: my captors are trying to kill me.

One hurls a knife – I can’t tell who it is. The blade flies from their fingers faster than an eagle dropping out of the sky, blood-thirsting for her prey. I duck, flattening myself forwards against the wooden beam, which I now see stretches across the room to the far wall. It must be to hold up the roof—

I’m not here. You can’t see me.

The place comes alive with another rush of hushed talk. One woman sits apart from the rest.

I feel the heat of Shaolin eyes. They see me when no one else can, but they’ve not spotted me yet. It is a battle of minds. I won’t let them catch sight of me, my kind captors so ready to kill.

Sweat pours down my face. Blood runs warm down my neck. I feel the pain no more.

I have no weapon: I am helpless—

I’ve been seen. One of the Shaolin throws a knife, again, faster than an eagle-strike. Everything seems to slow down. Heartbeat hammers, knife flies through the air so graceful, like a deadly bird, thick quiet everywhere, all eyes on me.