The Broken Lands (30 page)

“Anything?” Sam whispered.

“I don't see a single person. I think we're okay.” She elbowed her way through the flap and held it open with one shoulder for Sam.

“Xiao Jin!”

A few yards away, the wagon door burst open and Liao stood there, arms folded across his chest.

“Well, this wasn't supposed to happen,” Jin observed. Sam held very still and tried very hard to be invisible.

Liao gave the two of them a long, angry look, barked something in Chinese, and stepped back inside the wagon. Jin sighed, then set down her crate. “Come on.”

They trailed in after Liao. The second the door had shut behind them, he snapped, “Explain.”

Jin pulled a stool out from under the workbench, sat, and regarded her uncle. “I'm sorry if I worried you, Uncle Liao, and I'm sorry to have taken supplies without asking, but I need to tell you something, and I can't perform the display tonight.”

“You need to tell me something? Like, perhaps, about the book that is suddenly missing from our shelves?” Liao asked.

For the second time, Sam wished he could become invisible.

“Like . . . well, yes,” Jin admitted. “Like that. Uncle Liao, the men who killed the person we found in the bushes behind the hotel, they're looking for a conflagrationeer. Sam took the book for me because I asked him to.”

Liao's face hardened. An awkward moment passed, and Sam decided there wasn't much point in trying to hide in plain sight. “I'm sorry, sir. I apologize.”

“It is not easy to say no to my niece,” Liao said coldly.

“It's really not,” Sam mumbled.

“Uncle, what is a conflagrationeer?” Jin asked. “What is it they want you to do? These folks who are trying to stop what's happening, they think I need to stay away, or the killers might try to hurt me to make you do what they want. Do you know? Does Mr. Burns?”

Liao's scowl disappeared. “How are you involved with these men? And who are they?”

“They work for . . . for the man whose name was on the wall,” Jin said carefully. “And they can hear when we talk about him. They want a conflagrationeer, and they are coming after you and Mr. Burns.”

He nodded. “Then we will leave. Right now. Tonight.”

“No,” Jin protested. Sam's heart sank, but it was so obviously what had to happen that he nodded in agreement with Liao. Jin stared at him in disbelief. “I'm not leaving now!”

“I beg your pardon?” Liao thundered. “We leave immediately! Or at least as soon as the
yang guizi
returns. Don't be absurd. Why on earth would we stay here when this sort of creature is creeping about in the shadows?” His voice softened. “Your friend knows I am right.”

“My
friend
should—”

Sam flinched. “Jin, he
is
right. You know he's right. I'm sorry, but there's no reason for you to be here, in danger.”

“Yes, there is!” she snapped.

“What is that reason?” Liao demanded.

“Uncle Liao,” Jin said at last, “what if I could stop them?”

The old man folded his arms into his sleeves. “How, if you please?”

Jin likewise folded her arms into her sleeves and returned his skeptical look with a defiant one of her own. The two of them stared at each other for a moment. There was nothing for Sam to do but watch and wait.

“If we run,” Jin said at last, “if you and I and Mr. Burns pack up tonight and go away, nothing changes for the city.” She glanced at Sam over her shoulder. He shook his head.
Please, please,
he wished silently,
don't say what you're about to say. Please don't bring me into this. Please leave. Please be safe.
But of course, she did bring him into it. “Nothing changes for my friend, Uncle Liao.”

“Your friend, who you met only a day ago,” he said slowly.

She nodded. “My friend, Uncle. And it doesn't matter for how long. You taught me that, when you gave me Meng Chiao to read. A single evening can leave its wound in the soul.”

“Jin,” Sam said quietly. “You've got to leave town.”

Neither of them looked at him.

“My friend has a cinnabar heart, too,” Jin said at last. “And when have you ever,
ever
heard me call anyone my friend?”

Liao frowned. “Xiao Jin, I have always wished for you to have friends, but they are no good to you if you are dead.”

“Uncle, please.”

Sam cleared his throat. “You folks really ought to—” Both of them held up their hands: Jin's small and delicate, Liao's gnarled and long-nailed. Then they started speaking to each other in rapid Chinese. Sam tried to act like it didn't bother him that he had no idea what they were talking about.

It went on for a while.

At last, Liao's mouth curled up. “Too brave for her own good, my Jin. What is your idea, firefly?”

Once more, Jin outlined her plan for the message over the river. When she finished, Liao made a little noise that Sam couldn't interpret but Jin obviously took for approval. Then he looked at Sam. “It is not easy to say no to my niece,” he repeated. Then, to Jin, “And it does not seem right to me, if you wish to attempt to do something great to help so many people, to discourage you.”

Jin exhaled. “Thank you.” Then she frowned. “But what is a conflagrationeer, Uncle?”

The old man shook his head. “Xiao Jin, I know that word only from the book, the same way you do.”

“What about Mr. Burns?”

“Mr. Burns may well know more than I do, as that book comes from his grandfather.”

“So you aren't a conflagrationeer?” Jin asked. “
I'm
not a conflagrationeer?”

He laughed. “After all your brave talk, of all things, you are afraid of
yourself?
” Liao put his hand over hers. “Xiao Jin, you are a brilliant fireworker. More than a fireworker—you are a true artificier, an artist in the realm of pyrotechnics. You should be proud of who you are and what you can do.”

She nodded but said nothing, waiting as if she thought there was more. Sure enough, after a moment, Liao spoke again. “I have never been called by this name,
conflagrationeer,
but I suspect it is another kind of master of methods, a
fangshi
of a different sort. If I am right, then being a conflagrationeer is like being any kind of artificier or adept—all depends on what the master chooses to do with his skills.”

Jin frowned, as if this was less satisfactory than his first answer. The old man sighed. “I wish I could give you more comforting words.
You
have a cinnabar heart, my firefly, and while it is possible that you would be a terrible disappointment to the great sage, there has never been a time that you have not made me proud.”

Jin's eyes glittered. “
Xiexie,
Uncle Liao.”

“I can do the display tonight. That is no great thing. It will not be your beautiful reborn Atlantis, but I will make you proud.” He patted her arm. “You must, of course, not be here if these men are looking for fireworkers.”

“Mr. Liao,” Sam said cautiously, “do you think it's a good idea to even do the display? It's you they're looking for, after all.”

Liao gave him a short, narrow smile. His eyes were hard. “You have no need to fear for me. This I promise.” He looked to Jin. “How shall we reach each other?”

“In the sky,” Jin said. “The way you always call me.”

Liao nodded. “And the boxes? You have all that you need?”

“I think so.”

“And where will you stay?” Sam might've imagined it, but he was pretty sure he saw the old man's eyes flick sideways at him forbiddingly.

“You can stay with Susannah,” Sam said quickly. “Right upstairs in the hotel. I think Mike said she's in suite five fifty-seven. That way you're nearby, but out of sight. You'll feel better if you can look out the window to see if your uncle and Mr. Burns are all right.”

“And she will see that we are fine,” Liao said with an approving nod. He looked to Jin. “You believe that, my firefly? I promise these men will not harm us. You need not worry.”

She nodded back. “I believe you.”

“But you two . . .” Liao wagged a finger at Jin and then, maybe just a bit more forcefully, at Sam. “
You
I do not trust without defenses. Come, please.”

They followed him out of the wagon and across the gravel to the nearest tent, the one Walker and Bones hadn't been able to enter.

“This is Uncle's laboratory,” Jin whispered over her shoulder. “Mind the step.” Sam rolled his eyes and followed her through the door flap and up onto the wooden platform.

Inside, this tent was nothing like the last one. It looked more like a temple than a laboratory, except for the big iron furnace in the middle of the room. Sam stared, taking in the strangeness around him, while Liao went straight to the workbench on the north wall with Jin at his heels.

“Move your braid,” the old man said. Jin pushed her hair aside. Liao took a red grease pencil and drew a symbol made of angles on the back of her neck. “A
shenyin
for you, my firefly: the talisman for Opening Up the Mountain. It is said to give the means to control demons and spirits, and it is said to open one's eyes to the scriptures of
taiqing,
the Great Clarity, that one might know the ingredients of the great elixirs of
waidan,
even when they are hidden.”

“Well, these men are plenty demonic,” Jin murmured.

Liao grunted as he finished the talisman. He looked over at Sam. “You, too, young man. A talisman for you, as well.”

Sam walked self-consciously over to the workbench. Liao took a piece of yellow paper from a drawer and drew another red symbol on it. “A
shenyin
for you,” he said, “a divine seal for warding off harm.” He poured water from a pitcher on the bench into a yellow metal cup and held the paper over it. Abruptly, the bottom edge began to smolder. Black-red ashes fell into the water.

When the entire page had burned, Liao handed the glass to Sam. “Drink.”

Sam glanced at Jin. She nodded. He did as he was told. It had a piny-cinnamon flavor, and the bits of charred paper felt strange when they hit his tongue. It seemed almost as if the ashes were effervescing, like the bubbles in mineral water or phosphate soda. The fizzing feeling continued as the last swallow slid down his throat and into his stomach.

“What was that?” he asked as he handed the cup back to Liao.

“Talismanic water. Jin's braid will hide her mark. On you it would stand out.” The old man regarded Sam over the cup clasped in his gnarled hands. “It is a gift of protection, but you must think of it as luck, not as a guarantee of safety.”

“I understand,” Sam replied, although it was a bit of an overstatement.

The old man knew it, too. “I am sure you do not.” He patted Sam's shoulder. “But I appreciate your courage.” He turned back to Jin. “Go now, Xiao Jin. Call upon me if you need me.”

 

When they returned to the carriage, Mike took charge. It turned out that he had done a bit of scouting earlier that afternoon, after driving Mapp and Ambrose and Susannah to the Broken Land but before going back to Mammon's Alley for Sam, Jin, and Tom. Now he led them to a tradesman's entrance, and a little fast talking and a quarter eagle coin from what was left of Hawks's money got them into a lift that carried them up to the fifth floor, crates and all, with no questions asked. Then Mike led the way down the halls to a door marked 557 and pressed the bell.

The peephole darkened, and a moment later Susannah Asher opened the door. “Thank heaven,” she said. “It was giving me the twitches, being the only person in this suite.”

“Good,” Jin said, shouldering past with her crate. “Because we might need to bring in a few extra hands in the morning.”

“In the morning?” Susannah asked with a little frown. “Can't we do anything now?”

Jin sighed. “I wish we could, but I need one more chemical, something to keep the charges from burning out too quickly.” She explained to Susannah what she planned to do. “I can get what I need from a pharmacist I met yesterday, but he was out and not expected back before morning. There's really nothing that can be done until I have that ingredient.”

This was only partly true; there were things that
could've
been done, but none that
had
to be done quite yet. Jin told herself it wasn't selfish to want to spend an hour watching the sky.
I need it,
a childish part of her mind insisted.
I need it, or I'll go mad.

She set down her crate against the far wall and peered out the window just in time to see Liao duck into the storage tent. There was so much work for him to do. She wondered where Mr. Burns was. Probably raking the sand on the beach so there would be a flat surface from which Liao could fire the rockets. It was one of the very few things Liao and Jin trusted him to do to prepare for a display.

Sam came to stand beside her. “Jin,” he said quietly, and nodded over her shoulder.

Susannah sat on the sofa, staring at the crates of explosive supplies. Her face was drawn tight as a drum.

“Susannah?” Jin lowered herself onto the sofa beside her. “What is it?”

“What does this do besides buy us some time?” the other girl asked quietly. “Even if it works and we keep them from being able to find me, they'll still be out there. They'll never stop trying, unless I find a way to stop them. There has to be something I can do. Otherwise, what's the point of all this?”

“I have a question,” Sam said, perching on the coffee table before the two girls. “With Hawks and the other two gone, there's only you and the fellow who went over to the . . . the other side left. How do the three empty spots get filled again?”

“Well, I inherited it from my father, and so did Sawyer and Overcaste.” Susannah leaned back and stared hard at the ceiling, thinking. “But I don't think it
has
to happen that way. If it did, we'd have problems whenever one of us died childless. Furthermore, the inheritor is permitted to accept or decline the task. Also, I don't think the . . . the stewardships we fill are always the same. I know there is always a keeper of lore—that's me—and a smith, and a keeper of sanctuary.” She ticked off fingers on one hand. “Van Ossinick was the smith, and Hawks was the sanctuary keeper. The Sawyers were stonemasons, and Overcaste was the keeper of roads.”