The White Mirror (12 page)

The words of the Kunming merchant came back to him.
You're in our territory now,
he had said,
where blackened silver will warn you when water is bad.

Li Du stood up. His own reflection regarded him with an indistinct face. The wind had strengthened. The trees around him bobbed their limbs up and down and swayed from side to side.

A sudden clatter startled him, and he looked up to see a small cascade of pebbles clicking and bouncing down the face of the cliff. They struck the surfaces of several pools, which instantly clouded with sediment.

From above, Li Du heard a cry. It was thinned and warped by the wind, but it was human. Another cascade of stones fell, and Li Du raised his arms to protect his face. Lowering them, he saw movement at the top of the precipice. It was a dark mass, contorted, unidentifiable. Then, with a piercing shriek, it plummeted from the edge.

Li Du stared in horror as the shape unfolded in the air. Before he could move, there was a great splash on the uppermost tier. Drops of water splattered over his face. Without stopping to wipe them away, he began to clamber upward, scrambling through the mud around the pools. Loose stones tilted and slid beneath his feet. When he reached an overhang he could not scale, he rushed into the snowy forest and continued upward until he emerged level with the uppermost pool.

There were dark robes suspended within it. Slick leather and sodden wool floated to the surface. Beneath the water he could see the back of a head and pale hands. He plunged his arms into the pool, hooked his hands under the shoulders of the figure, and hauled backward. The head emerged, lolling forward onto Li Du's chest. It was Paolo Campo.

Setting his heels hard against the stone, Li Du pulled with all his might. The body became heavier as it was dragged from the water. Finally, Li Du collapsed under its weight. He freed himself as carefully as he could, turning Campo onto his back as he did so, then knelt beside the supine man. He touched the wrists and neck in search of a heartbeat. Finding one, he spoke Campo's name, taking the man's hands and rubbing them between his own.

Gently, he turned Campo's head first to one side and then to the other. His fingers came away bloodied, but upon examination the wounds appeared minor. Li Du looked up at the cliff. Campo must have been cut by branches as he fell. Miraculously, it seemed that Campo had struck the water without crushing his head or limbs against the surrounding stone.

Campo's eyes fluttered open, and he drew in a panicked breath. He stared at Li Du without recognition. He opened and closed his mouth several times without speaking. When he did speak, the words that emerged were whispered in a language unintelligible to Li Du.

“You are safe,” Li Du said. “You fell, but you are safe. Are you in pain?”

Campo registered the Latin slowly, then shook his head. His eyes were wide and terrified.

“I am cold,” he said. His gaze traced the rock up to the looming edge of the precipice, and Li Du felt him shudder. “I struggled,” he said. “I tried—but I was overpowered.”

“Who was there?” Li Du followed Campo's gaze, but there was no sign of movement above them.

“I do not know. I could not see. It was—the light was fading. I do not know what happened. But I felt—I felt hands on my back. Did I fall?” Slowly he raised his hand to his head. When he saw the blood on his fingers, his eyes filled with tears. “Am I dying? Here, with no one to say the last rites? No one to ease me with prayer?”

Li Du looked down at Campo. He could not leave him here to search for the assailant. And even if Li Du managed to overtake the culprit in the forest, what would he do? He scanned the trees. They were falling into deep shadow. He thought he could hear steps. Or was it the cracking of branches in the wind?

“You are not dying,” he said to Campo. “Your wounds are not severe. But we must get you to a warm place. Can you stand?”

With Li Du's help, Campo rose to his feet, water streaming from his coat. He leaned heavily on Li Du. “My legs are shaking beneath me,” he said.

Li Du observed with trepidation the climb down from the pools. He could not carry Campo the way he had come. “We will find an easier way down,” he said, and led the limping, slumping Campo into the trees.

*   *   *

Twilight fell. As they struggled through snow up to their knees, Li Du supporting Paolo Campo's drenched weight on one shoulder, the trees around them became black cracks in the purple-gray sky. Beneath the snow, brambles and forest detritus caught at their feet and threw them off balance. Campo began to ramble, slipping between languages, repeating words and phrases in supplication to his god.

Li Du felt himself tiring. The boulder with its crown of trees was ahead of them, but Li Du was not sure that he could carry Campo to the manor should Campo lose consciousness. They still had to navigate the steep slope down to the river and the bridge across it.

Close to them, in a thicket of bamboo stalks, something moved. Li Du concentrated on the place. It was something round and black. Li Du had seen bears before, but only at a distance, bounding across open scree slopes from one patch of trees to another.

A deep bark rent the air. From behind the bamboo stalks that clattered in the wind, a dog emerged, a mastiff with a wild mane and open jaws. It emitted another low bark that seemed to vibrate the tree trunks around them. Beside it, another shape appeared. This one was human.

“Who's there?” a thin voice called out in the language of the caravans.

Trying to catch his breath, Li Du managed to call out his name. “I am a guest at the manor house across the river. My companion fell into one of the pools. He needs help.”

The shape came closer, and Li Du saw that it was an old woman bundled in fur. “If you are thieves,” she said, “I will tell my dog to kill you. And if you are demons, you won't be able to cross my threshold. If you are neither of those, then you can come inside and sit by the fire.”

Without waiting for an answer, she approached and, with a grunt, lowered herself under Campo's other arm and stood up, taking half his weight on her own shoulder. “This way,” she said.

 

Chapter 10

The hut that materialized amid the trees was as small as a herder's refuge, but more solidly constructed. A path had been cleared from the door to a stack of firewood equal in size to the hut itself. Li Du and the woman carried Campo inside. Obeying her succinct instructions, he helped remove Campo's soaked coat and robe, wrap him in blankets, and arrange his clothes to dry near the hearth.

Campo endured their ministrations meekly at first, but as the heat began to revive him, he became agitated. His attention went first to the woman, then to the two dogs that dominated a corner of the room. The mastiff that had accompanied its mistress outside was one of a pair. As large as lions, their black manes tangled with twigs, they stared with open jowls at the scene before them.

Clutching Li Du's sleeve, Campo spoke in a panicked voice. “A witch,” he gasped. “You have brought us to the lair of a witch. We are not safe here.”

“We are less exposed to danger here than we were outside,” Li Du said. “You need warmth and rest. This woman risks her own safety to welcome us.”

Campo released Li Du's sleeve with shaking fingers, but whimpered as one of the dogs emitted a low growl. At a sharp command from their mistress, they slid their enormous front legs forward to lie down, their heads resting on their paws, their eyes alert.

The woman spoke to Li Du. “Will you go outside and bring wood for the fire?”

Li Du turned and went to the door. As he opened it, he noticed a sword leaning against the wall. Its corroded hilt was shaped like the head of a serpent. After a quick glance behind him, he went out and made his way between piles of snow to the stacked wood. He selected as many logs as he could carry and brushed the snow from them. His arms full, he returned to the hut and used his shoulder to push the door open.

On reentering, he was able to form more of an impression of the hut's interior. Years of smoke and heat had imbued it with living warmth. Bundles of lacy snow tea hung beside garlic garlands and lily bulbs strung like necklaces from one corner of the ceiling to the other. Tables and shelves were piled with wooden bowls and black clay pots. Animal skulls cast creeping, fanged shadows on the walls.

Campo was murmuring, his eyes searching the flames. The woman, meanwhile, had stoked the fire and was using a mortar and pestle to grind something soft and sweet-smelling. She added water to it from a kettle that rested on three hearthstones, then handed the bowl to Li Du. “Give him this,” she said. “It will quiet him.”

Li Du took the mixture and inhaled the familiar sweet scent of buckthorn. He knelt in front of Campo, gently persuaded him to take it, then rose. The woman gestured for him to sit on the bench beside Campo. She added a log to the fire, then sat across from him, the dogs close behind her. She and Li Du regarded each other in mutual assessment.

She was older than he. Her long gray hair was braided and draped over one shoulder, where it mingled with the shaggy fur of a vest worn over a dark dress. Her small face seemed to recede from a pointed nose. She appeared tiny, with fragile bones and narrow shoulders that curved into a thin, concave chest. But Li Du knew that her size was misleading. She had supported Campo's weight easily across her shoulders. She was looking at Li Du now with frank, unafraid inquiry.

He told her who he was, where he had come from, and, briefly, how he had come to travel with Kalden's caravan.

“I am called Lumo,” she said. She gave no indication that she intended to say more.

Li Du looked at the walls. “Have we come to the village?” he asked. “Perhaps I did not comprehend its location relative to the manor. I thought they were on the same side of the river.”

Lumo leaned forward to stir a pot of soup that was suspended from blackened chains over the fire. “This is not the village,” she said. Her accent was different from that of the family in the manor, and reminded Li Du of Kalden's voice.

Campo coughed as the smoke from the fire shifted toward him. He moved a little to the side and leaned back against the wall, drawing the blankets more closely around him.

“What happened to your friend?” asked Lumo.

“He fell from the precipice above the hot springs,” Li Du said. He recounted to her what had happened, attributing his own presence at the hot springs to the curiosity of a traveler. He did not mention the unidentified assailant.

Lumo clicked her tongue against her teeth. “Old Dhamo visited the pools yesterday, and now he is dead. Your friend visited them today, and he is lucky not to be dead. Perhaps you should take care where your idle curiosity leads you.”

Li Du did not know whether he imagined her emphasis on
idle curiosity,
but the look she directed at him was shrewd. He suspected that she guessed more about his motivation for visiting the pools than he had revealed.

“Then—you know what happened to Dhamo,” he said.

There was no change in her expression. “I saw him dead on the bridge.”

“Why did you say he visited the hot springs?”

The question gave her an instant's pause. “I do not know that he visited them,” she admitted. “But that was the only reason he ever came this way.”

Li Du nodded. “To collect cinnabar.”

Now she looked slightly surprised. “Yes.”

“Did you know him well?”

Lumo exhaled sharply through her nose. “No one knew him well. Dhamo sustained himself on the company of his own mind.”

“You do not seem upset that he is dead.”

“As I just told you, I did not know him well. As for Death, that is a different matter. I have met Death often, often enough to exchange nods when we pass each other.”

She looked at Campo. “I am not frightened by the sight of a mad monk who has cut out his own insides. But this man appeared very afraid for someone who simply lost his footing.”

Li Du hesitated, unsure of what to say. Her direct look emboldened him to be frank. “Did you see anyone else in the forest during the last hour?”

She considered, then shook her head. “I did not see anyone until I met the two of you,” she said. She reached behind her to pet one of the mastiffs. “But this one growled more than once. I thought she must have heard a bear nearby.” She returned her gaze to Li Du.

Campo's head had fallen forward. His chin rested on his chest. Li Du heard his breathing become even.

“I urge you to be careful,” he said.

Lumo appeared to search his face for the answer to a question. She frowned as if she was dissatisfied. “Careful of what?” she asked.

“I am not sure that Dhamo's death was what it seemed.”

To his surprise, Lumo did not question him. She nodded. “This path is walked by many strange visitors,” she said. “People with secrets. People who do not want to take the main road.” She leaned forward. “But never so strange as the gathering who have come to Doso's manor now.”

“Then you also suspect—”

Lumo interrupted him. “I know nothing of what happened to Dhamo. I have no wish to know, nor any wish to speak of it.”

Suddenly both the dogs raised their heads. Their ears, almost lost in the black shaggy hair around them, perked.

Lumo looked at the door, then at the dogs. “Why don't you bark?” Her tone was scolding, but her expression was troubled.

The dogs emitted low whines, but did not stand up. The firelight shone in their dark eyes and wild fur.

“Are you in there, librarian?”

Li Du started. “That is Hamza,” he said. “He is another traveler with the caravan.”

Lumo shifted her gaze from the dogs and gestured a hand in the direction of the door. “You may let him in,” she said.

Li Du moved quickly to the door and opened it. The icy air rushed in. It carried with it a thin flurry of snow that scattered and quickly melted on the floor.