Thirteen Orphans (50 page)
Beneath Isis’s watchful gaze, the group formed a procession, walking slowly, almost solemnly from beneath the lotus pillars and Egyptian quiet to the tiger’s jungle that was Pearl’s garden.
When the old man emerged through the empty air and collapsed at the Dragon’s feet, Brenda didn’t wonder why everyone acted like this was the most normal thing in the world. She knew perfectly well that all of them—well, at least other than Pearl and Righteous Drum and maybe Des—were simply in shock.
Dealing with the immediate and the essential, like stopping the injured man from bleeding to death, was something to do, something that made sense out of nonsense. So Brenda fetched hot water and handed Nissa and Riprap—who knew what they were doing—napkins and the like. When they had the Monkey on a stretcher, Brenda ran ahead because someone had to go in through the house and out through the garden to open the locked gate.
Hastings, the chauffeur, was in afternoon rehearsals for a bit part in a play, so he wasn’t around. It wasn’t one of the maid’s days. Wong, the gardener, had left earlier, afternoon in the summer not being the best time for tending plants, so Pearl’s garden was thankfully empty when the stretcher was carried around to the back and set down under the ramada on the veranda.
“When he comes around, the Monkey is going to be shocky,” Nissa said. “Pearl, you have some old sheets and blankets in the basement. Mind if I … ?”
“Help yourself,” Pearl said, “or rather, let someone else get them. I think you have the most medical training of the lot. I’d rather you stay with our patient.”
Pearl glanced at Riprap when she said this, and the big man shook his head.
“First aid, some trauma. Nissa’s better than me, though. I’ll get the stuff.”
Brenda did her part to help, and soon found that the best thing she could do was keep out of the way—and help keep Lani entertained. This wasn’t easy. Lani was tired out after her day’s ordeal, wanted her mother, and no one else would do.
No one else who was present that is. The little girl wouldn’t stop asking about Foster, repeating her questions with the regularity and unvaried rhythm of a metronome until Nissa decided the little girl should be sent off to bed.
Brenda was drafted to attend to bath and bedtime. She was very glad when at last Lani was fed, bathed, and put down for the evening. Despite bedtime coming almost an hour early, Lani dropped off almost at once. Now only Brenda’s own imagination could be blamed for the litany.
Where is Foster? What’s he doing? Why isn’t he here? Doesn’t he like me anymore? Where is Foster?
“Foster is gone,” Brenda said to the empty air in her room as she changed out of the T-shirt that had gotten soaked during Lani’s bath. “Flying Claw is the only one who remains.”
Brenda reached into the box on her dresser and pulled out a few fresh amulet bracelets. They weren’t as strong as those she’d used earlier, but she felt better when she had them around her wrist. She suspected her allies had taken similar precautions on the excuse of running inside to use the bathroom.
When Brenda rejoined the others out on the veranda, she learned that Waking Lizard, as the Monkey was properly named, had come around about five minutes before. While not exactly energetic, he was coherent enough to give an account of the events that had led to his desperate dive through what he called the Last Gate to collapse in the Dragon’s arms.
“You said we had lost,” Righteous Drum was prompting. “You mean our armies have been defeated?”
“That’s right.” Waking Lizard’s voice was whispery but still somehow resonant and strong. “I don’t know what the other side had. They had weapons I’ve never seen before … Creatures …”
He began to shake and Nissa spooned something hot into him. The shaking stopped, but Waking Lizard’s eyes remained wild.
“We knew our enemies had new tactics, new weapons, but this. I’ve never seen …”
He looked like he was going to start shaking again, but Pearl’s voice brought him back into focus.
“If things were that bad, how did you manage to get away?’
Waking Lizard glanced at Pearl, but he directed his reply to Righteous Drum. “Why me? You know me, Righteous Drum. I’m no Stone Monkey, no frontline fighter, no warrior out of legend. I was directing staff in the palace. When things went to hell, when the word rippled through the ranks that the Horse was dead and the Ram badly injured, I decided I could do nothing more productive where I was. I ran.”
He glanced back at Pearl. “And I didn’t run
away
either, lady. I ran
to
. To Righteous Drum. I thought he needed to know what had happened. Also, along with the Snake and the Tiger, he represents a full quarter of our cabal’s strength. The Tiger is young, but I thought he might be able to rally at least some of our troops. And what if the Dragon had discovered even part of what he had come to seek?
away
either, lady. I ran
to
. To Righteous Drum. I thought he needed to know what had happened. Also, along with the Snake and the Tiger, he represents a full quarter of our cabal’s strength. The Tiger is young, but I thought he might be able to rally at least some of our troops. And what if the Dragon had discovered even part of what he had come to seek?
“Then, as I was readying the spell that would give me access to Righteous Drum via the bridge he used to come here, a group of soldiers burst through the door I had locked behind me. They threw a bomb of some sort. It bounced off my shield, but retained sufficient power to shatter the stone floor of the room. Most of my injuries came from flying stone.”
Waking Lizard looked momentarily proud. “I’m not sure my attackers proved as hardy. I think I took one or two of them with me. Maybe more.”
“So our enemies might not know what you were doing, where you were going?” Righteous Drum sounded anxious, almost hopeful.
“I think they’ll figure it out,” Waking Lizard said, “but they may take a while to follow. A month? Hard to say. Depends on if any of the others survived, and what they’ll tell when questioned.”
There was something in the manner in which Waking Lizard inflected the word “questioned” that made Brenda certain beyond a doubt that such questions wouldn’t be restricted to words.
Riprap cut in. “So you’re looking for sanctuary. Not just Waking Lizard, all of you.”
Looking at the expression on Righteous Drum’s face, Brenda realized that a face might hold both defiance and denial, but show surrender nonetheless. Righteous Drum clearly wanted to deny that either he or his could ever need help from those who only a few hours before they had been fighting, but the reality was that they did need help.
Nissa broke the uncomfortable silence.
“Waking Lizard, I’m a bit confused. Was the enemy who drove you here the same as the one you people were fighting when Righteous Drum and the others came here?”
Waking Lizard struggled to sit a bit more upright on the patio chair on which he’d been settled. Riprap obligingly adjusted the backrest and lifted him into place.
“Thank you,” Waking Lizard said. “It is so hard to feel at all dignified flat on one’s back. As to your question, Miss Nissa, the fighting started out that way. Has Righteous Drum told you anything of the ongoing contest to hold the Jade Petal Throne—a contest that was old before your ancestors were exiled?”
“He has.”
“Well, for a time, even when our own position was the most desperate, the sense of the conflict was much the same, steps in a complicated and ornate yet still somehow familiar dance. I’m not sure when I began to feel something was different. It might have been when the usual truces were refused or when the Horse sent word of new weapons and tactics.”
“Usual truces?” Riprap interrupted.
“To gather up the wounded, for the recognition of some feast,” the Monkey clarified. “I can tell you’re going to want to ask about the new weapons and tactics our enemies employed, but I’m the wrong one to ask. The details of battle meant nothing to me. I have always focused on the end result. Suffice to say that our enemies were winning ground, more rapidly, more efficiently than we had expected.”
“Sounds as if your enemies made some new allies,” Des said. “Surely that has happened before.”
“Almost everything,” Righteous Drum said, “has happened before. That makes it no less unpleasant when it happens to you. Your Dog has implied that since our allies have lost the war, we will need to remain here. I, for one, have no desire to remain in this universe. I have family in the Lands Born from Smoke and Sacrifice, as well as friends and students. I could not abandon them, especially if the situation is as dire as the Monkey reports.”
Brenda nodded. She could understand this response. The uncomfortable beginnings of an idea were growing at the back of her mind. She was about to explore them further when almost simultaneously the doorbell rang and there came a rapping on the side gate.
“They’ll wake Lani!” Nissa said, springing to her feet and moving inside the house to listen for cries from upstairs.
Brenda ran for the gate.
“Stop making all that noise! We hear you!” she called, keeping her voice low. A hammering in her chest told her, before she’d even slid aside the panel in the door, who would be there.
Honey Dream the Snake stood with her hand on the wrought iron ring that served as a knocker. Flying Claw, looking almost familiar in the clothes Foster had worn when he had left the house that morning, stood a few paces behind her. From the way he was glancing up at the windows on the second floor, Brenda realized that he had remembered that Lani was likely to be in bed.
The expression made him seem almost familiar, but the gaze he turned on her remained three-quarters a stranger’s.
“Hang on,” Brenda said, “and keep it down. I’ll tell Pearl you’re here.”
She did. With a deep sigh and mutterings about letting enemies within her wards, Pearl said to let them come in, so Brenda went and opened the gate. The other two came in past her, and she couldn’t resist sniffing just a little as Flying Claw went by, wondering if regaining his memories had changed his familiar scent.
Brenda thought it had, and wondered if the new odor blended in had anything to do with Flying Claw, or only that he’d spent the last few hours doing a lot of worrying and sweating.
As Brenda closed and latched the gate, locking a massive array of locks that made perfect sense on a movie star’s garden gate, Honey Dream launched into her report.
“Flying Claw and I were talking, and I was filling him in on things that had happened when we both felt this surge. Flying Claw recognized right away that someone was attempting to establish a link to our bridge.”
She’s still trying to prove to her dad that Foster
—
Flying Claw
—
was worth coming after,
Brenda thought.
Well, recent developments are going to make Righteous Drum really unlikely to argue the point. He said there were many Tigers, many Snakes. I guess that’s not the case any longer. There’s just these guys … and us.
—
Flying Claw
—
was worth coming after,
Brenda thought.
Well, recent developments are going to make Righteous Drum really unlikely to argue the point. He said there were many Tigers, many Snakes. I guess that’s not the case any longer. There’s just these guys … and us.
“We went back to the apartment and did some investigating.” Honey Dream glanced over at Flying Claw. “This is really your part. You figured it out.”
Flying Claw stood very straight. “Our bridge home has been broken. It is not merely barred against us. It no longer exists.”
“You are certain?” Righteous Drum’s question was snapped out in the tones of a commander seeking confirmation, not as an expression of either hope or doubt.
“I am.”
“So we are stranded here,” Waking Lizard said, his tone filled with disbelief.
“For now,” Righteous Drum replied. “Only for now. There are other routes. That bridge was only the fastest and most efficient. Flying Claw, could you tell if the bridge was destroyed deliberately, or merely as a side result of our enemies pursuing Waking Lizard?”
Flying Claw reflected. “I think the destruction of the bridge was not done deliberately. After all, why should they create more labor for themselves when they come after us?”
Pearl cut in, forcefully interjecting herself into a conversation that had been—since Honey Dream’s arrival—dominated by the four from the Lands Born from Smoke and Sacrifice. Brenda saw the others start, as if they had been so absorbed in their own problems that they had momentarily forgotten where they were—or that others were listening.
“Why should your enemies come after you?” Pearl asked, but Brenda thought the older woman already suspected. “Is the urge for vengeance so strong—or is it something else?”
“Why will they come after us? Think on it, Tiger Lady,” the Dragon said, and his tone was not in the least mocking. “They will come after us for the same reasons we came after you—and with even greater cause. Four of the Earthly Branches have slipped their grasp: Tiger, Dragon, Snake, and now Monkey. Moreover, if they learn why we came here—as they surely will—they will almost certainly wish to come after the fragments that were already lost.”
“Soon?” Nissa said, and something in the way she stood made Brenda think she was about to rush up the stairs and grab Lani, though where they could hide would be anyone’s guess.
“Probably not too soon,” Waking Lizard said. “When I fled—and I admit, that’s what I did—our enemies had not yet consolidated their hold on the Jade Petal Throne. They will need to anoint their emperor first. Then there will be alliances to make, diplomatic ties to affirm. But they will come, never let yourself believe otherwise. They will come.”
Brenda felt the thought she had been exploring snap into shape. “Not if we go after them first.”
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