"Naamah's Curse" - читать интересную книгу автора (Carey Jacqueline)
FIVE
 |
On the morrow, I departed Tonghe.
I left in the early morning. As much as it had delighted me to meet Bao’s mother and sister, the increasing chill in the autumn air made me eager to be on my way. My young companion Hui’s father, a gentle, sensible fellow, advised me to make haste.
“Winter’s coming sooner rather than later, Lady Moirin,” he said with concern, his son translating for him. “You don’t want to be caught out on the steppes without shelter.”
“I grew up in the wilderness,” I said with an assurance I didn’t entirely feel. “I can take care of myself.”
He shook his head. “You will not have experienced a cold such as this one. Perhaps it would be better to turn back. You could winter in Shuntian.”
I had suggested that very thing to Snow Tiger. Gently but firmly, she had sent me on my way, telling me it was time to go.
My
So I set out, armed with Hui’s father’s advice regarding items to purchase at the Blue Sky Gate market. Hui followed me, shouting and waving, until I lost him in the distance.
It took no more than an hour to reach the Great Wall, the Blue Sky Gate, and the market that sprawled within the shadow of the wall. For those who have not seen it, the wall that the Ch’in built to keep the Tatars at bay is an awe-inspiring sight. It is high and unthinkably vast, sprawling for countless leagues in both directions. It is constantly being built and repaired, and an untold number of laborers have died in the process.
This northern section was one of the oldest in its original incarnation, which had been little more than fortified earthworks that had crumbled over the centuries, allowing the Tatar raids that had begotten Bao. Since that time, it had been replaced with new construction, solid and imposing, with an outpost of Imperial soldiers manning the gate towers and a market sprung up to serve them.
I wandered the marketplace astride Ember, my pack-horse, Coal, trailing behind us, listening to the shouts of the hawkers falter as they paused to stare at me, a buzz circulating in my wake. It wasn’t long before one of the Imperial soldiers hurried over to approach me on foot, a handsome young fellow with a merry face beneath his conical helmet.
“Greetings, Noble Lady,” he said with a bow, speaking a dialect close enough to the scholar’s tongue that I understood him. “I am Chen Peng. And I think you must be-”
I smiled. “The Emperor’s jade-eyed witch, aye.”
He laughed. “Swallower-of-memories, I was going to say. Is it true that you seek the twice-born one?”
“It is.” It occurred to me that for a country as vast as Ch’in, it had a powerful and extensive rumor network.
Chen Peng read my expression. “I fought at White Jade Mountain,” he said in a more somber tone. “When the dragon descended onto the battlefield, I was there. So please tell me, how may I assist you?”
I stroked Ember’s neck. “I’m in the market for attire fit to endure a Tatar winter. And such supplies as I will need to survive, at least until I find my stubborn peasant-boy.”
He bowed. “I will see to it.”
He was as good as his word, marshalling other soldiers to the task. Within an hour’s time, I had acquired a variety of supplies, including a long coat of padded cotton, worn sashed over thick trousers tucked into leather boots lined with layers of felt.
A fur-trimmed hat of felted wool that smelled of lanolin topped the ensemble. I wrinkled my nose at it. “Is this necessary?”
“Where you are bound, yes.” Peng adjusted it over my ears, tugging it in place. His fingertips brushed the skin of my temples, and he flushed at the unintended intimacy, taking a quick step backward. “It is a dangerous journey. Are you quite certain you must go?” He cleared his throat. “And quite certain that you must go without an escort?”
Desire.
I saw it in his flush, in the sudden heat of his eyes. There was a part of me that responded to it, my blood quickening. He was handsome and pleasant, and I was lonely. I did not know how many days or weeks or months it would take before I found Bao. When all was said and done, I was Naamah’s child, and I responded to desire. It was the path I trod and the element in which I swam.
My
“Aye,” I murmured. “I am.”
Chen Peng bowed. “Will you permit me one indulgence? I would beg you to ascend the wall and behold the scope of your task.”
I nodded. “All right.”
He escorted me to the right-hand gate tower. We climbed a winding stair and emerged atop the wall. The sky overhead was impossibly vast, a fathomless vault of vivid blue. I stood silent beneath it, gazing out at the endless expanse of grassy plain that stretched into the horizon as far as the eye could see. There were no farms, no villages. Nothing but grass and sky, and a few dots in the distance that might have been animals grazing.
“There is not even a road, you see,” Peng said quietly, watching me. “In the summer during peace-times, the Tatars drive their livestock here to trade.”
I felt Bao’s presence far away, the twinned spark of his
“They are a war-like folk.” The soldier nodded at the Emperor’s medallion. “And that will mean nothing to them.”
“I know,” I said. “But Ch’in is at peace with them now, is it not?”
He shrugged. “Peace is never certain with the Tatars. I beg you one last time, Noble Lady. Allow me to assemble an escort.”
The wind was cold on my cheeks. Standing atop the wall, I consulted my own
The open space of the gate yawned beneath the stone ramparts of the Great Wall. A powerful memory came to me unbidden. I had passed through another stone doorway long ago in Alba. It was a rite of passage among my people. Alone, I went through the stone doorway in the valley beyond the hollow hills into a world of dazzling night and shadowy day, a world of piercing beauty deeper and more profound than my soft, familiar twilight, a world where darkness and light were one and the same.
There, I had waited and waited, until the Great Bear Herself came to me, the Brown Bear of the Maghuin Dhonn.
At first, She came as a presence so immense She blotted out the stars. The earth had trembled beneath Her tread. With each slow, mighty pace, She had dwindled and shaped Herself to a mortal scale.
Her eyes had been so kind, so wise, so filled with compassion and sorrow.
She had breathed upon me, claiming me as Her own; and I had rejoiced, happy to bask in Her presence. And then She had shown me a vision of sparkling oceans filling the stone doorway behind me, and I had understood that I had a destiny to fulfill.
I still did.
And I would not find it until I found Bao, and somehow managed to reunite my divided
I sighed.
Dangerous or no, foolish or no, this was my quest; and I was bound to undertake it alone. That was the meaning of my memory’s vision, confirming the truth of my reluctant heart. I breathed the Breath of Wind’s Sigh, feeling the space behind my eyes expand to encompass the enormous ocean of grass I beheld.
My kind soldier Peng waited patiently, hopeful.
Standing atop the wall, I turned back to face the Empire of Ch’in itself, breathing the Breath of Earth’s Pulse to ground myself. The land that had once seemed strange to me had become a familiar place, filled with folk I could easily love.
Somewhere behind me, Auntie Li was reading tea leaves and regaling customers with tales of the Emperor’s jade-eyed witch, who had seen fit to patronize her inn. Closer, Auntie Ai was fondly scolding Bao’s mother and sister, bent over their embroidery, jade bangles on their wrists, exchanging glances and smiling.
No doubt young Hui was already boasting of our acquaintance to anyone who would listen.
Snow Tiger… what was my valiant princess doing? Sparring, mayhap, her slender sword darting and flashing steel-bright in her hands. Taking counsel with her father, the Emperor. Shooting at targets, reading the poetry she loved in the gardens of the Celestial City. Mayhap she was listening to music. Whatever she was doing, her faithful, hopelessly enamored guardsman Ten Tigers Dai would be hovering in the background, his bamboo staff at the ready. I hoped that when she thought of her erstwhile necessary inconvenience, she thought of me with the same poignant affection I held for her. I thought she did. My princess had sent me away with a smile as tender as a kiss.
The dragon…
The dragon would be drowsing atop the peaks of White Jade Mountain-sleeping or near to it. His opalescent eyes would be half-lidded, gazing at his reflection in the translucent waters of the pond below him, his coils and possessive claws sunk into stone and indistinguishable from the mountain, guarding the secret treasure that might grow upon its inaccessible slopes, the Camaeline snowdrops I had planted there at the dragon’s bidding.
Master Lo Feng.
I bowed and breathed the Breath of Trees Growing, drawing strength from it. “Forgive me, Master,” I whispered, turning away from my past. “I will do my best to be worthy of the sacrifice you made.”
Beneath the vast blue sky, the distant horizon beckoned me.
“You are going alone,” Chen Peng said with regret.
“Aye.” I had nearly forgotten his presence. “I am.”
| © 2025 Библиотека RealLib.org (support [a t] reallib.org) |