Blue Dragon

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

I felt them on the other side of the door. I saw them with my Internal Eye. Yep. It was Wong. He had a Mother with him. Just the two of them.

They can only come in one at a time, the stone said.

He’d send the Mother first. He was too much of a damn coward to come and face me one on one. The doorbell rang down the hallway. Oh my God, Ah Yat. She would answer the door and he’d kill her.

Don’t worry, she’s not here, Gold said.

I sighed with relief and then stiffened as the door was knocked off its hinges. I heard its footsteps coming down the hallway. It appeared in the doorway.

I hesitated in confusion. My Inner Eye saw it as a Mother, but my physical eyes saw April. I panicked: what if it was April? I desperately asked the stone, but it had been silenced.

April stood in the doorway, bewilderment all over her soft, round face.

‘April?’ I said.

Her face was blank.

I stepped forward, holding the sword ready. I studied her. My Inner Eye still saw her as a Mother.

‘April?’

‘Do I know you?’ she said.

‘It’s me, Emma. Do you remember me?’

Suddenly she smiled with recognition. ‘Hi, Emma, long time no see. I had a girl, you know that? A beautiful baby girl. She’s at home in Discovery Bay with the amah.’

I didn’t lower my sword. Something really didn’t feel right. It was extremely confusing. Mothers didn’t shapeshift. They only had two forms: human female form and True Form. If this was a Mother, then it couldn’t take April’s form unless…unless it was April.

April continued speaking as if nothing was amiss, not even appearing to notice the sword in my hand. ‘I’m going back to work soon, you know? It’s funny.’ Her smile widened. ‘All the scans said it was a boy, but I had a girl. A beautiful fat girl. Andy thinks she’s wonderful.’ An expression of bewilderment swept swiftly across her face. ‘Andy?’

I was stumped. I didn’t know what to do. As far as I could see, it was April. But it appeared to be a Mother as well.

There was a sound in the hallway and Simon Wong walked up behind April, grinning.

‘Hello, little Emma,’ he said. ‘It’s been a while. According to my research, you only turn into a snake when Simone’s threatened. You don’t care about yourself at all. I wonder how true that is?’ He turned his head to smile down at April, who still grinned with her eyes blank. ‘You like what I’ve done to your friend?’

I didn’t move. I waited for him to come to me.

Wong grabbed the side of April’s head and wrenched her around. She moved like an automaton. He kissed her, holding the back of her head with one hand. She didn’t return it; she was completely still. He moved his mouth over hers and she screamed and struggled. He grabbed her with his other arm and held her, muffling her screams with his mouth.

He released her and turned back to me. His mouth was bloodied. So was hers. He’d bitten her.

I didn’t move. I still wasn’t sure.

‘You wanna kiss?’ he said, grinning.

April’s face went strange. Her eyes widened and her whole body went rigid. She transformed. She took the True Form I had seen with my Inner Eye: she was a Mother.

‘I won’t kill my friend,’ I said loudly.

‘Good,’ Wong said. ‘That means you’ll have to let her kill you.’

The Mother slithered forward, its skinless head nearly brushing the ceiling. Its serpent back end didn’t leave the usual slimy trail.

I readied myself. I would defend myself if I had to, but I wouldn’t kill April. I studied it with my Inner Eye. It appeared to be a Mother right the way through; no trace of April at all. But I wasn’t willing to take the chance.

‘You can take off now, coward,’ I said.

‘No, I think I’ll stay and watch,’ Wong said, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning against the doorframe. He glanced up at it. ‘Still got the chip that Leo took out of the frame last time I was here. You should get that fixed.’

I made the sword sing. The Mother still came at me.

I silenced the sword, dropped it, and readied myself for hand-to-hand.

‘This would be a good time to come out,’ I said loudly.

The Mother lowered its front end so that its eyes were level with mine. Its serpent-like forked tongue flicked out; so long that it brushed the top of its skinless head. It lunged for me on its black coils. I dodged and struck it in the face.

‘Very good,’ Wong said with amusement.

‘Where the hell are you, Gold?’ I said as I lunged back out of the way of another swinging strike.

‘Oh, Gold,’ Wong said as I ducked under a vicious swing and struck twice at the Mother with my feet, hitting it in the abdomen and having absolutely no effect whatsoever. ‘Gold’s gone. Pissed off.’

‘No way,’ I said. ‘Not possible.’

I managed to dodge the punches that the Mother aimed at my head, left and right. It wasn’t trained in the Arts, but with its speed and strength it didn’t need to be. It just used brute force.

It feinted at my abdomen with its left and I spun around it, but I was too slow. It grabbed me by the throat with its right hand and lifted me.

I rose. It had me by the throat and lifted itself on its coils. We were close to the ceiling. The Mother charged forward and slammed my back into the wall. It held me, ignoring my struggles. I tried to grab its hand where it held me but it was too strong. My efforts to break free were useless.

I concentrated, filled my hands with chi, and slammed them into its shoulders, blasting it with energy from the outside in. Absolutely nothing happened. No damage at all, except that I had wasted nearly half my chi.

It remained unmoving, holding me pinned against the wall. I waited for it to taste me with its tongue but it had learned from the one that Leo had destroyed.

Wong sauntered closer and stopped beside the Mother, his head level with my stomach. He still had his arms crossed over his chest, casual and relaxed.

He raised one arm and punched me viciously in the centre of the abdomen. I wasn’t ready for it. The blood gushed internally, and I quickly concentrated to heal myself.

‘Let’s go,’ Wong said softly.

I came around on the floor of Kitty Kwok’s office at the kindergarten in Kowloon Tong. I shot to my feet and looked around; the shock of the incongruity of the location nearly knocked me over again. This was the desk where Kitty had sat and asked me to spy on John Chen Wu. I’d promptly resigned and walked out. It seemed like a million years ago.

I raced to the door: solid wood, and locked. I shoulder charged it and tore a tendon in my shoulder. Stupid.

I went to the window as I healed the shoulder. I couldn’t afford to do too much more healing; my energy reserves were running low.

The window, like most windows in Hong Kong, was barred. And not just the usual decorative grille; these were half centimetre square steel bars ten centimetres apart. I tried to bend one but I didn’t have the strength.

I concentrated, put my hand on the bar and hit it with chi, attempting to melt it. Not possible. The bar was too hot to hold way before it was hot enough to melt. I couldn’t throw chi at it; the energy would go right past it. I had to hold the bar to hit it with chi. Waste of time. I gave a few of the bars some optimistic pulls and was unsurprised when they didn’t shift.

I tapped the stone as I opened my Inner Eye to look around.

Holy shit. The kindergarten was full of kids. Human kids. They were right outside the goddamn door. The bastard was using them as a shield to ensure that I wouldn’t explode myself.

The stone didn’t make a sound, but it was probably me that was deafened, not the stone silenced.

‘If you’re talking to me I can’t hear you,’ I said. ‘But I’m out of ideas.’

I cut off a shriek as my hand was stabbed with pain. The stone had grown some sort of appendage and was cutting into me.

I tried to rip the ring off my finger, but it wouldn’t let go. The stone continued to slice into the back of my hand, then moved to the vein on my middle finger and sliced that as well.

The appendage disappeared back into the stone as I watched it with horror. Then, of all things, the stone grew a little smiley face on its surface.

I rushed to the desk and grabbed some tissues to staunch the flow of blood from my lacerated hand, silently cursing the stone. What the hell had gotten into it?

Then I saw them coming with my Internal Eye. Wong, and Kitty Kwok. Both of them.

I went ice-cold with fury as I frantically mopped up the blood. That bastard would not get me; I would blow myself up with chi first. And take him with me if I could.

The stone had done a good job; the finger was dripping; it had definitely hit a vein. The blood was everywhere. I concentrated, ready to heal the wounds, and the goddamn stone stabbed me again. I pushed the tissues into the wound, trying to stop the blood.

Blood.

Sweet.

Oh, yessss.

The door opened. Wong and Kitty sauntered in. The children sitting on the floor behind them were visible before Kitty closed the door.

‘Thanks,’ I said, and shoved the back of my hand into my mouth.

Sweet. My own blood wasn’t as good as somebody else’s, but the bitch in front of me looked extremely tasty, and the Demon Prince was powerful. But not nearly as powerful as me.

I pulled my hand away and grinned.

Kitty shrieked and spun. Wong pushed her aside and ran to open the door. He went through and closed it on her hand, making her shriek again. He opened the door, pushed her hand out of the door, then closed and locked it in her face.

She turned, leaned against the door, and slid down it to sit on the floor.

I went up to her, still grinning. I crouched in front of her. Her terror was delicious.

I picked up her hand and dropped it. She was limp with fear. Her mouth was open in a silent scream.

‘Simone!’ somebody shouted, and I remembered.

I changed and jumped through the open window between the bars. I was three storeys up, and I smiled as I fell.

A while later the sky was becoming dark and I was running out of puff. I was causing panic wherever I went, and I wasn’t even very big. I found a perfect place to hide.

‘Emma.’ Something prickled the back of my head and somebody was whispering my name.

‘Emma, wake up.’

There was a stone right in the middle of my back and it hurt. I grimaced.

‘Emma. Come on, I know you can hear me.’

‘Wha’?’

‘Simone needs you!’

I shot upright and cast around. I was next to a tall chain-link fence. On the other side were railway tracks. I was sitting in the dirt. It was dark. I was completely naked.

‘Where am I?’

‘You are in a vacant lot near the Kowloon Tong KCR station. You came here after you escaped from them. You went through the links of the fence and hid at the back here, in the tall grass, where nobody could see you. Then you changed back. I think you were too weak to conjure the clothes.’

‘Oh damn, not again!’

‘It saved your life, I think.’

My left hand hurt like hell and I checked it. It was covered in a network of cuts. I remembered, concentrated, and healed it.

‘Thanks for that,’ I said. ‘I didn’t know what you were doing.’ I looked around. ‘Could you call Gold for me?’

The stone was silent.

‘Oh my God, they got him, didn’t they?’

‘I am afraid he is not answering my calls,’ the stone said.

I felt a stab of pain and dropped my head. Gold was gone. Then I pulled myself together. ‘Well,’ I said, ‘I need to contact somebody to come and take me home. I can’t go anywhere like this. Any suggestions?’

The block was covered with construction debris, trash and tall grass, and surrounded by a chain-link fence. I’d chosen a good place to hide. The fence was nearly three metres high; it would take a good jump to get out, and I’d have to do it carefully so that nobody saw me.

‘I’ll see if I can contact any of my other children,’ the stone said. ‘They may be able to relay a message for you.’

I looked down. A snake’s trail wound across the dirt next to me. I was concerned there may be snakes in the long grass of the lot. Then I relaxed: the snake’s trail was from me. I curled up to sit with my knees in my chest behind the grass. It was high enough to hide me from anybody passing. I’d chosen a good spot.

Mid-July was always blistering hot, day and night, and the evening was very humid. The fact that I didn’t have any clothes didn’t make me any more comfortable; the dust clung to the sheen of sweat on my skin. I brushed at the dirt on my arm, then stopped to study it. The dust had stuck to my arm in a scale pattern, obviously left over from when I’d changed. I ran my finger over the edge of the scales, not completely sure how I felt about that.

‘Agate in Shantou. No,’ the stone said. ‘Amber, Xian. No. Hold on, Amethyst’s answering. Damn, he’s under the ice of the South Pole, having a holiday. Can’t contact anybody for us.’

‘You going through your address book?’ I said, amused.

‘Bauxite isn’t answering, that’s strange. He has a human family in Russia, Siberia. Should be there, I wonder what happened to him? Anyway…’ The stone fell silent again.

I waited patiently. I dozed off over my knees; I was exhausted. The lights above the train tracks blinked on. Crickets chirped. I hoped that everybody was okay: the students in the Academy and the Follies. And Simone. I sighed. Simone, more than anything. A train rolled past and I curled up in the grass and sat very still. I felt the vibration through the ground. Nobody in the train noticed me; they were moving too fast.

It occurred to me that John might be gone. I searched for him with my consciousness; I hoped that when he left I would be aware of it. I smiled slightly into my knees. Yeah, right. Not likely.

‘Found one,’ the stone said. ‘This is most unusual, Emma, a great many of my children are not answering my calls. To tell you the truth, I am concerned about them. Anyway, I managed to contact Fred in Lingnan—he’s calling the Dark Lord on his mobile. May take a while, the phones there are a bit dodgy.’

‘Fred?’

The stone didn’t reply.

‘Are you Chinese?’ I said. ‘Most of your children are in China, but you take European human form.’

‘Of course I’m Chinese,’ the stone said impatiently. ‘I took the European form to honour the present company.’

‘You were just stirring.’

The stone was silent.

‘You really like to watch?’ I said softly.

It stayed silent.

‘How does that work? You’re a rock.’

‘The Dark Lord made me promise to behave after I woke, and I have been extremely good,’ the stone said. ‘I meant it when I said that I was asleep, and he does me the honour of taking my word for it.’

‘Geez,’ I said into my knees. ‘I’m going to kill him.’

‘I have been extremely useful, you have to admit, Emma.’

‘Yeah, you just chopped up my goddamn hand,’ I said.

‘And it got you out of there.’

I sighed. I wanted to curl up and cry my eyes out. What I really needed was a hug from my man.

‘We will have you home soon, and you can have a long hot shower and sleep,’ the stone said.

‘Holy shit, I wear you in the goddamn shower!’ I said fiercely, curling up tighter.

‘Makes no difference to me whatsoever,’ the stone said.

‘Yeah. I really believe you.’

‘Really. You can ask the Dark Lord for confirmation. In that respect, I truly am a genderless piece of rock.’

‘You are extremely weird,’ I said.

I could picture the stone’s human form shrugging with a wry smile. ‘Aren’t we all? Leo is the only really normal member of the Chen household, Emma.’

I sighed into my knees again.

‘He’s onto them. They’re okay,’ the stone said.

‘All of them?’

‘All of them, Emma. They are all fine.’

I heaved a huge gasping sob of relief into my knees and went still.

‘Leo is on his way to collect you. Lord Xuan has remained at the Peak with Simone, because the apartment has no door.’

‘How many students did we lose?’

‘You will be home soon, Emma.’

I buried my face in my knees and waited.

‘That’s him, dear,’ the stone said, waking me. ‘He’s looking for you.’

The dark Mercedes rolled slowly past the block, its headlights bright.

‘There’s nobody around to see you,’ the stone said. ‘It’s okay.’

I rose and staggered towards the fence. The car stopped, then reversed slightly.

I raised my hand. Leo came out of the car and hurried to the fence. ‘What happened to you?’ He looked at the fence, each side and up. ‘How are you going to get out?’

I went closer to him and checked carefully around. ‘Move away, I’ll just come over.’ I decided against jumping; I’d use the energy centres. I took three steps back, then ran to the top of the fence. At the top I carefully placed my feet between the knots in the barbed wire, and floated down the other side. I touched down lightly. My knees buckled; I couldn’t hold myself up. I fell to my knees.

Leo pulled off his jacket and quickly wrapped it around me. He scooped me up and laid me on the back seat of the car. His huge dark face was right in mine, his voice gentle. ‘Do you need to go to the hospital, Emma? Are you injured? You have blood on you.’

‘She’s okay,’ the stone said. ‘Just exhausted. Take her home.’

The door slammed far away. I wasn’t aware of Leo climbing into the car, but I did feel it moving.

I didn’t know he carried me up to the apartment on the Peak.

I broke through the clouds and hovered about thirty metres above the ground.

The houses were scattered over the top of the mountain, some of them still swathed in the edges of the clouds. The ground was covered in soft, short grass; there were manicured shrubs and hedges, but no trees.

I swooped over the houses and landed on a narrow cobbled road next to a hedge. Nobody was around. I slithered along the road to see, but there wasn’t much. I climbed up the hill, towards a beautiful house with a garden surrounded by a low red brick wall. I could smell the flowers in the garden; I could taste them.

Home? No. But something close.

I threw myself up into the air again and flew over the houses. The entire mountain top was deserted. Why? Everything seemed perfectly normal. Something told me that there should have been damage, but I didn’t know why. Something also told me that the houses shouldn’t have looked like standard Western thatched cottages; they should have been more Chinese. What a strange idea.

I tasted blood and looked around, distracted. A bird flew past.

Dinner.

I raced to follow it. I could smell its blood from thirty metres away, the hunger driving through me.

Both of my hands were held and I jerked them away and threw myself upright with a gasp. I cast around desperately.

I fell back. I was in my room at home, in my own bed, clean and warm and in my pyjamas. John was on one side of me, Simone in his lap. Leo was on the other.

‘Simone, are you okay?’ I said.

‘I’m fine, Emma. The stone told us what happened,’ Simone said, taking my hand back and holding it. ‘How do you feel? You’ve been asleep for a long time.’

‘I’m okay.’ I rubbed my free hand over my face and pulled myself up to sit again. ‘Could someone get me a drink of water?’

Leo turned to my bedside, then turned back and handed me a cup. I took a huge drink and gasped, then handed the cup back with a nod of appreciation.

John gently slid Simone off his lap, but she didn’t release my hand. He moved to sit next to me on the bed and put his arm around my shoulders, studying my face.

‘I’m okay,’ I said.

‘Leo, take Simone out,’ John said gently.

‘I want to stay with Emma,’ Simone said.

‘I need to talk to her,’ John said, moving away again. ‘You can come back later. Okay?’

Simone hopped off her chair, grumbling about ‘bad Daddy’. Leo took her hand and gently led her out.

‘I was in the kindergarten in Kowloon Tong,’ I said. ‘I thought she had to give all that up, that they’d been closed down.’

‘She sold them,’ he said. ‘But to another company that was a subsidiary of Tautech.’

‘How many students and Masters did we lose?’

He returned to the chair and leaned his elbows on his knees. He studied his hands. ‘Two junior Disciples, and about ten seniors.’ He hesitated, still studying his hands. ‘And all but three of the Celestial Masters. Three Celestials remain: Liu, Au and Chow. Meredith is gone.’

‘Shit. How many demons were there?’

He glanced up at me, his face grim. ‘About fifty.’

‘Holy shit. How big were they?’

‘Between forty and seventy.’

‘Seventy? Good God.’

‘If they had managed a surprise attack, I hate to think what we could have lost. I am very glad you caught that one.’

‘Geez. Me too. Was it Wong or the King?’

‘Of course One Two Two. They were hybrids.’

‘Wong went for me rather than Simone,’ I said.

‘He probably felt you would be easier to carry. Simone is very large inside, much bigger than you. He is also a shocking coward, and you are the weakest of the three of us. Besides, if he holds you, then of course I must do what he wants.’

‘If you let him blackmail you by holding me I will be very, very cross with you.’

‘Of course you will.’

I sighed. ‘And I’m cross with you anyway. You didn’t tell me about the stone.’

‘Nothing to tell,’ John said mildly. ‘It has promised to behave, and it is a Building Block, so it will keep its word.’

‘I wear it in the shower, John. Doesn’t that bother you?’

‘Your state of undress means nothing to it; it is a stone.’

‘Really?’ I said.

‘Really.’ He sounded amused. ‘Absolutely. Its little predilections are in a slightly different direction.’

‘You should have told me,’ I said fiercely.

‘Nothing to tell.’

‘This doesn’t bother you at all, does it,’ I said.

He made a soft sound of amusement and moved slightly away. He opened his mouth to say something, then obviously changed his mind and closed it again.

‘Tell me,’ I said.

‘I don’t think it would be a good idea. You are very accepting, but I think this would be too much for even you to accept.’

‘Try me,’ I growled.

‘I don’t want to lose you, Emma,’ he said softly.

‘Oh shit,’ I said with despair. ‘Not you too? Where did my normal life go?’

‘She’ll find it amusing, my Lord,’ the stone said. ‘You’d better tell her; right now she thinks it’s much worse than it really is.’

‘Okay, I’ll take your word for it.’ John didn’t move but his face changed. ‘Spring of 1978,’ he said wistfully. ‘About three years after I’d lost the Serpent. The water around Hainan Island was unusually warm, and crystal clear. I ran into a stunning female turtle Shen. Pursued her for ages, both of us in True Form. She teased me, and evaded me, for days. Every time I thought I had her, she would take off again. She drove me mad.’

I was silent. I could picture it.

‘I finally had her; I had my flippers over her shell.’ His eyes were very dark. ‘I heard a sound behind me.’ His face twisted into a wry grin. ‘The Calypso. They were filming us, very excited. They launched a Zodiac and circled us, filming. I was the largest marine turtle they’d ever seen, and they’d caught us in the act. First time on film, marine turtles mating. They were delighted.’

I collapsed backwards onto my pillow, laughing silently.

‘See?’ the stone said.

I gasped for breath. I couldn’t speak I was laughing so hard. I wheezed with the effort.

‘She wants to know if you bothered to stop,’ the stone said.

John hesitated, then, ‘Nope.’

I rolled onto my side and clutched my stomach. I laughed so hard I felt like I was about to throw up.

‘I’ve…I’ve…’ I tried to suck in enough air to speak.

‘She thinks she’s seen it,’ the stone said.

‘Everybody’s seen it,’ John said. ‘It’s a standard piece of footage now. Whenever they bring up the subject of marine turtle reproduction, there we are, large as life.’

I gasped for breath.

‘Yes, Emma, we are a matched set,’ the stone said. ‘He is an exhibitionist, and I am a voyeur.’

‘The Tiger is three times the exhibitionist that I am,’ John said. ‘I don’t think I’m an exhibitionist at all. I’m just a Turtle, and when my flippers are over a nice piece of shell everything else falls beside the way.’

I wiped my eyes, my hands shaking.

‘And the fact that you don’t have one makes absolutely no difference at all to me,’ John said softly. ‘It is the inside that counts more than anything else. And the inside of you is the most…’ His voice trailed off.

‘He can’t finish it, Emma,’ the stone said.

I wiped my eyes with my palms. I was still shaking.

‘Rest,’ John said. ‘Simone is safe, you are safe, the remaining students are safe. That is all that is important in the world.’

‘Thank Leo for me,’ I said softly, my voice quivering. ‘For cleaning me up.’

‘I will,’ he said. ‘He refused to let Ah Yat do it. You were only semi-conscious and he was concerned she would drop you. He said you would not mind. Rest.’

I reached over to my bedside table, pulled a couple of tissues out of the box, and nodded into them.

John rose to leave.

‘Porn star,’ I gasped loudly as he went out.

He laughed softly as he closed the door.