occurred to Gavin that he had fled something-some
The moon spilled silver over cattle pastures and rice fields that eventually gave way to hills and paper-leaved forests. Roads threaded through the trees, then faded and vanished. Mountains rose up, some green, some frosted with ice. And then the little bird dove. Gavin followed, in a terror he would lose it. It flew toward a valley dotted with pinpricks of light. As he drew closer, he made out buildings cut into the side of one of the mountains, creating strange steps up to the sky. Graceful bridges and walkways arched between them, and trees clung ferociously among the rocks. And all of it was overrun by water. A hundred rivulets started in the forests at the mountaintop, streamed down the face of the mountain, ribboned through the network of buildings, and joined up in a serpentine river at the bottom of the valley. No building was more than a few steps from running water. Gavin’s eye wanted to trace all the rivulets, find the patterns and permutations, but he also needed to follow the bird. He tore himself away from the lovely waters and followed the bird down to one of the buildings. It lay exactly halfway up the mountain, between two streams. An overhanging tiled roof jutted out a little way like a porch. The bird fluttered down somewhere under the roof, and Gavin landed on the smooth stone beneath it. A pair of round paper lanterns hung on the two pillars that supported the overhang, and Gavin’s eyes took a moment to adjust to their yellow light amid the pearly sound of rushing water. He clutched the Cube to his chest as his wings powered down and folded back over his shoulders.
“So it found you. That’s. . fantastic.”
The voice was the same one that had come from the nightingale. Gavin’s body went weak, and for a moment he couldn’t find his voice. The Impossible Cube dropped to the ground.
“Dad?” he said.
Chapter Fourteen
The ghost parade floated through the empty city streets. Men and even a few women dressed in white robes and wide white hats beat solemn drums and carried white lanterns to light the way. A white-clad little boy with a candle led the way. A pretty woman walked a few paces behind him, giving quiet directions. She held a box wrapped in white cloth. Everyone else in the parade howled and cried and pulled at their faces. They groaned the dead emperor’s name and begged the spirits of the ancestors to welcome him and keep him safe. Their moans twisted down the streets and sent shivers down Alice’s back, even though she was among mourners. Her white robe swirled around her arms and legs, and she kept her head down so her hat would hide her face. The unfamiliar presence of the wire sword bumped at her side, and the battery pack pulled at her back and shoulders. The muddy streets had already stained the hem of her robe and splattered the cloth. Thank heavens she was wearing sturdy shoes. She desperately wanted to scan the skies for signs of Gavin, but she dared not look up and expose her foreign features.
“I don’t like doing this without Gavin,” she muttered to Phipps, who was walking beside her.
“So you’ve said a number of times,” Phipps replied from the depths of her own white robe. They were both walking in the middle of the group to hide themselves better. “But we can’t wait for him. If we’re going after the Jade Hand, we have to do it tonight.”
A crash, a small explosion, and a scream from a side street overpowered the groaning for a moment. Alice automatically turned, wanting to run and help, but Phipps put a firm brass hand on her arm. “Don’t.”
“But-”
“I said don’t. We can’t afford-”
A brass tiger pulling a two-wheeled cart with a black-clad Dragon Man in the driver’s seat galloped out of the side street. The tiger was carrying a doll in its mouth, and the Dragon Man-a woman, actually-was laughing uproariously. Alice shrank back, ready to run. The cart rocketed toward the ghost parade until the Dragon Man caught sight of the white-clad people. With a shout, she-he? — turned the tiger aside and rushed off down another street.
“Don’t,” Phipps said one more time. “The Dragon Men are still looking for us, but if they think we’re a mourning parade for the-”
“I know, I know,” Alice said. “But what kind of monster lets loose a bunch of lunatics on his own people?”
“The kind of monster we’re going to stop,” Phipps replied shortly.
Alice gave the little boy-Lady Orchid’s son, Cricket-an unhappy look. “Even if it means cutting off a child’s hand?”
“You’re doing your best to topple your second empire in a year, yet you balk at cutting off a child’s hand so he can become emperor.” Phipps gave a short bark of a laugh that meshed strangely with the cries of the men that surrounded her. “How do you live with all your contradictions, Lady Michaels?”
The parade continued. The mourners, Lieutenant Li and his troops in disguise, made a good job of it. The crying hid the occasional clank of sword or pistol or metal limb. Phipps herself kept her head down to keep both her Western features and her monocle out of sight. Occasionally people looked out of windows over courtyard walls or threw small packages of food and tiny coins wrapped in white or yellow cloth. The soldiers picked these up and ate the food and pocketed the coins. Alice worked out that in religious terms the packets were meant to be an offering to the spirit world, though in practical terms they fed and paid the mourners, much like offerings at church on Sunday were supposed to be for God but ended up buying food for the minister.
It was a long and nerve-wracking walk to Jingshan Park, which bordered the Forbidden City on the north and where one end of the Passage of Silken Footsteps was hidden. It seemed a strange way to hide, wearing white in plain sight and making as much noise as they could, but they moved unmolested. Three other times they encountered Dragon Men with animal-shaped automatons, and each time Alice’s heart stopped. But each time, the Dragon Man caught sight of the white robes and turned aside. Lady Orchid, with her white-wrapped box, remained a paragon of calm, while Alice was sweating inside her increasingly filthy white robe, and her mouth was dry as an iron pan on a hot stove from the constant tension. She wished for Click and her other automatons, but the little ones had their own part to play in this, and Click, who was obviously of Western design, had no way to remain inconspicuous in a Chinese mourning parade. So she had left him behind on the
The summer air was both hot and sticky, and Alice felt like boiled rice in the heavy clothing. Her legs ached, and she wanted nothing more than to lie down with something cool to drink. Then she saw a ragged shadow lurching along a red-painted wall. It was a plague zombie, the first she had seen since arriving in China. Lady Orchid had told her plague zombies were routinely rounded up and hidden away here. This one must have escaped, or perhaps the poor soul was a new victim of the disease. In any case, Alice worked her way to the outer edge of the false parade and made a dash for the zombie as it shambled around a corner. Phipps hissed something at her, but Alice ignored it. She followed the zombie, a dirty snowflake swirling after a bit of coal, and easily caught up with it on the empty street. Not it-him. The creature was a young man. Like every other zombie Alice had encountered, his clothes were rags. A foul smell hung about him. Sores wept pus and blood, and tattered red muscle showed through splits in his skin. Alice had lost count of the number of people she had cured of the plague, but the heartrending sympathy for its victims remained strong as ever. The young man stared at her with fever-yellow as she rolled up her sleeve to expose the iron spider. Its eyes glowed a hungry red. This would be her first cure in China.
“Spread this,” she told the uncomprehending young man. “Spread it far and w-”
A loud mechanical hiss interrupted her. Alice spun and found herself face-to-face with a multilegged, serpentine brass dragon the size of a horse. Perched behind its head at a control panel was a lithe, older man dressed all in black. White whiskers trailed from his chin, matching the brass ones on the dragon. The Dragon Man said something in Chinese, and the dragon hissed again. Damp steam issued from its nostrils. Alice squeaked and backed up, nearly bumping into the zombie. Her heart all but jumped from her chest. She fumbled for the wire sword, but it was under her robe and she couldn’t get at it.
The Dragon Man grinned and worked the controls. The dragon lifted its front leg, and with a delicate claw under Alice’s chin, pushed her face up so the moonlight spilled across it. The Dragon Man began to laugh with glee. He had recognized her-or figured out who she was. It didn’t really matter. Alice jerked the stupid robe up, still trying
