She steps to the next square and stands for a moment, then moves to the next square. Sometimes she makes a cross with her skate in the sand of the square before moving on to the next square. She quickly proceeds through the eight columns of eight squares. When she is finished, she goes to the end farthest from the entrance where I stand and looks back for a moment at the pattern. She seems satisfied with what she sees. She kicks the frame, making the sand in the squares shudder and clearing the marks she made in some of the squares.
When she has completed this lucky times and is about to kick the frame again, we hear shouts of excitement from outside the square.
“There’s been a letter orb! From Shin!” It’s the girl with the honking voice. “It’s probably from the hostages! There’s going to be sooo much trouble!”
Suki will find some way to use this against me. I can’t let Doi see this affecting me, though, because I’d just look guilty. However, Doi seems more upset than I am. Is it because people are blaming her father for putting the mayor’s sons in this position by sending them to Shin as goodwill ambassadors? Doi abruptly skates out of the square after Honking Girl.
I try to go back to practicing my Memory Palace meditation, but I’m too distracted to do any real Chi work before evenmeal. I’m about to kick the frame of the boxes to clear the squares of sand when I notice something. The pattern of squares that have a mark in them forms a strange picture. It looks like a box with ears and little feet. I draw it on the back of the paper that I brought to practice number memorization on. It looks like the form of a logogram, but unlike any I’ve ever seen. What could it mean? As I slip the paper back into my pocket, Doi comes racing back in. She frowns at the sand, then at me. She kicks the frame and clears the pattern from the squares.
This must be something related to preparation for the second Motivation. Some secret technique that she doesn’t want her rival to learn. That’s why she was so angry to find me here. But it seems like there was some time limit on it. I recall that certain wu liu maneuvers can only be done at a certain hour. Doi was pressed for time, so she performed it in front of me even though she clearly wasn’t happy about it.
I have no idea what it means. All I know is that somehow, this holds the secret to how I can make it through the second Motivation. And I’m going to find a way to make Doi teach it to me.
I know the key to convincing Doi is to present myself as an ally against Suki. But to do that, I need to find out why they hate each other so much, so I can decide the best way to insert myself between them. I need to find out what happened between them at Pearl Rehabilitative Colony for Ungrateful Daughters.
CHAPTER
EIGHT
In music class the next day, Sensei Madame Yao is demonstrating how to play a whole orchestra solo by using wu liu kicks to bounce beans off the strings of the instruments. Ping! Ping! Pah-Ping! The room fills with the sound of music.
As the class watches her, I skate up next to friendly Mole Girl and ask if she knows anything about Pearl Rehabilitative Colony, making sure I’m out of earshot of both Doi and Suki.
“That’s a horrible place!” says Mole Girl. “It’s a cram school penal colony that rich parents send their daughters to in order to make them shape up for the entrance exams for Pearl Famous—Ahh! There’s a bean in my nose!” She collapses to the ground, holding her nose.
Sensei Madame Yao stops the class and rushes over. As she helps Mole Girl to the Hall of Benevolent Healing, she commands, “Continue practicing on your own! Any students found slacking off will receive gong duty!”
“If they can’t get the bean out, she’ll probably suffocate. I heard of a second-year girl who died that way,” says Honking Girl, her eyes glimmering.
I hate gossips, but they can be good sources of information.
* * *
At midmeal, I sit next to Honking Girl and ask her if she knows anything about the history between Doi and Suki at this Pearl Colony place.
“Of course!” she says, her face lighting up. “I heard that they had to share a tiny cell together for years. Their captors forced them to cut parts off each other to prove their obedience. And the students were starved until they had to kill and eat each other to survive.”
That’s what I get for asking a gossip.
After midmeal, I go to the Hall of Benevolent Healing to check on Mole Girl. As well as get more information out of her.
“We discharged her after removing the bean,” says an old healer with a head as thin and angled as a folded paper figure. “It would have been interesting to learn if the obstruction affected the magnetization of the sinus bone, but Sensei Madame Yao wouldn’t let me remove the nose for study. Here. Feel how heavy the bean was.” She tries to drop it in my hand, but I pull away quickly. The bean sticks to her palm.
“No, thank you, Healer. Do you know where she is now?”
“I sent her to the Arch of Chi Retuning. Her Chi was terribly disturbed. I wanted to acquire her for further study, but Sensei Madame Yao can be so difficult.”
I skate to the Garden of Whispering Arches and find the Arch of Chi Retuning, but Mole Girl isn’t there. As I pass under it, I can feel the frequency humming from
