An Inch of Ashes (Chung Kuo)(25)

‘Who are you working for?'

‘Why should I be working for anyone?'

‘Then I don't understand...'

No, thought Chen. You wouldn't, would you?

They came to the second door. It hissed open. Beyond i





t stood four guards, their knives drawn.

‘No further,' said Ling, coming from behind them.

Chen met Ling's eyes, tightening his grip on Herrick's throat. ‘Didn't you hear me, Ling? You want your master to die?'

Ling smiled. ‘You won't kill him, Tong. You can't. Because you can't get out without him.'

Chen answered Ling's smile with his own, then pulled Herrick closer to him, his knife hand tensed.

‘This is for my friend, Axel. And for all those others whose lives you have destroyed.'

He heard the cry and looked back, seeing how the blood had drained from Ling's face, then let the body fall from him.

‘Now,' he said, crouching, holding the knife out before him. ‘Come, Shih Ling. Let's see what you can do against a kwai.'                       
       
           



       Chapter 52



ISLANDS



Jelka leaned out over the side of the boat, straining against the safety harness as she watched the rise and fall of the waves through which they ploughed, the old thirty-footer rolling, shuddering beneath her, the wind tugging at her hair, taking her breath, the salt spray bitingly cold against her face.

The water was a turmoil of glassy green threaded with white strands of spume. She let her hand trail in the chill water then put her fingers to her mouth, the flesh strangely cold and hard, her lips almost numb. She sucked at them, the salt taste strong in her mouth, envigorating. A savage, ancient taste.

She turned, looking back at the mainland. Tall fingers of ash-grey rock thrust up from the water, like the sunken bones of giants. Beyond them lay the City, its high, smooth, cliff-like walls dazzling in the morning light  –  a ribbon of whiteness stretching from north to south. She turned back, conscious suddenly of the swaying of the boat, the creak and groan of the wood, the high-pitched howl of the wind contesting with the noise of the engine  –  a dull, repetitive churring that sounded in her bones  –  and the constant slap and spray of water against the boat's side.

She looked up. The open sky was vast. Great fists of cloud sailed overhead, their whiteness laced with sunlight and shadow, while up ahead the sea stretched away, endless it seemed, its rutted surface shimmering with light.

Sea birds followed in their wake, wheeling and calling, like souls in torment. She laughed, the first laughter she had enjoyed in weeks, and squinted forward, looking o-liavaut across the sun-dazzled water, trying to make out the island.

At first she could see nothing. Ahead, the sea seemed relatively flat, unbroken. And then she saw it, tiny at first, a vague shape of green and grey, melding and merging with the surrounding sea, as if overrun. Then, slowly, it grew, rising out of the sea to meet her, growing more definite by the moment, its basalt cliffs looming up, waves swelling, washing against their base.

Jelka looked across at her father. He sat there stiffly, one hand clenched and covered by the other, his neck muscles tensed; yet there was a vague, almost dreamy expression in his eyes. He was facing the island, but his eyes looked inward. Jelka watched him a moment, then looked away, knowing he was thinking of her mother.

As the boat slowed, drifting in towards the jetty, she looked past the harbour at the land beyond. A scattering of old stone houses surrounded the quayside, low, grey-green buildings with slate roofs of a dull orange. To the far right of the jetty a white crescent of shingle ended in rocks. But her eyes were drawn upward, beyond the beach and the strange shapes of the houses, to the hillside beyond. Pines crowded the steep slope, broken here and there by huge, iron-grey outcrops of rock. She shivered, looking up at it. It was all so raw, so primitive. Like nothing she had ever imagined.

She felt something wake deep within her and raised her head, sniffing the air, the strong scent of pine merging with the smell of brine and leather and engine oil, filling her senses, forming a single distinctive odour. The smell of the island.

Her father helped her up on to the stone jetty. She turned, looking back across the water at the mainland. It was hazed in a light mist, its walls of ice still visible yet somehow less impressive from this distance. It was all another world from this.

Sea birds called overhead, their cries an echoing, melancholy sound. She looked up, her eyes following their wheeling forms, then looked down again as a wave broke heavily against the beach, drawing the shingle with it as it ebbed.

‘Well...' her father said softly. ‘Here we are. What do you think?'

She shivered. It was like coming home.

Jelka looked across at the houses, her eyes moving from one to another, searching for signs of life.

‘Which one?' she asked, looking back at him.

Her father laughed. ‘Oh, none of those.' He turned, giving orders to the men in the boat, then looked back at her. ‘Come on, I'll show you.'

Where the cobbles of the jetty ended they turned left, on to an old dirt track. It led up through the trees, away from the houses and the waterfront.

The track led up on to a broad ledge of smooth, grey rock. There was a gap in the screen of trees and a view across the water.

‘Careful,' he said, his grip on her hand tightening as she moved closer to the edge. ‘It can be slippery.' Then she saw it.

Below her was a tiny bay, enclosed on three sides by the dense growth of pines. But at one point the tree cover was broken. Directly across from her a great spur of rock rose abruptly from the water, and on its summit  –  so like the rock in colour and texture that at first she had not recognized it  –  was the house.

It was astonishing. Huge walls of solid stone rose sheer from the rock, ending in narrow turrets and castellated battlements. A steep roof, grey and lichen-stained, ran almost the length of the house. Only at its far end, where the sea surrounded it on three sides, was its steep pitch broken. There a tower rose, two storeys higher than the rest of the house, capped with a spire that shone darkly in the sunlight.

She stared at it open-mouthed, then looked back at p w

scrree sidesher father.

‘I thought it was a house.'

He laughed. ‘It is. It was my great-grandfather's house. And his grandfather's before that. It has been in our family nine generations.'

She narrowed her eyes, not understanding. ‘You mean, it's ours?'

‘It was. I guess it still is. But it is for Li Shai Tung to say whether or not we might use it.'

‘It seems so unfair.'

He stared at her, surprised, then answered her. ‘No. It has to be like this. The peasants must work the land. They must be outside. And the Seven, they carry a heavy burden, they need their estates. But there is not land enough for all those who wish to live outside. There would be much resentment if we had this and others didn't.'

‘But, surely, if it's ours...'

He shook his head firmly. ‘No. The world has grown too small for such luxuries. It's a small price to pay for peace and stability.'

They walked on, still climbing. Then he turned back, pointing downward. ‘We have to go down here. There are some steps, cut into the rock. They're tricky, so you'd better take my hand again.'

She let him help her down. It was cooler, more shaded beneath the ridge, the ground rockier, the long, straight trunks of the pines more spaced.

‘There,' he said, pointing between the trees.

She looked. About fifty ch'i distant was a grey stone wall. It was hard to tell how high it was from where she stood, but it seemed massive  –  twice her father's height at least. To the left it turned back on itself, hugging the cliff's edge, to the right it vanished among the trees. Partway along was a huge gate, flanked by pillars, and beyond that  –  still, silent in the late morning sunlight  –  the tower.

She turned to find him looking past her at the house, a distant smile on his face. Then he looked down at her.

‘Kalevala,' he said softly. ‘We're home, Jelka. Home.'


‘Do you know the thing I miss most?'

T'ai Cho looked up. Kim was standing in the doorway, looking past him. T'ai Cho smiled. ‘What's that?'

‘The pool. I used to do all my best thinking in the pool.'

He laughed. ‘Well, can't we do something about that?'

Kim made a small movement of his head, indicating the overhead camera. ‘Only if Shih Spatz wills it.'

T'ai Cho stared at Kim a moment longer, then returned to his unpacking.

‘I'll put in a request,' he said, taking the last few things from the bag, then stowed it beneath the pull-down bed. ‘He can only say no, after all.' He looked up again, meeting Kim's eyes with a smile. ‘Anyway, how have things been? Is the work interesting?'

Kim looked away. ‘No,' he answered quietly.

T'ai Cho straightened up, surprised. ‘Really? But I thought you said the research would be challenging?'

‘It is. But Spatz is not letting me get anywhere near it.'

T'ai Cho stiffened. ‘But he can't do that! I won't let him do that to you, Kim. I'll contact the Prince.'