Snow, Fire, Sword Read online

  “The master does indeed want to see you,” he said, without appearing to notice Adi’s change of dress. “It is wonderful. How fortunate you are, Adi. How honored I am!”

  “Mmm,” mumbled Adi, not sure what to say. He followed Sadik meekly enough, resigned to the fact he wouldn’t get away from here without meeting Sadik’s blessed master. As they trotted down the steps of the washhouse back to the road, he said, “Sadik, did you ask anyone about Kotabunga?”

  “No, not yet,” said Sadik airily. “In any case, it’s too late to go there now. You will have to stay tonight, and tomorrow morning someone is sure to be going there.”

  “But…” Adi broke off. What was the point of arguing? Sadik was obviously determined to show off his precious master to his new friend. It was annoying, but there was nothing he could do.

  As they went along, Sadik told Adi excitedly about how the master had been exiled from his own country, thanks to the intrigues of wicked men. He had come as a humble preacher to a tiny village in Jayangan, and people had come from near and far to hear his words. Soon, news of his fame reached envious ears.

  “They tried to capture him—imagine,” Sadik said, eyes wide. “Those of the Demons’ Army. They tried to destroy him, but an angel intervened and carried him far away, to a land where he was safe from persecution. And there, the angel protected him until such time as the Demons’ Army was routed for a while in Jayangan, and then the master came back, with many followers, and began his work again, in Gunungbatu this time. Again his fame spread far and wide, and again it won him many followers. His enemies could not do much against him because the angel protected him, but they watched. They still watch, for they know he leads the Army of Light and one day he will rout them once and for all. You will see, Adi, you will see what a great and glorious and generous heart our master has. There are some who say that one day he may even become the great Lord who will bring back again the glorious reign of Truth, of God in the whole world.”

  His eyes were shining. Adi did not know what to say. Gunungbatu was a poor, remote little hole, he thought to himself. How could it possibly be the center of anything as grand as what Sadik was suggesting? He muttered something noncommittal.

  “As an orphan, I could easily have become inveigled into bitterness and the ways of evil and ignorance,” Sadik said earnestly. “It was fortunate that one day our beloved Shayk came preaching to our village and I heard his great words. For here I am, now, at last on the road to purity and kindness of heart. Truly, God is great!”

  “Truly, that is so,” said Adi nervously. What sort of scary firebrand would Sadik’s master be? He had heard a few Pumujisal preachers before, and they seemed to mostly concentrate on hellfire and damnation for all unbelievers. They hated everything that smelled of what they called “superstition,” which meant all the beliefs other people had gathered through the centuries of life in Jayangan. They thought they could read God’s mind, those proud zealots. As for himself, he wasn’t even a Mujisal, let alone a Pumujisal. What would they say if they found out? He must not say he was Nashranee, or what he’d really been doing at the beach, or he’d get the most tedious earbashing.

  Sadik led the way past the pavilion and around the back, to the wall Adi had noticed earlier. There was a door set in the wall, with a little barred peephole. Next to it was a bell on a pull. Sadik smiled at Adi and pulled at the bell, which rang mightily. One flashing dark eye appeared at the peephole, and a rough voice, accented with the unmistakeable tones of the Great Desert, said, “Who is this?”

  “It is Sadik, Ibrahim. I have an appointment with the Shayk, with my friend, who stands beside me.”

  “Very well,” rasped Ibrahim. “Wait.”

  Sadik whispered to Adi, “Do not be afraid when you see Ibrahim. He is a good man, though he looks fierce. He has fought against the Demons’ Army in far distant lands, at the master’s side, and he has scars from it. But he is a good man.”

  At that moment, the door swung open, and an apparition filled the doorway. Despite Sadik’s warning, Adi could not help falling back. Ibrahim was fearsome. Massively built, he looked like a pirate in a storybook, for he had only one good eye, the other hidden behind a black eye patch. He had a strong face, crisscrossed with old scars; and he sported a mighty mustache, and a thick pepper-and-salt beard. He wore midnight-blue robes and a turban of the same color. In one hand he held a drawn kris, the biggest Adi had ever seen in his life. “Come here,” he said to the petrified Adi. And so saying, he grabbed Adi by the shoulder and pulled him roughly forward. Sadik scuttled in, and the door slammed shut behind them.

  They were in a beautiful garden, quite the most lovely Adi had ever seen, but at the moment he was too scared to take in any details. The huge guard loomed over him, shaking him like a puppy. He passed a rough hand over his robe, then under it, on his clothes. With a quick jerk, he ripped the robe down, so that it fell at Adi’s feet. He stood there looking at Adi in his fine Siluman clothes, a cruel smile curving the corners of his mouth. “So, why did you think to disguise yourself?” he growled.

  Sadik said timidly, before Adi could speak, “It was my fault, Ibrahim sir. I lent him a robe, thinking it would be for the best if—”

  “You are a presumptuous puppy!” roared Ibrahim, his mustache bristling, his eyes seeming to shoot sparks. “The master wants to see people as they are, not as they pretend to be.” Turning to Adi, he said, “You are to speak the truth, do you understand? Do not even think of hiding from the master, for he can see into your heart. And we do not like lies here, for they are the weapons of wicked Iblis, whom we have to fight every second of every day.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Adi, bowing his head. Now his heart felt as though it were melting with fear, though, ironically, the birds sang, and the flowers were so sweet and perfumed.

  “Ibrahim, my dear friend, you shake the very earth with your roaring, and what is this drawn sword in the garden of peace?” said a low, gentle voice from behind them. A great change came over Ibrahim then. He dropped to one knee and put his kris on the ground. He bowed his head. “Forgive me, Master. Forgive me, Lord.”

  “You are very zealous, my friend. How could any evil come into this place, with you guarding it so faithfully?”

  Sadik, too, had dropped to one knee, head bowed, at the first whisper of the voice. Adi turned to see an old man regarding them, a figure such as he had not at all imagined, given Sadik’s story and Ibrahim’s welcome.

  Shayk Rasheed al-Jabal, the master—for it must be he—was a small, slight man, dressed in pure, snowy white robes and turban. He shone with whiteness, for it was not only his clothes that were white, but also his hair, delicate and wispy around his curiously unwrinkled, ivory-colored, thin face, and his equally wispy beard. Only his eyes were dark, and they shone with a soft light behind silver-rimmed glasses. He wore no ornament save a thin silver ring on one finger. Standing there in the beautiful garden, framed against the green, he looked like an apparition from another, better world. Adi felt a strange desire to bow his head and bend his knee, too, but the master walked toward him, smiled, and gracefully gestured that he must not kneel. He enjoined his followers likewise to raise themselves up.

  “I think I have told you before you must not bend the knee to me,” he observed. His glance at Sadik and Ibrahim was loving and humorous. “Like you, I am merely a servant of the Light. It would be a problem if I became enraptured by such homages, my friends. Now then, this must be Adi, of whom I have heard so much from Sadik. Welcome to our home, Adi. You must be hungry. Will you not join me in a small repast? It is not much, I fear, but Sadik will fetch more if it is required.”

  “Of course, Master,” said Sadik submissively, his eyes shining with happiness.

  “Thank you, honorable sir; it is very kind of you,” Adi said.

  “And you must go to Kotabunga, is that not so? Well, then, we must make sure you get there as soon as possible to rejoin your friends. Let us walk in the garden, and you can tell
me all about how you came to be here, and what happened on that beach, and what happened to your friends, and I will do my utmost to help you in whatever distress you find yourself. Because I see you are indeed in great distress of mind. You, Sadik, pick up that robe, and fetch the repast, and you, Ibrahim, go back to your guard duties.” He smiled at Adi, who felt his heart melt under the power of those soft, kind eyes, at the purity of intent emanating from the master like a great light. I can see why he is so loved, why Sadik talked so warmly of him, Adi thought, as he followed the master of the Community of Light into the perfumed heart of the beautiful garden. And as he walked, he found himself opening up more and more to the white-haired old man, who listened benignly and did not once interrupt.

  FIFTEEN

  RATUPOHON LED THE way past the polluted pool and the savaged garden, down some stone steps that led to yet another water piece, which had also been disturbed, though not as badly as the first one. “I was away when it happened,” she said, rather more quietly than she had spoken before. “I was on a visit to my sister-spirit in the holy forest of Demityangan, far away. I had left one of my human servants as guardian. When I returned, he had vanished, and my garden was desecrated. In the old days, I could go on such visits with no fear. Today, our power is weakened daily. Too many forget to honor us, and so our protection cannot extend very far. There are holes in it that evil can exploit.” Her voice was full of sadness. “My garden is afraid now. Look, child.” And she laid a finger softly against each of Dewi’s eyes, in turn, and as gently took it away.

  Dewi felt as if her eyes had suddenly been rinsed clean. She looked around her and saw that they were not alone. Each bush, each plant, each flower had a presence; eyes looked at her from behind every leaf, soft voices breathed unintelligible words in every rustle of leaves. She felt she truly was now in the heavenly Water Gardens of Kotabunga.

  “Now look at what they did,” came Ratupohon’s voice. Turning to where the guardian was pointing, Dewi saw with horror the laying out of green corpses, the closing of eyes in death, the terrible wounds still bleeding green. “These are my people, whom I am sworn to protect,” cried Ratupohon, “and I was not here when they needed me. Too long had my garden been sacred and peaceful; I had forgotten there were still enemies. I am ashamed—oh—I am so ashamed!”

  Dewi felt the pain of it in her own soul. She whispered, “My Lady Ratupohon, I have a brother. His name is Jafar. He loves gardens. Perhaps he could…”

  “Perhaps,” said Ratupohon, and her voice was soft. “I thank you for that thought. Bring your brother here, when this is over, when you have defeated the evil ones, and we will see whether a human can heal what a human has wrought. Now—you called on Rorokidul earlier, so I suppose you must want to be taken to her sacred place. Come with me.”

  She was beckoning Dewi to what looked like an opening in the earth. Drawing closer, she saw that it was like a huge well, with a large spiral stone staircase descending down it, into deepest darkness. Yet right at the bottom, far below, was a pinpoint of soft light. Ratupohon started down the staircase, and motioned to Dewi to follow her.

  She went down farther and farther into the bowels of the earth, down the great stone staircase that seemed to go on and on. All around her was the sound of water—water trickling down the walls, water gushing below. She was not exactly afraid, only a bit nervous. She no longer had her ring of protection. She touched her finger where it had been, remembering the twist of blackened, shattered metal that was all that was left of the ring. Oh, how she wished she had it with her.

  At that moment, her foot kicked against something on the step—something that tinkled, and glittered with light. She stopped and bent down to look at the thing. It was the ring of protection Kwanyin had given her, as good as new! Greatly wondering, she bent down to pick it up and slipped it on her finger. As she did so, she felt a great jolt. Her finger burned with a cold, deep fire. She grabbed at the ring and tried to pull it off—but as soon as her finger touched it, she felt another huge jolt. “Ratupohon!” she cried then. “Ratupohon, where are you?”

  “Here, here, here,” came the green woman’s voice, strangely distorted. “Here, here, Dewi, follow me.”

  She could not see anything; she could only grope forward, following the thin threads of Ratupohon’s voice, the ring burning around her finger. Down, down, down she went, and the farther down she went, the lighter it became. At length, she came to a large and beautiful atrium surrounded by galleries; in the middle of the atrium was a pool of shining water. It was from this pool that the light came.

  In all the galleries, faces were pressing, curiously, watching her; there were the rustlings of many presences, the whispers of many voices. But the shining pool was undisturbed and placid.

  Down at the bottom, near the pool, difficult to see in the brightness but visible as a flowing of green, was Ratupohon. She called to Dewi. “You wanted to see the great Queen of the Southern Sea, Rorokidul? This is her atrium, the place where her human bridegroom, the Sultan of Jayangan, comes to pay her homage, every year, through all the centuries—or should. He has not come here for two years now, though it is the place of his family’s protection, the source of much of his power. You may call on her, if you follow my instructions very carefully.”

  “I will follow,” whispered Dewi, trying to ignore the pain in her finger.

  “Stand by the pool. Look into it,” said Ratupohon. “Now say, ‘Great Lady of the Ocean, O Monarch of the Sea, I crave an audience with you, will you speak with me?’”

  Dewi repeated the words, staring into the pool of water. The water began to boil in front of her, and clouds of steam issued into the atrium, hiding the galleries from sight, shrouding even Ratupohon in mist, so that Dewi was alone, quite alone, before the bottomless shining pool whose water boiled and churned. And then, from the great depths, something began to emerge. Just a thin pillar of mist at first, it grew and grew, and changed shape, and became a dark-eyed woman of great beauty.

  “Queen Rorokidul,” whispered Dewi. “Queen Rorokidul, I have done as you said and come here to your atrium because the afreet came and bewitched Sword, and I do not know what to do now.”

  “Sword?” The queen’s voice was strangely harsh, distorted. “The afreet has bewitched Sword? You are sure?” A strange smile played over her features.

  Dewi was puzzled. She repeated, uncertainly, “Yes. Please, Queen Rorokidul, will you—”

  “Ha, ha, ha, ha!” boomed the Queen of the Southern Sea. As she laughed and laughed and laughed, her voice rose in tone and volume, becoming a howl. “Ha, ha, ha, ha,” the voice mocked. Her face changed beyond all recognition, twisting, deforming into a hideous thing, shark mouth stretching, showing a thousand sharp, pointed teeth, throat red and throbbing, spewing out venom and flame like a vision of hell. And still the voice rose, screeching, tearing, rending at every shred of sanity left in Dewi. “You will die, Dewi! You will die! Die, like that fool driver of yours. Your death has been written—it cannot be escaped. You will die, transfixed by Sword, burned by Fire, smothered by Snow. It was your own death you came to find, Dewi! It was your death that sent you on the path to the rice field, your death that brought you to Kotabunga. Your death has brought you here!”

  And suddenly, out of the water came a human figure, blinding in its whiteness, wrapped in a shroud, with icicles hanging from it. One arm was extended, and in this hand shone a great blade. “This is Snow, and Snow is your death, coming white and pure and blinding at you. Snow is ignorant of his destiny, but I know it, and can turn him into an instrument of my will. Snow, pure Snow, will sever your spirit from your body,” screamed the eldritch voice. “Come forth, Dewi, and meet your death!”

  Dewi found her voice at last. “No, no!” she cried, stumbling back from the pool. But still the shrouded white figure kept coming toward her, machinelike. “No, no! Nothing is written, nothing can be, no one can know the future, in any of the worlds, save God.” She fell back, groping, in panic
. The mist around the pool thickened, became denser and brighter, and still the figure called Snow kept coming—human and yet not, sword in hand—while the voice screamed in wild, unholy delight. The ring on Dewi’s finger burned like a bright coal, and the pain of it reached into her, consuming her.

  But she did not want to die, not in this way, and so she fought. She would not die! Desperately, she scrambled away with all her will, and suddenly she could hear a voice, singing so sweetly. Softly the voice sang at first, then louder, and louder, until it felt as though the song were pulling at her, pulling, pulling. Gradually, slowly, the mist was being forced back and back and back, the shrouded figure hesitating, stopping, the arm lowered, the sword’s light dimming, and all at once the ring’s light winked out too, and it vanished in a puff of sulphur. Then she was falling into a blessed darkness, sweet and soft and cool; someone was holding her, rocking her; the singing went on, gentle now, soft, a wordless, blissful song. I know that voice, Dewi thought to herself, marveling, before she collapsed into the embrace of real and healing sleep.

  She could not tell how long she had been unconscious, but when she awoke, afternoon sunshine was streaming in through a window. She blinked, and closed her eyes again. Her head ached. She opened her eyes, trying to work out where she was, but it hurt. She tried to think, but that hurt too much as well. She could only remember running; and then falling into a terrible nightmare. The terror began to trickle back into her, and her heart hammered uncontrollably. She closed her eyes tight, but that was a mistake, because then random images began to flood into her mind, filling her with panic. Her eyes flew open.

  She looked down at herself. She was lying on a couch, dressed in the clothes she had discarded the day Kwanyin gave her the beautiful costume. She was in a quiet, small, rather dusty room, with junk piled high in every corner. She knew that place—the She-Po Gold Market! She was back in Kwanyin’s place, and bending over her were Husam al-Din—and Kareen Amar.