Barbara Hambly - Magistrates of Hell

‘Please do not fear that that name will be spoken beyond the walls of this room,’ Mizukami continued, into Asher’s wary silence. ‘I am a soldier. My country’s former alliance with Germany, and its present one with Great Britain, are matters which concern me only when armies march. Yet because this Ge-raa Sensei – whom I now see you do not resemble in the slightest degree – was a German, and the Kaiser lays claim to lands which are within the rightful sphere of influence of Japan, I felt that I had to follow yesterday, to be sure. Please excuse me if my impression was in error.’

‘I understand. I am grateful for the misunderstanding, without which my comrades and I would surely have been killed.’

There was silence then, save for the moaning of the wind outside, and those bright black eyes met Asher’s in somber horror.

‘What are they?’ asked Mizukami at last. ‘You had the villagers lead you straight to the mines, to the place where, I think, these – these akuma , these tenma , originated. Did you know they would be there?’

Asher hesitated. The fact that Britain and Japan were allies at the moment might or might not guarantee the help of this man, or his silence. ‘I didn’t, no.’

‘But it was they that you sought?’

‘Yes.’

‘What are they?’

‘We don’t know. It’s a form of pathology we haven’t encountered—’

‘Disease does not do what I saw last night. They took wounds no man could survive. Two of them we beheaded, and their bodies did not fall, but ran away down into the gorge. Ito cut the legs from several of them – in one case the arms also – and this did not kill them, did not even put them into shock. Without a word, they moved about you on the trail, like fingers of a hand, like dogs herding sheep. This is not disease, Ashu Sensei. Their faces were not the faces of men. Are they indeed devils, which science tells us do not exist?’

‘I don’t believe so, no,’ replied Asher slowly. ‘For all that the villagers call them that. But for this reason they must be studied, and studied in utmost secrecy. God only knows what the Germans would make of them – or do with them.’ He watched Mizukami’s face as he spoke, and though the Japanese remained expressionless, he saw the dark eyes move with his thought. He added, more quietly, ‘And God only knows what my own government would decide to do with them – or yours. And what the results might be.’

Mizukami’s breath whispered in a tiny sigh. But he only repeated, ‘I am a soldier. My business is with armies, not with . . . with the things that come out of Hell. But the new emperor of my land is . . . is not a well man. Since his accession this spring, nearly all the affairs of the Empire have found their way into the hands of the Diet – and of the High Command. I do not say that my judgement is better than theirs, yet I know that once the gates of Hell have been opened, it may not be possible to shut them again. You were not sent here by your government?’

Asher shook his head. ‘The soldiers were detailed by the ambassador to assist in my investigation of backcountry legend. The night was dark; I told them our attackers were bandits, and they appeared to believe me. None of them saw what you saw.’

‘And do any others know of these things? Ka-ru-ba-ku Sensei—’

‘He has made a study of their legends,’ said Asher carefully. ‘It was he who recognized the description, when a missionary wrote of finding one of their bodies. My wife also knows. No others.’

‘ Ah, so desu .’ The Count folded his hands over the hilt of his sword, studied Asher’s face with those bright black eyes. ‘So what now? Find how many of them there are, how long they have been there—?’

‘According to Dr Bauer, they began appearing no more than a year ago. We don’t know why. It’s one of the things we need to find out, and quickly. In the darkness it was hard to judge their numbers,’ Asher went on. ‘At least twenty.’

‘That was my thought. And more, I thought, remained in the gorge. You say they are in the Shi’h Liu mine—?’

‘I think so, yes. They are creatures of underground, of darkness.’

‘And yet not demons.’ Mizukami regarded him thoughtfully. ‘Would the records of the mining company be of use? This morning I sent to the offices of the Ministry of the Interior; I can have one of my clerks translate, if plans of the tunnels themselves exist.’

‘That would be of great help.’ Asher bowed again.

‘I see that there are things about these – these yao-kuei – that you are not telling me, Ashu Sensei. Yet one thing I do ask – I must know. Have they spread into this city? Or into any other part of the countryside? I can see they are devils: they are creatures of Hell. Yet their bodies are like the bodies of men. Their faces—’ He shook his head. ‘You say they have been there no more than a year, and you know not whence they came. Yet they must have come from somewhere. So I must ask: are they multiplying?’

Asher thought of the moonlight on the Charles Bridge in Prague, the inky shadows of its gothic towers and the stirring somewhere below its arches. There is a strangeness on this city , Ysidro had written to him . . .

He said, ‘It’s something we’re trying to find out.’

Asher went walking when the wind died down, through darkness that smelled of the Gobi Desert beneath a smoke-red moon. Rickshaws passed with a hiss of pluming dust, their pullers laboring. On the steps of the hotel, and in the doorways of every shop along Legation Street, Chinese servants plied shovels and brooms, and he knew that in every Legation tomorrow soldiers – German, British, Russian, American, Japanese – would be doing the same.

His breath in the moonlight made a cloud of diamonds.

Are they spreading?

Asher shivered at the thought.

Karlebach had grumbled about taking the Japanese attaché into their confidence, despite the fact that the Count had seen their attackers clearly last night: better that he know, than that he make inquiries that would touch off other inquiries. Once the gates of Hell have been opened, it may not be possible to shut them again .

Lydia had asked him: was it possible for the Count to arrange for her to see records from the Peking police, about either mysterious disappearances during the past year, or murder in which the victims had been either exsanguinated or torn by what appeared to be animals? She wanted particularly to know about the vicinity of the old lakes of the walled Palace pleasure-grounds, or near what were called the ‘Stone Relics of the Sea’, the two unwalled artificial lakes in the northern part of the city. Given the political unrest that had gripped Peking since the Emperor’s abdication – to say nothing of the Chinese troop riots in February and the roving ‘beheading squads’ which had followed in their wake – Asher guessed it was going to be very difficult to determine any pattern that might point to the appearance of Undead monsters in the city, but agreed to ask.

Peking was quiet now.

He reached the north wall of the Legation Quarter. Wind swirled dust around him, brought him the scent of tobacco from the gates, where the guards sneaked a cigarette. In the open glacis, vendors who dwelled within the Tatar City were taking down their barrows: candied fruit, second-hand shoes, scorpions skewered on sticks and fried in oil. Voices chattered in the brisk sing-song of the Peking dialect. Beyond that – beyond the wide Tung Ch’ang An Street – the roofs of the real Peking rose: the Tatar City that surrounded the Imperial City that surrounded the Forbidden City – more puzzle boxes, each locked behind its massive gates – where the young ex-Emperor still lived among half-deserted courtyards and pavilions going to ruin. And who’s sweeping the dust from his doorstep tonight?