The Emperor of Khanbaliq had grown restless, obsessed with acquiring a concubine from the lost city of Cynadicea—someone like the elusive Beatriss, but younger, rarer. (And, more to the point, willing to yield to his advances!) His latest favorite, Jiaohu, recently purchased from the Monastery of the Two-Fold Path, knew how to keep his attention. One evening, lounging at his side, she spoke with idle malice:
“They had another pale one, you know. Younger than her.
Prettier, too. Strong thighs. But the monks are keeping her for someone...
important.”
The Emperor sent gold, and messengers. But the monks
only delivered girls of vague resemblance, none matching the description. It
was clear now: they were hiding her.
So the Emperor turned back to Beatriss.
“If you can bring me this girl,” he said, “I will let you
leave. You may build your castle in the south.”
Beatriss listened, suspicious, and said nothing until she
had the full account. Jiaohu elaborated—there was a prisoner named Xing
in the monastery’s lower cells, and Ciuciu was the name the other slaves
gave to the pale girl. Xing would help, if approached with the correct
password.
Beatriss gathered her team:
- Naron,
a swordmaster who had bled beside her before
- Jumay,
priest and spell-caster of quiet but deep power
- Feng
Feng, a magician of shifting loyalties and sardonic insight
- And
lastly, Bayan—once a servant, still barely more than an apprentice
fighter, and utterly unproven, but eager to escape the confines of the place
and test herself in a milleu where the criteria of success were more
clear.
Bayan said little as they set out. She’d requested to come.
Beatriss had allowed it. Now, on the eve of action, her breath was tight in her
throat.
They entered through a crumbling postern gate on the
ruined side of the monastery. Wind rustled through rotting beams. The floor
shifted under their steps. Bayan stepped carefully, watching how the others
moved. She kept her hand near her blade—just in case, though she wasn’t
sure what she’d do with it.
They descended into a half-collapsed corridor, and there,
amid the scent of fungus and decay, came their first danger: a bloated,
tentacled compost creature, reeking and heaving as it dragged itself from a
collapsed cistern.
Before Bayan could even breathe a warning, Beatriss
charged, cutting it with swift, slashing arcs. It thrashed and struck her
across the face with a heavy, adhesive tendril. Beatriss dropped, choking.
“Do something!” Jumay shouted.
Bayan froze—then remembered a flask tucked inside her sash. She fumbled it
open, poured the acidic tincture over Beatriss’s mouth and jaw, dissolving the
syrupy film. It worked.
Beatriss stood again, unsteady, and glanced at Bayan. No
praise—just a nod. But Bayan would remember that nod.
When the battle ended, a woman peeked from a loft,
covered in straw. She was thin, bruised, but alert.
“Are you friends of Jiaohu?” she asked.
Beatriss gave the password.
The woman was Xing, and she recognized Ciuciu’s name.
She offered two paths: one through an overgrown garden, likely overrun with
venomous vines; the other, deeper, through the lair of antmen. Beatriss
chose the latter.
“Are we sure we need to go this way?” Bayan whispered,
nervously eyeing the dark descent.
“No,” said Beatriss. “But I don’t want to die in a garden.”
The antmen tunnels were cramped and damp, carved from
soft clay and overgrown with mold. Bayan trailed near Jumay, whispering
questions.
“Do they see in the dark?”
“Yes.”
“Should we be whispering?”
“No.”
Suddenly, from the gloom ahead, three antmen emerged—eight-limbed,
armored, with two shields and two blades each. One cast a net
that caught Beatriss mid-sprint. She fell hard. The antmen surged forward.
Bayan’s first instinct was to run.
Instead, she crouched behind Jumay, clutching her sword. She
watched Naron stand in the passage like a gatepost, parrying blow after blow,
while Feng Feng blasted one creature with lightning. Beatriss cut
herself free, rose, and together with Naron, finished the remaining two, and they crawled through the twisting tunnels, without direction, noticing that Xing was gone.
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“Where’s Xing?” Bayan whispered.
No one answered. From behind them came a scream—and then a wet crunch.
“Was that—?”
“Yes,” Beatriss said flatly. “Keep moving.”They pressed onward through chambers of rot—half-organic,
half-dug. One room pulsed with a humid, sour warmth. A mud chamber, slick and
bubbling. Beatriss entered first and was immediately swarmed by massive
white larvae, as thick as a man’s leg.
She shouted for retreat, slashing them away.
Bayan helped drag her out.
Wounded and weary, the party began their return. In a final
subterranean chamber, they stumbled upon two crocodiles, locked in a
lazy scuffle over a limp human shape. The beasts turned toward
them—hungry for fresh prey. The party struck fast. Bayan, trembling, landed a
single blow. It did not kill—but it felt real.
Afterward, they approached the body. It was hairless,
featureless, nearly bloodless.
“Is that Xing?” Bayan asked.
“I don’t think anyone is,” Jumay replied.
They returned to Khanbaliq bruised and empty-handed. The Emperor
was not pleased—but Beatriss’s report was thorough. Her commitment to
return was clear.
And Bayan? She slept that night still wearing her sword
belt, dreaming of tunnels, of breath she didn’t know she’d been holding, and of
the quiet nod that said: You didn’t fail.
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