The very day after the archery tournament, the village began to prepare for the Ancestors' Festival. People began cooking food for the feast, and the village children crafted horses out of straw to help the ancestor spirits travel quickly. Yona learned how to make the horses herself, but the man looking after the children made Yoon stop after making only one. Everyone else had begun marveling at how real his looked and feeling ashamed of their own.
When the village came together for the midday meal, Granny's bearers rang a bell to get everyone's attention, and the old elder spoke up. "Thank you, everyone. I've lived in this village for a hundred years, and when I think of the people I've seen pass on ahead, it makes me happy to see everyone working so hard to welcome them."
The villagers gave a rumble of agreement that was even peppered with a few sobs.
"But even beyond the Ancestors' Festival, we have another joyous occasion to prepare for!" Granny announced. "At the dawn of the new year, our Lord White Dragon is finally getting married!"
Yona, sitting right beside Kija, was taken by surprise, and the shock felt that much deeper as a hush settled gently over the room — not a sudden silence, but the sound of feeling gone slack. Normally the villagers were so easily affected, especially by anything to do with the dragons, but now Yona saw someone literally shrug.
They should be happy for him! she thought — and that made her realize, I should be happy for him! She pushed through her own shock and took him by the arm. "Kija, congratulations! I didn't know you had someone back home you liked. You should have told me!"
He blushed and stammered. "I — er — no! — that is —"
The young woman in question came forward, smiling sweetly, and when she looked at Yona she got down on her knees and started to bow. "Your Majesty."
"Oh, don't do that!" Yona insisted. As she turned she saw Kija reaching forward as if to stop her, but she was determined. "I want us to be friends, if you and Kija are going to be getting —"
"WE'RE NOT GETTING MARRIED!" Kija burst out suddenly. He brought his hands down on the table with a loud BAM! Dishes and teaware went flying —
— And crashed down on complete silence.
On the other side of the room, one of the village men elbowed another, who grumbled and handed over some money.
The young woman's sweet smile remained frozen in place even as tears started down her cheeks. Two other women took her by the shoulders and gently led her away. One of them whispered, "It's all right, we've been there…"
"I knew it might happen, but I didn't think it would be the fastest ever," she lamented quietly.
Jae-ha leaned forward. "That was a very unsightly way to break the news to a lady, Kija."
Granny reached over and patted Kija's hand. "We'll talk about this later," she said.
For his own part, Kija wilted face-down on the table. His knuckles curled, and his claws raised spiral shavings from the wood. "Gods, please take me now…"
The commotion of Kija's brief engagement settled with barely a ripple, and everyone turned back to their preparations.
The day before the festival, the scribes brought Zeno in the long shadows of the afternoon to the communal hall, where the ceremony would be held. The room was already being arranged, with a large cluster of tables in the center to hold the feast and a cushion as large as a bed laid out before them, and people were busy arranging more tables and cushions in concentric circles.
Kija had recovered by then, and he was also there for full dress rehearsals under his Granny's fading but still watchful eyes. He wore a special wide-sleeved robe of coarse, stark white cloth, tied with a ribbon on his right breast and hanging unbelted to his ankles. The effect was ostentatiously plain, if such a thing was possible.
"At the ceremony, I must do my best to become… a blank sheet of paper, so to speak, to let the ancestors speak freely without interference from myself," he explained.
Zeno chuckled, smoothing Kija's paradoxically-fancy robe. "White Dragon is always White Dragon, though, no matter how you dress him," he said. "That's what it is about you that makes your ancestor spirits happiest."
Kija blushed.
"Lord Yellow Dragon," one of the scribes called. They were coming forward with some of the people in charge of the ceremony, who were carrying a large chest. "Please come and look at this."
"With so many of our traditions not fully matching your Lordship's memory, we almost dread to ask, and yet we must," Granny said.
The bearers put the chest down and unlocked it. The lid extended very near the bottom, and when the dome of it was lifted away, what remained was a large footed tray holding a cushion, and on the cushion rested a circle of jewels.
"This is the object we venerate as our founder's necklace," Granny explained. "We know it has power, but we hoped you might assure us — is it genuine?"
Zeno sank to his knees in front of it and stared. It was a string of beads in every color of jade punctuated with five white stones carved into hooked curves like claws or teeth. The sight of it brought the memories flooding back…
This really seems more like Abi's kind of thing, Guen had said.
And the king had answered, I just imagined it on you and I thought it would look so handsome.
Well, if you say so…
It had looked handsome on Guen's brawny chest, nestled against the fur of his collar, askew half the time as if his thoughts passed it over, not out of neglect but out of trust…
And now here it was as a revered artifact, arranged into a perfect symmetrical loop on its cushion and borne with the utmost care. Even the sequence and mottling of the colors rang true, as if the village had spent two thousand years not letting a single bead get out of place.
Zeno reached out to touch it.
"Begging your pardon, Lord Yellow Dragon," one of the bearers stopped him. "We have a rule that only the elder and the white dragon are to touch the founder's necklace."
"Oh, no one will complain!" Granny scolded.
"I was sure no one would," the man said, "but I thought it would be disrespectful to let his Lordship break the rule unknowingly."
"Go right ahead," Kija encouraged him.
But Zeno folded his hands in his lap. "It's okay. Zeno doesn't need to touch it. But it is the real thing. Red Dragon gave this to the first white dragon."
The villagers gave a collective sigh of relief and veneration.
For Zeno, the feeling was more bittersweet, but he smiled. They'd chased the rumor of another of the Red Dragon King's gifts only to find that it had already been destroyed, but this time, here was something out of his memories that really had been kept ever since back then.
He was glad he'd gotten to see it again.
When the day arrived, every other activity in the village was abandoned except for a light watch and the final flurry of preparation. The entire party was reunited, and the housekeepers fussed over them, asking if there was anything at all they wanted.
"Should I be wearing something special?" Yona asked, looking down at her dress. It was freshly washed but still scarred with all the mends from their journey.
The women waiting on her looked at each other, blinked, then looked back at her as they stood there wearing the same robes that everyone in the village wore every day.
"What do you mean, 'wearing something special'?" one of them asked curiously.
"We could bring you robes like ours, if you'd like."
"No, that's okay," she told them, she hoped graciously.
They'd been given a guide to lead them through the formalities, the same mustached man who had guided Yona and Hak the first time they'd come to the village. "When you're all ready, please follow me to the great hall. We ask that everyone be in their places before sunset."
"I'm so excited!" Kija gushed. "Now that the day is here, I can hardly believe this is happening."
"I'm happy to get to meet your ancestors," Yona said — although after the incident in Green Dragon Village, where the ghosts had been so hurt and angry that their 'king' hadn't come for them, she was also nervous. Even then, she could say she was glad to have met them, but, "I just hope they're happy to meet me."
"Of course they will be!" Kija insisted.
"I might not know what to say to them, though."
"It's very unlikely you'll actually see them and speak to them," their guide said. "Other than the white dragon, any spirits people encounter at the ceremony would tend to be people with whom they had close attachments."
"So, since we didn't know any of your ancestors here, we probably won't see anything," Yoon surmised.
"I wouldn't say that. Spirits have been known to travel from far and wide to attend our Ancestors' Festival. Members of the village who've traveled have felt the presence of friends they lost far away from here."
Yona perked up. "So, anyone we've lost, we might see them?"
"It's very possible."
Hak and Shin-ah stared, but Jae-ha crossed his arms and let slip a quiet "mph."
"Now, white dragons have been visited by their predecessors from centuries ago," their guide added, forging ahead. "Even then it's very rare for them to converse with the people in attendance, though. Usually the current white dragon will become momentarily possessed and deliver some sort of revelation. Although when our Lord White Dragon's father was young, he would often collapse in a trance and not wake until dawn."
"And this strikes everyone as a good idea?" Jae-ha questioned, massaging his brow.
"Oh, it's quite safe. This has been our tradition for over a thousand years and only one white dragon has ever been lost."
At that, Hak also raised an eyebrow. "That's supposed to be reassuring?"
Suddenly the whole party showed misgivings, and Kija stepped in to try to calm them. "Don't let that frighten you. It's a sad story, but a very strange case. This year is nothing like that. And of course, this year it's me, and I've never seen or heard anything," he added, with a self-deprecating smile. "There's no danger. I don't expect to do anything but let the ancestors enjoy the honor of everyone's presence."
"Well, then, time is growing short, if everyone is ready," their guide announced.
Shin-ah held back. He showed the others a hand to ask them to wait a moment, and he went to one of the housekeepers. "You said, anything we wanted?"
"Yes, of course. Is there something I can get for you?"
"Ah, do you have… little bells…?"
As they walked through the village to the main hall, the cloudy sky was darkening into the slate blue of the year's last and earliest dusk. Soft flakes of snow wafted downward through the air and dusted the winter-dry grass, and some of the housekeepers came along, solicitously holding umbrellas over Yona and the dragons to keep even the gentle snow off of them.
"Please, allow me." Jae-ha took the umbrella from one of them and got a blushing giggle as his hands touched hers — but his suave smile didn't hold, and as the description of the ritual continued, he walked along ever more grudgingly.
"You may find the tea bitter, but it's very invigorating. We wouldn't want to disrespect the ancestors by falling asleep during their visit," the mustached man was saying. "Once the dances and the invocation are concluded and the white dragon sits down to listen for the ancestors, we ask that everyone maintain silence as much as possible until dawn."
Zeno bumped Jae-ha's shoulder. "Cheer up, Green Dragon. It's a feast, so there'll be lots of good food, see?" He gestured to some of the other people converging on the great hall, who were carrying steaming dishes and bottles of wine.
"Well, at dawn," their guide corrected.
"Not until dawn?" Zeno asked.
"We ask very respectfully that everyone refrain until then. We wouldn't presume to eat before the ancestors or take back food we offered to them. Once they've had the traditional opportunity, we won't let what's left go to waste, of course."
"Of course," Jae-ha echoed. "Will you excuse me? I seem to have forgotten something."
He began to turn back, but Hak caught him by the ponytail. "Get back here, Droopy Eyes. Being quiet for one night won't kill you."
"If you'd like to see me speechless, there are better ways to go about it…"
The joke earned him another yank on his hair as Hak hauled him back into line. "White Snake brought us all this way to meet his ancestors; you can suffer through it with the rest of us."
When they saw the torchlights at the great hall, their guide finally finished his explanations. In the lull, Shin-ah tugged Kija's sleeve.
"What is it?"
"You said, the one time—"
Before Shin-ah could finish, he looked around at the sound of rushing footsteps behind them. One of the housekeepers had come running, dusted with snow, and caught up to Shin-ah to give him the little round silver bells he'd asked for.
"Oh, I remember," Yona noticed. "When I first met you in the cave, you had bells like that. Do they remind you of someone?" she asked gently.
Shin-ah wasn't ready to answer. By the time he tried turning to Kija with his interrupted question, a group of village women was coming out from the great hall to meet them.
"Welcome! Please, let us escort you inside." It was a middle-aged woman leading them, and two younger women helped usher the guests of honor into the entryway and took their cloaks.
"Lord White Dragon, the elder is waiting for you," the lead woman told Kija.
"Oh, of course. I…" He turned to take his leave of the others, but the emotion of the moment was more than he could take. He went around the group in a flutter, hugging each of them in turn — even Hak. "Thank you all! I'm so happy!" he cried. "I'll see you very soon." And with a final bow, he left.
"I'm glad we came just for that," Yona giggled.
"But, milords, before you enter for the ceremony…" The older woman gestured everyone to a seat on the rise in the floor, beside the stairs that led up to the level of the hall, then the delegation bowed to the floor with sudden formality. "To all of you — and I speak with greatest deference to Lord Blue Dragon and Lord Green Dragon — your presence is the greatest honor to us, but if you will forgive the presumption of making a request…"
"Anything you ladies would like to ask of me, I'd love to hear," Jae-ha said.
It was the older woman who tittered, but she delivered her message. "My lords, as you can well understand, we wish to create the best possible welcome for the ancestor spirits, and so we would prefer to avoid anything, however worthy, that they might misunderstand as distressing or offensive. If you would be so good, we humbly ask that your shoes and your, that is, headgear…"
Zeno had leaned over in front of Shin-ah to listen. "Oh, okay," he said, and he pulled off his headband with the dangling medallion and beads. "Zeno does need his medallion, though…" He tossed the cloth around his neck as a second scarf. "There!"
"Er, Lord Yellow Dragon, that wasn't…"
Shin-ah knew what they meant. He took off his boots first, then hesitated, but finally he took off his mask and set it aside.
When the delegation saw his face, they couldn't suppress their delight. "Ohh, the blue dragon's eyes!" one of the younger women breathed.
Those gold eyes widened, and then Shin-ah covered his face with his hands.
"Please forgive us! Thank you! Thank you, Lord Blue Dragon," the lead woman said as the delegation offered another bow.
When they rose again, they hesitantly looked at Jae-ha, who hadn't moved to comply but still sat with his legs crossed, practically displaying his boots.
"Well, I wouldn't want your ancestors to be the least bit displeased with any of you," he finally said, moving to rise. "I'll trust you to give them my regards."
"No!" the woman cried. "Lord Green Dragon, please don't misunderstand! Our ancestors have waited over a thousand years to meet you! It was only a suggestion, an abundance of caution, but such a small matter is surely as nothing compared with the honor of your presence!"
"Now, when you ask me like that, I can hardly refuse," he said, admitting failure in excusing himself from what promised to be an excruciating evening. Of course they'd sent women to ask; with a delegation of men he might have had some chance.
Well, maybe it wouldn't be as bad as he imagined.
The evening was worse than he had imagined.
Bells at sunset began the 'festivities,' with villagers chanting invitations to the ancestors and offering music and dancing in their honor. The music, however, was dirgelike — why anyone would assume that the dead liked depressing music, Jae-ha couldn't fathom. The so-called dancing was too stiff and slow to provide a distraction from the incense, an herbaceous smoke that slowly but relentlessly abraded the back of his throat. The only relief provided was the tea, which had been steeped to the point of chalky bitterness and was not what his nerves needed that night — and to endure it all while staring at a table of forbidden wine added a special twist to the cruelty.
Jae-ha kept looking around for Kija but didn't see him, or even an empty seat except the huge cushion in front of the feast table.
When the last stony trace of light had left the sky and the stars began to come out, more bells called the music to a halt. The dancers stopped and turned toward the skylight under the eastern eaves, raising hands to their brows in an unconvincing pantomime of surprise.
"'The sun of the year has set,'" one of them recited, once she was sure she had everyone's attention. "'Only the pale stars remain.'"
"'The light that gives life has left us,'" another continued. "'What are we to do as we stand at the edge of darkness?'"
"'At the edge of darkness and death,'" they all chorused, just to rub it in.
The dancers looked around at each other and at the crowd seated around them. Probably it was supposed to be a show of confusion and distress, but it was so poorly acted that it only conveyed 'we're supposed to look around at this point.'
The script didn't even make sense. You already called the ghosts, don't pretend you're surprised now, Jae-ha thought sourly.
Suddenly Granny's voice boomed out over the hall: "'We will have faith!'" Finally, someone with some gusto for their role. "'The sun is the gift of the Red Dragon! We stand unafraid, assured of his return! Our life is the gift of the dragon gods! If this darkness brings us death, we accept their will with gratitude!'"
Jae-ha barely caught himself in time not to groan and cover his face. He tossed back a cup of tea, desperately trying to pretend that it was wine.
"'This night is a gift to us,'" Granny continued. "'Rather than beg for the light, with faith we will look into the darkness. We will remember our mortal fate. We will remember those who have gone before us, our honored ancestors whose lives also have given us life. We will treasure this night when the gods have brought us near to them — we will give thanks to them and open our hearts to receive their wisdom.'"
"'But who can hear the voices of the dead?'" the lead dancer asked. "'Who will dare to stand on the edge of the darkness?'"
"I will!" came Kija's voice from the back of the room.
Jae-ha turned to see him coming forward along an aisle between the onlookers' seats, and it was an unhappy surprise to see him dressed in an unfamiliar robe, stark white and unbelted — as if they were dressing him for the grave already.
The villagers bowed as one. "Lord White Dragon!" they called in chorus.
"'Lord White Dragon, you must not risk yourself,'" Granny insisted, clearly reciting but with a quaver in her voice.
"Do not dissuade me," Kija replied — of course sounding utterly sincere just when a bit of theatricality would have been welcome. "By the grace of heaven and our king, my power is here to serve our village. My walk in the light is brief —"
Jae-ha winced. Please tell me we don't have to explain that line later.
"— But while it lasts, I walk with the blessing of the gods. They strengthen me, and I am not afraid."
The villagers made another bow of praise to "Lord White Dragon," and then people came forward in turn. The first woman presented the feast to him. The village children came to offer the straw horses they had made — which their parents probably enjoyed watching, at least. People came with additional offerings and particular praises and appeals to the ancestors — thanks for a new baby, begging protection for relatives who were traveling… Kija accepted every gift, answered every sentiment by saying "I will bear it in my heart."
When the last of the villagers sat down, Yona got up from her seat, and Kija gave a start — a small one, but enough to know that his princess had gone off script.
But she'd seen the example, and had a message of her own to deliver. "Please give my thanks to your ancestors for protecting this village. Because of them, you were able to help me when I needed help, and I was able to meet everyone." The whole room murmured with emotional sighs and quiet sobs.
For the first time, Kija bowed. "It will give me the greatest joy to convey your wishes to them," he said, then straightened again. "This is a joyous year, when all that our ancestors worked for has been realized. Our king has returned, and the warriors of the four dragons have again gathered." Clearly now he was back on script.
—A script he hadn't warned anyone about. Jae-ha was taken aback as Kija turned to him and approached him. "Green Dragon Jae-ha, I will bear your presence in my heart," he said, knelt, and bowed his head to the floor.
Before Jae-ha could puzzle out how or whether he was supposed to reply, Kija rose and moved on. He repeated the gesture for Shin-ah, then Zeno — at least he was keeping it simple and for once not piling on embarrassing sentimentality. Yona still stood, watching with a smile and no doubt waiting for a cue to decorously sit back down, and Kija passed her over momentarily and moved on to Hak and Yoon. As people who had aided and protected the 'king' and brought her to the village, they got honors, too. After Hak and Kija's typical squabbling, it was enjoyable to see Kija offer such praise — nothing elaborate, but so painfully sincere that Hak averted his eyes, practically squirming and probably biting back a joke to deflect it.
Finally, Kija returned to Yona and bowed at her feet. "My Master," he said, "it is my honor to bear your presence in my heart, and to share this blessing with our ancestors. We thank you for accepting our hospitality." He rose and gestured her back to her seat.
When the moment settled, it was Granny's line again. By this time, tears ran down her cheeks, but her voice was still strong and clear. "'Let us give our Lord White Dragon a sign to bear to the ancestors!'"
Some of the villagers entered in procession bearing a multicolored necklace of jade beads and white curved jewels on a cushion. "'This favor was granted to our founder, the first white dragon, by the Red Dragon King,'" one of the men said. "'It has been worn by every white dragon who has come before.'"
"'By this the ancestors shall know you as the one blessed by the gods, and by this sign we send you forth to them,'" Granny pronounced.
"This is a treasure of our village," Kija answered. "May the gods help me to bear it with honor."
Granny had the honor of placing it around his neck. She had to be lifted up on her litter right behind his head, and she looked a bit comical reaching over Kija's shoulders with her small arms to feel that it was straight and the curved jewels were all in place. When she was satisfied, her bearers carried her back to her seat.
Kija was left standing alone in the center of the room. "Now let us have silence, that the ancestors may speak," he said. He stepped onto the cushion before the feast and sat down in the middle of it, closed his eyes, and fell silent.
Everyone fell still and silent, waiting to see or hear from the ancestors.
Well, almost everyone. Yoon was scribbling in his notebook, and a few of the women remained on duty keeping the tea hot and fresh, but the curtain had fallen, and the silence demanded silence.
No talking. No noise, it said. Only ghosts exempt. For the rest of the year — now until dawn. Shin-ah, sitting in the next seat, occasionally broke the rule by shaking the little bells he'd asked for, but their rustling silver music only added to the overall effect. Between their jingles, the only sounds were the crackling of the fireplaces, the sounds of people breathing or shifting slightly, and now and then a soft hiss of snow on the roof and walls when the wind hardened enough to make it heard.
For Jae-ha, the silence descended like a wall of isolation — since he certainly wasn't watching or listening for any ancestor spirits. He'd seen ghosts before from time to time and had had more than his fill of them in the incident with his own predecessors earlier that year. The idea of another visit held no appeal, and the blunt fact was that there was no one he hoped to see. Certainly no one from his own village — his resentment toward his predecessor, Garou, was tempered with something annoyingly complicated, but not enough to give the man who had held him back for years and occasionally beaten him another opportunity. He had lost some fellow pirates in Awa and would have liked them to know how things had turned out there, but he preferred to imagine them at the harbor enjoying the offering boats and the fireworks; he didn't want to drag them to a place like this.
And so, perhaps ironically for someone who'd occasionally seen strange things since childhood, he was left behind in the physical reality of the room while everyone else seemed to drift away.
Well, someone had to stay behind and watch over things, Jae-ha thought, settling in with his eyes on Kija's meditative posture and soft, beatific smile.
Just like the white dragon to march happily to 'the edge of darkness and death.'
What an annoying family…
Hak folded his hands in his lap and arranged himself. He'd gotten enough lessons from old Mundok — and enough bops on the head for falling asleep — that he knew how to meditate or at least fake it. He surreptitiously checked under his eyelids now and then, looking at Kija. Strange case or not, another white dragon had died doing this, and while Hak could agree to show respect for the ritual, he still didn't trust it. Only when he noticed Jae-ha openly watching like a hawk did he let himself relax and his mind move on to other things.
Listening for wisdom from the dead, huh? And they'd been told that spirits could come from every corner of the kingdom. Maybe even from Red Dragon Castle, even from the royal tombs…
You're here, aren't you? No matter what people said about you, I know you're not really the type to chicken out. There was a time when Hak would have asked his king, 'Is this what you wanted?' 'What am I supposed to do?' Now that the chance was supposedly here, he found he didn't need to, but that didn't mean there was nothing to ask.
What was going through that bubble head of yours? Was it true what Soo-won had said? Had King Il really killed his brother — and if so, why? Was that the reason he had been so set against Yona marrying Soo-won — or had he seen something in his nephew all along that Hak hadn't? If he had seen it coming, why had he just let it happen?
Why had he made certain Yona never touched a weapon? Was it his principles, his fatherly protectiveness, or was there something more to it?
You let her get thrown out into the world not knowing anything!
Hak clenched his jaw; the thought had struck a bitter well of anger. It even reminded of the time in Shisen, when the sight of Soo-won there in front of him had set off an uncontrollable torrent of rage. This was a much smaller current, but from the same stream.
And why not? If loyalty meant a blind eye or a blind heart, it wasn't worth having. Hak wouldn't betray his king, even if the entire kingdom already had, but…
He looked under his eyelids again, at Yona sitting beside him. Her red curls framed her cheeks; her eyes rested softly closed and her mouth in a supple curve just hinting of a smile. A blush rested on the tip of her nose, where the fireplaces around the room didn't quite beat away the chill of winter from the air.
Hak's heart pounded — and it drove the anger in deeper.
Come on, show yourself! Say something!
Zeno composed himself for the vigil, smiling and unworried.
The ghosts clinging to Kija were in a predictably good humor; the incense had stirred them up, but the praise and offerings pleased and soothed them and the necklace fascinated them. Now they rested happily around their feast and clustered around Kija's shoulders. Just a few of them benignly wandered the room.
Even those few had the good sense to give Jae-ha some space — enough space that it kept them from touching Shin-ah either, probably a good thing. And Kija remained oblivious and untainted as ever.
With nothing to worry about there, it was just an Ancestors' Festival like Zeno had seen hundreds of times before, although this one wasn't the way he tended to remember them.
When Zeno had first heard Kija describe the ceremony, it had sounded very much like the Ancestors' Festival as it had been celebrated in his own youth. He and the other dragons had even spent the festival with Guen's tribe once, and without admitting it to himself, he'd begun expecting to see that memory re-enacted, perfectly preserved. The image had begun to crack when he saw Kija dressed to rehearse his role in that stark white robe — in Guen's day, the medium had been a wild-haired old woman who wore a bird skull around her neck — but only tonight had the expectation fully broken apart.
As Zeno thought back over the ceremonious dancing and sipped his tea in the attentive silence, the contrast brought the old memory back perhaps better than a re-enactment could have. Back then, the idea had been to lure the ancestor spirits with merriment. The dance had been boisterous chaos with onlookers encouraged to call out and sing, and food and wine had gone around freely. Abi had looked even more put-upon then than Jae-ha was looking now.
Guen's people had been seen as a backward rural tribe with rough, quaint customs. Zeno remembered how it had been a step forward in the four dragons' understanding of each other to visit there and find a variety of people, clever or careless, quiet or forward, just like anywhere else. They did live up to their general reputation for being open and direct — apparently some things didn't change — but in fact no one else as straightforward and stubborn as Guen. It had made the others quietly acknowledge him as more than an exhibit of his tribe's reputation, a unique and self-willed man. It was after that that Abi started butting heads with him — for all the good it did — but it was better than passing over every crosswise thing he did as the inscrutable ways of some noble savage.
Perhaps ironically, it was Abi Zeno found himself reminded of most. Abi had also been a priest, but had come from a place where that meant very different things than it did for Zeno: the largest temple in the largest, most sophisticated and splendid city on the peninsula at that time. Rather than listening for the voice of the gods, he'd been taught to read their will in the stars, in people's names and the lines of their palms, and it was there that he'd learned the mix of sensitivity and confidence that had, in his better days, kept him constantly butting heads with people.
But then, if Zeno could look back and call any place from their time a vision of the future, it would surely have been Abi's city. Thinking on it, he saw echoes all around. Even this generation of dragons — gradually he'd learned to see the youngsters as themselves, not as shadows of his old friends, but still he could say that Kija and Jae-ha were each like their respective 'founder' crossed with Abi, each one sensitive and fastidious in their own way; maybe he'd tell Shuten that sometime if he wanted to tease him. If anyone was in danger of being taken for an inscrutable savage now, it was Abi's own successor, but even with Shin-ah Zeno could see it peeking through.
Kija wore it most openly, and he hadn't come into it all on his own. The roughness and simplicity of Guen's people was still here, but now the village performed their duty and their ritual more in what would have been the temple style, with practiced words and scrupulous rules.
Zeno gave a quiet, wistful sigh. It had been a long time since he thought much about the way things had been in those early days, and much of it had faded. Often the only answers he could give to the scribes' questions had been 'I don't remember,' or 'maybe it was something like that.' But sometimes — more often now — he would come across some reminder and be surprised at how vividly so much of it came back.
That's enough of a visit for me, he thought. It was as much as he expected. It turned out Shuten's spirit was still in this world, but he was probably busy with his 'kids' — who knew, maybe even Green Dragon Village honored them somehow on the solstice. And Zeno didn't expect anyone else to have waited two thousand years.
He caught himself in a mix of regret and relief. The people he most wanted to see, he also didn't want to see. It hurt that they would have gone on without him, but he also hoped that they had.
He was glad that they had. He could see ghosts anytime he encountered them, and he'd never seen the people — the person — who most stirred that mix of longing and dread.
What would Zeno have to say for himself, anyway? At least he could think it with a little twist of humor now.
It was enough just to spend this night with the living, and he settled himself to soak it all in — the heated breath of the fireplaces wafting through the chilly air, the sense of the other dragons' blood, the warmth of Yona sitting right beside him. Shin-ah's jingling bells were a mystery even to him — Zeno knew that he had carried bells for years, from around the time the last blue dragon had died, but he didn't know why, and in a way it was pleasant not to know and to just hear their innocent music. Even the occasional clink of a teacup made him smile. He knew all too well how fleeting these things were, but it was proof that, for now, everyone here was alive together.
Hours passed. Through his dragon blood, he could feel Shin-ah and Jae-ha struggling; considering what they'd each been through, it was no surprise if the ritual was hardest for them, but maybe that meant they needed their space more than anyone. Until they called on him or he felt something more, better to just let them be.
Gradually Zeno's mind released. He was still aware of the other dragons' presence, and of every small, sweet sound, but it all simply flowed through him.
And then, trailing after a jingle of Shin-ah's bells —
"You could have told me."
Zeno snapped back to himself with a gasp and opened his eyes. He looked around, but he didn't see anyone who might have spoken, flesh or spirit. The words had simply flitted across his mind, but they hadn't been his own thought; they'd been imposed as if by sound, but in no voice that he could catch hold of to identify. Now and then as he was falling asleep he would seem to hear snatches of nonsense in such a way. Maybe he had been falling asleep — but he'd clearly heard the bells…
Had someone been talking to him?
When he'd heard of the white dragon delivering revelations or remembered the shamans of his youth, he had thought that hearing a spirit would be a kind of controlled possession, or like how he remembered the voice of the gods — a seizing, irresistible impulse — but could it be more like this?
His heart sank at the thought — 'You could have told me;' there were far too many people who might want to say that to him. Without recognizing a voice…
It was no use worrying about it. He tried to tell himself that, but he knew he couldn't escape so easily. That snatch of words nagged at him — especially because the words were all he had. There was no telling who might have spoken, if it was anyone but himself, or if they had spoken in sadness, or anger…
More hours went by, and gradually the sounds and sensations of the room could reach his heart again. Still he couldn't let go of wondering entirely, but he was able to loosen his grip on it until, with just a light touch holding him to the worry and the question, he could begin to float on the sense of the other dragon's blood and the scent of the incense and the crackling of the fires…
Beyond his eyelids, across the room, someone coughed, and then came a slurping of tea. It sent such a turbulent wave through the stream of stillness that Zeno almost laughed at the jostling. He did break into a smile —
"It wasn't that I wanted you to die."
Zeno gasped. His eyes sprang open, and his hands flew to his mouth — suddenly he could hardly breathe.
This time, he had caught it. He'd let go enough to let the voice flow over him, but still been just watchful enough to hear it fully — again, words spoken in no voice, but this time the feeling behind them was as clear as a cool splash of water:
A smile of affection. It could almost have been 'It wasn't that I wanted you to die, Silly.'
It was enough to know.
She had said 'Let's meet again above the sky,' and it had tormented him ever since. 'I can't go to that place. I can't meet you again there.'
But now, over a thousand years later, Kaya was here — how could she be here? Why would she come this far? But she was here to meet him, even if all they could do was touch each other for one fleeting moment — because if he had to relax and let go to hear her voice, he already knew that he couldn't do it again before dawn.
One fleeting moment, and she had used it with just an honest smile, no pretense of heroics or wisdom. She had touched the place where he held that pain — 'Let this go; you know I didn't mean for you to keep this.'
I knew you didn't. I always knew, but by myself, somehow I… Somehow, even if he knew, he could never make himself believe it. There was no need to ask, 'Why would you come this far for me?' — she wasn't the one he needed to hear an answer from.
He was too agitated to hear her again, but he hoped that somehow she could hear him. I'm sorry — sorry he hadn't told her the truth, sorry he hadn't trusted her. I'm so happy you came. I'm so happy I got to hear your voice, even just a little…
Zeno tried to stay quiet, but he shuddered with silent sobs and wiped his tears with his sleeve.
Jae-ha could only stare at Kija and watch nothing happen for so long before the restless, isolated boredom overtook him again, and then it had hour after hour to sink its teeth in. He didn't know why he'd bothered worrying; judging from every previous encounter, Kija wouldn't notice a ghost if it bit him.
As Jae-ha looked around at the crowd he sat alone in, he found that not quite everyone else was lost in the ritual. Yoon had long since run out of notes to scribble and folded his arms on the table, and now he was resting his head on them, apparently fast asleep.
Jae-ha could only envy that solution. For him at least, it wasn't a slack sort of boredom, but one full of tension and pressure. Perhaps there actually was something supernatural in the room causing it, but more likely it was the always-hateful feeling of confinement, being chained down by social expectation so that he couldn't speak or move or do anything that would make a sound. Even when the pressure had reached a point where he was tempted to flout convention and brush off this ridiculous ritual, he looked over at the others — Hak's face was clenched with determination; Yona wore a rapt, warm smile and had lain a hand on Zeno, who was actually crying — and Jae-ha couldn't bring himself to disrupt the experience for them.
Under the table, he practiced quietly flicking his knives out of his cuffs, and eventually, moved by the tension, he paused with one of them in his hand, curled his finger so that the second joint rested on the knife-tip, then slowly and deliberately curled it tighter. The pain when it came cut through the stifling nervous energy, and he let it build, testing the edge of how firmly he could press without drawing blood…
Shin-ah silently lay a hand over his to stop him.
Jae-ha tucked the knife back into his sleeve and turned to look, but Shin-ah hadn't otherwise moved; he still just sat with his eyes closed — but then, he could see with his eyes closed and see through the table. He shook his little bells again, as though nothing but the seance was happening.
But Jae-ha decided it was interesting in itself to have Shin-ah sitting there with his mask off, offering a rare opportunity for a long, leisurely look at his face in the state where he appeared most powerful but also most vulnerable. Of course Shin-ah could see himself being stared at; Well, Jae-ha thought, if he doesn't like it, he'll hide behind his hands or make a face at me and then I'll stop. He didn't do either, and so Jae-ha just sat looking at him. His mouth had fallen into the small gaping expression that looked so familiar below his mask, but it looked half-strange combined with the markings around his eyes and his thin brows and short, fluffy hair; his face tightened and his mouth drew shut before Jae-ha could fully reconcile the image.
Jae-ha looked at him for a long time but finally let his attention wander to gazing idly at Kija again. I hope you realize what I go through for you.
A few minutes later, Shin-ah drew a sharp breath, and his next breaths after it were audible but shallow. His bells didn't ring but made tiny muted clicking sounds. Jae-ha looked and saw that he finally had raised his hands to cover his eyes, and that he'd begun to rock slightly back and forth. It didn't look like someone communing with their ancestors, at least no ancestors they ought to be talking to; it just looked like someone reaching the limit of what they could take.
Jae-ha leaned closer to him and whispered very softly, "Hey." He trusted Shin-ah to see his hand before it touched his shoulder, see the gesture of let's get out of here.
He did see it, and he nodded. They both got up and very quietly left the room, Shin-ah tucking his bells away inside his fur-trimmed robe.
Kija sat hour after hour in the traditional posture with his hands resting in his lap, the dragon claw cupping his human hand. Despite the happy excitement that kept him safely away from sleep, he was still able to take slow, relaxed breaths, but the proper meditative state eluded him.
Of course, he had never fully succeeded at this; he'd never seen a spirit at the Ancestors' Festival or been able to convey their words. Not when he was a child hoping for a word from his father, not in the years since when he'd hoped for any word to give to his people as he should. Granny had told him that he mustn't try at it, that he must simply let what happened that night happen — his own father had snored during his nightlong 'trances,' she had confessed with an indulgent smile — but Kija couldn't bring himself to follow that example, and the festival he'd spent trying not to try had only been more vexing.
And this year, how could he not try? After two thousand years, the Red Dragon King and all four Dragon Warriors were here. How could he not want to show the ancestor spirits — The ones we waited for, the ones you lived to meet are here for you at last! But that very desire filled his mind and kept him from being the open channel he was supposed to be.
Trying to put it out of his mind would be both futile and disrespectful, so instead he tried to embrace it and focus on the others' presence — the sense of Shin-ah and Zeno and Jae-ha's blood near him, the knowledge that the princess was sitting there. On their journey, that sense and that knowledge had become a familiar comfort as well as honor and blessing, but now it only reminded him of the momentousness of the occasion, of how magnanimous the others had been to come here for his sake.
As the hours wore on, the other dragons' presence distracted him still further as he felt their energy change — Shin-ah's especially tightened and strained, but the effect on Jae-ha was also enough to be concerning. They had both been concerned even at hearing the ritual described, and yet they had let him bring them here, even after what they had been through so recently at the hands of their own ancestor spirits. Perhaps he had been reckless and impatient, and his fellow dragon warriors were suffering for it.
When Kija felt Jae-ha and Shin-ah rise from their seats and walk away, his heart sank, and his face burned with sickly fire. He watched them go feeling both guilty and abandoned. He had asked too much — but they knew how important this was to him, what an honor to the village and the ancestors, couldn't they bear with it for one night? In any case, the perfect thing he had tried to do was in shambles…
Suddenly, Kija heard a tiny, sharp tik! and felt a tiny, sharp, fleeting pain, like a fingernail flicked against the nape of his neck just under one of the beads of the necklace, and it brought him back to himself.
The ancestors are chiding me for my self-pity, I suppose, he thought, and he smiled that at last they had been able to tell him something. Shaken out of his misery, he knew better than to blame Jae-ha or Shin-ah. Surely they had done the best they could — indeed they could each see the other struggling as easily as Kija could, and it was even a blessing that neither of them had left the other to suffer or let the other go alone. They did know how important this was and had been so generous thus far; they would return if they could, he thought.
The perfect thing he had tried to do was still in shambles, but if there was anything he should have learned from the others by now, it was that his perfect things were never as perfect as he thought they were. At every step, there had really been pain and struggle, longing and misunderstanding, bugs and weeds, and even through all of it, it was such a profound blessing that he had been chosen for.
Perhaps this is the way this night should be, he thought. He lay his claw on the founder's necklace and held it to his chest — it would be too disrespectful to let it dangle and drag — and bracing his left hand on the cushion, he bowed low with a silent prayer.
Honored ancestors, if our hearts are too full to receive you, please forgive us. It is only through your devotion that we have been so blessed. If I cannot convey your wishes properly, please at least accept my deepest thanks.
With that, he straightened himself and settled to a seat again. For the first time, it felt simply natural: whatever happened for the rest of the night would happen.
Chapter 2 - END
