Chapter Four
She wandered out into the practice hall, but no one was there. It was still five minutes early and normally the Lin Kuei would already be gathering, but there wasn't a soul in sight. Someone should be there, stretching and trying to show off what they had learned the day before. There weren't even any novices running through to their morning practice, a common occurrence.
No one roamed the halls either and concerned, she rushed past door after door leading to empty rooms. With so many people in the temple, it seemed impossible for them all to be someplace at once, and they certainly wouldn't all have gathered some place when it was clearly time for the morning exercises. Sifu insisted they do it together every morning, he thought it would help bring them altogether or some such nonsense.
She could hear footsteps behind her, but when she turned around there was nothing there but the still hall. Could they be on the floor above her? The walls were too thick for sound to carry far, but the ceilings were thicker. But the steps were echoing, so they must be on the same level as her.
Unsure of what to do, she ran towards Sub-Zero's rooms. If he had cancelled their morning exercises, he would be there, and if something were wrong he'd still be there giving orders. Even then the footsteps followed her, never seeming to speed up. When she reached Sifu's door she lifted her hand to knock, but someone knocked on the other side first, startling her.
And then she was waking up on the small table she had curled up on, still wrapped in the curtain that formally separated the main room from the sleeping space. It wasn't nearly as effective a blanket as she would have hoped, but at least it was something. Min was snoring softly on his palette, oblivious to the commotion at his door. The knocking continued. "Min!"
He didn't even stir. "Min, someone is knocking." But he still lay like the dead until she crossed the dirt floor to shake him. He awoke with a start, but dutifully staggered over to the door and opened it to find Wei's soldiers standing there. He stared at them in a stupor for a few moments before one of them spoke.
They had a quick conversation that ended with the two warriors thrusting a large, bumpy bundle at Min and storming off, clearly not happy to be awake while it was still dark out. Min looked quite displeased himself. "We're leaving soon," he said simply, handing her part of the bundle. "These are for you." He staggered back to his things to start packing.
She unrolled the fabric carefully and it turned out to be a pair of loose, black pants and a blue, thick-knit tunic. Unlike LiXue's, this one had long sleeves that came down over her hands when she held it up to her chest. She'd have to work on that. It wasn't the most attractive outfit she had ever seen, but it looked warmer than what she was wearing, and a lot less noticeable. There was also an ugly hat made out of some kind of tawny fur and a muff for her hands made out of what seemed to be the same animal. There was even a pair of hideous black boots, but they looked like they were lined in fur to keep the snow out. Someone seemed concerned for her well-being, even if they didn't have any fashion sense.
Min was busy storing the contents of his pots in pouches and stuffing them in a larger backpack. Atop them went his cooking pots and the flint, which he tied shut with a piece of string so it didn't set his pack aflame. "Don't turn around," she called and quickly stripped and changed into the other warmer outfit, debating on whether or not to take her Lin Kuei uniform with her. It felt wrong to just leave it in this awful place, but she didn't want to be carrying around a reminder of her failure the whole way.
Min was rolling up his bedding with the former curtain when she turned around. "…you're packing like you're moving out," she said.
He stuffed the bedding into the top of his pack and carefully added a few scrolls. "I am." Nothing was left but the empty pots, the bare furniture, and the floor cushion, which he promptly snatched up. "What is there for me here?" he asked, putting on a tattered looking over-robe. He looked over the empty room with an air of satisfaction.
There was no obvious answer, so she settled for asking, "Where will you go?" She began rolling up the pieces of her uniform angrily.
"Who knows?" Something in Min's voice sounded desperate enough for her to be worried.
"That doesn't sound like a very good plan." It may have worked for the hippies, but it probably wouldn't work for an Outworlder.
"I'll stay in Earthrealm, I guess. I might have family there. In any case, the food can't be any worse, right?"
"You wouldn't say that if you had some of the fast food I've had." It didn't look like he would change his mind. "I'm certainly not going to stop you, you're supposed to go to Earthrealm with me anyway."
"Yes, all the more reason to extend my stay. Do you really think I want to travel back with LiXue?" Min gave her such a look of mock horror that she had to laugh, breaking the tension. He did have a good point there.
"Point taken."
"Wonderful, but we have to get out of here." He nudged her towards the door, lugging his pack as he went.
LiXue was pacing impatiently in front of Wu, Wei and a few guards when they arrived at the southern edge of the village. They were standing in a sort of circle, the guards huddled together for warmth. A few curious villagers had gathered too, but most of the tribe was still asleep in their warm beds in the early morning darkness.
LiXue was dressed in warmer clothes as well with a sturdy looking pair of boots instead of her usual sandals. A large, lumpy pack lay at her feet, with the sandals neatly tied to the side, with another pack nearby. Two spears were stuck into the ground next to her, and Frost spotted a whip coiled from a hook on her waistband and a dagger with a dragon carved into the hilt peeking out from the top of one boot. It seemed the warrior girl wasn't taking any chances.
Wei was nearly as impatient as LiXue, but it showed only in his clenched jaw. Wu just stood sternly, watching the two newcomers arrive with her too wide eyes. She made no move to greet them, but Wei stepped forward and spoke to Min at length. Min looked grim, but said nothing.
He picked up the second pack near LiXue and handed it to Frost. It was a lot heavier than it looked. "What is this filled with, rocks?" she asked, hefting it with difficulty onto her back.
"It's our rations. You be nice to that bag or we'll all be in trouble," Min paused, then picked up one of the spears. He held it awkwardly away from his body. "Can you use one of these?"
"Theoretically speaking, yes I can. I've never actually used one in a real fight though." She handled it warily, but it acted like it was properly weighted, even if the length was more flexible than she would have liked. It was an excellently formed weapon, just not one she would have chosen if given the run of an arsenal. "Don't you get a weapon?"
"I'm not much of a fighter, actually…" Min blushed. "They refused to train an outsider, so the only things I know I picked up by watching."
Next to them, LiXue shouldered her pack and grabbed the other spear. After examining its point, she nodded curtly to Wei and made an unmistakable "let's go" gesture to the other travelers. Not waiting for a response, she turned her back on the village and started ploughing through the wet snow.
Min took one long, last look at the village and turned to follow her. He didn't seem too sure of himself now that the time to leave had finally come. Frost didn't even look back as she fell in line behind him. At last she was heading home.
"Does LiXue have any idea where we are going?" she asked as the village faded into the distance. It seemed to be a case of the blind leading the blind if what Min had said about the village's geographical skills was true.
"For now, yes," Min answered. "She knows her way through the catacombs better than any of the other guards. Most of them won't even go in there."
"She just knew the secret exit, that's all." She was reluctant to give the cranky woman any credit at all. Anyone could find their way through a secret tunnel if they knew where it was.
"That's still better than either one of us. I've never seen the inside, and you were lost from what I understand." Min wasn't going to let her off that easily.
The mountains grew steadily larger as they walked in silence. They had no snow on their peaks, a fact that surprised Frost, she hadn't noticed it before. When they came closer, she had to admit that she couldn't tell which one of the many cave mouths they had emerged from the day
before until LiXue disappeared into a particularly unassuming one.
Min, Frost noted wryly, looked absolutely delighted at the prospect of seeing the catacombs first hand and pulled out a blank scroll and a length of graphite as they climbed up the ladder and out of the false coffin. He hastily scribbled down the writing on the wall hangings as LiXue glared at him. He ignored her completely and finished up his transcribing with a happy flourish.
"Can you translate that?" Frost asked when they started up again.
"I hope so. Its not like the script the villagers use, but I might be able to pick it up," Min was so excited he could barely speak straight. She hadn't seen anyone this excited about a bunch of words since the last Harry Potter book had come out. "This could finally tell me what happened."
"That's good, I suppose," she ignored the angry stare LiXue fixed her with and looked around the chamber with the same sense of apprehension she had felt earlier. Something just wasn't right in the catacombs. Graveyards were usually peaceful, this place seemed agitated somehow, hopefully not from their trespassing.
Finally, Min tucked his transcription into the front of his robe and smiled cheerfully at Frost, practically skipping over to her and their companion, much to LiXue's obvious annoyance. He would have succeeded better in his bouncy step if he hadn't been sliding all over the place as he went. He just didn't have the natural grace of a fighter.
LiXue just spun on one heel with an audible huff and started off again at an overly quick pace as Frost and Min tried to keep up. Min nearly had to be dragged along, as he lacked the footing on ice that the two kori powered women had. He eventually figured out that if he slid along the ice like an ice-skater without equipment he fared better than his attempts at picking up his feet.
The journey through the catacombs was very uneventful with the only breaks from the monotony being Min's yelps of glee when he spotted what he thought looked like an interesting inscription on a tomb they passed. Watching him skid over to it like it was some sort of prize was amusement enough for Frost, but LiXue got visibly irate at the frequent stops. She did nothing but stomp her feet and wait with arms crossed grumpily across her breasts, a scowl plastered against her face.
It felt an awful lot like Frost's family vacations if you substituted a hyperactive six-year-old for Min and her bitchy older sister for LiXue.
All that was needed was someone asking "Are we there yet?" over and over
again. Well, that, and lots of threats that they were going to turn around and go home if they didn't start behaving.
"What are you smirking about?" Min asked, startling her out of her musings.
"My family," she replied. "…They probably still think I'm in China right now."
"I take it you weren't entirely truthful with them on where you were going," Min said with a smirk of his own.
"Actually, I told them where I was going, it was the "why" part I was creative about. Would you let your daughter go off to become a ninja?"
"…I'm not all that good with Earthrealm culture, but aren't ninjas Japanese?"
"Well, the Chinese version of a ninja then."
"So you're a Chinese ninja?"
"You know, it's not like you're going to tell anyone. I belonged to the Lin Kuei."
"Forest Demons? That's rather poetic. I'm more interested in your use of the past tense though."
She sighed unintentionally and tried hard not to blush. "I screwed up pretty badly, she said, flush creeping up her neck. "I doubt they'll really want me back."
Min was silent, but she could tell he was clearly itching to ask more questions. In the meantime, LiXue was tapping her foot in annoyance at the end of the tunnel. They must have slowed down while talking. As they hurried to catch up, Frost could see no visible continuation of the tunnel around the female warrior. She checked the ceiling for signs of a trap door, but it looked like solid ice and stone. It looked like the impatient woman had led them straight to a dead end.
But LiXue then merely slipped behind the rock wall behind her, giving away the optical illusion. The two side walls hid the small opening quite effectively, making the eye see them as a continuous line. Frost
followed her into the small sideways passage that quickly curved to open into an airy cave with a wide mouth.
Min let out a sigh of relief. "No more ice!"
"No more creepy tombs," Frost added. "And no more scary woman."
Min was ignoring her though; he was quite occupied by their surroundings, unremarkable as they were. There was still snow covering the flat ground, but only a few inches' worth. The whole area was very nearly featureless, just flat stony land interrupted by the occasional plateau. It wasn't very interesting at all, in Frost's opinion, but she had seen a lot of different landscapes in the last few years.
She let Min enjoy his first trip out of the village and plopped down to rest her aching feet. The new boots kept her feet warm, but at least when they were nearly frozen they didn't hurt. It was a surprise to see LiXue sit down not far away and stretch her legs out in front of her. The shorter woman seemed like the kind of person who would turn around as soon as possible once the mission was finished.
Min came to rest beside Frost as she mused. "Do you think she'll come with us?" Min asked, handing her a chunk of dried meat.
She hadn't realized she was even hungry until she bit into the chewy morsel. It was like trying to eat meat-flavored rubber. "I hope not. Weren't her orders just to take us 'outside'?"
"That's one way to interpret them," Min said mildly before waving at LiXue and signing something to her.
"Well?" Frost asked.
"She says Wei told her to make sure you arrived home safely," Min reported.
"She's going to follow us the whole way?"
"It looks like that. It could be worse."
"Don't say that…I feel jinxed enough as it is."
