...
The next morning was warm and bright. Above, the light of the sun was subtly tempered by the occasional intercession of small cloud wisps high in the blue sky. The last fragments of summer hung in the still air but autumn seeped up from the stones below and whispered in cool breaths of air that stirred across the many water channels in Kuang Harbor. These canals threaded their way everywhere across this town, a loosely connected appendage of the Impenetrable City. It was almost enough to make one forget about politics but like the sparkling, sun-speckled surface of the dirty canals, foul currents ran strong beneath.
Gold Toad Square was a landmark in the old quarter of the harbor town. Long ago, Ayika had determined that you could always tell the moneyed parts of the City by what color they were. Not the shining gold of gilt-painted decoration or the shimmer of dyed silk, but the living green of trees and other plants growing only for ornamentation, not consumption. Though Kuang Harbor was generally compared unfavorably to even the lower ring of the City, in these few old blocks, as Ayika followed a narrow path across a simple bridge of a few planks nailed together where alley abruptly switched sides of this thin waterway, she walked under willows.
As Ayika continued on the edge of that deep channel, to her right the sounds of men enjoying a late breakfast filtered over the water from the open rear balcony of a restaurant hung with paper lanterns. The windowsills held potted bushes dotted with flowers. Ahead, the path edged between the watercourse below and another row of buildings above, until a few narrow brick steps led the way up to intersect the foot of a stone bridge that vaulted over and past this little rivulet.
Ayika climbed those steps up onto a more formal street, ducking her head to brush past a trestle that sprung out from a house to support some flowering vine. She turned to walk up and over the bridge but had to lean against the stone pilings when two ladies in fancy robes and the sweating hireman pushing them crested the top. The women were sitting on flat seats on either side of of the one large wheel that held up the wheelbarrow-like conveyance. As Ayika watched, one lady lay her arm across the wheel's housing that to whisper something to her companion on the other side as the porter strained to ensure that gravity did not now send them both rolling down the bridge out of his grasp. Her companion laughed musically, covering her mouth with the painted fan she carried. Then they were rolled past and Ayika was free to walk alone over into the tree-shaded stone of Gold Toad Square.
She supposed that this was where she was to meet Mizumi. Though the other girl's command of the Kingdom's language sometimes faltered at inopportune times, the "Frog Well" message had to refer to the waist-high carved wall that surrounded a deep hole at the center of this square. Or she was supposed to be seeking out particularly healthy amphibians but this place seemed a more consistent landmark. In any case the midpoint between dawn and noon would be approaching soon and Mizumi would be forced to either appear or remain absent. Ayika leaned back against one of the well's snarling marble beast heads whose weathered faces decorated the four corners.
The normal traffic of the city continued along the beside white walled buildings under their dark tiles that were speckled with tufts of grass growing in pockets of air-delivered dust. A man pushed a handcart laden with long wooden planks, a precious commodity in the voracious city. An old woman was arguing loudly with a shopkeeper over the price of the eggs she was trying to sell from the large stack of straw-packed trays bundled together on her back. Elsewhere a boy was listlessly ladling from a bucket of water to wet the street in front of his father's small kitchen.
No one came near Ayika's waiting place, and she did not expect them to. At some point in the far past the well had helped sate the thirst of this neighborhood but Ayika suspected that since the government added the nearby drainage channel drinking a cup from these depths would count as willful self-harm. Nowadays water came piped into fountains. Still, the well's housing was pretty and the folktales surrounding it meant the local shopkeepers would not hear of filling it in.
Ayika had heard from her grandmother that a great spirit-toad was said to live in such wells. The story told in the city was that the toad was a canny spirit and took pride in arranging meeting and contacts between humans and spirits. For his services he was rewarded and soon the toad came to possess quite a pile of riches. However, his greed grew in equal measure and one day as he was sitting down in his damp well where he stored his treasure a crane came and perched above. The crane held in his beak a brilliant piece of jade, more beautiful than any the toad had ever seen before. At once its subtle hues seized his heart. So he called out to the crane.
"That jade is beautiful! I am Golden Toad who can arrange any service! Tell me your heart's desire and I will make it happen in exchange for that treasure."
The crane looked down the well and said to the toad. "I am very tired and hungry for I have just come a great distance from the mountains where the mines are. Truly the journey was difficult for I have been carrying not just one jade, but three. " At this he revealed each of his feet also held a piece of jade, equal or surpassing the first in their beauty.
The toad was consumed with desire. "For such treasures I could get you a palace under the sea. I could engage you to the East Wind's daughter. Name what you want and you shall have it!"
The crane eyed the toad down the well, sitting half in the water on his pile of hoarded coins and silver bars. The crane said, "I am very hungry, and one food has been on my mind all throughout my long journey from the mountains; toad legs. Give me one of your legs to eat and I will fly off happy, leaving this jade treasure here for you."
The Gold Toad thought quickly. He was not an active spirit, having always preferred to sit still and make others come to him. With such a precious stone in his possession he could easily hire someone to help him with any inconvenience that might arise from having three limbs. So he thrust his arm into the air and said to the Crane, "All right, deal. Here, come take it."
The crane looked down at the toad's proffered forelimb. "Tasty, I am sure. But I am very hungry and your hind legs look so much more powerful. Give me one of them and I shall pay you double, leaving two jades here at on the lip of your well."
By now Toad did not even think. He had to have those jades. "Deal!" he shouted, and the crane swooped down to pluck off his thick and strong hind-leg, before flying off into the sky leaving two shining jades on the edge of the well.
For a moment the Golden Toad sat staring up at his new treasures in perfect contentment despite the pain of his missing leg. But when he gathered himself up to leap out of the well and collect them he discovered that with only one back leg he could not reach the rim. He tried again and again, each time rising a little higher but still not near the necessary distance. It was then that a poor human laborer came staggering up to the well hoping for a refreshing drink after working in the hot sun. Instead he found two precious jade treasures sitting unclaimed on the stones. He let out thankful prayers to heaven and gathered them up, deaf to hear the shouts and threats of the spirit toad at the bottom of the well. He could not hear or perceive anything about the spirit for he was not a priest or a shaman and only an ordinary man. The Golden Toad raged and morned but he did not learn his lesson and to this day wealth still flows to him. Some may drop into the hands of those around his consecrated homes.
Grandmother had told the story slightly differently. "Jumping?" She spat, coughing heavily over her pipe. "You ever seen a toad that couldn't climb? Canny bastard got all three Jades for that leg and then gave two away hoping to attract the Moon's love. The Moon loves generosity and she's all that sap sees sitting at the bottom of his dark well. She loves those who are generous and kind so he thought to make a grand gift to prove his worthiness of her love. But he could not bare to give up that last jade so the Moon looked away, knowing he did not truly care about the people. Lesson is you can't half do a thing like love. Also birds carry gems, I guess."
Time was wearing on and it looked like Ayika was going to as alone as the toad spirit. Mizumi was not coming. Perhaps it was for the better, she had promised Xiaobao that she would give up taking risks to discover who had killed Professor Lizhen. Mizumi and her father had the whole Fire Nation Trade Mission defending them. They would be fine.
She on the other hand was out of a job and looking at going home to a mother who was intent on marrying her off to some boy as soon as humanly possible. This after she had only just managed to convince her mother that she was not going to marry either of the Bao brothers. Love was not a concern in her mother's eyes, if Ayika would ever even know what love was like. She leaned back against the well and said, "At least you get to see your love at night, Mister Toad."
Ayika's ears pricked up to hear a sound different from the rest of the normal bustle of the living city. A shifting sound, and it seemed like it was coming from below her. She slowly turned and planted her hands on the lip of the well. Everything looked normal down there in the shadow. Several meters below she could see the faint shimmer that signaled dark water amid dark stones. Or could she? Ayika leaned closer. Her eyes were adjusted to the bright sun but amid the colored blotches that swam in her vision it looked like there was something else down there. Something man-sized and wet like a section of collapsed wall. A collapse that looked like it was moving.
Something smacked Ayika lightly on the bottom and she yelped, almost pitching forward into the well herself. Hands grabbed at her waist but she spun around on her own ready to levy blistering reprobation on whatever lecher had dared to touch her, only to see an incredibly embarrassed Mizumi peaking through her fingers as she covered her face trying to hide suppressed laughter.
Ayika took a deep breath, trying to appear calm and collected. "And just what exactly was that?"
"I..." Mizumi began, biting her lip to hold in her giggles. "I am sorry. When I was at my old school on Kasai Island my friends and I would...I am very sorry. I apologize." She made fists at her side and bowed the the sharp military style of the Fire Nation.
Ayika put her hands on hips in mock reproach, "Well, I guess that kind of stuff explains some of the rumors about Islander girls." When Mizumi moved to begin another apology, Ayika waved her off. "Never mind, you just surprised me is all. I was just..." She glanced back down the well. Now her eyes were adjusted and she could clearly see it was empty. One of these days she needed to get a decent night's sleep. "...nothing. Just waiting for you. Wait, why are you dressed like that?"
"To continue the investigation!"
Mizumi was back in her school uniform, everything perfectly to code. She was even wearing kingdom style shoes that half the native students at the school would not risk since Fire Nation inspired fashion were so popular among the youth in the central rings. Mizumi began to explain her thinking. "Well, chasing leads of people who were around the school with Teacher Lizhen that day seems to have led nowhere good. Or rather it has led to too many suspect people and too many burning buildings. We are no closer to finding a leader. I thought we should start at the other end, with finding out more about the teacher himself, who he had quarrels with. At the school." She cocked her hip to the side and gestured to her clothes. "Headmaster Gang wants me to stay home for a while but I think I would not attract much attention in the halls as long as I am in uniform. We will only be there a short time and very few students know me yet."
But all of them would recognize you instantly, Ayika thought. Even if you weren't foreign, you do catch the eye. But she did not say that. In truth, Mizumi's plan sounded like a reasonable compromise to get around her promise to Xiaobao. This was practically just her going to work. It hardly constituted exposing herself to danger. And besides, Mizumi had sounded wistful when she spoke of her friends back in the Fire Nation. It would be cruel to abandon her here in a city that was strange to her.
"All right then," Ayika said. "Lets go"
...
The vaulted pillars supporting the earthbender tram-chutes were a constant landmark in every ring of the City. They connected its far-flung neighborhoods like stony thread stitching a fabric of brick and tile. Even outside the city wall their stretched out their thin strings into the countryside, rolling past orchards and fields out into the hills and plains of the vast encircled land, returning laden with the food to feed unknown millions mouths. Out in the wide reaches of the enclosed farm country the tram-line and its storage depots might be the only sign a farm worker ever saw that they in fact lived within the bounds of the City's land for the outer wall and the city wall were both hidden by the hazy distance or intervening mountains. The only riders those farmers would see were soldiers bound for camps clinging to the side of the outer wall, farm owners come to survey land, or tax collectors come to confirm that the numbers in their ledgers matched the numbers that lived and toiled in the country. Residents of the harbor town at least had the privilege of riding their tram, of entering the vast city that they supported with their labor.
The two girls crested the last set of stairs up to the Kuang Harbor tram station that rose up from the streets to meet that precious ribbon. Ayika breathed a sigh of relief as Mizumi came up behind her. The tram she had hoped to catch was still waiting. Betond the railings at the edge of the marbled station floor the varied roofs of the town stretched over its lace of canals and aqueducts from the dark bank of the river to where they spread into the endless fields beyond. The tiled eaves and peaks were decorated with tiny clay statues and ornaments, entreating the spirits in blind and mostly ignorant supplication.
Ayika turned to Mizumi, conscious of the fact that the foreign girl was not yet fully accustomed to life in the City and thus might be disorientated by the morning rush of people intent on getting on this tram to the Craftsman's Gate. "Ah, it's ok, the third morning tram hasn't boarded yet so we'll be able to squeeze in as soon as the guards open the doors."
"Squeeze in?" Mizumi suddenly had a twinkle in her eye. "My friend Ayika, last time you led me around the streets. Today is my turn."
With that she began walking straight over to the tram stop where the common class of people were still piling up outside, waiting to be let in to the rear. However, with a simple flash of Mizumi's gold embossed passport the doors to the Nobles Car were opened for her. Ayika supposed that when it came to the tram system nobility was something you could buy. Such a privilege apparently also included guests as Mizumi waved at her to come along. The forward car was completely empty and despite the entire tram being built as a single unit this space seemed newer than the passenger compartment where Ayika normally rode. Mizumi patted a seat at her side and Ayika gently lowered herself onto the sculpted and cushioned bench, remembering just a few days ago when she had not even been allowed to fit her entire body inside the tram walls.
As the car began to fill with a few other rich and expansive personages Mizumi gestured around her. "I still have difficulty getting used to this system you have here. Our benders back in the Nation would not be able to create something like this, and the Earth Kingdom has had it for hundreds of years. Of course without it I assume the city would have starved its self to death long ago. Food would rot in the time it took to travel from the farms in to the Inner Rings by traditional means."
Ayika found herself sitting straighter than normal, trying to ignore the looks of an older woman who had countless ornaments hanging from her hair-board and gold rings across her fingers. Ayika replied, "I'd thought everyone said the Fire Nation was much better than us when it came to machines and such. You really don't have anything like this?" She knew that other towns across the world were not as big as the Impenetrable City, but after living here all her life she had difficulty imagining what that would look like.
"Oh, of course we have trains now, they just are not powered by benders. We use coal and steam. What is impressive is how long ago they managed it here. These cars are basically a sheet of stone for bending on wheels with a compartment built on top. " Mizumi was staring forward into the front wall of the car as if she could see through it and out into all the endless kilometers of tram roads. "Of course it takes at least one bender to power each of these trams so it is very inefficient these days, but the infrastructure is all there. That is why my father is so exited for the chance to get a railroad contract from the King. Just lay the rails on the existing elevated lines and this city alone might eclipse all the track distance in the Nation! A thousand benders could be freed to do other jobs!"
There was the telltale shake which indicated the earthbenders had stepped into their positions at the back of the vehicle. The noble compartment only held less than a quarter of the people that there were seats for, let alone standing room, but none the less the doors were closed, just as a few feet behind the dividing wall the commoners were being helpfully shoved in by guards to better fill the space. Then the benders began their cycle of stances and motions that sent the tram of to its rattling, grinding start.
Mizumi squeezed her eyes shut at the tram's shaking. She grimaced as her teeth knocked against each other. "I take back every admiring thing I said. I love modern shock absorbers. History can be damned."
Ayika laughed, and could not bring herself to care what the rich woman across the car thought. They were riding above the roofs and Mizumi had ten thousand questions about the city that Ayika could answer. It was a good morning.
...