"Gateway" - читать интересную книгу автора (Shinn Sharon)

FOUR

“OUNCE MILLENIA AGO, the world was formed, and it was perfect,” Ombri said in his resonant voice. He and Daiyu had seated themselves across from each other at the table, while Kalen made tea in the tiny kitchen.

“Letusnotconcernourselveswiththemyriadgodswhohad ahandinitscreation,”Ombriwenton.“But there were factions among the gods-those who believed they could have created a better model-and they produced their own worlds.And more factions arose, and more, and each designed their own version, always taking as their template the original pattern. Eventually, the gods reached a truce and no more worlds were called into being, but by then there were at least a dozen copies, all variants of the original model. We call them iterations. Some were designed by spiteful gods, some by playful gods, some by sober gods, and no two are exactly alike, although all of them bear a great resemblance to each other, as if they were siblings born to the same two parents.”

Daiyu stared at Ombri. It was too bizarre to believe. “Is my world the original template?”

He smiled. “Hardly. It was constructed by one of the gods who has a-shall we say-streak of whimsicality. Your iteration is one of the most unstable of them all. Though I have to admit it is one of the most intriguing as well.”

Daiyu folded her hands and did not answer.

“In the normal course of events,” Ombri continued, “people do not travel between worlds. There are a few of us-servants of the gods-who move freely between iterations, carrying messages or watching over the native peoples. Although we monitor and report on the evolution of each iteration, we do not interfere with the way history unfolds in any of these worlds. Most of the time.”

Kalen brought over a tray holding a teapot, three cups, and a pile of what looked like scones. Daiyu realized that she was starving. Kalen sat on the bench beside Ombri, and they all took a moment to serve themselves. The sconelike bread was delicious. The hot tea was sweeter and more flavorful than the tea back home, but it was aromatic and soothing, and Daiyu took a couple of cautious sips before she said, “Go on.”

“It seems that one or two of the gods chose unwisely when they selected their servants,” said Ombri. “And these individuals-with the ability to slip between dimensions, as it were-have upon occasion moved from iteration to iteration and created great havoc. It has fallen to the rest of us to chase them down and return them to our original world. Most of them are now safely contained, but one or two remain unfettered.” Ombri blew on his tea to cool it, and then took a swallow. “One of them resides in this world. His name is Chenglei. We want to send him home.”

“We?” Daiyu said.

“Aurora and I. You will meet Aurora soon.”

Daiyu shook her head and then she laughed. “Everything you say sounds utterly ridiculous.”

Kalen looked up from his cup and asked diffidently, “I know it’s all very hard to accept, but how else do you explain what’s happened to you?”

She put a finger to her temple. “Concussion. Coma. At the very least, a bad dream. I figure I’ll wake up tomorrow and I won’t be in Oz any longer.”

“Oz?” Kalen said in a puzzled voice.

“It’s an imaginary place where someone went after she suffered brain trauma,” Daiyu said.

“If you believe that none of this is real, then you may as well accept everything I’m telling you as absolute truth,” Ombri said mildly. “It would at least be true within the logic of your dream construct.”

Daiyu took a deep breath. “Even if it is true,” she said, in a voice of exaggerated politeness, “what does it have to do with me?”

Ombri took another sip. “We cannot capture Chenglei without your help.”

She laughed in disbelief. “You’re a servant of the gods? You can move between parallel dimensions anytime youc hoose? And you need my help? I’m sorry, but that doesn’t make sense.”

“Chenglei is much too wily to allow Aurora or me to get anywhere near him,” Ombri said, unruffled by her scorn. “He surrounds himself with the affluent Han of this iteration, and so we need someone who looks like they do to approach him on our behalf.”

“I saw plenty of Chinese people on the trolley tonight,” Daiyu said. “Why don’t you recruit one of them?”

“Most of the people of this world are practically transparent to Chenglei-and to Aurora and to me,” Ombri said. “We have little difficulty reading their thoughts and emotions. If we tried to recruit some of the locals, Chenglei would almost certainly be able to read their intentions when they drew near to him.”

“But he won’ t be able to read my mind?” Daiyu asked skeptically.

Ombri smiled at her over his teacup. “Well,” he said, “I can’t. People from your world tend to be more opaque, even to the servants of the gods.”

“If he can’t read my mind when he meets me, won’t that make him suspicious?” Daiyu said. She could hardly believe she was buying into this fantasy enough to ask the question. “Won’t he guess I’m from another world?”

“No, for now and then even Aurora and I encounter natives whom we cannot scan. Chenglei will believe you are merely more complex than most of the individuals he has met so far. He may even be drawn to you for that reason-because he will see you as a puzzle, or possibly a challenge.”

Daiyu remembered the vendor from Fair Saint Louis, the one who had sent her on this journey to begin with. “Is that why that strange old woman extended the invitation to me? Because she couldn’t read my mind?”

“That was an important consideration,” Ombri acknowledged. “But that ‘strange old woman’ is another servant to the gods, and she has a knack for sensing who might be open to making such a crossing. You have already journeyed a long distance in your short life, from China to the United States.”

“I was a baby!”

He shrugged. “There is a part of your soul, no matter how deeplyburied, that responds to the call for more adventure. That is what our friend saw in you when she offered the ring.”

“And then, how did I get here? One minute I was standing under the Arch-”

“You were at a gateway,” Ombri interrupted.

“What? You mean the Gateway to the West? But-”

“The Arch you know is more than a symbol of man’s exploration of the western reaches of your continent,” Ombri said. “It is a magical portal to worlds beyond worlds. Every iteration constructed by every god contains a doorway in that very same spot.”

“The red gate,” Daiyu whispered. “I saw it when I first lookedaround.”

“Exactly. In another world it is a small wooden framework that leads between two simple gardens. In another, it is a massive gate built of towering stone. In every case, for wayfarers who know how to traverse it, it leads to other worlds.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Daiyu objected. “I’ve walked under the Arch a hundred times-”

“You have to be carrying the talisman that will bring you to the world you want to visit,” Ombri said.

Suddenly, Daiyu remembered the necklace that the old woman had asked her to deliver to “her friend” at the fair. “The pink stone…”shes aid, and glanced around as if looking for it. “I must have dropped it when I came through.” She opened her eyes wide.“ Does that mean someone else might find it? And go through the gate and end up in my world?”

Ombri shook his head. “That particular talisman can only bring someone to this specific iteration, and only if that person walks through a gateway. In this world, no matter who picks it up, it is harmless-just a pretty bauble. Though an expensive one.”

“And how do I get back to my own world? Is there a talisman for that?”

Ombri nodded. “Normally we would give you a small piece of rose quartz, a stone that is only found on your world, and send you through the gateway. You would arrive back on Earth in the place where you left, with no memory of your experience here-”

Daiyu blinked at him. “Wait. You mean I won’t remember any of this?”

Ombriwavedahand. His dark finger swere long and elegant. “One of the peculiar attributes of planet Earth is that it erases your memory of previous iterations. Every sojourner who goes there arrives with his mind blank of time spent anywhere else. Even the servants of the gods have trouble crossing to your iteration. We adjust, but the effort is immense. It is unlikely that you will remember anything more of your time here than an image or two, dreamlike indeed.”

“That’s not going to bother me,” Daiyu assured him. “So you’ll give me a piece of rose quartz and send me through the gate-”

“That is what we would normally do,” Ombri corrected. “But because we think it is possible you might be in danger when you confront Chenglei, we will craft a powerful talisman that will instantly transport you back to your world, no matter where you are in this one. You will not need to go through the gateway to activate it.”

“That sounds good,” Daiyu said, holding her hand out. “Let’s have it.”

“It’snotreadyyet. Aurora must shape it to the uniqu emake- up of your particular body. If you would entrust me with a few strands of your hair-”

Daiyu closed her eyes for a second. Now he was asking for DNA. It was getting more and more surreal. But… “Anything to be able to go home again,” she said, opening her eyes and quickly yanking out a couple of hairs. Ombri took them carefully and folded them into a piece of paper that he stowed in a pocket of his black pants. Daiyu said, “So where is this Aurora?”

“She’s working,” Kalen answered.

“If you’re really who you say you are, it seems odd that any of you would need a job,” Daiyu said.

Ombri gave her that serious smile. “We don’t need money,” he said. “We need entrée into the society that governs this particular city in this particular world. Aurora works for a childless woman who has great personal ambition. This will serve us well now that you have arrived.”

Daiyu leaned her elbows on the table. “Okay. I guess it’s time to talk about why exactly you brought me here. What you want me to do.”

“They want to send Chenglei back to where he belongs,” Kalen said.

“I heard that part already. How can I do anything about it?”

“First let me tell you a little about Shenglang, the city where you now reside,” Ombri said. He waved vaguely toward the windows, through which only darkness was now visible. But the coming of true night had cooled off the air a little, and Daiyu felt a welcome breeze tiptoe in. “Like your own St. Louis, Shenglang is located in the middle of a large continent. It is arguably the most important city in the nation. Chenglei has managed to get himself elected prime minister of Shenglang, and so he might be considered one of the most powerful men on the planet. He has used that power unwisely.”

“Some people like him,” Kalen said. “Mostly people with money.”

Ombrinodded.“He ha sdone a great deal to enrich the highest social class of the city and a great deal to destroy the precarious well-being of the poor,” Ombri said. “So far his scope has been fairly limited and local, but he will soon be signing pacts with neighbor nations on Jia that will extend his most onerous policies. There will be a great deal of suffering, and those who will suffer most are those who can least afford to sustain another loss.”

He could not have said anything more calculated to catch Daiyu’s interest. Maybe he knew that; maybe he had studied her life and her family before he found a way to get that dragon ring onto her finger. Oddly enough, that made her begin to distrust him, an emotion that resided uneasily beside her ongoing disbelief. “But what can I do to stop him?” she said.

“You merely need to place a bracelet on his wrist,” Ombri said.

Daiyu stared at him. It was the last thing she had expected him to say. “Couldn’t anybody do that?” she said.

“Nobody can get close to him,” Kalen muttered.

“A select few are admitted into his presence,” Ombri explained. “None of them are cangbai, like Kalen, or heiren, like me.”

Heiren,Daiyu thought. Mustmeanblack.

Ombri was still talking. “Chenglei only associates with Han-and Han of a certain social circle. If we can insinuate you into that circle, you will inevitably be introduced to him. You will place the bracelet on his wrist, and he will be flung back to the original template of the universe.”

“That doesn’t sound so hard,” Daiyu said. “So why do you think I might be in danger?”

“If Chenglei discovers who you are, he will be-displeased.”

Daiyu widened her eyes and raised her eyebrows, but she didn’t really want a description of what Chenglei might do to her to express his displeasure. She guessed punishment and torture were pretty much the same from world to world.

“That is why we want you to have the talisman,” Ombri continued.“So that if you ever feel threatened, you can instantly transport yourself to home and safety. We would then look for some other sojourner who is young and Chinese and potentially able to introduce herself to Chenglei.”

“Is he Chinese?” she asked.

“Part Chinese, part cangbai,” Ombri said. “Here on Jia, he pretends to be full-blooded Han.”

“When I came through the gate,” Daiyu said slowly, “everyone I saw was Han.”

Ombri nodded. “In this iteration, it is the Han who colonized the Western hemisphere, not the nations you know as Europe. The races are not absolutely identical from world to world, but you will fit in with the Han. You will be accepted. The language they speak will deviate a bit from what you understand as Chinese-”

“I don’t speak Chinese,” Daiyu said, putting up her fingers to rub her temples. Her head was beginning to swim; it was too much information to take in all at once. “I don’t think I can hear one more detail,” she said. “Is there someplace I can lie down? I’m so tired.”

“Of course. It was discourteous of me to talk so long,” Ombri said, rising to his feet. He gestured at Kalen, who jumped up. “It is difficult for any ordinary human being to make the transition between worlds-it takes a great physical toll, and exhaustion is commonplace. We have prepared a room against your arrival. Sleep as long as you like.”

She glanced around again, embarrassed to ask about a bathroom in front of two men. “Is there-a place to clean up first?”

“Of course. Kalen, please acquaint her with the amenities.”

The small room that Kalen showed her to looked enough like the facilities Daiyu was used to that he didn’t have to explain the faucets or the rather strange toilet, which was more like an open-bottomed throne contained behind a low enamel wall. It was quickly clear that there was no such thing as a toothbrush, but Kalen demonstrated how she should use her finger and some gritty paste to scrub her teeth, and the soap was completely familiar.

“ Aurora left you some clothes,” Kalen said al ittle awkwardly as he stepped out of the small room into the hallway. “She was just guessing what might fit you, but-Should I bring them in?”

“Is there something for me to sleep in?” Daiyu asked.

“A nightshirt. Let me get it.”

He disappeared and returned moments later with a voluminous blue shirt made of some soft, brushed material. “It’s kind of big,” he said with a grin, holding it up by the shoulders.

She smiled as she took it from his hands. “I’ll probably be all tangled up in it by morning. Thank you, though.”

He lingered in the doorway as if he wanted to say something else. She raised her eyebrows in inquiry. “I just-I don’t want you to be afraid, ”he said. “Here in such a strange place. Is there something I can do to make you feel better?”

Bring me that talisman that will send me straight home, she thought. “I don’t think so.”

He pointed toward the main room. “I’ll be sleeping right out there. If you wake up in the middle of the night and you need something-or you hear a sound that frightens you-come get me. Or just call my name. I’ll hear you. I’ll be there in a second.”

His sweet earnestness made her smile again. “I’ll keep that in mind,” she said. “Good night.”

Twenty minutes later, she was clean, wrapped in the oversized shirt, and stretched out on a thick mattress on the floor of a tiny room. The mat was surprisingly comfortable, especially since it was augmented with piles of pillows. The window was open, and some of the scents coming through were familiar and reassuring, while others were utterly strange.

Daiyu snuggled her head on one of the pillows and thought, I will wake up in the morning and I will be in my own bed. And I will call my father and say, “Daddy, I have just had the strangest dream.” Everything will be fine in the morning. I’ll be home.