Heaven's Golden Finger - Chapter 28: Chapter 28

Shun turned away from fake Shirong and tried to restore self-control. His cheeks were overheated and he had to keep the boy from seeing his expression. So many years of being the mostly unwanted one, the one who had to prove himself and his worth. And this young fool kept insisting on looking up to him when most of their sect barely tolerated his existence.
No, not just looking up to him but valuing him. Wanting him. He wasn't at all accustomed to being wanted. Oh, their Shizun cared about him, wanted him well and safe. Valued him. But not the way fake Shirong did. "Idiot," he muttered, trying not to let it get to him.
"Yes, Shixiong."
Picking up the doll, he had to admit the work was excellent. He wrapped it up in a bit of cloth from a nearby hanging and handed it back to Shirong Shidi. "Best keep it hidden away. It might be needed again." He hoped not. It'd been terrifying, those moments when he couldn't figure out how to get himself back to himself.
Of course, part of the problem was that the snake form was as much himself as the human. And he enjoyed, truly enjoyed, the sensation of being huge and powerful and capable. So capable. He was an excellent fighter in his human form but the snake form was hundreds of times stronger.
He needed to be human right now, though. They had to get out of this trap and he'd a feeling his snake form had no hope of escaping. Shun examined the room thoughtfully. Once, long ago, this had been the throne room of the Demon King, complete with an elegant tree-like device at the center. That would have been his mother's equivalent of a throne.
Now it was empty and the gold and gems that once covered it were scraped away. He wondered who'd dared steal from this place. Wondered, too, where all his mother's subjects were. So far all they'd met had been constructs, the magically crafted guards who protected the King's Hall from trespassers.
He wondered, too, where his mother was. Hadn't the story said she'd been bound here? Wouldn't this be the most likely spot to find her, trapped in spiritual ice upon her throne? "Where is she?"
"Master Qiong always told me... I mean, my predecessor... that he'd cornered her in her lair. Could he have meant her personal chambers?"
There was some sense to that. After all, she would have been protecting her egg, the one Shun hatched from. And that wouldn't have been here in the throne room. He scanned the room, spotted an opening towards the side that looked like it might lead further into the palace. "Let's look for it."
"Shixiong, shouldn't we be looking for a way back to the human realm?" Shirong Shidi sounded mildly nervous, as if he feared to face the entrapped remains of the woman his predecessor's father had helped imprison.
"At a guess, we'll find a way wherever she is. She would have been defending my father's escape from here with my egg."
Shirong Shidi considered that. Looked nervously around. And finally agreed despite himself.
The interior of the palace was a maze but Shun felt as if he knew it without ever having lain eyes on it before. Oh, but wait. All those dreams had shown him the paths and hidden ways of the palace. Showed him everything about the Demon World. He'd fought them, tried to ignore them. Now he was sorry he'd not paid better attention.
Still, he remembered enough to find his way from one layer of the building's peculiar interior to the next. He'd have just pushed his way directly through, ignoring the cloth walls, but that would have been risky as well. One never knew what the palace's protections would do if he behaved like an intruder.
Thus it took almost an hour to get them to the highest level of the palace, this one a balcony encircling the throne room. And from there, a bridge led to a hanging chamber, curtained off over the center of the throne room. If he'd stayed in snake form he could have climbed up the tree to reach it. In human form, he had to walk.
The chamber was dimly lit and dusty, the only light coming from the hole in the floor leading down into the throne room. Shun was about to pull out a lightstone when something shifted in the air, a flicker of magical energy responding to their presence. Candles, or what appeared to be candles, lit. Delicate patterns formed in the surrounding curtains, a constantly changing painted landscape, as if they stood inside a rotating chamber atop a high mountain.
It'd been a beautiful chamber once. Elegant, comfortable, decorated in the same barbaric style as the rest of the palace. Except almost everything had been smashed to pieces, crushed in the violent battle that'd taken place here. Even the bed, carved sandalwood and bamboo, was crushed, though Shun noted a depression in the mattress just exactly the size and shape of a large egg.
That, though, wasn't nearly as important as the thing coiled at the center of the room. It was smaller than Shun had been earlier, but Xing Baishe wouldn't have taken her largest form here. It would have destroyed the room entirely.
At first glance she seemed almost alive, a pale serpent frozen solid in a case of frost. It looked like she'd been caught in mid-bite, just about to latch onto her enemy. Nor could there be any doubt who that enemy was. Master Qiong's bases were Wind, Mountain, water, wood and metal, a combination that allowed the sect leader to create a form of ice stronger than any metal. Even back in the days before he'd become sect leader, he'd been a powerhouse among Leifeng's disciples.
Yet something seemed strange about the snake within the bloodstained ice. Shun stared up at his mother's form, trying to decide if he was imagining it or if something truly was wrong.
"What's wrong with her eyes?" Shirong Shidi asked suddenly, sounding a little sick. "Did he... did he blind her?"
Shun blinked. Looked more closely and saw his Shidi's meaning. Most of the snake's body seemed perfectly normal. Injured, yes, but like it might start moving any moment, once the ice was gone. Her eyes, however, were empty sockets, light shining into hollowness beyond.
Wait. Empty? Hollow? But how could this be? Hadn't Master Qiong imprisoned Xing Baishe, not killed her? Shun moved closer. Stared up at the snake coiled above him, ready to attack. He reached out. Touched the ice and felt the fire inside him react. Heat flared along his palm, flashing up and down the trapped form.
Within seconds the ice melted. Within seconds he stood in a puddle, boots soaked through by the icy water. The snake the ice had imprisoned slowly deflated and lay, flat and empty, across the floor. "It... it's just a skin."
Shirong Shidi came closer. Knelt in the water, ignoring how it soaked his clothing. Touched the remains and carefully examined the head. "No bones. Nothing left at all. Did she die and decay to dust? Or did she escape?"
The first wasn't likely. The ice would have held her body in perfect stasis. Shun joined his Shidi and slid his hands along the white scales. Soft. Cold. Empty. "Oh. I see. She escaped. Somehow she must have escaped. This is just her skin."
But if that were the case, if she'd really gotten away, why was it she'd never found his father or himself? No. There was more to this than just his mother cleverly getting away from her would be entrapper.
The question was, what?
In the end, they found no clue to what'd actually happened to Xing Baishe. They didn't find any of Xing Baishe's followers, either, a fact that bothered Shun. At the very least they ought to have been outside the palace trying to find a way to break in, trying to find a way to claim the crown for themselves.
"Do you think we should leave soon?" Shirong Shidi asked after Shun had searched around for a while. "There's nothing around but those demon beasts in the chasm. I really don't want them deciding they haven't eaten in centuries and we'd make the best possible dinner."
Ordinarily, Shun would have told his Shidi not to worry so much. Except he wasn't sure he wanted to find out he was wrong about those beasts eating humans, or even half-human, being. Noble demons like himself were bound by the pact with the Heavenly Emperor. Demon Beasts - and Spirit Beasts for that matter - were a different story.
"You've a good point, Shixiong. Start looking around for some sign of a portal." Shun paused. Remembered fake Shirong was unlikely to know what such a thing looked like. "Spread your spiritual sense. Cautiously." The last was necessary because Shirong Shidi opened himself too wide and nearly dropped himself to the floor. "We're surrounded by demon energy. Why do you think I lost control, earlier?"
Shirong Shidi flushed bright red. "I hadn't thought about that," he admitted as he readjusted himself. "What should I be looking for?"
"Search for a source for spiritual energy instead of demonic. You're a cultivator, or at least your predecessor was. Even as lazy as he was, his skills should be enough to let him draw qi to himself." Shun helped his Shidi to his feet and wondered why he went so pale.
"Ah. Yes. I... I mean Old Shirong... certainly knew that much." Pale features reddened. Then, looking away and finding down his flustered state, Shirong Shidi began searching around. Shun would have followed suit but with all the demonic energy around him he was afraid his demonic side would interfere. He had to form his demonic core and soon, if he was to learn to balance the two sides to his nature.
While Shirong Shidi focused his attention on finding an escape route, Shun examined his mother's shed skin. A split down the back, a little bit longer than he was tall, showed him what she must have done. Transforming just as Master Qiong had bound her outer form in ice, she must have taken her human form and slipped free just barely in time.
The question of where she went from there, how Master Qiong had failed to notice her and why she'd never made contact with Shun or his father remained. Or, oh, wait. Hadn't his grandfather told him his father had gone to help her after leaving him at Leifeng Sect? Something must have happened afterwards. Something no one ever admitted to.
"Shun Shixiong? I think I found something. But... it doesn't feel quite right." Shun pointed to a fallen brocade tapestry dropped in a tangled heap on the floor. "I think it's dangerous. Could it be the one leading right back to Leifeng?"
It wouldn't surprise Shun if it were. Given what was likely to happen if they landed back home, he fully expected to be bound and locked up yet again. On the other hand, it'd get Shirong Shidi to safety. Chosen One or not, staying in the demon realm like this was risky for humans. One good twist in the magic and Shirong Shidi might find himself becoming part of the world in an unexpected way.
Well, whatever else, they needed to look at the portal before they could make their decision. Shun picked the curtain up and found a bar to hang it on. Then he paused, examining the thing. The symbols were unfamiliar, but they belonged to a different branch from his Shizun's. "I don't suppose you recognize any of these?"
Fake Shirong blinked. "I... Old Shirong didn't pay attention in class much." He looked even so and breathed a sigh of relief that made Shun raise a brow at him. "They aren't from my future life, either."
Now why would he be glad of that? Shun would have thought the boy would appreciate something familiar. He didn't bother asking, just went back to examining the markings. Thinking on it, they were familiar. He'd seen something like them, not so long ago.
The memory hit them both at about the same moment. "That place I was dragged to, back when we went through the portal to the auction house!" Shirong exclaimed, just a moment before Shun could say anything.
"Yes. There were similar symbols there. Except... I don't think they were exactly the same." Shun considered the thing. Shook his head. "Wherever this goes, I'm not sure I want to risk being taken there again. Let's see if you can find another...."
*RUMBLE*
Automatically Shun reached out through his demonic cultivation and felt something huge moving through the energies surrounding him. Instinct made his demonic vision shift, the solid walls surrounding them seeming to fade to mere black lines. And beyond those lines was something huge.
The shape seemed long and spindly but as it passed the palace again, its lower end broke apart to form a dozen or so huge appendages. Ones it used to grab hold of a bridge and rip it free of its moorings.
"What is it, Shixiong?" Shirong Shidi sounded scared but trusting, as if he were sure Shun would know the answer and be able to do something about it. If Shun were properly in charge here, he supposed he might be. But a half-blood princeling, not yet acknowledged by his demon kin, surely had no hope of commanding the creatures of this realm. "Can I do anything to help?"
Shun made up his mind. There really was only one way to go. That monster, whatever it was, clearly meant to rip every bridge to safety they had. What it'd do once it'd completed that task was debatable, but it surely wouldn't be healthy for either of them.
"Open the portal. We'll go that way." When Shirong Shidi blinked at him, Shun caught his hand, chill and damp in his fingers, and set his finger moving along the characters surrounding the embroidered dragon coiled on the brocade fabric. "Set your qi to it, Shirong. We don't have time for hesitation or self-doubt."
A brief, startled, glance. An unexpected flush on already pink cheeks. Then fingers tracing the patterns, he set qi flowing through them.
The markings lit up with every stroke, until at last the final one was placed. The dragon at the center of the tapestry shifted. Coiled. Uncoiled. Grasped hold of a door Shun hadn't noticed in the tapestry before. A single, solid, pull drew the doorway open, revealing what lay beyond.
Without hesitation, because they didn't have time for such nonsense, Shun pushed his companion through.
Shun: So... Shidi... that doll...?
Shirong: *blushes* Er... yes?
Shun: Exactly when did you get that close a look at me?
Shirong: Wouldn't you rather know why?
Shun: That part I'm beginning to guess.