Eric Van Lustbader - Sunset Warrior 4 - Beneath an Opal Moon

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BENEATH AN OPAL MOON

Eric V. Lustbader

Published by Fawcett

Books:

THE NINJA

BLACK HEART

SIRENS

THE MIKO

JIAN

SHAN

ZERO

FRENCH KISS

WHITE NINJA

The Sunset Warrior Cycle

THE SUNSET WARRIOR

SHALLOWS OF NIGHT

DAI-SAN

BENEATH AN OPAL MOON

Quickly, man! Do as I say!"

Moichi stepped back so that the 1iIle of trees

brushed against him. He looked to where Kossori

was gazing. South of them a shadow had

materialised as if out of the night itself. It was in

violent motion yet silent and smooth, running

lightly then leaping across the narrow chasms

between buildings as if it were but a wisp of

smoke. A cool breeze off the water rustled the

spiky leaves of the trees and ~oichi shivered

slightly, feeling his muscles tense. Still he watched

the shadow approach, the fluidity of motion

mesmerising, for there seemed to lie no

disturbance to the continuous flow of energy, runt

leap, run, leap.

Now the shadow was spurting across the

adjacent buildings rooftop, the image abruptly

blossoming. But so swiftly did it move, that

Moichi only recognised it for what it was as it

landed on their own rooftop.

BENEATH

AN OPAL

MOON

Eric V. Lustbader

FAWCETT CREST NEW YORK

A Fawcett Crest Book Published by Ballantine

Books Copyright A) 1980 by Eric Van Lustbader

Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published

in the United States by Ballantine Books, a

division of Random House, Inc., New York, and

simultaneously in Canada by Random House of

Canada Limited, Toronto.

This book may not be reproduced in whole or in

part, by mimeograph or any other means, without

permission. For information address: Doubleday

& Company, Inc., 245 Park Avenue, New York,

New York 10017.

ISBN 0-449-21649-7

This edition published by arrangement with

Doubleday, a division of Bantam, Doubleday,

Dell Publishing Group, Inc.

All of the characters in this book are fictitious,

and any resemblance to actual persons, living or

dead, is purely coincidental.

Printed in Canada

First Ballantine Books Edition: March 1990

For Ralphine

Contents

PREFIGURE:

On Green Dolphin Street I

ONE: CITY OF WONDERS

Rubylegs 13

Koppo 36

Circus of Souls 66

Snatch 86

TWO: PURSUING THE DEVIL

The Lorcha 101

Mer-Man's Tales 116

Fugue 132

Water's Edge 164

THREE: THE FIREMASK

Intimations 181

Demoneye 189

The Anvil 204

Sardonyx 220

The Opal Moon 231

FOUR: LION IN THE DUSK

Idyll 243

The Orphans 250

And All the Stars

to Guide Me 256

Thus we struggle so that our

history shall become the

salvation of our children.

From the Tablets

of the Iskamen

PREFIGURE:

On Green Dolphin

Street

THE Scarred Man enters Sha'angh'sei at sunset.

He pauses before the towering cinnabar

escarpment of the western gate and turns in his

dusty saddle. Above him, a pair of ebon carrion

birds spread their grotesquely long wings,

hovering, startlingly set off by the flare of the

sky. Piled clouds riding like chariots of crimson

fire obscure for long moments the bloated ablate

of the sun as it sinks slothfully toward the heights

of the city already lost within the thickening

haze. It is a unique mark of the sunsets in

Sha'angh'sei that the city itself and the land all

around it is first engulfed by the purest crimson,

sliding, as the sun disappears behind the

man-made facade into the amethyst and violet

which heralds the night.

But the scarred man's deep-set eyes, slitted and

as opaque as dry stones, study only the winding

much-traveled highway behind him and the

steady lines of jumbled traffic ox-carts piled

high with raw rice and silk, horsemen, soldiers,

and traveling merchants, businessmen, farmers

on foot moving toward him and the city; the

outbound flow is of no import to him.

His horse snorts, shaking its head. Gently, the

scarred man strokes its neck below the short

mane with a thin red hand. The stallion's coat is

lusterless, matted with the mingled dust of the

highway, the caked mud of narrow back roads

and the grease of many a hasty meal.

The scarred man pulls at his hat, a floppy felt

affair which, constructed anaesthetically, does

little more than conceal his long and haggard

face. Satisfied at last, he turns and, slouched in

his high and dusty saddle, presses against his

mount with his heels, riding through the gate. He

raises his eyes as he moves, watching the

perspective changing, deriving pleasure

2 Eric V. Lustbader

from the shifting angles as he studies the endless

bas-reliefs carved into the cinnabar of the dark

western gate, an epic monument to a dichotomy:

the triumph and the cruelty of war.

The scarred man shivers even though he is not

cold. He does not believe in omens yet he thinks

it interesting that he enters Sha'angh'sei through

the western gate, erected as a sinister reminder of

a particularly odious aspect of man's nature. But,

he asks himself, would it really make any

difference if he had made his entry into the city

through the green-onyx southern gate, the

alabaster eastern gate, or the intricate

red-lacquered wood and black iron northern gate?

Then he throws his head back and utters a short

bitter laugh. No. No. Not at all. For at this hour

of sunset they are all stained crimson by the

lowering light.

The scarred man breaks into the populous surf

of the great city and his journey is slowed by the

milling throngs of people as if he is passing

through a moving field of poppies. He feels an

end to long isolation, far from the companionship

of man, a seemingly interminable time with only

his stallion, the stars and the moon as his family.

Yet as he rides into the explicit riot of the city,

his mount walking through the clouds of jostling

men and women and children, fat and thin, large

and small, young and old, ugly and fair, as he

passes the bursting shops, stalls, stands with

striped awnings, the tangled buildings with their

dense cluster of swinging signs advertising the

tempting wares within, he realizes that never

before has he felt such an apartness from the

warmth of.the family of man. And this peculiar

alienness suffuses him with such completeness

that his body begins to quake as if he is ill.

He digs his bootheels into the flanks of his

mount and shakes the reins, abruptly anxious to

reach his destination. Through this vast kinetic

sea he jounces, metal jangling, dusty leather

creaking, the grime of travel heavy upon him. A

torrent of filthy children, their torsos ribbed like

corpses, brush against his legs like a separate

eddy in this fetid surf and he is obliged to press

his boots tightly against the stallion's flanks lest,

howling, they pull them from his feet. He extracts

a copper coin from his wide sash and flings it

high into the air so that it catches the oblique

light. As it disappears into the swirling mass of

pedestrians on his left, the children abandon him,

rushing to follow the flight of the spinning coin.

They plow through the crowd, tenaciously

searching on hands and knees in the slime and

offal of the street.

BENEATH AN OPAL MOON 3

He moves on, turning a corner at an acute angle,

following the street. He inhales the rich musk of

coriander and limes, the heavy incense of charring

meat, the somewhat lighter scents of fresh fish and

vegetables flash-cooked in hot sesame oil. As he

passes the opening of a dark alley, the thick sweet

smell of the poppy resin for which Sha'angh'sei is

so famous, hits him with such intensity it takes his

breath away and he is dizzied.

The din of the city, after so long on the road,

alone with himself, is claustrophobically

overpowering, a constant harsh cacophony

consisting of wails, shrieks, cries, shouts, laughter,

whispers, chanting, a glorious babble of voices,

testament to the indomitability of man.

Within the deep shadows of the felt hat, the

scarred man is hollowcheeked. A long bent nose

leads inevitably to thick gnarled lips as if, in his

wild earlier years, he had fought with his fists

within the hempen circle, as is the wont of certain

of the folk of the western plains of the continent

of man. His hair is silver, silken, flowing long down

his back, held away from his wide wrinkled

forehead by a thin plaited band of copper. His

face, defiantly hairless, exhibits the tracery of livid

white scars puckering the flesh of his cheeks and

throat like rain on the surface of a pond. He wears

a long traveling cloak of a dark, indeterminate

color, owing to the grit of his journey. Beneath it,

a tunic and leggings of deepest brown. Hanging

from his waist from a simple stained leather belt is

a scabbarded curving sword, wide-bladed and

single-edged.

He pauses beside a wine stall on Thrice Blessed

Road and, dismounting, leads his mount out of the

enormous crush of the thoroughfare. As he strides

into the dimness beneath the pattemed awning, he

spies the wineseller, moon-faced and almond-eyed,

arguing with two young women over the price of a

leather flagon of wine. With a sweep of his

deep-set eyes, the scarred man takes in the curving

bodies of the women, their faces tipped high in

anger. But they are restless, his eyes, and while he

listens and waits somewhat impatiently, his gaze

darts this way and that, alighting on a face here,

the pale flash of a hand there. For a moment, he

observes a man with eyes like olives and black

curling hair so long that it covers his shoulders,

until he is met by another man and they depart.

The scarred man's head cocks at the thumping

sounds of running feet, shouts echo and diminish

as a body rushes past outside, elbowing through

the crowd. He turns away. He asks the wineseller,

now free, for a cup of spiced wine, downs it in one

4 Eric V. Lustbader

swallow. It is not the rice wine of the region,

which he finds too thin for his taste, but the

heartier burgundy of the northern regions. He

purchases a flagon.

The sunset is fading, the sky above Sha'angh'sei

turning mauve and violet as night approaches

boldly from the east.

The scarred man leads his stallion left into a

narrow alley, crooked and filled with refuse and

excrement. There must be bones here, hidden

perhaps in the high dark mounds heaped against

the sides of the building walls. Human bones

stripped of all flesh, all identity. The stench is

appalling and he breathes shallowly as if the air

itself might be poisonous. His mount whinnies

and he pats its neck reassuringly.

The alley gives out at length onto Green

Dolphin Street with its dense tangle of shops and

dwellings. Again the air is filled with the singsong

cacophony of the city and spices blot out the

more noxious odors. Half a kilometer away, the

scarred man finds the straw-filled sanctuary of a

stable. Leading his mount to a stall, he reaches

up, removing his saddle bags, slinging them over

his left shoulder. He places two coins in the dark

palm of a greasy attendant before venturing out

onto Green Dolphin Street. He walks for a time

down this wide avenue meandering, pausing from

time to time to peer into shop windows or turn

over a piece of merchandise at a street stall. He

turns often to peer behind him as he moves from

one side of the street to the other.

At last he comes upon a swinging wooden sign

carved in the shape of an animal's face. The

Screaming Monkey, a dark and fumey tavern. He

enters and, skirting the multitude of jammed

tables and booths, speaks to the tavernmaster for

just a moment. Perhaps it is the din of the place

which causes him to put his lips against the other

man's ear. The tavernmaster nods and silver is

exchanged. The scarred man crosses the room

and mounts the narrow wooden staircase that

folds back upon itself. On the landing, midway

up, his gaze sweeps across the smoky room

bubbling with noise and movement. Natives of the

Sha'angh'sei region do not interest him;

outlanders do. He studies them all most carefully

and covertly before he completes his ascension.

He walks silently down the darkling corridor,

meticulously counting the number of closed

doors, checking to see if there is a rear egress

before he opens the last door on the left.

Inside the room he stands for long moments

just inside the closed door, perfectly still, listening

intently, absorbing the

BENEATH AN OPAL MOON 5

background drift of sounds, setting it in his mind so

that, even if he is otherwise occupied, he will

automatically hear any deviation.

Then he crosses over the mean floorboards,

throws his heavy saddlebags onto the high down bed

with its pale green spread, moving ilTunediately to

the window, drawing the curtains. When they stop

moving, he pulls one side carefully back in the crook

of one forefinger, gazing out onto a heavily

shadowed alley perpendicular to Green Dolphin

Street. He is, he knows, within the heart of the city,

far from the long wharves of the Sha'angh'sei delta.

Still, if he strains, he can hear the kubaru's plaintive

hypnotic work songs filtering through the hubbub.

Peering sideways, he can just make out a slender

section of the far side of Green Dolphin Street. A

seller of herbed pork and veal is closing his shop

and, immediately adjacent, the lights are

extinguished in a dusty carpet shop as three

brothers, pear-shaped and identical down to their

embroidered saffron robes, shutter the windows.

They are rich, the carpet merchants, thinks the

scarred man, letting the curtains fall back into place.

The more prosperous they become, the heavier they

seem to weigh, as if they have been magically

transformed into living embodiments of the taels of

silver which they hoard.

The scarred man quits the far side of the room

and, satisfied that the curtains will hold in the light,

fires an oil lamp atop the scarred bedside table. One

corner is charred as if some former occupant had

clumsily overturned the lamp. He reaches into the

recesses of his saddlebags, withdraws the newly

bought flagon of wine, takes a long drink.

He washes at the nightstand until the water is

black with grime and presently he hears light

footfalls on the stairs. His head comes up and his

right hand grips the hilt of his curving sword. He

steps soundlessly to the wall adjacent the door and

waits, scarcely breathing.

A knock on the door.

- A young boy, tall and dark-haired, enters

carrying a tray of

steaming food. He comes to a halt seeing the

room empty.

Then the scarred man growls low in his throat and

the boy

turns slowly around. He tries not to stare at the

scarred man

but he cannot help himself.

"Well," says the scarred man. "Put it down."

The boy swallows hard and nods. He continues to

stare.

The scarred man ignores this. "Your father tells me

that you

6 Eric V. l:`ustbader

are quite reliable. Is this so?" His voice is thick and

husky as if he has something lodged in his throat.

Fright mingles with fascination. The scarred man

sees these often aligned emotions flickering upon the

young narrow face.

"Well," says the scarred man. "Have you no voice

then?"

"Yes," stammers the boy, ''sir. I have one."

"Close the door."

The boy complies.

"Have you a name?" The scarred man has gone to

the night table. He lifts a bit of fowl between the long

nails of his middle finger and thumb. The forefinger,

in between, juts out oddly. The scarred man swirls the

meat in the thick brown gravy, ignoring the long

wooden eating sticks Iying at the side of the plate,

pops it into his mouth. "Excellent," he says to no one

in particular as he licks the tips of his fingers. "Just the

right amount of fresh black pepper." He turns.

"Now "

"Kuo." Softly.

- "Ah." The scarred man studies him with an

awesomely

intense gaze, but even though he feels fear, Kuo

knows that

he must not show it. He stands ramrod straight,

concentrating

on controlling his breathing. He tries to ignore the

sound of

the hammering of his heart, which feels as if it has

lodged

itself in his windpipe.

"This is for you, Kuo. If you do as I say." A silver

coin has magically appeared between the scarred man's

fingers.

The boy nods, hypnotized by the shining coin. It

represents more wealth than he has had in his entire

life.

"Now listen to me carefully, Kuo. My horse is in the

stable down Green Dolphin Street. At the first stroke

of the hour of the boar you must bring it to the alley

at the side of this place. This one." He points one long

forefinger toward the curtained window. "No one must

see you do this, Kuo. And once here, stay within the

shadows. Wait for me. When I come, there will be

another silver coin for you. Is this clear?"

Kuo nods. "Yes, sir. Quite clear." The secretiveness

of his mission has excited him. How his friends will

envy him.

"No one must know of this, Kuo." The scarred man

takes a quick step toward him. "Not your friends, not

your brothers or sisters, not even your father. No one."

"There is nothing for me to tell," Kuo says, delighted

with himself. "Who would be interested in my

delivering another meal upstairs?"

BENEATH AN OPAL MOON 7

"Not even that!" And the boy jumps at the force

of those terse words, then nods. "No, sir."

The scarred man flicks his thumb and, shot from

the arbalest of his nail, the coin arcs into the air,

shining. Kuo's fingers enclose it and he is gone,

swiftly and silently.

The scarred man listens at the door. Then, as the

sounds of Kuo's descent fade, he turns his

attention to the food and for a time he is totally

consumed in the act of eating.

Sounds drift up to him, given an eerie

etherealness by the closed curtains. The cries of

the night vendors, drunken laughter, the heavy

creak of wooden-wheeled carts laden with to-

morrow's produce and dry goods, the snort of

horses, hoofs clip-cropping on the cobbles; a soft

wind rustles the leaves of the plane trees lining

nearby Yellow Tooth Street. Night.

Soft footfalls on the stairs and the scarred man

is up, wiping his greasy hands. He bends,

extinguishes the flame of the oil lamp. Silently, he

skirts the bed, opens the curtains. Dim, fitful light

from the thin corridor to the street seeps into the

room as slowly as blood drips from a corpse.

The footfalls cease.

The scarred man has positioned himself well

within the deepest shadows of the room with a

good line of sight to the door. He stands immobile,

one hand gripping the hilt of his sword as the door

opens inward to reveal an ebon silhouette.

"Mistral," comes a whispered voice.

"Who is the messenger?" says the scarred man.

"The wind."

"Enter, Omojiru," says the scarred man and the

silhouette disappears as the door is closed. There

comes the sound of a lock being secured.

"Cascaras,'' says Omojiru, "have you found it?"

The scarred man hears the tremor in the voice,

barely held in check as he watches the other in the

inconstant light. He notes the high forehead, the

flat cheekbones, the narrow thinlipped mouth, the

intelligent almond eyes and thinks, It was those

eyes which took me in. But now I know that he

would be nowhere without his father's influence. I

regret his involvement. Not because he is ruthless

and unprincipled. He would be useless to me

without those traits. But because he lacks the guile

he believes he has. That can be dangerous. He sees

Omojiru's lips compress into the narrow line of

intransigence preparatory to violent action and he

recalls this man's volatile nature. How different

you are from your kin, Omojiru, the

lyric V. I`ustbader

scarred man thought. If your father but knew

what you planned with me

' Tell me!'' Omojiru hisses, the words forced

out of him as if they are under pressure, and the

scarred man looks away for just a moment,

embarrassed for the other.

"I have found it."

"At last!" Omojiru moves involuntarily closer

and now the quavering of his voice is

unstoppable.

Greed, Cascaras thinks. And power. How many

would he kill to get them? "I do not have it yet."

"What?'' The enormous disappointment shows

across the young man's face, unmistakable even

in the dimness.

"But I know where it is."

"Ah. Then we will go to it."

"Yes," says the scarred man. "That is the way of

our bargain." And he wonders at what point

Omojiru will try to kill him.

"Where," Omojiru whispers hoarsely, "is it?"

The scarred man laughs silently. How

transparent he is. He will do it now and take no

chances. ''We will go there together, Omojiru," he

says with great patience, as if explaining a dif-

ficult and complex concept to a child.

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摘要：

BENEATHANOPALMOONByEricV.LustbaderPublishedbyFawcettBooks:THENINJABLACKHEARTSIRENSTHEMIKOJIANSHANZEROFRENCHKISSWHITENINJATheSunsetWarriorCycleTHESUNSETWARRIORSHALLOWSOFNIGHTDAI-SANBENEATHANOPALMOONQuickly,man!DoasIsay!"Moichisteppedbacksothatthe1iIleoftreesbrushedagainsthim.HelookedtowhereKossoriwas...

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