Tang sighed, resigning himself to a return trip after
Lady Feng recovered her senses and wanted her spell- book. He snatched his rope back, finished binding his mother's ankles, and fastened the other end of the line to his waist. The prince filled his waterskin with air and tied it around his neck, then helped the Third Virtuous Concubine seal her mouth with a gag of waxed silk. She picked up Yanseldara's staff, and soon they were in the water. Tang helped her out into the lake and swam over to where the treasure vault's ceiling sloped down to meet the water.
"Are you ready. Esteemed Mother?"
Lady Feng took a few more breaths through her nose, then nodded and mumbled something that might have been, "No dawdling."
She plugged her nostrils, and Tang dove beneath the surface, dragging the Third Virtuous Concubine behind him. The light from the glowing spirit gem in Yansel- dara's staff illuminated the watery cavern in shimmering scarlet light, revealing a huge, winding passage that was not so much a single corridor as a confluence of smaller tunnels arriving from all directions. Despite the labyrinthine appearance, there was no doubt about which passage Cypress used; even if the other tunnels had been large enough to hold him, his stony scales had scoured hundreds of shallow furrows along the proper route.
Although Tang could not be certain, the trip out of the treasure chamber seemed to go much faster than it had coming in. A slight current carried him forward even when he did nothing, while the light from the spirit gem made it much easier to find handholds. The prince drew himself yards at a pull, and he had just drawn his second breath from the air skin when the first brown hints of bog rot began to cloud the water. The rope grew slack as
Lady Feng drifted toward him.
Tang glanced back and saw his mother's pop-eyed stare locked on his kicking heels. Her waxed gag and nos- tril plugs remained in place, but her cheeks were puffed- out and her face was crimson with the desire for breath
She scowled and waved him forward, then clamped her free hand over her mouth and nose.
The prince looked ahead and pulled through the passage with renewed vigor. To his dismay, the water did not grow any murkier. The gentle current that had been pushing them forward died away. He started to worry that he had somehow lost his way, but that could not be.
They had passed no side tunnels large enough to hold Cypress, and the walls in this passage still showed the deep scouring marks left by the dragon's scales.
Tang began to sense a dark presence ahead. For a moment, he feared it was their foe swimming up the pas- sage; then he saw a curtain of gray stone at the end of the tunnel: Cypress had blocked the exit. The prince did not waste any of his precious breath lamenting the dragon's foresight. He simply pulled himself to the boul- der, then turned to take Yanseldara's staff from his mother so he could search for gaps around the edges.
Lady Feng's pop-eye was fluttering in its socket. Her cheeks were no longer puffed out and her face had turned more purple than crimson. Though she still held her free hand clamped over her mouth, a small stream of bubbles was rising from between her fingers. Tang knew she had pulled her gag aside to expel her breath and was strug- gling not to fill her lungs with water. Only one gulp of air remained in the air skin. The prince's own lungs were burning with the desire for another breath, but he pushed the sack toward his mother's mouth.
Lady Feng caught his arm. Her squinty eye rolled for- ward and looked Tang up and down, and the Third Virtu- ous Concubine smiled. She shook her head and pushed the air skin back toward the prince's mouth, then pointed from his lips to hers.
Tang nodded and expelled his breath, then sucked the last of the air from the skin. He held it in his lungs only a moment before placing his mouth over his mother's and blowing a long gasp into her lungs. It was the third time the air had been used, and he did not know how much good it would do her, but he hoped that it would at least reduce the temptation to open her mouth.
Lady Feng accepted the gift, then pushed Yanseldara's staff into his hand and pulled his dagger from his belt, Tang scowled in confusion. Before he realized what she was doing, the Third Virtuous Concubine grabbed his free arm and drew the blade across his empty palm. As blood clouded around his fingers, she opened her mouth and spoke. Water rushed into her lungs, and her body began to convulse instantly as it instinctively tried to cough. Horrified at the sight of what he took to be his mother's fast-approaching death, the prince reached out to draw her close.
Lady Feng pushed him away and pointed at the bloody cloud in the water beside them. To Tang's surprise, it was coalescing into the shape of a man's head.
Suddenly, the Third Virtuous Concubine threw her arms around the prince's neck. A series of powerful con- vulsions racked her chest; then her body went limp and her lips fell open. Tang clamped his hand over her mouth and tried not to think of the terrible burning in his own chest.
When the prince turned back to the crimson head, he was amazed to see the familiar grim face of General Fui
D'hang floating in the water beside him.
Fui's head tipped forward, as though bowing, and floated toward a small side passage. Tang jammed
Yanseldara's staff into his belt, then grabbed a handhold and pulled himself after the loyal general.
Cypress stood in the heart of the sunlit plaza, towering high above a sea of tent-roofed stalls. His empty eye sock- ets turned in the direction ofRuha and Hsieh. The dozens of lances and arrows hanging from his thick scales hinted at the fight Vaerana's Maces had put up before-before what? The witch had no way to guess whether the dragon had killed the Lady Constable and all her men, or had simply discovered the ruse and flown away.
Save for the groaning shadow-sorceress and the meat animals clucking and snorting inside their cages, the market was silent and deserted, with bolts of cloth strewn through the narrow lanes and dried legumes spilling onto the ground from open sacks. Ox wagons and pushcarts sat abandoned upon the road that circum- scribed the plaza, and all the buildings that fronted it had their windows shuttered and barred against the impending acid storm. On the far side of the bazaar, almost directly behind the dragon, loomed a handsome building of marble pillars and arched entranceways that could only be Elversult Hall.
The clang of steel against steel still rang from the darkness at Ruha's back, but it seemed wiser to risk that battle than to venture into the open with the dragon. The witch reached for Hsieh's shoulder, then groaned sharply as her bleeding wound protested with lances of pain. She settled for the mandarin's arm and pulled him into the blackness after her.
They took no more than two steps before Cypress's deep-voiced incantation rumbled across the marketplace.
The sunlight burned the magical darkness into ash, which fell to the ground and spread a grimy layer of soot over the many corpses-Shou, cult, and horse-piled atop the cobblestones. Five blood-covered Shou were bouncing between three and four attackers each, striking as often with a driving elbow or flying foot as with whirling blades. The street beyond was clear as far as the intersection, but beyond that it remained thickly choked with refugees.
The cobblestones trembled with the heavy thud of the dragon's step. Seemingly oblivious to his wounds, Hsieh leapt a mangled horse and charged toward his outnum- bered men.
"Stay close. Lady Ruha!"
The witch clenched her teeth against the pain in her side and circled the dead beast, shuddering with fear each time she felt the ground tremble with Cypress's heavy step. Hsieh reached the battle and swung his sword at the nearest cult member. The man raised a long-handled axe to parry. The minister's dark blade passed through both weapon and armor with no more effect than a shadow. The instant the black sliver touched the fellow's skin, however, it grew as solid as steel and cleaved him down the center.