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The White Mirror
By Elsa Hart St. Martin's Press
Copyright © 2016 Elsa Hart
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4668-8639-1
CHAPTER 1
In high places, a single storm takes many forms. A wise traveler knows to be wary of what the clouds and the mountains are saying to one another. So when Li Du observed a raindrop strike his mule's bridle and bounce into the air instead of slipping quietly down the leather, he stopped and looked up with some trepidation. Through dripping branches, the sky was like rough silk stretched tight across a frame.
A gust of wind pulled at the tops of the trees. Li Du's mule shook her head, upset. The wind had loosed the flap of a saddlebag. It fluttered and snapped at her flank. Li Du freed one of his hands from his coat sleeve and stepped carefully around the animal, aware of the precipitous drop to his right where the edge of the path fell away through gnarled oaks into a deep ravine. At its base, cascading water frothed and pooled around boulders and forest debris.
Once he had secured the saddlebag, Li Du patted his mule's shoulder and tucked his hand back into his damp sleeve. It had been precipitating since dawn, an irresolute rain that was now assuming the colder, sharper guise of sleet. Ahead, the trail rose steeply, slick stones and black mud churned by booted feet and shod hooves. He resumed his progress, stepping automatically into the footprints that were already there.
Li Du was a small man of middle age with a smooth, oval face, unassuming square eyebrows, and eyes that smiled when he did. It was his tendency to walk with his head thrust forward and his chin slightly tucked, as if he was scanning the ground for a lost item. His rumpled wool hat was worn and faded. His long coat, cinched at the waist by a belt, had been mended many times.
For Li Du, there was a rhythm to each day of mountain travel. In the mornings, he opened his eyes to the blue half-light of dawn with a feeling that he had become part of the cold dirt beneath him. Later, after a hot breakfast and the effort of packing up camp, his fatigue left him and he was eager to set out. There followed a pleasant interlude of walking and noting with interest the varieties of vegetation, the vistas, and the birdsong.
By midday, the morning's energy was spent. Small pains broadened into aches, breath became an exhausting necessity, and fears of injury insinuated themselves into his thoughts. Fortunately, on all but the most difficult days, this discomfort passed and Li Du settled into his own steady afternoon pace, content in the knowledge that nothing was expected of him except that he match his slow stride to that of his mule until the caravan stopped for the night.
This afternoon was different. Li Du was anxious. Over the last ten days, they had not seen anyone outside the caravan except for a single farmer in a distant barley field who, upon observing them, had hurried out of sight. The air had been growing steadily colder. That morning, Li Du had witnessed a worried exchange between Kalden Dorjee and his men as they discussed signs of an approaching storm.
Li Du was nearing the top of the ascent when a sound reached him. He gave a little sigh of relief as he recognized the bells of the caravan's lead mule. He crested the rise and, blinking away stinging ice, peered down. In front of him, a steep declivity led to a wide clearing on the bank of the stream, where the caravan had halted.
The sleet imparted a wraithlike uniformity to the shapes of the men, but he knew them. Bundled in their coats and hats, the six muleteers stood among their laden mules. Li Du had often remarked that, in dismal weather, the bright red plumes affixed to the lead mule's bridle seemed lit by remembered sunshine. They were clearly visible now, despite the precipitation.
He took hold of his own mule's bridle and began to make his way down. The bells jangled again. He looked at the clearing. The animals had shifted, and he could now see a narrow, flat bridge over the stream. On the far side, a spur path disappeared into the forest.
Distracted, Li Du stepped onto a loose rock and slid forward. He flung out an arm to stop his fall. His hand found an overhanging branch and he clung to it. When he had recovered his balance, he released the branch. As it sprang back into place he felt a pull and heard a rip as part of his sleeve tore away. He made a quiet sound of exasperation as he looked up at the threadbare strip of wool, now a forlorn pennant.
Down in the clearing the lead mule shook its head impatiently, and the bells rang for a third time. It was then that Li Du discerned another figure beyond the clustered men and horses. The stranger — a monk, judging by his crimson robes — was sitting cross-legged on the bridge, his back to Li Du. A disciplined ascetic, Li Du thought, who would meditate here, far from a hearth, with a storm coming.
As Li Du lowered himself from a rotted tree trunk down into the clearing, he felt the air become colder. He could no longer hear the skittering sleet. Not one of the muleteers raised a hand to him in greeting. Li Du's eyes were drawn to the man on the bridge. He approached to where he could see the figure clearly.
The seated monk was still, his head drooping forward. His robes, crimson and saffron, hung in sodden folds around a thin body. As Li Du tried to make sense of what he was seeing, snowflakes began to collect on the shaved head and crimson cloth. Still the figure did not move. This was not a man meditating on the bridge. It was a corpse.
CHAPTER 2
It was the forty-seventh reigning year of the Kangxi Emperor of China, the year 1708 by Western reckoning, and the earth rat year of the twelfth cycle in Tibet. In the in-between lands where Li Du currently found himself, he was unsure which, if any, of those measurements applied.
That it was autumn, at least, was beyond question. In the scattered enclaves of human activity, villagers cut crops of buckwheat and millet in fields and spread maize and sliced apples on flat roofs to dry. Outside those enclaves, the passes were filling with snow and ice, sealing off the paths that formed the great network of the Tea Horse Road. In coming months, many of the passes would become too dangerous for any but the most foolhardy travelers, and villages would draw themselves in close to wait for winter to end. For some, this would mean telling tales and whittling wood by the hearth while enjoying rich stores of salted meat, dark tea, butter, and roasted barley flour. For the less fortunate, it would mean a grim season of hunger.
Along the branching system of roads that ran through these lands, mules and yaks carried tight-strapped saddlebags and boxes heavy with furs, herbs, salt, gold dust, copper, and, most important, tea. The caravans too were preparing for winter, choosing their paths with care. When the passes closed, the blood pumping through the veins connecting the Chinese empire to its neighbor Tibet would slow. Only the roads near market towns were paved with stones. The rest were rough, and required travelers to navigate ledges carved into cliff walls and rope bridges strung high above icy torrents.
Li Du had joined this small company of Khampa muleteers eight months ago in the market town of Dayan, after unforeseen events had altered his status from political exile to independent traveler with silver to spend and freedom to go where he wanted. The caravan was headed north on its return journey, first to Lhasa, where the tea it carried from China would sell at the highest price, then home to Kham.
In the weeks since they had left the trade outpost of Gyalthang, the larches had turned brittle yellow. The mornings were colder, the afternoons darker. Kalden, gruff and impatient, had pushed his caravan to travel greater distances each day. The muleteers, who built shrines at every campsite, had begun to burn extra juniper as they looked at the leaden skies.
* * *
The dead man sat upright, propped against the crude railing built on one side of the bridge. The fingers of his right hand were curled around the protruding hilt of a knife buried low in his abdomen. As Li Du took in the wound, he felt an involuntary jerk through his own body, an imagined echo of another's pain. Blood soaked the crimson robes below the waist and overflowed the cracks and crevices of the bridge's planks.
Above the wound, his clothes were rent and parted, exposing a pronounced collarbone and faintly outlined ribs. Across the center of his chest, these human contours were obscured by a thick layer of paint. Vivid pigments, beaded with frozen rain, were smeared into the shape of a white circle framed in gold and blue.
The dead man's chin rested just above the mark. He appeared to be staring down at the destruction wrought upon his own body. Li Du knelt, facing him. The white circle was tinged pink where blood had mixed into the paint. Li Du identified the impression left by a fingertip that had slid through the blue pigment, spreading it into a sinuous trail at the base of the circle. His gaze dropped to the hand that clutched the knife. Its fingers were crusted with paint as well as with blood.
The man's left arm was flung out, palm upward, the hand suspended over the rushing water. Dangling from the fingers was a string of wooden prayer beads. The lowest section of the loop danced and jumped as the current tried to pull it away.
"We should not cross the bridge." The speaker was Norbu, the caravan cook. He stood beside a mule whose saddlebags bristled with pot handles and tea churns. The fragrance of herbs and aging butter that usually emanated from this mule was reduced to a trace as snow accumulated on it.
Kalden kept his eyes averted from the bridge. "The manor lies on the other side of the stream," he said.
"Then we should change our plans and keep clear of the place," said Norbu. He gestured at the body. "It isn't safe to cross into a valley with a gatekeeper like that."
Kalden frowned. "We are expected at the manor."
As the oldest and most experienced member of the company, Norbu was the only one permitted to argue with Kalden. He pointed at the path that led out of the clearing, away from the bridge. "We can reach the pass before the snow is too deep and camp on the other side."
Kalden's reply was short. "It is too dangerous."
"Dangerous? And what of him?" Norbu looked again at the bridge.
Kalden moved closer to Norbu, which emphasized his height and strength relative to the older man's. "If the snow is falling here, then it will already be deep up at the pass. We will not attempt it."
Li Du, who by now had a good command of the language common to the trade routes, awaited Norbu's capitulation. But Norbu resisted. "I'd rather face weather than demons," he said. "I still say we leave this place." He stopped. It was as if, like the trees around them, he was pressed into silence by the muffling snow.
Kalden raised his voice over the rushing water. "We will cross and go to the manor."
The debate was over. Kalden instructed two of the muleteers to lead the animals ahead and find a place shallow enough to ford. The other muleteers crossed the bridge one at a time, each placing as much distance between himself and the body as he could. Li Du stood with Kalden waiting for his turn to cross. "Should we carry him with us?" he asked.
Kalden shook his head. "It is better to leave him as he is."
"What do you think happened?"
A shadow of uncertainty crossed Kalden's face, but was gone by the time he spoke. "It has nothing to do with us."
Kalden's turn came to cross. The snow was falling heavily, and Kalden had not yet reached the far bank before Li Du lost sight of him. Li Du took a careful step onto the bridge. It was slippery under the snow. Li Du took another step. Then, perceiving movement out of the corner of his eye, he turned.
The string of beads looped around the dead man's outstretched hand had crept to the tips of his fingers. Li Du watched as a final tug from the water pulled the beads away and sucked them into the rapids. The current carried them spinning and bobbing down the mountain in the direction from which Li Du and the caravan had come.
Li Du looked down at the body again, and noticed two small, square items beside it, almost covered in snow. He bent to pick one up. It was a strip of rawhide that had been folded over itself to make a square packet. Li Du unfolded it. The inside was coated in a thick, sticky residue of white paint. Quickly, he examined the other one. It had held blue paint.
He set them down and straightened up. He was about to tuck his hand back into his sleeve when he noticed a glint of color from several particles that had adhered to his fingers. He raised his hand to look at them. They were deep red, and sharp, more like sand or shards of stone than dirt. He squatted down and ran his fingers over the planks of the bridge. More granules were scattered there.
A familiar voice called to him from the other side. He wiped his hand on his coat and continued across. As he rejoined the caravan, he turned and looked once more at the bridge and the figure they had left there, framed and confined by inexorably spreading ice.
* * *
The path up through the forest was steep but short. After a few minutes, they emerged from the dense trees and continued uphill until the ground became level. Li Du had the impression of open space, but the actual size and dimensions of the valley were impossible to ascertain through the falling snow. Luckily, there was not enough snow yet to cover the path worn down by feet and hooves into an uneven trough.
A dark shape like a boulder loomed ahead of them. As they neared it, Li Du smelled smoke and identified the obstacle to be a tiny hut. He hurried forward and reached the front of the caravan just as Kalden received a shouted answer from within the hut. The wind pulled the sound apart into indecipherable syllables, but Kalden seemed to have understood. He opened the door and ducked through it. Li Du followed.
Inside, a man sat cross-legged near a hearth. He was lean, with eyes set in fanning wrinkles above sharp cheeks. Three metal basins hemmed him in. Each was filled with opaque liquid: one white as the snow, the second white as a lotus petal, the third yellow as parchment. The man looked, to Li Du, like a frog surrounded by lily pads. In one hand he held a ladle, which he set down beside him in a shallow bowl.
Kalden introduced himself. "We are seven men and twenty mules."
The man nodded. "The family is expecting you. Your friend arrived yesterday." He reached behind him and pulled two knobby canes from the cluttered corner of the hut. He levered himself up and, leaning heavily on them, skirted the basins and went to the door. He peered outside at the caravan.
"I am called Yeshe," he said, returning to his seat. "This is where I live, but there's another place like this one. The manor lord invites you to stay there." He pointed. "It's not far. If you put your mules in a line, the front nose of the leader would touch the wall."
"And the manor?"
Yeshe swung his arm in the opposite direction. "It's farther away than the hut but you won't miss it — even in the storm. It is a grand place with walls all around."
Kalden nodded his thanks.
"There is cut firewood in the hut," said Yeshe, with a hint of impatience, "and Doso Targum will want to meet you." Yeshe looked at Li Du. "You must be the Chinese scholar. There is a room ready for you at the manor."
When Kalden still did not turn to go, Yeshe raised his voice. "You don't understand my words?"
"I understand," said Kalden. "We are grateful for the welcome. Excuse my hesitation, but we bring disturbing news. There is a man on the bridge in the forest. A monk. We thought he had come to greet us. But when we approached him we — we saw that he was dead."
Yeshe's lean body tensed. He picked up his ladle, gripping it so tightly that his skin strained around the knuckles and tendons of his fingers and hand. "An older man or a young one?"
"Older than I am, younger than you."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The White Mirror by Elsa Hart. Copyright © 2016 Elsa Hart. Excerpted by permission of St. Martin's Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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