History Keepers: Nightship to China (25 page)

Although he could not see his face, Jake knew it was Xi. He wore full armour fashioned from linked bronze plates; huge gold epaulettes stood out from his shoulders. A tail of golden hair cascaded down from his pointed bronze helmet, which he removed with his chainmail gloves to inspect the harbour; his two good eyes swept one way, his third lingering another. His rouged face no longer looked impish and playful; his expression was stony. He strode along the gantry, armour rattling, and disappeared through an archway, lit up by the glow they had seen from outside. As Fang followed, one of the soldiers fell to his knees and vomited; she turned and shouted at the others, who pulled him to his feet and hurried after her. The little harbour was deserted once again.

Jake looked back at the double doors through which they had entered; he wondered if they should escape this place now, before it was too late. But he knew that turning back was not an option. If Philip was there somewhere, that was enough reason to go on.

‘All right?’ Topaz asked him.

He nodded. ‘Let’s go.’

They levered themselves out of the water and headed through the archway; here a stairwell led down, deep into the earth. Jake’s ears popped as they descended, gas lamps lighting their way. After two flights, they came to a landing. The walls were decorated with panoramas of epic scenes from Chinese history. There were armies crossing rivers, climbing mountains and cutting down forests. In each, a leader in full imperial dress led his troops.

‘It’s Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor,’ Topaz gasped. ‘Look at the dates.’ She pointed to numerals in the corner of each panel. ‘211
BC
. That was a year before he died.’

‘That’s the emperor who had the army of stone soldiers buried with him, isn’t it? The first owner of the Lazuli Serpent?’ Jake asked.

But Topaz had seen something else. ‘
Ce – ce n’est pas possible
,’ she stammered. She was pointing to the end of the landing, where another, much grander flight of steps dropped in a succession of curving tiers.

‘It goes right under the sea . . .’ Jake said in amazement. It was the grandest staircase he had ever seen; diamond-shaped windows let in a dim, bluish light. He went down a few steps to look through one, and saw, far below, on the sea bed . . . a palace.

It was night-time now, but the huge building was floodlit, and there was a soft glow coming from its many windows. Jake could see the wall of the stone staircase, which spiralled round the base of the mountain. The palace itself was both stately and forbidding; it was built in the oriental tradition, with tiers of curving roofs. Other small buildings were linked by tunnels along the sea floor. There were even marine gardens of giant seaweeds. Most striking of all, the entire building had a blue hue, as if its millions of tiles were made of lapis.

Suddenly Jake realized what it was: ‘The Lazuli Serpent . . .’ he said. ‘This is it. On a huge scale.’

Topaz let out a sigh of wonder.

Since he had first met the History Keepers, Jake had come across a number of secret staircases. On his first encounter in London, he had wound his way down below the Monument. There had been the one concealed under Prince Zeldt’s laboratory in Venice; another below the Forum in ancient Rome. But this, he thought, was the most extraordinary by far.

Halfway down, ahead of them, they saw a soldier in ancient armour; then, as they followed the curve of the staircase, another, and another . . . They stopped and drew their weapons.

‘The guards from before?’ Jake whispered.

Topaz shook her head. ‘I think they’re made of stone.’ She peered round the corner; the figures remained utterly still. Finally she primed her crossbow gun and loosed an arrow. It struck the first soldier with a clang, before clattering to the floor.

She and Jake went to investigate. There were six amazingly lifelike warriors, bearing real weapons. Their poses were realistic too, as if they were chatting to each other, while keeping their eyes on intruders.

The pair edged round them and continued down. The pressure in their ears grew painful as they descended, and they had to swallow repeatedly to clear them.

Finally, at the foot of the stairs, they came to a vaulted hallway lined with doors – all shut but for the huge central portal. This led into a large room. As Jake and Topaz peered in, they saw, not far from the doorway, four dead bodies lying on the floor – the guards from the submarine.

Jake didn’t notice at first – it was gloomy and they were piled on top of each other – but the men had had their heads removed.

THEY FROZE, STARING
at the decapitated corpses in horror. Jake looked back up the curving stairwell, and wondered again if they should leave now . . .

Topaz peered round the doorway. ‘More statues – dozens of them.’ Holding her arrow gun in one hand, she unsheathed her sword with the other and stepped inside. Jake armed himself too and followed.

‘What is this place?’ he murmured.

It was a high-ceilinged, circular chamber, full of lifelike stone figures, their glass eyes glinting. One group stood together on a raised tier, as if gossiping, eyes trained on a point in the centre. On the other side of the room, twelve serious-looking men sat at a long table, all gazing ahead.

Between the two groups, on a dais, sat a man who was more finely dressed than all the rest. He too looked down sternly at the same central point of the chamber. A series of frescoes decorated the walls.

‘It’s a court,’ Topaz said. ‘A law court.’ She pointed to the various groups of people. ‘Spectators, jury, judge. In one of Yoyo’s books it said that in Chinese mythology, when someone dies, they are tried in the
hell court
. If their sins cannot be forgiven, they are punished.’ She indicated the frescoes on either side of the judge. In one, the dead were being beheaded; in another, they were being forced to climb trees made of knives that sliced into their hands and feet.

Speechless, Jake tiptoed around the space. He looked up into the granite face of the judge, then crept past the spectators. The statues were incredibly lifelike: one old man had his ear cocked as he strained to hear; the young girl next to him had her mouth open in a slight smile; the stout woman behind her looked frightened, and the man next to her had a cruel sneer. Further along, another man had his hands over his face. There was something familiar about his golden epaulettes, Jake thought.

Then the statue lowered its arms and let out a shrieking laugh.

Xi Xiang!

Without pausing to think, Jake raised his crossbow and fired. Xi ducked and the arrow struck the wall. On his hands and knees, Xi raced between the stone figures; Topaz swung round and discharged the remainder of the arrows from her gun, but her missiles merely pinged off the statues.

Unsure what was in store for them, she and Jake turned and ran, but their exit was blocked by a pale, bare-chested giant of a man, armed with bloodstained machetes. As they careered the other way, a net came down from the ceiling; it was pulled tight, sweeping them off their feet so that they cracked their skulls on the marble floor. They were winched up off the ground, caught like wild beasts. With their arms pinned to their sides, they couldn’t raise their weapons to defend themselves.

Xi snatched one of the huge man’s machetes and thrust it through the net, catching Jake under the jaw. Fresh blood dripped from the blade. ‘Take their weapons,’ he ordered.

The man stepped forward, cut a hole in the net and reached inside. Jake shrank away from his foetid breath. All their weapons were collected up – except for one broken arrowhead that Jake had managed to conceal in his palm.

Suddenly, behind the judge’s dais, Jake caught sight of Madame Fang. She stood there waiting while Xi reapplied his lipstick. Jake glared at him, teeth clenched, nose snarling.

‘So,’ Xi said finally, ‘welcome to our great first emperor’s secret palace. If anyone was in any doubt that the Chinese were the cleverest people in history, they need only come here.’ He swept his hand around the room. ‘It’s eighteen hundred years old and built under the sea – and it still survives, as if it went up only yesterday!’ He came closer and grinned at Topaz. ‘You’re quite clever, aren’t you? Cleverer than that halfwit next to you. Did you know that Qin had built this palace?’ Topaz made no reply. ‘Half a million people were washed away during its construction; some exploded from the pressure, eyes popping out . . . such a pleasure to watch. But what do half a million slaves matter, when this splendour is the result?’

Jake struggled uselessly against the ropes.

‘I am in awe of the great Qin,’ Xi carried on. ‘I still honour his traditions.’ He nodded to the de capitated guards. ‘Mere mortals aren’t allowed in – though these four were kind enough to convey me here. No, no, what if they were to speak of its location . . .? We’re a compact group here: Nanny, myself – and our trusty eunuch, of course.’ Xi patted the giant’s arm fondly as he whispered to his captives, ‘He’s my executioner, but don’t expect much in the way of conversation – I had his tongue removed.’ He cackled again. ‘Yes, just us three. And ten thousand statues, of course.’

Xi sliced his sword through the rope that held them aloft and they crashed to the floor.

‘Bring them . . .’ Xi strode off towards another set of doors, throwing them open. Madame Fang followed him into a wide, stately corridor.

The eunuch carelessly dragged Jake and Topaz across the floor in their wake, heads and limbs bumping into walls and doorways as they went. As they proceeded, lights came on as if by magic in an endless series of shell-shaped sconces. Jake scanned every inch of space, looking for clues as to where Philip might be.

They passed hundreds more statues – an entire imperial court. Stone soldiers guarded every entrance; pages, squires and attendants went about their duties, frozen in time. They passed a room where the empress and her ladies-in-waiting were being dressed by their maids; in another a motionless dance was taking place.

At last they came to a doorway from where steps led down into the largest chamber yet. Xi waited at the foot of them. ‘Qin built this palace to control the seas, just as he controlled the land,’ he purred, running his tongue around his mouth. ‘But I’m going to do it
so
much better.’

Jake and Topaz were kicked down the stairs,
thump, thump, thump
, and Fang closed the door behind them.

‘Where is he? Where’s my little one?’ Xi rushed over to an enormous glass tank in the middle of the room and took out an octopus. He put it around his neck like a scarf, and the tentacles clamped onto his face. ‘You missed me, didn’t you? And your sister? Next time I’ll bring her back from London, I promise. Careful of Daddy’s make-up,’ he said as the octopus’s suckers brushed over his lips. He held it and kissed it on its beaky mouth, then put it back in the tank. He turned to his prisoners. ‘Let’s make things a little more comfortable,’ he said, producing a knife and ripping open the net so that Jake and Topaz spilled out onto the floor. ‘If you try and escape, fish will eat you – it’s as simple as that.’ He clapped his hands in delight and did a pirouette. ‘So what do you think of the place?’ When they made no response, Xi kicked Jake hard in the stomach. ‘Get up, History Keeper,’ he sneered.

Eyes blazing, Jake got to his feet, still clutching the arrowhead. Topaz stood up next to him, while the eunuch watched over them, a machete in each hand.

Looking around, they realized that they were in Xi Xiang’s war room. In front of them, four colossal arched windows looked out across the dark sea bed. Along one wall, from floor to ceiling, there was an ancient mirror framed by a frieze of snaking sea creatures. In front of this, a row of empty cages fixed to the floor looked like something from a medieval torture chamber.

The tank that housed the octopus was the size of a small swimming pool. Stone islands shaped like the continents – Asia, Africa, Europe, the Americas – rose clear of the water in the centre. It was a map of the world. Hundreds of minuscule galleons bobbed on the surface, scale models of ships complete with masts, sails and rigging. Some had fallen onto the floor and been flattened underfoot.

Between the pool and the four windows stood another throne, this one so encrusted with jewels it looked like a big toy. Next to it there was a control panel, fitted with various buttons and levers. Jake started when he saw the golden revolver lying casually beside it: Philip’s other gun – exactly as depicted in his drawing, with its curving dragon shape and long, slender barrel.

‘Shall we light up the sea?’ Xi said, pulling one of the levers on the control panel. More floodlights, much brighter ones, began to illuminate the ocean floor, coming on one after another, stretching for miles into the distance and bringing the underwater world to life. It was rich with vivid colours of emerald, coral and amethyst, and alive with swirling schools of fish.

‘Ingenious, isn’t it? Light and power provided by natural gas from the sea. In a moment, Nanny is going to give us a little show out there. It concerns one of these,’ he said, pointing to the model ships in the pool.

Xi continued his tour of the room. ‘And that, behind you, is Qin’s looking glass. The world has no idea that the mirror was his invention too – the vulgar Romans always laid claim to it. Look at it!’ He took Jake by the shoulders and propelled him towards it, whispering in his ear, ‘They say that when you look into it, you can see your past.’ He pushed Jake’s face into the glass. ‘What can you see, you uncouth boy? Can you see your trivial life? The tribulations of your sad story?’ The third eye blinked slowly at Jake and his voice grew quieter still, his tongue darting like a lizard’s between his teeth. ‘
Can you see your brother?
’

Jake lashed out at Xi’s neck with the arrowhead. Xi cried out as he lunged again, this time aiming for his deformed eye. Xi swung round and kicked Jake hard between the legs, while the giant grabbed him around the neck with his fat white fingers and Madame Fang took hold of Topaz. Xi kicked the boy over and over again.