Daylight on Iron Mountain Read Online Free PDF Page A

to meet its creator.
    As his craft banked to the left, Jiang saw before him the massive hexagonal gap in that otherwise unblemished surface. Down there, in the deep gloom, at the bottom of a massive well five
li
across and two
li
deep, was what remained of China’s past.
    The Forbidden City.
    For 800 years this had been the heart of China, of Chung Kuo, the Middle Kingdom. Tsao Ch’un had made it his capital, once he had wrested power from the Politburo, taking on the mantle of the emperors and naming himself Son of Heaven in the ancient style.
    It was here, beneath the Dragon Throne, that Jiang Lei was to meet the great man at noon tomorrow.
    The craft descended slowly to the landing pad. From the way the banners tore at their moorings, Jiang Lei could see that a strong wind was blowing.
    Welcome back to Pei Ching, where the sky is full of yellow dust.
    They set down with a hiss and a shudder, the engines dying with a descending whine.
    On the flight, Jiang had been reading a collection of poetry from the Sung dynasty. It was not a period he knew well and the poems of Su Tung-p’o had, before now, passed him by. But after reading them he was intrigued, both by the poems and the man. Like Jiang Lei, Su Tung-p’o, under his birth name of Su Shih, had been a government official, a conservative by nature, upholding the Confucian ideals. Unlike Jiang, however, it seemed that Su Shih had spent time imprisoned and in exile for his beliefs – mainly for criticizing government policy in his poems.
    Jiang set the book down and looked across the narrow cabin. Steward Ho was sitting just across from him, staring out the window. Ho had begged to be brought along. He had been willing to pledge eternal loyalty if Jiang would but let him have a single glimpse of the ancient imperial city, and there it was, stretched out all about them, its steep tiled roofs and massive white marble stairways celebrating the grandeur and power of this most ancient of cultures.
    ‘Master…?’
    ‘Yes, Ho?’
    ‘Am I to accompany you to the rehearsals later on?’
    ‘It is certainly my intention.’
    Ho smiled.
    Much had changed since Jiang had last been here, among them this curious reversion to ancient imperial rituals. Which was why, before he was allowed to see Tsao Ch’un, he was to be tutored in court etiquette; taught how to behave and what to say in the great man’s presence.
    That troubled Jiang. Tsao Ch’un had not been like this in the old days.
    But word was that Tsao Ch’un had changed. Grown more brittle with the years. Responsibility could do that to a man, even one as great – and as unpredictable in his moods – as Tsao Ch’un.
    While Ho saw to his bags, Jiang Lei stepped out onto the landing pad.
    A small group of officials – clearly some kind of welcoming committee – waited by the entrance to the airlock, shivering in their thin silks.
    Jiang narrowed his eyes. This too was different. They could have stepped straight out of a historical drama, because no one had worn silks of this fashion for centuries. Not since the last emperor, P’u-i, had stood down.
    Raising his chin proudly, Jiang walked towards them, seeing how they fanned out and allowed him room to pass between them, their heads lowered respectfully.
    As indeed they should
, Jiang thought.
After all, am I not a general in Tsao Ch’un’s Eighteenth Banner Army?
    Only Jiang could not fool himself. He found this business loathsome. All this bowing and scraping. Oh, he would abase himself before Tsao Ch’un, but that was different. Whatever one thought of him, Tsao Ch’un was a great man. Was, without doubt,
his Master
.
    Inside, still damp from the fine, disinfecting mist, Jiang took his leave of the nameless men. He knew none of them, had been introduced to none of them. Whoever they were, they were simply there to greet each new visitor.
    Steward Ho appeared, minutes later, dripping wet and accompanied by a small, fussy man in a bright scarlet silk, the