A Magic Steeped in Poison (The Book of Tea #1) (65)
She gestures at the birds. “Only by working closely with your partner will you be able to succeed. One of you will transform a lethal poison so that the Piya will willingly ingest it against its nature. The other will counter the poison and save the bird’s life. If the Piya refuses to ingest the poison, you will fail. If the bird dies, you will fail. Only if your team fulfills both tasks will you be able to move forward.”
“What sort of poison will need to be transformed?” Wenyi asks, a question befitting one who has dedicated his life to the academy.
Elder Guo’s eyes gleam, and she utters with doting affection, almost as one would say the name of a dear child, “Jīncán.”
Gasps of revulsion, my own included, join the sounds of the birds.
“She’s mad,” Lian comments under her breath, and I agree.
The jīncán is a gold silkworm, an abomination of nature. Mother said it was folklore, an ancient ritual practiced by those who used to tamper with darker magics. It is a chaotic magic that will eventually devour anyone who delves too deeply into it.
The silkworm about to form its cocoon is harvested and sealed into a jar with poisonous creatures gathered under the darkest night of the new moon. The jar is buried, then opened one week later. The creatures will have slaughtered one another, and the pupa will turn gold, having subsisted on the blood of the ones that devoured each other beside it. The pupa never emerges from the cocoon, residing there in a suspended state. It is not alive, but neither is it truly dead.
Some say the spirit of the silkworm leaves the body entirely, and the spirit can only be satisfied with blood. One drop of the creator’s blood binds the jīncán spirit to do its bidding, but you run the risk of being devoured if you do not keep it fed.
Once I might have laughed at the absurdity of such a horror. But then last night I pulled a snake wearing three human faces out of a woman’s body. There are darker and stranger forces out in the vast, wide world than I could ever comprehend with my limited imagination.
“Tomorrow you will have access to the storeroom of the royal physicians. We will reconvene in the evening, after the summer rites have been performed.” I had forgotten that tomorrow is the Call to Summer, a festival signifying the change between seasons. “Tonight you will choose one of these birds and tend to it in your residences.
“These birds are national treasures,” Elder Guo says as we survey the Piya, considering the daunting challenge presented before us. “If they come to harm, it is not only your position in the competition you should worry about, but what sort of punishment you will receive.”
Shao and Guoming elbow each other with confident smirks, not worried about the threat. They are the ones who rush to the pedestals first, swiftly ushering away their chosen bird. I look at Lian and she gives me a shrug. I know nothing about the care of animals, but the choice is made for us soon enough. I lift the one remaining bird from its pedestal, and it gives me an indignant squawk at being jostled.
“What about the jīncán?” Shao asks when we all return to our places, birds in hand.
I trust none of the other competitors apart from Lian, even though Wenyi and Chengzhi are amicable enough. But of the remaining shénnóng-tú, I trust Shao the least, after having seen him in the residence of the marquis.
“You will be permitted the use of a single dried pupa tomorrow evening,” Elder Guo says, “upon which you will perform the transformation for us to review.”
We bow as we leave the chamber. I can’t help but glance back once more at the question on the calligraphy scroll hanging above our heads.
Good, or evil?
* * *
“How much do you know about these birds?” I ask Lian once we return to our rooms. I set the bird on one of the side tables. It swivels its head in an uncanny way, watching our every move.
“Not much,” she admits, peering at it through the bars of the cage. “They are … unnatural creations. I cannot imagine how many birds have to die in order to create them.”
“The same for the jīncán.” I shudder. “So many had to die, and for what?”
Lian nods solemnly. “It is contrary to the art of Shénnóng, to what my people call the t’chi, for its sole purpose is the taking of a life. It is a weapon, nothing more, as much as Elder Guo likes to pretend it has a higher purpose. I’m surprised the ministry has approved its use.”
“Perhaps it is a way for the princess to see who exhibits comfort with the use of poisons, and in turn, will lead her to the one responsible for the poisoned tea bricks,” I speculate.
Desperate people resort to desperate things. It is a daunting task before the princess, to wade through the murky pool of the court, determining who is loyal and who is an enemy.
“She remembered me,” Lian says, idly picking up a nut from the table and setting it on the edge of the cage. The Piya twitters and flies down to peck at it. When the bird deems it edible, the nut is tossed up in the air and eaten swiftly.
“Who?”
The bird ruffles its feathers and pecks at the floor, chirping. Lian pushes more nuts through, and the greedy creature swallows them one by one.
“Zhen,” she says, sounding like she is lost to memory. “Older Sister, I used to call her. When we were children, we were permitted to play together. But then the fear of rebellion came, and she was kept apart for her own safety. My father saw this and cautioned me that someday someone may want to hurt my family and hurt him, through me. He said that was why I had to be watchful and useful, because that day could come sooner than expected.”