Insignia (3 page)

“Please don't,” the woman continues,
pleadingly. Her eyes hold a terrible sadness. I think she looks
pathetic. “They have no home.”

Claris and I run out of the house, our legs
propelled by pure fear and loathing.

We do not speak of the house and the woman
again.

The spider-jinn woman finds her way into my
dreams, ending with the elderly
tian lung
mocking me with
his sagely eyes. I hate my sub-conscious. I find myself feeling
sorry for the spider-jinn lady.
Feng
shouldn't be feeling
sorry for spider-jinn. In Ping Jie's time and probably before her,
they burnt spider-jinn webs and kicked demons back into the
Eighteen Levels of Hell. Or destroyed them before they could be
re-incarnated. Remember Lady White Snake and her maid, Green Snake?
We hate the snakes as much as the next animal clan. But they also
exist on the same earth as us. Who would fault them, besides
self-righteous Buddhist monks and Taoist priests?

I wake up from these dreams, feeling
uncomfortable and strangely rebellious. If I voice my doubts to
Ping Jie, she would probably give me a long lecture. Definitely not
to Mom, because I would end up getting a lecture and a
grounding.

The snotty prefect isn't at her usual post.
I slip into school, heading straight to Claris who waits for me at
the canteen. She looks as miserable as I do, with panda eyes.

“Didn't sleep well?” Claris and I blurt out
together and burst out laughing. We hush up before one of the
teachers gives us the evil eye for being ‘rowdy’ early in the
morning. I sit down beside Claris on the hard wooden canteen seats,
idly looking at the graffiti and impromptu etchings. Someone has
carved out ‘school sux’ on one of the legs.

The sky is washed with orange and red,
before being shot through with the sun's rays. More students are
assembling on the parade ground.

“I dreamt of the spider-jinn.” Claris turns
to me, her voice secretive.

“So did I,” I whisper back. “I actually
felt... sorry for her.”

Claris stares at me. “We are supposed to
kill demons. Or that's what our grandparents have been telling
us.”

“She looks so sad...” I shake my head.

“Didn't you tell me that your sister and her
friends destroyed like a huge spider-jinn nest?”

“Yes, I did. No, that was her friend who did
the destroying. She didn't really take part, until a year
later.”

“Superheroes?”

“More like vigilantes.”

“Like teenage vampire slayers?”

“Kind of.”

“That's neat. But I think I am not like your
sister's friend. I don't like burning stuff.”

The school bell rings and we dash off to the
parade ground.

I walk past the abandoned colonial house
after my archery practice, drawn by an odd curiosity (Oh come on,
Chun, you, curious? My mind taunts me). No spider-jinn lady. Just
the creaking of crickets and hidden insects. I flare a bit of
phoenix fire and the noise fades a little. Before I know it, I am
walking through the shrubs and picking my way around the morning
glory vines. The flowers are still open this late in the afternoon
and are a rich blue. I haven't noticed this before.

A little black and white spider scuttles
across my Nike shoes and I almost squish it to death in sheer
fright. Remembering where I am, I back away, only to wander into
another spider-web.

“I hate it,” I mutter, realizing how
irritated I am feeling. The bits of spider web crumble. Burnt.
“Ugh.” My phoenix fire is up.

“You can't change the way you are born.”

A woman's voice.

I lift up my head, only to see the
spider-jinn standing in front of me. She is wearing a plain beige
tee and faded blue jeans. She looks ordinary, except for the tiny
spiders clinging onto her hair and crawling all over her arms.

“Don't come close!” I shout, trying to sound
brave. My knees have become wobbly. I raise my right hand up, my
fingers framed with bright orange fire.

The spider-jinn grimaces and waves her hands
frantically. “Don't! Don't! Stop! Not my children!”

Her tone and her voice–so hoarse, as if from
too much screaming–stop whatever I am about to do. The tiny spiders
scramble and the spider-jinn whispers comforting words to them. I
shiver.

“I am only a spider-jinn who needs a safe
home for my children.” The woman–no, spider-jinn–seems to calm
down, stroking a palm-sized, black-furred spider. “I am homeless.
So are my children. Please give me a chance.”

“But you suck energy out of men and your
children feed on their flesh!” I shake my head. “Your kind broke
the accord. You are a demon.”

Her lovely face crumbles in defeat. “You are
one of those who will not listen.”

“Of course, I will not. You feed on men. Why
should I help you?” There is the smell of burning. A spark dances
above my fingertips.

“Why?” The spider-jinn's voice tugs at my
heart. “I was cast out by my sisters. Homeless. My children are now
homeless.” I feel almost sorry for her.

It is then I see what her children have been
feeding on.

The carcasses of two stray dogs have clean
bones. Flies still buzz around, looking for more food.

I fight down the nausea.

“I chose not to feed on humans. My sisters
hated my choice and chased me out of the house.”

“Look, I am sorry. But you are spider-jinn.
A demon. We don't like demons,” I argue.

Her agitation triggers her transformation.
Her skin sprouts prickly black fur, her limbs lengthening. Her
forehead sprouts another dark, pupil-less eye. All black. All
soulless. She looks like the kind of spider haunting old musty
places. Huntsman spider? I must have watched nature documentaries
way too much.

Don't look for trouble...

The old
tian lung
.

Someone shouts. A flash of fire. A sharp
pain lances up my thigh when I trip over an exposed root. The last
thing I see is the blue morning glories catching fire.

“Chun?”

Claris leans over me, lightly patting my
face. This close to her, I can see her tear-filled eyes. “You
okay?”

I find myself on a stretcher with
serious-looking paramedics standing around. My uniform is
surprisingly intact. I struggle to sit up.

“The forest fragment burnt down,” Claris
says and I can hardly believe my ears. “They said it was
arson.”

I try flexing my left foot, now bound in
bandages. I remember falling.

“I found you lying on the pavement.” Claris
gives me some water. Chilled, it is fantastic. “The fire was
already burning.”

“You mean, I wasn't inside?” I blurt and
Claris glances at me suspiciously.

“You were inside the forest? Were you
---?”

“Shh!” I shake my head. My vision blurs.
“Did you save me?”

“No. I just saw you on the pavement.”

“No, no, no, she's in there!”

Claris shakes me. “’You okay or not? You’re
concerned for the spider-jinn?”

“I think she saved me. I think she saved
me.”

“Quiet, Chun...not so loud!” Claris hisses
urgently, darting anxious eyes at the paramedics.

Try as I might, I cannot see the spider-jinn
anymore. The rest of the forest is burnt, the trees reduced to
smoking stumps, the shrubs to dark twigs. Thick black smoke still
hangs above the forest. The house...the house is gone too. Two fire
engines wait while the firemen try to bring the minor fires under
control.

Of course, I got a good verbal walloping
from Mom, Pa and Ping Jie. I went back home, uniform slightly
singed–and bam! The lecture started. At first, Mom was angry that I
might have shown off my
Feng
powers. When I explained what
happened, with the spider-jinn, she became angrier, all banked
thunder and all, and went on about ‘preserving our heritage’ and
‘killing jinn is our duty’. After her verbal shelling, Pa added in
his piece. Ping Jie didn't really yell at me. She simply took me
aside and spoke quietly about ‘controlling the fire’.

I lock myself in my room after a quick
shower and dumping my uniform in the washing machine. I still have
Social Studies and Additional Math. I hate homework and I hate
being scolded for nothing. I doodle ‘No! No! No!’ and sad faces all
over my foolscap paper. Is kindness towards the spider-jinn that
bad? Am I a bad
Feng
? Have I failed my parents? Ping
Jie?

I am just a teenager, according to Mom and
adults in general.

And she did save me from the fire, at the
expense of her children. A whole generation lost, because
of...me.

My skin crawls as if tiny feet are running
across it. I feel bad. Awful. Like hell.

In my mind, I know the elderly
tian
lung
is laughing at me.

The End

I dreamed of a most strange beast;
part-dragon, part-horse, part-lion. It flew down from the evening
sky, trailing a blaze of fire behind it and landed with surprising
grace before me.

In my vision-state I was still dressed in my
favorite pink
pajamas;
my feet bare and
chilled by the damp lawn where I stood behind my house. I was not
physically present, but I felt the wind, blinked at the bright
moon, and smelled the subtle musky scent of the visiting
creature.

“Ting Sun,” the beast spoke my name.

I trembled, in awe, not fear. I had the gift
to communicate with earthly animals, and they sometimes spoke to me
in visions, but it was my first experience with one of the three
heavenly creatures: dragon, phoenix, and
qilin.

“I am,” I answered with a parched throat. I
straightened my back and neck, preparing to receive an important
message or task.

“Ting Sun, I request your assistance on a
simple, yet important matter.” The
qilin
rose on all four
hooved-feet and turned sideways. “Please sit on my back and we will
leave now.”

Me? Ride a
qilin
? I had never heard
of such a quest, but it filled me with excitement.

We traveled through the starry sky, soaring
over the land and waters of Yunnan province, heading north. I
gripped the
qilin’s
mane with one hand, the other I trailed
through its flaming fire. It didn’t burn at all and I thrilled at
the multitude of colors trapped in each thread of flame. I examined
the
qilin’s
body with great interest. The size of a large
lion, it was, however, covered in the scales of a dragon.
Beautiful, pearl-like scales in the lightest shade of blue. Its
thin mane was a darker blue and finished at the top of its
shoulders like a horse’s does. Two horns of smooth black ivory
curled outwards and up, resembling those of an ox.

Below me, mountains and deserts passed by.
Where were we going exactly? We were still in China as far as I
could tell, but I had never before left Yunnan so was unfamiliar
with the landscape we crossed.

Time could not be counted in a vision; at
one moment, I felt I had been flying with the
qilin
for
days, the next it seemed only minutes had passed. Finally we landed
on an old, but elegant, city wall. Numerous Chinese cities still
had their walls, or remnants of them standing, so I was still
unsure of our destination.

I slid off the
qilin’s
back and
looked around. There was a pretty view of a modern city from up
here. We weren’t the only visitors either, but I quickly realised
we were invisible to the real people strolling the length of the
wall.

“This is Xian, the ancient capital. Have you
been here before?” The
qilin
asked.

“No, never. It’s incredible.”

“The Great Phoenix guards this city, but
that is not why I brought you here.” The
qilin
began walking
towards the corner tower and I followed.

“Why did you bring me here?” I asked.

“See that man there?” The
qilin
turned its head and gestured to a lone man taking photographs of
the city. He had a very striking, yet composed profile. Dressed
casually in black jeans and a grey t-shirt, it was hard to know his
age, but I guessed he was a college student. I had a tiny shiver of
recognition, like I should know him, but didn’t.

“You are both still young now, but you are
destined to meet each other in only a few more years.”

“Really?” I didn’t know what to make of the
story. I had just turned seventeen, I couldn’t guess why the
qilin
wanted me to see this stranger now.

“While you have the gift to communicate with
animals, he was chosen to see those who have crossed to the other
side,” the
qilin
explained.

“You mean, ghosts? He talks with
ghosts?”

“He has the gift to, but ignores contact.
Like you, he can only connect with others in the dream world, but
he has been taking strong herbs to render him dreamless.”

“Oh, that’s strange. Doesn’t he have a
mentor? Someone to teach him how to use his gift and accept it?” I
asked.

“No. His gift passed from his mother, but
she abandoned him at a young age and he has grown up with a new
family. Therefore, he fears his gift, and does not understand it.
He only believes it brings nightmares,” the
qilin
said.

“And you want me to help somehow? What can I
do?”

“Your futures are bound, and both your gifts
must be balanced. I will help you show yourself to him now. You
will ask him to open to his dreams, so that he may meet with you
there. You will only have a few seconds tonight to show yourself,
but when he dreams of you, you will form a lasting connection and
you will become his mentor until the time you meet in real life. I
cannot tell you more than that, but ask for your trust.” The
qilin
bowed his head slightly.