Dragon Bones (Red Princess 3)

“These are golden mushrooms,” Angela answered, her voice oddly flat. “They popped up last night.”

“Are you going to give them to the chef tonight?” Michael inquired lightly. “Maybe he could sauté them with butter and garlic.”

“These aren’t for eating.”

“Poisonous, then?”

Angela didn’t bother to respond.

“Aren’t mushrooms usually found in shady areas?” Hulan asked.

“This once was a shady area,” Angela answered, then gestured to the skeletal remains of the nearby bushes. “Something killed the trees and this shrubbery.”

“Too bad those mushrooms aren’t lingzhi,” Michael went on. “You would have struck gold.”

Angela’s face reddened. To cover the emotion, she bent her head back down to stare at the little cluster that had surfaced near the trunk of one of the dead bushes. When she didn’t look up again, Michael looked at Hulan and shrugged.

Hulan headed east along the path. Michael followed, although she hadn’t invited him. In fact, she’d wanted time alone to think about what Li Guo had said. She was sure he’d been trying to send her a message. But Michael didn’t ask permission to accompany her, and she didn’t send him away. As he’d shown yesterday, he wasn’t a bad companion. His stride was steady and surefooted. He kept quiet even when they passed the little shack that belonged to the Wu family. The door was closed, but they could hear the baby crying inside.

They crossed over the trail that led down to the cave where the All-Patriotic Society held its meetings. A short way beyond this was another path. Hulan had already explored the main route to Brian’s refuge with David and Dr. Ma the other day, so she dipped down onto this new path, hoping it might give her a different perspective. Soon enough she could see the cove where Brian’s things had been found, though she wondered how much of the beach would be left there given the rising waters. Still, she wanted a closer look and edged down farther.

Michael was right behind her when she heard the Wu infant’s cries again. They sounded as though they came from below her, which meant that there had to be some kind of acoustical anomaly caused by the cliffs around them. She went down another five vertical meters and came to the entrance to a cave. The baby’s cries seemed to emanate from deep within. Hulan ducked inside, pulling her umbrella shut.

“Do you hear that?” she asked.

Michael nodded. “The mother must have taken the baby out, then gone into some other part of the cave.” He listened, then added, “I can remember my mom and dad piling us in the back of the car when my little brother wouldn’t sleep. This woman doesn’t have a car. Maybe walking the kid helps.”

Hulan took a couple of steps farther into the cave and called hello. The sound disappeared into the blackness. The baby continued to cry.

Michael reached into his knapsack and pulled out a flashlight. “I’ve been in here before. Want to take a look?”

To know the killer you had to know the victim, and Brian had spent his lunches and his weekends exploring caves.

“I’ll follow you,” she said.

They hadn’t gone far before the temperature began to drop. The umbrella had kept Hulan’s top half relatively dry, but her legs and feet were wet, so she chilled quickly. Otherwise, this cave was much like the one that she and David had been in the other night, except that there seemed to be many more side tunnels that led in different directions. Hulan and Michael went another fifteen meters past several turns and bends until they reached a room about four by four meters.

“Here’s where you have some choices,” he said. “This shaft used to let out down by the river.” He pointed the flashlight into a narrow opening that looked more like a well than a tunnel. “But now that the river’s risen, it’s running through the lower caverns. Hear it?”

She could. That passage could very well have led to the cave where she and David had talked with Ma on that first day. Now that she heard the water, she focused more clearly on the smell, which was not so much the muskiness of damp soil but something deeper and more primitive, as though the cave were alive.

“Caves are alive,” Michael explained, “and filled with organisms similar to those found on the ocean floor.” He swung the flashlight’s beam to another area. “This shaft also goes down, but it narrows into a crawl space very quickly. We’d need some other gear to go that way—headlamps, jeans, and maybe kneepads for you.” He arced the beam to the back of the room. “Or we can continue on. There are other caverns to explore, none of which are that difficult. There’s a hollow ahead with some spectacular formations.”

By now Hulan was very cold, and she was feeling the weight of the mountain all around her. The baby’s cries still echoed through the cave, and she wondered why his mother hadn’t done something to sooth him.

“Did you come here with Brian?” she asked. Her voice reverberated off the walls, and she felt increasingly claustrophobic.

“Once. But Brian preferred to cave alone.”

“I would have thought you’d follow the buddy system, just like swimming.”

“I do when it’s really challenging, but Brian and I didn’t consider this cave to be all that rigorous.” He scrutinized her, read her discomfort, then said, “I think we should go.”

He took a step toward her, and she watched in horrified fascination as he purposely stumbled on a rock and let the flashlight fall from his hand. The flashlight clattered to the floor of the cave and went dead, thrusting them into pitch black.

Hulan stood completely still, waiting for her eyes to adjust. They didn’t. There was nothing to adjust to. Cold fear held her in place. Was Michael Quon the killer? If he was, then she had foolishly walked into his trap. She heard nothing. After all the crying, the baby finally went quiet. Hulan held her breath, listening. She could hear Michael breathing nearby.

“Don’t move,” he ordered. There was absolutely nothing threatening in his tone.