Chapter 28

Ning Shu checked the time. Forty minutes and more had gone already.

She had lost only that little while at the Lu house, and the time had run away from her.

Ning Shu went up and down the streets looking for Wei Xiaotian. The place went on for ever. Where was she supposed to look?

And then, while she was casting about with no idea what to do next, a black shape came up at the end of the street.

Ning Shu knew it at once. It was the road-blocking ghost that had stopped her and Gouwa that night and tried to frighten them.

That mass of hair down to the waist, front and back alike with no telling which was which. You do not forget it, and the second time you want to hit it.

"God, you've got the nerve to turn up again." Ning Shu got the demon-subduing staff out. "What is it this time? I'll tell you now, I've no money for you and you're not having my life. Keep well away from me or I'll scatter you…"

Ning Shu had not got to the end of the threat when the thing beckoned to her.

"I know where your friend is. Come with me."

Never mind. She would trust it once.

Ning Shu went along behind the road-blocking ghost, and well before they arrived she could hear Wei Xiaotian howling and carrying on.

"What are you? What are you?"

"Get away from me. Get away!"

"I want to go home. Mum. Mum, I'm frightened!"

By the side of the road a few black shapes had Wei Xiaotian surrounded and were frightening him.

A new ghost on the road of the dead gets bullied by the old ones, and if it meets a vicious one it can be eaten away altogether.

For a new soul like Wei Xiaotian to have lasted this long was no small thing.

Ning Shu came up with the staff. "Let the boy go."

The staff flared gold, and the four faces on the head of it opened their eyes together, and the pack of them went out of their wits. Some dropped straight to their knees and begged.

Wei Xiaotian saw Ning Shu the way you see an angel and came running to her, crying. "God, you came for me. I can't find the way home. Get me out of here. What is this place?"

Ning Shu thought, don't call me that. My son and my daughter are both sweeter than you.

"I'll get you out. Stay close to me and don't get lost again."

"I'm with you. I'm staying with you." Wei Xiaotian had a fist in Ning Shu's sleeve like a man holding a rope.

Ning Shu looked back at the road-blocking ghost. "Thank you."

The road-blocking ghost said faintly, "Only don't hold that night against me, Master."

"I don't, I don't." Ning Shu waved it off. "My cousin swore at you, so we're square. What's your name?"

"When I was alive, Li Ping."

"Right, I'll remember. I'll burn you paper money when I get back, so you've the fare for the road."

"Thank you, Master Ning."

The road-blocking ghost pointed at a dim little track ahead. "Follow that and you can get back. Only be quick about it. The moon's nearly round, and the crack between the two worlds is about to close."

"Right, no hanging about." Ning Shu took Wei Xiaotian towards the track with the fog lying all over it.

Behind her the road-blocking ghost's voice came after them, drawn out and echoing.

"On the road to the Yellow Springs, don't look back. Don't look back."

Ning Shu told Wei Xiaotian, "On this road, whatever happens, you do not look behind you. Not once. Look back and you don't get out."

"I understand. I won't look back."

The two of them went on, strolling at first, and by the end Ning Shu was pulling him along at a dead run. There was not enough time, and the road ahead went on and on.

"Gouwa's sister, it feels like somebody's pulling me from behind," Wei Xiaotian said, shaking.

"I don't care what it is. Don't look."

A while later Wei Xiaotian said, "Gouwa's sister, I can hear my mum. She's calling me. She's telling me to stop. She's right behind me."

"That's false. It's lying to you. They want to keep you here."

"No, it really is my mum's voice." Wei Xiaotian slowed down. "I'll just look once. One look."

"You look back and I'm leaving you here."

Ning Shu checked the time. Five minutes left. She genuinely wanted to drop him and run for her own life. The boy was an anchor.

And then Ning Shu heard her grandmother's voice. "Ningning. Ningning, where are you going? You can't go on up there. Come home with Grandma."

"Get stuffed. You're not my grandmother." Ning Shu swore at it, hoping to drive the things off her back.

Then a low voice came, deep and warm. "Ah-Ning."

Everything in Ning Shu went still.

"Ah-Ning, it hurts." Lu Zheng said it quietly. "It hurts all over. Ah-Ning, can you help me?"

"I can't help you, Lu Zheng." Ning Shu said, "You've got a mother like that and a rich father, and they'll get the best masters in the country to treat you, and they'll find their phoenix blood and their qilin blood and you'll be fine."

"Ah-Ning, don't you care at all?"

"Oh, give over."

"Whether I live or die, you don't care?"

"Give over."

In fact there was a small part of Ning Shu that did care. Lu Zheng had been the death of her in the last life, and she still did not want to watch him die. After all, apart from her grandmother and her uncle's family, Lu Zheng was the only person who had ever been good to her.

Even if the way he did it was more than she could take.

Say what she liked, her heart still went his way.

"Ah-Ning, look back at me. One look and I'll let you go."

"I can't look back on this road. Be a good boy, little Lu Zheng, and look out for yourself. You and I aren't meant for each other this time."

"Ning Shu, have you forgotten how you begged me to let you go? I'll let you go now. You only have to turn round and look at me."

"God." Wei Xiaotian put his hands over his face. "Whatever's going on between you two, I don't want to know about it."

Ning Shu rolled her eyes, got the staff out and shouted, "I don't care what sort of ghost you are, going through my private business is out of order. One more word and I'll scatter you with this. Try me."

It went quiet at last. Nothing else came mimicking her grandmother or Lu Zheng.

They were a little ghost's tricks, all of it, to draw you in and keep you from leaving.

But the long road ahead of them never came to an end.

"What's going on? We should have been there long ago."

And then Wei Xiaotian said, shaking, "Er. I couldn't help it just now. I did look back, and there was nothing there, so it should be all right, shouldn't it?"

"What? You looked back?" Ning Shu was appalled.

"Only. Only a little bit."

Ning Shu stopped walking and looked at Wei Xiaotian the way you look at iron that will not become steel. She would have liked to leave him there. The boy ruined everything.

"On the road to the Yellow Springs, don't look back, and when Granny Meng holds out the tea, don't take the cup. That one look and now neither of us gets out."

"I." Wei Xiaotian hummed and hawed. "I heard my mum calling me."

"Your mother is at home waiting for you, and after that look you can forget about walking out of here."

Ning Shu could have died of him. What now? She could have every power under heaven and it would not matter. If she could not find the road back, once the join went she would be in the world of the dead for good.

Ning Shu stopped hesitating, took hold of Wei Xiaotian and ran flat out along the road. There was not enough time left. Whatever else, run.

"I can see it! That's the house!" Wei Xiaotian pointed ahead and shouted.

Sure enough, the building stood in the deepest part of the fog, faint and not quite clear.

"Go!" Ning Shu ran at it with him, and however long they ran the house stayed as far away as ever, like something seen over water that you can look at and never reach.

Ning Shu knew why. It was that one look of Wei Xiaotian's. Getting out now would be very hard.

"That's it. We can't get out."

Wei Xiaotian began to cry, with no shame about it at all. "Mum. Dad. I know I was wrong. If I get out of here I'll never make you angry again."

He cried until Ning Shu's head ached. She frowned and worked at what to do, and then it came to her. The seal. She still had the Heavenly Master's seal on her.

Had he not said that in the worst need, the seal would call four hundred disciples of his gate?

This probably counted as the worst need. She was about to die.

And there was no knowing whether those brothers and sisters of hers could read simplified characters. Never mind. Nothing to lose.

She pressed the Heavenly Master's seal down hard on a sheet of paper.

The moment it went down, a ring of gold light came off the yellow paper. The sheet vanished, and everything went quiet, as though nothing had happened at all.

Wei Xiaotian asked shakily, "What are you doing?"

Ning Shu kept her eyes on the track deep in the fog and said, impatient, "Be quiet."

And just then a black outline came up in the thick of the fog not far off, with two red lanterns.

Here already?

There was no telling which of the immortals this was. Was she to call him elder brother or elder sister?

"So my little sister in the school is here at last. Well, well. And such a small girl!"

The voice arrived before the man did.

And it turned out to be a deep male one.

So Ning Shu called out politely, "Good evening, Elder Brother."

The man came out of the fog, and Ning Shu looked him over. He wore a dark blue robe and a black gauze cap, and his beard was long and thick and came down to his chest, and his face was dark. He had an open book in one hand and a brush in the other.

Once he was out he introduced himself. "I am the Chief Judge of the underworld. Lord Cui."