Jade City (The Green Bone Saga, #1)

by Fonda Lee

A truly skilled Green Bone, of the kind Anden and all his classmates desired to be, could call upon any of the six disciplines—Strength, Steel, Perception, Lightness, Deflection, and Channeling—at any time.

“I need to stop by the bank,” she said. Maik said, “I’m supposed to take you straight home.” “It’s important. Hilo will understand.” Maik nodded and pulled the car away from the curb. She gave him directions to the bank, and when they arrived, he parked and got out of the car with her. He was loaded with weaponry—moon blade, talon knife, two handguns. “You can’t come into the bank like that,” she said. “I’ll wait outside the door.” The bank had just opened. Shae went in and requested access to her safe deposit box. The manager said, “Of course, Miss Kaul, come with me,” and showed Shae into the back room with its wall of small steel doors, then left her alone. Shae had not unlocked her safe in two and a half years. When she turned the key and opened the box, irrational fear gripped her for an instant. What if it was not there? But it was—her jade. All of it. Even before she reached inside, she felt the tug of its power setting off a tide in her blood like the moon’s gravity pulling on the ocean. She counted every stone as she put on the earrings, the bracelets up both her forearms, anklets, choker. Then she closed the safe deposit box door and sat down on the ground, her back to the wall, and hugged her knees to her chest. It had been so long since she’d worn jade that she felt the rush coming like the wave of a tsunami looming before it engulfs the beach. She did not tense or cringe from it. She raced alongside and let it sweep her up in its inexorable path. She rode it h...

When they arrived at the house, she walked past the sentries and found Hilo standing in the kitchen, his hands leaning heavily on the table so his shoulder blades jutted up and his head seemed to hang between them. Like Maik, he dripped with weaponry. He appeared in control of himself, almost thoughtful, but his jade aura heaved and roiled with the fiery consistency of explosive lava. Fists flanked him left and right, so the family kitchen was crowded with ferocious, waiting men, the collective aura clamor of their jade-adorned bodies assaulting Shae’s reawakened sense of Perception so much so that she paused to brace herself before entering. Elsewhere in the house, she heard Kyanla quietly sobbing. Hilo raised his head to look at her but didn’t move. “I’m going with you,” she said. “I know where we should go.” Hilo straightened and came around the table toward her. She tried to see into his eyes, but they were as black and distant as she felt. The Horn placed his hands on her shoulders, and pulled her close, and laid his cheek against hers. “Heaven help me, Shae,” he whispered into her ear. “I’m going to kill them all.”

Gont Asch took the phone call in silence, but every one of his men with any skill in Perception shifted away from him. Gont felt cold with astonishment. Then his neck flushed red with rage. Twenty-one members of the Mountain clan were dead in the surprise attack, Fingers and junior Fists who’d hastened to defend the trio of betting houses on Poor Man’s Road but were no match for the killers Kaul Hilo had assembled from No Peak. A couple of foolish Lantern Men who had fired on the attackers were in the hospital. Every square inch of the Armpit was under No Peak control. It was an outbreak of clan-on-clan violence such as Janloon had never seen. Gont hung up. For several seconds he was motionless. Then he tore the phone and its casing off the wall and hurled it across the room with such force that it embedded into the far wall on the other side of the Silver Spur. His men froze, shocked by the uncharacteristic outburst. “Kaul Lan is dead,” Gont said. “His family has come down from the forest. We are now at open war with No Peak. Their lives and livelihoods are for the taking, and jade goes to the victor.”

Of course, his family still considered him an unspeakable embarrassment, but being filthy rich was the best sort of revenge.

“There were two machine guns on the pier, and a dead man, a teenager. Ayt and Gont sent at least two men after Lan that night. One of them got away, and if I’m still alive when Tar finds him, I’ll force a jade stone down his throat and bury him alive to die slowly of the Itches. Don’t doubt, not for a single second, that the Mountain killed our brother.” “By sending a couple of jadeless thugs?” she cried.

The civil ceremony took only a few minutes, not the hour or more of chanting that would’ve been involved under Deitist tradition, but the legal marriage vows still harkened to the Divine Virtues. I will practice humility: putting my beloved before myself, expecting no praise or reward, for now we are joined in all things. I will practice compassion: giving gratitude for my beloved, suffering when they suffer, for now we are joined in all things. I will practice courage: protecting my beloved from harm, facing all fears from within or without, for now we are joined in all things. I will practice goodness: offering freely of myself to my beloved, honoring and caring for each other in body and soul, for now we are joined in all things. I make this pledge to you and you alone, under the eyes of the gods in Heaven, from this moment until the last one of my life.

When he got to the Kaul house, Anden went straight into the courtyard where the Pillar was sitting at the shaded table with the entire family. They were finishing up a New Year’s Eve dinner, and the delicious smells made Anden’s mouth water: roast suckling pig, seafood soup, spicy shrimp in sauce, pea shoots with garlic, fried greens. Anden only got food that good once or twice a year, but it was a modest holiday meal for a family like the Kauls, who in the past had hosted expansive public New Year’s feasts. Anden stopped to take in the scene.

“The clan is my blood, and the Pillar is its master. I have been chosen and trained to carry the gift of the gods for the good and protection of the people, and against all enemies of the clan, no matter their strength or numbers. I join myself to the fellowship of jade warriors, freely and with my whole being, and I will call them my brothers-in-arms. Should I ever be disloyal to my brother, may I die by the blade. Should I ever fail to come to the aid of my brother, may I die by the blade. Should I ever seek personal gain at the expense of my brother, may I die by the blade. Under the eyes of all the gods in Heaven, I pledge this. On my honor, my life, and my jade.”