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Twenty-Seven

The trouble with Hell, Zhu Irzh reflected bitterly, was not so much the palpable miasma of evil (with which he was, after all, ingrained) but the bureaucracy. This was now the fifth hour he had spent at the Ministry of Epidemics, in the crowded queue for the Second Level Third Administrative Assistant's Appointment Maker. At least after the third hour he'd managed to procure a seat, but the room was packed to bursting point and smelt of sickness and sweat. If he'd known that this was the best Dr So could do in the matter of contacts, he wouldn't have bothered, though he had to admit that the doctor had at least provided him with the necessary documentation to get through the Ministry's impressive iron portals.

"Stop doing that!" the woman sitting beside him snapped. "It's getting on my nerves!"

Zhu Irzh gazed blankly at her. He hadn't been aware of doing anything at all.

"That."

Her small, pursed mouth opened and a tongue flicked contemptuously in the direction of his tail, which was tapping impatiently against the iron surface of the floor.

"Sorry," said Zhu Irzh as insincerely as he could manage. With studied insolence, he curled his tail around his knees and glanced at the clock. It was getting late, and he'd promised to take one of his girlfriends to the opera. It had to be the razor-tongued Ren Ji, he thought with a sigh; it couldn't have been one of the others, the ones less likely to complain. . . The door of the appointment-maker's office opened and a frail figure shuffled forth. After a fifteen-minute wait, the lamp above the door glowed briefly, and the next in line went through. Zhu Irzh realized he was tapping his tail again. This was absurd. Time to take matters into his own hands, he thought.

"Excuse me," he said to the woman sitting beside him. "But do you happen to know where the lavatories might be?"

"Down the hall, on the left," the woman said ungraciously.

"Thanks. Would you mind keeping my place for me? I'll only be a moment."

"Certainly not. You'll have to join the back of the queue if you leave."

Grumbling convincingly, Zhu Irzh rose to his feet and pushed his way through the crowds to the door. Outside, he discovered that the queue extended down the hall, and was obliged to shove his way past a throng of muttering demonkind. This particular department of the Ministry was devoted to Hell's own citizens, not to the souls of those humans who had died from disease, and the queue represented just about every affliction that the Ministry was wont to test-drive on the locals. Zhu Irzh saw the ravages of tsetse fever; bone rot; open-lung, and the disgruntlement of people who could not rely on the mercies of death to relieve them from their suffering. Silently, he gave thanks to his Imperial Majesty that his own family position protected him from this kind of thing, not to mention the health insurance that consumed a large portion of his monthly salary, but you never knew when misfortune might strike. Suddenly aware of the tenuousness of his position, Zhu Irzh slipped through the door of the lavatories.

Inside, there were the usual stinking holes, and the floor was awash. Hissing with disapproval, Zhu Irzh twitched the hem of his coat out of reach and looked around him. One of the cubicles was occupied; he could hear the sound of prolonged retching. Another moment in here, Zhu Irzh decided, and he'd be coming down with one of those diseases so amply represented in the hallway. He stepped swiftly into a cubicle and closed the door behind him, then looked up.

Set into the low ceiling was, as he had anticipated, a ventilation grill. It was unlikely to serve much of a purpose insofar as actual ventilation was concerned, since it was clogged with dust and grease, but Zhu Irzh was not worried about that. It was narrow, but he thought he could probably get through it; it wasn't as though he was fat, after all. Reaching up, he hooked his talons in the wire of the grill and gave a sharp tug. Gripping the sides of the opening to the ventilation shaft, Zhu Irzh hoisted himself lithely upwards and pulled the grill shut behind him.

Inside, the shaft was wider than he had expected, and extended in both directions. Unfortunately, Zhu Irzh had very little idea of the layout of the Ministry, but he did know that, like all Hell's institutions, the highest levels were the most important. He therefore must find somewhere that led up. The shaft was too low for him to stand upright, but he could move faster in a crouch than on his hands and knees, and he was able to make reasonably rapid progress. He had been scuttling along for perhaps some fifteen minutes when he came upon yet another grill, set into the ceiling of the shaft. Not without difficulty, Zhu Irzh dismantled it, thereby dislodging a large rat that bolted into the shadows, its scaly body scraping against the metal floor. It left a faint trail of phosphorescence in its wake, and this proved helpful. Looking up, Zhu Irzh could see the tracks it had made in the upwards shaft, and although he was considerably larger than the rat, it was evident that there were rudimentary handholds in the walls of the shaft, provided by the grills which themselves led into other passages. Gritting his teeth, Zhu Irzh began to climb.

It was not easy going, and Zhu Irzh was relieved when the upwards shaft finally came to an end. Clinging to the sides of the shaft, he hooked the nearest grill with his tail and pulled, then levered himself into the passage. By now, dust had made its way down inside his collar and between the scales on his back, making his spine itch uncontrollably. There was a rip in the skirts of his coat, and his hair was full of cobwebs. Closing his eyes, Zhu Irzh directed a careful, precise, and hopefully untraceable curse in the direction of the First Lord of Banking. Then he froze. He could hear voices.

Very slowly, and as quietly as he could, Zhu Irzh inched forwards. The voices were muffled, but he could tell that one of them was female, and hissing in anger. Zhu Irzh hunched forwards until he was immediately above the source of the voices; here, too, a ventilation grill was set into the floor. Zhu Irzh peered through. He could not see the woman. He was looking down onto the top of a demon's head, and he could see that its owner's hair was combed carefully in long, black strands across a series of bald patches. The scalp revealed beneath was scabrous and flaking. Zhu Irzh once again thanked the fate that had seen him born into a family of scions of the Ministry of Vice. Plenty of interesting opportunities, and no hideously disfiguring diseases. . . He was unable to see the demon's face which, he reflected with a grin, was probably just as well. He squirmed round, trying to get a glimpse of the woman.

"You ought to be grateful," the demon was saying with some hauteur. "After all, have I not been magnanimous enough to forgive you, bring you back to the bosom of your home and family, protect you from the justifiable wrath of the wu'ei, who would otherwise cast you down into the Lower Realms for your disgraceful conduct. Well, haven't I?"

An inaudible murmur: possibly assent, possibly not.

"Come here," the demon commanded. "And stop muttering."

There was a shuffling sound as the woman made her way forwards, which was, Zhu Irzh realized, a result of the fact that her ankles were shackled. Her head was bowed: he could see the top of her glossy dark hair (no bald patches there, Zhu Irzh noted with approval). He could even smell her perfume: something subtle and spiced, a breath of sweetness in the rank air of the Ministry, and he inhaled it with gratitude. Then she looked up at the demon, and though her face was twisted with contempt, Zhu Irzh saw that she was beautiful. Pale soft skin, cheekbones like razorblades, eyes like wells of blood. She was wearing an extraordinary garment, which looked as though it had once been a dressing gown but which was now in tatters, revealing the curves of her body. The demon reached out a mottled hand and drew it along the underside of her breast, pinching the nipple with sudden force. Zhu Irzh, ambushed fleetingly by sexual fantasy, swallowed, and shifted position slightly against the floor of the shaft. He felt uncomfortably like a voyeur. Not that there was anything wrong with that, he reminded himself. The woman spat out a single glowing spark and the demon jerked his hand backwards. The tang of singed flesh rose upwards and Zhu Irzh's elegant eyebrows rose. She must be very angry indeed to do that, but given the circumstances, he couldn't blame her. He wondered who she might be: she was clearly someone of breeding, which made the references to the Lower Realms somewhat puzzling. What could she have done to merit such punishment, and such forgiveness? His voice furred with rage, the demon beneath said, "I don't have to tell you that you'll regret that."

"I don't care!"

Zhu Irzh winced. So beautiful, so brave, and so reckless. . . He entertained an idle fantasy of sliding down through the grill, knocking the girl's persecutor unconscious, and saving her from her own vile fate. In the fantasy, she fell to her knees in gratitude; winding her arms around his waist, her soft breasts pressing against his thighs, her mouth—Zhu Irzh blinked. This would not do. Whatever was happening in the room below, fascinating though it might be, was none of his business. Zhu Irzh tried to push the ever-present specter of sexual desire to the back of his mind and watched as the demon strode from the room, nursing his injured hand and leaving the woman to sink back onto the couch, her face defeated and weary. Surely, Zhu Irzh thought, all this could have nothing whatsoever to do with the matter on which he had come to the Ministry. Getting embroiled with this situation would cause nothing but woe, however beautiful the woman might be, however desirable. . . If he had any sense, he would move swiftly and quietly onwards. With that sensible thought well out of the way, Zhu Irzh pulled aside the grill and dropped into the room.

 

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Framed