CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
DREAM OF DREAMS
That night Fong wandered the deserted Xian streets alone. Visions of visions cascaded in his head. Seven hundred thousand bodies crammed in burial. Soldiers ready to attack, frozen in eternal stillness by the rising light. Seven unidentified corpses. Two generals kept apart from each other. Time itself standing still.
Then there was a shuffling of feet. Fong turned and somehow he was in pit #1 of the terra-cotta warriors. Before he could understand what was happening to him he sensed movement through the rank upon rank of clay soldiers in the pit. And colour. Then a shout. Someone shouting his name. Ordering him.
Fong moved past a kneeling archer and ran down a row of mounted cavalrymen.
And there he was.
Qin Shi Huang, dressed just as he was in the famous woodcut. On his head sat a rectangular, lacquered piece of hide from which hung silk strands — a dozen behind, a dozen in front. Each strand was strung with exquisite jade beads. His dark upper garment was of an almost blue-black silk. His voluminous sleeves were embroidered — light on the outside but dark as blood on the interior. The elaborate frontpiece was held in place by a white jade belt over an obi-like silk sash from which the jade handle of his sword protruded. Below the belt were silk skirts in several layers of light red that just exposed the tips of his wooden platform sandals. Fong vaguely remembered that the entirety of what the emperor wore was called Mian Fu. Both the name and the clothing style went back to the Xi Zhou people in the eleventh century BC.
“We’ve made it.”
The man’s gruff voice shocked Fong. The accent was unidentifiable.
“Help me off with this,” he said indicating the broad obi-like sash around his waist.
Fong was frightened to touch the illusion lest it return to nothingness.
“Hurry, the light fades and I must be prepared.”
Fong undid the white jade belt and put it on the ground. It was surprisingly heavy. Then he reached behind the emperor and untied the thin belt that kept the sash in place. The garment slid through his fingers with a silken whisper. The emperor bowed his head and Fong undid the straps and removed the headpiece, the Tong Tian, being careful not to snag the long ribbon attached to it that is supposed to connect the emperor to heaven.
A brisk wind picked up. Fong shivered. He looked around him. He was on the crest of a high rugged peak, timeless China down below.
The emperor stared into the distance. Fong knew that Qin Shi Huang was actually his own age although he looked ancient as the rock.
With a huge sigh, the emperor sat heavily on the cold ground and lifted a foot. Fong found the delicate straps and snaps and freed the emperor’s feet from the raised platform sandals. Then he slipped off the silk socks. The emperor’s feet were severely arthritic; the joints were swollen or broken and his toes splayed in odd crushed patterns. His toenails were extremely thick and deeply yellowed from fungal growth.
The emperor lifted his upper garment over his shoulders revealing a sunken chest and sparse growth of greying hair, narrowing to a single line that ran from his navel downward.
Qin Shi Huang stood and turned to Fong. Clearly Fong was to undo the ribbons that held the emperor’s lower skirts in place. He hesitated. His eyes were at the emperor’s waist. He glanced up, aware of what this looked like. But the emperor was once again staring deep into the far-off.
Fong unlaced the ribbons. The emperor’s skirts fell away. Before him, nestled in a bed of grey pubic hair, the man’s penis looked at him like a one-eyed eel, frightened of the world.
“Cover him.”
Fong whipped around. Dr. Roung was there holding a round flat stone, almost the size of a dinner plate.
“Cover him, Fong!”
The archeologist held out the stone. Fong took it. It was heavy and dropped to the ground with a thud.
This voice was different. Familiar but different. Fong looked up. Iman stood there, Jiajia at his side.
“Pick it up, Fong.”
This voice was high, lisping. It came from his left. It was the politico.
Fong picked up the stone. It was suddenly light as the finest porcelain. He handed it to the emperor.
The old man took the stone and turned away — toward the east.
Fong turned back.
There was no one there. Nothing there. Then he looked to the emperor. He too was gone.
Of course.
At the end there is only ourselves — and what we know — and time which knows everything but tells us so very little.