As the three rode along, the land about them graduallybecame more rocky and a crooked path appeared. It grewdark, and the White Jade Peak began to tower overthem.

　　"According to the map, the Secret City was builtaround the base of the mountain," said Huo Qingtong.

　　"It doesn't look as if it would be more than three orfour miles from here." The three dismounted and gavetheir two horses some water.

　　Chen stroked the white horse's mane lovingly, knowingthat without it, he would never have been able torescue Princess Fragrance. He also knew he would nothave left without her.

　　They rested for a while until the horses had recoveredsome of their strength and then continued on, thecries of the wolves already vaguely discernible in thedistance. Chen rode the chestnut horse alone and thetwo sisters rode together on the white horse.

　　The night was cool and the snow on the peak glistenedbrilliant white under the moon, looking almost closeenough to touch. The path became rough and treacherousand suddenly split a dozen or so ways, with noindication of which was the correct one.

　　"With so many paths, it's not surprising people getlost," said Chen. Huo Qingtong pulled out the map andexamined it under the moonlight.

　　"It says: `left three right two'," she said.

　　"What does that mean?""It doesn't explain." In the distance, they heard thewolves howling in unison.

　　"It's about midnight," Huo Qingtong said. "They musthave stopped to howl at the moon. When they'vefinished, they will be after us again. We must choosethe path and go quickly.""There are five paths on the left here," said Chenpointing. "The map says left three right two, so let'stake the third.""If it's a dead end, we won't have time to come backagain," replied Huo Qingtong.

　　"In that case, the three of us will die together,"said Chen.

　　As Chen spoke, Huo Qingtong felt a sudden warmth inher breast and tears welled into her eyes. She raisedher horse whip and led them into the middle path.

　　The track narrowed into a stone-walled corridor whichhad obviously been hacked out of the mountainside bymen. After a while, they came to another crossroadsfrom which three paths branched out to the right.

　　"We're saved! We're saved!" Huo Qingtong shouted withjoy, and they spurred their horses up the middle pathwith renewed energy. But the track had not beentraversed for many years, and in some places, it wascompletely overgrown by grasses taller than a man,while in others, it was blocked by sand drifts. Thethree had to dismount and lead the horses over theobstacles. Chen also moved rocks onto the top of thedrifts to slow the wolves' pursuit.

　　Less than half a mile further on, they came upon threemore paths forking to the left. Suddenly, PrincessFragrance screamed and pointed to a pile of whitebones at the mouth of one of the paths. Chendismounted to investigate and found they were theremains of a man and a camel.

　　"He must have been unable to decide which path to takeand ended up dying here," he sighed.

　　They entered the third path and found it suddenlysteepened sharply. The cold and darkness becameoppressive. A short while later another skeletonappeared by the side of the path with jewelsglistening amongst the bones.

　　"He was rich but he couldn't get out," Huo Qingtongsaid.

　　"But it means we're on the right path," replied Chen.

　　"There must be even more skeletons on the wrongpaths.""When we leave, none of us must take any jewels, allright?" Princess Fragrance said.

　　"You're afraid the ghosts won't let us go," said Chenwith a smile.

　　"Promise me!"He heard the pleading tone in her voice and hurriedlyreplied: "I won't take anything, don't worry." All thejewels in the world could not match having you twosisters as companions, he thought, and suddenly feltashamed. Why did he include them both together?

　　They continued up the twisted path the whole night,and by morning, they and the two horses wereexhausted.

　　"Let's rest a while," said Huo Qingtong.

　　"We must concentrate on finding shelter first and thenwe can all sleep easily," Chen replied firmly.

　　** 10 **A short way further on, the path opened out into awide, flat valley of extraordinary beauty. The sun wasjust rising and the white mountain soared up into thesky from the valley floor. Around its base was a citythat looked as if it had once been very prosperous.

　　But now, the thousands of houses that they could see,although magnificent in scale and design, were invarious stages of ruin and collapse. Not a sound wasto be heard, not even the twittering of birds. Thethree had never seen a place that was at once sobeautiful and so terrible. They stood for a moment,over-awed by the crushing silence, hardly daring toeven breathe, then Chen urged his horse forward andthey entered the city.

　　The area was extremely dry, so dry that there wasvirtually no vegetation on the ground. The contents ofthe houses had stayed undisturbed for countless yearsand most appeared to still be in good condition. Theyentered the first house they came to and PrincessFragrance noticed a pair of ladies' shoes on thefloor. Their colour was still fresh, but as soon asshe touched them, they disintegrated into dust, andshe jumped in shock.

　　"This city is in a basin surrounded by high mountainswhich protect it from rain and wind," Chen said.

　　As they continued through the streets, they foundskeletons everywhere and swords and other weaponsthrown about at random.

　　"It doesn't look as if the city was buried in a sandstorm as the story says," Chen commented.

　　"No," Huo Qingtong agreed. "It looks more like therewas a big battle and all the people were killed.""But there's so many paths outside the city," PrincessFragrance objected. "How would the enemy find theirway in?""There must have been a traitor," Huo Qingtongreplied.

　　They went into another house, and she spread the mapout on a table and leaned over to examine it. But thetable was completely rotten despite its apparentsturdiness, and it collapsed under the weight of herarms. She picked up the map and studied it for amoment. "I'm afraid these houses wouldn't withstand anattack by the wolves for very long," she said. Shepointed at a place on the map. "This is the centre ofthe city, right at the foot of the mountain. There area lot of markings around it, which probably means itis a place of importance. If it's a palace orfortress, it is bound to be very sturdily built, solet's go there.""Right!" said Chen. The three continued on their way,following the path indicated on the map. The roads inthe centre of the city were like a maze, twisting andturning until their head's swam. If they had not hadthe map, they would surely have lost their way.

　　After an hour or so, they came to the place marked onthe map as the city centre, but were disappointed tofind no sign of any palace or fortress. From close up,the White Jade Peak looked even more beautiful thanfrom a distance. It was completely white, pure andshining. A jade carver who found even a small piece ofwhite jade would never go hungry for the rest of hislife, but here was a whole mountain of the preciousstone. They looked up at the towering peak and felt asense of spiritual upliftment. Their cares and worriesdispersed and they reflected on the wonderful mysteryof creation.

　　Then, amidst the silence, they heard far off the howlsof wolves drifting towards them.

　　"They're coming!" cried Princess Fragrance. "Could itbe the wolves have a map as well?""Their nose is their map," Chen replied. "We have leftour scent wherever we have gone and by following it,they will never make a mistake."Huo Qingtong pointed at the map. "Look," she said.

　　"There is the mountain, but there are many roadsmarked inside.""They must be tunnels," he said.

　　"Yes. Now how do we find them?" She looked at theexplanation on the map and slowly deciphered it. "Toenter the palace, climb the tall tree and call out"Ailongabasheng" three times towards the sacredmountain.""What is Ailongabasheng?" Princess Fragrance asked.

　　"It must be the password," Huo Qingtong replied. "Butwhere is the tall tree? And could this really be amagic spell?""Of course it could," said Princess Fragrance, who hadalways believed in spirits and fairies.

　　"In the old days, there would have been people in themountain who would have pushed a switch when theyheard the password, opening a cave entrance," saidChen. But after so many years, everyone in there iscertainly dead."The howls of the wolves sounded closer. "Let's go andhide in one of the houses," Huo Qingtong suggested.

　　The three turned and ran towards the closest of thebuildings. As they ran, Chen tripped on a bulge on theground and saw it was the stump of a huge tree. "Thetree's here!" he called.

　　Princess Fragrance examined the sheer face of themountain above and pointed. "That must be the cavemouth there. Look, aren't those footholds?" Chen andHuo Qingtong looked up and saw with delight that therewere indeed notches in the rock face.

　　"I'll go up and have a look," said Chen. With thedagger in his right hand, he bounded up the cliff. Hemade it up about a dozen feet then used his InnerStrength Kung Fu to lodge the dagger in the rock facefor an instant and race up further. Finally, hereached the point where the footholds began. The twogirls cheered from below, and Chen waved to thembefore turning his attention to the cliff above. Overthe years, the cave mouth had become blocked by sand.

　　Chen grabbed an outcrop of jade rock with one hand andstarted to shift some of the sand with the dagger. Hepulled broken slabs of rock out one after another, andlet them drop to the ground, and in a short while hadmade a hole large enough to wriggle through. Hecrawled in and sat down. Then, pulling his PearlStrings from his pocket, he undid them all, tied themtogether end to end and dangled the resulting ropedown the cliff face to the girls waiting below.

　　Huo Qingtong tied the rope round her sister's waistand Chen slowly pulled her up. Just as she reached thecave mouth, she screamed, and Chen quickly helped herinside, saying: "Don't worry, you've made it."Her face was deathly pale. "Wolves!" she cried.

　　Chen looked down and saw seven or eight wolves hadalready arrived at the base of the cliff. Huo Qingtongwas valiantly fighting them off with her sword. Thewhite horse shook its mane and neighed loudly thengalloped off through the streets of the ancient city.

　　Chen hastily grabbed some large rocks from around thecave mouth and threw them down, forcing some of thewolves to back away, then dropped the rope down again.

　　Huo Qingtong was afraid that in her weak condition,she would be unable to hold on long enough, so shetransferred the sword to her left hand, and tied therope round her waist as she continued to fight off thewolves.

　　"Right!" she yelled. Chen yanked on the rope and sheflew into the air just as two wolves threw themselvesat her. One of them bit deeply into her boot andrefused to let go. As Princess Fragrance screamed infright, Huo Qingtong bent over in mid-air and choppedit in half across its belly. The top half of its bodyaccompanied her up to the cave mouth.

　　Chen helped her inside and tried unsuccessfully topull the half-wolf off her boot.

　　"Did it bite into you?" he asked quickly.

　　"I'm all right," she replied. She took the dagger fromhis hand and cut open the wolf's mouth, revealing theserried ranks of teeth sunk deep into her boot. Asmall trickle of blood oozed out of one of the holesin the leather.

　　"Your foot is wounded," Princess Fragrance said. Shehelped her sister remove the ............