“What, did you think we have a temple somewhere?”
Admittedly, yes, she’d thought something of the sort. But she wasn’t going to admit she’d absorbedKillerwatch’s fanciful tales—of parangs with blessed blades, vanguard flags, and initiation lairs in the hills, of cloth missives exchanged with cryptic seals and ancient trials for every climbed rank. Maybe they’d been inspired by stories of the original kongsi, or maybe it was all in the heads of the young radio hosts. Christina lit the only strange item in the room, a lamp made of an engraved red glass bulb fixed onto a metal stand. “What color do you want your butterfly? Anything but red, that’s only for the tang ki chi. That’s one rule we still have.” The Butterflies used the feminine version of the title—chi, elder sister, instead of older brother. “The goddess is supposed to give you your first butterfly, at the initiation. But you already have fire, so I guess I’m doing it on her behalf.”
Tian leaned against the wardrobe to watch. Unbothered, Christina retrieved from the medicine cabinet ink pots, a packet of sewing needles like any from the shop downstairs, joss paper, a dainty knife, and a fountain pen. She scribbled a complicated pattern ofcharacters and lines onto the paper, then nicked both their thumbs and pressed them onto the paper to seal. She burned the whole thing into the censer before Adeline could read it.
“What did you write?”
“We do it before every tattoo, so you can’t just go to anyone and get it done.” Christina attached the needles to a bar with a length of tightly wound black cotton, then heated them until they glowed. “A hundred and fifty years ago only the conduit had magic. It was the Needles who figured out how to channel the conduit’s power into the other members of the society as well, using these tattoos. Now any artist can do it, if they learn right. Each gang still has its secret ways of preparing the ink and arranging the needles, or the number of needles on the bar. And of course the paper. I fell in love with the ink from a man who once worked with the Needles, actually. Then Red Butterfly needed a new tattooist and I agreed to join them, to learn. He wouldn’t have taught me.” While the needles cooled, she lit the incense with her other hand.
They decided on plain black and a spot just over Adeline’s heart. Christina wiped the skin down and looked contemplative. “I don’t know how this will change anything for you, since your magic started differently from ours.”
But it wasn’t about the magic. Adeline already had the fire and wasn’t chasing for more. Red Butterfly existed because the girls kept its symbol, not the other way around—it was a brand that multiplied its power the more they wore it and showed it off and fought for it. The way people recognized Tian, the way the sailors gave the butterfly a berth on Bugis Street, the way even Pek Mun had pointed at her throat and saidthis means we’re together. Adeline could not truly be one of them if she did not wear it. She unbuttoned her blouse, exposing her collarbone.
“This will hurt,” Christina warned.
Pinpricks—wasn’t it? But no, Adeline’s shoulders stiffened as the needles broke her skin and burned like they were still red hot.Beads of blood welled up in the wake of the prickling lines, which Christina wiped off methodically.
The sensation got easier to manage as they fell into the rhythm, the incense building hypnotically around them, but it would have been worth it regardless for the way Tian watched the butterfly appear on Adeline’s skin, with the same sort of intensity Adeline had the first time she’d seen that mark on Tian’s arm. Adeline had known she’d asked for the right thing when Tian’s eyes lit up outside People’s Park. Now she was more sure than ever.
Humming heat gravitated to the needlepoint under Adeline’s skin, a sensation like heartburn. “I think people often forget that a kongsi needs two people to continue,” Christina said. “The conduit—and me. The Butterfly that taught me was a woman called Rosie. She had narrowly avoided arrest after Bukit Ho Swee, and she wanted a family. Your mother convinced her to stay until they found an apprentice, but she was resentful, by the time I arrived.”
“You know Rosie’s dead now.” Tian had been silent as Christina worked, but it seemed she couldn’t help herself. Rosie must have done Tian’s early tattoos, sat where they all now sat. “Cancer, soon after she left.”
Judging by Christina’s expression, she hadn’t known. Her needle hovered, a second of quickly metabolized grief. Adeline wondered how much Tian followed the Butterflies who’d left. Christina sucked in a breath and went back to the inking, the shape of their fire that a now-dead woman had taught her. “You ended up with your mother’s blood not by choice. This is something I have to teach. I have to find someone to take it, sooner or later.”
It was easy to forget that Red Butterfly had not always been the girls who were in it now. Hwee Min had only joined a year back; five years ago Christina and Tian and Pek Mun would not have been here; ten years ago it might have been her mother, and this Rosie, and the rogue Butterfly. It seemed a miracle in itself that it had lasted through all of these renewals, that it had managed to stayintact despite the never-ending comings and goings. That was the strength of the goddess, and her fire, and her symbol, and her name. As long as she remained tethered at the center of them, there would always be a Red Butterfly to come and go from. That was why they needed a conduit.
That was why she was getting the tattoo. Adeline relaxed into the rhythm of the needles again, the prickling and burning and the heady incense pulling her into an almost hypnotic state until Christina sank one last dot and pulled away.
A flare from the finished tattoo knocked a gasp out of Adeline, jolting her from the trance. Tian caught her hand before it could fly to the raw ink. “Just breathe,” Tian said softly. “Good girl.” She squeezed as Christina wrapped plastic over Adeline’s shoulder. “How does it feel?”
Adeline couldn’t entirely describe it. Rich. Full. Warmth coursed through her veins, heat given form at last. She felt flung open; felt like she’d been submerged for the past hour and was finally let up to breathe. The space of the house seemed to radiate stronger around her, as though all the girls that had ever passed through it were streaming past her again. She thought she felt the rogue Butterfly, keening somewhere.
“Try your fire,” Christina advised instead.
Adeline brushed her thumb over her finger pads, lighter and flint. It sparked almost joyfully, and burned stronger. She turned it through the air like a tiny phoenix. “It feels good.”
Tian beamed. “We would be nothing without Christina. We should have an altar to her.”
Christina snorted. “Don’t be stupid.” She started to put her equipment away, discarding the needles. Tian sprawled over the chair to grab her hand, and flipped her left arm over to her still-bare wrist.
“Give me one, too, since we’re here.”
Adeline had started cataloging the distinct pieces on that arm,which was almost sleeved with them, compared to the right, where just one dark chrysanthemum capped Tian’s shoulder. Around the flared butterfly there was a snake that wrapped around her upper arm and disappeared under her singlet strap, and the space between its undulations bloomed with more flowers and red waves. “It is sounding a lot like I’m your servant, Ang Tian,” Christina remarked, but she was already resetting her needles and heating them again. They glowed like three tiny claws.
“You really are worth more than that dickhead, Christina. We’ll beat him up for you.”
“Shut up and stop moving,” was all Christina said. “Or this will end up a slug instead.” But she was a little pink, and added, “I’ll tell you where he lives.”
Now Adeline was the one watching the butterfly appear. Staying perfectly still, Tian caught her gaze over Christina’s bent head and winked.
Adeline pressed her fingers onto her new tattoo, felt it beating and beating under the plastic.
CHAPTER THIRTEENTHE LONG NIGHT
While the search for Lilian continued, their inquiries into the river became hindered by three things. One: Red Butterfly had no business on the river, and hence no friends. What worked so well in Bugis Street and Chinatown was fruitless on the docks and godowns.
Two: the river was controlled by two rival societies, the Hokkien Green Eyes and the Teochew Red Eyes, kongsi that had rapidly grown to become the river’s primary lightermen. They were also the only two kongsi that followed the same god, some two-faced entity, but as a result of this rivalry, they were fiercely resistant to interference from anyone who wasn’t paying them on the regular. They would not help either, and prevented the girls getting anywhere near their cargo.
