Flight of the Butterfly

Consciousness returned like a poorly tuned radio, crackling in and out. The first thing I noticed was someone's fingers prodding my bicep like I was a cut of meat at the market. My eyelids felt heavy as stage curtains, but I managed to pry them open—only to find myself staring into the wrinkled face of an elderly woman who was methodically measuring my limbs with a length of red silk cord.

"Hmm, good proportions," she muttered, her accent so formal and archaic it took my brain several seconds to process the Mandarin. "Slender but strong."

I jerked upright, immediately regretting it as my head spun. "What the— Get your hands off me!" The words came out as a hoarse croak. "Where am I? Who are you?"

The old woman's face crinkled into a smile that revealed teeth the color of aged bamboo. Her grey hair was pulled back in an elaborate style I'd only seen in historical dramas, complete with jade pins and silk flowers. "Calm yourself, Miss. You've had quite an ordeal. Do you remember anything?"

The question triggered a flood of memories, and suddenly I couldn't stop talking. "Remember? Oh, I remember everything! I was on Flight 2317—you know, those metal flying machines that go up in the sky?" I made wild gestures with my hands. "My friend Mei, she got drunk and didn't show up, which is totally typical of her, by the way. And then the plane—whoosh!—right into the ocean! There were oxygen masks falling like yellow daisies, and the wing just peeled off like—like when you pull the wrapper off a zongzi!"

The old woman's smile never wavered, but her eyes narrowed slightly. She turned to a young girl standing nearby, who was dressed in what looked like a legitimate Ming Dynasty servant's outfit. "Poor thing's clearly confused from the sea water," she said in a stage whisper. "Note her down for the Amethyst Sea Palace. They're always looking for educated girls with refined features, even if they're a bit..." She twirled one finger near her temple.

"Wait, what? Amethyst Sea what?" I scrambled to my feet, nearly tripping over the plain cotton robes someone had dressed me in while I was unconscious. "Listen, I need to contact the Chinese embassy. Or the coast guard. Or literally anyone with a phone. You do have phones here, right? Please tell me you have phones."

The old woman just patted my hand sympathetically, while the servant girl scribbled something on a piece of actual bamboo paper. With actual ink. From an actual inkstone.

Oh gods, what kind of historical reenactment nightmare had I washed up into?

With a frustrated sigh, I collapsed back onto the bed—except it wasn't really a bed, was it? The gentle swaying finally registered in my brain, and I shot up, really looking at my surroundings for the first time. The walls weren't walls at all but curved wooden panels with ornate carvings. A paper lantern swung from a beam overhead, and through a small circular window, I caught glimpses of endless blue.

"Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit." I scrambled to my feet, nearly slipping on the polished wooden floor. My hands found the door—not a modern door with a handle, but a wooden panel that slid sideways—and I yanked it open with trembling fingers.

The narrow corridor outside pitched and rolled with the waves. I stumbled my way toward what I hoped was the deck, using the walls for balance. The cotton robes tangled around my legs as I half-ran, half-crawled up a steep set of stairs.

I burst into blinding sunlight and immediately froze. Everywhere I looked, men in what should have been historical movie costumes were working with ropes and sails. Real ropes. Real sails. The massive wooden masts creaked overhead, canvas snapping in the wind. Some of the sailors stopped to stare at me—a few with the usual confusion you'd expect for a woman running around like a crazy person, but others with predatory grins that made my skin crawl.

What the fuck am I going to do? I thought, backing away from a particularly leering sailor. I'm going to absolutely murder Mei if I ever see her again. This is so much worse than that time she convinced me to crash that wedding!

I retreated back to my "room"—if you could call this tiny wooden cell that—and slumped against the wall, my legs finally giving out. The gentle rocking of the ship that had seemed so strange before now felt like it was mocking me. This isn't happening. This can't be happening.

The door slid open with a soft scraping sound, making me jump. It was the same servant girl from before, now carrying a wooden tray. The smell hit me first—some kind of congee that probably wouldn't pass a health inspection in any modern city. But my stomach growled so loudly it was almost embarrassing, reminding me that the last thing I'd eaten was airplane peanuts in another century.

I practically lunged for the tray, shoveling the rice porridge into my mouth with the wooden spoon. It was bland and slightly mushy, but I couldn't have cared less. Only after I'd scraped the bowl clean did I notice the servant girl was still standing there, watching me with an expression that suggested she'd seen this exact scene play out before.

"Thank you," I said, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. "I'm Song Yunxi. What's your name? How old are you?"

She hesitated, then answered in a voice barely above a whisper, "This servants name is Xiao Liu and this servants age is fourteen." Her eyes darted to the door and back, as if checking if she was allowed to speak.

"Fourteen?" I set down the empty bowl, studying the wooden panels and paper lanterns with growing unease. "Listen, Xiao Liu, what year is this exactly? Or at least which dynasty?" I gestured at our surroundings—the ornate carvings, the swaying oil lamps, the traditional architecture. "Everything looks like it's straight out of a historical drama. And what's this Amethyst Sea Palace that old woman mentioned? Why is she so intent on sending me there?"