Red Phoenix

metal blaring loudly from the tiny headphones. He was the image of the rich, rebellious, spoilt Hong Kong teenager.
    I swallowed my feelings as I carefully saluted him. ‘My Lord Third Prince.’
    Na Zha grinned evilly at me. ‘Lady Emma.’ He shrugged. ‘Come on, we’ll be fine, no trouble, I promise.’
    ‘You’ve just given me your word, Na Zha,’ I said. ‘No trouble.’ I sighed with resignation. ‘I suppose it’s all right. Back by ten, okay? Michael’s half human, he needs his rest.’
    ‘Sweet,’ Michael said.
    ‘There’s a great mall in Bel Air. Wanna go?’ Na Zha asked Michael.
    ‘Bel Air Gardens in Sha Tin? There’s not much over there,’ I said.
    ‘Not Sha Tin, LA,’ Na Zha snapped impatiently.
    ‘ No way !’ I shouted, and both of them glanced at me. ‘I said back by ten, and I meant ten tonight ! You two will stay here in Hong Kong where I can call Michael. Do you have your phone, Michael?’
    I don’t need a phone any more, Michael said, straight into my ear.
    ‘When the hell did you learn to do that?’
    The Dark Lord taught me last week.
    ‘That’s all well and good, Michael, but you know I can’t do it, so I can’t call you if I need you. So take your phone, okay? And you two talk out loud when you’re near me, or there’ll be serious trouble.’
    Michael nodded. Na Zha put his hand on his hip, exasperated, but didn’t say anything.
    ‘Festie?’ Michael said.
    ‘Whatever.’ Na Zha turned and jumped through the glass of the living room window. The fire wheels materialised under his feet. He summoned a cloud for Michael.
    ‘Michael, please don’t get into any trouble. If you do, your mother will kill me,’ I said wearily. ‘A little restraint goes a long way, you know?’
    ‘Don’t worry, Emma, we’ll behave. There’s a new game out, we just want to check it out,’ Michael said. Na Zha gestured towards the cloud. Michael ran straight through the glass of the window and landed on the cloud. ‘Hey,’ Michael called as they left. ‘Thanks.’
    ‘Just don’t make me come down there and get you,’ I told their backs as they flew away.
    I stormed back to my room and returned to the spreadsheets. Oh well, at least I knew there was no chance of a demon getting him when he was with that little… gentleman.
    John must have known that Simone and I had arrived for breakfast in the dining room the next morning.
    Come and see me in my office after you’ve eaten, Emma.
    I picked up my tea and opened the newspaper. I froze completely.
    Simone saw my face. ‘What’s the matter, Emma?’
    I didn’t reply. I was reading the front page. There was a huge colour photo and a headline: LOCAL BUSINESSWOMAN ARRESTED . It was a photo of Kitty Kwok. My old boss from the kindergarten. She took up most of the frame. She was wearing huge designer sunglasses and scowling away from the camera, obviously being escorted by plainclothes police.
    The bottom fell out of my stomach. Walking behind her, grinning right at me over her left shoulder, was our favourite demon, Simon Wong.
    I read the copy.
Local businesswoman Kitty Kwok Ho Man Yee was today arrested in connection with what police have described as ‘illegal activities’. Sources say that she has been arrested as part of a money-laundering cleanup operation. There are suggestions that she has been using her chain of kindergartens to fund underworld activity.
    Miss Kwok’s husband, Cedric Ho, died in a mysterious boating accident in 1985, leaving her extensive corporate and property investments. A coroner’s inquiry ruled the death of the tycoon ‘death by misadventure’.
    As well as the kindergarten chain, Miss Kwok has extensive agricultural holdings in China, and is a major shareholder in Tautech, a bioengineering company with laboratories in China, Australia, Hong Kong, the US and Europe.
    Miss Kwok refused to comment.
    I dropped the newspaper and cast around for the Chinese one. It was still on the table. I could only understand about one character in five, but that didn’t matter. There were huge glossy photos all over the frontpage. The Chinese newspapers were always very good about having big, spectacular, and often explicitly gory colour photographs with every story.
    The Chinese-language newspaper had large colourful photos of the raids on the biotechnology labs in Dongguan. People in white lab jackets being herded into vans, and cages of animals and birds being loaded into trucks.
    The bottom photo showed