Forbidden Buddhist magic, thieves, assassins, and a mysterious jade dragon...what more could you want?
The sheet-wrapped bundle slapped the earth, and a white amputated arm flopped free. It rolled a little, and then lay still. Ben straightened his back with a sigh of relief, and drew thin icy air deep into his lungs. He wiped his brow with the back of a hand, leaving a bloody smear behind, the mark of Cain.
He nodded toward the arm. "You wanna get that for me, please?"
"Sure." There was a rustle of silk, the scent of jasmine on the breeze. Lang drifted in from the shadows and retrieved the limb, returning it to its owner. The wind caught her hair, shaping a raven's wing until she gathered it back in.
Telescoping the shaft of an entrenching tool, locking it in place, he began to dig. It was easy at first; the soil was loose, powdery beneath a layer of old pine needles. But as the evening progressed, the shovel had to bite harder and harder. Off to the side, a small cairn of stones took shape, pulled one by one from the growing hole.
Warmed by his exertions, Ben paused, shrugging out of a worn military jacket, stripped of insignia and patches, splotched with gore. Protruding from his waistband was the hardened plastic grip of a nine-millimeter handgun. Ben hung his coat on a nearby branch.
The slashed tee shirt he wore showed patches of brightly colored flesh as he moved. The colors matched those on his exposed arms. The right forearm displayed a blue-green dragon with golden fins dancing wildly amid tongues of red flame. His other arm sported a red-orange tiger crouching on a rock above a waterfall. Both images were rendered with a fine detail only an expert artist could have achieved.
His thoughts went back to the night before. As he lay sated from their love-making, Takiuchi sang, making him her canvas, sliding her naked body along his in the moonlight. She daubed him with paint and brush as white candles burned and primal magic thickened the air. The art-work was Takiuchi's gift to him; her guarantee that he'd always return to her from whatever dangerous mission he undertook.
Eventually, Ben grew satisfied with the hole, and dragged the canvas bundle over its lip. The package went in, and the amputated arm followed like an after thought, thrown in for good measure. Ben climbed out, and raked in the loose dirt. A mound formed where the hole had been. He jumped on the mound for awhile, flattening it out.
When he was done, he sprinkled the area with brown pine needles. The restoration wasn't perfect, but he wasn't overly concerned. This area was not often visited and the next rain would finish the job. He collapsed the shovel's shaft and stowed it away. Then he retrieved his coat, whistling a discordant tune.
"I'm headed back to the summer house, Lang. I suggest you head back to the city, and call your mom before she calls out the National Guard. You know how she worries."
"I know how she keeps at me, relentlessly--like a bulldog. I want to date. I want to party all night. I want to go shopping, and spend obscene amounts of your money."
Ben winced, pained by that last statement.
"Mother wants me to waste all my time after school doing homework or studying forbidden Buddhist magic with her."
"You have to admit," Ben pointed at the new grave, "that forbidden Buddhist magic does come in handy now and then."
Lang pouted in adamant silence.
Recognizing that reason had failed, Ben opened negotiations. "Five hundred bucks."
Lang sniffed with mild distain. "What can I do with that? Won't last me a week."
"One thousand, and I'll get your car out of the shop."
"How did you know my car was in the shop again?"
"Lucky guess. Well?"
"I don't know..."
"We could just wait until your mom calls in your grandfather and he unleashes Tsuru to fetch you home. Of course, they'll be no cash at all if that happens."
Lang smiled with radiant joy. "Dearest Father, I accept your offer--but I won't take a check."
"Go home. I'll have the cash deposited in your Swiss account by noon tomorrow."
Lang threw herself into Bens arms. She hugged him fiercely and kissed him, then broke away. The shadows swallowed her. Ben headed back through the woods toward the summer house. Soon, he heard the guttural growl of a motor bike in the distance, toward the highway, and knew that Lang was on her way.
Soon, Ben broke into the open. An A-frame building with smoking chimney drew him. Light spilled into the yard, illuminating his blue jag as it lounged in the drive. Everything was just as he'd left it except... His eyes narrowed as he studied the door. He'd left a small white stone on the top step. It was gone, brushed away by someone opening the door wide enough to enter.
Placing the stone was an old trick, and not much to hang your life upon, but Ben had discovered long ago that simplicity made the best servant. He entered the rental house, and pretended surprise as a chair swiveled to face him. He recognized the wrinkled man in the chair, sitting with his legs crossed, his fingers laced together across his knee. The visitor wore round bifocals over slanting eyes, and sported a thin goatee that somehow looked unreal. He occupied an expensive, charcoal gray suit that was sharply creased.
"Welcome home, Benjamin. Don't be concerned; I've not been waiting long."
"That's a relief. I shan't have to disembowel myself in ritual atonement. So, what do you want, Old Man?"
"Where's my granddaughter?"
"Why ask me?"
"You usually know."
"Not this time."
"That's a shame." The visitor pointed at the blood-drenched shirt. "Cut yourself shaving?"
"Maybe."
The visitor sighed dramatically. "You can talk to me, or I can send Tsuru around."
Ben grew dangerously still, like a viper about to strike.
"Does Tsuru know where you are?"
"Tsuru knows everything."
"If that were true , you'd have no need of my knowledge."
"Will you help me or not?"
"You know my rates, Old Man. I don't come cheap."
"Benjamin! You would charge me? We're family."
"It's funny how you only seem to remember that when you want something."
"Gai-jin dog!""
"That will cost you an extra hundred."
"I'm good for it."
A front window exploded inward. Time turned gelid. Shards of glass glittered in the air. Ben spun, drawing his Beretta as he lunged toward cover. Falling, he locked his sights onto a figure hurtling in past the window frame, a woman sheathed in electric-blue silk. She held her arms protectively before her face while her black hair fanning out behind her like the wings of night.
Ben threw himself down and slid across the polished hard-wood floor as time resumed its normal pace. He held his shot, reaching for understanding.
"It's Lam-Hu; the Blue Tiger!" The Old Man shrilled. "Shoot her!"
The woman landed lightly on her feet, black eyes glittering with untamed emotion as she bared her teeth and her blade, drawing her katana, her soul sword. "Where is the Yu Lung?" she demanded.
Ben rolled to his feet, keeping his weapon centered on the girl. "You could have used the door." He chided her with a velvet voice.
"Kill her, Benjamin. The half-breed's a Yakuza enforcer."
The woman turned her eyes to the old man in the chair. "You know me? Then you know what I want. Where is it?"
"Go walk a thousand hells looking for a husband!" Old Man shouted.
"Is it worth your life?" The woman asked quietly.
"Benjamin, are you working for me or not? Kill this creature!"
Ben smiled. "Take something from the wrong people, Old Man? Maybe you should just give it back."
The Old Man muttered, "Fifteen bullets in his magazine and he can't spare one of them to do his father-in-law a favor."
The Blue Tiger sensuously advanced. Poised for use, her katana become a bar of light as she shifted...then a sword...then a bar of light...
"She's trying to hypnotize you, Stupid. Take her out, now!"
"Old Man...," Ben said, "...shut-up!"
The katana flashed through an arc as the Blue Tiger spun, attacking. Ben squeezed off a shot as the blade caught the barrel of his Beretta. The tip of his gun fell to the floor as Ben stumbled back, muttering, "Damn, that was my favorite gun."
He let the rest of the automatic fall to the floor, hurriedly shrugging out of his coat. He held it before him like a bull-fighter's cape.
"That won't stop me," The woman warned. "I'd have taken off your hand and your head already if I felt you were any kind of serious threat?" The Blue Tiger slid a foot forward then shifted weight onto it.
"Overconfidence is a serious flaw," Ben said, falling back another step. "I too have been holding back." He threw his coat. The katana cut through it several times, quartering it, whipping the pieces across the room, into a pile. This confirmed her words that she was only playing--so far.
Ben displayed the bright images on his forearms. The Yakuza enforcer hesitated. "That's lovely work, but I will chop you to pieces if you stand in the way of my goal."
Old Man chuckled from his chair. "Run home while you can, assassin. He is Ch'i-Jen, the painted man. Your steel is no match for the magic covering his flesh."
Lam-Hu's brow furrowed. "I have heard that name before, whispered in shadows, a child's fantasy..."
"Don't make me prove how lethal a fantasy can be," Ben said.
"I will be killed for failure if I return empty-handed, so it does not matter what you threaten. I must have the jade dragon. It is the strength of my clan. Without it, we will be destroyed by our enemies."
"What concern is it of anyone if there are a few less criminals in the world?" Old Man asked.
"Your hands aren't that clean," Ben answered. "Look, why don't we all stop posturing and discuss this matter like civilized..."
She was quick. Her strike nearly took his head off. Only the fact that he was expecting the move, let him avoid it. His heart raced as adrenalin flooded his system. A thrill of fear went down his back. That was the trigger.
His right arm tingled a moment as the paint came alive, wafting off his body as blue and green swirls of mist, splotched with red and gold. The bright cloud condensed into the same image it had previously worn, only larger, filling out three dimensions instead of two.
A great three-toed dragon hung coiled between Ben and Lam-Hu. Scaled, wreathed with stylized flames, claws of gold; it waved like a flag in the wind though the air was still. It's warning hiss filled the room, a contrasting counter-point to Old Man's brittle laugh.
The dragon struck. Lam-Hu flipped back, barely avoiding the beast's lunging head. The dragon pulled back from shattered floor boards, shaking its head in irritation. The Blue-Tiger didn't wait for further developments. She kept tumbling backwards on the way to the broken window.
The dragon coiled and launched a second time, with greater speed. Ben noticed that Lam-Hu made a common mistake in trying to escape. Oriental screens are put at doors to keep dragons out. They succeed only because dragons fly in straight lines and can't turn corners, around the screens--and here she was running in a straight line!
She must have realized it herself. At the last moment, she veered sharply towards the door. The dragon flew past her, out the window, one of its claws slashing her lower leg as it went by. Lam-Hu stumbled to the door, leaving splatters of blood on the floor behind her. She opened the door, but halted at once, staring eye to eye with the smiling beast. It belched a sulphurous flame that consumed the Yakuza enforcer in moments.
Then, without further purpose, the dragon drifted over the charred body, losing cohesion. Paint sizzled on the corpse, turning it into a triumph of modern art, quenching the last tongues of fire.
"Dammit," Ben cursed. "I'm all out of sheets. You owe me for this, Old Man."
"Put it on my tab," The old man's laugh was a dry sigh of wind. "You know I'm good for it."
"So, you do have their statue."
"The Jade Dragon? Yes I have it. In the next room in fact. Now that you've dampened the Yakuza's interest in me, I'll call Tsuru to come and get me."
"Phones on the breakfast bar," Ben said.
"I'll use my own." Old Man swiveled away from Ben, extracting a cell phone from a pocket.
Ben walked into the bedroom. He found the Jade Dragon on the bed. It was two feet long, carved from pure jade. In the lamplight, it seemed to glow with mystic life. Ben spoke to it. "I told your clan elders I'd return you--for a modest fee. But they send an assassin instead. Don't worry. You're still going home. My finder's fee, however, has just gone a great deal higher."
Ben crossed to the bed, picked up the statue, and carried it to the window. He dropped to the ground, clutching the dragon, and carried it to his Jag. He vaulted the door and slid down the seat. The statue went into the passenger seat. The Jag rumbled to life, and he pulled away, heading for the highway. In the rearview mirror, Old man came ambling out of the house, shrieking in Mandarin.
Ben chuckled as the car accelerated, its headlights piercing the shadows. "A good nights work," he said. "Takiuchi will be pleased, and that will make my life so much easier."
He pulled up to the highway. A white limo turning onto the side road stopped beside him. The driver's window rolled down and Ben matched stares with Tsuru. The Husky Asian raised a single eyebrow in silent inquiry.
"Yes, I really want to do this, and yes, I know he's the only father-in-law I have." Ben answered the questions Tsuru didn't ask, then posed one of his own. "The question is, are we going to fight about it?"
"The old man sounded quite irate on the phone," Tsuru said. "If I were you, I'd take a long vacation--give him time to remember what Takiuchi would do to him if he were to ever harm you."
"Sound advice. Oh! You'll need a shovel. There's a freshly painted crispy critter at the house that needs burying. I'd put salt in its mouth if I were you. Sometimes these Yakuza devils come back."
Tsuru frowned in irritation. "You didn't clean-up after yourself?"
"No time," Ben said, one hand caressing the statue beside him. "Well, I gotta get my date back home. See you around." With a roar, the Jag pulled out onto the deserted highway and sped away beneath a dragon hunter's moon.
Lee, I'll purchase anything you write, how's that for approval! I've bought The Awakening, and now The Others... both are captivating page turners that the reader cannot put down. I like the way your mind works, and the way you put those mind-words to paper for us.
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