by Peter Fang
Inheritance
The next morning, Ansen and Maria didn’t wake up until the sun seeped through the bedroom curtains and slowly lulled them awake.
They turned on the TV to see if there was any news on the local channels. There was the usual local weather and sports news, but no mention of the event at the antique shop.
Ansen and Maria were still in a state of disbelief. They both knew what they saw yesterday afternoon, but could offer no explanation of what happened. The whole episode felt like a bad dream, but they both knew it was very real. How did the furniture disappear after only after a few hours?
Maria was going to the grocery store, but when she opened her purse she found a drawstring pouch.
“What is this?” Maria gingerly took out the bag with her two fingers as if it were a sacred object. She put it carefully on the coffee table and took a step back.
“It’s Manfred’s. You can see there are photos of his family. Why did he leave it in your bag? This is very incriminating evidence.” Ansen picked up the pouch and walked to the front door.
“What are you doing with that?” asked Maria.
“We need to get rid of this stuff. If somehow the cops show up here, we can’t have anything that belongs to Manfred.” He then stared at Maria’s purse and came back for it.
“Why are you looking at my purse?”
“We have to get rid of the purse as well because this ties us back to him.”
“Why throw it away? We didn’t do anything. We technically did not even break into his shop when we went back to get the purse…”
Ansen shook his head. “You have to trust me on this. I have a bad feeling about the whole thing.”
“You don’t need to throw away anything. He gave it to me for a reason. Maybe this will tell us who killed him.”
“Maria, we don’t know what kind of people we are dealing with here. Perhaps he owes someone money, and the collectors showed up after we left. He couldn’t come up with the cash and he paid for it with his life.”
Maria stood up and walked towards Ansen. She reached over and took her purse back. She yanked on it until Ansen had no choice but to let go. “Look, you can get rid of it later, but I’d like to see what is inside that bag he gave me. I just have a feeling––-about this. I can’t explain it. I feel like I knew Manfred, somehow, from somewhere. It almost felt like he was one of my relatives.”
Ansen knew that when Maria set her mind on something, there was nothing he could do to stop her. “All right then. Let’s see what’s inside. But we have to get rid of your purse and all of its contents. We then need to report it as missing.”
Maria scowled. “Everything? Do you know how much trouble that is going to put me in? Credit card, bank card, my checkbook, everything.” She then looked at her phone sitting on the counter. “Good thing I didn’t lose my phone. We can’t report our phone is missing because they already have record of where we were.”
Ansen nodded. “I also recall your phone was actually out of juice, and I left my phone in the car’s charger, so I don’t think the phone company had a record of where we were. That said, you should report everything missing.”
“Okay. I’ll do it. But don’t throw away that pouch.”
“Fine.”
Maria called the credit card companies and the banks. She then had to report the company access card missing as well. It took her almost the entire morning to get everything reported. After she was done, she looked at Ansen and asked, “Are you sure no one saw us going back into the basement? What if one of the surveillance systems recorded us?”
“Don’t worry, I checked already; that street corner didn’t have any surveillances.”
“None that you could see. Still, you have to be careful,” Maria corrected him.
“Listen to you. I thought you were the one who insisted on taking the risk and keeping the package, and now you are asking me to be careful?”
Maria snickered. She slowly opened the package up, but Ansen stopped her.
“Wait, you shouldn’t touch anything with your fingers. Use this.” Ansen handed her a box of tissue paper.
Maria nodded and encased her hand in the tissue paper. “Better be cautious.”
She poured the contents onto the coffee table and looked through each item one by one. There was only a small old notebook-sized photo album. There were pictures of a man that looked like Manfred. The photo was not dated, but it looked very aged. He was alone. In the next photo, he was with a girl.
“Wife? Girlfriend?” Ansen pondered as they looked through the photos. There were other photos of Manfred with the same girl, but the girl was aging rapidly; her shiny blond hair had turned crinkly, and her skin looked pale and tight. There was a final photo that showed Manfred holding an aging woman’s hand sitting in a wheelchair. Her hands were tied up. Next to Manfred was another girl, a teenager. She was not much older than maybe fifteen.
“Daughter?” asked Ansen.
“No, something isn’t right here.” Maria pointed at the picture. “You see that tree behind them? See the first one, then the last. That tree must have been eighty years old. It has gotten much larger, but Manfred did not age, and yet you see that girl he was with aged rapidly. This last picture of her in the wheelchair looks like she was almost eighty. I think this whole set of pictures is fake.”
Ansen nodded. “It could be. When you and I were in the shop, something was odd about the place. People were moving around, but something was just off. I recalled that someone passed me, and I smelled a strong odor. I thought it was a homeless person that passed me by, but it was someone with a suit. Did you smell anything?”
Maria tried to recall. “A guy that passed near me, and he smelled bad. It reminded me of something…rotting. Like that one time you and I found a dead rat in our garage? It was like that except worse.”
Ansen felt his stomach churning. “I don’t remember smelling something that bad in the shop. I’m sure it was just like a homeless guy; they always smell like a walking trash bin. Do you remember what the foul-smelling guy looked like?”
Maria closed her eyes and tried to recall the man’s face. “Yeah, he was wearing a weird tux, very tall, and had this odd fixed smile. Rather creepy, now that I think about it. He glanced at me as he passed me. I saw his left eye, and it gave me the chills. I didn’t think too much of it other than thought he was some misfit. My eyes followed him as he passed by me, and I remembered he had this kink in his walk––-it was hard to describe.”
Ansen shook his head. “I don’t remember seeing someone like that, and I didn’t notice any strange smell. If there were something dead in the basement, I would have smelled it.”
“You think I’m crazy?” Maria questioned Ansen with an inquisitive look.
Ansen recognized the trap but didn’t take the bait. He gave a slightest smile but said nothing.
“I see, looks like I’m the one that was crazy.” Maria wasn’t happy that Ansen didn’t take the bait. Although she was joking with Ansen, the fact that only she noticed the odd elements about the situation bothered her. She finally cupped her hands and covered her face inside. “It feels like a strange dream, but it is real, isn’t it?”
Seven miles away in Manfred’s antique shop, chilled air filled the empty room. After Manfred injured the queen, she retreated deep into the box, where she hid her pains and weaved vengeful plans. She didn’t find out June’s private chat with Manfred back in that cold forest so many years ago. Traitor! She screamed, but no one could hear her except the loyal Lão Chóng and her minions. She could feel Lão Chóng right beneath the ground, but she was too weak to communicate with it. She was grateful that Lão Chóng was still alive to help her recover.
After Lão Chóng sent up grubs through a thin feeding tube, the queen regained enough strength to bring herself back to full consciousness. She checked to sense who else was still around and found almost everyone––-Baobao, and the zombies––-lying dormant in the safe house that M
anfred had created. One body was missing, though, and it was Meredith. The thought of her name again boiled her over. How could you? After what we’ve been through? She wondered who else was part of the mutiny. Could Lão Chóng be part of this? It can’t be; it depends on me to survive.
June was too powerful. Perhaps she broke through my spell without me knowing? Her empathizers could still be here. A panic suddenly set in. The queen searched for her three ash boxes that she had entrusted Manfred with, but her probe was blocked by Meredith’s presence.
Queen knew that she could not stay here any longer. The only place she could stay was Maria’s place. But how to get there? There is a good chance. Yes, it will work. First, she needed to figure out how to get herself over to Maria’s house. It was going to take a while for her to recover, and she needed to get into Maria’s house so she could heal faster. As she was contemplating her next move, she sensed a scout bug near her keyhole. The bug had an urgent message from the snake clan. She had a sinking feeling; perhaps her concerns were real. Why else would the snake clan be trying to contact her without the toads? The snakes never contacted her directly, because the toads were in charge. She usually would have ignored and killed the messenger bug, but this time was different. Could this be a trap left behind by Manfred? The queen hesitated. She reached out with her claws and paused.
Curious, where did this spell come from? She was pretty sure Manfred had never seen this old spell before. How could she forget this ancient magic? It was the spell she used to reanimate the warlord’s child. A sudden sadness washed over her. How much she longed to be free again, to be a free person to go wherever she wished. Perhaps the snakes knew where the missing key was. She had to take the risk and hear what the snake clan had to say.
Cautiously, she let the bug connect with her mind and allowed the channel to open slowly––-like peeking behind a heavy door. There was a familiar smell––-what was it? Yes, it is the scent of the snake clan. She remembered the scent well. It brought back a flood of memories—the warlord, the tiger, the child she tried to save, and the torture that killed her. She still feel the pain of her skin as it boiled; the smell of her own burning body while she was still alive. Like standing over a dark chasm, she felt fear she hadn’t felt for a long time. She took a deep breath and widened the channel.
The first thing she saw was a shadow that she hadn’t seen for eons. It felt like so long ago, yet it also felt like yesterday. The shadowy figure was kneeling with his face staring at the ground. There were four others like him mimicking his posture. She could hear them weeping and their bodies shaking. She still recalled his name…Yhawri. He was one of the few survivors from the last power struggle in their sad little world. If she was healthy, she could have read every thought in his mind. But her damaged body was consuming her strength and devolved her ability. It wasn’t natural for her to ask questions that she usually would have extracted from their mind––-this time she had no choice but to ask.
“Yhawri, isn’t that your name? What is the concern?” Her voice was cold and steady. She lay her piercing gaze on the five snakes before her. “Why isn’t Toherd with you?”
“He is busy––-and sent me. Lão Chóng was injured while Manfred––-”
“Don’t speak that traitor’s name!” Her voice boomed. “I would have killed all of you if I was not surprised by that scum.”
“Forgive us, Queen. It was my greatest concern when I learned of your injury. I am so happy to learn that you are well.”
“Well? Thanks to Manfred and you, I almost died.”
Yhawri was concerned that his worst nightmare was going to happen. The queen might just take out her frustration on him. It was a risk that he perceived but was willing to take. This was not the time for him to back down. He had to push forward. It was now or never.
“I am here to tell you that I risked my own life to contact you. Toherd and his toad clan were in it with Manfred. They planned the whole uprising to escape from your grip.”
“And how did you find out about this? I read everyone’s mind, and yet I didn’t pick up anything of such nature.”
“It’s true, you can see for yourself inside my mind. You will know I’m not lying. My Queen, did you also know that Manfred was secretly feeding Meredith the centipede poison spell? That was forbidden, but Manfred managed to slip it past you. I intercepted this intel down here but could not find the right time to pass this to you without getting discovered by Toherd.”
“And how did you intercept this without Toherd learning about it? I didn’t get anything from Lão Chóng either.”
“Sorry to say, my Queen, Lão Chóng was also under the control of Manfred and Toherd, so you can’t really blame Lão Chóng. It is loyal to you but easily scared.”
“And why should I trust you now?” The queen was suspicious as she continued to read Yhawri’s mind for the information she had heard so far. It was just unfathomable that she didn’t know anything was going on under her own nose.
“My Queen, my goal is to serve you, and I’m grateful to have a chance to gain salvation and return to my physical form one day. I plan to help take over Lão Chóng for you and give you direct control of the worm so you will never have to worry about trust any longer. What I learned was that Manfred’s mind was infected by June long ago. Toherd knew about it, even though Manfred did not. Toherd decided not to tell you for fear of losing Manfred and losing control of Lão Chóng. It’s all recorded on my scroll, and you can read it yourself.”
The queen suspected that Manfred conspired with Lão Chóng, but she didn’t think about who else was involved in the mutiny. She thought about who was behind this with Manfred and could see the snakes were still wearing the rings around their necks. It was very unlikely that the snakes were the ones behind this. If anyone in Lão Chóng had a hand in this attempted assassination, it must have been the toads helping Manfred.
“Okay, time to do some housecleaning. I’ll give you permission to take control, so long as you obey all of my orders. The moment I see any deviation, I will rip it out of you, and all of your clan members will be dead. Understood?”
“Clearly, my Queen.”
“You made this great effort to see me. How did you manage to do this without the toads knowing?”
“My Queen, as soon as I found out that the toads were planning this deceptive deed with Manfred, I put a spell on myself so they couldn’t hear my thoughts. I only ask for your permission to take control of Lão Chóng and clean house, so we have a chance to serve you again.”
The queen was injured, but her mind was still sharp. She thought through the history between the two clans and recalled that the toads and the snakes had a big power struggle awhile back. The toad had been in control for a long time, and overall they had been good, but the current mess did happen on the toads’ watch, and she no longer could trust the toads.
It might not be a bad idea for the snakes to take over control for a while, the queen thought to herself.
Yhawri had anticipated the queen’s hesitation, so he tried to ease her mind. “Forgive me, Queen; we just want to serve you for giving us a chance for redemption. We lost so many worms in the hands of the toads over the century. Now, we only have one left. Please let us regain authority so we can grow more worms for you. We really missed serving you directly.”
Lão Chóng, a sanctuary for the trapped souls––-there used to be plenty of them. The queen knew the snake clan were best at growing Lão Chóng, and they were more loyal to her than the toads. She remembered that Manfred liked the toads more than the snakes. She had always liked the snakes more but had never really intervened with Manfred’s job of managing Lão Chóng. Perhaps she should have, she thought. Now that the traitor was gone, why not give the snake a chance?
The queen replied, “Make it swift. I have two things for you to do. The first spell is to grow me a special food. I need it to control Maria. The second spell will bring up a fungus that will paralyze the toads. Use the spell to
eliminate the traitors and take control of Lão Chóng. You also should not use the other spell you dug up from the past. It won’t work. The toads had already decoded the spell and made an antidote.”
The snake leader bowed deeply to the ground and felt the words appearing inside his head.
“We are grateful for Queen’s trust. We shall serve you to the end.”
The queen peeked into the snake’s mind and saw no deceit, but she still felt uneasy.
“Before you go, do something for me.” The queen smiled wickedly. “This is your first test. See if you have the casting ability. Send the cat to Maria’s place. She is not a cat lover, unfortunately.”
“The cat?” The snake leader was momentarily baffled; then he realized the Queen was calling the tiger’s spirit back. “You mean the Great Cat? We haven’t summoned it in a while. I can certainly do that for you, Queen.”
“What shall we do with Elise, the other blood child?”
“We will take care of her in time, but you need to help me to protect Maria and bring me to her. Get one of our proxies to call her and set up the arrangement to send me to her. Do it without the toad’s knowledge. You can do that, can’t you?”
“Yes, my Queen. We will be sure to get to it with haste.” The snake’s image faded away.
Shrinking back into her dark, lonely cell, she realized how much she missed the outside world. She used to ride the view with her blood child and enjoyed seeing everything that they saw in the human world. But after her betrayal, the queen wondered if what she saw were just images of June’s wicked tricks. She could not think of any previous blood child that had betrayed her like this. Most of them were loyal, and some were smarter than the others, but no one was as powerful as June. But it was also she who helped her find two of her ash cases. The previous two cases took her 500 years to recover, whereas June only needed sixty years. Since then, she took only peeks of the outside world when she needed to; she didn’t want to make the same mistake again. She focused all of her energy on finding the next blood child. The bloody mission took over fifty years, and it costed her dearly. She needed one more key, but then everything went to hell on her. She didn’t anticipate Manfred would turn against her, and his wife. She thought that by controlling his wife’s destiny, she could control Manfred, but everyone had their breaking point. She had miscalculated the situation, and it almost cost her life.