by Jasmine Walt
There was more silence on the line.
“What about our time together?” he asked.
“It doesn’t have to be in the cottage,” I said. “We could meet in a grungy motel, and I’d be happy. I just need to see this through first.”
“Tell me why, Nova. Why is this artifact so important?”
His voice was so soft. It urged the truth from me.
I was so close to telling him. I wondered if I would have in that moment if we were alone and I didn’t have a nosy Dutch woman behind me, most certainly eavesdropping. “I just need to know how this story ended. Can you understand that?”
“No.” He sighed, but there was no bite to his denial. “I’m a selfish man. I only care about our story. But I care more for your happiness, you know that.”
“You make me happy.” I cradled the phone in my hand, pressing the receiver closer to my mouth as though I could kiss him.
This world we lived in was filled with ugly, dark things. I spent my life digging up the evidence of that fact. And every time I found something disheartening, Zane would pull out his colors and paint me a dream world—a beautiful fantasy. I didn’t think I could go on every day without the beauty he showed me. I couldn’t remember how I did before I met him.
“I know I make you happy,” he said. “I am an old, dusty thing with lost stories to uncover.”
I giggled again. And then, “Zane? Do you remember Epsilon and Vau?”
The line crackled. We were obviously testing the boundaries of Delta’s signal boost.
“What made you think of them?” he asked.
“I saw Aleph.”
“I didn’t know you still visited her.”
“I check on her every couple of decades. She’s so preoccupied with death. I guess I just want to make sure she’s still with us. She’s living in a convent in Catalina now.”
“That woman is a menace, if to no one other than herself. I don’t like you being near her.”
I jerked away from the phone, my spine going rigid. “Are you telling me to stay away from her?”
Zane chuckled. “I’m a wise old man. I would never presume to tell Dr. Nia Rivers what to do. But I do hope you take my counsel, mon coeur. I have respect for my elders, but Aleph is on the edge of crazy. She likes to play games like Bet and Yod.”
“I think she remembers more than she lets on.”
“I’m certain she does. Why do you mention Epsilon and Vau?”
“Just something she said.”
“I remember them,” Zane said. “They were very much in love.”
“You speak of them in the past.”
“I haven’t seen or heard from them in a long time.”
“Do you think they’re dead?”
He didn’t answer.
“Do you think that could happen to us if we stay together too long? That we’d weaken and die?”
“No,” he said before I finished speaking. “We’re careful. We have a system. I’m going to love you until the end of time, Nova.”
My heart warmed at the declaration. And suddenly, I couldn’t remember why I’d flown to the opposite side of the world rather than landing in France to be in this man’s arms.
“And, Nova…”
But the phone crackled. The connection fizzled. The line snapped. And the phone died.
10
I stepped out of the hotel later that evening. Unlike in D.C., the Beijing skyline was completely obstructed by the hand of human progress. Steel buildings scraped the sky. Most of nature was covered in concrete. The evening looked like a cloudy day with smog visible in the pale moonlight. Not a single star was visible under the array of neon light that shone across the horizon.
There were Starbucks and McDonald’s amid the pagodas. Construction sites mixed in with rundown temples and steel high rises. A wrecking ball hung in front of a temple. On the beam of the ball, written in bold block letters, was the name Mohandis Enterprises. The man was literally bulldozing his way through this culture.
Out on the streets, people were dressed in modern garb, more futuristic than anything with glossy fabrics. No one was in black with covered faces. But I was still unsettled walking down the streets of Beijing.
“Hey.” A hand reached out and grabbed at my elbow.
In two seconds, with two flicks of my wrist, my blade landed against Loren’s neck.
A half second later, the tip of her cane dug into my rib cage. We were in a tight clench. No one could see the weapons unless they peered between us. Her eyebrows were raised, not in fear but in a question.
We stared each other down, neither of us saying a word. Neither of us backing off.
“I don’t like being snuck up on,” I offered instead of an apology.
She nodded slowly while pursing her lips. “So, no surprise birthday parties for you, then.”
I lowered the blade. She retracted the cane.
Wiping at the tiny nick at her neck, I said, “I have some concealer in my purse.”
I took out my makeup kit and applied a dusting on the damage I’d caused to her skin. She held still, eyeing me curiously, but she didn’t ask why I wore a blade beneath my skirt. Probably for the same reason I didn’t ask why she carried a cane in her purse.
“Cute dress,” Loren said after I put my makeup case away.
Most of the wardrobe in my luggage consisted of all-weather cargo pants, moisture-wicking shirts, and worn hiking boots. But I always made room for a little black dress.
“Thanks,” I said. “Yours too.”
My dress was simple, damn near plain compared to Loren’s. It hugged my bust and flared over my hips to allow my legs freedom of movement, if I needed it. Loren’s dress looked like it was held up by a wing and a prayer. Each time she inhaled, the spindly straps stretched as though they would snap at any moment to release what she claimed were her best assets. She grinned at me like she knew it.
“I still don’t understand why we’re wearing cocktail dresses to a business meeting,” I said.
Loren waggled her head and pursed her lips again. “It’s not exactly a business meeting, more of a party.”
We fell into step as we headed down the crowded street. My eyes darted right and left, taking in the sights and sounds. It was sensory overload after being out in the middle of a jungle with silent soldiers and focused scientists, and then in a convent of praying nuns.
“Party?” I asked.
This time, Loren lifted one shoulder before she answered. “More of a festival.”
“Festival?” I put my hand on her forearm to stop her forward motion. People bumped into us as they tried to reroute their steps on the crowded sidewalk. “Loren, do we actually have a meeting with an official from SACH?”
SACH stood for State Administration of Cultural Heritage. They were responsible for conserving and protecting China’s historical locations.
“It’s not a scheduled sit-down,” Loren said slowly, as though explaining complex math to a grade-schooler. “But my contact will be there, and we can meet with him.”
“Contact? You mean your ex-boyfriend?”
“Ew.” She shuddered. “I don’t do boyfriends. He’s a former lover. And I told you, we left it on good terms.”
I sighed, wondering what I was walking into. I could just ditch Loren and head down to the Gongyi on my own. But then I’d spend who knew how long just trying to find the site. I decided I could stick it out for the night. Besides, I needed a party to help loosen the last dregs of stress from my bones.
“It’ll be fun,” Loren said. “It’s a dynastic festival with performances from the Shang and Zhou Dynasties. They even have a performance from the Xia.”
“I thought the Xia still weren’t a recognized dynasty?”
“That’s what we’re here to change. That’s what you do, right? Save lost cultures. You’re the Wonder Woman of history.”
I snorted, but I let her lead me across the street. She ushered me through the gates of a park. There
were white tents set up around smaller pavilions outlined with red and gold flags. Men and women milled around with glasses of wine in their hands, their evening finery cloaked in an air of privilege.
“Ni hao, Li,” Loren said.
A tall, waifish man in a tailored suit turned around. His eyes met with Loren’s bust, and his nostrils flared. Then his gaze tilted up to her face, and he cringed.
“The answer is no, Ms. Van Alst.” Li gave a definitive shake of his head and sliced the air with his hand.
“Since when did I become Ms. Van Alst?”
“Since you nearly caused an international incident the last time you went onto the Mohandis construction site in Gongyi. Without permission, I might add.”
“I had permission … your permission.” Loren breathed in, her chest swelling. “Which I need again.”
Li’s eyes dipped down to the straps of Loren’s dress. One of the spaghetti straps quivered. The edge of his eye twitched along with it. He shut his eyes. “No.”
Loren frowned. Her chin hit her chest. She eyed her boobs as though something was wrong. I covered my mouth to hide my snort.
“You’re just using me,” Li was saying. “I nearly lost my job because of you when we were dating.”
Loren scratched at her temple and screwed up her eyes in confusion. “Dating?”
“I still haven’t forgotten about the Daqian painting that was in SACH’s possession last year when we were together. It had been authenticated when it came into our possession, but when it was sold, it was determined to be a fake.”
“An awful fake at that. A child could’ve painted a better copy.” Loren’s lip curled up. She caught my eye, averted her gaze, and turned back to Li. “Besides, it’s a bone, not a painting this time. This is Dr. Nia Rivers, world-renowned artifact authenticator. She says the bone is authentic.”
Li turned to me. “You’ve seen this dragon bone she’s going on about?”
“Well…” I began and stopped.
“She’s seen the picture,” Loren said. “And from that, she believes its authenticity. Now, if we can just get clearance to get down onto the land with a few of your people on our team—”
Li shook his head again, definitively this time. “I can’t trust your word. Your father was a good forger, and you have his talents. I can’t take that risk, no matter the reward.”
Loren’s grip tightened on her bag. I put my hand on her forearm. I was stronger than her, but I felt the strength of anger coursing through her. Luckily, Li wound himself back into the crowd before she could produce her cane.
“Blind asshole,” Loren spat. “He has the find of a lifetime in his grasp, and he won’t trouble himself to do the work to get his hands dirty.”
“Is that what you call leaving a relationship on good terms?” I asked.
Loren scratched at her cheek and screwed up her eyes in confusion. “Relationship?”
I chuckled despite myself, but then I sobered. “Loren, did you forge a Daqian landscape painting?”
Zhang Daqian was a renowned painter of splashed landscapes and lotus drawings. Many in the world might not know his name, but they could see his paintings in Chinese restaurants and copies on everything from calendars to wallpaper.
“No,” she said. She scratched at her nose, reminding me of the story of Pinocchio. Huffing, she turned to me with her hands on her hips. “Do you really care about a couple of watercolor paintings? Or do you want to get your hands on that dragon bone?”
My forehead wrinkled as I squinted at this woman before me. She was a definite tomb raider, an alleged art forger, and a likely liar. But she was also my only lead to finding out more about the Lin Kuie and what I’d been doing in China nearly two thousand years ago.
“So what’s the plan now?” I asked. “Do you have another way in?”
Loren’s eyes lit with mischief. But before she could hatch whatever new harebrained scheme that had come into her head, someone called out to her.
“Ms. Van Alst, is that you?”
We turned to see a slight man. There was a hunch to his back. His white hair was in wisps. But his smile, which wobbled as it spread, was wide and infectious.
“Dr. Nia Rivers, this is Mr. Xu,” Loren said. “He’s a councilman for the Gongyi province. He’s hoping to get a historical designation from SACH so that they don’t build on his ancestral land.”
Mr. Xu put out his hand to me. It was as gnarled as tree bark. His hair and even his eyebrows were snow white, but his eyes were sharp. I took his hand in mine gingerly, as I would an ancient piece of parchment.
A tingling feeling crawled up my arm. I wanted to pull my hand back. But when I studied the old man’s face, he looked entirely harmless. I wondered if he was a descendant of the men who routinely attacked me. If he was, we had obviously never met. He was alive, for one. He was old, for two. And, three, he was smiling at me without holding a sharp, pointed object over me.
No, this man was not ninja material. I relaxed marginally as I took my hand back from him. But he held on, his grip surprisingly strong for someone so old. He rubbed his rough thumb over the bones of my wrist.
“Well done, Ms. Van Alst,” the old man said. “You’ve brought her to me as promised.”
I gave my hand a yank, and it came free. Then I turned to Loren.
“I met Mr. Xu when I was in the Gongyi,” she said, not appearing to have noticed anything out of the ordinary.
“You were on sacred lands without permission, it would seem.” Mr. Xu chuckled and then coughed. His entire body shook with effort. After a moment, he straightened and smiled at me.
His eyes raked over me in a proprietary fashion that made me uncomfortable. There had been younger, stronger, more powerful men to look at me in that fashion. But none of them had made me squirm. I fidgeted with the hem of my skirt, tugging it down lower on my thigh.
“Am I to believe that the IAC sent you here to see the site in Gongyi?” Xu asked, hope filling his voice. “Are they finally taking up our petition to have our homeland designated a protected historical site?”
I looked between him and Loren. Loren raised her eyebrows at me, as though urging me to spin a tale. But she knew I wasn’t here on IAC business.
“I’m here on my own,” I said. “I’m doing a preliminary assessment. Can you allow me passage onto the land where Ms. Van Alst found the artifact of interest?”
“I’m afraid I don’t have that power anymore, Dr. Rivers. Not on my own land.” He shook his head sadly. “I am a direct descendant of the Xia—one of the few.”
Maybe that was why my fingers tingled at the contact. Maybe the beef between his people and Immortals was in the DNA.
“But with Mr. Mohandis’s lease on much of our lands,” he continued, “I feel I am a guest in my own backyard. A stranger has come to tear down what generations of my family have worked hard to build. No matter how loudly I shout, no one seems to listen. It doesn’t seem right.”
“No,” I agreed. “It is not right.”
I ignored the continued prickles at my back and directed my ire at the land-grubbing villain in this story—Tres Mohandis. He didn’t care who got in the way of his precious progress. He’d mow us all down if given the chance.
“There are not many direct descendants of the Xia who live in Gongyi. Only a few hundred or so. Our people simply disappeared from history. We believe it was a mass genocide.”
The prickles turned to buzzing in my ears. “Is there any documentation of who, or what, happened to cause it?” I asked. “A flood of the river? Or a Shang army, perhaps?” I couldn’t keep the hope out of my voice that some other option had been the cause of the decimation of his people, not me.
Mr. Xu shrugged. “The truth has been lost. But it looks like Ms. Van Alst has found a clue, just like in the adventure books.” He chuckled and then went through another round of coughing.
“The story is there on the bones,” Loren said. “I just need to get past the Mohandis security and
take another look. This time with an authenticator.” She turned to me. “And maybe then the government will believe me and allow us to excavate properly, just as my father wanted.”
“For many generations, the Xia have been protective of our history and culture,” Mr. Xu said. “Some say there is a great secret hidden within our bones. Perhaps it has come time to share our stories with the world.”
“I’m glad you are finally seeing the possibilities of progress, Mr. Xu.”
Loren and Mr. Xu turned at the sound of that deep voice. But it froze me in place. The cool steel of the blade against my thigh didn’t stop the trembling in my fingers.
I turned to see a massive man filling the space behind me. Tall, dark, handsome, commanding—a force. I’d turned to face Tresor Mohandis.
11
I knew this was Tres. Not because I felt a tickle in my throat or because I’d seen his pictures in old portraits and recent magazines. It was because I felt the power of him. Tres was old, older than I was. He radiated the same power as Aleph.
Pictures did not do Tresor Mohandis justice. I’d never had the occasion to come face to face with the man. I’d battled the legend of him for longer than I could remember.
In my mind, he was a land-grubbing ogre. In reality, he was a husky giant. He should have been swathed in reams of fabric like his desert ancestors. Instead of a sheik’s traditional garb, broad shoulders filled out a tailored suit. His pectoral muscles pushed at the front of his crisp white shirt. He stood casually on powerful thighs. Sand-touched skin was stretched across a strong jaw. Thick, chestnut locks fell just above dark eyes.
“It’s the past that makes progress possible,” Mr. Xu was saying.
The two men faced off. It was a white-haired, hunched-back David slinging a tiny pebble at Goliath’s massive chest. The pebble bounced and fell back down to the ground.
“The contracts have been signed, Mr. Xu,” said the mountain of a man in a deep baritone. “This deal will greatly benefit the people of your county.”
“Many of the people who live in my county are not the original Xia Dynasty, Mr. Mohandis,” said Mr. Xu. “You will be helping strangers in a land not their own. Meanwhile, the voices of the people who have been tied to the land for generations, the people of the original Xia Dynasty, are being ignored.”