by Jasmine Walt
She looked at me again. Her eyes were mirrors of skepticism, as though she didn’t believe me. Smart girl.
We walked along the shops of the pier. The wind from the waters kicked up a few strands of my hair. I looked over my shoulder again but saw no one. Then a shop proclaiming it was an apothecary that sold dragon bone elixirs caught my eye.
“Loren, I’m just gonna pop in here for a bit.”
She wrinkled her nose at the sign above the shop. “Fine, I’m going to take in some actual shopping. Drinks later?”
I nodded, and she turned with a finger wave.
I entered the apothecary. The walls were lined with shelves and cases that would’ve been at home in a library, except from the floor to the ceiling were glass jars of every shape, size, and color. Liquids, solids, sands, and plants filled each jar. I couldn’t determine a rhyme or reason to the order.
At one corner of the shop was a glass display case. Inside were bones—turtle shells, ox scapula, skulls, and femurs. They all had man-made etchings on them. The writings told of prophecies and pasts, predictions and tragedies. Dragon bones.
“Are you looking for a tincture for your health?”
I looked up at the old man who approached. He looked like he’d stepped out of a watercolor painting or an old martial arts film. His hair was all white and tied back from his face. His white beard angled down into a triangle that touched the waistband of his pants.
“The practice of drinking dragon bones is an ancient Chinese remedy,” the apothecary said as he picked up a vial filled with pulverized bone.
I took a step back from the counter. My fingers recoiled, squeezing into my palms. “People ingest that?”
The old man nodded as he poured a measure of the bone powder into a teacup. “For centuries, the bones have been used to cure diseases of the heart, liver, and kidneys.”
He turned his back and reached for a teakettle. It was a plastic one that was plugged into the wall using electricity to heat it instead of the fire from a stovetop.
“It is also used as a sedative to calm the mind and reduce stress and other mental ailments.” He took a sip of the steaming brew. His eyes closed and his face relaxed. “Many profess the tincture staves off aging, but I believe that is because the bones are naturally high in calcium, potassium, and sodium.”
He offered me a secretive smile and a chuckle, but I couldn’t return either. I stared into the cup at the white flecks swirling around. “Where do you get the dragon bones?”
“There are many unearthed from the Shang Dynasty. The practice was widely popular during those times, and the bones are plentiful.”
“You ever see any from the Xia people?”
The apothecary frowned. “A time or two, but they are rare. The Xia weren’t a very large culture and didn’t survive long. But it is believed that the practice of drinking the bones began with the Xia. You look unwell. Would you like a drink?” He offered me the teacup.
As I looked into the dregs, a memory shoved at the back of my mind. I saw hands etching a message into a bone. They were my hands. Water fell on the face of the bone as I signed my name. I was crying, and my hands were shaking.
In the memory, I turned and looked fearfully over my shoulder. My heart was pounding. I tried to stand, but my knees were weak. I felt darkness encroaching on me. It felt like there was no escape, but I had to get away.
I shut my eyes at the internal struggle. When I opened them, the apothecary regarded me with worry. I took one step, and then another, until I was out of the shop. Once outside, I gulped down fresh air. Slowly, my mind settled, my heart rate calmed, and my hands stopped shaking.
Out in the park, people were practicing Tai Chi. I focused on the slow movements, matching my breath to the unhurried rise and fall of their chests. Wind lifted the lapel of my shirt. The prickles started at my neck. I turned, my hand striking out before I had fully faced my opponent. I was met with an equally formidable force.
“Why are you following me?” I demanded of Tres Mohandis.
15
Tres’s lip curled as he gripped my fist in the palms of his large hands. One by one, he unfurled my fingers from their clenched fist, like he was replacing the safety on a cocked gun. Once my fingers were straight, he lowered my hand, but he didn’t step away. Nor did he let go of my fingers. The rough pad of his thumb brushed over my fingertips and knuckles.
“Why would I be following you?” he asked. His voice was low. He spoke slowly, enunciating each syllable. “This is my land.”
That broke his little snake-charming spell. I blinked, and my head jerked back. In the distance, I caught his name on a billboard. I turned my gaze back on him, nearly spitting my words at him. “You cannot own land.”
Tres quirked an eyebrow, along with one side of his mouth. “I have a piece of a tree with ink from the ground that says differently. My company built that park and the buildings on it.”
I yanked my hand from his. He let me go without a fight. We stood glaring at each other. Neither of us said a word for a full minute. He broke the silence first, which pissed me off because I was just about to say something.
“I’m surprised you’re still here after you’ve been denied your wishes.”
“Are you really?” I said. “I don’t give up easily. You should know that after all these years.”
He looked at me quizzically, weighing my words to assess their value as though they might be precious stones encased in rocks. “No, you never give up. Not on the things you truly want.”
Great, another cryptic conversation with undertones I couldn’t decipher without a Rosetta Stone. Did I mention I hate riddles?
“Why do you really want access to that land?” he asked. “And don’t tell me it’s for some old bones. Or that nonsense you spout about every voice being heard. You always have an ulterior motive.”
I struggled to keep my face blank and bland. Blinking my eyes slowly, I was careful to offer no hints in my gaze. I exhaled a light breath to hide any tension in my jaw. “You don’t know me as well as you think you do.”
The sharpness of his smirk nearly cracked my veneer. “I know you better than most, Dr. Rivers.”
His dark eyes were guarded and open at the same time. There was a way in, a path through the shield he’d placed before him. Deep down, I realized I knew the way in. But I didn’t dare take a step onto the playing field. I was going to lose this game. So, I decided to lay down my pieces.
I turned from Tresor Mohandis and began walking away.
But it wasn’t that easy. It had never been that easy when we battled with continents between us. I doubt if it had ever been that easy when we’d met face to face in the past. I picked up the pace of my retreat. But he was on my heels in less than two breaths.
He walked beside me, but he didn’t speak or accidentally brush up against me. He just kept pace with me as he waited patiently. I got the feeling he wouldn’t budge until he got what he wanted. I suddenly wondered exactly how many of those battles to preserve historic lands I had actually won, as opposed to how many he’d let me win.
“I want to know the history of those people,” I said.
“Why?”
I knew those words wouldn’t be enough to satisfy him. But I didn’t have the answers to give him other than, “Their story has been lost.”
“What does it have to do with you?” he asked.
I glanced over at him. His gaze was trained on me, not on the path before us. It needn’t have been. People automatically got out of his way as we walked down the sidewalk. It was like there was an invisible force around his every step. A force field that claimed the land before him as his own.
“When you’ve lived as long as we have, you know the only true death is to be forgotten,” I said. “Buried so deep that no one remembers you. Like you were erased from time.”
Staring up at him, I suddenly felt dizzy. I stumbled, my head going light. Tres reached out and caught me. We stopped walking and stood fa
cing each other between two buildings. The park was on one side of us, an alley on the other.
One of his hands went to my hip. His long fingers spanned to the center of my back. His thumb brushed across my hip bone in a rhythmic pattern that felt familiar. His other hand cupped my cheek and tilted my head back. The thumb of that hand brushed lightly over the slight bags that hung under my eyes.
“Why are you weak?” he asked. “Who have you been around?”
“None of your business.” I straightened and tried to step out from beneath his embrace, but he held me firm.
His embrace softened as he looked down at me, eyes full of concern. The fingers at my hip and cheek tensed before he released me. I was no longer in the cage of his arms. I could break free if I wanted to. Instead, I looked up into those soft, dark eyes.
“Tell me,” he said. His voice was a soft plea, not a hard demand.
“Aleph,” I admitted. “I went to see Aleph a couple days ago. And now you.”
The side of his mouth kicked up in something that looked like relief. He looked at my mouth. His gaze raked over my lips like they were familiar to him. His thumb returned to my face and caressed my lower lip while his eyes continued to appraise the top. His dark irises flickered as though a memory played out on the other side of them. His lips parted and his nostrils flared as though he’d already taken the first kiss and was now deciding if he would go back for seconds.
His hold was gentle but proprietary at the same time. He could tilt my head back and claim me if he chose. But I could just as easily escape his grasp. Why was I not pulling away from him?
Was it because that earthy scent of his began to whisper a long-forgotten tale to me? Or because those dark eyes were opening and shining a light on a vision I’d seen before with my own eyes? Was it because that thumb rubbing hypnotically over my lower lip knew its way around other parts of my body?
A sharp wind whizzed past my ear, breaking the spell. Tres’s hand struck out and caught the throwing star before it had the chance to strike. His eyes widened as he saw the blood on his fingertips.
He turned his head in the direction from which the star had come, and those obsidian eyes flashed murder. He took off before my mind processed the whole scene.
Tres raced down the alley after a man who moved nearly as fast as he did. The alley wasn’t very long. At the end of the narrow passage was a brick building. There was nowhere to go but up. And that was what the man dressed all in black did.
He reached up to the brick. His fingernails got purchase, and he pulled himself up. His vertical climb was short-lived, though.
Immortals couldn’t fly, but we could jump pretty damn high. Tres leaped up into the air and grabbed the man by his shoulders. The two came crashing down. The ninja fell onto his back; Tres landed on his own two feet in a crouch.
The ninja did a flip to get himself back on his feet, landing upright in a fighting stance. Tres didn’t give the man a moment to catch his breath. He was on him before he had his feet grounded under him.
Tres sent a series of devastating strikes at the man’s head and torso. As the ninja attempted to block and protect his face and chest, Tres struck out his powerful legs and attacked the man’s thighs. The ninja went down.
I wasn’t used to being the damsel standing on the side, but there was nothing for me to do as Tres incapacitated the bad guy.
“Who are you?” Tres growled as he put his knee into the fallen man’s chest.
“Bone for blood,” said the man through a bloodied mouth. He looked past Tres, his heated gaze finding me.
I shut my eyes at the three words I’d heard spat over the last millennia as men lay dying in their own blood. The only difference now was that I had a name to put to their kind—the Lin Kuie. And this time, the blood spilled was not by my hands.
I heard a crack and knew Tres had snapped the man’s neck. Instead of looking for confirmation, I turned away. Tres stalked around to the front of me like an angry bull.
He held up the throwing star in his bloodied hand. “Tell me the truth, Theta.”
I stared at the blood seeping through Tres’s fingertips from the sharp points of the blade. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He tossed the blade aside. It clattered to the ground. He grabbed my shoulders, pressing his bloodied fingers into the shirt beneath my jacket. “He’s been following you—from the docks to the shop. Why?”
I met his gaze with a defiant shake of my head. “If you know that he was following me, then that means you were following me, too.”
“Enough, Theta.” He gave me a shake. “Answer me.”
“I don’t know what they want.” I reached up and broke his hold on me with my forearms. “I’m trying to find out. I think the answer is buried somewhere on that land you’re about to bulldoze.”
He looked at me skeptically. “If this is some ploy, like in Thebes…”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I shouted. I was tired and fed up with not having the answers to these riddles everyone kept throwing at me.
Tres stilled. Then he studied me, searching my face for … something. I held still as he gaped in disbelief.
“You don’t…” He swallowed and tried again. “You couldn’t have forgotten…” His lips pressed together like he was about to make the M sound, like he was about to say “me.” But he didn’t. His lips parted as he took a step back.
I said nothing as he continued his retreat. His feet picked up, and he backed away from me with narrowed eyes, flared nostrils, and bared teeth.
He turned and punched the brick wall. I felt the reverberation roll through me. A hairline crack went up the side of the building. A few pieces crumbled and crashed down onto the ground. Without a second glance at me, he stormed out of the alley, leaving me alone with the dead body.
16
After the attack, I walked the city for a few hours to work off some of the adrenaline. I was also trying to jump-start my memories. But try as I might, I couldn’t recall a single thing about Tres Mohandis or Thebes.
The Beijing skyline at night looked like the interior of a nightclub. The sky was a dark blue streaked with neon lights, painting electric patterns of fuchsia, aqua, peach, mint, and violet. But I didn’t find progress beautiful. I liked old things, ancient things. Things with a bit of dirt on their faces, scuffed at the edges. Dented up instead of brand new.
I turned away from the city lights and stared at the Jiankou Mountains in the distance. The Great Wall curved into those mountains, forging its most precipitous peak. I knew the real reason that wall had been built. My records of the actual event were back on my island. But the truth of my time in the Gongyi, the facts of my relationship with Tres Mohandis, was a dark void in my mind. No matter how bright a light I shone on things, bits and pieces of my past constantly slipped through my fingers and the cracks in my mind.
I headed back to the hotel. As I reached the entrance, I tried to figure out how to get out of drinks with Loren. Girls’ night with my perceptive new sidekick was the last thing I needed in my current mental state.
I felt the tickle at the back of my throat announcing the presence of another of my kind. I turned on my heel, preparing to run. That may have been cowardly, but I didn’t want to deal with him again this evening. I didn’t want to face the challenge in his eye or the anger at my ignorance of our past.
It was the soft chuckle that halted my retreat. I turned back and watched his frame as he leaned against the front desk counter. He looked the same as the last time I’d seen him, but I stared at him as though it were the first.
His broad back made a rounded M shape as he hunched his tall form down to speak with the concierge. Ropey forearms rested on the glass of the counter. His shirtsleeves were rolled up to show the light smackling of dark hair on his tanned forearms. He wore jeans that showed off his toned ass.
“Your wife is a lucky woman.” The female concierge batted her eyelashes at him and leaned her
chest forward in an open invitation. “She’ll be thrilled you flew all the way here from France just to see her.”
“Oui, she will. Maintenant, if you’ll just give me her room key?”
“I can’t give you her key. It’s against hotel policy. But I can buy you a drink while you wait for her to come back from wherever she is.” The concierge continued to bat those lashes as though there were something in her eye. I wanted to tell her that move wasn’t sexy at all, but I felt no need.
Zane frowned. Well, pouted was more like it. I could see the concierge buckling under his lush lips. Poor woman—she was no match for him. But before Zane could launch the final assault, his nose twitched. His smile widened. The concierge leaned in, ready to take her shot, but he turned away from her.
His gaze started at the floor. He took in my hiking boots and worked his way up until he was looking at my face. I was in his arms by the time he met my gaze.
“Never mind,” he told the concierge. “I have found a way in.”
I ignored the woman’s glare as I buried my nose in Zane’s neck. Inhaling deeply, I got a hit of the earthy smell of sage, the buttery smell of croissants, and the tart smell of acetone. His arms wrapped around me, lifting my feet off the floor until he had my whole being in his embrace.
“You’re here,” I said.
“Happy anniversary, mon coeur.”
I pulled away from him, but not so far I couldn’t run my fingers through his thick locks. Brushing back the handful of unruly hairs that constantly fell into his hooded eyes, I said, “But you had a showing. Your first in decades—”
He kissed the fleshy blade of my palm, then nosed at my hand until his lips met the center of my palm. Raising his face upward, he scaled over the top of my knuckles and kissed each of my fingertips one by one.
“It always makes me appear more mysterious when I don’t show up,” he said. “And it makes the sales prices on the pieces go higher.”