by Mel Odom
“Junk?” Xander grinned nervously and tried not to let his irritation show through. “This isn’t junk. This is a . . . a family heirloom.”
Teresa looked at him and shook her head. “Not in this family. Some names the accessory fashion-challenged should remember, Geek Boy.” She tapped her purse. “Versace.” She tapped her sunglasses. “Oakley.” She tapped her tennis bracelet. “Tiffany’s.” And she tapped her shoes. “Anything Gucci.”
“Right. I’ll try to remember those.”
Teresa sniffed disdainfully. “As for your little trinket, you could probably find another in a garage sale. If you hit the properly downwardly mobile areas in Sunnydale. In fact, I’d start with your neighborhood.” Without another word, she moved on.
A small group of fashionably aware guys and girls moved with her, laughing fashionably at Xander.
You know, Xander thought, I’m not gonna get out of high school soon enough. He closed his hand over the necklace and turned to walk down the hallway. At least his luck hadn’t gone completely sour. At least he hadn’t bumped into—
“Oh my,” a familiar voice said.
Xander looked up, his heart stopping on the spot.
Chapter 13
CORDELIA CHASE STOOD IN THE HALLWAY IN FRONT OF Xander, looking every bit the high school beauty queen in silver-white Capri pants and a patchouli drawstring cami that showed a lot of healthy, tanned skin that Xander used to love to get next to. He hadn’t even known patchouli was a type of purple color before Cordelia because he’d never had a patchouli Crayola Crayon, even in the big 128-count box. Her dark hair swept back from her shoulders. “Hi,” Xander said, cringing inside because he knew saying even that much these days was enough to draw Cordelia’s wrath.
Cordelia glanced down at the necklace in his hand. “New hobby? Or rewards for begging?”
“More like a quest-type event,” Xander said. Think neutral, totally neutral, going stealth-mode here. No biting remarks, no attacks.
Cordelia looked a bit more curiously at the necklace. “Vampire thingy?”
“No.”
“Death spell talisman thingy?”
“Wouldn’t be holding it if it was,” Xander politely pointed out, just so she’d know it wasn’t dangerous.
“Unless it only killed brain cells,” Cordelia said. “Or eliminated that faithful trait that shows up more often in dogs than it does in the male species. You could still be safe then.” She smiled with cruel charm.
Xander started to respond, but caught himself. “Fair enough. Okay, you’ve gotten that out of your system.”
Cordelia eyed him archly. “That isn’t the only thing I’ve gotten out of my system.”
Xander walked away because it was the only nonviolent, nonderogatory thing he could do. “See you around, Cordy.”
“That would fall somewhere under the heading of aggravated assault.”
Xander didn’t look back through sheer force of will. He and Cordelia Chase had never traveled in the same circles—except when they were out slaying vampires and other demonic beings. And that hadn’t exactly been a barrel of laughs. Especially for Cordy, when she got ostracized from all the other cools for standing up to them and going out with him. Things were so much better when she simply despised me from a distance instead of making things so personal.
He squeezed the necklace in his hand, hanging onto the little bit of hope he’d crawled into bed with last night. I’ve met someone new. The swordswoman’s face had haunted his dreams all night, which had been kind of a pleasant experience as far as haunts went.
Reluctantly, he turned his steps toward the library. When you have to find out stuff, there’s really only one place to go around here. The drawback was that he wasn’t quite certain how ready he was to share the mysterious swordswoman with his friends.
Only Giles was in the library when Xander arrived. The Watcher glanced up at him from the main desk.
“Good morning, Xander,” Giles said.
“Not exactly,” Xander replied. “But I’m hoping it’ll pick up. I swear I’m due.”
“Oh?”
“Cordy. Hallway. Majorly bad scene.”
“I’m . . . sorry to hear that?” Giles tried valiantly.
“Yeah,” Xander said. “Me, too.” He leaned on his elbows on the countertop. “You know, I’m beginning to think she’s never going to get over me.”
“Really?”
Xander glanced at the Watcher suspiciously. “Sarcasm?”
“Not at all. It doesn’t surprise me that Cordelia is hurt. I actually suspect both of you have been quite hurt over this, and I wish things hadn’t worked out as they had.”
Seeing the honest sympathy on Giles’s face unnerved Xander. It was one thing to take the breakup as a bad joke, but it was another to overinvest in the heartbreaking side of it. “She’ll get over it. Her life is nothing but up from here, and she knows it.”
Giles remained noncommittal.
“Okay, enough maudlin self-pity, which, by the way, is a shame because I’ve learned to do it so well.” Xander laid the necklace on the counter. “I came here seeking answers, o wise and great oracle.”
Giles picked up the necklace. “And this is?”
“The swordswoman’s. She dropped it last night. I found it.”
“Why didn’t you mention it last night?” Giles examined the necklace with mild enthusiasm.
“Last night I wanted it for myself.”
“I see.”
“I know it sounds kind of weird.” Xander suddenly felt more than a little uncomfortable.
“Not really.” Giles turned the necklace over in his hands.
“Some people might think it was a fetish of some kind.”
“Oh, and do you have a habit of taking girls’ personal items for your own gratification?” Giles asked. He looked up quickly. “And if you do, please don’t tell me about it.”
“No, I don’t. She dropped the necklace. I just wanted to return it to her. I thought maybe you might be able to help me find her.”
“The necklace is quite old. Pity there isn’t a jeweler’s or silversmith’s inscription on it.”
“There are markings on the back,” Xander pointed out.
“I saw those, but I can’t read them.” Partially absorbed by the mystery, Giles reached for a piece of paper and a pencil. “They appear to be in Chinese, but I’m not expert enough in the different dialects to know how to translate it.”
“Do you know someone who could?”
Giles placed the paper over the back of the necklace, then took the pencil and rubbed carefully. The inscription materialized on the paper. “I can pass this around and see if anything turns up.” He glanced at Xander. “Mind you, most of our efforts right now are directed toward the Black Wind question.”
Xander nodded. With the violence that had taken place last night as well as the news coverage, all of Sunnydale was in an uproar over gangs and Asians. The school grapevine had it that some of the Asian students in school had decided not to come today. “Did I miss the morning briefing?”
“No.” Giles handed the necklace back to Xander. “I think everyone slept in this morning.”
Xander bounced the necklace in his palm, enjoying the solid, heavy feel of it. It was easy to imagine that she hadn’t simply dropped it, and that she’d intended for him to find it so he could find her. “What can you tell me about it? How old is it?”
“I’d guess easily four or five hundred years old,” Giles replied. “Probably a family piece that’s been handed down for generations.”
“So she’d want it back?”
“Oh, most definitely, I’d say. Although it may not be overly cosmetically appealing—”
“Glitzy,” Xander translated.
“—the age alone is going to make a piece like that a collector’s item. But I suspect the personal value she probably places on it would overshadow that.”
“What about this yin/yang thing?” Xander asked. “She was
really good at martial arts. Maybe I should check out some of the dojos around Sunnydale.”
Giles sighed. “Xander, you do know that the yin/yang isn’t a martial arts symbol?”
“Sure. Everybody knows it signifies good and evil.”
“That’s not precisely true, either. What it actually represents are the two polarities of existence that are believed to exist within everything. Yin, the dark half, symbolized evidently by the blue stone in the piece you’re holding, represents the female side of existence. It’s withdrawn, passive, and receptive, and tends to keep everything moving down and in. The white stone, the male half, on the other hand, represents yang. It is supposed to be masculine, forceful, and expansive, tending to keep things moving up and out. But neither of these two halves occurs without having a little piece of the other within them. That’s why each half has a small dot of the other within it.”
“And all this means what exactly?” Xander asked. Long explanations were the chief reasons he didn’t like coming to Giles for help. He wished there was a way to put the Watcher into TV Guide mode.
“That you may not be looking for a martial artist.”
Xander shook his head. “You saw how she moved. Even from across the street, you had to see how she moved.”
“I did.”
“If she’s not as fast as Buffy, then she’s definitely a close second. And as for jumping, man, she’s got Buffy beat hands down.”
Giles nodded. “I’d say that’s a fair assessment. But what I’m suggesting is that if it’s not a warrior per se that you’re looking for, it might be a Taoist monk.”
“A monk?” The idea jarred Xander. The image that instantly came to mind contained lots of little old guys in robes, shaved heads, and wrinkles. When you can snatch the pebble from my hand . . .
“The yin/yang symbol is derived from the Taoist beliefs,” Giles continued.
“She didn’t call me grasshopper,” Xander pointed out.
“Yes, and I’m sure that’s probably a very significant observation.”
Xander frowned. “Now that’s sarcasm.”
“Definitely.”
“Okay, I had that coming. Let’s say she’s some kind of monk, which kind of creeps me out in its own very weird way, do they all take some kind of vow of chastity or celibacy?”
“No.”
“Then that’s okay. She can be a monk.”
Giles looked at him. “Xander, from the little bit I saw of this young lady, as formidable as she appears to be, I’d say she’s already whatever she wants to be without your blessings in the matter.”
Yeah, but no vows means she’s dateable, too. Xander said thanks and headed for the door.
“You’re quite taken with her, aren’t you?”
Xander turned around and kept walking backward, never losing the smile on his face. “Not me, Giles. I’m just a gentleman, trying to return a lost item to a young lady.”
“Right.” Giles nodded, looking unconvinced. “While you’re caught up in this quixotic venture of yours, do be careful.”
“Of course,” Xander replied, still walking backward as the first bell rang. “Careful’s what I do best.” He turned around and walked into the wall beside the door.
Angel stood safely in the shadows on the west side of the warehouse away from the morning sun. Forklifts slammed and screeched as they ferried loads to and from the docks and the big ocean freighters sitting in anchorage. Men’s voices, mixed with the slap of the waves, echoed around him.
He carried a Styrofoam cup of coffee and a small brown paper bag. A fresh, white gauze patch covered the wound on his face. The pigs’ blood he had bought from a butcher he did business with had healed part of the damage from last night’s gunshot wound, but a complete restoration was a day or two off. Drinking human blood would have cut the time frame down to hours, but that wasn’t an option.
Sunnydale wasn’t big enough to have a huge amount of shipping, but what there was went briskly. Vegetables from different nearby farms were taken onto ships while other goods were off-loaded. Huge boom arms carrying cargo netting full of crates containing farm equipment, computers and peripherals, and clothing swiveled over to the docks.
Security teams, provided by the different shipping lines as well as harbor patrol, moved through the dockworkers and ships. Sunnydale police officers were in greater numbers than usual. It was no secret that they were looking for the Black Wind gang members who had terrorized the town the night before.
Angel had walked Buffy home after the meeting in the diner broke up, then returned to his mansion long enough to get a change of clothing. Nocturnal by nature, he hadn’t needed sleep. But the day and the wounds wore on him now.
He watched the brown gulls and white terns out in the harbor as they heeled through the blue sky. Their excited squawks signaled the times they found a prize bit of flotsam on the water just before they dove for it.
Then a familiar squeak-squeak-squeak of a grocery cart caught Angel’s attention. An ancient bag lady trundled her shopping basket along the wooden and concrete walkways of the docks.
The bag lady wore a heavy brown coat against the morning chill rolling in off the sea, a black-watch cap, and dark yellow galoshes that sported strips of gray duct tape applied in layers. She was leathery and wrinkled and thin, only a couple inches over five feet tall. Fingerless black gloves covered her hands. Iron-gray hair hung under the watch cap to her chin.
Her cart was battered and bent, and had the one wheel that continued to protest shrilly. Metal jangled as the basket rolled and shook. Plastic trash bags were only half-filled with the day’s bounty, but Angel knew they’d be filled before the old woman gave up.
“Louise,” he called softly.
The old woman’s head whipped around and she reached for the lead-weighted shark billy she carried in one of her galoshes. Her eyes narrowed as she studied Angel with wariness and suspicion. Her life had never been easy, and it showed in every coiled movement, every scar on her face and arms.
“Angel.” Then she recognized him, eyes widening. She smiled and waved. “How are you doing, my boy?”
“Top o’ the morning, Ma,” Angel said, because he knew saying that always made her smile. She loved his Irish accent, which he usually negated from his speech so he could blend easier in Sunnydale. He walked toward her as far as he could and still remain within the sheltering safety of the shadows. Louise knew what he was, and knew why he couldn’t come into direct sunlight.
She turned the shopping basket toward him and pushed it forward. Her bird-bright blue eyes studied him. “It’s been a long time since I’ve seen you.” When she drew even with him, she reached out and patted his arm. “It’s good to see you.”
“It’s good to see you, too.” Angel offered the coffee and the brown paper bag. “I brought breakfast if you’re interested.”
She held up a hand, the fingers crooked and bent from hard times as well as age. “You know I don’t take handouts.”
“I know.” Angel had met Louise when he’d first come to Sunnydale at Whistler’s insistence, before he’d met Buffy. The sea had drawn him because he’d known vampire predators hunted the shores, and hunting those hunters had been a step in the right direction. He’d saved the old bag lady on one of those restless nights, and she’d invited him into the cardboard shack she’d set up under one of the older pilings.
“Me and old Betsy,” Louise said, slapping her cart affectionately, “as long as we can still get up and down this beach, we make do.”
“I need some information.”
“Well, in that case I’m working.” Louise gratefully took the coffee and paper bag. She sat cross-legged in the building’s shadow.
Angel sat beside her, admiring her gusto as she prowled through the bag.
“A sausage, egg, and cheese bagel,” she said enthusiastically. “Bless you, Angel.”
“You’re welcome.” Angel sat with his knees raised before him, shoes just beyond the searing tou
ch of the sun.
Louise expertly peeled the bagel, took a paper napkin from the bag, and tucked it inside the neckline of the black Metallica concert tee shirt she wore. “What were you wanting to know?”
“Anything you can give me about the Asian gang that hit town last night.”
Louise ate as they talked, but when she spoke her words were always clear. Her eyes roved incessantly, bearing the mark of the hunted. The local vampires and demons stayed away from her for the most part, knowing she’d been put under Angel’s care.
Every day Louise panhandled her way through Sunnydale, picking up interesting seashells along the beach to sell to tourist shops, collecting aluminum cans to sell to can banks, and scavenging things that other homeless people she knew could put back together and sell somewhere else. In her constant travels, she was generally a good source of information.
“I don’t know how reliable this information is,” Louise warned.
“It will beat anything I know now,” Angel promised.
She looked at him as if to make sure he was telling the truth. “They call themselves the Black Wind.”
“That much I knew,” Angel said. “But I don’t know where they’re from or what they want.”
Louise nodded and took another nibble from the bagel. “I got this from one of the Chinese sailors on Ryan’s Star. Do you know the ship?”
Angel shook his head.
“She’s a deep-water English transport,” Louise said. She often talked about the ships like they were visiting relatives. She traded things she acquired or fixed for items the sailors had, then sold those items in town. “Handles cars and computers shipped out from Singapore. Old Soo-Pheng is a sailor aboard her. He grew up around Hong Kong and was in the merchant marine, so he knows a lot about China. And he knows about the Black Wind.”
Angel waited patiently though he was restless inside. Louise was a natural storyteller and couldn’t be hurried.
“The Black Wind is an old gang in China,” Louise said. “Until 1997 when the Brits gave Hong Kong back over to the Chinese government, they were kept out of Hong Kong proper. Then they spread throughout it. They work behind the scenes like most of the gangs there do. Soo-Pheng says the gangs there are sometimes called triads.”