Ninja Girl: The Nine Wiles

by Steven W. White

  23

  The quiet in the library seemed to draw itself out, stretching tighter and thinner.

  "How dare you," Ash whispered.

  She felt that night as if it was still within her, as if that knife was still slashing at her, so close to cutting her skin. She shivered, and tears filled her eyes. "How could you say something like that? Are you trying to hurt me?"

  "No, no." Mule reached a hand out to her, but came short of touching her. He let it drop to the table. "I'm sorry. You told me you hated him."

  "So you made that up to make me feel better?"

  "No. It's true. At least, I think so. I figured... maybe we should tell the cops."

  The image of Drake as the principal’s obedient servant had settled on her like an invisible weight, never tolerated in her conscious mind but relentlessly pressing on her anyway. Now, images of the principal, Drake, and the attack on that awful night swirled in her mind, nightmarish connections linking them like tentacles.

  Ash pointed at him. "If you ever say that to anyone, if you ever mention his name and that night in the same sentence, so help me, I'll never speak to you again."

  Mule swallowed. "Okay."

  Ash wiped her eyes. "God, Mule, how could you even think...?" She suddenly felt close to the reason Drake had disappeared. "Wait, did you accuse him of that?"

  "No." Mule looked at the knuckles of his right hand. "I just..."

  "What?"

  "Oh, brother. You're not going to like this. Damn, I wish you weren't dating him."

  Ash struggled for patience. "What have you done, Mule?"

  "It's just that…" Mule considered his fist. "Maybe I have sensitive knuckles. Or it's a muscle memory thing. I punch a guy and it's like a fingerprint. I never forget a good hit."

  "A good... what are you saying?"

  "Drake and I–"

  "Fought?"

  "Sort of a scuffle–"

  "You hit him? And that makes you think..."

  "I've hit him before."

  Ash felt sick, and it was Mule – as if she were allergic to him. "I can't hear this." She raised her hands as if to ward him off, but it was an empty gesture. She had to get away. Shaking her head, she fled the table, out of the library, as fast as she could without running.

  #

  In the main building's broom closet, Spencer could still smell the ammonia of years long past. Irritating sounds warbled from the air vent. And since Mule had stopped by, the sheer expectation of someone's heavy-handed knock distracted him from editing his article – a probing interview with Gil the janitor.

  The air vent's warbling settled into the hypnotic tone of Principal Alexander, having another of his one-sided telephone conversations. "He hasn't reported in. No one knows where he is. I've considered recruiting the local police."

  Spencer's ears pricked at that final word. He eyed the dull metal slats of the vent, listening.

  "I know he tends to run off. But now? When we are so close? I suspect the girl. No. No, I've made my decision. We're changing the schedule. We can't delay any more. The library renovation begins tomorrow night."

  #

  Ash had to see Drake, and now.

  The principal's home address in the Bellevue suburbs wasn’t hard to track down. She caught a bus a block away from campus. As it rumbled over the 520 Bridge, she leaned in her window seat and gazed through the foggy glass at the grayish choppy waves on Lake Washington. They blew in all directions, as if they were confused.

  What was she doing? Going to Mr. Alexander's house? Was she crazy? And would she knock? Ask if Drake was home? If Mr. Alexander knew about her, knew what she knew... she’d disappear without a trace.

  But Ash had to know if Drake was all right. So she decided that she wouldn't allow herself to be seen.

  Once off the bus, she wandered downtown Bellevue for a half hour, her memorization of the route tangling in her mind, getting lost. She finally called a cab, paying with the twenty dollars of emergency money she kept in a tiny zippered pocket of her backpack.

  The taxi dropped her off a block from the address at half past five. The afternoon had gone, and the street of evenly-spaced trees and perfectly-cut grass had lost its color. The time was perfect. The light was soft, but the hour wasn't so late that a wandering teenager would look like she was up to no good.

  The Alexander residence occupied a corner plot, bigger than its neighbors, surrounded by a six-foot brick wall with a couple of feet of decorative wrought iron on top. A black gate of bars, on an automated track, ran across the driveway. Ash circled around the corner to the side.

  She tossed her backpack in a bush by the sidewalk, and after a moment's thought, tossed her coat after it. She'd rather be cold than get caught on something or destroy more of her wardrobe from sheer speed. She breathed – in for five, hold for ten, out for twelve.

  This could go badly.

  She pushed those thoughts aside and concentrated on Drake. The neighborhood grew still, and the twilight grays and blacks around her took on a certain intensity, their outlines sharpening. She leapt the wall, twirling in a neat somersault as she passed over its wrought iron top.

  She landed in a bush.

  She held in her scream, and crunched her way out of its branches. It hadn't really hurt – it just surprised her. Had it been a rose bush, its thorns would have carved her into a bloody mess. Stupid... she quietly swore to never again jump somewhere she couldn't see.

  The bush had taken it worse than she had. It looked lopsided now, sagging where she had rolled out of it. She slipped between it and the wall, and after hiding out for a few minutes, bent some of the branches back into place. Pretty soon, it looked all right. Good thing she was small, or those branches would have broken rather than bent.

  The house was a dark behemoth against an overcast sky. Some of the windows were lit on the first floor, but translucent curtains blocked any view inside. Higher, she saw sliding glass doors behind a second-floor deck. No curtains. She could see a sliver of interior ceiling and part of a chandelier.

  An upstairs living room? A game room? Drake's bedroom?

  She had to get up there.

  She ran for the house and pushed off the lawn, sprinting up a support post. She rolled over the deck's wooden railing and plopped safely behind an enormous gas barbecue grill. She balled herself up tiny, hugging her knees, and peered over the propane tank at the glass doors.

  It was a dining room.

  Mr. Alexander sat alone at a massive cloth-covered table, set for one. His dark tie was loosened, his white sleeves rolled up, and his downcast eyes focused on the rare steak he sawed into with a glinting knife.

  Ash held perfectly still, fighting a panic-driven urge to leap into the sky, anywhere, just to get away. Mr. Alexander didn’t notice her, and she realized that he couldn’t see her – the chandelier’s light must be reflecting off the window, making it a mirror for him.

  She forced herself to relax. It was like a zoo, with the cobra just on the other side of the glass.

  Ash had never seen him this close. The chandelier put bold light on his features. His hair was dark and neat, traced with silver, and his face was angular and hard. He ate with neutral determination, his mind on something else.

  This was the enemy.

  Maybe it was the sight of him at ease, cutting into his meat, as she cowered in cold shadow. But whatever the reason, she felt a pulse-pounding need to move, to escape – to get out of his reach.

  She heard a low steady noise, like a growl... coming from the far side of the deck.

  Ash leaned, peeking between the legs of the barbecue.

  A tan monster of a dog had risen from its bed in the deck's corner. A mastiff, maybe. Its shining eyes looked down on her with profound disapproval from within the soft folds of its face. Its fleshy black lips pulled up, revealing teeth like ivory hooks. Its body was thick and solid as a barrel. The dog had fifty pounds on her, easy.

  "You must be Tank," Ash whispered.


  The dog started toward her, its paws thumping on the deck.

  Ash freaked, gasping in a hard breath... and the world wound down like an old clock. The dog's growl faded to an echo as it slowed mid-stride. A drop of saliva came loose from its lips and sank like a mote of dust.

  She jumped for it, as hard and high as she could.

  Her body arced backward over the yard, and she caught a glimpse of its greenery behind her as she sailed over the black iron spikes on the wall. For a brief moment she hung suspended, arms out, the evening skyline of Bellevue spread perfectly upside-down before her eyes. As her body dropped, she curled up, spinning, so she wouldn't hit the street head first.

  She stretched her legs down and caught the asphalt with her feet, collapsing into a roll. She rolled into a tree across the street, ending up flat on her back with her heels against its trunk. She stood and brushed herself off, probing for injuries, and searching the second floor of the house for any movement.

  She was sore in places. Maybe a bruise or two. But no blood, no broken bones.

  She'd torn yet another pair of jeans. At least her shoes were still on her feet. She was pretty sure she hadn't left anything on that deck.

  Yikes, what a thought.

  Tank watched her through the wooden slats of the deck's rail.

  That had been close. And no sign of Drake. But if he wasn't here, where could he be?

  Ash slipped away to the corner, grabbed her coat and backpack, and walked the streets in darkness. It was soothing, being unseen, and she quieted her footsteps. Eventually, she reached a bus stop in Bellevue and caught a bus to take her homeward.

  #

  Dinner had started without her when she opened her front door, and she told Dad she had been with Mule. She swallowed food without tasting or talking. Once she was upstairs and in her room, her mind returned to Drake.

  She remembered what Mule had said, and she opened the dresser drawer that held Elsbeth's box. The switchblade gleamed inside. Ash removed it, and felt its weight in her palm. She thought of pressing the silver button that would trigger the blade, but she didn't. She didn't want to see it. It was already etched in her memory.

  Drake... couldn't be the one who attacked her.

  Had Mule really chased him off Monday morning? She found that, whatever had happened, she couldn't stay mad at Mule. He had tried to protect her, because he thought Drake was trouble. And he only had that impression because she hadn't told him everything.

  Their last moments in the library came back to her. She had stomped off like a baby–

  Someone knocked on her bedroom door. The knob turned, and Elsbeth entered. She shut the door gently behind her. "Where have you been this afternoon?"

  Busted. It figured Elsbeth could smell when Ash lied. And what to say now? Ash couldn't keep her confrontation with the enemy to herself.

  "Elsbeth," she began. "I–"

  "Never mind," Elsbeth said. Her tone was quietly intense. "It doesn't matter. There have been developments."

  Ash put the knife in its box. "What's wrong?"

  "The school has changed its plan. The library will be emptied tomorrow night."

  "Tomorrow? Are you sure?"

  Elsbeth nodded. "The school has rented the trucks. Some supplies arrived on campus this evening."

  Ash raised her eyebrows. So that was the sort of thing Elsbeth did when Ash wasn't around. Ash was impressed. Elsbeth had ways.

  "We'll have to move more quickly than I'd hoped," Elsbeth continued. "We're going to the library to get the page. You and I... tonight."

  "Wait. Tonight?"

  Elsbeth nodded. "No sleep for you, Ash. Play sick tomorrow, if you like. But we make our move tonight. And there's plenty we need to do in order to prepare."

  Ash's mind reeled, and she took a moment to settle. "Okay. Tonight. Where do we start?"

  Elsbeth took a step toward Ash. "You're not ready, but there's no choice." She straightened. "We start with the third Wile."

  24

  This is it, Ash thought. By morning, everything would be different.

  From downstairs, Dad's voice echoed up to them. "See you two in a bit!" Ash heard the garage door open and close.

  "We are going to need the house to ourselves,” Elsbeth said quietly. “I sent your father shopping for a few items for tomorrow’s dinner. Rare items. He'll be gone for a while."

  "This late?"

  Elsbeth nodded, a subtle lowering of her chin.

  "Oh," Ash said meekly. Elsbeth had ways, all right.

  "Come on."

  Ash followed Elsbeth to the living room. Elsbeth clicked on the lamp and sat on the couch, in just the spot where she had been sitting when Ash first saw her. Almost by instinct, Ash sat in her old place on the sofa opposite.

  Elsbeth crossed her legs at the knees and tilted her head slightly, letting the lamp light fall on her face – as she had on her first night in the house.

  She's beautiful, Ash thought.

  "The second Wile," Elsbeth began.

  "Small moves," Ash said. "Got it."

  Elsbeth smiled. "The ash sleeps within the seed. It's about the journey. About endurance."

  Ash listened and didn't answer. She flexed her fingers, thinking of Punchy.

  "But the third Wile is about beginning."

  Ash nodded, then stopped. "Wait. Why didn't we learn it first?"

  "Because beginning is more difficult. When we begin – anything – we feel uncertain. But we must understand that this uncertainty is universal, a feature of all beginnings. Would you believe... we had a chance to stop the publication of the Mutus Liber?"

  The words seemed to hang in the open air of the living room. Discussing ninja stuff here felt forbidden and dangerous, and charged Ash's body with alertness. "Really? Why didn't you?"

  "We had managed to place someone close to Pierre Savouret. His neighbor's housemaid. She was just a year older than you, but she was wise and cautious. It should have gone well."

  Ash leaned forward on the sofa.

  "She had a chance to break into his house and steal the manuscript," Elsbeth went on. "But she feared discovery. She had another chance as the manuscript was transported by horse-drawn cart to La Rochelle, where it was printed. But there were other travelers on the road. She never made her move. If she had just tried, our world might have been very different."

  "She never even...?"

  "She hoped for certainty. She should have made a leap of faith."

  "Is that it? I can do that."

  Elsbeth caught Ash in her gaze. "Be careful, Ash. The answer does not lie in seeking certainty, in feeling sure of yourself. There are no guarantees in this world. The nature of an iron will is not to feel certain, but to act in spite of uncertainty. To feel terror, and to take a step anyway."

  Ash broke eye contact, looking at the coffee table. Terror? "Okay. I'll just have to–"

  "There's no instant enlightenment here. But remember the third Wile tonight, as we move against the library. You may have little warning. You may not be able to afford hesitation. The fool waits for the perfect moment. But you... you will strike when you can."

  Ash took a deep breath. I will strike when I can. Her exhale was jittery.

  Elsbeth was freaking her out.

  "Here." Elsbeth nodded to the old trunk in the hallway. "I have something for you."

  The trunk! Ash had been wondering what might be in there. She hopped up and raced to the hall... and found herself standing beside the trunk, alone.

  Elsbeth had gone to the kitchen. She clicked off the kitchen light. She returned to the living room, and turned off the lamp beside her couch. The only light in the hallway fell softly from Ash's bedroom upstairs.

  Elsbeth met Ash in the hall and eased the trunk open, letting the heavy lid back until its chain went taut. Everything inside was covered by a sheet of dark velvet.

  "You didn't lock it?" Ash said.

  "No."

  "Weren't you afraid... you know."

&n
bsp; "That your father would look inside?"

  "Yeah."

  Elsbeth shook her head. "Your father is a decent man, Ash. He's not a snoop."

  She was right, Ash had to admit. Ash wished she had known the trunk was unlocked. She could have–

  "And you assumed it would be locked," Elsbeth said. "So I had nothing to worry about."

  Ash opened her mouth for a comeback, but didn't have one. Elsbeth reached under the velvet, pulled out a bundle of black, and handed it to Ash.

  Ash folded her arms around the bundle. It felt like an outfit of silk. "What's this?"

  "It's yours," Elsbeth said. "And with luck, it will fit."

  Ash's first impression of Elsbeth came back to her – an inky shadow dropping from a rooftop – and Ash knew what she held. "Oh my God. These are..."

  "They are."

  "Wait a minute. You want me to wear... to dress like a..."

  Elsbeth closed the trunk and gazed into Ash's eyes, inspecting. "You'd rather not?"

  It wasn't that. Ash just couldn't imagine it. She cradled the bundle and ran her fingers over the fabric. It was cool and soft and very dark. She couldn't resist, couldn't say no. She grinned at Elsbeth. "Maybe I should try them on?"

  "Do."

  Ash sprinted up the stairs to her room and flung the bundle so it scattered over her bed. She picked up the biggest piece: a long-sleeved pullover top. She shook it out, bunched it in her fingers, and shook it out again.

  It was so soft. Not silk, not exactly. Silk couldn't quite manage this. Ash stared at the weave, unable to make it out. She had the strangest sensation that her room lamp wasn't working... but it was.

  There was something wrong with the fabric.

  She couldn't really see it.

  She stood at her full-length mirror and held up the pullover. It was black.

  What a pathetic word, Ash thought. She had been lied to her entire life, since she had learned her colors as a toddler. Everything her parents told her was black had actually been dark gray, dark blue, dark brown.

  She had never seen black, not before tonight. It was a new color for her.

  The other pieces lay on her bedspread like pools of ink. Ash stared at them.