The Fire King

by Marjorie Liu

  Stupid, he would say. After everything you’ve gone through. You’ve got nothing to prove.

  Nothing at all. Except her own faith and instincts, which had been borne out so far. Karr had not hurt her. That had to mean something.

  Right. Because every killer has a timetable. What a genius.

  Okay, so she was stupid. And crazy. Maybe she did have something to prove, after all. That didn’t mean she was wrong, though. She’d had a feeling from the first moment she laid eyes on him, a feeling that had only gotten stronger the longer she remained in his presence.

  The tape had helped, too. Watching him wake up from death, surrounded, trying to reason with strangers …

  No, he was not just a killer. Not a psychopath as Serena had implied. But she would never have discovered that while he remained locked up. Questions were a weak substitute to testing character in the field. Words could be twisted, manipulated. Lies were holy to a good manipulator. Masks, however, could only be worn for so long.

  “I will try to find us help,” she said, struggling to pronounce the words. “If you want it.”

  Karr hesitated, staring past her at the city. “Those lights are not fire.”

  There was no word in his language for electricity. “They are made from … small bolts of captured lightning. Very small, very controlled.”

  He did not argue or show surprise; he just approached her, slowly, his gaze still locked on the city until at the last moment he focused on her. Bearing the brunt of that scrutiny was like being lifted up, tossed about, caressed, and placed before a firing squad all at the same time. Soria had never felt so much from so little, but she set her jaw, forced herself to meet his gaze and wrestled her emotions into a neat little bundle.

  “Are there many of these cities?” he asked.

  “Not here. Elsewhere, there are many. Much larger than this. Erenhot is practically a village, in comparison.”

  “Populated only by humans?”

  “If there are others like you, they hide. Perhaps mixed in with humans. I have seen it done. Most humans do not even contemplate the existence of what you are. No one thinks to look.”

  Karr frowned, again staring past her at the city. “It was not so when I died. Humans knew of us. Served us. Some even … worshipped.”

  “Did they worship you?” Soria asked bluntly, wondering if that was what he had expected of her: to fall down in awe and subservience.

  He gave her a sharp look. “I stayed well away from humans, when I could. Most feared me.”

  “Because of your ability to change shape.”

  “Because I was dangerous.” He took another step toward her, drawing so near that Soria had two choices: either step back, or be touched.

  She dug in her heels, stubborn. Karr’s eyes narrowed, and he slowly, carefully, raised his hand. Giving her time to move. She did not, holding her breath as he touched her cheek with the tips of his large fingers. She fought not to show anything on her face—not fear, and not the tingling warmth that melted into her bones.

  “I cannot tell if your bravery is born from ignorance,” Karr whispered, searching her gaze, “or if it is true from the heart.”

  His other hand unexpectedly touched her empty sleeve. Soria recoiled: caressing her breast would have felt less intimate.

  Karr stared, and with great care, lifted his hand from her face. He did not give her space, though. Neither did she back away. Heat spread wildly into her cheeks, her heart thundering, aching with shame and embarrassment. Irrational feelings. But every time Soria thought she had overcome her loss it always managed to hit her again, in unexpected ways. She was not healed; not now, maybe not ever.

  Just a sleeve, she told herself, angry. Just a motherfucking sleeve.

  “True from the heart,” he murmured. “Who hurt you?”

  “Why—” Soria had to stop and clear her throat. “Why do you think it was a person? It could have been an accident.”

  “But it was not.” Karr leaned in, studying her with what might have been compassion. “I can see it in your eyes.”

  Soria set her jaw. “Mind your own business.”

  Karr tilted his head and then stepped around her, grazing her shoulder with his. He stopped, looking down at her. “You feel it, do you not? Your arm. As though it is always there.”

  “Yes,” she whispered, compelled to answer, unable to look away from him.

  “And you think,” he murmured, “that it is bad enough that you lost your arm, but that it is so much worse having it linger. Until you almost wish you could cut it off again, if only the sensation would go away.”

  Tears burned her eyes. She opened her mouth but could not speak.

  Karr leaned against her, briefly, just a faint nudge, their shoulders pressed together. “It will pass, in time. But it will take time. Memory clings longer than flesh.”

  Again, Soria tried to speak, but Karr moved past her, and the loss of his heat and presence cut almost as deeply as his words. Get a grip, she told herself, wiping her eyes.

  “You want me to enter that place,” Karr said. She turned, and found him staring at the city. “Why?”

  “Because I need to go there,” she said truthfully, “and I do not want to leave you on your own.”

  “You think I cannot care for myself?”

  “I think you might be surprised at how much this world has changed.” Soria joined him, staring at the lights of Erenhot. “Would you rather learn from me, or on your own?”

  “If I chose the latter? Would you accept that?”

  “Yes. I would call you stupid, but everyone has a right to be an idiot.”

  His mouth twitched. “Do you ever not speak your mind?”

  “Words are reflections. What we speak comes back to us. I prefer being told the truth, so I tell the truth. Within reason.”

  “Within reason,” he echoed. “So you do lie.”

  Soria gave him a hard look. “Are you coming?”

  “I think,” he said slowly, “that you might be the most dangerous woman I have ever met.”

  “That is no answer.”

  “But it is the truth,” he replied, and pointed to the city. “So teach me, while you can. Until the hunters find us again.”

  A chill touched her. “That is what I am trying to prevent. If I can find out who sent those men after you—”

  “You do not blame your shape-shifter ally?”

  “No,” Soria said firmly.

  “She imprisoned me.”

  “She thought she had a reason. She still does. She will be coming, too, before long.”

  Karr shook his head, giving her a look that was both contemplative and disbelieving, as if he still could not figure out what side she was on. Soria was not entirely sure of the answer, either.

  “It does not matter who wants me,” he said coldly. “The result is the same. The only way to stop a hunt is to kill the hunters.”

  “No questions asked?” Soria peered up into his face, trying to read his eyes. “Are you not curious about why they want you?”

  “I know why,” he said, and began walking away from the city.

  She frowned and ran after him. “Karr!”

  He stopped, golden light trickling from his eyes, spreading over his skin. Fur erupted along his throat and chest, rippling down his arms. His face took on a feline cast that was a far cry from the serpentine visage he had worn so recently.

  “Go,” he whispered. “Go without me. I changed my mind. I will leave this place and search for my people.”

  Soria stared. “I do not—”

  “Will you go back on your word? Or do you think you can force me?”

  Karr stalked toward her, circling, his body continuing to transform until Soria felt as though she was staring more at a lion than a man. He stood on two feet, but just barely, and his body was tense, coiled. Almost shaking. Not with anger but something else. Grief, perhaps. No way to know for certain—just a feeling, an instinct. Soria knew about pain.

&nb
sp; “I doubt anyone could force you,” she said softly.

  Karr’s chest heaved with a deep, rumbling growl. “Try.”

  I won’t give you the satisfaction. But Soria found herself walking toward him anyway. She stopped, shoulder to shoulder, as he had done to her, and leaned against him ever so slightly. He was huge beside her, muscles lean and rippling, hard as rock. A force of nature.

  He had his back turned to the city, but she gazed at the lights, at the modern human sprawl, and could not think of two more ill-fitting pieces than Karr and Erenhot.

  Man out of time, she thought, grieving for him just a little.

  “Stay or go,” she said, not looking at him, not needing to as he quivered in silence. “But I will return to this spot as soon as I can.”

  “Do not bother,” he replied. “You are one of them.”

  “We are all ‘one of something.’ ” Soria smiled sadly. “But I was looking for more.”

  And without another word, she left Karr behind and walked toward the city.

  Erenhot was like most other modern Chinese cities: it looked better at night, when the shadows could hide the rough-and-tumble sprawl of squat buildings that were more concrete than glass. Soria felt cold looking at them as she walked down the sidewalk, skirting parked cars and old bicycles. Green taxis whizzed by, dinosaurs glued on top of cab lights. She had caught a ride in one near the outskirts of the city, after a long, stumbling walk that made her feel like a refugee, years lost in war and wilderness.

  Her ribs throbbed, and a headache was building. She’d had the cabdriver drop her off in the area where foreign businessmen liked to spend time—which also happened to be the sleazy side of town. No real surprise. Music thumped from inside nightclubs, neon nights flickering wildly in the shape of a rainbow. Several other bars lined the road, as well as closed shops bearing advertisements written in both Cyrillic and English.

  Foreigners were everywhere, mostly white men, walking with beer bottles and cigarettes in hand. Some of them gave her curious looks, but most were too drunk to see straight. Soria kept her head down, walking quickly. She heard Russian spoken, French, some English—all three were easy to understand. Long-term exposure tended to make some languages permanent in her mind. She had spent several months in France and Quebec, and one of Dirk & Steele’s agents was Russian.

  But the words felt empty, the speech patterns dull. Her mouth wanted to coil vowels and purr rumbling growls, and so she let it, speaking to herself, trying to hold on to a dialect that was already fading from her mind a mere hour from Karr’s presence. It made her angry. Linguistically, she wanted more. Speaking his language was like eating cheesecake after a life spent dieting on oatmeal. Both were soft, both comforting; but she was used to oats, and had never realized she was tired of them until now.

  You shouldn’t have left him, she berated herself. He doesn’t know anything about this world.

  Though, she supposed Karr was smart enough to figure some things out. Like, how to stay out of sight. She had no doubt he was a man who could survive quite easily in the most remote regions of the world, invisible unless he wanted to be seen. Perhaps it was better this way. He was being hunted.

  And now, so are you.

  Soria needed a telephone. She thought about scamming a call from one of the foreigners walking the street—most of them probably had cell phones that would call out of the country—but bloodstains had spattered her white shirt, and a red crust remained on her left hand. She did not want to risk the chance of anyone asking too many questions, or contacting local police for help.

  A hotel was the best place to make an international call, but her passport would be required, along with other travel documents. She had most of that in her vest, along with cash, but given the circumstances, a paper trail seemed like a rather poor idea, right along with using a credit card, or writing her name across the sky with big giant arrows pointed down at her ass. No newspaper stands were around, either, which usually sold phone cards for cash. Local pay phones would be useless.

  Limited options, and no time. Soria went looking for a whorehouse.

  Finding one was easy. Along with dinosaurs and trains, Erenhot was also known for its sex trade. Women from Inner Mongolia and Russia were often brought through the city by organizations engaged in human trafficking. It was an easy scam, preying on girls desperate for work and who were willing to believe nicely dressed older women who promised respectable jobs in hair salons or restaurants. Until they arrived in cities far from home, and those sly older ladies sold their girls to men for the same amount of money that Soria had used to spend on a nice dress.

  Brothels were an easy place to get lost, too: no one ever remembered anything.

  Following the Russians led her to the right neighborhood. Large windows lined the buildings along the street, lit red from within. Girls stared out, some of them dancing, while others just looked small, shoulders slumped. Prostitution was illegal in Mongolia and China, but Soria would never have guessed.

  Only one of the buildings seemed to be doubling as a nightclub. Music pounded, neon lights throbbing over the doorway. It looked like it was doing well, with foreigners and Chinese in nice suits going in and out. Money demanded some civility in places like that, even for one-armed women in bloodstained clothes. She was certain they would have a phone capable of making an international call. In a place like that, there would have to be.

  She felt incredibly uncomfortable approaching the club. A very large Mongolian man stood beside the front door, watching her. His hair was slicked back, and he wore a white T-shirt and black slacks. A cigarette dangled from his mouth. He held out his hand when Soria drew near, his gaze flickering down to her empty sleeve and then over the rest of her.

  Yes, she told him silently. I look like shit. Get over it.

  “Not for you,” he said in badly accented English. “This naughty place.”

  Soria raised her brow, not amused. Words and nuance floated from his mind into hers, faster now than this morning when she had encountered the village children for the first time. Her mind had already been broken in. In perfect Khalkha she replied, “I need to make an international call.”

  The man blinked, startled. “You speak very well.”

  She shoved a small wad of cash into his hand. “A phone, please.”

  He tilted his head. “You a journalist?”

  “I am a girl having a bad night,” Soria replied firmly. “I am not here to cause you trouble.”

  A cold smile touched his mouth. “And all you want is a phone? Nothing else?”

  Soria gave him her best do-not-fuck-with-me stare. “One call. Right now. I will pay the charges, and I want a private room.”

  The man shrugged and tossed his cigarette to the ground. The cash disappeared into his pocket. He held open the door for Soria and ushered her inside.

  The lobby was small but well lit, the walls and floors tiled in glossy black marble. Gilt-framed oil paintings of naked Mongolian horsewomen hung on the walls, and below, like the waiting room of a dentist’s office, deep leather chairs were lined in a row. A man was seated in each, a mix of white and Asian; most looked like business types, texting messages on their smartphones while girls in miniskirts served them bottles of beer. They were waiting in line, killing time before sex.

  The men stared at Soria when she walked in, one after the other, glancing up and then doing a double take. Some of them smiled—smarmy, slick, but a smile nonetheless—until they saw her empty sleeve. Then the same look crossed their faces that she had seen a million times back home, at the grocery store or gas station, or in the airport: a flinch in their eyes, a faint twist of their mouths, and then nothing, a mask wiping their expressions clean away. As if she were no longer a woman. Just air. A thing taking up space.

  The mass scrutiny only lasted seconds before the men ducked their heads and began busying themselves on their phones; but seconds was all it took to cut Soria. Sometimes a person didn’t want to be caught starin
g, so they went out of their way to do the opposite, while others were frightened, disgusted, unable to handle the reality of a missing limb and capable only of seeing its absence, not the person. I’m still me, Soria told herself, glancing down at the silver bracelet on her wrist, turquoise glinting. It was the wrong wrist but the same body. The same heart.

  The front desk was staffed by a pretty young woman in a cheap gray suit, who wore a red ribbon at her throat. A faint bruise was healing around her eye. To the left a sheer curtain shimmered, hiding a room full of shadows. Music pulsed, mixed with rough laughter. Soria glimpsed a stage, and the dancing silhouettes of lithe bodies.

  “She needs to make an overseas call,” her escort said to the receptionist, with a hint of amusement. “What rooms are free?”

  “You sure a call is all she wants?” The woman gave Soria a once-over that ended at her empty sleeve, and a smile of both disdain and bitterness crossed her tired face. “Pay someone to poke her. No one else will.”

  The man shook his head, still smiling. Soria leaned over the counter, staring into the woman’s bruised eyes. “Save the commentary. All I want is a phone.”

  Her Mongolian was still flawless, the words settling comfortably on her tongue. Surprise flickered over the woman’s face. She looked from Soria to the man, and then back again. “Why do you need it?”

  Soria set her jaw and pulled out a one-hundred-dollar Chinese bill. More than enough to pay for a prostitute’s services in this place. She slid the money across the counter toward the receptionist, but the man intercepted and smoothly folded the crisp bill into his pocket. He gave the girl a hard look. “She can use the phone. And a room.”

  Not even Soria wanted to tangle with that glint in his eye. The receptionist fumbled inside a drawer. She pulled out a battered cell phone, and then stood.

  “Follow me,” she said.

  The building was larger on the inside than it had first appeared. Soria followed the girl up three flights of stairs, and on each floor she heard echoes of tears and laughter, smacking sounds and rough grunts. Her skin crawled, and she found herself twisting her empty sleeve into knots. She hated it here—but she’d been in worse places, other brothels, acting as translator for the various trafficking cases in which Dirk & Steele involved themselves. It never felt as though they made a dent. The wheel kept spinning, and girls and boys were always getting hurt.