The Haunted Onsen

by Phil Gabriel

  “Of course,” said the prince. Turning to the right-hand wall, he made a gesture. Suddenly, the alcoves started speeding past like the windows of a railroad car. They stopped so suddenly, I felt a jerk. I saw Kitty-Sue look at the left-hand alcoves. They hadn’t moved, and her treasure was still in place.

  The right-hand alcove now displayed a suit of samurai armor. The armor we had been seeking for days.

  The prince looked between the armor and the helm, his sunny smile gone. “There’s a slight resemblance,” he said. “But unless you can prove provenance, I’m afraid I can’t help you.”

  I cast my eyes down with a dejected expression. I could see his smile broaden.

  “If only we had an item from the original owner. Like a fingernail or a lock of hair,” I said.

  At Prince Sunbeam’s spreading smile, I continued with my most innocent expression, “Maybe this will work?” I held out the crystal sphere that contained a lock of the samurai’s hair.

  It was clear to any sensitive that the items were all linked, as the sphere, the helm, and the armor all glowed with the same emanations. Sunbeam’s bright blue eyes darkened to the gray of a summer thunderstorm, but he maintained his composure.

  “Oh, I see,” he said. “In that case, I’m happy to return this item that inadvertently found its way into my home.” As if this suit of armor had followed him home like a lost puppy.

  “I’m sure the owner will be most thankful for the item’s return,” I said.

  With a reluctance only apparent to a close observer, Prince Sunbeam opened the display case that enclosed the samurai armor. A scent wafted out: sweat, ancient blood, and magic. An image of the samurai, reunited with his armor and helm, standing over me with a sword in his hands, flashed through my mind. The image was gone in an instant. The hair on the back of my neck stood up. Was this another precognitive flash?

  John stepped forward and lifted the armor from its stand. Turning to me, he raised an eyebrow. Carrying this through Customs would be difficult.

  I stroked the invisible glyph on my dragonskin bag and it opened. Another gesture and it opened even wider, the opening now the size of a Hula Hoop.

  John, Sunbeam, and Kitty-Sue leaned forward. I said, “Don’t look inside! It’s time-warped, you could lose days of your life.” John and Kitty-Sue averted their eyes, John dropping the armor and matching helm into the opening. With a gesture, I closed the opening and the armor was safe.

  But were we safe? There was a new look in the prince’s eyes, the greed of a collector. Fae had a special relationship with time; they could speed up and slow down the passage of time. That’s why mortals could spend a decade in the fae lands and return to Earth the next day. My bag, with its time-warping interior, was like sugar to flies.

  As the satchel faded back to invisibility with camouflage mode, Prince Sunbeam licked his lips. “Perhaps you’d consider a trade for that bag?” he asked. “While not intrinsically valuable, it would allow me to complete a collection.”

  “Sorry,” I said, “it has sentimental value. It’s not for sale or trade.”

  Looking at the alcove that contained the document that had been of so much interest to Kitty-Sue, Sunbeam nodded and said, “Perhaps another item from my trove would serve as an adequate trade?”

  I hated to dash the look of hope in Kitty-Sue’s eyes, but shook my head. How to explain that giving a time-warping bag to a fae would only make him a threat to the mundane world? Dragon magic, mixed with fae abilities, could only cause chaos.

  “I believe our business is done, Prince Sunbeam,” I said. “We have an appointment elsewhere.”

  “Of course,” he said. “Go in peace.”

  As we turned away, he added, “Oh, by the way. There might be some small impediments to your egress. Your entry unfortunately released a number of time-locked criminals trapped here. Do be careful on your way out.”

  My oath kept me from attacking this scheming fae, but Kitty-Sue and John had no such compulsion. They both stepped forward quicker than I could move, only to see Prince Sunbeam fade away as if a cloud had occulted him.

  “What the hell did he mean?” asked Kitty-Sue.

  “He’s been collecting thieves,” I said. “Any thief who entered here was frozen in time until now. He just set them free to attack us. He’s hoping to take the satchel and the armor from my dead body.”

  Kitty-Sue’s eyes glittered with anticipation. “He doesn’t know who’s with you.”

  Then she pointed down the hallway, back the way we had come. “What’s happening to the door?”

  John and I turned and saw the hallway extending, the exit door moving farther and farther away. When the door stopped, it divided, then divided again, repeating the process until there were thirteen exit doors visible. Along the now prolonged hallway, arched doorways appeared, where before there had been only the alcoves for the treasures.

  We turned back to Kitty-Sue and she said, “Don’t worry, I can sniff out the real exit.”

  “Yes,” said John. “We just have to make it down this hallway full of thieves, murderers, and monsters.” His eyes were as bright as Kitty-Sue’s as he pulled out his knife.

  Kitty-Sue took point and headed down the hallway. I noticed she no longer skipped tiles, just paced normally. Apparently, the floor traps had been disarmed.

  Twenty feet down the hallway, on the right side, a huge man, at least seven feet tall, stepped from an opening. He was human, but massively muscled and his body was covered in scars. There was a large knife in his right hand.

  He kept the left side of his body hidden by the doorway.

  “The voices,” he said as his eyes darted around, “the voices tell me I need to kill her to get out.”

  “You mean me?” said Kitty-Sue. She stepped forward on silent feet. “You’re welcome to try.” Despite her size, she moved like a stalking panther.

  “Not you,” he said. “Her.”

  Faster than any of us could react, he stepped into the middle of the hallway and pulled his captive in front of him, holding her by her long hair.

  “Ajarn-Scott,” said Daeng, “I’m sorry. They said you were injured and needed help.”

  The man held her hair in his left hand and had a wicked knife at her throat.

  “Put your weapons down, or I’ll gut this hooker friend of yours,” he growled.

  “Do you know how many dead hookers I’ve left behind?” I said. Crossing my arms, I continued, “Go ahead and kill her.”

  Kitty-Sue said, “You’re not supposed to call them ‘hookers.’” She slid one foot back slowly, shifting her balance. “They prefer to be called prostitutes.”

  Turning to Kitty-Sue, ignoring Daeng’s kidnapper, I said, “When they’re still alive, they’re prostitutes. After they’re dead, they’re all hookers!”

  To get our attention, the kidnapper let go of Daeng’s hair and wrapped his hand around her neck and held her out at arm’s length in a show of strength. Daeng’s high-heeled shoes dangled in the air, inches above the floor.

  A show of strength, and stupidity. While Daeng had been held in front of him, Kitty-Sue had no clear shot.

  “I swear I’ll break her neck if you don’t—” His voice stopped abruptly as two crystal blades embedded themselves in his eyes, followed by a third blade that hit his larynx. He choked, dropped Daeng, and tried to pull out the blades. Unfortunately for him, they were kitsune blades. They eagerly squirmed around in his wounds, forcing their way in to cause further damage. His blood-slick hands slipped off the handles, and he toppled to the floor.

  Daeng looked on, with an indescribable expression on her face, as her assailant expired. Would she be angry we had distracted the kidnapper with that banter?

  “Nice blades,” said Daeng. Then she leaned down as if to extract the knives from the body. Kitty-Sue made the recall gesture and the blades flew back to her. She plucked them from midair and hid them away.

  “You’ll have to ask Scott to teach you to make your own
magic blades,” said Kitty-Sue. “These are MINE.”

  Daeng turned to me and licked her lips. With a bloodthirsty smile and greedy eyes, she asked, “Ajarn-Scott, will you teach me to make knives like those?”

  Even Akiko, my most advanced student, couldn’t make blades like that. “One day,” I temporized. “You’ll have to study a lot more before you can make those.” I shrugged in apology.

  “Sorry about the hooker comment,” I said, to change the subject. “Hope you’re not angry.”

  “Why should I be angry?” asked Daeng. “I’m not a hooker or a prostitute. I’m the student of a great magician. Whatever job I had before doesn’t really matter.

  “Anyway,” said Daeng as she put a ‘hooker-heeled’ shoe on the dead kidnapper’s head, “he started it.” Putting a foot on someone’s head is a Thai gesture of utmost contempt.

  “How did you end up here?” asked Kitty-Sue.

  “A Thai policeman came to the hotel and told me my farang boss had been beaten and left for dead,” she said. “He offered to take me to the hospital. When I got to the street, someone put a bag over my head and carried me here.”

  Had the damn time-warping Prince had enough time to set this up? Yes. Once out of my satchel’s area of influence, he could easily set this up. What other surprises had he set up?

  I shook my head, the only way to get out was before us, down the hallway.

  Stepping over the slowly spreading pool of blood, we continued down the hallway. I gestured for Daeng to follow Kitty-Sue. John and I brought up the rear.

  About halfway down the hallway, our next challenge appeared. A green-skinned female stepped out. Female, but of a size that dwarfed the kidnapper we had just dispatched. She was naked from the waist up, with huge breasts and an over-muscled body. Her eyes were large and round, flashing red in anger. From her mouth protruded a set of upward pointing fangs. In her hands was a long, ornately carved staff. The damn thing must have been eight feet long and must have weighed thirty pounds, but she moved it like it was a broomstick.

  “Yaksha,” said Daeng as she slid backward, bumping into me. “Very dangerous to thieves.”

  26

  Yaksha on a Leash

  Kitty-Sue threw one of her enchanted blades at the monster, but that staff moved through the air with a sonic crack, intercepting her knife and sending it away to embed itself into the wall.

  Kitty-Sue made the recall gesture, and the knife jerked from the wall and flew back to her hand. “Let’s see you do that trick with two blades at once,” she said.

  Two blades flew, aimed at the yaksha’s eyes, but the damned club still intercepted them.

  John slid forward until he stood beside Kitty-Sue. He sheathed his knife, then started pulling his grass rope from his pocket. “If milady would allow me? It appears this redoubtable beast may need our combined talents to best.”

  The yaksha advanced on John and Kitty-Sue, her deadly flail whistling in the air. Kitty-Sue slid one step back and said, “I’ll watch your back.”

  Good advice. I spun around to watch our backs for anything that might come down the hallway from the interior of the house. I pulled Princess from her scabbard and held her ready. My oath not to attack Prince Sunbeam meant I couldn’t hunt him down, but defense was permitted.

  “Daeng,” I said, “watch the fight with the yaksha and let me know if I need to step in.” Would Princess in her longest form be able to pierce the yaksha’s defense? Her hilt thrummed in my grip at the unspoken question. She was eager to try.

  A number of doubts tumbled through my mind as the fight progressed at my back.

  Would I have been a better choice than John or Kitty-Sue to fight the green-skinned monster? No, they were both better fighters than me, even with Princess to help me.

  Should I have given Princess to John or Kitty-Sue for this fight? No, Princess wouldn’t work for John. The number of people she trusted enough to wield her was small: me, Akiko, and Kitty-Sue, who preferred her knives.

  The sounds of the fight went on for minutes, the whistle of the staff followed immediately by a bang as it missed and hit the floor or wall. John didn’t speak; he had never spoken during a fight, just moved in deadly silence.

  Kitty-Sue kept up a running litany of insults to the monster. “Hey, watermelon tits!” she called. “I’m gonna carve a slice of your fat ass off to make green eggs and ham.” The insults must have had an effect, because the monster started responding, her deformed mouth making the words almost incomprehensible.

  “Blond bitch!” she said. “Put those knives away and make this a fair fight.” The five-hundred-pound monster with a magical staff wanted Kitty-Sue to put away her knives?

  “Hey, fat ass,” said Kitty-Sue, “that’s a great idea. Let’s make this a fair fight. Why don’t you diet yourself down to my size to make it even?” A thwack sound came as the yaksha deflected Kitty-Sue’s thrown blade.

  “Hey, she-Shrek,” said Kitty-Sue, “drop two hundred pounds, and you’ll be down to fighting weight.”

  Two more thwacks indicated the monster had batted away two of Kitty-Sue’s blades. I saw them speed down the hallway, stop in midair as Kitty-Sue called them back, and race back our way even faster than they had been sent. One was aimed straight for my right eye.

  I heard Daeng gasp as her hand pushed my head to force me out of the path of the knife. Not far enough—it looked like the knife would split my left eye, instead of the right. I didn’t blink as the blade swerved in flight to miss me entirely.

  “Did you do that?” asked Daeng.

  “Of course. I don’t make blades that can hurt me,” I said. “There’s a spell to keep them from hitting me. Keep your eyes on the fight.”

  As an afterthought, I continued, “You’d better stay close. You don’t have any protections.” I felt Daeng push her back up against mine so she would be within the safe zone from Kitty-Sue’s projectiles. Her warm body and firm butt were only a momentary distraction.

  I wanted to turn and watch the fight, help if I could, but the lessons of jungle patrols with John stuck. Each man monitored his sector. Trying to watch everywhere at once only led to getting overwhelmed. You had to trust your teammates.

  Daeng kept up a running commentary on the fight, which my imagination filled in with the sounds that we heard.

  “Khun-John has wrapped his rope around her ankle,” she said.

  “That’s good,” I said.

  “She’s pulling him around like a small dog on a leash,” she said.

  “That’s not good,” I said. I had a weapon that could end this fight, a very long-range weapon, loaded with a bullet that could destroy almost any supernatural creature. But using it would leave me unarmed against the samurai, a much more dangerous foe.

  John had said he could handle this fight, I had to believe he could do it.

  Several more times, Kitty-Sue’s blades flew past us, just missing. That sneaky ogress was aiming for us!

  “Khun-John has wrapped his rope around her other ankle—” Daeng was interrupted by a tremendous crash that made the floor shake. Far down the hallway, I saw several objects vibrate out of their alcoves and drop to the floor.

  “He’s got the rope around her throat,” said Daeng, “but her arms are still free.” Once again, Kitty-Sue’s knives zipped past us, then boomeranged back. The monster’s staff was still working.

  The shadows at our end of the hallway thickened, making it hard to see the end of the hallway. “Anything that comes through that fucking fog is going to get skewered,” I shouted. I raised Princess and willed energy to flow through her. She responded by shooting a gout of flame ten feet long. The shadows disappeared.

  Would that lance of flame help against the monster? Probably not. With my luck, it would just burn John’s rope and free the bitch.

  “He’s got her on her stomach,” said Daeng. “He did something with his rope. It’s contracting, pulling her head back towards her feet.”

  “Are her hands s
till free?” I asked.

  “Yes, but her face is changing color.”

  Another whistle of her staff that ended with a thunk instead of a smash. A chill ran down my spine.

  “Oh!” said Daeng, then silence. I poked her with my elbow to let her know I was waiting for an update.

  “Khun-John has been hit.” Her voice trembled. “It looks like his leg is broken badly.” She waited a few more moments before continuing, “He’s on the floor, and he isn’t moving.”

  “You bitch!” said Kitty-Sue in a voice that scared even me. “I’m going to take that dildo of yours and shove it up your ass so far, it comes out of your mouth.”

  “Daeng,” I said as calmly as I could. “Listen carefully. I need to turn around. I want you to turn with me so that you end up facing the other end of the hallway. If you see anything, let me know.”

  A few seconds to process and I felt her begin to spin to her right. I followed by spinning to my right. We ended up in the same back-to-back position, but now I faced the fight.

  John didn’t look good. He was lying on the floor on his back. One leg was normal, but the other leg was twisted around so that the toes faced backward. John could heal from almost any injury, but he needed time, time to get out of the danger zone before that monster pounded him to paste.

  As I looked, he raised up to a sitting position. Ignoring the twisted mess of his leg, he reached for the loose end of his rope.

  “I’m going to move towards them now,” I said to Daeng. “Keep backing up.” The yaksha had squirmed her way to one side of the hallway. She grasped at the wall with her left hand in an attempt to rise up. Despite the tight rope that ran from her neck to her ankles, forcing her spine into a backward curve like a bow, she almost succeeded.

  While she was distracted, Daeng and I managed to slide past her. Now we were all on the exit side of the hallway. When she saw we were past her, she started grunting and frothing at the mouth.