The Girl with Ghost Eyes (3 page)

“This wood came from a peach tree that grew at Mount Longhu,” I said, “in the shadow of the Hanging Coffins. My husband cut the wood himself. He was a Daoshi of the Seventh Ordination. Do you understand? He carved the Seven Stars into its blade, and danced their power. The simple fact that it is made from peachwood means it will be enough to harm a dead man like you. But endowed with the power of the Seven Stars? My sword can slice you apart as easily as steel cuts flesh, you dead ghost.”

I aimed the sword and shot into motion.

Shi Jin stumbled away in panic. I lunged at him, striking out with a forward thrust of the sword that left a deep red gash along his shoulder. Blood sprang from his wound. He cried out and I saw victory close by. In a thrill I pushed my advantage, driving forward. It was time to finish this. I dropped into a side-bow and swung my peachwood sword in a horizontal chop.

The sword turned to smoke.

I blinked. My sword had vanished. That should have been a finishing blow. It should have disemboweled him. But my hand was empty.

Shi Jin’s beefy fist caught me in the sternum with a thud. I staggered back, dizzy and confused, then stumbled and fell to my back, landing with a thud on the cobbled street.

The ghost laughed. “Where’s your magic sword, girl? Without it you’re just a slab of meat ready to be hung in the butcher shop.”

Amid the pain, the dizziness, and the disorientation, it was reflex and reflex alone that started me rolling away before the big ghost was on me again. Rolling on cobblestones took its toll on my hips, but I managed to stay just outside the range of the kicks and stomps he aimed at me. Then I sprang up to my feet and faced him in a horse stance, fists ready.

The ghost was twice my size but fury contorted my face so much that he looked into my eyes and hesitated. I must have looked like a mad dog, nostrils flaring, teeth gnashing. I wanted to rip the ghost to shreds, and Mr. Liu after him.

Shi Jin came down on me like thunder, like a rainstorm. He weighed at least twice as much as I did. His fists hailed down and found only wind. I stepped to the side and hammered a kick into his knee. He gulped in surprise and took a step back.

“A slab of meat, am I, you dead ghost?” I said.

The big man’s face registered determination, and something else. Was it regret? He said, “Yes, meat. I’m a ghost and you’re still alive, but which of us is being carved like roast pork?”

The thought of Mr. Liu cutting my stomach was sobering. In the world of the living, Mr. Liu must have broken the spell on my sword. That would explain why it vanished. And if he broke my spell, it meant he had power. At least the Third Ordination.

I cursed. I was unarmed in the spirit world, facing a dangerous opponent, and if I defeated him I’d still have to face a man whose magic was stronger than mine.

It made no sense. No one would bring so much force to defeat me. I had some skill with kung fu and magic, but the ghost was big and well trained, and Mr. Liu had more powerful magic than I did. Either of them could have beaten me on his own, yet they still felt the need to ambush and disarm me. I wasn’t being underestimated. I was being overestimated.

“You aren’t after me,” I said. “You want to possess me and murder my father when he isn’t expecting it.”

An affirmative snort moved the ghost’s black beard.

“Why?” I asked. “Father protects Chinatown from evil.”

The ghost circled, saying nothing. If I lost this fight, Father would die in shame, murdered by his own child’s hand.

My hand.

Cutting my stomach and possessing me were violation enough, but they were going to use me as a weapon against my father, and I would never let that happen.

A quiet anger found me. I wanted to punch the ghost until his spirit blood dripped from my knuckles. I wanted to pin him face down on the street and bash his brains out on the cobblestones. With the right strategy, I could even do it. But if I lost, Shi Jin would take the passport and murder my father. There was only one proper way to act.

I turned and ran.

Behind me I heard a startled huff of breath. Shi Jin ran too, giving chase. He pursued, relentless, angry, huge. His heavy steps smashed down on the cobblestones. But I ran faster, and every second put him farther behind me.

Through streets of Chinatown lit smoky and golden by the moon of the spirit world, I ran.

In blurs of dreaming light, Chinatown’s spirit world shifted around me. I had never spent so long out of body before. How long had it been—hours? Days? No, not days, not yet. The passage of time was my friend now. If I kept the soul passport out of Shi Jin’s hands long enough, Father would come home. He would go to the temple and find me unconscious, out of body. He wouldn’t be able to wake me, so he would examine me to find out what was wrong. He would find the one-armed man’s talisman carved into my skin.

If I could do that, if I could just keep the passport away from Shi Jin for enough time, then Mr. Liu’s plan would be thwarted. With enough time, Father wouldn’t be taken by surprise, even if the ghost managed to possess me. He’d have talismans and weapons ready for the ghost. There would be no stabbing him in the back or poisoning his tea.

I just needed to stall long enough and I would save my father.

Saving myself was another matter. Somehow I needed to get back. Back to my body, back to Father. He might need my help. Mr. Liu was trying to kill him. And he would be alone without me. No one would braise his pork, fry his vegetables, or prepare his tea.

I thought about the passport. I could destroy it, and then Shi Jin would never be able to possess me. But then he might smear my red string with his spirit blood, destroying it. So long as he thought he might be able to succeed, I would still have a chance. So long as I held the passport, he would continue hunting me. I needed to delay that for a while, but he would find me eventually. And then there would be a reckoning.

I found my way to Dupont, to Father’s temple. We lived in a small apartment in the basement. I approached the temple, and something like a slight wind began to blow. A force pushed me away. It felt like an ocean current. Looking up, I saw Father’s cloth talismans. They hung over the door, shifting in a slight wind. Father’s talismans barred all spirits from entry, with all the authority of a Maoshan Daoshi of the Seventh Ordination. Nothing short of a deity could force its way past the talismans. My red string would have granted me entry. Without the string, I couldn’t cross the threshold and enter my home.

My father’s talismans, his power and his magic, forced me out. Staring at my home, I felt helpless. I had no home, no place of safety anywhere. It was nearly enough to make me give up. Frustration and despair took over, and I felt tears begin. I forced the tears down. I refused to cry.

To be so near and yet so far. My body was inside, but even if I stood next to it, it would be impossibly far away. My body and I were worlds apart. Without the red string, I would never be able to retrace the passage across the fields of life and death. I could stand next to myself and still be lost.

If I manifested myself to Father, would he save me? Or would he exorcise me? I couldn’t truly say.

I curled up in the shadows of the painted balconies along Tian Hou Temple Street and slept.

Dreams have never been my friend. A feverish mixture of images swirled in my mind, and there was never a way to distinguish memory from prophecy. In dreams I ran down an endless road. I did not know what I was running from, but I knew I needed to keep running. I ran for hours, until my throat was dry and my feet were raw and bloody.

“Aah!” a gull cried, sad and laughing. “Aah! Aah! Xian Li-lin!”

That was no dream. Waking, I shot to my feet. Across the street, Shi Jin hulked, staring at the gull, open-mouthed. He must have been hunting me in my sleep when he heard it say my name.

I smiled. For once Jiujiu’s warning had been helpful. I wondered what offering I could burn for the spirit gull, if I made it back to my body.

Shi Jin turned his attention back to me. He’d lost the element of surprise, but he still held too many advantages. I was faster, but his long arms and legs still made it unlikely for me to defeat him. There’s a reason I prefer to fight with a weapon in my hand.

I turned and ran again.

*

In the afternoon I strolled down to Fish Alley. The smell of the fish was strong and rank, but somehow it came to me from a distance, almost more a memory than a smell. Eternal moonlight was shining in the world of the spirits, but I could tell the time of day by watching the men haggling for better prices at the stalls. “That’s been sitting out here all day,” a buyer would say, and the fishmonger would reply, “Only the freshest fish, morning and afternoon.” Like actors in an opera, everyone knew their lines, their cues, and they knew how the story would end.

Dead fish hung along every stall, their scales glistening. Fish bones littered the alleyway.

I turned to see Shi Jin walking toward me. Bones crunched under his heavy footsteps. His posture was aggressive, arrogant, perhaps a bit mad.

I stood my ground, facing the ghost. “Give up,” I said.

His beard puffed out as he snorted. “Surrender?” he said. “To you?”

“You’re trying to possess my body, Shi Jin. It was supposed to happen last night. My father was supposed to come home and find his daughter waiting for him. He wouldn’t be on guard. And you were supposed to be in control of my body, planning to kill him. But that’s not what happened, is it?”

Shi Jin’s eyes were sharp and thorough, not missing anything. “I am listening,” he said.

“My father came home and found me unconscious. Next he checked to see what was wrong with me, and he found a talisman carved into my stomach. From there he figured out your plan. So now, even if you possess me, you won’t be able to take him by surprise. Your plan has failed,” I said, “so you might as well return my string.”

A slow smile spread behind the ghost’s black beard. “That was their plan,” he told me. “My plan hasn’t failed.”

There was too much in his words for me to respond. Whose plan was it?
Their
plan, he said. But even that wasn’t my immediate concern. I began inching away. “So what is your plan?”

“To leave here. To get out of the land of spirits.”

“In my body.”

“Yes.”

“Give me back the red string,” I said. “You don’t want to be a woman, do you, Shi Jin?”

He looked away for a moment, ashamed. “Even that would be better than this. This place is wrong, girl. There is no daylight. There are things here out of the nightmares of men.”

“I know,” I told him. “There are fox-spirits, walls that move to block your path, and eel-women who lurk beneath bridges. Hungry things drool in the shadows. And tonight is the Bai Gui Yexing, the Night Parade of a Hundred Devils.”

“Tonight?” he asked. His face registered fear.

“Yes, dead man, the most freakish of spirits walk tonight. You know we cannot kill each other in the spirit world, but if we fight, we can harm each others’ spirit bodies. You would not want to face the Night Parade with a broken arm, Shi Jin. Give me my red string and I will give you your passport, so you may cross the gates and enter the city of the dead.”

He snorted again, but this time, I thought, it was an expression of loss, not contempt. “My forty-nine days are long past, girl. The only way for me to get out of here is to possess you.”

I had run before because losing would have meant more than just my end. At that time, losing would have killed my father. But Father would be safe by now.

“I’m sorry,” I said, and launched a flying kick at the ghost. I gave him no time to block or dodge. My heel connected with his massive chest, and he stumbled backward, trying to regain his balance.

I took slow, deliberate steps, relaxing as I approached him. I brought forth in myself the experience of liuhe, the Six Integrations, so spirit could guide my skills and energy. I was an army now, hands and feet and knees and elbows working together. To beat him I would need relaxation, smoothness of movement, nimbleness, stability, and emptiness, but more than anything I needed strategy.

Shi Jin lunged at me. I brushed aside the jab from his right arm, but the reverse punch he followed it with was quick and powerful. I weaved to the side and his fist swung by me, close and fast enough that I felt the wind of his swing in my hair.

I chambered a leg and shot a kick into his ribcage. My foot thumped against his chest. Grunting, he sprang away. The kick probably hadn’t broken any of his ribs, but I was wearing him down. He brought his spirit body back into alignment, finding his centerline.

Pedestrians stepped around him without seeing him, without knowing he was there. He stamped a foot, leaned into the opposite leg, and extended his right arm, with the palm facing inward. I recognized the form. It was bawang dou jia, King of Kings Shaking His Armor. A posture designed for powerful strikes. From there he could launch any number of large movements capable of shattering my bones.

But any of those movements would leave him unprotected for a moment. And that was precisely what I needed. I needed him to swing hard and miss.

I stepped rapidly forward and faked a lunging kick at the knee with his weight on it. He shifted back and lifted the leg, stepping forward into a kick of his own that likely would have broken me if it landed.

The beauty of a fakeout is that I was nowhere near where he expected me to be. Instead of kicking, I dropped my foot to the cobblestones and leaped, twisting my hips and lifting up into the air. All the momentum of his forward kick added to the momentum I had built with my running steps, my lunge, and my leap. I raised my knee in a hard half-kick and drove it against the side of his head with a cracking noise. He fell backward and I was falling with him, but I wasn’t finished. I swung a foot at his neck and hooked his throat.

We hit the street, hard, but he hit harder. I jammed my shin against his throat. He made a wheezing sound, struggling for air. I scrambled to my hands and knees but Shi Jin grasped my ankle in one huge hand. He yanked on my leg with unbelievable strength. To keep my knee from dislocating, I spun in the direction of his force, and brought the heel of my other foot down against his face.