“Little brothers,” he repeated.
Mr. Wong let out a heavy sigh.
“I have sent assassins, of course. Bok Choy can’t even shoot straight. Do you know what he does in a gunfight? He takes a .45-caliber pistol in each hand, and then he closes his eyes. With his eyes closed, he squats down and spins around, shooting at random. He could shoot his friends or his bodyguards by accident. He’s no warrior. My assassins should have killed him.” He looked down at the floor and fidgeted with his silver badge.
“He has their corpses brought here in the night. Here, to my restaurant. He leaves the corpses of my little brothers on my front step. My Daoshi makes sure their corpses are well treated, their names revered in the Hall of Ancestors.”
He clasped his hands together. “I have the best Daoshi in America working for me,” he said. “Fifteen years ago I brought him here from China. He was fleeing something, and he had his daughter.”
I sat alert, suddenly interested. I hadn’t come here today expecting to learn about my past. What did he mean, Father was fleeing something? This was something Father had never told me.
“The American officials wouldn’t let him in. Not with a daughter. It was the Chinese Exclusion Act. I sent him letters. Leave the girl behind, I said. Sell her, there’s always someone willing to buy a girl. But he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t come here without her.”
I stared at him. My mouth was open in a perfect circle. What he was saying couldn’t be true. If it was true, it meant I had misunderstood my father for a lifetime. If it was true, it meant he valued me more than he’d ever led me to believe. I had spent my life wishing I could make him proud of me, and Mr. Wong was telling me that my father valued me all along.
“He wouldn’t leave me behind?” I asked in a tiny voice.
“He wouldn’t leave you,” Mr. Wong repeated. “So I had to bribe the officials to classify him as a merchant. It cost me a fortune. A fortune! It cost a fortune to bring the great Daoshi Xian Zhengying and his daughter to Chinatown.”
I sat there, stunned. Father always seemed so severe, so distant. And yet Mr. Wong was telling me that Father risked staying in China rather than leave me behind. It didn’t make sense at all. He had given his eye for me, but he had only done it to save face. What had he hoped to gain by refusing to leave me behind?
Mr. Wong picked up his cup of rice wine and took a sip. But it seemed casual, unthinking; did it mean he considered me no enemy? Or had he simply forgotten? I had no way to tell. I was full of hope and confusion, a mess of childish emotion, and utterly bewildered.
“All this I did for your father, and he would not do the one thing the Ansheng tong needed most. He would not summon evil spirits to kill Bok Choy.”
I felt suddenly cold. Horror washed over me as the words sank in. I pushed back my chair, ready to run, ready to fight. My pulses were racing. “You asked him to unleash monsters in Chinatown?” Outrage was plain in my voice.
Mr. Wong raised a hand to silence me. “For three years I asked this thing of him. For three years he refused. ‘It would go against the ideals of my lineage,’ he said. It took me a long time to accept his position. Daoshi Xian Zhengying honors his lineage, his ancestors. He is a man who does not compromise. I hope to honor my ancestors as he honors his.” Mr. Wong looked down and away. I felt my pulses begin to calm down.
“Some of my 438s did not feel the same way. They watched our businesses go under, they saw their glory extinguished, and they saw Bok Choy and his American ways gain in power. They have been saying I am too old. My ways are too Chinese, too old-fashioned, they say. There is one man in particular,” he said, and I saw pain in his eyes, “one in particular who disagrees with me.”
The pain made it clear to me. “Tom,” I said. Mr. Wong gave a slow, heavy nod.
“Tom said I should not tolerate your father’s insubordination. He said if your father refuses to summon monsters to kill Bok Choy, we should hire someone who will do as he’s asked.”
“Liu Qiang,” I said. My hand involuntarily went to touch the cuts on my stomach.
Mr. Wong gave a barely affirmative gesture, and continued. “My son and a number of his friends are acting outside my authority now. They issue commands in my name but I have not asked them to do as they’re doing. There is disharmony among the Ansheng tong. There are sworn brothers who follow my son and not me. I do not know how many. Others follow Tom’s commands, believing they came from me.”
I watched his face, weary and heavy. I could hardly imagine all the years he had spent building the Ansheng tong into what it was, both a surrogate family and a criminal empire. First he watched it lose power and status to the upstart Bok Choy, and now he was watching his organization fracture. How it must have broken his heart, and how much more it must have hurt him to know the man trying to overthrow him was his own son.
I looked at Mr. Wong, the great man of Chinatown, who had done so much for so many, including Father and me. He was lost in thought, and seemed alone. If I showed sympathy, I would cause him to lose face. I needed to take advantage of the moment.
“Will you tell me about the miners?” I asked.
“Miners?” he said, turning to me. He looked baffled.
“The corpses in the gold mine. I was told you had them exhumed to send their bones to China.”
“No,” he said, “I have ordered no such thing. It must be Tom’s doing. But what would Tom want with corpses?”
“I don’t know, Mr. Wong,” I said.
“Whore!” he said. The contract girl and I both jumped. He turned to her. “Why did you bring only one cup for rice wine?”
“I … it was my mistake, Mr. Wong,” she said. She fled to bring me a cup.
He waited for her to leave. Once the door was closed behind her, we were alone, and he looked at me with a gaze of centuries. “I will not help you fight my son, Xian Li-lin. If you need allies, go seek out the Xie Liang tong, and tell them Bok Choy is in danger,” he told me.
“Mr. Wong,” I said slowly, “the Ansheng tong is my whole world. I will not work with the Xie Liangs.”
“Go to them if you need help,” he repeated, and the next words he spoke felt like he had etched them in granite. “But if my son must be killed, I want you to do it, not some Xie Liang scum.”
My eyes went wide but I said nothing. He had made certain no one else was in the room. He had advised me to seek aid from his enemies, he had given me permission to kill his son, and he had made sure no one would witness him saying these things.
I could not believe a rift had grown so wide between Mr. Wong and his son. Tom was a good man; filial piety had always mattered
to him.
The woman returned with a cup and placed it down in front of me, full of steaming rice wine. Mr. Wong offered me much face with this gesture, so I had to drink it. I took a sip and the rice wine flowed into my mouth, warm and pleasant, and left a burning sensation when I swallowed. I loved it.
“Your face is red,” Mr. Wong said with some amusement.
“Your rice wine is excellent,” I replied.
“It is rice wine,” he said. He stood then, and bowed. I stood also, bowed more deeply than he, and then I went to the door.
I walked out through the hall of whores, trying not to hear the sounds of men and women moving together on straw cots. A few moments later, I emerged into the pleasant clamor of men dining at Hung Sing, and the mouthwatering aroma of cooking.
Mr. Wong was a deep and strange man, I thought. He was caught up in conflicts both internal and external. He seemed to have little respect for women, but he showed me some respect. He encouraged me to go to his enemies for help, and yet I was certain he would show me no mercy if I did. He shared his rice wine with me today, but he had no intention of ever doing so again.
He asked me, as a kind of favor, to become his enemy. If I killed Tom, he would mourn his son. And I was certain he would owe me a secret debt.
My head full of doubts, I walked through the re
staurant, out of Ansheng headquarters, and into the street.
There were seagulls crying and I heard my name among the seagulls’ cry.
Four men loitered in the street. They’d been waiting for me.
One of them was Tom Wong. One of them was Hong Xiaohao.
And one of them was Liu Qiang.
14
Liu Qiang’s arm should have ended in a stump. It would have looked that way to anyone who didn’t have yin eyes. But now there was a spirit at the end of the stump. It was sickly white and thick as an arm. It moved like an arm, but also like a snake, and it was longer than an arm should be, six or seven feet long. The spirit arm was pale as mold and it writhed like a rabid animal.
Where a human arm ends in a hand, Liu Qiang’s spirit arm ended in some kind of monstrous reptile head. A yellow forked tongue flicked out between needle-thin fangs. The snake’s red eyes—all three of them—watched me with a cruel intelligence. Whatever it was, I had the feeling it wanted to make me suffer.
The spirit-snake looked like it had been grafted onto Liu Qiang’s arm. My father’s sword had severed the bone and muscle, and somehow Liu Qiang had interwoven this snaking, dangerous spirit with his own flesh. The bones and muscles of the man’s spirit body had been torn apart and knit together into the body of this yaoguai. It must have been agony to endure the bonding.
Liu Qiang was dangerous, far more dangerous than my father had led me to believe. Powerful sorcery bound that arm to him, and I had no idea what it could do. He no longer seemed to be off-balance; his spirit arm balanced his movements, so he stalked with a predatory grace.
Somehow, earlier, when he walked into Father’s temple, he left the arm behind. Father’s talismans would have barred its entry. But that meant the snaking phantom was bound to Liu, and yet independent of him. They were two, and yet one. I had to treat Liu Qiang and his arm as two separate opponents until I knew more about the spirit-arm’s abilities—and its mind.
The spirit-arm gazed at me, hatred evident in its three red eyes. Then it opened its mouth and spoke, in a voice like claws ripping against flesh and bone. “The baby means to fight,” it said to Liu Qiang. The other men couldn’t hear it, didn’t seem to know it was there.
I stared at the monster and shuddered. “I want to eat the baby,” it said, its voice sickening as the sound of nails being driven through eyelids.
I glanced around at the rest of the men. I didn’t know the fourth man, but his short hair and shaved forehead could only mean one thing. He’d gotten out of prison recently. Barbers had clipped off his queue in prison, and now he was growing it back. He stood stiff and alert, like a city guard. His face seemed hard, almost pitiless. It was the look of an enforcer.
The four of them had me surrounded. In a fair fight I might stand a chance against four unskilled men. But Tom Wong used to spar with Rocket, and Liu Qiang had trained alongside Father, so at least two of them had some training. And there was no telling what Liu Qiang’s monstrous arm could do.
I do not hide from monsters, but facing them here, on the street, I couldn’t hope to win. I could only fight and die, and then they would come for Father while he was still recuperating, and then there would be no one left who could stop their plans. I knew what I needed to do. I needed to get away.
“Tom,” I said, facing him, “don’t do this.”
My husband’s friend looked down and away, then looked back to me and shrugged. “Sorry,” he said.
I turned to Xiaohao, whose lips were pursed and inexpressive. “Xiaohao,” I said, “two years ago you wanted me for a wife.”
He said nothing, only smiled; and in his grim smile I saw a world of confusion. Hong Xiaohao had no idea what he was doing here. He had wanted to become a little brother of the Ansheng tong, and now he was involved in schemes he didn’t understand. I gave a frustrated huff.
The man without a queue leered at me. “My Tiger Style can kick apart your Crane Legs,” he said.
Tom Wong backhanded him, knocking the leer off his face. “Never,” Tom said to the other man, “never talk to her like that.”
The other man wiped blood from his lips. “I don’t understand,” he said.
Tom’s voice was hard as iron. “You can fight her, you can even kill her if you have to,” he said. “But never forget that she’s my friend’s wife. You will show him respect. Do nothing, say nothing, that will cause Rocket to lose face. Do you understand?”
The short-haired man dropped his eyes and nodded.
I stared at Tom, taken aback by the intensity of his feeling, the contradictory impulses of a man who would allow me to be killed but protect me from insult. There was a part of me that still cared about my husband’s friend, and maybe there was a part of him that still cared about me. But it wasn’t about me, I realized; it was Rocket, my dead husband, who mattered to him.
“Tom,” I said. “Let me go. You were my husband’s friend.”
“You think I’ve forgotten that, Li-lin?” Anger and pain distorted his pretty face. “I’m doing this because of Rocket!” Tom shouted.
“What are you saying?” I felt dizzy. I felt ill. It felt like a wound had been torn open, and all I could do was watch the blood seep out, oblivious of all else. “Tom,” I began, “if you think my husband would support what you’re doing, you never knew him at all.”
“Of course he wouldn’t support this, Li-lin! He was a hero. But there’s no place for heroes anymore.” Tom looked at me with anguish in his eyes. “Rocket was the strongest. No one could match his skill in kung fu. And none of it mattered, none of his strength and courage and brilliance mattered when they shot him,
pow pow.”
Tom Wong was quiet, facing me.
“My husband died, Tom, and no one mourns him more than I do,” I said. “I am your friend’s wife, and I have been faithful to him, his chaste widow, and yet you allowed a man to bare my skin and cut me. How can you justify the things you’ve done?”
Tom’s eyes were hollow with old pain. “Everything is different now,” he said, his voice bitter. “When they shot him, everything changed. That’s when I realized the old ways aren’t enough. We can’t live by the old rules, Li-lin. Kung fu is useless when they have guns, and magic is worthless if you won’t use it to kill your enemies.”
“Tom,” I said, shaking my head. “You don’t know the horrors you’re stirring up. A weapon is as good or evil as the hand that holds it, but magic doesn’t work that way. Liu Qiang’s magic is
filthy.”
The monstrous arm made a sound then, a hideous screech like iron against bone, and I realized it was laughing.
“Want to eat the baby’s hands,” it said, in its horror of a voice. It wanted to eat me, but it wanted to cripple me first. I didn’t comprehend why anything would hate me so much.
Liu Qiang’s lips were trembling. He stepped closer to me and yelled, “You call it filthy, but it’s stronger! After tomorrow night, everyone will know my magic is stronger!”
Tomorrow night. I made sure I would remember it. And then Liu Qiang blew stupefying powder in my face.
*
I had been learning for as long as I could remember.
The women at the mission taught me English. They taught me to add, subtract, multiply, and divide, to weigh ounces and pounds, to measure inches, feet, and miles. Everything else, my father taught me.
My yin eyes were the result of an imbalance, and it was important to him to balance my yin with yang. So he taught me the martial arts of Mount Wudang, and he taught me the Dao.
He taught me through repetition and he taught me through scorn. I studied the Daolu Registers until I could name eighty thousand gods and demons. I could not count the hours spent practicing taiji postures, or the hours scribbling with my left hand, drawing down the moon through my closed eyes, until I could write in ghostscript.
Of all the forms of learning, I loved sparring the best. I loved standing up, facing an opponent, ready to strike or be struck. Ther
e was something about those moments facing an opponent, all my skill and intelligence pitted against another human being in a few minutes of all-consuming alertness.
But I also loved listening to my father when he would tell me stories. He told stories of the immortals and stories of the Daoshi. There were stories of men brave enough, clever enough, or hungry enough to overcome monsters. There was a man who sold a ghost into slavery, and another man who fried a ghost and ate it. He told me stories where men married foxes, women fought like men, outlaws stood up to injustice, immortals could speak in thunderclaps, and evil men practiced the forbidden skill called dian-si-shuei, the death touch—striking five points along a victim’s body to cause instant death.
I was ten years old when my father told me about the scholar Wang Zhaosu. Wang made some philosophical arguments about the nature of the universe. His arguments made little impression on me. What I remembered of Wang Zhaosu was that he was capable of turtle breathing.
Wang Zhaosu could take a single breath and make it last for eight minutes. Eight minutes of heightened awareness.
I was ten years old and turtle breathing became my obsession. Slowing the breath, awakening the spirit. When Father was busy I practiced it. I would inhale deeply and let the vital breath fill me. The vital breath moved through me with an electric tingling to the tips of my fingers.
Twenty-second breaths. Thirty-second breaths. Ninety-second breaths. I got better and better.
I was up to five minutes. Two and a half minutes breathing in, two and a half minutes breathing out.
Liu Qiang blew a puff of yellow powder in my face. I had no time to inhale. That meant I had to hold the breath in my lungs. It meant I had two and a half minutes before I needed to gulp down air.
After so many years of training, holding my breath brought mental clarity. It brought instant-to-instant focus and a deep calm from which I could make decisions. A cloud of yellowish powder floated in the air near my face. And all these men thought I had been drugged.