Flying Swords 22

I tried writing the conflict with the Westerners first, and nothing flowed, so I backed up and wrote this first. It took some serious rewriting, but I think this works now.

On another note… OMG. I moved from history to English to keep a younger teacher from being laid off, and Holy Hannah… teaching English is either a shit-ton more work or I am too old and crabby to change preps. The kids are still nice and I like teaching, but dude… they can’t consistently tell the difference between facts and opinions. I had no idea how much I was relying on the freshmen English teachers because kids are not this helpless when I got them as sophomores.

Leander stepped out of the crowd, moving to a spot behind a Chinese juniper. The gnarled trunk and untrimmed branches gave them privacy from the crowd.

“Did you spot someone?” Xi asked, his suspicious gaze darting around the street.

“No, but we’re near the hotel.”

“Okay,” Xi drew the word out and looked at him with confusion. “But why are we stopping?”

“Can you control shadows now?” Leander asked.  He knew it was his fault that Xi was hurt. Leander’s enemies had targeted Xi, and his attempt to cure Xi had damaged his magical pathways. However, if he wasn’t healed enough to use shadows, he wasn’t safe.

“Some,” Xi said.  His tone did not inspire confidence.

“You should wait here,” Leander said. He stepped deeper into the shadows created by the ragged juniper. Its wild strength and unyielding sense of protection made Leander feel safe, and he rested a hand against the juniper’s bark.

Xi’s expression turned mulish. “Why did I bother coming at all if I’m going to stand out here while you go in?”

“Because you’re here if someone comes from the street. You can call for help.”

“While you risk your life? No. If someone targeted Heng and his friend, then I’m going in there with you.” Xi practically growled.

“So both of us can get caught? One of us should wait out here.” Leander fought to keep his voice quiet. He wanted to shout and curse and call Xi an obstreperous, addle-pated moron who didn’t have the brain processing power of a leaf sheep slug. But that would attract too much attention. “If Druwolf sent someone after me, having you out here to call the authorities might be the difference between life and death.”

“Or whoever these people are, they might have come looking for me,” Xi argued. “Besides, having even partial control over shadows is more useful than plants.”

Leander snorted. Xi didn’t know what plants could do–that much was clear.  But he had to admit buildings had more shadows than plants.  Logically, Xi should come, but Leander didn’t want him to. He wanted him safe out here.

“What is that?” Xi asked, looking down to where Leander was mindlessly fingering his new bracelet.

“Shanlin made it.” That wasn’t an answer, but Leander wouldn’t be distracted from the subject of Xi’s safety. 

Xi chuckled.  “For someone who insists he’s a terrible person, you’re a stereotypical doting dad when it comes to Shanlin.”

Leander jerked his hand away like the bracelet was made of fire instead of peanut shells and string. It was an ugly thing with uneven holes drilled into peanut shells that had been roughly carved into… in truth Leander couldn’t tell. But Shanlin had tied it around his wrist with such solemnity that Leander had promised to wear it. He wasn’t willing to cut it off.

“I’m all he has.” Even as Leander said it, he knew it wasn’t true. Shanlin now had grandparents who provided a stable home. They’d even offered him a new name, one that would hide him from Druwolf. They could provide better than Leander.

“You talk like you’re not enough. You’re a better parent than either Tecca or Finn.”

Leander scowled. “Don’t say that. Finn loved Shanlin.”  Tecca did too, but Leander didn’t feel any need to be kind or even fair to the woman’s memory.

“I will say it because I never approved of him as a father. He knew they were in danger, and he and Tecca weren’t willing to run. They were too afraid of having to give up their lives. You’re the one who put Shanlin first, so you’re a better parent.”

That was so wrong it was amusing. Leander gave an inelegant snort. “I don’t know how to be a parent at all.”

“Yet you’re doing the most important thing–protecting him.”

Leander wasn’t sure of that–not if Druwolf’s people had followed them to China. Wearing ugly jewelry was a poor imitation of fatherhood and no substitute for proving a safe home, but it was all he could offer the boy.  He still remembered making macaroni necklaces in grade school, and his mother had thrown hers away. He was trying to do the opposite of his own mother.

“If we’re family, I want to help protect you the same way,” Xi whispered.

Leander sucked in a quick breath. He hadn’t expected such a subtle counterattack from Xi. “I’m not a child,” Leander said, his teeth clenched in frustration.

“But you’re family. You have been since we were pre-pubescent kids in that home.  So I’m going with you.” Xi ended the argument by striding toward the hotel with the hand lettered sign and peeling paint.  Leander hissed his name, but Xi was moving too fast for him to physically grab. There was a chamomile close enough that Leander could have distilled the plant’s essence into a powerful knock-out potion, but Xi was moving too fast to hit him with it.

Cursing, Leander had to chase after the idiot. Who ran toward a potential fight with potential henchmen of Druwolf while possessing a damaged magical weapon?  Brainless, boneheaded, moronic half-wits with a deathwish. And that was the kindest way Leander could think to describe Xi.

They had Heng’s room number, and Xi rushed past the desk where a worker was calling out offering of help in a clear effort to nicely stop them from rushing into guest rooms. Leander took a moment to offer a small bow. “My brother has called for me to come with haste,” he blurted before he ran after Xi who had reached the stairs.

The third floor was stifling hot and the corridor narrow. Either someone had painted the walls an obnoxious dull yellow, or a lot of people smoked cigarettes in here, but Xi was already at room twelve’s door, so Leander had very little time to consider interior decorating.  Xi laid his hand on the door and closed his eyes. A wrinkle formed between his eyes, so pulling on his shadows clearly still hurt.

“Two people, both lying down. I can’t see details,” Xi said, his voice tight with pain.

Leander shoved him aside and shouldered open the door, wincing as his joints protested the physical activity.  The room was as dingy as the hallway they’d come from with a single dirty window and two twin beds.  Leander rushed to Heng on the nearest bed.

“Are you okay?” Leander dropped to his knees and took Heng’s hand in his. Heng’s hair was dull and tangled, and this modern shirt had several mystery stains.

“Compared to death, I am glorious. Compared to any previous state of being, I am miserable,” Heng said with a groan.

“Not as miserable as I,” said the woman from the next bed.  Huang Min.  Older sister of the boy who had abandoned him and Xi when asked to escort them to the river.  A half second later, Leander realized she was also the servant who had brought him that disagreeable donkey when he had been working for Pill Master Yang Xiangren.  “Someone poisoned us.”

“Or we fell ill,” Heng said. “Very, very ill. Dizzy and nauseated and ill.”  Heng groaned again.

“I think it’s rather more logical to assume the outsiders poisoned us. We were following them,” Min said. She tried to sit up, but ended up falling back onto the bed with a groan.

“There are people watching from the street,” Xi said.

“What?” Leander went to the window, standing next to it rather than in front as he peered out into the crowded street.

“You won’t see them. They’re in the shadow of the building across, west side. I can’t tell you any details, but I feel three people.”

“Maybe they’re just in the shade to smoke,” Leander said even though he didn’t believe they would have luck that good.

Heng climbed out of his bed, clinging to the wall as he tried to get to the window.  “If there are evil eggs out there, we need to be out of bed.” Despite saying that, Heng took two steps back and sat on his bed.  His whole body heaved like he might throw up from the effort.

“Eggs?” Xi asked. The translation pill apparently didn’t work on idioms, but Leander was surprised Xi hadn’t already heard someone insulted using “egg” since a good dozen different insults used it.

The question caused Min to glare at Xi with a disgusted expression. Leander thought of the Chinese as having exquisite manners and impressive poker faces, but Min was breaking every stereotype. Xi, however, ignored her and said to Leander, “You can pull the poison out of them.” Shock transformed Heng’s face, and even Min forgot to look pinched and unhappy for a moment.  

“I did that to you, and it almost killed you,” Leander pointed out.

“I was already dying when you pulled the poison out, which is why I almost died. If we have Druwolf’s people in town, they need to be up and moving. Otherwise, it's not the poison that's going to kill them.”

“If enemies are targeting us, it is because you brought them to town,” Min said, the pinched expression back.

Leander ignored her. “Heng, should I purge the poison from your system?” Leander didn’t want to take the risk, but Xi was right that they were too vulnerable like this.  If he were healthy, Heng would be able to defend himself from any Westerner. He had a much more flexible and powerful form of magic than the highly specialized form Druwolf’s people would possess. Even without magic, he could vanish into a crowd or run for his life. However, right now he couldn’t even stand.

Heng looked from Xi to Leander and back, a crease between his eyes suggesting either worry or that he was sick enough that he was not quite tracking the conversation. “Can you do this safely, qidi?”

Min visibly flinched.

“I don't know how safe it is, but I can pull all the poison out of your blood at once. Xi was dying when I did it to him. But it bruised the pathways his qi uses, so his magic won’t flow freely.”

“But will you recover?” Heng looked to Xi with such concern that guilt swamped Leander.  Heng was too good, not just for Leander, but for anyone.  He didn’t even know Xi, and yet his concern was so genuine that his whole face twisted with it. Ten years. That’s how long Leander had ignored Heng. He’d never answered a single letter or call, and yet not only did Heng take him in, but he cared about a stranger who had followed Leander. A stranger Leander had taken into his bed. As much as Leander and Heng weren’t in a relationship, Leander still felt like he had cheated.

Leander cleared his throat and pushed all the dark emotions into the smallest possible box in the back of his mind. “Master Teacher Wang Bo says that Xi will fully recover, although he should not be using his magic until he heals.”

Xi snorted. “I’ll rest my magic when we don’t have people trying to kill us.”

Heng seemed to think about that for a moment before he nodded. “Do it,” he said to Leander. He smiled and laid back down on the bed. The trust he was showing took Leander’s breath away.

“Wait,” Min objected. “You should not risk your life on the unknown skills of an outsider.”

Heng glanced in her direction. “I do not ask that you follow me on this, but I would rather be healthy sooner rather than later. I was always the one who took my mother's hangover cure because a moment of misery was worth a quicker recovery. That is especially important if we have enemies near.

Leander came to the side of the bed, and Heng smiled up at him.

Guilt crawled out of the box where Leander had shoved it. They hadn’t been together as a couple for a decade, but there also hadn't been anyone else until Xi. Before that, Heng had been the only person other than Finn that Leander had ever shared his body with. It was such an intimate thing, sharing a physical body with another. He knew that others didn't feel that way, but he always had. When Leander allowed someone to touch him, to run their hands over him and make him shiver, to control how fast he breathed by making him pant with the need or hold his breath in anticipation, that was power. 

Leander did not share his power easily.

He’d shared that with Heng, and now he had given the power to Xi instead. He wished he had the privacy to confess to Heng and ask for his forgiveness. The man was kind enough that he would likely offer it, but Leander would not speak in front of Min.

Leander forced himself to focus on Heng’s body, to sink into his magic and chase the poison in his cells. The teachers at the school had provided a huge range of poisonous plants, and within a minute, something familiar teased Leander’s magic. The poison was warm. Inviting. It danced with Leander’s magic, but he could feel the toxic corrosion hiding in Heng. It took him several minutes before he realized it was night scented lily. 

From there, Leander drew the poison from Heng, forcing it into Heng’s lungs were the poison gathered and thickened until Heng started coughing. He sat up in bed and leaned over the edge and hacked out a clot of corruption and phlegm before taking a deep breath.

“How are you?” Leander asked.  There had been very little poison in Heng’s system, but Leander still could have damaged him by pulling it out.

Heng took several deep breaths.  “Much better.  You are a talented man.”

“That’s what your mother keeps telling him,” Xi said with a chuckle, “but you know Lian. He never listens to complements.”

“Very true, but my mother does not say that which is not true.” Heng sat up.  “Min, allow him to cure you.”

“I do not require the assistance of outsiders with their strange magics,” Min snapped. “Not even Master Teacher Bo can remove poison from the body. I do not trust these Americans with their weak magic.”

Heng frowned. “You have seen the proof with your own eyes.”

“I cannot see into your body to see the damage that one might have done,” she shot back. She sat up, her hand braced against the wall. “I will allow my body to heal naturally.”

“Magic is natural,” Heng said. “Do not allow your fear to rule you, Min.”

“I am not afraid. I am also not blindly trusting.” 

Leander didn’t like the vitriol in Min’s face. He sent his magic out into the air, dancing with the traces of flora that existed everywhere. The frame of the bed remembered being a tree.  The sheets carried hints of bamboo growing in muddy soil. But then Leander found the night scented lily, not in Min’s direction, but over toward the dresser.

Leander stood, and the quiet argument between Heng and Min fell silent.  “What are you doing?” Min demanded when Leander walked to the dresser.  “Stay out of my possessions.” She hurried to him, shoving him to one side. Leander yielded rather than get in a physical fight with Heng’s friend.

“Why do I sense the poison in there?” Leander demanded.

Heng stood.  “Are you certain?”

“Absolutely,” Leander said. “And I do not sense any poison in Huang Min.”  He crossed his arms and dared her to contradict him. Given that she had leaped across the room and shoved him aside, she didn’t have many symptoms of the poison that had left Heng miserable.

She looked from Leander to Heng and back, her eyes narrowing in fury.

“Min, what have you done?” Heng whispered, his voice full of horror.

“I hoped it would bring us closer. We were here and you did not choose my bed.”

“I would not dishonor you so,” Heng said.

“Yet you take your qidi back after he has taken a wife and fathered a child. His life is back with his wife’s family, with his family. He should not be here.”

“He has no family. You know this. I told you of this.” Heng held out a hand as if trying to placate her, but her fury only grew.

“You told me you were done with being a qixiong, yet your parents hosted a ceremony and you have done nothing to stop them.”

“They wish for a grandson, and Lian has given them one.”

Min slapped away Heng’s hand. “I could give them grandchildren. There would be space in the Nie home for us to have a half-dozen children, and yet you reject me.”

Heng stepped back, his own anger starting to bubble to the surface. “I told you I was dedicating myself to cultivation. I cannot seek a relationship while I seek to distance myself from worldly matters. You know this. You were a cultivator before you decided to seek worldly knowledge.”

Min threw her hands into the air. “You encouraged me to believe you would follow. I gave up my place in the school for you, and I was left working for a man who treated me worse than his donkeys. And I accepted my role. I believed the universe would lead me to my success. Only then you came out of the school for him. For them.” She poked her finger toward Leander and Xi with such violence that it was clear she wished she had a sword in her hand to stab them. “You came to search for outsiders when you never once came to see if I had a safe home in the outer village.” Her voice rose until she shouted and spit flew.

“I never wanted to interfere with your choices.”

“I made choices for you! Always for you!” She threw herself forward and punched Heng with both her fists on his chest.  He toppled over backward onto the bed, and she ran for the door, shoving Xi out of her way before fleeing into the hallway.

“Whoa. That was a lot of drama,” Xi said softly.  “So, does that mean she murdered the pill master or did she just take inspiration from his death and my near-death to… I don’t know… what was she doing?”

Heng had fallen on his bed and now he sat up.  “She had been nursing me. I imagine she hoped I would feel grateful. But I do not know if she was responsible for the poisonings back in the village. She certainly sounds jealous enough to poison one of you.”

“Me,” Leander said softly. He understood jealousy that crawled into a person’s heart and destroyed everything it found.  “Xi got sick because he touched the basket, but she hoped to kill me.”

“I feel like a great fool.” Heng pushed his hair away from his face. “I thought she was a friend.”

Leander gave a wry laugh. “I’m not going to talk. I’m the one who trusted a drug dealer.”

“Not elaborating on my stupidity is a great kindness,” Heng said, his voice weary and thin in a way Leander wasn’t used to hearing. “Thank you for coming to my aid.”

“I don’t think you would have needed aid if not for me.”

“I’ve seen a lot of obsessed partners. She would have done something to come after him eventually,” Xi said.

“Since I have no interest in a relationship with her, I tend to agree. If she was determined to be my wife, we would have come into conflict eventually. I am only regretful that her schemes nearly cost your life,” Heng told Xi.

He shrugged. “It’s not the first time someone’s tried to kill me. I doubt it’s the last.”

“I would hope that it is the last.  Magical China is not so dangerous that one must watch for assassins. This is not a historical drama, even if we prefer to take fashion tips from one.” Heng smiled, and while he still looked pale, there was genuine humor there.

“There are three people watching the hotel that might challenge that assumption,” Leander pointed out.

“Oh shit,” Xi said. The profanity didn’t translate well into Chinese, but Leander understood the general meaning, and Heng looked concerned enough that he must have as well.  “Little Ms. Obsessed has just walked into the shadows with our watchers.”

“En… his mother,” Heng cursed.  Not even Xi’s confused expression at the literal translation of the vulgar term was enough to dent the horror Leander felt. She could lead them straight to Leander and Xi, and if those were Druwolf’s men, that’s all the help they would need to kill everyone in the room.