People were looking at me. From the shop front on the right a middle-aged white woman in camo fabric stared at my legs, then at my head, as if she wanted to shoot me. Magic probed me, teasing, testing. A couple of younger men, probably Chinese, leaned to each other, whispering. I caught bits and pieces. A word stood out: hu. Tiger. Didn’t take them long to see through my human form.
I felt like a cow being led past a row of butcher shops. I raised my chin. Show no fear, or they will swoop like vultures.
A stall to the left looked richer than the rest: The table was sturdy and the cloth on it was red silk, the real thing, not a cheap imitation. An old wizened woman, Korean by her dress, sat guarding the wares, looking bored. I stopped and looked at the dried-out parts displayed on the silk.
I bowed. “An-nyung-ha-se-yo.” Hello.
The woman bowed her head back. “Hello.”
English. Great. My Korean was rusty.
I paused by a small white sack that lay half open. Inside lay minced leather strips.
“Bear gallbladder,” the woman said.
I picked up a small slice and sniffed it. “Pig.” If it had been a real bear gallbladder, she wouldn’t have let me pick it up. “Do you have bear?”
The woman reached under the table, pulled out a small wooden box, and opened it. Dried leathery strips. Could be bear gallbladder.
The woman snapped the box closed. “When were you born? What is your sign? You have nice pale skin, but the eyes are not so good, yes? We have snake glands for the eyes. Dried cicadas, make it into soup, it will make your eyes stronger. Or does your man need help in bed? I have something very special for that. Not like all those dried-out dog parts over there.” She grimaced at the stall across the street. “I have a sure thing. Want to see?”
I nodded.
Another box appeared as if by magic. I looked inside. Rhino horn. The genuine article, too.
“I’m looking for a rare thing.”
The woman pondered me. “How rare?”
“Very rare. Keong Emas.”
“The Golden Snail.”
“I will pay well.” I reached into my hoodie and showed her the money, just a hint, but it was enough.
“Keong Emas is powerful magic.” The old woman stared at me. Her eyes were cold like two pieces of coal.
“Makes it easy to recognize a fake,” I told her.
She let out a short little grunt and called out something in Korean, too fast to follow. “You go inside now.”
I stepped over a small crate containing a pair of frightened rabbits, and went inside. Cages lined the walls. Monkeys, dogs, birds. Big frightened eyes. They screamed and shied away from the bars at my approach. I clenched my teeth. I just had to get the snail. Just get the snail.
An adolescent boy came through the curtained doorway and waved to me. “Come this way.”
I didn’t want to go that way.
The boy waved at me. “Come! Come!”
Crap. I followed him through the curtain. A long dark room smelling of blood. Great. We kept going, farther from the street, deeper into the house. I was probably walking into a trap, but I had to get the snail. This was the only way. As long as Jim stayed awake, he would get me out. He would. Of course he would.
Another set of curtains and I stepped into a large room lined with tables, supporting a medicine man’s smorgasbord, as if a dozen street vendor carts had vomited their contents into the room. Boxes, wicker, wood, and plastic. Bloated glass bottles, skinny glass vials, jars containing powders and liquids. Dried herbs, in bundles and packets. And bones. So many bones: bear bones, wolf bones, tiger bones. Bastards.
An Asian man sat at the table, wizened and old, dressed in dark clothes. Behind him a white man leaned against the wall. He was tall and beefy, and his fatigue jacket made him look rectangular, like he was made out of bricks. A short reddish beard hugged his chin. A red NC State baseball cap covered his hair.
In the right corner a large cage sat covered by a tarp. A blond woman stood by it, leaning on a baseball bat. She wore jeans and a huge man’s T-shirt with an oversized blood drop and the words DONATE BLOOD on it. The T-shirt was threadbare and patched in a couple of places.
Something moved in the cage. I could hear it breathing in long, labored gasps. People moved in the outer rooms, too, to the right of us and behind, making small noises. A lot of people. At least eight, maybe more.
I just had to get the snail. That’s all. Just get the snail and save Jim.
The old man regarded me. I wouldn’t bow to this asshole. My back would break.
“You want to buy Keong Emas.”
“Yes.”
The boy who brought me here walked over to the far table and brought a wicker box to the old man. The man opened the box and removed a glass tank with five snails inside. Each had a dull brown shell.
The old man offered me the tank. “Choose one.”
This was it.
I reached into the tank and passed my hand over the snails. The smallest one tugged on me, tiny needles of magic prickling my skin. Gently, I plucked it from its leaf and held it in the palm of my hand.A faint glow lit the snail from within. It lingered for a second and burst, painting the snail’s shell with brilliant gold.
“Only powerful magic can see Keong Emas,” the old man said. “White tiger magic.”
Oh shit. I clamped the snail in my hand and felt it slide into its shell. “How much?”
“Take her.” The old man nodded to the guy in the red hat.
Red Hat peeled himself from the wall. Behind me a man and a woman moved from behind the curtain, cutting off my exit.
“You shouldn’t have come here,” the old man said.
“Jim!” I yelled.
“He won’t help,” the old man said. “Nobody will help.”
I dashed left, but Red Hat’s hand gripped my shoulder and he jerked me off my feet with superhuman strength. I kicked at him, but he batted my legs aside and carried me back to the corner, where a woman pulled the tarp off the cage. A man knelt in the cage on all fours, filthy, wearing rags smeared with old blood. Plastic ties forced his wrists together, and above them a ragged cloth with a holding spell scrawled in ink bound his forearms. A leather muzzle clamped his whole face, leaving only the narrow strip of space around his eyes visible. Bandages hid his head and all I saw was one eye, mad, furious, and brilliant turquoise.
There was a second cage next to him. An empty cage.
Panic squirmed through me. I kicked and thrashed, but the cage kept coming closer and closer. If I went tiger, he couldn’t carry me, but I’d be too dazed to fight and I would drop the snail. I couldn’t drop the snail, or Jim would die.
Jim would come for me. He wouldn’t fall asleep. He wouldn’t let them kill him.
I kicked and jerked with all the shapeshifter strength I had.
“Don’t make this harder on yourself,” Red Hat told me.
We were almost to the cage. “How can you do this?”
“Your uncle kept a lot of people from feeding their families.” Red Hat shoved me the final five feet. “We have mouths to feed. I don’t have a problem doing this.”
I thrust my legs at the cage and braced myself. “Jim! Come get me!”
The man in the other cage moaned a wordless scream and rammed the bars.
Red Hat jerked me down. “Nobody’s coming for you.”
No! No, I will not be put into a fucking cage. I kicked against the cage, pitching myself backward. My head smashed into Red Hat’s face. He dropped me. My feet touched the ground. Yes! I scrambled left.
Something smashed against my temple. Pain exploded between my ears. I spun. The woman behind me swung again and the bat took me straight in the face. The world shivered and I tasted blood on my lips.
Red Hat clamped me and muscled me forward. The man in the other cage let out a long desperate wail.
It was over. Jim fell asleep. Nobody was coming for me.
*
RED HAT WAS dragging me to the cage. The blond woman leaned over and swung open the door.
A man flew through the curtain and slid across the floor, knocking the tables and benches out of the way until he hit the wall. I caught a glimpse of long dark hair. He clenched his hands to his throat. A thin red spray shot from between his fingers. He gurgled, his eyes huge with sharp fear.
The curtain fell, revealing Jim, drenched in blood. His eyes glowed green and his face was terrible.
He came! Oh my gods, he came for me. It was going to be okay. Everything was going to be okay.
A stocky man lunged at Jim from the left, swinging a machete. Jim grabbed him. His knife flashed, and the man crumpled down, his machete slick with his own blood.
Red Hat threw me aside. I crashed into the cage and thrust the snail into the pocket of my jeans.
The blond woman by the cage screamed and swung her baseball bat at me. I ripped it out of her hands and bashed her with it. The bat snapped with a sharp wooden crunch. The blow knocked the woman across the room. That’s right, fuck you!
A man fired a crossbow at Jim. Jim swayed out of the way, leapt, clearing the tables, and struck. The crossbowman fell like a lifeless doll. More people streamed from the back doorway.
Jim looked at me and smiled.
Red Hat shrugged his jacket off. A dark pattern swirled along his skin, like the whorls of wood grain. He headed toward Jim. A table got in his way, and he knocked it out of the way. The table splintered. Oh shit.
In the corner the old man waved his arms. Angry magic streaked through the air.
Jim was cutting his way toward me, his knife sending arcs of blood left and right. People screamed, wood crashed, Jim snarled. The scent of blood made me dizzy.
The prisoner moaned at me. The empty cage blocked his door. I pushed it. It didn’t move. I wedged myself between the wall and the cage, planting my feet on its base, and pushed, pushed as hard as I could. Wood creaked, and the cage slid out of the way. I dropped to my knees. A long knotted cord bound the door, the knots holding coins. I grabbed it. Magic scorched my fingers and I jerked back, wincing.
The prisoner screamed, hitting the bars.
“It’s okay,” I told him. “It’s okay, it’s okay. I can do this. Just hold on one second.”