“He reared his shuddering limbs and quelled

His gasping breath, and spread his arms to meet

Her panting bosom:…she drew back a while,

Then, yielding to the irresistible joy,

With frantic gesture and short breathless cry

Folded his frame in her dissolving arms.

Now blackness veiled his dizzy eyes, and night

Involved and swallowed up the vision…”

From Alastor by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Prologue

Northern China, 1322C.E.

It was already dark out but Jiang Li couldn’t bring herself to go inside, not yet.  The smell of the summer air was intoxicating and she wasn’t finished with practice yet.  She paced the stone courtyard and in the moonlight warily noticed the severed bamboo.  Her mother would blame that on her if she wasn’t careful.            

Jiang Li spun on her toes and pulled the sword from its leather sheath in a fluid movement.  She took two steps.  Parry, slice, jump, swing, crouch.  It was almost like dancing and she let her body adapt to the rhythm.  With her eyes half closed in the dark she practiced, knowing each indent in the stone courtyard and where every plant was.  She was completely lost in her reverie when she heard her mother scream.

Jiang Li’s head snapped around, her long braids spinning towards the noise.  With a loud gasp, she ran around to the front of their small house.  When she got inside she nearly dropped her sword.  Her mother was lying on the floor by the small table.  Jiang Li fell to her knees and pulled her mother’s limp body into her lap.  Her mother’s throat was slashed.  She was no longer breathing.

Another yell came from outside.  Jiang Li pushed herself up, loathe to leave her mother alone but bolted outside as fast as her bare feet could carry her.  She found the bodies of her brother and father lying in the dirt road in front of the forging shed.

“What is going on?”  she screamed into the air.  “Show yourself, cowards!”

Jiang Li spun around, her sword held in front of her.  Where were they?  Who had done this?  She could hear more screams coming from the center of town.  She could feel the blood rushing in her ears as she ran down the dirt road towards town, her sword to the ready.  Something evil had invaded her town and had killed most of her family.  There was only Junde who hadn’t come home yet.

When she got to the center of town a woman grabbed her by the shoulders and tried to stop her.

“What are you doing?  Let me pass!”

The woman shook her head sadly and wouldn’t let go of her.

“Where is Junde?”  Jiang Li asked frantically.

 The woman just shook her head again.

 “Junde too?  All of them dead!”

 Jiang Li threw her head back and howled.  Everyone in her family murdered.  It had happened so fast and she hadn’t been able to help them, to help anyone.  She didn’t even know who or what had done it.

“I will kill them all!  I swear vengeance! I will find who did this and murder them like they did my family!”  she screamed out loud.

Hands supported her as she nearly collapsed in her mental agony.  Someone gently placed her precious sword into the sheath on her hip.  She was taken into a nearby hut and given tea.  Jiang Li sat on the dirt floor, holding the chipped cup in her shaking hands.  She didn’t try to drink it for fear she’d spill the contents all over the ground.

A man walked into the room and stared down at her.  It was the town magistrate, dressed in fine silk and soft leather boots.  He crouched down so his face was even with Jiang Li’s.

“You are the swordsman’s daughter?”  he asked.

Jiang Li nodded, adverting her eyes as she had been taught. 

“He is gone?”  the man asked.  It was more of a statement than a question.

“All of my family is gone.  There is only me left.”

“I have sent a group of men, our strongest fighters, after the ghosts that did this.”

 He called them ghosts. “I want to go with them,” Jiang Li said defiantly.

 The man chucked sadly.  “You are only a girl.  Let the men handle this.”  When he saw the anger in her eyes he raised his hand.  “No one is questioning your courage, young lady.”

Jiang Li sighed and set down the cup of tea.  The man stroked her head.  The gesture was meant to be comforting, but she found it annoying and was glad when he left.

It took her most of the night but she dragged the bodies of her family to the temple.  She spurned the other town folk who offered to help her.  She felt this was something she had to do by herself.

She sat all day at the temple.  By nightfall the other mourners had gone home.  They were afraid to leave her alone in the dark but she refused to leave her family. She sat on the steps to the temple staring out into the darkness with her father’s sword hanging listlessly in her right hand.  Behind her two torches burned, casting a soft red glow around her.

            Jiang Li could feel his presence before she could see him.  The hair on her arms stood up and she could sense movement in the woods.  A man, a foreigner, was silently walking down the narrow dirt path to the temple.  He was tall and thin with pale skin and large dark eyes.  He was dressed in a long tunic with a broadsword strapped to his hip.  It looked large and cumbersome unlike the fine swords her father had forged.  The man climbed up the temple steps towards her.  He had an inhuman grace to the way he movee, like a tiger in human clothing.  When he stepped close enough Jiang Li flicked her right wrist, so the tip of the sword was pointed at his belly.

“What do you want?”  she demanded.

“The night stalkers were here, weren’t they?” he asked quietly.

“Night stalkers?”  she repeated the strange words slowly, trying to find the meaning.

“The ghosts that killed your family.”

With the back of his hand he easily pushed her blade aside and sat down next to her.  He was close enough that she could smell spice, tea leaves and something masculine and dangerous beneath.  In defeat, Jiang Li rested her narrow chin on her knees and tried to ignore him.

“I heard you last night.  You pledged an oath of revenge on those who killed your family.

She nodded wearily, wishing he’d just leave her in peace.

“I can help you exact that revenge if you’re interested,” he said.

She lifted her head and turned to him. “How?”

He reached inside his pocked and pulled out a silver cross on a woven cord.  He held it up in front of her.  It was an equal arm cross encrusted in jewels.  It was very beautiful.  She touched it with a slim finger and sent it spinning.  The torchlight made the jewels shimmer and cast sparkling show of dancing lights.

“What is it?” she finally asked.

“It’s called the Avenger’s Cross.  It can only be worn by a hero whose family line has been broken by the night stalkers, by someone who had pledged and oath of revenge.”

“I am no hero.  I’m only a girl,” she said and rested her head on her knees again.

“When I look at you I see a woman.  I see a warrior.  I see someone who has had everything she knows and loved ripped away by a pack of ghosts.  I see someone who deserves justice.  Who else is going to balance the scales for you?”  he asked temptingly.

“A group of men went after them.”

“All dead,” he said stoically.

This shocked her.  “What do you mean?”

“I mean what I say, they are all dead.  They were no match for the night stalkers, but with this you can be.  All you have to do is put it on.”

He took her hand and placed the cross on her calloused palm and gently folded her delicate fingers around it.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“Just a simple crusader,” he said. When she raised her eyebrows he added.  “They call me Dave the Assassin.” He stood up and stretched. “Revenge is in your hands, use it if you will.”  Dave the Assassin stood up and walked down the temple steps.  “Just remember,” His voice got softer the further he walked away. “They come out after dark.” 

A shiver raced down her spine, slipped through her legs and rested on the ground.  Jiang Li slowly opened her fingers and stared at the cross.  How could something as simple as a piece of jewelry give her enough power to overcome the group of ghosts that had slaughtered her family and her friends?

She took the woven cord in her hands and slipped it over her neck.  The cross lay heavily on her chest between her small breasts.  She sat there for a moment and wondered what was supposed to happen.  She didn’t feel any stronger.  First the burning started and then the flames.  She screamed and tried to rip it off but it was too late, the woven cord disintegrated in her hand.

Jiang Li stood up and started running back toward her house, towards safety.  She made it there in half the time it usually took her.  Something had happened to her.  She reached down and caressed the raised skin where the Avenger’s Cross had crawled under her flesh.  Had this made her stronger?   She open and closed her hand in front of her face.  She balled her hand into a fist and drove it through the center of the small table, pleased to see the wood splinter around her hand.  She stood up and smiled slowly at her new found powers. 

Using the blade of her father’s best sword she cut off her long hair and dressed in her brother’s clothing so she could travel unhindered as a boy.  She dug up the floorboards in the kitchen and found the stash of coins her father hid there, so she’d have money for food and shelter.  She stole a horse from an unmanned stable and rode west, to where rumors were floating back that there had been blood and death in the night.

Days later, she was half way across the great dessert on the trail of the night stalkers. They eluded her during the daylight; they must bed down beneath the desert itself.  Up ahead she could see houses.  It must be next city, Kajisten, if she remembered correctly.  The sky was starting to get dark, it would be nightfall before long.

When she got to the city she boarded her horse at a stable and noticed the set of eight beautiful black stallions that were stabled next to her.

“Those are beautiful horses,” she said. “are they for sale?  I’d pay a lot of money for beasts as fine as those.”

“I would sell them if I could,” The stable boy assured her.  “But they belong to a group of people that came in to town before daybreak.”

“Do you know where they are staying?  Perhaps I could make my bid in person,” she asked slyly.

“There’s an inn at the far end of town.”

“What did they look like?” she asked.

“They were from the continent, pale skin and dressed in nice clothes.  They kept staring at me in an odd way and looking around.  I was glad when my father got up to help me with the horses.”

“You’re lucky to be alive,” Jiang Li said sternly.  “If you see them again, run.  They are bad people.”

She hiked across the dusty roads of town towards the inn at the opposite end of town.  She passed a whitewashed house and heard wailing inside, someone was in mourning.  There was a similar scene in the center of town with a dead man being wheeled in a barrow towards the edge of town.  His family walked behind wailing.

As they passed her, Jiang Li took a look at the body.  She didn’t want to intrude upon the family’s mourning but she needed to see the marks.  She craned her neck and saw that the side of the man’s neck had been torn off and his body was almost bluish white as if he’d been drained of all his blood.  Were the night stalkers brazen enough to feed from the population before booking their room for the day?

Jiang Li felt her blood rush quicker a wicked smile twitched at the corner of her mouth.  She had finally caught up with them.  Revenge was in her grasp.  She quickened her pace and made her way to the edge of town.  She walked into the inn and sat down at a table in the main dining room.  A woman put in front of her a bowl of gruel and some crusty bread and moldy fruit.

Jiang Li pulled a gold coin from her purse.

“That’s too much; I don’t have enough money to make change,” The woman stammered.

Jiang Li waved off her excuse.  “Keep it.  I’m interested in meeting the eight travelers who got her before me.  I have an appointment with them,” she said which wasn’t entirely untrue.

“They traveled all night and specifically told me they weren’t to be disturbed until sunset.  One of the women was so distraught.  She’d been mugged along the trade route and was covered in blood.  I sent down some bandages and water for her.  I hope the poor dear will be all right.”  The woman wrung her hands in her apron like she was genuinely concerned for the ghosts.

“You said down?”  Jiang Li asked.  “You put them under the house?”

“The inn was full, they said the cellar would be fine as long as they weren’t disturbed.  They made it very clear that they weren’t to be disturbed until dark.” 

Jiang Li looked out the window.  It was nearly nightfall.  “It’s nearly sunset, show me where the cellar is.”

The woman started stammering and when Jiang Li started to take the coin back the innkeeper pointed towards the kitchen.  Jiang Li tossed the coin to her and drew her sword as ran to the kitchen.  It was getting darker outside.  The man had said they come out after dark.  She found the door to the cellar and yanked it open.  Instead of using the ladder she jumped down, landing quiet as a cat on the dirt floor.  She could see eight mounds of raised earth.  She strode over to the first on and drove her sword in its center as deep as she could.  When she pulled the sword out the figure sat up in an explosion of soil.  Jiang Li swung hard and whacked the creature’s head off.  The body burst into flames and so did the rolling head.  There was more movement as another one was trying to climb out of the earth.  Jiang Li jumped over the other forms and stabbed at the rising creature.  She hacked at the head and was only able to get it half way off but it was bleeding bad and didn’t seem able to fight back.

A hand came out of the ground and grabbed at her foot.  She hacked off the hand at the wrist and heard the creature bellow a loud cry from beneath the earth.  She waited for it to rise while watching the five other mounds start to struggle from within their earthen graves.  As soon as the handless creature in front of her began to sit up she hacked off its head in a single flawless stroke.  Her father would have been proud.  It burst into flames like the last and she noticed the one behind her had also bled to death and was flaming as well.  Their monstrous bodies burnt down to a pile of ashes leaving no other trace of their horrible existence.

The other five had risen and were circling her.  They were covered with dirt and grime, quite different than the gentlemen and ladies that had entered the city on their fine black stallions only hours earlier.  They opened their mouths to show misshapen teeth and as they hissed, spittle mixed with mud dripped down their chins.  A fair-haired woman leapt at her and Jiang Li struck her across the neck, severing an artery.  The woman came at her again and Jiang Li stabbed her in the stomach.  As she was withdrawing her sword, someone grabbed her from behind.  She grabbed the arm that was draped across her chest and threw them over her shoulder and into the night stalkers in front of her.  With a back hand swing she chopped off another one’s head.  The body stumbled backwards before it fell against the wooden ladder and caught fire. The head rolled towards her and she kicked it into the advancing stalkers.  The one whose artery she had severed had finally bled to death and burst into fire. 

Someone above was screaming “fire” and she could hear people running around upstairs.    The ladder had caught the inn’s floor on fire.  Jiang Li swore, she was trapped among the flames and smoke.  She smiled wickedly, then again so were they.  There were three night stalkers left and they were starting to look worried.  Jiang Li swung her sword leisurely in front of her, cornering them against the wall, they seemed as reluctant to face the fire as they were to face her sword.  She hacked at one of the men, leaving his arm hanging by a tendon from his shoulder.  One of the women was fumbling with something in her blouse.  Jiang Li swung her sword at her neck and missed as the woman ducked and rolled.  The man advanced on her and Jiang Li kicked him in the stomach, sending him sprawling backwards.  She chased him down and hacked repeatedly at his neck until he burst into flames. 

She was left with two women.  Flaming floorboards and wooden joists fell from above barring the way upstairs. Jiang Li could barely breathe for all the smoke but was determined to see this through.  One woman tried to climb up a flaming joist and Jiang Li struck her down quickly, the woman’s body catching fire after a second life threatening blow.  Then the last woman was on top of her and she felt the exquisite pain of a dagger pierce her chest.  She grabbed onto the woman and took her down to the ground with her.

“Who are you?”  The woman growled.

Jiang Li coughed up blood and sputum.  “I am the Avenger.  You killed my family and now I kill you.”

“But you will die down here with us.”  The woman said frantically trying to struggle out of Jiang Li’s grasp.

Jiang Li coughed up more blood.  She could feel herself getting weaker.  Where had she been hit?  In the heart or lungs?

“I will go to my ancestors.  Where will you go?”  Jiang Li asked then using her sword and her bare hand against the blade, pulled in towards her and into the back of the woman’s neck.  She could feel her hand getting cut from the blade but she kept pulling until she felt the woman’s head fall off.

Jiang Li lay on the ground as flaming wood fell from above and the final night stalker lying on top of her caught fire.  Everything was starting to go dim and she could swear she heard her mother singing.

When you’re fighting multiple people at the same time it’s best if you try to line them up and take them one by one rather than let them all get a hold of you.  I’m guessing no one bothered to tell this to the kid dressed in all black who was getting his ass kicked.  I sighed.  I had just finished and hour of kung fu training and another hour of showing my sword form to my Sifu.  I was enjoying my walk home in the dark and rain but I couldn’t just walk past a fight of three against one.

They were in front of St. Michael’s Cathedral so I threw my gym bag down against the side of the church and started running.  My black raincoat floated out behind me and my long blonde ponytail danced across my back.  My katana bounced across my right hip but I didn’t plan on using a weapon, not if I didn’t have to.  One of the guys had the goth kid’s arms pulled behind his back while another one appeared to be trying to rip open his shirt.  The third guy was punching the kid repeatedly in the gut.          

I went first for the guy who was doing the punching.  I grabbed his hand and in a fluid movement twisted it sharply, forcing him to kneel to the ground or break his wrist.  The guy who was restraining the goth kid let go of him and lunged at me.  

He opened his mouth wide and hissed at me.  Spittle dripped down his chin and his teeth looked jagged and pointed like an animal's.  I faltered a bit at his appearance.  He somehow looked distorted and wrong.  Was I seeing things or were they all on some sort of drug?  When he got close enough, I kicked him in the gut and snapped the other one’s wrist before the third one decided to turn on me as well.  

The one with the broken wrist stood up and grabbed me by the throat with his good hand.  He squeezed hard and pulled upwards so my feet were dangling.  I clawed at him arm, gasping for air.  He was stronger than an ordinary thug should be.  I gurgled something incoherent and kicked him in the groin.  

It was enough for him to loosen his grip on me but not back down.  I struggled frantically, until I felt my feet hit the ground.  I executed a snap kick to the inside his knee and smiled as his leg collapsed to the side as his tendon ripped.  As he fell, I kneed him in the chin knocking him flat on his back.

I staggered a bit, trying to fill my lungs with air.  The goth kid was lying on the ground with the third guy on top of him.  It looked like the guy was trying to strangle him or go for his jugular.  I tried to grab him around the neck but the guy suddenly jumped up, rubbing his hand like it had been burned.  I watched as a silver crucifix slid across the goth boy’s chest on its silver chain and onto the ground.

I pushed away the attacker to see if the kid was all right.  He didn’t seem to be moving.  Something struck my back and I cried out in pain.  I whirled around to find the guy I had kicked in the gut swinging a knife around.  I hadn’t seen a weapon earlier.  I swore at myself for being stupid enough to turn my back, even for a second.

“Damn!”  I growled.  “That hurt.  You like to play with knives?  Fine.” 

I unsheathed my katana and put myself between the kid and the three attackers.  I held the sword with both hands waiting for someone to move.  The guy with the knife lunged at me and I parried and sliced his arm.  When the other two came at me, I took them in quick succession.  Parry slice, parry slice.  It wasn’t pretty.  They were spilling a lot of blood and I didn’t know why they just didn’t run.  Why were they so intent on this one kid?  And what the hell were they on that they didn’t feel the pain of my sword and kept coming back for more?  Something was very wrong here.

One of them opened his malformed mouth in a soundless hiss.  He grabbed at the other two and dragged them away.  They ran down the block and disappeared around the corner.  I turned to look over my shoulder and saw the guy dressed in black, leaning against the church and holding his shining silver crucifix in front of him. 

It took me a minute to figure out that he wasn’t a goth kid at all.  He was older, probably late twenties, closer to my own age.  He wore a long black coat that came past his knees, black pants and nice black shoes along with a white clerical collar around his throat.  He was a priest.

“Thank you,” he said and dropped his crucifix so it hung loosely around his neck.  “I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t been here.  What are you?  Some kind of superhero?”  he asked, his breathing labored.

I wiped the bloody blade of the katana off on the arm of my jacket and slid it into its sheath.  “No, I’m a librarian.”

“You’re like no librarian I’ve ever met before,” he said.

“Yeah, I get that a lot.”  I pushed some stray blonde hair out of my eyes.

 He looked at the ground behind me then turned me by the shoulder.  He lifted up the back of my trench coat. 

“You’re bleeding,” he said.  “Please come inside.”

Truthfully, all I wanted to do was go home, but I probably should find out how deep that jerk had cut me before I hiked the seven blocks back to my apartment.  I went and picked up my workout bag then followed the priest into his church.  I bunched up my t-shirt in the back, trying to staunch the flow of blood so I didn’t leave a trail of it in the church.  That struck me as somehow being sacrilegious.  Not that I’d know about such things.

“You don’t lock the door?”  I asked.

“We’re open all the time to serve those who need spiritual guidance.”

 I eyed the drunk guy sleeping in a pew.

 “Or need a warm place to sleep,” I added.

 He ignored my comment as we walked to the side of the pulpit and down a narrow hallway.  The priest led me up a flight of stairs and opened a door.  He turned on a light and let me into what looked like a studio apartment.  We went into his kitchen.

“I’m Gabriel.  Father Gabriel McTarnahan,” he said and helped me ease my coat off.

“Marae Venger,”  I said.  “Do you know what those men wanted with you?”

Father Gabriel put my coat down on the counter and started digging through a drawer until he pulled out a first aid kit.  “Those weren’t men.”

“What were they then?”  I asked.

“They behaved like some sort of demon.”

“And do you believe in demons, Father Gabriel?”  I asked.

He shrugged.  “When I was younger I would have said I wasn’t sure.”

“And now?”

“I know those weren’t ordinary men.”

“This wasn’t your typical mugging?”

“What I’m saying is that I know evil when I feel it.”  He made a motion with his hand for me to turn around.  I started shrugging out of my T-shirt and heard his sharp intake of breath.

“Don’t worry, Father, I’m wearing a sports bra.  You won’t see anything you’re not supposed to.  It covers more than most bathing suits do.”

He laughed nervously.  I leaned over the counter, feeling my back ache as I stretched the skin taut.

“Give it to me straight, Father, how bad is it?”  I asked.

“It’s long but not deep,” he said.  “This will sting.”

 I gritted my teeth as he dabbed alcohol onto the cut.  From what I could feel, the cut ran down my back and over to the side.  I’m lucky the blade hadn’t dug any deeper or I could have lost a kidney or bled to death.  I stared at my bloody and ripped raincoat.  I’d have to get a new coat.  On a librarian’s salary a new coat would cost me a few days work.  Maybe I could find something vintage at a used clothing store.

“You live here?  In the church?”  I asked.

“I’ve been in Portland for two months and haven’t had time to find an apartment.  I guess I just kind of settled into here.”

“Where did you move from?”  I asked.

“I was in Vatican City.”

“Hmm.”  Was all I could think of saying.

“Why did you help me?”  Gabriel asked.

 I shrugged, a gesture which made my back hurt and forced me to wince.  “I saw a fight of three against one.  I didn’t think those were very fair odds.”

“You are a very good Christian,” he said.

 I giggled.  “I’m a Buddhist, Father.”

“Oh,” he said, sounding genuinely surprised.  He laid a piece of gauze over the cut and proceeded to tape it into place.  “There, I think it will be fine,” he said.

 I turned around and finally got a good look at him.  He had short brown hair that was pushed back from his face, except for a few recalcitrant strands that fell onto his forehead.  His light brown eyes were framed by dark eyebrows.  His mouth was wide and sat above a nicely chiseled chin.  I would have thought him handsome if he wasn’t wearing a clerical collar and staring at me with reddened cheeks like he was embarrassed.  I looked down and realized that even though the sports bra did offer good coverage it was still tight and managed to press my ample chest together in an impressive display of cleavage.  I took my ripped and bloody shirt from the counter and slipped it back on, careful not to dislodge the bandage.

“How about you?  Are you all right?”  I asked staring at the bruise that was forming on his left cheek.  I reached out but then had second thoughts about touching him and pulled my hand back.

Father Gabriel nervously wrapped his arms across his chest.  “I was roughed up a bit but I think I’m just bruised.”  He looked down at my sword hilt.  “Where did you learn to fight like that?”

Unconsciously I fingered the sword sheath.  This was the first time I had ever spilt blood with it.  Normally one wouldn’t even sharpen a sword used in forms competition but I liked the meditation of methodical sharpening.  “I’m working with a local sword master.  I’ve studied martial arts since I was in junior high.  Recently I’ve been working on a long sword form, mostly pretty looking stuff to do at local competitions.  The fighting part comes from training.  When you do it long enough it becomes instinct.”

“And you’re a librarian by day?”  he asked teasingly.

“Actually I’m a librarian by night.  I’ve got the late shift at Portland State.  Third floor.  Middles ages through Victorian.”

“The middle ages?  Anything in Latin?”

“Quite a bit, actually.  You should stop by.  I’ll hook you up with a community card.” 

I looked around the kitchen.  It was clean and Spartan, just how you’d expect a priest to live.  There was one plate and one cup sitting clean in a dish rack next to the sink.  The refrigerator was beige with nothing stuck onto it.  Above the doorway was a large wooden crucifix.  I looked past the kitchen into his living room and immediately started walking into it, drawn by his small bookcase.

He followed, perhaps surprised at my brazen invasion of his tiny apartment.  Truth was, I had always been attracted to books.  By analyzing someone’s library I’d always been able to sum up their character, define who they were by whom they spent their time reading.  As I suspected he had mostly religious books: theology, history and philosophy.  I picked up a hardcover and held it up with a quizzical look.

“John Grisham?”  I asked.

“I like a good thriller now and then,” he said.

I slipped the book back on the shelf.

“No Harry Potter?”  I asked.

“Witches and warlocks?”  he said sternly.  “That would be blasphemy.  Besides, Father Malone loaned me his copies last year.”

I smiled at him, pleased to see a lightened look on his face.  He seemed so disconcerted with me earlier.  It was odd at how much I wanted to please this man, this priest.  I had always made a point of avoiding churches.  I suddenly felt self-conscious. 

“Thanks for the patch up Father but I must be getting home,” I said.

I went into the kitchen and grabbed my coat and put my bag carefully over my shoulder so it would not bang into my side.

“I would tell you to be careful but I believe that’s unnecessary,” he said and followed me to the door.  “but I’ll say it anyway.  There’s something evil out there.  Be careful, Marae Venger.”

“Watch your own back.  I may not be around next time.  Good night, Father.”

I glided down the stairs and went back out into the rain.

I was hiding out with the Bronte sisters.  Charlotte, Emily, Anne and I were nestled in a quiet corner of the third floor of the library.  I was lazily reshelving books after spending three hours on the floor’s information desk.  The first couple weeks of the school year were always the worst.  The freshman looked younger and younger each year and I swear they were getting stupider.  I had spent three hours, holding their hands, showing them how to use the computerized card catalog and explaining that the savvier sophomores had already checked out the required text books and they may have to actually buy their text books this semester.

My friend Alysoun walked by with a couple of eager looking freshman in tow.

“You can’t hide here forever,” she muttered under her breath as she walked past me in a waft of rose oil and sandalwood.

“I can try,” I sang back to her in my sweetest voice.

She had the info desk now and had on her best customer service face, which was something between smug and surly.  Her long brown hair trailed down her back and her short bangs framed perfectly arched narrow blue eyes.  She was tall and well built, sort of like Xena.  Aly and I had been hired at the library about the same time.  We had bonded immediately over our mutual love of literature.  Aly was currently working on a biography of Charles Clairmont. We had talked about going to England for a summer to do research.  Of course that meant money and money wasn’t something you got a lot of working in a university library.

I put the Bronte biography I was leafing through back on the shelf.  I saw the tail of a long coat drift past the end of the aisle.  I startled.  I recognized that coat.  I ran to the end of the aisle and watched the man slowly wander down the aisle.  He hadn’t been here all summer but now that the students were back so was he.  This was the library pervert, the man who flashes the coeds.  We never managed to catch him because he always ran out of the building before we knew what was going on.

I ran for the information desk and picked up the phone.  I hit the intercom for the check out desk.  My boss, Quentin, answered it.

“How did you get stuck doing check outs?”  I asked him, surprised to hear his voice.

“Long story short, Ellie called in sick.  What can I do for you, Marae?”  He sounded impatient, not his normal giddy gay self.

“The perv is back.  Is Mouse down there?”

I heard Quentin cover the receiver with his hand and yell for Mouse.  Mouse was our security guard.  She was five feet tall and one hundred pounds soaking wet.  She generally got the library shift because we were quiet and low risk.  Of course, I noticed the fire in Mouse’s eyes and knew that she was a kindred spirit.  She took her job seriously.  When things got slow around here she’d show me wristlocks and police holds. 

“She’s on her way up, don’t let him get away this time,” Quentin breathed into the receiver.  “I want this fucker out of our library for good.”

“You can count on it boss,” I said and hung up.

I met Mouse at the top of the stairs and waved her over to the northeast wing of the library.  She went down one side of the aisles and I went down another.  I randomly grabbed a couple of books so I’d look just like your ordinary librarian shelving books.  I slipped between the rows and peeked over the top of the critical theory books.  I could see him in the next row.  He was pretending to be scanning the titles of the books but he was sneaking up on a couple of freshman girls who were talking quietly to each other.  I saw his hand drop to his waist as he started fussing with the waistband of his pants.  I held my hand up to Mouse and she stopped in her tracks.  It’d be harder for him to run this time if his pants were undone.  As soon as he had them unbuttoned and unzipped I dropped my hand and Mouse pounced.  I ran around the other side and pushed the squealing students aside.  The perv looked frantic.  Usually women scream and run away.  He hadn’t counted on two actually running towards him.

The perv elbowed Mouse in the ribs so she fell and started running towards the stairs.  Mouse rolled onto her feet and was after him like a dark blue blur, her curly brown hair streaming out behind her.  I dropped the books and ran down the other side of the aisle and took the opposite staircase down in case he tried to criss cross onto another floor.  I was having a difficult time navigating the stairs in my heels.  I poked my head over the banister.  They were almost an entire flight of stairs ahead of me.  I was beginning to worry that he’d get away again.  Before they hit the main floor I saw Mouse launch herself into the air and nail the perv’s back.  She wrapped her arms around his neck and held on like a wild spider monkey.  He stumbled and fell face first onto the linoleum with his pants around his ankles.

 I ran and jumped onto his legs, trying to hold him still.  He kicked and sent me flying back on my ass, my skirt flying up over my head.  That’s when the flash went off.  I pushed my skirt down and found Quentin standing there with his camera.

“Quentin!  Quit taking pictures and help us!”  I growled at him and lunged for the man’s feet again.

“Fine!” Quentin sighed dramatically and helped Mouse get the pervert’s hands behind his back and secured with a plastic tie.  For good measure they tied his feet together as well.  Mouse sat down on the perv’s back and used her radio to call the security station.

I pushed the guys coat down and sat down forcefully next to Mouse.  The guy moaned.  I patted Mouse on the knee.  “Good job, Mouse.  I always knew you had it in you,” I said.

She smiled at me, looking more like a lost child than a bad ass security officer.  “Thanks for your help.”

  “I just wanted to check out a book.”  The man groaned beneath us.

“Oh shut up!”  Mouse, Quentin and I said in harmony.

It was nearly nine o’clock and I had just finished my lunch break.  When you work the night shift lunch is around eight and dinner closer to one in the morning.  I was putting away a stack of restoration literature when I heard a crash come from the other side of the shelves.  I walked around the corner and found a young guy lying on his back in the aisle with about twenty books on top of him.

“Dude, I was just trying to get a copy of Dante’s ‘Paradise Lost’ from the top shelf and they all just kind of stuck together and fell on me.  You guys should like watch that, it’s dangerous,” he said, his words tumbling out quickly one right after another.

I knelt down, careful not to flash my knickers at him, enough people had seen my underwear today.

“It happens all the time,” I assured him sweetly.

He straightened chunky plastic glasses frames and started to help me pick up the books.    I put them in order and pulled over a step stool with the toe of my brown leather shoe.  I jumped up and started putting the books back onto the shelf.

“I want to read the Inferno.  Nine levels of hell and all that,” he said.

“Of course you do,” I said and held out two copies of Paradise Lost to him.  “Do you prefer the Penguin edition or Oxford?”

“What do you recommend?” he asked.

“Oxford, definitely,” I answered and handed him the copy.  “I wasn’t aware anyone was teaching Dante this semester.”

“I’m reading it on my own.”

“Really?”  I stepped down and took a closer look at him.  Not many of them read for fun or personal enrichment.  Frankly, he looked like all the rest:  sporadic facial hair, glasses, messy hair, ironic T-shirt and jeans.

“I like the renaissance,” he said by way of explanation.

“Who doesn’t?”  I answered.

Suddenly there was a pair of hands covering my eyes.  My first instinct was to grab the hands and throw the offender over my hip into the stacks but I restrained myself.  Instead I grabbed each thumb and gently twisted it until I could sink under the hands and spin around, tying up the arms of my would be attacker.  I came face to face with my young cousin, Marta.  She looked stunning in bright purple hair, low cut black shirt and her tight plaid miniskirt.

“You really are a trained killer!”  she giggled.

I held tight to her thumbs despite her wriggling and smiled at her.

“I was wondering when you’d find your way to the library,” I teased and let her go.

“I came last night but they said you were already gone,” She hugged me tightly and I tried not to gasp as her arms wrapped around my back and over the knife wound.

“I traded for an early shift yesterday.  Welcome to college life.  Nice hair, I love the purple.  Does Auntie Rose know about your nose ring?”  I asked.

 “Not yet, I was saving that little surprise for Thanksgiving break.”

Another girl walked into the stacks with us, I noticed Inferno Man was still lingering, eyeing my cousin and the skinny bleach blonde that had joined us.

“This is my roommate, Nicole.  We’re both in English together.  Do you have any cheat sheets on Shakespeare?”

I raised an eyebrow at Nicole who was wearing enough black eyeliner to be a member of Kiss.  She was also wearing a tiny black tank top even through it was cold and rainy outside. 

“We’re reading Midsummer’s Night Dream,” Nicole said, cracking her gum between syllables.

I tapped at my temple for a moment and led them to a copy of Charles and Mary Lamb’s “Tales of Shakespeare” along with a teaching manual on Shakespeare that had a chapter on the themes and imagery of Midsummer’s Night Dream. 

“If you read these and the introduction in your Riverside Shakespeare, you’ll be able to fake your way through discussion tomorrow.  You have Professor Carlson?”  I asked.

They both nodded. 

“Laugh at his jokes no matter how corny they are and don’t forget to bring up the symbology of the names of the fairies and the flowers they represent.”

“See, I told you she was cool,” Marta said, nudging Nicole in the ribs.  Inferno Man followed them off to a study table.  I could hear him trying to introduce himself and chat them up.  It was nice to know that some things about college life never change.

I went over to the info desk and sat on the corner and watched the trio with Aly.

“Faking their way through Shakespeare?”  she asked.

“Yep,” I said. “The purple one’s my cousin.”

“Nice nose ring,” Aly commented.

“My aunt is going to have a heart attack during Thanksgiving dinner,” I answered, checking my fingernail polish for chips.  “I may have to make it home this year.”

“I wouldn’t miss that for the world,” Aly sniggered.  “Can I help you, darling?”  she asked, peering past me to the very lost looking spiky blonde haired freshman who had a four page syllabus from Dr. Rose’s Chaucer and His Contemporaries class.

I wandered into the back room and pulled out a Yale University Press catalog and grabbed some requisition forms.  I twisted my hair into a spiral and pinned it up with a dull pencil so it’d be out of my face.  I flipped through the catalog trying to figure out what we could buy on our paltry budget.

My mind drifted back to my cousin.  I was happy that she was here in Portland.  I couldn’t wait to show her around.  I had a very small nuclear family and Marta was my only cousin.  Now I could see her all the time and not just during the holidays.

The library closed down at the witching hour.  We dimmed the lights at 11:50 and started doing walkthroughs at midnight.  Sometimes you actually had to physically pack people up and herd them out the doors.  I was tired.  I had gotten up early to teach a kung fu class then had stayed an additional hour to practice my sword form.  Tomorrow was my day off and I was looking forward to sleeping in and reading all day.        

I did the final walk through on the third floor, shut down the computers and locked the doors that led to the stairwell and elevators.  I had to dig out my old leather jacket from my punk rock days, but at least it was warm.  I zipped it up and draped my backpack across my shoulder. 

I waved good-bye to Mouse and walked out into the cool air.  I shivered at least it wasn’t raining tonight.  My apartment wasn’t very far from campus.  I walked through the park blocks and down past Neuberger Hall.  There used to be a time when the park blocks and campus were filled with homeless people asking for money or sleeping on the benches.  Street kids would loiter in groups begging for change for the bus or a phone call and a myriad of other excuses that they had for money.  Ever since the new Mayor had taken over with the promise to take care of the “homeless problem” downtown was pretty quiet at night.  The bars were still busy and the nightclubs still had their crowd but the streets were much more desolate.  I actually felt safe walking to and from my apartment at any hour.

At least I did until I saw the pale leg sticking out from under a bush.  It was so pure white that I thought at first it wasn’t real.  It had to be a mannequin or someone’s art project.  It must be some sort of prank, this perfectly formed alabaster leg sticking out from under a bush.  I could feel the hair on my neck starting to stick up.  The part of me that was still animal was screaming to run fast and run far away but I couldn’t leave until I figured out what it was and if anyone was hurt.  I got closer and I saw the ripped clothes and the dark hair and the nose ring.  It was my cousin.

“Marta!”  I screamed and dropped to the ground, my hands grabbing her face. 

She was ice cold to the touch.  Her shirt had been half ripped off her, her bright pink bra still perfectly in place.  There was blood dried to her neck and two deep puncture holes along the curve where her neck met her shoulder.  She seemed to have more marks on her, what were they - bite marks?  It looked like she’d been stabbed, but with what, an ice pick?  I felt around her neck frantically for a pulse but didn’t find one.  I rolled her onto her side, and discovered the ground below her was dry.  If she was dead and stabbed, shouldn’t there be more blood?  Something caught my eye, further back in the bushes.  I crawled and found Nicole also white and lifeless, her neck was ravaged, her throat nearly torn from her body.

“Oh God, oh God, oh God,” I said over and over again.  I knew it sounded stupid but I couldn’t get my mouth to form anything coherent.  I was on my heels rocking back and forth as I looked from my cousin to her dead roommate.  “This isn’t happening, this can’t be happening.”

I stood up and in the full throttle of an adrenaline rush ran back to the library.  Mouse and Aly were walking out together, laughing at something Aly said.  My eyes must have given it away because they both froze at my appearance.

“Murder,” was all that came out of my mouth.

“What?”  Mouse squeaked.

“My cousin and her roommate have been murdered.  Their bodies are over here,” I grabbed both of them by the hands and pulled them around Neuberger hall to where Marta and Nicole were lying.  I pointed and covered my mouth with my hand.

“Oh no,” Mouse said quietly and grabbed the radio from her waist and called it into the security station.I fell to my knees and started crying.  Aly kneeled down next to me.

“Should we try CPR?”  she asked.

“Their bodies are cold.  They have no blood.  They’re dead.”  I said.  My voice sounded cold and detached, even to me.

It felt like it took forever for the police and paramedics to arrive.  I stayed in my spot, staring at Marta.  As there was nothing the paramedics could do, the police started putting up tape and decreed the place a crime scene.  The paramedics turned their attention to me.  I wasn’t sure why as I hadn’t been hurt.  I wasn’t the one who had been attacked.  Aly urged me to go with them and sit in the back of the ambulance.  They asked me questions but I couldn’t quite understand what they were saying to me.

“I’m not hurt.”  I kept repeating.  Aly just looked at me with mournful eyes.

They put a blanket around my shoulders and placed an oxygen mask on me.  I sat in the back of the ambulance with my legs dangling down with Aly sitting next to me holding my hand.  We watched as the state forensic unit ran around the scene collecting evidence and taking pictures.  This all seemed very unreal to me. 

From the shadows a burly man walked onto the scene and went right up to the crime scene tape and started snapping pictures.  He took about ten in quick succession until a police man spotted him and shooed him away from the perimeter.  The man took a few more quick shots then backed off.  He wandered around talking to people, writing things down on a small pad of paper he kept in the shirt pocket.  He came over and stood in front of Aly and I.

“Do you know who they were?”  he asked a bystander.  The woman shook her head. 

The photographer snickered and pulled out a cigarette.   “I bet they were out looking for some action by the way they were dressed.  Their own damn fault.”

I took off the oxygen mask and slid off the end of the ambulance.  I took two long steps, curled the fingers of my left hand into a fist and belted the guy across his jaw.  He collapsed onto the ground, his cigarette broken in half, his precious camera bouncing across the pavement.

“That was my cousin,” I said through rough vocal cords. 

Aly grabbed me and started pulling me away.  It was probably for the best as I was considering kicking him in the ribs for good measure.