Tiger Eye

by Marjorie M. Liu

  One shot, close range, and an intruder fell to the floor.

  Hari had collapsed to one knee and was struggling to rise. Dela wanted to weep for him, scream, but she swallowed her fear. Hari is immortal, she reassured herself, desperately hoping the bullets had not done more damage than magic could repair.

  The last man shot at Eddie. His aim was off, but the bullet grazed Eddie’s arm with enough force that he dropped his gun. Eddie staggered to the floor, scrabbling for the weapon.

  Time slowed. Dela saw the intruder aim at Eddie, his finger tightening on the trigger; behind him was Hari, now on his feet, lifting his sword. She knew, deep in her gut, that he would never make it in time.

  Something immense surged through Dela’s mind, and she threw herself between Eddie and the intruder, hands outstretched.

  The gun fired.

  She felt the bullet leave the barrel, an instant recognition of steel, leaving a trail of mercury fire through her brain as she clutched and grappled—faster than the eye, fast—stay ahead of it now, stay—

  Stay.

  Stay.

  Her vision cleared; the room was deathly quiet, but she was still alive. She saw it then: the bullet, hanging in the air, just in front of her hand. She blinked, the connection broke, and she caught the bullet in her palm before it could hit the floor.

  “Fuck,” whispered the intruder.

  “Yeah,” said a familiar voice, tinged with awe. “That about sums it up.”

  Dean stepped clear of the doorway, followed closely by Artur and Blue. Hari reached the masked intruder first, easily tackling him to the floor—slippery with blood, the air thick with its scent. Hari pulled off the ski mask, revealing a pale face framed with black hair. The same face of the man who had been watching her at the airport.

  Hari looked like a piece of raw meat—everywhere, blood. Bullet holes riddled his body. Even Eddie, pale with pain, gawked at him. Dela and Blue helped the boy to his feet. While Blue guided Eddie to the couch, she ran to the bathroom for towels to press against his shallow wound. Bodies filled her peripheral vision; she shut them out, swallowing hard.

  Dela switched on lamps as she came back, flooding the room with yet more light to see the carnage. She brought towels for Hari, but when she got up close, all she could do was stare, helpless. She did not know where to touch him, how to begin.

  “Why are you still alive?” Dean looked like he was going to be sick. Hari said nothing, his jaw clenched so tight Dela thought it would take a miracle to pry his mouth open again.

  “Magic,” Dela answered for him.

  Hari’s blood had begun to soak through the intruder’s clothing; the man whimpered. Dean and Artur quickly stripped him of all his weapons and flipped him on his back, guns pointed at his face.

  “Think anyone called the police?” Dela asked.

  Blue shook his head. “It’s three in the morning, and you’re the only one who lives in this part of downtown. ‘Sides, these guys were using silencers and we were careful not to fire our own guns outside.”

  “How many?” Eddie pressed a towel to his arm.

  “Six. They weren’t taking any chances this time. Trying to crack the security system when we caught them.” He looked down at the prone man. “They won’t be bothering anyone again.”

  Dela closed her eyes, feeling sick. “Blue, you better take Eddie to a hospital. Tell them he got mugged or something.”

  “Ma’am—” Eddie began to protest, but Blue shook his head.

  “No problem. If they need an address …?”

  “Give them mine. They’ll probably know who I am. Tell them you’re my guests.”

  “Sure thing.” He helped Eddie to his feet, the young man biting back his groans with a stoicism that made Dela think he had been shot before. They stepped around the bodies by the front door and disappeared down the hall.

  “Hari,” Dela pleaded, as blood continued to pour from his wounds. “You need to rest.”

  The shape-shifter shook his head. The man on the floor stared at the enraged warrior with an expression almost pitiful in its fear and confusion.

  Resigned, Dela knelt beside her intruder. “Who are you working for? Come on, now. I don’t want to force you.”

  “I do,” Hari said, finally breaking his silence. His voice revealed no pain; it sounded smooth, like dark honey with a hint of acid. He reached for his sword and blood spattered everywhere.

  The man made a low croaking squeal as Hari pressed the tip of the blade against his trembling throat. He sounded like a dying pig.

  “Answer her questions,” Hari commanded, “or I will saw your head from the rest of your body. You will feel every cut. You will choke on your own blood. I promise you this, because I have seen it done. Now talk.”

  His menace was stunning; not with malevolence or cruelty, but with the heavy certainty of experience, commitment. No one, not even Dela, doubted him. Dean looked very impressed.

  The man wet his lips. Dela could see his calculation: Who was more frightening? The bloody maniac standing above him with a sword pressed to his throat, or his bosses?

  Apparently, Hari won hands down.

  “I work for Wen Zhang,” he confessed, hoarse. “He’s based out of New York. Chinatown.”

  “And why does he want to murder me?” Dela knew the answer, but had to hear it again, to make it real for herself.

  “You made the knife that killed his niece. The entire family wants you dead. I just follow orders.” The last sounded like a plea.

  “What does your boss do?” Artur asked.

  When the man did not immediately answer, Hari pressed down on the blade until he gasped and squirmed. “Okay, everything! There are two enterprises running Chinatown. Zhang heads one of them. Prostitution, illegals—all the body traffic goes through him. He controls the snakeheads, safe houses, all the new blood.”

  “What’s he babbling about?” Dean asked.

  “Human smuggling,” Dela replied, grim. “Bring in illegal aliens from China, men and women who are willing to work under any circumstances. Indebt them for thirty grand or more so they can’t ever escape, and then keep them in Chinatown, working for employers who get cheap labor for three dollars an hour, at conditions a rat wouldn’t crawl through. If anyone objects, kill or torture them.”

  “Shit,” Dean said. “And just when I thought my night couldn’t get any worse.”

  Dela took a deep breath; the scent of fresh blood threatened to overwhelm her. She struggled not to vomit.

  Control, she reminded herself, swallowing hard. Keep your control.

  But it was difficult; she had never been witness to so much violence. Men dead, injured—and all because of her.

  Dela staggered to her feet and went to the kitchen for paper and a pen.

  “Dela?” Artur called softly.

  “I’m going to write a letter. I don’t trust this guy to remember everything I have to say.”

  The letter was short; there was nothing she could write that would adequately express her remorse. She kept it simple.

  Words and actions will never be enough to make up for what happened. The knife was meant to be an ornament, never deadly, and when it was stolen from me, I had no idea what it was used for. I am so sorry.

  “Add this,” Artur said, when she showed it to him. “‘We will find the murderer as a sign of good faith, but any more attacks will not be tolerated.’” He pulled off his glove and pressed his hand to the intruder’s forehead. Artur closed his eyes. His jaw tightened, distaste etching shadows in his face. “‘We know where you are,’” he spat, “‘and what you look like. Be warned.’”

  He wiped his hand on his jeans. “Did you get that, Dela?”

  She nodded, and tucked the carefully folded letter into the front pocket of her would-be murderer’s pants. Hari stood back and the man climbed unsteadily to his feet. With his shoulders hunched, his eyes big, he looked like a mouse caught under the gaze of hungry cats. Dean made a shooing motion with h
is gun.

  “Get the fuck out of here, stupid. This is your lucky night.”

  “But if you try to hurt Delilah again …” Hari rumbled.

  “Yes,” Artur said. “We will not be so pleasant. Now go.”

  Her intruder did not need to be told a third time. Silent, quick, he stumbled through the doorway, hobbling past the fallen bodies of his compatriots without a second glance. Loyalty at its best. No one followed to make sure he left; they could smell his fear, his desperation. This man was not planning to hang around.

  As soon as the intruder disappeared, Hari swayed. Dela called out his name, wrapping her arms around his waist, unmindful of blood. His sword slipped from his hand; Dean caught the hilt, swearing as he staggered under its weight.

  “Bedroom,” Dean ordered, laying Hari’s sword on the floor. He propped the shape-shifter on his shoulder and grimaced. “This man’s beginning to remind me of a vegetable strainer, except it ain’t water that’s pouring out.” He looked at Dela. “I guess Hari full of bullets and still breathing would be a pain in the ass to explain, huh?”

  “Try impossible,” Artur murmured, holstering his gun. He slung Hari’s other arm over his shoulder and the two men dragged him off to Dela’s bedroom.

  Hari coughed up blood as they walked, his lungs gurgling like an old air conditioner. He tried to say something to Dela, but the moment they lay him flat on the bed, his head slipped sideways into unconsciousness.

  Everyone felt for a pulse. It was there—slow, but steady.

  “Twisted,” Dean muttered. “You sure know to pick ‘em, honey.”

  Dela did not say anything. She sank down on the edge of the bed, wrapping her arms around her stomach, and sucked down the beginnings of a sob.

  “Hey now.” Dean pressed his lips into her hair. “It’ll be all right, Dela.”

  Warm hands touched her cheeks, lifting up her face. Artur, with his gloves off. He had never touched her before, skin to skin. He shivered, his eyes going dark with compassion.

  “Nothing lasts forever,” he whispered. “But this … all of us, and Hari … we will be with you for some time yet. We are not over. You are not alone.”

  The tight fist around her heart loosened. Dela took a deep, shuddering breath. “Thank you,” she said, her gratitude encompassing everything: his kindness, his friendship, his presence.

  He nodded, pulling on his gloves. Dean gently patted her shoulder.

  The two men returned to the living room to take care of the bodies. Dela stayed with Hari, her fingers tangled in his hair—the only part of him not covered in blood. Events replayed in her mind, again and again, an incessant picture show.

  She saw Hari lift his sword and kill the intruder; she watched him get shot, bullets filling his chest and stomach, blood jetting from the wounds. She watched Eddie fall, and felt herself leap between him and a gun. A bullet, racing toward her chest.

  Dela shook herself and closely examined Hari’s slack face. His silence during the attack had been complete, without a single gasp of pain. He had stood tall, eyes set, determined and angry. As though the bullets in his body were nothing.

  She wondered, horrified, what Hari could have suffered during his enslavement that was worse than a body full of gunshot wounds. Something more terrible, suffered enough times that his current injuries were, in some way, manageable.

  She heard a squelching sound, meaty. A flicker in her vision, and she looked down as one of Hari’s entry wounds trembled, the edges around the hole rippling like a grotesque mouth. She saw metal, the glimmer of soft, round, edges. The bullet popped out of Hari’s body, rolling down his stomach onto the bed. The wound sealed over, the skin knitting together before her eyes. A bloody hole … and then, none at all. Smooth flesh.

  It was like watching a horror movie; Dela almost expected the slug to grow arms and legs, and do a little dance on the bloody sheets.

  The cycle repeated itself, a slow process of rejection. Dela tuned herself to the bullets, listening as Hari’s body edged them out. They had no stories to tell, and after a time, she raised her shields. It was bad enough watching; she did not want to feel it as well.

  Dela was unaware of the passage of time, lost in watching Hari heal himself, but Dean eventually opened the door. He gestured for her to follow him. Sighing, Dela pressed a gentle kiss on Hari’s forehead, keenly aware of a bullet wiggling out of his shoulder, scant inches away.

  “How’s sleeping beauty?” Dean asked, as Dela joined him and Artur in the kitchen. They looked tired, and it was clear why. Where blood and gore had covered the wooden floors and walls, now there was no sign of death or the gunfight. Everything glistened; she smelled bleach, vinegar, an army of cleaning fluids. Vanilla-scented candles burned on the kitchen counter. Dela wanted to hug and kiss them both.

  But still … still, she could see the bodies, the blood. Violence, sprayed against her walls. Her home would never feel the same.

  “He’s sweating bullets,” she said, holding one up for them to see. They stared at her, and then the bullet, until Dean suddenly blanched and scrunched up his face.

  “Oh,” he said. “That’s gross.”

  Dela nodded. There really was no way to disagree. It was gross.

  “Dean and I are going to take the bodies away,” Artur said mildly, still looking at the bullet in her hand. “We will be gone for most the night, but this is something we must do before light. I do not think you have anything to worry about.”

  “Um, sure.” Dela took a deep breath. Dean patted her arm.

  “Nothing to feel bad about, Dela. It was us or them, and the first law of survival: Always choose yourself.”

  She nodded, not entirely comforted, but willing to believe her friends harbored no regrets or resentment.

  “Blue called me,” Dean said, as she walked the men to the remains of her door. “Eddie is going to be fine. They had to file a police report, but everyone believed their story, especially when they dropped your name and their connections to Dirk & Steele.”

  “It’s amazing what a good reputation can buy,” Dela mused.

  “A good reputation is priceless,” Artur observed, pulling his gun from its holster. He handed it to Dela, safety off.

  “You remember our lessons?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Good,” he said wistfully.

  And then they were gone.

  It was impossible to stay away from Hari, but there was that big broken door to consider, and no matter what Artur said, men had entered Dela’s home to kill her and her friends. Indeed, Artur passing over his gun did not inspire copious amounts of confidence in her own safety.

  So, Dela darted from the bedroom to the living room, and back again, over and over, barely resting in one place before feeling the incessant urge to head to the other. She vomited several times, thinking of the dead men. She was not terribly sorry they were dead, and that made her feel guilty.

  It was exhausting, and when she finally heard Blue call her name as he stomped up the stairs, she almost cried with relief.

  “How’s Eddie?” she asked, meeting him at the door and handing over Artur’s gun. Blue frowned, clicking on the safety.

  “Eddie’s fine. Just needed some stitches. He wanted to come back with me, but the nurses wouldn’t let him. You, apparently, are now his hero. He thinks you’re the best thing since Buffy the Vampire Slayer.”

  Dela blushed. “Eddie’s pretty nifty, too. You should have seen him, Blue. He acted like a pro.”

  “So did you.” He gave her a speculative glance. “You’ve gotten more powerful, Dela. I know only one person who can stop a bullet with his mind, but that was after years of meditation and practice.”

  “You’re talking about Michael, right? He’s getting ready to retire, last I heard.”

  “Don’t change the subject.”

  “I’m not. It’s just … desperation can do wonders.” Dela grabbed a can of ginger ale from the refrigerator. Her mouth tasted bad. She did n
ot want to think about this.

  “It can’t do that much,” he muttered, gesturing for a beer. She handed him one, and he leaned against the counter. There were circles under his eyes; he looked rumpled and tired, his long black hair coming loose from its tie. Dela had a feeling she looked a whole lot worse. She hadn’t had time yet to change her clothes, which were covered in Hari’s blood.

  “I wasn’t really thinking clearly when I did it,” Dela confessed. “I felt the bullet leave the gun, recognized the metal casing inside my head, and just told it to … stay.”

  “Stay?”

  “Stay.”

  Blue frowned. “We should run some experiments. You’ve always been sensitive to metal, more familiar with it. Maybe that familiarity made it easier for your mind to hold on to the bullet.”

  “Cool,” she said, although she felt anything but. She had enough on her plate without her psi-powers doing unexpected things—even if they were good unexpected things. She held the cold can of ginger ale against her neck. “Let me ask you something, Blue. Did you ever imagine your life could get so weird?”

  Blue smiled. “This is sane, Dela.” When her eyebrows shot up, he laughed. “No, it really is. I’ve got friends I don’t have to hide from, I’m helping people, saving lives, getting the bad guys. As far as I’m concerned, this is it. The Dream. So what if things get dicey every now and then. I wouldn’t change a thing.”

  Dela opened her mouth, but the words that sprang to mind didn’t seem adequate. Instead, she kissed Blue on the cheek. “Thanks,” she said, as he blinked back surprise. “I needed to hear that.”

  “Sure,” he said, smiling. “Now go and check on your Hercules. Dean called as I was leaving the hospital. Said your man was spitting out bullets.”

  “That’s one way of putting it,” Dela said. “Thanks for being such a good friend, Blue.”

  “Back at you,” he said, saluting her with his beer.

  Dela padded back to her room, carefully opening her bedroom door. Hari still lay on the bed, covered in blood. Bullets rested on the surface of his chest and stomach.