Sūn Wùkōng grabbed my arm and took us through the nothingness. I managed to keep from squealing with surprise, but barely.
We came out in a pagoda, on a tiny column of rock high above the valley below, with my heart beating a million times a minute.
A narrow walkway, perhaps four inches wide, spanned the twenty yards from the pagoda to the mountain beside us. I had no idea where we were, and the ball of light had dissolved to nothing when we went into the nothingness. It was also broad daylight. I let my backpack slide down my arms and settle on the stone floor beside me.
The Monkey King gave me just enough time to take in our surroundings, and he attacked.
The stories tell us The Monkey King defeated most of the Chinese gods and goddesses. I had no hopes of beating him in a fight, but I soon realized he was playing with me.
Unfortunately, playing for him meant all-out-fighting for me.
He didn’t use his staff, at first, but when he did, he only used it to swing around and move, and not to strike me, so I didn’t form a staff of light.
Monkey King staff exhibitions in China are more dance than martial arts — a combination of baton twirling and advanced pole work that loosely resembles the acrobatics an advanced American pole dancer would do, high above the stage. However, the Chinese practitioner has to balance himself and the tall staff, instead of rotating and flipping on a stationary pole. There are also leaps, twirls, no-handed cartwheels while twirling the staff, and other tricks that take years to master.
The Monkey King took all of this to an entirely new level, and it was all I could do to be defensive — there was no room for offense.
We fought inside the pagoda, on top of it, on the narrow walkway between the column and mountain, back on the pagoda. I felt like a sheep being chased by a sheepherder, going exactly where he wanted me whether I wanted to be there or not. There was no time to think — I could only react.
My bun came loose and my hair cascaded around me in curls. There was no time to secure it and I wished I’d practiced more with it free — having to swing my head the right direction to keep my hair out of my face made fighting The Monkey King even harder. Finally, I felt I had no choice but to form my staff of light. How would a nángùn face up to a hóugùn in a fight? It probably depended upon the fighters. They’re similar in length, but the fighting style is completely different.
Monkey could make his as long or short as he wished, but then, so could I.
I created mine about a foot longer than his.
He took one look at my staff, shrank his staff down to the size of a needle, and stuck it in his hair over his ear. I absorbed mine back inside me.
The books say he can do it, and I was in shock with the knowledge the books were freaking right.
We were also on top of the roof again, and I wanted to be back inside the pagoda. I levitated off the roof, aiming so the tiny bridge was under me when I wasn’t over the top of the pagoda, and then aimed my trajectory inside. If I fell off the pagoda or the bridge, we were at least a half-mile straight up and I'd fall a long way before I found the ground and could push up from it with my energy. I hate free-falling while trying to find the ground.
And now my opponent fell off the pagoda and into it, as if he’d lost his balance. He staggered past me, his eyes glazed.
"Drunken monkey? Really? If you want to fight me, fight me, but I’d rather skip this step, if you don’t mind."
He jumped up on a rail on the side of the pagoda and balanced in a squat. One slip, and he'd fall a half mile or more straight down. Though, he was a god who could reportedly do a single back handspring across China, so what did he care?
And after seeing him shrink his staff down and hide it over his ear, I wasn’t discounting anything in the books.
“If you don’t fight, you can’t make friends.” His Mandarin sounded odd. Kind of like a New Yorker might sound to someone from New Orleans. I couldn’t place the dialect, but I could understand him easily enough.
He seemed deadly serious, and I had no idea how to respond. It was true — I knew more about him after fighting him, but damn, that so isn’t an American concept. I’ve become pretty good at understanding the difference in thought processes, but this one needed a few minutes to think through.
When I didn’t respond, he asked, “You do not wish to fight?"
"I wished to meet the Monkey King. I had no specific plans for what might happen next. Is it safe to be Sūn Wùkōng’s friend?"
A smirk. "You think you know what to expect from me because you've met my brother, Coyote."
He said coyote in English instead of Mandarin. Did I know the Chinese word for Coyote? I didn’t think I did. Had he known I wouldn’t understand? Or did he merely use Coyote’s name, instead of calling the purported god by his animal. I didn’t know, but I needed to answer Monkey.
"Lore, indeed, says you're both trickster gods. I have no hopes of understanding you merely because I’ve met him." I didn’t ask how he knew I’d met Coyote.
"You call me a god?"
"I said the legends say you are. It also says you're long-lived and powerful. I don't see a problem with viewing you as one. The stories are clear you believe yourself to be one, and if they’re true, you’ve proven yourself more powerful than most gods."
“What is your name?”
Hmmm. Nothing is free in these stories. I’d gain no respect by giving information without demanding something in return. "Tell me a secret, and I will tell you my Chinese name."
“Your Chinese name is not your name."
"It's one of my names."
"You've had sex with the Dragon King and Lion King"
Great. He was either seeing into my head, or seeing into my past somehow. Or, perhaps only seeing who he knew in my life.
"Personal, but not a secret. Tell me a secret I don't know."
He wagged his finger at me. “Ah-ah-ah. I told you a secret no one in China knows besides you, and now me.”
Did Lauren know? She assumed I had with Nathan, but had no reason to believe Aaron and I had ever been intimate. Besides, she wasn’t technically in China at the moment, so I wasn’t sure she counted.
“Kuàiyàn” He’d tricked me with his answer, but it technically fit my parameters. I’d have to do better.
Out of the blue, he attacked with a combination of drunken monkey and stone monkey. Had Mordecai known I'd need to know this? He'd been the one to familiarize me with all the monkey styles of Kung Fu — not enough to use them as second nature, but enough to recognize and counter them.
This time, I sank into the battle and the height didn't bother me. We fought on the roof of the pagoda, jumped to the narrow bridge I’d been terrified to be on earlier, ended up back inside the pagoda, back on the bridge, to the trail on the main part of the mountain, back on the bridge.
Stone monkey style basically means he left open the parts of his body he'd conditioned to be able to take abuse, so he could pummel my tender parts while I was vulnerable during my strikes to his body parts I couldn’t hope to hurt.
I stopped taking the shots he left open, and protected myself better. I knew he wasn’t striking me at full force, and yet the seven spots he kept hitting felt like seven huge bruises. They throbbed with pain, but I used the sensations to focus.
Finally, I lost my footing and tumbled off the side. I'd known I would free-fall a long while before my reach could find the ground, and it was at least ten seconds before my levitation took hold. I couldn't push myself back up, but I could move myself sideways until I was on the mountain.
In a flash, he was in front of me.
“Who taught you this?”
"Who says anyone taught me?"
“You didn’t learn this without a teacher.”
I stared at him, daring him to think otherwise.
And it was at this moment, my necklace decided to show itself. I felt the leather shrinking, felt the coin moving up, but trying to hide it would’ve been obvious. Beside
s, Shīfù had given it to me for a reason.
Monkey looked to my chest a good three seconds before he met my gaze in surprise.
“Xuānyuán?”
I must have looked confused, so he tried again. “Huángdì?”
I shrugged. “I call him Shīfù. He never offered an actual name.”
His eyes narrowed. “You’re looking for another teacher.”
I went through every story I could remember about The Monkey King, and told him, "It probably isn’t you, but you’ll point me to the person who can teach me what I need to know." Or he’d let me flounder along until I was off course, and pop in to give me riddles to set me back on track before disappearing again.
He stepped to the side, stood tall, and used a different voice.
Before Chaos was divided, Heaven and Earth were one;
All was a shapeless blur, and no men had appeared.
Once Pángǔ destroyed the Enormous Vagueness
The separation of clear and impure began.
Sometimes, Heaven arrives on Earth.
When it arrives on a mountain, it is worshipped.
I smiled. I’d been there. Héngshān. Nányuè. One of the five sacred mountains in China, famous in part because both Taoism and Buddhism share the temple at the base of the mountain. Also, the temple is the largest in southern China.
What had fascinated me when I visited, though, was the huge meteor on top of the mountain. What are the odds a nearly-Volkswagen sized meteor would land on the highest peak of a mountain chain?
I stepped into the nothingness and came out behind one of the temples on the side of the mountain — and inwardly groaned when I remembered the stairs. I didn’t dare appear higher on the mountain, though. This was the only place I could be relatively sure I wouldn’t be seen appearing out of nowhere.
I loved Kung Fu Panda because it got so much about China right — especially the fucking stairs. Still, as much as I hate the climb to so many of the sacred temples, I can’t deny it gets you into the proper meditative state. Today, I’d ascend the mountain as it was intended to be climbed.
Well, half of it, anyway.
I’m in good shape, but my thighs burned hotter than the fires of Hell when I finally reached the temple at the peak.
I spent most of the day at the top of the mountain. I sat and meditated. I talked to people. I explored.
I wasn’t struck by sudden knowledge.
As soon as I was far enough down the mountain I could get off the trail for some privacy, I went through the nothingness to the city below. I aimed for a portion of the temple at the base of the mountain, in a room I’d been in alone last time, but on this day, a couple was sneaking a quick kiss. I scared them, appearing out of nowhere, but merely nodded and walked out, as if nothing were odd about appearing out of thin air.
I left the temple area, bought some incense, and returned to add to the mountain of incense in one of the courtyards. I also lit some in other areas, and spent more time in the Taoist section than the Buddhist areas this time.
In the interest of being a tourist, I had a big meal with lots of alcohol.
And I felt alone.
If I were doing this right, I’d feel at one with the universe. I contemplated what I could do differently, but nothing came to me. It felt as if I were looking for the haystack that I’d eventually have to pull apart to find the needle — with no way of knowing which part of China to even look for the haystack.
I checked into a hotel and wished the Chinese believed in soft mattresses, but still fell fast asleep with no problem. The day had been long and exhausting.
My alarm woke me at six the next morning, and I used my messenger program to call Nathan. I’d been checking in via text messages through the app, and Aaron had sent a text telling me Nathan was biting everyone’s head off, and suggested I might do more than leave the grumpy cat brief messages.
Yes, I owed Nathan some time so he could see I was okay. It’d be six in the evening at home, and I hoped I’d catch him at a good time.
“Hang on,” he said, without video. “I just need to step outside.”
Thirty seconds later, his face appeared. “Are you okay?”
“Yes, and I have some time to talk, though it appears you may not.”
“No, I have all the time you can give me. Where are you?”
“I’m in China. I thought we’d been through that?” I’d turned sideways in bed, so all he would see was the blank, beige wall behind me. Before he could growl at me, I added, “My teacher wouldn’t take Lauren on as a student while I was close, so I’m off on my own adventure while she hopefully learns a whole lot.”
“Someone needs to know where you are.”
“No one does. Not my friends or enemies. I should be safe.” As long as the Monkey King didn’t get me killed, but I was convinced Shīfù wanted him leading me on this adventure, so I’d trust I was on the right path. The right Way.
“If you were wandering around China as a tourist, you wouldn’t have been without a cell signal for over two weeks.”
“I spent those two weeks at an out-of-the-way temple. What’s going on there? Anything interesting?”
“There are problems with the Ringgold Pack. Your buddy Patrick is fighting to gain control and clean it up. He has Randall’s backing, but…” He shrugged. “It’s a risky move.”
When everything goes to shit and I need a bodyguard, Patrick most often goes with me while I’m with Master James. We’re friends, but nothing more. He’s a Dom, so he understands what’s happening and doesn’t rush in to save me, and I’m not embarrassed knowing he can hear because I know he gets it. I wished I was home so I could help him. And yes — even though I’d pulled away from the supernatural community, I’d have stepped in to help Patrick in a heartbeat.
“I almost wish I was close, so I could help.” I sighed. “Yeah, I know. If he needs a human’s help, he can’t lead the way he needs to. I still wish I could help him.” I took a breath and changed the subject. “Nothing from the Celrau? Any news of Josh?”
“No, and he seems stable.”
They weren’t giving anyone information on where Josh was currently learning. I wanted to check in with him but understood the need for secrecy.
“I’ve been speaking Chinese for so long, it feels odd to speak English.”
“I hope you aren’t carrying around eight months’ worth of cash.”
“A third of it in a plastic lined pouch in my bra, a third in a waistband under my clothes, a third hidden away in the lining of my backpack, with enough handy so I don’t have to dig in my stash to pay vendors. If I miscalculate and need to pull from my stash, I do so where no one can see. Our airline tickets home are paid for and available online.”
“If something happens and you need cash, let me know.”
I didn’t intend to, but I nodded. I had other ways to get cash, if it came to it. Still, it was nice of him to offer.
“Tell me what you’ve learned.” Nathan used to annoy me with his order/questions, but I was used to it.
What could I tell him, without telling him too much?
“My Shīfù is Buddhist, but I’ve been focusing on Taoism this trip. I don’t know that I’ve learned a whole lot I can quantify, but I’ve had some amazing experiences.”
“I miss you.”
His voice, his eyes — my heart hurt. I could go through the nothingness and spend some time with him, but that would be cheating. I was in China and I had to do this.
“I miss you, too. I need to do this on my own though. I depend on you and Aaron for so much, and I love that you always come through for me, but I need to stand on my own.”
“I know, and the lion in me respects you for it while the man wants to spank your ass.”
I laughed. “I love you too, Nathan. I’m hungry — if there’s nothing else, I’m going to shower and hit the restaurant in the hotel.”
“You know I love you. Take care of yourself.”
“You to
o.”
I called Cora for a quick check in, talked to Smokey via video chat, and disconnected — and nearly jumped out of my skin when The Monkey King appeared in the chair on the other side of the room.
“You love The Lion King, but you refuse his help? And the Dragon King?” He shook his head. “A wolf who belongs to you, and you speak to giant dogs.”
“You understand Aaron and Nathan are shifters, right? Nothing like the lion and dragon in traditional Chinese dances.”
“Our dragon is different. Chinese Dragon is a water animal. Western Dragon is land and air. However, the lion is the same.”
I shook my head. “The Lion in the dance represents Nathan?”
“Not as a person, but the symbolism is there for both. You are friends with the king of the lions and the king of the dragons. You’ve had sex with both. You just avowed your love for the Lion King, and he returned it.”
I shook my head again. I was probably giving him more information than he needed, but it felt important. “Nathan and I aren’t together. Not like girlfriend and boyfriend. He has too many responsibilities. I’m human. It can’t work. We’re friends. We love each other.”
“You are intimate.”
I shrugged. “Intimate friends, then.”
“I wondered how Báizhǒngrén called me to her. Even more, you are Měiguórén.”
Being American is worse than just being white? He was probably right, from a Chinese perspective, but I chose not to respond as if insulted.
“You think I was able to call you because of who I’m friends with?”
“I believe it’s because of who you are, which is the type of person who draws those in power to her.”
I shook my head. That couldn’t be right.
“You disagree?”
“I’m going to take a shower. I trust you won’t pop in there with me?”
“Will it make you fight me again?”
“It might.”
12
The Monkey King was gone when I stepped out of the bathroom fully dressed and ready for the day. I wished I’d asked him questions about why I was here, but it was doubtful he’d have told me.
Edge of Humanity (Only Human Book 5) Page 9
