N I N E T E E N

So that wasn't green cheese bobbing around out there but something way different. If we hadn't been riding on a straight stretch of road, Rick would have plowed us right over the edge.

"Did you hear that?" I asked, eventually.

"Yeah. Yes, I heard it," Rick said, looking a little green himself.

"About what you asked earlier. Something must be up."

"No shit, Sherlock."

He wasn't joking. It would have been stupid for me to say "don't worry" or anything like that. I couldn't even tell myself that I wasn't scared. IT was out there. It wasn't over. My skull was ringing with a jumble of crap by the time we pulled up in the drive but the big kicker was, I felt as much relieved as anything else. The other shoe was finally dropping.

Faster than I would have guessed, too. Didn't know what to make of the figure standing in the yard. At first I thought it was a ghost. Seriously. Or another harbinger of doom or challenge, it would have been so in-keeping with Fae theatrics. Could see Rick was wondering and worried, too, but it wasn't a ghost. She wasn't a ghost. It was just that her jacket and jeans, her hair and skin was so covered with road dust, she looked like something that had stepped out from the other world. Her bike was a mess, too.

She waited for us to get out of the van and a whole bunch of different gears started shifting about in my head maneuvering around all the other nutcase speculations. I walked towards her. Stopped a yard or so away. Said, "Hello, Snakelady."

She said, "Hello."

She was standing with her feet braced apart and her hands jammed in her pockets. Noticed I was standing exactly the same way facing her and tried to move into something else but it just wouldn't come. It was just like we were still standing on that path out in the woods.

"Good to see you," Rick said breaking too-long quiet. "How'd you find us?"

"Cruised the area. Tracked the van. I know your patterns, Mallock."

"Gee — I didn't think you cared," he said. "You just passing by or are you planning a real visit?"

She gave a little shrug, not looking at me.

"Come on," I said, turned around and led the way inside.

Night's-breath hadn't stopped her. The dogs were quiet although they came bounding up to investigate when we went inside. Still, there wasn't anything unusual about that. Snake walked alongside us like she'd always been part of the household.

"Hungry?" Rick asked and Snake nodded and said, "Starved," so he started pulling things out of the fridge and like that. Pretty soon, the smell of cooking meat filled the room. I knew he was glad to have something to do other than think about what we had to think about.

"It wasn't hard to find you once I decided to look," Snake offered out. "I had a feeling I'd find the two of you together."

"Rick told me what you did, how you stood up to Dodger," I said. "Thanks."

"You're welcome."

"It went okay, didn't it?" I asked. "You weren't hurt?"

She gave me a quirky, lopsided little smile. Her face wasn't used to that expression. "No. Rick caught the best of the fireworks before he left." She sighed and stretched and tried to settle more comfortably in the chair. "I thought that was the last of it and took off. I'd done my part. But it wasn't over. You were pulling me back towards you even then."

The gold in Snake's dark eyes flickered.

I shook my head and said, "I didn't do anything."

"I wanted to put some distance between us." She ignored me and went on. "Headed west. Next thing I knew, I was riding for home, for California. That's not where I wanted to go either but.... I wasn't quite eighteen when I left home. I went back only one time and promised myself I'd never return again."

"Famous last words," Rick said and placed a bowl of shredded lettuce and raw vegetables on the table in front of her. She regarded it like she would some alien life form. He went back to the cabinet, took out a bottle and poured two drinks. She picked up one, he took the other.

"I was the very spoiled daughter of a very rich business man who had come to America to establish another branch of family fortune," she said. "My brother and I were born here. I do not recall that my family ever refused us anything. The time came, however, when I refused to follow their wishes. We argued. I ran away. My father cursed me and said he no longer wished to see me again."

"Things like that happen in a lot of families," Rick said. "It isn't supposed to last. It usually doesn't."

"But it did. You don't understand, Mallock. He cursed me. You know," she said to me. "You guessed from the first."

I was feeling angry and helpless as usual. I wanted to yell out that I didn't know, that I hadn't done anything. But I didn't. Just kept still.

She swallowed some of the bourbon, a small, delicate sip.

"I grew up in a house divided among traditional Eastern customs and the freedoms offered by the West. When I was a little girl, I spent most of my time with my grandmother, with Nari. She was — and is — the spirit woman. She knew how to make the trees talk, how to raise kami from the shrines. She sang to the water, to the lakes and streams and sea, and they answered her back. She told me how her gifts were passed to me through my father. When I was a little girl, I believed her. I was magic. But I grew up, I went away to school, found another life, other friends and other beliefs. The magic never went away, I simply refused to hear it."

I watched, fascinated, as tears gathered in Snake's eyes, as they pooled in the lower lids and ran silently down her cheeks. They dropped like liquid diamonds from her chin and made black, shiny patches on her jacket when they landed. Snake never even blinked, her expression didn't change, her voice never wavered. Her eyes cried for her. She allowed herself no other relief.

"I went away," she said. "There was no returning, I knew that and felt pleased and proud of my independence. The first warning came to me in a dream. I ignored it. But soon, I didn't even have to close my eyes to read the omens — danger to my mother. Nari says we have the sight not so that we witness unalterable consequences but so we have the opportunity to change a thing before it occurs — perhaps not completely. Perhaps we can only reduce it. She says it is the gods' gift to their children."

"You went back for your mother's funeral," I said. "She died, didn't she?"

"She didn't have to," Snake said. "It was an accident — I saw that much, they told me the rest. Perhaps it couldn't have been avoided. It didn't have to have been fatal."

"You don't know that," Rick said, gently.

She blinked a little and looked up. "That's right," Snake said. "I don't."

As hard as it was to look at her, it wouldn't have been right to turn away so I didn't. Rick shoveled food onto a plate and set it down. He tipped more bourbon into her glass.

"Eat while it's hot," he urged.

She picked up a knife and fork handling them the way a neurosurgeon maneuvers steel. She cut off a piece of steak, put it in her mouth and chewed.

I said, "What did you and your father fight about?" and Rick glared blue-eyed, undead-seeking missiles at me that snarled, Shut the fuck up, Bozo!

"He had arranged a marriage for me according to custom. I wouldn't go along with it."

Her tears were gone as if they'd never been — except for the tracks. We could have been talking about the price of grapes in Greece.

"You didn't like the guy?"

"I never met him. I simply refused to cooperate."

"And he threw you out?"

"He said I would never have a family again, never have children, that anyone I loved or who loved me would wither and die. The usual."

Rick frowned, grim. "That's pretty strong," he said.

"It was an important alliance."

"Well, it doesn't sound to me like your mother's death was all your fault," I said. "Your father laid out the rules."

She sliced off another chunk of medium rare beef. "That's the problem with curses, they always fly back to the sender," she said. "How he hated me when she died. How he hated himself.... Even so, it doesn't make it any easier to accept or alter my responsibility."

"You are hard as nails, Snake," Rick said.

"I have learned to be."

That was obvious. Life's lessons had left their mark on her, to the bone.

The one big lesson I had learned was playing out even while we talked. You see, even when all kinds of weird jazz is going on, even while Revelations are stacking up at your feet, pawing at your shirttail to be noticed and Big Time Change is in the wind, time and life just keeps trucking on. Relentless. You don't get Time-Out, you don't get a hall pass, and if you don't at least try to march along, it will knock you down and tramp you flat — at best. At worst, rip you into ragged, bloody chunks.

Snake finished her meal. Rick drank some more. I mucked around with the CD player. The dogs whined to go out. It had turned into one damn long night and there were still a couple of hours to go before dawn. Nights are longer in winter. Usually, I was glad of that.

"Why don't you take those dogs outside?" Rick growled after a while so I said, "Okay."

Snake said, "I'll come, too. I need to walk."

So we headed out to the beach. Kami and Kismet weren't really puppies anymore. They were as tall as their mother although not as broad. Figured that when they got their full growth, they were going to be monsters. Not Bosch-types, just big. Good natured, too. They took off over the dunes at a dead run. Karma paused at the crest and looked back at me, head up, very alert and I looked back at her, wistful.

"Go on," Snake said. "Don't wait for me. I'll catch up."

I felt a little foolish, a little crazy taking off after them with her watching and all but that didn't last long. Running felt too good. Howling, too. That unnatural moon was gone — not forgotten — but out of the way for the time being.

It's never completely dark by big water. There's too much light in the sea. It picks up any kind of brightness and reflects it all around. When a full moon's out, it's brighter than day at the beach. Well, as bright as I remember day ever being.

I could outrun Karma and had to pace down for her to keep up. Kismet and Kami could outrace me and it pleased me to think I knew why. They were so beautiful to watch, so graceful and sure of themselves. Then they'd get distracted by some puppy eye-catching, nose-watering mystery and tumble all over themselves seeking it out like big, black furry Marx brothers without Groucho.

Surprise at Snake's arrival bordered on shock but I wasn't sorry to see her. Once that concept registered in okay, I headed back towards the house to look for her. She'd made more progress following than I'd have guessed possible. Running had probably felt good to her, too. When I found her, she was sitting on the sand pulling off her boots.

"It's pretty cold to go wading," I said.

She hit me with that lopsided smile again. Stood up. Stripped off her jacket and shirt. Jeans followed. "Who said anything about wading?"

She took a running dive into the surf, plunged in head first. The dogs got excited by this new activity and dashed over to join in. They lost interest quick enough, though. They were dogs, after all, not polar bears or seals. Pretty soon, they were streaking back towards the house where I knew Rick would be so glad to see them.

It was my turn to stand on the shore and watch. I'd given up more than sunshine making my Change. Snake cut through the sea, slicing through gently rolling waves. The smell of salt and sand was thick enough to taste. Across the dunes, wind whipped through dried out, winter rushes that rattled and wailed like the bones of Old Dead singing songs, Remember me....

At the moment, I wasn't interested in remembering anything. There'd been too much of that.

We'd rumbled with each other in the woods that time in the park but I'd never seen Snake completely naked before. She stood out in the water for the longest time, the waves lapping against her thighs. Her body was slim, almost skinny. Her hip bones jutted out like edged blades beneath tawny skin. When she moved, the lean transformed to muscle, like a dancer. Her black hair was slicked back from her head as she came towards me. Her chest rose and fell although not just from physical exertion.

"I heard them," she said. "They sang to me."

"You've been hearing and seeing them again since you left your grandmother."

"Yes."

"I'm glad for you."

I held her jacket out at her. She was crying again but beaming at me. Tears, like the sea, lit up her whole face. She was still strong-looking but beautiful, too. Too perfect now to touch.

"You're going to freeze," I said.

"Salt water is purifying."

"It's your ass."

And it was a very nice ass, too.

"You don't have to be so distant," she said. "You weren't before."

I should have been stronger, should have told her the truth right then, "I fuck up everything I touch. Keep away," but, of course, I didn't. Said instead, "What did Nari tell you when you went home?"

"That I follow the path of the Dragon." Her face twisted a bit and became hard again. "That I would die ... and live again."

"Aw, shit."

"There it is."

"It doesn't have to be. You can get the hell away from here. You said it tonight, people see things so they can change it."

"Nari says I can't change this. Some visions are like that."

"God, Snake, if someone said you were going to drown at sea, would you sign up for a cruise?"

"It's not what I want. Who would want this?"

"I did. I chose it. I couldn't wait for it to happen."

"Why?"

"Well, hell, baby, what do you think? It seemed like a good idea at the time."

That was a cheap shot. She gaped at me, open mouthed, horrified, and I turned away from her, pissed to the core.

"I fell for it," I snapped. "Swallowed the whole ball of wax, hook, line and plunger. I was in love with her."

"Now you aren't?"

"I don't want to talk about this, Snake. I can't. It's none of your business anyway."

She took a deep breath and let it out slow, considering. "You still love her, don't you? You'd go to her in a minute, the second she called."

"Faster." I glowered. "Which just means you should Keep Away From Me."

"Right."

I heard her move — closer — behind me. Her hands were hot as brands against my skin, warring against the anger. Turning it into something else.

Why does it have to feel so good to be held, to be touched? Why can't we learn to go on without that?

Why does it have to feel so good to hold another?

She had small breasts. The nipples were small, too, dark and drawn from wet and cold — honed with passion. Her heart beat fast beneath my palm, racing like some trapped, hidden animal. I had fed well earlier. Shouldn't have been feeling what I was feeling but the Hunger was so strong it was like pain. Nari's damned visions filled my head. That lousy ghost-chorus was moaning through the weeds again.

"You've got to leave," I said. "You're going to get hurt."

Her teeth were finally chattering and she was chanting again, "I don't want this. Who would want this?"

I couldn't answer. She got quiet so I looked at her. The gold in her eyes was alive and blazing.

"I want you, though," Snake said at last.

And that was that.

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