No shit. “How did you know where to find me?”
Finally, Ernie looked uncomfortable. “You always see the baojia unit leader on Thursdays. But he drinks,” blurted out the boy, and then stared hard at his shoes, which had holes where his big toes should be. “He’s mean when he drinks. We all know that.”
I thought of the hotel clerk, smiling as she talked about old man Ernie. And here, the boy, still a champion of women. I felt a howl swell in my throat, but swallowing it down only made my eyes burn with tears.
Here’s your chance, I thought. Ask him about the Black Cat. Don’t waste time.
But when I opened my mouth, all I said was, “Go on home, Ernie. Thanks for helping me.”
Nothing else to say. Nothing. He was just a kid, and I was the grown-up here. Whatever was happening now was bad news, and would get him killed in sixty years. If I could take care of it without getting him involved more than he already was, if I could do this without upsetting time more than it already would be—then I had to try. I had to keep him, and his friends, safe.
Which meant talking to—and finding—someone else.
Ernie nodded, but still lingered—like there was more he wanted to say. He rubbed his wrist as though it hurt.
“What is it?” I asked, as gently as I could. “Ernie, you can tell me.”
He ducked his head, fingers going still around his wrist. I glimpsed a mark there, half-hidden beneath his thumb. Reached for him without thinking. He flinched, taking a step back—and shot me a haunted look that cut me to the core. I had seen those eyes before, on other kids, and it was a bad look. Kids were not supposed to grow up that fast.
No chance to say a word, though. He turned and ran down the street. I let him go, and then became aware of others watching me, both Chinese and European. Curious stares. Some calculating. I was a new face, and fresh meat.
I melted back into the dark lane we had emerged from. It was still and empty, unlike the road; and I needed a moment. I needed more than a moment.
“Zee.” I breathed, sliding down the wall into a crouch. I tugged at my collar, and then stripped off my leather gloves. Armor glinted along my fingers and the wrist cuff had grown in size, embedded now in my lower forearm with quicksilver tendrils. I would be lost to this metal one day. If I lived that long.
Small clawed hands touched my knees, long fingers edged in flesh sharp and hard as obsidian. Zee whispered, “Maxine.”
“Playing games with my life,” I murmured, listening to bells clang, and distant shouts in Chinese. I heard the echoing report of guns, very distant; synchronized single-shot blasts that made me imagine an execution. I smelled shit, and realized it was coming from my hair.
“You want truth,” Zee rasped. “Give you truth.”
I gritted my teeth. “I suppose we’re in Shanghai. When?”
“Four-and-four.” He glanced over his shoulder as Raw and Aaz melted from the shadows, chattering at him in their native tongue—which I did not, and never would, understand. Zee stiffened, and then relaxed. I tapped his hand.
“We know,” he said quietly, still watching his brothers. “We know we are here.”
We. The other Zee and his brothers—who were in their right place, and right time. I was probably creating some kind of planet-wrecking paradox by having them in the same place, together, but hell if I knew what to do about it. The boys had brought me here. I had to assume they knew what they were doing in between the teddy bear decapitations and soft porn.
“I need clothes,” I said. “I stand out too much.”
Raw disappeared into the shadows, and emerged less than a minute later with a bundle of cotton that, when shook out, appeared to be a dark brown dress, loose and flowing. Simple cut, with long sleeves, mother of pearl buttons up the front, and a round collar. The hem came down to just below my knees. He also gave me a new matching pair of lambskin gloves.
I moved away from the road into a nearby doorway, dressing quickly. I tossed my jeans and turtleneck to Aaz for disposal, and then reluctantly put aside my cowboy boots for a pair of brown shoes that had a hard, flat, sensible heel. Raw slid my other shoes into a cloth satchel the color of mushy peas. Inside, I glimpsed knives, and tins of food.
I felt like a stranger to myself. I stood for a moment, sweating and weary, and tilted my face to the sky. No stars. Just clouds, bruised with the faint reflected light of the city.
China, I thought. I was in Shanghai. And it was World War Two.
I found my grandmother less than thirty minutes later, flirting with a drunk Nazi.
I had been floating until that moment, drifting in a daze through the soup of the hot night and suffering a dreamlike schizophrenia; lost in the shadowed kiss of a European-flavored city, only to be torn sideways into Asian byways: meandering lanes and alleys no wider than the span of my shoulders. I passed elderly Chinese women perched on low wooden stools, playing mahjong while bickering at naked, shrieking children who played in the stifling darkness among piles of trash that had been swept into rotten heaps wet with water trickling down the narrow gutters.
Most ignored my presence, but some of the children chased me with their hands outstretched, begging for money, trying to sink their small hands into my bag. Open sores covered their arms and legs. I could count their ribs. I gave them the tins of food.
Zee led me; in snatches, glimpses. Dek and Mal were silent in my hair. I did not see Raw and Aaz, but knew they were close. I was comforted by that, but it was a painful, uneasy consolation. I was lost in time. What I did here would ripple into the future. It was not my first journey into the past, but I had never been set loose, faced with the potential cost of being that butterfly flapping her wings—and causing a thunderstorm on the other side of the world.
Ernie’s young face filled my mind. Save him, whispered a small voice, but I could no longer blame the letter on the back of that photo for such urgency. You have to make sure he doesn’t die in your arms. Not murdered. Not him.
Not any of them.
I heard music in the night. A lonely saxophone playing a heartbreaking version of “Over the Rainbow.” Zee glided through the shadows, little more than a glimpse of spiked hair and sharp joints. Dek licked the back of my ear. I patted his head as I stepped free of the residential alley and found myself staring at a party.
Just a glimpse, beyond an open gate built into a thick stone wall that followed the curve of the road. Barbed wire fencing rose almost five feet higher than the wall itself, ending on the right-hand side at a distinctive fluted turret that was as out of place as the German signs framing the gate. Young Chinese children squatted on the sidewalk, playing what looked like rock, paper, scissors with a pair of Jewish kids, a boy and girl. Carts rumbled down the road between us, hand-pulled by gaunt Chinese men—who gave wide berth to a car parked alongside the street; a black Peerless, top down, revealing quilted leather seats that looked soft as a glove. I knew cars. This one was old-fashioned for 1944, but lovingly cared for. An Asian man sat behind the wheel, dozing.
No one paid attention to me: lone woman lurking at the entrance of the alley. The streets were dark. No electricity to spare. No oil to waste in lamps.
I heard glasses clinking, and smelled food. Yeast scents, and something meatier. Even a hint of coffee. My stomach growled. Zum Weissen Röss’l was the name of the place, according to the largest of the signs hanging above the gate—written, too, above the arched entrance of the elegant white building that was at the far end of the courtyard. Round tables and wicker chairs dotted the swept stone ground, and the saxophone’s mourning tones were pure and sweet. I could not see the musician.