Ali stopped in the doorway, watching Josh and Clarise descend to the yard. Her ears swiveled. What was that? She tilted her head and listened, her whiskers twitching. Her nose flared as she caught the scents. Fuck, boots on concrete, soft, sneaky. Someone’s in the carport—three or four men by the smells.
As the couple reached the ground, laughter and catcalls came from the area under the house, the carport between its stilt pilings.
Then she heard it. “If’n ya gonna slum it cousin, ya at least got a cute’un.” Her ears flattened, recognizing that voice. Tommy, the fucking racist brought friends. Her eyes narrowed as she tapped into the ley lines, drawing extra mana into her.
Below, Josh spun on his heels. His eyes locked on the thin, sandy haired man in a hunting vest and combat slacks. “Tommy Cullun! You know damn well yer not welcome here. You an’ yer ‘friends’ can get. Now!”
Tommy shook his head and tsk'd. “That ain’t no way to talk to family Josh.” Still shaking his head, he started to walk slowly towards his cousin, motioning to his boys to join him. “You know that.”
Josh stepped back, motioning Clarise to stay behind him. He looked over the three men backing Tommy. They were solid muscle, two carrying baseball bats, one just cracking his knuckles. Shit, he came lookin’ f’r trouble. He stopped himself from looking up towards where Ali was still standing.
Ali grinned slightly, the muscles along her muzzle bunching, baring her fangs. Smart Josh, draw him out. In another corner of her mind, she was sifting through spells, ways to weave mana into the fabric of reality, hunting for clean usages.
As Josh and Clarise backed into the yard, Tommy and his boys emerged from under the porch. Tommy kept walking straight, half grinning at the pair. The others moved from his side and began to flank them.
Once she had a clear line of sight, Ali acted—amber shimmers flared on the porch and behind Tommy as she teleported. Her ears were still flat to her skull, her tails were fanned and their fur bristling. Her voice was sharp, the snarl unhidden. “Thomas Alva Humphry Cullun, what the fuck do ya think yer doin’ on these here lands!”
Tommy stopped dead, his grin slipping. Instinctively his hand went to his nose, a flash of pain and blood in his memory. “Alison?” His voice was quiet, tinged with disbelief and anger.
He turned, his voice a growl trying to cover the pain and humiliation. “So, yer back, bitch…” His voice faded as he saw her—fox headed, furred, bared fangs, and orange flames in front of her eyes. His mind blanked, refusing to restart.
“Ah-yup.” Her fist swung, landing square on his nose. Cartilage and bone cracked loud enough to echo, blood pouring from his nose.
“Yer not family and haven’t been f’r a long, long time, dumbass. Ya’ve got zero right or business t’ be here. Ever!” That last word was drawn out to two syllables. She loomed over him. “Understand?”
He blinked, the pain dragging his mind back into the moment. “Someone kill this fucking thing!” His hands were fumbling at a knife sheathed on his belt.
“Nuh-uh” She snatched the hunting knife before he was able to get it free. With her other hand she pressed claw of here of pointer finger into his forehead. “めまい” (Spell: Vertigo – Japanese)
Tommy felt his legs buckle as the world spun around him. “Wh-what the hell did you do…” He felt his stomach lurch.
“Just stay put” She looked to the thug to her left. He was smacking his bat in his hand. Uncertainty was etched on his face. “히코리에서 산사나무까지. 손목과 팔을 단단히 묶습니다. 나무껍질과 가시는 그대로 남아 있습니다. 살은 꿰뚫려 있었다.” (Spell: Hickory to hawthorn. Binding wrists and arms tight. Bark and spines intact. Flesh impaled. – Korean)
Forest green energy and orange flame erupted around his bat. The weapon twisted in his grip, its shape flowing into hawthorn branches. Bark roughened the surface under his hands as the branches coiled upward, wrapping his wrists and forearms. As his arms were bound tight, spines burst through the bark and into his flesh. He screamed, blood streaking down his arms as the thorns pinned him fast.
She then looked to her right. Both of those thugs looked at each other. The one with the bat, aluminum, started to run at her. The other reached for a gun concealed in his waist band at his back. Her eyes narrowed as her mind raced. Aluminum bat—metal. Metal—simple and pure, elemental under the five. An older tone for control, the flavour and foundation of Mandarin. But the knife in my hand, for my intent that’s precision, penetration—a strike wanting Japanese or Korean. Korean though—that carries the weight of the kumiho. That’s payback with viciousness, like the hawthorn. I don’t need to flirt with that type of brutality here. Precision, not cruelty. So, the bat melts, and the knife flies clean.
She off-handedly flipped the hunting knife in her hand. She focused on the bat first and intoned. “熔化。” (Spell: Melt – Chinese) The aluminum bat started glowing, rapidly going to red, and then white hot. Before he could drop it, it had begun to bend and sag. As he let go, he was screaming. The bat hit the ground as a puddle while he stared at the second degree burn on his palms.
Ali had already turned her attention on the last one. “探す。突き刺す。” (Spells (2): 1) Seek 2) Pierce – Japanese) She threw the knife with force. It struck him in the right shoulder. The arm he was reaching around his back with. The blade sunk smoothly into his flesh. Its tip protruded slightly from his back, clearly having passed through his shoulder blade.
Ali stepped around Tommy and walked the man she just pinned. She crouched and rolled him up on his side. She removed a handgun from his waistband. “What a shame.” She let him drop onto his back, eliciting a yelp of pain. She stood and stepped back. “Josh, Clarise, you good?”
Josh looked at Clarise and then nodded. “Yeah, Ali. Uh… are… are you?”
“More or less. Li’l pissed this piece of shit still thinks he’s allowed here.” Nodding at Tommy.
Clarise’s voice was quiet, tinged with something between awe and fear. “This is what you learned over that year? Not the four since ya left for Seattle?” She looked hard at the hawthorn binding the one thug.
“Some of it. The protectiveness of family and friends, well that’s always been there.”
“An’ it’s appreciated, Sis.” He walked over to her. “Though I gotta admit the wooden bat… what ya did there was…” He looked at the man, kneeling, staring almost vacantly at the hawthorn wood wrapping his arms. Josh shuddered.
“I know… I don’t like some of the results I get from invoking kumiho groundings. The fox-spirits of the Korean peninsula are, well, retaliatory in ways. Warping the wood, changing it from bat to bindings fell into Korean naturally.” She paused, looking at the man, her ears somewhere between upset and accepting. “I wanted him pinned and stopped, and I was still boilin’ about him.” One of her tails flicked in Tommy’s directions. “I pulled quick an’ cast. And it jarred me just enough t’ not repeat that choice with the knife.”
Clarise looked at her old friend with confusion in her eyes. “Kumiho and Korean? But you said you’re a kitsune, that would be Japanese. Wouldn’t it?”
Clarise looked at her old friend with confusion in her eyes. “Kumiho and Korean? But you said you’re a kitsune, that would be Japanese. Wouldn’t it?”
Ali nodded. “Yeah, folks like to think in discrete groupings. Problem is, reality don’t always work that way.” She folded her hands and looked at Clarise. “In my mind, heart, and soul the first term that echoes is ‘kitsune’. But it’s followed damn quick with ‘fox-spirit’. Then ‘kumiho’, ‘huli jing’, and ‘hồ ly tinh’. Korean, Mandarin, Vietnamese.” She paused. “Great-Granma Misha, Great-Granma Michi, Granma Kim, Granma Lin.”
She sighed softly. “Each term, each language, they have their own weight. But they are all linked, part of the same whole. I’ve been worrying that since I started writin’ a journal entry in kanji. More so when that responsibility landed on me.” She chuckled softly. “Maybe I should start referrin’ t’ myself as ‘Swamp Fox’ more oft’.”
“Ya may have somethin’ there, Sis. Sounds like ya see yerself as much a part of the bayou as a kitsune.” Josh grinned. “Maybe the family of fox-spirits needs remindin’ there’s room, and need for ‘em here.”
Ali nodded, her ears dipping in appreciation. Her tails fluffing up with joy at the thought.
Then she took another look around the yard. “Now we need t’ figger out what to do with this lot. All four are goin’ t’ need a doc.”
“Couldn’t you just send ‘em somewhere?” Clarise asked.
“I got a handle on teleportation magick an’ such. But not t’ that extent. ‘Sides, I’m much more inclined to just let ‘em hike to Lockport.”
She crouched next to Tommy, the man still reeling with extreme vertigo. “How about it, Tom-Tom? Think you an’ yer goons can find your way to Lockport?”
He spat blood at her paws. “T-this ain’t over, bitch. Swamp ain’t big enough t’ hide what you are.” He slowly pulled himself up to something between a crouch and sitting on the ground. He brought his eyes level with hers. “You think this is over, you God damned freak?”
To the side, Josh and Clarise watched. Josh’s jaw tightened as Tommy kept digging. Same ol’ Tommy, never learning. Thinkin’ he c’n bluster an’ bully people that know him. Refusing to see his in way over his head.
Clarise’s eyes darted between her friend and Tommy. She muttered under her breath. “Fool can’t see he’s pissin’ into the wind. That she’s been actin’ nice.”
Catching her words, Josh nodded, agreeing with his fiancé’s thoughts.
Ali held her cousin's eyes, her voice was soft velvet laced with steel. “Swamps bigger’en ya think Tom-Tom. More to it, an’ the world, than yer narrow mind wants to accept.” She smiled, an unnerving thing slightly baring her teeth and not quite reaching her eyes. “Yer gonna leave. Yer gonna see a doc. And yer never coming back here. Never talking to my family. Never touching ‘em. If’n you do, I’ll know. And I will find ya, and I’ll more’n break yer nose, I’ll beat you like a tom-tom.” There was fire in her eyes, not foxfire, but the hard glint of someone setting an involatile boundary.
Tommy shuddered slightly but still held her eyes.
Josh raised his eyebrows. Bright Lady, that not a threat, she’s makin’ a promise—almost an oath. He done royally fucked up.
Clarise whistled low, slow, and quiet. Tommy… Tom-Tom hasn’t just dug himself a hole. He’s dug his own grave.
Hearing that whistle snapped something in Tommy. Growling, he lunged at Ali, his fist swinging.
Ali coldly caught the fist, her fingers wrapped it. This time her claws sunk deep into his flesh. Tommy screamed in pain. She just stared at him for a few beats. “Ya startin’ to get it Tom-Tom?”
She shoved against his fist, pushing him onto his back. He claws raked the back of his hand, tearing flesh. A small part of her mind let the vertigo lapse.
She looked at the thug with the knife sticking through his shoulder and one with severely burned hands. They had managed to get to their feet, though still obviously in pain. “You two,” she snarled. “Get Tom-Tom on his feet. An’ yer other nitwit friend. And get yer damn sorry asses outta here. Now!” There was a flicker of foxfire in her eyes and blood dripping from her claws as she snarled that last word.
They scrambled, yanking first Tommy and then the thug with wood bound arms to their feet. Then the four of them made a hasty, if clumsy, retreat, disappearing into the undergrowth in minutes.
Ali, Josh, and Clarise watched them go in silence. Once they were gone, Ali looked at her bloodied claws. Her ears slanted in frustration and her tails waved slowly, brushing the back of her legs.
Josh walked up behind Ali, gently laying a hand on her shoulder. “Ali… Sis, he didn’t really give ye choices.”
Ali’s voice is steady, soft, and a little melancholy. “Yeah. Don’t make the weight any less, or the blood here any less red.”
“Ali…”
Her voice remained the same. “Josh, I’m OK. I just…” She sighed softly. “I know in my bones I did right. That I’d do the same if given a redo. Family f’r me is them that I know have my back unconditionally, an’ f’r who I’ll move heaven, earth, and anything else for. It ain’t blood, Tom-Tom made that real clear in high school.” She looked at her brother, holding his eyes. “That man comes back, fucks with you or Clarise… there won’t be anythin’ left of him to find.” A promise made by tone of voice. “An’ I’m OK with that. It’s not somethin’ I’d have contemplated three or four years ago. But now… It’s in my bones. It’s a weight I accept. Part of me is wishin’ for that past, time when that ache, that responsibility wasn’t there.” She looks at him, ears back in humility. “I hope you c’n understand that my brother.”
Josh nodded slowly. “I think I can. Ain’t fair you gotta shoulder it. Ain’t fair I can’t take that burden from ya, even a part of it. But, Sweet Lady, I appreciate you bein’ here. And, yeah, I’ve got your back best I can. Ya ain’t alone, yer never, ever alone.”
Clarise had been very quiet, working through all that has happened. All she had said. When she spoke, it was quiet, deferential. “Ali… I don’t know how you carry alla this. But, I see you, I believe you, believe in you. Thank you.”
