"I've got Shang Haoming's homework!" I told her, thinking on my feet. "The dunce left his stuff at school and I grabbed it for him." I gave her a reassuring smile and took a large step towards the door.
"Be back by dinner!" Mom called after us.
We walked down the road for a bit before something hit me. "Do you know where we're going?"
"No," Zhao Jie said in confusion, "You've been there before, not me!"
"Yeah, but Ku Tou was leading us," I remembered, "And it was dark!"
We turned in the direction of the school, hoping to jog my memory. I was studying the sidewalk when I heard an incantation being chanted in the distance. "That has to be them!" I thought. We ran towards the sound.
We got to a house that, sure enough, was at the edge of a large watermelon field. The building was made of stones that looked on the verge of collapse. The heavy wooden door was black. It reminded me of a coffin. A house safeguarding amulet was pasted in the very center of the door frame. It was a pale yellow amulet with very little supernatural air. "That wouldn't keep away a shadow spirit." I thought to myself.
I tried the knob and the door was unlocked. Before I could do anything, a loud thud came from inside the house.
"Should we go in?" Zhao Jie asked nervously. I turned to reply when I saw a small group of adults coming towards the house. I moved to greet them when an older woman cut me off.
"I know you boys! You're Zhao Laohei and Mr. Shi's boys!" She smiled kindly, "What are you doing here?"
I scratched my head and said, "I, uh, we came to see the man performing religious rites."
Another man beside her looked about forty. Something about him was vaguely familiar, but I couldn't put my thumb on it.
Zhao Jie got there before me. "You were at the Locust Tree Mountains!"
The man smiled. "Yes, indeed. I was part of the crowd that tagged along. Your master said we had some kind of air about us that could help out." He walked past us to the door. "Good to see you again" He said, and then walked inside.
We followed after him, passing through a short hallway before reaching a small open yard near the rear of the house. In the center of the yard was a middle aged man moving in conjuration footwork by an altar. A man and a woman stood behind him in frocks.
An old man saw us coming and said, "Lu Jianjun, don't come in. You'll bother the master."
We peeked around at them, standing behind the now named, Lu Jianjun.
Lu Jianjun nodded to them and then leaned to another man in his group. "Wang Xian is upset today. Do you think his brother's in danger?"
"What's wrong with Wang An?" I wondered.
Lu Jianjun tapped my shoulder and said, "You might not know, but Wang An was enchanted by something. His brother, Wang Xian invited these masters to help him."
"Can you see him?" Asked one of the others, "How does he look?"
"He hasn't eaten or drank anything in days." Lu Jianjun whispered. "And he raves about his dead granddaughter, Xiao Yi."
I watched the three masters move across the yard. They might have Taoist powers, and there was definitely supernatural air about, but they didn't move like any masters I'd seen.
The middle-aged man moving in step shook a small bell with each foot placement. Finally, he rang the bell against the altar and slammed his last step down. He looked into the doorway of Wang An's room and spoke firmly, "Do you want to bargain with me?"
Then I saw her. A little girl in red appeared in the doorway. Her cheeks were bright pink, the same as when I'd seen her in the watermelon field.
I gasped, startling the few people around me.
"Grandpa is sick!" The girl shouted, her voice rolling through the air like ice. "I need to help him! Go away!"
The pink blush on her cheeks seemed to darken as the rest of her paled. I'd never seen a spirit pale before.
"Don't get on my bad side." The middle aged man said. He took out a soul binding amulet. It appeared to be a blue one. I made a silent prayer that he was skilled enough to deal with her. He murmured the incantation, bursting the amulet into flames. The master cast it into the air and the familiar flaming rope snake launched itself towards the girl. Her visage flickered like she was trying to get away, but the flaming bindings were around her in seconds. The master closed the distance between the two of them and brandished a stean from one of his deep pockets. The small stone water pot glowed in the firelight. He raised it towards her and I watched as her spirit sank into it.
"This guy's good." I said under my breath.
The master put away the pot and went to Wang Xian. "The spirit is under my control. Your brother shouldn't be afflicted any longer. However, you may want to take him to the hospital, he might still require medical care."
Wang Xian thanked the Taoist and then handed him a small velvet bag. The Taoist opened it, counted a few coins, nodded and then began to put away his things.
I pushed past Lu Jianjun and went to the Taoist, asking, "How did you do that to the girl?"
He and his colleages stopped what they were doing and looked at me in surprise.
Lu Jianjun came up to us smiling and said, "How? It's over isn't it?"
Wang Xian stepped closer to me, "Did he say girl? Was the spirit a girl? Someone from the family?"
The middle-aged Taoist shook his head dismissively and said, "It was an adult spirit. Don't think too hard about it."
I opened my mouth to tell Wang Xian that he was lying, but the Taoist put a heavy hand on my shoulder. "Come with me. I need to talk with you."
He steered me into a side room. His colleagues followed suit, asking the others to excuse us and closing the door.
The middle aged man took off his frock and then patted his overshirt until finding a pair of glasses. He placed them on his nose. The glasses made him look a bit younger and kinda like a hip teacher I'd seen on TV.
"Are you Liu Chunan's godson?" He asked abruptly.
I was so excited to hear them mention Master Liu that I forgot to be outraged. I asked, "Did he ask you to come here?"
He shook his head and said, "No, my superiors sent us. Master Liu and I once worked together, but he's far surpassed my stage."
I cocked my head in question, but he forged ahead. "There was a ferocious ghost, a man died, I got my orders, we're here, it's captured, we're done." He spoke very quickly and casually.
"But you didn't try to help her? You didn't even ask why she was still here! Why did you just… catch her like that?"
The little girl's face flashed in my mind again. She was just a kid, she didn't deserve to be trapped in this existence forever.
"I want to send her away, but I don't have that ability right now. I brought with me the tools to capture a ghost and that's what I did."
I considered the man before me. He might be more powerful than Zuo Qingmu, but definitely wasn't as strong as Master Liu.
"In respect of your godfather, I'll answer any questions you have, but then we must be on our way."
"Where will you go?" I asked.
"Not far. We're working with the police to capture some grave robbers. Anything else?"
"Why did that girl appear in my Peach Blossom Mirror?"