the back of my neck burned my skin. Something deep in my belly flipped like a fish on the bottom of a boat. I fell to my knees and retched.
"I am not broken," the thing said. "God himself cut His knuckles against me, but I am not broken. You nothing but a mongrel bitch, coming around here."
I launched myself at her again, my shoulder low. She hadn't expected it, and the cane whistled by my ear, cracking the marble floor where it struck. My shoulder took her in the knees and we tumbled together. She smelled like overheated motor oil, like fish and paprika, like rage. I had my hands around her snakeskin dry throat. She clawed at me, and I felt blood on my arm now too.
Her eyes fluttered and began to close. I was killing her. She was dying. I eased my grip a little, giving her a sip of air. Instead of breathing in, her body shifted under its skin. Bones cracked like a splitting rock as her jaw unhinged, her lower teeth and tongue hanging down almost to her collarbone, and a huge serpent slid out of her skin.
I jumped back, tripping over the bent cane. The snake was easily twelve feet long, thick as a weight-lifter's leg, and its scales glowed from within. The woman's skin lay abandoned on the floor behind it, black and ashen within the mocking brightness of its dress. The serpent turned black eyes toward me then flicked its head a degree to my left, its attention drawn by Chogyi Jake still motionless at the edge of the frozen fountain.
"Legba," I said, not sure what I meant by it.
The snake turned back to me, powerful curves forming in its flesh as it gathered itself to strike. The fish in my belly flopped again, banging against my spine. I shook my head once. No.
We were as still as the world around us, statues in a field of statues. I felt my body steeling itself for violence, and the small place in my head where consciousness retreated at times like this noted that either I was about to die or the thing across the lobby was. Even money.
The shriek didn't come from either of us. Grating, wordless, wet, the sound smelled like raw meat and pain. The shining serpent hissed, turned back upon itself, and sped into the fallen skin. The old woman was just beginning to stand when something flashed through the door. I had the impression of knives and pale skin and something soft and organic colored a red so deep it verged on purple.
The black woman turned, and her jaw still had the great snake's needle teeth, her eyes still flat black. The blur spun past her, and I saw the impact on her body without ever seeing the blow. I rolled forward, scissoring my legs against hers, and the black woman stumbled.
I didn't see her elbow twisting around until it hit my temple and the world went distant and dim. The snake-toothed mouth came down lightning fast, flashing toward my bared throat, but something pushed it aside. An impact like two trucks crashing head-on. The black woman went sprawling, then raised her twisted hands, shouted once, and was gone.
Sound returned, trombone and clarinet blaring with something like joy. In the fountain, water crashed and splattered. I heard Chogyi Jake say something like... I would need to understand... um. An unfamiliar arm was around my shoulders, strong and gentle. The scent of musk and hyacinth washed over me. My hair tugged a little at the back as I sat up, the blood adhering to the marble floor.
She was beautiful. The brightness in her blue eyes, the careless grace of her hair, the amusement that waited in the wings behind her smile. She wore a low-cut white lace blouse and black leather pants. No one looks good in leather pants, but she did.
"You must be Jayné," she said. "I'm Karen Black."
THE PRODUCTION number that followed would have been comic if I hadn't ached from head to foot. The marble floor was broken where the rider had struck it, and Karen, thinking on her feet, had pointed to it as the thing that had tripped me. The concierge fluttered around me, hotel functionaries bringing wet cloth and hot tea, offering to call a doctor and fearing I'd call a lawyer.
Chogyi Jake knew better, having seen the flicker of lost time, but no one else questioned our version of events. By the time