Hounded

China, a place where a woman could own a business if she chose, and so I bought passage there too, bribing the captain with promises of sexual favors to keep my name off the list.
    » He was unimaginative in bed and smelled awful. Perhaps he sensed my dissatisfaction, for when the ship ran into some rocks off the coast of what is now Mendocino and the hull began to fill with water, he did not take me in his lifeboat.
    » Everyone got into lifeboats, but I was sharing a boat with Chinese crewmen who had no loyalty to me and did not speak any language I knew. And on the water, without the time and space for ritual, I am not powerful.
    » As we were making our way to shore, with four of the men rowing, I saw that the men were looking at my necklace and talking about me. They were probably thinking that I could simply disappear, a victim of the shipwreck, and no one would be the wiser. They probably planned to sell the necklace in San Francisco and split the money between them.
    » Whatever their plan was, one of them suddenly drew a knife behind me and plunged it into my back, while another tried to tear the necklace from my throat. In tremendous pain and trying to get away from the knife, I stood up abruptly and pitched myself overboard, taking the would-be thief with me, still fighting for the necklace.
    » I could feel myself dying, and I could not swim anyway. Luckily, neither could my assailant. He succeeded in pulling the necklace from my throat, but not from my hands, and soon he gave up in a panic and left me to thrash his way to the surface, where his crewmates would rescue him.
    » With my vision fading and not trusting the vetala’s methods in water, I had to choose between leaving this world or sending my spirit into the stone through direct contact. Obviously I chose the latter, and now here I am. « She did not finish her story with a smile. She simply stopped and waited for my reaction.
    » All right, what are your goals now? «
    » To get my necklace back and then get a new body. «
    » Right, let’s take those one at a time. Why is it important to get the necklace back? We can go to the jewelry store and buy you a ruby right now if that’s what you want. «
    » No. That particular necklace is a magical focus, crafted by a demon. It amplifies my powers. Does your necklace not serve the same purpose for you? « She pointed a finger at it and tilted her head quizzically.
    » It wasn’t made by a demon, but, yes, it serves a similar function, « I replied, trying my best to sound nonchalant. All this time my Scary Witch-O-Meter had been traveling further and further into the red. The phrase crafted by a demon sent it all the way over to the right so that the arrow was pointing only a degree or two above the x axis. But I asked myself, Why stop there? Let’s ask her a really scary question. » Tell me about getting a new body. How do you propose to do that? «
    » In the past I just took them, but now I adhere to a higher moral standard. «
    » Took them? I beg your pardon, did you mean live ones or dead ones? «
    » Whatever was available and attractive at the time. «
    » So the body at the bottom of the sea—that wasn’t the body you were born with? «
    » Of course not! I am not knowing of a way to make bodies last for hundreds of years. «
    » Of course not. « I smiled and shook my head. » Stupid question, sorry. « The dial on the Scary Witch-O-Meter was now maxed out. If I told her I had figured out how to make my body last thousands of years with a special tea blend, would she eat my brain? Had she heard me tell Granuaile about my knowledge of Airmid’s herblore? » But forgive my ignorance on this issue—when you took a living body, what happened to the soul that was in it at the time? «
    » This is the question that has puzzled humanity for centuries. «
    » You mean you killed them? «
    » I allowed them to move on in the cycle of birth and rebirth. «
    I struggled to contain my disgust at her actions and her callous rationale for them. I don’t think I was entirely successful; I saw the beginnings of a frown on her face as she registered how I was taking it. » How do you know they moved on? « I asked. » If you shoved their souls out of their bodies rather than allowing them to die, they may still be wandering the earth as unhoused spirits. «
    » That may be true. And believe me, I now know it was terribly wrong of me. I have had plenty of time to dwell on my actions over the past