Skydance

by Katherine Rhodes

  Amy put a hand to her heart and stared at him. “Never walk up behind a woman who hasn’t had her coffee yet. Who are you? What are you doing in Max’s kitchen?”

  “I could ask you the same thing.” He smirked, a thick British accent peppering the words. He held out his hand. “Hi. Collin. I’m the thing that lives in the basement.”

  “Max’s son. I’m so sorry. I’m Amy.”

  “Amy, the woman he won’t shut up about. Hi.”

  The door to the basement was slightly ajar, and Amy looked back at him. “Did he stick his son in the basement?”

  “Nah, I picked it. There’s a bedroom, full bath, and rec room down there, and I just come up to use the kitchen.” He shrugged. “Considering you’re wearing Max’s clothes, I’m going to guess I picked correctly.”

  “Oh, my suitcase is in the car. We didn’t…uh…”

  “Yeah. That.” Collin grinned. “Here, the coffee should be working now. Thanks for getting the tank going. I’m pretty shite without my morning cuppa, myself.”

  “Shouldn’t a cuppa be tea?”

  “It’s whatever gets the motor going in the morning, luv.”

  “Don’t hit on my woman, Son,” Max said, walking in wearing a robe.

  “You got it, Pops.” He gave him a thumbs-up. “Max, that robe is covered in dust. Do you never wear it?”

  “I usually wear what she’s wearing.” Max jerked his thumb at her, and then gave her a filthy smile Collin didn’t see. “Or less.”

  Collin put a hand to his forehead. “No. I’m not going to listen to this. You need to tell me what happened in the meeting last night, and then I need to go to work. We still need to talk about my hoard as well. I…oh.”

  Amy saw the look that said, ‘don’t talk about that or I’ll kill you’ on Max’s face and had to laugh. She put a hand on his arm. “It’s okay, Maximillian. I know about the hoards. I don’t know about yours specifically, but I do know about them. Whatever you need to talk about.”

  “Who told you about the hoards?” Max looked confused.

  She grabbed a mug out of the cabinet to make her coffee, and answered Max as the coffee flowed from the brewing contraption into the mug. “Uh, the Gray Eminence? Like, my boss? He pulled out a book and explained it. Y’all are greedy and keep money tucked away. And not just money.” Amy sipped the coffee. “Shit, I forgot sugar and creamer.”

  Max and Collin laughed, and Collin disappeared back down the stairs to the basement. Amy stared at Max. “You didn’t tell me he was living in the basement, Max. Christ, I think your neighbors three doors down heard me screaming for God last night, and he was right down there?”

  “Amy, you have to remember, he and I are never going to have the typical father-son relationship. Ever. He’s a hundred, and I didn’t get to raise him. We’ll be friends, we’ll be great friends, but even when he calls me pop and I call him son… that connection isn’t there right now and may never be.”

  “That’s…sad.”

  “Nope. Not sad. I still get to have him in my life. We can be good friends. We can rely on each other, and I get to teach him all about how to be a proper dragon. Well. Me and Niko and Henry and Raissa, anyway.”

  “Four of you to figure out how to teach one dragon how to be a dragon?”

  “All four of us are pretty fucked up, so I figure if each of us is one quarter normal…”

  Amy punched him in the shoulder. “Nice. I don’t even think you have that much. Do you at least have cream and sugar in here?”

  “I got both.” He grinned broadly.

  Amy couldn’t help but laugh. “I don’t think I want that in my coffee, dear.”

  “I would have asked last night, but your mouth was full.”

  Collin’s yell came up through the floor. “Christ! Close the door!”

  Amy looked at Max, who was biting his lip, and they both burst out laughing. Max finally went over to the fridge and pulled out the creamer, then showed her where the sugar was. A few moments later, Amy had her coffee perfect and let out a sigh.

  “Where on Earth are we going to start with this?” Max asked. “I mean, it’s funny that we’re calling it a power outage, but holy shit, Amy. Losing my power while I was flying? Terrified me.”

  “I can imagine. And Rijn was horrified when he was in my dream last week. He’s been terrified too. He doesn’t love his ability, but he’s also kind of lost without it.” Amy sat at the kitchen table. “We have thousands of volumes, all kinds of information. But we need an idea.”

  Max held up a finger and walked out of the room for a moment. When he came back, he had his laptop, and it was starting up. “So, here’s one of the fun secrets of Pine Valley. We have a newsletter and website, as well as chat rooms and all kinds of information. Sia and Villalobos set up about three years ago, and it’s been a great help. It’s how Sia got the word out that Betsy was stealing things.”

  He navigated to his email, and there was an email from Poppy. “This is going to be the instruction on how to access the information that everyone is sharing about the power outages. We can also request any interviews we like through this. Everyone in Pine Valley has an email address on here. They are also triggers to make everything automatically blind copy. No one sees the address unless you give it to them.”

  The email opened in Outlook, which made Amy giggle. “You know until about two years ago, we were doing everything by hand in the Sectorum. I think we need Sia and Villalobos to help us make sure that everything is running well for us, too.”

  “Magic in the modern area. It’s delightful. You have no idea what a pain in the ass it was to try to find other magicals in the Victorian era. I can only imagine it was worse before that Here we go. She opted for a message board, instead. And, your credentials are in here so you can access it.”

  “I get my own Pine Valley email?” Amy grinned.

  “Absolutely.”

  “What about me?” Collin asked, walking up the stairs. “Wait. Are you done with the sexual innuendo?”

  “There was no innuendo about that last comment,” Amy said.

  “True. So you’re done for now?”

  “Yes,” Max said. “You want to help? I can get—no, wait, Sia did send me your information in a different message. You can both get in.”

  Collin nodded and trotted back down the stairs, Amy assumed to get his computer. “Max, my stuff is out in the car, still. If we have three people working on the stories, we can get a lot done.”

  “Of course. Do you want me to bring in just the computer, or everything?”

  “I’ll need everything, so if you could?”

  “Of course.” He dropped a kiss on her head. “I’ll be right back. And we can delve into this.”

  Running a hand down her face, Amy sat back in the chair. “Holy shit. There are so many stories. I thought this only started happening recently?”

  “Just four weeks ago.” Max sat back and cracked his neck.

  “How are there so many stories?” Collin’s astonishment was clear in his voice.

  “I don’t know. I do see that it started out slow and then in the past two weeks it’s grown exponentially.” Amy tapped a pen on a piece of paper with a chart on it. She had mapped out how many per day, and what time of day. “This is crazy. Have either of you felt any other outages?”

  “We wouldn’t feel them as much as a sorcerer or a witch might,” Collin said. “We’re not always tapped into the magic.”

  “So we need to talk to a few people in town who rely on magic at all times.” Amy scrolled through the names on her screen. “Who would always have the magic on tap? Aside from the coven members?”

  “Vampires. Harpies. There are a few demons who couldn’t make it without it,” Max said. “Anyone who has to rely on magic all the time, or to appear human, or blend in.”

  “Do you know any vampires? Are they even awake this time of day?”

  Collin shrugged. “They might be, but not in the sun.”

&nbs
p; Spinning his laptop around, Max pointed to a name. “Rigel Florescu. He’s the vampire lord of the town.”

  “Vampire lord?” Amy wrinkled her nose.

  “Yes, they work and live in clans. We don’t have a lot of them in town, but Rigel is the leader, the lord. Bigger towns will have princes and somewhere like Chicago would have a king. Anything small just has a lord, and we have under fifty vampires here.”

  “Ah, see, I’ve heard of the kings and princes, but I didn’t know there were little clans.” Amy opened her Sectorum database and navigated to the vampire file, adding in that little bit of information. “Okay, so you know Rigel?”

  “I don’t. Niko does. His grandmother is dating him.”

  Collin and Amy turned their heads to look at Max, and Collin went on, “Excuse me? Niko’s grandmother?”

  “Yeah…she, uh. Well. Once she found out her daughter was marrying a dragon, she found out about the nature of Pine Valley and became a trusted ally. She’d been helping Rigel and a few other vampires keep their places clean and neat, offering ideas on where they could hunt and such to keep them out of the path of humans. Rigel took a liking to her. She doesn’t look like a grandmother anymore.”

  “Ew?” Amy asked.

  “Well, he’s four hundred and she’s eighty-seven. So it’s not as weird as you think it is. The only thing that freaks people out is the reversal of her aging. She looks like she’s about twenty-eight again.”

  Amy and Collin exchanged looks, and Amy shrugged this time. “Well, hell. I’m dating a one hundred and twenty-five year old dragon, so more power to her. Can we get Niko to take us there, or call her and ask her to come over?”

  An hour later, the three of them were in the car on the way to the compound that lay north of the town on the way to Oak Hill, beyond the state park and the cliffs there, but not quite out of Pine Valley. The driveway was between two old stone pillars that once held gates, and the gates were long gone. The road, while gravel, was well maintained and easy to travel.

  The compound, romantically called The Whispering Wood, was nearly a mile down the driveway. A beautiful, massive Baroque building appeared with a neat lawn, tennis courts, horseshoe pit, bocce lanes, a massive pool, and some of the most extensive gardens Amy had ever seen. There were terraces and fountains, hedgerows and a maze. There were gardens in the distance, as well as a horse barn and what looked like acres of farm land.

  “What the hell?” Collin asked as they parked in the driveway at the side of the building. The three of them climbed out. “This is hiding back here?”

  “The vampires are wealthy,” came Niko’s voice from stairs. “It rivals our own hoards. And when you’ve lived for four hundred years, Pappous tells me, you get sick of squatting in two-bedroom apartments and just always do the best for yourself.”

  “They also work the fields and donate all that food to some of the pantries in Minneapolis-St. Paul and other local ones,” Max explained. “The horses are available for children’s parties on Saturdays. The lighted ring allows some riding lessons, and on Yule, they host a massive, huge Christmas party and the place looks amazing. Everyone in town is welcome. Human or magical.”

  “Lord Florescu demands that the vampires maintain civility.” Niko motioned to the door. “Come on in. Grandma is in the kitchen, getting the dinner ready.”

  “Getting dinner…” Collin asked.

  “Vampires can eat for enjoyment. They don’t need much more than a few bites, which is good, and the blood requirement is only once or twice a week.” Amy smiled at Collin. “They’re not sparkling, and they’re not irredeemably evil dungeon dwellers. However, I didn’t expect to find a mini-Versailles in the back woods of Minnesota.”

  The house was more a palace than a manor. The entrance to the building was white and black marble, laced with pyrite—fool’s gold—to give it a rich look. The main hall was three stories tall, with double staircases, one on each side of the room. They wound back and led to the third floor as well. Not giving them much time to study the rooms, Niko headed down to the right through massive receiving rooms, rec rooms, a music room, an enormous library, a dining room, and finally, the kitchens.

  As soon as their foot hit the floor of the kitchen, a raven-haired woman spun to look at them. A grin spread across her face, and she walked over to Niko, arms wide. She had the same blue eyes as her grandson, but didn’t look the part of ‘grandmother’ at all. “Nikomedes!” She wrapped her arms around him. “I didn’t expect that you would actually show.”

  “Why on Earth not?” Niko asked.

  “Well, vampires. And your weird grandmother.”

  “Please. I don’t care. If you’re happy, then whatever. I just haven’t been able to make it because of the new line of jewelry and the store and going to see my wife whenever I get a chance.”

  “I get it, Niko. Who are your friends?”

  “You know Max,” he said, stepping back. “This is his mate, Amy, and his son, Collin. Amy, Collin, Max, this is my grandmother, Dolores.”

  “Please, call me Lola,” she said, shaking their hands. “Niko tells me you’re here to talk to Rigel? You’re entirely too early, I’m afraid. He won’t even wake for another two hours. He only sleeps about eight hours, but it’s too soon to wake him. I got bored in the bedroom, so I came down to play with the food and make a dinner tonight. Would you like to stay? I can certainly make enough for an extra four hungry humans and forty-eight disinterested vampires.”

  Amy laughed. “I’d like that. Are you comfortable around all those vampires?”

  “Oh, quite!” Lola laughed. “At least half of them have mates, and that alone will curb the supernatural appetites. Dinner is usually just whatever anyone can find, but sometimes, I get adventurous and make a meal. It’s a massive meal, but I only do it about once a week.”

  “What’s dinner tonight?”

  “Lasagna. I have to make four pans of it. It’s not too bad. The salad is simple too, I just do iceburg wedges,” Lola said.

  “The noodles, though?” Collin asked.

  “Ha! You don’t cook much, do you? There are no boil noodles now!”

  Niko stepped over and started helping Lola cook. Amy sat at the kitchen bar with Max and Collin when Niko pointed it out. They didn’t want to get in the way, either. Amy cleared her throat.

  “Lola, can I ask you how much you know about the vampire connections to their magic and if they’ve been affected by the power outages?”

  Lola stopped what she was doing for just a moment, then started to work again. “I put that story on the message board.”

  “I know,” Max said. “But we need more information.”

  Pausing again, then resuming her cooking, it was clear she didn’t like the question. “Vampires rely on magic to stay alive. As it were. They are intimately connected with it. They cannot exist without it. The magic in their bodies combines with the living blood they drink to keep them young and powerful. Without either of them, they are husks. Useless corpses.”

  “So they are affected by the power outages,” Collin said quietly.

  Lola turned and stared at them sitting there. “Do you know how utterly terrifying it is to see your friends, the man you love, drop to the floor, completely dead because the magic in the air was suddenly gone? Do you know what it is to be standing in a palace full of true corpses?”

  Amy hadn’t even begun to think of it that way. But if vampires needed both, and were denied one, they really would just drop. Withholding blood could drive them mad, but withholding magic would destroy them.

  “If it does that to the vampires, it’s gotta drop the controls that harpies and demons have over their appearance,” Max said. “But I haven’t heard anything like that.”

  “There’s a warning,” came a voice from the right. They looked at the door there, and a tall, handsome, well-built man was standing there. Lola smiled, wiped her hands, and walked over to him, collecting a sweet kiss as he wrapped his arm around her waist.
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br />   “Rigel, it’s early yet,” she said.

  “Yes, Lola, I know. But the bed was empty without you.”

  Niko cleared his throat.

  “Oh, stop it, Nikomedes,” Rigel said, walking into the kitchen with Lola at his side. “Your grandmother is a wonderful companion, and she shares my bed.”

  Collin coughed this time. “Sir, with all due respect, I don’t care to hear about my father’s sexcapades, either.”

  “Stiff.” Rigel smirked.

  “How are you able to stand in the sunlight?”

  “Wonderful advances in technology.” He smiled. “All of these windows filter out most of the harmful rays from the sun. We can walk around our home without being burned at all. The first time I saw the sun in four hundred years was the day my Lola here had all this screening put it. She’s a genius, really.”

  “I’m not, I’m just practical. Being trapped in a dark house didn’t appeal to me.”

  “Sir, Master Florescu, can you tell us about this warning that you’re talking about?” Amy tossed her question in the middle of the discussion. She didn’t have a problem with anything going on—she didn’t know these people before today. She was here to discover the source of the power outages.

  “Oh, I’m sorry!” Lola exclaimed. “Introductions!”

  After a quick intro to Rigel Florescu, he smiled at Amy. She was glad that she didn’t find him threating at all. She always worried that vampires would be one of the magical creatures who scared the shit out of her. But he seemed a very nice, devastatingly handsome man, and he was clearly in control of everything around him.

  “The warning is a short few seconds before the outage hits. It’s a fluttering of reality around us. Like you were looking through perfectly still, perfectly clear water and someone or thing rippled the surface and everything grew wobbly. It’s only seconds, and it’s barely a warning, but it’s long enough for us to find a place to sit or lie down.”

  “The first time, though, they didn’t know what was going on,” Lola added. “And all of them hit the ground, dead.”

  Chewing on a thumbnail, Amy didn’t want to ask the next question, but it had to be. “I’m pretty good with everything else that involves the vampires, being Sectorum and all, but I have to ask. We know that you can go mad without blood, and that interval depends on the vampire. Do we have any idea how long vampires can survive without magic?”