“Rest up for a while, Vic,” she said, as she gingerly helped me to one of the stools around my kitchen island. “You’re not used to channeling that kind of power, and it’s pretty different from what it takes to call your snow leopard in through the dark matter running in your veins, so it’ll take you a while to recover until you get used to it, and… well, even then, you can still use too much and do yourself some serious damage.”
My brain stuttered over so many parts of that explanation that I didn’t even know where to start. Self preservation took over my mouth for me, though, and I asked, “How long until it’s safe for me to use the power again?”
“Whenever you stop feeling like walking across the room is akin to climbing Everest, you’re probably on the road to recovery. Honestly, just like with anything else in life, when you feel rested and whole you’re good to go, and if you feel ragged and awful, you’re not. There’s no trick to it, outside of practice.”
Well, that was both reassuring and not. Of course, it would have been sweet if my newfound powers were limitless and never strained me, but that would have been too much like some poorly considered fantasy gimmick, where the rules of magic mold to fit the author’s purposes, and were only limited randomly, when it suited the plot. Even though Gwen had claimed to be my narrator, and then I had “taken over”… I didn’t believe that I was in a book. Or if I was, it wasn’t that kind of book. My life had never been that easy.
Whatever, I should be stoked that I could suddenly will myself through time and space. It didn’t have to be easy. It was already ridiculous enough that I could turn myself into a snowleopard without much strain. Now, I had suddenly added Whovian style powers to my arsenal. I was all for it. Or I would be. As soon as I could have a nap.
I WOKE UP sometime the next day blinking groggily at Cary Elwes & Robin Wright cutting their way through the fire swamp. It was nice to open my eyes in my own room, staring at one of my favorite posters, even if I was dismayed to find that I had passed out before I’d had a chance to interrogate Gwen. As I slowly stretched my way out of bed, and plodded to my shower, I was relieved to discover that my brain and muscles now moved slightly faster than molasses in January.
Gwen may have left, but Sol, Seamus, and Trev were all present when I made my way down to the kitchen, throwing on the least-dirty clothes piled on my floor.
“Vic!” everyone chorused, as I jumped the last couple steps and skidded into the kitchen/dining area.
They were all perched on stools around the kitchen island, noses buried in mugs of hot beverages, until their heads popped up collectively at my less than subtle entrance.
I waved and then bowed, because what else do you do when you walk into a room full of people happy to see you?
“Hey folks,” I said, making a direct line to the half-full pot of coffee I spied on the kitchen counter next to the fridge. “Whichever of you dug out the pot and made coffee is my new hero.”
Seamus raised a hand and waved it casually.
“About time I managed to rescue you, instead of the other way around,” he said, smiling.
I poured coffee and scowled at him.
“You have done plenty to save my ass in the short time we’ve known each other. And saving me isn’t a prerequisite to being my friend, or anything.”
Now Seamus was raising both hands.
“Calm down, Vic. It was a joke. I’m perfectly happy with the number of times you’ve saved my ass.”
I kept the glare going, just for appearance’s sake.
“Somebody woke up grumpy,” said Trev, waving his mug of green tea at me. I marveled at the fact that I could smell it from where I stood, still five feet away from him. This whole feline senses when not in a feline body thing was both interesting and weird.
“I’m grumpy,” I said, as I walked over to join them all at the tile-topped kitchen island, “because I woke up with a thousand questions buzzing through my head, and my primary source of answers is off doing… Gwen knows what.”
I chuckled internally at my word choice. Gwen certainly would know what she was doing. Unlike the rest of us.
“We might be able to piece together a bit for you,” Sol said, her smile making my stomach tighten again. She was dressed now, and I wondered what she’d done for clothes, as the ones she was wearing didn’t look like mine. I guess she’d had plenty of time to head out and buy stuff while I was sleeping. I filed it away as way too low on the priority list to ask about now, and instead listened as she continued talking.
“We’ve been trying to piece things together all morning.”
“Is it even safe to talk here?” I asked.
Trev nodded. “I’ve taken care of any monitoring ‘devices’ that were left behind.”
The way he said devices made me think that some of said devices might actually be spells.
“How far have you gotten in unravelling our mysteries, then?” I asked, looking around at all three of them.
My heart stuttered for a moment, as I realized how damned relieved I was to see them all here and in one piece. I didn’t have many friends. I mean, I’d had a few friends in Colorado growing up, but most of them hadn’t known how to act around me after my parents had died, and I had run off to Arizona before they’d had a chance to figure it out. They might be there for me in the future, they might not. But these three people… these three people were my rocks now. It hadn’t taken long, fuck, if you considered the fact that I’d only known Trevor for eight years before he was taken from us, I hadn’t known any of them as long as my friends in Colorado. And I’d only known Seamus and Sol for a handful of days… but I already knew I could count on them. I knew that if someone was trying to kill me, they’d try to stop them. That they would risk their own lives to save mine, and that I would do the same for them. I’m not sure there was a higher bar for friendship, and I certainly didn’t want to find out if there was. I took a deep breath, blinked until the tears that had threatened to do more than make my vision fuzzy disappeared, and then focused on what Sol was saying.
“Well, luckily, Seamus was around when you got turned all Agent-of-Gwen, so he was able to explain how the hell you managed to flit in and out of nowhere to save our butts back on the cliff.”
I nodded, appreciating not having to go through that part again.
“Though,” Sol continued, “he never did explain how you managed to find time to get dressed while Gwen had you whisked away to that clearing.”
I quirked my eyebrows for a second, unsure what she was talking about, and then remembered that Seamus and I had both appeared fully clothed when we returned to the cliff.
“Probably the same way that all four of us were fully dressed when we materialized in the clearing yesterday,” Trevor suggested.
I hadn’t been conscious for that part, but I had noticed that Trev and I were indeed both fully clothed when I came to. After thinking about it for a minute, something occurred to me. That first time I’d met Gwen, she’d been naked at first and then had conjured clothes out of nowhere, magically converting them into an entirely different outfit later.
“Gwen’s power certainly lets her shift clothing around however she likes. Maybe it’s part of my new arsenal of magic.”
That had eyebrows raised all around.
“What’s the big deal, guys? Wardrobe change is hardly something noteworthy on the list of badass talents a person can have.”
They all chuckled.
“You clearly haven’t been a werecat very long,” Trev said, still smiling.
“Well, duh.” I said.
“The rest of us have had longer to get frustrated with always having to carry clothes in our mouths, or stash them somewhere convenient, or just get used to being naked in front of people, which is fine for us, but generally weirds out norms.”
“You mean nons?” I asked.
“He means muggles,” Sol said, smirking. “And he’s right, many of us would trade a limb for the convenience of not having to de
al with the clothing fiasco in the modern world.”
I just stared at all three of them.
“A limb?”
Sol just shrugged. “Ok, maybe not a limb. After all, sometimes it’s nice to just be naked whenever you feel like it, which is certainly how we handle things in a community of weres, but…”
“But it’s a pain in the ass if you’re surrounded by mages,” Trev grumbled. “They’re superior gits at the best of times, and add in the necessity of going naked to use your were powers, and you have to burn the crap out of quite a few of them just to keep them from teasing you every time you shift.”
That made me laugh.
“Ok, so clearly you three will just have to stick with me forever, so I can always conjure clothes for you. Next item?”
“How about the reports I got from my supervisor last night about a fire-drake wiping out most of MOME’s Bolivian facility?” Sol asked.
“Wait. What?!” Seamus and I asked, in unison.
Trev just smirked a bit, leading me to believe that he knew something about that.
“Apparently,” Sol continued, “after we escaped MOME, a few fire demons and some selkies wreaked havoc in the lower levels, causing a massive evacuation of MOME, which, combined with a massive security breach disarming most of the wards in and around the building, caused all the people being held by MOME to be released.”
“Well, that was the plan wasn’t it?” I asked. “Didn’t we mean to release all of the kids that MOME had taken over the years?”
Sol glared daggers at Trevor.
“We were supposed to be releasing the children, but everyone MOME was holding escaped. Some of whom may very well have deserved to be held.”
I looked at Trev, wondering what his reply would be. He simply shrugged.
“We didn’t have time to be choosy about who was released, and besides, who died and made us the arbiters of all justice? Who am I to judge who deserved to be in MOME’s clutches and who didn’t? MOME is a dishonest organization from the core. I can’t be sure that their reasons for holding anyone are legitimate, so it just made sense to let everyone go.”
“But what about the serious criminals?” Seamus asked.
“How could we have determined who those were in any reasonable amount of time? Not to mention figuring out how to release everyone else but them? Besides, it sounds like being caught in the facilities yesterday would have been a death sentence. Did they all deserve to die?”
That left both Sol and Seamus quiet, and I had to admit that I didn’t have any answers to Trev’s questions. I had a hard time believing that MOME’s idea of justice was in any way unbiased, so how could we possibly have discerned who deserved freedom and who didn’t, even if we’d had enough time, which we certainly hadn’t?
“Ok. Can we get back to this fire-drake business?” I asked, trying to contain my excitement. “Was there seriously a dragon there? Am I misunderstanding fire-drake? What happened?!”
Sol sighed.
“The report I read said that after the building had been evacuated, a large, black-scaled fire-drake began immolating the entire premises.”
Trev’s smile was so wide that I had a hard time not laughing.
“You know exactly who that was, don’t you?” I asked.
He shrugged and I punched his shoulder playfully.
“Ow. Hey! What was that for? You know just as well as I do who it was.”
I just stared at him for a minute, until a memory came back to me. A sibilant voice in the darkness. A beautiful young woman with iridescent ebony skin and reptilian irises…
“No way!” I said, punching Trev’s shoulder again.
“Seriously, Vic. Ow. Stop punching me. You’re a lot stronger than you used to be.”
I stared at him, baffled. He’d never used to whine about our sibling arm punches when we were kids, but ok, fine. He certainly didn’t have to let me punch him. Honestly, it was a habit I thought I’d grown out of after I’d started actually training in martial arts, but apparently something about having my brother back made me jump back in time to when we’d still spent every day together.
“Sorry, Trev,” I said, wrapping him in a hug instead. “So, you want to tell us how you know Rhelia?”
“We’re friends,” he shrugged, pushing me off of him.
I do not want to talk about this now, he added, just to me.
I sighed.
“Fine,” I said. “Be all mysterious about it. What about the kids? And what about Rhelia? Did she escape? Have you heard from any of them? Did MOME not manage to round everyone up again after they took care of the fire?”
Trev chuckled briefly.
“There was no ‘taking care’ of that fire, Vic. And yes, I put Rhelia in charge of getting the kids to safety, so I’m sure they all got somewhere where MOME will have a very hard time tracking them.”
“Well that’s a relief,” I said, and looked at Sol and Seamus, who also looked satisfied with that response, at least.
Then a thought struck me.
“Wait a second. Is Rhelia… your girlfriend?” I asked. “Is she the main reason we went back there?”
My jaw dropped at the thought that Trev could be romantically involved with a woman as… intimidating as Rhelia had seemed. Not because that would be a bad thing, just because… well, Trev was pretty laid back, and Rhelia seemed pretty no-nonsense to me.
I said I don’t want to talk about it, Trev complained mentally.
“Whatever,” I hastily added, waving the topic away as if it horrified me—which it absolutely did not—before Sol or Seamus could ask any follow-up questions. “I want to talk about the paperwork I tracked down in MOME, anyway. We still need to look at that together.”
“Wait,” Sol said, not allowing me the change in topic I was hoping for, “you both know the fire-drake?”
A sharp knock on the door conveniently made it so that neither Trev nor I had to reply.
I looked at Trevor, who closed his eyes for a moment, then nodded.
“Uncle Algernon,” he said, his eyebrows rising. “Why on earth is he here?”
“What day is it?” I asked. I’d left my phone upstairs after my shower.
“The 21st,” said Seamus.
I nodded.
“It’s the day he usually checks in with me,” I said, getting up to go to the door. “And you’re going to have to explain how you just checked my front porch from the kitchen table without a device, Trev.”
When I opened the door, I found uncle Algernon, which I had expected, thanks to Trevor’s warning. And a gun pointed right at my chest, which I had not.
VICTORIA MARMOT
and the
INCONVENIENT PROPHECY
Virginia McClain
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, governments, events, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Cover design by Natasha Snow
Copyright © 2018 Virginia McClain
All rights reserved.
ISBN-13: 978-1-9994612-1-8
To Corey, for being a true partner.
“UMM… NICE TO see you too, Algie.” My tone may have been less than sincere. As you might expect from someone who found herself with a gun pointed at her chest by one of her few remaining relatives.
“I’m terribly sorry, Vic. I wouldn’t be doing this under normal circumstances, but… I’m being coerced.”
“Ok. That doesn’t really make me feel any better about the hot lead you could pour into my chest at any moment, but I appreciate that it’s bugging you.”
Algernon had always been cordial with me, and he was, in fact, my great-uncle, not my uncle, though as a kid I’d never known the distinction. He was my dad’s father’s brother, and even though we’d never spent a ton of time together, I’d never gotten the impression that he wanted me dead before.
“Come outside, Vic, a
nd close the door behind you. I really don’t want to shoot you, but I won’t have any choice. They put a godsdamned compulsion spell on me.”
I nodded, wondering what the point of getting me outside was if the plan was just to shoot me anyway. If they were willing to risk my getting shot due to non-compliance, then what was the end goal? Or was Algernon just trying to get me outside and doing a bad job of coming up with lies? Knowing that no one in the kitchen could see me from where they were, I decided to share some intel with Trev as I stepped out the front door.
Kidnapping commencing in 3… 2… 1.
What?! Trev’s thoughts conveyed shock and disbelief. Vic, what the fuck!? Is Algernon taking you somewhere?
But even as Trev’s reply entered my mind, Algernon was reaching back with the hand holding the gun, tears streaming down his face as he brought the butt of it down against the back of my skull. Before I could convey anything else to Trev, the world turned black.
“OW.”
WAKING UP on a strange floor with your arms bound is probably never fun (this was my first time, so I couldn’t really be sure, but it seemed like a safe bet). It’s even less fun, however, when you have a raging headache and a goose egg on the back of your head (again, no basis for comparison, but this seemed like another obvious truth).
Embracing the whole "I’m a victim of a recent head trauma" trope, I lay there and moaned for a bit while I waited for the world to stop spinning. As the room settled into a single ceiling with only four walls, instead of the crazy-assed kaleidoscope it had started off as, I began to put my thoughts in order.
Clearly, my warning to Trevor hadn’t been quite fast enough. Or, at least, it hadn’t been fast enough for them to stop Algernon before he ran off with me. Hopefully, it had at least been enough to keep any of them from getting caught by whoever had Algernon by the nuts.
I decided to remain prone. Besides not feeling capable of the ab workout it would take to get upright with all of my limbs tied behind me, my head was pounding enough to make my gorge rise without putting it through the trauma of changing its elevation. So, even when I heard the unmistakable sound of a door opening to my right, I didn’t bother to move much. Instead, I slowly and carefully turned my head to see who had come to torment me.
Victoria Marmot- The Complete Series Page 14
