by E J Frost
“Tsara—”
Shit, I’d forgotten about my other uninvited, but very welcome, guest. “Oh, Peter, I can explain.” I can’t, actually. But I’m very good with memory charms. “Do you want to come inside for a moment?”
“Sure.” He follows me into the parlor, which is the only room in the house that’s really for public consumption, and takes a seat on the couch when I wave at it with my free hand. I drag the shifter through the pocket door into the dining room, where I heave him up onto the table. Good thing he isn’t very heavy.
The antique table groans and I can almost hear my grandmother’s ghost hissing in my ear.
I blow at the corners of the room. They blaze with witch-light. In the strong, golden glow, I examine the shifter’s wounds.
His side is a mangled mass of meat. When I spit into the wound, the blood sizzles. Poisoned.
I grip the shifter’s shaggy hand. The pads of his palm are rough against my fingers. “You’re going to be okay.”
Green eyes focus on me. “Hurts . . .”
“I know. I can heal you. Stay here and lie quiet. I need to deal with the human in the other room.”
The paw contracts painfully around my hand, the points of his claws pricking my wrist. “Don’t go.”
He looks very scared. And sounds very young. “How old are you?”
“Seven . . . teen.”
“Is this your first year?”
The furred head bobs. Shit. A brand-new shifter. Bleeding to death on my dining room table.
“You know the second law?”
He nods again, and his brilliant green eyes glaze.
“I uphold the Therian laws.” Because if I didn’t, one clan or another would probably eat me. “So I need to deal with the human. And then I will help you.”
“The human is listening to all of this,” Peter says from the doorway. “And he’s getting concerned.”
Shit. Shit, shit and shit.
Chapter 8
I blow into my coffee and glance across the kitchen table at my guest. He looks tired, which is understandable, since it’s nearly three in the morning and neither of us has been to bed yet.
That fact is particularly disappointing, given how cute my guest is. Even at three a.m., covered with blood.
He also looks like the world has rocked on its foundations. Which is also understandable, given what he’s seen in the last few hours.
I glance at my other guest. Not the werewolf, who is now peacefully sleeping on my dining-room table under a hand-woven blanket imbued with all the healing charms I could weave into it, but the tall, hawk-nosed woman leaning against my sink, sipping from her own cup of Swiss Chocolate Almond.
“I liked the Mocha better,” she says.
“Sorry, I’m all out.”
“Can we talk about something other than the coffee?” Peter asks hollowly.
I stifle a giggle. I don’t want to laugh at him. I was raised knowing about the Secret World and I still find shifters a little alarming. No wonder he’s in shock.
“Professor Buselli,” Ana says, and I can tell she’s trying to be gentle. “Don’t you think you’d prefer to take the potion?” She nods at the small, green vial sitting on the table.
Peter looks at it like it’s a scorpion. “No.”
“What do you want to talk about, Peter?” I ask.
He hunches over his steaming cup. “How many of you are there?”
I figure that question’s directed at Ana, so I let her field it.
“Wouldn’t it be better if you didn’t know?” she says.
I wince into my coffee cup.
Peter’s eyes lift to meet mine. They’re glassy, like blue marbles. Dazed. Hurt.
“Which kind are you?” he asks. He sounds sullen.
“I’m not a shifter—”
Ana stirs against the sink. Ruffling her feathers. “We prefer therian.”
“Right, sorry. I’m not a therian.”
“Then why.” I hear him force the next words out between his teeth. “Is there a werewolf sleeping in your dining room?”
“We prefer—” Ana begins.
I hold up a hand. She’s really not helping. “Lycanthrope. They like to be called lycanthropes. And there’s a lycanthrope sleeping on my dining room table because I’m a healer.” Ana clears her throat with a noise that sounds remarkably like a caw. “Among other things.”
“What other things?” Peter grits.
“She’s a sorceress,” Ana says.
“I prefer witch.” She’s beginning to get on my nerves. I generally get along pretty well with shifters, even shifters as arrogant as Ana, but anyone can rub me the wrong way at three in the morning.
Ana shrugs one shoulder. “Witch has such negative historical connotations.”
As opposed to sorceress. “Whatever. I can heal most injuries.” Although I discovered my own personal limitations with spinal injuries. “I brew potions, I speak with the dead, I can do a little sympathetic magic, and I hang out with therians. And the occasional fae.” I add hastily, because Lilliwhite has yet to make an appearance tonight, but she often stops in if she sees my lights on after midnight.
“And she makes a mean cup of coffee,” says a small voice from near my coffee-machine.
Cue Lilliwhite. “Help yourself,” I say to the pixie.
Ana casts a disapproving glance at the little fae. “I cannot see how this concerns you.”
“Tsara’s my friend. I can visit when I like. And everyone knows you’re a bitch.”
Pixies not being known for their tact.
“Okay, okay.” I rise from the table and interpose myself between Ana and the pixie, before the Horai decides to take a snap at the fae.
Lilliwhite decides that discretion is the better part of valor and retreats across the kitchen after I pour a few drops of coffee into her thimble-sized cup. She alights on the kitchen table and examines the memory charm while she sips her coffee.
Peter watches her with a mixture of shock and terror.
I rub my gritty eyes. I’ve seen that expression too many times tonight. When Toby-the-Werewolf first showed up. When he began gouting black blood out of every orifice. When his patroness Ankhenaten appeared and changed from a hawk to a woman in my dining room. When I had to ask Peter to help Ana hold Toby down while I poured Naga antivenin into his wounds.
It’s been a long night.
“Peter, that offer is still open if you want to take me up on it,” I say.
Unfortunately, that offer is just to sleep in the spare bedroom. I wouldn’t mind him sleeping elsewhere, but between his expression and the dried blood all over both of us, I’m thinking tonight just isn’t our night.
He stands slowly, and I can see him shaking. I don’t think any less of him for it. Suddenly discovering that the world is not what you think it is – and that it’s full of witches and shapeshifters and faeries – can make anyone a little shaky.
I lead him upstairs, show him the guest bedroom, and leave him in the bathroom, using my toothbrush, which any other time would be romantic, but tonight is just sort of sad.
I head back downstairs to face the shifter and pixie in my kitchen.
Happily, they’ve separated before things have gotten out of hand. Ana’s back in the dining room with the sleeping werewolf.
I hand her a pillow I’ve brought from the spare bedroom and watch while she gently slides it under Toby’s head.
“Son?” I ask. I don’t know much about Ana’s family – she’s never mentioned them – but her gesture is very maternal. I do know shifting runs in families, but I thought it usually stayed in-clan. The way Ana’s looking at the werewolf, though, I wonder if I’ve gotten it wrong.
“Only in a spiritual sense,” Ana says. “Toby’s parents were killed several years ago. Eric is his godfather, so he came to live with us. He’s only been shifting for three months.”
“He’ll be okay,” I say. “He’s young. Strong. He’ll make a full recovery.
Just give him a few days.”
Ana brushes long fur back from the shifter’s face. “He wants so desperately to prove himself.” She makes a little clucking noise. “Taking on a full-grown Hisaka.”
“He’s smart. He knew to come here for antivenin instead of trying Mass. General.” Which has a pretty liberal policy about stitching up shifters, but draws the line at stocking antivenin for mythological creatures. Can’t say as I blame them. They must have an interesting time with their insurers as it is.
Ana touches the corner of one golden eye. She could just be tired, but I think she’s wiping away a tear she doesn’t want me to see. “I told him where to go,” she says. “I just wish I’d known why he was asking.”
I pat her on the shoulder, which she doesn’t respond to, and leave her to her vigil. I stop in the kitchen to say good-night to Lilliwhite, but the pixie’s decided that the better part of discretion is leaving. She’s even turned off the coffee-pot, a sure sign she’s gone. Upstairs, I check on my human guest, who is snoring peacefully, his wayward lock of hair covering one eye.
My grandmother’s ghost is waiting for me in the bathroom.
“I’m too tired to argue, Dala,” I say, picking up my toothbrush and pouring Listerine over the bristles. On further thought, I snap a quick disinfecting cantrip over it. You never can tell what’s lurking in another person’s gums.
“I taught you better than this, beti.”
She’s not too tired to argue, evidently.
“Why did your great-great—”
I begin brushing my teeth to the greats. There are six of them. It takes a while. “Grandmother Sorina,” I supply.
“—burn to keep the Secret World a secret only to have you—”
“Reveal it to the first gorgio who comes along,” I finish. We’ve had this conversation just a few times. I can repeat it verbatim. That’s the problem with talking to ghosts. They tend to repeat things they said in life, a little too often. “He’s not the first gorgio to come along, Dala. He’s the fifth. I like him. Now’s as good a time as any to see if he could live in my world.”
I stop brushing for a moment and listen to make sure the subject of our conversation is still snoring. He is. It’s a nice sound, although I’m not sure I’d feel the same way if he was lying right next to me.
“Well, he can’t. You saw him.”
She’s not wrong about that. Peter didn’t take it very well. But, then, Saul seemed fine at first. It took him six months to freak out. And I never did find out what broke the camel’s back.
I rinse out my mouth. There’s always the memory charm. “I’ll deal with it, Dala.”
“Like you dealt with that tulla gorgio, what was his name?”
“James. And he wasn’t fat.” James was on the big side, sure. I’ve always had a thing for big men. Peter will be the smallest guy I’ve dated – if we end up dating. “He was my first boyfriend, Dala.” And if I didn’t handle him very well at the time, at least we’re still on speaking terms, which is more than I can say for my most recent romantic misadventures. “I was seventeen. Give me a break.”
“If you would only date Rom, this wouldn’t happen, beti.”
I snort into a towel. Most of the Rom men I know are cousins, or somehow related to me on my father’s side. I grew up with them. I remember them as dirty boys only interested in getting dirtier. The idea of dating one of them makes me queasy. “Good night, Dala.”
“Sweet dreams, beti.” She crosses herself before she rolls up. I flick off the lights and stand in my darkened bathroom for a moment, listening to the soft sounds of the three other people in my house.
Three other people in my house. Practically a party.
So why am I sleeping alone?
Peter’s more freaked out after a few hours sleep. I watch him covertly while I brew a pot of dark roast. His hands shake. He flinches at every small sound. A snuffle from the dining room has him jumping out of his chair.
Not good.
Regretfully, I slip the memory charm into his coffee. I make him scrambled eggs and toast, because it seems like a nice thing to do after I’ve just given him a mickey. While I cook, I watch his cute butt fill out his jeans and wish that I wasn’t such a nice girl.
I should jump his bones while I have the chance. He won’t remember it tomorrow anyway.
He grows increasingly groggy while we eat, and by the time I’ve finished my second piece of toast, he’s sitting slumped at the table like a zombie, his eyes rolled back in his head.
“Come on, Peter.” I help him up, out of the house and to his car. I drive him home, carefully under the speed limit because I don’t have a license. He navigates me through Medford in a monotone.
I’d give anything to hear him laugh.
I park in the parking space in front of the apartment block that he directs me to and turn to look at him. He’s sitting in the passenger seat, limp, lifeless. He could be a puppet.
“Peter, I’m Tsara, do you remember me?”
“Yes,” he says in that dreadful monotone.
Good. The memory charm hasn’t turned his brain to complete mush. “We had dinner together last night. Do you remember that?”
“Pizza,” he says. “We had a good time.”
Nice to know he thought so, too.
“That’s right. And you drove me home afterwards. Do you remember?”
He frowns. No, he doesn’t remember. The memory charm’s working.
“After dinner you drove me home, Peter. I live in Somerville. You parked in front of my house. We sat in your car. You had a cigarette. We talked about movies. We both like Dances with Wolves.” About the only movie we could agree on. I like Kevin Costner. He likes war movies. Bleh.
“Dances . . . Wolves,” he repeats.
“Right. We said good-night. I went into the house. You sat in the car and had another cigarette.” I don’t actually know what he did. It’s unlikely he sat in the car, or he would have seen Toby arrive. But I can’t think of anything else. “Then you knocked on my door. I let you in. We had a cup of coffee. I told you I just wanted to be friends.”
This is the part that hurts. Because it’s not true. None of it. And I hate lying to him. But it’s necessary. Peter’s not ready for my world. And I can’t deal with a repeat of Saul.
His frown deepens. He’s fighting it. Because deep down, he knows this isn’t right. “Just friends,” he repeats.
“I’m getting over someone. I’m not ready for a relationship right now.”
His tampered psyche seems to accept that more easily. His frown smoothes. “Not . . . ready.”
“That’s right. So we’ll just be friends.” Maybe I can ease him into my world a cantrip at a time.
He smiles. “I’ll wait for you.”
Shit. That’s not supposed to happen. “No, Peter. We’re just going to be friends. That’s all.”
His smile widens. Turns beatific. “No, I’ll wait for you.” The idea’s becoming set in his altered memory. Somehow, he’s self-hypnotizing.
I try to salvage the situation. “We said good-night—”
“Kissed you good-night.”
Now he’s fantasizing, building his own false memories, and I don’t know how to stop it. “And you drove home,” I say firmly. “You watched TV and went to bed.”
“Went to bed,” he repeats.
I sink back into the driver’s seat. Not a total disaster. Before he can embellish the false memory any further, I get him out of the car, up into his apartment, which looks comfortable and homey in a messy, male way, and into bed. Stripping him down to his boxers makes me teary, because he really is cute, and he really seems to like me, and I would do almost anything to be able to climb into his unmade bed, cuddle up, sleep in his arms for a few hours, and wake up to see what develops.
But that would be wrong for so many reasons. Only slightly less wrong than what I’ve just done to him.
I tuck him in instead and give him a gentle peck on the cheek.
He smiles and pulls a pillow to his chest. He hugs it, snuggles his face into it. I’ve never wanted to be a pillow so badly in my life.
I close the curtains and creep out, taking his blood-stained clothes with me in a CVS bag. Unlike me, he has a deadbolt on his front door, so I don’t even need to charm the lock. For some reason that has me in tears all the way to the bus-stop.
Chapter 9
It’s days before I can look at the binder Peter’s given me without bursting into tears. He calls me every day. We talk. He makes me laugh. I like him more all the time. He tells me he doesn’t want to push me; he just wants to get to know me. The lie becomes further and further entrenched between us. I want to scream.
And every one of his calls starts with that weird interference. I have my line checked. I tell Peter that there’s something wrong with his cell phone. He calls from his office instead, but it happens there, too. Just a few seconds of dead air, and the whispered words, please make it stop.
I wish I knew how.
I finally sit down with Peter’s binder on Sunday afternoon. I’ve done everything else I can think of. Cleaned the whole house. Raked up all the leaves that have fallen from the four big trees in my yard. Turned the compost heap. Fed the ward spiders and thrown peanuts to the watch squirrels. Baked cinnamon rolls. Painted my nails. Colored my hair. Had my daily call with Peter. Changed Toby’s dressings.
The werewolf’s sitting on my couch, watching football. To the sound of cheering and the faint smell of dog, I open the binder, flip through the tea-stained pages and begin reading.
It’s engrossing. The author of The Secret History of Solomon’s Temple and the Ancient Order of Free and Accepted Masons knows how to tell a story. I finally look up only because I’m squinting at the page. It’s gone dark and the house is quiet.
There’s a ghost hovering over my dining-room table.
The small hairs on my neck rise. My skin prickles into goosebumps. This isn’t a family ghost, or anyone I recognize. She’s ethereal. Barely defined. Just the suggestion of a female shape. A rounded face. Soft gray curls.
I peer at her. Speak softly. “Hello.”
