Fire and Fantasy: A Limited Edition Collection of Urban and Epic Fantasy

by CK Dawn

  “Yes, Ms. Pavlovich. I know your gifts.” He did not move.

  She waved her hand as if the action would clear away whatever kept her from scenting him. “Explain how you consistently sneak up on me.”

  Nax sniffed. “Combination of downwind approaches and the constant background calling scents I make.”

  Lying, roared through her mind so loudly she wondered if she’d screamed it at him.

  He sobered. “I told you to get off my property. You are not wanted here, do you understand? Leave my boy alone. This is your final warning. I will call the authorities.”

  No he won’t, she thought. Something about the hiding, and the isolation, suggested that Nax did not socialize with other Shifters. His threat of calling in “people” was likely as hollow as his explanation of his sneakiness.

  “Who, exactly, will you call?” Calling his bluff probably wasn’t the smartest idea, but it gave her a good excuse to pull out her phone. She swiped it open and held it up. “The Dells police department?”

  Daisy pulled up the camera app. Shifter enthrallers couldn’t enthrall cameras, though a good one could enthrall a person to still see a falsehood even when everyone else saw the truth of photographic evidence.

  She did her best to look as if she wasn’t taking photos. Hard, though, when the camera wouldn’t focus in the dark.

  She took a step closer to get a better image. The shadows under the tree were messing with the phone’s light sensors and she damned well better not use the flash.

  “Are you going to call the FBI? They’ll run you and Orel through all sorts of databases.” Maybe. Honestly, she didn’t know, but it sounded good.

  “Put away your phone, woman,” Nax growled.

  Nax squared his shoulders and he… flickered. Five-eight Nax suddenly felt a lot taller, and a lot broader, than he appeared.

  Daisy blinked.

  No, he looked like normal Nax. Not like the mega-Nax she saw earlier. The version Drako supposedly made. She snapped a photo. It might be blurry, but at least she would have something. She swiped to look at the picture.

  Nax grabbed her phone.

  “Hey!” she yelled. How the hell did he move fast enough to get from the edge of the canopy to snatching her phone?

  He swiped through the images and tapped at the screen. “Here.” He tossed her phone back to her. “Now get off my property.”

  Daisy caught it. He’d deleted the blurry photo.

  Nax turned his back. She half-expected him to vanish right before her eyes. Yet he didn’t. He walked toward the garage.

  But she couldn’t leave it alone. Couldn’t let him be until she understood why her gut kept punching out liar.

  She snapped a new photo of his back.

  He stopped, but did not turn around. Even fifteen feet away, his shoulders clearly tensed.

  She tensed, as well. What the hell was she doing? This man was dangerous.

  She needed to understand. But why? Because she was a scientist? Because knowing was her job? Or because she was arrogant enough to think she had a right to pry? Because everything here jittered?

  No one pried when she was a kid. No one asked if she was okay. No one offered a hand and said “I can help you understand who and what you are.” Her Shifter mother hid her and they faded into the background to “fit in.”

  It didn’t matter who the child was. It never mattered. A Shifter, a Fate, a child was a child and every child should be okay.

  She pointed at the office. “You’re hiding Orel from Fates, aren’t you?”

  He had to be. He took Orel from his Fate mother and he was using his ability to hide in the middle of the Midwest while his son spent his time not making local waves.

  Fates who wanted the boy because of the obvious power his future activation would bring. Fates who might be his family, or might not. Fates playing vicious games.

  Nax’s neck tightened.

  “You’re messing with Orel’s head and using his trauma-induced imaginary friend to keep him hidden and under control, aren’t you?” Daisy asked.

  No other explanation fit.

  “If you think his Fate family will harm him, I can help.” Daisy tucked her phone into her pocket. “My father can help. I’ve been in a situation like Orel’s, Mr. Nax. I can help. We can help both of you.”

  Nax was right there, directly in front of her, his breath in her face and his anger raw and undisguised.

  “How will a Russian help?” he spit out the words.

  “A Russian? We’re Shifters! We’re family—”

  Nax’s hand curled around her throat—his huge hand, even though the hand she perceived was only marginally larger than her own. He looked up at her, even though, somehow, he looked down.

  He didn’t speak. He stared, then inhaled. His hand released.

  She couldn’t read his scents, nor could she read his face. Nax walked away just as much of an enigma as he’d been when they met.

  The now-black-with-the-night sign creaked. The tree rustled. The cloying, aromatic scent of creeping Charlie made her sneeze.

  Why wouldn’t he just tell her the truth?

  When she looked up, Nax had vanished once again.

  “The Fates will find you,” she called anyway. If Fates were why he hid Orel and himself. “Fates always find you.”

  Fates or fate itself, no one could hide forever.

  No one—

  Orel stood next to the oak’s trunk, directly behind the sign. He ducked and stepped under it.

  He held his hand against the bark as if the tree was his protector. As if the massive oak was a dragon standing between him and all the ills of the world.

  Like his father, Orel remained silent. But unlike his father, Orel’s scents and face clearly signaled every thought in his head.

  Am I safe? Why is this happening? My father loves me.

  I don’t understand.

  “Orel…” What had she done? “Don’t worry. Don’t—”

  “The people who came spoke Russian,” he said. He blinked and the dazed expression returned.

  And so did the whiff of electrical fires that she’d noticed when they were under the sign. But the breeze picked it up and it vanished as quickly as it hit her nose.

  Orel muttered in a language she didn’t understand, then looked up to the side as if listening to his friend.

  The dazed look cracked. His slight body shook. He staggered into the tree before extending his hand to his imaginary dragon.

  “Drako is real!” he screamed. “I hate you! I don’t want you here!”

  The kid ran after his father before Daisy could answer.

  The same fear that had iced her gut earlier—the same chill that overran her body when Nax said You talk a lot—turned the air frigid. The same sense that perhaps she’d gone too far into a situation. The same poking that screamed Run!

  Daisy did the one thing left to her: She listened.

  Twelve

  Daisy’s dreams often involved to-do lists and trips to the store. Sometimes, when her classwork pressed on her mind, she would dream of the unending aisles in a city-sized grocery store and how she only had one chance to find the canned tomatoes or the right kind of cheese and if she missed her chance, she would never again eat spaghetti or nachos.

  She’d had a lot of dreams like that just before the University of Minnesota accepted her into the Veterinary Medicine program. What if her one chance in life to become the trained animal healer she dreamed of being passed her by? What if she screwed up the one part of the application process that mattered the most?

  What if she couldn’t quite grasp what she needed to grasp to make the future she wanted?

  Because even at twenty-two, she had a past that shackled her in place—or at least to certain behaviors. Why else would she continue to date terrible men?

  Why else did she poke her nose in where it wasn’t wanted?

  She should have learned her lesson, but obviously a deep part of her mind refused to let
go of the familiar.

  Daisy opened her eyes.

  The ceiling of her room at the Rocky Arbor Park Lodge looked the same as it did the day before—dingy white but otherwise clean and fresh. The room continued to smell of lemons and vinegar, though whoever cleaned it while she was out yesterday had also used a strong disinfectant in the bathroom.

  She’d dreamed of the unending grocery store again. The one that meant she couldn’t get her priorities straight.

  Something was wrong up the hill at the Auto Repair shop. Something Shifter-based and Fate-complicated. Something too dangerous for her to handle on her own.

  No more nights in The Dells. No more worrying about Orel and his father. Jacob had promised her a ride this morning, and she’d get herself on this afternoon’s Empire Builder destined for Minneapolis and St. Paul.

  Daisy grabbed her new phone off the side table and swiped to unlock its screen. All her icons were in the correct places. Her background photo still showed her German shepherd, Dawnstar, who lived in Branson with her father.

  At least Nax hadn’t messed with her perception of her tools.

  She dropped the phone on the bed and rubbed her forehead. Nax was the other kind of douchebag she attracted—the manipulative creep. The dangerous asshole who saw her as a something to break. The man all sane people needed to stay away from.

  She was bad-man honeydew. Not one could resist.

  Men like that often saw their children the same way.

  Daisy picked up her phone. Should she get her father involved? Allow the equally powerful and probably more deadly Shifters of The Land of Milk and Honey take care of Nax? Her dad could handle the politics.

  Or she could track down the local Shifters on the way out of town and save her father the trouble. Ask them if they really did support Nax. But that, too, offered up a massive dose of possible complications. Who knew if the local clans would see her as a whole different type of prize, as Nax insinuated? Better to stay the tourist.

  Or what if her original intuition was correct? What if Fates were involved?

  Her phone buzzed and The Land of Milk And Honey icon she used to represent her father’s number appeared.

  The name of the individual you asked about is not familiar to those with whom I have spoken, the text said.

  Your timing is impeccable, she responded. But of course his timing was impeccable; he was Dmitri Pavlovich Romanov.

  You have a new issue?

  What should she say? I stuck my nose in too deep and now I’m confused? I think Fates are involved, she texted. And Russians. All tied up with a Shifter of indeterminate power.

  Then she texted the blurry image of Nax’s back. In case a photo helps jog memories, she added.

  After a long moment, he responded. I will ask again.

  Thank you.

  She stared at her phone for a long moment. Her father was taking his sweet time answering.

  Leave, popped up on her screen.

  That was it. No rationale. Just the one word.

  Fates were not to be trifled with. Not known Fates. Not mysterious ones. And especially not ones tied to Russian nationals.

  Yet something told her she needed to run back into that burning house, which was stupid. So, so stupid.

  Her father wanted to make sure that this one time, she didn’t get burned.

  Will do, she responded.

  Be careful.

  I will, Dad. Extra careful, not only for herself, but for everyone.

  Jacob put his sedan into park and pointed out the window. “The ticket booth is through that door there.”

  She had a couple of hours, but soon she’d be on her way home and away from Wisconsin Dells.

  Jacob patted her arm. “I got dumped once, when I was about your age,” he said.

  Daisy unbuckled her seatbelt. To him, her anxious finger tapping and her constant frowns were about Brad. Better that way. Normals often did not fare well when they got mixed up in the world of Shifters, and even though Wisconsin Dells crawled with enthrallers and morphers, Jacob and his family seemed oblivious.

  Most of Branson knew nothing of her father’s business. Safer for them that way.

  “In my day, we didn’t call them douchebags.” Jacob grinned. “She was beautiful. I’ll give her that. Was big into righteous living and made sure everyone knew about it.” He shrugged. “We got cornered one night after leaving a party.”

  He leaned closer. “Lived in Chicago at the time.”

  Daisy nodded.

  “Anyway, we got cornered. She basically used me as an offering to keep from getting her ass whooped.” He tapped the steering wheel. “Didn’t work. She proceeded to blame me for the entire scene when we got out of the hospital.”

  Sounded like something Brad would do, right down to the “righteous living.”

  “Sued me. Can you believe it? Judge laughed her out of the court.” He shook his head. “I have two pins in my left leg because of that fight. I left and came here shortly afterward.”

  “I’m sorry,” Daisy said. “Douchebags are ubiquitous.”

  Jacob laughed. “In time and space.” He patted her knee again but his face lost all joviality. “Look, if you end up staying, call, okay? If there’s a room open, we’d be happy to have you back.”

  “Thanks,” she said. Most likely, she’d be on the evening’s train.

  “If you stay in town, stay away from the Lexicon.” He nodded toward the tourist district. “They may not take well to one of their own they don’t know.”

  His family must not be as oblivious as she thought.

  His eyes widened and he lifted one eyebrow, and tapped the side of his nose. “Not many of us unblessed can recognize a bloodhound when we meet one.”

  Daisy chuckled, and shook her head. “I’ll be careful.”

  “When your card came back registered to The Land of Milk and Honey, I figured I’d better make sure you stayed out of harm’s way.”

  So Jacob knew more about Shifter politics than she’d originally suspected. “I can handle myself,” she said.

  “Damn straight, you can.” Jacob snorted. “Better than most, I’d say. Still, as a guest, it’s my job to make sure you’re well cared for.”

  Daisy reached across the seats and gave Jacob a quick hug. “Thank you.”

  She pulled her backpack from the rear seat and stepped out of the car. Jacob waved once more before pulling away and heading back toward his lodge.

  This close to the waterslides, the air smelled more of chlorine than car exhaust. More people moved around as well, though not a lot walked. Like so many other Midwestern towns, Wisconsin Dells was not set up for foot traffic unless you were inside a park or a mall.

  Daisy shouldered her pack. The warm brick of the historic Amtrak station and the exposed beams of the roof gave the little building a charm only reflected in the older, more natural parts of the town. The station also gave off a sense of loneliness that its otherwise sweet and clean exterior did not. Being isolated in the gray sea of a parking lot would do that to anyone or anything.

  The teenager behind the ticket counter grinned and nodded as her job demanded, and proceeded to dispatch her check-in duties with the bored intensity needed for correctly typing in a name and printing off a piece of paper.

  Daisy would be on tonight’s Empire Builder back to St. Paul. No more weird enthrallers. No more Brad and his bullshit. Then she would make sure her father looked into Orel’s situation in a timely and politically well-tuned manner that didn’t start a Midwestern Shifter war.

  And Daisy Reynolds Pavlovich would step back onto the veterinarian-in-training road into her bright and shining future.

  The eastbound train chugged and clicked outside as it waited, its big blue cars imposing but still somehow friendly. A few people filed into the station from the track-side doors, most with suitcases and other tourist gear.

  Daisy hoisted her backpack onto her shoulders and walked out to the benches on the track side of the little
station to take a look around.

  A family hustled their way off the train, mom in front, dad carrying a sleepy three- or four-year-old, and a distraught, angry-smelling teenaged son bringing up the rear.

  Dad was a Shifter. Daisy sensed him clear as Nax’s doorbell, and he sensed her, as well. He tipped his head and waved, then walked by with his wife and kids, but stopped no more than a few strides beyond Daisy.

  Both the dad and his son were large, the way Shifter men tended to be. The kid had pulled his hoodie’s hood over his face, and sauntered as if he wanted the world to know it owed him big-time.

  Dad looked over his shoulder. His son stopped next to Daisy, and looked up from his phone.

  The seer of a Fate washed over the Shifters as a well-dressed, corporate-looking man stepped off the train.

  Dad’s face tightened and Daisy knew exactly what he was thinking: How did I not know?

  The Fate must have been traveling in a different car. If he’d gotten on at a different stop, and didn’t use his seer, the Shifters wouldn’t have known.

  Most seers had a musical quality to them—chimes or sometimes drums. A Shifter understood and felt the seer more than experienced any hearing of it, sort of like remembering music. From how Daisy’s father described his many interactions with triads, most Fates’ seers reminded him of an orchestra’s woodwinds, though some, like the corporate Fate, had more weather-oriented seers. She’d always suspected that whatever allowed a Shifter to know a nearby seer was in use somehow connected to—or adjoined—the parts of the brain that remembered sound.

  So a seer felt like music or thunder or sand blowing in the wind even though it was literally none of that.

  When she told her father her theory, he’d only nodded and said that he would be happy to pay for medical school as well, if she wanted a second doctoring degree.

  He had high expectations, her father, and every time she exceeded them, it made him happy. Not every child was so lucky.

  The man’s seer flowed over her again like sand moving through dunes. Soothing, soft tinkling, all clear and pitch-perfect, filled her mind. This man was not malicious, or at least was able to hide any malicious intent. If anything, the seer indicated an even-keel take on the world.