by Bonds (epub)
Which, Daisy was beginning to think, he might just be. Because no matter what that Fate told either of them, he wasn’t going to run away without saying good-bye to his eleven-year-old.
“If I vanish, Rysa won’t take it well.” He took another bite of his burger.
His kid’s name was Rysa, which was pretty, Daisy had to give him that. He said it meant “laughter” but she already knew what it meant because she took Spanish as her second language. Daisy picked at her burrito. “No, your daughter won’t take it well. But she’ll take it even worse if you get yourself killed. Or a… triad… finds her and her mom.” She still didn’t quite understand the politics of what was happening. But she did understand the danger involved.
And the doctor seemed to trust the Fate who called at what now seemed to be random-but-not-random intervals. Though every other sentence out of his mouth was “Never trust a Fate.” Then he’d make a little twitch with his cheek and lip. The man had a Fate tell.
He did the same little twitch when he talked about his wife. So Daisy wondered, though she thought it best not to come right out and ask. The Fate on the phone told her explicitly “not to ask questions beyond what you need to know in the present moment.” Said something about “the less you know, the better hidden from a future-seer you will be,” which echoed what Dr. Torres said.
Like that made sense.
She’d picked up what, she figured, was the basics about the Fates, besides the whole past-present-future bonded triad thing: They called themselves Parcae because, as the doctor said, they tend to be assholes who think they’re in charge. He said “Parcae” sounded more like what assholes would call themselves than “Fates,” so they went old-school with the Latin. Daisy shrugged.
The Shifters had a Latin name too and she remembered the Fate telling her what it was. She laughed when the doctor said it again because it sounded like some superhero gang. Dr. Torres smiled at that. Though he wasn’t smiling now.
He tapped the table and fidgeted. Every time someone entered or exited the diner, he got distracted.
Poor guy was totally stressed out.
“My daughter is having a… difficult time with school right now.” He pushed at his fries. “With life.” His face crunched up like someone just punched him, but then it cleared and he looked over her shoulder at the door to the diner’s kitchen.
He seemed paralyzed. Like he didn’t know what to do. But he was a doctor, so he should know.
“What would you do if she got hurt?” Maybe talking to him in a doctor-patient way would help. “With lots of different wounds to different parts of her body.”
His eyes grew wide for a moment and his shoulders tensed.
Maybe “wounds” wasn’t the best way to describe what Daisy meant. “I didn’t mean to make you more stressed.” What was she saying?
But he shook it off. “I’d heal the worst right away.” He didn’t sigh, though Daisy suspected he wanted to. “Then triage the rest. But there are some problems even class-ones can’t fix.”
He’d explained the Shifter rating system to her, too, and at least it made sense: Class-ones were rare and super powerful, class-twos less so. Class-threes not much at all.
Dr. Torres didn’t say, but Daisy got the impression he might be one of the rarities. Again, she thought it best to keep her mouth shut, like the Fate said.
But he gave off an aura. She couldn’t really put her finger on what it felt like. It sort of tingled, but it didn’t. Sort of like that split-second between when something caught the attention of the instinctive part of her brain and when her thinking brain put a label on it. That fraction of time when she knew something was there and when she actually understood what it was. His aura felt like that. She just didn’t know what it was.
When she finally activated, she wondered if she’d give it off, too.
“Then focus on the greatest threats,” she said. “The ones she needs the most protection from. And trust her mom to help her through the chronic stuff.” Daisy poked her fork into the last of her burrito. “I think that’s probably what my mom did. She hauled my butt out of Perth and into the States because we probably needed to get away from people who could seriously hurt us. I suspect the… artifact… she stole was an insurance policy.” At least that was the story Daisy would continue to tell herself. She didn’t want to think about what the alternative meant.
Her mom worked hard. They didn’t have money, so her mom hadn’t sold whatever it was. And she’d always thought they hid because they were, technically, here illegally.
But being illegal won’t get you killed.
Daisy stuffed the last bite of her burrito into her mouth. “What do you think the artifact is?” The Fate refused to tell either her or the doctor what it was. Said it best not to talk about it.
The doctor looked up at the ceiling. His fingers tapped on the table again. “It’s a talisman. It’s always about their talismans, with the Fates. But who it belongs to is anyone’s guess.”
Talismans. “Great. More not-god mumbo jumbo.”
The doctor chuckled. “They’re metal objects that focus a triad’s seers. Sort of give them a context through which to view the world.” He chuckled again. “They’re arrogant enough to think their talismans are more important than anything else.” He rolled his eyes. “More important than antibiotics. More important than enough food to feed the planet. Or clean water. Or technology and science in general.”
The more he talked about the Fates, the less Daisy liked them.
Though she was beginning to hear the voice of her social studies teacher in the back of her mind. He paced back there, reciting his lessons about human psychology, cultural stereotyping, and prejudice. So Daisy made a conscious effort to continue gathering data on their mysterious angel-Fate who seemed to be determined to “protect the correct path,” whatever that meant.
Dr. Torres stuffed the last of his meal into his mouth and pushed away his plate. “It’s not just Fates. There are groups of Shifters who have acquired a great deal of power. They are, for the most part, as bad for the world as the Fates. Your mom likely stole from one such syndicate.”
Daisy hadn’t thought of that. “Like the Yakuza or the Mob?”
He sniffed and sat back, nodding. “I used to work for one. I don’t anymore.”
“Oh.” So the man sitting across from her was an ex-Mob doctor.
He glanced over his shoulder at the door, like he expected someone neither of them wanted to see to burst in at any second. “Just be careful about who you do business with.”
Maybe her mom knew a whole hell of a lot more than she let on. “I don’t think my mom would keep that kind of secret from me. She wants me safe.” But then again, she’d never told Daisy her father’s name.
But maybe not telling was to protect Daisy.
“I want Rysa safe. I want her to know, so she doesn’t end up pursued, like you.” He dug out his wallet and pulled enough cash for the meal, tip included. “Guess I stop using the credit cards, huh?” He looked sad.
Sad like he’d just acknowledged that he was, in fact, about to run. And vanish.
Just like that. No more fretting. No more flipping back and forth between options. Just “Yep, time to do what the Fate said,” like he had attention deficit disorder or something, like half the boys in Daisy’s school. A lot of them did shit like that. Flopping around and then bam! Off doing the least expected version of what they might do. Because, in the precise moment they made up their mind, it had been the option that swirled up to the surface. How the hell did he get through medical school?
“So you’re not going home?” It might let them gather more information, at least.
He dropped the money on the table. “Like you said, I need to trust that Rysa’s mother will do the right thing.” Frowning, he stared at the remnants of her burrito. “And that your mother will, as w
ell.”
So they were going to her home. To talk to her mom. And to figure out why she kept secrets.
And maybe activate Daisy.
She was going to be a superhero. A real life, powered-up, super-being. Someone who might be able to enthrall strangers and make them do whatever she wanted them to do. Or, the doctor had told her, she might become a real changeling and be able to shapeshift, though it sounded like it took practice and wasn’t a “form of a lion!” kind of thing.
Or maybe she’d be able to do what he did, and lay her hands on someone else’s pain and make it go away.
She’d like that one the best.
The doctor scooted out of the booth and offered his hand, to help her out. “At the very least, we need to find out if your mother is able to activate you. You’ll be safer once we know what your abilities are.”
He wasn’t telling her everything. She could tell. And she was beginning to think that a level-up to superhero might not be enough to get her through a trial-by-Burner.
The little bell over the diner’s door jingled when they walked out into the early evening heat. Daisy hadn’t called her mom yet. She’d be home soon, walking into their closed-up apartment, wondering where her daughter was.
“We should go,” Daisy said. Her mom must be worried by now.
The doctor looked her up and down. Nodding once, he motioned her toward his car.
8
Daisy pulled her apartment key out of her pocket. She should change clothes, too. The car that hit her tore a hole in her jeans and even though it looked “cool” she didn’t like it. And if she was about to become a superhero, she should probably change into something more… she didn’t know. Distracting? Garish? Stretchy?
But Dr. Torres looked like everyone else, except for the whole man-mountain thing. Which was actually kind of cool. It meant the pool of Shifter boys she’d soon have access to would be brimming with the tall and the handsome, something she could wholeheartedly appreciate.
Not that being tall bothered her. But it did make her stand out in a crowd.
The doctor followed her along the cracked walk to the entrance at the back side of their building. He did that weird, nose-crinkling, sniffing thing again, the same thing he did when the Burner showed at the clinic, like he was testing the air for the presence of assholes.
“You need to teach me how to do that.” Walking backward toward the door, Daisy pointed at his nose. “So no one sneaks up on me again.”
He grinned. “The smells are called ‘calling scents’ or ‘pheromones,’ though technically, they aren’t pheromones. Some people like to call them that.”
Daisy turned and skipped backwards around the picnic table that one of her idiot neighbors had flipped a week ago and was still on its side. “Do all Shifters have calling scents? Will I be able to smell my own kind?”
“No. Shifter abilities vary much more than the Fates or the Burners. We’re mercurial.” He dodged the picnic table, too. “This place is a rat hole.”
“You think?” Daisy yanked on the door. It was supposed to be locked but half the time it wasn’t. It swung open. “What’s ‘mercurial’ mean?”
The doctor stopped at the bottom of the steps and stared at her all father-like. “What do you think it means?”
Daisy smiled. “I think it means I’d better start studying now for my SATs.”
Dr. Torres laughed. “It means quick and changeable, like mercury.”
“Ah…” She held the door for him and he stuck his head in, sniffing again. “We good?” she asked.
He stepped into the cramped foyer at the bottom of the complex’s back stairway. Bare concrete steps led up to the second and third floors, where her apartment was. One of those emergency lighting-smoke detector things hung off the wall where the steps turned the corner and Daisy doubted it worked anymore.
The place really was a dump. But it was what her mom could afford.
Dr. Torres looked down at her face, his arms crossed. “You sniff.”
Daisy blinked. So few men were tall enough they had to lower their chins to look at her. And he was so broad shouldered he swung his body sideways when he came through the door. “Are all Shifter guys big, like you?” She could wish.
The doctor’s face got all fatherly-tight. “Time to think about something other than boys.”
“I don’t always think about boys.” Daisy couldn’t stop the pout her lip wanted to make no matter how she tried. “Why can’t I think about boys? I just asked a question. It’s not like we’re being attacked right now. Why can’t I ask?”
His head pivoted toward the stairs so fast Daisy gasped. When his arm came up, she didn’t fight. She moved behind him.
“Sniff, Daisy. Do you sense that?” Dr. Torres flattened them both against the wall next to the stairwell.
She breathed deep, hoping to catch something. And there, on the edge of her perception, a faint whiff telling her to do exactly what everyone told her to do drifted down the stairs, as mercurial as he’d told her all the Shifters were. “I smell ‘do what I say.’”
He nodded. “It’s ‘comply.’ And in a large enough dose it’s filtering down the stairs before it dissipates.”
“Which means a strong Shifter, right? Someone you called an… enthraller?” And she wasn’t active. So she could still fall victim.
Chatter floated down the stairs. Chatter that wasn’t in English. Or Spanish.
A whiff of ‘surprise’ rose off Dr. Torres. At least that’s what Daisy would have named it. It held that sense of Oh my God! that she always associated with surprise.
Japanese? he mouthed.
She nodded. Yes, Japanese. She didn’t speak much of it, but she recognized it from when she was little. “A couple of the shipping companies with guard dogs my mom used to treat were run by Japanese families,” she whispered.
One company in particular had been full of men who smelled a way that had, at the time, seemed weird to her primary school brain. Even now, she had a hard time remembering what they looked like. Were they big, like the doctor? Small? Did they all have dark hair or were some of them lighter toned? Were they all men? She only remembered that they were “at the docks with the dogs” and that she shouldn’t think too much about it.
But she always got a sense that maybe scary monsters were about when her mom took her down to the piers.
Japanese monsters, like maybe her mom’s past just caught up with them. “Oh, no.”
Daisy burst up the stairs, not thinking. Something wiggled in the back of her mind, some memory from when she was a little kid, and she knew smelling calling scents and hearing Japanese wasn’t good.
She took the stairs two at a time, running as fast as she could go toward the door at the top. The one that led into the hallway leading toward her apartment’s door. The one where the Japanese voices drifted from.
Daisy spun around the rickety metal railing to the last flight of stairs and a wave of something new hit her. Something that smelled just like ‘stop.’
But she didn’t. She fought through it.
And Daisy walked right up to the short man she remembered, but didn’t. The handsome Japanese-looking guy with the clean, conservative haircut in the clean, conservative suit that looked expensive but probably wasn’t. The guy flanked by two other men as equally huge as he was small. The guy who, when she and her mother ran, looked exactly like he looked right now. He lifted an eyebrow and smirked when she crested the top step. When his hand flew out, she knew she’d better shake it.
“Daisy! Darling,” he said in perfect American English. “My, how you have grown.”
“Mr. Kobayashi.” She remembered this man, but her brain fought to not remember.
Or something in the air told her brain to not remember.
Not this time. This time, she’d overcome.
He gri
nned all sly, his eyes more condescending than anything else. “Just the young woman we were looking for.”
9
So, not all Shifter men were huge. Some, like the snake standing in the door to the hallway in front of Daisy, were little pieces of shit.
“Who’s this with you?” Kobayashi pointed over her shoulder and a blast of ‘truth’ filled the tiny, wobbly, landing to the third floor of her apartment complex.
“He’s a doctor.” She’d keep it in check.
Behind her, Dr. Torres stopped on the top step. There really wasn’t room for him, Kobayashi, and Kobayashi’s bruisers, who were the two most forgettable men she’d ever seen. They both had generic faces under generic hair. Generic to the point she’d have a hard time describing to a cop even what ethnicity they appeared to be. White? Hispanic? Asian? She couldn’t tell. They seemed to be shifting right before her eyes.
Morphers. That’s what Dr. Torres called Shifters who were changelings. These two must be morphers.
Kobayashi stared around her shoulder at the doctor, his eyes wide. “Well, well. Looks like our little darling’s found herself a protector. I can smell it on you.”
The two morphers laughed.
Kobayashi dismissed them with a flick of his wrist. “Go check on Tony.”
The two morphers glanced at each other, both shrugging at the same time, like they were mirror images of each other. The one on the left ducked into the hallway while the one on the right returned to his hands-behind-his-back bodyguard pose.
Kobayashi sniffed in much the same way as Dr. Torres had before. “You’re strong enough to resist my calling scents.” He wisped his hand at Dr. Torres this time. “And a doctor. A healer, I presume?”
Another blast of ‘truth’ filled the landing.
