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

by CK Dawn

  Sveta’s triad wouldn’t tell Ben their story, and he didn’t pry. Prying would destroy the fragile trust the Shifters were building with three traumatized Fates and their little boy who needed a safe place to live.

  Nax’s property was now theirs. Orel would not have to change schools, or move again, or hide. The Shifters of the Wisconsin Dells, and the Shifters of The Land of Milk and Honey, made it publicly and abundantly clear that they were aware of the Fates in their midst, and that those Fates were now under their protection.

  It was the least they could do, after allowing one of their own to keep a kidnapped little boy under their noses.

  The Dells doctor set up an appointment for Orel to see a specialist at a clinic run by elite Shifters in Chicago. She’d called it a “Special Medical Unit” and said that Orel would be in the best hands.

  And from the smile on Orel’s face as he stood next to Ladon’s big, black, delivery-truck-style van, the doctor had been correct.

  “You ready?” Daisy asked.

  Orel looked up at the clear blue sky and smiled again. Then he took her hand. “I am!” he said, and bounced up and down like the happy, healthy little boy he was.

  Ladon patted his shoulder. “Dragon wants you to know that he’s happy to have met you.”

  Orel bounced again. He ran around the back of Ladon’s van. Daisy had always thought that, from a distance, the van looked more like a water utility truck than any delivery service, with the stenciled, faded licensing number over the rear fender. Ladon worked the occasional surveying jobs for land management and housing up in Jackson Hole, and the van was his work vehicle.

  But mostly the van was the smallest enclosed vehicle capable of transporting a dragon. Orel jumped up onto the back bumper and ducked his head through the rear door. “Drako was like you!” He tapped his chest. “He helped me, too.” He hugged the near-invisible beast’s neck.

  Ladon’s face softened and he pushed up his sunglasses, but he didn’t say anything.

  Ladon and Dragon were older than Daisy—a lot older—which meant they had centuries’ worth of bad interactions with the worst Fates on Earth. An interaction like this, with a young Fate he’d helped, was probably good for Ladon’s soul.

  A train whistle echoed through the parking lot. Orel clapped his hands and hugged Dragon again, then hopped back onto the blacktop.

  “Thank you!” he said, and quickly hugged Ladon’s waist.

  And once again, Ladon’s face softened. He patted Orel’s back before squatting to look him in the eye. “You grow up strong, okay?”

  Orel’s eyes narrowed, and for a split second, Daisy could have sworn she felt the same pre-seizure energy push she’d felt before. But it vanished, and ozone didn’t permeate Orel’s scent. Maybe she’d imagined it. Maybe the doctor had gotten it under control. She didn’t know and likely never would.

  “Not all Fates are bad,” Orel said.

  Ladon frowned.

  Orel smiled though, and hugged Ladon one more time, then took Daisy’s hand. “Are you sure you don’t want to meet Mama, Maty, and Papa?” he asked Ladon.

  Ladon shook his head. “I need to stay with Dragon.”

  “Oh,” Orel said. But the kid seemed to know the truth—Ladon and Fates didn’t mix. Orel’s new big friend in the black t-shirt didn’t want to frighten his family.

  Or perhaps Ladon just didn’t want to find himself in a place where he’d have to admit that Orel spoke the truth. Not all Fates were bad.

  Enough were, though, that someone needed to keep their guard up. And long ago, Ladon and Dragon had taken on that responsibility.

  Someone had to look out for the Daisys and the Orels of the world, and she was thankful they took their jobs seriously. “Thank you for detouring.” She leaned toward Orel. “From both of us, right?”

  Ladon chuckled. “We only detoured because a wise person called for back-up.”

  Orel nodded. “I waited for Daisy and she came then she called her father and he listened and called you and I met a real dragon!” He jumped up and down again, then tapped his chest. “I saw the truth.”

  Ladon’s eyebrow arched. “Orel,” he said. “Dragon wants you to be careful and quiet about seeing the truth, okay? You can’t trust everyone.”

  “Oh,” Orel said again. He squared his shoulders and extended his hand. “I promise never to talk about my real dragon friend with people I do not know.”

  Ladon shook his hand. “Thank you.”

  Orel tugged on Daisy’s hand. “Someday, I will be Dracae.”

  Ladon grinned. Orel smiled.

  The train whistled again. Orel tugged on Daisy’s hand. “Come on!” he said.

  Ladon waved and Orel pulled Daisy into the small station to meet his mother.

  Daisy sensed Ben the moment Orel pulled her through the door onto the train platform. The Shifter Amtrak employee was around, as well. The three Fates, though, were still a mystery.

  She leaned toward Orel. “Who do you sense?” she asked, just to see if the kid already had a sense of other paranormals.

  He inhaled and closed his eyes. “You aren’t the only Shifter here,” he said. “Mama is on that car!” He pointed at the train.

  He shouldn’t be able to sense that well at eight. He shouldn’t be able to sense at all until he was active. The kid was going to be an immensely powerful Fate.

  Ben stepped off the train first. Like so many Shifter men, he was a big bear of a human being, right down to his warm brown eyes and his handsome beard.

  A thick cloud of ‘ignore the Fates’ preceded him—enough that Daisy would have a difficult time seeing through it to perceive Orel’s family.

  She squeezed his shoulder. “See the Shifter who just got off the train? His name is Ben.” She waved.

  Ben waved back.

  “Ben is making special calling scents right now to hide your family, so don’t be surprised if—”

  “Mama!” Orel yelled and leaped at the open air.

  Ben’s ‘ignore the Fates’ cleared. Less than three feet from Orel and Daisy stood two women and one man. All three were thinner than she thought was healthy. The two women wore their dark blonde hair in tight buns. The man’s brown hair looked as if he’d shaved his head a few weeks ago and was now allowing it to grow in.

  The face of the woman who threw open her arms was as thin as her frame. The other woman watched the boy from a round yet gaunt face. The man frowned and stared at the other people on the platform more than he watched his triad mate’s reunion with her son.

  They obviously were not people who felt comfortable out in the open.

  “Orel!” said the woman who must be Sveta Doroshenko. She embraced his shoulders and all but picked him up. “Oh, Orel.” She kissed his forehead, hair, and ears while speaking rapid Ukrainian.

  “Mama,” Orel pushed her off, but not really, and continued to hug her tightly.

  A musical seer spread outward from the second woman, one that felt more like water dripping on crystal glass than any instrument. She extended her hand. “Marta Doroshenko,” she said. “My husband, Pavlo.”

  The man nodded, but did not move closer, nor did his intense expression change. Ben touched Pavlo’s arm and spoke in Ukrainian. Pavlo nodded.

  Sveta enveloped Orel in her skirt as she stood. He looked out from the cotton drapes of his mother’s long dress and blinked at Daisy.

  “Dyakuyu,” Sveta said.

  “Thank you,” Marta said.

  Pavlo nodded but continued to frown.

  “You’re welcome,” Daisy said.

  The next few days would be a whirlwind for the Doroshenkos—a new nation, new town, new home, new language. Making medical appointments and procuring identification. Setting up a home and introductions around town.

  But Ben was here, and all the Shifters wanted to help.

  The family was safe. Orel was safe—and from how he hugged his Mama, Maty, and Papa, he was happy once again.

  Daisy stuffed a crumple
d-up newspaper into a recycling bag. “How do you live like this?” She gingerly picked up a stinky old pizza box and added it to the second trash bag she held. “Your van smells worse than a Burner!”

  Maybe riding back to St. Paul with Mr. Never-cleans-his-van and his poor dragon wasn’t such a good idea.

  Dragon snorted and added a smashed water jug, an empty vodka bottle, and a plastic clamshell that had once contained a lump of highly-refined carbohydrates to the recycling bag. The van’s disaster was more recyclables than landfill, which was probably good, except for the evidence of Ladon’s poor beverage and dietary choices.

  She pointed at the clamshell. “I smell sprinkles. Ladon ate a huge donut covered with frosting and rainbow sprinkles, didn’t he?”

  Dragon bobbed his big head while raising his shoulders—the dragon equivalent of a shrug.

  “How does that crap not affect him?” She stuffed another newspaper into the bag. “And where did you find an actual, printed newspaper?”

  Human will not read on his phone, Dragon signed.

  Ladon did not like his phone. Neither did AnnaBelinda. Everyone at The Land respected their choices and accommodated, but no one understood why.

  Daisy did. Once, during one of their hand-to-hand training sessions right after she’d come to live with her father, Ladon let slip that cell phones gave him a headache.

  It had been a moment of unexpected openness, and for Daisy, it had helped her feel accepted by not only her father and his life, but by the most magical of the paranormal world, the dragons.

  She never told Ladon how much that moment meant to her. She suspected that Dragon read the truth at the time, which meant that Ladon was fully aware. She knew that for them, she was family, and they had her back.

  Always. Now, here in The Dells, and in the future, no matter what happened. Ladon and Dragon were her big brothers.

  So giving him shit about his food choices was both a kid sister thing and a bit of brat behavior all wrapped up in one.

  Daisy hopped out the back door of the van and walked around the corner just as Ladon swiped his credit card through the pump reader.

  She held out the recycling bag. “Eclairs, Ladon? Really?” She mock tsked just to reinforce her ribbing.

  Ladon grinned. “Every century or so I test the limits of my body’s endurance.” He flexed his bicep.

  Daisy smacked his shoulder. She would have called him “silly” but making Ladon aware of his silliness often destroyed the moment. And these moments were few and far between enough as it was.

  She looked into the bag. Should she ask about the vodka? Like her father, Ladon could drink alcohol as if it were water and suffer no ill effects. But the fact that she’d found an empty bottle rolling around in the back of his van—rolling around in front of Dragon—worried her.

  “I’m fine, Daisy.” He lifted the pump handle. “Dragon’s fine.”

  His scent did not alter. No indignation, no fear that he’d been found out. No weariness. Just no change.

  The vodka, the donuts, the garbage, the disconnectedness from modern life because it gave him a headache, that was life for Ladon and Dragon. They were resigned to it.

  Over on the road, a classic muscle car rumbled by. Ladon’s posture stiffened and his scent took on a lemony annoyance.

  “Don’t like Impalas?” Daisy asked. Maybe some more good-natured teasing would bring back the smile.

  Ladon pointed at the car. “I have an ex with a preference for cars like that one.”

  “You have an ex-girlfriend?” Not once in the almost-five years she’d known him had he spoken of any romantic connections. Not that Ladon wasn’t popular at The Land. All he had to do was touch an arm and whisper in an ear, and he had a date for the night. But no one ever fell into the “girlfriend” category.

  Ladon snorted. “Mistakes were made.” He clicked off the pump. “Lessons were learned.”

  Daisy laughed. “You have never struck me as a settling-down kind of guy.”

  This time, his scent changed. It took on a low undernote of fragrant hardwood—Ladon’s body’s way of signaling the topic was off limits, even for her.

  So much for the good-natured attempts to make Ladon smile. “I’m sorry,” she said. She’d managed to take the teasing a little too far.

  Ladon shrugged. “For what?” He pushed up his sunglasses, but wasn’t able to cover his genuine surprise.

  “Never mind.” She tied off the bags. “I’d like to get home before the UCard office closes.”

  Ladon twisted on the van’s gas cap. “UCard?” He snapped the van’s gas tank cover closed. “Sounds… electronic.”

  Daisy dumped the garbage into the station’s receptacle. “Come on. I’ll give you a tour of campus.”

  Twenty

  The freshman behind the UCard office counter held out his hand. “That’ll be ten dollars,” he said. He smiled at Daisy all dumbstruck as if she was a rock star, or a movie star, or maybe some random goddess upon whose lap he wished to eternally lay his head.

  “Okay,” she said, and fished out her credit card. They’d gotten back into town just in time for her to dash into the Student Union and pick up her new ID.

  Ladon and Dragon waited outside in one of the loading zones, pretending to be an actual delivery van. Dragon had crawled up to the roof, and was right now fully mimicking the buildings and sky so the milling students didn't notice him. When she’d jogged into the office, Ladon had taken up leaning against the bumper and glowering at the clumps of Freshman Orientation kids walking around the St. Paul campus.

  Incoming freshmen were frightened and overwhelmed enough as it was. No one needed a big, bored-looking guy dressed head-to-toe in black watching them as if they were all about to burst into flames.

  Which wasn’t what Ladon was doing. He watched the environment. Checked for Fates, Shifters, and the more dangerous, erratic Burners. Ladon and Dragon were really protecting the entire campus from things the kids did not understand.

  And the faster she got her new ID, the faster she’d get him back to her house for a nice, decent meal and a bit of relaxation before he and the beast went on their way.

  The kid behind the counter was cute, with big blue eyes and a sweet smile. But immaturity wafted off him like it did most of the underclassmen on campus. It hung in the air between them like a cloud of the stoked-up hooting and yelling that young males do before they jump off roofs.

  The ten bucks paid for her grad student badge, its clear plastic holder, and a lanyard decorated with the U of M logo and lots of puppies and kitties. The badge marked her official transition from an undergrad to the University of Minnesota’s Veterinary Medicine program.

  She swiped her credit card through the reader. The kid tucked her new badge into its holder. “Good picture,” he said. His voice held only courtesy and professionalism. His scent, though, crested into earthy musk of masculine desire.

  Want that rolled off him in bright, distracting waves.

  But she was done with men for a while. Time to get her head on straight, and honestly, her vet studies were about to keep her extremely busy, anyway.

  “Thank you.” Daisy clipped the lanyard to the badge holder. Daisy Reynolds Pavlovich — Student blazed in a large, broad font under her never-meant-to-be-glamorous photo. But Daisy had inherited her father’s tall, lean, athletic frame and her mother’s big black curls and amber eyes. Bad photos of her mostly didn’t happen.

  She threw the freshman an equally courteous and professional smile. “Enjoy your evening,” she said, and dashed for the door.

  Ladon and Dragon were exactly where she’d left them in the loading dock near the Student Union’s main entrance, Ladon leaning against his van and Dragon invisibly watching the students and the incoming proto-students pass by.

  Ladon held out a small strip of paper. “In case you want an ASL refresher.”

  Daisy took the little rectangle. “American Sign Language tutoring,” it said, with a non-University
email address, “g.bower” at one of the local internet providers.

  Daisy tucked the paper into her pocket. Yeah, no more random men for a while, even ones who could help her dust off her ASL. “Dragon!” she said, and patted the van as close to the roof as she could. “I’m not that rusty, am I?”

  Ladon did his staring-at-distant-objects, talking-to-Dragon look, then chuckled. “He says that if you practice while you continue your animal doctoring studies, you will not become rusty.”

  Leave it to a dragon to be practical.

  Ladon pointed around the van’s back corner. “The young man offering lessons was putting up his fliers over there.”

  Daisy stepped to the side and glanced around the back end of the van.

  About thirty feet away, a group of incoming proto-students stood in front of one of the University’s many kiosks. The senior in charge of the group—a clean-cut guy in a “Disability Services” t-shirt—pointed at the Student Union and rattled off some introduction to the St. Paul campus.

  A young woman with auburn hair turned her back to Daisy and yanked off the kiosk a rectangle of paper identical to the one in Daisy’s pocket.

  And for some reason Daisy could not quite put her finger on, the kid in the train station danced into her memory. The boy with too much anger to activate, and the one lone Fate who did good by the world with a simple, uttered, future-seeing.

  Perhaps the memory surfaced because of a scent in the air which her nose understood but her consciousness could not label. Or perhaps an eighth or ninth sense triggered.

  Orel’s words surfaced: We’re not all bad.

  She couldn’t see the young woman’s face, but she saw the foot tapping and the distracted attention.

  And more memories surfaced.

  That night, during hand-to-hand training, when Ladon had opened up about cell phones and headaches, she hadn’t done the same. She’d kept quiet.

  There was a reason. One she’d done her best to bury, because if she didn’t and a malicious past-seeing Fate read the truth, it could mean the death of a good man and his family.