by K. M. Shea
“I think so,” I said, shifting in my chair.
“Okay here we go First question: I just moved to a new city and there’s a school next door All the kids, every last student, wear the same clothes Are they all related Is this one of those mafia families I need to be careful around You know the answer?” Toby asked, swiveling to face me.
“Perhaps,” I said after thinking for a moment. It took a second to distinguish when the question ended and when Toby’s remarks started.
“You sure, I can check real quick 1 2 3 I check that fast,” Toby said, his words zooming out of his mouth while the Google search engine page abruptly popped up on his computer screen.
“You use Google to answer questions?”
“If Wikipedia doesn’t have the answer,” Toby said.
“Wow. Well, the answer to the patron’s question is school uniforms. The kids most likely go to a private school that requires school uniforms. Males and females have an assigned uniform. It’s like a dress code for work, only it’s for students,” I answered.
“Dress code got it that was fast!” Toby said, sounding impressed.
“Thanks,” I said, glancing at my feet. That was when I noticed the baby dragon was sitting underneath Corona’s chair, curled up like a cat, staring at me.
I smiled and waved at it.
Toby moved onto the next email. “Next question Dear MBRC my next door neighbors have started attacking pumpkins with knives and etched demented faces in the vegetables’ surfaces what is going on sounds like they’re cannibals we can say they’re cannibals,” Toby said, his long fingers already typing out a reply.
“They aren’t cannibals,” I said. “That would require the humans to be pumpkins and then eat the pumpkins. They’re decorating for Halloween, which is October 31. They’re carving Jack-o-lanterns,” I said, fluttering my fingers, trying to coax the dragon towards me.
“Wikipedia say Jack O’ Lantern is a carved pumpkin with insides scooped out you humans are scary freaky,” Toby said, typing out the reply.
“It’s a holiday,” I said, smiling as the baby dragon stood and stretched before ambling in my direction.
“Holly day is Christmas not no Hallolatern,” Toby paused.
“Holiday is what we call days we celebrate. Christmas is a holiday, so is Halloween. For Halloween, we make Jack O’ Lanterns,” I corrected, sad when the little dragon paused a foot away from me before scurrying back to Corona.
“Right next question.”
The sheer volume of questions astounded me. Toby was thrilled that we averaged one question per 25 seconds. His previous average was 35 seconds. Of course, I think the answers he was sending out with me around were probably more complete and truthful than his Wikipedia and Google answers.
“Look, Toby, I promise you, poodles don’t get the fancy hair cuts because humans sell their fur. It’s just for show. Originally, they were hunting dogs so they were cut funny to warm their joints. Google it!” I said, leaning back in my chair.
“Then what do humans do with the fur hmmm I think it goes to black market 1 2 3 and it gone made into coat just like 101 Dalmatians.”
“That was a movie,” I groaned. I was pleasantly surprised when there was a sudden weight on my lap.
The blue baby dragon had hopped up on my lap and was holding its chin out, clearly wanting something. I hesitantly offered my hand, which he started rubbing his head on.
His scales were stiff, but slightly flexible. The scales were all approximately the size of my finger nails, and they curled up, placed over each other in a protective coat.
Doggy’s chest rumbled in an adorable purr.
“Google say you right I think it lie but we answer and we done,” Toby huffed, pausing to take a drink of his fourth cup of coffee.
“Uh-huh. Whatever you say, Toby,” I said, tickling the blue, baby dragon under its cheeks.
“Toby, it’s your time to go on break,” Corona announced.
“You got it,” Toby said, zipping out of his chair and hopping over the desk in seconds.
“I see you’ve made a new friend,” Corona smiled as the baby dragon flipped on his back so I could rub his tummy. The scales there were softer and yielded under my touch. Doggy cooed in satisfaction as I rubbed him.
“Yes, he’s adorable,” I smiled.
“Isn’t he? His mom works here as an instructor for dragons. I was friends with her long before the MBRC started up, so I offered to watch him for her while she works. He’s no trouble anyway,” Corona said, opening a drawer of the desk. She dug out what looked like a circular dog biscuit and held it out.
Doggy bolted upright on my lap and balanced on his hind legs, eagerly holding out his paws. Corona gave him the biscuit, and the baby dragon clutched the cookie between his paws before rolling back on his spine.
He nibbled at it and, noticing my gaze, held the cookie up.
“No, thank you. It’s your cookie,” I said.
Doggy opened and closed his mouth in a happy snap before chomping on his biscuit.
“Has Toby been giving you any problems?” Corona asked.
“No, not really. Besides that last question about poodles, we’ve been doing pretty well. He can be a little hard to understand, though. He speaks so quickly, it’s like his sentences have no punctuation and flow into each other,” I laughed.
“Tell me about it. Someone needs to put that hobgoblin in rehab for caffeine. Oops, looks like I’m needed. You can take a break. Toby should be back in ten minutes,” Corona called, shuffling back to her seat. She smiled across the counter at a willowy elf.
I tickled Doggy while he continued to munch on his cookie but froze when I heard a deep, rich voice.
“So this is where they stashed you. How amusing!”
I looked up and bristled.
It was him.
The fake kelpie.
Horse Guy.
5
Walking a Werewolf
“Fake Horse Guy,” I said, hugging Doggy to my chest.
“Devin, actually,” he corrected. “The Pooka if you want to be politically correct.” His smile was white and sharp.
“Beat it,” I snarled.
He gave me a falsified look of injury. “What, is it because I’m not soft and fluffy that you don’t want to hug me anymore?”
My face burned with humiliation and fury. I’m pretty sure I could have fried a piece of bacon on my cheeks at that moment.
Doggy, picking up on my mood, barked and snarled at him. I pat the baby dragon once before setting him down and scooting out of the desk. The other MBRC employees were busy helping people, but Corona saw me go.
“Look here, buddy,” I said when I reached the black-haired guy. “I mean it. Go away. I never want to see you again,” I said, prodding him in the chest with the edge of my decently long fingernails.
He chuckled and looked down at me, his yellow eyes glowing with amusement. “You could hardly make me leave, even if you wanted to, sweetheart.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Watch me.”
Fake Horse Guy spread his arms out, telling me to go ahead.
When I deeply inhaled, he said, “That’s what I thought,” and took a step towards me. Which was exactly what I wanted.
“NOOOO!” I screamed, my shrill voice piercing the hustle and bustle of the main chamber. “PERVERT! DON’T TOUCH ME THERE!” I shrieked as I fell backwards, landing on my butt. The palms of my hands stung, but the guy’s stupefied expression made the whole act totally worth it.
“Wha—,” he started, but a gigantic griffin stalked up behind him, flanked by a stout dwarf and a slender nymph.
“You there, what did you do to the mademoiselle?” the griffin demanded. His voice was fascinating to listen to. It was sharp and golden.
“I recognize him,” the nymph spat. “That’s Devin. The Pooka. He went after one of my river sisters.”
Both the griffin and the dwarfs’ eyes widened. “You’re the Pooka?” the griffin demanded.
“Oh, tha’s rich! No small wonder yer feelin’ up the lady,” the dwarf spat, giving me a sympathetic look as I stumbled to my feet and did a reasonable impression of blubbering.
“Gentlemen, and lady,” the fake horse guy said, scrambling to get a hold on the situation. “Clearly there has been a mistake.”
“There’s no mistake. Especially when the Pooka is involved,” the griffin said, his words were crisp and pronounced.
“Come along. Leave the lady alone,” the dwarf said, prodding Fake Horse Guy in the gut with the tip of his axe.
“I never—” the handsome guy started.
“You did. And I won’t let you do it again,” the nymph argued, the blue hues of her skin catching in the light.
My rescuers escorted the objecting shape-shifter away.
I couldn’t help the smirk that twitched across my lips as I slipped back behind the desk. Doggy rubbed up against my legs as I plopped back down in my chair. Ahhh, the sweet, sweet taste of a win.
That was when I noticed the cyclops.
It threw me for a minute. (Not like anything about the MBRC didn’t.) In all of the plays and stories, cyclopes are stupid, clumsy creatures that are gigantic and wear animal skins for clothes.
Not this one.
He was dressed in an Armani suit, gold cuff links sparkling, tie properly tightened…I imagined even his shoes were shiny. He had perfectly trimmed, perfectly combed brown hair, and his face was quite fine looking…except for the whole one eye thing.
He was tall, but not over 6’6, and after some of the giants I had seen, that seemed pretty small. He was leaning over the counter, blinking down at a single form, a fancy pen clenched in his right hand.
At first I scoffed. Twilight had failed me (thank you Dave), why not the classics? Epic fail, Odyssey. Epic fail.
It was then that I realized the cyclops appeared to be having some sort of trouble.
He kept blinking at the form, occasionally tilting his head forward or backward to try and get a better look at the papers.
“Can I help you?” I asked.
The cyclops looked up and hesitatingly smiled. “It’s nothing. I’m just—I’m supposed to fill out this form,” he said. “And I’m having a hard time making it out.”
I blinked. The font on the form was straight up Times New Roman. It was printed in an easily readable size, too.
The cyclops must have sensed my confusion and continued. “I’m a cyclops, you see? We have terrible depth perception, and most of us are far-sighted,” he sighed. “Sadly, human contacts and eyeglasses don’t fit us.”
He spoke in a pronounced, yet friendly tone. Not at all like the man-eating cyclopes from The Odyssey.
“Would it help if I were to fill out the form for you? My…coworker is currently on break, so I’m free to help until he gets back,” I offered.
“That would be magnificent. Thank you ever so much,” the cyclops professed.
Behind me Corona and Orion stirred.
“Do you think we should tell her?” Corona whispered.
“Let her discover it for herself,” Orion said, his voice old like a forest but as rich as a chocolate truffle.
Wondering about their conversation, I still continued. “I’m Morgan, by the way,” I smiled as I took the paper and the fancy pen from the cyclops.
“I’m Nick,” he said, which had to be the most anti-cyclops name on the planet.
“Alright, Nick, have you ever been…arrested and/or do you possess a criminal record?” I prompted, reading the first question.
“No,” Nick said.
Within five minutes, Nick was on his way, paperwork finished and properly filed. As I sat back down in my chair, immensely pleased with myself, Corona called out to me.
“What on earth did the Pooka want with you, Morgan? That was a neat trick you used to get rid of him,” she said as Doggy hopped on my lap.
I cuddled the baby dragon, gentle with him in spite of the sour glare that took over my face. “He tricked me.”
“Oh, goodness. Please don’t say he offered to take you on a wild ride?” Corona said, covering her reptilian mouth with a webbed paw.
“What? No!” I said, horrified. “I was working in Dr. Creamintin’s office with a unicorn. I was supposed to be brushing a kelpie, and I mistakenly thought that guy, Devin, was the kelpie. I mean, he was a big, black horse, and he responded when I asked who I was supposed to brush.”
“So…he tricked you into brushing him?” Corona asked, leaning back against the desk. Orion joined us at this point, his black hooves clopping on the marble floor.
“Yeah. It doesn’t sound very bad, but I brushed him like three times. He was friendly as a horse, plus he looked like a horse, so I was…affectionate with him.”
“Oh,” Corona said, exchanging understanding glances with Orion.
“I mean, I thought he was a horse! I don’t mind if a horse lips my shoulder or nuzzles my neck, but a guy doing that? No way!”
“It’s odd. Generally, he uses his male shape to lure in helpless girls, not the other way around,” Corona murmured.
“What is he anyway, a shape-shifter?” I asked, shifting in my chair.
“No,” Orion said, speaking directly to me for the first time. “He is the Pooka.”
“Alright, then, what’s a Pooka?” I said.
“Not a Pooka, the Pooka,” Orion corrected.
“Devin is the only one of his kind. The idea is that he is both a normal human male and yet one of the fairies because he can take on several traditional animal shapes associated with the Pooka. Most commonly, he uses the form of a horse, but he can also take on the shape of a dog,” Corona said. “The Pooka is known for being a mischievous sprite. He, it is always a he, plagues travelers or people who may stumble upon him in the dark. Generally as a horse, he lures them onto his back. The second they mount up, he bolts and takes them on a wild ride before dumping them in the nearest swamp or river. Some of the old Pookas were so rough, they would kill their riders. As a dog, he chases people through the moors.”
“You mentioned there were other Pookas, but I thought you said he was the only one?” I asked.
It was Orion, this time, who replied. “The title of the Pooka is passed through the males of Devin’s line. His father was the previous Pooka and his grandfather before him. When the current Pooka dies, his son becomes the next one.”
“So…there aren’t any girl Pookas?” I asked.
Corona could see where I was going with this. “No,” she replied. “As I mentioned before, only males can be the Pooka, and there is only one at a time. The Pooka will marry a regular human—sometimes she knows what he is; most times she doesn’t—and from their children, a single male offspring will be born with the ability to shape-shift. Additionally, there are easily identifiable personality traits that are passed along. Like Devin’s penchant for mischief,” Corona dryly said. “He’s not malicious. He is a practical jokester and something of a womanizer, but he’s completely harmless.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” I glowered as Orion turned to help a fire elf.
Corona laughed, her dark eyes dancing with amusement. “You have nothing to fear from him, Morgan. Soon the Fairy Council will catch up with him and drag him back to Britain for work purposes. Besides, I doubt Frey will allow him to get much closer to you. Pack dynamics would drive him to stop it.”
“What?” I blinked.
Corona didn’t answer and picked up a ringing telephone. “Good afternoon. This is the MBRC’s main information desk, Corona speaking. How can I help you?”
I settled back into my chair, intending to wait for Toby, but I spun around when I heard someone speaking across the desk. “Um, excuse me. Are you, by any chance, Morgan?”
I turned around and smiled. A young, female cyclops was hopefully blinking at me. Again, shattering the cyclops-literature-norms, she wore an adorable black skirt, a white tailored shirt, and stood probably a few inches over six fe
et. She had a black clutch in one hand and fussed with a simple silver necklace that hung from her neck with the other hand. Her single eye was fastened on me.
“I am,” I acknowledged. “Can I help you?”
She looked immensely relieved, and the death grip she had on her purse slackened. “Thank goodness! Nick said you might be able to help,” she said, digging in her clutch to unearth two rolled up sheets of paperwork. “I’ve been trying to fill this out for days, but I’m afraid I just can’t make out the font. The MBRC refused to give me a PDF copy so I couldn’t enlarge it as usual on my computer,” she said, looking hopefully at me.
I glanced over the sheets. It was the same, basic form I helped Nick with. “I would be glad to help you. Let’s start with your name, shall we?”
By the time Toby popped back behind the desk four minutes later, I had finished helping the female cyclops and sent her on her way.
“Youreadytoanswermorequestions?” Toby breathed.
Apparently he had more coffee while on his break.
“Sure,” I agreed.
“Herewego123,” he said, his fingers flashing across the keyboard. “DearMBRCwhatisadoggybag?”
The second question/answer session with Toby was much more intense. I resolved to switch his coffee with something decaffeinated if I ever had to work with him again.
When Frey strolled up to the desk, I was so relieved to see him I could have hugged him.
“Time to head home, Morgan,” he announced as I snatched up my backpack and things.
“Excellent. Good night, guys! It was fun working with you!” I said, lunging out of the desk before Toby spit out another question. I barely dodged Gristles, the pervo fairy, who was sitting on the desk. “See you later!”
“Tomorrow actually. Morgan will be returning here tomorrow,” Frey smiled at everyone behind the desk before he turned on his heels and strolled out. “How was your afternoon?” he asked in a conversational tone as we walked down the hallway.
“Interesting. Really interesting. And I mean that on a multitude of levels,” I said, glancing over at him before bulging my eyes.
