“She’s my daughter. If anything happened to her…” Marcus’ jaw clenched.
“I can’t promise that nothing will ever happen, the world is way too unpredictable. But don’t worry too much. The Village is a good place to be. We look out for each other here. And like I said, Jennifer’s boys will keep Cassie safe.” Kai swore to himself to do a better job watching over the community that was his to protect. He wouldn’t let his people down.
“They seemed like nice kids, but…”
“They’re griffons. Born protectors. They helped take on a cave full of wights not very long ago and did fine.” Kai scrubbed a hand over his face and yawned.
“You look tired,” Marcus said. He was holding very still, trying not to let his skin brush against anything. Kai looked over and took in the skin burned such a bright red that it seemed the man glowed in the dark. Kai had been badly sunburned once or twice, so he could imagine how awful Marcus felt. He got up to refill the glass of water so that Marcus didn’t have to move any more than necessary. It also kept him moving, which meant he was more awake than he had been.
“I didn’t sleep last night,” Kai said. “I have trouble sometimes. I’m glad, though. It meant I was there when Cassie needed help.”
“I’m sorry you have trouble sleeping, but I’m glad too,” Marcus said. His black eyes almost seemed to burn when he looked across to where Kai slumped in the chair. “I owe you a debt for this. If you ever need my help, I will stand with you.”
“I’m more than happy to help out a neighbor,” Kai met the lidérc’s gaze, feeling the natural magic surge though the space, and nodded. Kai would have stepped in for anyone that needed his help, but it was always good to have a friend.
8
Well, it’s looking better, Kai.”
“Thanks, Doc,” he said and turned to watch her twist the lid back on the jar of ointment she’d just spread on his back. “I feel great, actually. Not cold at all today.”
They were gathered on the pool deck, Kai stretched out on his stomach on one of the lounge chairs with the sun pouring over his shoulders, as prescribed.
“Oh?” Eric grinned, and dumped his glass out over Kai’s neck. It was just ice at that point, but the little bit of soda left at the bottom dribbled into his hair when he yelped and jerked upright.
“Dammit, Eric!” Kai sputtered. He grabbed his towel and looked around at everyone, laughing and enjoying themselves. The smell of grilled meat floated over the area, and many of his friends and neighbors sat around the pool deck chatting and enjoying the warm Sunday afternoon. The neighborhood cookout was always fairly well attended, but today seemed to be a bit more crowded than usual. Kai grinned, enjoying the scene.
“Totally worth spending my day off here,” Sarah cracked up. Kai grinned despite himself when Sebastian stepped up behind her and yanked her off her feet to spin her around.
“Hey, no roughhousing on the pool deck!” Kai yelled. “You two’re old enough to know better.” He sat back and let the sounds of laughter and conversations wash over him, basking in the sunny mood as much as anything. Kids splashed and shrieked in the pool, Nick Panagos was arguing cheerfully with his wife Alex about how done the burgers were. There was a bird singing its little lungs out in a tree somewhere.
When he closed his eyes, he could sense the magic swirling around them as they all relaxed in trusted company. They were all safe here, and they knew it. After the past few weeks, they also knew that they had to work to make sure they stayed safe here, but after the relief of their victory over the wights, everyone brought a sense of security with them to the cookout.
“Hey.”
Kai opened his eyes and squinted up at Cassie, standing there looking exhausted in a yellow t-shirt and cutoff shorts.
“Hey Cassie. What’s up?” he asked. She shifted on her feet slightly and glanced up at the table of chips and soda and whatever else people provided for the potluck style afternoon.
“I just wanted to say thank you. For yesterday,” she said. Kai watched her staring around at the crowd. She was getting some curious looks, but nobody looked like they were willing to interrupt.
“No problem at all. I’m glad I was there to help, actually. How’s your dad?” When Kai had left the man finally, he’d been blistered all over his face and trying to lie down to sleep on the sofa in some way that wouldn’t rub his terrible sunburn.
“He’s okay. He heals pretty fast, but sunburns are bad. He’s still pretty pink all over his face,” she said. She shifted again. “He stayed home last night.”
“Oh yeah? Probably for the best, really, if he was still burned.” Kai wondered what it was like for this girl, so obviously human, to be growing up surrounded by spirits. He glanced over at Eric, his fully human brother. Eric had spent the school year with them, first in Florida, then in New York when they’d moved, but they’d all spent summers apart— Eric with his mom in the Midwest, and Kai and Sebastian here in the Village, learning about their heritage and how to use their abilities.
Cassie perched on the edge of the chaise next to his own and watched Sarah shriek when Sebastian splashed her while she chatted with Doc at the side of the pool. Doc raised an eyebrow, and with a flick of her fingers sent a bubble of pool water chasing after him until he ducked underwater. The bubble simply hovered over the surface, tracking him as he tried to out swim it and Doc smirked.
“He should know better than to provoke a witch,” Kai grinned.
“How does that work?” Cassie asked, watching as Sebastian finally had to surface for breath and the bubble popped right over his head.
“Cold! Oh man, Doc, that’s not fair!” He shouted to a great deal of laughing from the whole party.
“What, floating the water like that? You’d have to ask Doc for specifics. I don’t know much about witch magic,” Kai answered. “I know that was pretty complicated though.”
“No, I mean magic in general.” Cassie shook her head. She had laughed along with everyone else, but now she was frowning, puzzled.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean…” She sighed and paused to collect her thoughts. “I guess I’m not sure. It’s just… I guess I’ve grown up pretty much with Dad around, you know? Mom met him when I was really little and I don’t remember much from before he was around. But I never really knew any of his friends from work, and I couldn’t talk to anyone at school about any of it.” Kai nodded.
“You probably have a million questions, huh?” he said.
“Yeah, I guess.” Cassie turned to him and Kai remembered that she was only eleven. She’d had to grow up a lot in the last year, but in a lot of ways she was very young.
“Well, why don’t we start with one thing and move on from there?” he said. “Magic like Doc and Sarah do is pretty specific. It’s unique to witches, really. They have a… a sort of life force, I guess I’d call it, that supports the effects they want to produce in the world, and it’s very closely connected to nature. They can tap into that energy with their spells and rituals, and they also have a very close affinity to the natural magics already in the world, which is why they’re known for potions. They can combine the natural magics in the ingredients they use with their own magic in a way that nobody else can. Doc doesn’t often do anything that showy because it’s exhausting for her, since she only has her own power to pull from to do it. I’m willing to guess that Seb has been working her last nerve lately for some reason. Probably something to do with Sarah at work, I’d guess.” Kai grinned, glad that Cassie smiled back.
“So, what about Dad? I mean, his healing and stuff. And when he wants to he can move really fast or blend in to be almost invisible. What about that magic? Is that the same thing?”
“Well, again, you’d have to ask him for a detailed answer,” Kai said. “Marcus is the first lidérc I’ve ever met, so I’m mostly guessing, but I’d say it’s probably part of why he needs to consume energy as part of his diet. The energy he gets from feeding is what powers h
is abilities. And it’s different again for spirits like me. I can do a lot just by drawing on my own energies, like Doc and Sarah, though I have a lot more to draw from than they do. But I am also much stronger when I have the support of the community. When everyone believes I can do something, I find that things are a lot easier to do. It’s something that helps make me a good manager.”
“I didn’t think you needed magic to be a manager,” Cassie looked confused.
“You’ve clearly never asked one,” Kai laughed. “What I meant was that everyone seems to think I do a pretty good job managing the apartment, which is an energy I can draw on to make sure I am doing a good job of it. Magic is a funny thing. It takes a form based in large part on the area of the world it originated in. Some of it is elemental, and some is ritual, and some is communal. It all depends on what sort of spirit you are. One of the amazing things about this place is that there are so many different kinds of magic gathered together. It could be really dangerous, I guess, but we all work things out together in the end, so it works for us. Witches are pretty special because they can tap into the power of a lot of different branches of magic, even though they have to use their own energies to tie it together. We’re pretty lucky to have two here, and Sarah is going to be one serious force to be reckoned with when she gets a little more practice.”
“Oh.” Cassie sat there, watching the people playing around in the pool. The kids had mostly migrated to the lawn now, and several couples and a few older kids were splashing and flirting. It seemed that there was something more than the many theories of magic out there.
“Any more trouble? No more sign of that werewolf wannabe?” he asked. Cassie shook her head.
“No. And Judah and Asher were really nice,” she said. “They walked me to school and they were there when I got out of class too. Then they took me out for burgers because they said that anyone who stood up to a bully like that deserved a reward.” She smiled again, and Kai felt some more tension melt off his shoulders. Kids shouldn’t have to worry about lunatic kidnappers with movie-monster fetishes. Something about the whole thing bothered him, though. Beyond the attempted-kidnapping aspect, that is.
“They’re right. I saw personally how tough you were. And then you didn’t even blink when I showed up like I did? Definitely worth a burger,” Kai agreed.
“Um… excuse me.” A grinning six-year-old that lived in one of the Creekside units with his water spirit family came running up and dripped a puddle of pool water off his swim trunks. He turned his ocean blue eyes to Kai and squirmed with the effort to remember to be polite.
“Yeah, David? What’s up?”
“Mom says I should introduce myself politely and use my grownup manners if I want to play with someone.” He turned to Cassie. “Hi. My name is David and Asher said that you chased off a bad guy. Want to play with us? We’re playing ice cream tag! If you get tagged you have to name a whole new ice cream flavor or you can’t move till you count to a hunnred!”
Kai laughed. “Did you get deputized to come over here?” He glanced past the boy to where a small group of kids were waiting on the grassy area just outside the pool fence, watching and whispering. Asher was standing back a bit further and completely failing to look innocent.
“I dunno. They just said I should do it cause I’m the wettest.”
“Um, okay,” Cassie said. “If you don’t mind.” She turned to Kai.
“Go ahead, it’s a great day for tag. And you’re welcome to grab some food, too, if you want. You’re a resident, so you were invited,” Kai said, before turning serious for a moment. “And so you know, if you ever need anything, you can come find one of us. Sebastian and I are both on the emergency call sheet that your dad has, but you can just knock on our door, too. Doc is around a lot, as well, if you need. And tell your dad that we’ll make sure he can come to the next cookout.” Cassie flashed him a smile and nodded before turning to run after David.
“She seems like a good kid.” Eric walked up with a plate sagging under two burgers with all the fixings. He sat on the next chaise and put his beer on the deck next to his feet. “I’m surprised that you let people have beers out here.”
“We really don’t, technically. But for the potlucks we pretend not to notice, so long as nobody is getting trashed or making a mess. Some days it’s good to be management. I get to make these decisions.” Kai grinned at his brother. “Yeah, Cassie seems to be pretty grounded considering everything she’s been through. They’ve been hunted for a long time.”
“What, not quite a year from what you’ve told me,” Eric shrugged.
“That’s still too long,” Kai frowned. “Especially for Cassie. She’s just a kid, she should be doing kid stuff, not dodging serial killers and nut job kidnappers with a cosplay fetish.”
Kai hadn’t heard anything else about the kidnapper, and there was no trail to speak of by the time he’d gotten back to investigate it. Too many joggers had used the path by then. He and Sebastian had set up a new patrol schedule and warned all the parents living in the complex to be careful until they knew more. Added to the gossip he’d overheard at the Apothecary, and Kai was distinctly uneasy about what could happen.
“Well, I can’t say anything about kidnappers, but I’d guess the hunters think of themselves as the good guys, not as murderers.” Eric shrugged again. “I mean, the guy is some kind of vampire you said. They’re pretty well known to be literally bloodsucking monsters.”
“I didn’t even know that vampires were a real thing until Marcus showed up,” Kai sighed again. Some days it was good to be management, and some days it was very, very hard. “I do know that he had a long talk with Alex about where he could get any necessary meals. She’s only semi-retired from nursing these days, so she has a few resources, and even though blood is a stop-gap measure for him, it’s better than starving to death before he can get a decent job. He seems like a pretty solid guy, and he’s clearly committed to raising his daughter. The whole situation has to be really tough for them.”
“Yeah.” There was a strange note in Eric’s voice that Kai couldn’t identify. It wasn’t sympathy, which is what Kai had expected. He glanced up at his brother— step-brother, he thought suddenly. It was the first time in a decade or more that he’d really felt the difference.
“You okay, man?” Kai asked.
“Fine. Just thinking,” Eric said before shaking his head to clear it. “So, you’re sure this vampire guy can be trusted? I’ll have to take your word for it, brother. After all, I’m only human.” He grinned at the old joke and saluted with his beer bottle.
9
Sebastian yipped and Kai turned towards his brother. They slunk through the brush easily, near silent paws leaving barely any trail to follow should anything be so inclined. Sebastian’s fox was big— the size of a good family dog. The mass of his animal was much closer to his human form because his three-quarters-human genetics refused to fully bow to the magic of the transition, but Kai was indistinguishable from a wild fox, and he could get into tighter spaces if it became necessary.
They both enjoyed going out in the dusk to run around and play in this truly inhuman realm. Los Gatos Creek made for a very handy highway around the back of the apartments, and once they rounded the corner of the wards that marked the boundary of their property, they were very nearly inside the Open Space Preserve, which made for some fun romps once in a while.
Sebastian yipped again and a shimmer of magic washed over Kai.
“Well, I haven’t seen anything,” Sebastian said. “It’s almost 1 in the morning. We should head in, I think, do another lap right before the kids start heading to school, maybe?” Kai stretched into his human shape as well and joined his brother on the jogging path.
“Yeah, sounds good.” Kai stretched his neck side to side, listening to the quiet pops that always accompanied the gesture. “I have a ton of stuff to work on tomorrow before we meet up with the contractors. I was thinking, what do you say we do the clubhouse up so
that it could be a coffeehouse, when we get to that stage? That way Suze won’t have to run it from her own kitchen anymore, and we can relax a little about random people wandering in and reporting her.”
“That’d be good. I know she’s been a bit stressed about it. Not like she actually charges money or anything, she just likes feeding people, so I’m not actually sure she’s breaking any laws, but still. We should run it past Jennifer and see what she says.” Sebastian said.
“Yeah. I’ve been pretty hesitant to do that. I’m a little afraid she’s going to tell me it’s all wrong and then I’ll have to do something about it. Suze would be crushed if we had to tell her to stop.” Kai grimaced.
“What’s the schedule look like? I mean, I know we’re just starting to talk to folks, but some of those repairs need doing like, last week.” Sebastian turned to start strolling back towards the apartment’s small, hidden door. It was masked with a large bush and a pair of twisty oak trees that had been blown across each other when they were young and never quite untangled. It always made Kai think of The Secret Garden– not that he would ever tell anyone that.
“I haven’t nailed anything down yet, you know that.” Kai said, falling in step with Sebastian from long habit. The two of them had been close since Sebastian’s birth, Kai feeling responsible for keeping his little brother safe and teaching him about his abilities as a spirit when they weren’t here with Obaachan and the rest of the Village. It had been tough, especially for Seb, who had to learn control while surrounded by humans who didn’t understand.
Living in the Village, surrounded by spirits from all over the world, it was easy to forget that the further one got from Los Gatos, the rarer his kind were. They slipped through life blending in with humanity these days, where once upon a time they had often been revered as gods. Mythology and folklore were almost exclusively filled with accounts of spirits of times past. And Kai sometimes wondered what it would have been like to have been born when they didn’t have to guard their secrets so closely. When they could have simply shrugged when a human discovered that kitsune and witches and cyclopes lived among them.
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