Temporally Out of Order

by Unknown

  “I must say,” said Toni, “you are the most inept government agents I’ve ever seen.”

  The two men picked themselves up off the sidewalk. “It’s our first job,” said Darley.

  “I never would have guessed. Is it really carnivorous?”

  “Certainly. We wouldn’t lie to you about that.”

  “Yes, you would. You’d lie to us about anything.”

  Darley was about to argue, but shrugged. “Fair point. Turk, let’s try to find that dinosaur.”

  “Should we get back-up?” Turk asked.

  “And explain how this happened? No.” Darley turned to Toni. “Those kids of yours are a handful.”

  “Try living with them every day.”

  Darley nodded and headed off to follow the trail.

  oOo

  Colin stared sullenly into his bowl of Cap’n Crunch. He had had the same hurt look for the past week.

  “I’m certain she’ll be fine,” said Toni.

  Colin looked up. “What if they caught her?”

  “Then she’ll be well taken care of.”

  “What if they didn’t?”

  “She’s a dinosaur. She knows how to survive. And the woods have plenty of food.” She hated having to repeat the platitudes, but it was best to shield them from the truth for now.

  Kevin came down. He said nothing, sat down listlessly, and stared at his empty bowl.

  It was time to bring out the big gun.

  “All right,” Toni said. “I had meant to hold off on this, but I see I can’t.” She went to the closet and took out a box.

  Colin looked up, with his “I’m not taking that bribe” expression. Then he saw the box.

  A helicopter.

  Colin’s eyes regained their brightness. “For me?”

  “For the two of you,” Toni said. The gift card had come in handy.

  Kevin looked up and, at the sight of the box, said, “Does it fly?”

  Toni smiled. “It’s radio controlled. Now, there are only two rules.”

  At the word “rules,” their enthusiasm waned. “What are they?” Kevin asked suspiciously.

  “Don’t fly it inside. And you have to share.”

  The two boys weighed the decision. “All right,” Kevin said gravely.

  “Good. Now finish your cereal and you can try it.”

  “I’m finished!” said Colin, shoveling spoonfuls into his mouth.

  “Not before me!” said Kevin.

  It was a photo finish—impressive because of Colin’s head start. In a few minutes, they had the toy out of the box and were heading for the driveway.

  Toni waited. The kitchen’s quiet was soothing.

  She went to the refrigerator and took two baby-cut carrots, then headed for the basement.

  In the back of the laundry room, there was a computer paper box. Toni lifted up the lid.

  “Meep?” said Michael.

  “Quiet,” said Toni. She dropped the carrots into the box. Michael scampered over to nip at them.

  She had come back the night she had hatched. “Bonding,” Kevin had said. And like a cat, Michael bonded to the one person who didn’t want to have anything to do with her.

  She watched as Michael chewed up the carrot. Herbivore, definitely.

  “Now, keep quiet,” Toni said. “Let this be our little secret.”

  It would remain so: she knew from experience that neither Kevin nor Colin would venture anywhere near the laundry.

  It was nice to have another female around the house.

  NOT ALL IS AS IT SEEMS

  A Story from the World of Jane Yellowrock

  by Faith Hunter

  Author’s Note: This short story takes place (in the JY timeline)

  after Broken Soul and before Dark Heir.

  I didn’t like moonless nights. Even with the protective ward up over the house and grounds, I felt isolated and vulnerable, not that I’d ever tell Big Evan. After years of struggling, his business had recently taken off, the result of an offer from the rich son of a sultan to create astounding and extravagant lighting for his string of casinos and clubs around the world. It required travel, this time back to Brazil for a week, which we all hated, but the gig was profitable enough for us to finally put money aside for the children’s educations. And Evan was making a name for himself and his fantastic lighting creations. He was fulfilled and excited. I could live with a little disquiet.

  I finished washing dishes, listening to the kids play in their rooms, Angie talking to an imaginary friend or a doll or toy soldier and Little Evan making growling noises as he played with his newest toy bear. He’d picked it out himself, a pink bear with purple nose, paw pads, and eyes. Probably a girl’s toy, but no one cared in this household. Our children were being raised to express themselves and their imaginations as every proper, nascent witch should—

  The ding on the wards interrupted my woolgathering. I dried my hands, spotting two figures standing on the street, side by side, slender males by their body shapes, possibly human, but they could be anything. There was no car by the road, so they had walked, or flown, or run. Or teleported. I studied them, and they didn’t move, though they could surely see me outlined in the lighted window. There was no movement, no small shifts of posture or weight distribution, no change in body position at all. I smiled grimly. It was one hour after dusk, the perfect time for vamps to come calling. Not that I ever had vamps come calling. But these two didn’t move, exactly the way vampires didn’t move, in that whole undead thing. With the Mithran/Witch Accords being planned, there was no way to ignore them or send them on their way.

  I picked up the landline phone and held it up for them to see, then pointed at it to indicate I was checking them out. One bowed, an old fashioned and proper bow. The other waved, a modern gesture.

  Son of a witch on a switch! I have vamp callers.

  I dialed Jane Yellowrock at Yellowrock Securities and went through the electronic procedures to be put through to my best friend. While I waited, I put on a kettle for tea. Even though things had been strained between us, I knew she would take my call. Jane killed rogue-vamps for a living and there was no one better to give me advice. When she answered I said, “Big-cat, I’ve got vamps in front of the wards and my hubs is out of town.”

  “Descriptions.” That was my pal, economy of, well, of everything.

  I gave her the descriptions, and heard her make a call on another line, her voice growing clipped, pointed, and slightly snarly. When she came back on she said, “Lincoln Shaddock sent them on an errand. I wasn’t able to find out what kinda errand. I don’t like it, though I have no reason to tell you to turn them into fried toads. Your call whether to let them in.” Jane sounded ticked off, letting me know that she was not happy that visitors had come calling without her prior approval. I had a feeling it wouldn’t happen again. Ever.

  Turn them into fried toads was my BFFs way of describing my new death-magics, if used to defend myself. At the simple thought, I felt my powers rise, eager to be let loose, free and destructive. The only problem was that I might not be able to get them back under control. I could kill the ones I loved while trying to defend them. No. Not an option.

  I breathed slowly, forcing the magics back down as I stared into the dark, watching the patient-looking vamps. With the accords so close, little moments like this might make a huge difference in vamp/witch relations for years to come. “I’m letting them in.”

  “Your call,” she repeated. “I’ve sent a message to them that if they hurt you or yours, heads will roll.” Jane was a rogue-vampire hunter and the on-again/off-again Enforcer to the biggest, baddest fanghead in the Southeast, so when she said heads would roll, she meant it literally.

  “Thanks. Later, Big-cat.” I ended the call and set the phone down. I held up one finger so the vamps would understand that I needed a moment, and went to my living room where I prepared three defensive workings and one offensive working. The defensive ones would turn an attacker into fried
vamp, which would take a long, painful time to heal, even with access to healing, master-vamp blood. The offensive one would kill them true-dead.

  I checked on the children, who were playing together now in Little Evans’s room, bear and toy soldiers in some form of Godzilla-bear versus the US army. I closed the door and opened the front door. Night air breezed through, still warm from the day, but holding the bite of deepening night. I took another breath and let it out, thinking, Bite. Haha. Nerves. I prepared the easiest defensive wyrd spell, dropped the ward with a thought, and waited.

  The vamps walked slowly up the drive, not moving with vamp speed, but like humans, which should have put me at ease, but didn’t. Nothing a vamp could do could put me at ease, not with Big Evan gone and me with the kids to protect. The vamps stopped a polite three feet from the open doorway and I looked them over. One was wearing jeans, his red hair in a shaggy, mid 80’s, style, his hands clasped behind his back. The other had dark brown hair cut short, wore a suit and tie, and looked like a lawyer at first glance. Until I looked down at his hands. They were calloused (strange among vamps) and stained with dye or ink—a working man’s hands, not the smooth hands of most dilettante vamps, letting humans do everything for them. Something about the man’s hands set me at ease and I nodded once.

  The suited one bowed slightly again, something military in the action, and offered me his full titles, in the formal way of vampires who want to parley. “Jerel D. Heritage, at your services, ma’am. Of Clan Dufresnee, turned in 1785 by Charles Dufresnee, in Providence, and brought South when Dufresnee acquired the Raleigh/Durham area. Currently stationed with Clan Shaddock of Asheville.”

  The other vamp said, “Holly, turned by the love of my life in 1982, and now serving with my mistress, Amy, under Clan Shaddock.” Unassuming history, no last name, making him very young as vampires went. More interesting, he was ordinary looking, until he smiled, a fangless, human smile, but one that transformed him into a beautiful man. I knew why Amy, whoever she was, had turned him. It was that smile. He tilted his head in a less formal bow than Jerel’s and yet somehow turned it into a graceful gesture. “We come in peace,” he said, the smile of greeting morphing into true humor.

  Jerel looked like a fighter and a gentleman from his own age, a bit stiff, too formal for modern custom, yet the kind of man who stood by his word. Holly looked like a dancer and a poet. Yet, possibly, Holly might be the more dangerous of the two because he looked so unvampily kind. Looks can be deceiving.

  Reluctantly, I said, “Molly Everhart Trueblood, earth witch of the Everhart witches. I grant safety in my home to guests who come in peace.”

  The two seemed to think about my words before they carefully stepped in. They took chairs in my great room, the space and furniture sized for Big Evan, oversized leather couches and recliners and lots of wood. The smaller vamps looked like Angie Baby’s dolls in the chairs. The one in the suit—Jerel—said, “We come at the request of the Master of the City of Asheville, to ask if you recently came into possession of a teapot.”

  My brows went up and I barely managed not to laugh. This visit by vampires was about a teapot? I said, “I drink black China tea with Jane Yellowrock, my friend,” I enunciated carefully, to remind them that I had friends in high vamp places, “is here to visit. I prepare herbal teas as needed for health. I have several teapots. None recently acquired.”

  “We received a call from the Enforcer’s partner, Alex Younger, while we awaited your response to our visit,” Jerel said. “No insult was intended in our unannounced arrival. Please allow me to explain.

  “The Master of the City, Lincoln Shaddock, was turned in 1864. When he was freed from the devoveo—the madness that assaults our minds after we are turned—the first thing he did was visit his wife, though this was strongly opposed by his master. The year was 1874, and his wife had remarried. The meeting was … unfortunate.”

  “I’ll bet,” I said.

  Holly smiled and Jerel frowned before going on. “The teapot we seek was his wife’s. It is a redware, hand-thrown, English-styled piece, salt-glazed in the local tradition, and painted with a yellow daisy.”

  “I see,” I said, not seeing at all. My powers, my death-magics, had begun to roil as he spoke. I held on to them with effort, trying to balance my waning earth magic with my growing death-magic. “Again. I have acquired no teapot in the last few months and certainly not one like you described.”

  “May we,” Jerel took a breath and his face twisted in what I might have assumed was human distaste, had I not known he drank blood for sustenance, “inspect your kitchen?” he asked.

  I stood in surprise and said, “No. You may not.”

  Angie Baby burst from behind the door opening and down the two steps into the great room, shouting, “You can’t have him! You can’t!” Child-fast, she whirled, strawberry blond hair streaming behind her, and ran through the house. The door to her room slammed.

  My mouth slowly closed; I hadn’t been aware that it hung open. Everything—every single thing—had just changed. “Will you do me the kindness of waiting here while I speak with my eldest?” I asked, carefully. When they both nodded, as unsure as I was, I added, “There is a kettle of hot water on the stove. Tea is in the tin beside it. Please make yourselves at home in my kitchen. And if you take the opportunity to search for the teapot you desire, I assure you, it isn’t there.”

  Jerel said, just as carefully, “As I recall, children are … difficult, at times.”

  “Yes. I’ll return as soon as I know what’s going on.” They nodded and I followed my daughter to her room. When I was still several feet away, I heard the sound of furniture moving and realized that Angelina was barricading her door. My eldest, possibly the only preadolescent witch with two witch genes on the face of the Earth, was hiding something. Something important. Something dangerous. Something that could hurt her? Had bespelled her?

  I didn’t bother with simple responses. I unleashed the spell I had prepared for the vampires and blew her door off the hinges. It was a restricted spell, releasing and containing any debris, intended to toss vamps off my property, but not injure them. Much. Angie’s door shuddered, tilted in from the top, and fell forward to rest upright against my daughter’s bed.

  Big Evan would have some new things in his “honey do” jar when he got home.

  Angie was standing at the foot of the bed, fists on her hips, and shouted, “You broke my door!”

  “Yes. I did,” I said as I crawled over the mess of the door, the bed, the toy box, and into the room. Except for tears and an out-poked bottom lip, Angie Baby looked alright, no streams of black magic wafting off her, no dark manacles. Standing with my hands on my hips I demanded, “Young lady, what is going on?”

  “George is mine. He came to me,” she shouted, arms out wide, her face red, tears streaking her cheeks. “They can’t have him!” She was positively furious. I struggled not to smile at the picture she presented; she needed only a sword and blue paint to look like a Celtic warrior princess, and something about her stance made me feel inordinately proud. My baby was defending something, not bespelled.

  I sat on the foot of the bed and laced my fingers together. From behind me, my familiar—not that I had a familiar; no witches have familiars—leaped into the room and stalked across the bed, purring. I said, “Tell me about George.”

  Angie’s eyes narrowed with suspicion, but when I didn’t do anything more frightening, she opened her toy box and removed a teapot. It was redware, made from local red-brown clay and glazed in red-brown, except for the yellow daisy on the front. Angie cuddled the teapot like a doll in both arms. And I had never seen it before, which pricked all my protective instincts again. “How did you get it,” I asked. “Did you buy it with your allowance? Did someone give it to you?”

  “No,” Angie said, crossly. “It showed up in my toy box this morning. Like poof.” Like poof meant like a spell. Like magic. “Its name is George. It loves me.”

  “May I
hold it for a moment? Please?”

  Angle scowled but passed the teapot to me. It tingled in my hands like an active working, a spell still strong. Worse, it felt … alive somehow. As if it quivered in terror. I handed it back to my daughter who petted the teapot and said, “It’s okay Georgie. I got you now. It’s okay.”

  “Angie Baby, do you remember the time KitKit disappeared? We looked and looked and then we found her at Mrs. Simpson’s place, down the hill?” Angie’s scowl was back and, if possible, was meaner. “She was lapping up milk from a bowl and Mrs. Simpson was mincing salmon for her. KitKit had no interest in coming home, but she belonged here, with us. Remember? Mrs. Simpson gave her back to us.”

  Angie looked down at the teapot, her hair falling forward over it, a tear splashing on the top handle. “But—” She stopped, sniffling. “Okay. But I wanna give George to them myself.”

  “Okay. Can you be nice?”

  “I don’t wanna be nice. But …” she sniffled, “I can be nice.”

  I stood and grabbed up KitKit in one hand and helped Angie over the mess of her broken door with the other. In the great room, Angie, with huge tears racing down her cheeks, walked slowly over to the two vampires. They watched her come with strange lights in their eyes, and I realized that human parents didn’t allow their children anywhere near vamps. Human children, and especially witch children, were surely rarities in their lives. Angie stopped about six feet away, inspecting them. To Jerel, she said, “You’re not wearing a sword. You got one?”

  “Yes, little witch child. I have a sword.”

  “Can you use it good? Well?” she corrected before I could. “Can you use it well?”

  “I can. I am a swords master as well as a master cabinet maker.”

  “You get to protect George and fight off the bad guys.” To Holly, she said. “Here. George is scared. It needs you to hold it close and pet it. Like this.” Angie demonstrated, one hand stroking the pot.