Once Upon A Midnight Drow (Goth Drow Book 1)

by Martha Carr

  “Oh.” Cheyenne glanced at her own arm, then remembered how much of herself she hadn’t explained to her neighbors earlier that morning. “No. It helped a lot, so thanks. I just put it away to keep it safe. You came back to get it, right?”

  “Oh, no. Please.” R’mahr waved her off. “You keep it for as long as you need.”

  “I only needed it to drag that orc out of your living room. Hold on. Lemme get it.” The halfling turned away from the door, paused, then stuck her head out into the hall and glanced in either direction. “Should you guys be standing out here without…you know. Your illusion spells, or whatever?”

  “Our own…oh.” R’mahr chuckled and shook his head. “That’s very good, Cheyenne.”

  “She doesn’t know.” Yadje turned toward her husband and cocked her head. “And she doesn’t need it.”

  “Oh, if she wants to keep it a little longer, Yadje, let her.”

  “I didn’t say she doesn’t want it. I said she doesn’t need it.” Yadje stared at her husband with wide eyes and gestured at Cheyenne. “And she doesn’t know about illusions.”

  “She doesn’t…no, no. Now, don’t talk to me in riddles in front of our neighbor. You know I don’t like having to guess—”

  “We’re wearing them.” As soon as Bryl spoke, her parents stopped their argument and glanced down at her with self-conscious smiles.

  “Okay.” Cheyenne smiled at the troll kid, suddenly very aware of how much younger Bryl was than the kid they’d found in that church. And he had been young too. The halfling blinked and looked back at R’mahr and Yadje. “I feel like I’m missing something here.”

  “Illusions,” Bryl answered for all three of them. “Ours are made for friends to see us and everyone else to see…not us. Not really.”

  “Right.” The halfling nodded. “That makes sense.”

  “But you didn’t know this.” Yadje shot her a quick frown, part curiosity and part intense skepticism. “And you’re not wearing the armband.”

  “Yeah, you pointed that out. So I’ll just go get that real fast.” One more time, the halfling turned from the door, then stopped awkwardly. “You guys are welcome to come inside if you want.”

  Bryl grinned and peered around Cheyenne at the huge desk covered in blinking lights and monitors and keyboards and whirring fans inside the halfling’s custom towers. R’mahr nodded vigorously. “That would be excellent—”

  “No.” His wife smacked his arm, and he went from nodding profusely to vigorously shaking his head. “That’s not how we offer gifts. We’ll wait.”

  “Of course.” R’mahr cleared his throat, then shared a knowing glance with his daughter. The child giggled and shook her head, trying to hide her expression by nearly burying her face in the basket she held.

  Completely caught off-guard, Cheyenne turned awkwardly toward her backpack against the half-wall, acutely aware of the three trolls standing in her doorway and watching her grab the armband they’d lent her. She got it out quickly enough and almost jogged back to the door. “Here you go. Thanks for letting me use it. Definitely drew a lot less attention to myself that way.”

  Yadje smiled and held out her hand for the halfling to drop the intricately crafted copper armband into her palm. She held it in both hands and turned it over, then looked up again, her blatant curiosity bursting out all at once. “What are you?”

  Chapter Eighty-Five

  “Now you just…now wait just a minute,” R’mahr stammered, ogling his wife as his mouth opened and closed without any other sound.

  Cheyenne smiled back at the female troll and nodded. “Finally, somebody’s asking an up-front question.”

  “Cheyenne, I apologize for my wife’s disrespect.” R’mahr wrung his hands and bobbed his head. “Yadje tends to push too far for the sake of knowledge, a trait she’s passed down to our Bryl. Please, don’t hold this against us. We can forget this ever happened. Bryl, hand it over. Then we’ll go home.”

  Why is he so terrified?

  Despite R’mahr’s bumbling and backpedaling, the half-drow couldn’t help but let out a little laugh. “Don’t worry about it, R’mahr. Seriously. It’s not a hard question to answer. Most people who don’t already know won’t just come right out and ask.”

  “Did you hear that?” R’mahr hissed at his wife. “Most people don’t ask.”

  Yadje scoffed and waved him off. “You worry about every little thing. What is this supposed to teach our child, hmm?”

  Cheyenne looked down at Bryl again and shrugged. “You wanna take a guess?”

  The child’s eyes grew wide, and her teeth—much straighter than her parents’ but still with the crookedness normal for trolls—flashed under the hallway light. “You’re a phér móre, aren’t you?”

  “Uh…” I really need to brush up on my Ambar’ogúlish. Or whatever language people keep throwing at me.

  “A phér móre!” R’mahr laughed, although it still sounded incredibly nervous. “Don’t insult her, Bryl. That’s nothing more than myth and fireside stories from the reservation. Cheyenne has much better things to do with her time than entertain myths.”

  Cheyenne wiggled her eyebrows. “Phér móre. If that translates to ‘halfling’ over here, then you nailed it, kid.”

  Bryl gasped in wonder, her mouth falling open. Her father choked, patting down his bright-blue t-shirt that looked a size or two too big. Yadje lifted her chin and gazed at Cheyenne with a renewed excitement behind her scarlet eyes. “I knew it.”

  “You did not,” R’mahr whispered. “How could that thought even enter your head?”

  “It entered our daughter’s, cin naeg. You’re the only one who thinks as slowly as a giant slug.”

  “What?” The male troll looked baffled, blinking furiously. Then he rubbed a purple hand over his pale-pink hair, unbraided and not quite as long as his wife’s, and looked at Cheyenne again. “Is this true?”

  “Yep.” The halfling shrugged and gave the family a smile that felt strained and unsure. “No armband, no illusion spell. Just half-human.”

  “And half-drow,” Yadje added with way too much enthusiasm.

  “Right. After this morning, I guess that part was pretty obvious, huh?” Taking in the looks of awe, admiration, curiosity, and shock—the last coming from R’mahr—Cheyenne couldn’t help but wonder what telling other magicals straight off the reservations about her mixed heritage meant for her. “Is that, like, frowned upon? Or something?”

  “Oh, of all the—” R’mahr clapped both hands to his head and gaped at her. “How can you even ask that? Please, my wife’s curiosity does not come from a place of fear, I can promise you that. Or rejection.”

  “I…okay. I didn’t think it did.”

  “It is most certainly not frowned upon, phér móre.” Yadje thumped the metal armband against her husband’s chest, which he took without the ability to argue, and reached out both hands toward Cheyenne. When the halfling just stared at those violet hands opening toward her, Yadje nodded in invitation. The half-drow slowly took the troll’s hands and was surprised by the strength and gentleness in them at the same time. “You cannot know how much this means to hear you say this is what you are. To O’gúleesh, Cheyenne, a phér móre brings hope. Two worlds overlap at the Borders, and you are living proof that full peace can be made between us. That life can endure on either side. Maybe even love.”

  Cheyenne didn’t have the heart to tell the woman that she had not been conceived in love or for any attempt to bring two worlds together. L’zar didn’t love my mom. He just took everything she had for one night and left her to pull it back together on her own.

  Yadje was looking at her with such open adoration, waiting for a reply to her little speech. The halfling had to say something. “Well, it’s good to have hope, then, I guess.”

  “If we have nothing else, hope must always endure.” Yadje squeezed the halfling’s hands and finally released them, looking like she’d just realized she was standing in the presence
of a god.

  Or a demigod, and I’m not either of those.

  “Bryl.” Yadje turned loving eyes on her daughter, who’d been standing there with a ridiculous amount of patience. The kid couldn’t have been older than five or six, at least going by human years. “It’s your turn.”

  The kid pushed the basket toward Cheyenne, her arms quivering under the weight now that it wasn’t tucked against her body. “We made these for you. To thank you for protecting us. And for being our friend.”

  “Oh.” The halfling reached slowly out to take the basket, the tips of her perfectly round ears burning, not with the threat of shifting into her drow form, but with plain old embarrassment. “Thanks. You really didn’t have to make me anything.”

  “This is to show our gratitude.” R’mahr had apparently gotten hold of himself again and now looked every bit as eager as his wife. “We can’t repay you for what you did today, but please don’t forget that we are in your debt. I am in your debt. We’re still learning the ways here on this side, and you did for my family what I could not. That will change. You’ve given me hope for that too.”

  “Anyone else would’ve stopped to help. I just happened to be on my way out to the car.”

  Yadje shook her head. “No, anyone else would not have done what you did, phér móre. It’s rare in Ambar’ogúl, and it is just as rare Earthside.”

  “Well, hopefully, that changes pretty soon.” Cheyenne shot them another smile, wondering what in the world was making the basket in her arms so heavy.

  “Please.” R’mahr gestured toward the basket. “Open it.”

  “Right now?”

  “Yes.”

  “Uh, okay.” The halfling settled the basket in the crook of one arm and quickly unfolded the squares of bright-orange cloth covering the top. Inside was just more cloth. A lot of it. “Oh.”

  “Take a look,” Yadje prompted.

  Taking the first bit of lime-green fabric off the top of the pile, Cheyenne shook it out and recognized its shape immediately. What kinda can of worms did I just open with these people? Turning toward the half-wall of the kitchen counter, she laid the first pair of lime-green underwear on the countertop and picked up the next bit of cloth in a dark scarlet covered with gold sequins. More underwear. Blue, purple, silver, decorated with beads of clay and painted wood. Woven in seriously intricate designs that would have been more than a little impressive. But this family of trolls had literally just given the drow halfling more than a lifetime supply of fancy underwear she would never use.

  “Uh…” Cheyenne choked on a laugh, then set the whole basket down on the counter and scratched the side of her head. It was hard enough to look R’mahr and Yadje in the eye; they were clearly proud of themselves and their effort. “Those are really something.”

  “It’s good to see you like them.” R’mahr puffed out his chest, and Cheyenne nearly lost it.

  “You, uh, you made these, huh?”

  “Spent all day on them, yes.”

  Yadje squinted at the halfling, her eyebrows flicking together. “You don’t like them.”

  “I didn’t say that. I’m sure someone would really get a kick out of all this.”

  “But not you. It’s too much, isn’t it?” Yadje didn’t look like she’d just gotten her feelings hurt. The look she gave her husband made it perfectly clear she blamed him. “I told you it was too much. We should have filled the smaller basket.”

  “Hey, it’s okay. I mean, yeah, it’s a lot of underwear.” Cheyenne couldn’t hold back her laughter anymore. It burst out of her, making R’mahr jump in surprise while his wife turned to stare at the halfling. “I’m sorry. It’s just a surprising thing to give somebody as a…as a thank you—”

  Another laugh took over, and the half-drow doubled over, bracing her hands against her thighs.

  “A funny surprise.” Yadje turned toward her husband and whispered, “Why is it funny?”

  “I don’t know. I thought it was a normal thing over here.”

  “Nope.” Wiping her eyes, Cheyenne sighed and shook her head, trying to wave off their concern and keep herself from cracking up all over again. “Not that normal. Underwear is one of those personal preferences. I mean, it’s a great thing for you guys to give each other. You know, ‘cause no one else is gonna see you in it.”

  Yadje’s eyes widened, and with a gasp, she slapped her husband’s chest again. “Now who’s being insulting?”

  “I thought it was. I mean, all the stores. All those tall signs and in the shiny books. With all the pictures. They’re everywhere.”

  “Oh, in magazines? Uh, yeah.” Cheyenne stifled another laugh. “Yeah, I can see how you got confused.”

  Yadje clicked her tongue at her husband. “Confused. You just ruined our gift and wasted an entire day of my time. Do you know how many other things I could have done with all that?”

  “I’m sorry.” R’mahr lifted his hands in surrender. “I made a mistake. This is…this is not what I wanted.”

  “Hey, don’t worry about it. It’s fine.” Finally back in control of herself, Cheyenne waved them off. “Seriously. It’s really thoughtful, and now I’ll never run out.”

  Her laugh this time echoed down the hall, and she clapped her hands over her mouth.

  Bryl glanced at her parents, who’d started the bickering all over again, and tugged on the bottom of Cheyenne’s t-shirt. The halfling looked down to see the kid cupping her hand around her mouth before she whispered, “I think they’re beautiful.”

  The halfling bent over to join the private conversation. “They are. I can tell you guys put a lot of time into it.”

  “If you don’t want them,” Bryl glanced at her parents, who’d forgotten her completely in lieu of their arguing about what they were supposed to do now, “You can give them to me. I won’t tell.”

  Cheyenne chuckled and winked at the kid. “Maybe we can figure something out.”

  “We’ll make this up to you.” Yadje whisked her daughter away from the half-drow, nodding over and over. “We’ll try again with something that isn’t so completely different than what we meant to say.”

  “You really don’t have to—”

  “Oh, we do. My husband will have one good idea on this side eventually. But please know we meant every word we said.”

  “I know.”

  “Come share a meal with us,” R’mahr shouted, pointing at Cheyenne as his wife ushered him and their daughter back down the hall. “You eat food, don’t you?”

  “Every day.”

  “Can’t go wrong with that. We’ll, uh, we’ll cook for you. Tell us when is a good time—”

  “Probably never, now,” his wife hissed.

  “And come sit with us in our home. You’re always welcome.”

  “Okay. Thanks.” Cheyenne waved back at R’mahr before Yadje slapped his hand out of the air and shoved her family toward their apartment three doors down. The halfling stepped back into her apartment, closed the door, and burst out laughing again. Crossing the Border had to be hard enough, based on what little Rhynehart had told her about the difficult journey magicals made just to get from the other side onto a Border reservation. But trying to fit into a new home that was so completely different from their own—not just a different country, but an entirely different world—was apparently even harder.

  When she finally finished laughing, Cheyenne went back to her chair behind the desk and plopped into it. “A year, and they still don’t know their way around underwear.”

  That made her stop short, and she thought of her tour through Rez 38, the training centers and schools in Q2, the marketplace set up only for magicals in Q3, all those houses in neat little rows in Q4, where the refugees were given a place to live safely but were otherwise left to their own devices.

  The Accord and the FRoE weren’t actually helping these magicals find and make a better life. They just cataloged the whole thing—every magical and their race and maybe some of their background—before lettin
g them out into the world with no clue what they were doing. No jobs. No tour through the closest city. No warnings about which neighborhoods were safe, where they could find other magicals, how they’d bring suspicion on themselves if they made one wrong move.

  “Like letting a dog free in the woods and expecting it to survive.”

  All the laughter that had been a more-than-welcome break from the rough day melted out of her when she realized how useless the FRoE’s Accord and their “assimilation” with the world on this side of the Border really were.

  They don’t care about any of these people. They don’t even try to step in until things get really bad. And they think they’re doing a good thing.

  She sighed and hung her head, trying to keep the image of that goblin kid’s face—glassy, dead eyes open in surprise—out of her mind. It had returned full-force, and Cheyenne wanted to punch something.

  The FRoE’s system was broken, and the “Earthside Dream” was a lie. She rubbed her face, then sat up straight in the chair and smoothed her black hair away from her face. If Yadje thinks a halfling will fix it all, she’s got the wrong halfling.

  It took her a moment to calm down again after realizing what a huge joke the FRoE and the reservations and the Border Accords were. Then the exhaustion from the last few hours finally caught up to her. The halfling picked herself up out of her chair, turned off the monitor, and went to her backpack to grab her cell phone from the front pocket. She tried not to look at the basket of fancy, brightly colored troll-crafted underwear as she headed to bed.

  She’d stripped, climbed under the sheets, and grabbed her phone to make sure her normal alarm on the weekdays was turned off for tomorrow. Saturdays were for sleeping in.

  Just when she set her phone down, the thing buzzed on the bedside table and lit up with a text from Ember.

  Hey, just fyi. Looks like I get to stay at the hospital for a few more days. And they’re funneling me right into the rehab and therapy the doc suggested. I didn’t lift a finger to make this happen. Crazy, right?