by Eric Asher
“Are you a goth?” I asked, completely losing the grip on my anger again. The kid could disarm me in a moment. I wondered subconsciously if that was really why I had been avoiding her.
“I’m undead,” she said. “It seems fitting.”
“I’m sorry.” The words felt inadequate. “I don’t want to put you at risk, but you’re exposed now.”
She ran her fingers through Jasper’s fur. “It’s not your choice anymore. It hasn’t been your choice for the last year.”
I frowned, fishing for the right way to apologize to her, to tell her how happy I was she was home, to tell her how much we all talked about her, to tell her she had another family at Death’s Door.
Instead, I stood there like a mute idiot while the child—young woman, if I was being honest with myself—rose to her feet, walked over to me, and put her arms around me.
“I missed you,” Vicky said.
“Missed you too, kid.” I failed to fight back the tremor in my voice.
“Next time, just talk to me. Don’t make me ride a dragon through the Arch to get your attention.”
Jasper trilled on her shoulder, and I let a tiny laugh slip.
“Let’s go talk to the folks,” she said. “You could’ve at least responded to my dad’s letter. That was just rude.”
“But I—” I started, remember the words of gratitude her father had written me. But how could I respond to that? What could I say? She grabbed my wrist and pulled me out of the room, dragging me down the hallway while the realization dawned on me that I hadn’t gotten a single answer I was looking for.
CHAPTER SEVEN
A minute later, I was sitting in the living room, my back against a rather uncomfortably rigid floral-patterned chair. The family on the couch across from me looked like any other. A nuclear family, two parents with their arms around an irritated teenager and a fluffy dragon pacing back and forth on the back of the couch.
Okay, so maybe they weren’t like any other family.
I waited for them to say something until I couldn’t take it anymore. “Was there anything you wanted to talk about? Because I have a few things to tell you.”
James glanced at his watch. “Let’s just give it another minute. Then we can say what needs to be said.”
I frowned and looked at my own wrist before remembering I didn’t have a watch on. In fact, I almost never wore a watch. It was just one of those annoying things, if you see someone else check their watch, you glance down to check yours, even if you aren’t wearing one.
I doubt it was more than another minute, even though it felt like an eternity. For a split second, the room shook like a rare Missouri earthquake had struck beneath our feet. Lori patted Vicky on the shoulder and stood up, heading for the front door. Voices drifted in from outside.
Just as Lori cracked the door open, I heard the old New Orleans drawl of an irritated Cajun.
“You crushed their petunias,” Zola said, not even trying to hide the exasperation in her voice.
“These things can be hard to judge,” Aeros’s voice boomed back. “There are many rocks in this property, and I do apologize for moving the wrong ones.”
“Crushed them flat,” Zola muttered. “Ah’m sorry about that, Lori.”
Aeros crouched down until he was peering through the front door. “Greetings, Vicky. It is good to see your family doing well. I rather miss your visits with Shiawase.”
Zola interrupted the rock. “I’ll ride back with Damian. You head to the base. Make sure that fairy hasn’t stabbed anyone else.” Zola sighed and shook her head.
“Be well,” Aeros said to no one in particular as he vanished into the ground once more. There was a brief rumbling as the sod closed over the hole and the mulch churned to cover the flattened petunias.
It was about then I realized I was now standing, staring slack-jawed at Zola. “Zola! What the fuck?”
“Language,” Lori said.
My eyes flashed to Lori before returning to Zola as she stepped through the front door.
“Ah asked them to call me when you showed up. Thought it might be best for everyone.”
“It’s good to see you again,” James said.
“Likewise.”
“Again?” I felt like I’d accidentally skipped several chapters of a very important book. “What do you mean again?”
“You know damn well what Ah mean by again, boy,” Zola snapped.
Vicky blew out a slow breath. “Zola was worried my parents were going to flip out when my memories returned. The whole death resurrection now I’m a teenager thing. You remember that?”
I blinked at Vicky. The friendly girl I’d come to love had turned into a miniature version of my unbelievably sarcastic sister. I was both horrified and impressed.
Zola let out an exasperated breath. “Ah would not have put it so crudely, but yes, Ah spent some time with the family a couple weeks after Vicky came home. Wanted them to understand what happened, and Ah wanted Vicky to understand why you might not be around that much.” She stepped forward and poked a finger into my chest.
“Ouch,” I said.
I made my way back to the chair and watched as Vicky hopped up and hugged Zola. The things Zola sometimes did without me knowing, or without anyone knowing, surprised the hell out of me. She didn’t have to make time for these people. Zola had done enough with her life. She’d saved enough people, and the world was better for her work.
“I just wanted to thank you,” James said. “The letter I sent you was never enough. Nothing could ever be enough.”
“You gave us more time,” Lori said. “Every day has been a gift.”
“I didn’t …” I started. “I couldn’t …”
And I felt the dam breaking in my chest. That hopeless sense that I was going to tear this family apart again.
I tried to speak, but no words would come. Moisture gathered at the edges of my eyes a split second before Zola’s palm cracked across my cheek.
“This is why I’m here boy.” She stepped closer to me, and despite the difference in our height, she stared me down. “You may never think what you did was good enough, but it was better than that. You saved that girl, boy. And there is nothing more you could have done.”
“Nothing,” James said, echoing Zola’s words.
“I told you he’s stubborn,” Vicky said.
I choked out a halfhearted laugh and smiled at the kid.
She scratched behind her ear. “I know you felt you had to stay away. And I know I have to go with you now.”
“Although that does lead me to a question,” Lori said. She exchanged a glance with James and wrung her hands. “If something happens to our daughter, and that means it happens to you, why exactly would you give her a dragon?”
I laughed nervously. I wasn’t sure I had the best answer to that question. “Jasper’s a guardian. He kept me and my sister safe when we were kids, when my powers first started … causing issues. And a couple years ago, he helped us fight off the fairies that destroyed so much on the east coast. You guys know the whole story?”
“Once my memory started coming back,” Vicky said, “it wasn’t like I was going to keep it from them. I don’t think they were any safer not knowing.”
“Certainly not with what’s been going on in the world,” Zola said. “They need to have an understanding of what could come calling.”
I cursed under my breath and sank back into the chair. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I looked up at Zola.
“You had too many close calls, Damian. Ah was a little worried you might do something stupid and end up getting all three of you killed. But as you’ve been doing stupid things all your life, and haven’t ended up dead yet, Ah figured the time had come.”
She winked at me, which told me a lot in one gesture. There was truth to her words, lord knew I’d done some stupid shit over the years, but there was more to her reasoning. I trusted Zola, maybe more than I trusted anyone else on this earth. And that would be enough
for me, for now.
“Did Vicky tell you she knows Drake?” I asked. “That was a new one on me.”
Zola turned toward Vicky, who had retaken her seat on the couch. One of the old Cajun’s eyebrow slowly arched, and I watched Vicky try to disappear into the couch cushions. I knew exactly how she felt.
“Who’s Drake?” James asked, exchanging a look with Lori.
“Yes, Vicky,” Zola said, settling into a chair across the room. “Why don’t you tell us who Drake is to you?”
Vicky frowned at Zola. “Drake’s just an old fairy with a dragon. Like Jasper. He’s nice enough, even if you’ve had your differences with him.” She sounded angry, like Zola had made a ridiculous accusation about a childhood friend. But Drake had fought alongside the Fae for millennia. Aideen and Foster thought he was older than they were, and that left his true age to be anyone’s guess.
“He attacked Casper and Park’s squad,” I said.
Vicky blew out a breath.
I cocked my head.
“What has he told you?” Zola asked.
Vicky crossed her arms. “It doesn’t matter. I believe him.”
I blinked at the girl. She sounded wiser than she should, and confident in her convictions about Drake and his dragon. I’d been face-to-face with them before, and while I thought the dragon seemed pretty okay, I couldn’t say the same for Drake. I suspected his agendas had agendas of their own. He wasn’t someone I’d be quick to trust.
Zola drummed her fingers on her knobby old cane. “Drake was responsible for your aerial performance downtown.”
Vicky crossed her arms. “I was helping a friend out of a tight spot. And speaking of friends, I hear Hugh has been having problems of his own.”
I leaned forward. “Hugh and the River Pack have been in Kansas City, facing down some of their leftovers.”
Vicky shook her head. “You don’t understand. You haven’t seen the worst of them yet.”
Her words curdled in my stomach. I still remembered the dark-touched from the Burning Lands. I remembered how well-spoken it had been, and even though that one had been a Geryon, Graybeard said he’d seen the like in the ranks of the dark-touched. A small part of me had hoped they’d been lost or had vanished completely when the Seal was restored. Vicky’s words made me think they hadn’t been.
Zola frowned. “That would make a terrible kind of sense. None of the creatures we’ve battled would’ve entered into a contract with Nudd. They may have been controlled by him, or manipulated by him, but not part of a conscious agreement like so many of the Fae seem to think exists.”
I nodded. “You told them about Koda?”
“The old ghost likes books,” Lori said. “She’s mentioned him once or twice. But mostly the panda bear.”
“Panda samurai,” Vicky said under her breath.
I grinned at the kid for a moment. “Koda thinks the dark-touched might be a hive mind. But not in the traditional sense of the word. He thinks it’s more ordered, like a military structure, where a few in charge give orders to those below them, and so on. Until it trickles down to the ground troops, like the rabid creatures we fought.”
“And is that good or bad?” James asked.
Zola shrugged. “We don’t know. And Koda might be wrong. Though Ah think Ah could count on one hand the times that ghost has been wrong.”
“I want to help,” Vicky said.
I leaned back, unable to stop my eyebrows from rising. “I have to get you out of here for your own safety, but that doesn’t mean I’m putting you in harm’s way.”
“Why not? I’m faster than you. And I’m better armed than half your allies. Maybe more than that, if you count Jasper.” The ball of fluff on her shoulder puffed up and trilled.
“Kid.” I rubbed at my forehead.
Vicky narrowed her eyes. “You can’t stop me. You might as well use me.”
I looked helplessly over to her parents.
James tilted his head to one side. “This is her decision. It’s true you can’t stop her. Trust me.”
Lori patted him on the knee, and her words sounded rehearsed. “Our daughter is strong, and brave, and she’s fought battles we can scarcely imagine.”
I slowly turned back to Vicky. “You told them about the Burning Lands?”
She nodded.
I tried to imagine what that must’ve been like. Did her parents think she was insane? Or did they just accept it? They already knew their daughter had come back from the dead. They’d seen the power she could wield. They’d seen her dragon. Stories of the Burning Lands probably weren’t so much of a stretch after that.
“It sounds like her friend Carter took good care of her,” Lori said. “She wants to fight for his memory.”
“And Maggie,” Vicky said.
The words gutted me. Every logical argument I was scrambling for fled in a heartbeat. Carter and Maggie had watched over her. The whole Ghost Pack had. This girl had been through hell, died, been to a different kind of hell, and come back. It wasn’t my place to stop her.
Zola nodded once. “I think the real concern here is what happens if Nudd loses control of the dark-touched. The military can’t drop a nuke on every harbinger that pops up. And if Koda’s suspicions are right, and there is a chain of command within the dark-touched, we don’t know what’s coming.”
“But it’s what we have to be ready for,” I said. “Vicky, it’s why I am worried about you getting into this. And Drake is a manipulative bastard. I’m worried about that, too.” My words came out in a hurry to preempt any protest. “I won’t stop you from helping, but you have got to be careful. Stay close to one of us as often as you can. If you’re not at home, I’d feel better if you were with Foster and Sam, or even Frank.”
“The arms dealer?” Lori said, raising an eyebrow. “I may take issue with that.”
“He’s not a …” I started before turning back to Vicky. “What have you been telling them?”
“Only what they need to know,” Vicky said.
Zola let out a slow laugh. “Oh, Ah do like this one. It’s good to have you back, girl.”
I groaned and sank back into my chair.
“What can we do?” James asked.
“If you’d like,” I said, “I can give you my parents’ phone number. They don’t live far from here, and they’re pretty well experienced with some weird shit, too. They do have a necromancer for a son and a vampire for a daughter.”
Lori shook her head. “That would be wonderful, thank you. It would be nice to speak to some fellow …” She glanced over at Vicky. “Some fellow ‘commoners,’ as our daughter calls them.”
Zola smiled. “Ah think you’ll like them just fine.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
We spent a few more minutes talking to James and Lori. They seemed to be trying to convince us they were happy with whatever decisions their daughter made, but I didn’t understand how anyone could be happy knowing their daughter would be put in harm’s way. Or worse, knowing she was always in harm’s way, being tied to me and Sam.
James held up a finger before asking, “Are we safe here?”
I hesitated, cutting myself off before I could even begin to speak words that weren’t true. “Probably not. I don’t think anyone who’s friends with me or my family is safe. You’ll be safer if Vicky isn’t here.”
James nodded, though we hadn’t really answered his question. “Sounds like a good time to visit the relatives in Texas.”
I stood up to go, and Zola followed me to the front door. Vicky trailed behind her, scooping up her backpack from behind the chair and tossing it over her shoulder.
“She always keeps a backpack,” Lori said. “Ever since she got home.”
“I wonder where she learned that?” Zola said, her forehead wrinkling.
I laughed nervously and ducked out the front door, hoping to avoid an awkward conversation about how I’d turned their child into a prepper.
“Damian,” Lori said.
I
paused and started to turn, unable to hide the surprise as Vicky’s mom wrapped her arms around me.
“Thank you.”
James reached over his wife and clasped my shoulder. He didn’t say more, but he didn’t need to. I nodded to them both, and headed for the ’32 Victoria parked in their driveway.
“Aeros really flattened those petunias,” Vicky said as the door clicked closed behind us. She followed Zola around the car and hopped in the back seat.
“Aeros did good,” Zola said, closing the car door behind her. “He didn’t accidentally crush me, and he got the job done he needed to get done.”
“Probably would’ve been easier to call a taxi,” I said. “Why didn’t you drive yourself?”
“Ah was at the cabin, boy,” Zola said. “It would’ve taken me over an hour to drive back up here. Who knows what kind of stupid things you would’ve said by then.”
I frowned for a moment. “So, you basically used Aeros as your own personal express subway?”
“Oh,” Zola said, a smile stretching out her face. “Ah rather like that.”
Vicky leaned up onto the back of the front seats. “Where to?”
I glanced at her and said, “Put your seatbelt on.”
“Are you serious?” Vicky asked. “Aren’t we a little beyond seatbelts at this point?”
“Hell no,” I said. “No one in this car is beyond a seatbelt. I’m not scraping anyone off the inside of this windshield.”
Vicky blew out an exasperated breath and flopped back into the seat. I heard the click of a belt a moment later.
“The girl did ask you a question,” Zola said. “Where are we going?”
I glanced down at the clock. “Sam and Foster will be in training for another hour. We can meet up with them for dinner after that. Let’s head to the shop and keep Aideen company.”
* * *
We made it back to Manchester Road before a memory flickered to the top of my mind. Foster had eviscerated a vampire in the basement of a parking garage. That same vampire had killed a dozen people. One of those people had been a child, and her ghost had appeared in the back of my car, this car. That night had set off a chain of events I could scarcely imagine. I don’t think anyone could have foretold that Vicky’s ghost would’ve led us to the Burning Lands, would’ve put us up against the Destroyer, or would’ve given so much power to the Ghost Pack. The question I had now was, why did she still have so much power?
