by Martha Carr
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 letting 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 t
o 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?
Cheyenne smiled. If Ember was trying to get a confession out of the halfling, she’d have to do a lot better than that. She texted back a response that was just as vague.
Yeah, totally crazy. Glad you’re getting what you need. Let me know if you need me for anything. I’ll start shopping for badass canes.
Chapter Nineteen
At 9:30 the next morning, Cheyenne walked quickly down the hallway of the recovery ward at the VCU Medical Center with a bag of takeout from 821 Cafe in her arms. Apparently, sleeping in these days meant she got up on her own just after 8:00, and she wanted to start today off with something that was just for fun. Mostly.
She stopped at Room 317 and knocked quickly before opening it. Ember was sitting up in the hospital bed with an open book in her hands. The injured fae looked a heck of a lot better than Cheyenne had seen her so far. Her blonde hair was brushed and tied back in a loose ponytail. There was more color in her cheeks, and she’d finally managed to get out of that stupid hospital gown and into the light sweater Cheyenne had brought with the other clothes a couple of days before.
Ember looked up at her friend, dog-eared the page in her book, and tossed it onto the sheets beside her. “Well, hey.”
“Morning.” The halfling flashed her friend an exaggerated grin.
“Woah. You’re not gonna start growling at me, are you?”
“My smile’s that bad, huh?”
Ember laughed. “Only when you don’t actually mean it.”
“Thank God I don’t have to force myself to smile at you anymore.”
“Oh, is that what you’ve been doing all this time? What’s that?”
Cheyenne rolled the bedside table on wheels toward the foot of her friend’s bed, then dragged the crappy armchair closer and sat. “Just some surprise goodness from 821.”
Ember stared at the takeout bag on the bedside table and hummed in approval. “You know, I’ve always wanted someone to bring me breakfast in bed.”
Cheyenne snorted and opened the bag to take out the to-go boxes and put them on the table.
“This looks like the complete opposite of hospital-approved nourishment.”
“Yeah, well, I brought you microwaved pizza rolls the other day, and you seem to be doing just fine. If Dr. Andrews has a problem with it, he can take it up with me.” The halfling froze, blinked, and shook her head. “Actually, I think we’re all better off if I avoid that guy altogether.”
“Yeah, he tried to hide it, but I think he was really freaked out about the whole emergency tech-removal surgery. He asked me a lot of questions yesterday.”
“He did?” Cheyenne grabbed the box of rosemary potatoes with bacon, ham, sausage, and cheese and offered it to Ember, secretly knowing her friend would opt for the box of Nutella-stuffed French toast instead. Which she did, nodding. “What did you tell him?”
“Just your whole life’s story and all the secrets you’re trying to keep and how much trouble you’d be in if the wrong people found out about what you’re doing.”
“Em.”
The fae looked at Cheyenne with wide eyes, then burst out laughing. “I’m kidding. Are you serious?”
With a snort, the halfling shook her head and unwrapped a plastic fork before crossing her legs beneath her in the armchair. “After everything I’ve seen and heard in the last couple days, it honestly wouldn’t surprise me if even you stopped acting like yourself.”
“Wait a minute!” Ember laughed around a forkful of her breakfast.
“No, I know I can trust you.” Cheyenne jammed a bite of greasy, cheesy potatoes into her mouth and talked around it. “It’s everyone else I’m worried about. The people who seem like they know what they’re doing are turning out to be just another huge part of the problem. And all the good people with better intentions and no secrets have no idea what they’re doing.”
“Huh. And you started talking in riddles all of a sudden.”
Cheyenne rolled her eyes. “Yeah, I know. It’s ridiculous.”
“Is that orange juice?”
“Yep.”
“With pulp?”
“Just for you.”
Grinning, Ember stuck a straw into the jumbo-sized to-go cup and gulped for at least ten seconds. “Oh, man. That’s so much better than the watered-down crap they bring up here in those stupid plastic cups.”
“Yeah, I knew you’d like that.”
“So.” Ember took another bite, closed her eyes to enjoy it, and swallowed. “Who are these good people with no secrets? I didn’t even know that was a thing.”
Cheyenne had to chew and swallow her giant mouthful of bacon and potatoes with extra hot sauce before she could answer. “I just found out yesterday that there’s a family of trolls living three doors down from me.”
“Woah, what?”
“Yeah. A couple and their daughter. I guess they’ve been over here for about a year or something. It’s not really, uh, I don’t know. Maybe a year just isn’t long enough to figure out human things?”
Ember smirked around her food. “Did they just move in or something?”
“Nope. Been there the whole time. And I had absolutely no idea.”
“So, what? You just bumped into them in the hall?”
The halfling buried her smirk in the to-go cup of coffee, then shook her head. “More like I barged in on an orc trying to shake them down for…hell, I don’t know what. Only took me a minute to get the guy off their hands, and now they’re pretty much tripping over themselves to thank me more than it’s worth.”
“You got the guy off their hands.”
“Yeah, more like off their living room floor.” Cheyenne shrugged. “After I put him there.”
“Holy crap.” Ember dropped her plastic fork into the to-go box and stared at her friend. “You met the neighbors by beating up a bad guy in their living room.”
“Pretty much.”
“So why aren’t you as amused by this as I thought you’d be?”
The halfling took another bite, chewed, and waited until Ember’s mouth was full too. “They made me like a hundred pairs of underwear as a thank-you gift.”
Ember choked and sprayed bits of her breakfast into the to-go box. “What?”
Cheyenne just let out another qu
iet laugh and drank more coffee.
“What the— Hand me one of those napkins, huh?” Ember snatched them from her friend’s outstretched hand and wiped the mess she’d made of her breakfast off her mouth and the front of her sweater. “Are you serious?”
“They were too.”
“Underwear.”
“Bright colors and shiny dangly parts and everything. I could open a belly-dancing costume shop with how much they put in that basket.”
Ember barked another laugh. “That’s…so cute.”
“They were really embarrassed. Now they wanna make it up to me by inviting me over for dinner so they can make me something I’ll actually appreciate, I guess.”
“Well, that’s nice.”
Shoveling another forkful into her mouth, Cheyenne just shrugged. “I mean, I’ve seen magicals eat before. Not a big deal. But if they think making me a bunch of fancy underwear is a grand gesture, I’m a little worried about their idea of sharing a meal.”
“Oh, come on. It’ll be fine. You’re making friends.” Ember grinned.
“I wasn’t trying to.”
“You’re making magical friends. With your neighbors.”
Cheyenne shot the fae a deadpan glare. “Keep saying it like that, and I’m gonna have to find a new apartment complex. I really like this one.”
Shaking her head, Ember took another bite, then set her half-eaten breakfast back on the bedside table. “I’m so full. That’s the weird part. I used to put one of these things away in five minutes, and then I sleep for too many days and wake up to sit around on my ass all day, and now I can’t keep up with you.”
Slurping the last bit of breakfast into her mouth, Cheyenne paused over the to-go box and flicked her gaze toward her friend.
Ember laughed. “See? I got a lotta work ahead of me before I get back up to full speed.”
The halfling stuck her empty box back into the takeout bag and licked her lips. “You look like you’re doing really well, though. All things considered.”
“Yeah. All things.” With a little sigh, Ember settled her hands in her lap again and nodded slowly. “And now I get to focus on just how much rehab I can handle. Just outta the blue, you know? Everything’s all taken care of, paid for up front for like two months out. I mean, I’ve always been lucky, but this feels excessive.”
