by Danny Bell
“Yeah, of course we’re in,” Jason began. “Whatever you—”
“No,” Teague interrupted. “Sorry, man, but this is what I was talking about with you earlier. Exactly what I was talking about! We go looking for trouble, it’s going to find us, and I’m not with it. Elana, if you need me for regular life things, I got you. But I know what this is before you say it. It’s you about to wreck our lives so you can play hero.”
Olivia stood up forcefully at that. “Hey, she didn’t go looking for this!”
“So you know what this is?” Teague asked, accusation rich in her voice.
“No, but—”
“Of course you do. You’re really going to be the voice of reason on this?” Teague insisted. “Am I high right now? You know better than the rest of us what happens when—!”
“Whoa!” Ann said suddenly, stopping Teague before she could finish that horrible thought.
“The hell did you just say to me?” Olivia was incensed, and Claire and Jason got in front of her immediately.
“Hey!” I said loud enough that I got everyone’s attention. “Teague, you’re right. The last thing I want to do is put you in danger, so it’s for the best if you’re not here for this next part. That doesn’t change the fact that you absolutely need to be back here tonight, in a few hours at the most. I’m serious. It won’t be safe anywhere else, you understand?”
Teague gave me a look like the heat was leaving her, but she didn’t know what to do with it. She looked from Olivia to me and back to Olivia again. I could’ve sworn she wanted to say something, but she left instead. I moved to Olivia the second the door closed, ready to calm her down.
“Logan?” Olivia spat. “She goes straight to Logan?”
“Hey, she’s scared,” I said softly as I put an arm around her, quietly amazed at how calm I’d managed to remain. “She wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
“I don’t give a shit,” Olivia swore. “She crossed a line.”
“Then let’s do what we can now to make sure we can to keep Logan safe, okay?” I asked patiently.
Olivia nodded her head at that, still in shock at where Teague took things. “Okay. Tell us what’s happening.”
“Maybe take a second, grab a coffee or something,” I suggested. “I know that wasn’t where you thought this conversation was going to go.
“I’m fine,” Olivia insisted.
“Yeah? Well, I’m not. That was intense,” Claire added, giving me a knowing glance. “Come on, I think we could all use a coffee, my treat. Elana, since this is technically your shift, do you want to give me a hand?”
The others took the hint and sat down as Claire and I went behind the counter. I got the grinder and press out, and Claire got the cups ready. “Do you got this?” The question was asked with trepidation and was waiting on a sincere reply.
“The coffee or the situation?” The lack of response from Claire meant I should have known better about which one she meant. “I sort of have to, right?” I replied, giving the side of the grinder a little whack to dislodge some sediment.
“Seriously, everyone here is a little raw, but they respect you,” Claire said. “Everyone misses Logan, Chalsarda is M-I-A, and Teague just broke the solidarity, so read the room. Take charge, make everyone know that you can handle this, because if it’s as bad as you say, they’re going to need to believe in you.”
“They need General Elana, got it,” I replied sarcastically.
I felt Claire’s slap to the back of my head before I ever saw her hand move. I wanted to say something, but the sternness in her gaze shut me up. “That answer but actually that answer, right?”
“All right, Jesus!” I hissed, gathering the steaming mugs with Claire and taking them to our friends.
As I played the role of waitress, my mind went to an old Fry and Laurie sketch where Stephen Fry smacked Hugh Laurie with a cricket bat and caught him more squarely than he needed to. Hugh Laurie broke character after stumbling around clutching his head for a bit and, with a frustrated yelp, shouted, “Never mind the frigging sketch, that was too hard!” I was tempted to shout something similar at Claire, but I didn’t. I think sometimes she doesn’t know her own strength. In fact, I know it.
I pushed away the annoying throbbing in the back of my head and gave everyone a silent invitation to raise mugs to each other and took a short but satisfying sip before I continued.
“I wasn’t kidding when I told Teague this was the only safe place to be after tonight,” I said to the group, before taking a deep breath. “This is going to be hard for me to say. There’s no easy way to put this, so I’ll just say it. Freyja made me steal, or at least try to steal, an artifact from a Japanese storm god if I wanted to keep our deal for Logan going, and then what was possibly a fox spirit took that artifact and now that storm god, whose name, by the way, is Susano-o, it’s Susano-o by the way, is having an eight-headed snake monster try to kill me and anyone who tries to help me, but Freyja made this shop neutral ground, but also Susano-o is going to slowly try to flood the city until either me or the eight-headed snake monster, who by the way, its name is the Orochi, it’s the Orochi by the way, is defeated but also, Freyja is kind of blocking the rain, and nothing is going to attack you until, like, midnight. Midnightish. Oh, and that’s when the rain starts. Is everyone caught up?”
“That is the absolute worst way to convey information!” Ann exclaimed, dropping her mug just high enough off the table that it didn’t splash too much. “You can’t just info dump like that. None of us had time to process, and we’re all going to need you to tell us all of that all over again.”
“I said it was going to be hard to say,” I countered.
“You think? Did you even breathe in during all that?”
So, I took it from the top. Once more with feeling and all that, straddling the border between too much information and overloading everyone with the knowledge of our impending doom, but this time I used shorter sentences.
“And then we all drown?” Jason added cautiously, peering into his empty mug. I stared into the dark liquid of my own cup, studying my slightly twisted reflection for a moment.
General Elana, reporting for duty.
“No, not if I do what I need to,” I said, still unclear on the complete definition of what that meant. “Look, no one here is useless, we all have things we can do. Claire, this is your shop, so keep an eye on it, and let everyone know what you need. Ration the food, keep an eye on the rain, all of that.”
Claire nodded, and I looked at Jason. “You’re a history nerd, and that’s awesome because we need that. Get online and see if you can connect some dots between the real-world history of all of this with all the mythology stuff that I guess is also history or whatever. Look, buddy, you know what I mean.”
“Have you figured out that sap spell?” I asked Olivia.
“Of course, I have,” she replied tightly. It was one that she made a personal point to master early on.
“Well, between that, a couple of tarps, and a ladder, you can keep the roof from leaking. And I’m sure Claire would appreciate her thousands of books staying dry.”
“I would definitely appreciate that very much,” Claire confirmed soberly as if this was the first time she realized her books could be flooded.
“Take my rod and go slow with the spell, and really try to save your strength since you’re going back out with me later.”
Olivia blinked in surprise, probably because she wasn’t going to have to fight me for once. Truth is, I didn’t have a warrior elf or a security team or a deity I could summon. I would need the backup, and Olivia was stronger than me. More importantly, though, I trusted her. Olivia got to work without another word, and when she was out of earshot, I turned to face Ann.
“What about me?” Ann asked, giving her hands a little clap.
I took a step towards Ann, leaning well into her comfort zone, and whispered into her ear, feeling the tension from her as I did. “You and I need to talk ab
out who you and Chalsarda killed and why you hid it from me.”
Chapter Twelve
The shock on Ann’s face as I took a step away from her could not have been more apparent than if she’d just touched the terminals on a car battery.
“She told you?” Ann gasped.
“Worse,” I growled. “She didn’t. Come here.”
I took Ann to a back corner in the shop where rows of books and, hopefully, a sense of duty would mask our conversation. Her cheeks were flushing red, betraying something bordering frantic and uncertain, but I was pretty sure my mood was about to overshadow it.
“Dude! What the hell?” I didn’t know exactly how I was going to react here, but I practically shaking with an effort not to yell. “It’s true?”
“Yeah, it’s true!” Ann said in a huff, looking past me to the rest of the shop. “But if Chalsarda didn’t tell you, who did?”
“Oh, we are most definitely getting to that, but first, you’re telling me everything!”
“Dude!” Ann’s eyes snapped to meet mine.
“Dude,” I expertly countered.
Ann looked ready to show me her lunch. “Look, I can’t.”
That wasn’t the answer I was looking for. “Seriously? After all the crap you all have given me about keeping secrets—”
“No, I just mean.” Ann adjusted her glasses and stopped to compose herself. “Chalsarda isn’t here, and she knows way more than I do. I’m sorry we didn’t tell you, but it was crazy dangerous, and we thought it was done.”
Images of those poor people at the IHOP tearing into each other popped into my mind. “Well, it really, really wasn’t. So, give me something here, Ann! Jesus Christ.”
Ann seemed to hesitate for an instant before resignation showed on her face. “Whatever. The whole point of keeping it from you in the first place is kind of moot if you already know, right? Well, how about this. We almost died.”
“We almost die all the time,” I replied harshly. “But we also tell each other why. Something you’ve made abundantly clear to me in the past.”
Ann looked hurt at that, which made us even. “Don’t be a dick. I’m sorry, okay?”
“Let’s hold apologies until the end of the presentation, how did you two almost die?”
“Chalsarda’s ex poisoned me,” she nearly spat. “And he manipulated Chalsarda and I into some pretty dark shit, happy?”
That took me off guard and, all of a sudden, I did, indeed, feel like a dick. “Chalsarda has an ex?”
“Had,” Ann corrected. “He’s dead, and good-goddamn-riddance.”
“Why?”
“This is the part I was sort of hoping Chalsarda could tell you.” Ann looked less happy by the moment.
“Well, she’s not here and you are. Trust me when I tell you, any and all parts of your story have the potential to wreck our shit, so I need to know.”
“Okay, if you need to know that bad, then here.” Ann’s tone gave me the sense that she wasn’t trying to be as helpful as that statement implied. “Chalsarda spent most of her life doing horrific, awful things because she was a slave to an immortal asshole, but we don’t think about that too much, do we? We don’t want to think about the insane amount of willpower she must have had to not lose her soul working for a goddamn demon like Abarta, do we? It’s not fun to think about the betrayal she’s lived with all that time, we take for granted that she trusts us at all, somehow, after all the…!” At some point, Ann began shouting and trailed off.
Claire and Jason poked their heads in our direction.
“Are you two okay back there?” Claire asked cautiously.
“Uh, kind of,” I called back. “Just give us a minute.”
When I turned back towards Ann, she was sobbing. Huge ugly sobs that looked like they were physically hurting with each one. “You…shit. You Knew her, didn’t you?”
Knowing someone is one of the abilities people like Ann and me just sort of have, and neither of us have a firm grasp on the specifics. If someone offers their hand willingly, we can take information from them. Give some of our own back as well, if we’re so inclined. What we take is the most they could ever give. Their life, their thoughts, their feelings. It’s not always reliable, no one’s memories ever are, but it’s also more than that. We feel them, sometimes for a long while after. The long-term side effects are unknown, and it’s not like I went to school for that sort of thing.
Ann violently pulled her glasses off her face and clutched at her eyes. Eventually, she nodded her head, but said nothing. Neither did I. I wanted to comfort her, tell her it would all be okay, but I didn’t. I also wanted to tell her that taking on two centuries worth of pain was probably the dumbest thing she’d ever done, that I was furious at Chalsarda for offering when neither of them could’ve known for sure what would happen. I didn’t do that either. What I wanted to do most of all was cry with her. She was one of my closest friends and favorite people, and she was in agony, but I didn’t dare let myself do that with everything on the way.
Instead, I said, “Hey, come on. I have a box outside that I cry in all the time.”
I took my friend away from the store to sit in Big Sister, quiet even as we climbed in, and gave her a moment to just let it out. When it looked like it was under control a bit, I finally spoke again. “I’m sorry for being an asshole. I had no idea.”
“Pretty dumb, right?” Ann sniffed hard.
“I mean, yeah, I’m not going to lie to you, that was dumb as hell,” I started, drawing a small sour laugh from Ann. “But also, you know, not at all. You two have really grown close, I guess it makes sense. I’m afraid to Know people, that shit sticks with you. Remember when I Knew Bres?”
“Yeah, none of us had any idea any of this stuff was even real back then.”
“Bres was actively trying to shield his mind from me. I only got a glimpse of his life, and the anger he feels at the injustice of, god, just existence as a concept, is something that I have to suppress sometimes. I feel it too, probably the way he feels it. I’ll be having a nice day and, out of nowhere, that jerk pops up in my head.”
“I’m sorry,” Ann said weakly.
“What?” I was genuinely surprised to hear that. “Dude, no! I’m just making a point, I’m just saying that to take on as much as Chalsarda has, it was…it was kind. And brave. And compassionate. And I don’t know that I would have done the same thing given the chance, and even just the fact that she offered that to you and not me is… I’m glad she has you. You two have something special.”
“She’s getting better,” Ann said after a moment. “The gratitude she feels for you is enormous and, like, right now I’m feeling it and I can’t help it. The way she feels about you was one of the strongest parts of that experience we had, so don’t get mad at her, okay? She didn’t involve you in our mess for your sake, she wasn’t trying to deceive you.”
“That’s fine, but I need to know more,” I said evenly. “This Knowing stuff doesn’t change that.”
“Yeah, I know.” Residual pain reached Ann’s eyes but she continued, went into her story. What a story it was. Abarta recruited a traveler like Ann and me, a man named Alistair, to find an elf for him. Someone with a lifespan long enough to fit into Abarta’s plans and, as a fae being, someone he could keep under his thumb. That traveler came back, now with two hundred years of magic on his side, and poisoned Ann to get to Chalsarda. Forced her to track a bounty for the Gardeners or someone like them, despite the fact they’re not supposed to be in the city at all. Something called a Battle Born, which, when explained, sounded not too far off from something out of a comic book.
In the end, Chalsarda killed her Wizard ex and freed the bounty, a super strong woman named Debbie, formerly known as the aforementioned Battle Born. Turns out Alistair wasn’t the only casualty along the way. Members of the organization, an honest to god Harpy straight out of Greek mythology, and a whole mess of cult members and their leader all got killed in her wake, most of it bloody
. Ann made it all sound like I’d missed a war.
They were fine now, but not overnight. Ann was weakened from prolonged poisoning and Chalsarda had been hit with a thousand different kinds of magic, none of it pleasant, but she’s still standing. Most of her recovery was due to a potion maker that Ann had begun an apprenticeship under, who nursed the two of them back to health, as well as Debbie, who was now off living a new life. Happy endings all around, it would seem, but when compared to the rest of the story, I understood a lot more why Ann was crying. I wanted to cry as well.
“Is that it?” I asked, finally, when it was all done. “Is that everything?”
Ann paused for a long moment, not looking at me before she nodded her head and spoke. “Yes, that’s all of it.”
I hated myself for the split second that I considered that she might’ve been lying, and I let it go. I blew out my cheeks and muttered a curse under my breath. Ann heard it and echoed the sentiment. “Well, my turn. Do you remember a Kate? White streak in her hair, probably not human?”
“Didn’t catch her name, but she tried to set Chalsarda and me on fire. Whammied Chalsarda on the way out when things got nuts. Debbie’s pretty sure that’s who killed all those cultists at the compound,” Ann answered, then added, “Didn’t realize she wasn’t human.”
“Well, she blames me, came at me last night. Tried to kill a bunch of people with a curse just to make a point; said she’s going to pick us apart until I’m just as broken as she is.”
“You weren’t even there! Why you?”
“Doesn’t matter to her, but she knew that I freed Chalsarda, and that shouldn’t be possible unless Abarta told her himself. Super short list of people who know about that. Not even Olivia or the rest know the particulars, and you only know because you Know, you know? Either way, Kate’s blaming me, but I get the feeling there’s something else going on. Definite bully vibes coming off her.”
