Between Shifts (The City Between Book 2)

by W. R. Gingell

  Still, it gave me something to think about on the way home with JinYeong. It was a pity Zero seemed to finish earlier than we did; walking home with JinYeong was just about as fun as walking to work with him. At least it was a bit quicker this time, though. When we were a few steps away from the supermarket, he pinched a bit of my sleeve between two fingers, as if I was something that had been dragged into the house by a cat who liked to kill small animals, and towed me Between with him.

  The bitumen beneath our feet started to look a lot spongier, and the cars around us looked a bit deader—or maybe they looked a bit more alive. They were just skeletons of metal here Between, but they were grown over with flowers and greenery, and they looked like they might still have been able to move if they wanted to. Mind you, they gave the impression that if they had moved, it would have been under their own inclinations and not at the demands of a driver, but they still looked like they could move. A sort of flock of free range cars.

  I don’t know how being Between shortens the distances between places, but I’ve got the feeling it involves magic. I know that sounds like it should be common sense, but what I mean is that I think it must be a more noticeable magic. I think my three psychos could shorten the distance when they’re out in the regular world, too, but I reckon it’s something people would notice. Like seeing the Flash out and about, you know? Here in Between, it felt like it was something that anyone who saw you kind of expected. The normal way to travel.

  That’s my guess, anyway, because none of the maybe-sentient cars paid any more attention to us when our surroundings began to blur than they had when we first arrived, and the almost-rabbit I saw foraging nearby just hopped to the side to make sure it wasn’t in our way.

  For a couple of minutes everything looked like an oil painting around me, nearly making sense but too blurred to discern the details of exactly what was happening, then life sharpened again. JinYeong still had a pained look, and a bit of my sleeve pinched between his fingers, but at least I could see Between around me properly again. Here, it was smooth and kind of bitumen-y beneath our feet, and instead of the houses that should have been on either side there were pale rocky walls divided by falling ferns at roughly house-sized intervals that grew from the top of the walls and framed a twilight sky far above us.

  I pointed up at it and asked JinYeong, “That mean we’re in Unseelie, or something?”

  Yep. I’d been studying.

  JinYeong made a contemptuous pft sound that got on my nerves a lot for how soft it was, and stopped by a section of the rocky walls.

  “Going through the back door?” I remarked.

  That made him look annoyed, which was nice; but how he expected me not to know the bits of coloured glass that made up the top section of the back door, I don’t know. They weren’t glass here on the rocky wall, mind you. What should have been pieces of red glass were shimmering reflections of light from some sort of glass or crystal covered lantern nearby, and the green and white parts of the pattern were leaves that mingled with the reflections. The pattern was pretty clear, though. When I reached out to the suggestion of a bump in the pale surface of the rock, expecting to feel the coolness of the back doorknob, it turned at once beneath my hand.

  “Jaemi obseo,” JinYeong muttered. He tossed me ahead of him by my sleeve, propelling me back into the human world with disorienting suddenness, and sauntered in after me.

  I didn’t stumble, which was a nice, smug feeling to take with me into the living room, where Athelas sat in his usual chair with one leg crossed over the other, and Zero now sat on his haunches by the coffee table, making a nonsense jigsaw puzzle of the contents of one of the files Detective Tuatu had given him. He looked cool and clean, and his hair was still damp, like he’d had to take a shower to get rid of the feeling of the cold, concrete storeroom.

  “Ah, himdulotda!” sighed JinYeong, and threw his tie on the coffee table where it caused two of the photos to flutter away. “Petteu! Coppi!”

  “Yeah, it must be so hard sitting in the office all day and flirting with the cash office ladies,” I muttered, but I kept going on and up into the kitchen, because I was pretty sure Athelas was also looking hopeful. I mean, it wasn’t like I’d killed myself working today, either.

  Zero didn’t say anything, but the tie came flying into the dining room and slid across the top of the table before slithering onto the floor. I grinned and left it where it was. JinYeong’s mellow mood had lasted longer than I expected it to last, but it looked like he was back on his regular crusade to provoke Zero into a fight. I shuffled myself a bit faster with the tea and coffee; if JinYeong was going to be a pain in the neck, there wouldn’t be any real discussion of our case—just snarling and unpleasantness and danger for pets who happened to be caught in the cross-fire.

  “A difficult day, I take it?” enquired Athelas, from the other room.

  JinYeong must have been sulking in silence, because it was Zero who said, “More boring than difficult. How was your hunting?”

  I regretted that the kettle was now boiling at full bore; it meant that Athelas’ quiet voice was harder than usual to hear.

  I think he said, “More difficult than I suspected. Did you meet with the next shadow after I called you?”

  “He was staying out of sight,” replied Zero.

  Shadow? And what did they mean by next shadow? Was that what Athelas had actually said?

  I spooned tea into Athelas’ pot and prepped the coffee pot, wondering if I’d misheard. Too late now; I’d have to ask them about it later and see if they’d tell me. Right; biscuits, coffee pot, tea pot. I had ’em all now.

  I picked up my tray to go back to the interesting part of the house, and JinYeong, his voice sour, said something that had the word dog in it. I didn’t know if he meant an actual dog, or if he was just swearing about something in Korean, so I called to Athelas, “Wosse say?”

  “He says the whole staff area smells of dog,” explained Athelas. “Hardly surprising, since we’re investigating an animal attack and you were infected with lycanthropy.”

  “Beauty!” I said, stepping down into the living room. I put my tray on one of the spare seats instead of the coffee table, with a pointed look at JinYeong. “Does that mean he can sniff out the one who did it?”

  JinYeong put his nose in the air just a fraction.

  “What, you can’t? What’s the use of a sniffer like yours, if you can’t even find a werewolf?”

  “Ya, Petteu!”

  “There are no such things as werewolves,” said Zero, accepting a cup of coffee from me.

  “So, what?” I asked, frowning. He hadn’t said that yesterday. Mind you, I seemed to remember him talking about wolf shifters, not werewolves. “I’m infected with a figment of someone’s imagination?”

  “Lycanthropy is a real condition; a subset of a virus that affects a person’s blood and physical makeup. Werewolves are a story told to frighten Behindkind children.”

  I stared at Zero. “There are things that frighten people from Behind?”

  “Lycanthropes, or shifters in the vernacular, are Behindkind that were once human—”

  “Like vampires?”

  “Ya!”

  “All right, settle down, I wasn’t insulting your ancestors,” I protested.

  “Shifters,” said Zero, in a tone of voice that shut JinYeong up as well as me, “are Behindkind that were once human and have now gained the ability to see and live Between and Behind. Most of them choose not to do so; they like the easy pickings among humans. They are one of the few things from this side of Between that can kill Behindkind.”

  “Although, technically speaking, it could be said that it’s a Behindkind virus,” mused Athelas. “Since it came about from bringing humans Behind. In any case, it’s one effect of the changeling initiative that has been unfortunate from a Behindkind viewpoint.”

  “Really?” I couldn’t help feeling a bit impressed. Go mutated humans! “What, they just tear out throats? Like
vampires?”

  JinYeong snarled at me, but to my surprise Zero answered the question.

  “Wolf shifters are stronger than normal humans, but that’s not how they kill Behindkind. The same virus that alters the chemical and metaphysical makeup of humans mutates the bodies of Behindkind past resolve. It’s a long, painful death.”

  “Naega andwae,” said JinYeong, and this time his voice was smug.

  “That’s because you’re already dead,” I told him, sitting down with the plate of biscuits. “You can’t kill someone who’s already dead.”

  For the first time since I’d met him, I saw JinYeong flinch. It was the briefest thing; a not-quite-snarl that wasn’t smug, or angry, or threatening.

  Then he stared at me for a second longer, snatched the plate of biscuits away from me, and turned his back on me to scoff them all by himself.

  I was going to say “Oi!” at him, or maybe make a dive to get the biscuits back, but just then Athelas said, “It doesn’t affect vampires because they’re not Behindkind Originals either.”

  I forgot about the biscuits and turned to look at Athelas. “Does that mean vampires can kill Behindkind, too?”

  “What a bloodthirsty little pet you are!” said Athelas, in a thoughtful sort of a way.

  Surprising me again, Zero said, “There are many things that can kill Behindkind, if you know how to use them.”

  It wasn’t until I looked at him and saw the way his icy blue eyes bored into me that it occurred to me that he thought I was planning something. I said hastily, “I’m not trying to work out how to kill you blokes! I was just interested!”

  Zero held up a fist and lifted fingers one by one. “Shifter saliva, vampire tooth, true bargain, power of name. Each of them originates from this side of Between and in the right circumstances can kill Behindkind.”

  “How the heck do you kill someone with a name?”

  “There are some things in which it doesn’t pay to be too closely interested, Pet,” said Athelas gently.

  “Yeah, but—” I stopped as another thought hit me. “Hang on, what if like a shifter ant bit you? Or a shifter mosquito? Would that kill you?”

  There was a biscuity sort of snort from JinYeong’ direction, and Athelas’ eyes shut briefly.

  “Fortunately, Pet,” he said, “fortunately, the virus has not thus far mutated to include anything other than quadrupeds and the occasional bird if the human infected has a creative enough mind. We see shifter wolves, bears, and sometimes a tiger—very rarely an eagle or hawk.”

  “It’s the sorta thing someone should be looking into,” I mumbled to myself. I didn’t say it too loud, though. More loudly, I added, “So we’re looking for a shifter wolf, and the breakroom smells like dog, so we know we’re in the right place?”

  “It would appear so,” agreed Athelas. “Of course, I was not there, so I can’t speculate upon the smell or lack thereof—” he paused for the fraction of a second, maybe for JinYeong to react, but JinYeong was still eating biscuits— “but one would assume as much.”

  “Hang on,” I said again. “If shifter saliva is dangerous to Behindkind, shouldn’t Zero stay away from the supermarket?”

  “That would be up to Zero himself,” said Athelas, with a curious little smile.

  “Shifters don’t typically fling their spit at their enemies,” Zero said. He didn’t sound particularly worried, but he never did sound particularly anything. “And I would have to be unfortunate enough to be wounded at the same time.”

  “Yeah, like a bite?” I asked, with more emphasis. “Me and JinYeong can work from the inside ourselves. You don’t have to be there.”

  There was a contemptuous spray of crumbs from JinYeong’s direction, and Athelas sipped his tea with a great deal of enjoyment.

  “I have my own methods of protection,” said Zero briefly. “You should worry about your own symptoms.”

  “I’d do that,” I said, “but I don’t know what symptoms to expect. Athelas is being mysterious and the vampire doesn’t speak English.”

  There was far too much about my condition that I didn’t know, even if what I did know made me feel more than slightly sick. It wasn’t something I could go to the hospital for—I was entirely at the mercy of my three psychos, and I didn’t like it when they didn’t tell me stuff. JinYeong was pretty obviously annoyed at having to help me, and I was certain he’d rather I just die, so that wasn’t surprising. I had the feeling that Athelas would as easily let me die if it seemed amusing to him, too, so his lack of helpfulness wasn’t really surprising, either. Lucky for me, I didn’t have to trust JinYeong or Athelas.

  The problem was, I thought, huddling up in my hoodie, that I could only trust Zero to a point. Zero would save me if he could, I was certain about that. I would trust him to fight for me, but he couldn’t guarantee we’d be able to find the right bloke in time, either.

  Zero’s eyes rested on me, light and unemotional. He said, “Dry mouth, faintness, stronger than usual sense of smell. When your stomach begins to change you’ll start vomiting up anything cooked.”

  “I’m gunna have to eat raw meat?”

  “Ne,” said JinYeong, eyes glittering as he turned to face me. He poked the empty plate into my stomach and added, with relish, “Mani mani mokaesso!”

  “JinYeong has an uplifting view of your condition,” remarked Athelas. “If you do indeed get to the stage of eating a great deal of raw meat, you will undoubtedly survive the condition.”

  “Good to know,” I said. I suddenly didn’t feel too good again. “Oi. There was a woman I met today.”

  “Nado,” said JinYeong, looking smug and pleased. What, he’d found someone too?

  I ignored him, because my lead was sure to be better. “I think there’s something going on with her,” I told Zero. “Like maybe someone’s scaring her. When I walked in on her in the locker room today she was asking someone to come and meet her so she didn’t have to walk home alone.”

  “There are many reasons for human women to be afraid, Pet.”

  “Yeah,” I said to Athelas, “but they don’t usually spray themselves with half a bottle of perfume before they go out of the store, do they? Reckon that’s the sort of thing I’d do if I was being bothered by someone who can find me by smell.”

  “Wolf shifters can be territorial when it comes to a woman they see as their own,” agreed Athelas. He sounded slightly more interested, and I think Zero must have been, too, because he leaned forward just a bit.

  He asked, “Did she know you were in the locker room with her?”

  “She nearly jumped through the roof when I came around the corner, so I reckon prob’ly not.”

  “I see,” said Zero, and went back to sipping his coffee. “It’s a pity JinYeong has only been able to confirm that there are wolf shifters, and not who or how many.”

  “He smells more than one?”

  “Ne,” said JinYeong.

  “So we’ve found a motive, but we don’t know whose it is?”

  “We’ve found a potential motive,” Zero corrected me. “The deaths could be jealous rage against people who get too close to the woman, but there are five deaths to account for, and if there were such a significant number of deaths attached to one person it would be all around the store.”

  “Oh yeah,” I agreed glumly. It would definitely have been around the store already if all the people who had died were directly connected to Erica. I complained, “People shouldn’t leave motives lying around where they could be anybody’s. It makes things messy.”

  “Not all the links might be immediately obvious, however,” said Athelas.

  I beamed at him and poured him another cup of tea.

  JinYeong made a dismissive sort of noise and said something that might have had the words woman and myself in it.

  “Copycat!” I said. “Just because I’ve found a lead, doesn’t mean you have to, as well!”

  JinYeong showed me a bit of tooth but continued talking, which was anno
ying. It meant he probably did really have a suspect; and okay, I know it wasn’t a competition, but I wanted to find the culprit before he did.

  Zero listened to him in silence, and when he finished speaking, only said, “Interesting. Keep looking into it.”

  “Looking into what?” I complained. “How come you two can understand him, anyway?”

  “JinYeong said that there is also a woman who wears a great deal of perfume in the office upstairs, and that the office itself also smells distressingly of dog.”

  “Oh,” I said. I still didn’t feel completely gruntled again, though I wasn’t sure if that was because JinYeong had a reasonable person of interest, or because I was annoyed at JinYeong himself. “Oi. How come everyone has to learn Korean to be able to understand the vampire? If we’re three people, shouldn’t he learn English?”

  “We’re two Behindkind and a pet,” Zero said. “If you want to understand JinYeong, you’ll have to work it out for yourself.”

  “It should be added that neither Zero nor myself have learned Korean,” said Athelas.

  “Then how the flaming heck—?”

  JinYeong smirked at me, so I stuck my tongue out.

  “Outside, Pet,” said Zero, standing up.

  “What? What did I do?” I protested. JinYeong was still smirking, and that was annoying.

  “Outside,” Zero said again, and I scuttled after him, because he was using the Voice That Must Be Obeyed.

  I don’t know what happens if you don’t obey it, but I don’t wanna find out.

  When we got outside, Zero reached up into one of the trees in the back yard and snapped off a branch. He didn’t say anything about it, but he trimmed the ends a bit, and that was enough to make it pretty clear what it was for.

  “Don’t I get a real weapon?”

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t want to pick up your head from the lawn.”