by Zoe Chant
“I honor them for their choices,” he said gravely.
Bird’s heart swelled. She blinked, then discovered how far they had come down the length of the beach. The cave-riddled palisades loomed large. “We’re here! There’s the old rest station.”
Mikhail accepted the subject change with the calm that she was beginning to suspect was part of his nature. “Was this once a public beach then? I did test the water in that old shower contraption over there. I was surprised that it still runs.”
“Yes, it used to be public. The town council closed it down after we had some landslides,” Bird said, pointing at the cliffs. “But they left the water running. I wouldn’t drink it, but the fishers use it to wash off their boats.”
“Did you happen to bring a flashlight? I apologize, I neglected to mention that it is quite dark in there.”
She stopped. “I didn’t! I can run home and get mine—I’m only ten minutes away.”
“Ah, no need, I brought an extra in case.” Mikhail pulled out a good-sized incandescent flash as well as a headlamp flashlight, and brandished them. “These should be adequate to sketch by.”
The palisades always reminded her of melted candle wax. The caves were like hollows. Though she’d lived in Playa del Encanto for twenty-seven years, she had never ventured a foot inside the caves. Squishing through the wet sand into the dim space, she was aware of how safe she felt with this man she had not known forty-eight hours ago, and yet felt as if she had known him all her life.
“Hold your nose,” he cautioned, smiling ruefully. “Those who sneak in here don’t appear to make personal hygiene a priority.”
“Ugh,” she said, laughing as she glanced around. “The graffiti slathered all over the walls doesn’t look much better.”
He said, “It’ll get much darker once we get around this rock up here. Would you prefer the headlamp or the incandescent?”
“I’ll carry the lamp, if you’re more used to the one you wear,” she said.
Mikhail handed the larger lamp to her, adjusted the head lamp, and turned it on. They paced inside. Once they got farther in, the smell of trash gave way to a more pleasant scent of stone and brine. As their beams of light played over the rough stone curving overhead, a sense of adventure accelerated Bird’s heartbeat. She was having fun, poking in this weird space, with this man at her side.
Here much of the graffiti and illegible scrawls were scoured away by seawater. Before long, the ground abruptly became more rocky, the entry more narrow. There was no more graffiti, and the rock was lighter—less exposed to wind and water.
“This must be where the quake shook loose,” she said. Her voice sounded odd, not quite an echo.
“Indeed it is. Let’s slow a bit, shall we? This next area is a lot more rocky. As you can see, the stone cracked significantly here.”
Mikhail played his light slowly up a mighty crevice at least four stories high. “Careful there—that rubble is loose. Would you like a hand?”
“I’m good,” Bird said uncertainly. She gazed up at that crack, feeling the sheer weight of the stone overhead. An oppressive sense that made her want to turn away.
“I have explored here thoroughly,” Mikhail said gently. “It’s sturdy enough for our venture. Here, let me help you over this rubble.”
He held out his hand. She took it, eyeing the tumble of rock doubtfully.
The moment his warm, strong fingers closed over hers, a sense of security swept through her. With his help she scrambled up the rock pile. Then she halted, gazing in amazement at the paintings revealed along the raw stone within. He let go of her hand and stepped away so that he did not block her view.
“It seems a miracle the taggers haven’t found these yet,” Bird whispered in awe.
“Perhaps they are satisfied to remain in the caves closer to the shoreline,” Mikhail said.
They stood in silence, Bird playing the lantern over a mural painted in blacks and reds, with fading chalky smears here and there. Roughly painted people and animals had been grouped around a central space, doing activities that seemed to relate to everyday life. She studied them with interest as she fumbled for her sketchpad.
She was going to ask if she should begin drawing now, but when she turned to Mikhail, she saw him standing a few feet away with his eyes closed. His head was tipped slightly upward as he leaned lightly on his cane. The headlamp—at least, it had to be the headlamp—reflected light over him in a faint shimmer that she found eerily beautiful. Was he listening to something she couldn’t hear? Or had he merely gotten a headache in the close, humid air?
Reluctant to disturb him, she quietly slid her drawing things out, swung her backpack behind her, and perched on a flat stone so that she could rest the sketchpad on her knee. She had been hired to do a job, so she might as well get to it.
She began sketching, carefully copying one group at a time. She had done two groups and was beginning on the third when she became aware that there was a pattern to all the little figures. There was always one person turned toward one of the other groups, as if each of those was a link in a chain of activity.
Bird set her sketchpad down on the flat stone and stepped close to the rock wall, examining the mural more carefully. She noticed that the black figures, seen from six inches away, were not complete silhouettes, nor were they as rough as they seemed. Though the stone they were painted on was coarse and uneven, the painter had stippled tiny crests along heads here, the suggestion of a tail there. All the figures had tiny slits for eyes and mouths, not only conveying a surprising amount of expression, but also showing the direction their faces were pointed.
When she took a step back, she stared again at the groupings, and made a discovery.
Many of them were looking at the chalk smears, which—she realized when she trained the lamp right on them—were actually very faded figures. Symbolic figures, it looked like, doing symbolic things, for how else did you explain a human mother carrying a child-sized lizard with wings? And larger winged lizards, too. Or were they...?
Mikhail opened his eyes and bent over her sketchpad. “These are excellent.”
“But they’re wrong.” She sighed. “I have to start over.”
“Wrong? I confess I haven’t examined them more closely, as I was . . . I had another task first.” His voice faltered.
She held up her lamp, frustrated as the beam from his headlamp obscured his face. But she could hear confusion in his quiet voice.
“What is it?” she asked.
He held up a hand. “I think, right now, it’s more important to ask what you have found.”
They stood together, her shoulder brushing his arm, as they studied the mural.
“I missed the second set of figures,” she said. “See? It’s like they’re having a war with the others, maybe. I think these chalky ones are much older than the others. You might even need an expert on Alta California, when California was a part of Mexico in the early 1800s...”
Mikhail slowly shook his head. “I believe those are far older than that.”
“You mean the Chumash and the Gabrieleño, before the Spanish came?”
“Older. I mean the time when humans, and others, first wandered through this area.”
“Others?” she repeated.
“Others as in . . .” He looked away, then back, meeting her gaze. “Not human. Or rather, only sometimes human.”
Her first thought was, he’s kidding, right? Then, Oh, no, I hope he’s not about to tell me about his abduction by aliens.
But those steady silver eyes were completely sane, and his husky voice rang with sincerity.
And here it was, another change in the regular tread of her life. This one hinted at wider possibilities, the wild ones that had been dutifully snipped and tucked under the construct of responsible adulthood as she grew up. If Mikhail told her he’d been sucked up into a flying saucer and examined by little gray men, then she’d believe in little gray men.
Bird drew a breath, aw
are of the sense of wonder she had so loved as a child, when anything might happen, and magic beckoned beyond the fog, beyond the sunset, and in the very air of those days when she woke up full of joy.
It was that sense she had tried so hard to capture in her books, written for other children like her . . . that sense she had lost, she thought forever, when she stood in that courtroom listening to the man she’d married itemizing her failings.
“What kind of others? No, perhaps that isn’t the question right at this moment.” She made herself turn to the mural, and back to what she’d been hired for. That too was fascinating, in a different sense. “These top pictures are saying something about the older ones. Almost a threat—”
“A claim,” Mikhail said. “I—”
The ground trembled.
Earthquake!
She dropped sketchpad and chalk, her arms coming up. Sick with terror, she turned her face skyward toward the implacable stone overhead as tiny rocks began to rain around them. A sharp sway sent her reeling. But before she could fall, Mikhail’s strong arms closed around her.
As the world rocked and stones clattered around them, he held her against him, and murmured into her hair, “You are safe, my Bird. Whatever happens, I will never let you fall.”
SIX
MIKHAIL
This quake was deliberate.
Mikhail sensed the power thrust into the cracks deep in the ground. But he could not shift in order to track the malicious intent to its source without endangering Bird.
Until now there had been no sign of any threat. Why now? Coincidence or deliberate? He couldn’t answer any of those questions, nor could he investigate while Bird was with him. Protecting her was the most important thing. Once she was safe, he could go hunting.
Using his dragon’s strength and agility, plus just a little bit of the magic that enabled him to fly, he lifted and guided Bird past the unsteady boulders, shielding her with his own body from sifting rain of pebbled and sand. As soon as they were out of the crevasse, he sped them toward the entrance to the cave.
The tide was still sufficiently out for him to set her down gently fifty paces from the cave entrance. She cast frightened glances around the cave, but was clearly unaware of how much of their retreat had defied gravity.
“Well, that was scary.” Her voice was high, and trembled a little at the end, but she met his gaze steadily. “We should probably wait to see if there are aftershocks before going back in. Oh! I left my sketches back there.”
The mate bond made them a match, but there were so many permutations of love. His gentle Bird’s bravery hollowed him to the heart. He lifted his hand, cupping her cheek as he said, “We’ll give it a day, shall we?” He saw the relief she tried valiantly to hide, and added, “Your discovery in there puts us way ahead.”
“Really? Her brow furrowed. “But I’ve no training. How can that be?”
“It’s your artist’s eye. On my first exploration, I wasn’t paying attention to the mural. I regarded it mostly as decoration, maybe even a distraction. I was concentrating on the structure of the stone and . . . other aspects that are more difficult to describe.”
He hesitated, looking into her wide eyes. All he saw, and sensed, was her vanishing fear, a little worry, and curiosity. But there was no anger, disbelief, or resentment.
Aware that this was a new step in his courtship, he said, “I would like to tell you about them, but perhaps in more comfortable surroundings?”
She bit her lip, looked at her hand, then raised her honest eyes and said, “I’d love that, but I promised old Mr. Kleiner—he’s a painter and he owns the property I live on—that I would come over and stretch canvases for him this afternoon. But . . .” She squared her shoulders and he sensed her coming to a decision, one that resonated with tentative trust.
Again appreciation washed through him. He could feel how difficult trust came to her.
“How about dinner?” she asked. “I don’t claim to be a great cook, but I could double one of my friend Doris’s recipes. I’ve been her guinea pig for years.”
“I would love that more than anything,” he said, tentative happiness washing through him.
An invitation to her nest! Our mate trusts us, the dragon trumpeted.
Mikhail shoved him back down. “Unfortunately, there is a reception tonight that I must attend. As I’m the guest of honor, I can’t refuse, though I would like to, very much, now.”
“Oh,” she said. In a bright tone, she said, “Of course you’re very busy.”
The way she tried to hide her disappointment caused a sweet sort of ache that he had never felt before.
Our mate must come with us, stated his dragon, humming again. Let us show her off.
I can’t drag her to a tedious affair among a lot of strangers, who except for Joey Hu have no interest in us, the book, or anything we care about. This is strictly cover.
She must come, nagged his dragon.
Perhaps such events were a part of courtship? A straightforward battle with cranky krakens would be easier, he thought dismally.
As the humans say, time to man up, came the remorseless voice.
This exchange was faster than a heartbeat. Mikhail smiled at Bird, and said tentatively, “I had planned to make my appearance, shake the hands that must be shook, and then slip out. But it would be a great deal more bearable if you would consider accompanying me?”
He was about to add that she ought not to feel obliged, but he swallowed the words when her entire countenance brightened.
“I would be delighted,” she said softly. “Is it a formal occasion? Where is it to be held?”
“At the university. A colleague of mine who is employed there arranged this reception as part of a book tour—what is it?” He halted his explanation, looking more closely at her.
She gave him that fixed, bright smile again. “Nothing, nothing . . . But I can’t ride my bike there, especially if I’m dressed for a reception.”
“Ah, but my friend promised to arrange transportation,” he said. “This gives me an excuse to borrow a car from him.”
“Have you been taking taxis or Lyft all over town?” she asked. “That really adds up!”
“All the more reason to find my own transportation,” he said, deciding to evade that question for now. “If it is not too much trouble, might we combine your most welcome invitation with my obligation, then?”
She brightened even more. “I’d love to fix dinner first. We can leave from my place. The university is only fifteen minutes away.”
Once again he sensed a cloud of sadness dim her brightness. He knew enough about her now to guess that she had chosen her residence thinking of visitations from her children, though how that connected to the university was unclear. But almost immediately her sunny countenance was back as they settled on a time. She furnished her address with a slightly self-conscious air that he found endearing.
By then he had walked her up the pathway to the top of the palisade. They parted, he watching her as she wheeled away on her bicycle.
Then he wrapped himself in invisibility, shifted to his dragon, and shot skyward, spiraling down toward the house belonging to Joey Hu, a nine-tailed fox shifter he’d met on a mission years ago.
Joey seemed to change professions every couple of decades. Currently he worked as an academic at this university. It was he who had set up the book tour as an excuse to cover his investigation.
As Mikhail had hoped, Joey was at home. Mikhail sent a mental call to Joey, then shifted back to his human self as he settled into the beautifully landscaped yard behind the home.
Joey soon appeared, a foxy grin on his cheerful face. When they first met, Mikhail’s hair and beard had been black, and Joey golden. Time and life had altered them both to silver.
Mikhail said, “I find I must accept your offer of a car.”
“Because?”
“Because I have found my mate.”
Joey let out a cheer. Though they were roughl
y the same age, Joey had always been irrepressible as well as independent—typical for his kind. His fair-haired form shimmered, a fan of plumed tails fading in and out of the mythic realm behind a noble fox-mask.
Then Joey quirked a brow and cocked his head, fox-like. “Though the timing is . . .let’s call it interesting.”
“More interesting than you think,” Mikhail retorted. Bird’s image lingered before his eye. But he was also convinced that the quake was not a natural occurrence.
Joey’s brows twitched together. “You’re not backing out of our shindig tonight, are you?”
“No. I promised to be there, and I will be there—but I wish to bring her.”
“Good! I’d love to meet her. As for our cover, a plus-one always looks good to the honchos.”
Mikhail regarded him with exasperation. “Why does it need to look good? In all the years I’ve known you I’ve never seen you get political. Don’t pretend to argue. There is no scholar here even remotely interested in my book. You could have gone about covering my presence a lot more quietly. Why the . . .”
“Hoopla?” Joey’s grin showed teeth, making him look more foxlike than ever. “Because I like my colleagues here. I like the university’s policies with diversity, and I really like the students and what they are working toward. But it all could get shipwrecked if the wrong person becomes Dean of the Humanities. Which is why I brought you in through the arts and not through archaeology or paleontology.”
“I’m still not seeing it.”
“That, my old friend, is because you have never cared about politics. You have earned stellar degrees at four prestigious universities, and been awarded how many honorary degrees?”
Mikhail shrugged. “I study when I’m not under orders. It passes the time. And, well, I have been alive a long time, so these things tend to accumulate.”
“Yes, yes, I know—if you’d been born two thousand years ago, no doubt you would have been a monk somewhere, turning out legendary scholastic tomes in Latin, or Chinese, or Persian. The thing is, someone has to keep an eye on politics, and right here I’m that someone. I’m gunning for the deanship. It’s the only way to keep that jackass Waterson from getting it, and destroying the school.”