“Lots of birds there,” Titus whispered, nodding toward the large garbage bin by the ruins of Draven’s house. Crows and seagulls were plentiful, as well as a couple of tricolor herons and great egrets.
Draven couldn’t tell right off the bat which ones were just birds. He’d have to be closer to them to discern that, and now wasn’t the time.
“The cleanup crew is going to be here in a few minutes,” Riveen said as he jogged over to join them.
There’d been a long discussion about whether Riveen should be with Draven and Titus, but the consensus was that, had there been any kind of emergency, Riveen would have been at his brother’s side. For him to be elsewhere would have been suspicious.
“How many people did we hire?” Draven asked as he took Titus’ hand in his.
Riveen stopped a couple of feet away and swiped at his forehead. “The company I called is sending a group of ten people, a backhoe and some other equipment. I don’t remember what-all, but hopefully with them and us working on it, we’ll get most of this cleaned up in the next few days.”
“I hate that you lost your home.” Titus moved closer until they were standing shoulder to shoulder.
Draven knew Titus meant it, even though they’d outlined a rough plan for conversational topics in case they were overheard by the enemy—whomever that was. “Thank you, sweetheart. Everything is gone, but together, we’ll rebuild, and we’ll make a home that you and I both design. It’ll be our home.” And it would. Draven wanted that, wanted Titus, forever.
After searching his eyes for a moment, Titus smiled. “I want a cat. Two cats.”
“That wasn’t—” Draven pressed his lips together.
Riveen snickered. “Good job, Titus. You should have at least two cats, and a couple of dogs. Oh, hedgehogs are—”
“Riveen,” Draven grumbled.
“What?” Riveen tried for an innocent look but failed. “Two cats for each of you. Have you seen those Savannah cats? They’re huge! That’s what you need, Drave, a man’s cat. Big. Tough. Half-feral. No one will doubt your masculinity when you’re walking it out in public.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Draven asked. “No one walks a cat!”
Riveen shook his head. “Damn. You’re gonna be a shitty cat owner. People walk their cats. Look it up online.”
“Relating the size and breed of a cat to someone’s masculinity is just not right,” Titus said. “And I think Draven would like a ragdoll or two.”
“A what? Why would I want any kind of doll?” Draven wondered if someone had spiked Titus’ coffee.
“Ragdoll is a breed of cat,” Titus explained. “You’d love them. Some people do walk their cats. I had a neighbor down the block from my house, he used to walk his goat on Wednesdays and Fridays, and his chicken Mondays and Tuesdays. I have pictures on my laptop I can show you sometime.”
Draven was trying to figure out what to say to that offer when he saw a van pull into his driveway. “I think the cleaning crew is here.”
“Look at every one of them,” Riveen muttered. “You too, Titus. See if any of them give you the creeps or looks like you know who.”
“That’s the plan.” Draven headed for the group getting out of the van.
Titus tugged his hand free.
Draven looked at him.
“We’ll be there in a minute.” Titus tipped his chin toward the van.
“Y’all are plotting to get cats, aren’t you?” Draven asked.
Titus grinned. “Maybe.”
In truth, they were giving him a chance to check the people out first. If Andres—or his doppelganger—were there, and he saw Draven alone-ish, perhaps he’d give himself away.
“Hi,” he called out as he neared the cleanup crew. “I’m Draven. Who’s Zach?”
“Me.” A tall, older man with grey hair stepped forward and held out his hand. “Zach Morris. I’m sorry for your loss of property.”
“Thank you.” Draven shook Zach’s hand. “I’m just glad no one was hurt. “
Zach nodded. “Yeah, things can be replaced, unlike people, and even pets. You’ve got the right attitude.” He turned and gestured to his crew. “We’ll work our asses off to make this as easy for you as possible.”
“Y’all been at this a long time?” Draven asked, hoping Zach would mention any newcomers.
“Over a decade now. Got a great group working for me, and I know they’ll do right by you.” Zach pointed at a huge truck hauling a backhoe on a trailer. “That’s gonna help a lot right there, and there’s another two bins on the way. If we don’t need ’em, that’s okay. You’re only charged for what we have to use.”
“Sounds good.” Draven didn’t get a weird feeling from Zach or anyone nearby. He wasn’t sure that meant anything. “I have my brother and boyfriend here, and some of my family will arrive in a bit to help if we need them.”
Zach hadn’t so much as batted an eye at the boyfriend comment. “I’ll tell ya, it’s best to keep people away while we work. You, your guy and your brother, that’s fine, and you can have your family here, I’m not telling you you can’t, but we’ll have to keep an eye on them and make sure they don’t get in the way or endanger themselves.”
“So they’d be a distraction,” Draven said. “Hmm. Well, if they show up with food and drinks, we’ll keep them away from the working area.”
Zach nodded. “That’ll do.”
Titus and Riveen walked over, and Draven introduced them to Zach, then the work began.
Draven kept close to Titus, and they tried to check out every person there. None of them were Andres, and after an hour, Draven began to think Zach and his crew were just regular people.
Working on cleaning up the debris, then clearing it out, was hard work. Riveen, Titus and Draven didn’t slack off. Though Zach wanted them to stay away from the remains of the structure itself, there was still plenty of hauling and lifting to do.
When they broke for lunch, catered by Draven’s family, Draven was ready for a break. He had soot in places no one ever should have it. Titus and Riveen were grungy, too.
“I swear I’ll never not smell this.” Titus held up a burned piece of wood, then tossed it aside.
“Same,” Riveen mumbled. “My back is starting to hurt like a motherfucker.”
“You can sit back and watch,” Draven said.
Riveen shook his head. “Nope. Things seem calm here. Everyone is nice.”
Translation—no weird vibes from anyone.
“Yeah,” Draven agreed.
Titus nodded. “Very professional and friendly folks. I’m going to wash my hands then use the portable toilet. Well, use that then wash my hands. Or wash them both times—whatever. I’ve got to hit the head.”
“We’ll be here.” Draven watched Titus jog over to the water hose and wash his hands, then enter the blue portable.
“He’s only twenty feet away,” Riveen pointed out.
“Doesn’t matter. Been closer to bad people and things,” Draven replied. He took a bite of the sub sandwich he’d gotten off the food table that had been set up.
“Yeah, that’s true.”
And even though Draven hadn’t looked away for more than thirty seconds—forty, tops, as he’d taken a bite and a drink—when Titus didn’t come out of the portable in three minutes, he began to worry.
“He’s probably doing, you know,” Riveen said, looking at the toilet. “You’ve been watching.”
“Except for when I grabbed my sandwich and picked up my drink.” Draven set the can down. He wiped his hands on his shorts.
“Seconds.” Riveen set his food down as well. “Just seconds. He’s in there.”
Draven stood, and Riveen was right behind him, striding to the porta potty. Draven knew he was probably being paranoid—until he saw the door was open an inch or so.
“Titus,” he rasped as he reached the door and pulled it open— and found it empty.
“Titus!” Draven shouted as he ran past the po
rtable. There was no use in trying not to panic—fear clawed at Draven from the inside out. “Titus!”
“Draven! Draven!” Riveen grabbed his arm. “He can’t be far. Maybe he just walked—”
“No!” Draven tried to shake Riveen off but couldn’t. “I feel it, Rive. I feel that he’s gone!”
Riveen paled. “G-gone?”
Draven snarled. “Not that kind of gone!” Draven was certain he’d know, but the idea of a world without Titus in it bruised his heart and soul. “He’s been taken!”
“Who’d take him?”
Draven spun around and almost slammed into Zach. “What?”
Zach frowned. “You’re yellin’ for your boyfriend and said he’d been taken. Who’d take him? I can call the cops—”
“No,” Draven snapped. “No cops.”
“But if he’s been kidnapped or…or whatever, then we need—”
“No,” Draven reiterated, cutting off Zach’s argument. “No cops, I mean it. This is…not that kind of thing.”
Zach didn’t look cowed. “Um, what kind of thing is it, then?” He folded his thick arms over his chest.
Riveen squeezed Draven’s arm just as Draven opened his mouth to put Zach on blast.
“This is a game we play with some friends of ours, fake abductions,” Riveen said. His smile looked strained, but hopefully Zach wouldn’t notice. “It’s like a treasure hunt. We have to find clues and track them down, then we get Titus back and formulate our revenge.”
“That’s messed up,” Zach muttered, staring at Draven.
Dariel was approaching behind Zach. “It is, but that’s how we roll. We’re a group of weirdos.”
Zach turned to look at him. “I guess, whatever floats your boat.”
“Yeah, so we need to get on with our scavenger hunt. I’m sure y’all can do your job without us taggin’ along,” Dariel said.
“Of course we can.” Zach glanced back at Draven and Riveen.
Draven wanted to punch Zach for causing a delay. Instead, he nodded. As far as he was concerned, he was done answering questions.
“The family’s already spread out and looking,” Dariel whispered when Zach headed back to his lunch. “As soon as you realized he was gone. Come on.” He took off, and Draven was right beside him, with Riveen there as well.
And probably all the rest of the cousins that’d been hanging around the cleanup site.
Draven looked as he ran, searching for any trace of Titus—or Andres. He saw birds flying overhead, heard them calling out and recognized their voices.
His family was there, had been there and yet, Titus was gone.
“What kind of fuckery are we fighting against?” he mumbled.
Dariel pointed to the house at the end of the block. “Stop there, around the corner.”
Draven didn’t want to stop. He wanted to find Titus and not rest until he held him in his arms.
“Stop,” Dariel growled. “We need to formulate a plan. Otherwise, we’re running around like a bunch of chickens with their heads cut off.”
Several birds squawked at that.
Draven stopped around the corner. “I have to find him. I have to find him, now!”
“Right,” Riveen agreed, grabbing him and giving him a shake. “So let’s figure out how best to do that.”
“How?” Draven laughed but there was nothing other than fear in the sound. “We don’t even know who has him for sure. If it’s Andres, we don’t fucking know what Andres is!”
Birds settled around them.
“He has to be magic. He couldn’t have been only a human being. Andres had to have been more, and maybe…maybe he became something stronger upon his death,” Riveen said.
“Like a goddamn evil phoenix,” Dariel added. “No one has heard from Aunt Jusis. Damn it, what would she do?”
“I don’t care what she’d do—we have to find Titus!” Draven was ready to punch someone. He’d never felt so helpless before, and his anger was only held in check by his fear for Titus.
“Yes, we do. It’s—” Dariel hissed when one of the birds began to shift. “Not in public!” He moved to shield her from anyone who might have been watching. Riveen helped him.
“We fight magic with magic.”
Draven recognized the voice of his cousin Ninfa.
“I am sorry I only just arrived to help. I came as quickly as I could, and that’s enough on that. You must remember, we are supernatural beings, too,” she said.
“That’s not helping us find Titus,” Draven bit out.
Ninfa peered over Dariel’s shoulder. “We are looking with the wrong part of ourselves. We are shifters. We were created with a drop of blood from Alquinones—have you forgotten?”
Draven had heard the tale a dozen times. “That’s just a—”
“Not just anything,” Ninfa interrupted. “It’s not a fable. It’s our past, our creation. It’s real, and we carry the blood of the animal god in our veins.”
“So what does that do to help us?” Draven wasn’t going to argue. If there was any chance Ninfa was right, that she could do something to help find Titus, then Draven would listen.
“Magic all comes from the same place, from the first moment of time, when the great goddess gave birth and particles collided and energy spiraled out in great and lesser amounts,” Ninfa explained. “The greater energy became our demigods, and the lesser, humans and animals, all life as we know it. Alquinones wanted his own people, and we are the result of the compromise he struck with the great goddess. You have heard this before.”
Draven ground his teeth. He’d heard it before, and time was being wasted on the story now, when action was what was needed.
“We can find him,” Ninfa said. “Through our blood. Through your blood, Draven, because it is your mate who is missing. Come here and someone give me a knife.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Ninfa had to be Aunt Jusis’ protégé. She had the aura of power, of magic, all around her.
She chanted and the air seemed to waver and spread out in a circle. “So we will not be seen,” she explained after the ripples had surrounded the family. “Marybelle, a feather, please.”
A heron waddled over and fluffed out her feathers. She squawked when Ninfa plucked a tail feather free.
“You’ll grow it back quickly.” Ninfa held the feather up in the palm of her left hand. With her right, she traced the quill, then blew on the feather. It should have become airborne, but it didn’t—immediately. After she raised her right hand and wiggled her fingers, the feather floated up and spun around several times.
“Follow it,” Ninfa said before shifting again.
The rippled air around them vanished and the feather dipped and spun as if being carried on a breeze.
The cousins in bird form ascended and flapped their wings lazily. Draven, Riveen and Dariel, along with a few other cousins, watched the feather and began following it when it moved.
It was slow going, and sometimes the feather hesitated, turning this way and that before resuming its path.
Draven wanted it to move faster, but he wasn’t stupid enough to bitch about speed. Magic was his best hope of finding Titus, and snarling at a magical feather wasn’t going to help.
They were led around the center of town, and maybe they looked like a pack of tourists strolling along, not that it mattered. The feather didn’t seem to be noticed by anyone they passed, and no one would think anything of a flock of birds flying overhead.
Once they’d cleared the small downtown area, the feather turned toward the beach. Draven’s heart raced as he considered what that could mean. Titus was human—he wouldn’t survive submersion. Would Andres—whoever, whatever he was—care about that? What was Andres’ goal, anyway?
Draven wished he knew.
Riveen touched his arm as if to reassure him everything would be okay, but Draven wasn’t sure he could trust that.
“I can’t lose him,” he rasped as they cut a corner. The dunes rose up i
n front of them. “I can’t.”
“You won’t,” Riveen assured him.
Draven opened his mouth to say what, he didn’t know, when the sky went as dark as night and a cold wind slapped against him. “What the fuck?”
The feather shot up in the air and a bolt of lightning struck it, singeing it into a blackened pile of ash that scattered on the breeze.
“Shit,” Draven muttered as his cousins and Riveen all began talking at once.
Ninfa shifted again, as did the rest of the cousins. They gathered close and Ninfa held out one hand. “Silence. Everyone is talking, and nothing is being said.”
No one cracked a joke or even exhaled loudly.
Ninfa nodded, her gaze locked with Draven’s. “His magic is stronger than mine, but it is not stronger than ours. He has brought us into his reality.” She gestured around them.
The beach was familiar in some ways, but foreign in others. The dunes looked ominous, as if they’d rise on legs of thorns and pull down anyone who stepped on them—or got too close. Creatures skittered across the sand, but they weren’t the crabs Draven was used to seeing. They were dingy red, with dozens of glowing white eyes and pinchers that looked like blades.
Something that looked like seaweed jetted out strands that caught up one of the creatures, and it shrieked before disappearing into the mass of vegetation.
“Maybe we shouldn’t be standing around,” Dariel said nervously.
“They can’t harm us.” Ninfa didn’t sound as certain as Draven would have liked.
Something roared out in the murky water, making everyone wrench their head around to look.
“Fuck me,” Riveen muttered.
Draven felt dizzy as he stared at the—he could only define it as a sea monster, a bastardization of animals Mother Nature had created, twisted and blended into a living nightmare.
“Is…is that real?” someone asked.
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