Recognition sparked. “You’re the one who contacted me about the manananggal,” I said.
“Yes, and we very much appreciate you taking care of that for us. My mate and head nurse spoke very highly of your handling of that matter, which is why I was willing to take your case. We don’t treat many humans at St. Giles’.”
“Well, I really appreciate you taking the time to look after me.”
“The pleasure was all mine, Miss Price.” Dr. Morrow smiled. “I know how much you’ve done for this city. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” I said.
“I brought some clothes for you,” said Uncle Mike. “You want me to take the mice so you can get dressed?”
“Please.” It wasn’t like the mice hadn’t seen me naked before—that was sadly unavoidable, no matter how much I might try to avoid it—but I still had standards.
“Thought so.” Uncle Mike handed me a folded bundle before standing, making a sweeping motion with his hands. “Come on, you lot. There’s cheese and cake in the waiting room.”
Cheering and hailing his name, the mice scampered from my bed and streamed across the tiled floor, disappearing between Dr. Morrow’s bare, vaguely-taloned feet. He watched this with an air of vague discomfort, finally saying, “We don’t treat many human patients, but the ones we do treat rarely come with their own traveling biosphere.”
“My family is special,” I said, with a smile.
“I’m getting that idea. Please don’t leave without speaking to me, Miss Price.” With that, the doctor stepped out of my hospital room. Uncle Mike paused long enough to kiss my cheek, and then he was gone as well, shutting the door behind himself.
I waited a few minutes to be sure that no one was going to come barging in before I stretched slowly and folded back the covers, finally moving into a full sitting position. I was wearing one of those pale green hospital gowns. It was almost a relief to realize that those were just as much standard issue in cryptid hospitals as they were in human ones. I took a breath, steeling myself, and pulled the gown up to get a look at my stomach where Peter had shot me.
Dr. Morrow was telling the truth: the gunshot wound was gone, and while the skin there was slightly paler than the skin around it, there was no scar. I touched it lightly with the tips of my fingers, feeling the first tears wet my cheeks. I was going to be okay. I was going to be better than okay, in fact. And that meant that whatever came next, it was going to be something that I needed to deal with.
Uncle Mike had chosen well, where clothes were concerned: he brought jeans, a tank top, a flannel shirt, my loosest hip holster, and a brace of throwing knives for me to hide wherever it would make me most comfortable. For shoes, he had a pair of broken-in trainers and some thick wool socks. By the time I had the last of the knives secured inside my clothes, I felt almost like myself again.
I tried to hold onto that feeling as I walked to the door, opened it, and stepped out into the hall. Remembering the promise Uncle Mike had made to the mice, I paused for a moment to listen before making my way toward the sound of cheering.
When I reached the waiting room, there was a full-scale dance number going in the middle of the floor, with the mice literally waltzing around with their slices of cake and chunks of cheese. Uncle Mike was watching with detached amusement; Ryan and Istas with something approaching awe. Dominic wasn’t watching at all. He was staring fixedly at the hall, waiting for me to appear. He straightened as I came into view, and by the time I reached the doorway, he was standing, stepping around dancing mice as he made his way toward me.
Ryan turned to see where Dominic was going, and his face split in a wide smile. “Verity. You’re up and moving again.”
“I am,” I agreed. “Hey, Istas.”
“The mice are performing a dance of thanks,” she informed me, frowning. “You should observe the mice.”
“All right,” I said. I let Dominic gather me into his arms and leaned up against him, my shoulders to his chest, as we stood and observed the mice. Istas clapped her hands, happy as I’d ever seen her, while Ryan looked tolerantly on. Uncle Mike caught my eye and smiled. This was it, then. This was my life. Since it was going to continue, I might as well get used to it.
There are worse fates.
Twenty-five
“Family, faith, and knives. Those are the things that last in this world. Everything else is essentially extra.”
—Evelyn Baker
St. Giles’ Hospital, an establishment for the care of cryptids
THERE WAS ONE THING I had to do before I could leave the hospital. Everyone knew I had to do it. And so when I said that I was going to go and talk to the doctor, they all let me go. Even Dominic. Even the mice.
There are some things that we have to do alone.
Grandma Angela was sitting next to Sarah’s bed when I came into the room. She looked up at the sound of my footsteps, and smiled. “Hello, Very-Very,” she said, making no effort to be quiet. There was no reason for it. Sarah was deeply unconscious, and from the slow, shallow rise and fall of her chest, she was at no risk of waking up. She was dressed in a pale green hospital gown, just like I’d been. She was flat on her back, like a princess in a bad Disney remake of some ancient fairy tale. Only it was going to take more than a kiss to wake her up.
“Hi, Grandma,” I said, walking over to the bedside. “How’s she doing?”
“Asleep, mostly, but I think she’s getting better, a little bit at a time. It can be hard to tell, since I can’t pick up what she’s projecting.” Grandma reached over and smoothed Sarah’s hair back from her forehead.
I swallowed hard. “Are you shielding the rest of us right now?”
“Yes.” Grandma nodded. “I didn’t want to risk it being something that wasn’t . . . well. That wouldn’t go over well.”
“But it could be important. Maybe we need to know.” I stood a little straighter. “Can you unshield me? Just long enough for me to tell you what she’s projecting at the rest of us?”
Grandma looked unsure. “Verity . . .”
“Please. This is partially my responsibility, even if it’s not my fault, and I’ve had Sarah screaming in my head before. I’m a big girl. I can take it.”
“If you’re sure . . .”
“Will it help?”
Very slowly, Grandma nodded. “I think it will, yes.”
“Then do it.”
“All right.” She looked at me gravely. The edges of her irises went white, the lack of color spreading into the blue like frost—and just like that, the static buzz of “telepath nearby” returned, Sarah’s presence once more making itself known to my mind. I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed it until I finally had it back again.
Then her thoughts came flooding in, hot on the heels of the static. There were no words: just an emotional slurry of images and feelings and panicked reactions. I staggered, eyes going wide. Grandma half-stood, and I gestured for her to sit back down as I braced myself and started trying to sort through what I was receiving. It wasn’t easy.
“She’s scared,” I said finally. “She doesn’t know how she did what she did, she doesn’t know whether it’s something she should have been able to do. She volunteered, but she didn’t think it would be quite that easy, or quite that strong. So she’s scared. And she’s afraid that because it was easy, it’s going to be something she wants to do again. Like this is something she’ll just do now.” But you won’t, I thought fiercely. Sarah, do you hear me? You won’t do anything like that unless you don’t have any other choice, because you’re one of the best people I know, and good people just don’t do that kind of thing. So don’t be scared of something that’s never going to happen. That’s just silly.
There was a brief pause in the overwhelming flood of guilt. I didn’t know for sure whether that meant she’d heard me, but I still took it as a good sign.
“She really did hurt herself. It was easy, but it was a strain at the same time, like those people who get hopped-up on adrenaline and throw cars around. She’s afraid to be awake, because if she’s awake, she might manipulate people just to avoid straining herself further.”
Grandma nodded. “That’s what I was afraid of. Well, we can keep her out long enough to get her home, where there’s nobody she can do that to.” Grandma didn’t receive; Grandpa was a Revenant, and having died once, he was basically immune to telepathic influences. My Uncle Billy might have had more issues, but he wasn’t living at home at the moment, and he could stay away while Sarah recovered.
“She’s going to get better, right?” I bit my lip as I waited for her answer.
To my deep relief, Grandma nodded. “If she’s projecting clearly enough that you can hear her, but not so strongly that she’s knocking you unconscious, then yes, I think there’s a very good chance that she’s going to get better.”
“Good.” I looked sternly at Sarah’s still, pale form. “You hear that? You’re going to be fine. And if you’re not, I’m going to kick your ass.” I mean that. Whether you can hear me or not, I mean it.
“You’re a good cousin, Very-Very,” said Grandma.
“I’m a terrible cousin who leads Sarah into the path of danger because I think she needs to get out more,” I said. “I’m also a terrible granddaughter.”
Grandma blinked. “Oh? How’s that?”
“I’m going to let you be the one who tells Artie.”
Much to my relief, she laughed. “Oh, you are a terrible granddaughter.” She paused. “There is one thing you could do to make it up to me.”
“Name it.”
“Can you watch Sarah while I go and get myself something to eat? I haven’t wanted to leave her unattended for long, but it seems to me that you have a pretty good handle on things.”
I smiled. Grandma might not be a receptive telepath, but she knows how to read people, and she knew that I wanted some time with Sarah alone. “Take as long as you need,” I said.
Grandma hugged me before she left the room. I took her seat next to Sarah’s bed, reaching over to take Sarah’s hand in mine. Her skin was cool, but no more than usual. Cuckoos run a little cold compared to humans.
“Hey, Sarah,” I said, trying to mentally project the words as I said them. I wanted her to hear me with her ears, as well as with her mind. “I just wanted to say thank you. I mean, you saved my ass back there. If you hadn’t shown up when you did . . . well, this would be a really different scene, and I don’t make nearly as good of a Sleeping Beauty as you do. Not that you’re a Sleeping Beauty. More of a Snow White, with your coloring. Too bad Artie isn’t here. He could kiss you awake. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
Silence from Sarah. There was no change in the mix of thoughts and emotions rolling off of her.
I sighed. “I know you’re feeling pretty rotten right now, but seriously, you found the best solution. You found the answer where everybody walked away. How many cuckoos would have done that? Most of them would have just reached for the matches and watched the whole thing burn. You did the right thing. You did the best thing. You did the thing that saved the most lives, and that’s why I love you.”
Silence from Sarah . . . but I thought, for just a second, that I felt her fingers tighten on mine.
I closed my eyes. “So Grandma says that you get to go back to Ohio for a little while. You like it there, right? You’ll have all your books, and you can pick up your comics from the comic book store for the first time in like, a year. Lots of spandex drama for you to catch up on. Speaking of drama, you realize we’re stuck with Dominic now, right? The Covenant won’t be coming back for him . . .”
I talked until I ran out of words, and then I just sat there and held her hand, “listening” to the mixture of thoughts and images that came pouring off her. This, too, was a part of my life; remembering that everything costs, and sometimes, what it costs is more than we want to pay. But we pay anyway, because that’s the right thing to do. Sarah would get better. She had to.
I was still sitting there, holding Sarah’s hand, when Grandma came back into the room. She came and stood next to me, putting her hand on my shoulder, and the three of us stayed that way for quite some time.
Epilogue
“Any ending where you’re still standing on your own feet is a happy one.”
—Alice Healy
A semilegal sublet in Greenwich Village
Three days later
WITH THE COVENANT out of Manhattan, it was safe to return to my apartment . . . and with the apartment’s actual owner returning from her year-long sabbatical at the end of the month, it was also time to start packing my things. It was time for me to go home.
Uncle Mike was already on the way back to Chicago. He’d taken Grandma Baker and Sarah with him when he left, promising to drop them in Columbus, where Grandma would be able to focus on nursing Sarah back to a reasonable facsimile of normal. Sarah was still asleep when they left. As far as I knew, Grandma was planning to keep her that way all the way home. I didn’t question it. She knew better than I did what was safe for cuckoo biology.
Kitty had accepted my resignation with a minimum of argument once I explained that I was leaving the city. New York was too dangerous for me, at least for a little while. My parents and I were both right when we said that my time in Manhattan would determine my future. I was just wrong when I said that my future was going to be in ballroom dance. That was a good world. It was one that I enjoyed visiting, and would probably be a part of for the rest of my life. But it wasn’t my world.
I was a Price. I was a cryptozoologist. I needed to accept that, with all the good things and bad things that it included, and that meant that I needed to focus on my training. If I was going to be a serious cryptozoologist, I needed to get better. I needed to make sure that I would never be caught flat-footed again. It was time to approach my real calling the way I had always approached dance: with total dedication, and my whole heart.
Well. Most of my heart, anyway. I could save a few bits out for special purposes.
The mice scurried around my feet, carrying small items and articles of my clothing to the appropriate boxes. The Sacred Ritual of Packing All the Crap was one that they knew well, and they were surprisingly good at not getting stepped on.
I was packing my collection of perfume bottles filled with holy water in sheets of eggcup foam when there was a knock at the front door. I straightened. I’d been waiting for that knock all day, but my hands still shook when I heard it. Slowly, I walked to the door, and called, “Who is it?”
“Let me in, you infuriating woman,” said Dominic.
Smiling, I undid the locks and opened the door.
Dominic De Luca was standing in the hall, wearing his oh-so-classic black duster, holding a paper sack of what smelled like fried chicken in one hand. He held it up. “I thought you might be hungry.”
“Starving,” I said, and stepped to the side. “Come in.”
He did, stepping past me before turning to look in my direction. “Verity—”
“I would have called, but I didn’t have your number.” I closed and locked the door. “That’s going to have to change, you know. You can’t be the mysterious disappearing boy anymore if we’re going to do this thing.”
“Do what?” he asked. There was a hopeful note in his voice that told me I was doing the right thing. I’d already been almost sure, but it was still nice to hear it confirmed.
I turned to offer him a shrug and a smile. “I’m leaving for Oregon in the morning. Renting a U-Haul and everything, since I can’t exactly ship the mice across the country via FedEx, and it would be nice to have a little time to just drive. I thought you might want to come with me. There’s a lot more to America than New Yo
rk, you know.”
“You would want me to come with you?”
This was it, then: this was the moment of truth, for both of us. I reached out and carefully took the bag of chicken from his hand. He let it go without resistance, and didn’t look in the least bit surprised when I chucked it into the kitchen. A river of mice followed the bag, cheering. I stepped closer to him, closing the distance between us.
“You said you loved me, before,” I said. “Did you mean that?”
“With all my foolish heart,” he said.
I put my arms around his shoulders, offering him a very small smile. “Then yes. I want you to come with me. I want you to come to Oregon; I want you to meet my family. You chose me over the Covenant of St. George, so I guess that means I need to show you that you did the right thing.”
“Really?”
There was something I hadn’t said to him yet, even though he’d said it to me. Realizing that I was doing this all out of order—who invites a guy to come meet their parents before they tell him whether they love him or not?—I leaned in close, and whispered, “I love you.”
Dominic didn’t say anything. He just tilted his head to close the distance between us and kissed me, hard and desperate. He was shaking. I hadn’t realized it until that moment, but so was I. I clung to him, returning his kiss with all the force of my own fear behind it—the fear that I had lost him when the Covenant came and made him choose between us, the fear that I had lost everything when they took me. There was so much fear, but some things are stronger. Like love, and like the knowledge that sometimes, you can win.
The scorching-hot kisses don’t hurt, either. Dominic wrapped his arms tight around my waist, literally lifting me off the ground as he started walking backward down the hall. I pulled my mouth away from his long enough to shout, belatedly, “Food for privacy! Food for privacy!”
The cheering of the mice accompanied us all the way into the bedroom, shutting off only when Dominic kicked the door shut behind us. We could finish packing in the morning and still be on the road by noon. There was a whole country out there for us to cross before we got to Oregon . . . and for once, I had a guy I wouldn’t need to warn about my family. Maybe I’m naïve, but if that’s not a happy ending, then I don’t know what is.
Midnight Blue-Light Special Page 32