“No,” she said, disgusted. “I didn’t have time. Plus I can’t spell it.”
“You should try it,” I said. The couple went around to the other side, and I booked it forward before someone else horned in. “They can sometimes guess the spelling-”
“Mom!”
“All right,” I said, pulling us to a stop. “It’s a… disease that makes you cuss.”
“Oh, fuck,” Cinnamon said-then, angrily, struck the car door repeatedly with her balled-up fist. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”
I stared over at her, trying to put Doctor Isaacson’s words from my mind. She was cussing, sure, but it didn’t sound like an uncontrolled outburst; it just sounded natural. Her life had been pretty shitty and she didn’t need anything else on her. “I’m not sure you’ve got it.”
“But you’re not sure I doesn’t?” Cinnamon said, mouth closing oddly, like she was biting off more than she could chew. “I does, doesn’t I?”
I started to say no, and then her head snapped aside in that weird sneeze-and now I could clearly see it wasn’t a sneeze, but a tic: a quick snap and a mouth motion, miming the biting gesture she’d just done seconds ago, but grossly exaggerated. What had sounded like a sneeze was a clearing of her throat, followed by a choked-off exhalation.
Oh, hell. This was exactly what Isaacson had said he’d seen in his special needs ministries. Not necessarily cussing, he’d said, but facial or verbal tics, often manifesting in puberty and worsening progressively through the teens, difficult to willfully control The car in front of us beeped, and I slammed my brakes. I’d let us roll forward, and damn near hit them as they started to back out. I waved and backed us up, then pulled forward and took their space once they were gone. As I put the car into park, I looked back over at her.
“You don’t gots to say it,” she said, staring at her hands. “Your face said everything.”
I started to respond, but she unbuckled her belt and got out of the car. Before I could smooth her feathers, a motorcycle rumbled past, nearly running us over. The biker shook his fist at us as he passed, and I started to flip him off, then laughed. It was Calaphase.
He looped around once more, then wedged his bike into a half-space at the end of the lot and came to join us. “Now that’s how I remember you,” I said, grinning, as he walked up in a long-tailed leather biker’s jacket over a slightly punky take on a business suit.
“Should have known it was you grabbing the last damn space,” he said, taking off a pair of gloves and stuffing them into his pocket. “Hey, Dakota.”
And without thinking we leaned forward and gave each other a hug. It felt natural, and good; and he was so strong. Embarrassed, I leaned back and looked him over, trying to brush off the familiarity of his touch, and said, “I like it. The suit is a nice touch.”
He winced. “Revy’s… service,” he said. “It was today.”
“You should have told us, Cally,” I said. “We wanted to-”
But Calaphase shook his head. “Sorry, persona non grata, Kotie.”
Cinnamon snorted, tugging at her collar. “Kotie and Cally sittin’ in a tree-”
“Hey you,” I said, tousling her hair. “Shall we go in and face the music, Calaphase?”
“Why of course, Lady Frost,” he said, slipping a small laminated card out of his jacket. I took it curiously: it was an Oakdale Clan Affiliate Card, with an older picture of me someone had scarfed from the Rogue Unicorn web site. “Just in case.”
“Thanks,” I said, still staring at it. “You don’t think I’ll need it in there?”
“You never know,” he said. “Our little Vampire Queen looked pretty steamed.”
“Can’t hurt,” I said, slipping it into my back pocket and starting across the alley towards the low brick structure that was Manuel’s Tavern. “More comfy than a steel collar, anyway.”
“For you,” Cinnamon said, again tugging at her own. “Why am I stuck with this and you gets a card? You don’t even changes-and you never actually said why you lost it.”
“She did not lose it,” said a smooth voice, in a lovely but clipped South African accent. “My Lady Saffron took it from her in a rage.”
All three of us froze in the middle of the street. Darkrose stood there, leaning against Manuel’s Tavern, form expertly blended into the black curved shape of a giant Coca-Cola bottle advertisement painted on the yellow wall. A second ago I could have sworn she wasn’t there.
The black vampire stepped forward, dark cloak falling open around her to reveal another full-length leather catsuit, of which she apparently had a full wardrobe. Her tall, always striking form was enhanced by knee-high boots, with heels almost high enough to make her my height, and she stalked forward in them expertly, stepping right before us, barring our path.
“So it was the bitch throwin’ a fit,” Cinnamon hissed. “Thought so.”
“You two have created quite the mess,” Darkrose said, staring at me and Calaphase with dark black eyes that seemed to bore into us. Her hair was pulled back in tight cornrows which made her exotic South African features harder, more severe. “She is in a mood.”
“This mess and her mood is her fault,” I said tightly. “ She chose to interpret her ex having an innocent dinner with a friend as some kind of marital betrayal.”
“True,” Darkrose admitted, glancing at Calaphase. “But I do not think she would appreciate seeing you tonight. Either of you.”
“What?” Calaphase said. “I know she was angry, but this is ridiculous. ”
“I agree,” I said. “ I started these meetings. And it’s a public restaurant.”
“But she still blames you, and is too hot under the collar to think clearly.” She stepped aside. “ I will not bar your path. But I came to warn you- it is not safe to go inside. ”
“Not safe? What the fuck? What is she, two? ” I said. “I mean, God damnit -”
“Not safe-really?” Calaphase said. “You heard us coming. Can she hear us?”
“If she was paying attention,” Darkrose said, smiling. “She’s very, very powerful, but inexperienced. If you entered she would know, but you are safe, for the moment.”
“Well, screw her,” I said, a shade short of livid. “Come on, let’s go to the Vortex.”
“However,” Darkrose said carefully, “I’d like to take Cinnamon inside.”
“What?” I asked, putting my hands protectively on her shoulders. “Why?”
“To shame my Lady Saffron into admitting that the protection on Cinnamon still stands,” Darkrose said. “Perhaps I can get her to re-extend it to you… ”
“Now I’m a little too hot to go under the collar again,” I said, still feeling the flush in my face. “You know, I didn’t think I cared, but… she had that made for me, and she threw it away. Kind of like she did with our relationship when she became a damn vampire.”
Calaphase twitched and Darkrose put her gloved hand to her mouth.
“I’m so sorry,” I said, now feeling embarrassment. “That just popped out.”
“You sure you don’t has Tourette’s?” Cinnamon asked, looking up at me.
“No, your mother is right,” Darkrose said. “It is a… hard thing when your lover becomes a vampire, when the one you love becomes a thing that feeds on human life. It is very hard, for you know in your heart the first life they want to feed on is your own.”
My lips parted. This wasn’t a vampire talking anymore; this was a human. And it was not abstract; this was very real, and very personal. It had happened to her.
“I’m so sorry,” I said. She looked sad and very old now. “I didn’t know.”
“It was a century ago,” Darkrose said. “Another life. Another time.” She straightened, smiled. “I do not blame you. Selfishly, I am glad, because I want her.”
She said that simply, openly, staring me straight in the eye. But I couldn’t blame her for staking her claim clearly. Some tiny part of me would always be connected to Savannah and remember what we’d been like
together, when I didn’t want to wring her neck. “I’m glad you have her, my Lady Darkrose.”
She inclined her head gratefully. “Thank you, my Lady Frost.” She extended her hand to Cinnamon. “I promise I will treat your daughter well. As if she were my own.”
“You didn’t turn your daughter into a vampire, did you?”
Darkrose looked up in shock. “No!” she said. “That would be unthinkable-”
“I was messing with you. Sorry,” I said, squeezing Cinnamon’s shoulders. “So, Cin, feel like hanging with the gang while your Mom and her fang go neck in a back alley?”
“Don’t come back with no bite marks,” Cinnamon said, “just k-i-s-s-i-n-g.”
“When did you become the mom?” I said, hands on my hips.
“When you started dating fangs,” she said, head snapping in her sneezy tic.
“All right,” I said, glancing at Calaphase, who seemed amused by the ‘fang’ comment. “Try not to get us into more trouble with her highness.”
So Calaphase and I were left there, on the corner of North Highland and Linwood, barred from our favorite restaurant. We stared at each other uncomfortably. “Sorry about the damn vampire comment,” I said. “And when she called you a fang-”
“You mean Cinnamon? Oh, she mouths off like that,” Calaphase said lightly-but my heart fell at the implication. “I’d love to say I don’t take things like that personally, but I’d also love to say that we vampires don’t deserve it, and that isn’t true. There’re reasons humans fear us, and werekin hate us-oh, screw it, let’s get some drinks. What about Vino’s?”
“Believe it or not, I was just there,” I said, “but Virginia Highland is one of the best walking neighborhoods in the city.”
“And it is a nice night,” Calaphase said, eyes resting on me calmly, slipping his hands into his pockets. “Stroll up to San Francisco Coffee? It’s right near to Beaver’s Books.”
“Does everyone but me love bookstores?” I said, sighing as my phone blooped at me. I pulled it out, saw a text message from a number I didn’t know, and set the phone to vibrate. “I think we’ve been to every one in the city looking for used audiobooks for Cinnamon.”
“So what will one more hurt?” Calaphase said. He poked his elbow out at me. “Come on, we can windowshop restaurants for our next date.”
I took his arm. “I thought this was our next date.”
“Technically our first, if the last one was an innocent dinner,” Calaphase said.
“Ouch,” I said. “I’m even more sorry about that than the vamp comment.”
“Then I’ll call this our second,” Calaphase said, “and hope there is another.”
“Hope springs eternal,” I said. “You know, you’re a very unusual vampire.”
“It’s like Saffron said the other night-I once thought becoming a vampire would be liberating,” Calaphase said. “Dark lords of the night, free of all restraint, on an endless orgy of sex, blood and violence. But vampirism turned out to be more addiction than superpower, and vampire culture is all prancing poseurs, petty politics and turf wars. So I never changed.”
“You sure about that?” I said, feeling his arm. He was lean, but his movements still had that immense strength of a vampire. If I let my hand flow with the sway of his elbow, he felt gentle; but when I got out of sync it felt like tugging on a building, or trying to stop a car. “Remember when we first met? You called me morsel.”
“I can put that mask on if you like,” he said, smiling, but not looking at me, “but I’m not on duty, impressing my employer by terrorizing trespassers. I’d rather just be myself.”
“I’d rather that too,” I said, and I wasn’t sure whether I was talking about him or me.
We strolled into San Francisco Coffee and in minutes were sitting down across from each other at a tiny striped wooden table-a vampire and a skindancer, wedged in with granola girls from the Little Five Points alternative district and trendy yuppies from the Virginia Highland walking district, without a one of them being the wiser. Well, that wasn’t entirely true; with my coat, deathhawk and tattoos I stand out more than a vampire. But you can’t tell a skindancer from their canvases unless you look closely.
I stared down at the beautiful leaf pattern the barista had woven into the surface of my mocha, then looked up at Calaphase, sipping a frosted slushy with a grimace. “Just like old times,” I said, raising my mug and taking a sip.
“Just like old times,” he responded, rubbing his forehead with two fingers. “Ow. Brain freeze.”
I don’t remember what we talked about; it didn’t matter later anyway. All I know is that halfway through our drinks, Calaphase got a buzz on his phone, frowned, and then stood to take it. I sipped my coffee, sighing, looking at a cute girl with a woven knit cap who was scoping my tattoos; maybe I had another customer.
Then my phone buzzed, and I looked up to see Calaphase staring at me. With a sudden flash of fear, I whipped out my phone and saw another text message, same number: ‹‹check your email, “skindancer”››
And then a picture of a graffiti tag began slowly loading on my phone’s screen.
“We gotta go,” Calaphase said, closing his phone with a click and picking up his coffee without sitting down. “Saffron has ordered us back to Manuel’s Tavern.”
“Oh, shit,” I said, reluctantly closing my phone, swallowing the dregs of my cup, and standing. “Don’t tell me she’s taken away Cinnamon’s protection-”
“Nothing of the sort,” he said, swigging the rest of his with a grimace and motioning for us to go. “Emergency war council. We’ve got serious problems. Demophage, our new Lithuanian vampire, you met him the other night-”
“Curly,” I said, following Calaphase outside. “He got the sand. I liked him.”
“Yeah, well, he’s gone,” Calaphase said. “Demophage is training a new recruit, and when the putz didn’t show up at Revy’s service. Demophage decided to track him down, against my orders. Now he’s missed his shift and is not answering his phone.”
“Maybe he’s just… ” I began, then stopped. Maybe nothing; he was dead. “ Damnit! ”
Calaphase wanted to run, but I couldn’t. My knee was throbbing from too much recent activity. So, by the time we burst into Manuel Tavern’s dark wooden cave, both our phones were buzzing, and by the time we navigated the huge round tables until we found the one where Saffron held court, we found both Darkrose and Jinx with their cellphones out-while Saffron fumed. The table looked strangely empty without Revenance and his girlfriend.
“I’m sorry, we came as quickly as I could,” I said. Saffron and I glanced at each other, then we both looked away. “My knee’s been acting up since Transomnia’s attack.”
“Still?” Darkrose said, staring at me sharply. “I forget how fragile humans are.”
“Lady Saffron, what’s wrong?” Calaphase said, leaning over the table. “When I reported Demophage’s disappearance, you said you had more bad news.”
Saffron stared down at the table. When she spoke, she sounded shocked. “The Lady Scara, the Gentry’s enforcer, tells me two more vampires are missing. When I called Lord Delancaster to inform him, I got no response. Not from him, his servant, or even his chauffeur. Vickman just called from his house and confirmed-my master has disappeared. Whatever’s happening to vampires, it’s taken the Master of Georgia.”
Finally Saffron looked up at me, actually afraid. “We’re on our own now.”
Cave Magic
The Harris Mural is a majestic piece of art dominating the atrium of Emory University’s Harris School of Magic. Three stories tall, its rippled surface is infused with magical pigment, breaking the surface into intricate polygonal shapes like a vast stained glass window. The mural’s supposed subject is Edmund Harris, the magician after whom the School of Magic and Harris Hall are named. His stylized figure stands to the left of the mural, holding a wand over a hat to his right. But it is the magic bursting forth from the wand that takes center stage
.
From the wand, an explosion of light and color ripples across the mural, a thousand intricate overlapping patterns that change constantly from a starburst to snowflakes to spreading leaves to striking lightning. Every day, as the sun moves across the huge glass windows of the atrium, as students crisscross the three levels of catwalks in front of it, shifting light and shadow changes the pattern of mana building up in its network of magical capacitors, making the starburst flow like a slow-motion version of my tattoos.
I stared up at it, hands jammed in my pockets. Someone knew how the mural was made. At Saffron’s impromptu war council, we decided that I would investigate this thing, at least finding out how the graffiti worked, police approval or no. And the Harris Mural was our best lead on how magic writ upon a wall could work for as long as it had taken to kill Revenance.
My attempts to research it online Sunday hadn’t gotten me far, but it was only nine, Cinnamon was safely at school, and I had three full hours before I was expected at the Rogue Unicorn-not that my fellow tattooists cared. Winning the Valentine Challenge had brought more tattooing work into the parlor than we could handle, and it was actually easier for the rest of them to take advantage of that business when the famous Dakota Frost wasn’t there to hog all the inking. So… I had all the time in the world, and the whole library of the Harris School of Magic at my disposal. Time to crack this thing.
“Hey, Emorrhoid,” a familiar voice called down to me.
I looked up and saw Michael Bell grinning at me from the second-story catwalk. In high school he’d helped me through English, in college I’d helped him through Calculus. Now we were both dropouts, after a fashion. But where I’d bailed before I got my degree, Michael had gotten as far as law school before skipping the bar, buying a used UNIX workstation and diving into the world of computers. Five hardworking years later, prematurely grey but with a still-dark goatee and sparkling blue eyes, he was Director of Computing at the Harris School of Magic.
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