by R. J. Blain
Within twenty minutes, I’d freeze my ass off, and I deserved to be mocked for my failure to plan accordingly. “Hey, Quinn?”
“What is it?”
“I need scarves and mittens and gloves and a cute little hat to keep my ears warm, assuming I survive this. Winter is bad for cindercorns. There’s no fire. No fire anywhere. I’m going to turn into a block of ice before the team gets here.”
“Check the back of the SUV in my black leather bag. I anticipated your special needs.”
Huh. I really did have the best husband. I checked the back, and sure enough, there were several pairs of black leather gloves that would fit me, several scarves, and a winter hat meant to keep my poor ears warm. I bundled up, muttering over how phones were evil and I’d have to wear the pair without fingertips in order to take the needed pictures. “We need an actual camera, one that doesn’t need me to touch a screen to operate.”
“Normally, we have one as part of our work kit, but we’ll get one of our own just in case. Until the team arrives, you’ll survive using your phone.”
“But will I?”
“You better.”
The gorgon was the only victim I believed to be dead, but I struggled to comprehend how seventy-three women had been left as statues for so long. Fortunately, none of the statues seemed weathered, which offered some hope they would survive being returned to flesh. While I took pictures, Quinn handled running the facial recognition software while keeping Blizzard and Avalanche company in the SUV.
When I finished documenting everything I could, I returned to the vehicle to watch him.
“Have I told you today you’re beautiful and smart?”
“Not sure,” I replied. “I could probably handle being told again. I haven’t had time to recruit the entirety of a mental health department to resolve my self-esteem problems.”
He snorted. “You’re smart and beautiful. I wouldn’t have thought to go this far back in Audrey’s records despite having them, and I probably wouldn’t have thought to come to some little bed and breakfast, as I would have assumed it was just yet another location of one of her trysts.”
“It looks like a lot more than that. What have you found so far?”
“A lot of missing women, the newest of which is six years ago, so they’ve been here a while. The oldest is from eleven years ago.”
“Long before you married Audrey.”
“Bingo. The real question is how do these women connect to Audrey or Morrison? If they connect to them. They might not. However, considering Audrey became a gorgon and killed her brother when he refused to go through the process, I’m starting to think this is far more than a mere coincidence.”
“Audrey had weak snakes, too. Like Michella.”
“And she was just as impotent, so that tells me that the batch of dust, while registering as high potency to the scanners, didn’t have sufficient magic to create strong gorgons. Perhaps it’s got a higher infection rate?”
“Easy to infect, hard to destroy.” I wrinkled my nose. “Which supports my general decision to torch 120 Wall Street. I really thought Yale would kill me for that stunt if the CDC didn’t get me first. In other news, that hangover really sucked.”
My husband shot me a glare, which promised retribution in some form or another. As his favored form of retribution involved trying to convince me I had value, I expected to enjoy every minute of it. “Without your napalm order, a huge number of weak gorgons may have been created, and they would have become easy targets for gorgon trafficking—and they would have become excellent pets for the wealthy. They would have fetched a high price on the black market.”
“They wouldn’t have been able to defend themselves.” I regarded the nearby statues with a frown. “How many of these women do you think were infected?”
“None of them. They would have reversed their petrification on their own if they’d become infected. Whoever did this probably dosed them with pixie dust to make them cooperative, had them pose, and then exposed them to the gorgon dust to see if they would become infected. Infection rates are typically low. But, considering there were at least two infections from this batch of dust, it’s not the normal one-in-a-thousand rate.”
“But why kill the gorgon they had? Do you think that one was infected, too?”
“No, she’s probably a natural gorgon. Gorgon males are usually the ones killed and used to create the dust, so she would have been killed for sport or to force the male to cooperate. The females can get quite vicious trying to defend their hive, and she wouldn’t have been useful to the dust producers.” My husband shook his head, checking something on his laptop. “Honestly, I’m impressed we have reception at all out here. I’m not getting any hits on the gorgon, so chances are the entire hive was wiped out. The hive was probably small, with one male, two or three females, and no whelps. Hives with whelps tend to be poor targets for schemes like this because the male will fight to the death along with the females, and they want the males alive.”
“But they just need the bodies for dust production, right?”
“The most common method of dust production involves the gorgon victim being alive at the start of the process, and then the decaying body used to strengthen the dust. It is possible to make the dust from just the bodies, but the dust is typically impotent and incapable of infecting others with the virus. You can view that type of dust as potent bile. If they took a male, they would have killed his females first to demoralize him before they began the batch of dust production—or held them hostage to force himself to be a more willing sacrifice.”
“Like that gorgon prince where we killed Audrey.” Technically, Quinn had done the killing, but I’d been there causing trouble, so I accepted my share of the responsibility for his ex-wife’s demise.
“Exactly right. He wouldn’t have done that unless he was trying to save his bride, his wives, and his children. That much of his sacrifice didn’t go to waste. He lost his wives, but his bride and youngest whelps survived—and his sole surviving daughter.”
“The little whelp was his?”
“Yes, from his previous hatching. She’s with her grandfather’s hive now.”
“Do you think she would get along with Beauty and Sylvester? They have a lot in common.”
“We can inquire for fostering. And yes, they do. I’ll call about fostering her after we’re back and we have a chance to talk with Beauty and Sylvester.”
“Maybe we should have requested napalm.”
“They’re bringing a few cups for you. They’ll have you purify the statues with flame before we use neutralizer on them. You’ll torch the entire exterior, and then we’ll do an investigation of the interior. They’re going to dome the building so you don’t light it on fire, and they’ll do a secondary dome around the garden so you can be a happy little pyromaniac. Hopefully, you can neutralize this batch of dust without harming the victims.”
I had my doubt on how effective that would be, but I would do my best. “Should I shift now?”
“If you want. You can poke around while sporting your fur coat if you think you won’t get too cold. And if you do get too cold, I’ll enjoy warming you up tonight.”
“Can you warm me up tonight even if I don’t get cold?”
“That was my plan,” my husband admitted with a shameless grin.
“Gorgon-incubus doohickeys are not precisely complicated to care for, which is a good thing, as I’m not sure I could deal with a high maintenance man. I only have lower grade pills with me.”
“They’re bringing a supply of the high grade pills, so don’t worry about it this once. It’s not that you can’t take the lower grade transformatives, the higher grade ones are just better. But at this stage? You can get away with a lot—or so says my grandfathers. All of them.”
“Has anyone told you that you have too many grandfathers?”
“On occasion.”
“I have more grandfathers than you do, so I can’t really say anything. But we have
too many grandfathers.”
“We really do. Try not to light anything on fire before the CDC arrives, but if you went inside and had a look while a unicorn, you shouldn’t do any harm. Just don’t step on anything that might be evidence.”
“You could ride me inside and tell me what’s evidence and what isn’t evidence.”
“I didn’t bring your saddle, Bailey.”
“You don’t need a saddle to ride me. You’re not going to hurt my back.”
“I was less worried about your back, truth be told. Your spine is more pronounced than a horse’s underneath all that fur, though I wonder if you being at a healthier weight has helped with that.”
Oh. I thought about that, and I winced at the thought of a sharp spine to the groin. “You’re right. You’re banned from riding bareback unless it’s an emergency. Should such an emergency occur, I will have to nurse you back to good health. We should check and decontaminate the statues first, anyway. If we have time, then we’ll investigate the building.”
“To be fair, I’m not really a fan of riding regular horses bareback, either. Saddles are useful things.”
“I don’t know how to ride a horse,” I reminded him.
“You’ll learn how to ride on a cindercorn, I’m afraid. I’m very jealous, and I don’t want my wife riding a horse when—”
I lunged across the vehicle and clapped my hands over my husband’s mouth. “We do not pervert my future horseback riding lessons with your gorgon-incubus doohickey naughtiness!”
My husband laughed and kissed my hands. When I released him, he said, “Okay, my beautiful. I will try to limit my jealousy and inquire with my uncle on how to shapeshift into a regular horse, too. Especially when you’re first learning, I’d feel a lot better if I’m playing at being a horse rather than put you on a school horse. Some of them have opinions.”
“If you say so.”
Without any other sources of fuel to work with, I ate an obscene amount of underbrush before running around the garden and bucking to elevate my body temperature enough so I could begin the tedious process of checking the victims for anything of use before burning the contaminated clothing off them and prepare them to be treated with neutralizer and returned to flesh. My husband joined me as a cindercorn after locking our pets in the SUV with the window cracked open and the engine running so they’d stay toasty warm while we flirted with dust contamination.
I suspected the dust had been exposed to weather for long enough Sunny had detected the residual scent, which in such low concentration wouldn’t be able to petrify most people.
“Pretty stallion,” I observed after having lit several statues on fire enough to destroy the contaminated fabric. “Remind me to thank uncle. He make you pretty stallion.”
“Well, I am part incubus, Bailey. The whole point is to be irresistibly attractive.”
“Ir-res-ist-i-bly attr-act-ive, all for me. Like this math. Other math suck.”
Quinn laughed. “I’m sorry he hasn’t helped you with your English, though.”
“So rude you talk good.”
“I know. You can punish me later over it.”
I bucked, careful not to hit one of the statues. “Much punish!”
“You are such a one-track mind.”
“Your fault you gorgon-incubus doohickey.”
“I don’t mind taking the blame for this situation.”
Of course he didn’t. He enjoyed whenever I became frisky. Or friskier. Could anyone blame me for falling for his charms? I couldn’t be blamed for falling for perfection. “Just no show other lady-ees your per-fec-shun. Comp-e-ti-shun bad.”
“You’re so jealous.” Quinn nipped my shoulder. “Show me how to help so I can be shapeshifted back to human before the CDC arrives, especially if you don’t want to share me with others. I’m pretty sure half of the CDC’s evaluators are women.”
“Check clothes, light clothes on fire, but not big fire. Little snort. Little snort ignites clothes. Several little snorts may be needed. Big snort might hurt statue. Stone okay against little snort, might melt in big snort.”
“I’m going to need some help with this, Bailey. Show me a big snort so I know not to do that.”
I eyed a large patch of snow a safe distance from the statues, charged it, and exhaled, snorting a large burst of flame at the patch, which sizzled and evaporated in the intense heat. I then gave a small snort, which was enough to ignite the air in front of my nose without sending a big column of flame billowing at the ground. “This little snort. That big snort.”
“That is a very big snort,” my husband agreed before giving a little huff, which was like my little snort but smaller.
“A little harder, not much harder,” I prompted.
He obeyed, and he gave a little snort with the appropriate amount of flames to light the clothing on fire.
“That good, do that on statue after nosing through the fabric. We look for things not cloth. Like sharp pointy things. Or wallets.”
“For some reason, I don’t think we’re going to be finding any wallets, Bailey.”
“Can dream.”
“Sure, my beautiful. You can dream. The facial recognition system is working on the photographs now. We might have results before the CDC gets here with the neutralizer.”
We made it halfway around the house, taking turns torching the statues, when my husband came to a halt, turned his head, and snorted flame at some snow in a big enough cloud I recoiled, flattening my ears. “What? What?”
Quinn snorted again before turning his attention to one of the statues. “I know her.”
Shit. “Guess no need to look at com-pu-ter then. Who is she?”
“She’s one of Audrey’s friends, the daughter of a New York senator. Her name is Kendra. A nice enough woman, tends to prefer a vanilla way of life, but she was always pretty open about practitioners, general magic usage, and even pixie dust usage, so she’s not precisely like your asshole parents.”
“How long Kendra missing?”
“I wasn’t aware she was missing. She doesn’t live in Manhattan, and while she was a friend of Audrey’s, I didn’t see her often. Please be careful with her. She’s nice enough—and her father is actually a pretty decent man for a politician.”
“You get praise from politicians for this,” I warned. “You dislike praise from politicians.”
“Hey, you actually said that without having to sound it out carefully. Good job, my beautiful. See? You’re already getting better with English with practice.”
“You bad in-flu-ence.”
“Bad?”
“Very bad,” I replied in my most solemn tone. “Naughty, even.”
While my husband chuckled and rewarded me with a nip on the shoulder, I took care of checking Kendra’s clothes for anything important and flammable, discovering a pouch tied around her wrist. “Find thing!” Careful not to gouge her with my teeth, I gnawed through the leather and dragged off my prize, clawing through the string until I could peek inside.
The smell informed me I dealt with gorgon dust. “Rude! Dust. No gorgon-incubus doohickey ex-posed.” I picked the pouch up in my teeth, went to a deeper patch of snow, and set the pouch down. “Both make big flame on it. Big flame make it go away. Big snort. Extra big snort. Actually, me make biggest flame. You watch, admire my biggest flame.”
My husband joined me, pawing at the snow-covered ground with a clawed hoof. “Use that column of fire you eliminated that gorgon with,” he suggested.
“Must run fast and get hot to do extra big fire. That is biggest flame? May-be.”
“I will make sure the pouch doesn’t escape while you go run.”
I tore off and did several circuits of the garden before skidding to a halt near my husband and blowing as much flame as possible at the pouch. Blue fire burst from my nose and engulfed the pouch, which vanished in a flash of white before the blue overtook it and eradicated the pouch and reduced its contents to a fine powder. “Pow-der!” I pranced in p
lace and snorted more blue flame. “All gone, now ash.”
“I’ll shift and bring Sunny to see if she can detect any dust,” my husband said before trotting off in the direction of the SUV.
I snorted more flame at the smear in the smoking ground. “Dust no like blue flame!”
“Better safe than sorry,” my husband retorted.
I pawed at the ground before eyeing Kendra’s statue. “You make shit choice in friend. Audrey no good. Me introduce you to nice people, you do better next time. Me better friend than Audrey.”
The statue didn’t reply, and already bored waiting for Quinn to return, I rolled on the ground and kicked my hooves. When that didn’t help alleviate my boredom, I played in the snow to learn if cindercorns could build snowmen.
To my dismay, hooves did not work well for packing snow into vaguely ball-shaped objects, although I could make ice statues using little snorts of fire on the piles of snow I made and carving it with my claws. By the time my husband returned, in his human form, I’d crafted a small ice sculpture of a cindercorn.
Well, if I tilted my head to the side and squinted, my artwork almost resembled a unicorn of some sort.
“What are you doing?” my husband asked, keeping a firm hold on Sunny’s leash.
“Bored, bored, bored,” I complained, shoving more snow into a pile so I could try to carve another ice sculpture. I snorted little flame, waiting for it to partially melt and freeze over before layering on more snow. “Sunny no bark!”
My puppy sat and regarded me with one ear flicked forward.
Damn. Even my puppy recognized I was more than a little crazy.
“That’s a good thing. Apparently, pregnant cindercorns are rivals of phoenixes for heat and flame generation. I’m not going to allow them to study this, for the record.”
“Left no dust for them to study.” I snorted, checking to make sure my flames no longer glowed blue before resuming my work checking the statutes. I discovered no more pouches, and I took care to be gentle with burning away the clothes covering them. “No be per-vert. Go to car and not look at pretty women not me. Cuddle pets. Make CDC bring me pink pow-der.”