“A mial.”
“A meal?”
“Mee-all.”
“Yes, but what is it?”
“What’s a human?” she retorted, scrubbing her fingers through her loose hair and almost glaring up at him. “What’s a werewolf, what’s a warlock, what’s a night mare? What’s a witch, what’s a dryad, what’s a vampire? What’s a fairy, a goblin, a troll? It’s just another creature sharing the planet, that’s all.”
“Yes, but what is it?”
“Oh, right. Uh. That’s a tough one to explain. We’re just—we’re just another species here. There’s about . . . um . . .” Her eyes slitted as she thought. “Maybe half a million of us on the planet?”
He thought of Pot, the triplets, the night mare. “What kind of magic can you do?”
She smiled. “No kind. We’re pretty boring. The only thing interesting about us is our life span—the average mial lives to be about twelve.”
“Twelve?” he almost shrieked. “How old are you now?”
“I’m old,” she said wistfully. “Old to be having a baby. Four next month. Don’t worry,” she added, “it’s not creepy or anything that we did it. We reach maturity at ten months.”
“Wh—but—wh—”
“But Cole, listen!” She grabbed his forearms. “Listen to this! If I have a baby with a human or a human hybrid—like a werewolf or a witch or whatever—he or she will have an enormous life span! Fifty or sixty years, at least! Think of that! That’s practically forever.” For a moment she was looking through him, not at him. “My line could go on for centuries. We can’t get a foothold on this planet because everybody else lives eight times as long, but my baby has a chance—we have a chance—”
Definitely the weirdest day ever. And this from a man who routinely turned into a wolf and ate cows. “You want to take over the planet?”
She looked shocked, as if he had slapped her. “Heck, no. We just want to have a chance. We can’t get a chance, you know, because—but my baby will have a chance. My line, my name.”
“Your baby won’t know anything about anything,” he said, almost shouting. “He’ll be stronger and faster than everybody, live longer than his mother’s people, be alone, die alone. You want that? That’s your big plan?” He realized he was towering over her, roaring, and didn’t care. “Because that’s what you’ve got!”
“He’ll have the world! He’ll be able to do whatever he wants!” she shrilled back. “He’ll have more than ten years to live, and that opens up anything you can think of.”
“You’re cursed. I’ve cursed you. And the baby.”
“We’re blessed,” she snapped back, “and you’re a moron. You’ve given the baby great gifts and you don’t even realize. The life span alone is the birthright of practically everyone else here; my child deserves it, too. And she’ll be strong—able to defend herself and stay safe. And live.”
“You are,” he said carefully, “a crazy person.”
“Yeah, well, it takes one to know one.”
“And I’m not having anything to do with this.”
“Who asked you to?”
“If I walk out this door . . . ,” he threatened.
She threw the empty milk glass at him; he ducked easily. “Bye!”
He walked out that door.
Twelve
“And then you left?”
“Well. Yes. I said . . . you know . . . If I walked out that door I was never coming back, and then—”
“She threw the glass at you and good-bye.”
“Yeah.”
“And you’ve been in town—what? Less than a week?”
He almost groaned; the full moon was a few hours away. He had actually forgotten about the moon, that’s how crazy Charlene was making him. Forgotten! Christ, what next? Forgetting to eat?
“Are you sure you won’t have a piece?” Pot asked, tapping the box with a bony finger.
“No.”
“It’s goat,” she wheedled.
“I’m not hungry.”
“That,” Rae announced, “is seriously screwed up.”
“Hush, ghost. You’re not helping.”
“Come on, Potty. There isn’t one part of that story that isn’t weird. Charlene’s a mial? Whatever that is. And pregnant? All part of her plan? And she’s dying?”
At Cole’s fresh look of alarm, Pot quickly said, “She’s dying as we all are, Rae. Everyone has a time limit. You’re just too silly to acknowledge yours.”
“She can talk,” Rae said as if Pot wasn’t sitting right there at Cole’s kitchen counter. “Her people live for a zillion years. Poor Charlene! Just think, she could be dead before Bush is out of office.”
“I’m going to puke,” Cole said, and went to the bathroom, and did. When he came back after brushing his teeth, Pot was still there. So, presumably, was Rae.
“What are you going to do?” the queen asked.
He opened his mouth, but no words came out.
“Boy oh boy,” Rae observed. “Not the sharpest knife in the drawer.”
“Enough, Rae. Well, Cole? Are you going to stay here with Charlene, raise the baby? See to its upbringing after Charlene—ah, after? Or leave them and find your people?”
“Door number two,” Rae added, “makes you a gigantic loser.”
“That’s not true,” the queen interrupted. “You have no obligation to her; she admitted she tricked you.”
“Which doesn’t sound like it took much effort on her part.”
“Rae!”
“All I’m saying is, Einstein he’s not.”
“As I was saying,” the queen continued, sending looks of irritation to all corners of the kitchen, “you’re not mates, she has what she needs of you, she has in fact released you from any obligation.”
“Yep, she’s totally fine living a life alone, being a single mom, dying young, and leaving your kid an orphan. Don’t give it another thought.”
Cole leaned over far enough to rest his forehead on the counter. It felt smooth and cool. “Why did you come over?” he asked the Formica.
“Well . . .” The queen paused. “I don’t want you to read anything into this, but—”
His front door was thrown open. “My queen, your kingdom awaits!” several people shouted in unison, which was a good trick.
“—I’m leaving town,” she finished.
Thirteen
“Holy Christ on a cracker with Cheez Whiz,” Rae gasped, while Cole stared at the naiads—he assumed they were naiads—milling around in his living room.
“Forgive us, Queen Potameides,” one of them said, and the group—there were seventeen, severely straining his living room space—went into a deep bow. “We have been from you so long, we could not remain in the front yard a moment longer knowing you were not far away, and so we—”
The queen waved the explanation away, and the guard or whoever it was instantly shut up. “Yes, yes, that’s fine.”
“What’s going on?” Rae demanded.
“Probably the ones loyal to her overthrew the ones not loyal to her,” Cole said. At the queen’s unguarded look of surprise, he added, “Violence I understand.”
“Yes. Ah. Yes. My cousin is dead—”
“Long live the queen!” another one interrupted. They all, Cole noticed, looked a great deal like the queen, the same long stringy hair and watery eyes, the same damp smell and long, spidery limbs.
“Right,” the queen finished. “So, I go.”
“This very damned minute?” Rae asked, sounding upset.
“Rae.”
“I mean, you gotta leave right now, pack a bag and your swim fins and off tonight? Without a good-bye or anything?”
“Rae.”
“Because that rots!”
“Rae. The river is my home, and more, my people need me.”
“Well, shit!”
“You must have known I wouldn’t stay forever.”
“Why not? All the other freaks in this town don’t see
m to be in any damned rush to leave.” The ghost audibly gulped. “Uh, no offense, Cole.”
“That’s okay,” he replied. To Pot: “So you’re taking the chance to go back and be with your people?”
“As I said. Don’t read anything into that. Our situations are different. I’m an exiled queen and you—”
“Are a chump if you let Charlene get away,” Rae said, “but we’re getting off the subject. Why do you have to leave now? Because I know that look, Pot, you cow, you can’t fool me, once you’re in the wind we’ll none of us see you again, and stop me if you heard this already but that rots.”
“I’m of the royal family of the Naiad,” Pot said sternly, “and I do not have the freedom ordinary people have. The Mississippi is a large territory and I lost it once through carelessness and—”
“The Mississippi River?” Cole asked. “That’s your kingdom?”
“Was,” Pot replied. “And now, is again. But I wanted to come by and say good-bye. In fact, you and Rae are the last ones on my list. I can’t have my kingdom and Mysteria both—don’t read anything into this—so I’ve traded the café to the triplets and their mother for, ah, future favors, and have wrapped up my other affairs. So now—”
“Wait a minute,” Rae interrupted. “We were last on your list?”
“Well . . .” Pot paused. “I went, ah, geographically. This house is the last one.”
“Fine, go then!” Rae shouted. “I never liked you anyway!”
“I will go,” the queen replied, smiling, “and that is a lie. And Rae, I adore you, and that will never change, not if I rule for a thousand years.”
“Go soak your head in the deep end!”
“I go, then.”
One of her hench-naiads opened the front door, but before Pot could grandly sweep out, in the manner of a river queen, a tall dark-haired man blocked the doorway.
“What now?” Rae griped, but Cole could hear the undercurrent of tears in her voice.
“Aside for the queen,” one of the naiads demanded.
“Shush,” the queen said. “He’s not one of my subjects, Mr., ah . . . ?”
“Michael Wyndham.”
“Potameides.”
They shook hands. “Pack leader,” the tall man explained.
“Queen of the Mississippi River naiads,” Pot offered. “Good night.”
“See you.”
She left. She took all the river people with her. The werewolf came in.
Fourteen
“Hi,” the werewolf said. He was dark-haired and broad, with gold eyes, big hands, and a feral scruffiness that Cole felt and instantly responded to. He had the weird urge to kill a cow and present it to the stranger. Two cows.
“Hello.”
“I’m Michael Wyndham. In case you didn’t hear me at the door.”
“Cole Jones.” He didn’t offer his hand to shake; he had the very strong sense that the man wouldn’t want his hand. Instead, Wyndham was sizing him up and Cole saw his nostrils flaring as he took everything in. Oddly, this was in no way alarming. It was almost—comforting?
“I can’t believe she just picked up and left with those other weirdos. I didn’t even like her,” Rae said tearfully, “but you talk to someone for fifty years, you get used to them, you know?”
Wyndham flinched. “Who the hell is that?”
“That’s my ghost.”
“Hey, pal.” The tears instantly vanished. “I’m not your anything.”
“Sorry,” Cole said. He kept trying to look Wyndham in the face and his gaze kept skittering away. He had been raised to know that it was polite to look people in the eye when you spoke to them, but Wyndham didn’t seem to mind. “My roommate.”
“A ghost? And a river naiad. I’ve met an eleionomid before—”
“Marsh nymph,” Rae explained, before Cole could ask.
“—right, they’re all over the Cape where I live. Lots of river marshes out there. And lots of witches, but that’s about it. Oh, and you.” Wyndham smiled in a perfectly friendly way, keeping his teeth covered, and Cole, responding to the man’s natural charisma, actually smiled back.
“What—” Cole began, and stopped. Still the weirdest day ever, and getting weirder. And too many damned questions. Pack leader? What was he doing here now, tonight? How had he found Cole? What did he want?
Rae saved him the trouble. “Are you—what?—the boss of all the werewolves, then?”
“I am.”
“So—what? You’re here to—what?”
Wyndham was recovering quickly, and didn’t seem to mind being interrogated by a dead woman. “I’m here to assist a member of my Pack, if he needs it.” To Cole: “You don’t look like you’re in any real peril to me.”
“He knocked up the local Realtor,” Rae offered.
“Oh. Congratulations?”
“We’re, uh, still working that out,” Cole said. “How did you find me?”
“Another Pack member lives here. He got in touch with me—apparently there’s a vampire killer in this town? Someone who knows quite a bit about werewolves?”
“You don’t sound like you believe that all the way.”
“Well”—Wyndham shrugged—“I don’t take chances, period. As you were new, we thought you might need a hand. And with the moon on her way”—Wyndham gestured to the window, which showed nothing but unalleviated darkness; there were no street lights this far out of town—“I thought you might be vulnerable. Normally I wouldn’t travel this close to a Change, but in this case . . .”
While Cole processed this, Rae said, “Whoa, whoa, whoa. That stud wannabe Justin told on Charlene?”
Wyndham blinked slowly, like an owl. “My Pack keeps me informed of any potential threat, yes. Which reminds me, Cole, why didn’t you tell me about this vampire killer?” His lips actually curled at the word “vampire,” and Cole instantly knew: the boss werewolf didn’t believe in vampires. But had come anyway. Perhaps he assumed Charlene was a crazy person. God knew there were enough of them in the world. Still, it was nice of him to check up, even if Wyndham had doubted anything would come of it.
And he was waiting for an answer. “My parents were killed when I was a baby,” he explained. “I was raised by regular people. I mean, my foster mother.” Not exactly “regular people.” He prayed word of his slip wouldn’t get back to Mama Zee.
Wyndham was nodding. “Yep, yep, that’s what I figured. I can smell them all over you. That’s not a bad thing,” he added quickly. “You can probably smell them all over me—I married one.”
“Ha!” Rae cried. “There you go. He married a regular person.”
Wyndham laughed. “I didn’t say that.”
“She’s no threat to you,” Cole said quickly. “The vampire killer. She was just trying to—” What? What in the world could he say? Annoyingly (or mercifully), Rae remained silent.
“Are you sure? You’re part of my family, even if you never knew, and I want to help you any way I can.” Wyndham clapped a large hand on Cole’s shoulder. It felt like a brick. “You’re not alone anymore, Cole.”
Then why, he wanted to ask, did hearing that—at long last—make him feel exactly nothing?
Fifteen
“That was, no joke, the most amazing thing. Pot leaves, the werewolf guy shows up, and how nice was he? I mean, wow! He had kind of an Errol Flynn thing going on, did you notice? Yummy. And where’d he go already? You guys didn’t even get a chance to catch up or anything!”
“He left for his Change.” Change. Pack. He could hear the capital letters in his head, sensed their deep meaning. “We don’t like to be in towns or cities when the Change happens.” We. Werewolves. My people. Us. Our.
“How long do you have?”
“About an hour.” Fifty-three minutes.
“So you have time!”
“Time?”
“You’re not fooling me, pal. I heard you sticking up for Charlene. And I heard you tell him you weren’t in any big rush to get out to the C
ape.”
“Too many tourists,” he said automatically.
“Ha! The thing you came here for, the reason you blew Charlene off, it’s handed to you on a platter, and what? You’re all Mr. Cool, ‘Oh, well, I’d love to visit, maybe for Christmas.’ Give me a goddamned break.”
He said nothing.
“I mean, look at the situation,” Rae continued. Christ, she loved the sound of her own voice. “You’ve basically got a choice: go off with your people—like Pot did—or stay with what you like and marry a local—like your boss says he did. And he’s soooo helpful: you don’t have to move in with all the werewolves on the Cape. What’d he say again?”
“There are too many in the world to live in one place,” he said automatically.
“I just knew you were paying attention. Aaaaaaand?”
“Any werewolf past the age of consent can live anywhere, with Wyndham’s permission.”
“Which he gave you about five minutes ago. Aaaaaaaand?”
“I don’t have to choose; I can move between worlds, as his mate does.”
“Ding ding ding!”
“What?”
“Cole. For Christ’s sake. What are you still doing here? You’re talking like I didn’t hear you puke at the thought of Charlene dying alone.”
Fifty-one minutes.
“And you’re talking like you have a choice. When really, you never ever did.”
“That’s true,” he said.
“So, again. Stop me if you’ve heard this. What the hell are you waiting for? Does that Wyndham guy have to chisel an invite on your forehead?”
“No,” he said, and practically jumped toward the doorway. But before he could get it open, it opened by itself (but not really) and like magic (but not really; she probably just drove up and he was too distracted to hear the car) Charlene was standing there. Her thereness, her concentrated punch, washed over him like a wave and he wondered why he was surprised. Of course: she had a short life span; her people jammed everything they could into a dozen years. Of course they were more there than ordinary people. And how could he ever have resisted her?
“I knew this would happen,” Rae said, sounding shocked. “I think I’ll see if I can install free cable.”