an_alien_sky (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} an_alien_sky) wrote,@ 2005-08-10 16:57:00 |
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The Association
This was a fragment of an "in-between" intended after "Shattered Stone" (which initially had a much different ending), to carry the tales of Journey dealing with magic & Faery into modern San Francsico. Somewhere in SF, there's a hidden group of gifted/cursed people who have loosely networked across the country...The Association...
---------------------
Kris looked rather determined, and Steve wasn’t about to get in the way of someone with that large a pair of pliers.
“Need another set of hands?” Cari said.
“Brains, you mean,” Kris said, over her shoulder.
Cari grinned. “That, too.”
“Yeah, sure.” Kris swung around the banister and down the stairs to the common room, toed open the basement door and snagged a kitchen chair to prop it open.
Despite himself, Steve followed. He kept expecting things to jump out at him or for nasty surprises to be lurking in every corner. After everything of the last couple days, these people seemed too...well...normal.
There was a loud whump and an equally loud curse. Steve rounded the corner of the basement stairs in time to hear a ringing clang as Kris whacked the water heater with the pliers. She was rubbing her head and glaring at one of the pipes.
“It might help more,” Cari said politely, “if you fixed that.” She pointed towards a dripping pipe that had a puddle under it.
Kris glared.
Steve turned away. There was a lot of junk down here, piles of boxes and plant pots and leaning metal shelves. In one corner, there was a box labeled “Radioactive”, another with a huge skull and crossbones on it, a third that simply read, “Go ahead.” He wandered impatiently, unable to keep still, half-listening to the metal squeaks and clangs and curses behind him, and he couldn’t resist poking through the junk. Especially the huge stack of old record albums half-hidden under a wooden bench...
“My god,” he said, picking up the topmost album. “You people actually listen to this?”
Kris looked up; Cari turned. He held the album up -- the Partridge Family Christmas album.
“Cat didn’t warn me nearly enough,” Steve said.
Something crossed Kris’s face, something serious, alarmed. “Don’t move,” she said quietly, urgently.
Still holding the album, Steve froze.
Carefully, Kris picked her way around the water heater and wove a wary path through the junk piles. Her gaze stayed on him, as if she was a hunting cat, trying not to scare off prey. In the dim light, the way she moved, she reminded him of Darkwater. Steve saw her snag something up from one of the piles, something long and green and thin.
Now he was scared. He stood paralyzed, hardly daring to breathe. But Kris stopped a bare pace away, draped the something across his shoulders, then stepped back.
“There,” she said, with satisfaction. “Perfect.”
He glanced down. The something was a string of Christmas lights.
“We’ll put you up on the front porch,” Kris said. “You make a perfect Christmas decoration.”
Behind her, Cari cracked up.
Steve opened his mouth, shut it, confused.
Kris tapped the record album with one finger. Her grin was evil. “A partridge in a Per-ry.”
Screw Cat, Ross warned me about these two...
Suddenly a huge crash shook the floor above them. All three of them startled, but Kris was the first to shake her shock and run for the stairs, taking them three at a time...Cari close behind her.
Steve stood there for a moment. He could hear angry, muffled voices through the ceiling; it didn’t sound pleasant. He pulled the lights off, dropped the album on the workbench, but suddenly couldn’t help grinning. If this was what these folks were like, then maybe...just maybe...
He headed up the stairs; the air exploded into yelling at the top. Cautiously, he peered around a corner. Kris’s back was to him, Cari next to her, but in front of them...
A huge man, beefy, in jeans and t-shirt, his face red, his eyes glazed. The alcohol smell was strong even from where Steve was. There was no mistaking what had caused the crash, either -- one of the huge bookshelves lay toppled, books scattered all over the floor and the wood cracked. Across from it, cowering in the corner, was a small boy.
Kris and Cari were talking loudly to the man, bracketing him and keeping him distracted. Steve stood in the doorway, uncertain -- but Kris glanced at him, then at the kid, a silent, no-nonsense command.
Get the kid out of here.
He saw her shift to her right, yelling in the man’s face to get the man’s attention. The man swung at her, she dodged, and he rounded to follow. Steve didn’t wait; he eased along the wall over to the kid.
“You...” Suddenly the drunken man lunged past Kris, towards Steve.
Oh fuckin’ shit.
Steve couldn’t think, didn’t have time for anything else. The power was just there, and he flung his hand out.
Red flashed, caught the man in the face. He yelled, his hands going to his face, and he stumbled...
...and Kris twisted, swept the man’s legs out from under him. Her hands snaked out, pressed against the man’s chest. Something else flashed, an electric jolt of light.
The man collapsed.
Silence. Steve fell back against the wall, shaking from the adrenaline.
“Slow,” Cari said quietly.
“Everyone’s a critic.” Kris crouched beside the unconscious man, then glanced up to Steve. But before she could say anything, noise burst into the hall outside, then into the room. A group of three people came in, one woman, two men.
“You okay?” said the woman to Kris. She was an older woman, late 60s, her features dark and Hispanic.
Kris just looked at her.
The woman sighed. “Sorry I asked.”
“Anyone check on Samuel?” Cari said quietly. “He was on door watch.”
“Cracked skull,” one of the men said, square, blonde and bearded. He knelt down beside Kris to look the unconscious man over with a cold eye. “Bastard forced his way through --”
“Who’s that?” said the third harshly.
Steve didn’t like being pointed at. He really didn’t like it, especially when the pointer was a balding, stuffy-looking prig.
“He’s with me,” Kris said, and gave Steve another look, followed by a glance at the kid.
“Don’t you move,” the prig snapped at Steve, then glowered over Kris. “I didn’t okay him. You don’t have any right --”
“Fuck you,” Kris said. “You --”
“Everyone settle,” the bearded man said quietly. “Downs, get Josh out of here. Mar, you --”
“Jonah,” Kris said, just as quietly.
The bearded man glanced at her, then at Steve. “Later,” he said to Kris.
The stuffy prig stepped past Steve to where the boy was and scooped the boy up. Steve didn’t move, but that didn’t stop the man from glaring at Steve as he left the room, though. The other four were talking in hushed tones; it sounded urgent, scared.
“Um,” Steve said.
The hushed consultation cut off. Four sets of eyes turned to where he still leaned against the wall.
“My last name,” Steve said carefully to Kris, ignoring the others. “Before they white-washed it. It was Pereira.”
Annoyance flickered on her face. Kris opened her mouth, then took another look at Steve. “Okay,” she said instead, slowly.
“Portuguese,” Steve said. “Means ‘pear tree’.”
Kris blinked, then grinned.
“Oh lord,” Cari said.
“You going to introduce us?” the Hispanic woman said to Kris.
“Steve Perry,” Kris said, nodding at him. “Mage. Thinks he can sing. Steve, Maria Mountainhawk, Jonah --”
“Jonah,” the bearded man said firmly, cutting Kris off.
“Um,” Kris said, reddening, “yeah.”
“Mountainhawk,” Steve said, looking at the Hispanic woman, then at Kris and Cari. They looked nothing alike.
“My ma,” Kris said. “Sort of.”
“Adopted,” Maria drawled. “The old-fashioned In-jun way.” Then, to Kris, “We’ll take care of this one. Go on and get him,” she nodded at Steve, “upstairs. He looks shaky.”
“I am not,” Steve said.
“Don’t argue,” Kris said quietly, as she got to her feet and came over. She put a careful hand on his shoulder, pushed him gently towards the stairs. Steve felt his legs tremble; it had been a while since he’d had to use anything Darkwater had taught him. He took the stairs slowly, Cari behind him and Kris leading the way up. He wasn’t sure he liked being boxed as that.
“Portuguese,” Kris said lightly. “Huh. That’ll teach me.”
Steve just looked at her.
“Had you pegged as Native Am and Welsh,” Kris said.
The Native American bit, he’d heard before. The other was a new one on him. “Welsh?”
Kris shrugged. “Well, Perry’s English. The dragon’s Welsh.”
Steve stopped.
Kris glanced back, then stopped herself. “Um...”
“Oh for three today,” Cari murmured.
“Dragon,” Steve said carefully.
Kris was red again. “Forget I said it. I’m tired. Babbling like an idiot --”
“No,” Steve said.
“Wide open,” Cari said to Kris. “Don’t bitch when you get hit.”
“Mar’d kill me.” Kris sighed again. She started back up the stairs again, gestured for Steve to follow. “Um...I...around some folks, I just...ah...see animals. Totems. Spirit-medicine. ‘Specially if they’re Native Am and follow the old paths.” Her face was red again. “But dragon’s from the Isles. Welsh. So I thought... well...”
She sounded uncomfortable. Steve shook his head, but held himself silent as they topped the stairs and rounded two corners, finally turning through a wooden door. The room they entered was small, but comfortable, bright-colored beanbags splattered along the floor. There were a couple other doors, and Kris went straight to one, gestured Steve towards one of the beanbags.
“Get comfortable. Mar’ll --”
“You still see it?” Steve said.
Kris turned, her face closed.
“Another one,” Cari sighed.
He wasn’t sure what set them off. “Please,” he said to Kris.
“Least he’s polite about it,” Cari said.
Kris’s mouth was tight. “Why?” The word was harsh. “So you can puff yourself up with how advanced you are? Look, everyone, I got a big bad dragon totem, I’m so fuckin’ spiritual...”
That had the tone of something often run into and sick to death of. Steve kept his voice quiet. “I just want to know what it looks like.” He managed a grin. “If it’s big and bad, I’m running.”
“That’s a new one,” Cari said.
Steve couldn’t read Kris’s expression. She stared at him for a moment, appeared to decide something. “Small,” she said slowly. “Long legs and toes, like a tree frog. Glowing eyes. She’s... um...sitting on your shoulders, like this.” Kris traced her hand across her shoulders, indicating something curled up.
She. Steve couldn’t hold that gaze. He looked down, his eyes suddenly burning.
Silence for a moment. “Sorry,” Kris muttered, and turned back to the door, fumbled with the knob.
He wasn’t getting a good start here, not at all. Steve made it over, stopped her. “No. She...” The words hurt; it was hard to admit this, even knowing what these people were. “She was real. I mean, really real. She... died. In that other place.”
“Real,” Kris echoed.
“Yeah.” Steve still couldn’t meet her gaze. “She was a friend. A good one. She said...she said she’d wait.”
Kris looked at him, her expression odd. “You just explained something. Sort of. I think. Hold on.” She pulled free of his hand, went through the door.
“Clear as mud,” Steve muttered.
“Get used to it,” Cari said. “That’s what makes a Blade. A whole pattern from only a thread or two.”
“You’re not one,” Steve said. He didn’t mean it to be a challenge, but it was.
Cari only grinned. “No. I’m clean-up. Remember that.”
Before he could figure that out, Kris reappeared. She thrust something into Steve’s hands. “Here.”
It was cool and glassy to his touch, a black stone egg. His face must have shown his confusion; Kris grinned.
“Take it to the window. In the sunlight.”
Wondering, he did. The black suddenly burst into a shimmering sheen of gold; his jaw dropped in awe, delight. It was beautiful. He looked back at Kris.
“It’s obsidian,” Kris said. “Sheen obsidian, I mean. For the gold.”
His hands shook suddenly. He tightened his grip, still nearly dropped it. Obsidian, in an egg.
Nestling...
“I was at a rock show last week.” Kris hadn’t seen his reaction. “I saw those, and it was like something was at my shoulder, crawling all over me and yelling at me in this little high voice to get it. But it wasn’t mine. I knew that.” She hesitated. “I knew it was yours.”
“Her name was Sid,” Steve whispered. He closed his hands around the egg. It was warm to his touch. “Short for Obsidian.”
He thought he heard something, a whispery rrrr. Maybe it was just the air conditioning. He didn’t want to think so. He leaned against the cool glass of the window, cupping the obsidian egg in his hand.
“Oh for four,” Carrie murmured.
“No,” Kris said. “I had to do that.”
Steve swallowed, closed his eyes. It hurt, still. But not as bad as he feared. He could almost see Sid curled up on the window sill in front of him, with a gaping, lolling, smart-ass grin.
Kris had crossed the room, to lean against the window frame next to him. That close, he couldn’t avoid her gaze. “You okay?” she said quietly.
“Yeah,” Steve said. He stared out the window. “Thanks. Thank you.”
---
“Why?” Steve said, not looking at her. He stared out the window. His voice was hoarse. “So you can prove how much better you are at this crap? Freak the fuckin’ newbie out and get your kicks...”
Silence. “We’re even, now,” Kris said finally, still in that quiet tone. “I guess.”
“Sorry.” He didn’t sound it. He wasn’t sure he meant it.
Kris crossed the room, to lean against the window frame next to him. That close, he couldn’t avoid her gaze. “We’re not better,” Kris said quietly. “Just...look, your curse came on you what, couple years ago?”
Steve didn’t answer.
“And you had Cat. And Jonathan, from what I’ve seen, and that man scares the shit out of me.”
That startled Steve into meeting her gaze. “But...but Jay’s not...”
Kris waved the words aside. “Listen to me. You got it late. You had folks around you who knew what it was. Who helped you. Here...” Her eyes were shadowed. “Most of us weren’t that lucky.”
He dropped his gaze again.
“Imagine getting it at puberty,” she said. “Or earlier. Here. In school. Seeing things. Feeling things. Getting all sorts of awful information about everyone around you. You blurt stuff out, thinking someone’s said it to you. Or you react to something you know is right there. It’s like sight. Or hearing. You don’t think about it. You just react.” Something in her face twisted. “They got a word for that. And treatment. Lots of treatment.”
“If you’re lucky,” Cari said quietly.
“Yeah,” Kris said. “That.”
“Great,” Steve said bitterly. “You’ve been doing this since you were toddling. Sue me.”
“No,” Kris said. “Listen. For once in your spoiled rotten life, just listen.”
It was an unnerving, stinging echo. Steve stared at her, hearing, seeing someone else, some other place, some other time.
You do not think, you do not listen...
“You’ve got control,” Kris said. “You’ve got a handle on your curse that most folks here would kill for. And have tried to. And you’re fuckin’ upset because someone who doesn’t have that kind of control, that fuckin’ privilege, acts on something that she can’t block out.”
He could feel her anger, thick and crawling over him. Memory was just as bad.
Whenever someone tries to make you listen, you dredge up the worst you can, and fling it in their faces, to get them to be silent...
“I don’t ask you to be blind,” Kris said. “So don’t ask me to be head-dead.”
“What are you,” Steve said hoarsely, “my Blood Guardian?”
Kris just looked at him, then pushed away from the wall, headed for the door. She stopped in the doorway, looked back at Steve. “No,” Kris said quietly. “Not yours.”
-----------
“A teek,” Steve said carefully.
Cari just looked at him.
“I...uh...read the book,” Steve said.
“I was nowhere near there,” Cari said. She paused, and there was an odd glint in her eye. “Officially.”
Steve swallowed. He turned, and saw Kris behind him, her expression the deadpan of someone trying too hard not to grin.
“You?” he said.
She said nothing.
“I’ll find out,” Steve said, “eventually.”
Her expression shifted. “Yeah,” she said. “You will.”
“Oh for two,” Cari murmured, and Steve felt his face go hot.
“Before you start,” Kris said, before Steve could open his mouth, “before you fuckin’ start on us, you better ask yourself one question. Like, what the hell is that Seth doing on Mount Tam? Why’s he keeping it open?”
“He’s not,” Steve said hotly.
Both women snorted.
“Right,” Kris said, and pushed herself away from the window. “Keep thinking that. Keep believing that. I’m sure it helps you sleep better at night.”
This was a fragment of an "in-between" intended after "Shattered Stone" (which initially had a much different ending), to carry the tales of Journey dealing with magic & Faery into modern San Francsico. Somewhere in SF, there's a hidden group of gifted/cursed people who have loosely networked across the country...The Association...
---------------------
Kris looked rather determined, and Steve wasn’t about to get in the way of someone with that large a pair of pliers.
“Need another set of hands?” Cari said.
“Brains, you mean,” Kris said, over her shoulder.
Cari grinned. “That, too.”
“Yeah, sure.” Kris swung around the banister and down the stairs to the common room, toed open the basement door and snagged a kitchen chair to prop it open.
Despite himself, Steve followed. He kept expecting things to jump out at him or for nasty surprises to be lurking in every corner. After everything of the last couple days, these people seemed too...well...normal.
There was a loud whump and an equally loud curse. Steve rounded the corner of the basement stairs in time to hear a ringing clang as Kris whacked the water heater with the pliers. She was rubbing her head and glaring at one of the pipes.
“It might help more,” Cari said politely, “if you fixed that.” She pointed towards a dripping pipe that had a puddle under it.
Kris glared.
Steve turned away. There was a lot of junk down here, piles of boxes and plant pots and leaning metal shelves. In one corner, there was a box labeled “Radioactive”, another with a huge skull and crossbones on it, a third that simply read, “Go ahead.” He wandered impatiently, unable to keep still, half-listening to the metal squeaks and clangs and curses behind him, and he couldn’t resist poking through the junk. Especially the huge stack of old record albums half-hidden under a wooden bench...
“My god,” he said, picking up the topmost album. “You people actually listen to this?”
Kris looked up; Cari turned. He held the album up -- the Partridge Family Christmas album.
“Cat didn’t warn me nearly enough,” Steve said.
Something crossed Kris’s face, something serious, alarmed. “Don’t move,” she said quietly, urgently.
Still holding the album, Steve froze.
Carefully, Kris picked her way around the water heater and wove a wary path through the junk piles. Her gaze stayed on him, as if she was a hunting cat, trying not to scare off prey. In the dim light, the way she moved, she reminded him of Darkwater. Steve saw her snag something up from one of the piles, something long and green and thin.
Now he was scared. He stood paralyzed, hardly daring to breathe. But Kris stopped a bare pace away, draped the something across his shoulders, then stepped back.
“There,” she said, with satisfaction. “Perfect.”
He glanced down. The something was a string of Christmas lights.
“We’ll put you up on the front porch,” Kris said. “You make a perfect Christmas decoration.”
Behind her, Cari cracked up.
Steve opened his mouth, shut it, confused.
Kris tapped the record album with one finger. Her grin was evil. “A partridge in a Per-ry.”
Screw Cat, Ross warned me about these two...
Suddenly a huge crash shook the floor above them. All three of them startled, but Kris was the first to shake her shock and run for the stairs, taking them three at a time...Cari close behind her.
Steve stood there for a moment. He could hear angry, muffled voices through the ceiling; it didn’t sound pleasant. He pulled the lights off, dropped the album on the workbench, but suddenly couldn’t help grinning. If this was what these folks were like, then maybe...just maybe...
He headed up the stairs; the air exploded into yelling at the top. Cautiously, he peered around a corner. Kris’s back was to him, Cari next to her, but in front of them...
A huge man, beefy, in jeans and t-shirt, his face red, his eyes glazed. The alcohol smell was strong even from where Steve was. There was no mistaking what had caused the crash, either -- one of the huge bookshelves lay toppled, books scattered all over the floor and the wood cracked. Across from it, cowering in the corner, was a small boy.
Kris and Cari were talking loudly to the man, bracketing him and keeping him distracted. Steve stood in the doorway, uncertain -- but Kris glanced at him, then at the kid, a silent, no-nonsense command.
Get the kid out of here.
He saw her shift to her right, yelling in the man’s face to get the man’s attention. The man swung at her, she dodged, and he rounded to follow. Steve didn’t wait; he eased along the wall over to the kid.
“You...” Suddenly the drunken man lunged past Kris, towards Steve.
Oh fuckin’ shit.
Steve couldn’t think, didn’t have time for anything else. The power was just there, and he flung his hand out.
Red flashed, caught the man in the face. He yelled, his hands going to his face, and he stumbled...
...and Kris twisted, swept the man’s legs out from under him. Her hands snaked out, pressed against the man’s chest. Something else flashed, an electric jolt of light.
The man collapsed.
Silence. Steve fell back against the wall, shaking from the adrenaline.
“Slow,” Cari said quietly.
“Everyone’s a critic.” Kris crouched beside the unconscious man, then glanced up to Steve. But before she could say anything, noise burst into the hall outside, then into the room. A group of three people came in, one woman, two men.
“You okay?” said the woman to Kris. She was an older woman, late 60s, her features dark and Hispanic.
Kris just looked at her.
The woman sighed. “Sorry I asked.”
“Anyone check on Samuel?” Cari said quietly. “He was on door watch.”
“Cracked skull,” one of the men said, square, blonde and bearded. He knelt down beside Kris to look the unconscious man over with a cold eye. “Bastard forced his way through --”
“Who’s that?” said the third harshly.
Steve didn’t like being pointed at. He really didn’t like it, especially when the pointer was a balding, stuffy-looking prig.
“He’s with me,” Kris said, and gave Steve another look, followed by a glance at the kid.
“Don’t you move,” the prig snapped at Steve, then glowered over Kris. “I didn’t okay him. You don’t have any right --”
“Fuck you,” Kris said. “You --”
“Everyone settle,” the bearded man said quietly. “Downs, get Josh out of here. Mar, you --”
“Jonah,” Kris said, just as quietly.
The bearded man glanced at her, then at Steve. “Later,” he said to Kris.
The stuffy prig stepped past Steve to where the boy was and scooped the boy up. Steve didn’t move, but that didn’t stop the man from glaring at Steve as he left the room, though. The other four were talking in hushed tones; it sounded urgent, scared.
“Um,” Steve said.
The hushed consultation cut off. Four sets of eyes turned to where he still leaned against the wall.
“My last name,” Steve said carefully to Kris, ignoring the others. “Before they white-washed it. It was Pereira.”
Annoyance flickered on her face. Kris opened her mouth, then took another look at Steve. “Okay,” she said instead, slowly.
“Portuguese,” Steve said. “Means ‘pear tree’.”
Kris blinked, then grinned.
“Oh lord,” Cari said.
“You going to introduce us?” the Hispanic woman said to Kris.
“Steve Perry,” Kris said, nodding at him. “Mage. Thinks he can sing. Steve, Maria Mountainhawk, Jonah --”
“Jonah,” the bearded man said firmly, cutting Kris off.
“Um,” Kris said, reddening, “yeah.”
“Mountainhawk,” Steve said, looking at the Hispanic woman, then at Kris and Cari. They looked nothing alike.
“My ma,” Kris said. “Sort of.”
“Adopted,” Maria drawled. “The old-fashioned In-jun way.” Then, to Kris, “We’ll take care of this one. Go on and get him,” she nodded at Steve, “upstairs. He looks shaky.”
“I am not,” Steve said.
“Don’t argue,” Kris said quietly, as she got to her feet and came over. She put a careful hand on his shoulder, pushed him gently towards the stairs. Steve felt his legs tremble; it had been a while since he’d had to use anything Darkwater had taught him. He took the stairs slowly, Cari behind him and Kris leading the way up. He wasn’t sure he liked being boxed as that.
“Portuguese,” Kris said lightly. “Huh. That’ll teach me.”
Steve just looked at her.
“Had you pegged as Native Am and Welsh,” Kris said.
The Native American bit, he’d heard before. The other was a new one on him. “Welsh?”
Kris shrugged. “Well, Perry’s English. The dragon’s Welsh.”
Steve stopped.
Kris glanced back, then stopped herself. “Um...”
“Oh for three today,” Cari murmured.
“Dragon,” Steve said carefully.
Kris was red again. “Forget I said it. I’m tired. Babbling like an idiot --”
“No,” Steve said.
“Wide open,” Cari said to Kris. “Don’t bitch when you get hit.”
“Mar’d kill me.” Kris sighed again. She started back up the stairs again, gestured for Steve to follow. “Um...I...around some folks, I just...ah...see animals. Totems. Spirit-medicine. ‘Specially if they’re Native Am and follow the old paths.” Her face was red again. “But dragon’s from the Isles. Welsh. So I thought... well...”
She sounded uncomfortable. Steve shook his head, but held himself silent as they topped the stairs and rounded two corners, finally turning through a wooden door. The room they entered was small, but comfortable, bright-colored beanbags splattered along the floor. There were a couple other doors, and Kris went straight to one, gestured Steve towards one of the beanbags.
“Get comfortable. Mar’ll --”
“You still see it?” Steve said.
Kris turned, her face closed.
“Another one,” Cari sighed.
He wasn’t sure what set them off. “Please,” he said to Kris.
“Least he’s polite about it,” Cari said.
Kris’s mouth was tight. “Why?” The word was harsh. “So you can puff yourself up with how advanced you are? Look, everyone, I got a big bad dragon totem, I’m so fuckin’ spiritual...”
That had the tone of something often run into and sick to death of. Steve kept his voice quiet. “I just want to know what it looks like.” He managed a grin. “If it’s big and bad, I’m running.”
“That’s a new one,” Cari said.
Steve couldn’t read Kris’s expression. She stared at him for a moment, appeared to decide something. “Small,” she said slowly. “Long legs and toes, like a tree frog. Glowing eyes. She’s... um...sitting on your shoulders, like this.” Kris traced her hand across her shoulders, indicating something curled up.
She. Steve couldn’t hold that gaze. He looked down, his eyes suddenly burning.
Silence for a moment. “Sorry,” Kris muttered, and turned back to the door, fumbled with the knob.
He wasn’t getting a good start here, not at all. Steve made it over, stopped her. “No. She...” The words hurt; it was hard to admit this, even knowing what these people were. “She was real. I mean, really real. She... died. In that other place.”
“Real,” Kris echoed.
“Yeah.” Steve still couldn’t meet her gaze. “She was a friend. A good one. She said...she said she’d wait.”
Kris looked at him, her expression odd. “You just explained something. Sort of. I think. Hold on.” She pulled free of his hand, went through the door.
“Clear as mud,” Steve muttered.
“Get used to it,” Cari said. “That’s what makes a Blade. A whole pattern from only a thread or two.”
“You’re not one,” Steve said. He didn’t mean it to be a challenge, but it was.
Cari only grinned. “No. I’m clean-up. Remember that.”
Before he could figure that out, Kris reappeared. She thrust something into Steve’s hands. “Here.”
It was cool and glassy to his touch, a black stone egg. His face must have shown his confusion; Kris grinned.
“Take it to the window. In the sunlight.”
Wondering, he did. The black suddenly burst into a shimmering sheen of gold; his jaw dropped in awe, delight. It was beautiful. He looked back at Kris.
“It’s obsidian,” Kris said. “Sheen obsidian, I mean. For the gold.”
His hands shook suddenly. He tightened his grip, still nearly dropped it. Obsidian, in an egg.
Nestling...
“I was at a rock show last week.” Kris hadn’t seen his reaction. “I saw those, and it was like something was at my shoulder, crawling all over me and yelling at me in this little high voice to get it. But it wasn’t mine. I knew that.” She hesitated. “I knew it was yours.”
“Her name was Sid,” Steve whispered. He closed his hands around the egg. It was warm to his touch. “Short for Obsidian.”
He thought he heard something, a whispery rrrr. Maybe it was just the air conditioning. He didn’t want to think so. He leaned against the cool glass of the window, cupping the obsidian egg in his hand.
“Oh for four,” Carrie murmured.
“No,” Kris said. “I had to do that.”
Steve swallowed, closed his eyes. It hurt, still. But not as bad as he feared. He could almost see Sid curled up on the window sill in front of him, with a gaping, lolling, smart-ass grin.
Kris had crossed the room, to lean against the window frame next to him. That close, he couldn’t avoid her gaze. “You okay?” she said quietly.
“Yeah,” Steve said. He stared out the window. “Thanks. Thank you.”
---
“Why?” Steve said, not looking at her. He stared out the window. His voice was hoarse. “So you can prove how much better you are at this crap? Freak the fuckin’ newbie out and get your kicks...”
Silence. “We’re even, now,” Kris said finally, still in that quiet tone. “I guess.”
“Sorry.” He didn’t sound it. He wasn’t sure he meant it.
Kris crossed the room, to lean against the window frame next to him. That close, he couldn’t avoid her gaze. “We’re not better,” Kris said quietly. “Just...look, your curse came on you what, couple years ago?”
Steve didn’t answer.
“And you had Cat. And Jonathan, from what I’ve seen, and that man scares the shit out of me.”
That startled Steve into meeting her gaze. “But...but Jay’s not...”
Kris waved the words aside. “Listen to me. You got it late. You had folks around you who knew what it was. Who helped you. Here...” Her eyes were shadowed. “Most of us weren’t that lucky.”
He dropped his gaze again.
“Imagine getting it at puberty,” she said. “Or earlier. Here. In school. Seeing things. Feeling things. Getting all sorts of awful information about everyone around you. You blurt stuff out, thinking someone’s said it to you. Or you react to something you know is right there. It’s like sight. Or hearing. You don’t think about it. You just react.” Something in her face twisted. “They got a word for that. And treatment. Lots of treatment.”
“If you’re lucky,” Cari said quietly.
“Yeah,” Kris said. “That.”
“Great,” Steve said bitterly. “You’ve been doing this since you were toddling. Sue me.”
“No,” Kris said. “Listen. For once in your spoiled rotten life, just listen.”
It was an unnerving, stinging echo. Steve stared at her, hearing, seeing someone else, some other place, some other time.
You do not think, you do not listen...
“You’ve got control,” Kris said. “You’ve got a handle on your curse that most folks here would kill for. And have tried to. And you’re fuckin’ upset because someone who doesn’t have that kind of control, that fuckin’ privilege, acts on something that she can’t block out.”
He could feel her anger, thick and crawling over him. Memory was just as bad.
Whenever someone tries to make you listen, you dredge up the worst you can, and fling it in their faces, to get them to be silent...
“I don’t ask you to be blind,” Kris said. “So don’t ask me to be head-dead.”
“What are you,” Steve said hoarsely, “my Blood Guardian?”
Kris just looked at him, then pushed away from the wall, headed for the door. She stopped in the doorway, looked back at Steve. “No,” Kris said quietly. “Not yours.”
-----------
“A teek,” Steve said carefully.
Cari just looked at him.
“I...uh...read the book,” Steve said.
“I was nowhere near there,” Cari said. She paused, and there was an odd glint in her eye. “Officially.”
Steve swallowed. He turned, and saw Kris behind him, her expression the deadpan of someone trying too hard not to grin.
“You?” he said.
She said nothing.
“I’ll find out,” Steve said, “eventually.”
Her expression shifted. “Yeah,” she said. “You will.”
“Oh for two,” Cari murmured, and Steve felt his face go hot.
“Before you start,” Kris said, before Steve could open his mouth, “before you fuckin’ start on us, you better ask yourself one question. Like, what the hell is that Seth doing on Mount Tam? Why’s he keeping it open?”
“He’s not,” Steve said hotly.
Both women snorted.
“Right,” Kris said, and pushed herself away from the window. “Keep thinking that. Keep believing that. I’m sure it helps you sleep better at night.”
