Discount Armageddon: An Incryptid Novel (38 page)

Knowing exactly what he looked like under that shirt and duster wasn’t helping matters. It says something about what passes for “normal” when I’m around that the pictures of the dead girl on my computer screen weren’t doing anything to dampen my desire to jump his bones. They weren’t helping it, either, but they weren’t enough to kill the mood in and of themselves.

Dominic clicked the send button and pulled back. “There.”

“Thanks,” I said lamely. “You’ll let me know if you find anything?”

“I will.” He hesitated, eyes fixing on mine. “Verity—”

Someone started hammering on the front door of the apartment, about half a second before the telepathic static clicked on inside my head, telling me that “someone” was “my cousin,” who I’d forgotten to call. “Crap, it’s Sarah,” I said, knocking Dominic to the side as I scrambled from my chair.

Sarah had her hand raised to start hammering again when I opened the door. At first, she didn’t say anything. She just let her hand drop, and looked at me.

“Sarah, I’m sorry. I lost track of the time.”

Her eyes narrowed, frostbite seeming to spread around the edges of her irises. I took an involuntary step
backward. For Sarah’s eyes to be whiting out like that, she had to be
pissed
. “I thought you were dead,” she said, in a clipped, tightly controlled tone that was belied by the wave of telepathic fury that underscored it. “You disappear right after fucking a boy from the Covenant, you’re not in any of the usual places, no one’s seen you anywhere, and then one of the gargoyles tells me he saw you going back into the sewers
alone
. You couldn’t even tell me where you were going?”
You scared the living shit out of me, and what is
he
doing here, anyway? I thought you were done with that asshole after he explained his platform on racial cleansing!

The transition from spoken word to telepathic scolding was so smooth I barely noticed it at first, until I saw how much the white had spread across her eyes. “Sarah, you need to calm down. I’m fine. I’m sorry I scared you. I really didn’t mean to.”

You didn’t think! You never think!
She stormed into the apartment, which was something of a mixed blessing. On the one hand, it meant I could close the door, thus sparing the neighbors our little family drama. On the other hand, it meant I was shutting myself in the apartment with a pissed-off cuckoo and a man from the Covenant. Not the sort of combination that inspires many funny anecdotes. A few cautionary tales, maybe, but nothing you can really go repeating in mixed company.

“Miss Zellaby.” Dominic straightened up, offering a shallow but impeccably polite bow in Sarah’s direction. “A pleasure to see you again.”

Sarah turned her narrow-eyed gaze on him, making me glad once more that Antimony’s comic books got it wrong, and telepaths can’t actually kill you with their brains. Give you a whopping headache and earworm you with annoying jingles, yes; kill you, no. (Although sometimes, when she’s managed to stick “The Happy Banana Song” in my head for a week, I sort of wish she could kill people with her brain. It would be kinder.)

What are you
doing
here?
she demanded.

He didn’t respond. He couldn’t. Without spending a lot more time around her, there was no way he’d be attuned enough to actually “hear” her when she thought at him like that.

The white rimming Sarah’s eyes started to fade, replaced by a look of sheer frustration. “What are you doing here?” she repeated, out loud this time.

“You were the one that alerted me to your cousin’s absence, if you’ll take a moment to remember,” he said mildly. “I went looking for her because I shared your concern, and assumed you’d like her returned to you with as many of her original limbs as possible.”

The white fled Sarah’s eyes completely, leaving her chagrined and a little embarrassed. “Oh,” she said. “I did call you, didn’t I?”

“Yes, you did.”

“I shouldn’t have had to.” She stalked over and smacked me solidly on the shoulder.

I yelped. “Hey!”

“Don’t you hey me! Why didn’t you call? You know you’re supposed to call before you go running off to your certain death!”

“I don’t remember that rule.” I rubbed my shoulder. Sarah doesn’t hit hard, but she has an unerring gift for hitting squarely atop any preexisting bruises you might happen to have. “I’m pretty sure I’d need a better cell plan if that was actually a rule, because I’d be making a
lot
of phone calls. Besides, your note said you were going to class. I didn’t want to interrupt you in the middle of algebra.”

“Probability theory,” corrected Sarah sharply, “and next time you’d damn well better interrupt me, or I’m telling.”

“Who are you going to tell? Alex knew where I was going. Mom and Dad would’ve known, except they’re off chasing basilisks, which is arguably even dumber than going into the sewers where the servitors are. I
mean, all the servitors will do is bite me and maybe haul me back to the dragon for mutation. The basilisk will turn me into a piece of lousy garden statuary.”

“I am oddly less reassured than I believe you intended me to be.”

“And I find myself in the somewhat uncomfortable position of agreeing with a nonhuman,” Dominic said, frowning. “Mutation does not strike me as being a desirable or laughable consequence.”

“Oh! That reminds me.” I dug the jar of gold dust out of my pocket and held it up, giving it a little shake to make the powder swirl like the world’s most expensive snow globe. “The dragon princesses said that eating gold will keep us from being mutated.”

“… why does this statement not seem even slightly unreasonable or insane?” asked Dominic. “Something has gone terribly wrong with the world.”

Sarah patted him reassuringly on the arm. “Welcome to life with Verity. Just wait. Soon she’ll have you thinking that three-inch heels are suitable for combat situations.”

“Unlikely,” said Dominic.

“But funny,” I added. “Besides, you have the legs to pull it off. Not many men do. Anyway, Dominic, I
know
you’re planning to go down there again, and Sarah, I’m hitting the point of ‘better safe than sorry.’ So who wants a gold smoothie?”

“Can I have mine with ketchup?” asked Sarah.

Drinking the world’s most expensive milkshakes, the kitchen of a semilegal sublet in Greenwich Village, soon to be late for work

T
HE PERFECT RECIPE FOR GOLD MILKSHAKES
turns out to be two tablespoons of gold dust to two scoops of vanilla ice cream, a cup of vanilla soy milk, and either a sizable quantity of Hershey’s Syrup (if you’re a reasonably normal human being) or a quarter-cup of leftover chunky Prego with mushrooms (if you’re a cuckoo). Sarah was kind enough to let me make the human-style milkshakes first, since past experience has taught us that preparing one of her milkshakes leaves the blender looking like the site of a particularly nasty massacre. This time was no different. I could probably have achieved a very similar effect by blending a human hand, provided it was wearing a watch or a wedding ring, or maybe just a lot of glitter.

Dominic watched me pour Sarah’s milkshake, clearly
unsure as to whether he should be fascinated or utterly appalled. He settled for a combination of the two, demanding, “Why did you put spaghetti sauce into your cousin’s drink?”

“Because I like it that way,” said Sarah, taking the glass. “You have your chemical stimulants and I have mine, monkey.”

“Monkey?” echoed Dominic, now sounding more puzzled than anything else.

“Not actually a mammal,” said Sarah. She sipped her tomato-based milkshake before adding, “We’re pretty sure cuckoos evolved from some sort of really big bug.”

“Thanksgiving dinner with my family is
awesome
,” I deadpanned. “Now drink your gold before somebody comes along and mutates you into a twisted parody of humanity.” The milkshake tasted basically normal, if I was willing to ignore the gritty residue it left at the back of my throat. I’m willing to ignore a lot in the interest of avoiding mutation.

Dominic sipped his own shake, grimaced, and took a larger swallow. “Are you sure this will protect us?”

“Nope. But the dragon princesses said it would, and I don’t have a good reason to think they’re lying. Besides, they gave me the gold. Getting them to part with gold is sort of like getting Sarah to part with her laptop—it only happens under extreme duress, and it’s something they’d really prefer to avoid if at all possible.”

“I’m not that addicted to the Internet,” said Sarah frostily.

“Sure you are. It’s like telepathy you don’t have to feel bad for using. Also you don’t have to worry about stumbling over any sexual fetishes unless you’re checking somebody’s browser history, and I figure once was enough to teach you that lesson.”

Dominic choked on his milkshake.

“I hate you.” Sarah sipped her shake, expression mild.

“I know.” I finished my own milkshake, putting the cup in the sink before I began digging in the junk drawer
for plastic baggies. “I’m going to give you each a scoop of gold dust for later. I’d say wait about six hours and then swallow it. Mix it with something if you need to, but make sure it stays in your system.”

“Are we even sure this stuff is going to work for me?” Sarah held up her glass. “It’s tasty and all. I just don’t want to take it away from the two of you if you’re going to actually need it.”

“Better safe than sorry.” I started tipping gold dust into baggies, trying to distribute it in roughly equal portions. “We don’t know that it’ll work for you—we don’t even know if dragon blood can mutate you the way it does humans, given your biology—but I’d rather not take the risk. The last thing we need is a snake cult with a cuckoo-lizard-hybrid doing its bidding. The servitors are problematic enough without adding telepathy.”

“I’m afraid I would have to kill you at that point,” said Dominic. He sounded apologetic, which was a bit of a surprise. I would’ve expected him to be happy about an excuse to kill a cryptid, even if the cryptid in question
was
a member of my family.

“It’s okay, I get that,” said Sarah.

“Touching as the threats of mayhem are, Dominic and I really do need to go and talk to Piyusha’s family. What are your plans for the rest of today, Sarah?” I handed her a baggie of gold dust.

She tucked the baggie into her pocket, replying, “I’m going to hang out here, if it’s okay with you. I promised the maid service I’d give them a few hours to clean my room before I locked them out again, and I’d like to catch up with the mice.”

“That’s cool.” I handed Dominic his baggie. He promptly made it disappear into his coat. “Can you do me a favor before you go?”

“What’s that?”

“Take Dominic on a Starbucks run? I’d kill for an iced coffee.”

Sarah glanced from my empty milkshake glass to the
blood spiking up my hair.
You need a chance to shower?
she asked, as she said, out loud, “Your usual order is good?”

“Yes, exactly,” I said.

“No problem. Come on, Covenant boy.” She grabbed a startled-looking Dominic’s elbow, tugging him toward the apartment door. “You can buy me a scone.”

“Are you going to insist on covering it with ketchup?” he asked, glancing back at me with a question in his eyes. I nodded reassuringly. Either he was starting to trust me, or he could guess my real motives, because he didn’t fight her as she guided him out of the kitchen.

“Don’t be ridiculous; ketchup doesn’t go on scones.” Sarah stepped out into the hall, still pulling Dominic along. “Curry goes on maple scones, and steak sauce goes on blueberry scones.”

“What about chocolate scones?”

The closing door cut Sarah off mid-”Ew.” I smiled slightly, shaking my head, and turned to sprint for the bathroom. If I was going to tell Piyusha’s family that I hadn’t been fast enough to save her, I was at least going to do them the courtesy of doing it while not covered head to toe in gore.