The Things We Water

I swept my hand down Duncan’s back as he yawned. I’d only told this story twice before, but he knew it. “That was a little over two years ago, and we’ve been together ever since,” I wrapped up our first meeting, impressing myself. I couldn’t have explained that any simpler or to the point.

The learning curve I’d experienced afterward—having to figure out how to feed a newborn magical creature, how to clean him, teach him how to be alive—all belonged to me. I’d share those stories if they wanted. It didn’t seem like they did based off the silence that followed our meet-cute. Him being the cute and me being the “meet” part.

“To make sure I understand,” the man with the glasses said after a long, loaded moment, “you didn’t see who spoke to you?”

I shook my head. “All I saw were red eyes in the distance. We stayed there for a month, but she never came back.” At some point, I had gone from hoping and praying Duncan’s mom would come back to dreading she would. His little nose bumped my inner wrist, those ruby eyes peering at me through his curly eyelashes.

I wasn’t sure what it said about me that I hoped she never returned. And if she did? I couldn’t even think about it, so I didn’t.

“You never met the mother before?” Glasses asked after another minute, his expression watchful.

Too watchful.

“Not that I know of.” There wasn’t a doubt in my mind she had something that dampened her magic like we did, not after the way I’d felt her and then hadn’t. Obsidian wasn’t hard to get. Some versions of it were more expensive than others, but it wasn’t astronomically priced. Most people just didn’t care enough to hide themselves. But if I packed the kind of punch she did? I’d have five bracelets on me at all times, and I’d rob a bank to afford them.

“Does the child speak?”

“Not verbally,” I answered. “He understands language. Soon after he… changed, he started being able to speak to me, to tell me yes and no, telepathically. We communicate as well as I could with a toddler, but he’s more well-behaved, and he’s potty trained. He’s more mature than a normal two-year-old.” He was perfect, dead food habits not counting.

That got me an unexpected lazy lick on my wrist that made me smile. He was so freaking cute.

“His form at the moment… that’s how you met him, and he’s stayed this way since?”

He meant the fact he looked like a black hound puppy, except for his red eyes and the blue flame at the tip of his tail.

I nodded. “Yes. He hasn’t changed into a human form. I don’t know if he can.”

It made me feel slightly better that Duncan’s magic was such a mystery. I had tried to figure it out on my own, spent hours and hours looking up whatever I could on certain beings. On some I’d never heard of. Some that were more well-known figures.

There was only so much information available.

Somewhere in history and time, it became dangerous to be different. The trolls left their bridges, the unicorns fled their forests, and the thunderbirds abandoned their great nests in the greatest mountains.

And gods that were once worshipped for millennia became names that you couldn’t find in textbooks….

But people weren’t ready for that knowledge bomb, and I had a feeling that it would take centuries before that was the case, and even then, whatever I was, wasn’t something even most of those who were “different” could handle. Case in point: the Jenny Greenteeth, the chupacabra two years ago, and a handful of other people I’d run into when I didn’t have my bracelet on for some reason.

But this wasn’t about me.

This was about the sleepy baby on my lap who was back to yawning. One of the modern wonders of the world, I told him. A myth of a myth.

He was no dragon, no chimera, no giant devil dingo, no Shisa, or white greyhound. He was missing two heads, otherwise I would have thought he was a Cerberus. There were a few other options I thought might fit, but the rarer the magic, the harder those beings would be to find. The magical people of the world were secretive for a reason after all.

And there was no master list of mythological creatures to check off. Every culture and civilization had its share, and there were a lot of them. Rumor had it, they overlapped and went by different names in different pieces and places of mythology. They adapted with time to survive.noveldrama

The elders whispered among themselves again, their voices too low for my ears to pick up, but since Matti didn’t seem to be getting tense and he could hear, I didn’t worry about it too much. Either they would help us, or they wouldn’t. I liked this place, so far, but I would never stay where we weren’t wanted.

When they stopped murmuring, the man with the glasses got my attention. “We have some ideas on what the pup may be.”

“You do?” I almost squeaked. Could it be that easy?

He inclined his head. “I would need to make some enquiries to confirm my suspicions, but I have reason to believe I may.” The men and women around him nodded in agreement, and he kept speaking. “It will take some time and effort to validate, but once I get an answer, I’ll share what I find with you.”

I kicked Matti, and he kicked me right back. I hadn’t expected it to be this fast. “Okay,” I said. “Thank you. We would really appreciate it.”

None of them said another word. The elders kept staring. Freaking Sienna coughed, and I almost turned around because that hadn’t exactly sounded like she was trying to muffle a laugh. I’d probably misheard it; Matti didn’t seem concerned about that either.

I waited, then I waited a little more, hoping someone would say something. But a minute passed, and then another, and I started counting in my head each second, so I had something to focus on. When the third minute hit, I tried not to feel disappointed that they couldn’t at least let me know they weren’t interested in having us join their community.

I wasn’t going to pitch a fit or fight them… I understood.

Maybe they thought Duncan was a danger. Maybe they thought I was. Maybe they just didn’t want someone new living here in this special place with them.

Duncan lifted his head at that moment to peer up at me. We’re here for him. How could I have forgotten? It might take months until we found another safe place, if this one didn’t work out. We needed this to work.

I’d beg if I had to, dang it.

We didn’t have the luxury of letting them say no without trying. I couldn’t forget that.

Someone across the table let out a long, long exhale. “I have so many questions,” the silver-blue-haired woman suddenly admitted in a rush.

“I do too,” another woman added. “It’s taken all of my self-control to stay quiet, but I can’t anymore.”

What was happening?

“This is the most exciting thing to happen here in the last ten years, if not longer,” the cyclops chimed in.

“Oh” was all I could say, because I didn’t think “Are you messing with me right now?” was an appropriate or polite response.

But were they? Messing with me, that was.

“You seem surprised,” the man with the glasses noted as I watched them, not sure what was going on. First, none of them could say a single word, and now, they seemed kind of excited. They were going to give me whiplash.

“I am,” I admitted to Glasses. He was the worst of them all, in a way, with his extreme wariness.

“Why?” the cyclops asked, sounding genuinely perplexed.

“You were all being really quiet, so I was pretty sure you weren’t interested in letting us join your community.” My chest felt a little funny, but I figured I might as well keep being truthful. “Some beings don’t always welcome me with open arms.”

That got them to stir, and I took a second to sneak a glance at Henri. That tendon along his throat was strained again. He seemed to be focused on whatever the elders were whispering over.

I turned to Matti and tipped my chin at him. He gave me a thumbs-up beneath the table that I was going to take as a good sign since he could hear their discussion. It took a couple more minutes before they wound down.

“We are a community who intends to preserve the gifts we’ve been given,” Glasses said after a minute. His eyebrows were knit together, giving him a thoughtful, if not uptight, face. “We don’t shun any creature of any kind here.”

One of the women gently cleared her throat. “Beings like you, like you both, are no exception.”

I blinked at the same time Matti kicked me harder than before, and now I was going to have to get Sienna to twist both his nipples. My eyes watered as my leg throbbed.

“We will help you discover what the pup’s origins are and allow you to join the ranch as long as you’re aware of the commitment required to belong to it.”

I kicked my friend back as hard as I could. But visibly, I nodded at the group. “The marrying part. I’m aware of it, and you can sign me up right now as long as I get to choose… don’t I? Who to marry, I mean?” I asked, wanting to see if they were going to pull some arranged marriage on me. I mean, I wasn’t going to be that picky. I couldn’t be. I’d accepted that reality already. I liked an attractive person as much as anyone did, but all the people I had ever liked had great personalities, they had all been funny and likable, and it hadn’t mattered how symmetrical their features were or how many ab muscles they had either. When you’re used to being judged for things out of your control, you learn how to focus on the things that matter sooner rather than later.

I was also pretty sure I could come to love anything under the right conditions, but I still wanted a choice.

Multiple nods answered me from across the table, thankfully.

Henri’s grunt wasn’t subtle at all.

Why was he glaring at the elders all of a sudden?

“You’re all skipping a hell of a lot of fine print right now,” he said in that gruff voice.

Did he have a problem with me wanting to live here?

Henri’s statement got the elders bickering. “Well…,” one of the quieter ones replied as Silver-Blue Hair challenged, “This is a unique situation….”

The man I’d known as a child shut them down with a no-nonsense slice of his hand that had no business being so commanding. “You’re all aware of our rules, and it doesn’t matter how excited any of you might be⁠—”

This was them excited?

“—we aren’t changing the way we go about things. We don’t talk about the ranch. We don’t let strangers in. We don’t talk about the children. And everyone has to go through the trial period.”

I suddenly didn’t like Henri so much.

I was pretty sure from the way my eye was twitching, it didn’t like him much either.

I’d been so worried about what these people were going to say, and he was the one throwing wrenches now? He was supposed to be on my team, wasn’t he? He’d called me Cricket not even thirty minutes ago.

“Come on, Henri,” Matti interjected, but his cousin shook his head.

“No. There are special circumstances, and you were one of them, but that’s also part of the guidelines for living here. Children with no families and minors with relatives who already live here are always welcome. Anyone else has to go through a trial period before any unions happen. The way we’ve done things has worked for a long time, and we can’t afford to put our people at risk,” the big man argued. “No exceptions.”

I blinked.

So there was a trial period before any marrying went on?

Everyone started speaking. They were loud too. It was only Sienna, Duncan, and me that weren’t running our mouths from the sound of it.

I raised my hand, and Henri was paying attention because in a voice loud enough to be overheard despite the voices, he asked, “Cricket?”

I was Cricket again, but I hadn’t been a second ago when he was making it more difficult for me to join this place?

That made about zero sense, but all right. If there was ever a time for me to be on my best behavior, it was now. Dang it. I tried to plaster on the most pleasant face I could and be the better person. “I’m curious. What exactly is the fine print I’m missing by asking to join and what’s this trial period? Living here for a little while to make sure I like it before you all officially let us stay? How long is that for?”

The elders stopped bickering. It was Henri that answered though. “That’s what it is. It’s mandatory you live here for a minimum of three months before an official invitation is offered. It’s to make sure you’re a good fit and that you can live by our rules and values.”

“Some beings have been known to change their minds,” the man with the glasses added.

“Most,” Henri corrected.

None of this sounded wild. They were protecting their investment and themselves. Plus, that would give me time to meet people and get to know them. Under normal circumstances, three months didn’t seem long enough to get to know someone well enough to marry them for the rest of your life, but that was a normal-person thing. When you had different senses, it was easier to get to know the root of people, to see what they might not want you to if they had a choice. You could pretend to be a good person as much as you wanted, but when you could smell anger or frustration or attraction, or the million other emotions a body produced, there was no hiding that.

Or so I’d been told.

Sienna had sniffed out more than a few people for me before.

“I understand,” I told them.

Besides, the satyr woman had already been looking at me funny, and that was with my bracelet on. What if too many of the beings here reacted the same way?

They were going to need to suck it up because Duncan needed this place.

My donut’s wet nose nuzzled the palm of my hand, his little teeth nibbling it. “A three-month waiting period is fine.” I pet Duncan’s tail with the hand he wasn’t corn-cobbing. “After that, how long do I have before I’d need to marry someone?”

“One year,” one of the women answered.

I kicked Matti before I could stop myself. A laugh burst right out of me, and I kicked him one more time for the hell of it. My leg was still throbbing. “A yearis a lifetime.” I was relieved. There were guidelines they had mentioned, but I wasn’t worried about them. I’d bet I already lived my life with stricter rules than anything they could come up with.

We had bigger stuff to talk about than maybe having to pitch in around the community or whatever else they had in mind. They’d have to do some Handmaiden’s Tale kind of crap for me to second-guess being here, or every male resident would have to have an awful personality.

One year to marry someone. Wow, and here I was stressing over it. Would more time be nice? Sure. But I’d been mentally prepared to get hitched in a month. Realistically, I would’ve even done it tomorrow if I had to.

A whole year was a boulder off my chest.

Now, all that was left was that I needed to talk to them about the biggest elephant in the room after the sippy-cup-sized mystery on my lap. It was going to be the deal-breaker, and we needed to tackle it now so I could knowfor sure. I’d been vague with the explanation about what had happened to Duncan’s would-be kidnappers, and I was well aware they were cutting me some slack by not asking how exactly I’d managed it. It was one of the benefits of the secrecy all magical beings widely embraced. I was going to milk it too.

“I appreciate you all agreeing to let us stay here on a trial basis.” I shot a glance at the backstabber who had brought it up in the first place. A part of me still couldn’t believe Henri had done it. It was hard not to give him a little bit of a stink eye. “I’m aware you already mentioned you welcome all people here, regardless of their heritage, but….” I scratched my throat as Matti kicked the living shit out of my foot.

We had agreed to disagree on this point. “No one cares,” he whisper-hissed at me.

I gritted my teeth in pain. We’d never outgrown this part of our friendship. “More people care than people who don’t,” I muttered under my breath before kicking him back hard enough that he winced just a little. He had a high pain tolerance. I should have been proud of myself for putting in enough effort to get that much of a reaction. “It’s going to come up, and I’d rather them be aware now.”

My best friend growled.

I growled right back. Or at least, I tried to.

But it just made him laugh like it had since we’d been kids, like he thought it was so dang funny I “sounded like a chihuahua,” as he liked to say. Fortunately, I knew I’d gotten my point across. I set my shoulders and began. “You’re all being really accepting of Duncan, but I don’t want to start here with secrets,” I warned them as gently as possible. Too many secrets.

I took a breath and palmed my donut’s back for support. He stopped nibbling and peered up at me. His steady breathing calmed me.

He loved me for who I was, and so did the man beside me and the woman behind me, and that gave me more strength than all the weightlifting in the world could have.

“Many beings don’t appreciate what I am, but I can’t change that, no matter how much I might wish I was something else. If there’s a name for what I am, I don’t know what it is. I never met my biological parents. But there’s something I need to be upfront about.” I swallowed. “Women who spend a lot of time around me get pregnant easily. Is that going to be a problem?”

Someone snickered. Everyone else made a face that said they didn’t understand or didn’t believe me. But it was a real thing.

Beside me, Matti reluctantly nodded.

“Maybe I affect men’s sperm count, maybe women are just more fertile… I’m not sure. But women between the ages of twenty and mid to late forties end up getting pregnant like—” I snapped my fingers “—when I’m around them.” It was part of the reason why I moved so often and preferred to stay around people over certain ages. I wasn’t making people have unprotected sex, and it wasn’t my fault condoms and birth control weren’t 100 percent effective on their best day, but….

Enough things had happened that had convinced me, and everyone who knew me, that this was a very real occurrence after a while.

When we’d lived together and Sienna had a boyfriend, she had been on birth control, bought mega packs of condoms, and had been a firm believer in the pull-out method. She hadn’t put her whole trust into anything. I hadn’t either, not trusting my body. I hadn’t dated much, but when I had, I’d done the same as her. Since then, we hadn’t been around each other long enough for me to affect her and Matti, but in her words, “You could never be too safe.” They just didn’t have sex when I was around.

The elders still looked to be in a state of confusion. Cyclops’s eye was squinted. Silver-Blue Hair and another woman started whispering to each other. Glasses had his arms crossed over his chest, that wary expression was plastered even more strongly over his features.

“I can’t control it. It isn’t something I knowingly do. I just want to be upfront. Maybe you can put out a warning so there aren’t any unintended surprises.” I laughed a little nervously. “Normal people, the magical… it affects everyone.”

Murmurs spread among the members.

Eventually, it was Glasses again who spoke for them after clearing his throat. “Whatever effects your presence could have on our members⁠—”

“I don’t mean to cut you off, but it isn’t a ‘could have.’ It happens. Sienna, back there, used to live with me when we were in an apartment complex. Eleven months after we moved in, almost every female tenant in the complex under the age of fifty and over twenty was pregnant. The same thing happened in every other apartment building we lived in after that.” It wasn’t every woman I lived by, but it was enough of them for it to be suspicious.

And people weren’t always happy about it.

“We meant what we said. We’re a community for all magical beings, especially those who have a harder time being accepted by the outside world, and I’m sure you’ll see that here. Fertility is not an unwelcome gift.”

So he said.

I wasn’t sure he believed it from the way his eyes searched mine. Was I overthinking it?

I pressed my lips together, fully aware they weren’t taking this seriously enough, and I would just need to warn anyone who spent a lot of time within fifty-ish feet of me. Shifting blame wasn’t something I wanted to do, but I had tried.

Silver-Blue Hair nodded. “You don’t need to ‘classify’ yourself to us if you don’t want to.”

But they had questions; it was obvious on their faces.

I thought about calling out Henri who had literally asked what I was when we were outside, but unlike him, I wasn’t a snitch.

The thought of it made me smile, and I let the implication hang in the air. I was what I was, and they could only guess for now.

“You and the pup are welcome here,” Glasses claimed, lifting a hand to mess with his eyewear once more. The movement made his sleeve slip down his wrist, showing off a hint of… a beaded bracelet?

Had I seen that correctly? There was too much magic in the room for me to filter out what belonged to who. If he was sitting beside me, I’d have an easier time, but….

“As long as you agree to the three-month trial period and the marriage stipulation. We can help, if you’d like. We have a good record in matching couples,” the man explained. “As mentioned, there is a one-year period for you to find an acceptable mate.”

Cyclops leaned forward. “You’re under no obligation to explain your background to anyone unless you choose to. Your nature is yours alone, and you’ll be accepted for who you are. We can assure you of that.”

I got what he was saying, but I also understood that people were way more complicated than that.

Holding my breath, I peeked at the man I should have called Fluffy again in public just to see how he would react and found his attention already back on me. He wasn’t smiling. He wasn’t frowning. He was simply watching.

His nostrils were slightly flaring though.

He’d deserved that bite from earlier after this crap.

Maybe we hadn’t been friends-friends, but he knew me. He had been my neighbor for a year when he’d lived with Matti’s family. You didn’t have nicknames for everybody, and he hadn’t forgotten mine even after so many years.

Loyalty, man. Where had it disappeared to?

“Now,” the man with the glasses butted in. His hands were beneath the table again, hiding what sure had looked like an obsidian bracelet to me. “About our other guidelines.”