Periwinkle
Istare after the fleeing humans as the anxious glow fades from my hair. “At least… they assumed we’re aliens and not monsters? And they’re running in the direction we wanted them to go.”
Mirage nods vigorously. “Might as well look on the bright side!”
One of Rollick’s assistants who helped usher some of the humans out of the buildings stops near us with an expression like he swallowed a lemon whole. “Rollick isn’t going to be happy about this.”
“There isn’t really anything about this situation to make anyone happy,” I point out. “What’s the point in hiding our shadowkind powers when the whole city’s flooded with weirdness? They can’t be mad at us after we help them get out of the disaster safely, can they?”
On second thought, maybe I don’t want that question answered. But if the choice is keep our powers hidden while the humans turn into mutated synchronized swimmers or risk them realizing they’ve been saved by monsters while actually saving them, I’ll take the latter.
Jonah turns to Mirage, his expression tensing as if he’s coming to a similar conclusion. “Mirage, you can use your supernatural skills to downplayourweirdness, right?”
The fox shifter twirls his hand, and the piranha-bear spins like a ballerina before lumbering off in the direction he pointed it. “I can make them focus on what they reallyreallywant that’s down the street. Even if it’s not quite what they think it is.”
“That’ll do.”
Hail’s jaw clenches. “You want us to fling around our powers in front of the mortals? Maybe fox boy can deflect some of the panic, but we’re talking about a whole city full of humans.”
I set my hands on my hips. “Let the glass be half full for once! We’re not going to meet even a tenth of all those humans. And if they start freaking out, then we’ll figure out a new plan. Right now, I’d just like us to get on with the plan of Getting The Humans Out Of This Place Before It Turns Them Into Surrealist Art.”
Raze gives a sharp huff. “I agree. There isn’t much point in us even trying to help them if we aren’t going to use the advantages we have. Now let’s get going.” He gives his massive, sinewy frame a shake. “This stuff feels like dried mud that won’t flake off.”
That doesn’t sound any more pleasant than cold porridge.
I point down the street in the direction we were headed. “Let’s get some more humans out of here!”
We set off with renewed vigor, aiming our calls to flee at the windows all along that street and the next. Raze tackles anotherhuge shadowkind creature that charges into our midst, and Hail walls off a few smaller ones in temporary door-free igloos.
There still isn’t a whole lot I can add to the evacuation efforts with my powers, so I stick to cheerleading, which is more my forte anyway. I smile and wave to the humans poking their heads out and emerging onto the sidewalks. “It’ll be okay! Just a brand-new kind of flood. Very exciting, but better to watch it from outside the city than inside, all right?”
I’m not sure how much they believe me, and several gape at Raze’s abrupt shows of strength and the flashes of ice Hail casts out. But with a few whirls of Mirage’s bushy tails, they seem to forget all about our monstrous strangeness—including those tails—and drift off toward the edges of the city.
It isn’t just the humans who go. Many of them squeeze out of the doorways clutching pet cats or with dogs trotting at their heels. The cats just peer at us with their ears laid flat, but barking bounces between the buildings.
“Don’t let them go chasing after any squirrels!” I holler after them. “They might not be the kind of squirrels you’re used to.”
Hail halts in his tracks. “What the fuck isthatrodent up to?”
A vole-like creature with a ridge of spikes down its back is hurling itself at the wall of a nearby building. Its body smacks against the bricks to no effect. After the first few batterings we witness, it lets out a disgruntled huff and starts scrabbling at the bricks with its claws.
I frown. “It seems like it really wants to go inside. What’s so exciting in there?” I cock my head, contemplating the building, but it looks like a perfectly regular apartment complex to me. I wouldn’t have thought any shadowkind creatures were in the rental market.
As he watches, Raze’s forehead furrows. “It’s kind of like Viscera, isn’t it? Smacking and shredding everything around. Except… she was a lot better at it.”
I guess we should be grateful that the spiky vole is nowhere near as talented in the destruction department as that higher shadowkind was.
The comments the rogue woman made echo through my head—all her talk about the city drawing her in and then shutting her out…
A shriek carries from around the corner. We dash over to find a woman poised on the threshold of her building’s lobby—gaping at the front step which is swiveling as if on a hinge. One corner sprouts upward in a concrete bramble.
Raze leaps over and smashes the cement fixture with a slam of his fist. The woman flinches backward as if she finds his assistance as distressing as the shifting concrete, but the flow of her neighbors behind her brings her stumbling out into the street.
“Get out of the flood!” I shout. “There’s safety outside the city! Just keep walking as quickly as you can, and your limbs should stay where they’re supposed to be.”
The humans don’t look especially comforted by my reassurance, but they get moving anyway.
Another small shadowkind creature slithers across the road toward us, its round pink tongue slurping at the shadows and its furry torso rustling against the asphalt. Two puffy feet protrude partway down its body, adding a lurch to its progress with every few winds of its body.
