“You’re sure about this?” Arch asked. His eyes were narrowed; he was clearly still wary of the offer.
“It was never my decision to make, but she says it’s fine, so it’s fine,” I told him.
“Just be sure you wipe your feet,” Charlotte added. “I don’t need anyone muddying up my clean floors.”
It was three days after the fiasco at Richard’s, and I’d more or less gotten myself back to full strength. Admittedly, I still felt a touch off (not bad mind you, just off), but for all intents and purposes I was back in my regular condition. Once the dust had settled, and I’d heard the accounts from everyone about how much Arch had helped, I realized that we were indebted to him. There wasn’t much I could offer an agent, of course, but I had hit upon one thing that might benefit both him and someone in need of company.
“I know how to keep clean,” Arch said. He and Charlotte had been introduced the evening prior, and I’d left them to chat for a trial night to see if the arrangement suited all those involved. She hadn’t tried to kill him, nor he her, and both seemed amiable enough toward the other. I suspected that was as good as I was going to get.
“It’s true,” Krystal said. “You should see his desk. So organized it makes our records vault look like shambles in comparison.”
“Our records vault is shambles,” Arch said.
“Cynthia has her system, and I’m sure as shit not going to be the one to try and talk her into changing it,” Krystal replied.
Arch said nothing, which I was slowly learning to recognize was his way of yielding a point. Seizing the momentary lull in banter, I made a slight coughing sound in my throat so that we could get the discussion back on track.
“Regarding the matter at hand, I have some paperwork for you both to sign.” I reached into the briefcase set before me and pulled out the final sets of documents, sliding them over to Charlotte.
The four of us were in the Charlotte Manor dining room (a place where I’d all too recently been held hostage), hammering out the final details of Arch’s new living arrangement. Moonlight shone through the window, but, in spite of the late hour, Charlotte had agreed to make us a celebratory meal, and I could scarcely wait to be done with the meeting and on to enjoying her culinary artistry.
“Feel free to peruse the fine print, but you’ll find I worked in the finalized conditions,” I said. “Arch will pay a set amount of rent each month to retain one of Charlotte’s rooms, whether he is actually in town or not. That money will be used, at Charlotte’s discretion, for updating features and incorporating new technology.”
“Pretty curious to see what all this internet hub-bub is about,” Charlotte muttered.
“In return for the rent, Charlotte will provide Arch with three meals per day, weekly turndown and laundry service, as well as reasonable security,” I continued. “Everyone good with that?”
“Still a little insulted that my security is defined as ‘reasonable’,” Charlotte said.
“Don’t take it personally; you should see what he says about The White House,” Krystal said. “From Arch, ‘reasonable’ is about as high of praise as you’re going to get.”
“Guess I’ll have to take it.” Charlotte produced a pen from somewhere unseen and scratched her name into the paper before her. When she was done, she moved the pages across the table to Arch, who produced a gleaming metal writing implement and proceeded to do the same.
“Excellent. Now, I’ll just need to sign on as caretaker for the funds,” I said.
Arch slid the pages across to me, his pen still on top of it, which stopped inches away from where I sat. Like everything else he did, it was eerily accurate and precise. I still had no idea exactly what Arch was, and the more I dwelled on that fact, the happier I was with my ignorance. If my realization about Sally Alderson had taught me nothing else, it was that there was peace to be found in the darkness.
I plucked the pen up from the pages and quickly scrawled my signature across the final line. Looking it over, I noticed Charlotte had forgotten to put the date next to her name. It was a minor matter that I could easily have remedied, but it was better to get her accustomed to how contracts worked. There would doubtlessly be more in her future, as we brought her into the modern age.
“Charlotte, you need to put the date next to your signature.” I slid the pages back over to her.
“Sorry.” She reached forward, intent on picking up Arch’s pen, but when her fingers made contact, she let out a soft yelp and jerked them away. Small wisps of smoke rose from her fingers, and she stared angrily at the table’s residents. “What the hell! Why did you give me a silver pen?”
“My mistake,” Arch said. “I keep that one in case I need an quick, covert weapon. This one should be fine.” He pulled out a golden pen and held it out to Charlotte.
“Yeah, no thanks. I’ll use my own.” She re-summoned the same pen she’d used the first time, then pointed to the silver one still resting on the documents. “Someone get that thing away from me.”
Arch reached forward, but Krystal put a hand on his arm before he made it to the pen.
“Fred . . . why didn’t you notice it was silver?” Her voice was soft and low; though, based on the look in her eyes, I could sense that violence was only a few wrong words away. I could hardly blame her. I’d just been wondering the same thing myself. Silver grounded magic, and it was essentially poison to creatures composed of it—like me, or Charlotte. Touching that pen should have smarted like heck, but I hadn’t even realized it was made of the stuff.
“I honestly have no idea.” I reached over and picked up the pen, bracing myself for a shock, a burn, or even a low-level tingle. Instead, there was nothing. It was like I was holding any other piece of metal.
I heard the click of the gun before I saw that she’d drawn it. Krystal had the sight trained on my head, and at this range, I highly doubted she’d miss.
“Nothing personal if that’s really you, Fred, but after that fake Gideon, I’m not taking any chances.”
“Did I miss something?” Charlotte asked. She seemed remarkably calm, given that someone had just drawn a gun at her dinner table.
“Fred seems to be unaffected by silver, which should be impossible for a vampire,” Arch explained. “Agent Jenkins thus suspects that her boyfriend has been replaced by an imposter, most likely a fey, who doesn’t share that allergy.”
“Well, she’s wrong. This is the same Fred I met a few weeks back, and he’s definitely not a fey,” Charlotte said. “If anyone has made the veiling magic to beat my detection abilities, I’ve yet to see it.”
“Really? You didn’t mention that when you were listing your security features,” Arch said. His voice was slightly higher, and it was quite possibly the first time he’d shown genuine interest in something since I’d met him.
“Just one of those things. The mages who built me added a ton of features to make sure I could discern friend from foe. Now, since I only met Fred recently, I can’t say that this is the original one you two met, but he’s definitely the only one I’ve ever known.”
“Okay,” Krystal said, slowly lowering her gun. “But that doesn’t explain the silver.”
“Perhaps it’s only ineffective when applied externally,” Arch suggested. Before I could offer an opinion of my own, he had thrown a small dagger across the table and struck me in my shoulder.
“Gaah!” My yelp came as soon as the blade pierced my flesh, more reaction than an actual expression of pain. After a few seconds, I realized that the dagger didn’t really hurt at all. Reaching up carefully, I wiggled it a bit and found that, while it was certainly not comfortable, it wasn’t exceptionally painful either. “Actually, I would like to retract my scream. This isn’t really all that bad.”
“Pure silver,” Arch said. “And it doesn’t bother you in the slightest?”
“Sorry . . . but no. The fact that you just ruined my shirt, however, does have me a bit miffed.” I pulled the dagger out and set it on the table.
“It has to be a side effect from whatever Gideon did,” Krystal said. “I have no idea how that could have happened though.”
“Amy warned me several times that dragon magic is unpredictable.”
“We’ll have to call in a specialist,” Arch told Krystal.
“I very much dislike the sound of that,” I said.
“Don’t worry about it.” Krystal reached over and took my hand. If she felt any compunction about such a tender action less than a minute after pulling a firearm on me, it certainly didn’t show. “We’ll figure this out. You’ve always been a bit different than most vampires; this is just another thing that makes you one of a kind.”
“Though, really, the accounting job is far more bizarre,” Arch added.
“I get the feeling that this is sort of a big deal,” Charlotte said. “So, if you all want to skip dinner—”
“No,” I sighed, shaking my head. “Charlotte, you will learn this sooner or later, but with us, there is seldom a time when there isn’t some worry or emergency to deal with. Curious though my silver immunity might be, I see no reason to skip an excellent meal over it. Besides, you and Arch have reason to celebrate. As of today, you have a full-time tenant, and he has a place to live.”
“Okay then, let’s eat,” Charlotte said.
The kitchen doors sprang open and the wait staff filled the dining room, trays of food already giving off aromas that made my mouth water. As they paraded around us, Krystal leaned over and whispered in my ear.
“I’m proud of you, Fred. A year ago, something like this would have had you in fits.”
“Sadly, I think I’m slowly beginning to build up a tolerance to the panic-inspiring events that seem to plague us,” I whispered back.
“Just don’t get too tolerant. I like you just the way you are, panic and all.”
“And I love you as you are, death-courting job and all.”
That wasn’t how I’d ever intended to say it for the first time. In truth, I don’t know that I had ever really intended to say it. That was the sort of thing that took more bravery than men like me were born with, but it seemed folly could intervene where courage dared not tread. But there it was—in Charlotte Manor, the sentient house, and surrounded by non-existent waiters and an agent I didn’t wholly trust, while still processing the fact that I might not be as back to normal as I hoped—I’d told Krystal Jenkins that I loved her for the first time.
She stared at me for a long moment, then gave me a tomcat grin and slid back to her chair. It wouldn’t be until later that night, when we were alone and the environment was more intimate, that she would echo my sentiment with her own voice. That was fine, I didn’t need to hear it right away. I’d known it for a long while, just as she had no doubt been aware of my feelings for her. Neither Krystal nor I were the most expressive of people, emotionally speaking, but it didn’t mean we were incapable of getting better.
Undead or alive, human or parahuman, everyone is capable of taking steps forward. Ours might have been moving at a lurching, unwieldy pace, but we were taking them all the same. It was irrelevant if we might have been a bit slower than more socially adjusted people.
We were taking our steps together, and that was all that really mattered.