jinks, they didn’t have any way to defend themselves when the Covenant came calling, and so their population took an even greater hit. I don’t know how many sylphs are left in the world. I don’t think any cryptozoologist does. I’ve learned more about Fern’s species by hanging out with her than I ever could have from book research, and that’s only part of why I have almost no human friends.
“Fern,” said Cylia, leaning close to the curtain. “Showers, Fern. Hot water. A real kitchen. Pancakes.” She drew the last word out until it turned obscene.
Fern yanked the curtains open again. “I’m listening,” she said sullenly. Then she blinked. “We’re not moving. Why aren’t we moving? Are we in Oregon already?”
“We’ve been making good time, but not bullet train time, so no,” I said. “We’re in Michigan right now. Near my old family homestead, in fact, which means we’re also near one of my grandmother’s favorite bars. How do you feel about getting a drink?”
Fern blinked at me, looking confused. Cylia grinned.
“Finally, you’re speaking my language,” she said. “Let’s go.”
* * *
According to Sam, the engine had thrown a rod and would need to be replaced. James was distraught and unwilling to take the easy way out, which would have involved abandoning his car in Michigan while we grabbed a new junker off of Craigslist. Not even Cylia’s reassurances that the new car would prove to be remarkably resilient were enough to sway him. His car was one of the only things he had left in the world, and he was holding onto it.
I could sort of see where he was coming from. During my self-imposed exile from my family, I’d been incredibly protective of the few things I had to call my own. Come to think of it, I still was. I’d just expanded that list to include three cryptids and an untrained sorcerer from Maine. I should learn to pick more portable souvenirs.
Anyway, James had elected to stay with the car and call the local mechanic while the four of us went down to the Red Angel for a frosty glass of whatever was on tap. He’d get towed to the shop down on Lakeside Drive, and we’d join him there once we were done at the Angel.
The fact that I knew it was an easy walk, and that we’d have no trouble finding the place, was our first real piece of evidence that maybe breaking down in Buckley had been a better thing than breaking down in some town big enough to have a Motel 6 to call its own.
I waved to James before turning to lead Cylia, Sam, and Fern across the field between the state highway and Old Orchard Road. I wasn’t a Buckley native by any measure—no one in my generation was—but we’d all been visiting since childhood, and I could get myself to the big landmarks without too much trouble. The old Healy house, which we rented out to keep it from sitting empty and falling into disrepair; the old Parrish place, which Grandma Alice maintained mainly for her own use, and which was too cursed and overrun by tailypo to ever fall apart; the police station; the mechanic; the Red Angel. Maybe taking your kids to see the local bar is weird, but my parents did it anyway, the summer I was twelve years old. It was important. My family has a longstanding relationship with the Red Angel, and they weren’t going to let a little thing like the legal drinking age get in the way.
“You know I can’t actually drink, right?” asked Sam, stepping over a large rock in the field.
“Why not?”
“Because it’s hard to stay tense when I’m buzzed,” he said, waving a hand to indicate the still apparently human length of his body.
Most therianthropes—shapeshifting cryptids— default to their human forms and have to concentrate to change out of them. Fūri work the other way around. Sam has described the sensation of holding human form as being like fighting to hold in a sneeze that never quite comes.
I grinned at him. “You don’t need to worry about that.”
“Hold up, hold up,” said Cylia, grabbing the back of my shirt and using it to pull herself forward, miraculously not choking me in the process. “Are you telling me that there’s a cryptid bar in this middle-of-nowhere town?”
“I was hoping to surprise you, but if you really need to know, then yes, I’m telling you precisely that.”