Page 3 of Outside the Veil (Endangered Fae #1)

Chapter three

Odd Reactions

S oft. Bed? Footsteps nearby. Muted clink of dishes. Cooking smells. Cumin, chili. Mama?

No, she was gone. Years ago.

Pain edged into his back and his joints. His hip stabbed at him. Someone had overstuffed his head with cotton batting until it threatened to burst. A low moan escaped before he could open his eyes.

“Diego? Despiertos ?”

The voice percolated through the fuzz in his brain and took on an identity. “ Si, Tia Carmen. I’m awake.” Not him, that scraggly rasp. Couldn’t be.

“ Bueno . That wasn’t so long.”

Tia Carmen’s face hovered above him. Teacup. Aspirin. Diego blinked, trying to pull the disparate images into a less disorienting whole. He took another moment to resolve the usual idiotic questions himself. What happened? Grand mal. Where am I? Living room sofa.

“When did you get here?”

She perched beside him, her white hair luminous in the lamplight. “I heard drumming on my ceiling. I thought ‘Diego is either having a tantrum or a stroke’.”

“Seizure,” he corrected absently. Though I might have both at once someday.

“Yes, yes.” She patted his arm. “So the door was unlocked and your friend was with you—”

“Mitch?”

She snorted. “That one? No. The sick one with the pretty hair. He was crawling on the floor shoving furniture away from you.”

Diego’s head snapped around to search for Finn, the movement knifing pain behind his eyes.

“I put him back to bed.” She rested an arthritis-gnarled hand on his chest to keep him down. “With a plate of platanos .”

“Is that good for him? Fried food? I don’t think he’s eaten in a long time.”

She gave him a look, at once imperious and amused. “And how many children have you raised, nino ? He liked them. He ate them. Let him eat what he wants right now.” She rose, smoothing her skirt. “Dinner will be ready in an hour. Try to sleep.”

“Tia Carmen? I’m sorry.”

“Shush.” She flapped a dismissive hand at him. “Don’t be sorry for needing help. Everyone needs help sometimes. So someone told me.”

Diego managed a wry smile at having his words thrown back at him. He downed the aspirin and, as he sipped his tea, her words slid through his jumbled brain. Finn, sick as he was, had dragged himself out of bed to help. He couldn’t begin to contemplate what that meant yet.

And how had he gotten on the sofa?

He woke later to the sound of dishes being set down near his ear. Finn sat cross-legged on the floor at one end of the coffee table, already wolfing down a portion of mole -smothered enchiladas.

“Your stomach’s going to hate you.”

Finn put down the plate and wiped his chin on his sleeve. “Evening. Feeling better?”

“I will in the morning. And you? You seem…livelier.”

“This lovely lady’s cooking has amazing restorative powers.” His hair was brushed to gleaming and pulled back in a black elastic, most likely Tia Carmen’s doing. “That nasty churl was your lover?”

Diego levered himself up against the cushions, nausea fighting hunger. “Was. Yes.”

Finn shook his head and returned to devouring his dinner. “Can’t say much for your tastes. Anyone who’d run off while his friend has an attack of the falling sickness…a right bastard.”

“I told him this, many times.” Tia Carmen settled in the wing chair to his left. “He never listens to me.”

Wonderful. My landlady and my bridge jumper have formed an alliance. “I’d like to take you down to the clinic tomorrow, Finn,” he said, to change the subject. “Get you checked out.”

Finn cocked his head to one side like a puzzled bird. “Checked out?”

“Let the doctors run some tests. To see if you’re sick.”

“I need a doctor to tell me?” Finn grumbled around a mouthful of enchilada. “Poisoned air. Poisoned water. Of course I’m sick.”

“Eat your dinner, Diego.” Tia Carmen handed a plate over. “Finn will go with you to the clinic, won’t you, caro ? To make Diego happy?”

A white-toothed grin replaced the scowl. “Did I say no? For my hero, I will go to whatever this place is.”

Tia Carmen laughed and Diego concentrated on his food to hide his embarrassment. Odd. He was hungry after all.

Finding clothes for Finn proved easy. Mitch had left enough cast-offs in the front closet from which to choose, three bags Diego hadn’t had the chance to take to the mission yet.

Though Finn was far lankier and at least two inches taller than Mitch, a pair of old track pants and a stretched-out sweatshirt fit well enough.

There was even an ankle-length, black leather coat Mitch had declared ‘too Goth’ a week after purchasing it.

Shoes, however, posed a problem.

Finn’s feet couldn’t be shoved into Mitch’s old sneakers.

He tried to curl his long, elegant toes under to make it work, but gave up the effort when he realized how painful that would be.

They finally had to settle for a pair of flip-flops, not quite the right size, but at least only the ends of his toes hung off the front.

“We’ll find you something better today,” Diego reassured him. “The Goodwill on Fulton always has shoes. Are you up for a walk? It’s about four blocks to the clinic and I’ll probably be making some stops along the way.”

“Blocks?” Finn tilted his head, again looking like a puzzled bird.

“Never mind.” Diego shrugged into his jacket. “It’ll take us about twenty, thirty minutes to get there. You feel well enough? Or should I call a cab and forget the stops?”

Finn pulled in a slow breath, as if assessing his lung capacity. “It’s better today. I believe I’ll manage.”

“You’ll tell me if you feel tired or woozy?”

“My word of honor.” Finn tapped a finger against his heart, an odd smile twitching at his lips.

Tia Carmen poked her head out as they clattered down the stairs. “Diego? Could I contribute today?”

He stopped to kiss her cheek. “If you want to. Just a couple dollars, though. I’m doing all right today.”

She handed him a five and he knew better than to argue. “Don’t keep him out too long in this cold,” she admonished, though it wasn’t clear whether she meant Diego or Finn.

Outside, Finn’s head twisted this way and that as taxis and bicycle messengers whizzed by. He appeared more interested than frightened, though he did edge closer to Diego when a bus roared past.

“Best to watch where you’re walking.” Diego grabbed his sleeve to steer him clear of a fire hydrant.

Finn nodded, though his head kept swiveling, his nostrils flared. A skateboarder zipping by, the rumble of the subway under a grate, a woman laughing as she spoke on her cell, the chestnut vendor across the street—every sight and sound had Finn’s attention whipping in a thousand directions.

“Here’s George,” Diego offered, hoping to provide some momentary focus. He indicated the pretzel cart at the corner. “He’s our first stop.”

“Morning, Hemingway!” George waved from under his umbrella. “How many today?”

“Ten, I think.” Diego dug in his pockets to gather enough change. “Finn might want one.”

“That your new friend’s name?”

“Yes. George, this is Finn. Finn, George Stanakopoulis.”

“Honored,” Finn said, and offered a theatrical bow.

George laughed. “Not from around here, is he?”

“No.” Diego nudged Finn. “We don’t, ah, greet people that way. Usually.”

“Oh, I don’t mind,” George said. “Neighborhood could use a little class.” He bagged up the pretzels and handed one to Finn.

To Diego’s enormous relief, the pretzel absorbed all of Finn’s attention as they walked. He turned it this way and that, sniffed it a few times and licked it.

“Do you eat all of the salt?”

“You don’t have to. It brushes right off.”

Finn nibbled a corner and grimaced. “The things you people consume.”

“Put it in your pocket. Maybe we’ll stop on the way home and feed the birds.”

“Pockets,” Finn mused as he stuffed the pretzel in his coat pocket. “Ingenious invention. I’ve always thought them the only legitimate reason for wearing clothes.”

“Hey, D-man!” A bundle of cardboard and wool called from the sidewalk.

“Josh. Where’s Tiff?” Diego crouched down where he could see the too-young face peering out from under a mop of brown hair and handed over a pretzel. Runaways. Sometimes he could coax them into the shelters, sometimes they refused.

“She’s gone to, y’know, freshen up.” Josh snickered and attacked the pretzel with gusto.

“It’ll be single digits tonight. Make sure you get inside, please.”

“Yeah, yeah, okay, Mom.”

“You might make it. Tiff and the baby she’s carrying won’t. At least say you’ll go to the mission.”

That got through. Josh shot him a guilty look, grumbled something unintelligible and disappeared under the blankets with Tiff’s pretzel.

“Everyone else simply goes by the ones on the walkway,” Finn said after a few more stops. “Or walks over them. And they don’t seem to notice anyone either. Except you.”

Diego shrugged. “I think it’s important to know your neighbors.”

Finn regarded him for a long moment. “How charmingly na?ve. You’ve no idea what you are.”

And what am I? Diego kept this to himself, fairly certain he didn’t want the answer.

“Holding up all right?”

“Well enough.” Finn rubbed at his chest. “One could wish to draw a full breath.”

“Almost there. Just need to see if Rodney’s home.”

Rodney West lived in the alley across the street from the clinic.

His domicile consisted of cardboard and cloth, corrugated pipe and plastic sheeting.

Every inch crawled with complex designs and figures of symbolic significance made with any medium Rodney could find—leftover paint, pen, charcoal, crayons, colored bits of food wrappers and bottle tops.

The History, he called this indecipherable work, though Diego never got it quite clear whether the title referred to a history long past, an ongoing one or one describing an apocalyptic vision of the future.

“Wait here a sec.” Diego stopped Finn ten feet from the wild construction. “We have to follow certain steps to see him.”

He picked up an empty can and rolled it toward the door, its hollow rattle serving as doorbell and alarm.