Page 9 of Transfiguration

Because of her power or her transgender status? Con didn’t ask. He’d cross that bridge with the counsel of other adults when he got there. “Do you need more food? I can order more?”

She shook her head. “Thank you.”

Crazy polite kid. He knew he hadn’t been that polite as a kid, but he’d also had a mostly normal childhood. Normal enough for a male born to a lower-class Dominion family.

Con wiped his hands on the napkin and gathered up the remains of their meal to toss it away. “We have awhile before we have to be at the gate. Let’s wander the shops?” Kids liked that sort of thing, right? “The flight is three hours. Do you want to find a book to read? I don’t have games on my phone.” And he brought little when he traveled like this. His travel phone was dumbed down and registered to someone else completely, as it was too easy to trace modern devices.

“Can I pick what I want to read?”

“Um, sure,” Con said as he tossed away their stuff, and added the tray to the top rack above the bin. They headed down the main hall of the airport, passing a few other restaurants and a handful of shops.

There were a few signs advertising for Human’s First, which made him flinch. It looked like a religious advertisement, pious and righteous bullshit. Touting the beliefs that magic belonged to God, no idea which god they meant, and should be returned to Him. How did they plan to do that? There was a website address and everything. He hurried Bella by them, hoping she didn’t ask questions about them. Con encountered them a time or two. Zealots who burned anyone they thought was a witch without question. They were sort of hyper patriots, deeply indoctrinated into the strange sort of “we are the best without magic” point of view. Con had never asked for his magic, but he didn’t think he’d know how to function without it. He didn’t realize they’d taken to paying for normal advertising, but there were a lot of cults who did that nowadays.

Bella’s gaze found the sign, eyes widening for a minute, but Con tugged her down the hall. “Bookshop is this way.” Had she encountered them before? “If you meet any of those Human First people, run away,” Con said. “Hide.”

Bella nodded. “They kill witches.”

Anyone really. Didn’t matter if the person was a witch or not. But Con didn’t add that note. “Yeah. The ghosts tell you that?”

“Yes.”

Con didn’t ask more questions. He led her down the hall with more retail. The bookshops in these places usually only had a handful of chosen big names. Would they have anything for kids? “Did you want to reread those?” He pointed to the display of wizard books she had left behind.

Bella flinched. “No. The writer said not nice things. I had already picked my name before I knew.”

“Bella is a pretty name,” Con offered. “Lots of good books with Bella characters.” He couldn’t think of any off the top of his head in that moment, at least not appropriate for kids, and hoped she didn’t ask. She was way too smart for him. “How long since you left your family?”

She gave him a side-eye. “After I told them I saw unalive people.”

“Which was when?” It was like pulling teeth! He got more information from the criminals he interrogated than this nine-year-old kid.

“I told them a few times before they believed me. They didn’t really listen until I told them about Ben, who they beheaded and buried behind the shed because he could call water. I was six when the man came to take me away. It was only a few weeks after telling them I knew about Ben.”

Fuck. “That man, did he…?”

She gazed at him with an expression too old for her face, and he thought he’d expire right there. Six foot two, covered in tattoos and cowed by this slip of a girl in pink.

“I’ve got great things to say about therapy,” Con said. “Might need more myself once this trip is over.” Her gaze didn’t waver, but she shrugged and browsed the shelf. She picked out a few books about a young girl witch beside the other more popular books, and Con chose a vampire romance.

There was a fudge and chocolate shop next door. “Do you like chocolate?”

Her eyes were still huge as Con pointed to the fudge bricks. “My favorite is the dark chocolate fudge brownie flavor. But they are all good.”

“You’re not real,” Bella said.

“How’s that?”

“No one gives me books and chocolate and doesn’t want something from me.”

Con’s heart broke. He thought of himself as a badass, breaking into places, stealing artifacts, killing bad guys, and now rescuing princesses, but he was a big marshmallow at the center. “Bella… I want you to be safe. Is that okay? I couldn’t save my sister, Kat, but I won’t let anything bad happen to you anymore. I’m not a superhero or even all that good of a guy, but I don’t mess with kids.” He kept his voice low as people walked around them. A woman waved to him from behind the glass. “Can I have a quarter pound of each flavor?” He asked her. It was a lot of fudge, but Luca loved the stuff, too. The woman nodded and cut slices, weighing, then sliding them into boxes.

“Are you going to eat all that?” Bella asked.

“We are going to eat this on the plane, and whatever is left my boyfriend Luca will help us finish.”

She stared at him for another minute before taking his hand and tucking herself close to his side. Maybe she wasn’t such a hard nut to crack after all.

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