An Interrupted Cry by Laura Anne Gilman

Author:Laura Anne Gilman [Gilman, Laura Anne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Book View Cafe
Published: 2016-02-29T05:00:00+00:00

oOo

Ellen had spent most of her life being told that there were no such thing as…well, pretty much anything other than humans. That the things she saw in the corner of her eye, heard in the dark, or early hours of the morning, weren’t real. Imagination, they told her. Crazy, they muttered. And of all the things that had haunted her, growing up not knowing that she was Talent, the half-seen images of fantastical creatures had been the most disturbing.

The few years she’d been aware of the Cosa Nostradamus, the time she’d spent working for someone who wasn’t a hundred percent human, the fear had been wiped away, replaced—mostly—with awe that these creatures were real.

But that awe never stopped her from being very cautious around them.

There were high-res Talent and low-res, law-abiding and less so, but all Talent, far as anyone had ever been able to determine, were human. There were certain rules that held true for all humans, in terms of what they wanted, needed, could be held to—or they would suffer consequences.

The crash course Ellen had gotten on the fatae, the non-human members of the Cosa Nostradamus, said that there were at least thirty-seven distinct breeds, or species, who stayed still long enough to be counted and named, not including demon, who might or might not be a distinct breed—the jury was still out on them. Thirty-seven, most but not all of whom interacted with their human counterparts, some of whom would be just as pleased to eat their human counterparts, if it weren’t for the censure that would follow.

And at least half of those thirty-seven, in some form or another, had enclaves in New York City or the suburbs surrounding the city. Danny had contacts in most of them, but Ellen…. She swallowed, and firmed her chin. They knew her, some of them. They knew she was Danny’s protégé, and Wren’s mentee, even if they didn’t know her for herself, yet. It would be enough.

It would have to be enough.

She considered asking Bonnie or Lou for a translocation directly to her first destination, but they were both busy, and some fatae took it the wrong way if you just appeared on their doorstep without proper warning. So she did it old school, and went down to the street to hail a cab.

It was still a few hours until dawn, but Ellen thought she could tell the difference in the sky; the stars seemed dimmer, the moon higher but less radiant. A cyclist sped past her, tiny red and white lights blinking as they went somewhere in a hurry, before one of the fare-hungry cabs glided to a stop at the curb.

“Hell of a thing, huh?” This cabbie seemed slightly more cautious than the one earlier, although he too swerved through an intersection, barely checking to see if anyone was coming the other way. Ellen hadn’t taken many cabs, she thought maybe they were always like this? “I mean,” he went on when she didn’t respond, “they’re saying maybe no power until tonight, can you believe it? Fucking ConEd, man.

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