The Shambling Guide to New York City (26 page)

“I haven’t told Phil about how Granny Good Mae is helping me. I mean, she’s really teaching me about coterie, not just rescuing me when I do stupid shit. Although he may ask questions soon. I have to decide what to tell him.”

She took a sip of her coffee, hoping Arthur would speak, but he stayed silent. “I am not trying to play two sides against each other. I just want to put out a book and figure out how to stop whatever’s going on. They say there’s a zoëtist coming to town to mess with the balance. It seems it’s also someone from my past who has cause to dislike me greatly.” She didn’t look at him, instead focusing on his stark living room. “If you don’t want me around I’ll understand. But I guess I wanted someone, a human, to talk to who understands what I face every day.”

Arthur still stood by the coffee table, looking down on her.

“All right,” she said, putting her hands on her knees and getting up from the couch. “I’ll go. I’m sorry to have intruded on your Sunday morning. Incidentally, you’re looking a lot better. I’m glad you made it through the zombie scare.”
Stop babbling and go!
she admonished herself, and headed for the door.

She didn’t look at him as she slid past his half-naked body. She had opened the door and was halfway out, her face still burning, when he finally spoke. “Hey.”

She stopped, but didn’t turn around.

“If you go out again, I take my coffee black.”

She smiled, said, “Noted,” and closed the door behind her.

If you find yourself running low on hell notes in the city, look to the ravens. These birds are the bankers, and will be happy to do an exchange of human money for hell notes, or dip into your existing account. Their bank is the most sophisticated in the world, connected to all the raven branches throughout the world.

If you do not normally bank with ravens, then they’ll still allow you to make a withdrawal, but for a mutually agreed-upon negotiating price. It will be unique to your situation. And we definitely recommend opening an account with the ravens before travel to the city so you do not run into this problem.

Most any raven in the city will help you out with your banking needs; you can usually find them congregating near Wall Street.

O
n Monday morning, Zoë got to work early and taped a sign to her office door.

This sign drew Morgen immediately, as Zoë had known it would. The water sprite tried the door and, when she found it looked, yelled at her to open up, or she would come in anyway.

“Look at the sign,” Zoë called.

A wet sound came from the other side of the door, and a stream of water slid through the crack. Zoë had forgotten that part of Morgen’s coterie skills. The sprite slid easily under the door as a puddle of water and re-formed in front of Zoë, her hands on her hips.

“Wonder Twin powers, activate,” Zoë said. “What about the sign did you not understand?”

Morgen sat down on Zoë’s guest chair and waved her hand
casually. “Oh, I don’t pay attention to those. I wanted to hear about the zombie attack and that guy from Public Works!”

Zoë closed her browser. “Look, if you know that much about it, you already know the details. Phil probably can tell you more, being a vampire and all. The whole weekend was a blur and I’m glad it’s over.”

“But it was that cute guy that lives next to you, right? He’s in Public Works?”

Zoë nodded. “Yeah. Awkward, huh? Even though I saved him from being undead he still doesn’t trust me as far he can spit a dead rat.”

“So no hopes of getting laid in the near future, huh?”

Zoë laughed, finally. “Yeah, you could say that. But seriously, between all this shit that’s been going on outside the office, I still have a book to put together. Can you help me out here and let me work?”

Morgen stood. “Sure. I’ll keep the bastards away from your door, too. But we’re going to lunch, dammit. You’re going to tell me whatever you’re not telling me.”

Zoë just stared at her. “I don’t even know what that would be.”

“That’s what we’ll figure out at lunch,” she said, and melted again into water.

“You could have just opened the door from this side,” Zoë said, leaning over the desk and watching the puddle slither under the door again. “Show-off.”

Zoë noticed quickly that the sign on her door did more to attract curious coworkers than to repel them, and at ten in the morning she slammed her pen down on the desk and picked up her phone to dial Phil’s extension.

“Yes?” he said smoothly.

“It’s Zoë. Listen, if you want this book done I need to work from home, your office is driving me crazy. I’m heading home
and working from there. I’m turning off my phone right now to avoid distractions.”

“Zoë—wait, I need to talk to you about—”

“No, Phil. You said you wanted this book done. It can wait till tomorrow. Whatever it is, it can wait until this project is done. You give me the deadline, you deal with me not being available to traipse around the city getting into coterie intrigue with you. Understand?”

“But—” her boss said, but she hung up on him.

Shutting the phone off, she felt a sense of freedom, and gathered her stuff.

Morgen came up behind her as she was leaving. “Now what?”

“Working from home,” she said over her shoulder. “Don’t call. I’ll be back in tomorrow.”

“But—” Morgen said, but Zoë shut the door behind her.

She paused when she got out on the street. Phil obviously couldn’t get to her apartment until sundown, and he couldn’t send any of the vampires or, likely, the zombies (
zombie
, Zoë mentally corrected herself, realizing Montel was the only one left) after her. But he could send Gwen or Morgen or—she gulped—John. She’d have to remember to lock her door.

Then she wondered if living beside someone from Public Works would make her coworkers less likely to visit her, or more. She wondered if living beside Arthur put him in danger. Then she remembered the weapons rack by his door and decided he could probably take care of himself.

She wondered for a moment if a weapons rack would keep Lucy away from her. Then, to remove the thought of the evil couple from her mind, she ducked into Bakery Under Starlight for a cup of coffee. Carl was checking out a guy who had bought a grocery-bagful of baked goods and two coffees. The customer
backed up from the counter slowly, staring at Carl, who just smiled at him.

After the man stumbled out, splashing coffee on the door and window, Zoë laughed. “Let me guess. He came in for one coffee and a Danish?”

Carl smiled uncertainly. “Why?”

“Because you’re an incubus.”

The baker’s face went slack with shock. “How did you know? Did John tell you?” He looked around quickly. The empty shop seemed innocent and friendly, but he looked as if he’d been cornered.

Zoë laughed at the big powerful incubus who seemed scared shitless of her. “Carl, calm down. I’m just learning to spot the signs. Part of the job.”

“What gave me away?” he asked, breathing a little more regularly and shoving several croissants—her usual order—in a bag. He handed her the bag, heavy with baked goods, over the counter.

“Your bracelet. I’ve seen it before,” Zoë said, pointing to his left wrist before she accepted the bag. Slim links interlocked around his wrist, held together with a tiny padlock. “Another incubus I know wears it.”

His face was slack as he stared at her. “You’re basing this on a bracelet?”

“Well, not just that. Your nails are perfectly manicured. You have scars on your wrists and neck. I just guessed you were a submissive incubus.” She put her hands on her hips. “What I can’t understand, though, is why I’m not madly attracted to you.”

He looked at her as if she had just suggested they put on goggles and go to church together. He shook his head once and said, “I’m gay. My sexual energy is directed toward men. They love my pastries, and I feed on that love.”

She smacked her forehead. “Of course, makes perfect sense!”

He finally grinned at her. “So for scaring the shit out of me, are you going to give me a write-up in that book I hear you are working on?”

“Of course! And I’ll take two large coffees, no sexual energy on the side, please.” Zoë paid him (he didn’t charge her for the croissants; hush pastries, she assumed) took her bag and drink caddy. “Thanks a lot. And don’t worry, I’ll keep your secret.”

“Don’t keep it secret from your coterie friends, though! I give discounts!” he called as she left the shop. Zoë looked up at the sign above the door. “Bakery Under Starlight”—or “BUS.” She needed to pay attention more often.

Arthur wasn’t home. Zoë left the coffee outside his door and returned to her apartment, where she promptly took the phone off the hook.

She got out her laptop and toyed with the idea of checking her e-mail, but shut off the Wi-Fi with a firm resolve—she was here to work and she didn’t need distractions. Besides, Godfrey might be online, and she kept forgetting to block him on her IM programs.

Here at home, the work was surprisingly easy. She had worried about how well she would be able to lay out a book based on a people she had known about for only a few weeks, but quickly the problems coterie might face seemed just like the problems humans would: where to get food, where to stay, what would be interesting to see. It made sense to cover dangerous parts of the city as well, as she’d seen some of the more progressive rival guides do in their chapters focused toward gay travelers.

She got into the groove, setting a rough outline for the book and assigning writers to each area. She decided to make sure each
section had a diurnal and a nocturnal writer covering. Ideally, she wanted to have one of each major coterie group—vampires, zombies, fae, and demons? Where did the succubi and incubi fall? She’d have to check—covering each section of the book, but for now she’d settle for two writers per project.

Once the book was planned, she made a list of her current writers, assigning them to food, nightlife, sightseeing, lodging, and other areas, and then she made a list of what she’d need in staffing, in terms of both writing ability and race.

No affirmative action in the coterie world, she guessed. Remembering there was still a good deal she needed to learn, with just what races existed in the coterie at the top of the list, she began to jot down notes that she would need to follow up on.

Her hands began to ache from typing, and she looked up with a sudden full feeling in her bladder and an empty feeling in her stomach. She squinted at her watch—three p.m. She’d completely blown off lunch. Still, she’d gotten the thing laid out and outlined. It did have several question marks and notes where she would have to research more, but it was a solid outline she could present to Montel and Phil with confidence.

She rubbed her tired eyes and got up from her desk to deal with her various bodily needs. As she was cutting a ham sandwich in half, a knock sounded at her door.

She sighed. Arthur would be good. Anyone from work would be bad. John would be very very bad. The sky through the kitchen window over her sink darkened as a shadow crossed. Zoë blinked.

Ah.

She put the knife down (she’d planned on answering the door with it in hand in case of a threatening coworker) and went to greet Gwen, the death goddess. Unfortunately John was with her. And from the looks of him, he was very, very hungry.

“Hey guys, come in, I guess. I’m mostly done with my outline, or I wouldn’t have—”

The death goddess barged past her into her apartment. “You have been impossible to get in touch with.”

John followed more sedately, moving like a panther. He tried to slide past Zoë, close, but she stepped out of the way so she wouldn’t touch him. She shut the door calmly. “I said I would be. I was actually hired to do a job within the office, not wander around getting attacked by incubi and zombies.” She glared at John, who merely grinned at her.

“When the coterie know of your existence, and know that you know of theirs, you are in greater danger than normal people. You should have been accessible.”

Zoë tried not to flinch. Gwen’s presence filled the living room, her black cloak seeming to billow in the still air. Outside it grew darker as more sparrows perched near the windows.

“Well, you can taste how far away I am from death. Did this afternoon mess that up?”

She didn’t blink. “Yes.”

Zoë looked at her with a steady gaze. “Is there anything I can do to reverse that?”

“Possibly.”

“Are you going to give me more information, or did you just come here to stand there like a goth princess, intimidate me, and deliver bad but vague news I’ll never be able to prove right or wrong?”

The goddess’s cloak stopped billowing and she gave an unexpected, rueful laugh. “Yes, I suppose I can do that.”

The tension in Zoë’s chest loosened, but she was careful not to look visibly relieved. “Then why not have a seat?”