Chapter 2 · Amnesiac Himbo Insurance (2)

"Even worse. He's a cryptid with identity issues. He's a thembo." Mia clutched her chest. "I'm in love with him. This is a love story. You and the cryptid. I'm going to officiate."

"We're not — Mia. There's no 'we.' He's a stray. I'm feeding him until the shelter situation —"

"There is no shelter situation. You said it yourself, he 'escaped' twice. He doesn't want to be sheltered. He wants to be YOURS. And honestly? Given the way he looks at you when you're not looking at him —" She shuddered, delighted. "— he wants to be yours in a way that has nothing to do with shelter."

I told her to shut up. I told her he was a liability. I told her I was going to figure out who he was and return him to whatever hole he crawled out of, and then I was going to go back to my very normal, very boring, very safe life.

And then, on day seven, the man with the too-white teeth came into the café.

He was normal. That was the problem. In Harrowgate, you learn to spot the weird — it's a survival skill, like knowing which gas stations are open after midnight. The weird has a texture: too-smooth skin, eyes that don't blink on schedule, a smile that arrives before the joke.

This man had all of it. He walked in at 2:47 PM — between rushes, when the café was empty except for me and the jazz Mr. Ashworth insists on playing — and he smiled at me with teeth that were too white, too even, too many.

"Good afternoon," he said. His voice was pleasant. His voice was the kind of pleasant that makes you check your exits. "I'll have a black coffee. And a conversation, if you have a moment."

"I have a lot of moments," I said, because I am a professional, and professionals make small talk with strangers who may or may not be human. "Anything else?"

"No." He took his coffee. He didn't drink it. He just held it, watching me over the rim. "I'm looking for someone. Perhaps you've seen him. Tall. Dark hair. Wounds that don't — behave."

My hands went cold. The cold thing in my chest sat up, sharp and sudden, and for the first time in years I felt it — not cold. Angry. The stone in my chest was angry, and I didn't know why, and I didn't like it.

"I see a lot of people," I said. "It's a café."

"Mm." He nodded, like I'd said something profound. "You'd remember this one. He's been — damaged, recently. He would have sought shelter. Food. Warmth." His smile widened, a millimeter too far. "Someone like you."

"Sounds like a stray," I said. "You should check the shelter on 5th. They take strays."

"Ah." The man laughed — a small, dry sound, like a leaf crumbling. "The shelter on 5th is full of people who want to be found. Our friend is not that. Our friend is the kind who crawls into a corner and licks his wounds until the world forgets him." He set the coffee down, untouched. "But the world doesn't forget, does it, miss...?"

"Voss," I said. "And no, the world doesn't forget. The world sends men with too many teeth to ask questions."

For a second — one single, frozen second — something flickered behind his eyes. Not anger. Interest. Like I'd said something he hadn't expected.

Then he smiled again, tipped an invisible hat, and walked out.

The coffee he'd left behind was cold. I know that's not unusual. What was unusual was that it had been sitting on the counter for thirty seconds, and it was <em>frozen solid.</em> Frost creeping up the cup in thin, crystalline lines, like winter had walked through the café and touched only him.

I stared at it.

Mr. Ashworth came out of the back, took one look at the frozen cup, and went very still. Then he picked it up, carried it to the sink, and ran hot water over it without saying a word.

"Boss," I said. "Boss. That was —"

"Don't." He didn't look at me. "Don't say it, don't think it, don't invite it. You finish your shift, you go home, you don't look back." He paused. "And you tell your guest to be more careful about who he bleeds near."

"He's not my —"

"Girl." Mr. Ashworth turned, and for a second — just a second — his one good eye was not an old man's eye. It was something older. Something that had seen wars and watched them end. "You brought a storm into your house. Storms make enemies. And enemies, when they can't reach the storm, reach for the shore."

I didn't know what that meant. I still don't. But I went home that night with the cold thing in my chest burning like a banked coal, and I found Kael sitting on my fire escape, shirtless, watching the street below with an expression of patient violence.

He turned when I came out. "You're late."

"Working. Some guy came in today. Creepy. Asked about a man with — wounds that don't behave."

Something moved behind his eyes. "Did he hurt you?"

"No. He froze a coffee cup. Which is — weird, right? That's weird. I'm not being dramatic. That's a weird thing."

"Yes." His voice was flat. "It's weird. Did he say where he'd be going?"

"Somewhere to find a 'stray.'" I watched him. "You know, you've got a lot of opinions about strays for a man who lives on my couch."

He didn't answer. He was looking down at the street — at the dark space between the streetlights, where the rain made a curtain and the shadows made a meal — and his hands were very, very still on the railing.

"Kael."

"Go inside, Lynn."

"Kael. Did you hear me? There's a man looking for a wounded stranger, he froze a cup of coffee, and I feel like I'm going crazy —"

"GO INSIDE."

His voice cracked like a whip, and for one electric second his eyes went gold — burning gold, furnace gold, the gold of a thing that has not been human for a very long time — and the cold thing in my chest roared up in answer, a wall of ice meeting a wall of fire, and the window behind me <em>cracked</em> — a thin, sharp line, from the frame to the lock, like the air itself had flinched.

We both went still.

The rain was very loud.

Kael looked at me. The gold was gone, but the thing behind it was not — I could see it now, in the set of his jaw, in the way his chest moved when he breathed, in the way his hands were still wrapped around the railing like he was holding himself back from something.

"Lynn." His voice was rough. "Please. Go inside. I'll explain — I'll explain everything, soon. But right now, please, go inside, lock the door, and don't come out until I do."

I should have argued. I should have demanded answers. I should have called the police, the shelter, an exorcist, anyone.

Instead I went inside, locked the door, and pressed my back against it, feeling my heart beat in my throat.

The cold thing in my chest was quiet.

It had stopped being cold.

And I didn't know which of those facts scared me more.