Lust and other Drugs
Chapter 1
OFFICIALLY, EDRA Tendric’s job didn’t exist. Unofficially, every mytho knew that it was Edra they needed to speak to at Mythological Services if they had a problem with the law.
In some ways his job hadn’t changed that much since before the collapse. He still dealt with crime and dispensed justice, though he was sure the human cops would not agree with his methods even if they were traditional—humans didn’t like anything that was traditionally mytho.
In most other ways, his job was unrecognizable. His sword had been lost in the collapse, and sometimes not even mythos listened to him.“Enough.” The vampires continued to fight as though they wanted to tear the skin off the other. “Enough.” Edra stepped between two snarling vampires, fully expecting one of them to attack him. Vampire blood dripped on the wood floor. “First blood has been shed.”
The fight was technically over, but the vampires continued to growl, and the sound grated on Edra’s bones.
Edra drew in a breath. He could cut the tension with a claw—well, if he shifted to his dragon form he could. But he kept his hand out, wishing he held his sword and not a rather fancy letter opener that had been donated for the ceremony.
The room was lit by enough candles to be a fire hazard, and a dozen vampires watched, rapt with the spectacle. This was as traditional as it got these days.
One aspiring groom curled his lip, and the other aspiring groom snarled.
The bride grinned as though it was her birthday and she was getting a unicorn.
“To the death. As is tradition,” said the groom who was bleeding.
“No, first blood only. That is the new rule.” It had been the rule for the last five years. They shouldn’t be killing each other when there were plenty of humans who wanted them dead and didn’t understand the mytho way. So the mythos compromised where they could without destroying their way of life completely.
Hisses erupted around Edra. If he had to shift and fight his way out of the nest of vampires, the paperwork would take him a week. He needed to talk them down before things got uglier.
“I know you don’t like it.” He had never particularly enjoyed witnessing two grooms fight to the death for a vampire heiress, and he liked it less now, and not just because vampires looked more like monsters than models after the collapse. No one ever brought that up and walked away with their tongue intact. “We can’t be killing each other.”
More hisses.
He sensed rather than saw the attack, but he was still slower than a vampire and was falling to the floor before he could react. He lashed out, threw the letter opener into a thigh, and twisted around to grab the other man.
He shifted at the same time. His pants ripped as his tail formed and his legs reshaped, and his shirt tore as his arms became wings, and he roared loudly enough to rattle the windows. Then he smacked a wing into the attacker and held the other one down with a clawed foot.The eyes that had been full of bloodlust and glee were now wide with fear.
That was more bloody like it.
Maybe knights were a dying tradition, like so many others who didn’t survive the collapse. But he was still a knight, and they should respect that. He swiveled his head to stare at the vampire who’d dishonored himself. He’d have to pay a penalty to the bride and to Edra.When Edra had everyone’s attention, he shook off the shift, but the adrenaline was still flowing and his skin was cold and silvery. He gritted his teeth and tried to find calm. He couldn’t control his visibility in human form when his emotions spiked. The vampires couldn’t see him. There went any respect he’d garnered.
Someone giggled.
Yeah… being invisible didn’t help when he was trying to prevent an all-out brawl.
He tried to find calm and slow heartbeat. Gradually the cold receded, and his skin lost its silvery sheen as he became visible to the vampires. “As I said, enough. By breaking the rules of the fight, you forfeit any rights. You are to pay a week’s wage to the bride and one to me.”
The would-be groom pulled the letter opener out of his thigh and dropped it on the floor instead of handing it back. “You are no one here, lesser dragon.” He limped out of the room.
Edra doubted he’d get that money, and he was down a pair of suit pants and a shirt.
Without police support, not all punishments would stick. The vampires could put pressure on the man to pay, but he wasn’t a local, so he’d probably skulk back home and never mention losing. If the cops knew, they would probably arrest them all and call it gang warfare. But in vampire pairings, there were always two contenders—the parents’ choice and the daughter’s choice. There would always be bloodshed.When the door shut, Edra turned to the bride-to-be. “Satisfied?”
“Yes.” From her smile, the man she’d wanted to win her hand was still in the room.
“I want the loser’s details before the end of the day.” Fuck him. Edra would report him to the knight where he lived. “No fighting to the death.” He sighed. “There aren’t enough of us for that.”
***
FROM HIS office in Mythological Services, Edra could hear the protesters. The Earth for Humans mob was out there waving signs and telling mythos to leave. To judge by the shouting, anyone would think the world was collapsing again. But there was no tremor in the ground or tearing in his bones that would signal another collapse. That experiment was on hold indefinitely.
He had filled out a form naming the dishonorable vampire and was ready to send it to the head vampire in his jurisdiction. He should’ve known the vampire was from LA. The vampires there were more traditional, and they had numbers, while San Francisco had more satyrs than anywhere else.
As he started the rest of the write-up, he took a sip of hot chocolate and dipped his tongue in to taste the sugary sludge at the bottom. He had to be careful with what he wrote because sometimes humans actually read the reports, usually when they wanted to prove that mythos were somehow less than human, as though humans were the pinnacle of creation.
Edra’s lips twisted into a grin. He was sure the gods thought otherwise, though humans had even killed them after the collapse, no longer believing in their power.
He sighed and wished, not for the first time, that the human world had collapsed into Tariko, preferably in the desert inhabited by manticores and djinn.
In days gone past, when humans had come to his world to hunt and complete quests, they had been treated with the kindness any traveler deserved—until they tried to kill dragons and take trophies home. Greater dragons had long memories, and some still had gauntlets between their teeth.
The hair on the back of his neck prickled.
“This morning was a mess,” Ardel said.
Edra didn’t jump, even though his boss had almost managed to sneak up on him. Vampires were predators, even if they liked fancy clothes and pretended to be your friend.
Someone had probably complained the moment he flew home to get another pair of pants. “I’m just finishing my report. I’ll email it to you.”Ardel glanced over the floor where the various mythos worked. While the whole building was for Mythological Services, this floor was for more intricate cases. Downstairs was a front counter where mythos first made contact if they needed help with housing or schooling, though visits had dropped off as the mob out front had grown. Fighting his way through each morning was a pain in the ass, even though he looked human.
He was sick of having people shove signs in his face telling him to go home.
But it was worse for those who didn’t pass for human. He could go to the shops and not draw attention… unless he accidentally became invisible.
“Come to my office.” Ardel walked away before Edra could answer.
Several mythos lifted their heads. Carly flicked her ears in sympathy. Going into Ardel’s office was the last thing any of them wanted, and Edra had been called in one too many times since he started working for Mytho Servo.
Without Mytho Servo the mythos would have no one to speak for them, to liaise with potential employers and convince them that hiring a mytho was a good idea. Many had trained, only to find that no one wanted to hire them because the public doesn’t want to see that. As a result, many mythos had started their own businesses and catered to mythos.
Edra picked up his cup and followed. He couldn’t be fired, could he? He was doing the same job he’d always done, protecting the greater dragons and looking after the townspeople. Ardel had been part of the ruling family who ensured the laws were followed. He was still very much the mytho ruler of San Francisco. The elves had been voted out because they sought only to enrich themselves, and there was still bad blood between the elves and the other mythos.
Edra shut the door, but didn’t sit when Ardel continued to stand.
He finished his hot chocolate—the only good thing about the human world—and then licked the bottom of his cup.
Ardel stared out the window at the protesters below. He was dressed immaculately in a human-style three-piece black suit. His plum-colored shirt and tie made him look like he was ready to step off a runway in New York. Before the collapse, it had been hard to choose who was a ten and who was a nine point nine between the elves and vampires. Now… well… vampires had faces that scared babies and made women—and some men—cry. Unable to deal with their reality, some vampires had taken their lives after the collapse.
Edra waited, sure he was about to get a dressing-down for not letting the LA-based vampire kill the bride’s chosen. It was vampire tradition, but at what point did they have to let go of tradition to be accepted? Would that be enough or would the way they looked be enough for humans to shun them forever?
Edra crumpled the cup and tossed it into the trash.
“Do you like what you do here?” Ardel asked without looking at him.
“Yes.” But he hated to see the way the cops ignored mytho complaints. He’d thought about becoming a cop, but mythos weren’t citizens, so they couldn’t serve and couldn’t vote, which was a pity. He dealt with mytho-on-mytho crime long before the human cops got involved.The human cops didn’t like to police the ‘freaks’ anyway and didn’t want to go into areas that had become mytho zoned. Mythos weren’t officially separated from the humans, but no one wanted their darling little Tommy going to school with a vampire or a satyr.
“The SFPD approached me last week. They want us to provide a liaison officer.”
That sounded like a hassle. Every time Edra had dealt with cops, he’d ended up being threatened with obstructing justice, even when he was just trying to stop the mytho in trouble from being treated unfairly. “What for?”
Ardel glanced at him, and the creases of his face looked like crevasses. “To help the cops be more sensitive—”
Edra laughed but clamped his lips together at Ardel’s expression.
“We have to assume this is an honest attempt to reach out,” his boss continued.
“You don’t believe that.”
“Of course not. They’re buttering both sides of their bread. If the pro-integration mayor gets in, then they look like they’re trying, and if the current one stays, then they can say they’re keeping a closer eye on us.” His lip curled to reveal several sharp teeth. “You’re going to be the liaison officer.”
Edra stared at his boss.
“I did consider Carly. She gets along better with most people, but I feel that the humans would prefer to deal with someone who looked more like them.”
Carly was more popular with mythos. She was a werewolf who was genuinely nice, and it helped that she’d never had to deliver a penalty.
But his job wasn’t all bride fights and feasting with dragons. Now he was supposed to help the human cops? No one would ever talk to him again.
Edra curled his fingers and forced a stupid grateful smile to his lips.
“Will you be able to do it?” Ardel asked.
Edra opened his mouth but wasn’t sure what to say. He hadn’t earned a new position because he was good at what he did or because he could negotiate the fine line between tradition and human law. They were handing him the job because he looked like a human.
His hands went silver and cold raced up his neck. He would not shift and ruin his suit. It was expensive, and he didn’t have money to waste. He breathed in and out and let the shudder race down his spine as he regained control. His shoulder blades itched as though his wings were ready to rip free. He’d go for a fly tonight, leap from the New Golden Gate Bridge and dip his wing tips in the bay as he skimmed the surface—though he’d steer well clear of Alcatraz and the mermaid pod that lived there.
“You….” His boss pointed at him.
“Yeah, I know.” He hadn’t shifted, but he was invisible. His hands gleamed silver. “Guess I don’t pass all the time.”
“You’re still the best we have… at passing for human.”
Edra nodded and then remembered his boss couldn’t see him. “I’ll work with the cops, but I don’t know if they’ll work with us.”
“We need this to succeed. We need to integrate. It’s been ten years. Everyone needs to change and adapt. They’ve offered us this chance, and we’re going to take it.” Ardel rested his hands on the window frame and glanced at the protesters. “However, humans talk out both sides of their mouths. They lack honor. You will liaise with them, but I don’t want the anti-mytho crowd getting any more fodder. We need to tighten things up before this election.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean you are to cover up whatever you can before the humans can investigate it.”
The cold left his skin along with the silver, and Edra was visible again. “You want me to keep investigating mytho crimes, but not report them?”
“I want you to work with the human cops where appropriate and make sure mythos don’t look guilty.” Ardel gave him a look, his brilliant blue eyes the only reminder of the beauty he’d once been. “I’m sure you’ll make the right decisions about which cases require human involvement. It’s not that much different from what you do now.”
Except that Edra didn’t work with humans at all. When people came to Mytho Servo with a grievance, Ardel handed the case to Edra, and he ensured it got settled and did his best to keep the cops out of the way. Carly did the more friendly stuff. He only got the ones she couldn’t smooth over with talk. There was a reason he’d carried a sword as a knight—not everyone liked justice. Nothing much had changed. Between Carly and him, they policed the mythos and kept them out of trouble. It was hard to help a mytho once the humans were involved. The cops saw monsters and automatically assumed guilt. “Do I have a human counterpart?”
“No. Liaise with the Special Investigators Division as required.”
Edra scowled. “They’ve taken us so seriously in the past. What happens when one of us gets killed? Will that go to homicide? That’s right. They don’t see us as people. They think we should all be in the zoo.”
Ardel stared at him. “Things are changing. We have to work with them, not against them. This is an opportunity.”
But for who? He forced out a breath. He didn’t want to be the face of Mytho Servo. He just wanted to help his people. “You actually believe that?”
“They requested the liaison.”
“Someone to blame?” He didn’t trust a human as far as he could throw one.
Ardel shook his head. “Keep us clean, shut up the anti-integration mob, and maybe we can get a mayor who’ll do something.”
Or maybe the mayor was just hoping to use the mythos for political gain the way everyone else did. “Have you seen the protest on our doorstep? They hate us.”
“They fear us. We’re their monsters. We need to prove we’re not.”
Edra was putting in his best effort already. Everyone was. But what was normal for mythos was often wrong according to humans. No, he couldn’t eat a stray dog for dinner—or buy one from the pound for a snack. Ogres couldn’t have log throwing contests without a permit or solve their problems with wrestling matches that horrified humans, even though no one got seriously hurt. Ogres were hard to kill. Two years ago a cop shot one seventeen times, and the ogre threw a car at him and then went home to sleep it off. The cop wet his pants.
“They’re the monsters.” Only the European Union had managed to give an apology for the collapse and took steps to treat the mythos fairly. He wished he’d found himself over there instead of in San Francisco. But at least he wasn’t in West Africa where mythos were actively hunted.
Ardel swept his long hair off his face. “Regardless of what the cops do or don’t do, I expect you to put in your best effort or, passing or not, I will remove and replace you. You’re on a three-month probation. If you muck this up for us, it will cling like naga shit to your file.”Edra swallowed and nodded. “I understand, sir.”
Officially they were now working with the cops. Unofficially? Who knew what was going on. If the pro-integration mayor didn’t get in, there was a good chance they’d all be rounded up and put back in internment camps.
***
EDRA CLOSED the file on the mytho store owner who had a shoplifting problem. The human cops had done nothing to help, because the shoplifters were human. If it had been mytho shoplifters in a human store, the kids would’ve been locked up after their first offense. But the humans were too busy dealing with human issues, and the mayor had made it clear he didn’t care about mythos, so why should anyone else? Ten years was long enough for everyone to stop freaking out and make a plan forward. The mythos had been forced to adapt, and the humans needed to catch up. With his new title, he was going to step into this case and make the human cops do something. On his way out of the office, he grabbed a set of keys for one of Mytho Servo’s unmarked cars. In the first three months, four of their marked cars had been set alight—unsurprisingly, no one had been charged. Edra made his way across town to the shop. Mythological Services wasn’t broken into districts the way the human police force was. It covered the whole of San Francisco and was modeled on something similar that had existed in London, Paris, and Frankfurt since the first year of the collapse. Five years ago LA, New York, and San Francisco had decided to copy them. The shop looked like any other suburban store, but it was in the middle of what had become a mytho neighborhood. The area was run-down, the houses in need of a coat of paint, but the air of depression that had existed two years earlier was gone. The well-kept gardens held all manner of plants. Even the weeds in the sidewalk were thriving. He parked, got out, smoothed his tie and jacket, and walked into the store. The aroma of fresh bread and rotisserie pig head hit him hard. He hadn’t had time for breakfast after the bride-fight fiasco.The young man behind the counter, who was too pretty to be anything but an elf, watched him warily. Edra flicked out his tongue, the only thing that marked him clearly as mytho, and the man relaxed. “You the owner?” “Nah, my dad is.” “He around?” “Yeah. Why?” He was a boy really. It was hard to tell with elves because they always looked like teens, but the voice gave him away. It hadn’t reached the musical tones that an adult would have. This teen would’ve been young when the collapse happened—too young to remember what their old world had been like. It was probably easier that way. “I’m from Mytho Servo.” He should have used the full name, but no one did. The teen crossed his arms. “’Bout those humans?” “Let me talk to your dad.” The teen turned on his heel and stalked out the back. Edra watched the pig heads turning on the spit. They wouldn’t be ready for hours, but he could come back at dinnertime. Or he could eat whatever was already in his fridge. There were leftovers from the roast beef he’d cooked last night. It wasn’t the same as fresh roasted pig head, though. That was a treat, a reminder of home he couldn’t afford all the time. He turned away and glanced around the store. There were a few other traditional mytho treats—or at least as close as they could make here—along with more human things like dried pasta, cereal, fruit, and vegetables. Humans still lived in the area—some were too poor to move away and others had found the price of their houses had dropped because of their neighbors. A tall man with long blond hair came out of the office. He wore jeans and a bright blue T-shirt, but he still carried himself as though he were important, like rank still mattered. He’d been one of the Elvish King’s archers before the collapse. “Archer Vlash.” Edra nodded in greeting. Vlash didn’t smile. “Do not call me that. That man is dead.” Yeah… so was Knight Tendric. He didn’t mind his old title, but some mythos didn’t like being reminded of the past. He’d misstepped already. “I received your complaint.” “Then you know the problem.” “I want some more information.” “It was in my report. I put in the complaint because the insurance company told me to. I complained to the SFPD too. They haven’t turned up. I do not expect them to.” Edra opened the file. “Human boys have been coming in and stealing?” “Yes.” Edra glanced up at Vlash. “The more you give me the more I can help.” “You will arrest the humans? I do not think so. You don’t have that power.” Edra wasn’t a cop, so he had no actual power to do anything more than smooth things over and make sure the mythos didn’t do something reckless. “I have other skills.” He could lurk around invisible and scare the pants off the kids, but that would only stop them for a while. He doubted anyone would approve of feeding the troublemakers to the dragons, and dragons didn’t really enjoy eating humans. They tasted strange, apparently. Vlash lifted one fair eyebrow. “So do I.” “No paying the Strega for curses.” That was the last thing they needed. Strega magic was patchy at best—the collapse had affected all mythos, some more than others. “I have hired some extra security.” There was something about the way he said it that made the hairs on the back of Edra’s neck ruffle. “What kind of security?” Please not a chupacabra. Once they had a scent they didn’t stop until the victim was dead. One didn’t really hire chupacabras, though they were most definitely animals, the kind of guard dog that few could handle. “Some ogre friends of my son.” The average ogre was eight foot tall. Even when ogres were still in school—and many dropped out because they weren’t that bright—they were bigger than the average man. “If they hurt anyone—” “You will assist,” Vlash said smoothly, his voice laced with magic that had no effect on any kind of dragon, greater or lesser. Edra forced a grin. “It’s easier to assist before people get hurt.”
EDRA CLOSED the file on the mytho store owner who had a shoplifting problem. The human cops had done nothing to help, because the shoplifters were human. If it had been mytho shoplifters in a human store, the kids would’ve been locked up after their first offense. But the humans were too busy dealing with human issues, and the mayor had made it clear he didn’t care about mythos, so why should anyone else? Ten years was long enough for everyone to stop freaking out and make a plan forward. The mythos had been forced to adapt, and the humans needed to catch up. With his new title, he was going to step into this case and make the human cops do something. On his way out of the office, he grabbed a set of keys for one of Mytho Servo’s unmarked cars. In the first three months, four of their marked cars had been set alight—unsurprisingly, no one had been charged. Edra made his way across town to the shop. Mythological Services wasn’t broken into districts the way the human police force was. It covered the whole of San Francisco and was modeled on something similar that had existed in London, Paris, and Frankfurt since the first year of the collapse. Five years ago LA, New York, and San Francisco had decided to copy them. The shop looked like any other suburban store, but it was in the middle of what had become a mytho neighborhood. The area was run-down, the houses in need of a coat of paint, but the air of depression that had existed two years earlier was gone. The well-kept gardens held all manner of plants. Even the weeds in the sidewalk were thriving. He parked, got out, smoothed his tie and jacket, and walked into the store. The aroma of fresh bread and rotisserie pig head hit him hard. He hadn’t had time for breakfast after the bride-fight fiasco.The young man behind the counter, who was too pretty to be anything but an elf, watched him warily. Edra flicked out his tongue, the only thing that marked him clearly as mytho, and the man relaxed. “You the owner?” “Nah, my dad is.” “He around?” “Yeah. Why?” He was a boy really. It was hard to tell with elves because they always looked like teens, but the voice gave him away. It hadn’t reached the musical tones that an adult would have. This teen would’ve been young when the collapse happened—too young to remember what their old world had been like. It was probably easier that way. “I’m from Mytho Servo.” He should have used the full name, but no one did. The teen crossed his arms. “’Bout those humans?” “Let me talk to your dad.” The teen turned on his heel and stalked out the back. Edra watched the pig heads turning on the spit. They wouldn’t be ready for hours, but he could come back at dinnertime. Or he could eat whatever was already in his fridge. There were leftovers from the roast beef he’d cooked last night. It wasn’t the same as fresh roasted pig head, though. That was a treat, a reminder of home he couldn’t afford all the time. He turned away and glanced around the store. There were a few other traditional mytho treats—or at least as close as they could make here—along with more human things like dried pasta, cereal, fruit, and vegetables. Humans still lived in the area—some were too poor to move away and others had found the price of their houses had dropped because of their neighbors. A tall man with long blond hair came out of the office. He wore jeans and a bright blue T-shirt, but he still carried himself as though he were important, like rank still mattered. He’d been one of the Elvish King’s archers before the collapse. “Archer Vlash.” Edra nodded in greeting. Vlash didn’t smile. “Do not call me that. That man is dead.” Yeah… so was Knight Tendric. He didn’t mind his old title, but some mythos didn’t like being reminded of the past. He’d misstepped already. “I received your complaint.” “Then you know the problem.” “I want some more information.” “It was in my report. I put in the complaint because the insurance company told me to. I complained to the SFPD too. They haven’t turned up. I do not expect them to.” Edra opened the file. “Human boys have been coming in and stealing?” “Yes.” Edra glanced up at Vlash. “The more you give me the more I can help.” “You will arrest the humans? I do not think so. You don’t have that power.” Edra wasn’t a cop, so he had no actual power to do anything more than smooth things over and make sure the mythos didn’t do something reckless. “I have other skills.” He could lurk around invisible and scare the pants off the kids, but that would only stop them for a while. He doubted anyone would approve of feeding the troublemakers to the dragons, and dragons didn’t really enjoy eating humans. They tasted strange, apparently. Vlash lifted one fair eyebrow. “So do I.” “No paying the Strega for curses.” That was the last thing they needed. Strega magic was patchy at best—the collapse had affected all mythos, some more than others. “I have hired some extra security.” There was something about the way he said it that made the hairs on the back of Edra’s neck ruffle. “What kind of security?” Please not a chupacabra. Once they had a scent they didn’t stop until the victim was dead. One didn’t really hire chupacabras, though they were most definitely animals, the kind of guard dog that few could handle. “Some ogre friends of my son.” The average ogre was eight foot tall. Even when ogres were still in school—and many dropped out because they weren’t that bright—they were bigger than the average man. “If they hurt anyone—” “You will assist,” Vlash said smoothly, his voice laced with magic that had no effect on any kind of dragon, greater or lesser. Edra forced a grin. “It’s easier to assist before people get hurt.”
- Gay dragon shifter romance
- crime solving partners
- forbidden love
- mythological creatures
