Anthony Francis - Frost Moon

I opened my eyes to see the face of the feral girl.

"Aaaaa!" I screamed, jumping and klonking my head on the headboard. She was still there, and I shoved away, falling onto the floor, dragging half the bedcovers with me. I lay there frozen a minute-I couldn't see her; had it been a dream?-and then pulled myself up to see the feral girl still curled up on my bed, looking straight at me.

"I let myself in," she said. "I hopes that's OK."

"How the hell did you manage-" and then I saw overturned glassware in the kitchen: she'd let herself in through a second floor window. "Never mind. How did you find me?"

"I followed you. You gots the world's lamest bike. It was easy to keep up-"

"My precious Vespa is a scooter,; not a bike," I said, "and she gets like sixty miles to the gallon." My brow furrowed. "You mean followed, like on foot?"

She smiled, her tail flickering up in the air.

"I find myself less and less enamored of were-whatevers," I muttered, cracking my neck where the collar had kinked it in my sleep. I reached up to the desk next to my bed and batted at my computer mouse: after a moment the monitor turned itself back on, and I peered at the system clock. "Jeez! It's like, eight in the morning! Who's up at this ungodly hour?"

"The day is young," she purred, slinking forward to peer down at me on the floor.

I eyed her warily. I didn't like the way this was going. And in the light I could she was a lot younger than she'd looked at the werehouse. "What's your name, kid?"

"You called me Cinnamon," she said dreamily. "That will do."

"Look, Cinnamon, the last thing I need is another spice-themed girlfriend, suitor or ex," I said, standing up at last. "You had a name before I smelled your perfume. What was it?"

"They called me Stray," she said. "Or Foundling."

Oh, God. She was serious. That was horrible. "I'm so sorry."

"Don't-don't you be sorrying me!" she said, face fierce and tragic all at once. "You didn't talk down at me before!"

"I'm sor-" I stopped, and held up my hands. "I'm sorry you're an orphan and I'm sorry I'm sorry. Get the hell over it."

She started to get mad, then just smiled, a huge sunny smile. "Okay, DaKOta!"

I stared at her suspiciously. "How the hell old are you?"

"Twenty-three," she said proudly.

"And how old are you when you're not trying to buy beer?"

Her face fell. "Nineteen."

"And how old are you when you're not trying to get down my pants?"

Her face fell further. "Seventeen."

"Not likely," I said, looking at her face. Lots of baby fat, few lines even for a street cat. She had a lot of tattoos, but-"Not even fifteen. Maybe thirteen-"

"I am too fifteen," she said indignantly, then held her hands to her mouth.

"Jeez," I said. "You are not old enough to be alone on the streets-"

"I can take care of myself," she said.

"I don't doubt it," I said. "But being able to take care of yourself, and having to take care of yourself, are two different things."

"I'm a foundling," she said. "My mother spent most of her time as a beast during her pregnancy so… so I wouldn't die when she changed. And after all that time."

"She couldn't change back," I said. "I'm so sor-so, you know."

"They say my dad went with her so…" She stared at her hands, at the tufts of fur between her fingers, then said, "So I don't have any parents. The werehouse is my home, but I gots to take care of myself."

"Look… uh, Cinnamon. Why are you here?"

"T-to get down your pants?" she stammered, eyes wide, a little shocked at herself. "I-I-means, I means like you said that you thought that-"

"You haven't thought this through at all, have you?" I said quietly.

I just stood there, in pajama shorts and an old Emory t-shirt, staring down at her with my arms folded. Where I'd changed clothes-except for the damn collar-Cinnamon wore the same ghetto-chic vest and crop top, the same pants: probably the only ones she owned. She was on her own, on the streets at the same age I'd been a choir girl in Stratton Christian Academy, only Cinnamon had more tattoos than I'd had at twenty.

Finally she held out her hand, the one bearing the butterfly mark. "No? Then maybe another super tattoo to match this one?"

"I can't do a tattoo on you, Cinnamon. You're a minor."

She actually hissed at me. "You gave me this-"

"When I thought you were older," I said. "Technically, transferring a mark by magical means doesn't count, but if I actually inked you-I could lose my license."

"Oh, come on," she said. "You looks so cool, but you're just a big square-"

"You like my apartment?" I interrupted.

She blinked, then looked around, at my posters, my DVDs, my books, my cats, even glancing curiously at my glass computer desk and its Herman Miller chair. "It's a cool pad, I guess. I means, cool for a square. Yeah, I likes it, in a dorky kind of-"

"So do I," I said. "I keep it by keeping my job."

"Oh, come on, who'd know?" she said. "It's so pretty. I want another one-"

"Cinnamon… you're thirteen." I said. She started to protest, but I held up my hand. "I got my first tattoo, and started tattooing, when I was nineteen. I've been doing it for nine years. I'm five years older than who you were pretending to be. You could be my daughter."

"Oh, could I?" she said sarcastically. Then her eyes grew distant.

We stared at each other for a moment.

"Oh, hell," I said. "I've gone and picked up another stray."

"I am not 'Stray' anymore," she shouted, standing up on my bed. "I'm Cinnamon!"

The bed squeaked underneath her as she shook with rage, and the noise seemed to catch her attention. Experimentally she threw her weight on it, then started bouncing. I was about to say something.. . and then my cell rang.

The number was unknown, a 770 area code-outside the Perimeter. I let it ring once more, then reluctantly answered it. Maybe it was a client. "Dakota Frost."

"Hello," said a deep voice. "This is Buck."

"Buck?" I said, confused. Then it dawned. "Lord Buckhead!"

"The one and only, but Buck will do," he said. How was he using a phone with a deer's head? Did he have one of those faux old- timey candlestick phones with the mouthpiece on its own cord? "The Bear King just called. He was quite agitated. He seems to think you may have taken something that belongs to the werehouse."

"Let me guess," I said, watching Cinnamon jump up and down on my bed, both feet together. "You're missing a cross between a tiger and a pogo stick?"

"The wonderful thing about Tiggers is, Tiggers are wonderful things," Lord Buckhead said. "But yes, that does sound like their Stray."

She looked over, enraged. "You ratted me! You fink!"

"S-T-R-A-Y seems to want to go by 'Cinnamon' now," I said, turning around, to keep the phone out of reach of her tufted claws. "And I didn't 'take' her. She followed me without my knowledge and broke into my home-"

"That does sound like their missing Tigger," Buckhead said. "Lady Dakota, I do not mean to impose, but would you do me a very great favor?"

"Certainly," I said. "After you interceded on my behalf, I am in your debt-"

"Watch over Cinnamon today."

I froze, staring back at Cinnamon as she stamped her feet and made claws at me to get the phone. "Uh, suuure, Lord Buckhead."

"Thank you, Lady Dakota," Lord Buckhead said. "She rarely has opportunities to leave the werehouse. It will do her a lot of good to see the mundane world."

"Buck," I said. "She's… not a prisoner there, is she?"

"No, it is not that she is never allowed to be out but… it is good for her to be out," he said. "The Bear King means well, but he can be overprotective of his fellow foundlings."

"Oh," I said as the full meaning of "fellow foundlings" blossomed in my consciousness. I assumed that his monstrous bear form had been a deliberate effect, or side effect of his power, or something to do with proximity to the full moon. I looked over at her ears, her tail. "She… uh, mentioned she was a foundling."