I swallow hard. “I think a lot of them were getting hurt already because of all the ways humans don’t understand us.”
“Excuse me!”
A reporter with flushed cheeks is hustling around the still-performing shadowkind to where we’re standing, her camerawoman hurrying behind her. She thrusts her microphone toward Rollick. “Are you part of this coalition of supernaturalbeings too? What’s your role in the group? Can you say who’s responsible for the damage being done to Jackson City?”
Rollick’s eyes narrow. I tighten my grip on his arm, tasting the acrid emotions rolling off him like fetid salsa.
But I recognize the flavor of them. They don’t taste like anger or revulsion, not really.
Like I tasted with Raze that first day I stumbled into my dorm room and found myself face to face with him—Rollick isn’t furious.He’sscared. He’s not sure we’re wrong, only afraid of what will become of all the beings he’s tried to shelter if we are.
I nudge a wave of my determined affection over him. “We can make them see. This is the best chance we’re ever going to get, isn’t it?”
Rollick sucks in a breath. Then, to my immense relief, he puts on one of his charming smiles as he turns fully toward the reporter. “Until recently, I thought of myself as something of a leader in this group. But I may have overestimated my own importance.”
12
Hail
Peri’s plan is going well. Humans mill all around us, babbling to and about us, shoving their cameras in our faces. Gaping as if they’ve never seen a snowflake before.
Which, all right, fine, they probablyhaven’tthis far south in the middle of summer, but that doesn’t mean they have to look like such dopes about it.
My Cream Puff’s mission appears to be a massive success, and I hate everything that makes it one. All those staring mortal eyes. All the gasps of astonishment and anxious murmurs.
If they’d opened their eyes properly centuries ago, we wouldn’t have needed to make ourselves into a sideshow act to prove we’re no more harmful than clowns.
Of course, an awful lot of humans are afraid of those too. They really are so easily terrorized. I don’t see how it was ever our fault.
Still, because Peri is beaming in her beautiful, joyful way and even Rollick is deigning to speak to a couple of the humans, I keep up my end of the deal. I bring down another brief shower of snow and then summon a tower of ice crystals to provoke more oohs and aahs. I paste a smile on my face and turn so the cameras get my best angles.
I mean, if I have to be on TV screens all around the world anyway, I might as well give them a good look. They should know that Peri deserved the best possible mates. And that our human audience is lucky we’re even bothering to show ourselves to them.
More humans have drifted over from the refugee camp we’re on the outskirts of. I think some of the news people must have called in colleagues as well, because a few additional vans sporting satellite dishes roar up.
As the newcomers spill out, one of them hollers to his colleagues loud enough for me to hear. “What’s the big fuss? Looks like a bunch of Halloween tricks and costumes to me.”
My teeth grit behind my determined smile.
He thinks so, does he? Peri went to all this effort to present us to the beings who’ve threatened us across all of history, and he’s going to spit in her face?
I might not like that we’re courting their favor, but if that’s what she wants, I’m going to make sure this show hits all the right notes. She deservesthat.
She deserves their respect.
Reaching inside myself, I summon more of my wintry power.
Spires of gleaming ice shoot up from the ground all around our makeshift stage, close enough for the reporters surrounding us to touch them. Let them feel the chill and try to tell us it’s all smoke and mirrors.
Peri beams out a little more light. The humans farther back are craning their necks to watch—I’m not sure they can even see her.
We need a bigger stage. And even more shadowkind to make her point.
I turn my head toward the shadows around us where I can feel other beings are lurking, drawn by the spectacle but afraid of emerging. What can they really be scared of now that even Rollick is talking with the reporters like a diplomat rather than a demon?
“Come on, you wimps!” I shout to them. “Let’s really give them something to talk about. They need to see just how amazing shadowkind can be.”
And how many of us there are. I won’t deny a small part of me wants these humans to recognize they could be outnumbered.
