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32: BLUE MOON, YOU SAW ME STANDING ALONE


The kids arrived back at Sacred Heart shortly after dawn.

Guy had done a good job of distracting them; they were all happy and full of plans. Merry and Rustle wanted to find sheet music for the songs that they had heard playing on the jukebox. Barley wanted to learn more about the mysterious “Tex-Mex cuisine” and try to make his own chili. Cattail Reeds wanted to set up a game room next to the nightclub with pinball machines salvaged from across the city. Baby Duck had discovered the team’s aquarium, filled with gleaming gold pesantiki won at countless street fairs over the years. Andy had scooped out a half dozen for her, transferring them to a large wide-mouthed pickle jar, cautioning her that she’d need to find someplace bigger to transfer them to quickly.

Oilcan asked Moser’s people to find an aquarium with a pump and filter and then had a long talk with Baby Duck about no more pets. It was a dual problem of finding space for them as the number of people living at Sacred Heart increased, and finding food for the animals as the war dragged on.

“Quee,” Baby Duck quacked while Blue Sky frowned at him and Spot looked nervous.

“You can keep the fish in your room, but please, don’t bring anything more home until we’re sure we can feed them, and don’t have to eat them—because that would be very tragic.”

“I promise,” Baby Duck said in quiet and solemn voice.

* * *

The impending Noah’s Ark temporarily halted, Oilcan moved on to Moon Dog. He wanted to make his offer to the male before Moon Dog drifted off in search of whatever had brought the holy warrior to Pittsburgh.

He caught Moon Dog in the foyer, coming out of the gym, looking clean and neat as if Oilcan hadn’t dragged him to hell and back the day before. His brown hair was damp, so someone must have explained the showers to him.

“Moon Dog!” Oilcan trotted down the stairs to him, aware that Thorne Scratch was retreating to give him space. He was surprised how nervous he felt. His palms were actually sweating. He wiped them on his blue jeans as he struggled to put thoughts into words. “I…I…I wanted to thank you for everything you did yesterday.”

Moon Dog beamed. “It was a good time! I have spent a hundred years training for battle, wondering if I would stay calm and rational and strike true and be everything that people expected of me. It was wonderful to know that it was all worth my time and effort—that I am all that I wanted to be.”

“I am not sure what you know of me,” Oilcan said. “Forge is my great-great-great-great-great-grandfather. His only child, Unbounded Brilliance, went to Earth and was trapped there during the Oni War. Unbounded Brilliance fathered a half-elf son with a human woman and was killed during a political uprising. For generations, my family has thought of themselves as human. Only a few days ago, Forge…Forge made me a domana elf.”

“Waya!” Moon Dog said. “That explains much. You seem so at ease with all things strange to me.”

“I was born on Earth and when my mother was killed, I was brought to Elfhome by my grandfather, Tim Dufae, and raised with my cousin. Earlier this summer, she became the Wind Clan domi.”

“Ah, so the female who saved us on the bridge is your cousin,” Moon Dog said. “She tapped the Fire Clan esva but held a Stone Clan shield and then did a Wind Clan spell.”

“Yes, she has three esva but I only have access to the Stone Clan Spell Stones because Forge made me true to his son’s bloodline. But…but that does not make me Stone Clan. I am Beholden to my cousin, Beloved Tinker of Wind. My household is Wind Clan.”

Moon Dog tilted his head in confusion. “The children are Stone Clan.”

“They were…” Oilcan wasn’t sure how to explain without saying negative things about the Stone Clan. The children had been abandoned by their clan long before they walked away from it. “It has been a very intense and confusing summer for all of us. To those of us who were born human—mostly human—our choice of clan was based on sentiment, not genetics. We…My family has always seen ourselves as Wind Clan, because we were surrounded by elves of that clan when we were young. I know that it was a hard choice for the children, but we have decided to align with my cousin.”

“Ah, I see. It is very sensible. Tempered Steel has always said that the clans were one of the worst things that we had done to ourselves. To willfully set ourselves apart from each other. It is a hatred of genetics that we should have never embraced. The color of one’s eye should not determine love or hate.”

“Yes, exactly,” Oilcan said and then paused. Where was he going with this line of thought? How should he pose the question that he wanted to ask? “I am not sure of certain customs—because I was raised as a human. I was not even sure if I wanted to follow tradition and take a full Hand. Yesterday, though, I came to realize the value of having a Hand. We could not have survived all that the oni had thrown at us without you. I would like very much if we could be…if you would be…my Second?”

Moon Dog blinked a couple times, utterly silent. He finally said, “Could you repeat that?”

Oilcan carefully formed a clearer question. “Would you be my Second?”

“Ah, yes, that is what you said,” Moon Dog murmured. He thought for a moment and glanced over Oilcan’s shoulder. The only thing behind Oilcan was the front door. “I…I have something that I must do. I am not sure how it will go. I will return and say ‘yes’ when it is done.”

After Moon Dog hurried away, Thorne Scratch came down the steps.

“What did he say?” she asked hesitantly.

“I think he said yes.” Oilcan wanted to wait for Moon Dog’s return but the male hadn’t given him a time frame. He was an elf. His concept of time was vastly different from that of a human. Oilcan had too much to do to wait.

The next thing on his to-do list was to make sure the twins had more furniture in their bedroom than two elvish camping cots. The whole point of going to Once More With Feeling had been to present the twins with a viable place to live. He’d utterly failed to have a nice bedroom with a large workspace set up before they arrived. He could still salvage the situation if he delivered the furniture before the novelty of everything else in Sacred Heart wore off.

He would need help to get it done as quickly as possible. He didn’t want to drag his kids back out of the enclave. Guy had managed to make yesterday a fun adventure. Oilcan was afraid to take them back to the South Side where they could plainly see how close to disaster they’d been. He headed into the gym to find Moser.

The night owls of Moser’s commune had gotten to bed early and were—somewhat—awake. Their daylight counterparts had already gotten up, hung up their bedrolls to air, and were in the kitchen with Barley, starting breakfast.

“Hey, yesterday I bought a ton of furniture,” Oilcan explained to Moser as the man sat up in his bedroll and scrubbed at his hair. “I need to go down to the South Side and pick it up at Once More With Feeling. I really could use a hand with the heavy lifting.”

“Sure. Sure. No problem.” Moser climbed out of his bedroll to stretch. “Geoffrey was out earlier, checking on how things stand. He says that there’s still a shitload of oni scattered through the East End that the royal marines are mopping up. The EIA wants all humans to stay out of the area so there’s no chance of friendly fire. We’re stuck here until we get the all clear.”

“And maybe another truck?” Oilcan had seen Moser’s van outside last night but there had been cardboard and tools tucked under it, as if it had broken down beside the gate.

“My van is dead,” Moser said. “Geoffrey’s got his pickup here. He’s in the kitchen. I’ll grab him.”

Moser’s household was made up of fourteen adults—elves and humans. More, if one counted Geoffrey and any other stray they’d taken recently in. With Moser’s people pitching in, getting the twins’ bedroom furnished should be fairly quick.



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Framed