Vulcan's Kittens (Children of Myth Book 1) (16 page)

“You’re excited, but you can’t stay here,” she told him firmly. He hopped down and came over to her, putting his forepaws on her knees and headbutting her stomach. “I’m staying with you, my friend,” Linn assured him.

They followed Bes and the twins out of the plane and down the narrow steps. A small group of people was waiting for them there in the bright sunlight. Linn squinted, trying to see. Bes handed the girls off to a tall man... Steve, she realized. Gareth and Blackie ran ahead of her and pounced on their mother, who sat down on the tarmac with an exaggerated “Oof!” before ruffling their fur and letting them lick her face.

Linn smiled, and then got a good look at the other woman.

“Grandmother!” she shrieked, and ran into her arms. As they closed tightly around her she could feel tears rising in her eyes. Grandma smelled the same as ever... exotic and flowery. “I missed you so much,” Linn told her, choking up.

“I missed you, too.” Her grandmother put a hand under her chin and tilted her head back. “Let me look at you. How much you’ve grown!”

Linn gasped. Her grandmother’s eyes glowed with power. Rich crimson and white danced with yellow glints. “You are Pele...”

Her grandmother’s round cheeks appled with the broadness of her grin. “Yes, I am. Welcome to my home, my dear.”

Linn laughed in delight. “Of course he would choose you,” she marveled. It seemed so obvious now.

“Maybe it was me who chose him! Pursued him shamelessly, too!” the older woman retorted joyfully.

They both laughed, hugging again. When they finally let go and turned to look at Bes, still arm in arm, he chuckled.

“Anyone seeing the two of you together would know you were related. Although,” he made a small bow in Pele’s direction. “as mother and daughter, not Grandmother.”

Pele laughed heartily. “Flattery will get you everywhere, Bes. How are you, old war-horse?”

“Well, despite the harrowing experience of having trained Linn.” He returned smoothly with a wink at Linn, who stuck her tongue out at him.

“Do you stay with us?” Pele asked.

Linn looked at her in dismay. It hadn’t occurred to her that Bes would leave them once he’d brought them to Sanctuary. She turned and looked at him and knew what he would say before the words left his lips.

“No, I return to Heff. I am needed, he tells me. The battle is coming faster than expected.”

Linn went to him, feeling her lip trembling, but not wanting to cry. He hugged her gently. “You will be safe, child.”

“I’ll miss you. Will I ever see you again?”

“Of course. I need to do this, though. Don’t change while I’m gone?”

“I hadn’t planned to.”

He chucked her chin and hugged Pele, who whispered something in his ear. He nodded and then walked away, around the plane. Linn’s vision was blurry with tears. She gulped. “Now what, Grandma?”

Pele squeezed her hand gently. “Now we go home.”

Linn looked around. Quetzalcoatl was standing, waiting for her. Steve and Sekhmet, still in human form, were walking the children toward waiting cars.

“Thank you for bringing us,” Linn told the Mayan god. “I guess we are safe now.”

“You are, child. Don’t grieve. He always keeps his word.”

“It’s just...” She felt her voice slide away. She cleared her throat. “Give my love to Grampa Heff.”

“Of course I will.”

“And mine,” Pele added. Quetzalcoatl laughed.

“I think it will be safer for me if you do that yourself, my Lady.”

Linn watched him walk up the stairs, and then turned to follow her grandmother to the car. She settled into the backseat with her grandmother and Blackie, who had chosen to ride with them. The driver, who looked very small to Linn’s eyes, nodded to Pele and pulled out once they were settled.

“Now,” Pele turned to Linn and took the girl’s hands in hers. “Tell me everything.”

Linn giggled a little, her laughter finally banishing her tears, although there was still a knot in her chest. “Well, I thought it was just going to be another boring summer at Grampa Heff’s cabin... He doesn’t have Internet or anything!”

Her tale took them all the way to the entrance of the Sanctuary, a surprisingly normal door in an office building, which led to an elevator. They all crowded in, Sekhmet adding a few comments as she realized what Linn was telling her grandmother. Linn picked up Moira and balanced her on her hip without even thinking about it, not realizing until later it was not something the Linn from the beginning of this summer would have done. She had despised babysitting. The kittens had been different... cute, cuddly, and helpless.

Linn kissed Moira’s head and told her Grandmother about the helpless flight through the forest, thinking the girls were dead in the wreckage of the cabin. The toddler hugged her neck.

“Linn!” she said clearly. They all fell silent and stared at the little girl. She giggled. “Linn!” she said again, obviously pleased to be the center of attention. The elevator doors slid open.

Pat, not to be outdone by her dark-haired sister, pointed. “Go!”

They all laughed and stepped out into the brightly lit tunnel. Linn looked around her in amazement. The tunnel stretched off in either direction, with doors every so often. Her grandmother spoke softly. “I got the idea from the Cold War of the humans. I wanted to create a place where some of us could be safe through almost anything.”

“What about regular people?”

“We are doing our best, child. But for them to be safe, there must be guardians, and the guardians must have sanctuary.”

Linn nodded. That made sense. She knew her grandfather and grandmother both wanted humanity to continue to grow, unchecked. It was almost, she mused, as though they, Bes, Coyote, and even Quetzalcoatl, felt about humans the way they felt about children. Her train of thought was interrupted as a small train of... golf carts?... pulled up to them.

A funny little person with large ears hopped out of the first once and gave them all a sweeping bow. “Welcome, welcome!” he cried in a squeaky voice.

Then the other drivers all crowded around them, putting leis on Linn and the children. Pele laughed. “They all wanted to come to the airport to greet you, but it was decided such a crowd would be too much to hide.”

Pele and the lead driver, who Linn had decided was the leader of the little people, came over to her. Behind them, Linn could see the little people, who had a greenish tinge to their skin and points on their ears, making much of the kittens and little girls. They were getting into the carts with their parents.

“Linn, this is Daffyd. He is the king of the Coblyns.”

Linn took his offered hand and tried to curtsey. “Pleased to meet you, sir, um... majesty?”

He laughed, a bright chortle. “Daffy is fine. ‘Tis what Pele calls me.”

“And you are all... Coblyns?” Linn was trying to remember where she’d read that word.

“Aye, also known as goblins and the little people. When Pele opened the Sanctuary she called in a gang of us to help with design and construction.” He shrugged. “We liked it so much we asked to stay on.” He waved her to the nearest car. “Come, then! We want to get you to your rooms, and then tonight we party!”

Linn climbed in the cart with her grandmother, and looked around as they whizzed down the tunnel. Grandma murmured in her ear “The Coblyns modified the carts. Keep your hands inside, dear, we are going faster than we ought to.”

Linn nodded. She was not inclined to let so much as a finger stray. “How long is the tunnel?”

“Oh, I don’t really know. The Coblyns add to it every so often. With my power, it’s not going to collapse, and they really are superior miners, you know. Many miles, that’s for sure.”

“Wow. And a party?”

“Oh, yes. We wanted to welcome all the children here with a party on the beach. It was decided we would give you a few hours to rest, and then have our little luau. Linn...” Pele hugged her close. “I am so happy you are finally here.”

Linn snuggled back. “How many of us are there?”

“Well, you aren’t really one of the children. Only those who haven’t reached maturity yet were brought here.”

Linn felt absurdly pleased. She wasn’t a child.

Her grandmother continued. “So, let’s see. There is Cloud, who is very quiet, and about six years old. Stith, from the Arctic, is thirteen and the happiest boy. The Japanese triplets, Akako, Botan, and Cho are very energetic. They are seven years old. Cora will be here shortly, she is Hades’ daughter, and I was told she is twelve. And then in the morning Parja and Fjorgg from Lithuania will be the last arrivals. They are twins, nine years old.”

“So, with the kittens, there are twelve children.”

“Yes, and it should be a lot of fun for all of you to get to know one another.”

Linn nodded dubiously. “The kittens are babies compared to the rest.”

“Not really. They are maturing like cats... the girls are about three, and the boys perhaps even older than that. The girls will mature at a more human rate now that they have chosen this form.”

“I would have thought immortals would mature at a slower rate than humans.”

“Not and survive among humanity.”

“What happens to immortals that don’t make it?”

Pele started to answer, but they stopped just then. Daffyd hopped out and opened the double doors. Pele followed him through them. Linn walked into what looked like a huge living room, with flowering plants and waterfalls everywhere.

“Welcome home, dear.” Pele kissed her cheek.

Blackie padded with her as Daffyd led them down a hall. “Here is your room, Linnaea.”

“Call me Linn, please.”

“Gladly!” the little creature beamed at her. “Now, you have a few hours. There is food and drink within for you.”

He bowed and went out again, leaving Linn to look around the room. She was suddenly very tired, and homesick. It was a nice room, a bit like a hotel room. Bland, she decided. Blackie leaned on her leg.

“We’ve come a long way from the hayloft.”

She started to pick him up and then decided against it. He was really too old to baby. He hopped up on the bed and sprawled out, purring.

“I miss it,” she told him, even though he didn’t look like he was listening.

She went into the bathroom, which didn’t resemble a hotel bathroom at all. A big tub made her decide to take a bath. She hadn’t been able to do that since she had left home. She started the water running and went back out into the other room.

“Shoot. I don’t know where my clothes are.” Her pack, with Lambent neglected in it, lay on the floor. She pulled Lambent out of it, and then unsheathed her. The dancing fire, red and white with little tendrils of her own pink, made her remember the bonding with Bes and Grandpa.

“I hope they are OK,” she whispered, sliding Lambent back away.

She looked in the pack again. Her survival kit, looking rather useless in these surroundings, the books Coyote had given her. No clothes. She laughed suddenly, looking down at herself. She was going to a Hawaiian beach party dressed in ratty jeans, black t-shirt, and a flannel shirt two sizes too big.

“Oh, kitten. I never meant to be this much of a tomboy.”

Blackie slitted one golden eye at her and then pointedly went back to sleep.

“I know you don’t care.” Linn threw one of her dirty socks at him. Those she had spares for in the survival kit, not that she needed them in Hawaii. Bath first, then she would try to figure it out. Maybe she could cut off the jeans and modify the tee to be cooler.

She soaked until her fingertips were pruny. Emerging from the bath wrapped in one towel with the other twisted around her long black hair, she felt positively decadent. She had decided to make her jeans into shorts, with their various rips they were ready for it anyway. If she cut the tee a little, sleeves off and cropped, maybe, it would work.

She stopped dead when she saw the room. Her pack was gone, Blackie and Lambent where she had left them. There was art on the walls, flowers in vases, and a bookcase on the far wall. It was filled. Open mouthed, Linn wandered over to it. She spotted Coyote’s books, and a mix of her childhood favorites. She pulled a copy of the White Dragon off the shelf and realized it was her own copy. The inscription from her mother to her on her eighth birthday was on the flyleaf. Bewildered, she put it back.

Crossing the room again to the dresser, she pulled open the top drawer and found her underwear. Looking through it, she saw that some was her own, some was new. She started to dress with relief. She really, really hadn’t wanted to put the dirty clothes back on. She stopped and looked around. It was gone, too.

Linn pulled a long, well-worn t-shirt on and looked at the clock. If she napped for an hour she’d have plenty of time. She curled up and the bed and pulled Blackie closer. He started to purr and she closed her eyes. She slept dreamlessly until the alarm she had set sounded.

Chapter 23

Linn got up and looked in the closet. She had no idea what to wear, but when she saw the lone dress hanging there, she guessed it was the one. A vibrant blue covered with white hibiscus flowers, she realized as she took it off the hanger that it was a tankini and a wrap-around skirt. It almost completely covered her, but it felt light and cool. She shook Blackie awake.