This debut collection by multi-award-winning author and artist Raven Oak brings together fantastical stories from the past ten years of her career, ranging from gothic and urban fantasy to post-apocalyptic and steampunk tales.
Youāll find coffee-drinking ghosts, ever-changing faces, elemental spirits who both protect and harm, assassins, magical pockets, and snarky creatures in these ELEVEN fanciful fictions. Dragon Springs & Other Things contains SIX never-before seen stories for your enjoyment, including two stories featuring fan favorite character, Ida, from Oakās Boahim Trilogy.
STORIES INCLUDED: Mirror Me, Water the Fire, Alive, Learning to Fly, The Drive to Work, The Ringers, Cookie Man, Amaskan, Peace Be With You, Friend, The Snark, and Dragon Springs & Other Things.
This debut collection by multi-award-winning author and artist Raven Oak brings together fantastical stories from the past ten years of her career, ranging from gothic and urban fantasy to post-apocalyptic and steampunk tales.
Youāll find coffee-drinking ghosts, ever-changing faces, elemental spirits who both protect and harm, assassins, magical pockets, and snarky creatures in these ELEVEN fanciful fictions. Dragon Springs & Other Things contains SIX never-before seen stories for your enjoyment, including two stories featuring fan favorite character, Ida, from Oakās Boahim Trilogy.
STORIES INCLUDED: Mirror Me, Water the Fire, Alive, Learning to Fly, The Drive to Work, The Ringers, Cookie Man, Amaskan, Peace Be With You, Friend, The Snark, and Dragon Springs & Other Things.
Human waste and the sweet smell of blackberries mixed as a tech sawed at the brambles snagged in the dead guyās clothing. "Lucky that joggerās dog escaped," said Detective Frye at my shoulder. I turned away from the body but not before I caught a glimpse of his broad face, thinning eyebrows set over brown eyes, and chapped, generous lips. The face shifted for a moment as the āmirrorā superimposed my face over the vic's.Ā
I closed my eyes against the sight.Ā
When I opened them, Frye chuckled. "Never seen you get queasy over a stiff before, Chandler."
I ignored the jibe and focused on the dozen officers canvassing the hobos dumb enough to stick around. More officers walked Rizal Park hoping to find a sober witness, but that seemed unlikely considering our proximity to the Jungle. Hundreds of dirty tents and cardboard hovels lay under the elevated section of I-5āhome to a thousand transients. Nothing but an unsafe harbor of depravity and helplessnessāone I avoided when I could.
Here, more than anywhere else, the āmirrorā fell upon me, giving every hobo my face and serving me their drama on a painful platter.Ā
The medical examiner tapped my shoe from where he squatted beside the body, and I turned, careful to avoid looking at any faces. With the blackberries cut back, Dr. Moots shaded his eyes against the setting sun and pointed to a gunshot wound to the chest.Ā
"Cause of death?" I asked.
"We'll know more after the autopsy."
My gaze slid upward. The vic's brown eyes disappeared in my own, which stared back at me without emotion. No pain or hunger. Just an emptiness that left me chilled in the shade of I-5.Ā
Why now?
The āmirrorā had left me alone for years. Left me to see people with their filter intact. But here, now, I couldn't tell where the vicās face began and mine ended. Dammit.Ā
"Are you okay, Detective Chandler?" Moots asked.Ā
"Yeah, I'm fine," I said before jotting down a few more details: the manās feet were bare, his Levi's a couple sizes too big, and his well-worn purple polo sported an alligator logo.
Ten feet away, a uniform chatted with the jogger whose inquisitive corgi whined. "We go to the park every evening to get in a few miles,ā the guy said, ābut Ein slipped his leash when he spotted a cat. Or maybe a raccoon? Look, I don't know--he spotted something and was off. I followed him under the overpass until the blackberries. Darned things are impossible to get rid of. I thought Ein was snacking on them 'til I saw the dude's foot."
I didn't have to turn around to recall the teeth marks that marred the vic's feet, one big toe missingāpresumably in the dog's stomach now.
The corgi whined as I approached, and the jogger flinched.Ā
"Did you see anyone else?" I asked.
"N-no, just the dead guy. Look, when I saw Ein chewing on himā" The jogger paled and swallowed hard. "I just got the hell out of there and called you guys. I didn't see anybody except the usual homeless and dog walkers."
The uniform scribbled notes as his gaze flickered between the witnessās face and mine. His feelings washed over me, and fear gripped my stomach. The uniform didn't want to be here. Not in the Jungle. Too much color for him.Ā
I shook my head to clear my mind before shifting focus back to the jogger. "You'll need to keep a close eye on your dog's excrement when scooping. That toeās evidence, so if you find it, give us a shout."
The jogger looked like he was going to decorate the homeless encampment with his dinner. The officer glanced at his watch as he shifted his stance.Ā
Shadows shifted as the Jungleās inhabitants watched us. We needed to talk to them, convince them we needed their help and weren't going to harm them.Ā
But as the sun dipped closer to the horizon, people drifted away from the park. Once the sun set, no one would be safe in the Jungle.
Not even a dead guy.
* * *
Thirteen. That's how old I'd been the first time.Ā
I'd turned the corner on my bike to find a homeless man shambling toward me, carrying a jar of something yellow. "Spare some change?" heād asked, and I'd stood there blinking furiously against the way his face blurred. Iād still been able to see him, but my face was superimposed over his like I'd crossed my eyes funny.Ā
His Vodka craving had swept over me, and shocked, I'd fallen to the pavement and scraped my knee. A nearby gas station attendant had chased the homeless man off with a slew of curse words.Ā
Nothing else looked weird, so I had chalked it up to too much soda and sun. Until it happened again.Ā
Soon I couldn't go anywhere without seeing this āmirror,ā as Iād dubbed it. My grades had dropped as Iād ditched school because thereās nothing worse than a bunch of middle schoolers bleeding pain. Two weeks was all it took for my mother to weasel it out of me.Ā
Her advice was, "Just close your eyes until it goes away."Ā
The rest of seventh grade had been a montage of darkness. By the time Iād entered high school, I'd figured out that emotions fed it. If I wanted to survive it, I needed to remain numb.Ā
So at eighteen, I'd entered the police academy with the goal of turning myself into a methodical, hardened cop as fast as I could. Steeped in depravity, desperation, and violence, Iād figured Iād soon learn everyone was shit and cease to care. There weren't any innocent people in this worldāonly varying degrees of bad. But this vicāsomething about him brought the mirror back. Like the Terminator, it had resurfaced.Ā