Magic burning carnival o.., p.1
Magic Burning: Carnival of Mysteries, page 1
MAGIC BURNING
CARNIVAL OF MYSTERIES
KAJE HARPER
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
1. Chapter 1
2. Chapter 2
3. Chapter 3
4. Chapter 4
5. Chapter 5
6. Chapter 6
7. Chapter 7
8. Chapter 8
9. Chapter 9
10. Chapter 10
11. Chapter 11
12. Chapter 12
13. Chapter 13
14. Chapter 14
15. Chapter 15
16. Chapter 16
17. Chapter 17
18. Chapter 18
19. Chapter 19
20. Chapter 20
21. Chapter 21
22. Chapter 22
23. Chapter 23
Epilogue
About the Author
Other Series by Kaje Harper
Standalone Stories
Free Novels
Standalone Free Stories
Carnival of Mysteries
Kaje Harper
Kaje Harper ©2023
Edited by Debbie McGowan
Cover Art © Dianne Thies https://www.lyricallines.net/
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Content warning: For adult readers over the age of 18 - contains explicit sexual situations between two men. One episode of severe physical injury on page.
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ABOUT THIS BOOK
Alan
I haven't been out with a guy in the last two years. Partly because I'm a gay elementary-school teacher in a fairly small, conservative town. Partly because I'm a sorcerer, and dating ordinary humans only leads to trouble. Sleeping with one though? That's doable, so when my birdbrained familiar Sunny lines up a tall, muscular firefighter for me, I'm not going to say no. Just once, though. Maybe twice. I don't need more trouble in my life.
Jason
I don't regret moving back to my hometown and my big family. Well, not much. I'm not out to them, and I miss the anonymity of the big city, but I like the local fire house and the slower-paced life. Still, when I see my niece's teacher, Mr. Hiranchai, in gray sweatpants talking to a mini-parrot on his shoulder, something inside me (or maybe something in front of me) perks up and says "I want that one." I can't have an actual boyfriend, but I sure wouldn't mind getting laid, and Alan's slim, dark-haired, smart-assed style rings all my bells.
It's no surprise we turn out to be great together, even if my job and his responsibilities make it hard to find time. It is a surprise when I realize I want more than just an occasional night. But some weird fires out in the brush keep us firefighters hopping, and when this strange carnival comes to town and lands me with a pair of magical doll shoes, life gets truly confusing. There's more to Alan than he's telling me, and I'm getting a bad, bad feeling about all this.
Magic Burning is a story in the Necromancer universe, 60 years after Marked by Death, and is part of the multi-author Carnival of Mysteries Series. Each book stands alone, but each one includes at least one visit to Errante Ame’s Carnival of Mysteries, a magical, multiverse traveling show full of unusual acts, games, and rides. The Carnival changes to suit the world it’s on, so each visit is unique and special. This book contains a snarky, matchmaking bird, a lonely young teacher, and a gay firefighter finally coming out to his large family.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I want to thank Ari and Rachel for inviting me to join this adventure. The Carnival was a lot of fun to play with, and I’m excited to be sharing this concept with several of my favorite authors. Big thanks to Hannah, for suggestions about keeping my Thai-American character real, and to Tom, for making sure I hadn’t gone too far past plausibility with my firefighters. To Kathy, once again, for your invaluable eye on my worldbuilding and characters.
And thanks to all the readers who’ve enjoyed my Necromancer books. This story should stand alone, but you’ll recognize a cameo or two, and your enthusiasm for this alternate universe made me eager to play around with the Necromancer world in new ways, sixty years down the timeline.
CHAPTER 1
Alan
“Dammit, Sunny,” I muttered under my breath as I listened respectfully, yet again, to the ranting of Mrs. Gomez from apartment 207. Justified ranting. “No, ma’am,” I said aloud when she ran out of steam. “I don’t think it’s funny. No, ma’am, I didn’t train him to do that. It’s all his own idea.”
“Well, you have to get rid of him! I won’t have this nonsense! Another dinner ruined.” She stomped off across the parking lot in her housecoat and slammed into the building.
The firefighters lounged around their truck at the curb, joking among themselves. They were probably pretty tired of being called out here for false alarms too. One of them peeled away from the group and approached me. I thought about pretending I hadn’t seen him and dashing inside, but sadly, he’d probably follow me to “have a word.”
On the plus side, if I had to get chewed out by someone, I had no problem with it being six-foot-two of stubble-jawed first-responder hotness. I put on a receptive expression and folded my arms, as if that might keep him from noticing my chest was narrow and skinny and entirely unlike the muscled expanse straining his T-shirt beneath his suspenders.
He stopped in front of me. “Alan. We meet again.”
“Um, yeah. Sorry, Jase.” On my shoulder, Sunny, my conure, gave a wolf whistle, which I knew for damned sure I never taught him. I could feel the heat flooding my face.
“He mimicked the fire alarm again, huh?”
I bit my lip. I didn’t need to answer that. This was the third time Sunny had managed an alarm scream so loud and perfectly pitched that neighbors had called 911 as they ran out of the building. For a twelve-inch bird, his volume was ridiculous.
Jason held a hand out toward Sunny. I flinched, but my temperamental bird never tried to nip Jason, instead arching his neck to allow a gentle stroke. “Shouldn’t you have him restrained out here?” Jason asked. “Aren’t you worried he’ll fly away?”
“No.” I didn’t explain why.
“Well.” Jason shifted from foot to foot and chewed his lower lip, his expression uncertain, which I found ludicrously attractive on his broad, handsome face. “I’ll have to put in another report. I don’t think they’ll cite you as a public nuisance, but I do worry you’ll be evicted.”
I looked around at the few neighbors still watching, all of whom probably hoped this big fireman would put me across his knee and spank the hell out of me— yes, please— or failing that, would haul me off to jail— not as much fun. No doubt the landlord would be getting some irate emails. Again. “Can’t say it won’t happen.”
“Where will you go? Rent’s ridiculous around here.”
I waved an airy hand. “I’ll think of something.”
“Okay. But.” He fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a card. “I wrote down my number. Just in case. If you’re desperate.”
I let a little purr warm my voice as I took it. “Oh, I wouldn’t have to be desperate to call you.”
It was Jason’s turn to color. I liked the way that looked. “I didn’t mean—” He waved randomly as if unable to finish that sentence.
“Or you could call me.” I pulled out my phone, entered his number, and sent a text. “Sometime when you’re not on duty.”
“Right.” He cast a look over his shoulder. “I am on duty now, so I have to go, but, um, perhaps you could teach that bird to make sounds other than the fire alarm, so next time I’m here, I won’t be official.”
“Next time. I like that.”
From my shoulder, Sunny let out another wolf whistle. A woman passing by turned to glare over her shoulder at me.
Jason said, “And perhaps not that one either.”
“He thinks he’s being funny.” I shrugged my shoulder hard to jolt the bird, but he just dug in his claws and cackled like Ricky Gervais on helium.
“It might’ve been smarter not to pick a bird like that for an apartment.” A deep frown creased Jason’s forehead.
Ooh, Daddy, lay down the law. “He picked me,” I said, which was only the truth.
One of the women on the fire crew called to Jason and he turned. “Right. Well, um, take care.” He strode off across the parking lot and swung up into the truck, g iving me a look at mouthwatering biceps before he pulled the door shut.
I watched as they drove away from the curb.
“See,” Sunny murmured by my ear. “It worked. You have his number.”
“Jesus freaking Christ on a cracker,” I muttered, heading toward the back stairs where I hoped I wouldn’t meet any neighbors. “He thinks I’m an idiot. An about-to-be-homeless idiot, and he could be right. You know, I can find dates without your help.” Especially ordinary human dates for light conversation and hot sex, and nothing more. Sorcerers seriously dating humans got messy, but there was nothing wrong with a little fun. Now, if Sunny could hook me up with a hot, muscular sorcerer… Somehow, that thought didn’t fully take my mind off Jason Miller. “I could even have asked Jason out on my own if I wanted to.”
“Didn’t look like it from where I was standing.” Sunny clamped those claws deeper into my skin, and I winced, glad— not for the first time— that he wasn’t a full-sized parrot.
“Get a familiar, they said.” I pushed open our apartment door. “Sorcerers need familiars, they said.” I let the door slam shut, and toed off my shoes. “They never told me my familiar would be a combination of a yenta and Groucho Marx.”
Sunny swooped from my shoulder to his favorite perch on the top of an open door and polished his beak on his feathers. “I’m unique. You’re unique. We go together. And that hunky firefighter is unique too. You like him.”
“I do,” I admitted. “But come on, couldn’t you have just nagged me, instead of splitting my eardrums and getting me evicted?”
“This was more fun.” Sunny cackled again. “But now I’m going to nag you, since you have his phone number. Call him, or I’ll take up opera singing. At three AM.”
I sighed. I planned to call Jason. I wasn’t going to shun this gift the universe— or Sunny— had dropped in my lap. But I couldn’t let Sunny have the last word. I called a little power into my hand, pushed until the green light became a flickering flame, and swooped it in little circles. “Maybe the next time there’s a fire alarm, it’ll be because someone overcooked the rotisserie chicken. Very small rotisserie chicken.” My power flared and I hastily extinguished it.
Sunny huffed and swooped over to his always-open cage, fishing a piece of apple out of his dish. “Sorcerers. No sense of humor. That’s all the thanks we hardworking familiars get.”
I went to the fridge and fetched the strawberries. Holding one out to him, I pulled out my phone and dialed. Voicemail. No surprise— Jason would still be on duty. “Hey, Jase. It’s Alan. Maybe when you’re done saving lives and being all strong and firefightery, you’d like to go out for a beer somewhere. Your choice, my treat. Call me.” I set down the phone and held up crossed fingers.
Sunny eyed me, red berry smeared across his dark beak. “He’ll call you. He likes you too. And that’s not some kind of Foresight. That’s a hundred years of watching humans do this dance.”
I took a second strawberry and toasted him with it before popping it in my mouth. “And here’s to another hundred years,” I told him. “May we spend most of them driving each other crazy.” Familiars. Whatever would we sorcerers do without them?
CHAPTER 2
Jason
I sat in the passenger front of the pumper, while Tiffany steered us home through rush-hour crowded streets. Tiff was one hell of a driver-engineer, and I could relax with her at the wheel. Behind me, Norm grumbled, “False alarms suck. Repeat false alarms suck worse.”
Tiffany said, “At least this one comes with pretty scenery.”
“The hot Asian guy?” Charise in the other rear seat laughed. “He’s a bit young for me, but yeah, he’ll do for cougar bait. Great hair. Very pretty mouth.”
Tiffany tossed her head. “I’m a proud cougar. I own that shit. Anyway, I think he’s a teacher at the elementary, so he has to be what, at least twenty-three? He’s old enough to drink? He’s old enough to fuck.”
“Let’s not objectify the civilians,” I said, purely because it was my duty as captain to ride herd on our reputation, and not at all because I didn’t want Tiffany going after Alan. She was awesome and smart and the farthest thing from the Barbie doll her mother apparently wanted her to be, but she also had wavy blond hair, a body that wouldn’t quit, and killer cheekbones. If Alan happened to be bi, she might have a chance. I didn’t like that idea. Tiff was too old for him.
If she is, you are too. What the hell were you thinking back there?
I suppressed my inner critic, who was hyperventilating over me giving the hot teacher my number. I hadn’t meant it like that, like a date. I just wanted to make sure Alan had a safe place to land if that troublemaking bird of his got him evicted. I’d heard muttering from the other residents as we confirmed everyone was fine and no actual flames had occurred.
The other tenants were at the end of their rope, for which I could hardly blame them. Some of them also had it in for Alan because his skin was golden-brown, his eyes tilted, and his silky hair was true black. All of which added up to “not from around here” to the locals, and “Chinese communist” to the bigots. Some of the muttering had included slurs I wanted to wade in and correct, but only one had been said out loud to my face. Telling that old biddy, “He’s not Chinese and that’s a stereotype,” hadn’t changed her mind, of course. I saw the curl of her lip as she walked away.
Small towns, you gotta love ’em, and sometimes hate them. Out on the coast, in Seattle and Olympia and places like that, there was a lot of room to be different. Especially if you were queer like me, or probably if you were Asian. Here in our cozy little Shadecliff, Washington, well inland from the ocean, not so much.
Which was why I said to Tiff, “He’s too smart to date either of you,” instead of the “Dibs” I really meant. My crew were my best friends, and I trusted all of them with my back in a blaze. But there were secrets no one had to know, and the way my dick pointed was one of those. Especially in a town that included my parents and three of my five siblings.
We pulled into the firehouse drive and parked outside in the late May sun to do our equipment check. A formality, since we hadn’t used anything, but no one was getting slack on my watch. Another less than wonderful part of being a small town— the apparatus bay was built in 1972, for the size of equipment they had back then. Those walls got a little tight around the brand-new pumper we’d added to the fleet, and requests for an upgrade were met with “We just bought you a new truck.”
Once the check was completed, we headed inside, pulling off our bunker gear and stowing it away. Folks think the Northwest is cool and rainy, but get past one range of mountains, and you find plenty of hot and sunny, even in May. I hung my gear in my spot and called to the others, “Showers if you want ’em. Who’s on dinner duty?”
“That’d be me,” Norm said.
“Ah, good,” I lied. Not that Norm couldn’t cook. You don’t spend twenty-five years around a firehouse and not learn how to fill bellies. But his idea of a meal was always meat-and-potatoes, and I felt parboiled already.
Cold shower. A cold shower would be perfect. For multiple reasons.
I shoved the thought aside to go into the office, and sat down at a terminal. My crew deserved first dibs in the bathrooms, and anyway, incident reports always hung like swords over my head if I didn’t get them done right away.
The boring, official language I used to describe the call out was a mile from the reality of Alan Hiranchai. …a loud sound that residents thought was an alarm, leading Mr. Foley in 109 to pull the actual alarm… parrot owned by the resident in unit 206… I left out the way Alan’s eyes danced with humor, even when the joke was on him. Or how he moved like a dancer, despite his loose sweatpants and old sneakers. Or how he somehow saw the secret I kept thoroughly buried within the city limits of Shadecliff, and teased me, but gently enough it didn’t feel like a threat…
