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I knew my luck couldn’t last.
I ignored the butterflies in my belly and the flare of excitement in my ladybits and grabbed my duffle and Fen’s carrier out of the car. I darted towards my room quietly, hoping I could get in and out without seeing the Charger’s owner. My libido suggested it might be very nice to see him, but my brain was in charge, thank the gods.
Inside, I flipped on the lamp above a small table and used the remote to turn on the TV. Rifling through my bag, I found Fen’s water dish and a big Ziploc bag of kibble. I made a mental note to stop at the grocery store tomorrow and get him some fresh produce. Hell, we could both stand to eat some veggies.
Blue light flickered against the wall as the comedy network played on TV. A fake news show was talking politics, which was a nice change of pace from their usual shtick about the gods. I loved election years for that.
After releasing Fen from his cage, I sat on the bed and watched him.
Fennecs are ridiculous and perfectly useless as divine familiars. I’d been given Fenrir as punishment for insolence when I was fifteen. Twelve years later, the immortal little shit had grown on me, and I was actually glad to have his company. I’d spent my whole adult life crisscrossing the country following storms. Without Fen, I think I’d have gone mad.
But, unlike other Rain Chasers’ familiars, he was barely useful for any magical or protective purposes. Most got ravens or owls. Nocturnal birds of prey were great for scouting ahead or surveying the land.
Me, I had a bad attitude, so I got a hyperactive miniature fox with giant ears who ate kibble and spiders and liked to talk back.
Fen sniffed his dry dog food, then sneezed at it. Never mind it was super-expensive gourmet stuff, apparently made from real meat. What a brat.
He pipped loudly at me, then let out a screech noise, similar to a bat.
“Oh, shush. It’s just for one night.”
Fen hopped, spinning in a circle, then dashed into the bathroom, scrambling on the tile and making a soft thud against the tub when he couldn’t stop. He ran back into the main part of the room, ricocheted off an armchair, and landed on the bed. Fennecs were nocturnal by nature, so he was at the peak of his energy right about now. I was hoping if I let him run off some steam, he wouldn’t keep me up all night. Thankfully he was small and light, and none of his rambunctious behavior was likely to draw attention from other hotel guests. If he got riled up, he could make loud shrieking sounds that would convince anyone listening a woman was being murdered inside, but he knew better than to draw that kind of attention unless it was actually serious. He wasn’t exactly a normal fennec.
Outside, a car engine roared to life, and I waited, holding my breath. He must have seen my car. Must have. And if I knew his, there was no way he hadn’t realized the Mustang belong
ed to me. Especially not with my stupid storm-cloud air freshener.
Not to mention, muscle cars were sort of a calling card for the divinity-adjacent. We tended to favor them over more practical vehicles, because our cars were often the only thing we had any personal say in selecting.
At least I got to pick my clothes. Some others weren’t so lucky.
The car drove off, engine growling the whole way, and when the sound had faded out, I breathed a sigh of relief.
Fen shot off the bed and started tearing around the room from one end to the other, pausing periodically to give me a look like he was testing me. Would I ask him to stop? Yell at him?
“You do you, buddy.” I got a couple pee pads out of my bag and laid them out inside the small, open-front closet. After twelve years the fennec knew how this worked. Normally I’d take him outside since he wouldn’t bother trying to run away, but I didn’t want to get in trouble for having him here, so for tonight he’d need to go indoors. To his credit he didn’t even sneer.
The wee fox might not be able to speak my language, but he managed to communicate with me just fine when he was unhappy about something.
I got off the bed and shucked my jacket, wanting to take a look at the damage before I headed out again.
In the too-bright light of the tiny bathroom I turned my back towards the mirror and peeled off my black tank top. Glancing over my shoulder, I sucked in a breath. Certainly not the worst I’d ever had, but the marks were there.
Whenever lightning strikes, be it the ground, a tree, or in my case a person, it leaves behind a calling card. The official sciency phrase for them is Lichtenberg figures or fractal scarring. Fun fact: lightning itself is actually a Lichtenberg figure. Which was why the scars it leaves behind so closely resemble what made them. Winding, forked branches etched their way across my back from my left shoulder down to my right hip. They were an angry red color that made the pattern stand out obscenely in contrast to my skin.
I let out a small grunt. My whole body felt sore and wrung dry, worse than if I’d run a marathon or done a high-intensity workout. A low-level throbbing ache was working its way through all my muscles. My skin buzzed faintly.
This was what I’d been trained for. What I’d been born for, depending on who you asked. Anyone else who’d taken a lightning strike like that would be dead, but not me. I’d channeled it and used it like a weapon.
Harnessing the power of Seth was one of the perks that went along with being his Rain Chaser. It’s the perks that they love to talk about in the news and in magazine features. The media makes it seem like being destined for a life of servitude to the gods is a special treat.
Those of us indentured knew differently.
They never talked about this side—the ugly, painful, scary side—where we almost die or are left permanently scarred.
Who would drop their kids off at the temples then, if they knew?
I touched the mark at the back of my neck, still perfectly black twenty-seven years later. A cloud with three drops of rain and a black lightning bolt. They used the same image on the weather network to depict a coming storm. To my family it meant that I’d been predestined for a very specific kind of life.
