Lust and Other Drugs Read online

  Table of Contents

  Blurb

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  More from TJ Nichols

  About the Author

  By TJ Nichols

  Visit Dreamspinner Press

  Copyright

  Lust and Other Drugs

  By TJ Nichols

  Mytho: Book One

  Police officer Jordan and dragon shifter Edra might have to work together, but they don’t trust each other—even if sparks do fly between them.

  If anyone finds out Jordan’s a mytho sympathizer, it could kill his career. No one can know that he frequents the satyr dens and uses the drug Bliss. A dead satyr might not get much attention, but two dead humans who appeared to overdose on Bliss? That shouldn’t even be possible.

  And it might not be an accident.

  Edra, Mythological Services Liaison, has been covering up mytho crimes to protect the community’s reputation. With a mayoral election looming, the last thing his people need is a scandal.

  To get a murderer off the streets, Jordan and Edra will be spending a lot of time together, and it won’t be easy to keep up with their deceptions… or to keep resisting each other.

  Prologue

  WHEN HUMANS first started to experiment with the Hadron Collider, it was predicted that black holes would swallow the world, but it never happened. In fact, for the first few years, nothing transpired in the human world that would prepare people for what was to come.

  During the human experiments, Tariko was racked by earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanic eruptions. Even the gods, usually more concerned with their own pleasure and petty squabbles, started to wonder if it was the end of days. Emissaries were sent through the standing stones to visit the human world, which they had ceased to frequent thousands of years before.

  What they found had changed completely. It was no longer the same place that was talked about in myth, and it was no safe haven.

  No one in Tariko was ready for the destruction.

  No one but the human scientists knew what had happened. They saw the readings and knew something major had occurred, but it was only when they stepped out of their labs and saw dragons in the air that they started to understand.

  They had collapsed another world into their own.

  The creatures people had thought were myth had become very real.

  Many humans and many mythos died that day as buildings fell and new buildings from Tariko sprang up like mushrooms, and others died in the skirmishes that followed. Martial law was declared in many countries, and some countries set out to exterminate all mythos.

  The US created internment camps for the mythos and separated them from humans for everyone’s safety. Then the UN decided the mythos were refugees, their home destroyed. The collider was shut down. No one wanted more worlds to collapse, or worse, for the human world to collapse into somewhere else.

  But which mythos were animals and which should be afforded the same status as humans? There was a simple talk test, though many humans felt that satyrs and mermaids were still animals, even though they could speak. The worst humans thought that all mythos were animals and should be returned to mythological status. Hunting mythos for trophies became popular and profitable.

  While the humans debated what to do with them, the mythos grieved for their lost home, their lost families, and their lost culture and magic. The collapse affected each species differently. Vampires became ugly, werewolves became trapped midshift, part man and part wolf. Mermaids remained as spiteful as ever.

  Gradually the governments of some countries established Mythological Services to help mythos integrate. The idea spread from Europe and is now being tested in several US cities.

  In the ten years since the collapse, the mythos have tried to hold the balance between being too insular and too open, and those that can pass as human at first glance are more accepted.

  Mythological Services helps mythos with housing, education, and work and occasionally steps in when mythos run up against human police who don’t understand or don’t care.

  Copying the European model, the state of California is encouraging police departments to have a contact at Mythological Services, a mytho liaison officer who can help the police in cases that involve mythos.

  It’s a good idea on paper.

  Chapter 1

  OFFICIALLY, EDRA Tendric’s job didn’t exist. Unofficially, every mytho knew that it was Edra they needed to speak to at Mythological Services if they had a problem with the law.

  In some ways his job hadn’t changed that much since before the collapse. He still dealt with crime and dispensed justice, though he was sure the human cops would not agree with his methods even if they were traditional—humans didn’t like anything that was traditionally mytho.

  In most other ways, his job was unrecognizable. His sword had been lost in the collapse, and sometimes not even mythos listened to him.

  “Enough.” The vampires continued to fight as though they wanted to tear the skin off the other. “Enough.” Edra stepped between two snarling vampires, fully expecting one of them to attack him. Vampire blood dripped on the wood floor. “First blood has been shed.”

  The fight was technically over, but the vampires continued to growl, and the sound grated on Edra’s bones.

  Edra drew in a breath. He could cut the tension with a claw—well, if he shifted to his dragon form he could. But he kept his hand out, wishing he held his sword and not a rather fancy letter opener that had been donated for the ceremony.

  The room was lit by enough candles to be a fire hazard, and a dozen vampires watched, rapt with the spectacle. This was as traditional as it got these days.

  One aspiring groom curled his lip, and the other aspiring groom snarled.

  The bride grinned as though it was her birthday and she was getting a unicorn.

  “To the death. As is tradition,” said the groom who was bleeding.

  “No, first blood only. That is the new rule.” It had been the rule for the last five years. They shouldn’t be killing each other when there were plenty of humans who wanted them dead and didn’t understand the mytho way. So the mythos compromised where they could without destroying their way of life completely.

  Hisses erupted around Edra. If he had to shift and fight his way out of the nest of vampires, the paperwork would take him a week. He needed to talk them down before things got uglier.

  “I know you don’t like it.” He had never particularly enjoyed witnessing two grooms fight to the death for a vampire heiress, and he liked it less now, and not just because vampires looked more like monsters than models after the collapse. No one ever brought that up and walked away with their tongue intact. “We can’t be killing each other.”

  More hisses.

  He sensed rather than saw the attack, but he was still slower than a vampire and was falling to the floor before he could react. He lashed out, threw the letter opener into a thigh, and twisted around to grab the other man.

  He shifted at the same time. His pants ripped as his tail formed and his legs reshaped, and
his shirt tore as his arms became wings, and he roared loudly enough to rattle the windows. Then he smacked a wing into the attacker and held the other one down with a clawed foot.

  The eyes that had been full of bloodlust and glee were now wide with fear.

  That was more bloody like it.

  Maybe knights were a dying tradition, like so many others who didn’t survive the collapse. But he was still a knight, and they should respect that. He swiveled his head to stare at the vampire who’d dishonored himself. He’d have to pay a penalty to the bride and to Edra.

  When Edra had everyone’s attention, he shook off the shift, but the adrenaline was still flowing and his skin was cold and silvery. He gritted his teeth and tried to find calm. He couldn’t control his visibility in human form when his emotions spiked. The vampires couldn’t see him. There went any respect he’d garnered.

  Someone giggled.

  Yeah… being invisible didn’t help when he was trying to prevent an all-out brawl.

  He tried to find calm and slow heartbeat. Gradually the cold receded, and his skin lost its silvery sheen as he became visible to the vampires. “As I said, enough. By breaking the rules of the fight, you forfeit any rights. You are to pay a week’s wage to the bride and one to me.”

  The would-be groom pulled the letter opener out of his thigh and dropped it on the floor instead of handing it back. “You are no one here, lesser dragon.” He limped out of the room.

  Edra doubted he’d get that money, and he was down a pair of suit pants and a shirt.

  Without police support, not all punishments would stick. The vampires could put pressure on the man to pay, but he wasn’t a local, so he’d probably skulk back home and never mention losing. If the cops knew, they would probably arrest them all and call it gang warfare. But in vampire pairings, there were always two contenders—the parents’ choice and the daughter’s choice. There would always be bloodshed.

  When the door shut, Edra turned to the bride-to-be. “Satisfied?”

  “Yes.” From her smile, the man she’d wanted to win her hand was still in the room.

  “I want the loser’s details before the end of the day.” Fuck him. Edra would report him to the knight where he lived. “No fighting to the death.” He sighed. “There aren’t enough of us for that.”

  FROM HIS office in Mythological Services, Edra could hear the protesters. The Earth for Humans mob was out there waving signs and telling mythos to leave. To judge by the shouting, anyone would think the world was collapsing again. But there was no tremor in the ground or tearing in his bones that would signal another collapse. That experiment was on hold indefinitely.

  He had filled out a form naming the dishonorable vampire and was ready to send it to the head vampire in his jurisdiction. He should’ve known the vampire was from LA. The vampires there were more traditional, and they had numbers, while San Francisco had more satyrs than anywhere else.

  As he started the rest of the write-up, he took a sip of hot chocolate and dipped his tongue in to taste the sugary sludge at the bottom. He had to be careful with what he wrote because sometimes humans actually read the reports, usually when they wanted to prove that mythos were somehow less than human, as though humans were the pinnacle of creation.

  Edra’s lips twisted into a grin. He was sure the gods thought otherwise, though humans had even killed them after the collapse, no longer believing in their power.

  He sighed and wished, not for the first time, that the human world had collapsed into Tariko, preferably in the desert inhabited by manticores and djinn.

  In days gone past, when humans had come to his world to hunt and complete quests, they had been treated with the kindness any traveler deserved—until they tried to kill dragons and take trophies home. Greater dragons had long memories, and some still had gauntlets between their teeth.

  The hair on the back of his neck prickled.

  “This morning was a mess,” Ardel said.

  Edra didn’t jump, even though his boss had almost managed to sneak up on him. Vampires were predators, even if they liked fancy clothes and pretended to be your friend.

  Someone had probably complained the moment he flew home to get another pair of pants. “I’m just finishing my report. I’ll email it to you.”

  Ardel glanced over the floor where the various mythos worked. While the whole building was for Mythological Services, this floor was for more intricate cases. Downstairs was a front counter where mythos first made contact if they needed help with housing or schooling, though visits had dropped off as the mob out front had grown. Fighting his way through each morning was a pain in the ass, even though he looked human.

  He was sick of having people shove signs in his face telling him to go home.

  But it was worse for those who didn’t pass for human. He could go to the shops and not draw attention… unless he accidentally became invisible.

  “Come to my office.” Ardel walked away before Edra could answer.

  Several mythos lifted their heads. Carly flicked her ears in sympathy. Going into Ardel’s office was the last thing any of them wanted, and Edra had been called in one too many times since he started working for Mytho Servo.

  Without Mytho Servo the mythos would have no one to speak for them, to liaise with potential employers and convince them that hiring a mytho was a good idea. Many had trained, only to find that no one wanted to hire them because the public doesn’t want to see that. As a result, many mythos had started their own businesses and catered to mythos.

  Edra picked up his cup and followed. He couldn’t be fired, could he? He was doing the same job he’d always done, protecting the greater dragons and looking after the townspeople. Ardel had been part of the ruling family who ensured the laws were followed. He was still very much the mytho ruler of San Francisco. The elves had been voted out because they sought only to enrich themselves, and there was still bad blood between the elves and the other mythos.

  Edra shut the door, but didn’t sit when Ardel continued to stand.

  He finished his hot chocolate—the only good thing about the human world—and then licked the bottom of his cup.

  Ardel stared out the window at the protesters below. He was dressed immaculately in a human-style three-piece black suit. His plum-colored shirt and tie made him look like he was ready to step off a runway in New York. Before the collapse, it had been hard to choose who was a ten and who was a nine point nine between the elves and vampires. Now… well… vampires had faces that scared babies and made women—and some men—cry. Unable to deal with their reality, some vampires had taken their lives after the collapse.

  Edra waited, sure he was about to get a dressing-down for not letting the LA-based vampire kill the bride’s chosen. It was vampire tradition, but at what point did they have to let go of tradition to be accepted? Would that be enough or would the way they looked be enough for humans to shun them forever?

  Edra crumpled the cup and tossed it into the trash.

  “Do you like what you do here?” Ardel asked without looking at him.

  “Yes.” But he hated to see the way the cops ignored mytho complaints. He’d thought about becoming a cop, but mythos weren’t citizens, so they couldn’t serve and couldn’t vote, which was a pity. He dealt with mytho-on-mytho crime long before the human cops got involved.

  The human cops didn’t like to police the ‘freaks’ anyway and didn’t want to go into areas that had become mytho zoned. Mythos weren’t officially separated from the humans, but no one wanted their darling little Tommy going to school with a vampire or a satyr.

  “The SFPD approached me last week. They want us to provide a liaison officer.”

  That sounded like a hassle. Every time Edra had dealt with cops, he’d ended up being threatened with obstructing justice, even when he was just trying to stop the mytho in trouble from being treated unfairly. “What for?”

  Ardel glanced at him, and the creases of his face looked like crevasses. “To help the cops be
more sensitive—”

  Edra laughed but clamped his lips together at Ardel’s expression.

  “We have to assume this is an honest attempt to reach out,” his boss continued.

  “You don’t believe that.”

  “Of course not. They’re buttering both sides of their bread. If the pro-integration mayor gets in, then they look like they’re trying, and if the current one stays, then they can say they’re keeping a closer eye on us.” His lip curled to reveal several sharp teeth. “You’re going to be the liaison officer.”

  Edra stared at his boss.

  “I did consider Carly. She gets along better with most people, but I feel that the humans would prefer to deal with someone who looked more like them.”

  Carly was more popular with mythos. She was a werewolf who was genuinely nice, and it helped that she’d never had to deliver a penalty. But his job wasn’t all bride fights and feasting with dragons. Now he was supposed to help the human cops? No one would ever talk to him again.

  Edra curled his fingers and forced a stupid grateful smile to his lips.

  “Will you be able to do it?” Ardel asked.

  Edra opened his mouth but wasn’t sure what to say. He hadn’t earned a new position because he was good at what he did or because he could negotiate the fine line between tradition and human law. They were handing him the job because he looked like a human.

  His hands went silver and cold raced up his neck. He would not shift and ruin his suit. It was expensive, and he didn’t have money to waste. He breathed in and out and let the shudder race down his spine as he regained control. His shoulder blades itched as though his wings were ready to rip free. He’d go for a fly tonight, leap from the New Golden Gate Bridge and dip his wing tips in the bay as he skimmed the surface—though he’d steer well clear of Alcatraz and the mermaid pod that lived there.

  “You….” His boss pointed at him.

  “Yeah, I know.” He hadn’t shifted, but he was invisible. His hands gleamed silver. “Guess I don’t pass all the time.”