Daemons in the Mist

Chapter 1 - Secrets in the Mist

1

Secrets in the Mist

Monday, January 9th

NUALLA                

I looked out the window at the never-ending sea of fog, concealing the city as it came alive in its morning rush. In the mist, everything seemed timeless and still and wondrous. The fog drifted past buildings, their tops poking out and making it look all the world like there were castles in the sky.

San Francisco.

The exception, it seemed, to California’s bright and sunny weather. It wasn’t the foggiest city in the world, but it was pretty damn close. Countless people had written books based here, and songs and movies. Even Mark Twain was quoted as saying, “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.” Though if I heard one more tourist say it, I was going to hit someone.

“So, socks or leggings?”

“Huh?” I turned to see my cousin Nikki standing in the doorway holding up two types of leg coverings. One was a pair of bright purple leggings, the other was a pair of paler blue thigh-high socks with penguins dancing across them.

“Which should I wear?” she asked again as she jiggled them for effect.

Nikki and I went to Bayside Academy, a private school for the Bay Area’s elite, so of course that meant uniforms. I was glad our school had gone in for the whole tieless-V-neck-knit-sweater-over-pleated-skirt look because personally, I thought ties on girls was really creepy. However since our school uniforms didn’t extend to things like shoes, socks, or hair, so some students—like Nikki—went to town with their individuality.

I clicked my phone on to check the day’s weather. “Nikki, it’s like forty-five degrees out.”

“Socks it is,” she announced, sitting on the edge of my bed to slip them on.

“You’re crazy!”

“Don’t you know it,” she replied with a wink.

I rolled my eyes at her and stood up. I had gone for the more sensible I’m-not-going-to-freeze-my-ass-off standard black leggings with tall faux fur-lined boots for good measure.

Another look at the time said we’d better head out, or we were totally going to be late. “Come on, Nikki. Let’s not be late the first day of spring semester, okay?”

***

Minutes later, we coasted down the street, the buildings sliding into existence just a few seconds before we passed them, my car’s engine quietly purring. Most people hated driving in the fog, but I loved it. It kept you on your toes; you had to be ready for what might appear before you at any moment.

Like this cat darting across the road in front of me.

I took my foot off the gas as she streaked past me, a flash of smoky gray, like the fog materializing into a solid form. As her paws hit the curb on the other side of the street she turned her lamp-like eyes to stare at me.

She knows me, the true me. Not this mask I have to wear each day.

There was something profoundly odd about it. That a cat could be more calm and rational than—

“Hellooo, earth to Nualla,” Nikki said as she waved a hand in front of my face. “What are you looking at?”

The cat was gone, disappearing into the mist like a dream. “Nothing,” I answered slowly. And that’s when I realized the cat had used a crosswalk. Smart little thing—even she wasn’t stupid enough to jaywalk. I mean sure she had just crossed against the red, but hell, at least she hadn’t been mindlessly listening to an iPod as she stepped off the curb. Sometimes I thought they—cats—were smarter than people. Or maybe they just had a higher level of self-preservation.

I returned my focus to the road and hit the gas. The buildings floated past, an odd collection of shapes so far from matching it was almost funny.

The city weaved together stringent modern simplicity and Victorian mystique in a way that almost seemed intentional in its randomness. Cultures seamlessly blending into each other so slowly as to be unnoticed, while at other times changing rather abruptly—like the Chinatown Gate—announcing your passage into another world in large, imposing glory. The residences themselves were almost as odd. The houses in most cities were colors like tan, brick, and the occasional sage, but not San Francisco; it was a mélange of colors. I had even seen a house once that was lilac with chartreuse trim.

Yeah—chartreuse.

The light flipped to red and I drifted to a stop. I leaned back into the seat and folded my arms as I glanced over at my cousin. Nikki sipped her coffee in the seat next to me, the steam rolling off it already fogging up the windows. She wiped the window with her sleeve, so she could peer out at the buildings.

“You know it’s just gonna fog up again in like two seconds,” I pointed out with an amused snort.

“Then I’ll just wipe it again,” she answered as she slid her arm across the window like a windshield wiper.

I rolled my eyes at her and pressed my foot to the gas as the red blur in the distance shifted to green. The globes of light lining the streets floated past, the sky still too dark for them to register that it was morning.

It was like driving through a dreamland—some of the things you saw just seemed way too unreal. Like people in shiny disco ball Gaga-esque clothes dancing outside Ghirardelli Square, or joggers in tutus, or water valves painted up to look like videogame mushrooms—just a few of the crazy things I had seen on the misty streets of San Francisco.

But the mists also held a secret.

They concealed a world that existed between yours, around yours, underneath yours. Though we might have looked like you, acted like you, we were not like you. And so as humanity raced forward, trying to catalogue and destroy the last mysteries of this world, we eluded your grasp. Always one step ahead of you, hiding away the things you refused to believe could be possible. Allowing us to pass among you unnoticed, carrying our secrets to the grave.

And so you had carved us into your myths, into your fears, distorting us into something that no longer seemed real. And we became your stories, some of us working in your favor, while others tried to tear you down. Protectors and destroyers. A world of opposing forces battling for the upper hand. Muses, demigods, devils—the humans of antiquity gave us many names. But we claimed one for ourselves.

Daemons.

Every triumph and travesty in human history had a daemon behind the scenes. Like mist, we run through your world; seeping into your lives and disappearing when you try to look too hard. In the beginning, we tried to reveal ourselves to you. But well…let’s just say concealing our true nature was just better for everyone.

Sometimes I wondered if humanity was ready to know the truth now. That we had been silent passengers all along in their struggle to thrive.

Probably not. People get crazy when you mess with their paradigms.

***

As we arrived at school, the fog was already giving way to lighter swells of mist. I pulled into the last above-ground spot and opened the door into the utterly cold morning.

I burrowed down deeper into my heavy black velvet pea coat with a shiver. The wind was picking up, swirling the mist past the students. I could already tell Nikki was rethinking her choice of socks over leggings by the expression on her face.

She turned to me, her teeth already starting to chatter. “Ready to go inside?”

“Naw, I think we should hang out here longer since it’s a balmy forty-five degrees out.”

“The weather thingy could have been wrong,” Nikki said with a shivering shrug.

“By what, thirty degrees?” I asked dubiously.

“Sometimes you really suck,” Nikki grumbled as she crossed her arms and scowled at me.

“Yeah, but you know you love me,” I stated as I looped my arm through hers and started walking toward the building.

We drifted among the other students—just another set of pretty faces in a sea of prep school uniforms.