Free Rise of the Poison Moon by MaryJanice Davidson Page A

of the local American Legion post, and Susan’s mailman for the last seven years. Mr. Simmons had been the latest person to die under Big Blue. Jenn’s mother couldn’t save him in time; his appendix ruptured, and he died of peritonitis.
    Death was always scary. Unlike in movies or television, how Mr. Simmons had died was depressingly mundane. It hadn’t been sexy or cool or scary—was death ever really that way?—and he hadn’t been burned or stabbed; he hadn’t died trying to save children or fight for his life. He’d . . . he’d just gotten sick. Didn’t feel right standing up. Sat down. Maybe lay down, after a while. Told a friend to take him to the hospital.
    And died , before he ever got to sit up or stand up or do anything else, ever again.
    It was dumb, but that upset Susan more than anything else. Dragons run amok? Huge spiders jumping around? Overzealous, sword-flinging, jackbooted thugs? She could handle these things. Jennifer Scales had trained her well.
    But dying of appendicitis? That was supposed to be nothing. That was supposed to be no big deal.
    Also, her gums had started bleeding, despite all the flossing, and she was achy and sore almost all the time now. She’d done some research outside her boyfriend’s watchful gaze, and was as equally amused and appalled to recognize the early symptoms of scurvy.
    Frigging scurvy!
    She’d never taken a vitamin supplement in her life (her late mother had been convinced vitamins were a plot by the drug companies to make money on unnecessary crap, so children’s chewables were verboten), and by the time she checked out the local supermarkets and drugstores, there were none to be had. As for fresh lemons, oranges, and grapefruit? Forget about it. Even cans of juice concentrate were gone.
    She had said nothing of this to Gautierre. Some things weredragons were no good for, and curing scurvy was right up there on the list.
    “Maybe we’ll go back to the old days,” she mused aloud,
    “and the barber will knock out our rotten teeth and sew up our wounds.”
    “What?”
    “Eh. Pass me more Pez.” She wolfed down the sugar pills and chewed defiantly.
    At least they were wearing clean clothes. Her gums might be bleeding excess sugar and Gautierre might have seen every single one of her outfits and she might not remember the last time she had any cheese that wasn’t Velveeta (what the hell was “processed cheese food,” anyway?) and . . . okay, she was giving serious thought to suggesting it was time for the cats and dogs of the town to be turned into lunch. But dammit, she did laundry every week. Religiously. Possibly laundry was her religion now.
    “What if we never get out?”
    He had been searching the tree line. He looked at her and blinked slowly, like an owl. “We will, though.”
    “No, come on. What if we don’t?”
    “We will. I know we will.”
    “How?” She was genuinely curious; he sounded so certain. “How d’you know?”
    “Because I’m not letting the love of my life die under a dome like an ant under a magnifying glass.” His calm certainty touched her and, it must be said, frightened her a little.
    He looked like a boy, and he acted like a boy, and he kissed and groped and obsessed about sex like a boy. Yet he was more than that. They weren’t the same: not the same sex, the same religion, the same political party, or the same under a crescent moon. Yet he was cloven to her, and she felt him in her even when he was miles across town.
    “You say the sweetest things.”
    “Mom.”
    She sat up so fast the top of her head rapped against his chin. “Boy, did you just get me out of the mood. It’s Susan, remember? Sooo-zen.”
    He’d seized her arms with both hands, stood in one smooth movement (How did he do that? His knees didn’t even creak! Who gets up from a sitting position without at least a crackle of cartilage?), and shoved her behind the enormous willow tree they’d been snacking beneath.
    “It’s Mom.”
    “I