by John Conroe
“At least, not more than once,” Nika said.
We all piled into the car, including Dr. Singh, who came down the plane’s stairs at the last minute and therefore missed all the baby fawning.
“What can you tell me about my grandchildren, Sanjay?” Galina asked while the heavy limo started across the asphalt.
“Their body temperatures have settled in around ninety-nine point seven. Tanya’s milk is roughly thirty-five percent blood and plasma, the rest a fairly normal, if maybe a little extra rich version of human breast milk. Cora is slightly heavier at nine pounds, two ounces, and Wulf weighs eight-seven. Both weights are a few ounces heavier than their birth weights, so they’ve begun to grow. Neither of them ever lost any weight, which is a little unusual, as usually, babies burn off fat as their metabolisms stabilize. I calculate that their metabolisms are, at this point, about ten percent higher than human normal. They both have the V-squared in their blood, but it is strangely quiescent. They seem to heal just slightly faster than a normal human as well, but not at vampire or lycanthrope speeds. Other than that, they seem as you see—healthy, growing babies,” Singh said.
My phone buzzed and I looked down, then answered. “Thought you would have left already,” I answered.
Declan sighed. “There seems to be a lot to this whole process, at least from Oracle’s point of view. We’re about ready to cross over but man, it’s taken freaking forever,” he said. “Inoculations, culture lessons, medical tests, all kinds of buro-crap.”
“Got enough stuff? You’re gonna be there at least a month,” I asked.
“Yeah, got a couple of big duffles of stuff. Aunt Ash made me overpack, although if you want to see overpacking, you should see how many pieces of luggage Stacia has,” he said. A smacking sound and a slight oof came through the speaker loud enough for everyone in the car to hear.
“Is good the wolf takes her young vedmak in hand, yah?” Galina asked, looking at Tanya, who rolled her eyes and turned to me to grin where her mother couldn’t see. Lydia was nodding yes to Galina’s question.
“That sounded painful,” I said into the phone.
“Par for the course,” he said, a laugh somewhere in his voice.
“Mack and Jetta okay?” I asked.
“We’re supposed to just step out on land, but if we come out over water, they’re both gonna drown. I think each of them is carrying their own bodyweight in ammo and weapons,” he said. “I should talk. My backpack has 7.62 and 9mm ammo for the Suttons and a buttload of twelve gauge stuff for Stacia.”
“What about you? What are you packing?” I asked.
“Got my little Ruger .357 and like fifty rounds. But I don’t need much ammo, ‘cause ya know… I got four balls,” he said.
“Walk with pride, lad. Walk with pride,” I said, rolling out my Scottish brogue.
“I am so sorry that your father is so weird,” Galina said to both babies, who focused on her like they were in class.
A frown formed itself on my face, but I kept my attention on the phone call. “You sure magic works well over there… for you?” I asked. Fairie had enormous magic, but no one could tell us how well it would work for a witch.
“Aunt Ash seems really confident. In fact, she seems to think it might be a little overwhelming. She’s got a pretty strong precog streak, so I’ve learned to trust her instincts on these things. I should be fine,” he said. “But apparently it is highly unusual for a full witch to go over. All the years of stealing human babies with Talent, but they always avoided witches. Ashley thinks that most of them believe I’m just a weak male. I mean, her bodyguard, Neeve saw me at Rowan West, but Ashley doesn’t think she told too many people about it, and the Wild Hunt are mostly shunned.”
“Are you bringing Draco… for backup?” I asked.
“No. He’s an Air elemental and this is his world. I don’t think it would be good for him to leave Earth. He’ll hang out at Rowan West with Aunt Ashling and Robbie,” Declan said. “Okay, it looks like we’ve finally got the green light. Kinda funny. All this fuss just to step between two rocks on top of a little hill on the Moore family farm. You’d think it was the damned TSA the way they’re going on,” he said. “I’ll say goodbye now.”
Tanya, Nika, Lydia, and myself all chorused goodbye into the phone, then I hung up.
“The vedmak is strong, no?” Galina asked, still looking at Cora but her attention somehow on us.
“You saw the videos, Mother. What are you really asking?” Tanya asked.
“Senka has been asking questions that I don’t have answers to about your young witchling. I think maybe she wants him for her own,” Galina said.
“No, we don’t share our warlock,” I said. “He requires special handling. She’d be too rough.”
“You worry he would break?” Galina scoffed.
“No, we worry he’ll snap,” Lydia said. “Big difference. The kid’s wound a little too tight.”
“What do you mean snap?” Galina asked.
“He’s got daddy issues and maybe a bit of a latent draw to death magic. I mean, Stacia’s doing her best to relieve his stress, but no one wants to see that witch go over to the Dark side. Make Darth Vader look like a wannabe,” Lydia said.
“Who? Oh you refer to the villain of those Space Wars movies,” Galina said.
“Star Wars, Mother, and Lydia is correct. Declan has had a few brushes with death magic, and we think he inherited his ancestor’s talent for it. It would be best for him to avoid it for, oh—like forever,” Tanya said. “That’s part of the reason we sent him to Fairie.”
“I remember something about witches and Fairie,” Galina said. “I think the boy’s aunt is correct. Witches don’t go to Fairie.”
“Is it harmful to them?” I asked, concerned.
“No,” she said slowly, clearly trying to recall something. “It’s more like they are not invited. I don’t know. Senka will, though.”
Four days later, our jet touched down at Fiumicino airport, also known as Leonardo da Vinci airport, in Rome, Italy.
Our jet was given instructions to the private terminal and we began to taxi to it. A long, black limo pulled up next to our moving plane, driving alongside.
The captain disarmed the cabin door and I opened it, looking down into the open sunroof of the limo. A familiar blonde face looked back up at me. I backed away from the door and the opening was suddenly filled with a very attractive blonde soccer mom in a dark skirt and jacket. She smiled at me while absently adjusting her left shoe. She jumped from a moving car, through a sunroof, into the door of a moving jet and only needed to readjust the strap of her shoe.
“Hello Christian,” she said with her rich Oxford accent.
“Hello Elder Senka,” I answered, holding a tractor trailer load of aura ready. She was the oldest vampire on Earth and in a fight, I thought there was a pretty good chance I wouldn’t win. Yes, I had the whole aura blast-change them to human-age them to death thing, but a small piece of depleted uranium might completely ruin that advantage.
“Elder-smelder, Chris. We are family. You call me Senka,” she said, smiling slightly. Then she breathed in to replace the air she had used to speak. Her face froze, then her head tilted and her eyes trembled like they might actually widen. Thirteen hundred years old and we’d managed to somehow surprise her again.
“They smell of me,” she said.
“They carry the V-squared of your line. Like your daughter and granddaughter. In fact, my virus is also of your line, as it came to me from Tanya,” I said, backing out of the way to let her in.
“Yes, but yours is slightly off. There is that which was buried in your blood before birth that… alters it just so,” she said, moving past me, which allowed me to close the cabin door.
“Everyone is upstairs in the lounge," I said, waving her forward. She moved confidently to the spiral stairs that led to the upper lounge and I followed her up, watching her body language for any hints of a threat. I did not, I repeat, did
not look at Tanya’s grandmother’s butt as she fluidly climbed the stairs. That would be wrong.
In the upper lounge, Galina and Lydia each held one of the twins, with the massive bulk of Awasos standing on all fours between Senka and them, Tanya standing to his side, one hand on his furry shoulder. Nika and Arkady stood off to the side.
Senka froze, but I was behind her and couldn’t see her expression.
“Grandmother,” Tanya said.
“Granddaughter. I applaud your caution. Well done. Chris behind me, you and this behemoth in front, and Arkady on my flank. I would be hard-pressed to counter all of you. Oh, I would do it, but it would be perhaps my greatest battle,” Senka said.
No one mentioned that the little dog-sized, robot-toy-looking construct that was parked on the table top between Galina and Lydia could fire a laser beam that could cut her in half. The Mark 4 lite was immobile and looking very much like this Christmas’s must-have toy. Omega was our hold card if things went south.
“They are… beautiful. May I touch them?” Senka asked. I felt Tanya through the bond and nodded to her. She touched ’Sos and he moved just enough that Senka could slide by him, turning to keep her in sight.
For her part, she ignored the massive barrel head full of teeth behind her and instead bent forward to look at Cora and Wulf. Our babies looked back at her, eyes clearly focusing.
“Amazing,” she said. “You exceed all expectations,” she said and I wasn’t sure if she meant the babies or Tanya. The she turned and looked at my vampire. “You have cleansed the Vegas Coven, no? It was sorely in need of pruning. The new First has been in touch with us for direction. I think she has promise.”
“You used us to clear out one of your nests,” Tanya said. It wasn’t a question.
“Yes, dear one. I used you. Get over it. You use Darkkin and human alike to achieve your goals. So do I. It is generally called leadership,” Senka said.
“No, Grandmother, I think it’s called manipulation,” Tanya replied. I wasn’t sure now was exactly the time to get into a fight with her scary grandmother, what with the twins so close.
“Exactly. Same thing. They call you the Young Queen. You need to be able to make queen-like decisions and offer ultimate consequences or the title will just become a joke. Now they all view you as a real Darkkin leader,” Senka said, letting Cora’s little hand grab onto her finger.
“Strong. This one is strong,” she said.
“They both are. Did you know Arlan was going to assassinate the American President?” Tanya asked.
“No. He kept it quiet. I have not been excited about this revealing of Darkkin to the humans, but I think you and Christian handled this one well. This new president seems much more amenable then his predecessor,” Senka said.
“Really? Because it seems the pitchforks and torch crowd got riled up this time,” Lydia said quietly.
“Have you seen the recent news? Sentiment has shifted yet again. The common man is upset with his leaders for letting, how do they call you—God’s Couple—get away. There does appear to be some angst about the boy witch and his werewolf, though. Where is he, by the way?” Senka asked.
“They’re not available,” I said.
Senka looked at me with eyebrows raised. Must have been my tone.
“We sent them off-world—to Fairie,” Tanya said.
Senka straightened up, poker face broken, eyes going wide. Then she started to laugh—a real hard, honest laugh.
“Always do you surprise me. You sent a witch—that witch—to Fairie? No witches have been allowed there in a thousand years,” Senka said.
“What? Why not?” Tanya asked, flashing a worried look my way.
“Because Fairie doesn’t just have magic, Fairie is magic. A witch over there has overwhelming access to power. The Queens of Fairie forbade any witches ever coming to their world after the last one did an eon ago. How did you get permission—especially for that witch?”
“He is part of Ashley Moore’s party, and it was cleared through Morrigan’s daughter, Neeve. We don’t know if the rest of the world knows that much about Declan,” Tanya said.
“Oh trust me, some of them know. Enough of them know. This is a surprising development, dear one. The politics of Fairie make this world look like a children’s group. Someone is making a massive play and taking a huge risk. Offhand, I’d say it was Morrigan or the Crone. Maybe both,” Senka said.
“What does that mean for Declan and Stacia?” I asked.
“I don’t know, Chris, but he was scary powerful here on earth. On Fairie, he could be like unto a god,” she said.
I looked at Tanya and she stared back, both us wondering if in trying to save them, we might have just lost them both.
“Anyway, I’d offer you a ride, but I believe the pope has sent his Popemobile to bring you to the Vatican in style—with an escort by the Swiss Guard and the Carabinieri,” Senka said, smiling. “That seems a more respectful greeting than what you got at home, doesn’t it?”
Chapter 44
The Cryptic News
By
Brystol Chatterjee
What happens in Vegas… doesn’t always stay in Vegas. At least, not if it happened two weeks ago and involved giant black-furred werewolf demons, the walking dead, witches, and vampires. Oh, and melted deserts too.
I have a painful admission to make. I don’t know exactly what happened. That’s right… I, Brystol, your faithful journalist of the supernatural, explorer of the fringe, and delver of dark secrets has got nada—zilch—zip. Dear readers, you just can’t imagine how painful that is for me to write.
But my favorite supernatural couple, Steclan, have virtually vanished, gone, seemingly, from the face of the earth, leaving me bereft of their company and more importantly, their answers. And my second favorite couple has left the country for the pasta and pizza-rich shores of Italy, and they aren’t taking calls.
So I can’t tell you the unvarnished truth. But I can take a really educated stab at guessing my way to most of the truth of the now-famous events in Sin City.
Let’s start with what I know. I know that the world’s hottest female werewolf recently took a trip to Maine to investigate what we now know were brutal killings by rogue werewolves. I’m dead certain that she and her pet warlock hunted those rogues down and killed their vicious asses, all while fighting with the witch that led and controlled them. How do I know? Because she told me. We’re friends, remember? What she didn’t tell me was if she and her young wizard ever actually caught the witch. Which leads me to suspect that the fight in that massive skin palace in Vegas was a permanent resolution to just that issue, only this time, they brought the God Hammer with them.
Good thing, because the God Hammer testified before Congress that the black-furred werewolf that rampaged the Strip was a demon hybrid. Because regular demons aren’t scary enough, no, now we gotta have giant demon werewolves ripping up our country’s favorite adult playground.
No, honestly, how scary is that shit? Demon werewolves? Some are saying he came from the union of the death witch and a werewolf Alpha. Some are now saying we should do something about Steclan before they create something worse. I say bite me. You don’t know them. I do. They would never—never—do something that would give any child to a demon. They freaking hunt demons with the God Hammer, for God’s sake. I call bullshit.
But back to Vegas. Here’s my theory: The witchy bitch from Maine turned up in Vegas and our gang hunted her ass down and ended that shit along with her demon werewolf beast thingy. Then they maybe somehow stopped a nearby Utah desert from blowing up, a desert suspiciously close to the Yellowstone supervolcano, which, by the way, is the scariest motherfucker out there. Oh yeah and then, right in the middle of all that shit, they paused to have some kids. ‘Cause saving the world ain’t enough… ya gotta bring the next generation of ass kickers into the world too.
I mean, didn’t our new president just about say as much? At least about the world-saving part? Yea
h, yeah, I know. He copped to the whole neither confirm nor deny thing, but let me tell you what—that ALWAYS means confirmed. Him and Oracle’s Director, who said we faced a near extinction-level event. EXTINCTION, folks. That’s the end of our species, for those of you playing along at home.
And our dream team stopped it. Nothing to see here, folks; move along on home and leave it to us.
So what did our genius leaders do? They chased ‘em outta the country. Of course, the politicians didn’t do it on their own. They had help. I mean, come on… how slow is the newsroom when Mainstream Media decides it’s a good idea to tarnish the rep of the only people that A) have a clue, and B) can do fuck-all about it?
Sorry. I’m cursing a lot. Not my normal thing, but sometimes you just gotta drop an F bomb or throw some S*&% at the wall to really get your point across. And my point is this: We just drove a pair of real, honest-to-goodness, ever-loving Angels of God out of our country because they have the temerity to save our stupid asses from Hell. Again. And where the Hell are their proteges? Doing more ass saving? Somewhere else… not here.
