A Mate Worse Than Death

by J. L. Ray

Poor Cal teared up and clutched her tighter, “It’s gonna be okay, old girl, just hang in there! The WE-Evac is here is get you to a hospital. You’ll be fine in no time, am I right?” His voice broke on the last word because he could only hope so. Their case might depend on having Heraphina’s evidence, so he wanted her alive. But deep down, he found room in his overflowing heart for a little pity for the witch. She didn’t ask to be a witch. Everyone couldn’t be an ogre, could they?

  Azeem cleared his throat. “Cal, hand her off to the med tech, now!”

  Cal looked down, very far down, to see a little gnome in flying gear who was holding up his arms to take the witch.

  “Hey Lieutenant, this little guy can’t carry her, can he? She’s double his size.”

  “He isn’t going to carry her with his arms.”

  “Oh,” Cal shook his head and apologized to the gnome. “Sorry, man, it’s been a real freaky day, right?”

  “Freaky is a normal day for me, detective. Now, let’s get her loaded onto Ethelyne before she gets impatient.” As if on cue, the wyvern stomped one of her legs and long curls of smoke rolled out of her nostrils. The gnome’s arms were out to about the right width to hold Heraphina, and when Cal very gingerly placed her in his arms, he realized that the air above the gnome’s arms was where she was cushioned. The gnome wasn’t holding her; he was moving her with a magical cushion of air. “Nifty trick,” he said. Then he added, “We’ll catch up to you at the hospital in Charlottesville.”

  “Very good, sir. Hopefully, we’ll know what is to be done by the time you arrive.” And with that, the gnome trotted to the Ethylene, who put her body low to the ground. The gnome secured Heraphina in a glass tube strapped behind his seat that looked far too much like a coffin, and then they were off, the wyvern leaping gracefully up high enough to get through the thin tree canopy where the officers had awaited the team’s arrival. She flapped off into the distance, her tail whipping behind her and acting as a rudder.

  Cal stood and watched the creatures disappearing toward the east until Lieutenant Azeem brought him back to earth.

  “Calvin Kelly!” he heard the Lieutenant growling.

  “Sir!”

  “Get your mind back on the here and now.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “We need to search the perimeter. Gather the deputies and bring them and the Sheriff over so we can divide up the search.”

  “The search, sir?”

  Azeem stared at him for a second. “That witch has addled your brain.”

  “No, sir!” Cal paused for a brief moment. “Okay, maybe a bit. But, what search?”

  “We still have a vampire to find.”

  Cal blanched and nodded and hurried off to assemble the rest of the officers.

  “Shoot!” Tony, Hiller, and Davis all shot at the vampire, but it screeched at them and slashed out with its nails, dodging the nets, two of which actually landed on Phil, hampering any attempt he might have made to get away from it. Unfortunately, since the nets were law enforcement grade magicks, he couldn’t free himself from them, nor could he stop the vampire, which was coming at him, or rather at his thigh, once again.

  “Tony! Those aren’t the teeth I want hovering this near my--”

  “Jumping Jove on a pogo stick! Really?” she said as she turned and shot her net, this time, hitting the vampire. As it went down hissing, trying to crawl away but unable to manipulate the magical trap, Hiller and Davis got on either end with their NASH guns pointed at the thing that had been a beautiful Being and was now an undead, keening wretch.

  Tony leaned down and pointed her f-light at the nets lying over Phil, de-activating the spell that made them so useful. She drew the nets carefully off of him, making sure not to jar his leg, all the while giving him hell. “You are unbelievable. You have a vampire heading right at you, ready to suck you dry, and all you can think of is sex.”

  Phil looked over at the two male officers, who looked back, faces carefully deadpan.

  “I don’t know why that occurred to me, dear detective, but it must be my twisted sense of humor,” Phil told her, his voiced choked.

  Tony heard sounds that suggested snickers from the two officers near her. “Uh huh.” She muttered, “And Cal wonders why I gave up on dating. Stupid frigging testosterone swamped...” She flipped up her f-light and contacted the officers on the perimeter. “Any signs of Melinoe?”

  “None, ma’am. It’s like she vanished into thin air.”

  “Literally, as in you had her and she vanished into thin air or figuratively, as in by using the word ‘like’ you mean you never had eyes on her at all?”

  Tony’s tart response suggested what the answer should be, so there were several uncomfortable minutes before the office admitted, “Figuratively, as in, we never saw her.”

  “Officer...?”

  “Officer Chan, ma’am.”

  “Have you worked Super division before?”

  “No, ma’am,” he answered quietly.

  “Let’s not make this the last time? Speak literally when reporting in this division. There’s too much room for confusion! What with the magic and all, y’know?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Now, inside, we’ve got a contained vampire, and outside, you have a van with a cage that will hold it. I’m going to use a spell to get the cage down and then back up to you. You’ll need to open the door to the van so you’ll know when the cage reappears in the van with this vampire inside. Put at least four officers in the van to run it back to headquarters. Put only non-humanoid Supers in back with the vamp! Then you and the rest of the officers come on down here. We’re going to take a look around and see if we can figure out where that damned nymph went. Okay?”

  The fact that Tony wasn’t giving him vamp-sitting duty must have made him realize that he wasn’t completely out of favor, yet.

  “Yes, ma’am!” he told her, far more enthusiastically.

  Ten minutes later, the cage that had materialized in the room next to the vampire dematerialized and left in the van, one snapping, angry, undead creature inside. Two Natty officers drove the van, and two goblins rode in the back. Vampire abilities tended to work better on Natural humans or creatures with a Natural-looking form. Anything that didn’t have a human form, like an ogre, a dwarf, a gnome or goblin, couldn’t be enthralled by a vampire’s gaze. Anything that did have a human form could, which explained how the former Haldis Holstrom had lured both Lilith and Signa Engstrom to their deaths. Both Beings appeared as Natural-looking humans unless they took on one of their other forms. Lilith must have known Holstrom from the dating site and Signa had been Haldis’ little sister. They had seen someone they knew, and in trusting what they thought was her, had lost their lives. The saddest part of this would be telling King Holstrom of Swan Island in the Netherlands that two of his twelve daughters were dead. Tony really hoped the Lieutenant would take that one. Especially since one of the dead daughters had killed the other, and that killer still needed to be...well, put down seemed to be the best way to say it. Was it possible to kill something that was already dead? Tony shook her head and decided to leave the philosophical questions to the people who weren’t on a deadline.

  She looked around at the officers standing in Phil’s office. One of the officers, a gnome, had medical training. Once Tony found out, she and another uniform moved Phil over to his couch and she had Officer Green attend to the bullet wound. The Officer Green started to cut open the leg of Phil’s sinfully expensive jeans, but just as she began, Phil transmuted them to a pair of silky black boxers, which made the officer giggle. Since the medical training included magical medicine, she soon had him in a happier state of mind, good enough that Tony moved away to concentrate on managing the situation. The other officers moved in around her for instructions.

  “We last saw Serena there,” she stopped and pointed at the wall behind Phil’s desk. “She pressed something on the desk, and the wall opened.”

  “Oh cool,” Davis murmure
d. “A secret passageway.”

  Phil called in over the heads, “Or an illegal portal.”

  His comment was met with silence, and then all eyes turned to him.

  “Crap. That makes a lot of sense. Please, tell me you didn’t know about that portal,” Tony asked him gravely. Producing and concealing illegal portals earned the owner a felony charge and a trip to Lock Up for a long stay-cation from everyday life. The Powers That Be really did not like uncontrolled entries and exits between the Realms and Mundania. The legal portals scanned for intent and filtered out the worst problems for the SCI divisions world-wide. Illegal portals? No filters. A big bag of ugly, all the way around.

  “I cannot believe that you would think this of me! I did not know about that portal,” he told her. “You can believe that because I would have contacted the Powers That Be and asked them to shut it down. You do not think I would want that sitting right behind my back while I am working? I have told you before that I have many, many enemies. With that portal at my back, I might as well have had a target between my shoulders for the past few months.”

  “Point taken,” Tony told him mildly. Then she turned back to the officers, “We will get that thing shut down. I’m surprised the energy signature hasn’t registered at headquarters and raised questions already.”

  Hiller raised a hand.

  Tony raised an eyebrow. “Officer?”

  “Maybe it hasn’t been there for long. Or maybe it isn’t there all the time. Can there be an intermittent portal?”

  Tony looked at Phil, who shrugged and commented, “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

  Tony rolled her eyes. “And he’s back to quoting Shakespeare.”

  “Keep in mind that the office renovations were overseen by none other than,” and Tony chimed in with Phil as he said, “Serena.”

  “It may have been there and masked, or it may be new,” Tony frowned, seeing another long set of report questions to answer at the end of this case. She also saw something else, “So, Officer Green, I think you can leave your patient and come help with the investigation now.”

  Green, who had been finishing by putting a bandage over the wound for the last five minutes, stopped stroking the Magic-Aide across Phil’s remarkably muscular thigh, each stroke moving dangerously close to Phil’s crotch. She blushed and jumped up, trotting over to join the rest of the officers.

  Tony sighed. “We can’t all search the desk, so I want Hiller and Davis doing that. I need to get the rest of you,” she nodded at the other four officers,” reviewing Serena’s work area. See if you can find out anything there that might tell us where she may have run.”

  The officers got started and Tony went over to Phil. “You okay?”

  He looked down at his leg. “That might actually leave a scar!”

  “You don’t gain weight, but you scar?”

  He gave her a chagrinned glance, “I should have known you would not believe that. No, it will not scar, at least not physically. But it really hurts! And I do feel great emotional damage. I think I need a hug.”

  “I’ll send Officer Green right over.”

  He grinned, “She might kiss it and make it better.”

  “At least I know you’re okay now.”

  She stood up to leave, but he reached out a hand and grabbed her arm. “Tony, find the portal’s key, but don’t open it until you are on guard. Serena may be counting on having you do exactly what you are doing. It may be a trap.”

  She nodded, “Good point.”

  She turned back to Hiller and Davis, ready to tell them to refrain from activating the key when Davis suddenly yelled, “I found it!” and pressed the button.

  Then all hell broke loose.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Azeem and Cal had just started the hunt for the missing vampire when Officer Chan contacted them to let them know that the vamp had been at Monster-Mate’s offices, that Detective Newman and her back up had captured it, but had lost Serena and were attempting to locate her.

  Azeem asked the Sheriff if his deputies would be willing to hold the perimeter while he sent in the GOOEN squad to do an analysis of the scene. Then he and Cal could split up. Cal would take him to the hospital in Charlottesville to talk to Heraphina and then go and join his partner in trying to capture Serena.

  Sheriff MacMurray, who turned out to be a tiny human, almost Elven in appearance and certainly long past retirement age, slapped Azeem on the flank. “It’d be my pleasure, sir, to he’p y’uns out with that. This shore has been one of the most interestin’ nights of my life! And I’ve had me some real doozies, I reckon.”

  Cal waited for Azeem to blast the Natty for taking the liberty of slapping him like some farm animal, but instead he sat back on his haunches and held out a paw. “Sheriff, I will personally set up a training schedule in Super tactics for your men. I would like to come out myself and supervise, if that would be acceptable. It has been a true pleasure for me as well.”

  They nodded at one another, and then Azeem and Cal headed back to their car, moving as fast as they could.

  “What the hell?” Davis yelled as a stream of huge gray wolves poured out of the doorway he had just opened. “How did wolves get in there?”

  Phil stood up as he saw the door opening, “Those are Changelings, not wolves! We need to get them back into the portal! Serena is manipulating dimensions and Beings with that door! They must go back!”

  Tony ran to the office door and called down the hall to the other officers to return. They came in on the run and tried to form a protective ring around Phil, who was still having trouble standing on the leg that had been shot. The Changelings, who obviously hunted together, were circling the ring the officers had formed, creating a standoff. Each group watched the other, looking for a weak spot, waiting for action.

  At that point, Serena came stalking out of the portal, her characteristically bouncy attitude and pink couture now replaced with head-to-toe black leather, thick enough to act as body armor, her blond curls slicked back into a severe braid, and her ridiculously high peep-toe pumps replaced with ridiculously high spiked black boots. She carried a sword and as she walked, swiping it through the air in a business-like way that suggested she looked forward to drawing blood.

  “I had hoped that stupid creature would do what it was made for without assistance just one damned time,” she hissed, her girly-girl voice acid sharp.

  Tony and Phil exchanged a look and Tony asked, “The vampire didn’t work out so well?”

  Serena giggled as she walked over to her Changelings, planting the sword tip and standing next to what was clearly the alpha. “Poor Haldis. She was indecisive before she died and indecisive as the undead. Lilith had finally talked her into telling her father about their relationship. They told me all about it, asking for advice on how to break the news to him. They had been covering it up for years because of him.”

  Phil nodded. “Haldis only dated other Changelings.”

  “King Holstrom is a bit old-fashioned. Probably would rather have a dead daughter than a daughter who mixed race,” Serena giggled again, reminding Tony of Adonis and suggesting that somewhere along the way, crazy must have gotten contagious. “I gave him his wish.”

  “You murdered two of his daughters,” Tony reminded her. “And Signa Engstrom was married and had children.”

  Serena hissed, “Signa was collateral damage. She came to check on her sister after the news about Lilith got out. She knew about their bonding and came by Haldis’ apartment, where we were keeping her. I knew that second murder would cause problems. The first one was difficult enough! I had no idea that vampires retained any of their personalities.” “What do you mean?” Tony asked.

  “I had to force the vampire to kill both Lilith and Signa. We had to make them bleed to get it go after them. It turns out that the vampire retained just enough memories of its old life to be reluctant to harm friends and loved ones.” She looked
at the nails on her left hand, still sporting a perfect French manicure. Then she looked up at Phil and sighed. “I had so hoped to ruin you and get the Geas to destroy you like it destroyed Adonis, but at least now I will have the pleasure of seeing your face as I kill you.”

  She barked out an order to the Changelings, who went on the attack. The officers had regulation stun guns for Supers and the NASH guns, but the Changelings were on them so tightly that it made shooting almost impossible. Instead, the six officers were grappling with the animals, trying to keep from being eviscerated by claws or bitten and attempting to get the stun guns on them to take them down.

  Serena moved in toward Phil, her sword up and out, ready to behead him, a move which would end even his long life, no doubt, if she could carry the move through. Without thinking he brought up his hands and gathered power, and as she planted her feet and began to swing, he threw his hands out at her. A net, like those in the NASH guns, landed on her and dragged her to the floor, where she sat screaming obscenities at the demon and calling to the wolves to free her.

  In the midst of all of this, Phil realized that Tony had been uncharacteristically silent. He looked over at where she had been and saw that she was on the floor, writhing. She had fallen within the protective ring, so she wasn’t being attacked by a Changeling, but whatever was attacking her wasn’t visible. He dropped to a crouch, screaming as he felt something rip, then reknit under the Magic-Aide. He couldn’t scar, but he could hurt and bleed.

  Reaching for her hand, he called to her, “Tony! Tony, what is hurting you?”

  As soon as he touched her, she calmed a bit, no longer thrashing around. Her eyes still shut, she muttered, “Who are you? Are you me? What do I do?”

  Phil put both hands on her shoulders and shook her. “Tony, look at me.”

  “Uh, Mr Akkadian? Sir? The wolves?”

  The wolves lay in loose ring around Phil and Tony, stunned by the officers who had managed to subdue them quickly enough to avoid any fatalities, but several of them were dripping blood from claw marks, and Office Green had been bitten.