by brett hicks
Biting into my lip so hard I felt a few drops of coppery blood coat the tip of my tongue, and I seemed to loosen my stiff muscles. In all honesty, I didn’t know what I was feeling.
“Detective over here!”
The loud Yankee-toned voice of a brightly masculine voice shocked me out of my reveries.
How in the fuck did he notice me?!
My thoughts spun a mile-a-minute.
I spun and looked to the young uniformed officer about my age. He was fresh-faced and full of youthful vibrancy. His body was slender and shaped more like a runner’s form, than a bulky cop. Then again, I had seen many flavors of cops in my very brief time in the academy. God knows I do not look like I can handle myself, nor did I when I was largely human, but I had managed to survive the cruelty of the streets.
The young man had a crew-cut and dark stubby roots protruded thickly. He looked like he was either a dark brunette or raven headed like me. His eyes were like muddy-green orbs lit with his seemingly perpetual excitement.
He was standing about five-ten, so average height. He had the boxy cut jaws and a crooked nose. He was not traditionally handsome, but his vibrancy and uniqueness made him very appealing in his unorthodox manner. He stood waving to me like an idiot. He lost a few of those points I had just given him, due to his bazar excitement.
After the walk sign lit, I crossed over to the excited young cop. I realized for the first time in a dozen seconds, my glamor had shattered. I swore and I trot very quickly across the road, already people were stopping to gawk.
Shit!
I breezed right past the young man and I kept trotting hotly towards the doors of the apartment building. There was nothing special about this one, a bored-looking doorman, and an electronic locking steel security door with bullet-proof glass—currently being held open by a uniform cop watching the door.
I heard the clumping of the young officer quickly catching up to me. I flicked my eyes back to the young man. My first instinct was to sass at him about breaking my glamour, but then I would probably have to explain why I was casually throwing up glamour in the first place. That would spiral. While glamour is not yet being regulated, human legislation is pressing hard for most forms of illusions to be confined to inhuman places, or homes. Any mixed or human areas in this city or any other public place glamour is highly discouraged.
While I get the problems facing the public, I still am not sold on glamour being controlled. Personally, I am accosted on nearly a daily basis, due to my high publicity.
Humans are fine with anti-wrinkle glamour products now flooding the market. Not at all like humans couldn’t use the glamour cream to obscure their true age enough to through off being fingered for a crime later, nope!
Simply put, the world was changing and magic was the new hot topic. There is magic for everything; magic for growing crops, magic for daily use, magic for office use, and even magical enchantments for many forms of entertainment.
“Detective Salvo, Thea Salvo, correct?”
I cut my gaze to the young man and narrowed my eyes a fraction.
“Yes, yes keep it down please!”
I whisper-yelled at him in a less than a friendly hissing tone of annoyance and I kept trotting towards the looming building. Only now, seeing my amber gaze scanning the gawkers the young man’s face ran red with embarrassment. He had not realized the public scene he had just caused. Now our crime scene was going to be infested with the vultures!
“Sorry about that ma’am, I didn’t even bother to think about the fact that you’re famous!”
His smile was not the same type as the thousand-watt panty-melter of the more typical charming dickheads I knew, but a cheerful and sincere comfort blanket. He was A-typical and his good nature seemed to make me want to cool down and cut him a little slack.
“It’s fine, just don’t advertise next time.”
I managed to sound even and not snippy, which was a vast improvement. He nodded vigorously and we walked past the doorman texting on his phone like it held all the answers to the world’s ailments. (For a girl of twenty-two I am not exactly a techie. This was mostly due in part to being so dirt poor that I was struggling for my next meal, than any dislike of technology.)
The uniform cop at the door eyed me like I was a slithering pit-viper. I noted that despite my golden shield and dress blues, his hand crept to the forty-five strapped to his waste. A girl could take great offense to such a warm welcome from the very men she was supposed to be working with. Besides, being on this crime scene made this uniform more than likely a part of the same unit as me.
I nodded to him as I stepped into the door and the man seemed to tilt his body as far back as his stiffened body would allow for. This was not at all an uncommon human reaction to being in the presence of a vampire, or a Necrovamp in my case. Some seemed twice as leery of me, due to the very fact that death would not stop me from further violating their bodily rights. In fact, new legislation was currently being drafted to outlaw willy-nilly zombie and ghoul resurrections.
“Good afternoon officer,” I said as I tilted my head politely as I brushed past the man. I made every effort to keep my body as far as the limited space allowed me. I might be annoyed and even hurt by the fear and rejection, but I was not going to fuel the man’s burgeoning prejudices.
His eyes widened and he made a point to focus his gaze far the hell away from my eyes. While I had managed to withhold some of the vampire abilities, we had openly admitted to our glamour to ease and alter some memories during feeding. Granted, we had fudged the mildness of such an exchange. While that was wholly true, we could do far more mental damage than anyone of us was willing to admit to humans. Still, most humans now preferred not to make any eye contact with a known vampire. Sunglass companies have seen several thousand percent sales increases over the past thirteen months.
Humans might not want to admit this, but we were now suddenly in a new economic boom. With the plethora of new magical markets opening and the conventional human house-hold items closely tied to various myths, humans and creatures alike were experiencing record-breaking capital returns.
Don’t even get me started on the old-blood inhumans and their insanely far-reaching market investments. Being one of the most wealthy of said old-bloods, my kin Seri was possibly holding no less than several trillion dollars in profits from this year alone. (No, I did not stutter or exaggerate!)
The young officer led me up to the milling mass of uniforms and CSU techs. I caught the silver nameplate on his uniform and I looked at the young man’s features again. Something sparked in my mind within a moment’s observation. I pulled my gaze away and casually spoke.
“I didn’t catch your name, Officer.”
I saw him shrug in my periphery vision and I managed to catch the very subtle exhale of air from his chest. Clearly, this was a hot topic for the young cop.
“My name’s Skylar, Skylar Johnson. I’m also a rookie cop just like you.”
I nodded and I turned and met his gaze. I noted that Skylar did not fear me using glamour on him. He looked into my amber eyes as if I were human, and just his peer. He had not dug at my ranking, just stated the facts of our shared hire timeframe. My class was not the only one this year. The NYPD currently ran two groups simultaneously. His ceremony must have been the first one last week. Skylar was also on his first week of duty now.
“Well, I’m Thea, here’s to hoping we both survive our first year together pal.”
I extended my hand and gave him a friendly smile. I schooled my features as though I did not already know his facial structure and his crook nose and hazel eyes were all the spitting image of his father’s. Though, his eyes were slightly browner than pure green, but not by much.
He seemed very satisfied with the fact that I did not bring up his father and I could tell Skylar was sharp enough to note that I did make the connection. Despite him shattering my glamour, I walked into the middle of the crime scene feeling a little lighter, because my gut t
old me I had made my first friend on the force.
Three:
Blood battered my senses and a faint pulse of dying magic assaulted my metaphysical senses. I was already intimately acquainted with the ripeness of death and decay, but this held a miasma of emotional imprints.
I gaged for a moment, feeling nearly as if I had just walked a mile in my victim’s shoes. I knew it was a she and a young she before I was even close to her spread-eagle corpse. Her light tan carpet showed deep scuff marks all around her limbs. She had put up a damn good fight before being brutalized to death.
Her panties were discarded near a houseplant nearest the kitchen entranceway directly across from her modest living room. Her dark-grey dress skirt was hiked so high it looked like a large belt around her waist. Her chest was threadbare, and she looked like she had her skin pulled off in every visible section of her upper body.
I noted the bloody streak on the carpet just beneath where her sex was positioned. I did not need to check to know she had been violated. Being a vampire and a woman, I could feel the tangible fear, shame, and violation on the tip of my tongue with every breath.
What made me hitch in my stride forward was not the grotesqueness of this act, but the animal musk that twinned with her humanoid scent. I could also smell traces of one of the local park foliage and maple wood on her skin. Along with the decaying undertone of slight magic, I would guess her to be a shifter, a weak one, but she was a shifter nonetheless.
“I don’t think your detective here had the stomach for this work.”
My gaze snapped up to the snide man with the two bars of a captain on his uniform. I managed to incline my head respectfully and keep advancing towards the horror display before me.
“Sirs,” My tone was completely devoid of all emotion. My gaze snapped to Inspector Harry Johnson. His inquisitive gaze swept over me, taking in every detail of my posture and the state of my neat dress blues. He was a middle-aged man with greenish-brown eyes. He was a well built and still gym-fit type of man. His posture screamed of military service, but that must have been much further back in his life. I knew that the Inspector had been with the NYPD for over twenty years.
The Inspector’s gaze slung to my right and landed on his rookie cop son. His jaw seemed to tighten and I could practically feel his discomfort at his son’s proximity to this murder, or possibly any murder.
“Detective, what kind of creature are we dealing with here?”
My eyebrows shot up and I looked at my boss with a quizzical look. I was almost sure he had meant the perp behind this murder and not the victim, so I cleared my bile-tasting throat.
“I’m not sure what kind of shifter the victim is because it is a lesser known variety I have yet to interact with before now.”
I made my tone as clear and clinical as possible. The inspector’s eyes furrowed, but the police captain beside him, from his name-plate, I knew his last name was Tomlin. He was a few years younger than Inspector Johnson and infinitely fewer patients. Either that or he just had a bone to pick with me for being a blood-drinking, card-carrying vampire. Both options were just as likely, but I refused to waste my time on his shortcomings.
“What do you mean?! This is a human.”
His hand swept over the victim at our feet. His expression and complexion seemed to further darken with his anger. I shook my head slightly and spoke evenly and politely.
“Sir, this vic is a shifter of some lesser variety.”
He snarled and flung out his hands theatrically.
“I don’t see any damn fur on this body!”
I mentally cringed at the ridiculous human misconception and was silently saying my thanks that there were no other inhumans within ear-shot of this conversation.
“Sir, shifters do not have any distinctive markings or fur, unless they are phased into their animal forms. Even then, they maintain the exact same level of intellect and awareness as a human. Besides fur and a second body shape, shapeshifters are very human.”
The Captain muttered a few choice thoughts on my educational speech about shifters. I looked to Inspector Johnson and I waited for him to catch my gaze. When our eyes finally connected, I spoke.
“Sir, what did you call me down here for? How can I assist?”
I managed to ignore the Captain muttering how utterly useless a “blood-whore” like I was. Blood-whore was a derogatory term for vampires stolen from several popularized paranormal genre series. The term was so well liked by bigots in the “Humans for a Safer Future,” or the HSF for short. Just imagine the KKK, but for anti-inhuman sentiments and not race.
The HSF has begun to sweet through most of the larger nations of the world. Acts of violence and terror have been conducted by radicalized members worldwide. The less radical elements are focused more on political control.
Our government is experiencing the first major upheaval in party divides in over one-hundred years. All of this can be laid at my feet in some way or another. I am the one who pulled the trigger on all of this. However, had I not, then we would likely be dead or at war on two fronts by now.
So, lose, lose for me and others in the positions of authority left to clean up the fallout of the meltdown that was “The Dawning.”
I looked to my boss expectantly and asked, “Do you have an extra set of gloves by chance?”
Johnson nodded and he reached into his trench coat and pulled free a pair of sturdy blue disposable gloves common to all NYPD personnel. I nodded my thanks and plucked them free from his grip and I quickly pulled the blue latex over my hands, lest I contaminate the body.
While I was a necromancer, I was still growing accustomed to touching corpses. In a life-or-death moment fighting one is entirely different from handling a dead rape victim. My stomach was knotted into a mass of nausea. I felt like I was truly going to be sick learning in closer to the body. I summoned every single fiber of my stubborn Latin genres to will my stomach contents to stay the hell down!
A girl learns new tricks every day, including how to not spew all over a crime scene.
I gingerly opened the mouth of the victim and I was assaulted with the bile of her own sickness. She had slightly elongated canines, as if they had begun to phase, but had managed to be suspended before her form changed.
What the actual fuck?!
My eyes widened and I looked up to the Inspector.
“Sir, something stopped her from phasing. That shouldn’t be possible, but you can see her teeth had just started to change shape.”
I opened her mouth wider and pointed to the long canines.
“Those do look a little too long to be normal.”
Inspector Johnson said as he leaned in next to me, non-paused to brush upright against a vampire. He and his son seemed to lack the typical human fear response to my proximity. I was becoming accustomed to the usual response now. Even when people do not know why they tend to arc out away from me to avoid the predator in their midst.
“What about magic Detective Salvo? What other lingering magic do you detect on the body?”
I eyed him and from the look he gave me, this was not a trick question. I shook my head quickly and licked my lips.
“Nothing sir, just some subtle hints that she had the natural magic to phase between human and animal, nothing more or less.”
He hummed and stroked a hand over his mustache in silent contemplation. Above us the Captain interrupted our thoughts and snarled, “Impossible, we have a magic detection charm lighting up red when swept over this body!”
I looked to the Inspector and cocked a questioning brow.
“Might I see this charm, sir?”
The Inspector stood and I followed suit and he snapped his fingers towards a milling CSU tech nearby.
“Miles, fetch Detective Salvo the MDC, she needs to check the readings.”
Miles nodded and rushed off to a large silver toned case filled with delicate instruments. He returned with a white and wood wand looking device. I plucked it from his gr
ip and the charm went from a neutral grey to green, then yellow, then finally red in a moment. I doubt the humans caught every color tone change, but it was obvious for my keen sight.
My brows pinched in confusion. I could feel the basic intent of the spell work on the wood and the strip of enchanted white material. I held the device farther from my body and it changed to yellow.
Magic levels?
I kept the device where it was and I let my Necrovamp magic rush out like two great wings unfurrowing around me and chilly air swept through the room. I felt everyone else still in the room and the charm turned black and then it exploded in my hand sending wooden shards in every direction. I looked at the Inspector and gave him a sheepish smile.
“Sorry sir, I was trying to figure out how this thing gauges magic, but I’m afraid this thing is probably just a kettle-witch charm. Any immortal would probably register off the charts, as you have just witnessed. That shows how weak this young shifter was and there is certainly no other magic present, or the device would have exploded on your men. I would personally recommend discussing new charms, preferably from an immortal witch.”
Kettle witches were little more than humans with basic sight and some magic, mostly brewing and enchanting. While I have nothing against them personally, the kettle witches often tend to meddle in things they do not comprehend in their pursuit of greater power. Even in the thirteen-months, I have been aware of my inhuman status, I have had cause to detain, or even kill several such kettle witches meddling with dark forces that threatened my domain. Thank the stars for the Kelpies! The water horses will eat any fresh body you toss them, probably why the many mobs have been using the rivers around NYC for generations—not that they know the bodies are being eaten.
The Captain looked like he was about to pop his balding top. His gaze could have boiled a lesser woman, or maybe one with less chilly magic rippling off of her body. I had to actively keep my necromancy from animating the corpse beneath me. Part of me wondered if I could raise the dead woman in a way that she could recount her final hours for me, but I was still much too new to my craft to attempt to raise a proper Revenant. Unlike the ghoul or the zombie, Revenants were brought back with full awareness and immortality tied directly to the caster. They lived on raw meat, preferably human, but anything large and mammal would do.
