#Unwizzards

[klatukattdreams]

Feanor’s Treasure Hunt

“Happy Birthday my little Fea! I thought we could do a fun treasure hunt around the city. But you better hurry, the clues will only last until sunrise!”

Feanor was doubly puzzled by the note he found on his apartment door; firstly because it was not close to his birthday and secondly because Sierra’s text had sounded urgent and fearful. A scavenger hunt? This sounded like his kind of puzzle. He perused the clues all the way to the last note at the bottom.

”Once you have all the answers meet me at sunrise where we first met.”

~~~

If you care to see a play

Try this fiery display.

 Feanor got this one easily as he could only think of one theater that had burned down recently. He hopped in his car and took a short detour to Burien.

The repairs were all finished by this time. The fire hadn’t caused too much damage to the building and Feanor walked around back to where he remembered the fire started. A crop of crocus were already blooming as Spring started earlier every year. The blossoms shot up everywhere through the small patch of grass that had been installed after the building’s renovations.

Feanor crouched down to see the flowers better in the darkness and as he drew close some of the blossoms began to glow with their own light. Grass and flowers twined together into the shape of a small humanoid which fluttered its tiny bladed eyelashes at Feanor. Sierra was really good with plant magic.

“A question for the Rosenchild.” The tiny flower creature’s voice was barely audible. “What happened to the Alchemist?” With a puff of magic the light went out and the creature dissolved into the earth. Feanor sat back. What a strange question. The Alchemist? The one who set those fires over a year ago? How did Sierra know about that?

Feanor noted the question down to ponder on later and continued on his treasure hunt.

 ~~~

Should you venture to the Hatchery

Take a rest by Bruce’s Tree

 The hatchery part was obvious but Feanor had no idea who Bruce was. He was getting a little tired of driving around all night but this had to get done.

It was actually easy to find the tree Sierra meant as there was a well lit plaque stating “In memory of Bruce, FISH Guide.” The tree shook as Feanor read the sign.

“Greetings Rosenchild.” The tree was a young maple, only 15 feet high and probably five years old but it already had the voice of a much older tree. It was well cared for here.

“Not long ago Death walked these grounds. I was here and felt it rise.”

“Do you have a question for me, maple?”

“Yes. I was told the sorceress who poisoned the water was a vampire. But such power could not come from that alone. From whence came her power? Who was her sire?”

Its message delivered the maple settled again into its restful state.

Feanor noted down what the tree had told him. Thinking back they had never questioned where the vampire had come from. Magic was so new to the group it was hard to judge what was serious and what was light. Where was Sierra leading him?

~~~

The stone man ponders a tiny bug

Once defaced by a kindred thug

 This one had to mean the Freemont Troll. Feanor was getting an eerie feeling revisiting all these familiar places that he had never told Sierra about.

The setup felt like the worst trap ever. There was a big bouquet of geraniums sitting right in front of the troll and the whole area was bathed in the light of the streetlamps. It was long past 3am and the streets were deserted so Feanor, on his guard, went directly to the vase.

“HOW DO TROLL—“

Feanor clapped his hands over his ears and looked up. The troll was talking. He was clearly still cement but the eyes were looking at Feanor and the mouth was slightly open.

“W—w—what?” Feanor managed to ask.

The troll rolled its eyes. The effect made Feanor’s brain hurt. It was like a poorly constructed flip-book, the pupils moving from one point to another with no fluid motion in between. The troll spoke again only slightly softer so Feanor got it all.

”HOW DO TROLL KNOW SECRET SUMMER WAYS?”

The troll blinked and went back to staring straight ahead.

Feanor boggled. The troll was a real troll! No one would believe him but he had to write an article.

 ~~~

A good Gardener knows

The best rose grows

From the dung

Of exotic toes

 Feanor had to guess at this one. Exotic toe dung probably meant Zoo Doo, the fertilizer program at Woodland Park. The zoo also had a rose garden so Feanor hopped the fence and got inside.

For a moment it was quiet then a soft glow and a humming rose and all the roses began quietly to sing.

“First the Ravens was set free

He planted seeds of demons, three

And all creatures inside to be

Chaos, madness and deadly

 To keep the wizard’s loyalty

Next to the zoo came in Bradley

And brought the werewolf too, did he

To tie her up so temptingly

 The thread of this insanity

Was to make all pets flee

And though unknown to poor Ichi

Help grow his court’s authority

 But also transmit secretly

A calling to all wild faiery

It said “For murder, pain and glee

Bring your hunt to our city.”

 But once again foiled was all

By the child of Rosenthall.

 Feanor hurried to write all this down. This was so much information! Someone had wanted the hunt to rage through Seattle and kill all the animals so much so that they had brought in these two scary wizard types. Feanor made a note to find out more about Ravens and Bradley. This could tie everything together.

 ~~~

The city’s biggest bit

Took too big a bite

And bought it in this pit

 This was a puzzler. Feanor was quite tired and it was almost sunrise so he did the logical thing and went to Google. It worked! The first headline was “Big Bertha Bites It In Earthquake.” Feanor reread the article as he remembered. They were drilling for the stupid tunnel when the 6.2 earthquake hit. Most of Seattle was fine but, alas, the Viaduct was not. The Viaduct was still mostly a pile of rubble as the city tried to save the waterfront. Bertha was still stuck underneath because they couldn’t spare the resources to dig her out.

Feanor didn’t exactly know where to go as he made his way to the entrance of the “tunnel” because he had never been there before. He eventually spotted one lone pot sitting on the unfinished overpass. It was a bit of a trick to get up there but what he found was unexpected. A single blooming snapdragon stretched happily out of the pot. It wasn’t nearly warm enough yet for this flower to be blooming.

“Hello Rosenchild.” The voice of the flower was quite close to Sierra’s. “Look down into the pit. She asks you remember what the ghosts have told you. It draws them down. It eats. It wakes.”

Standing high up over the open pit and hearing the words from the tiny blossom filled Feanor with a sudden dread. “What is it?”

“The Dragon.”

Feanor took the snapdragon with him to the convention center. He and the flower waited until Feanor almost passed out, but Sierra never came.

inspirecompetence

[inspirecompetence]

Unwizzards Brief Cases: Feanor Gets in a Fight

(Brief Case 2.1.5, precursor to Episode 2.2: Spawn till you die.) 

  Feanor Gets in a Fight

                Feanor was on his way to Fight Club. He didn’t exactly go with Sierra but they got off at the same bus stop and Sierra said she should walk with Feanor to protect him from any overzealous gardeners. They rounded the corner to get on the correct side of the church when Sierra stopped suddenly. Cookie was outside the building talking to a woman Feanor didn’t recognize.

                “What is she doing here?” muttered Sierra with a scowl, but not so quiet as Feanor would miss it. She started walking to the pair slowly and slightly in front of Feanor, not wanting him to interject.

                The unknown woman saw Sierra and turned to face her and the placid Cookie stepped back with the casual stance of a police officer waiting to stop a crime.

                “I don’t know what she has told you,” said Sierra loudly, “but I can assure you that she has no idea what she’s talking about.”

                “I was just warning the Lieutenant that there is a former criminal in her midst and was asking if she had seen any suspicious activity, such as drug dealing.” The tone in the strange woman’s voice conveyed a different message meant only for Sierra.

                “I did my time for that, Aviance, which you would know if you’d bothered to stick around.”

                “I had to make it clear I wanted nothing to do with that crowd, ‘Sierra.’ If that crowd is in town, people need to be aware.”

                “That is not my problem, or your problem. I haven’t broken any Laws,” meaning magical laws, “unlike some people. How did you find me, anyway?”

                The hostile Aviance’s eyes flicked to Feanor quickly before looking away. She took a breath to speak but Sierra interrupted.

                “Were you scrying on him? That is a total invasion of privacy.”

                “No! I mean, yes, but I wasn’t trying to.”

                “That’s not an excuse –“ Sierra was getting ready for an argument.

                “But now that I’ve found YOU I will be watching you like a hawk.” Aviance smiled. “Or a cat, or a mouse. You’ll never know I’m watching.”

                “What’ll you do if you see something you don’t like?” said Sierra, frankly. “Call the wizards?” Her tone carried heavy notes of sarcasm.

                “I’ll just have to tell your friends,” said Aviance simply. She shoved her hands in her pockets and walked briskly away.

                Cookie nodded slightly and went to open the door to the basement.

                “What was that about?” Feanor finally asked.

                “I don’t want to talk about it.” Sierra was grumpy. “The point is I didn’t do anything wrong before and there is no reason for her to think I am working for –“ Sierra stopped herself and grabbed Feanor’s arm. “C’mon, I’m feeling punchy.”

[inspirecompetence]

Unwizzards Brief Cases: Drew & Toby witness a murder

(Brief Case 2.1.5, precursor to Episode 2.2: Spawn till you die.) 

Drew & Toby witness a murder

                Drew polished the pints behind his wet bar station at the bustling bat-mitzvah; Tony’s page and package had both come early in the morning, shoving work under  Drew’s fingernails before the noon hours an anathema unto itself. Worse, since it was October Tony had ruled that all magicians had to do ‘spoo-ooky’ acts to get in the spirit of the season (frankly, Drew had as much ‘spirit’ as he could stand as-is). So along with his kerchiefs and cards Drew now toted a compliment of fake blood, hands, and eyeballs to ghoulishly spurt at unsuspecting victims throughout his act. Drew rarely inspected his mystery parcels Tony would leave, and idly noted that today’s parcel was smaller than normal but seemed too-heavy for its compact size –maybe Tony was smuggling lead, or plutonium.

                Drew didn’t care; as long as the money kept coming in and he wasn’t getting himself into any more trouble than he already had he slotted this gig as a win. The second performer finished his unpolished Halloween act to faint applause and less-faint jeers. Drew exchanged a companionable nod with him as he came up and ordered a neat scotch, settling down to watch the headlining magician’s set. Drew found the grim magic more interesting to watch than the awkward dancing of teens and kept his gaze over the shoulders of the intoxicated patrons (not-so-stealthily sneaking kids drinks), focusing on the skilled tricks of the master craftsman on stage.

                Though he had never really had much more than a passive interest in stage magic before, his summer practicing the craft had sparked a passion for minor trickery in Drew; he reveled in his subtle palms, misdirections, and close-up magic that could leave tiger-moms breathless. Drew watched the senior magician Troy the Magnificent go through his usual magic-motions, playing up the macabre angle harder than either of his previous performers. Girls squealed in disgust and boys hooted and hollered as the magic-man performed a twist on the classic endless-scarf trick, instead pulling a concealed length of phony intestines out of his mouth, knotted entrails tied to the end of a scarf dripping fake blood.

                Troy performed perfect fake-hand removals, a gloriously grisly SAW-inspired variant on the traditional saw-a-woman-in-half routine, and even stunned a few patrons with some gifted cold reading. For his finale Troy had his assistant bring out a massive Iron Maiden etched with almost cheesily grotesque torture frescos. This was new, Drew noticed, and perked his attention fully to the stage; Troy went through the motions of picking a ‘random’ woman from the audience, doubtless the mother of the newly-christened woman, before leading her to stand in the impressive Iron Maiden. Drew realized it was going to be a magic-sword trick, with Troy inserting dummy blades into the torture-chamber to the horror (and possible delight) of her daughter and friends.

                Drew, and truthfully everyone in the room, was enraptured by Tony’s masterful performance, perfect down to his ghoulish, maniacal cackle. He violently stabbed each dummy blade in, one at a time, to the clearly-fake screams of the woman ‘trapped’ inside. Troy pierced the Maiden half-a-dozen times before picking up a smaller dummy blade, scarcely longer than a standard kitchen knife. He grinned as he called up the mitzvahed now-woman, encouraging her to come up and plant the final blade. The group grinned and waited eagerly to see the climactic finale as the not-quite-a-girl crept up to her mother’s pseudo-tomb, holding the dagger in both hands.

                Drew wasn’t sure what alerted him to danger, but he was suddenly certain that knife wasn’t a dummy; Toby must have realized it in the same moment, because both Drew and Toby tried to shout a warning through the same throat, competing cries strangling each other in their throat. The daughter stabbed the blade down to the subtle hole in the Maiden and the mother’s screams from inside leaped to a higher register and Drew realized she was no longer faking anguish. He managed to cram Toby’s voice down long enough to shout the warning, and by then the rest of the party had noticed that something was wrong. The maiden had begun shaking as the woman inside convulsed, panicking and trying to fight her way out from inside the suddenly all-too-real torture chamber.

                Troy shouted everyone back as he tried to withdraw the blades and pacify the crowd, but as he withdrew the first dummy sword the woman shrieked in agony and the blade came away covered in blood. People panicked throughout the temple, shouting in fear as more blades were hastily withdrawn, eliciting more pained shrieks from within the Maiden. Troy struggled to remove the offending dagger and fought, leveraging his body against the minute blade and failing to draw it out. Toby starting fretting into Drew’s ear, encouraging him to bounce, but Drew was locked in sickened fascination as the crowd drew the last of the blades out. Blood glinted on every blade, and the woman’s cries from the inside had sunk to sobs.

                Toby started forcing Drew’s legs to move out of the temple, citing them being here to be questioned by police wouldn’t help anyone. Drew tried to argue that they had to wait to make the switch for the parcel before he realized the small package was gone from where he had stowed it beneath the bar. Sitting in its place was a single large bar of solid gold. The pried the Iron Maiden open using a crow-bar from Troy’s gear and Drew turned to bail. The lifeless woman fell to the ground; a profusely bleeding gash in her chest was level with where the dagger had been inserted.

                Drew grabbed the gold-bar and fled. He wasn’t exactly proud of it, but the taste of real horror had shaken him and he had to run outside of the temple just to keep from spilling his guts on their plush carpets. He panted, breathless outside of the quickly-emptying temple and tried to get his head together. Someone had, without his notice, taken the parcel and left the gold in its place, instead of the usual method of exchange. Drew suspected Tony would be livid, but tried to put it out of his mind. As he scampered away one more thought crossed his mind; the dangerous dagger that had ended that poor woman’s life was just the right size to have fit in the parcel-box.

[inspirecompetence]

Unwizzards Brief Cases: Felix makes a Deal

(Brief Case 2.1.5, precursor to Episode 2.2: Spawn till you die.) 

Felix makes a Deal

                The off-leash area at the Magnuson Park on the north-end of Seattle proper was massive; large mounds of cold sod and woodchips surrounded a wide filthy plain of play-space for rambunctious pooches. Wagner walked calmly beside Felix in the park, despite the coiled leash in Felix’s hand, watching the other dogs at play with disinterest. Felix took a drag on his rolled cigarette and caught scorn-filled glares from a yuppie couple baby-talking to their toy terrier. Felix returned their gaze with a withering look of his own as he and Wagner stalked into the thicker brush beyond the field. High grass nearly rose above Wagner’s slender shoulder blades as he scampered happily through the brush. Without warning he stopped, body pointed in a primal dog way for a moment before he took off like a shot, barking loudly as he leapt the meager fence meant to contain the other animals effortlessly.

                Felix angrily stabbed out his dog-end (the term feeling quite apropos given the current climate) before chasing after his dog, neatly leaping the fence himself. The brush stretched into a light wooded expanse, the marshy ground sucking noisily at his boots as he tromped through the quickly thickening swamp. He saw a flash of gold and red fur deeper in the woods and heard Wagner’s barking bubble into a low growl. Quickening his pace Felix bounded over a fallen log, pushing down with his unscarred hand; he hadn’t expected the log to give under his weight and toppled into the murky cold mud of the marsh, knocking the breath out of him.

                Felix lay stunned for a moment, struggling to take a deep enough breath while keeping track of Wagner’s rolling growl. A sharp snapping sound at his left made him twitch his dizzy head in time to see another tree give way to old rot in its roots as the pillar of wood toppled towards Felix. Present of mind enough to roll his head away from the blow Felix was still to sluggish, slowed by the grasping mud, and became pinned under the oppressive weight of the fallen tree. The heavy bark bit against his T-shirt, abrasive against his chest, and he tried to wiggle his arms enough to bench-press the tumbled timber off of himself long enough to catch his breath and wriggle free.

                Try as he might Felix was unable to lift little more than a small portion of the weight off of his chest, and when he struggled to get clear jagged broken branches prodded delicate flesh deep enough to draw a surprised yelp of pain from Felix. A deep throated hum split the otherwise silent swamp and a man Felix dimly recognized strolled casually into view before planting his muddy boot on the very log that kept Felix pinned. Felix tried to piece his head together enough to shoot a glare at the offending foot when he realized where he recognized the man’s face from; Vin Diesel, movie star, stood smiling down at Felix with casual grace.

                “Vin Diesel?” asked Felix, unable to think of anything else.

                The actor laughed with a voice that was from someone else. “No, but if you could look like any man on Earth, who would you pick? Besides, I had to make sure I had your attention.”

                Vin pulled Felix out from under the log with one hand. Felix noticed Wagner’s growl had turned into excited yelps as he splashed and jumped with a giant bull mastiff, both of them becoming caked in mud. Vin plopped down on a nearby log and pulled his own hand rolled smoke out of his shirt pocket. He lit it with a flick of his thumb.

                “You see, Northstar, there are some things that need to be made clear to you.” Not Vin Diesel took a long drag and proffered it to Felix who sat down next to him.

                “That isn’t actually my name,” said Felix, as he pulled in some smoke. Though Felix was far from a connoisseur of tobacco he could taste an unfamiliar sweetness in the rich smoke of the tobacco.

                “The title fits, under the circumstances,” said Vin, taking the roll-up back. “You don’t run into many fae in your line of work, so let me tell you the number one rule. Never take a gift from a fairy. They cannot actually give gifts because everything must balance, so when you take a ‘gift’ you are also giving them a debt. You recently accepted a powerful gift from my wife.” Vin paused to smoke.

                “Your wife. The coin from Feanor’s mom was from your wife making you… the wild king?”

                “The confidence in your tone suits you, Hunter. Going forward you may call me Hern.”

                “Hunter isn’t my name either, Hern.”

                “You do not want me to say your Name. Anyway, you owed my wife a debt and what’s mine is hers.”

                “So I owe you for the coin now?”

                “That, and the assistance with the log just now, among other things.” Hern twirled the cigarette in his fingers.

                “Hold on,” said Felix. “I took that without knowing you were a fay and the log thing you set up yourself.”

                Hern laughed. “All right, we’ll let those pass. I had hoped to work with you more than once, but there is still one grand favour to be repaid.” Hern let that sentence linger in the air as he smoked.

                Felix pulled out his own tobacco pouch but found his fingers too covered in mud to make a roll up, though his tobacco was still dry. Since he couldn’t pass the time pleasantly he became impatient. “All right, what is it you need?”

                “You hunt monsters,” said Hern slowly.

                “Not really. I usually help people. I’m a paramedic.”

                “Things have changed now you are marked as the Northstar. The monsters will want to hunt you. Sometime soon I will call on you to kill a terrible creature, one worthy of the gift bestowed on you.” Hern smoked in silence for a moment more.

                “Is that it?”

                “Nay, I also wish to tell you this.” Hern made eye contact which froze Felix to the spot.  “I would like to see you join the Wild Hunt someday. Let it be known that you are in the Wild King’s favor as well as his debt.” Hern stood up suddenly and whistled for his dog. “Cain! Come.”

                Hern wandered off into the wild away from the dog park as Wagner ran up to Felix, splattering him with even more mud. Felix had no idea what to make of this encounter as he knew next to nothing about fairies. He would have to ask Feanor about his step-dad the next time the Fellowship got together. That made Felix chuckle and got him moving. He and Wagner went back to the dog park to take a swim and get clean in the not quite too cold October lake. If Seattle was good for one thing it was a temperate climate.

[inspirecompetence]

Un-Wizzards Brief Cases - Phoebe Leaves a Message

(Brief Case 2.1.5, precursor to Episode 2.2: Spawn till you die.) 

Phoebe Leaves a Message

                Phoebe stood in her flat’s spacious and elegant bathroom adjusting her make-up before she allowed Llewellyn to take her out for coffee. She could say this for the svartles; what they apparently lacked in height they more than made up for in style, and she subdued an unconscious grin from splitting her black-framed red lips. She glanced down for a moment, capping her tube of lipstick and drawing out her favorite eyeshadow from her bag and was so startled when she looked back into the mirror she dropped the case, $60 of quality Sephora product scattering over the bathroom’s tiles. A message written in a familiar messy scrawl obscured most of her mirror, written in a blood red script.

                The message read simply “I must convince Delphine to Leave the city.” A simple signature of two X’s was below the message, which Phoebe at first thought to be an archaic symbol for kissing before realizing where she knew the handwriting from. Xandrix, Phoebe’s some-time mentor and major time pain in the ass, had sent notes previously in the same distinctive style. She fumed at the intrusion of her space, much more the obfuscation of her mirror, and stormed downstairs into her office area to yank the landline phone off of its receiver and bludgeon Xandrix over the head with her rage.

                She stopped short when she entered the Fellowship office space; a plain piece of paper spun gently on its corner on top of the desk bearing the same message, and indeed Phoebe found the message written over or upon nearly every surface of her workspace. The message was huge on the white-board above the stairs, filling the entire space with red, threatening letters. When she picked up the spinning note she felt more than heard a snap of energies and she looked up to find the scribbled note gone from the rest of her home. Phoebe glanced angrily down at the suspicious paper, recognizing it to be torn from a composition notebook similar to the one she had seen Xandrix take obscure notes in. On the piece of paper was the same messily scribbled warning, with a date written above, October  14th.

                Phoebe checked her calendar on her phone, just to assure herself she hadn’t gone crazy; the date on the note was for a week in the future. How could Xandrix have written this, and why did he send it to her so pervasively Phoebe wondered as she looked at the only other content on the otherwise blank page, a tiny postscript written with a pink gel-pen. The P.S. read only ‘C/o Ivy.’ Phoebe breathed out frustration as she reached once more for the office phone while looking up the number for Xandrix’ shoddy fortune-teller shop in Crown Hill on her cell. She found the number quickly, stabbing the touch-tone phone with slightly more force than strictly necessary.

                The phone picked up on the second ring, and Phoebe could hear soft music on the other end of the line which she recognized after a moment as Disney’s Poor Unfortunate Souls. She had expected Xandrix to answer and layed into him right away. “Who the hell do you think you are, X? You can’t send me messages like this! I gave you my number for crying out loud!”

She had not expected a woman to answer, much less a woman with a rich voice and vaguely eastern-European accent.

“Oh, I’m sorry, darling, Xandrix isn’t available at the moment. May I ask who’s calling?”

Phoebe was surprised but quickly regained composure. “Tell him Phoebe is calling. I’ll wait.”

“I’m sorry, but he is a bit tied up at the moment.” The woman paused, perhaps to suppress a laugh? “Phoebe, yes? I have heard of you. I am another of Xandrix’ students.”

“I am not really a student, he is my consultant,” Phoebe corrected. “I didn’t know Xandrix taught any students.”

“No, not many. You know how he likes to work alone.” The woman’s conspiratorial tone left Phoebe confused and angry. “Let me take a message. What is this regarding?”

“He’ll know what it’s regarding,” said Phoebe through clenched teeth.

“Ha, yes, he will, won’t he? Anyway, tata.”

Their innuendo-laden conversation left Phoebe starring, puzzled and angry at her phone. Who was this woman in Xandrix’ home, and what did she mean when she said Xandrix was ‘Tied up’? Without any outlet for her fury she pounded back an espresso on her way out the door with Llewellyn, fuming as they walked. Audacious seer, thinking he could drive her from her town. Next time she saw him she would slap him right in his stupid mouth.

[inspirecompetence]

Brief Cases: Or how I spent my summer vacation

(From the Freemont Fellowship. These are short stories to go between season one and two.)

  Phoebe: Stars & Stones

                  Phoebe had been having an idyllic summer; set loose on the city from her Amazon contract in time for the offices to move (with a healthy bonus for Monster Hunting) Phoebe was able to spend most of her time in pleasant relaxation. Most that is, with the exception of her time spent with Rose. Phoebe cherished her time with Feanor’s fully-fairy mother, in part because she knew it bothered Feanor but mostly stemming from the wealth of knowledge and understanding Rose provided.

                Since accepting and donning the stylish locket from Mrs. Rosenthall-Hern at her engagement brunch in June Phoebe’s persistent problematic seizures had petered off entirely, much to Pooshkin’s delight. In their place Phoebe now found her downtime dominated by the spruce company of her self-assigned godmother. Rose (as she insisted Phoebe call her) seemed to enjoy spending time with Phoebe in turn, taking her for lunch and a ramble almost daily. Which is not to say that the summer passed without drama; indeed, one of the first outings the pair took together was to a premier of A Midsummer’s Night Dream in Ashland, Oregon.

                Phoebe was still attempting to work out how Rose had pulled that off; each day Rose would arrive in a dapper green town car and usher Phoebe inside before the car rushed off through the streets of Seattle, and yet 9 out of 10 times when they would exit the car it would be in a different state entirely, if not in a different hemisphere. They would treat to brunch in Venice, or attend the Royal Wedding of the Princess of Sweden, while never getting out of the car or boarding a plane. Phoebe recalled Feanor saying something about his mother’s subtle grip of magic, but even on the occasion where Phoebe never tore her eyes from the windows of the town car she could not determine when they would slip through a portal to arrive scores of miles away.

                Today was different; Rose had arrived on a scooter, a shining emerald-green Vespa number that would have looked garish under the umbrella of anyone else but managed spectacular beauty in the company of the fairy. She wordlessly offered Phoebe a helmet before zooming north on 99. Phoebe’s shenanigan detector was steadily shouting cautions at her by the time the Vespa veered onto 15th, Rose cackling as she urged the zippy motorbike between cars and traffic. When they pulled up outside a dingy ramshackle burger joint next to a sketchy bar, Phoebe had had enough.

                Turning to demand explanations from Rose, she was preemptively shushed; Rose winked at Phoebe before prancing up to the front of the line (a common habit of hers that never seemed to bite her in her well-deserved ass) and ordering for them both. Only then did she answer Phoebe’s queries.

                After Phoebe had asked her most pertinent questions, she began to think about the answers Rose didn’t give; fey were tricky folk, and though they couldn’t lie per-se they were masters of circumlocution. Phoebe prized herself on the quality and sharpness of her wit, and started unraveling the clues contained in Rose’s answers. When the door chimed its alert of a new customer Phoebe didn’t take notice of him until a titter from Rose piqued her interest.

                Phoebe recognized the man, though not right away, unused to seeing him in what must be his normal street clothes during the day; a shade on the tall side he spoke very softly to the man at the register, so much so that he had to shout over the sizzling grill to be heard.

                “I called ahead a to-go order for Xandrix? With two ‘x’s?” The grill man nodded at Xandrix, a sign of recognition, before pointing to a bagged-up order next to the register. It wasn’t until Xandrix had paid for his meal and turned around that he noticed Phoebe, eyes wide with surprise. Rose coughed politely and excused herself, telling Phoebe she would see her tomorrow before slinking out of the crowded space. Xandrix stood, stunned, and watched her go before turning back to Phoebe, his face gone ghastly pale.

                Xandrix spoke at length with Phoebe about her Locket, and the Rosaesidhe; eventually their conversation got to the matter that had been taking up most of Phoebe’s time spent away from Rose, finding an improved venue for the Fellowship. As a test, Xandrix suggested she try asking the stone for a place for the group. A vision of an old brick building, crystal clear in her head swam before Phoebe, clear enough that she could have believed she was in Old Ballard standing in front of it. After [arcana symbology] formed on the surface of the stone, Phoebe and Xandrix set about interpreting the symbols. Phoebe knew what lurked in the building; something not-quite-dead; something that didn’t like the sun; something evil.

                “Black courts!” Xandrix gasped after they had decoded the symbols. “Vampires of the worst sort.” Xandrix told Phoebe a quick-and-dirty summary of the bloodsuckers, focusing on how to take them out. “Any black court is bad news. If the Stone wanted you to see this, it must mean something. Gather the fellowship. Meet me there tomorrow with the group. If we hit them fast enough we might be able to nip this problem in the bud before it gets out of hand.”

                Phoebe had to call a cab to get home, and by the time she returned the left-behind Pooshkin was as surly as his stubby little body could be. Phoebe fired up her phone (left home to charge after she lost the first one to one of Rose’s side-adventures) and attempted to reach the Fellowship; she started with the organizer of the group, Meri, hoping she would have had contact with the group recently. When Meri’s voicemail message informed Phoebe that she was on “Academic Vocation” Phoebe was able to conclude that this likely meant “cavorting with fairies” and moved on to trying to reach the rest of the group. Feanor was equally unreachable, which didn’t make sense to Phoebe as she knew he was still unemployed and should have few places to be at 7 on a Saturday. Maybe he got himself a hobby?

                Phoebe tried Drew, favoring to send him a text instead of dealing with the dual-screams of Toby and Andrew trying to speak over each other on the phone. She got a message back pretty quickly, but had replied to let her know that Drew was busy for the next few days on a job. She pressed Toby for details but he clammed up, despite her insistence that it was an urgent matter. Phoebe stared angrily at her phone, considering dialing 9-1-1 in the slight chance Felix appeared before frustratedly tossing her phone deep into the encompassing over-stuffed cushions of her designer couch. As an act of true desperation she loaded Pooshkin into the car and drove to Gasworks, parking in the lot of the Marina where she had known Cheaux to live. She asked about his boat to a passing neighbor and they told her that the whole place had burned down in May, Sorry. She would just have to do it alone. How difficult could one measly vamp be?

                She arrived the next morning at the building that was now engrained in her memory; the entire night before had been filled with stoker-fueled dreams of Gary Oldman attempting to drain the life from her tender throat, and her attitude was surly-at-best even through her Grande coffee. Xandrix stood sheepishly around the corner, the bustling Old Ballard Sunday Farmer’s market already in full swing in the early-morning sunlight. Phoebe had casually prepared a stake and a squirt-bottle filled with garlic water, and felt underdressed when she got a good look at Xandrix as she got closer.

                Xandrix loomed (or at least tried to loom) in the shadow of the building, his neck adorned with an almost comedic number of braids of whole garlic heads, crosses dangling from hastily sewn thongs. He sported two brightly colored water pistols, offering one to Phoebe, explaining he had filled them with Holy Water late last night. In his left hand he held a long length of wood, carved with subtle runic patterns intertwining over the wood.

They peeked through the boarded up windows and could espy two junkies lounging inside, weakly chuckling as they half-dozed in the burnt-out dusty room. “Don’t look like Renfields,” Xandrix confided. “They’re most likely thralls; that’s good, means the vamp hasn’t got up to full strength yet. You ready?” This he said to Phoebe, standing in front of the bolted-and-boarded door. Phoebe nodded, and Xandrix drew his staff along the length of the door frame, chanting softly under his breath as he did. Slowly at first, then more quickly as his chanting increased in speed, ice began forming over the door regardless of the summer’s heat. When his staff completed its circuit of the frame the ice formed over the door entirely, and after a moment the hinges popped in protest as the door fell inward and shattered into chunks of frozen wood.

The two thralls in the room had definitely been fed upon, barely starting at the boom of the door; Xandrix pointed at one while charging the other, smacking their head smartly with his staff and rendering him unconscious in seconds. The other thrall, perhaps slightly less drained, leapt up to charge Phoebe, but a quick boot to the last place a man wants a boot sent him to the ground, groaning in testicular torsion. Phoebe spat fury as Pooshkin angrily barked at the coiled man, taking time to pee on his recumbent form. Xandrix pushed deeper into the dilapidated building, mutedly calling out to Phoebe when he found the ruined cellar door.

Phoebe and Xandrix took time to smash out the back windows, letting the early-morning light pour in and flood the musty room. Xandrix nodded at Phoebe as they each gripped one of the cellar door’s handles, the water-pistol in their opposite hands. The pair tore open the doors letting the light streak through the darkened cellar. A hissing shriek burst from the bottom of the chamber, a burning half-corpse streaking up the stairs, swearing bloody curses. Phoebe and Xandrix wasted no time, stepping in to unload the small pistols at the wailing mass. The water hit the flaming body and tinged the fire blue-white with holy heat, the staggering form immolating on the stairs before their eyes with a shriek of pure pain and fury before crumbling to sticky ash on the foot of the steps.

Panicked and out of breath, Pooshkin comfortingly rubbed up against Phoebe’s trembling hand to help steady her nerves; not unaccustomed to monsters, the psychic barrage of energies as the vampire died had shaken Phoebe more than she had been prepared for. Xandrix raised his eyebrows at her, but she was able to regain her composure and take the lead down into the now-vacant cellar. By the time she reached the foot of the stairs she had regained her composure enough to carefully inspect the room.

The cellar was dark and cold, like most cellars; a narrow crack on the far wall breathed dusty, cool air through the room, stirring the mothballs cluttering the floor. Beside a dirty airmattress (this vampire was so low-budget it couldn’t even spring for a proper coffin?) two withered, small forms lie dead, their old flesh clinging to their withered corpses. Phoebe could clearly see puncture wounds on the throats of the corpses, and then she noticed what was wrong with these bodies. Though assuredly humanoid, they were definitely not human. The bodies were small and slender, unlike human dwarfism, and the palour of the skin was not a tone human flesh could accomplish alive or dead.

“Svartles, Stars and Stones.” Xandrix breathed in the dark as he came up beside Phoebe, cupping a small sideways-hourglass shape in his hands, shedding dim golden light through the empty room. Xandrix told Phoebe that svartles were a branch of fairy that chose to live in the mortal world. “You have probably met their…well, leader isn’t the right term, but elder is pretty close. He runs the Jade Dragon down at the Market?” Phoebe recalled the face of the strange-but-kind old man who ran the jewelry shop. He had been the one to show her the locket she now bore.

Phoebe set herself; dead bodies meant crime, and with this kind of crime and no fellowship to speak of, she had little choice but to place a call to officer Cookie. She and Xandrix walked back up to the main floor so she could get some reception. Nervously eyeing the cell phone Xandrix shied away beyond the busted door frame. When officer Cookie picked up he muttered something about needing to leave and turned tail.

Cookie showed up within 15 minutes, her interceptor parking in front of a fire-hydrant across the road. She and her partner hustled across the street. As her partner taped off the area, Cookie had Phoebe lead her down to the bodies in the cellar, where Phoebe filled her in on the details she could share. “Looks like you had this in hand; though you should have called me in sooner, this was police business. I could charge you with breaking and entering��” Cookie trailed off at Phoebe’s withering gaze. “But I’ll settle for letting you out the back door and forgetting I saw you here. Go on, get.”

Phoebe didn’t care for being shooed away, but she was tired and frustrated and ready to unwind at home. She halfway glared at the heavy stone on her chest, judging it for leading her to this filthy sty instead of to a building she could make some use of. All she had reaped was a bad taste in her mouth that left her spitting until she could get to her car and pop a handful of gum. She drove home, a steady grey rain-cloud shedding the constant Seattle drizzle she was used to.

She didn’t sense anything as she came home. She unlocked the door to her building, scanned her card and punched the button to her floor with a tad more force than was strictly necessary. She turned the key in her door and shouldered it open, dropping her purse on the floor before striding in to her kitchen for a drink. A soft tinkle, the sound of ice tumbling in a glass, startled her and she snapped her attention to a small, familiar man sitting on her couch. “What are you-“ Phoebe began to demand, but he cut her off.

“My people, the svartle, are people of peace, prosperity, and balance, Ms. Phoebe. You broke in to one of our homes. I am simply repaying the favor.” He spoke calmly, with no venom to his words, but Phoebe found herself still on edge.

“We didn’t even-” She tried to defend her actions, but Eitri kept speaking calmly, as if he hadn’t heard her.

“Moreover, you slew an enemy I did not know we had even attracted, and were able to bring the spirits of my kin to rest. Fey do not dole out favors lightly, but you, Ms. Phoebe, have placed us in your debt.” The svartle stood up, a smile blossoming across his face as he took out a manila envelope from an inner-breast pocket. He tossed it on the table. “I am very grateful, to you and yours. You have done me a service I hadn’t known to ask for, so I shall help you in turn. We’ll be watching.” With that, the svartle finished his drink and left, though Phoebe did not notice him use the door on his way out.

Her curiosity overcoming her blind frustration she went to the table and picked up the envelope; inside was a photo, and a folded piece of paper. The photo was of the old brick building in Ballard, with the words ‘it’s yours’ written in neat, curly script in red ink on the back. The piece of paper turned out to be the deed for the building, including the cellar below and the offices above. A second, small note written in the margins in tighter black script read ‘ps. It may need some ‘Tidying Up.’’ The use of quotation put Phoebe’s teeth on edge, but she resigned it to a problem for another day. At least she had found the Fellowship’s new venue.

[inspirecompetence]

Brief Cases: Or how I spent my summer vacation

(From the Freemont Fellowship. These are short stories to go between season one and two.)

Meri: Puppy problems

The coyote pack had burst into Meri's living room per usual, but all was not well; Some of the collegiate-shifters were in their human forms and some of the others in-coyote but there was one, June, that was seemingly stuck in some hybrid-form. From the looks of it she was in an enormous amount of pain. Meri turned to address the senior-and-alpha of the pack, Eric.

"What going on?" Meri asked calmly Eric as he shed his Lupine coat.

"We don't know exactly. June has been having difficulty controlling her shifting for the past couple months; only when she changed tonight she went nuts and started snapping at us. She smells..." Eric looked down-and-away, clearly embarrassed. "Um, how long is… gestation for coyotes?"

"Oh, for the love of peat," Meri muttered. "Tell me the pack hasn’t been… experimenting with sex while shifted?"

"Well, it wasn't exactly on purpose... The first time."

Meri sighed. These kids were smart, but did not always deserve the Power bestowed on them; People between 15 and 25 need to figure out how to be human before trying to be anything else. Meri tried to approach the half-turned June but the furry half-woman snapped and backed into a corner, clutching her stomach protectively.

"June, listen to me; I know you're scared," Meri said calmly as her tattoo Raven gave began to prickle with unseen energy as she continued, her voice tinged with Power. "We are here to help you. You are not alone." As Meri stared at the girl her irises became more rounded, more human. She allowed Meri to approach her close enough to be embraced in a fierce hug.

"Okay," Meri puffed-out a sigh of relief. "We are going to need some towels and boiling-hot water, if Eric’s guess is right." Meri wracked her brain trying to think of how to take care of puppy/human hybrids. "Lots of towels. Sara, upstairs bathroom." Meri barked out orders, used to her role of den-mother for the pack by now.

"Nuh-uh. I ain't going in there," Sara said immediately. She looked up to Meri's exasperated face plainly. "It smells funny. Makes my nose go all itchy for days" This was obviously all the information the rest of the Coyotespawn needed.

"Fine," said Meri hotly, settling June down on the couch. "You all know her best. Make her feel safe, at home, comfortable. I’ll get the damn towles." The coyotes crowded around June, those still-fully shifted closest, while Meri went upstairs to sort through her piles of old towels. The upstairs bathroom did indeed smell funny, even to her mortal nose. This was, she discovered, because someone was lurking in her bathtub.

"Hello Professor," Hunter greeted when Meri walked in. Hunter was technically a Fomor so he needed to be kept moist at all times. He had scarcely left the tub all summer, and the guest bathroom had started to reek of low-tide.

"Hunter, why are you still in my bathtub?"

"Hiding."

"Have you been foiling more Fomor attacks?"

"Yes. A threshold is a comforting barrier between me and the enemy." Hunter's toneless voice was off-putting but the decrease in humans kidnapped by the Fomor was measurable. Meri considered her options and found them annoyingly limited.

"Well since you're here you can help me with some of your former, not Fomor, fellow students please."

"No thank you." The mostly emotionless boy was almost revealing vulnerability, his face a mask of earnest discomfort. "Mammalian reproduction is … not my specialty."

"Hunter, do I need to remind you that you were, and still are partially, mammalian?"

"No. The mammalian side of me does not wish to be involved even more vehemently." Hunter thought for a moment. "I believe it stems from the gender issue; I am the wrong one."

"Fine," Meri spat, not wanting to fight when June needed urgent help, "but don't think I won't put you to work later." She grabbed some towels that she could live without and headed back downstairs. The pack had moved June into the kitchen because the tiled linoleum would be easier to clean. After that it was fairly simple, aside from the phone ringing off the hook; Meri yanked the cord from the wall after June started to Crown as she did not need any more problems at the moment.

June's animal side took care of the birth, much easier than a human birth, and then Meri examined the pups. They looked like pretty standard coyotes with no shifter tendencies, though Meri couldn't be sure and made a note to make an appointment with Ravens to look at them. June shifted to human soon after the birthing was finished, though she soon went back to a coyote to nurse her newborn pups.

*

Days passed with a full-house. Ravens came by and declared the pups to be healthy and fully mortal, with no detectable trace of magic influence. The coyote part of June had been pregnant, not the human part apparently. Meri breathed a heavy sigh of relief.

Hunter disappeared early one morning but Meri was confident he would be back; she hoped she could open him up to embracing even more free will over time. It was a project. Everyone deserves a choice.

[inspirecompetence]

Brief Cases: Or how I spent my summer vacation

(From the Freemont Fellowship. These are short stories to go between season one and two.)

  Felix Bilikas is; The Fist of the North Star

  Well, this hadn’t gone as expected; Felix was used to working alone but his recent experiences with the Fellowship changed him, so he went to church to see the Bishop. Peter had been born into the cloth, his parents devout Christians before him so far back that his lifetime was more-or-less signed to the clergy since he was old enough to evangelize. That being said, he was trustworthy, and had never given Felix a bum-steer.

Until now, at least; though he had only the barest idea about the significance of this seemingly harmless old coin, He knew when something was so out of his league he would need help. So he brought the coin to the church, trusting that the Bishop would handle the next step.

And now he was chained, actually CHAINED, in a church basement. He hadn’t seen the blow coming; Peter had gone white when Felix had shown him the coin, physically recoiling as though the sliver circle was spewing blasphemous profanities from just being exposed to the light. Wagner had growled at Felix’s clutched hand the entire ride, his ears pasted back. That was even stranger, as up to now Wagner had been content to lick his balls in peace.

The coin hadn’t felt wrong; A little cold, maybe, and maybe a shade too heavy for its diminutive size, shrunk by centuries of wear and tear. Felix was far from an expert in ancient coinage, but from the Roman lettering just barely visible along the coin he felt confident in concluding that it must be from some period of the Roman Empire. Which was remarkably unhelpful Felix reflected, considering the grand size and span of the legion at its peak.

His head still rang from the sudden blunt-force impact of the heavy vase, but Felix struggled to string his thoughts together; why had they chained him down here; what had they done with Wagner; how long had he been out? He checked the sky he could barely see through the small window set high in the wall of the cellar. Somewhere in him he knew, if he put his mind to it, he could break theses chains and wriggle to safety, or better yet reap fiery vengeance on the foolish mortals who-

Holy Ghost, where did that train of thought jump-rails from? Flummoxed as he was at the mo.’, Felix would never consider harming any member of the church. Maybe this is what the Bishop had been so concerned over; that some entity lurking in the coin was now coiling over his soul, warping it to the will of the Fallen. Felix hadn’t really ever believed in devils or angels, even after his hand had started its lite-brite imitation. He regarded the scripture as a decent attempt at using metaphors to help people to be better, but he’d never thought about the events therein as actually having happened.

In the cold darkness of the cellar Felix could hear whispers; at first he thought it must be people outside his door, but the more intently he listened the more Felix realized the whispers were in the room with him. They were not any language Felix could identify, but he felt the suggestion behind the words, they were offerings of power, promises of vengeance, urges toward violent retribution. The longer Felix listened the harder he found it to pull himself away, as if the voice was slowly swallowing him in its malevolence.

            A whine at the high window cut-off the insidious whispers; Felix tore his eyes away from the darkened corner he had been spacing-out into and espied the furry face of Wagner snuffling along the windowsill, pawing at the panes. Felix gulped a gasping, terrified breath. What the hell had just happened? Whatever was in this coin was dangerous, and meant to harm the people in this church. Felix couldn’t let that happen.

            Even now he could feel the anger boiling in the pit of his stomach like a pot left to simmer on a stovetop. He could see flashes at the edge of his vision, horrible distorted screams echoing in the cavernous darkness. His muscles flexed in reflexive terror and the chains slid from his once-bound limbs, the padlock holding them together sheared in twain. ‘When had that happened?’ Felix thought to himself as Wagner started barking and growling at the window well.

            Now standing Felix could see a bit better in the semi-darkness granted by the moon fluttering silver light into the cramped room. The window wasn’t as small as it had seemed from the far corner, and Felix was able to leap up to it with ease. He shooed Wagner back before neatly punching out the panes, the frame long-ago painted shut. Before he had even given it much thought his body had carried him up and out the window, the cool night air a refreshing stream washing away the stagnant stench of the cellar.

            He didn’t know where he needed to go; he just needed to get this willful malevolence away from innocent people. He didn’t care that they had hit him, at this point, he understood the danger they had been afraid of. Sighting on the Big-Dipper, Felix set off at a run with Wagner in-toe, bolting down the street and away from the church before the foul spirit caused him to do something he’d regret.

            He’d barely ran a few blocks before an ear-splitting shriek of terror pierced the otherwise quiet night-air; a woman’s voice, tinged with panic and pain, cried out for help before being cut short. Felix pivoted mid-stride, used to being in the right place in the right time. ‘This is probably why I was allowed to escape the cellar,’ Felix reasoned, used to being strong-armed into saving those in need from his lifetime of deific gentle guidance. As he checked left and right he found the street deserted, freeing up the option of Felix using his Fist if the girl was seriously hurt which was a bit of fortune in the normally crowded city.

            He raced down the narrow alley seeing the convulsing form of a man pressing into a struggling small body beneath, the shrieker Felix guessed. He darted forward, taking the man by the shoulder and roughly shoving him back; a disquieting ‘shluck’ sound split the night as the man was hurled back and fell limp, dead. Felix could see a neat slash across his throat, his mouth a medley of grisly ichor dripping down his ruined shirt. He glanced over his shoulder at the cowering form of the woman, who unfolded from her fetal position she had adopted beneath the man revealing the length of an entire human tongue dangling from her bloody mouth.

            Felix recoiled in stunned disgust from the woman as she smiled and drew towards him; her white sundress stained the deep red-brown of wet blood. She mewled with sexual pleasure as she devoured the tongue as though it was an otter-pop, noisily sucking the quivering muscle into her stained mouth before wiping her face clean (or at least more evenly smeared) with her sleeve. A smile split her face and she actually skipped the last few steps between herself and the back-peddling Felix. He got the feeling that whatever the Big Man had intended, he hadn’t had saving this lady in mind.

            She giggled before speaking, a gesture ruined by the droplets of blood still running down her chin. "You here to right some wrongs? My hero. How can I ever repay you?" she asked, sexually.

Felix scoffed. "You can't be serious." Felix thought about adding 'cliched bimbette' but was still a little too afraid to do so.

"Oh, I know how your tastes run. Perhaps I should introduce you to one of my friends. I can be quite the excellent wingman."

Wagner growled, a low warning bubbling in his chest barely registering as sound. "Like I need your assistance. I am in no way working with you," Felix said.

"Really. I thought you would be tired of how poorly your White God treats you. We don't discriminate like He does."

"He have never complained before. In fact He's given me quite a lot of power."

"You know nothing of power," the woman/Rosanna growled. "Thrice I ask and done. Join us and know true power."

The twisted dark whispers promised Felix the power to change the world to his vision, the chance to finally be free from the half-baked plan of the Maker. Felix considered the idea for the barest of seconds before throwing the foul coin at the horrid woman’s feet. “Hell. No. Bitch."

            The woman dived for the coin, hissing as she moved as her body changed; not shifted or transformed, but was one moment the slender form of a dark haired young woman, and the next a literal freaking demon with hooves, wings, horns on her head and even a damned slender tail twitching from behind her. She was faster than Felix could have expected, and in one fluid motion she had scooped up the coin in her newly-taloned hands and was on-top of Felix, straddling him as she held him against the dirty ground of the alley with casual ease.

"You ungrateful little bastard," she said, much too calmly. "It doesn't matter, we will have you anyway. Obsiel will devour you from within." Her hand brandished the coin like a child’s wafer. Felix raised his hands to shield his mouth and found the demon to be as strong as she was quick, a second set of eyes erupting above her face like shards of fiery fury. He tried to access his power, channel the force of God through his righteous fist, but he had never had to use it for self-defense and his power didn’t shine. Her claws inched closer even as he pushed against her arms with all his might, the coin wiggling between his lips.

A burning sensation erupted from where the coin touched him and Felix’s mind bloomed with pain as the feeling of hellfire consumed him. He opened his eyes and found the demon gone, or at least missing, as another loomed over him now; Felix’s entire body was incased in black, glossy stone, smooth to the touch but sickle-sharp as soon as he tried to free himself. The demon let out a rumbling basso laugh that rebounded endlessly around the cramped space the pair of them now occupied. After a moment it dawned of Felix that they were far from the cramped alley, in a small domed space seemingly made of tangible darkness. It's voice erupted from all around Felix.

"I’ve trapped your soul here in your mind, mortal, so you will watch as I take your form and unleash due wrath on the waking world the likes of which hasn’t been seen since before your kine grazed the ground." The twisted demon cackled taking merciless glee in watching Felix struggle against the jagged black stone.

"I won't let you have my mind," snarled Felix

"It is much too late for that. I already own your body, mind, and soul. They were mine the instant you touched the coin, though you did not know it. You are lost. We are the Denarians; we are the Fallen; you cannot fight us. You cannot kill us."

Piercing silver light shone down through the darkness, shattering the demesne created by the twisted demon. High-above in the clear night sky Felix could see the Big Dipper, bright and glorious in the sudden flood of starlight. A crystalline voice spoke through Felix then, booming in the silence of the still night; "You are right. you are the fallen, you cannot be killed. You’re Already DEAD"

The demesne fell away and Felix was once-more aware of the writhing demon-form of Rosanna atop him, still attempting to force the coin down his throat. His hand exploded into golden light, throwing the demon back as though she had been hit by a Mack truck; Felix spit the coin out from between his pursed lips where it hissed in the dirty puddle of the alley. Without thinking he brought his hand down in a fist of righteous judgment on to the coin which literally exploded into molten shrapnel, the heat of the blow splitting Felix’s knuckles with nearly-blinding pain. The spirit trapped inside the coin let out a shriek as its totem was obliterated, the soul of the fallen angel turning to smoke in the steady light still shining from Felix’s balled fist.

Rosanna just stared in shocked silence; "Pugno Muzania!? No, this can’t be!" she screamed before lunging in blind fury at Felix. Years of punching pretty much everything came back to Felix in a rush and he met the leaping demon with a tiger’s uppercut as she clawed at his face. The golden light of his fist flashed brilliant enough to give him spots in his vision, the split knuckle screaming in protest of its continued use; Rosanna soared into the air, her body pinballing off of the fire-escapes cluttering the upper walls of the alleyway. Black blood dripped down from her retreating demon form, her wings carrying her into the empty night. Wagner padded up to Felix’s side, letting out a remorseful howl as their quarry escaped.

Sudden footsteps thundered towards the mouth of the alley causing Felix and Wagner to look down the dim corridor in-time to see a dozen men, all dressed identically in drab dark-grey clothes, all armed to bear with heavy fully-automatic rifles. They each took aim down the alley, preparing to fire. Felix looked back and forth for some modicum of cover and came up empty; the only other thing left in the alley was the de-tongued corpse still slumped against the wall where Felix had thrown him. As the squad prepared to pepper the pair with deadly slugs a shadow leapt down from the rooftops, a shining Calvary saber clasped in both hands.

He landed heavily on the ground before the men, converting the energy into a roll as he lashed out with the blade once, twice, thrice; the gun in the hands of each of the men clattered to the ground, sliced neatly in two. Undeterred the squad immediately turned the attention to the newcomer, swarming him with clawing hands and a ferocity normally reserved for rabid animals. The scales a little more balanced with the sudden absence of firearms prodded Wagner into action as he charged down the alleyway and launched into the chest of one of the pugnacious minions like a furry cannonball, his coat shining with a faint silver nimbus of light.

Felix began to surge towards the combat to help but the mystery-man shouted for him to stop; "Stay out of my way!" he barked in a thick Russian accent. "You are injured and they don't need an ally."

"I was going to help you," Felix protested.

"Stay back, friend, and watch!" the man demanded, whipping his sabre around in an arc, shining light slicing limbs and heads from the menacing minions. Wagner let out a growl and smashed into the legs of another of the maddened men, knocking him prone and neatly in the path of the downward-arcing blade. After a minute of bloody, visceral battle the man and his dog stopped, the sliced pieces of the former aggressors quickly turning into a clear sludge before evaporating all together. The man muttered to himself in Russian as he wiped his blade clean before sheathing the saber neatly at his hip.

He stood and looked at Felix for the first time, his face kept impassive, his eyes scanning Felix, searching for something. "So," Felix started, but the man shook his head.

"Nyet. It still may be dangerous. My name is Sanya. Come with me, friend, and we shall have our fill of food and hopefully answers." For some reason, Felix found Sanya easy enough to trust; maybe he had a trustworthy face, or maybe it was the fact that he had just reduced a dozen men (or at least 10, Wagner did help after all) to jelly in less time than it took Felix to shave.

Before getting into Sany's car the Russian pulled a large emergency medical kit and handed it to Felix. By the time they got down to the Hurricane (this Russian had a odd choice of a 'safe' place) Felix had his hand all bandaged. Nothing was broken, thankfully, but there were some suspicious first and second degree burns blossoming over his knuckles that would probably scar. Felix ached for something stronger than the ibuprofen from the med kit and resoned whiskey would do for now until he got back to his ambulence.

They got a table in the back of the 24 hour diner and ordered. Sanya proposed he and Felix trade questions for answers, as he was sure they both had a lot to talk about…

[inspirecompetence]

Brief Cases: Or how I spent my summer vacation

(From the Freemont Fellowship. These are short stories to go between season one and two.)

  Feanor; Putting the Club in Fight Club

            The Pacific Northwest Flower & Garden Show was a thing of beauty; scores of busy mortals – people, Feanor corrected himself – bustled around the crowded convention center filled-to-burst with every variety of rose, lily, and rhodie a half-dryad could dream of. Feanor, freed from the shackles of responsibility from working for the man (he had chosen a slightly alternative outlook on the past events) had reveled in his new-found free time which allowed him to focus on his true passion; plants. Working as a freelance blogger for the Strangers website was more fulfilling anyway, he told himself over hot tea.

            He had turned in a few articles and been able to pay his bills, but his heart and soul had gone into his bonsai trees; Feanor had spent years cultivating his bonsai, and he had his eyes set on the Blue Ribbon at the garden show, and the $10,000 check that came with it. He had arrived at the show late due to the fragility of modern alarm-clocks and Feanor’s unconscious habit of smacking at things that beep shrilly with his Wood. He put on a presenter’s smile as he pushed through the crowded throng of the convention, fighting his way up flights of packed escalators to make it in time for the Judging.

            Feanor arose, breathless, at the top floor of the center, catching a glimpse clock on the wall and gladly seeing he still had ten minutes until the judging was supposed to start. He burst through the doors into the throng of tourists ‘oohing’ and ‘ahhing’ over laughable attempts at arrangement. Feanor permitted himself a confident smirk as he found his presentation table. He began setting up his tree and making last-minute checks along its tiny branches when a prickle up his spine caused him to check over his shoulders; along the various other tables a tableau of tittering women were sharing a dozen hushed conversations with eyes locked on Feanor, or more specifically, his arm.

            Feanor felt his smile slip into a scowl, but recovered it before turning to face his would-be competitors. “Hello ladies. Lovely trees you all have. May the best person win, eh?’

            Feanor had been prepared for scowls, trash-talk and the like; this was professional botany, and competition breeds bullies. What he hadn’t expected were ‘aww’s or whispers of ‘he is so Brave!’

            “Seems like you ladies have something on your mi-“

            “Your mother was here!” A rosy-cheeked plump younger woman cheeped from behind her miniature birch tree. Feanor groaned automatically. His mother, while he loved her to pieces, meant trouble wouldn’t be far behind.

            “What did she tell you?” Feanor asked, trying not to sound defensive or crestfallen. The collective women all chimed his virtues, bravery, sacrifice in the face of hardship, and Feanor got the distinct impression his mother had given these girls entirely the wrong impression. “Wait wait, somebody start from the beginning; What exactly did my mother tell you about me?”

            One woman, a brunette with a fiery look about her that reminded Feanor enough of Phoebe that he immediately didn’t like her stepped up and put her arm around Feanor in a sisterly way. “Rose was here to help us set up. She was early and cheerful. She even brought us all scones. We got to talking over tea and she told us about you and your…” the woman gestured at Feanor’s arm and whispered conpiratorily “cancer.”

            “Oi ve,” Feanor droned. This routine again; anytime his mother caught wind of Feanor competing in something she would inevitably show up and throw the scales in his favor. For his first spelling bee, she had ensured that all the other children were out with chicken pox. He hadn’t ever asked for it, she did it out of Motherly Love, at least so she claimed. And now Feanor was backed in to another gaffe with no-way out. He couldn’t tell these women ‘cancer? Nah, I’m half fairy!’ They’d look at him like he was a loony, and he didn’t picture it ending as smoothly as Iolanthe.

            So, cancer, sure, great. He let the women fawn over him like he was a weak lamb and hated every moment of it. When the judges came around Feanor had to fight to skew his scowl back into a presentable smirk. The judges were impressed, and as the three older ladies crept along he heard another whisper from one of them about how brave he was. Feanor couldn’t take any more and stormed out of the presentation before the judges had finished, desperate for fresh air free of his mother’s subtle taint.

            He stalked with his arm before him like a cattle-catcher on a freight-train, brusquely nudging aside anyone between him and the back entrance used for presenters. Feanor was in such a huff when he shoved the door open it plowed into a young woman carrying a massive potted fern, practically prehistoric in its scale, knocking her down and sending the pot toppling. Feanor’s wooden arm shot out like a jungle snake and caught the bottom of the pot, preventing it from smashing on the concrete of the stairway landing, before setting it down gently and profusely apologizing to the woman.

            She shot a scathing glare up at his eyes, but looked away hurriedly when she saw the sincerity in his apology. Though she didn’t accept Feanor’s offered hand up, she flashed him a brilliant smile while rubbing a darkening red welt on her forehead with the butt of her hand.

Mommy! the fern thought, willing itself foward the girl. That was different, Feanor thought. Usually plants could care less about the mortals that surrounded them.

"I am so sorry," Feanor said as she brushed herself off. "That is a spectacular fern, if I may say so."

"Thank you. And thank you for catching it! I would have been so upset, plants are like my babies, and this is my biggest baby. I'm Sierra. I need to get this in for judging, but I haven't been here before. The convention center is big!"  She adjusted a couple leaves as the fern cooed at the gentle attention.

"Oh, you just got here?" Feanor tactfully asked, wondering if she was privvy to all the gossip. "They just finished judging the bonsai; I can show you the way. I'm Feanor, by the way."

"Yes, Thanks so much!" Sierra looked relieved and showed no recognition of his name. His mother's lies hadn't made it this far. Feanor held the door open and helped Sierra to find her assigned table, discretely monopolizing her time so he wouldn't have to make eye contact with anyone else.

Suddenly a shriek echoed around the lofty roof of the convention center from the topiary displays; Feanor’s head jerked at the sound of panic and saw rising up above the heads of the attendees of the garden show a looming leafy mound. Several of the topiary exhibits seemed to have bonded together, creating a lumpy mass of twigs and leaves shuffling blindly across the hall’s floor, panicked mortals people fleeing before it.

"That thing! I- " Sierra half-muttered before shouting "We need to leave!" Urgency and fear tinted her voice. Feanor saw the shambling mound rise up over the head of a young child holding a tiny purple orchid and he saw red; no one was hurting a small, delicate flower if he had anything to say about it. Oh, and the kid too, he guessed.

            Feanor charged the thing at a fast woodsman’s gait, dodging through the crowd and towards the plant-beast at speed. He reached the monstrosity as it slowly began to bring its crushing appendage downward, and Feanor swung his cudgel of a limb in a scything arc through the mound’s midsection, neatly branching the beast in twain. Feanor smiled at the young girl, who screamed when she looked at his arm and ran, dropping the potted orchid and smashing the pot on the floor. Feanor cursed under his breath as he stared at the quickly-dying beauty before him, and then swore again more loudly as the two halves of the mound continued surging through the center, absorbing any plant life it touched.

            Soon two looming masses shuffled through the packed center, and Feanor decided that they should go with Sierra’s plan of getting the hell out. Finding her guarding her fern at the far end of the show Feanor shouted everyone in the direction of the presenter’s emergency stairway. The noise drew the attention of the shambling mounds as they pair of them converged on the panicked group making a break for the stairs.

"Don't worry, I'll stop them!" Feanor called, not entirely convincing himself, as people rushed past. He brought up his arm like a massive wooden hoplon, and the surge of the mounds crashed against his wooden limb like Sea-foam against a cliff face. He was pretty sure the blobs couldn't absorb him. Fairly sure. Almost positive.

            He braced his arm against the leafy tide. As the wave of former show-exhibits recoiled in preparation for another surge Feanor quickly stepped back, slamming the emergency door shut with his wooden arm hard enough to warp it in its frame; he brought a wooden fist down on the handle with enough force to neatly snap it off, effectively sealing the door shut. Feanor leapt the first flight of stairs, landing in a rough roll on the landing below and nearly colliding with Sierra.

            “We should be safe here, this stairway is wrought-iron, it’s an anathema to-“ Feanor caught himself before he shouted ‘fairy’ in a crowded stairwell. “…whatever the hell that thing is.” He finished. An echoing boom shook the stairs below him as the monster above still sought its way into the stairs. Feanor urged people to keep going as a massive fist of roots and vines smashed through the wall; the momentum behind the blow proved too-much as the fist smashed into the iron guardrail of the stairs and silver fire immolated the plant-mass on contact. As they continued to flee down the stairs they were met with a sooty-shower of leaves and the distinctive slime of beings from the NeverNever, ectoplasm.

            They emerged as a panicked crowd from the service entrance of the convention center, shunted into an awkward alleyway behind two tall buildings. The group was covered in quickly-evaporating slime, soon leaving them standing around in nothing more than a few stray leaves covered in soot.

"You weren't afraid." Sierra was suddenly very close to Feanor. "You saw a monster and you knew what to do."

"I guess it's all those Black Lagoon sequels," said Feanor lamely.

"And you're strong too."

"Ah, it's mostly just gravity." Feanor hefted his arm, slightly turning it to its good side. If this girl was flirting with him he was gonna have to flirt back. She had a strange glimmer in her eye though that gave Feanor pause.

"That was weird, and it's not the first weird thing I've seen in Seattle. I was wondering if you'd like to talk about it, maybe." Sierra rolled her eyes adorably up to Feanor's.

"Definitely!" Feanor said with sudden overt enthusiasm. "I mean, sure."

"Great!" Sierra pulled a sharpie out of her pocket and looked around for something to write on. Feanor profferd his arm and she wrote down an address. "This is where I'll be. Tomorrow night; seven’ o’clock. Sorry I don't have a phone." Her hands were calloused and soft. There was a stratum of soil under her nails.

"Sure, no problem," Feanor finally managed when he tore his vision from what were, in his soiled opinion, immaculate hands.

"See you tomorrow." Sierra smiled and dissapeared into the crowd. If this was a trap, Feanor knew he was screwed. But if it was a date...

*

Feanor hadn’t been exactly sure what to expect, but it hadn’t been a church. He stared up at the crucifix atop the high spire of the chapel on lower Queen Anne and suppressed a grimace; a date was a date, after all, and it was even a rarer occurrence for Feanor to be asked out by a woman who wasn’t secretly working with his mother. He knocked gently on the basement door Sierra had mentioned and a moment later a familiar, if entirely unexpected, face answered.

Detective Cookie was a Known Quantity in Seattle to those who were clued in; she was a sharp, persistent and extremely competent cop, who could have risen to the rank of captain easily if she hadn’t stayed a detective specializing in what is known on ‘the force’ as Blackbird cases, aka anything involving the spooky-side. She smiled when she saw Feanor, a muttered ‘Perfect’ escaping under her breath. As she opened the door into the small basement room Feanor saw several other women (and a few scrawny men to-boot) including Sierra standing nervously around a small snack-table.

“Gather ‘round everyone,” Cookie shouted to the nervous group of people in the basement; “Sierra has found us a new victim…” Cookie led Feanor into the room as the people inside began stretching and going through slow kata, practicing various tia-chi movements. Sierra bounded up to Feanor and Cookie, clearly excited and relieved that Feanor had made it.

"I'm glad you came. Sorry I didn't give you much info; Sifu” –and here she indicated Lt. Cookie- “practically made it the first two rules when we were getting started." Sierra was in excercise clothes, but Feanor could see dirty handprints on the thighs and *ahem* rump areas.

"Um," Feanor started, "didn’t you say you wanted to talk?"

"I realized show would be better than tell and, well, here you are. Unless you’ve busted out some fancy glamour on me." Sierra teased, playfully poking Feanor’s stiff arm.

Cookie stepped up to the pair. "Before you ask, these guys are all clued in. We even have a couple somewhat talented people here, like Sierra." Sierra smiled coyly, but did not look very embarrassed at the praise.

"I haven't seen any of these guys at the Fellowship." Feanor observed.

"Well, most folks don't like to advertize their knowledge." Cookie sounded hesitant, guarded; "This group is… a bit different."

"Different how?" Feanor cast a glance around the room and could feel the steady presence of energies pulsing in place; this dingy basement had a powerful enough ward on it that he could feel it in his bark.

"We take a more physical approach to the city's threats. We don't usually invite," there was a pause as Cookie obviously vetoed her first choice of words, "magical people, people who know how to defend themselves; besides this class isn't just for magical threats." Though Feanor wasn't receiving hostility directly, the furtive gazes from those in attendance definitely made him feel akin to a non-native transplant. Sierra saw the hesitance play over his face and jumped to the rescue.

"But we need your help; we’ve just been practicing with each other, which is good training but not very realistic. We were hoping we could use you for some advanced training."

"Wait, what kind of training?"

Cookie pointed to an old, battered padded suit, the kind, Feanor realized, normally used in women’s self-defense classes or when dealing with vicious dogs. Feanor was skeptical but blossomed into a smile when he caught Sierra looking hopefully at him. He heaved a heavy sigh and asked for help sliding into the padded outfit, swallowing the last dregs of his pride with it. Almost as soon as he had put the final piece of protective padding on his head Cookie spun in a roundhouse kick aimed for his temple; relying on adrenaline and reflex Feanor brought his heavily padded wooden arm in front of him, stopping the blow it its tracks.

Cookie allowed a rare smile to dance across her lips before giving him a curt nod. “Yes,” she said, “I think you’ll do nicely. Just don't let the other Fellowship guys know what you're doing." Now Feanor understood the getup; he didn't need it but it was a bit of blackmail. Feanor would keep Cookie's underground fight-club discreet, and Cookie wouldn't tell everyone how ridiculous he looked in the padded monstrosity of a suit.

Over the next few hours Feanor was a punching dummy for the impromptu fight-club, using his heavy limb as a shield to protect himself from blows while dodging the snake-like strikes many of the club favored. Queen’s greatest hits blasted out of the old tape-deck boom-box and Feanor was quickly able to hit his stride, turning the tides on the would-be attackers and wielding his heavy limb like an attached club, smashing his fist down in slowed, sparring blows.

Several hours later everyone was sweaty, panting, and exhausted, lying against the walls of the divine dojo and snacking on fruit-leather someone had brought as a poor-excuse for snacks. Feanor had a sudden, albeit brief, pang of longing as he thought of Cheaux’s impromptu catering skills. Sierra lay next to him, her head resting on his still-padded arm, a tired smile across her face. The club dispersed for the week after confirming the time for the next meeting, and Feanor found himself agreeing to come back. Sierra locked her arm around his, smiling up at him.

“C’mon,” she said, “I’ll let you walk me home.”

[inspirecompetence]

Brief Cases: Or how I spent my summer vacation

(From the Freemont Fellowship. These are short stories to go between season one and two.)

Andrew: Fresh Prince of Seattle

              Drew sat on his usual stool at Captain Blacks in the early-afternoon heat; practically the bars only customer, Drew drank enough for two people, which made sense really. In June Drew had attended an engagement brunch, and practically ended up married himself. Now a very old-fashioned gentleman’s ghost had more-or-less taken up a permanent residence in his head, and his life had plummeted to startling new depths of complicated.

            The old TV crackled with faint static from its mount on the wall, but then any TV Drew looked too-hard at these days would pretty quickly wobble to indecipherable levels within a few minutes, and that wasn’t even the worst of it; Drew leered out at the blurred lines of the world through thick, dark sunglasses pressed tight against his face to impede the unholy flood of images swimming before him. Since accepting the bonding ritual to the Genus Loci known as Toby (or Tobias, if he was feeling formal) Drew had come to share his personal brain-space with the spirit of the former Seattle industrialist, allowing him to tap in to the digital data that flowed through the city. Actually, not so much ‘allow,’ perhaps ‘force’ would be more apropos.

            It wasn’t that Drew minded the info available to him from tapping in to the intellectus; the bigger problem was the sheer volume of the bombardment of never-ending updates. Andrew knew, with scarcely a moment’s thought, the times for every bus in the city proper; he could track the Fellowship through their texts and emails, if he wanted to; he knew the movie times, happy hours, cab rates and proximity for every possible location for miles around. The other side of the coin was the perpetual deluge of irrelevant status updates, tweets, and blogs gushing through the ether, which Drew was just-as-much aware of. The problem was that there was no filter, no friends list, and no locked accounts: Andrew saw it all, whether he wanted to know about it or not.

            The booze helped, for what it was worth; it took Drew nearly twice as many drinks to fell the effect these days. Toby said it was because he was drinking for two, like a mother, only he promised not to burst from his chest unless it was unavoidable. Toby’s alcoholism made Andrew feel as though his interest in alcohol previously had been more speculative than practiced. Toby drank as though the proof preserved him, egging Drew to drink two whiskeys with breakfast just to get them both staggering out the door. Even now in the sweltering heat of the mostly vacant bar a line of drained tumblers sat on Drew’s left side, Toby occasionally twitching the arm up to the mouth with such fervor they had more whiskey on them than in them at this point.

            The staff didn’t care; Drew was known here, even with his new physical quirks and dark shades, and as long as he stayed polite and could pay they would let him drink the summer down. Drew stared out through the World Wide Web through the bottom of his glass before setting another drained tumbler down with more force than he had strictly meant to. His limbs felt tired and too-heavy, as if the added spirits piled invisible mass onto his flesh. He couldn’t keep drinking like this, he knew, as Toby scrolled their collective current bank balance on a ticker-tape of info constantly scrolling along the bottom of their shared vision like his own personal CNN. He needed money, a job, and something to keep him from dying of liver failure before 2011 came ‘round.

            “Ooh! My show’s on!” the ghostly voice of Toby burped to Drew; his head snapped to look at the television and with a wink of his left eye (Toby seemed to have a modicum of control over Drew’s left side) the TV switched from the afternoon local trashy judge shows just as Will Smith’s Fresh Prince was starting on TBS. Drew glared at the screen hard enough to distort the audio for a second before he pulled his vision back to the bar, his left eye still locked on the screen. This had become an all-too-common practice of late, as Drew sighed and tried not to think about what would happen to his brain if his two eyes focused differently for too long.

            Toby drunkenly sang his own interpretation of the theme through his cultural language filter (see attached), with little regard for the music’s meter or rhyme scheme. Drew was muttering angrily to his selves when the bar man approached; “Everything good, Drew?”

            Drew twitched his head to get both eyes on Alex, the man running the bar today. “As always, Al- Great Scott! Is that the time?! We’ve got to go!” Drew’s left leg lurched painfully as it smacked into the neighboring stool. Alex gave him (them) a curious look before saying that he’d get their bill. What the hell, Toby? You’re not supposed to use my mouth! We’ve been over this! Drew shouted internally. Dreadfully sorry old-boy, but I just remembered we have a chore to handle today! Jolly good, get the lead out what-hwhat Toby replied through drunken, slurred speech. “What kind of chore?” Drew asked, realizing a moment to late he’d said it aloud.

            “What?” Alex asked from the register.

            “Oh, uh, nothing, nevermind” Drew muttered, embarrassed. I need you to… Toby hesitated, which Drew recognized as unusual; Toby had very little filter and spoke freely (a little too freely, at times) about most things. What could make an old, drunk ghost pause? We need to go and…acquire my previous lodgings. You mean the fortune machine from the magic shop? The very same Toby belched, giving Andrew a slimy sensation inside his mind. Gross.

            Alex brought the bill and it took Drew a minute to clear his vision enough to make out the faint numbers on the receipt. He gaped at the $80 worth of alcohol he had apparently consumed. Screw it, he thought, and tipped Alex another $20 for putting up with him, spending the last hundred dollars to his name. It was official; Andrew needed a job. He dragged his body & Toby, already having forgotten his task after a particularly witty quip from Geoffrey, out the door so he could talk to Toby without fear of judgment and alienation from his favored drinking hole.

            Why do you need the old bucket of bolts, anyway? Drew thought as he shuffled through back-alleys, knowing with the familiarity of decades the quickest route to the nearest bus that would take him to the market. It’s the principal of the thing, chap. Think of it like one of the womenfolk bringing along her toothbrush for an overnighter wink wink Toby chortled. That is not making me feel any better about this, Tobes. Drew stalked to the bus stop knowing with total certainty that the next bus would arrive in less than 3 minutes. Look, Andy, just go down there and talk to Tony. Tell him you’ve bound yourself too me. You can even let me do the talking if you’d like. No way! Drew hissed. Not after you almost got me killed last time. Come now, Andy, that idiom was perfectly commonplace in my- Well it’s not your time anymore, Toby, and you can’t say Porch Monkey, got it? Drew shouted in his head, familiar with this particular defense of Toby’s.

            The bus arrived, and it was at this point Drew realized despite his wealth of knowledge, his monetary wealth was severely diminished. He made a show of checking his pockets, but when he came up dry the driver scowled at him and muttered something about ‘fucking junkies’ before pointing a rough thumb to the back, letting Drew on. The pair of them continued to argue as the crowded bus rolled down the hill to Seattle’s downtown, though Toby eventually convinced Drew to go to the magic shop; he was too tired, too broke and too bored to do anything else anyway.

            The Market was its usual packed self during the hot summer day; tourists and kids crowded the tight corridors, each shoving to see their turn of the singing fisherman or donut assembly line. Drew allowed Toby, with his increased familiarity to the market, take the lead and they were able to duck/dodge through the throng of elbows and knees before skipping down a flight of stairs to the hard-wood floor of the lower market. According to Toby the market went even deeper, if you knew the right set of stairs, and would lead into the feywilds or blackreaches if you looked deeply enough. The idea had a small appeal to Drew but Toby pressed him forward before he had a chance to escape their current task.

            As they approached the magic shop a familiar face appeared in the doorway; Mrs. Triebowits, as Drew had taken to calling her, stepped out of the crowded shop with an emerald-green motorcycle helmet tucked under her arm. She smiled at Andrew, winked at Toby (Toby specifically, somehow) and click-click-clicked upstairs on viridian stilettos. Andrew watched her go, paying attention to some attributes more than others, before Toby coughed loudly to get his attention. Drew shouldered the door open and was exuberantly greeted by the shop’s owner, Tony Dennisson.

            “And aren’t you two a sight for sore eyes!?” Tony shot out, drawing bewildered looks from the few browsing customers in the store as they looked to only see one person.

            “Are we?” Drew ventured.

            “You can be damn well bloody sure of that!” Tony chuckled. “Seems you owe me a debt, Drew-my-boy, the Rosasidhe just traded it to me donchaknow.”

            “The who did…what?” Drew floundered, struggling to get a grip on the fast-flying conversation.

            “What, dontcha know Rose? She just left, you must have seen her!?”

            “Feanor’s mom? What did you call her?” Drew was lost, and Toby seemed stone-quiet.

            “Feanor’s mother, is she, that’s a juicy tidbit if I know my salt. You’ll be here for the old box then?” Tony nodded at the fortune-teller in the back. “Shame to see it go; Just as well, woulda had ta put it inta storage what with the Elvis coming in.”

            “What, you’re not, like, mad or whatever?” Drew asked skeptically.

            “Nah,” Tony replied casually. “I already told ya, traded for yer debt, why would I be mad for a gopher?”

            “What do you mean, ‘traded’?”

            “Stars & stones she weren’t lying, you really are a clueless sod. Look, come back tonight and I’ll explain everything. For now though, take this;” Tony held out a large post-it note with an intricate sigil drawn over it. “It’ll shrink down the dummy, dummy, so small you can fit it in yer pocket if all is to be believed.”

            Drew stared at the sigil but didn’t reach out to take it. “Isn’t it supposed to be like, bad luck or something to take a gift from…” Drew cast suspicious looks around the shop, in case any of the browsers were taking an interest in the odd conversation. “You people?” he finished lamely.

            “Oh, did you just say you people? Did I honestly just hear a ‘you people’!?” Now the browsers were looking, staring daggers at Drew in open contempt. “I’m just clowning you, dope. You’re right though, ain’t nobody supposed to accept anything from fairies, but that didn’t seem like it’d stop you since you were already neck-deep in debt to the rosasidhe. ‘Sides, this ain’t even mine, ‘s yours anyway.” Tony said, flicking the note at Drew so precisely that it stuck to the breast of his jacket like a moth.

            “What do you mean it’s mine?” Drew spat, recoiling from the sigil lest it explode in over-sensitized awareness.

            “Look, dummy; you came in here last night, blind drunk, scribbled this thing down, said you’d be back for it today, then left. Jeesy-peets man, I knew you were tossed but I didn’t think you’d black the whole mess out!” Tony looked all-too-amused by this revelation as the surprised Drew turned angry thoughts inward.

            Toby, Drew seethed, what is he talking about?! I…look, Andy…I knew we’d need to be down here anyway…and sooo… You took control of my body without asking!? I never asked before, figured it wouldn’t be a problem. What do you mean before? How long has this been happening? No worries chap, not long, not long at all, just since we bonded. Juneish? June-ish? Toby, we’ve been bonded for months? How could you not tell me you were gallivanting along with my body for joy rides!?!

            Tony stood and chuckled as if he could hear the quarrel. Drew turned an irate eye to him. “You let me walk in here, not under my own power, and accepted a sigil from me? Why?”

            “Easier than saying no to a drunk man. ‘Sides, I’m always looking to collect on stray favors.” He said this with a wink, which again was somehow only meant for Toby. “Look, there’s your little sigil, slap it on the box and be off with you. Be back here at 9 tonight when I’m closing up shop.” With that he shooed the squabbling pair away. True to his word, when Drew slapped the note on the machine and sent a whisper of will into it the machine shrank before his eyes, until it was the size of a small fridge.

            Not exactly pocket sized, Drew noted to himself. His sigils had been weaker since he got rid of the book, not that he could read much these days anyway with his permanent barrage of the city’s tweets. Drew hefted the heavy box and had to duck-walk his way to the closest bus stop; the next bus going by his place would arrive in 5 minutes. Unfortunately, the second driver was far less accepting of a junkie carrying what was clearly a stolen piece of junk, and Drew was forced to furiously hike up Capitol Hill back to his apartment where he collapsed in exhaustion.

            When he awoke, someone was slapping him in the face; upon closer investigation (which, in this context, involved opening his eyes) Drew found that he was slapping himself in the face. C’mon Anduriel, up and at ‘em Toby chimed. Drew took stalk of his surroundings and noticed he was standing in the lower hall of the Market for the second time that day, though he hadn’t recalled the journey down. TOBY! Did you ghost-walk my damned body again?! Figured you could use the sleep, chap, not that it seems to have helped much. Drew ached. The thought that his body not getting a chance to rest from midnight rambles crossed his mind and he scowled to himself. Before he could chew Toby out proper, Tony stepped out of his shop and locked the door behind him.

            “Hey! Look who it is, thought I’d have to break your legs to get you down here on your own,” Tony said as he threw fake punches at Drew’s gut.

            Drew glared at the overly jovial new-york accent Tony drawled out, stating “Not on my own. Toby walked us down here without my permission.”

            “Haw, yeah, he’s a scamp, gotta watch out for that one, kid. Listen, we gotta square this debt between us, capice?”

            “What debt are you talking about?” Drew half-screamed, anger boiling in his overworked and underfed stomach.

            “Look, you made a deal with Rose, yeah? Midsummer, bonding ceremony, whole deal right?” Tony gestured at the Ipad Drew carried in its protective case, which served as some kind of vessel for Toby. “You make a deal with a fairy; you owe that fairy a debt. Now, for reasons we’re not gonna go in to, Rose traded me your debt for something that ain’t any of your business. So now, you’re my new gopher.”

            “Hold on, she can just sell you my debt like that?” Drew demanded.

            “If the price is right, sure enough. I had something she wanted, she had you. We traded, simple as breathin’. Be glad of it, mate; anything I ask you fer is bound to be less trouble than dealing with her.” He tossed Drew something out of history: an old but pristine pager. “Keep that with ya. Keep it on. If it beeps, you call the number. If you’re late…” An evil grin split Tony’s face, and for a moment he blurred as the glamour over him was dropped revealing the spiny, grinning being from the NeverNever beneath. “I’ll come a callin’ and trust me, love, nobody wants that. What debts can’t be repaid in kind can just as easily be taken in blood.”

            “Are you trying to threaten me?” Drew accused, unnerved by the momentary flash of fairy-flesh.

            “Nothin’ of the sort, sport. Look, you owe me now, and the jobs’ll be easy; I call you, you come see me, pick up a little package, no big deal, go do a gig, come back and get paid. Look, I got somethin’ for ya already; Kid’s batmitzva, up on Phinney. I’ll send you the address, it’s tomorrow at noon. Show up, do some magic for the kiddies, and when the time comes to make the switch you’ll know it. Bring what you get back here and you’ll have one under your belt.”

            “And that’ll make us square?” Drew asked hopefully.

            After Tony’s belly-laughter had died down, he rested a hand on Drew’s shoulder and wiped a too-green tear from his eye. “Oh, Kid, you slay me. I’ll tell you when we’re square. Here’s an advance on the first job, just to get you going.” He handed drew a wad of bills, mostly twenties. There was at least $300.

            “I don’t know any magic tricks though.” Drew protested.

    ��       “Then you better figure some out fast, unless you like being pelted with gafiltafisk. Good luck, kid. Take this chest of old tricks from the shop and see what you can work out. You only have to have a 15 minute set for tomorrow, the rest of the time you’ll man the bar. That’s where you can expect the trade.” Tony pointed at the blue plastic crate at his feet.

            Drew looked at the crate and was about to argue but when he looked back up Tony was gone. Just then the pager buzzed and beeped, an address scrolling across its pathetically tiny screen. Drew sighed. At least he had found a job, and got paid. He picked the crate up (the damned thing weighed more than the fortune-teller) and hauled his ass back up the hill to his apartment where he collapsed into bed and forbade Toby from any more wanderings until he was rested.

            The rest of the summer flew by in a busy, blustery blur; Tony would page almost daily with gigs for Drew, from kids parties to corporate jobs. Drew was always expected to perform some stage-magic, and then would man a bar at the gigs until he met his contact and they’d make a trade. The packages from Tony were always small parcels, and he never asked what they were or what was inside. He considered it once, but Tony shot the idea down before Drew had even articulated it.

            Drew kept so busy he didn’t see hide or hair of the Fellowship besides Felix, who still showed up for the occasional drink at Captain Blacks. Drew was making enough dough to keep himself pretty well preserved in drink; he spent so much time and money at the bar they were able to afford expanding their patio, and were grateful enough to Drew for the business they kept a stool reserved for him. It didn’t bother Drew that the stool was in the back, away from the eyes of the nervous nellies, he enjoyed the respect the bar paid him (in the form of whiskeys and scotches, naturally).

            The work kept him busy and flush, and he enjoyed the chance to practice magic; after a few gigs Tony said the clients claimed the kid had a knack for it. It seemed simple enough to Drew, and he worked his way up the tricks to some pretty complicated stuff by the end of the summer. He and Toby were able to pull-off cold-reading schemes for most groups, using Toby’s access to social media to illuminate secreted facts about party goers. For the first time since Drew came to Seattle he felt like he was hitting his stride.

            It wasn’t until one night in late August that Drew and Toby argued again. Drew had been sleeping better since he let Toby have it, and he had assumed the late-night wanderings had ceased; when he awoke this night, the air was cold, clammy, and stale, as if there had been little-to-no air flow in years. Drew glanced around him trying to get his bearings and slapped a hand at where his bed-side light lay. His hand splashed in cold, stagnant water as the arm found no light to be found. In the pitch black he called out to Toby, demanding an explanation.

            Toby sighed. There used to be so many of us, not long ago. Toby’s voice was laced with sadness, the thought filtering through Drew’s mind. Where have all the flowers gone, Andromeda? Toby, man, what’s up? Where are we? Drew tried to keep the panic from the tone of his thoughts, but the enveloping black and cold of his surroundings were plucking on his nerves. Worry not, Andrew. We are in The Underground. I had hoped to catch up with old friends. Friends? Like, other ghosts? Aye, indeed. I came a'hunting for ghosts but they’re all long-gone ‘twould seem. Gone where? Did they, you know, pass on? No, I’m afraid not. Their shades would leave an impression still if they had passed on. It’s as if… Toby trailed off. What? Can ghosts die or something? Not exactly. The life energy of a shade cannot dissapate but it can change or be exchanged. No, it’s as if something simply gobbled them up; sucked their presence clean from the city. A chilling thought. I am sorry to have bothered, Andy. Turn on my light and I can guide you out.

            Drew found the Ipad sitting next to him, and after fiddling with the screen to get the app ready he turned on the flashlight widget that whited-out the screen of the Ipad, turning it’s display into a flat plane of pure, white light. Blinded by the sudden presence of the light it took Drew some time to adjust to the room; it was a small, dank chamber, as he had guessed, lined with shallow, stone seats before what appeared to be an altar of sorts. We used to come down here and share, talk, what passes for living among the dead. As his eyes adjusted, Drew could make out one final detail, carved into the stone by razor-sharp claws, apparently. In blocky, slashed lettering, words clung to the back wall of the chamber: From below us it devours.

            The words were unsettling to both Drew and Toby in a way they could not place. As a small tremor shook the chamber Drew’s legs made the decision without checking in with him first and the pair high-tailed it from the deep, forgotten tomb. It wasn’t until they breached the surface and Drew had gulped several lung-fulls of fresh (fresh-ish at least, for being in Pioneer Square) air that they were able to compose themselves enough to speak. What was that down there? Why did my body run from it like I was a terrified animal? I felt it too. I don’t know what it means, but I think I know what happened to the ghosts; something below the city, something ancient and powerful… In truth, I think something ate them, Andrew. What kind of thing could do that? Haven't a clue, but whatever it is, heaven protect us if it ever gets hungry for more.

            The thought blew a chilly wind over Drew’s spine. He bunched up his new leather jacket, checked the schedule ticking away over his vision, and hiked though forgotten alleys to the bus. He hoped to get a hold of the Fellowship soon; maybe someone else would know about what lies beneath Seattle. For now, Drew checked his beeper, reminded Toby to get him up in time for their gig tomorrow, and headed home to get some sleep.

[inspirecompetence]

Toby the Ghost

(From the Freemont Fellowship. Toby was a fascinating character our friend came up with and even though they never played Toby became an integral character to the story. Here is his backstory.)

Toby lived in Seattle all of his life and survived the Great Seattle Fire of 1889. As a young rich man he traveled the world and enjoyed its many flavors, including the cornucopia of tastes provided by brothels. He nearly married the matron of Seattle’s most famous brothel, Nellie Curtis.

After the fire he stayed in Seattle to help rebuild the city, though his name was never put on anything. Although he was not actually magically “clued in” he started to see some of his old friends that had died in the fire and realized they were ghosts. The possibility of staying in his beloved city after he died intrigued him, and through a difficult process he made a deal with a mysterious entity so that he might haunt the city after his body had passed.

Sure enough, upon his death at the age of 62 his contractor had his ghost tied to a, then new, mechanical fortune telling machine. These days it is a fixture of the magic shop in Pike Place Market. Toby loved to wander the market at night and talk to his fellow ghosts and learn what was new in his city.

But Toby soon found he was not like other ghosts. Over the years he learned and changed, which is impossible for a normal ghost. After practice haunting the fortune machine Toby realized he could manipulate other machines as well and even speak to regular people through these new telephone things. As time passed and wires were put in everywhere Toby realized he could travel through them like an electric current. As long as he stayed inside the wires or a physical object he could move around during the day without being destroyed by the sunlight.

Toby is strongly drawn to our Freemont Fellowship group. He has a sense of familiarity with all of them, but especially Andrew and chooses to haunt Andrew’s phone most of all. As a ghost he has “the sight” which normally allows wizards to see the energies of the world. Most recently he was able to point out a spot where alchemy had been performed and could see the leftover radiation from the unstable elements used. Toby also knows how to use computers and can get into files normally hidden from the general public (most commonly police records).

Unfortunately, Toby sees the world through the lens of his time. Even though he can zip through wires and access computers he has no idea how they work. When communicating he always has trouble finding the right vocabulary to accurately tell his friends what he knows. Even if he has the relevant information he may not know it as he cannot easily connect abstract thoughts because he just doesn’t have the same way of thinking.

[inspirecompetence]

Feanor Gets Kidnapped

(From [Un]Wizzards Season 1, Episode 4: The World Wide Web - What happened to Feanor when he couldn’t attend.)

Feanor had some work to catch up on but he didn’t want to write about his, um, date and writing about the Seattle troll seemed cliché. He pondered for quite a while before falling back on the simple “X tv show/movie is making fae look bad” article. Other than that, Feanor had a supernatural free week.

Until Andrew texted him.

Andrew asked Feanor to meet him at Captain Black’s on Capitol Hill. Andrew drank there all the time so Feanor wasn’t worried when he showed up that evening. Andrew was there with Ravens and was puzzled. He hadn’t sent Feanor a text and his phone was in fact missing. The three agreed that this must be a trap.

They headed out the back and ran into a group of eight strangely dressed men. They were almost identical in their entirely black outfits with glassy eyes and damp skin. Ravens murmured a tired word and changed into a humming bird and sped off. Andrew dodged in a gap between the guys and started sprinting down the alley and two men chased after him, but the other six began advancing on Feanor. He held up his arm to protect himself. One of the men took a glowing thing out of his pocket and threw it at Feanor.

As soon as the tiny glowing bug hit Feanor it somehow split into hundreds of tiny beetles that were lit with fire from within. They wriggled into the cracks of Feanor’s arm and started scratching and burning inside him. Feanor freaked. He barely noticed the net wrapping him as he thrashed his arm around trying to shake the bugs loose. Unconsciousness finally enveloped Feanor.

~~~

Feanor was only vaguely conscious when the gunfire started. He was more comfortable that he should have been in such a cramped space and he realized that he was planted in soil with his arm sticking up and out. He tried to move but he was enclosed in some sort of pot. When he remembered the bugs he tried to thrash even more but the soil was packed too tightly.

He could definitely hear muffled gunfire outside. There was also the creak of big metal doors and someone was pulling on his arm and digging his head out. Meri and Cheaux hauled Feanor out of his pot and he shook himself all over to make sure there were no bugs. It was hard to mutter about them as well.

Cheaux helped Feanor outside as he limped on his sore legs where they ran into a group of small time practitioners, most of whom Feanor recognized. As they tried to head away from the shipping containers (Feanor now saw they were in the sodo shipyards) a very large man blocked their path.

“Not that way,” he said in a thick Russian accent. “Too much crossfire. They are coming this way. Into that container. It will protect us.”

The group hobbled into the next open container and saw Andrew and an EMT taking the chains of Xandrix, the wizard from the LaConner incident.

“We’re pinned down,” said the Russian who had came in last.

Xandrix, whom Andrew was now supporting, looked straight at Meri and said “You have to open a way.”

Meri looked hesitant but tore a slit into the NeverNever as the wizard pulled a stone out of his pocket and murmured to it. Xandrix placed the stone on the floor and they retreated into the NeverNever. As the gap closed there was a whine and a growing light that was quite disconcerting.

The NeverNever was cold and icy. Meri looked uncertain and the big man looked strained, but Phoebe kept everyone moving despite the cold and the fact that no one was dressed for it.

“Here!” Meri called. They were looking at a freestanding door in the middle of nowhere. She opened the door and they entered a bedroom with lots of dark wood and fine furniture. There was also an exuberant looking hobo.

“Meri!” the hobo yelled and embraced her. “I’m sorry I was such a drama queen. Here, let me send your friends home so we can talk about it.”

So this was Coyote, Meri’s husband. Feanor had much he wanted to ask but he was exhausted and Coyote was hurrying everyone away through their own personal portals. Feanor graciously took the god’s offer and went home to sleep.

As he started chronicling the adventure the next morning he realized Ravens wasn’t in the rescued party. What had happened to him? And who was the large Russian whom Coyote called a minotaur? What about the EMT? Feanor had never seen him in the magical community before.

Questions questions.

[inspirecompetence]

Andrew Gets Kidnapped

(From [Un]Wizzards Season 1, Episode 4: The World Wide Web - What happened to Andrew when he couldn't attend. UPDATED WITH NEW LOST DIALOUGE)

Andrew woke in the early afternoon one day and checked his phone to find a voicemail from Ravens. The line was filled with static but Andrew could still hear Raven’s requesting assistance with a ritual he was setting up at the Fellowship building. Andrew threw on some clothes and headed out.

At the building Andrew met a haggard but happy Ravens. Ravens explained how there had been an outbreak of magical rabies, for lack of better words, and he had been working hard on the cure.

“Think of building a ward like building a house,” Ravens told Andrew as they began to work on the Fellowship building. “Small things, like what Daniel Moleg does, are like sand. The parts are small and insubstantial and very hard to build on. The sand can be shifted easily and the building can fall apart. Buildings are solid ground. Easy to build on but an earthquake or flood can wipe them out. That’s what we have here.”

Ravens continued his circuit of the building, encouraging Andrew to feel the energies he had already put up. Andrew couldn’t quite tell what Ravens was talking about, but he faked it. After a while Ravens continued his metaphor.

“A house, no, a home has a foundation. It is a tree. As people live in the home its roots grow deep into the earth. The tree grows and its stability is its own protection. It is very easy to build a long lasting ward on a home. The tree bends but does not break. Only great power can knock it down.”

“Cool,” said Andrew for lack of comment. “Hey, can I ask you something? Why is your name plural?”

Ravens smiled as if he had heard this question many times. “Because ravens are never alone. Neither am I.”

“Right.” Mystic answer.

Ravens got out a piece of paper to show Andrew. “Here is the base of the ward we are going to lay down. What do you see?”

Andrew fought to get his focus. This pattern was very different from his own style. It looked tribal. Well, duh, Raven’s was native American.

“Uh, well,” Andrew started. “You have obvious water symbolism because… water grounds out magical energies, right. But the focus is kind of… static. If we are doing a cleansing we would want something more active than just a large chunk of protection. Like if you stretch this wave…”

Andrew made some adjustments and Ravens smiled in encouragement. Andrew’s head was hurting again though. He needed a drink.

Ravens put up a sign on the door and left a voicemail for Meri Hall, and then they headed out to Captain Black’s to celebrate. Felix was supposed to show up there later anyway.

They headed out the back and ran into a group of eight strangely dressed men. They were almost identical in their entirely black outfits with glassy eyes and damp skin. Ravens murmured a tired word and changed into a humming bird and sped off. Andrew watched it dart around in an obvious pattern before leaving, so at least they would have someone gone for help. Andrew dodged in a gap between the guys and started sprinting down the alley but something wrapped around his legs and he went down. His legs looked to be wrapped in a leathery plant, maybe kelp? It was dripping everywhere and tightening around his ankles. Two of the men came over with more kelp in their hands. Andrew looked past them to Feanor and saw the rest of the men advancing on him. The other men were on him and put a hand on his face. Unconsciousness enveloped Andrew.

~~~

Andrew only woke a couple of times. He could see a big door and other people around him, all bound up in kelp like him. His mouth tasted like salt and he couldn’t form a coherent thought.

That is until the gunfire. He could hear lots of weapons going off and ringing thunks as bullets hit something thick and metal. Something that he was in. Andrew’s mind started to clear and he realized he must be in one of those big metal shipping containers. As he got his bearings he heard another blast from the other end of the container and the door began to creep open. Bright light came flooding in and with it people Andrew knew.

Meri, Cheaux, Phoebe, her dog Pushkin, and leading the way was Felix. Felix had never looked more attractive. He seemed to be the source of the light. Felix went to Andrew first and ripped the kelp ropes apart. He slapped Andrew’s face, healing a cut he didn’t know he had. There were others in the container that Felix and Cheaux went to help as Meri darted out and said “Clear!” to a person Andrew couldn’t see.

There were six more people tied up, but soon they were freed and shuffled outside in a small group. Meri had already opened the next container. Felix looked in, puzzled and continued to the next container where a huge smiling man was busting up the lock. Andrew followed Felix in to a sight of horror. A man was chained to the ceiling and the walls and was dripping blood from a hundred cuts into a small pan under him. He raised his head and one eye had a huge gash over it, the eye itself looking deflated.

Felix, glowing with power, wound up and punched the man in the face as hard as he could. The man’s head snapped back and when it came back his face was whole and perfect. He looked shocked and with his healed face Andrew recognized him as Xandrix from the LaConner incident.

Andrew helped Felix get Xandrix down as the sounds of gunfire got louder and the rest of the group came into the container. Cheaux and Phoebe were helping Feanor, who looked shaken and the last people in were Meri and the man Andrew didn’t know.

“We’re pinned down,” said the man, in a heavy Russian accent.

Xandrix, whom Andrew was now supporting, looked straight at Meri and said “You have to open a way.”

Meri looked hesitant but tore a slit into the NeverNever as the wizard pulled a stone out of his pocket and murmured to it. Andrew caught  a whisper of “They won’t be a problem anymore.” Xandrix placed the stone on the floor and they retreated into the NeverNever. As the gap closed there was a whine and a growing light that was quite disconcerting.

The NeverNever was cold and icy. Meri looked uncertain and the big man looked strained, but Phoebe kept everyone moving despite the cold and the fact that no one was dressed for it.

“Here!” Meri called. They were looking at a freestanding door in the middle of nowhere. She opened the door and they entered a bedroom with lots of dark wood and fine furniture. There was also an exuberant looking hobo.

“Meri!” the hobo yelled and embraced her. “I’m sorry I was such a drama queen. Here, let me send your friends home so we can talk about it.”

There was some talk about the big Russian being a minotaur, but Andrew was tired. He excepted Coyote’s offer and a way opened right next to Captain Black’s.

Andrew walked home and flung himself into bed. Then he groaned suddenly. He still didn’t have his phone!

[inspirecompetence]

Mother's Day

(From [Un]Wizzards Season 1, Episode 6; Gathering Storm)

Feanor got out of the taxi at the Seattle Museum of History and Industry in the center of the arboretum. He had never been inside the MoHaI as little of the history/industry for a city interested him. There would be far too-few exhibits about plants, and placards about old automobiles were as revolting to Feanor as a bloody steak. He didn’t know why his mother was here, much less why he was carrying lukewarm Chinese food with him.

Feanor had to at least appreciate meeting in the arboretum. Some majestic plant-life enriched the air here, and Feanor’s bark and roots just felt fresher as he stepped off the paved parking lot away from the taxi and onto the freshly-mowed grass of the lawn in front of the museum. The Chinese food in his hand hung heavily, several orders of delicious barley-green noodles from Shanghai Garden in china-town wafting enticing scents by Feanor’s nose. He moved to step into the shadow of the looming stone building when the grass called out to him in a faint voice: “Your Mother awaits!”

Feanor turned back to talk to the shrill whistling voice of the blades. “I know, thank you, I’m going to see her now.”

“Not in there!” The grass cried, each single blade singing out its pennywhistle voice in a shrill harmony. “Your Mother awaits you in the woods!”

“What?” Feanor turned to look at the lawn. “But she told me to meet her here in her message!”

“Uhhh…” the grass hesitated. Feanor didn’t blame them. Grass was seldom composed enough to say much of anything, let alone maintain much of a dialogue. “Your Mother awaits you in the woods!” the grass repeated.

“Empty night, this is so like her” Feanor grumbled, looking into the deep shadows of the woods. It’s not that Feanor would mind the stroll through the marshy forest, but his mother’s proclivity for never telling him the full plan set his roots creeping and his leaves rustling. There were many deep paths to the arboretum and many Ways if you knew how to work the subtle magicks. It would be foolish to meet his mother there, but he found himself already strolling towards the sod path.

“Your Mother awaits you in the Woods!” the grass shrieked as form of goodbye, a call that echoed through the basso tones of the trees lining the path, sending shivers down Feanor’s branch. He shouldn’t be here. He knows his mother’s tradition of life-complicating, and nothing good could come of this. Still, if he didn’t show he would do more than anger his mother, he would hurt her feelings. She was sort of the only family Feanor had left, since his father passed last year. His deformity (or his liberalism) didn’t jive with his father’s Alabamian relatives, but since he hadn’t committed to his Mother’s Family they would have nothing to do with him. Family is important, Feanor knew, and he couldn’t afford to jeopardize the only relation he had left, even if it was his loony noble Fairy mother.

The trees continued to echo the grass’ alert, leading him down a path of bowed old oaks rumbling the message at near deafening volumes at times. Twice Feanor had to shout at them to quiet down, but he gave up when they didn’t quiet and he embarrassed himself in front of an early-afternoon jogger. The path twisted and peaked around the park, and soon Feanor realized with growing dread the trees stretched taller and he didn’t recognize the portion of the park he was in. Feanor had roamed this park many times and was familiar with each flora in its grounds. The sensation of not recognizing the surrounding plants could mean only one thing; somehow Feanor had wandered in to the Never-Never without noticing.

This had his mother’s workings written all over it. She was always adept at blending the NeverNever in with the ‘real world’ with seamless ways. Feanor didn’t see his mother use much power ever, but when she did it was such a subtle working you couldn’t be certain she did anything at all, at least until the giant spiders jumped down from the trees. Feanor shuttered at the memory of a Mother’s Day several years ago, the too-many legged beasts still causing a deep revulsion in his mind. He gritted his roots as he spied a clearing not far off in the distance, with a long table set for high-tea.

His mother hummed and buzzed around the table merrily, though Feanor could sense a forced business about her, as she took on when she was worried about something big. A tinny blare of a tiny little-folk water-trumpet sounded as Feanor crossed the edge of the clearing and there was a feeling like a rubber-band being snapped on the top of your spine as a circle of power clicked into place around the clearing. Feanor recognized the hum of his mother’s power; she didn’t want someone to hear this conversation, so she sealed him in. She looked up at him brightly as he walked further into the clearing.

“Oh Fey, honey-suckle, you made it!” his mother nearly squealed with excitement. Literally squealed, like a middle-school girl. What was wrong with her, Feanor wondered to himself. He’d rarely seen this kind of energy around her.

“Mom, what is this about, I was in the middle of an article on-“ She cut him off, her face suddenly severe as a sun-baked skeleton in the heart of the desert. “What, no ‘Hello’ to your mother? No ‘Bubalah, my dear and lovely, not to mention ever-so-young mother I’ve missed you?!’”

Feanor back-peddled before her blazing face blanched his leaves. “Mom, it’s great to see you, but why did you have me pick up Chinese if we were doing tea?”

Her eyes darted around the edges of the glade, but her smile didn’t waver. “Oh the tea is delightful ambrosia, darling, but your stubbornness in staying with the mortals will keep it from providing you any sustenance, you know silly boy.” Feanor cast a slow glance around the edge of the clearing, and though it took him several moments he could eventually make out dozens of small, crouched forms among the brush with beady gleaming red eyes. Feanor recognized them almost immediately.

“Are those goblins!?” he half shouted.

She didn’t shush him, but she did speak very quietly, as if there was nothing to shout about at all. “Always a busy boy, you’ve been darling, but you must take tea with your mother sometimes. Sit sit sit, I’ve so much to tell you!”

Feanor leered around the woods and saw they were completely surrounded, and got the impression that the goblins were intent on keeping them both here, though for what reason he dared not attempt and imagine. He sat down and the glamoured table and politely took an ambrosia tea-cake and some leafy green tea from a crystal pot. His mother smiled and poured herself a modest cup of some sticky brown tea from a darker clay pot before speaking again.

“So how’re you? Has there been any lady luck in your life? Is the job good?” she rattled off a series of questions, not leaving space for him to answer, a nervous gaiety about her.

“Mom, stop, what is this about?” Feanor interjected.

“Well, bubala, I’ve Met someone who might be able to help your little city dodge the Hunt.” The oddly placed capitals, somehow making it through her speech, troubled Feanor on many levels. Before he could interject again, she continued. “But mostly I just wanted to make sure I got a chance to see my boy! You’re so busy, never having time for mother or coming for Court on the Suddyan.”

The NeverNever equivalent of a temple, each Sunday night at midnight Feanor knew the courts of Winter and Summer met to resolve issues throughout the ‘verse. His mother had taken him once, in a glamoured suit of branches and leaves, and the entire exchange had been dreadful; terrible crimes, beyond-severe punishments, and casual cruelty flowed through the eldest fey like wine through a prophet, since the denizens were mostly immortal pain was much more of an annoyance than the mortal burden.

He found thoughts of the hunt storming across his mind again, vision of shadowy beasts tearing through downtown Seattle, crushing and goring anything in their way. A rumble of a feral cackle echoed through the glade from the goblins, gleaming yellow teeth on the edge of vision.

“Mom, why are the goblins keeping us here?” Feanor asked calmly, quietly over his tea cup.

“For an investigator sweetie, you can be so slow. I would have thought the restaurant gave it away.” Feanor stared down at the Chinese food now cold still wrapped in its plastic bag. ‘Shanghai Garden’ printed on the menu was barely visible through the thin sheet.

“Son of a BITCH” Feanor breathed furiously into his cup. “Mom, how long have I been in the NeverNever?!”

“How should I know, darling, no one here owns a watch” his mother said with a wink.

“You know what I mean, how long has it been in the Mortal World!!?”

“Oh, several days now, I would imagine” his mother replied, her smile widening.

“Days!? Mother, I have a job, I have pets-“

“Plants,” his mother corrected him “you have a collection of potted plants.”

“I have responsibilities, mother!”

“What about me, Fey!?” his mother snapped. “You never come to court, you never come for dinner, and you barely take my calls! This is the biggest thing to happen in scores of seasons in my life and I had to quite literally shanghai you from your desk to tell you!”

“Tell me WHAT?” Feanor was yelling now, his roots shaking. He had dreaded this. The old-fashioned mother guilt-bomb. It hadn’t taken as long as usual, maybe next year they could skip it entirely and just play Boggletm like a normal mortal family.

“I’m Getting Married!” his mother burst with joy, anger playing off her face in a bluff, and she stood and danced around the table, singing the phrase. Feanor sat, shocked into silence for a moment.

“M-married?!” he managed after a moment. “To who?”

“No one you know, but you have to bring your friends to the announcement brunch! It’s in June, just a fortnight before the solstice! You have to come!” Feanor thought about it. He’d never been to a fairy party as an adult. He couldn’t imagine they would be any less tramatizing.

“…I’ll try to make it, mom.”

“You Will make it, Fey, I’ve already seen to it that you’ll have the time off work. See you soon!” She kissed him on the cheek before he could ask any questions, and when she moved away Feanor was enveloped by darkness. Something furry and stiff brushed his skinny arm, and a reflexing startled twitch sent his arm smashing through some pressboard in front of him. With a groan, Feanor realized he had been dumped in his coat closet and broken the door.

“Well, great.” Feanor grumbled as he stepped out of the closet. “My mother’s getting married, I’ve been gone for Lily knows how long, my mother has interfered with my job (again!), and my plants are probably parched.” No sooner had he said it than his dozens of leafy friends wagged their stamen excitedly and called to him. He calmed them and himself down by watering and turning on his happy-light before he realized the pile of mail in front of his door. Much bigger a pile than 3 days. Feanor looked with dread, and found one postmarked for 3 weeks after he left.

That’s what his mother had done. Trapped him in the NeverNever for weeks, thereby guaranteeing he could make the brunch because he was now unemployed. Fantastic.

[inspirecompetence]

Date Night with Feanor

(From [Un]Wizzards Season 1, Episode 3; The Trouble With Trolls)

Feanor collapsed onto his creaky futon after an exhausting day at work. The quarterly fire-drill had put his roots on edge and he just needed a little happy-light time and some cool water. His newest answering machine (he has a nasty habit of accidentally smashing the stupidly-fragile things) blinked a pestering red glare over his ferns. Feanor returned the glare at the eggshell-machine and tentatively stabbed a finger at the play button.

“Fe! My little Bubala. You never visit me anymore. What, just because your mother lives in the NeverNever you think you don’t have to pop in for Brunch once in a while?” Feanor grimaced and longed for his UV lamp. A message from his mother was rarely a good thing, and was a known-quantity trouble maker. “Anyway darling, You’ll love this girl. She’s sweet, and feisty, and independent like you honey! She hasn’t made her choice yet either, though I’m just saying her mother and I go way back and…”

“You’ll know [*] right away, she practically glows with youth, despite being older than you dear. She wants to meet you tomorrow for dinner. 7 sharp in the private booth of Purr. Have fun doll, and come by on Sunday for drinks! The Winter Lady might stop by! LOVE YA.” Feanor ran his stump through his tangled hair. A date. With a woman. It had been a little while, how bad could it be?

Turns out, Bad. When Feanor heard his mother say Purr, he hadn’t realized Purr was a massive Dance Club on Capitol Hill that catered to a very specific clientele. Exuberant gay men and women desperate for a bar where they won’t be battered with small talk and pick-up lines gathered behind the velvet rope in front of the Club. Feanor stared stun at location of his dinner-date for the evening. He took a bracing breath of fresh air and stepped up to the bouncer.

A mighty oak of a man, he stood head-and-shoulders taller than Feanor and smiled down at him with an intoxicated energy. The man greeted Feanor by name, and with a knowing wink opened the door for him. “What the hell?” Feanor thought. “Who is this woman, and how did she get me on a list at an exclusive dance club? More importantly, what kind of Changeling would want to meet me here? Oh no, don’t tell me mother set me up with a man again…”

Lost in thought, Feanor drifted around the main floor of the club. Already the techno pounded through the floor while men and women stomped out a savage dance. The smell was repulsive to Feanor, and he longed for the sweet scents of his Rubber Trees and window Daffodils.

Squeezing his way to the bar Feanor finally managed to attract the scattered attentions of the Barman when he accidentally cracked the glass-top panels along the bar. “Er…I can pay for that?” Feanor shrugged at the barman.

“Don’t worry about it cutie, your date’s upstairs.” The barman winked at Feanor and nodded over his shoulder to a spiral staircase leading up. “Third floor, behind the curtain. Nice and PRIVATE!” The barman was shouting over the bass of the beat, and the bar chortled and hooted like schoolboys. Blushing a shade of sequoia Feanor hurriedly rustled up the twisting metal framework, feeling pressed in place from the sweltering heat of the dance party.

The third floor was empty besides a gaggle of tipsy women tittering as Feanor crested the last step. The women all distinctly did not look at Feanor as he scanned the balcony for his date. Tucked in the back corner he spied a black velvet curtain drawn over an intimate table-space. Struggling to find fresh air, Feanor bowed his head and ducked behind the curtain.

The girl sitting at the table took Feanor completely by surprise. He had expected a woman, and worst-case scenario had prepared himself for a slithering sea-weed beast (he pictured his aunt Hag-atha who his mother had brought to his graduation and shuddered). Instead, he found a young woman who appeared to be scarcely older than 13.

“Naughty Boy!” The girl’s voice was high and flutey, almost musical in its prepubescent tones. ”Keeping me waiting like that. We agreed to meet at 7, and here you are almost 10 minutes late!” Feanor made to explain but the girl’s face broke into a toothy grin and she let out a laugh that shook the curtain with its merriment. “I’m just kidding, naughty boy! Though if you got your heart set on a spanking, I wouldn’t dash your hopes just yet.” She let out another laugh warm enough to swell wood.

Feanor just stared. He found himself at a loss for words, the worst fear of a reporter. “What?” The girl asked. ”Why are you staring at me like that? Do I not meet with your approval?” She gestured down at her body.

“N-n-no!” Feanor managed to stutter out. “I just wasn’t expecting someone so…young?”

[inspirecompetence]

Drew's Bad Day

(From [Un]Wizzards Season 1, episode 6; Gathering Storms)

Andrew slept poorly, as he often did since he came to this city. To say nothing else of New York, at least its weather was consistent: Andrew had given up on fighting with his bedroom window (or rather, his only window), as Seattle proved too fickle to let a night go by without incident. Even if Andrew found himself sweltering under his duvet in the night he knew better now than to open the window, as the poor masonry would cause the sticky sill to rattle in its holding through the night at the slightest breeze. Much less the nightly shower would drench his floor and rugs.

So Andrew became accustomed to suffering in heat. Buried under his comforter provided precious solace in his life, and the heat would only bother him as he awoke most afternoons when the sun turned the covering into a downy oven. That was not what awoke Andrew this morning (and it was indeed morning, Andrew could see the alarm clock blinking a bleary 10:30 at him from across his studio); The sound came from deep in the throat of a feral cat, a rolling yowl just barely audible.

The two met in a flurry of furry fury above Andrew before plummeting onto his face in an angry ball of claws, blood, and matted fur. Andrew let out a shriek of his own he was glad no one else heard before fighting off the cats and tearing them apart to throw out in to the hallway (the only place he could think to get rid of them) before realizing he’d just cut off his only way out of his building. Andrew was going to get a new phone today, he’d scrimped for weeks and was finally able to reserve an Iphone3c at the Apple Store in U-Village.

Andrew peered back into the mess that was his apartment. Even without the cats’ help the place was sort of messy, and Andrew did not look forward to the prospect of being trapped inside all day. He braved a glance outside, only to find the two cats still circling each other in the slow murder-dance of cat territory disputes. Looking down at the long gashes in his arms Andrew decided it was best not to brave the hallway. He picked up his duvet, the poor thing drenched in blood and angry cat urine and flopped the monster over the railing of his fire-escape to dry out while Andrew showered and cleaned his wounds.

A choking rattle in the pipes reminded Andrew of the notice posted by the mailboxes he’d avoided looking at all week; The water was shut down today for city maintenance, meaning Andrew was forced to clean his wounds with about 30 alcohol swipes before applying ten Band-Aids to his various nicks. By the time he’d gotten himself cleaned and ready to go his alarm blared its first half-hearted attempt at waking Andrew at 11:11. Andrew glanced back towards the hallway before deciding that risking the rickety fire-escape seemed like a safer option at this point than braving the gantlet of enraged pussy.

The climb was bracing, several times Andrew feared the wrought-iron monstrosity of a fire escape was going to pitch him over the bannister, but Andrew safely made it to the lowest level and released the latch keeping the security ladder up. Climbing down the hot ladder proved a trick however, and Andrew was forced to drop the last 6 feet and rolled his ankle with a twinge and pop of sudden pain. Andrew grabbed his ankle and glared around as he swore he could hear a snicker from the seemingly innocent herb garden behind his building.

Andrew hauled himself up, sucked in a pained breath as he steadied himself on the now-tender ankle, and began climbing the hill to his bus-stop. He arrived at the stop early as the bus wasn’t scheduled for another 15 minutes, and Andrew risked ducking in to the Rite-Aid to snag a 4 pack of Red-Bulls to stave off the subtle pulse of pain from below his knee, trying instead to focus on the sigils he had spent last night toiling on. Caught behind an old woman using food stamps to buy chocolate, Andrew rushed outside just in time to see his bus pulling away without him. Andrew flailed at the retreating bus, furious that he would have to wait 30 minutes at this stop for the next one. The only other person waiting was a well-dressed man in a bowler, reading the paper and smiling to himself.

After chugging a red-bull and jamming the rest back in his bag Andrew had started to feel a little better. The pain had eased since he sat down in the shade of the bus-stop, and the caffeine in his system tugged at his scattered thoughts and helped him feel a modicum calmer. When his bus arrived Andrew let the fancy-man on first, who took a seat behind the driver, while Andrew made his way to the back of the bus to be left in peace. The bus ambled through Capitol Hill on its way to the U district, and soon Andrew found himself shoe-horned in next to a morbidly obese man with a severe body-odor problem.

Almost choking on the stench of the man Andrew tugged on the stop cord but was unable to make it out of the over-crowded bus until he was two stops beyond the village. Again he longed for the perfected transportation of the east-coast, but breathed freely in the afternoon air, cleansed of fat-man sweat-stench. On the walk back towards the village, the dull pain of the ankle (which Andrew was increasingly convinced was sprained) began to seep back into the back of Andrew’s mind. The harsh lights of the Apple Store glared down from their mounts as a helpful Genius chimed a cheery hello at Andrew before the greeting caught in her throat.

Andrew caught a look at his reflection and realized between the cat-attack and lack of shower he looked closer to hobo than Apple user. He assured the nervously cheerful woman he was here to purchase a new phone and despite her incessant cheeriness and apparent lack of training Andrew helped her through the transaction and was able to leave with a refurbished white Iphone 3 (since they had sold out of the colored copies and he couldn’t afford a new model). Several hundred dollars lighter, Andrew spied the bus rolling up the block towards his stop and rushed after it, barely making it in time as he shoved his breathless way on to the most crowded bus he had ever seen.

Several jerky stops punctured Andrew’s personal space bubble as the press of bodies kept the passengers constantly tripping and swaying together. 20 minutes into the sweltering ride the man next to Andrew began yelling something. It wasn’t until he shook Andrew that he realized he was the subject of the shouting, the man screaming “Yo you are dripping, son! You done pissed yourself!?” Before Andrew could protest the sticky-handed mob of the bus shoved him out, the bus-driver dropping him several blocks away from his apartment. Andrew drew out his bag to discover the other red-bulls in his bag had somehow ruptured, and the contents of his bag (new phone included) were now soaked in sticky skittle-water.

Dumping his bag out onto the grass Andrew took inventory of his ruined gear; his journal he’s had since She gave it to him, ruined. The sigils he spent all last night working on, destroyed, save one. Mercifully, his iPod survived the flood of taurine and Andrew popped in his ear-buds as he hiked towards Captain Blacks for a drink. Despite his repeated skipping his IPod was convinced it would only play music that reminded Andrew of New York. The track stuck on a song She had introduced him to, that they had kissed over, shared dozens of time. Andrew shoved the iPod back in to the still-dripping bag as he ducked in to the Bar.

The bar was nearly empty, and Andrew sat up at the bar to order a beer and a shot to help him steady his nerves. The bar tender, who had served Andrew more than a dozen times, looked apologetically at Andrew before asking to see his ID. Andrew had never been carded at Captain Blacks and started feigning looking for his wallet. The Bartender leaned in conspiratorially and confided that the county was cracking down recently and they’ve had to check everyone, even regulars. In his feigning to find his wallet Andrew came up empty; he inspected the length of small chains that connected his keys to his wallet only to find one end neatly snipped, his wallet no longer attached.

Without an ID the bartender was forced to turn Andrew away apologizing. Andrew stomped out into the night despite the light chuckle he felt more than heard through the bar. Overcome with frustrated fury, Andrew threw a punch at a bus-stop, which connected with his knuckle and split it open, sending Andrew reeling with sudden pain and even more anger. Desperate to calm down Andrew shoved through his sticky bag in search of the one surviving sigil.

Energy was quickly escaping Andrew as he found his last sigil. Hoping against hope it would be a restfulness sigil, or a cleanliness sigil, Andrew breathed the whisper of power into the symbol to awaken its energies before crushing the paper in his hand and feeling the surge of magic through his veins. As it turned out, the sigil super-charged Andrew’s alertness, and all-of-a-sudden the screeches and shrieks of the city began assaulting Andrew in doubled force, the overstimulation driving him to his knees.

“I say boy, are you alright? I dare fear I have overdone it.” A voice called out to Andrew back in the direction of the bar. The same man from the bus-stop this morning lurked in the shadows by the doorway, still slightly smiling though now the grin appeared more savage and hungry to Andrew. Still reeling from the boosted alertness and busted knuckle, Andrew attempted to shoot the man his most baleful glare to encourage him to fuck-right-off. This turned out to be a mistake.

Andrew had barely heard of the phenomena known as soul-gazing, though he had heard vague mentions through some of his readings. He had only experienced it once before, back in New York, with Her. He had seen Her then, in full beauty and ugliness, and it was what had allowed him to understand Her so well. Andrew was not prepared for what he saw in this man’s eyes.

As before, he saw the scene as a sprawling album-cover; A vast expanse of barren land in the foreground held only the sobbing, bloated form of a man similar to the one Andrew stared at outside of the bar. His face was sunken, his eyes puffy and exhausted, as if all he ever did was shriek and sob. The background was a towering violet barrier, behind which Andrew could just make out a monstrous form relentlessly pounding on the barrier that held it back.

Though he heard no words, Andrew understood this man lived in fear and torment from the monster trapped behind the veil. Instead of the dulcet tones of the man’s soul-song, Andrew found his ears besieged by a screaming cacophony of jagged sound. When he tore himself from the man’s gaze after what felt like a life-time Andrew could feel a cool trickle of blood running down his lip from his nose. The man stood equally stunned, muttering quietly to himself. All he said to Andrew before stalking off in to the night was “A Malkavian? How interesting. See you soon, Andrew…”

Andrew stalked home, exhausted, bloody, and beaten. He resigned himself to climbing into bed and trying to have a normal mortal’s day tomorrow. Two blocks from home, the blistering heat of the setting sun in Seattle turned to a torrent, soaking Andrew to the bone in his home-stretch. Returning to his apartment complex, Andrew found his comforter, knocked down by the rain, soaking up a mud puddle in the herb garden. Assigning that as “another problem for another day,” Andrew went in to his building and checked his mail. A hand-written note from his land-lord explained that they knocked out water to his floor, and that they will strive to get the issue resolved later this week. With an exhausted grunt of annoyance Andrew stumbled upstairs and through his door (the cats, it would seem, having fought, terror-shit, and shredded the carpet, had since fled).

Throwing his bag into a corner along with his wet clothes Andrew collapsed on to his stripped mattress, pulling a pile of dirty laundry around him as both covers and pillows, and fell into a restless sleep. He had the same dream he always had. Her. Him. Them. And then she was gone, and he would wake in a sweat, screaming sorrows, before fighting his way back into unconsciousness. He let one thought take him over as he drifted back to sleep thinking of his Fellowship meeting the next day; At least tomorrow can’t be any worse.