Many Happy Returns
a Castle fantasy fan fiction
by Laura Picken

This is story is in my continuing *very* alternate universe of the Guardians of Shangri La. If you have no idea what that means, go to my author page and look up the "Four Winds" series. I promise, you will have a *incredibly* hard time following this story if you haven't read at least one of those stories.

STORY DISCLAIMER (aka fair warning): I have some purely selfish motives when it comes to this story. For several months now I have been wanting to turn the origin story of the Guardians into an original novel, but I've had a massive case of writer's block. In particular, I want that story to focus on one central character, but I'm having trouble fully developing her back-story. So there will be a solid chunk of this story devoted to working on her. I *promise* to write enough Castle Guardian-y goodness to keep you guys very happy, but I *need* to start developing this character more, and I'm writing this story to force myself to do that. So please, I'm asking in advance for *no* "why are you focusing so much on her?" comments. Feel free to pick her apart every which way you can think of (I *adore* questions and constructive criticism, as some of you know), but she *will* be the primary driving force for this story. If that doesn't float your boat, I apologize in advance. Please feel free to look elsewhere.

DISCLAIMER: Castle, Beckett, et al. are property of Andrew W. Marlowe and ABC. The legends and related legendary characters described herein are (mostly) adaptations of my own twisted imagination and should not be taken to reflect the traditions of any particular group. In the ever-expanding universe of these stories we've had a couple of crossovers to this point, so there may be occasional references to the Avengers (Marvel comics) or characters from the old TV show "The Sentinel" (Pet Fly Productions). All non-English language phrases are courtesy of Google Translate, so please forgive me if I get anything unintentionally wrong.

Okay, enough business, let the adventure begin!

#

New York can be such a dull place, sometimes...

He walked into the center of Times Square and stood still, letting the busyness of the crowd and the energy from the bright lights of the neon and LCD signs wash over him like a lukewarm shower. It wasn't enough. It was never going to *be* enough.

Things used to be so much easier. Even in his great-grandfather's day the people of this city used to pulse with an energy, a vibrancy...a life-force that fueled New York City like nothing else in the world. That was why New York was considered the greatest city in the world. Why people were drawn to Ellis Island like moths to a flame. It was what drew his family to emigrate to America along with all the others.

And yet, over time, the exchange began. As the lights grew brighter and the energy of the city was amped up through television and technology...human energy was dissipated in return. "Auras used to be bright enough to light my way at night," his grandfather had told him. Nowadays he could barely see auras in the brightest of daylight...if he could even see them at all.

It was depressing.

So there he was, looking to feed off the energy from the Coca-Cola sign and the ABC News Ticker tape. He hated it. He hated every second of it. But what could he do?

It was then that he noticed it: just barely, out of the slightest corner of his eye. Light. Real, honest to goodness, true light. It seemed like it was no bigger than a pinprick at first, but it shimmered with such a radiant purity that he couldn't help but follow it. He turned toward the light, desperate to find the source of what he had been looking for for so long. There, over by the theater door...my God, it's so beautiful...

He watched a couple as they left one of the Broadway theaters, completely fascinated by the sight in front of him. The man's aura was the source of the light he had seen: pure, clean and bright like the shimmering of a pond at sunset. The woman, though...the woman's aura was starting to fascinate him even more than the man's. Where his was light and radiance, hers...hers was the black of darkest night. And its pull...it was like her aura called to him. It begged him to go to her; begged him to crawl into her darkness and never come out. This requires further investigation...

He followed the couple west as they headed away from the bright lights of Times Square. The interplay of the couple's auras was fascinating to him: it was as if light and shadow were dancing around each other in an intimate tango. The couple were walking arm-in-arm, laughing and joking playfully about the show they had just seen. The man stumbled; it was clear he had consumed large quantities of alcohol throughout the evening. The woman pulled the man into an alley and kissed him fiercely. The man kissed the woman back with equal passion; she squealed and giggled as they pushed each other back and forth between the two buildings, causing some of the bricks to crack and crumble around them.

The couple came up for air for only a minute. It was long enough to give their observer pause to wonder if he needed to leave. Those thoughts were quickly replaced, however, when he watched the dim light from the window above the couple revealed that the woman had...fangs. Sharp, animal-looking fangs. She used those fangs to bite into the neck of her boyfriend; the gesture shocked their observer at first, but that shock was changed to curiosity as he watched the woman drink from the wound and the man close his eyes, reveling in the ecstatic pleasure of the moment. A vampire? Here? Living amongst humans? His mind was reeling with the possibilities of what that could mean for him and his future.

Yes indeed, this definitely requires further investigation...

#

Two weeks later...

Kevin Ryan studied his wife's face for what must have been the fifteenth time that morning. "Jen?" When he got no response, he tried again. "Jen?"

Jenny never quite looked up from doing the dishes, clearly *very* preoccupied. "Hmmm?"

When Alexis started fussing in her high chair, Ryan used his telekinetic gift to pull a few dozen Cheerios out of the box and scatter them on the tray; this caused the toddler to squeal with delight. He then turned his attention back to his wife. "Jen? What's wrong?"

The momentary distraction once again caused Jenny's focus to shift away from their conversation. "Hmmm?"

Ryan eyed Jenny warily; the concern on his face was obvious. "What's going on?"

In the short time it took Ryan to ask the question, Jenny's focus had wavered once again. "Oh? Oh, sorry, honey...just got a thousand thoughts running through my head, is all."

"A thousand thoughts..." mused Ryan, trying and failing to try to piece together what was going on. "Jen, honey, you know I try not to be in your head without your permission, but unless you can explain to me why you've been so all over the place the past couple of weeks..." When Kevin discovered that he had lost his wife's attention for a third time, he could no longer allow himself to remain polite. He connected with his wife's mind with a frustrated sigh, reaching deep to try and discover the source of the thoughts that were so distracting to her...

The couple recoiled simultaneously from the mental contact, husband and wife both holding their ears to try and soothe the pain. "What the hell was that?!" Jenny exclaimed.

Ryan, for his part, was still trying to shake the ringing out of his ears. "I don't know..." he gasped. His mind reached out for the only connection he could think of that could possibly bring answers. Lanie?

Lanie had to stop herself from dropping the coffee pot as Ryan's mind-voice called out to her. The fear in his voice was obvious. Ryan? What is it? What's going on?

Something...happened just now between me and Jenny, Ryan replied. How fast can you get over here?

We're on our way, said Lanie.

#

By the time Lanie arrived ten minutes later, Ryan was a bit of a panic, which started to worry Lanie all the more. "Kev? Baby, what's going on?"

Ryan stepped to the side to allow Lanie and Esposito to enter the apartment. "It's Jenny. Something...something's happening between us. And I just can't figure it out."

Lanie entered the living room to find Jenny sitting on the couch, her expression matching the fear that Lanie had seen on her husband's face when she walked into the apartment. "What happened?"

"I haven't been able to focus much lately," Jenny replied. "My mind's been wandering so much I can't keep a conversation with anyone that has an attention span longer than Alexis'. And then this morning..."

"I tried to read her mind," Ryan added, picking up on his wife's narrative, "but this time...instead of hearing her thoughts, all I heard was this really loud whistle..."

"Whistle?" asked Esposito.

Ryan nodded. "It was this awful, really loud screeching noise. It was deafening."

"And how long did it last?" asked Lanie.

"Until I broke the connection," Ryan replied.

Lanie tried to process the information she had gotten to that point, and realized quickly that she needed more. "Okay," she declared, "exam time. Kevin, you first."

Ryan held out his hand, and Lanie took it, mentally sweeping through his body to see how her friend was doing. "You're fine, Kev. Nothing's physically wrong with you."

"Nothing?" asked Ryan, clearly confused by the diagnosis.

Lanie shook her head, then turned to Jenny. "Your turn, hon." She took Jenny's hand and closed her eyes. The examination started out normal...but when Lanie's eyes started to twitch rapidly, Ryan connected with his partner's mind and gave her the focus to finish the exam. Once Lanie's eyes opened, they quickly widened in amazement as the pieces of the puzzle fit together in her mind. "Same poles of a magnet..." she gasped.

Esposito picked up on the reference immediately. "Like what happened with me and the Prophet?"

Lanie nodded, then turned her attention back to Jenny, whose nerves were starting to amp up exponentially. "Lanie?" she asked, her voice shaking badly, "what is it? Is something wrong with me? Did I...did I flip or something?"

"No, sweetie," Lanie replied, squeezing her friend's hand, "You didn't flip." Her gaze went between both Kevin and Jenny to make sure both of them had her complete attention. Lanie then broke out into a wide, joyful smile. "Jenny, honey...you're not the one hearing all those thoughts. Your baby is."

"I...I'm *pregnant*?" Jenny gasped out in amazement.

Lanie nodded. "You're not very far along, but I think the thoughts that have been going through your head aren't your thoughts. I think they're the thoughts of people around you in the building."

"You mean...?" asked Ryan.

"I think so, too," said Esposito, making the connection that his wife (and probably his partner) had already made. "My future niece or nephew to be has your gift, bro. And because your kid has it, for now...so does Jenny."

#

Katya withered under her father's lack of attention. She could stare down a snow leopard without fear, argue with her mother from sunrise to sunset, and fight off all of her brothers at once...but one meeting with her father could wound her spirit like nothing else ever could. "I hear you fought and killed a snow leopard today, child," her father said coolly, his eyes never leaving the roaring hearthfire he was lounging beside.

"Yes, father," Katya agreed, hoping for at least a small gesture of approval.

She was destined to be disappointed. "You endangered a horse by fighting that beast, child, and that is something I cannot abide. Your riding privileges are suspended through the remaining moon cycle. You will be confined to camp to during that time unless I or another elder send for you."

Katya's heart sank, knowing that meant going almost a full month without the only activity that gave her any joy. She took a step forward, opening her mouth to argue her case...then closed it quickly, years of beatings reminding her that any protestations would only serve to make the punishment *far* worse. "Yes, father," she finally relented.

Her father's only acknowledgement of her acceptance was a curt not. "While you are in camp, child," he continued, "you will be working as a tent servant."

Katya swallowed hard, not liking one bit where her father's train of thought was headed. "Tent servant?" she repeated, looking for clarification.

It was only then that Katya noticed there was a stranger sitting in the chair next to her father. "We have a guest, child. He is going east and has asked to rest with us through this moon cycle. Your mother has informed me that you need lessons in how to take care of a man if we are to have any hope of finding a husband for you. Therefore, I am assigning you to be our guest's tent servant while he is with us."

Katya pulled her hands behind her back to keep her father from knowing that they were shaking. "Yes, father," she consented, her trembling lower lip the only indicator of her growing fear and despair.

The stranger got up from the chair to examine Katya, and it was only then that Katya was given the opportunity to examine *him* for the first time. He was like no one she had ever seen before in her young life: startlingly pale, with a face and hands so delicate that he reminded her more of one of her childhood dolls than she did of any other man she had ever met. It was his eyes, though, that she found most captivating. They were dark; almost *too* dark, as if the part of his eye that should have been brown was swallowed up by the blackness in the center. Someone who wasn't paying attention too closely, Katya reasoned, might not have noticed. They would have been far more likely to be entranced by his exotically beautiful features or his exceedingly confident, assured demeanor.

Katya, though, noticed. Even though she wished, more than anything, that she hadn't...

Katya woke with a start, gasping for air that she didn't need and grateful that she, for once, hadn't awakened her fiancé. Slipping quietly out of the bed that they shared, she left the bedroom...resisting the urge to run her fingers through his hair or trace the outline of the bite marks that had yet to heal at the base of his neck. Closing the door behind her with a soft click, Katya then opened her living room blinds, trying to get a handle on what time it was. The mid-afternoon sun streaming through the window gave her her answer: it wasn't 2 am, it was 2 *pm*. "Why can Mark not get used to the 24-hour clock," she grumbled, "it would make my life so much easier..."

Her next stop was the kitchen, opening the refrigerator to see what her 'late-night' snacking options were. Seeing the bottle of cow's blood and the leftovers of a bag of AB-negative from the night before sent her 'dream' rushing back to the forefront of her mind.

It wasn't a *dream*, she knew with absolute certainty as she poured the cow's blood into a coffee cup and put it in the microwave to warm it. Katya had been 'dreaming' about her human life: memories that she was re-living in her sleep with startling clarity. It had been *centuries* since she had thought about her human life or the family of her youth. She had believed those memories to be so far in her past that they were no longer relevant. She wasn't even sure she *could* remember those times with any accuracy...even if she wanted to. And yet she winced as she sat down, her muscles screaming in protest over a day's ride on a horse that had been dead for over four hundred years.

What in the world was going on?

#

As always, folks, comments highly encouraged! C'mon, lemme have it...