Title: Death Love and Rock 'n Roll
EMAIL: crc@crcdesign.net
SUMMARY:
DISCLAIMER: I have no claims to Oz, any other Buffy-related characters or the stories surrounding them. Original characters and the plot of this story are mine.
DISTRIBUTION: If you want it, great! Please let me know.
FEEDBACK: I'd love some.
RATING: PG (for a little language and some violence)
AN: This draft is a little rough right now, but I'm smoothing it out as I go along. Please let me know what you think!



"You're joking, right?" asked the tall brunette, watching her fellow covenmates wander off now that the circle was broken.

Eleanor just looked at her, trying to convey a sincere "No, I'm serious" with just her eyes. If she actually had to say it, this was probably a dead end.

The head witch got the message and took a deep breath. She wished they could find someplace else to hold these meetings. That nasty, musty smell from all these old books in the basement of the occult shop was ... well, nasty. It made her nose itch. This girl worked here, maybe she was getting high on the dust and mildew - maybe she was getting high on something else - she obviously a problem. "Well, I don't really feel comfortable offering you advice, but I do know someone who might be able to help."

Apparently Eleanor had been holding her breath, because she let out a long one. It seemed like she should say something, but the hope that she wasn't entirely nuts - that someone else had been through this and could help her - choked anything else back.

"A couple of the girls have had problems during spells. You know, seeing things; Believing that the 'magic' is like, fairy-tale real. They went to this psychologist over in Oakland. He seems to have helped a lot."

"You mean the magic... A psychologist? But I was hoping..."

"Oh honey, you thought our 'coven' was all about casting spells and making pencils float and stuff?" asked the witch. "I really think you should go see Dr. Hartram. He...."

"No. No, I already saw a psychologist a couple times. It... didn't work out very well."

'Didn't work out well? That's one way to put it,' thought Eleanor. 'And neither did Napoleon's strategy at Waterloo. Or Custer's attack on the Sioux. Yeah, when you eat someone, the session didn't work out well.'

***

The orange light of dawn nibbled at the eastern edge of a night marked by a nearly full moon, painting the black and white zebrastripe van more of a tiger scheme as it sped south along I-79, close enough to Pittsburgh to get a good cell phone signal.

"Gregg? Hey, I got your e-mail yesterday," said Oz into the hands-free set.

"I'm pulling into town now, tomorrow should be fine," he said, taking down directions with his free hands.

"Well, I downloaded the MP3s from your site, sounded pretty cool to me."

"I hope so," he said, pushing the "no" button on his phone to disconnect.

'Pretty good,' thought Oz. 'I'm not even in town yet and I have a shot at playing with a cool band. Now as long as they aren't too picky about how good their new guitar player is, things will be set.'

***

A string of sleigh bells applauded merrily as Oz stepped into the little occult bookshop just around the corner from where he parked the van. Unfortunately, he didn't have any leads in Pittsburgh on mystical powers that might help increase his control over the wolf. That mage in Cleveland had been a dead end except for the newspaper sitting on his dining room table with an ad for the band Oz was about to audition for, but it never hurt to browse. As soon as he crossed the threshold though, Oz knew. There's just nothing like the musk of another werewolf - a female werewolf. A quick scan of the room didn't show anyone looking up at him with return recognition. In fact the only other person there was the woman behind the counter so engrossed in her book she didn't seem to have noticed his arrival. He headed for the steps running down from the middle of the floor. Yup, thought Oz, definitely downstairs. Sniffing the air in this place brought back some interesting memories. High school, Willow, graduation, Willow, Giles... mostly Willow. It was still painful to think about her, but the musty smell of old books was a good one, generally. Comforting.

Oz descended the steps slowly, not quite sure what to expect. The few times he'd run into a female werewolf unexpectedly, things always tended towards the extreme. Either they wanted to mate with him, or they wanted to eat him. Sometimes both. The look he got from the short strawberry blonde shelving books at the other end of the room as her glasses slid to the very tip of her nose in surprise told him a lot about this particular werewolf. 'A newbie,' he thought. 'I'm the first werewolf she's ever met. Well, the second obviously. Becoming a werewolf requires a meeting, but you can't smell that coming.'

'She'll probably freak if I just walk right up to her,' he figured. So at that moment Oz developed an intense interest in whatever books were on the shelf right in front of him.

"Huh." 'Transgender issues and fiction. Interesting choice. They get a whole section? What kind of occult bookstore is this?' After looking at just enough titles to get some really disturbing mental images, Oz risked a look up at the girl and found her still staring at him.

Eleanor jolted a bit from her daze when he looked up. She was still feeling the . . . desire? No, Not like some common lust - the guy was cute but that wasn't it. Considering the books he was studying she figured he was the last thing she needed. But it was something strange - primal. She walked up to him, what kind of employee would she be if she ignored the only customer in the store? "Is there anything I can help you find? We don't have much on... this, but some of the titles we don't stock we can get from the publisher."

"Huh? Oh, no I'm good. Quite a selection."

"Well, we pride ourselves on catering to the alternative communities that can't find many books anywhere else. Wiccans, Herbalism, the transgendered... not that...."

"Werewolves?"

"What?" cried Eleanor, backing up and looking at her hands. Was she changing? That only happened at night last time!

"Hey, wait. Listen, it's OK. I just needed to be sure you knew."

"Knew what? Why?"

"What you are. What we are."