A/N: To recap (because it's been so long) Ravyn, Selene and Michael's hybrid daughter, and her partner Chris have been commissioned by the Chicago Police to kill Kraven. In trying to do so, they were captured by Kraven. After escaping, they go to Evelyn (who taught Ravyn how to use her psychic abilities) to recuperate. Evelyn finds out that Xareth, her enemy from another world, is involved as well. She calls Kestral to tell her what happened and warn her about Xareth. Selene ends up hearing about what happened to her daughter and comes to Chicago for a visit. Which brings us up to the present.
Disclaimer: Don't own. Don't sue. K?
Chapter Eleven: Parental Visit
"Remember," Ravyn said to Chris, her hand on the door handle, "Don't mention anything about immortals to my parents."
"Calm down," he told her. "Everything will be fine."
Ravyn took a deep breath, put on her best smile, and opened the door. Selene and Michael stood in the hallway outside the apartment. Selene looked more than a little uncomfortable in jeans and a tank top. Ravyn was glad her father had talked her out of wearing her leathers.
Michael stepped inside, kissing his daughter on the cheek and handing her a bottle of wine.
"Hi Daddy," she said, giving him a kiss. She hugged her mother, saying, "Hi, Mum."
Ravyn heard her father say, "Ravyn, who's your friend?" She turned to see Michael gesturing to Chris.
"Oh. Mum, Daddy, this is Chris. My boyfriend," she added. She saw her mother's nose twitch slightly, and knew her parents had noticed Chris's humanity.
A slightly awkward silence followed. Thankfully, Michael smiled warmly and stuck out his hand.
"Michael," he said, shaking Chris's hand. "Nice to meet you."
"Dinner will be soon," Ravyn said, gesturing to the table. "As soon as the meat's done."
The buzzer of the oven went off and Ravyn hurried to get the meat out of the over before it burned.
When everyone was sitting down and the dishes had been passed around, Selene said, "So what are you doing these days?"
Ravyn took a sip of wine. "Well, not much. I'm an assassin."
Her father choked on his wine.
"Really?" Selene asked, sounding interested.
"Yes," she said, nodding and taking a bite of steak. "I'm part of a guild. Most of the jobs are criminals."
Selene nodded, taking a sip of the wine-blood mixture Ravyn had poured for her.
"What kind of gun do you use?" she asked.
"I don't use guns. Too easily traced." She glanced over at her father, who still looked shocked. "Don't worry, Daddy. They all deserve it."
Michael nodded slowly. "I see."
"What are you doing right now?" Selene asked.
"Well, Chris and I—" she began.
"Chris does this too?" Michael asked, almost choking again.
"We're partners, Daddy," Ravyn told him.
"So…?" Selene prompted.
"Well, right now, we're working on this guy from Budapest," Ravyn said. "I think you know him, Mom."
"Oh really?" she asked, curious.
"His name's Kraven," Ravyn told her, taking a sip of her wine.
Michael choked again. Chris pounded him helpfully on the back.
"Kraven?" Michael exclaimed. "He's here?"
"Ravyn, what are you thinking?" Selene exploded. "You've heard what he's done! You can't go up against him alone!"
Ravyn smiled up at her mother. "I won't be alone. I'll have Chris."
Selene snorted. "Ravyn, he's—" she stopped short.
Ravyn stood, and gestured for her mother to follow her. "Excuse us," she said to her father and Chris. She pulled her mother into the kitchen and said in a hushed voice, "Mother, I have been doing this for a few years now. I know the tricks. I can take Kraven."
"You think a few years experience as a hired killer can help you take out a 600 year old vampire?" Selene hissed. "You aren't even a century old, Ravyn!"
"It's not like I'm going in there alone, Mum!" Ravyn said.
"You think a mere human is going to protect you?" Selene demanded incredulously. "I don't think you really understand what you're up against!"
"And I don't think you understand how capable I am," Ravyn shot back. "I can do this, Mom."
Selene sighed and shook her head.
"Do you want me to show you?"
"What?"
"Let's go. Right now. Let me show you what I'm capable of."
Selene stared at her daughter uncomprehendingly for a moment, then nodded. "Alright."
"Let me go get changed," Ravyn said. She hurried out of the kitchen into her bedroom and pulled on her black skirt and tank top. She dug through her closet until she found the black stilettos she was looking for and shoved her feet into them. She ran a brush through her hair quickly and walked back into the dining room. Selene was waiting, dressed in her leathers, and Ravyn could see the outline of a gun against her mother's hip.
"Ready?" she asked Selene.
"Where are you going?" Michael asked, a note of concern in his voice.
"To kick some ass."
Selene looked at the entrance to the nightclub skeptically. "In there?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.
Ravyn nodded. "Trust me, Mom," she said. "This is the best place to find people."
"I thought you said you did things by contract?" Selene asked.
"I avoid killing for fun, if that's what you mean," Ravyn told her. "But there are a few people who the Guild's been after for a while that no one's ever gotten around to killing yet. Mostly rogue assassins who put the rest of us in danger of exposure." She handed the guard at the door enough money to get the two of them in, sliding briefly into his mind so he wouldn't see Selene's guns, and then continued, "You see, the police know about us, but not 'officially'. If we let the rogues get too out of hand, then the police will have no choice but to shut us down. So every now and again, a Guild member will take one out as an example to the rest."
Ravyn had killed a rogue or two in her time as an assassin. She enjoyed the challenge of it, but she lost all pleasure in it when it came time to kill the rogue. Most of them were fun to fight, though. Many knew her by reputation, and some on sight. Few were fooled by her human guise and most were experienced fighters.
Selene nodded in understand. "How are we doing this then?"
Ravyn grinned a feral, predatory grin of a creature that is looking forward to the hunt. "You came here to watch your little girl work," she said. "So you watch, I work."
She slid into the crowd, both physically and mentally. She moved to the music, not drawing attention to herself as she searched the crowd for a rogue. She found several, but one caught her eye—or rather, her mind. The things she found there made her shudder with distaste. She withdrew from his mind quickly, leaving a small amount of power behind so she could find him.
She looked around the room, searching for the ebony glow that would mark her victim. She found it, hovering around a small man with a face like a rat and a scraggly beard. He leaned against the bar, watching the dancers. He was obviously looking for someone, though she avoided going into his mind to see who.
She stepped into his view, blocking out the rest of the dancers. He looked surprised and Ravyn took advantage of that to ask him to dance, grabbing his hand and pulling him after her before he could agree or decline.
She put her arms around his neck, dancing close, letting him feel the curves of her body. He grinned wolfishly, putting his hands on her hips. She slid carefully into his mind and saw immediately that he knew who she was. That didn't surprise her. What surprised her was how.
But she put her shock aside, and whispered into his mind, You've been looking for me.
"I have," he agreed. "And now I've found you."
He didn't betray any shock at her speaking to him mentally in his expression or his voice, but Ravyn was in his mind, and felt his inner fear. She held back another feral grin. Mind-to-mind speech was a disconcerting thing, which was why she continued to speak mentally, wanting to throw him off balance.
You want to fight me.
"And I will win," he said confidently.
She laughed silently in his mind, letting the soft feral laughter of a wolf reverberate through his head.
We shall see.
Abruptly, she turned, and left the club, catching her mother's eye, and gesturing for her to follow. Selene did, and Ravyn made sure the man didn't see her mother leaving.
The man followed her out, and she led him to the alley where she had killed her most recent victim, occasionally speaking into the man's mind and laughing the low laugh of a wolf, knowing it put him off balance.
She arrived at the ally quickly and waited for him, altering her appearance slightly. She made her hair appear to be a pale silver, and her gray eyes to glow red. She let her vampire fangs slide out into view. She intended to scare this man out of his wits.
He arrived and recoiled at the sight of her.
Come to me, she whispered in his mind.
"Holy shit. What are you?"
You wanted to fight me, she said. Now fight. Fight for your life, Jeremiah Galway.
"How do you know my name?" he asked hoarsely.
Ravyn didn't answer, only grinned and attacked with a roundhouse kick, knocking him to the ground.
Stand and fight, Jeremiah. Fight or die.
He got up and lunged at her, aiming a punch at her face. She dodged, aiming a punch of her own towards his stomach. He stumbled backwards, hunched over, and Ravyn waited for his next attack.
He straightened, and seem to steel himself against fighting one of the undead, and attacked again. From somewhere in his clothes, he had produced twin daggers and he attacked, blades ready to slash her open. Ravyn jumped back, grinning.
You'll never get me with those blades, she said in his mind. You're nowhere near fast enough.
Calling on speed bred from immortality, she rushed behind him and jumped, her feet landing squarely between his shoulder blades.
How can you fight an opponent you can't even see?
Suddenly she was in front of him and he lashed out in desperation born out of fear with his knives, trying to strike her somewhere—anywhere, but she was prepared for it. She scuffed the heal of her shoe on the pavement, then brought it up to connect solidly with his chest.
A look of surprised flashed across his face, and he looked down at his chest, his daggers falling from his hands.
"How...?" he whispered, and she jerked her foot free. He fell forward and Selene stepped out of the shadows.
"Efficient," she said approvingly as Raven pressed an invisible button on the bottom of her shoe which pulled the knife installed in the heel back in with a snap.
"American movies have some good ideas," Ravyn answered, kicking the body over.
Blood came from the man's chest, and unbidden, Ravyn's fangs came out. She could tell her mother's hunger was aroused by the smell as well.
She controlled the urge, however. She hadn't fed too long ago, and she didn't need to drain this man. Selene, however, rarely had real blood and she bent to feed. Ravyn looked away while her mother drank from her kill.
Ravyn opened the door to the apartment with a broad grin on her face. On the way back, she and Selene had talked, and Ravyn had convinced her to let her have a go at Kraven alone.
As soon as the door had opened, Michael and Chris looked up from their game of poker, in which they appeared to be using chocolate chips as betting material. Chris smiled at her, but Michael's face darkened. Ravyn could tell that he knew what she had done, could smell the blood on her and on Selene.
Selene sensed it too, and crossed the hallway to him quickly.
"Michael," she said. "Calm down. Let us explain."
"Who?" he asked in an undertone. Chris looked at Ravyn, and suddenly understood that she hadn't gone to show her mother she could fight, but to show her that she could kill.
"A rogue," Ravyn said quickly. "A Guild defector. Not an innocent."
"Ravyn, don't you tell me—"
"Dad! Listen to me! This man has killed many people, and few of them deserving. He was not a good person," Ravyn told him, knowing that her father had a very strong sense of moral decency, and was not going to approve of this no matter who the man was.
"He still had a family, Ravyn!" Michael said, his voice slowly rising. "He had a family! And friends! Your mother has killed people who didn't deserve it. Does that make her a bad person?"
Selene looked shocked. "Michael? What are you saying?"
"I am saying that it was a bad idea to kill someone to show off and to feed. Wasn't that outlawed, Selene? By your own sire?"
"Do not bring him into this," Selene said through clenched teeth.
"And you, Ravyn," Michael continued. "I thought we raised you to be better than this. Instead, I come here to find that my own daughter is little more than a common killer! A leader of sheep to the slaughter! Just like every other vampire ever to walk this earth."
Ravyn gaped at him for a moment, not realizing that tears were filling her eyes. As soon as she did, she left, running out of the apartment as fast as she could, trying to get away.
Behind her, Selene and Michael yelled at each other, their eyes flickering back and forth between human and beast. Chris watched them with fearful fascination as Selene's fangs were bared and her eyes flashing icy blue and then dark brown. Michael's skin was slightly mottled and his eyes were more black than anything else. He could not control the change as much as Selene could, and they both seemed to have forgotten him.
He waited for a few more minutes, and then, as calmly as he could, said, "I'm going to look for Ravyn."
They both stopped mid-sentence and stared at him. Chris could practically see the word food going through their minds as they looked at him.
Well, humans are their natural prey, he thought humorlessly.
Selene nodded and said, "You're right. We should look for her." There was a slight clip to her voice that hadn't been there before; the fangs affected her patterns of speech. Michael couldn't seem to speak at all, only nod dumbly. His lips were protruding oddly, and Chris would venture to guess that he was hiding a mouthful of canine teeth.
"Then let's go."
Ravyn stopped when she realized she didn't know where she was. Tears stained her cheeks, and her eyes were read and puffy with crying. Her feet ached from running in heels and she looked around for a place to sit down.
The street corner where she stood was well-lit by streetlamps. A bench seemed to wait for her just outside the circle of light. She sat down with a sigh, burying her face in her hands. Sobs shook her body as she cried.
"Poor Ravyn," said a voice in her ear as hands descended on her shoulders. "Did you have a fight with your human?"
She twisted around and saw Kraven standing behind her. She surged to her feet, aches and pains forgotten, as she demanded, "What are you doing here? What do you want?"
"You, my dear Ravyn," he said, smirking. "And, by extension, your mother."
"What—" Ravyn started, but was cut off by a calloused hand pressing over her mouth and a strong arm wrapping itself around her middle, effectively pinning her arms to her sides. She struggled against her captor, but, whoever he was, he was strong enough to hold her. She stopped and felt his grip relax slightly. Immediately, she brought her foot up to connect with his groin.
He released her with a groan of pain and she sped away. Swearing violently, Kraven followed her.
Ravyn was fast but Kraven was older and stronger. He caught up to her and knocked her to the ground. Her head connected solidly with the curb and she knew no more.
Selene and Michael followed Ravyn's scent through the dark streets of the city, Christ trailing behind and feeling useless. They didn't even need him to carry a flashlight, he reflected bitterly, because they could see in the dark.
Michael stopped at a street corner and sniffed the air like a dog.
"Do you smell that?" he asked Selene.
She nodded. "Blood."
"Whose?" Chris asked immediately.
Michael didn't answer, walking and sniffing away from the corner out of the yellow light of the streetlamps. He stopped a few yards away and Selene went to him immediately. She bent down and touched something on the ground she put her fingers first to her nose, then to her lips.
"It's hers," she confirmed solemnly. "From a head wound, unless I miss my guess."
"Kraven," Michael said darkly.
"You can smell him too?"
"Yes."
"You mean Kraven has her?" Chris asked incredulously.
Selene nodded grimly.
Christ turned on his heel and began to run back to the apartment. Michael and Selene followed.
When he reached it, Christ grabbed Ravyn's keys from where she had left them by the door and her cell phone from the dresser. Selene and Michael watched and followed as he ran down to the garage of her building and then comprehension seemed to dawn on them.
"I'll drive," Selene said in a tone the brooked no argument. Chris tossed her the keys, ignoring Michael's groan.
They got in the car and as Selene recklessly drove out of the garage at a higher speed than was really necessary, Chris hoped this wasn't a mistake. He gave Selene directions out of the city and then turned his attention to Ravyn's phone.
He scrolled through her contacts until he found the name he was looking for: Evelyn. He pushed the "call" button and waited impatiently as the phone rang.
After four rings, Evelyn picked up.
"Hello?"
"Evelyn, it's Chris. Ravyn's friend."
There was a pause on the other end and then Evelyn said, "Oh! The human! What's up?"
Christ wondered slightly at her use of the word "human" as though she wasn't really human herself, but said only, "It's Ravyn. Kraven's got her."
"Shit."
"Yeah. We need your help."
"I should think so. Who's we?"
"Me. And Ravyn's parents."
"Right. Are you on your way?"
"Yes."
"We'll be ready."
Ravyn woke feeling very uncomfortable. It took her a moment to figure out why. Her head ached, and she could feel the trail of blood running from a cut there, down her cheek and neck. Her hands were bound to the wall behind her with cold iron. She tested them. They didn't budge. There was no way she'd be able to wriggle out of them this time. She tried to look around and the movement made her head hurt more. She moaned slightly as fresh wave of pain washed over her.
"Awake, I see?" Kraven's voice drawled from across the room. Through the darkness, her immortal sight could make out his form sitting in a chair. She wished she were sitting. Her feet felt like a mass of blisters. But her hands were bound to the wall, effectively preventing her from sitting.
"What do you want, Kraven?" she asked.
"Didn't I tell you that already? Well, no matter. Your mother will be here soon enough. And maybe that human of yours as well. Tell me, is he as bad in bed as he looks?"
Headache forgotten, Ravyn lunged forward, fangs out, hissing.
Kraven smirked at her and stood, crossing the room to stand just out of her reach.
"Perhaps I shall take you to my bed as well as Selene," he drawled. "You seem to be as passionate as her. And probably as tasty."
Ravyn bared her fangs at him and he gave her an evil grin over his shoulder as he left.
The tires squealed as Selene pulled into the driveway. Adara waited for them at the front door, a grim expression on her face. She nodded greetings to them before leading them into the kitchen. Evelyn was calmly cutting up a piece of meat. Chris stared at her. She looked very odd.
A dagger lay beside the cutting board and a sword was sheathed at her waist. She wore a long slit skirt and a tank top. Her blonde hair was pulled back in a braid wound around her head like a crown. She looked like a woman out of legend and very out of place in such a domestic setting.
Selene seemed to think so too. "What are you doing?"
"Preparing," Evelyn said calmly.
"Preparing what? Dinner?"
"A spell, actually. One of the few spells I do that requires blood."
Selene narrowed her eyes suspiciously, but said nothing else.
Amarice came into the room, and she too was dressed oddly. She wore long pants, boots, and a tank top. Chris could see daggers peeking over the tops of her boots and he was willing to bet that she had many more hidden in her clothes. Her hair was bound back in a bun with chopsticks stuck through it.
"Hey Mom," she said. "Have we got any willow bark?"
"It's in the spice drawer. Near the back," Evelyn replied. She had placed a piece of wire mesh over a bowl and was pressing the meat against the mesh, forcing out the blood.
"Thanks," Amarice replied, leaving with the small jar of willow bark.
Evelyn poured the blood into a pot and placed the lid on it.
"That just needs to simmer for a bit. Now, if you'll follow me, I've got some weapons for you."
"Weapons?" Michael repeated.
"We have weapons," Selene said, drawing her trench coat aside to reveal her Berettas.
Evelyn grinned and something in her smile reminded Chris that she wasn't as normal as she appeared. "Not like these."
She led them upstairs to the weapons room through the linen closet and even Selene looked a little impressed.
"Now then," Evelyn said, crossing to one wall and inspecting a sword she found there. "You won't only be fighting Kraven, but possibly a man named Xareth. I'll do my best to keep him occupied, but it may be that I can't do that. In that case, one of my girls will take care of him. Unless things get much messier than I think they will, Xareth shouldn't be too much of a problem for you.
"But just in case, you should know that Xareth is pretty much as immortal as yourselves, if not more. I doubt bullets will have much effect on him. A sword to the heart, though, will kill anyone, immortal or not."
Selene frowned. "Swords are really not my forte," she said. She knew how to use one, but she wasn't as good with one many other vampires, Kraven included.
"I've never used one," Michael confessed.
Evelyn frowned at them. "You guys really haven't thought this through very much, have you?"
Selene didn't answer, and Michael shook his head.
"You don't have a plan, do you?"
"No," Selene said shortly, her patience growing thin.
"Good thing I do then, isn't it?" Evelyn said with a grin. She loved a good challenge and, looking at Selene, she was wiling to bet the older vampire did too.
This was going to be interesting.
A/N: I just want to say I'm sooo sorry it took so long. I'm going to update faster, I promise. I'm on summer break right now, and I fully plan to have this completed by the time school starts. So there!
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