A/N: Wow, I got a chapter done in a span of two days. A few things I forgot to mention about the fic in the prologue: It's going to be pretty AU, as my OC comes into the mix just a little before Shippo shows up. But I'm not going to bother recounting a bunch of episodes from the show, although for the purposes of moving the plot along, I am going to include a few of episodes, and there are going to be a few events in this fic that don't happen in the series. It might take me a couple of chapters to get the ball rolling, but I'll try to keep it perpetually interesting after I get all the "how so-and-so got to such a place" stuff out of the way. Oh, just a warning to the wary, there are a few decidedly vulgar English slang expressions in this chapter, my apologies if you're offended by foul language. I was attempting to make the dialogue a bit more realistic.

A great big thank you to rehab 41 for reviewing, and giving me TONS of great ideas for developing my character, and to those who are reading. Enjoy!

"This is mind-to-mind speak"

This is thought

Chapter 1

The Shaman flopped down in her bed, thoroughly exhausted. She hadn't slept in days. She was able to hitch-hike to Port-au-Prince, only to find that a flight to London wasn't available until the next week. Trying to sleep at the airport proved to be an interesting learning experience. She learned that sleeping at the airport was impossible.

"Ugh…and now I have to plan a flight to Tokyo…" she moaned, burying her face in a pillow. She rolled on her back, staring up at the white, textured ceiling of her cozy London flat. She had never been so happy to see her home again. The place had grown cold and stale in her three weeks absence, and it was taking a while for her to get used to the hustle and bustle and noise of the city again, but it was still home.

Just as she was drifting off to sleep, her bedside phone rang, scaring her senseless. After her heartbeat slowed back down to a normal rate, she picked up the receiver.

"Hello, Sylvia Cardinal speaking."

"Sylvie! Where the fuck have you been the past month!" shouted an agitated Scot.

"Who is this?" she asked, massaging her temple.

"'Who is this' she says! Fucking Nora! It's Al McLain, you remember, your agent? I've been trying to reach you for the past two weeks!"

"I got that impression from your oh-so-cordial greeting, Allan. Are you going to tell me WHY you've been trying to reach me, or do I have to go over there and beat it out of you?" she said irritably.

"Oh, don't be so bitchy! You'd think you hadn't gotten your beauty-rest or something!"

"Allan…I haven't…and my patience is rapidly deteriorating."

"Fine! Fine! The publisher wants to do a second printing of your book, but they need your permission to do it. Trust me, you should DEFINITELY give them permission. The amount they're going to pay you is more than I make in a bloody-fucking year."

"Oh really?" she asked. Between the sleep-deprivation and the jet-lag, nothing was going to excite her.

"Well don't jump for joy or anything!" said the frustrated Scot. "So? What do you say?"

"Fine, fine, they have my permission. Can I go to bed now?"

"Now you know that verbal contracts don't cut it! You have to sign a written contract."

"Can't I do it tomorrow?" she groaned, flopping back on the bed.

"No! They've already been waiting longer than they wanted to!"

"For crying out loud…alright, alright…bring the contract over and we can get it over with…"

"Finally some sense! I won't be a minute!" With that, she heard a loud click, and then the annoying buzz of the dial tone. Allan McLain had been her agent for several years, and at that point she knew him pretty well. He had a mouth like a toilet, but he was a decent agent.

Rolling off the bed, she dragged herself out to her living room. Her shamanic exploits had always been her first priority, but they didn't help to pay the bills. She worked her fingers to the bone through high school, and moved to England from a town in Oklahoma to study World History at the University of Oxford, writing a controversial thesis entitled Religion Through the Ages for her PhD, and soon after, got the work published. One large advantage was that getting a work published earned her tenure at Oxford. She could teach there until retirement. However it surprised her to some extent that the publisher wanted to do a second edition. It may have been rather controversial, being written from the standpoint of a non-Christian, but she couldn't see how it would appeal to anyone without a genuine interest in world history.

As her head started to nod, she heard the door buzzer go off. That must be Allan...she thought, dejectedly forcing herself up. She walked over to the intercom and pushed the button.

"Hello?"

"It's Al! Buzz me in!" he said. She winced, he always seemed to think that he had to shout into the box to be heard.

"I'm tired...not deaf," she replied, pushing the button to let him in. In about a minute, he was pounding on her door. She opened it, and he charged in with hismotorcycle helmet in one hand and his black briefcase in the other.

"Hello! Long time no see! I have the contract right here," he said, holding up his briefcase. "Bloody hell, you look half-dead. Have a wild night?" He grinned lecherously, his steel-grey eyes sparkling. She decided to ignore his comment, gesturing for him to follow her to the kitchen.

"Can I offer you anything? A drink?" she asked. There, the obligatory hospitality's out of the way.

"No, I can only stay for a bit. Agents don't get to go on sabbatical," he replied, feigning jealousy. She rolled her eyes and plopped down in a chair.

"I was hoping you'd say that. We can get this over with quickly."

"Shitting hell! You're even more frosty than usual! Why are you so knackered?" he asked. He seemed to be genuinely concerned.

"I've been in Haiti the past three weeks. Could you show me that contract now?"

"Haiti? Fuck a duck! What the hell were you doing there? It couldn't have been to work on your tan!" She glared at him dangerously. "Ack…sorry Sylvie." Her tolerance of him calling her anything other than Sylvia and his potty-mouth notwithstanding, she didn't appreciate him making jokes about her being African American, or partially anyway. He ran his fingers through his dark hair awkwardly; he looked fairly young for a man of forty-four. A few grey hairs could be seen in his sideburns, and shallow crows feet were starting to be visible, but he looked better than most of the men she knew. He opened up his briefcase and dug around for a minute, producing a large manila envelope and sliding it across the kitchen table to her.

"I got Neville Blake to look it over, and I read it through myself. It's all pretty straight-forward, no fine print." She read through it herself, and finding no problems with the contract, she signed it. Neville Blake was her lawyer. He wasn't a well-known attorney by any means, but he got the job done.

"There you go. I'll walk you to the door…oh wait, before you go, do you have any idea when my check from the second publication will come?"

"I'm going to over-night this to the publisher, so I shouldn't have your check any later than the end of the week."

"That's fine."

"Anyway, I'd better bugger-off. I'll show myself out. Get some sleep, eh love?" he said, getting up.

"Don't worry, I will." With that, he picked up his briefcase, and his helmet, and left. Sylvia yawned loudly and dragged herself back to her room. She flopped down on her bed, and, almost immediately, fell asleep.

When she woke up the next day, she still felt weary, but she was rested enough to function. She stretched and climbed out of bed, took off her jeans and sweater and walked over to her small altar in the corner of her room. It was nothing terribly extravagant. A framed drawing of Hecate in her most well-known form sat at the back with candles on either side, and a yew branch in the middle. Small stone statues of a dog, a bear and a raven were placed at the front of the altar. These were her totems, her animal guides. They were the different parts of her nature that made her whole. Dog was her loyalty and social nature, Bear was her love, and Raven was her mind, constantly searching for knowledge. These animal guides aided her when she called, and often visited her in her dreams.

She took a small boom box off her dresser and turned it on. The familiar, rhythmic beat of tribal drums pulsed out of the speakers, almost automatically sending her into trance. She began to spin and whirl, swaying her hips and losing herself in the steady beat.

She looked around, gazing at the familiar surroundings. A clearing in a huge, green forest. At the centre, a fire burned. This was her inner temple. Not a part of the astral realm, but part of her psyche. This was where she communed with her totem animals. She sat by the fire, and was soon joined by Dog. She smiled at the familiar being.

"Hello, my friend. You know why I'm here, I'm sure."

"Yes. We are going to Japan," he replied, his tail wagging in excitement.

"Mother says that this mission may take a long time. Are you prepared for it?"

"I will remain with you until the end of time, no matter what trials you face."

"As will we." A great black bird perched on her shoulder, and a huge brown bear lumbered out of the bushes, sitting down on the edge of the clearing. For some reason, although she was always loyal, and always came when needed, Bear never came very close to Sylvia when she communed with them like this. She hugged Dog tightly and caressed Raven's feathers.

"Thank you all. Farewell."

She snapped back to reality, turned off her boom box, dug around in her drawers for some clothes and ran to the bathroom to have a shower. She had a lot to do that day, she needed to go to the university to get her sabbatical extended, and plan a flight to Tokyo. She was just glad she had taken an interest in Japan. Her shamanic endeavors had lead her there many times over the years, and at that point she was fairly fluent in Japanese, although sometimes she had to search for the word she needed, and she tended to switch back and forth between English and Japanese without realizing it. But unlike when she attempted to speak Creole, she could carry on a conversation withthenatives without sounding mildly retarded.

She stepped out of the shower and dried off, pulling on some dress-pants and a blouse. Walking down the hall to the front door, she grabbed a light jacket, her umbrella, and her keys, leaving the flat.

Several hours later, she made it back to her flat with all her business taken care of. She went to her room and changed into a pair of pajama-bottoms and a t-shirt, and then went out to the living-room, curling up on the couch with a book and a blanket.

She sensed Dog pad out of her room andsit down by her feet, looking at her accusingly.

"You should be going to the gym," he said.

"I just got back from Haiti, and I had to do a lot of walking while I was there. I think I can go a couple days without going to the gym."

"Maybe, but I want exorcise!"

"Come on now Dog, I need some time to get my energy back. I don't know how you always have so much of it." It was only after shefinishedspeakingthat the obvious reason for it came to mind.

"Well, the fact that I'm a spirit helps," he replied cheekily. "Oh fine then, if you're too lazy to get off your big butt I'll find other ways to amuse myself." With that, she sensed him get up and pad away. She chuckled, saying, "Cheeky creature."

The next day, with her energy fully back, she took the opportunity to go to the gym and practice her kung-fu with her friend Alisa Brown. The two had been roommates all through University, and soon after they started living together they enrolled in a kung-fu class as a way to keep in shape, and as a way to bond and get to know each other. Sylvia hadn't had the best luck in the gene department. Her mother, an African American woman named Latisha, was short, plump, and had an over-abundance of curves. Sylvia had inherited her curves, and her bad metabolism, but her body structure was a bit slimmer than Latisha's. However she had to work out frequently to keep in shape. Her trance exorcises involved belly-dancing to tribal drums, so thathelped as well. Luckily, Alisa proved to have the same problem, so they encouraged each other to keep going to the class, and as a result, they were very proficient in the martial art, having studied it for nearly ten years at that point.

"So," said Alisa, ducking under a roundhouse kick and thrusting her knee towards Sylvia's stomach. "When are you leaving?"

Sylvia blocked her knee, countering with a open-palmed thrust. "In a couple days."

"Wha--OOF!" Sylvia's attack connected, landing square in Alisa's stomach, sending her flying on to her back. She coughed several times, choking out, "Bugger! Why didn't you tell me earlier? I would have had time to plan a bonne-voyage party!" Sylvia helped her up.

"Girl, I just recovered from the last 'bonne-voyage' party you threw! I just about went home with some Cockney shirt." Alisa laughed and with a cheeky grin replied, "Why didn't you go? You could stand to have a good one-nighter! You might be less of a tight-arse after a good shagging!" Sylvia stared at her in mock shock, and dropped down on her hands, swung one of her legs out and knocked Alisa's feet out from under her. Alisa landed with a loud "Oof!", glaring at Sylvia andtugging onher legs, making her fall down in a heap. They glowered at each other for a moment before they both burst into hysterical laughter.

"But why do you have to go so soon? You just got back from bloody Haiti!" Alisa cried, wiping the tears from her eyes. Sylvia paused. Although she openly admitted that she wasn't Christian, she was reluctant to talk about her true religion. Many people in England were open-minded, but many weren't so open open-minded. She had often considered telling Alisa her secrets, she was a kind, easy-going person. She'd had no problem with her mixed heritage; but Sylvia was afraid. Not only of alienating one of her few good friends, but also of becoming dependant on someone. If she told Alisa that she was a shaman, she would have to depend on her to keep her secret. That might have not been such a bad thing, if Alisa didn't mind the fact that she was pagan, knowing that Sylvia was sharing her deepest secret with her could only cause their friendship to grow, but such dependence wasn't in her nature. She preferred to be self-reliant. Putting all this into consideration, she used the same excuse she had used with Allan and the dean at Oxford U .

"I need to start doing research for a new book. You know I like to do my research at the source," she replied, standing up and dusting herself off, wiping sweat from her forehead.

"I know, always the scholar. I just miss you when you go off on these daft trips of yours Sylvia!" said Alisa. She wrapped an arm around Sylvia's shoulders as they strolled into the locker-room to shower and get changed.

"Come on, I'll buy you a drink," said Alisa once they left the gym. "It's not a huge send-off, but it's something!"

"Of course," said Sylvia, grinning. "What would a send-off be without getting shit-faced?" The two laughed gleefully and hailed a taxi to go to their usual pub.

The day had come. Her bags were packed, her tickets and passport were ready. She slipped the small animal statues from her altar into a blue velvet pouch she had made herself, and slipped it into her carry-on. She didn't know if she would have a place to herself where she could keep an altar, or even do her trance-work in piece, but when she was unsure about her missions, she always felt a bit safer when she brought her statues with her.

A few hours later, she sat in the plane, looking out the window as the plane took off, and the buildings gradually shrunk. Well...Japan, here I come.

A/N: Thanks for reading, and PLEASE take the time to review. Reviews make me work faster !