Disclaimers for ownership of Blood Ties in part one.
Let me add an additional disclaimer - I know nothing of Harry Potter fandom, and no character here is intended to resemble any particular real life fen.
Everyone at school was talking about it. How Tiegan had killed Jen's mom. With an ax! Some people said it wasn't true; he hadn't really done it. Conspiracy theories were spinning. It gave excitement to going to school. Tina herself, didn't know what to think or what to feel. It had happened the very evening she'd seen them! She had resented and even hated Jen at times, but she would never have wished such a horrible thing on her. She didn't think. No, probably not. Her mom, how awful.
But otherwise, Tina was ecstatic. Thirteen compliments was not a deluge, but it was better than the feedback she'd gotten before. No one had contacted her after those thirteen, but it was enough to give her courage. People were finally seeing how good her story was, how fascinating her main character was. Floating on happiness, she posted the first chapter of her story to a couple of the fic communities with public feedback. Then she'd had to leave for work.
The day had been busy, but Tina did sneak a couple of looks at the community and there was still no feedback. Dread began to grow in her stomach, and anger smoldered there as well. She opened a DVD of Little Miss Sunshine and there was one of those mystery discs again. "Tim," she asked. "I keep finding these in the wrong covers. Do you know what it is?"
"No," her manager said. "Just go get the customer another one."
Well, duh. She knew she'd have to get another one. She was just asking what the darn disc was so she could get it in the right case. She stalked off to the shelves and returned with the proper disc. She rang the customer up, and the woman and her kids left. Tim, she saw, had tried to remove the disc but had broken it. Ha. That had happened to her, too.
Finally Tim left her alone and went to stock shelves, so she logged into the web and went to the community. Someone had responded! She clicked on the link eagerly and read:
Did anyone else read this? OMG, can you say Mary Sue? And Sweetie, does your word processor not have spellcheck? I suppose everyone has at least one HP story in them, and in this case, that's where it should have stayed. Beta readers - not just for breakfast anymore.
Tina felt the shock all through her body. No one had ever been this rude in this community before. Not just flat out like that. She couldn't believe it. She almost didn't get the web shut down in time as Tim returned, she was so stunned.
She took her turn restocking the returns onto the shelves, and, as the shock wore off, she wanted to cry. Her character was not a Mary Sue. She wasn't! There was a whole list of reasons why she wasn't. But all someone had to do was throw that label around and the entire story would go in everyone's trash. No one would even read it if they thought it was a Mary Sue. She slammed the DVDs and tapes into place on the shelves, blinking back tears. What should she say? How should she respond? It wasn't fair. Just because a character was female didn't make her a Mary Sue.
She had to put on a more composed face when she returned to the counter. She and Tim and the new guy, Antonio, handled customers for a half hour while Tina wrote angry emails in her head. She felt so wretched, like all her friends had abandoned her. She opened one DVD case of The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, and there was another one of those mystery discs. She didn't feel like talking, either to a customer or to Tim, so she just snapped the case closed and rang up the rental. The thirty-ish guy and his little boy walked out with it.
Not long after that, Tina was alone at the counter long enough to get on the web again. She felt sick as she opened the community to respond, and she felt even worse when she saw there were four responses, not to her story, but to the first critic's message. She couldn't help but read them, no matter how bad it was.
They weren't bad. It was totally the opposite. All four messages were angry defenses of her story, listing all the reasons - that's right! - why it wasn't a Mary Sue, and praising her writing. And the fourth message defending her - the fourth one was from the community moderator, an excellent writer herself and a Big Name Fan in Harry Potter fandom, someone who had never even deigned to notice Tina before!
She finished work in a daze of self-righteous happiness.
A boy stood in the freezing rain watching Vicki's office building. His age was indeterminate - middle teens to early 20's. He had clear blue eyes in a heart shaped, pale face. His coal black hair reached below his soft cheekbones, tickling his jaw, and fell over one eye. He had been shivering for hours.
He saw when the friend arrived and drove into the underground parking lot. He crossed the street, not noticing the cars until one almost hit him. He reached the parking garage but stayed out of sight while he watched the man exit his car. He slunk further into shadows when the aura of immense strength brushed over him. A vampire, and of the most powerful kind. One who kept his soul but sacrificed all sight of the light for eternity. Unexpected; someone of such power would make an excellent candidate for a final offering, himself. But the boy could not use him to reach the Marked One.
The vampire, fair and dark, lithe and lethal, leapt into the stairwell. The boy turned away. His hands were so cold he almost couldn't use them, but that was the least of his pain.
Celucci had a full caseload, and he and Dave were close to solving one homicide, but he still made time to drop in on Dr. Mohadevan and ask if there were anything unusual about Kate's case.
"Unusual, Detective?" she asked, switching off the light to her microscope and focusing on him.
"Yeah, the body. Anything . . . unexpected."
She frowned. "Nothing I noticed. You can read my report. Isn't that case closed?"
"So, humor me. She was killed with an ax?"
"Very clearly. Her skull was split, her spinal cord was severed. I understand the young man found an ax the family used for splitting wood."
"Is there anything missing? Internal organs, unusual blood loss . . ."
Mohadevan took him seriously. "Nothing like that, no. Perhaps if you told me what you think I should be looking for."
Celucci shook his head. "Nothing. Sorry to have taken your time." He turned to go but turned back. "Has Vicki Nelson or her partner been by?"
Now Mohadevan did smile, and cock and inquisitive eyebrow. "Should I be expecting them?"
"I don't know. Probably not. Thanks."
Celucci went back to his desk. The case was closed. They had the perp. The woman's daughter was a witness. The fact that the carved symbol in a circle reminded him of the tattoos on Vicki's wrists was irrelevant.
He kept telling himself that.
The day had been difficult. Rain had become freezing rain on the very day Vicki had to spend outside trying to cut enough dead foliage to reach the junked trailer once occupied by the man she was searching for. His disgusted landlord had pushed it into a ravine that abutted his property and there it had become entangled with brush so thick and voracious it might as well have been a jungle. Vicki had spent grueling hours with heavy-duty hand clippers, wishing for a squad of flatfoots and heavy machinery. Or at least for a partner who could work during the day.
She had long since warmed up back at the office with food and hot coffee, but now her hands and forearms were aching with a soreness that grew worse each time she thought about it. She almost couldn't hold the phone she'd called Henry on.
Henry arrived at her office promptly, something Vicki had learned to take note of. It meant he probably hadn't fed before he came. Which didn't necessarily mean he was hungry; he didn't seem to need to feed every night. She wished she knew more about his needs, but after Mendoza she couldn't bring herself to ask.
Her own needs were distracting enough. Even tired and sore, something carnal in her responded when he breezed in the office. He exuded youth and strength and vitality and it all hit her like an ocean wave, leaving her wet and alert. Henry hung his coat on the rack and came straight to her where she perched on the edge of her desk, stopping well within her personal space. "Hi!" Coreen said, from behind the computer.
"Hi," Henry replied, but smiled at Vicki. "What's this about an incubus?"
Vicki refused to be daunted into moving away. She lifted her chin. "You didn't have to come over, I just wondered . . ."
"She's had another visit from Emmanuel," Coreen said.
Vicki turned to her. "What was that spell that took away your mouth?"
Coreen smiled.
"You have?" Henry asked, putting a hand on her upper arm. Vicki shrugged it away by standing and turning slightly. "You saw him or was he in your bed?"
"Can we leave the details out of this?"
"It may matter. Emmanuel entered this world in physical form in order to enjoy his women, but it's more common for incubi to visit in dreams." Henry's tone turned provoking. "Did you have a visitation or a date?"
"A visitation," Vicki said, trying to hide her irritation.
"I've called all the women he was with before," Coreen said. "They haven't seen him since the jealousy demon. Of course, we figured out he could make them lie."
Henry shook his head. "I didn't think he could maintain physical form for long. He had nothing to sacrifice."
"Sacrifice?" Vicki asked.
Coreen answered. "Most forms of arcane power require some kind of sacrifice on the part of the person who wants the power. Right?"
Henry finally looked at Coreen. "Essentially, yes. A minor demon has nothing to sacrifice and doesn't have the power to do what Astaroth tried." Henry moved to Vicki and took her forearms, turning them up to show the tattoos. He frowned. "What's the matter with your hands?"
Vicki was frozen, torn between wanting to snatch her hands back from him and . . . not. Inactivity won out. "There's nothing wrong," she said with a dry mouth. "The muscles are sore. I guess I don't keep those ones in good enough shape."
"What were you doing?" He stroked a thumb along the aching muscle just beside one tattoo.
"Squeezing hedge clippers." Now this had gone too far. Vicki took her arms from his and brushed back her hair.
"All day? Why?"
"Because the life of a PI is so very glamorous. What I want to know is how do I get rid of him and am I in any danger from him?" She walked behind Coreen and looked at her computer. "How do you find those sites? I never can."
Coreen looked smug. "You don't have my Google-fu."
"Your what?"
"You also don't have this." She placed a York University ID card on the desk.
"You're on the U library," Vicki said, the light dawning. She'd lost that access when she quit the force.
Coreen shrugged. "I'm deep into their connections with other academia, actually, but I really can't find much about getting rid of incubi."
Henry had turned his back when Vicki moved away from him.
"Henry?" Vicki asked. "You seem to be my expert."
Henry turned toward them looking resigned. "I don't think anyone ever found anything that kept them away. There were some herbs."
Vicki thought Henry looked upset.
"St. John's wort, vervain and garlic," Coreen read from the screen. Henry nodded, looking at Vicki across the gulf she had put between them.
"They don't work?" Vicki asked.
"I don't think so."
"Isn't garlic supposed to keep out vampires?" she teased, hoping to dispel the odd look on Henry's face.
He gave his head a small shake and smiled a little. "It stinks, but it would never keep me from something I wanted."
Vicki came around to the front of the desk. She couldn't help herself. She seemed to have a lot of things she wanted to ask him but couldn't. "So, what's the danger from an incubus? Didn't you say it takes the woman's soul to Hell if she . . ." She didn't finish, for she saw the sadness in Henry's eyes deepen. "Coreen didn't find that anywhere."
Henry looked at Coreen. "The main danger from an incubus was always that the Church might suspect you of having relations with the Devil, and the consequences of that were never good. My source of information about the incubus's motives may be somewhat unreliable."
"What's your source?" Vicki asked.
"The Inquisition."
"No one expects the Spanish Inquisition," Coreen said, then gasped and paled against her dark eye makeup.
That girl's mouth, Vicki thought viciously.
Ignoring Coreen, Henry approached Vicki, the small cross he wore in his sleeve in one hand. He took Vicki's hand and pressed it into her palm. "He's only a minor demon; this might help. I don't think you're in any real danger, but I could guard your sleep, if you like." He looked hopeful, but not flirtatious, which Vicki found more genuine and therefore much more attractive. Her knees felt weak. That would involve Henry in the room with her as she slept. Or tried to. That was so not a good idea. "You have other work to do," she said. He smelled like soap and rain.
"And I'd better go do it," he said, releasing her.
As he gathered his coat, Vicki asked, "Do you really think this will work?" She held up the cross.
"No," he said. "You're a heretic Protestant, anyway." Then he was gone.
Vicki snorted and turned back to Coreen who gazed after Henry with an expression like she'd just come out of a tragic movie.
"What?" Vicki asked.
Coreen composed herself and looked archly at Vicki's computer. "None of my business," she said.
"Probably not. What isn't?"
Coreen gave her a glare.
"What? Not being your business has never stopped you before."
"You wouldn't have an incubus in your bed if you were satisfied," Coreen said. "That much the records all make clear."
"You can stop right there," Vicki said.
Coreen gathered her purse and her jacket. "Fine, I'm going home." As she went through the door she added, "You'd rather have an incubus than Henry, and he knows it."
to be continued