CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Dean

It was early. Like, way too early. Usually, I could get by on, oh about, three hours of sleep, but the adrenaline high from the past few days seemed to be wearing off. Clutching my coffee, I took a look at our rather pathetic looking group. Despite last night's events, Zak seemed fine and was back to being a bossy know it all. And Ezra was just a morning person, ugh. Sammy, in jeans and a t-shirt, was staring vacantly at the book filled coffee table from the far side of the couch, eyes at half-mast. Aaron, still in his plaid pajama pants and very dorky, 'I heart Vancouver' t-shirt, was next to Sam, and sipping coffee. Straight across from me, in the same form fitting green shirt and dark jeans that he'd been wearing yesterday, was a 'less shimmery' Brian, sitting cross-

legged on the floor next to the table, looking like he needed whatever the Fae equivalent of coffee was. Then me, in the arm chair, also still in my pjs, inhaling coffee and praying to whatever god would listen that the caffeine would kick in soon, because there were a lot of books on that table.

"…four in Cyrillic,"

"What's Cyrillic?" I yawned, and rubbed my eyes, trying to tune back in to whatever it was Zak was going on about.

"Russian." He answered, sounding only slightly annoyed, and gestured to the center stack of books, three leather bound ones that looked really old and one blue and purple Trapper Keeper. "And, five…" he nodded to the last stack, "in English. So, who, other than Sam and I, is good at Latin?" He paused, and looked expectantly at Aaron.

"What, me?" Aaron's eyes darted around the room, "Like, um, full sentences?" Aaron sputtered, while Zak crossed his arms and gave Aaron a, very impressive, 'annoyed dad' stare. "Well, um, I'm a little rusty." He scratched the back of his neck, and looked either embarrassed or nervous from Zak's stare, probably both.

" 'Rusty'?" I mimicked, kind of surprised, "Isn't Latin, like, Wizardry 101?"

"Hey, I'm not…"

"I can read full sentences." Ezra piped in, sounding entirely too chipper and looking way too put together.

Aaron's face pinched in surprise, "You can?"

"Of course." He smirked and walked from the dining table to pick up one of the Latin books. "I paid attention at wizard school." Then sat down and gave Zak a wink.

Brian snort laughed, and looked at the weirded / surprised look on all of our faces, "What? It was funny!" He smiled as he looked up at Zak, who was just staring at him with his patented Vulcan glare, complete with eyebrow.

"Okay, so, Ezra and Sam you get…"

"Zak," Sam scrubbed his hand over his face, "do you have anymore of that purple stuff you've been putting in our coffee?"

"Purple stuff?" Aaron grimaced, looking confused. Then it was like a lightbulb went off, and he raised his hand, "I too would like some of the 'purple stuff'."

"What the hell is 'the purple stuff'?" I asked, feeling out of the loop.

"Vitality potion." Aaron grinned and waggled his eyebrows.

"Ugh, you mean that stuff that tastes like ass?"

"No, no, Zak's actually tastes good. Right buddy?" He smiled up at Zak.

"Oooo, okay," I grinned and slapped my leg, "I'll take two please."

Zak, looked around the room at our expectant faces and with a resigned sigh, stomped over and grabbed the black backpack that was resting against the armchair I was in, while muttering something about being the 'only adult in the room'.

"Um, Zak? Would you mind?" Brian asked timidly from the floor.

Zak's lips thinned as he looked down at the Fae, then without another word, set the bag at his feet and pushed his sleeve up to his elbow, Brian followed suit. Leaning over slightly, they grasped each other's arms in one of those dramatic handshakes you see in movies. As soon as their hands touched each other's skin, two blue tendrils, like a double helix appeared and circled around their clasped arms.

"Whoa." Aaron whispered.

It looked like Zak didn't like whatever was happening very much as his eyes were shut tight and his brows pinched as if he was either concentrating really hard or he was in pain. Probably a combo of both. From what Sam had told me that Zak had told him, letting Brian snack on him was a lot different than being a Consort, where the Fae slowly sucked the magic out in small doses so that you didn't really notice. Something Brian couldn't do since Zak would apparently explode if he tried to possess him. So the way Brian had to do it made him feel like puking while his chest was exploding. Fortunately, it only lasted about thirty seconds.

"Ahh, thanks." Brian said with a satisfied exhale, his normal bright 'shimmer' returned. Zak opened his eyes and rolled his neck, gave Brian a curt nod and kept going to the kitchen.

"C'mon, Sam. I need your help grinding shit." Zak stated dryly, and disappeared into the kitchen.

Aaron's eyes widened as he stopped with his coffee cup halfway to his mouth while Ezra looked just as surprised

Sammy cleared his throat, "Uh, yeah, of course. Coming." He managed to get out, and looking totally shocked, headed to the kitchen.

"Wow." Aaron whispered.

" 'Wow' what?" I asked, looking at the two of them.

"He must really trust your brother…" he took a sip of coffee.

"Whadda ya mean?"

"He never asks for help." Aaron replied, turning to the kitchen where we could hear bowls clanging and Zak giving instructions, then turned back to me with a small smile.

Research sucked. It sucked double because Aaron had had to go to some sort of 'professional development' seminar, like an hour after we started. Thus, leaving me with all the English books. I blinked and tried to focus on the notebook on my lap, which for a spiral notebook that had butterflies on the cover, was filled with some pretty nasty shit. "Dude," I sighed, "we do not appreciate Bobby enough… If we live through this we're buyin' him a case of that Johnny Walker he likes…" I thought about it, "Or maybe just a bunch of gift cards."

"Hmmph," Sammy huff laughed, "good idea."

"Who's Bobby?" Ezra asked, looking up from his book and notes from his seat across from Sam at the dining table.

"Oh," I tossed the notebook on the table and leaned forward so my arms were resting on my thighs, "You know, a grouchy but loveable hermit who knows everything about everything creepy with a houseful of books to prove it." I smiled and sat back.

"Sooo, basically, Zak." Ezra smirked and Brian gave a quiet laugh.

"Yep. Oh, and he also really likes the word 'idiot'." I smiled and nodded at the couch that Zak had claimed and was currently lying stretched out, head resting on the arm, left leg stretched out while the right was sliding off to the floor.

Slightly narrowed eyes peered over the old leather book propped on his chest, "I'm going to take that as a compliment."

I raised my eyebrows and nodded. "You really should. Plus, the same goes for you." I pointed my finger at him and picked the notebook back up.

He gave me the Vulcan over his book.

"You just tell me your poison and I'll get it. Or, you know, a year's supply of diapers." I frowned and looked at Sam. "Isn't that shit really expensive?"

"Yeah, baby stuff is ridiculously expensive." Ezra answered, not looking up from his book.

Zak, brows pinched, stopped reading for a second and angled his head just enough so he could look over the arm rest at Ezra. Then with a small smile, turned back to reading his book.

"Alright, diapers it is." I nodded at Zak. "But for real, does anybody have anything? Because I've got diddly with a side of squat." I sighed and tossed the notebook back on the coffee table.

"I thought I might've had something, but I'm pretty sure one of the ingredients is," Sammy squinted at his notes, " 'lungs of a virgin'."

A collective 'blech' and disgusted faces followed.

"God, why is it always virgins?" I grimaced and shook my head, "Talk about a raw deal."

"And lungs? That's definitely a new one on the 'required organs' list." Sammy said, still looking disgusted. He sighed and leaned back in his chair, "I don't know…" He scratched his head, "Maybe we're just making this too complicated." He heavy sighed, then blinked and straightened in his chair like he'd made some grand realization, "I think that's it, we're making it too complicated."

"And how exactly are we doing that?" Brian huffed, sounding annoyed. Probably because Sammy had taken away his phone privileges.

"Okay, hear me out," he stood up, and walked to the center of the room, "Dean, whenever we've gone after something that was really, really old, the way to kill it was usually pretty simple and actually should've been pretty obvious, right?"

I shrugged, "Yeah, I guess."

"But we're not trying to kill her, we're trying to trap her. So I can kill her." Brian smiled evilly.

"Or, you could just tell us how to kill you and we'd be good to go." I smiled at Brian.

Brian gave me a nasty glare, "As I have said before," he growled through clenched teeth, "it wouldn't work. As your brother just pointed out, all truly ancient mythic creatures have a unique way to be killed and unless you know that ahead of time, you'll only succeed in pissing them off." His lip twitched up in an angry grimace, "It's why she exiled me in the first place."

"But you just said you were gonna kill her. Doesn't that mean you know how?"

"Yeah, I'm gonna eat the bitch," the maniacal smile returned, "only surefire way to kill her."

"Ew." I grimaced. "That's just gross. Anyway, Sammy, you were saying?"

Sammy looked a bit grossed out as well, but he continued, "Anyway, Zak,"

"Hmm?"

"The array we used to summon Brian wasn't actually that complicated, right?"

"Yeah." Zak turned his head so he could look at Sam.

"That monstrosity wasn't complicated?" I gaped at the both of them, not believing what I'd just heard. The thing had been huge, outer circle in Fae, inner a demon summoning circle with lines of runes at five points that converged in the center. Sammy gave me his 'annoyed' face and opened his mouth, but before he could get a word out, Zak's phone buzzed on the coffee table. He reached for it, doing his best to stay lying down, but when he saw the screen his eyes widened and he shot up to a sitting position.

"What is it?" I asked, but the guy didn't respond, instead his eyes were laser focused on the screen, flicking through what I assumed were pictures or a really long e-mail. He grabbed the back of his neck, then dropped his hand onto his thigh.

"It's from Kit." He choked out.

"The cop?" He finally looked up and nodded. My stomach twisted. If Kit's message had unnerved our 'expert in Dark Arts' fearless leader, then whatever was in that message was bad news… Really bad news. He touched the screen and a second later, all of our phones buzzed.

Son of a bitch. They were crime scene photos of the ICU baby nurse… One of the Druids from the MPD file. The first was an overall photo of the scene, which was incredibly gruesome and disturbing to say the least. Whatever had done this had curled her body into a fetal position and laid her in a shallow basket, her pink scrubs were soaked in blood and she'd had the shit beat out of her. The next four photos were of the injuries. She'd been bludgeoned, garroted, her throat was slit, and she had vertical slits running from her wrists to the crook of her arms. Just one of those wounds would have been enough to kill her, so whatever had done this had enjoyed it. And it was for sure trying to draw us out.

Ezra cursed, Zak's face was back to Vulcan stoic and he was intently staring at his phone and I heard Sammy angry-breathe out his nose.

"What?"

I looked up from the screen just as Brian stood up and grabbed Sam's phone. His body stiffened and his eyes turned to angry slits, "That fucking bitch." He seethed and then my mind went fuzzy and I suddenly had the urge to murder the next person who looked at me wrong.

"Brian! Uugh, calm down!" Ezra groan – shouted, palm pressed to his forehead, eyes squeezed shut.

"Oh, shit…" I heard Brian exclaim.

As quickly as it had come, the murderous rage was gone. I let out a slow breath and pried my fingernails from the armrests, then looked around the room. Sammy, still next to Brian, had his gun pulled out, and Zak had his eyes closed, head on the back of the couch, and was taking measured breaths while squeezing his temples.

Ezra was the first one to regain the ability to speak and he didn't sound too happy…

Inhale, "What…" Exhale, "was that?" he asked through clenched teeth and glared at Brian.

Brian winced, "Sorry about that, I didn't think I was strong enough to do that."

"Sorry for what exactly?" And shook my head again.

"Um, well," he paused and his right hand reached for his imaginary harp strap, for a guy who claimed to be a god, this dude had some serious anxiety issues, "if I have strong feeling about something, those feelings can seep out and the people in my general vicinity will feel the same way." He gestured to all of us.

"Strong feelings?" I repeated.

"It's a thrall?" Zak asked at the same time.

"Kind of, I guess…" Brian grimaced and shrugged at Zak, "But more like I just enhance what's already there, you know? It's very useful if you're leading an army." He nodded to the room.

"I bet it is." I mumbled.

"Can you control it?" Ezra asked, his usually warm and friendly tone turning to ice.

"Yes, yes of course. Don't worry, it won't happen again," Brian gave the room a reassuring smile. "I should probably get my harp though…" he mumbled to himself.

"Good." Ezra leaned back in his chair, sighing in relief.

Zak took a quick glance at Ezra, blinked and shook his head.

"Well, our timetable just moved up," I pushed out of the chair and walked to the kitchen to take stock of supplies… As suspected, not enough food and definitely not enough alcohol. The bottle of Jack was nearly empty and that was unacceptable. "Sammy," I walked into the living room, "pie."

"On, it." Sam nodded as he grabbed his jacket and headed to the door.

I looked down to Ezra, "Pizza." Ezra nodded, but looked a little puzzled. Clearly these people had no idea how to handle an all night research session. "Zak," he looked up from his phone, face blank, "more of the purple stuff. And, you," I pointed at Brian, "You need to get it together and start thinking about everything you know about this skank. We sleep in shifts." I crossed the room and dropped back into the chair. "She's got another thing comin' if she thinks she can kill a baby nurse and get away with it."