Author’s Note: Please vote in my polls

Author’s Note: Please vote in my polls. Stay tuned; people will die. Special accolades to Casey Drake! She is one of only three people to have read the entire series (if you count my professional editor, who is only partway through The Enigma Person but has covered everything else) during this period of being an amateur.

On October 7, 2008, I will sign a book contract (the reasons for the specific date are complicated). If all goes well, a good deal more than three people will read the entire series. But Casey Drake, being neither paid to do this nor someone I first met in real life, will be showered with all honors of gratitude I can come up with.

Casey, I salute you and give you a virtual medal of loyalty.

And don’t worry; I’m still going to write after this series is over. Casey also read my short story “Summer Unlove” and was the only person to review it on fictionpress (many people reviewed at , where I have a bigger profile). She asked about the consequences of killing Summer, and helped inspire what will be called: Seasons Four, Open the Door.

Anyway, here is the last of Laconia. Please enjoy.

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As a moral vampire, I'm used to getting prank calls on Halloween, but I certainly didn't expect a serious call from the local police station saying they had a young female there of unknown species claiming to be my niece.

"Unknown species?" I asked, trying to pull my pants on one-handed.

Val handed me my shirt, smiling. After three years of marriage we still looked approximately the same age, though that would soon pass - I tried not to think about it. When your loved ones are of many different species, aging at different paces is a necessary evil. She also managed to find things in what was to her darkness, to me somewhat indecently bright lighting, and cooked for other people when she could never feed me.

"She says she's a Greymalkin, but we can't find any references to such beings anywhere, though obviously she can't be human, Elf, either kind of demon, vampire, dryad -"

"Just tell me what she is, rather than what she's not. And why is she in jail?" I had a feeling I'd heard the term before, but I couldn't remember where.

Val kissed me on the shoulder and I wrapped an arm around her creamy skin, stroked her waist-long maroon hair, ran my fingers on the angular lines of her pointed ears. All was an effort to apologize for the interruption. With her illness, we didn't get much of this sort of time together.

"Why don't you come down the station?" the man was saying. "It'll be easier to explain."

"But on what grounds does she claim to be my niece?"

"She says she's the sister of Charity Bright, the adopted daughter of your adoptive father's granddaughter."

"Well, if she isn't, she's certainly done her homework. I'll be there. Goodbye." I hung up.

"Charity was looking for a sister?" Val asked. Charity, besides being related to me, was the basis of a young religion that saw her as their Lady and Savior, a successor to Jesus. My own feelings on that matter I kept to myself.

I buttoned my shirt as I talked. "On Charity's first big quest, she obtained a mystical clarinet -"

"Why a clarinet?" Val settled back into the blankets, her violet eyes calm and good-humored.

"Why does it always have to be a harp or trumpet? Anyway, the inscription says only her sister, fulfiller of the prophecy (whatever the prophecy is), who will save the world, can play it. Ever since then she made every female person she met play it."

"Couldn't it only be an Elf?"

"You'd think that, but it's a spiritual sister. And people say Charity just wears the guise of an Elf."

"I think we all only wear the guise of our species. We're all people."

I leaned down and kissed her. "I love you for knowing that. I'm sorry about -"

"Don't be, Rivki. I was actually getting slee-" and she fell into unconsciousness. Two years of being abused by her older brother had left the scars of narcolepsy and abnormal forgetfulness, both courtesy of head trauma and the fragile sleep and memory centers of Eudemons. Her mother had fared worse; at least they had been reunited, with Lise living in Val's old house, taking care of the domestic violence survivors we sheltered there.

Two young people were sitting in a parked car next to mine, making out to angry music like the wails of the damned. It was a Smart Car, which could be seen as either an asset or a liability depending how much they melted together. No backseat, so that was out, but for tongue hockey there are worse things than a small space. I tapped on the window and they shrieked.

The young man of the pair, Felix Jangoral, rolled down the window. He'd tried and tried to give himself corpse-pale skin in keeping with his Goth sensibilities, but his skin was simply too dark. His hair was too thick to hang round his face in greasy shadows. And he was too short and lithe - a gymnast's physique - to appear threatening to anyone.

"Vampires, scaring people," he muttered, using the pseudo-sullen tone he employed for jokes. "You think this is your special night, don't you?"

I grinned. "I just wanted to warn you that your mom's probably got spies." I pointed at a raven, most likely her pet Jonathan Strange, sitting in a tree branch.

Felix was actually past high school, but since he went to Laconia College right in town and they wouldn't let him bring his pets, he still lived with his parents. Amaranth and Luther tried to keep a watchful eye on the youngest and most problematic of their children.

Felix sighed and snapped his fingers. Two cats appeared from the shadows and snuck up the tree. Then hissing and squawking began. Feathers were lost. Bodies were pecked. Such was the life of those who shared Derrick Jangoral's blood - Felix's grandfather could control all animals, but the powers grew more specific with each generation.

The female of the pair appeared fully human, but you never can tell with pale nineteen year-olds who could either have dyed their hair fuchsia or actually be part Eudemon. "You're staring at my neck."

"If you don't want people doing that, maybe you shouldn't have gotten a rose tattooed right at the jugular," I said, sounding slightly strained. "It's like leaving a repentant kleptomaniac alone with your jewelry chest."

"Rose, steady," Felix said. "He's my friend." That wasn't entirely accurate - he tolerated me and was actually friends with Val. I appreciated even lip service, though.

"Happy tongue-hockey," I said, unlocking my bicycle. It wasn't far enough to warrant a car that needed to be filled up once every two months. Val and I were doing okay, but we needed her disability payments to give us any room to keep some money in the bank. There was a passenger seat, so if I needed to bring this girl home it would be all right, as long as she didn't have much luggage.

I put on a helmet to be a good example to young people who were of more fragile species. 2:20 AM on a chilly Thursday, freezing rain expected in the forecast. Not many people out. I came across one of my fellow Black Ribboners washing her car. I ran a support group for abstemious vampires, taking the name from Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels. I still wish those hardline vamps hadn't forcibly turned him. Yes, he had a terminal illness. Yes, he did great things for Magics in the days when he thought we were all fictional. I agree that his work since then has still been of stellar quality. But if he wanted to die human some fifty years ago, they should have respected his wishes.

"Hey there, D.H." I called softly, to not wake any sleepers. She waved. Most of us choose occupations that allow us to be nocturnal, but a few manage normal jobs, just as some humans can take night shifts. Still, leisure is generally late at night. More natural.

Before the Fantasy Coup, Laconia looked on the surface like any other large town in the more woodland parts of the eastern United States. After the Fantasy Coup, though, when Magics joined the mainstream, the true quirks came out. We were the international headquarters of the Official Magics-Humans Institute, our very own sector of law, order, and lobbying.

There were drinking chocolate shops for Elves, along the same pattern as human coffee shops but with nothing that would kill a chemically sensitive species. There were straight vampire bars and gay vampire bars; Elf-wear boutiques; Eudemon fight clubs; werewolf shelters for that time of the month (pay 15 a month for a two-year subscription, food, cage, and armed guard provided, if you escape and hurt anyone or yourself get all your money back); dryad restaurants that sold many different types of soil and natural fertilizer. My favorite was Yarns, a books and enchanted crafts store I owned shares in and which Felix stood to inherit.

And of course there was the ancestor of all those, Junglelaughter's Pet Pavilion. I passed it on my ride, brick with ivy climbing around it. Most retail buildings were brick and the downtown area was paved in gray stone. The streetlamps were energy-saving bulbs but built to look like the soft gaslights of yesteryear. Many smaller streets had trees lining them. This was thanks to the considerable Elf presence, a group that can't stand living anywhere not beautiful.

The station, a small, inoffensive cinderblock rectangle, had only two cells. One was a drunk tank and the other held suspects. The OMHI had its own holding cells for any Magics criminal awaiting trial in their specialized Interspecies Court.

I chained my bike to a tree and went inside, taking off my helmet as I walked. Two officers were there, one a man and the other a female Elf. Both looked sleepy. "Why don't you hire vampires for this hour?" I asked.

"Hello, Mr. Anghel," the Elf said, shaking my hand. "We do, but this is their night off. There is no malice on Myra's part, but she was found breaking and entering into a closed groccery store."

"Is that the young female's name?"

"Yes," the man said. "We have to warn you, her appearance is very unusual, and she is both deaf and mute. She has one of those AudiAider machines and has communicated with us through that."

As they led me down the hall, a soft voice sounded like she was talking on the telephone. She had an interesting accent, as if she'd learned English from fifteen teachers who all came from different countries. "Very pleased to meet you, Ma'am, isn't it wonderful that once you're on the other side all languages become comprehensible? I'm sure he'll be pleased to know that. It'll be a shock of course - it is for everybody, but then the trouble is getting them to agree to leave you alone."

"Who is that?' I asked. It couldn't have been Myra.

"Who is what?" the Elf asked.

"The girl."

"There's no one talking, sir."

--Oh, no, that was me. Vampires can hear me and I can hear their voices.-- said the robotic tones of an AudiAider, responding to the young female's typing motions. Her thin, breathable gloves registered the words she spelled on an imaginary QWERTY keyboard, and a small monitor strapped to her wrist transcribed anything other people said for her to read.

She did indeed look unusual. She had short silver hair in a cloud around her head, like a dandelion puff. Every part of her visible skin had short gray fur. Massive wraparound sunglasses obscured her eyes. It was only from her voice, delicacy, and assurances that I knew she was female, for her chest was completely flat. She had sounded like someone in late teens or early twenties, but she was the only person I've met who would make Felix look average-sized. I was no giant and I could have enveloped both her hands in one of mine. She wore an oversized button-up shirt as if it were a dress; the way girls do with their boyfriend's clothes in movies. She also wore a clarinet slung around her neck.

"Could you explain that, please?" I asked.

She stood, walked up to me, and shook my hand through the bars. "Hello, Rivki Miriamson Anghel. My name is Myra. I do not as yet have a last name. Charity Fletcher Bright sent me here to be under your protection, but she was worried a message to you might be intercepted."

"She's just moving her mouth and no sound's coming out," the man said. "She's been doing that constantly."

"But I can hear everything she says," I protested.

--It's simple. I can only hear and speak to the dead. You are not entirely dead, so cannot hear those on the other side, but are dead enough so we can speak.--

The Elf sighed. "She is neither lying nor insane." They could always tell.

"Your mother is very proud of how you turned out," Myra told me. "She said Ferdinand Anghel was the best choice of guardian she ever could have made."

My eyes widened and I turned the police officers. "How much bail?"

"25. She only broke in and purchased something. We wouldn't consider that worth an arrest, but when someone living nearby stormed in and aimed a gun at her, mistakenly believing her to be an armed robber, he had a heart attack." The man sighed. "We thought she might have some mystical power of self-defense."

--I've been telling them that I do, but I can't control it. I can't turn it off. If any living being makes a motion to harm me, their heart stops. And I broke in rather than entered during --

I wrote out a check. "Why was Charity worried about the message being intercepted? Why are you here? What is a Greymalkin? Isn't that a cat familiar mentioned in Macbeth?"

"It is somewhat perturbing that you two are conversing and we can only hear half of it," the Elf said, unlocking the door as the man pocketed the check.

Myra took my hand. "First you must know the oldest legend of my people." She told the story on the way home.

There was once a time, long ago, even before the sun followed the course it does now, when the world had three sentient mortal life forms: Human, Fae, and Eldritch.

The Fae were generally seen as benevolent - though they did steal away the children of the others from time to time, and had to be appeased.

The Eldritch were generally seen as malicious - though many individuals made alliances with the Humans, even profitable ones.

The Human felt envy at the power of the Fae and the Eldritch. The Fae could sing down the stars and compose the loveliest lays. The Eldritch were hardly ever bested in battle. The Human had to copy all the talents; from the Fae came fire, from the Eldritch the spear. All Human could do was refine these things and perfect them.

Three Great Hunters, the greatest of the Human, grew fed up at this order of things, so they went on a quest for the Changer. It was a dangerous journey and took them from frost to melt to frost.

The Changer was waiting, for she knew of their plan. The Changer did not create. The Changer only modified what already existed, had always been. She was more beautiful than the Fae, but more terrible than the Eldritch. The Three Great Hunters kneeled before her throne.

"We wish for greater power," they told her.

She warned them, "Someday, the Human will rule the Earth. To become more powerful now would mean losing your humanity. The Human of that time will shun your descendants, perhaps even try to destroy them."

"We will pay the price," they told her. They wanted to be strong now.

"I will speak to each of you in private," she replied, waving two away. She laid her freezing hand on the First Great Hunter's head. "Tell me your specific wish."

His intestines burned within him as he explained, "I see how the Fae remain young long after we sicken and die. I see how the cold chills us, how the darkness frightens us. I wish for physical prowess, and to be the thing the darkness fears. And I wish to give these abilities to those whom I desire to have it."

"You will be wretched at the end."

"I will pay the price."

"You will constantly thirst after what the Human take for granted."

"I will pay the price."

"Very well." And she spoke a few words in a voice deep as the expanse of the sky.

The First Great Hunter began to cough. Then he coughed harder, red pouring from his mouth. Red dribbled from his nostrils, ears, and eyes. Soon it gushed forth in torrents. When it was all gone, he had become pallid and thin. He touched himself, exploring the changes. His ribs protruded, almost as sharp as his teeth now had become.

"I name you Blood-drinker, always seeking to compensate for what you have lost. Leave me now."

He cried out, "Please! I crave a boon!"

"I have already given you what you asked for."

"You tricked me!"

"I kept my promise." Then she saw how he shivered like a newborn lamb, and her eyes softened. "I will not undo, but I can redeem. One day, a Blood-drinker will see the light and save the world."

He departed then, sadder and wiser.

Amazed at what he had seen, the Second Great Hunter shuffled in. "What did you do?"

"I gave him what he asked. Do you still want the favor?"

"Yes. I wish for speed and ferocity - to be an animal when I choose, and to hunt greater than a Human ever could. And I wish to give this ability to those whom I want to have it."

"You will be wretched at the end."

"I will pay the price."

"You will be hounded..." a thought struck her and she laughed. "Never mind. Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"Very well." And she spoke a few words in a voice deep as the heart of the forest.

The Second Great Hunter shook and convulsed, his hands and feet becoming paws, growing fur and yellow eyes. He howled.

"I name you Wolfman, and as my price, one night in each moon will you lose all thought and reason. Then you will be a hazard to anyone and everyone. You will kill without compunction, and the next day regret will swallow you up."

He howled again, this time a howl of pain.

"I cannot undo, but I can redeem. One day a Wolfman will rise from the dead and save all the living."

The Third Great Hunter tiptoed in. He was in shock at the changes he had seen the others go through, but he remained resolute.

The Changer hesitated with this one, for he was barely more than a boy. "What is your wish?"

"I love the leopard, reverence, and worship the leopard. Yet at the same time I wish to see the future, and to manipulate the darkness to do my bidding. I wish to have magic to rival the Fae. I also want my children to be like me."

She sighed. "This is greater than what the others asked."

"I will pay the price."

"Your price will be steeper than the others."

He swallowed. "I will pay it."

She extracted a knife from the folds of her cloak, and in two swift movements cut off his ears.

He wailed and sobbed at the pain, and at the terror of being in a silent world. But he noticed that his skin had sprouted gray fur, and his long hair was silver. He could see as though the cave were brightest noonday.

He could not hear her words, but because of his new foresight, he knew his people would be called the Greymalkin. And he knew one day, a Greymalkin would hear what no Human could hear, and would save the world.