Witches, Voids, and Other Sanity Suckers

One would think that four days without Ms. Astraea Vardan – or Crazypanties McNutjob, as I've taken to calling her in my head – would be peaceful. No one disrupting the pack's daily routine, no one inciting acts of insubordination, and no one making every damn second a rollercoaster of insanity.

And no one to cheer up an increasingly morose Jose. No one to channel all the Momma Fox instinct no one knew Greta possessed. No one to lighten the atmosphere during meals. No one to explain to me what the hell Reggata Root is and why Kooky Claire would use it in her spell o'doom.

Things have been anything but peaceful. The bedroom renovation has continued nonstop. Jose's changed the paint color twice, and I've made more trips to Ikea than I care to remember. Greta disappears for long phone conversations every few hours. Sally's left four voice messages. Hank and Ike have started planning a 'Welcome Home' party complete with a banner and a floral arrangement.

On the fifth day post-Crazypanties McNutjob, after listening to a debate over whether Astraea prefers blueberry or chocolate pancakes, I abandon my omelet in favor preserving what sanity I have left with some alone time in the garage. It's my sanctuary. It's also the armory. There's nothing like a little weapons maintenance to take your mind off the lunacy around you.

"Hey," a female voice calls out while I'm in the middle of cleaning the Walther PPK Ike gave me for my last birthday.

My reaction is instantaneous. More muscle memory than thought. My arm is steady, my finger poised to pull the trigger. The gun in my hand has saved my life a hundred times.

Astraea goes cross-eyed staring at the barrel. "Yeah. I can see now where this might have been a mistake."

"You think?" I return the gun to the table. No. Wait. I tuck it in the waistband of my jeans. There's no telling what flavor of whacko she is today. "How did you get here?"

"Taxi. Then bus. Greta gave me the keys to the Mustang in her garage, but I can't drive."

"You don't drive." Who over the age of eighteen doesn't drive? How do you get anywhere? I taught myself how to drive when I was ten. Someone had to get to the store to buy food.

"Don't implies that I chose to ride with the very talkative but kinda skeevy Mr. Balducci and then chose to navigate the confusing and crowded Metro system. Can't, which is what I said, implies a physical or legal inability to perform a certain action."

A few days ago, I thought there was nothing more annoying that Astraea at the peak of madness. I am secure enough in myself to admit that I was wrong. It is apparent that there is an inversely proportional relationship between her insanity and her ability to be exasperating. Fucking wonderful.

"I'm not teaching you to drive. Neither of us would survive the experience."

"That's fine. I brought you a present." She circles the table and plops on the extra stool before tossing a white business card between us.

The cardstock is nice and heavy. The blocky script is done in a dark shade of blue. The card is simple yet professional. Tasteful. There's only one problem with it.

"R & A Investigations?"

She shrugs. "I figured AA Investigations sounded a little too hokey."

"Bit presumptuous, Princess."

That damn shrug again. "We didn't too badly with that witch."

"You busted a glass table, lost your marbles, and left me to do the clean up."

"But we caught the bad guy." She pops up from the stool and holds out her hand. Her neat but still-too-long-for-my-peace-of-mind fingernails are painted hot pink. "Maybe we should start over. My name is Az Vardan. I'm a void, but I know magic inside and out. Knows how it works. How it moves, how it breathes."

Her blonde hair is clean and pulled back in a single, fat braid. The bruises on her face have faded enough that she no longer resembles a hooker caked with makeup or a boxer after a rough match. Dressed in dark jeans and a t-shirt the same color as her fingernails, she looks normal. The only things dancing in her eyes are impishness and laughter.

She is pretty. It’s not something I took the time to notice before –with her trying to set me on fire and then generally acting like a lunatic and all – but I sure as hell am noticing now. She looks normal, or what passes for normal when magic's involved, but it could all be an act. A girl growing up like she did had to learn a few tricks.

"What am I going to do five minutes from now?"

"Get really snarly again." She grins and taps her temple before plopping back on the stool. "Sorry, no future-watch up here. Just regular ol' Az brain cells."

I'm pretty sure that last statement was an oxymoron. "That's not exactly reassuring."

"Well, that's just because you know me." She gives the stool an experimental twist. It squeaks but turns smoothly. Her glossed lips curl into an even wider grin, and she transforms from merely pretty to downright beautiful. Shame all that beauty only serves as disguise for a wealth of trouble.

"Don't do it."

She does it. Four times. Laughing long and loud with every spin. There's been more laughter in the garage in the past two minutes than in the ten years I've lived in the house. After the last spin, she clutches the edge of the table and pants like a greyhound after a lap around the track.

The sound of paper being ripped isn't particularly loud, but it makes a great attention grabber. Astraea's head snaps up when I tear the business card in half. That's right. Playtime is over, Princess. "Putting words on paper doesn't make something real."

"Unless you're a djinn or you were trained in Cao magic."

She's going to give me a nervous tic. And send my blood pressure through the roof. "Yeah. Yeah, that." One mental train successfully derailed. Judging by the smug look on her face, she knows exactly what she's doing. Ha. You won’t win that easy, sweetheart.

"You can't just wake up one morning and decide to be a PI. To be my partner. That's like trying to run a marathon the day after waking up from a coma."

"Baby steps. I get it." She winks, spins the stool. My next project is going to be welding the damn thing so that it doesn't move. My hearing is more sensitive than a normal human's, and the stool's squeaking makes my eardrums ache.

"Not just baby steps, Princess. You need to learn to crawl first. For the love of all that's holy, sit fucking still."

I can't believe what I'm about to offer. It's going to drive me straight to the loony bin or an early grave. Not doing it, though, will mean living through the last four days on repeat. Stuck between Crazypanties McNutjob and a pack of demanding, moody Shifters is not a comfortable place to be.

"If you want to head out on your own, that's fine with me as long as you keep your head down and stay out of your daddy's way. I'll give you half the money and the name of a contact who can hook you up with identification."

She stops fidgeting. Her gaze has the intensity of a laser, but she has no hope of winning this staring contest. Hank's five-year-old niece taught me well. I have eyelids of steel.

"Houston's not such a bad city. The humidity reminds me of home. I'm tired of snow and ice. And states that start with 'M'."

"I know you’ve got nowhere to go, and trust me, we understand that around here. I’m not kicking you to the curb, but this isn't a hotel. It's a pack house. Official and everything." My pause isn't for dramatic effect. It's to make sure I still have her attention. This is something I've only offered a handful of times. "It could be your house, too."

Her eyes achieve a width I'd thought only possible for anime characters and ugly kids' toys. She reminds me of a kid coming down the stairs on Christmas morning. "Really?"

"It won't be easy."

She nods eagerly. "Nothing worthwhile ever is."

"You'll be pack. Bound by the same rules as everyone in the house. You have to follow my orders. Put the pack first. Always. If you step one dainty toe out of line, I won't hesitate to kick your ass."

"I can do that."

"Really? Cause disappearing like that wasn't a smart move, Princess." Remembering the sound of the glass table breaking and the span of silent seconds sets my teeth on edge. "Neither was leaping on that bitchy witch. You don't act as an individual anymore. You act as pack."

"I was protecting the pack. Protecting you."

Puff out that lower lip all you want, Princess. It won't do a damn bit of good. Lessons start early around here. Mistakes are too costly to be lax. "There has to be communication. Trust. Without it, we're just a bunch of strangers sharing space."

"And you don't know me well enough to trust me."

At least she's a fast learner. "You have to learn to trust the pack to protect you, too. You can't sneak off to lick your wounds."

"That was to protect you, too. Did you feel that magic?" She shivers, wraps her arms around her waist. "Couldn't risk exposing you to all of it. Had to discharge it before Greta showed up."

Which brings up a whole list of questions. I've been compiling it for days. If I am going to allow her to live with my pack, with the people I've vowed to protect at any cost, then I need to know how much of a threat she poses.

"How did you transfer that magic to me? Why did you do that?"

"It's one of the ways I can discharge energy or magic. I can only put it in someone or something with the capacity for it. Can't walk around handing out magical jolts willy-nilly. Which is probably a good thing. That's dangerous and rude. Shifters make good receptacles. You're made of magic. It's in your muscles, your bones." Her lips curl down in a frown. "Sometimes, if the magic is exceptionally… painful… I have no choice but to discharge it into the air or the ocean. It disperses it. Makes it hard for anyone to reabsorb."

"Dark magic like what Kooky Claire was using is painful?" The little she'd given me hadn't hurt, necessarily. It had been uncomfortable as hell and a little frightening.

"To me. Burns from the inside." Her frown deepens. She's staring right at me, but it's obvious she's not in the room anymore. "Tasted like ashes and fur. Boiling blood and shifting bones. Almost as nasty as seer energy. Reminds me of a man I met once in Michigan. Blech, another 'M' state."

"You mentioned test tube Shifters to Greta."

She blinks and returns to the room. "Really? I don't remember that, but anything's possible. Magic and energy from clairvoyants scrambles my brain for days. Everything gets jumbled. I absorb more than I should and get the not-so-nice parts. I try to put my thoughts in order, but they scatter like marbles every time I touch them. It's the worst."

"You recognized the items Kooky Claire was stealing."

"Of course. I told you, I know magic."

"What could she use them for?"

"Number of things. None of them pleasant." She gives the stool a final spin before hopping to her feet. "She has a master."

"That's what she said. I searched her house, but there was nothing that pointed to his identity."

"Sally has wolfsbane."

"I haven't forgotten." I have started to go to her house three times, but each time I get in the truck my anger grows. I don't want to go over there when there's a risk I could rip out her throat. Who knows how long she's been growing wolfsbane in her backyard while serving me tea in the parlor. Duplicitous, conniving bitch.

"We could take a ride to see her. Dig up the wolfsbane. Poke around Claire's place."

Because what I really want to do is take a road trip with the recently insane. And dig up something that could kill me. Not to mention the fact that Claire's apartment is a hoarder's version of Eden.

"On a scale of one to ten, how crazy are you at this moment?"

"Four. It's my baseline."

Which is par for the fucking course. I suppose a lifetime of absorbing more magic and energy than you're designed to handle takes its toll. Then again, Greta maintains a one-point-five, and in my opinion the average woman is around a two, so it could be worse. I'm afraid to ask where her state at the coven headquarters ranks.

"Twelve," she answers. She throws her hands up before I can ask the question on the tip of my tongue. "No psychic vibes, I swear. That only happens when I absorb from seers, and I try to avoid them. I spent a lot of time reading expressions. It’s how I learned to avoid punishment.” She winces. “Sometimes, at least. You're pretty transparent."

No poker with Princess. Got it. "You need to spend time with the pack. Acclimate to them and let them get used to you."

Usually there's a three-day camping trip involved with bringing new people in. I'm willing to forgo it in this instance. I can't picture Princess sleeping under the stars in the middle of the Sam Houston National Forest, and I don't think she'd appreciate the moonlight run.

"You can't let Sally twist for much longer. She needs to be dealt with. Need to find Claire's master. The one with the preference for wolf skin rugs."

"Because this is, after all, my first case. I don't know where I'd be without you."

"Chained to a succubus's bed and slowly losing your life force one glorious orgasm at a time." She tosses her head back and laughs. When she's not nuts, it's a pleasant sound. She doesn't titter like some women nor do that stupid half-laugh that makes me think I'm a drooling idiot. It's a full-bodied laugh rich with amusement and joy. I’ll give her this: she doesn’t do anything half-assed.

"You were no help with that. You don't get credit."

"Sure I do. I helped you catch an active, unregistered succubus."

"You almost got me eaten."

"But only in the best of ways." She reaches across the table to pat my cheek. It's all I can do to keep from nipping her fingers. "You make good succubus bait. If the PI thing ever gets old, there's a market for that."

"I loathe you."

"Yeah." She bobs her head once, continues to smile. "That happens. You'll get over it."

She skips toward the door before I can make a grab for her. "The natives are getting restless inside. I should go see my room before Jose implodes." She chews on the inside of her cheek, crinkles her pale nose. "Is it really as pink as Greta says?"

"More so." Every shade of pink imaginable is crammed into the room next to mine. The rugs on the floor are hot pink. The gauzy canopy over the bed is pastel pink. Hank painted an entire rose garden on one wall. It's a room fit for a fairytale princess about to celebrate her fifth birthday. Or a blind person.

"Perfect!" She shoots me a quick salute. "I'll run up and squeal over it until Jose's happy. Meet you back down here in ten. Grab a shovel. And some salt."

The door slams shut. Wait. What? Meet me back here for what? I hadn't agreed to go anywhere with her. Especially not anywhere that involves a shovel or salt.

Hear that sound? That's the last of my sanity fleeing in terror. It's going to be a long, long day.