Paranormalcy

It was a problem. I didn’t know what he was trying to do to me, and I didn’t want to find out.

Not surprisingly, there was no signal on my communicator. I didn’t even know if I was technically on the planet anymore. The Faerie Realms coexist with ours, but cross time and space and all sorts of other boring and weird physics things that I never cared about before now. I added Faerie Realms and knife fighting on my list of things to pay more attention to.

I could call for him using his real name again, and he’d have to come. But that worked out so well before. The phrasing I used still killed me. I need you? The way I figured it, he took that as the command and would now fill what he thought my need for him was. If I called him back and negated my command before he took my voice again, there was no telling how he would interpret it. If you give a faerie conflicting commands, they can’t fill them and therefore come up with something completely different (and always bad). I was so screwed.

Faeries are the slipperiest things in the world. IPCA (before it was IPCA and back when it was APCA and all sorts of individual country acronyms) worked for decades to find a faerie, any faerie, and learn his true name. Their plan involved using pretty young girls as kidnap bait. Dozens of pretty young girls, none of whom were ever seen again. Except one girl, who discovered a great secret.

Faeries are unaffected by alcohol, but much to her surprise—and the faeries’ undoing—they get very, very drunk on carbonation. Using copious amounts of Coke, she was able to discover a single faerie’s true name. With that she was able to force that faerie to do her will and reveal several other faeries’ names—who were forced to reveal other faeries’ names, as well. Thus followed the great Faerie Catalog and Control Operation of ‘95.

It sounds more impressive than it was. A whole bunch of workers on the project ended up dead or missing, and faeries guard their names closely even from one another, so IPCA only got a fraction of them. Here’s what IPCA should have learned, still hasn’t quite learned, and probably never will learn: you cannot control fairies. Can. Not. They aren’t logical or rational. They don’t obey the same laws (physical, social, emotional, traffic—you name it) that we do. They always have their own agendas and are just plain smarter than us. Plus, in finding and using their names, we were messing with paranormal magic deeper and more powerful than any of us understood.

I say us. I mean arrogant IPCA.

I pondered all this as I sat on Reth’s couch, trapped in the Faerie Realms and wondering how long I could hold out before I had to sleep, eat, or drink. Or pee for that matter, because I wasn’t seeing a toilet. Stupid immortals. Was faerie magic really worth all the mess and risk we incurred by working with them?

There had to be another option. I couldn’t—wouldn’t—call Reth back. I knew he would never let me out, and there was no way to escape other than the Faerie Paths.

Another faerie! It was perfect. The faerie names I had been assigned were to be used only in dire straits. These were dire enough for me. I opened my mouth and stopped.

I still couldn’t remember. The names were so strange, and I had been so scared I’d blocked it out. Lying back on the couch, I stared at the ceiling; it shimmered with crystals. I watched it and racked my brains for the ruby-haired faerie’s name.

The crystals reflected an unidentifiable source of light. It seemed like there was some sort of meaning, a pattern. And now I was detecting faint colors, too. They were telling me something. If only I stared long enough, hard enough, didn’t think about anything else … and if I closed my eyes and didn’t think, it would be even better and it would all work out….

“No!” I sat up, blinking to keep my eyes open. No more ceiling.

What was her name? I knew that I knew it. And then I remembered—she was the faerie Lend had hitched a ride with. Fehl! Fehl was her nickname. And her full name was …

“Denfehlath!” I shouted, triumphant. After a few seconds the outline of a door formed on the wall and she walked through, still looking bored.

“Oh.” She frowned.

I jumped up, giddy with relief, but stopped myself before I said anything stupid. This time I would be careful. Specific. “Please take me back to the IPCA Center where I live.”

She held out her hand and I took it.

“Stop!” Reth commanded from behind us. I didn’t let go of Fehl’s hand as I turned to look at him. “She’s mine.”

Fehl gave him a sharp smile. “It’s a named command. I have no choice.”

Reth’s golden eyes brimmed with rage. That’s another thing about faeries. Nasty tempers. I had seen him lose control once before—it was what finally shocked me into giving him up.

“Let’s go, now.” I pulled on her hand. The ambient light in the room had shifted; now everything seemed to glow with a red, menacing hue.

We darted through the door and into the Faerie Paths. More frightened of what was behind me than around me, I kept my eyes open for once. Fehl squeezed my hand so hard it hurt; the look on her face was pure fury, tinged with a hint of smugness. I wondered if there was something going on. Those two had a weird dynamic. Whatever. I didn’t care as long as I got home.

But then I had a brilliant idea. “Can you open a door to Lend’s room?”

She gave me a glare so cutting I was surprised I didn’t bleed. A few more steps and the white lines opened in front of us. She shoved me out and disappeared into the black.

The room was the same boring color scheme as the rest of the Center. A door to a small bathroom was open; other than that the room was a simple square with a gray bed against the wall. Lend, wearing me of all things, was sitting on it. He glanced over, surprise flitting across his/my features. Then he looked away, and I realized Raquel was talking.

I backed up against the wall. She must have been standing in the hallway, because I couldn’t see her and was pretty sure from the lack of reaction that she hadn’t seen me. Not busted. Yet. And now I knew where Lend was. Sometimes faeries came in handy, after all.

“… would all be much easier if you’d just give us some simple information. I’ll let you think about it.” Raquel finished and I heard her pumps tapping away down the hall.

Lend-as-me looked over and raised one eyebrow quizzically.

“Hey, no fair!” I whispered. I’d never been able to raise just one eyebrow at a time. And not for lack of trying, either. He looked confused, so I gestured to my own eyebrows and shook my head. He grinned in response and I melted away, replaced by the dark-haired dark-eyed hottie.

“What are you doing here?”

I shrugged, sliding down the wall and sitting against it. “Just thought I’d drop by for a visit.”

“Really.”

“Yeah. I was bored.”

“Me, too.” There was a long, awkward silence. “Are you planning on staying for a while?”

“Not sure. I think I’m missing.”

“Raquel did seem very on edge.”

I sighed. “Yeah, I should probably let her know I’m not dead.” I didn’t get up.

“You look tired.” He briefly shifted back to wearing me, showing me my heavy eyelids and the dark circles under my eyes.

“Gee, thanks. I love hearing that. Why not just tell me I look like crap?”

He laughed and switched back to the cute guy. “I still can’t get your eyes.”

“I’m an original,” I said cheerfully.

“More than you know, I think.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

He shrugged. “Just that I’ve never met a human I couldn’t replicate exactly.”

I stood, scowling. “Look, Water Boy, the only paranormal in this room is you.”

“If you say so.”

I was too tired for Lend’s nonsense. The doorway was wider than a normal door and totally open. “What’s the security on this room?”

He lifted the foot with the ankle tracker. “If I cross the threshold of the room, an alarm goes off and my ankle thing goes zap.”

No problems for me then. “Excellent. I’ll see you later.” I walked out without another word.

I didn’t spend much time in the security sections of the Center. By the time paranormals got here, my work was done. Guessing, I turned left and followed the hall to a familiar area. I was pretty close to Central Processing, so I went in and found Raquel talking frantically with Lish. “That’s not acceptable! The werewolves have to be able to find something!”

Lish looked up, saw me over Raquel’s shoulder, and promptly burst into tears. At least, I think that’s what she was doing. I’d never seen her cry, and there weren’t tears since she was already in water, but the facial contortions and shoulder movements were enough to clue me in.

Raquel turned around and yelped, then threw her arms around me. “They didn’t eat you!”

“No, they didn’t eat me.” I had to laugh at the odd symmetry, pushing back my own tears of relief. I was so glad to be back here, with Raquel and Lish. For a while there I’d honestly thought I might not ever see them again.

Regaining her composure, Raquel pushed me out to arm’s length, holding onto my shoulders. “What on earth happened? Where have you been? And why did you kill all those vampires?”

“I—Wait, what? Kill the vamps?”

She nodded, looking severe. Killing paranormals is not okay for employees of IPCA. All paranormals are classified as endangered; that’s why even the icky ones just get neutered instead of, well, dead.

“I didn’t kill them! They were one bite away from killing me! I tased a few and slashed around with my silver knife, but I’m sure I didn’t pierce any hearts.”

“How did you get away?”

I looked down at the ground. “I called for Reth.”

She let out a this is going to be an even bigger mess than I thought sigh. “Then who left twenty-five vampires dead?”

DUMBBELLS, BOYS, AND OTHER DENSE THINGS

Raquel’s vampire explanation came first. “When the panic team got there, they found all the vampires dead.”

“Were they staked?” I asked.

“We have no idea what killed them. There were no marks of any kind, no indication that any of the ways to kill vampires were used. What were they all doing there in the first place?”

“Not a clue. I followed my vamp and burst into the room to find them all waiting. A few more followed me and locked me in.” Frowning, I thought back. “They did seem to think I was there to kill them, though.”

“Are you sure you didn’t do anything?” Raquel asked, the line between her eyebrows deepening.

“Besides almost get sucked dry? Yeah, I’m sure.”

She sighed. Pretty much the same why me sigh as before. “Well, where have you been?”

I rubbed a weary hand across my eyes. “I messed up. Big time. No one was coming and I was gonna die, so I called for Reth.”

“That’s fine, that’s why you were assigned names.”

I shook my head. “It wasn’t calling for him that was the problem. Everything was happening so fast, and I could feel the vamp’s teeth on my neck and I—When I called for Reth I yelled out, ‘I need you.’”

Raquel’s face went from understanding to seriously pissed. When IPCA gives you faerie names, they also make you take a yearly two-week—two-week—course on appropriate named commands and how to use them. “I need you” was about as open-ended and stupid as they get.

“‘I need you’? That’s what you said? That was your named command?”

“Don’t get mad.” I was on the verge of tears. “I already paid for it, trust me. I told him to take me home and he took me to his home, tried to take my heart again.”

“Evie, honey, I know you have a history with Reth, but he can’t just take your heart. It doesn’t work like that.”

This was too much. On top of everything else, she was going to tell me—again—that what happened was all in my head and wasn’t some sort of faerie freakiness. She had never felt the warmth, felt it sneak in and surround her heart, felt it consume her. She didn’t know. She couldn’t. And I was sick of her acting like I was some sort of stupid little girl, still mad over an ex. “Whatever,” I snapped. “I’m going to bed.”

I turned and stalked out of the room without saying good-bye to Lish. She would sympathize, I knew, but she still just didn’t understand.

No one understood. Well, that wasn’t true—Reth understood. Everything. And he was right, too. I was completely alone and it sucked. When I got to my unit, I went straight to my bedroom and dug around under my bed until I found the three-pound dumbbells I had stolen from one of Bud’s training sessions. They were iron, the best protection against faeries. Or at least, I was pretty sure they were iron. Okay, I really, really hoped they were iron, because my only other option was to sleep with my knife on my chest. Images of impaling myself during a nightmare flew through my head. Dumbbells it was.

Putting the weights on either side of me, I closed my eyes and was instantly asleep.

I woke up late the next morning; half-formed memories of a woman’s voice calling to me tickled the edge of my thoughts. Both dumbbells were still in place, tangled up in the covers, and my heart was still mine. The night appeared to be a successful one.

I took my time getting ready for the day, pretty sure it was Saturday. Sometimes it was hard to tell the days apart in the Center, but since none of my daily tutors had shown up wondering why my homework wasn’t done yet again, Saturday seemed a good guess.

After eating breakfast I went to talk to Lish. I felt bad about running out yesterday. When I walked in her eyes lit up. “Evie,” the monotone voice said, but I could tell that she was saying it with an exclamation point. “I am so glad you are okay. I was so worried about you.”

I gave her the best smile I could manage. “It was a bad day.”

“I am sorry.”

I wasn’t sure what else to say. “Any leads on the vamps?”

“None.”

Weird. Also, not my problem. I wasn’t especially heartbroken about it, either, so I shrugged. “How about Lend? Do they have any more ideas on who or what he is, or why he broke in?”

She shook her head. Then her eyes crinkled in a smile and she leaned toward the glass conspiratorially. “I did hear that he requested paper and pencils. Raquel thought he was going to write down information, but all he did was draw.”

I smiled. Whatever else he was, Lend was a professional at annoying Raquel. Usually that was my job, but I kinda liked sharing the duty. “Speaking of Raquel, do you know where she is? I want to talk to her.” Whether or not she believed me about Reth, she had to help me figure out how to negate my named command.

“She is in meetings all day today.” If anyone at the Center worked harder than Lish, it was Raquel. She lived here, too, and pretty much worked every waking hour of every day. I’d never known her to take a vacation. In a way it was nice. It would feel lonelier without her here.

I frowned, frustrated. But then it clicked: if Raquel was in meetings all day, that meant I was free to do whatever—and see whomever—I wanted. I smiled at Lish. “That’s okay. I’ll talk to her later. Thanks!”

I ran back to my room. After checking myself in the mirror, I gathered up all my magazines, my mini-video player, and a couple of books. Then I tucked Tasey and the knife into my belt and headed for Lend’s room.

I turned the corner just in time to see Jacques walking away. Perfect. I ran down the hall and ducked in. Lend was sitting on the bed eating lunch, wearing an attractive black guy. “Don’t you look nice today,” I said. He looked up, surprised, then smiled.

“What’re you doing here?”

I dumped my armful onto the floor. “I’m bored, you’re bored. Thought we could hang out.”

He narrowed his eyes. “This isn’t some bizarre good cop, bad cop thing?”

I laughed. “I don’t care what you tell or don’t tell Raquel. But you’re the only semi-human person here that’s my age, and I thought it would be fun to, you know, just hang out.” I was hit by a horrible thought: What if he didn’t want to hang out?

I mean, sure, there were worse things. Like if he was actually a psycho paranormal assassin and had been waiting for the perfect moment to kill me. But I didn’t think so. And somehow that would hurt my feelings less than if a teenage guy didn’t think I was cool enough to spend time with. Especially a teenage guy who could be cute in so many different ways.

To my relief he smiled again. “Sounds good.” He got off the bed and walked over, glancing through the magazines. “You like reading this stuff?” He raised an eyebrow at all the girly teen and star-stalking content.

“Hey, don’t judge. I happen to like popular culture. There’s a reason it’s popular, you know.”

He shook his head but looked amused. Picking up the mini-video player, he sat down on the floor with his back against the bed and started it up. “Do you have anything besides Easton Heights on here?”

“Easton Heights is the best show on television right now, bar none. But if it’s not good enough for you”—I sniffed haughtily—“then find the movie folder.” He laughed and the black guy melted off to be replaced by none other than Landon, the freaking hottest guy in the world and conniving lothario of Easton High. “Shut up!” I practically yelled. “That’s awesome!”

He laughed at my reaction, then went back to looking up movies. Part of me was giddy that I was sitting in a room with Landon. And the other part was still looking at Lend underneath, and actually liking his face a little bit better.

“Is there anyone you can’t do?” I asked, curious.

He shrugged. “I can’t do some paranormals. I also can’t go up or down in height more than a few inches, so I can’t be a little kid. Bulk’s about the same as height when it comes to stretching, so I couldn’t weigh three hundred pounds. And I can’t do your eyes.”

“So you keep saying,” I muttered. I lay down on my stomach, propped up on my elbows as I paged through one of the magazines. Lend settled on something and we spent the next hour in companionable silence. It was slightly dull and utterly normal. It rocked.

After a while I looked up and noticed a bunch of papers under his bed. “Oh, are those your drawings?” I grabbed them.

“Oh, I—don’t—” he said, but I had already started looking at them. He was amazing. He had drawn a portrait of Jacques that was so exact it could have been a photo. Apparently he could copy people on his own body and on paper. I flipped through to the next page and stopped. It was me.

“Holy crap, Lend, these are amazing. You’re really, really good.” He looked embarrassed, shrugging. “I mean, with a subject as cute as me, of course it’s going to turn out well, but still,” I teased. He smiled. Gosh, was I getting good at flirting, or what? You’d never know I only practiced during daydreams. I went back to the papers. Now it was my turn to be mildly embarrassed since the majority of the drawings were of me. Mildly embarrassed and really flattered. One of the last ones was a close-up of my face, focused on my eyes, which he had left unfinished.

Turning to the last drawing, I was surprised. He had been trying to draw himself—his real self—with much less success than all his other portraits. “You’ve got a stronger jawline, and your hair has a bit of wave to it.”

“You really can see me that well.” He sounded awed.

“It’s what I do.”

“Yeah, I’ve been meaning to ask you. What do you do? Why are you working here?”

“I help identify and bring in paranormals.”

“Do you have any other powers? Super strength or anything?”

I laughed. “Oh, yeah. Absolutely. That’s why I nearly got killed by a room full of vamps yesterday. Because I’m such an awesome fighter.” He looked confused. I rolled my eyes. “No, I don’t have any powers. I’m normal, I can just see a little better than your average person.” I didn’t explain that I could see through all glamours, since that was classified information.

“How did they find you?”

“Long story. Or not so long. Just boring. I’ve been here since I was eight. There’s this whole international treaty that I’m pretty much the star of.”

“So they own you.”

“No! They don’t own me.”

“So you can leave any time you want?”

I gave him a funny look. “Why would I want to leave?”

“I don’t know—it just seems like you aren’t very … happy.”

“I’m plenty happy!” I said, frowning. “Besides, I do a lot of good. I’ve neutered—” He looked horrified, and I quickly corrected. “Neutralized! Like, made hundreds of vampires harmless over the last few years, identified werewolves before they could hurt themselves or others, helped track down a troll colony, and done countless other things to make the world a safer and more organized place.” Had I just said I made the world a more organized place? Wow. Lame.

“Could you leave if you wanted to?”

I shrugged, uncomfortable with the topic. I had been pretty happy here for a long time, but ever since Reth, I’d been wondering more and more what my options were—and kind of worrying that I didn’t have any. It was easier not to think about it. No one else ever brought it up, and hearing it so bluntly from Lend made my stomach clench. “I don’t know. It’s safer for me here.”

“Safer for you, or safer for them?”

“Just drop it, would you? This is my job, my life. I’m fine with it.”

He held up his hands. “Sorry. It just seems to me like you’re more of a possession than an employee.”

“They can’t hold humans,” I snapped. “Under international regulations they’re only allowed to detain or monitor paranormals.”

He gave me that look again, the one he was so good at. I watched his water eyes; they were sad. “Evie, you aren’t exactly normal.”

Standing up in a huff, I gathered my magazines and pulled my mini-video player from his hands. “At least I know what I look like.” I stormed out of his room, furious.

Halfway down the hall I slumped against the wall, barely able to breathe. He was exactly right.

THERAPY BILLS

Stupid, stupid, stupid,” I muttered as I stomped down the halls. I wasn’t sure what exactly was stupid, but it seemed like a lot of things were lately. Lend, for one, with his dumb questions, making me think about stuff I’d rather not. I stopped in front of Raquel’s office. She needed to believe me about Reth, do something about the command I’d given him. She still thought that faeries didn’t care about humans at all. Sure, she knew the histories, how they kidnapped mortals to take to their realm and dance (yeah, it’s as weird as it sounds), but since IPCA gave their faeries a named command not to, they figured it was a non-issue now.

I knocked and the door slid open. Raquel was standing at her desk, gathering papers and looking tired and stressed out. “What is it, Evie? I’m due back in five minutes.”

I walked in and sat down, scowling at her desk. I was all set to tell her about Reth, using as evidence the creepy comments Fehl had made about me being his, but when I opened my mouth the first thing that came out was, “What if I want to leave?”

She looked surprised. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, what if I quit? What if I’m tired of doing this? What if I’m sick of stupid vampires and clueless werewolves and poltergeists and trolls and the Center? What if I’m done dealing with psychotic faeries? What if I want to go to college?”

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