Werehunter (anthology)

“Then you are about to be happy, cherie, for I have had the brainstorm—” Andre ducked into the livingroom and emerged with a dusty leather-bound book. “Remember I said there was something familiar about it? Now I think I know what it was.” He consulted the index, and turned pages rapidly—found the place he sought, and read for a few moments. “As I thought—listen. ‘The gaki—also known as the Japanese vampire—also takes its nourishment only from the living. There are many kinds of gaki, extracting their sustenance from a wide variety of sources. The most harmless are the “perfume” and “music” gaki—and they are by far the most common. Far deadlier are those that require blood, flesh—or souls.’ ”

“Souls?”

“Just so. ‘To feed, or when at rest, they take their normal form of a dense cloud of dark smoke. At other times, like the kitsune, they take on the form of a human being. Unlike the kitsune, however, there is no way to distinguish them in this form from any other human. In the smoke form, they are invulnerable—in the human form, however, they can be killed; but to permanently destroy them, the body must be burned—preferably in conjunction with or solely by Power.’ I said there was something familiar about it—it seems to have been a kind of distant cousin.” Andre’s mouth smiled, but his eyes reflected only a long-abiding bitterness.

“There is no way you have any relationship with that—thing!” she said forcefully. “It had no more honor, heart or soul than a rabid beast!”

“I—I thank you, cherie,” he said, slowly, the warmth returning to his eyes. “There are not many who would think as you do.”

“Their own closed-minded stupidity.”

“To change the subject—what was it made you burn it as you did? I would have abandoned it. It seemed dead enough.”

“I don’t know—it just seemed the thing to do,” she yawned. “Sometimes my instincts just work . . . right. . . .”

Suddenly her eyes seemed too leaden to keep open.

“Like they did with you. . . .” She fought against exhaustion and the drug, trying to keep both at bay.

But without success. Sleep claimed her for its own.

He watched her for the rest of the night, until the leaden lethargy of his own limbs told him dawn was near. He had already decided not to share her bed, lest any movement on his part cause her pain—instead, he made up a pallet on the floor beside her.

He stood over her broodingly while he in his turn fought slumber, and touched her face gently. “Well—” he whispered, holding off torpor far deeper and heavier than hers could ever be—while she was mortal. “You are not aware to hear, so I may say what I will and you cannot forbid. Dream; sleep and dream—I shall see you safe—my only love.”

And he took his place beside her, to lie motionless until night should come again.

Wet Wings

This was originally for a Susan Shwartz anthology, Sisters of Fantasy 2.

Katherine watched avidly, chin cradled in her old, arthritic hands, as the chrysalis heaved, and writhed, and finally split up the back. The crinkled, sodden wings of the butterfly emerged first, followed by the bloated body. She breathed a sigh of wonder, as she always did, and the butterfly tried to flap its useless wings in alarm as it caught her movement.

“Silly thing,” she chided it affectionately. “You know you can’t fly with wet wings!” Then she exerted a little of her magic; just a little, brushing the butterfly with a spark of calm that jumped from her trembling index finger to its quivering antenna.

The butterfly, soothed, went back to its real job, pumping the fluid from its body into the veins of its wings, unfurling them into their full glory. It was not a particularly rare butterfly, certainly not an endangered one; nothing but a common Buckeye, a butterfly so ordinary that no one even commented on seeing them when she was a child. But Katherine had always found the markings exquisite, and she had used this species and the Sulfurs more often than any other to carry her magic.

Magic. That was a word hard to find written anymore. No one approved of magic these days. Strange that in a country that gave the Church of Gaia equal rights with the Catholic Church, that no one believed in magic.

But magic was not “correct.” It was not given equally to all, nor could it be given equally to all. And that which could not be made equal, must be destroyed. . . .