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Thalia

Vivlio

So, I’m sitting at a table with a fairy, a mage, and a vampire. No, this isn’t the beginning of a bad joke. This is my life.

Naomi looked across the table. Like all the other tables at Spitfire, Munich’s premier supernatural club, it was made of polished wood. The spinning light show above speckled the glossy surface with a shifting spectrum of colorful dots. They were going all-out with the lights tonight. Naomi felt like she was rolling around inside of a kaleidoscope. The air was heavy with sweat and alcohol and magic, the floors clean except for the occasional scattering of peanuts. Everyone in this club was high on music. Music, after all, was magic.

Naomi’s gaze slid over the three supernaturals sitting with her, each one a throwback to a different era. The hippy fairy was dressed in a tie-dyed purple and pink cotton dress, earth-toned sandals, and a crown of flowers over her long strawberry blonde hair. Her name was Blossom, and she had the sort of carefree, unassuming smile that instantly put everyone around her in a better mood.

“Blossom, have you seen this couple?” Naomi asked, showing the fairy a photo of Calvin and Daria, the half-fairy couple who had gone missing from Spitfire last Friday. Blossom was a fairy, and she seemed like the sociable type. Surely, she had to know something.

But Blossom just shook her head, smiling sadly. “Sorry, no. I wasn’t here last Friday night. I was sliding down the diamond rainbow.”

That must have been a metaphor for something, but Naomi had no idea what. So she turned to the next person at the table, a mage named Ace. He was sporting a sparkling gold disco suit and a pair of enormous sunglasses like it was 1977. His dark hair was…well, big. It glowed with a pale halo of magical fire. It was a neat trick, and it sure went well with his ostentatious outfit.

“Did you see them?” Naomi asked, showing him the picture.

He shook his head. “No, I was with Blossom.” He winked at the fairy.

Blossom giggled behind her hand. Ah, so that diamond rainbow had something to do with sex. Naomi was pretty sure she didn’t want to know more. Ok, so she could party as well as the next girl. She was half-fairy after all. It was in her blood. She’d discovered her fair share of rainbows in her twenty-five years, but she’d never done it in a costume like theirs.

She turned to her last chance for help at this table. Odin, the vampire, was dressed in baggy clothes and sneakers. He looked like he was headed for a house party. His hair was artfully arranged into a sort of ordered chaos, as though every strand that was out of place was not actually out of place. They were all exactly where he intended them to be.

“And you?” she asked him. “Were you also chasing rainbows?”

“Nah, I was hanging out at Wretched,” he said. His feet moved beneath the table, tapping in time to the beat of the music.

Wretched was another club in Munich. It was too hardcore for her taste—and, she was pretty sure, for the sweet smiling couple featured on the photograph in her hand.

Naomi sighed. She’d been chasing rumors of missing hybrids for weeks, hoping to find some clue of who was taking them. So far, she’d gotten about as lucky as that wallflower who was hanging out next to the bathrooms, sipping sparkling water through a twisty straw.

“Cheer up, hon,” the vampire said. “Join me for a dance, and you’ll forget all your problems, I promise.” His tongue slid with languid pleasure over one of his pointed fangs.

“Sorry, Odin, I’m working tonight.” She didn’t tell him that his drooping sweatpants weren’t doing anything for her. He seemed like a nice enough guy—for a vampire anyway.

“No problem,” he said. “I think I’ll take Blossom for a spin.” He rose to his feet, dropping into a smooth bow as he extended his hand to the fairy. “Care to dance?”

“I’d love to,” Blossom said, the beaded bracelets on her wrists jingling as she took his hand. She grabbed hold of Ace, and the three of them skipped to the dance floor.

Naomi watched them for a few moments, surprised at how well their varying dance styles blended together, like they had all been taught by the same teacher.

Like Blossom, Ace, and Odin—three different kinds of supernaturals, three different blends of magic—music and magic were tied together in an unbreakable bond that went back decades. It had all started about fifty years ago when the Magic Council, the body that governed the world’s supernaturals, had decided it was high time they stopped hiding in the shadows. Knowing how horribly wrong the coming-out could go, they opted for the slow drip approach. They initiated what became the longest PR campaign ever in the history of the world.

First up were the fairies. They spearheaded the hippy movement, spreading their message of happiness, love, drugs, and music to the masses. Humans took to the fairies like bees to honey. After all, what wasn’t to love about the sweet, friendly fairies? The influx of drugs the fairies introduced, designed to make people high and happy, didn’t hurt either.

The mages were introduced to humanity about a decade later. They arrived on the scene with the flash and glitter that defined the disco age. The music was fast, the drugs psychedelic, and let’s not forget those disco balls. They were positively hypnotic.

Finally, it was the vampires’ turn. Blood-suckers were a hard sell to humanity, but the Magic Council did it with house music and parties. Vampires’ super reflexes made their dance floor moves jaw-dropping, and the drugs were taken to a new level. Humans wanted to be them. They shared blood with the vampires, getting a small but addictive taste of that agility—not too mention a buzz that lasted all night.

The fourth pillar of supernatural society, the otherworldly, didn’t need a coming-out party. Humans couldn’t even see ghosts, and spirits were perpetually stuck in the spirit realm.

The supernaturals’ nonstop coming-out party lasted decades—and what a party it was. A combination of lots of music, lots of drugs, and lots of flashy lights, it was much like the atmosphere at Spitfire. As far as coming-out parties went, it turned out to be pretty painless. And then there was that rumor the Magic Council nudged along, that little white lie that told humans if they could just get hold of a magical object, enough magic might rub off to grant them magic too. It worked like a charm. After all, who didn’t want superpowers?

Of course that was a lie. Only supernaturals could absorb magic, and it usually required complex spells and artifacts. The Magic Council was very good at what they did. Their PR department was the best in the world. From the day the first fairy walked out throwing flowers and spreading sunshine, the Magic Council had enjoyed the peace of having humans on their side. And supernaturals and humans had been partying and sympathizing together ever since. The end. Happily ever after.

Or not.

The campaign of music, magic, and drugs worked for half a century—up until an ancient supernatural-hating organization called the Convictionites managed to finally find a way to ruin it all. The end was called Bloody Friday, and it happened the night the Convictionites used a magical artifact to set vampires loose on London. That night, the spell shattered and the party died. That night, humans began to turn against supernaturals.

Thinking about it was downright depressing, so Naomi got up and walked to the bar. After weeks of futile searching to find the missing hybrids, she was in dire need of a drink. She ordered a Hawaiian Fairy, a cocktail that made some fairies see pretty lights. Well, she was only half-fairy, and if she ended up seeing lights anyway, then so be it.

“Hey, pretty fairy, you sure are cute,” said a vampire as he sat down beside her at the bar. He wiggled his dark eyebrows up and down, as though he hadn’t just uttered the lamest supernatural pickup line in the book.

But Naomi didn’t roll her eyes at him. She gave him a sweet smile. “You come here often?”

“Every week.” He primped up his hair, which was as crimson as his shirt.

“Do you know Calvin and Daria? They were in here last Friday night.”

“Doesn’t ring a bell.” His lips slid into a smile that was doing its utmost to be ruggedly charming.

“You’d remember them. They stand out. They’re about my height and have long golden hair and were wearing flower necklaces over silk tunics and shimmering tights.”

“They sound like elves.”

“They are elves,” she told him, showing him the photo.

Well, half-elves. Elves, like all kinds of fairies, were hard to miss when they entered a room. They possessed magic that attracted people wherever they went. Even though Daria and Calvin were only half-fairy, everything Naomi had heard indicated that they turned heads. Anyone who had seen them would remember them.

“Did you see them?” she asked.

“I saw them. They were here for about an hour, drank some peach nectar, didn’t dance with or talk to anyone but each other, then they left. You fairies are usually so much more sociable.” He gave her an assessing look.

“It was their wedding night. Of course they had eyes only for each other. You sure no one tried to talk to them or lure them away?”

“Not that I saw. Let me order you a drink, and I’ll see if I can remember anything else.”

Naomi shook her drink, the pale fluid swooshing around. “Still full. Thanks for the information.”

He caught her hand as she stood to go. “Wait a minute.” He smiled at her. This was the sort of guy who obviously got only two responses from women: an easy screw or a drink in the face. Encouraged by the fact that she hadn’t yet dumped her Hawaiian Fairy over his head, he leaned toward her. “How about you and me go into the back and you show me your Fairy Dust and I show you my fangs?”

Yep, he really said it. Shocking. Guys seemed to think that being blonde made a girl easy.

“Why wait, honey? I can show you my Fairy Dust right here,” she said with a sugar-sweet smile, priming her magic. Glittery silver-pink sparkles slid down her fingertips, snapping at his skin.

He pulled his hand away, shaking out the numbness. Fairy Dust was a fairy’s top tool for knocking people out.

The vampire’s eyes darted from her pink sparkles to the knives strapped to her arms and legs. Then he slid off his barstool and melted into the crowd of supernaturals on the dance floor. Either her steel or her magic had made him decide she was more trouble than she was worth. Naomi was betting on her steel. As a half-fairy, her Fairy Dust didn’t glisten or glow in blinding pulses like most fairies’ Dust. The other half of her magical makeup was mage, but her mastery over that branch of magic was even more tenuous. Her elemental spells backfired at least as often as they succeeded. In short, she was caught between two worlds, belonging to none.

She sat back down on her barstool. The sparks died on her fingers, her magic spent for now. Her magic had a habit of being unreliable, which was why she always carried at least a knife on her body. When she was on the job, she also carried a sword. And sometimes her crossbow too. She hadn’t expected to need any of those things here. Clearly, she’d vastly underestimated the local male population.

The neighboring barstool screeched against the floor. “Hey, darling, can I buy you a drink?”

Naomi turned to face her next suitor. Her eyes widened when she saw him, a man with soft dark hair and lovely olive skin. He winked at her with devilish pleasure.

“I remember you,” she said.

“Of course you do. How could you forget this handsome face?”

She leaned in to kiss his cheek. “Xanthus.”

He set his hand over his cheek where she’d kissed it. “I will treasure your kiss forever.”

She grinned at him. “Of course you will.”

“I’ll never wash this spot,” he promised with solemn silliness.

“You’d better. It will get all dirty and stinky.”

“A small price to pay to keep your kiss with me forever.”

She snorted. “How are you?”

The wicked spark in his eyes died down. “Well. Thanks to you.”

The night of Bloody Friday, Naomi and her friends had rescued some mixed-magic supernaturals—and then ended up caught in the middle of the bloodbath. Xanthus, a vampire-mage, was one of those hybrids.

“I’m glad you’re feeling better,” she told him, setting her hand on his arm.

“I am feeling much better.” His smooth gaze slid down her body like a river of silk.

Xanthus was a good-looking man. There was no denying that. And he looked like he knew how to have fun. Usually, Naomi would be game for a little fun with him. There were just two problems standing in their way of a blissful night of distractions. Firstly, she was working. Secondly, he was a bloodsucker, albeit only half vampire. But half or not, vampires had some really weird ideas about sex. Plus, the last guy she’d slept with had turned out to be a psycho who betrayed her family to a demon-dealing dark fairy, so she was going to be a bit pickier from now on out. Ok, so maybe that was three reasons.

“I’m glad to hear your injuries aren’t interfering with your lifestyle,” she said. “Have you seen this couple?”

He glanced down at the photo. “No. Sorry. Friends of yours?”

“I’ve never met them actually. They are a hybrid couple that has been missing since last Friday.”

“Ah, so you’re here to work.”

“Yes,” she said, giving him a sweet smirk.

Ok, maybe she wasn’t going to sleep with him, but it sure was fun to flirt. His hand twitched, as though it was taking every shred of self-control not to touch her. God, she loved to watch self-assured men squirm.

“Naomi, you tempt me terribly,” Xanthus said, his voice a soft rasp. He slid a pale ivory business card with gold text across the bar to her. “If you ever need a break from saving the world, give me a call.” He rose smoothly. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, my date is ready to go.”

She laughed. “You were hitting on me while on a date with another woman?”

“Of course.” He winked at her. “I had to try in case you wanted to join us.”

He blew her a kiss, then strode over to a woman in a tiny red dress that vaguely resembled a dishcloth—except a dishcloth had considerably more fabric. Naomi sat at the bar for a few more minutes, slowly stirring her drink while allowing the music to melt into her soul. She was just about to resume her search for answers when a quintet of humans in faded tops and tattered jeans stormed into the bar, their gunfire splintering the melody.