Harry Potter and the Cynical Necromancer

Harry Potter and the Cynical Necromancer

The oppressive August heat slapped me in the face as I pushed the sliding glass door aside. I ignored the heat as best I could and stepped onto the deck at the back of my house. I did not do oppressive heat well. I grumbled and slid the door closed behind me, trapping the cool air conditioned air inside. Cherry handed me a tall glass of iced tea with a small smile and scooted over on the picnic bench, making room for me to sit.

"Thanks," I told her. Cherry was one of my wereleopards. I'd inherited leadership of the local wereleopard pard when I'd killed their old alpha. Gabriel had been a sadomasochistic bastard intent on killing me, so I hadn't lost much sleep over his death. The fact that I was a human and almost Jean-Claude, the Master of the city's, human servant didn't seem to bother the wereleopards. It bothered me.

I didn't like having a group of people completely dependant on me for protection, so I'd set out to find them a real wereleopard alpha. Without an alpha, the leopards were only so much meat for the other lycanthropes in the city.

The supposed answer to my problems had arrived in the form of Micah and his leopard pard. Micah was a bona fide wereleopard alpha and a Nimir-Raj, a leopard king, to boot. Being Nimir-Raj was like being an alpha among alphas, and was pretty rare according to them. Things would have been fine, but of course then the situation had gotten complicated. No surprise there.

I'd received most of the marks which bound a human to a master vampire. The marks were weird, mystical connections of power between myself and Jean-Claude. My on-again-off-again (currently off) boyfriend Richard also bore a similar set of marks with Jean-Claude, but as he was an alpha Lycanthrope the connection was not as close. I was considered Jean-Claude's human servant with all the powers and colossal headaches the position entitled. I'd gained power with each mark Jean-Claude had given me. Recent additions included faster reflexes and the ability to call an animal like a master vampire. My animal just happened to be the leopard. Gee, what a coincidence. The leopards had loved it. Now I could be their alpha for keeps. As a tidy bonus, they got a Nimir-Raj as well. Micah and his pard had decided to stay in town. The Maneater clan had relocated to St. Louis and joined with the Blood-drinkers. I couldn't really have left the city so Micah and his pard had uprooted and moved in. Some moved in more literally than others as Micah now lived in my house.

Maneaters and Blood-Drinkers. Such poetic names, I reflected. But then I don't suppose "The Fluffy Bunny Snuggles Pard" would be terribly impressive. I wondered if we'd have to come up with a new name to reflect the new pard. There were some issues to resolve but the two groups were melding together peacefully for the most part.

I sipped my drink and watched the people lounging around my house. When she wasn't furry, Cherry was a nurse. Right now she was reading a book with a pastel cover. No doubt it had a mostly naked man on the front and contained every synonym for "throbbing" listed in Webster's. I hadn't figured Cherry to be one for escapist romance novels, but to each his or her own I guess. Not that I'd had much time for reading recently.

Nathaniel, I knew, was inside the house fixing dinner with a few other new pard members. Nathaniel was a stripper in one of Jean-Claude's clubs when he wasn't wandering around the house doing voluntary chores. He was one of the least dominant people I'd ever met, were or not.

Micah and Zane were tossing a Frisbee out on the wide lawn under the watchful gaze of Merle who wasn't really reading his news paper. Zane was one of my kitties and had tried leading the leopards for a short time before they'd decided I was really the one for the job even if I wasn't furry once a month. Merle was fifty-ish and one of Micah's bodyguards. I had to give Merle brownie points for taking his job seriously, but he was kidding himself if he thought I hadn't noticed his covert watch for danger.

We were just one big happy, furry, family. The Brady Bunch theme song popped into my head and I absently hummed a few bars. Cherry looked up from her book and winked, having made the same connection.

The combined pard, minus a few exceptions, was over after having slept off the previous evening's full moon. Three months and we already had a routine. Good lord. Tonight was a working night for me however. I had three naive chickens in a coop beside my jeep and a date with three recently dead zombies. Fun.

Aside from protecting submissive wereleopards and being a human servant, I was a Necromancer. I had the power to raise the dead. I worked for a firm called Animator's Inc. My boss, Burt, set up appointments with clients who wanted to raise the dead and ask them questions. Tonight I was raising a murder witness, a recently dead matriarch who hadn't left a will and another guy who'd left a will, but a poorly written one. The chickens were for raising the dead. A death was needed to raise a zombie. The bigger the death, the older the zombie you could raise. Eventually the only death big enough was a human sacrifice. I didn't do those.

"Don't even think about it Caleb," I said, not even bothering to turn my head.

"Aww," Caleb whined. Truth was I didn't know what he'd been about to do, but I did know that a) he was going to do something and b) I wouldn't have liked it. He slumped into a seat on the other side of Cherry. Caleb was another of Micah's leopards. He reminded me a lot of Jason, one of Jean-Claude's werewolves. Both knew just how to push my buttons. Thankfully, for him, Caleb had learned just when to stop.

"Here comes trouble," Caleb joked after a moment. I turned and looked down the driveway. Vivian and Stephen were walking up. Vivian was one of the leopards. Stephen was one of the local werewolves. Vivian was all smiles and I could feel her power flow and merge with the pard members already present. Stephen's smile was a trifle forced.

Stephen had gotten most of over his awkwardness around us, well, me. I used to date his Ulfric, his pack leader. Since Richard and I had broken up, most of the werewolves were awkward around me. My position with the wereleopards didn't help matters and the entire thing was compounded by my new place as Bolverk in the pack. As Bolverk, I was officially the person sent to deal with unpleasant things Richard didn't want to deal with. Usually this meant threatening people much bigger and scarier than I was with the real possibility of having to kill those same scary people.

Vivian and Stephen were dating. Weres of different types didn't usually stick around one another, but these two were so low in the power hierarchy that no one really cared. Tonight, however, Stephen was nervous again and that meant trouble. Shit.

"What's up?" I asked Stephen as Vivian greeted me in the standard pard style, face rubbing my left hand. It still creeped me out, but I was a heap-big vampire slayer so I dealt with it.

"We had a lone wolf at the Lupinar."

"Lone wolf?" Yet another furry phrase I had yet to learn. Most groups of were had their own special names. An Ulfric was a werewolf king. A challenger for place as Ulfric was called Fenrir. The Ulfric's girlfriend or wife was the pack's Lupa. I'd been Lupa until I'd become the leopard's Nimir-Ra, the female version of the Nimir-Raj. The wolves seemed to have more of the names and titles than the other were types. Or the wolves were just chattier about their traditions. It was hard to tell.

"A lone wolf is a wolf without a pack," Stephen explained.

"Right." I could have guessed that one. "Trouble?" I asked, expecting the answer to be yes.

"No, not really. He's been in town for a few days and has been extremely polite. He caused a slight bit of a stir though. He's not like us," Stephen said.

"How so?"

"He's English. European weres are a lot different."

This was news to me. But then all the weres I'd met had been from this country if not this hemisphere. "Really?"

"You'd have to see it. It was nothing the Ulfric couldn't handle though," Stephen said. Pride for his Ulfric rang in his voice and shone in his eyes. Yay for Richard. Richard had been fighting division and upheaval in the pack since he'd become leader. He needed all the fans he could get.

"He's cute in a sort of floppy Hugh Grant sort of way," Vivian chimed in. She'd spent the full moon with the wolves.

"Hooker in a car Hugh Grant or charming clean cut movie Hugh Grant?" I asked. Vivian laughed.

"Clean cut movie."

"Sounds interesting." Cherry had put down her book and joined the conversation.

"Do I have to meet him?" I asked Stephen. I didn't think my responsibilities as Bolverk included meeting foreign weres unless they needed to be dealt with forcefully.

"Not now. He's been speaking with the Ulfric privately since he got here. Richard's even more brooding than usual. Word is, this guy has been traveling the country talking to all the Ulfrics."

"Will want to speak with a Nimir-Raj or Nimir-Ra?" Micah asked. He and Zane were now standing at the edge of the deck. Zane had the Frisbee in his mouth between his pointed teeth like a retriever. Zane's long canines were kitty teeth though. Too much time in the animal form left marks on the human one. He caught my eyes and wagged his eyebrows before spitting the disk out and tossing it onto a deck chair without comment.

"He hasn't mentioned you or the rodents or even the hyenas that I've heard of." Stephen shrugged. The wolves, rodents and hyenas were the three largest and most powerful groups in the area. The leopards got special mention mostly because of me. I hoped that this "Lone Wolf" wouldn't want to speak to me or anyone else for that matter. I was sick of being in the midst of multispecies were troubles.

As if my plate wasn't already so full it was overflowing, I was the head of a were communication coalition for the city. St. Louis has something like twenty different species of were living in its limits and of those groups only the rats and the wolves talked to one another with any regularity. It had taken a psychotic alpha called Chimera and the gruesome deaths of several weres to convince the local populations that they needed a common forum or the next bad guy could take them all out. We'd met five times and I was already sick of dealing with the politics. If this was a wolf only problem that was peachy keen for me.

"Richard thought you should know since you're the chair of the coalition," Stephen said. What I wanted to say was that Richard didn't even have the guts to call me up himself. Lovely. What I said was; "How kind of him." Bitter? Me? No! I decided to keep my head down and maybe this too would pass. Yeah, right.

Several hours and three dead chickens later, Asher found me cleaning blood off my knives at the edge of a graveyard. I was a professional and took care of my tools. The legal eagles and the relatives of the dead were busy off by their cars a little ways away. The zombie was back in the ground, my work was done.

"Anita." The vampire greeted, golden hair flowing over the ruined side of his face. A couple hundred years ago Asher's face had been ruined by Holy water when a couple of priests had tried to burn the devil out of him. Holy water reacts like acid with vampire skin and half his body was riddled with the scars. Asher was Jean-Claude's second in command

I smiled and put the knives back and wiped my hands free of grime before giving him a hug and a kiss on his uncovered cheek. I would have been kind and kissed the scarred side, but experience had taught me that that move only got me a mouthful of hair. Jean-Claude had shared memories of Asher before the scarring, with me. Asher's human servant and lover had also died that day, burned as witch. The guy had been through a lot so I tried to be considerate. And, as vampires went, he wasn't that bad once he'd stopped wanting to kill me on sight.

"What does Jean-Claude want?" I asked without preamble. The vampire spread his hands wide and tried to look innocent. He did a pretty good job too, but I knew better.

"Anita, what makes you think that Jean-Claude would have sent me to get you?"

"About two hours ago I felt him get a brief thrill of fear. I nearly sliced my arm and not the chicken. I thought you would have shown up earlier, actually."

"He knew you were working this evening. But as you are now free, would you please accompany me?" it wasn't really a request and we both knew it.

"What's up? Don't play games. It takes something spectacular for the Master of a city to be that scared, even for a moment."

"Musette has arrived," Asher explained, charming nonchalant façade now gone. That got my attention. Jean-Claude and Asher both had, haltingly, explained why they were not happy when the vampire council told them that Musette would be paying them a visit. I'd met a variety of people who'd sexual tastes had run to the gory and exotic. People who go off on things like sniff films and even made them. The people Musette played with couldn't die again as much as they wanted to.

"Do I have time to go home and change?" I asked Asher. He shook his head, blonde curtain of hair shining in the moonlight.

"No. She spoke to Jean-Claude at length. When she was done he told me to get you."

"Who is getting Richard?" I asked. It was a reasonable question. No doubt the council was here because they were interested in the whole triumvirate again. They had investigated Richard, Jean-Claude and I before. It hadn't been pleasant. Vampires and the were-animals they could call were a dime a dozen, but as a necromancer I was special. The three of us linked together was a triple threat combo that I suspected scared the council. Yay for us. I wondered if Jean-Claude had sent one of Richard's wolves to collect him, or if he'd sent one of his vampires. I wasn't looking forward to seeing Richard again so soon and I pitied the messenger.

"She did not wish to see Richard." Asher, I could tell, was slightly confused that Musette would not want to see all three of us. Obviously something other than an investigation of our triumvirate was going on. And me without my bigger weapons. Great. At least I had my knives and my Browning.

I put the dirty cleaning supplies in their little case and sealed them up. I'd get rid of the bloody stuff when I got to the circus, but for now they were in a sealed gallon Ziploc bag. I was as ready to go as I could be I supposed.

"Let's go," I said. Asher nodded and headed for his own car. I got into mine and headed for the Circus. No time to change clothing and I had a scary Council representative waiting for me. Normally Jean-Claude was as into the whole pageantry bit as the rest of the supernatural community seemed to be. I was coming in jeans, blue ones, and one of my working shirts. If I didn't have time to go home and put on something impressive and slinky or at least made of several dead animals, things were Not Good.

I arrived at the Circus of the Damned in record time. Catchy name for a Vampire run carnival, huh? Asher's driver pulled his car up behind mine and we all got out. The circus was alive and kicking, no pun intended. Even this late at night, the place was packed with the typical mish mash of wannabe's decked out in loads of black leather and metal spikes and tourists with bright shirts sporting socks with sandals. I ignored the tourists and thrill seekers and hurried behind Asher. I could feel Jean-Claude somewhere below. He wasn't frightened, which was a good thing. He was almost relieved, but he was concerned. I'd soon find out why.

Musette was one of Belle-Morte's lieutenants. Belle-Morte was the head Asher and Jean-Claude's vampiric line and was a member of the vampire council. She was a scary bitch and have tried to invade my head a couple of times. I'd been able to throw her out of by drawing on my link to Richard and Jean-Claude. She couldn't control me, so she didn't like me. Council members rarely left France, so she'd been negotiating for Musette to come investigate for months. Asher and Jean-Claude had been reluctant to let Musette into the city. More than a hundred years ago they'd been playthings for her. They hadn't given me all the gruesome details, but then I really didn't want to know.

Musette was scarcely taller than I was, but her taste in clothing ran towards high spiked heels so she had to look down just a little to meet my eyes. Because I'm a necromancer I'm pretty good at telling how long a vampire has been dead. She was old but she wasn't a thousand yet. She also felt like a master vampire. She had long, wavy brown hair which suddenly became wildly curly around her waist. After 600 years in the dark her eyes had become a light honey color. And her eyes were just eyes. That was a good thing. There had once been a time when I could have drowned in the hypnotic gaze of a vampire, but not now. I was protected by my link to Jean-Claude. For a reputed nymphomaniac she'd dressed rather conservatively. Her dress covered everything but it showed off every curve. I was surprised. It was something I would consider wearing.

"How nice to finally meet you, Anita," She purred and held out a hand. The way she said "finally" I immediately thought of some cheesy 40's villain. "And so we meet, for the first time, and for the last." Insert evil laugh of choice. I bit my cheek and clasped her hand. Brownie points for me. Thirty seconds and I hadn't actually said any smart comments. Musette was French, but her English was British. It made for an unusual accent.

"Hi." I managed and shot a look at Jean-Claude. His face was impassive but this much closer to him I could feel conflicting emotions; Concern, caution, annoyance, and perhaps a little lingering fear.

"Musette is here from the council. But she has not come to speak to us about Mr. Zeeman, myself and you." I had gathered that much from my brief conversation with Asher, but I'd thought she was here on Belle-Morte's orders as her lieutenant. Now it appeared she was here on behalf of the entire council. I nodded and waited for them to explain what she was here for.

"We have a task for you Anita," Musette said. I didn't like the word "task". My name was not Hercules. "We wish for you to come to the old country and kill someone for us."

"I'm not a contract killer,'" I stated and sent a glare Jean-Claude's way. What in the world had he gotten me into?

"Non," Musette agreed with diplomatic hauteur. I could tell she didn't believe me though. "You will not be paid," she said. As if that made the difference, "but you will probably want to do what we ask when you hear who and what the target is." The vampire seated herself in one of the richly upholstered chairs in the room. She looked like a queen surveying her court. Damned if I'd be the jester.

"So who does the council want to see dead? Or dead-dead if we're talking about a vampire." No beating around the bush for me today. I was somewhat curious as to what I could possibly kill that the council couldn't. Perhaps this was a test of some sort. I rigged test no doubt.

"He is a wizard. He calls himself Voldemort," Musette waited for my response. I met her gaze and shrugged.

"So he thinks he can do magic and he's French. What's so bad about that?"

"No, Ma petite, you misunderstand. He is a wizard, a real one and a very powerful one. He is causing much concern for the Council," Jean-Claude said. Why did I get the feeling he wasn't telling me something?

"He's a human who had pissed off the council and you want me to go kill him as a test right?'

"Close," Musette smiled. I didn't like that smile. It, unlike mine, did reach her eyes. But there wasn't anything happy or wholesome in those eyes.

"Voldemort was supposedly killed a number of years ago. We have found that this is not so. He has returned and he has been bringing some of our younger and more impressionable vampires to him. He seems to have some control over their actions and we cannot stop them very well. The council is expending considerable energy to keep them in check." Musette sniffed. She managed to make a serious problem sound like a minor inconvenience.

"Is he a necromancer?" I asked after a moment. I wasn't sure I'd help them, but it couldn't hurt to see what they were dealing with. I didn't like the council, but they were a known evil. They had rules, however bizarre. A psychotic wizard with a bunch of vampires under his control had the possibility of being much worse.

"Non." Musette shook her head.

I was a necromancer. I could call the dead from their graves and vampires were just another dead creature. I even had my own vampire servant, though I hadn't intended for that to happen. I'd accidentally called a number of 'sleeping' vampires to me when they were gone for the day. My power over one had severed him from other more powerful vampires somehow. Since the merging of the marks I felt certain that I could add others to the group I could call, but I sure as hell didn't want to.

Theoretically, a necromancer of sufficient strength could gather vampires to him as a human Master of sorts. The vampires would be severed of their ties to their old masters and the heads of their bloodlines and become hard for the council or another vampire to control. If he wasn't a necromancer, I was at a loss on how he was managing to control the vampires.

"So, how is he controlling them?"

"We, and the witches and wizards we have been speaking to, do not know. We wish for you to find that out."

"Why haven't you gone in and killed him?"

"It is the affair of humans." Musette said haughtily. "We are doing enough by sending you to help them kill the monster they created," Musette said and stood. This was an obvious signal that the meeting was over.

"They will be sending a contact. Jean-Claude, tell her what she needs to know."

Jean-Claude nodded. The woman turned on her heels and stalked down the hall.

Jean-Claude waited until she was out of even vampiric hearing and then sat on the couch.

"You have been studying with a witch, correct?"

"You know I have," I snapped back, annoyed.

"I think she has not entirely been truthful with you."

"How so?" I hated people lying to me. Jean-Claude smiled at my sharp reply. I let it slide.

"If she is a real witch, then she lives in two worlds. One which you and I and most of the world can see. But there is another world. The witches and wizards keep it hidden from non-magical peoples. They cause bits of their world to go unnoticed by most humans."

"How could I have not noticed?" It seemed preposterous that I wouldn't notice something.

"You probably have. They are everywhere, but they do not draw attention to themselves. Probably some of the oddly dressed people you have seen on the street are wizards or witches. Perhaps you've even seen their hidden buildings but never noticed that no one else saw them," Asher added. Jean-Claude nodded agreement. I arched an eyebrow.

"You are telling me that there is a world wide conspiracy to keep the majority of humanity ignorant of the existence of an entire group of people, and that none of the witches I know and study with are real witches?"

"Non. They may be real witches and wizards, but they may not have shown you the full extent of their powers, Ma Petite."

"So Marianne and every other witch I've known has been keeping their real powers secret so they can hide an entire other world?"

"Yes." Riiight.

"Next you'll be telling me that the tooth fairy exists. What is this really about Jean-Claude?" I was running out of patience. I smelled like dead chickens and grave sites and was not in the mood for weird cloak and dagger vampire shit.

I was about to tell Jean-Claude this when a man appeared out of thin air.

"Do not shoot!" Jean-Claude commanded. I'd had the gun out before I'd even realized it. Dratted superhuman reflexes. The man had some pretty fast reflexes himself. He'd ducked to the side and was covering his head with his arms. I put up the gun and watched the man warily. He uncovered his head after a moment and looked immensely relieved to be alive. He smiled somewhat cautiously.

"Perhaps you shouldn't have done that," Jean-Claude told the man. No shit, I thought. "Anita, Mr. Lupin is a wizard. I gave him permission to apparate to this room."

"Sorry to give you a scare," he said in a rich English accent as he extended his hand. Seeing no one else was thoroughly creeped out by the fact that a man had appeared out of thin air, I put my gun away and grasped the proffered hand. The moment our flesh touched, I knew this was Stephen's lone wolf.

Every were has a beast. It's a sort of psychic manifestation of whatever animal they become on the full moon. Sometimes you can see a person's beast in their eyes; a waiting animal barely contained. I have a beast too, I think because of my link with Richard, but I'm no were-anything.

My startled beast roared along my skin and met his equally startled beast with psychic force. We jumped away from one another, releasing our hands. Just as suddenly as they'd roared by, the two beasts retreated to their corners as we broke the physical contact. I had the mental image of the two creatures, leopard and wolf, glaring at one another and growling as they cautiously backed away.

"The hell was that?" Lupin asked, running a hand through his grey flecked brown hair.

"I'm not sure myself," I answered. I hadn't known Lupin was a werewolf until I'd touched his hand. He was extremely good at hiding what he was, possibly even the best I'd ever met. "I think my power was just startled to meet your beast. You pretend to be human very well," I said.

"But I am human." Lupin's brow furrowed. Why did I feel like I'd just kicked a puppy?

"Er- Normal human," I amended quickly, "So, are you going to take me to Europe or wherever to defeat this Voldemort guy?" The werewolf flinched when I mentioned the name. Perhaps that was the reaction Musette had been expected.

"No. But I am taking you to meet your contact and I am going to be dropping off some reports as well," Lupin explained.

"Right. How much time do I have to pack?"

"Well, we're going to meet her at this address," Lupin eyed me as he reached into his coat and drew out a card. The address was for a little park just outside the city.

"When and how long am I going be gone?" I asked. I knew at this point it was almost pointless in trying NOT to go.

"Meet her the day after tomorrow at 10 am. We'd like for you to stay during the school year at the least." Something in Lupin's pocked began chiming. He pulled out an antique looking pocket watch. "I have to meet with the Ulfric again. See you the day after tomorrow. Your contact will explain everything when you get there," Lupin said then disappeared. I blinked hard.

"Did that just happen?" I asked no one in particular. Somehow I was more comfortable with people threatening to kill me. "And what did he mean by school year?" I rounded on Jean-Claude. The master vampire shrugged.

"I believe they wish to station you at a wizard school," Jean-Claude explained, "But as for why, I am not sure. You know as much as I do, Ma Petite."

I sighed. At least I had a chance to put my affairs in order. "Put my affairs in order." Why did that sound so final?

Two days later I shoved all my things in the back of my jeep and hopped into the passenger side. Burt, my boss, had been strangely quiet about my leaving. Normally if one of his employees took any time off, he'd whine and complain the entire week before they left then call about twenty times while they were away. Burt had grumbled for a few days but then seemed to resign himself to the fact that I would be going. This had been a good thing. Really did not want to deal with Burt. I thanked God for small blessings and buckled my seatbelt. Nathaniel hopped energetically into the driver side, his long auburn braid nearly hitting me. He put on his own belt and started the car. I heard the click of Micah's belt in the back and then we were off. I wasn't happy to be going, but I knew I had to go or the council would send someone else to try and convince me. The last council visit to the city had been disastrous and I wanted to avoid that. I'd left the were committee in the capable paws of the rat king and didn't feel a bit guilty about it. My leopards were fine with me leaving since they had Micah to protect them. Nathaniel, I decided, had to come with me. Micah was a Nimir-Raj and could probably protect him well, but I still felt responsible. That and there was the little nagging detail of his being my Pomme De Sang, my own personal blood donor.

I was linked to a master vampire who could feed on either blood or lust. Lucky me, aside from getting to call an animal I also felt the need to take a bite out of someone sometimes. I hated it. A lot. I did not like seeing my friends as food. Jean-Claude thought that perhaps distance between us would weaken that little aspect of our sharing power. A few months of being more normal again? Of being more human than I'd been in months? Sign me up! Despite the magical, vampire controlling psycho, Europe was looking better and better all the time.

While I was looking forward to not wanting to bite anyone till they bled, I wasn't going to take any chances. It was embarrassing enough that I had to deal with this; I wasn't going to ask a stranger to be a blood donor. So Nathanial was coming along and they, whoever they were this time, had could damn well deal. They'd thrown me into the bizarre situation, so I should be allowed to drag along whomever I wanted. Nathanial healed quickly because he was a were, and he liked being chewed on. Sometimes I wondered which bothered me more; my wanting to take a chunk out of Nathanial or his wanting me to take a chunk out of him. I shook my head to clear it.

Micah rode in the back of the jeep, lost in thought. He was there to drive my car home since I assumed we'd be getting a ride with this contact. His otherworldly cat-green eyes caught mine and saw he was worried for me. I was worried for me too. The short ride was uneventful and silent. The jeep pulled into the small gravel parking lot and Nathaniel cut the engine. I looked around and didn't see anyone. No cars, no people.

There were some ducks at the edge of the small pond and I saw small bird of some sort fly into the tree at the water's edge. A small cat sat on the picnic bench under the tree. Nathaniel got out of the car and dragged our bags out. I would have struggled a little with them. Nathanial could bench press a Toyota; he didn't have a problem with the bags. Micah and I got out of the car and scanned the area.

"See anyone?" I asked.

"No," he said after a moment.

"Wonderful," I muttered.

"Do you think this Lupin guy set you up?" he asked. I shrugged.

"I don't think so. Jean-Claude seemed to think he was really a wizard and that he was telling the truth." I watched as Nathaniel walked to the cat on the picnic bench.

"I don't know. People who can appear out of thin air? That sounds a bit fishy to me." We walked over to the bench. Nathaniel was staring at the cat with a look of confusion on his face. The cat for its part was staring back. But that was silly. Cats didn't stare. They sort of gazed around, like they ruled everything.

"So, are you a were?" Nathaniel asked the cat. That caught my attention.

"That's just a cat. Isn't it?" I asked. Micah was moving in closer for a scent check or something. The cat stood up and jumped off the table changing shape as it did so. What had started as a grey and black tabby cat at the beginning of the jump ended up as a tall woman wearing a dark green business suit. Her hair was as black as my own and was curled into a bun at the back of her head. Small square glasses were perched on her nose. One word came into mind as I took in all the details; strict.

"How did you do that with your clothes on?" was the first question that came into my mind. Weres usually lost their clothing during their transformations. Extra bones and muscle mass erupting out of a human form tended to shred any garments they wore. The woman arched one dark eyebrow.

"I'm not a were cat," She replied. She had a Scottish accent. I think. The corner of her mouth tugged at the edge as if she thought of the idea of a were cat was something rather silly. I'd met were dogs before so I didn't think it was that preposterous. "I'm a witch," she said.

"The only shape shifter witch I've met had to kill a werewolf, skin it, and wear the pelt to change shape," I told her. The woman's blue eyes blazed with indignant fire as her jaw clenched. I'd hit a nerve. Goody.

"I am a classically trained Animagus. I do not need to kill and steal to do my transformation." Her voice was arctic and razor sharp. She looked down on those sorts of witches obviously. Good for her. She got brownie points for that one.

"I've never seen anyone do what you just did," I told her. She didn't seem surprised. Perhaps there really was a grand conspiracy, but I was still suspicious. Besides, I'd seen witches practice magic before. Witches were just normal people.

"My name is Minerva McGonagall." the woman offered her hand. I shook it and was glad my leopard didn't come screaming out to fight any little kitty cats.

"Anita Blake. You are my contact?"

"Yes. How much did Remus explain?" She asked.

"Go to Europe, kill some guy called Voldemort." she winced but not as badly as Lupin had. "The vampires want me to find out how he is controlling their people. Lupin also mentioned something about a school," I said. McGonagall was about to answer but was distracted by a car rumbling down the road. I recognized Sylvie in the driver's seat, Shang-Da in the passenger side and someone else in the back. The car parked next to mine and Remus Lupin climbed out of the back seat before Sylvie had even turned off the engine. I sent her a questioning glance and she mouthed the word "later".

"Professor!" Lupin called out, pleasure at seeing the woman genuine. The woman's stern features melted into a softer, almost maternal expression I didn't think she'd been capable of.

"Remus," She greeted Lupin.

"How was your trip. Not too horrible I hope?" the werewolf asked. McGonagall replied but I didn't hear. I was more interested in watching Shang-Da and Sylvie unload a suitcase from the trunk of her car. Shang-Da and Sylvie were also werewolves. Shang-Da was a bodyguard sort of like Merle was. As ever, he looked like he'd stepped off the pages of GQ. Sylvie was the Geri, the second ranked werewolf, in Richards pack. She's 5'6" which make her only a few inches taller than I am, but she is one of the toughest people I've met. Not one of the toughest women, one of the toughest people. "Professor McGonagall, this is Sylvie Barker," Remus introduced. The alpha female hurried over and shook hands with the witch. "She's the second in command for the St. Louis pack. Her pack leader is sending her with us to check things out. He can't come himself, but I already reported that none of the pack leaders were likely to come in person," Lupin explained. McGonagall nodded and pulled out a long tapered stick from her pants pocket.

"Well, a representative shows he isn't going to ignore the problem outright," the professor said. She sounded tired and I wondered how many Ulfrics had politely ignored Remus Lupin. "If you would put your luggage over with Anita's, I'll shrink it to a more manageable size." Sylvie blinked at the woman in slight confusion then cautiously set her suitcase next to Nathaniel's and mine. She looked at me and we exchanged shrugs. The professor flicked her wrist and I felt a brush of magic. She said a Latin phrase I didn't know as she flicked her wrist downwards and suddenly our luggage shrunk down to the size of a box of matches.

"Cool," Sylvie said.

"That should be manageable. So I assume you are returning with us then?" McGonagall asked Lupin. The werewolf nodded.

"I can show her around, make my reports and check in on Snuffles," he explained. The tall witch nodded. Snuffles?

"Our ride should be here momentarily," McGonagall told us, "Your friends can take your cars." It was clearly a dismissal. I shrugged at Micah, gave him a quick goodbye kiss and waved as he drove off. Sylvie tossed her keys and Shang-Da snatched them out of the air.

"Don't scuff the paint job," She told him. He shot her a slightly aggravated look but got into the car and drove off without a word. It was then McGonagall and Lupin noticed Nathaniel.

"And he is?" McGonagall asked.

"He's Nathaniel. He comes with me."

"We don't normally allow Mu- non magic peoples." She hastily amended. I shrugged.

"What about Sylvie and me?" I asked.

"She's a werewolf and you are a Necromancer. You have magic."

"Nathaniel is one of my were leopards."

"He is an Alpha?" Lupin asked.

"No. This is why he has to come with me."

"I see," Lupin said, but he clearly didn't. The two exchanged a look and strolled off a way before waving their wands again. They then began talking but I couldn't hear a thing.

"I'll be damned," Sylvie said, "A silencing spell."

"You know magic?" I asked. It wouldn't be the first time Sylvie had held out on information about herself. She tilted her head in a wolf like gesture and laughed.

"No, no. But I can't hear anything they're saying and I should be able to. They do have magic. What else could it be?" she had a point. I shrugged.

"I don't have to go, Anita." Nathaniel looked at me with his huge violet eyes and I knew he would run home if I told him to. I shook my head and patted him on the shoulder.

"You have to come with me. I have...issues and I am not sure I want you on your own again." The witch and werewolf finished their discussion and returned.

"Ms. Blake I am not sure the school governors would allow him on the property," Lupin said, "They nearly didn't let me back on the grounds and I have to leave three days before the full moon. I'm not sure we have the facilities to deal with a were leopard during the full moon."

"Nathaniel is very submissive. He doesn't always run around with the pard on the full moon anyway. He can stay in my room those nights," I explained. Remus looked at me like I was insane.

"He'll ruin your room! What if he gets out?"

"I won't leave if Anita asks me not to," Nathaniel spoke up, "I do anything she asks me to." The "asks" was a big improvement for us. He'd gone from "whatever Anita tells me to do" to "whatever Anita asks me to do." It was a small change but an important one. Nathaniel needed to be more dominant for his own good. Lupin was eying us curiously. He turned to Sylvie.

"They don't change like we do, do they?" They obviously meant wereleopard. Sylvie looked from me to Lupin and shrugged.

"He gets furry once a month, has a bit of a run in the woods, a couple deer here, a good howl there. Well, roar in his case. It's not so much different. If I'm there long enough I'd prefer a nice wooded area myself." she playfully punched him in the shoulder, "You can show me the English country side. Fair's fare since you saw my territory."

"When I am home, I take a potion and lock myself up someplace on a full moon. I don't have a pack to stick to like you do." Lupin told her. Both Lupin and McGonagall looked somewhat afraid and Sylvie's suggestion they the weres go off for a night out during the full moon. Lupin more afraid for some reason.

"Ok, this has to stop." I broke in. "What we have here is a cross cultural difference. Am I to take it that werewolves drug themselves and are locked up on a full moon?"

"Well, yes. How else can we be prevented from biting anyone else? We don't have powerful Ulfrics to keep up in line. The last ones were killed in the 40s." Sylvie Nathaniel and I exchanged a look.

"An older pack member once told me that werewolves in Europe go into a killing frenzy on the full moon. I thought he was being racist or something." Sylvie eyed Lupin curiously.

"Well," Lupin dropped his eyes, "It's not really a killing frenzy. It's more like we want to bite people. I want to make someone else a werewolf. It's Horrible! I'm barely myself." If he'd been in wolf form, his tail would have been between his legs.

"Well a potion explains why you were so out of it at the lupinar," Sylvie mused. "I've never seen a werewolf so inclined to sleep through most of the night." To McGonagall she said "It doesn't happen like that here. Sure the alphas keep the packs away from people, but not because want to go around biting people. Keeping the pack away from civilization is more so we don't kill anyone's property and call bounty hunters into the area."

"Were leopards don't seek out people to bite either," I said.

"We don't even kill all that many deer," Nathaniel added. The witch and the werewolf looked dubious. Well, if I came from a place where even experienced werewolves had as little control as the newly furry, I'd be a bit pessimistic as well.

"You can lock me up if you want," Nathaniel said. He smiled that not-so innocent-yet-little-boy smile of his. "It might even be fun." The witch blushed but her expression didn't change otherwise. Lupin coughed and looked away from the grinning were.

"Don't mind him," I said, "Nathaniel will be a good boy. I'm his Nimir-Ra. If I tell him to curl up by the fire like a good kitty, he will."

McGonagall examined me with her sharp gaze. Lupin shrugged. It was obviously her call to make.

"He may come, but he will be restricted to your rooms and sealed behind wards on the full moon. The children need to learn tolerance." Somehow I got the feeling that she thought the children weren't the only ones who needed a lesson in tolerance.

"Thank you," I said. She nodded curtly. That matter settled she pulled a spatula out of her pocket.

I've had a lot of things pulled on me, but this was a new one. Lupin grabbed the suitcases from the table, put them in his pocket and then touched the tip of the spatula with his index finger.

"Do you have any idea how silly that looks?" I asked.

"That's rather the point," McGonagall answered. "This is a portkey. You all need to touch part of it. When it activates we'll be taken to a stop-over just outside New York."

"It's a magic spatula?" Sylvie asked. She was politely trying to stifle giggles but she touched her index finger to the spatula anyway.

"Yes," Lupin blushed, "the point of the silly shape is to pick something no one would go and pick up. That way we can leave them around in case of emergency or if we have to abandon them." It made sense. Sort of. But then nothing had made much sense in the past two days. I shrugged and placed the tips of my fingers against the spatula. Nathaniel followed my lead. I felt really dumb. We were five grown adults standing in the middle of nowhere holding a spatula.

"One minute." McGonagall looked at the antique pocket watch.

"So about this school thing." This had really been bothering me. The more pressing matter of my leopard settled I could ask what I was in for. Neither the werewolf nor the witch had explained it to me.

"Oh! That's right I didn't get to tell you that part. We'd like you to teach for us this year." McGonagall eyed her watch as Lupin spoke. Kids? Teaching? Me?

"Wait, wait. I think I can think of someone better to teach kids than me." I was thinking of Richard. Richard was a science teacher when he wasn't being a wolf king.

"You can teach them to defend themselves," Lupin said, "You're a vampire executioner. I'm going to be around to help with the spell part so don't worry about that."

"Spell part?"

"Ten seconds," McGonagall noted.

"Yes. Defense Against the Dark Arts has a spell component but you can teach them the practical stuff."

"Like guns and killing people?" I couldn't believe this.

"Five seconds. I think we'll continue this in New York," McGonagall said as she put her pocket watch away. I was about to take my hand away from the Spatula and look for the hidden cameras when I suddenly felt a jerk from somewhere behind me. I couldn't have moved my hand from the spatula if I'd tried. My hand was connected to the plastic. I felt a conflicting sensation which didn't so much ignore the laws of physics as moon them and make rude gestures. It was standing in one place but the sensation of rapid motion. Suddenly we hit the ground even though I was sure we hadn't moved an inch

I gasped as my knees and teeth were jarred by the impact. Sylvie gave a yelp of surprise and nearly fell over. Lupin caught her and gave her a small debonair grin. Too bad for him, though. Sylvie played for the other team. Nathaniel had managed to stay on his feet and McGonagall looked completely unfazed. Must be a magic thing. She took the spatula over to a counter and handed it to a bored looking man. It was then that I noticed that I was in a large vaulted room.

Large antique looking lamps hung from the ceiling. The roof was a lattice of glass and green copper girders. Sunlight shone through the yellow tinted glass adding to the light of the lamps. Little groups of people clustered around sign posts which read the names of major cities. Cairo, Berlin, Moscow, Tokyo, Buenos Aires, Cape Town, Sydney, Beijing, Paris and London were a few I could make out. There were many more clusters and signs I couldn't read further down.

"Why do I feel like I just stepped into the 1930's," I asked.

"Well the Portkey exchange in New York was remodeled in the 1930's," Lupin explained. McGonagall was writing something down for the bored man behind the counter.

"This place is huge," Sylvie observed, "I've never seen it before and I used to live in New York."

"We hide it from the Muggles pretty well. The Americans' pride themselves on it and frankly I don't blame them. Diagon alley in London isn't nearly as busy a place and that's saying something. This is one of the major portkey hubs in the world."

"Anyone who had no idea what he just said, raise your hand," I deadpanned. Nathaniel and Sylvie looked apologetic as the three of us raised our hands. Lupin laughed.

"Sorry about that. That was a portkey. You touch it and it transports you someplace else. Here we get portkeys to the major cities of the world."

"It's a magical airport?" I asked.

"Er. I think. I'm only vaguely familiar with airports." Lupin admitted. He didn't know what an airport was? Weird.

"What's a Muggle?" Nathaniel asked. I had wondered that too.

"Non-magic person," McGonagall answered. She handed each of us a ticket with the word "London" carved and gilded on it. "We take these to the appropriate spot and port key out," she explained. We nodded and followed her past a group of people who disappeared all at once. We stopped at, surprise, surprise, the London post. A few witches and wizards were already there.

Most people here wore robes. I didn't want to know what they wore underneath. The occasional person wore normal clothing like Lupin and McGonagall did. A few were wearing normal clothes but they had it all wrong. I got the feeling they weren't used to wearing what I considered to be "normal" clothing. Maybe it was the fuzzy pink bunny slippers with the blue crushed velvet suit, tangerine fedora and broad red belt the person next to me wore. Or maybe I just didn't have keen fashion sense. I didn't have time to contemplate further because that jerking feeling was back again.

The second landing was better since I knew what to expect. Our small group landed in a fragrant courtyard. The sun was higher in the sky and I made a mental note to reset my watch to account for the six hour time difference. The courtyard looked like something out of a Victorian era movie. The area was partitioned into little squares by short hedges and was paved with broad slate stones with carefully trimmed grass poking out of the cracks. I half expected to see women in broad dresses and corsets stride by us, parasols held delicately over their shoulders. A woman in particularly ugly green robes, a tall witch's hat and a large handbag passed us instead.

"Is that a vulture on her hat?" Sylvie asked in a low voice. I spared a glance at the witch's head gear.

"I think you're right," I said. We quietly snickered.

"Professor Lupin!" A boy of about fourteen or fifteen came running over. He held a huge green toad in his hands.

"Hullo Neville," Lupin greeted the boy, "How's Trevor?" Trevor turned out to be the toad. Yuck.

"Oh, he's fine. Are you coming back to teach us again?" Neville looked hopeful. "Professor Moody said he was only going to teach us for a year."

"Well, sort of. I'll see you on the first."

"Right!" the boy grinned and ran down the path. My heart caught in my throat as he tripped on a stone. I was sure he was going to crush his toad. It was going to be messy. Miraculously he recovered and continued his sprint with a cry of "Gran!" This was one of my students? Lord, help me.

"Longbottom?" McGonagall had returned. She handed each of us a ticket to a place called "Hogsmeade".

"Yep. He's a good kid, really." Lupin sighed, "He's one of your students too."

"Yes. About that," I began to say I wasn't cut out for the job as teacher; killer of madmen, yes, teacher no. I didn't have time to finish because we were suddenly jerked backwards as the portkey grabbed us.

******************************

Challenge requirements met so far:

1) Anita Blake MUST be featured in the fic. It doesn't have to be told like the Anita Blake books are, but she must be a prominent roll in the story.

4) Any of Jean-Claude's vampires (Asher, Damian, Willy, Gretel) or Jason making appearances.

5.) Nathaniel being in the fic and tagging along with Anita.

Three down, five to go!