Conor collapsed down on his couch exhausted. Was it March yet? Ever since his impromptu performance in Deep Ellum before the Unseelie Court of The Marchioness he’d been very busy.
The denizens of the Winter Court, both highborn and low, had discovered a new “flavor of the month” in Conor. It seemed as though every party, every celebration, every debauch of the season demanded the presence of "Conor of the Bluebonnets." Winter was at a zenith of power it had not enjoyed in some time and was eager to celebrate.
Hospitality demanded certain concessions to the… darker… nature of the Winter Court. After all, Conor couldn’t claim the excuses of mortality or even allegiance to Summer. To refuse all would be rude… and it was something he couldn’t afford to do both politically as well as financially. His mind was still his own, but he had done things that would probably shock his new friends… well maybe not Ren. But then, she was Fae (of a fashion) herself.
Matthew steps out of the bathroom, once again appreciating the setup in his apartment that allows him to have a hot shower. Helping with some church repairs in Pleasant Grove made for a long day, but maintaining those relationships (and the couple of days’ worth of food in the fridge) made it a fair exchange. He puts on a pair of sweats and a random t-shirt and sits down at his desk. He shuffles through piles of loose papers scattered around the desk – notes about the prayers and scriptures that he has used over the last few months during his encounters with the supernatural. After debriefing with Arthur on some of the things he had encountered and discovered, Arthur had given him a journal to start recording some of the insights he had gained about “monster hunting.” After a number of false starts, he has finally decided on a title for his notes, tongue firmly in cheek. He picks up his fountain pen, and on the first page of the hand-stitched, leather-bound journal, carefully writes " The Book of Armaments."
He smiles as he sets down the pen, but is immediately distracted by the downstairs buzzer for his apartment. Odd, he thinks, I don’t usually get visitors. He pads over to the intercom and presses the button. “Yes?”
Elena crouches in the shadows across the street, carefully studying the layout of the cars. Not many passers-by this time of night, but she waits several moments, anyway, before moving closer to the building she is casing. She hears a shower shut off and looks up at the bathroom window, seeing his image cross the glass as he leaves the room. Dude needs to not silhouette himself in a lit room at night, she thinks, her brows coming down with concern. Should tell him to buy some good curtains, even if he only uses ’em at night. She checks her watch and gives him five minutes to get dried and dressed.
When the five minutes are up, she carefully checks her surroundings again, then prowls through the shadows and up to the intercom at the ground floor of his building. She dislikes the exposed nature of the intercom and pushes the button quickly, her eyes constantly moving across the street, at all the parked cars and the one passing car, up to the building tops, watching for any potential threat. Waiting outside the old shelter where all those people disappeared, even though the threat has been dealt with, makes her more edgy than usual.
Within moments, she hears Matthew’s metallic voice coming through the box. “Yes?”
I wheezed a little as I took the measure of my opponent. I’m not in bad shape, but this guy had me outclassed in every way. Strength, agility… heck, it even seemed impossible for me to hurt him. I spat and rushed him, hauling back and swinging the bat as hard as I could. But he just caught it in one hand, wrenched me towards him, and then delivered a hammer blow to my chest that sent me staggering back, gasping for breath. What exactly had I gotten myself into?
“Yer sure, Matchew?”
“I wouldn’t have called if I wasn’t. That ice tree-thing we took on in the Nevernever nearly took my head off. I need to learn how to fight better. And not to put too fine a point on it, but you’re the best I know.”
“I dunno.” The Irish lilt on the other end of the phone faded a bit.
“Look, Conor – I’m not going to use my rebar on you, and I hope that you’d do me the same courtesy of pulling your punches a bit. I’ve got to step up my game a bit… besides,” I grinned, knowing I could hook him in, “how often do you get to beat up a priest and not suffer for it?”
I could hear his smile. “That’s a fair point. Tomorrow then?”
“Sure. Got a place we can meet?”
Conor rattled off an address. I recalled it from my wanderings – a large, abandoned construction site. Terrain challenges, and nothing that couldn’t survive being damaged (or that anyone would miss).
With the final words of the ritual complete the Wizard tore hole from the physical world into the Nevernever. Casting such a spell in his lab and home domain was a much simpler process that it would have been so it only required a small amount of preparation. The Wizard then steps through the portal he has made and enters the world of fairies, ghosts and other spirits. He has only recently began to explore more in this spirit world and over the last few months had become much more comfortable walking between worlds.
The Wizard is once again struck by how gloomy his house seems in this realm. While the Nevernever is not a mirror image of the physical world it does share some aspects in common. Once he gets to the first floor he sees evidence of the violent magical confrontation with Raven that ended their marriage. While the damage had been fixed in the physical world here in the Nevernever there was still a hole in the wall where the Wizard slammed his wife into the wall using a nasty piece of Air Evocation. The Wizard wondered for the 100th time that day where Raven was now and when she would come back for her revenge.
The scene opens up at Murray Street Coffee Shop in Deep Ellum, a private local non-franchise coffee joint that’s well loved by Dallas hipsters, indie musicians, and downtown yuppies. It’s about 6:45am and John Wolf had dropped by to check up on a barista named Tom Dixon, a young man who tends to hang out with the wrong crowd and get into more trouble than he should (the Dallas DA is pretty sure that Tom is not guilty of the crime that will be bringing him into a Dallas courtroom in a few weeks and John was sent to go and get more information).
Unfortunately, John arrives at the coffee shop to discover a broken front door and two baristas dead of gunshot wounds… one of them is Tom. The money is still in the register so it’s not a robbery. John calls it in to the Dallas PD.
Conor must appear before the The Marchioness before the next full moon after the Winter Solstice and he does… along with his friends, on Saturday night the 7th.
The Lady holds her court in the Nevernever via a secret passageway at the Trees nightclub in Deep Ellum. There’s nothing for it so Conor makes plans to court… minus his favorite hat which he can’t find.
After a dinner at Jaime‘s house… where Conor gets a nervous sensation in the pit of his stomach… the heroes attend court. The various quirks of the Winter Court are fully on display and Elena marks an individual as a target for later, Matthew deals with the advances of a Satyr… Ren is fully swept up in the moment and is happily drawing away… Jaime is tempted by his own particular addiction… and Conor heads down to center stage of the amphitheater and puts on a spectacular performance where he doesn’t even bother to try and hold back any of his Fae nature.
It’s New Year’s Eve, and I’m sitting at a table in Atwater’s – hangout for the supernatural in Dallas. There are some familiar faces present – Conor doing his thing, providing entertainment; Elena was in the shadows somewhere; and even Ren and Uncle made a short appearance earlier in the evening. But there is one thing I didn’t expect from tonight:
Peace.
Definitely unexpected, especially given the events that led up to Christmas. Heck, I didn’t even expect to have a silent night on Christmas Eve. But I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – the Lord works in mysterious ways.
Conor stood in his bathroom looking at himself in the foggy mirror. He had wiped away enough condensation to see himself with only minimal distortion. As he closed his eyes, he allowed the Glamour that normally maintained his mortal visage to fall away. As it had been recently, the sensation was growing less and less like putting on a new form as removing a restricting coat that was now a size too small.
He opened his glowing blue eyes and beheld a form that was becoming less and less familiar to him. Conor had always been a powerfully built farmboy; but now he radiated power from corded muscles and sinews. Crisscrossing his luminous skin were blue patterns of whorls and lines that formed Celtic pictographs and knotwork patterns. Even as he watched his naked form in the mirrow, he could see the patterns gently shifting around as if they were alive. As always, his black hair seemed to move on its own as if blown by a spectral wind. He had been “letting his true nature” out more and more, and it was affecting him.
My station contacts didn’t get me the sources I asked fer (Fool Moon) to me in time to bone up on werewolves. But it’s dang good to know that with enough conviction, enough outside help (thanks again fer that glamour, y’all), an’ enough riding on it, the authority of my badge can make even werewolves think twice about crossin’ our path!
It’s also good to know that there’s a few “outside” resources that I can depend on an’ turn to in a pinch. Y’all be sure to look me up if’n there’s somethin’ I can be of service with…I owe y’all that much at least.
The scene opens up at Murray Street Coffee Shop in Deep Ellum, a private local non-franchise coffee joint that’s well loved by Dallas hipsters, indie musicians, and downtown yuppies. It’s about 6:45am and 
