Chapter 1
In this day and age I was known, to the few I was known to, as Allison Spade. Or, just Ally, if you were a close friend of mine. Or even that teeth-grinding nickname, "Happy Feet". Why I started off with "in this day and age" was because I was more then a couple of centuries old. Although my current form didn't show it, I was around two hundred and eighty-four-ish years old. And yes, it did sound like I was a stripper, but hey, that's what you get when your supposed to be a powerful succubus. The way that the naming process works with us is that whenever a new age is ushered in, the "less fortunate" succubi were given more provocative names, so that we could become more "fortunate". Our fortune was defined by, well, you know.
My form was one of a twenty-two year old woman who was five feet and four inches tall, with long blonde hair that was curled, just so that it looked nice, big blue eyes, and the rest of my features were relatively small, considering I was a short woman. Although, being a succubus, I had generous features as well, most would call them curves. So being a succubus, and a particularly old one at that, how come I was given my stripper name? Well, about one hundred years or so, I decided killing horny men and women was more of a stupid purpose then it may sound. So I pretty much quit caring about eating people after—or before—sex.
Today, I woke up for my day job, a police detective, at around 3 A.M. This wasn't the usual time I would get up for the daily crawl through paperwork and coffee, but, I hated getting up two hours later as well. The phone rang,
"Hey there Happy Feet, I got a present for you, 'corner of 15th and Federal," my partner, and best friend, Joseph said cheerily,
"Yeah, sure, I'll be right there, and kill it with the Happy Feet thing, it's really not as funny as you think it is."
"Only to you," he remarked. I arose out of bed, looking as I would when I left, except for one thing, my hair. With hair that goes down to your mid-back, when it's frizzy, it looks like Albert Einstein's with extensions. So after a mandatory shower, I put on my usual clothes, a black suit, and headed for the door.
When I arrived at the scene, it smelled like death, I prayed it was a suicide, less hunting,and more paper work, easy stuff. It wasn't. At first it looked pretty normal, but as I got closer, and got a good look at it, I realized it wasn't human,
"What is it?" I asked, unsure,
"I think it's a harpy." Joe had had to be kidding,
"A harpy? Okay, I know it's only three, but you really need to catch some sleep. Or lay off the acid. Or whatever you've been doing 'cause-"
"It's a harpy, okay?" He'd cut me off, he rarely did that,
"Oh yeah, I bought some coffee, want some?" he inquired, trying to break the tense conversation,
"Yeah, I think I'm gonna need it," I said softly. He brought me my coffee, and after a sip, I was ready for my next question,
"Okay, well, what happened to it?"
"Judging by when the blood dried, it looks like it's wings were ripped off first, and then it's head to finish it." he said grimly, "I was hoping you could tell us a little more, due to your eye-magic," My "eye-magic" or magic vision, was something that very few creatures were capable of. It allowed me to see any trace of magic anywhere. Unfortunately, when the effects first start to show up, your eyes turn entirely black, and stay that way. Oh yeah, and the best part is, it can start to occur anytime between 17 and 22 years old, and it takes a few days, or weeks if you're really dumb, to know how to switch it on and off. So to appear normal, and not like a demon (which were the only beings that had magic vision throughout their entire race), I had to have a rather permanent magic glamour over my eyes. There were pro's and con's to my glamour, the only pro I could think of was that I could change eye color whenever I wanted, the drawback was, whenever I wanted to use my magic vision, I had to take down the glamour, or I would just see the shiny white-pink light of the magic of my glamour everywhere.
Joe knew about the magic vision, and was the only person, or rather, creature I had ever told about it, and he didn't care. My problem with Joe was that I was pretty sure that he loved me. Which wouldn't be a problem if I had the capacity to love him back. Being a succubus, a creature that literally lives to eat peoples desires, the ability to love was taken from us long ago. It was done to improve our capacity for ♥♥♥♥♥iness, I guessed.
I turned off my glamour and looked at the body, turning on my magic vision,
"Holy ♥♥♥♥, Joe."
"What? What's up?" he said almost dropping his coffee, his eyes were wide,
"It's a harpy." I said, only believing it at the moment I could identify it,
"Yeah, I gathered that. Is there anything special about it?" he asked, relieved, but glared at me,
"The place where it's head was cut off has residual magic lingering on it, the wings do too, whoever killed it used a magical blade. Call Julie,"
Julie was a forensic scientist, and possibly the best one out there. To anyone that wasn't supernatural, it would seem that she had superior analytical and perception abilities. She didn't. Julie was merely a special kind of shape shifter, a doppelganger, and all she had to do was consume a little bit of your insides, and presto! Until she turned back to her original form, she would assume that one, with all of it's memories. We needed her for two reasons, one: she could tell us who the killer was, and two: how the damned thing got through the Wall.
