Necrofairies

Necrofairies

  By

  Shane Griffin

  Smash Words Edition Published by Poupichou Press

  Copyright Shane Griffin 2013

  Cover Art by Jack Sananikone 2013

  This one is for you Ma.

  #

  Neen landed, with some effort, on the small ledge in front of the tiny steel door to her apartment. She lived high up on the 17th floor, but even so she still felt vulnerable. She opened the door quickly and slipped inside. Then, out of force of habit, locked and bolted it immediately.

  Only when the door was locked tight did she let down her guard and relax a little. She unbuckled the heavy enviro-coat that she wore to protect herself from the dense murky pollution that smothered the city. She slipped her arms out of the coat first and then slid out her delicate silver wings, from their lightweight clear plastic sleeves, one by one.

  Although the coat was designed to protect her wings, while still allowing her to fly, the going was tough and it didn’t do them much good to be stuck in the hot and sweaty sleeves for long periods. However, if it wasn’t for the coat, the pollution would have ruined her wings long ago. She checked them carefully to make sure there had been no contamination. She had to spend more and more time each day just to keep them in the shape they were in.

  Having wings was almost more trouble than it was worth these days, but as a fairy she could not imagine life without them. There were some fairies that let their wings be rotted away by the pollution, supposed believers in evolution. She did not subscribe to that theory, at least not in that way. The wingless fairies she had met always looked gaunt, hollow and spiritless. She on the other hand believed in true evolution, by survival of the fittest. As far as she was concerned the only way you could do that was to adapt to your environment, not let it consume you.

  Free of the heavy coat she felt instantly weightless and hovered across the small living room towards the kitchenette, enjoying the sensation of fresh air against her wings as she went. She had not even made it half way when there was a knock at the door.

  Neen spun instantly in mid-air and drew two small, yet angry looking, black pistols from the holsters strapped to her thighs. She trained them on the door as she hovered. They were loaded with dark elixir rounds, making them deadly to any magical creature, especially other fairies. Normal bullets could kill a fairy too, but given a fairy’s ability to use magic to heal itself, a dark elixir round was the only sure way. In her line of work there had been more than occasion where she'd had to make sure. Neen steadied her breathing and concentrated on a flash spell as she watched her front door.

  “Who is it?” she called as casually as possible, then quickly displaced to the opposite side of the room, her pistols never leaving their target.

  “You can relax and put your guns away Neen. It’s me, Sliver.”

  Neen hesitated and stayed in position, then holstered one pistol before flying over to the door and unlocking it. She hovered back away again as Sliver entered and shut the door behind him.

  Sliver turned around to face her and immediately saw that she still had one weapon drawn. He stared at her warily for a moment and looked as though he might go for his own guns, but instead shook his head and rolled his eyes.

  “I don’t know how many times I have to say it. You won’t know until it’s too late if I ever come for you in that way. I certainly wouldn’t bloody knock first.”

  Neen holstered her remaining pistol, wondering if she should have taken the opportunity when Sliver still had his back turned. It was not very often you got the drop on someone like him.

  “Curse the Battle of Tarva,” he grumbled as he took off his own heavy enviro-coat and ruffled the sweat out of his bleached short white hair. “The pollution gets worse by the day. It won’t be long before you never see the sun again in this city.”

  ‘Curse the Battle of Tarva’.

  How many times had she heard that lately? It had almost become the standard greeting amongst fairies. Too many people were clinging on to the past and to tell the truth she was a little over it. As far as she was concerned if you wanted to survive you had to deal with the here and now. It was certainly a little strange hearing it coming out of Sliver’s mouth.

  “You sound like an elder. Next you will start lecturing me about how a battle fought over 2500 years ago caused the end of the world.”

  “That battle won the war against the orcs and goblins. Ever since then the humans have been on top of the pile and look at what they have done to the world. The goblins and orcs have been relentlessly exterminated. The minotaurs live like savages in their shrinking forest reserves. The elves have been all but bred out of society and every magnificent magical beast that roamed this world has been hunted to the verge of extinction for the sake of sport or profit!”

  “What are you complaining about? If the humans didn’t win the war we’d still all be slaves, or food for the orcs. At least you have the freedom to do whatever you want.”

  Sliver hovered over to her, snaked a hand around her slim waist and pulled her forcefully up against him.

  “If that were the case, I’d have made you mine a long time ago,” he whispered provocatively into her pointed ear as he slid his other hand down towards her backside.

  She forced herself free of his grasp before he could go any further. It wasn’t that he was unattractive, even with the scars on his neck and face, in fact she found those a turn on. The reason she never wanted to let things get that way between them, even casually, was because she knew for a fact that if paid the right price he would slit her throat without a second thought.

  “Not even with a love potion!”

  “If I could still find the ingredients for a love potion you would already be mine.”

  “Are you planning on hovering around my apartment all night being a sleaze or is there an actual point to this visit?”

  “I have a job that requires some of your special skills. It will be a big score if we pull it off.”

  “Just how big exactly?” asked Neen sceptically.

  “One hundred thousand...each.”

  “Uh huh,” replied Neen thoughtfully. Inside she was doing loop to loops. With one hundred thousand she could get out of the city and go travelling for a year. She was wise enough to know, however, that nothing at that pay rate was going to be easy. “What’s the job?”

  “We need to steal a very special key.”

  “For that price! What’s the catch?”

  “We need to do the job tonight before our target disappears again and it’s likely to be well protected. You had better prepare yourself for trouble,” he warned ominously.

  Neen had learned long ago that any job where Sliver needed help was going to be dangerous, regardless of the pay rate, so she always went prepared. She quickly fluttered out of the living room and into her small bedroom. She pushed the door part way closed so she could change in privacy.

  She unstrapped her pistols from her legs and quickly stripped to her underwear then squeezed into a pair of tight fitting black leather pants and a black leather bodice that left her pale shoulders bare. She pulled the side straps tight so it wrapped snugly around her waist and chest. She felt safer with it on. Although it looked a little impractical and revealing it was lined on the inside with a material that was laced with an ancient magical potion. She had stumbled across the spell on another job some five years prior and then spent the next two years tracking down the ingredients. The potion was supposed to slow the effects of dark elixir, so that if she was ever shot she would still have some chance of living through it.

  She quickly rummaged through the top draw of her dresser and grabbed out two small black leather pouches and attached them firmly to her belt. The first contained a very special purple
dust that she had concocted and refined over the years. The other a rare silver dust that she saved for special occasions.

  Finally she pulled on a pair of knee high black boots then bent down to grab her pistols and strapped them back onto her thighs. As she did this she felt eyes on her and she turned around. Through the gap in the partially closed door she could see Sliver had advantageously positioned himself in the living room so that he could see into her bedroom.

  “You are a pervert Sliver,” she said loudly as she finished strapping on her pistols. She grabbed a pair of black butterfly hair clips and came back out into the living room. Sliver was looking at her with open desire now and she decided she would teach him a lesson by teasing him.

  Her hair was jet black and cut into a neat bob, but her fringe at the front was quite long. She dipped her head slightly so it dropped down over one of her green eyes then pouted invitingly at him. She knew it drove him wild and would frustrate the hell out of him.

  “You want to play that game then maybe I will just take what I want right now,” he said seriously.

  Neen quickly brushed her hair aside and clipped her fringe back out of the way with the two black butterfly hair clips. She stared back at Sliver fearfully, wondering if she had pushed him too far this time. The thought of him giving her no choice in the matter was both repulsive and exciting.

  She kept her hand on the second hairclip pretending to adjust it. Hidden inside the clip was a hollow needle laced with dark elixir. It was a little weapon she had come up with herself and one that even Sliver did not know about. It was her last resort self defence and she was wondering if she was going to need it right now by the ravenous look in Sliver’s eyes.

  “Fortunately for you this job is more important and we are on a strict time limit if we want to pull this off.”

  Neen breathed a quiet sigh of relief and finished placing the hair clip.

  “I’m ready,” she said.