Of course it wasn’t new to Dante. He’d seen just about every kind of creature out there. In fact, he’d seen one just like this girl the last time he’d gone out with Phineas. What had that kid been, a wombat? Something like that. Of course, this girl wasn’t a wombat.

In the blink of an eye, her clothes fell over her and she shrunk down. When she managed to shake the clothing off herself, a little auburn head appeared, much the same tone as her hair. But now, it was fur. Now, she was a fox.

“A vixen,” he said. “Of course.”

She snorted, but he could almost see the smile on her face. She still looked like herself, which seemed strange. A fox with a human face. Her eyes were the same brown, and the white that lined her jaw was darker than a normal red fox, matching her skin tone. Her expression was entirely human, and Dante could easily read the embarrassment and pride on her face for changing in front of him.

“Alright,” he said. “So one of those shifters.”

She coughed a moment, a cute noise that sounded like it wanted to be a bark. Then she spoke. “What am I called?”

It was her voice, clearly, but sounded odd, distorted. Of course, a human voice through animal parts would get a little changed on the way out. It took Dante a moment to register the words she said. He gathered himself and thought a moment.

“I’m sure I’ve heard the term before, but it’s not… Therianthrope, I believe?”

“I’m not a werewolve.”

“That’s lycanthrope. Anyway, you can change back if you want. I think I’ve figured it out.”

She let out a soft snort, then grabbed her clothes in her mouth and dragged them to the floor. She pulled them around back, just out of Dante’s view. Not that he cared. After a moment, she straightened out, just pulling her shirt down over her stomach. Dante waited for her to take her seat again before continuing.

“Therianthrope,” she said as she sat back in the chair, arms crossed. He just shrugged.

“I think there’s something about your kind,” he said. “Always seem to get tangled up with other supernaturals. Tell me, is it a vampire?”

“You don’t need to know that, do you? Or do you require my life’s story? Should have told me in the email, I would have written it out beforehand.”

Dante sighed and rolled his eyes. He was trying to help her, after all. Her attitude, and the minimal amount he was getting from her, was ridiculous. He tried to keep his head, though. It was like she wanted to see him lose his cool. Like she’d come here just to make him lose it.

“Just a question,” he said. “The more I know, the better I’ll be able to help.”

He watched her, waiting to see if she’d give the information up. Honestly, he didn’t need to know. He hadn’t even really needed to know she was a therianthrope. But he wanted to break her down, just like she was trying to break him. Because her entire exterior was formed with lies.

“Yes,” she said.

“Yes what?”

“He’s a vampire, but don’t get any ideas.”

Nor you. Heaven forbid you tell me the truth. But he believed her about the other end of the link being a vampire. For some reason, this particular situation happened a lot. Admitting he was a vampire did no additional damage to whatever image she was trying to uphold. But God forbid they had sex.

“Alright, then, now that that’s settled, I have seen this before, and it’s relatively easy to undo. I’m assuming the twins sent you, though I hope they didn’t offer you any type of customer loyalty discount or some other such thing. I’ve already dealt with that once and…”

He stopped himself when he saw the look on her face. Brows furrowed, lips slightly open as her head tilted only just to the side, like a dog. He sighed. “You have no idea who the twins are, do you?”

She just shook her head.

“Alright, well… that’s irrelevant, then. So price wise, this really isn’t all that hard, so I could probably get this done for five.”

“Five dollars?”

Dante sighed and rolled his eyes. “Five hundred.”

“Um, okay,” she said, looking down at her toes. And to think, he lowballed it, figuring she couldn’t afford what he might actually charge. She probably would have said no to five dollars. He kept his temper though. No sense giving in to her again.

“How exactly did you plan to pay?”

At this she jumped up, and whipped her backpack out from behind her. Dante waited patiently until she’d rummaged through and found what she was looking for. He wasn’t expecting much, but he had been expecting a little more than a few trinkets.

“Um…”

“They’re sentimental items,” she said. “I don’t know. I have a lot of them, and I know, I mean, I knew some of you guys take that as payment.”

Dante snorted. “Yeah, if you’re buying drugs.”

“Exactly!” she said, sitting up on the edge of her seat. “The vampire-”

“Oh you’ve got to be kidding me.”

“- I’m with gets uh… gets drugs from this one guy, and he takes sentimental items. I mean, I don’t ever get any or anything, so I have a lot of items, if you want. I mean, it’s all I’ve got.”

Dante could almost hear Phin in the back of his head, and if he’d still been doing this at their apartment, he was sure Phin would have burst from his room, sun or no sun. “Close the goddamn window and take the goddamn items. I will personally pay you back for it. Don’t you dare say no.”

But Dante had no use for sentimental items. There was a power to them, sure, but it was so far beneath him, it did nothing for him. It was like giving a plastic flute to a virtuoso. At one point it might have done them some good, but now it was cute, at best. For Phin, of course, who could tease at magic — as all vampires could — but not really control it at all, the power in the sentimental items sent him on a high. He surrounded himself with them. The real drug.

“Well,” Dante said. “The good news is, I’m not the only one who can break the link. The person on the other end of the link can break it, too, if you both agree to it. And since you have so many sentimental items, I’m sure you’d be able to buy him enough demon drug to get him to agree. But there’s not much else I can do for you.”

She stopped and looked at him, some odd look of shock on her face. He waited for her to protest, to beg him to take whatever payment she had. But she didn’t. Not right away, anyway.

“How did you know it was demon drug?”

Dante paused a moment, because he wasn’t actually supposed to know Phineas. A lot of his customers wouldn’t care, of course, but those like the twins, and all the customers they were now bringing him, would probably be disgusted. So he thought about it a moment, then shrugged.

“What else would it be?”

“There are tons of other drugs,” she said, though it was in more of a mumble. Not that he hadn’t already known she’d lied through her teeth about not having done the drug before. No doubt she was addicted. She just hadn’t been on it long enough for it to show.

“Anyway,” Dante said, rolling his head away from her. “There’s not much else I can do for you, so if you don’t mind, I do have other people to see today.”

“No,” she said, standing up as he turned and headed for the door. Dante sighed and turned around, cocking an eyebrow at her. “No, he won’t do it. I know he won’t. He’s a dick. He’d never to it.”

Dante sighed. “A payment plan, then. You pay me as much as you can when you can, and when you’ve made up the money, I’ll destroy the link for you.”

“No!” she said when he turned around again. “No, I need this now! Please?”

Dante just looked at her. She grunted and jumped to her feet, pulling her backpack up with her.

“Don’t you do any pro bono work?”

“No,” he said, keeping his face flat. “Now, really, if you don’t mind.”

“There must be something,” she said, rushing up to him. Close enough that it forced him to take a step back. “Please, I’ll do anything.”

“Not what you’re thinking of,” he said, taking another step back.

“I’m extremely desperate.”

“Really? That’s what got you into this mess in the first place, and you’re going to try it again?”

“I didn’t sleep… Come on! Anything you want!”

“I don’t want that,” he said. “You’re not at all my type.”

“And you’re too much of a fucking gentleman,” she said, turning away from him and storming off.

Dante snorted. “Don’t say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“Anything,” she said. “Let me work for you. Anything you need. I’ll be your gopher. Your housekeeper. Anything, please. Anything at all.”

“I don’t need any help,” he said. “And certainly not anything from a… therianthrope. So please, until you have something-”

“Please,” she said, almost in tears now. “Please. I can’t go back to him, and he’s going to find me any minute now, I know it. Don’t let me go back to him.”

“Your tears are ineffective.”

“I’m not putting on a show,” she said, her voice still shaking. “I will sit here until you do something about this because I can’t go back to him. I won’t. Please.”

Oh there are plenty of things I could do that would get you out, but I’m afraid you’d just keep coming back. Dante watched her a moment longer, trying to judge if there was anything at all he could do to get her out. He’d scared her once before, but even that wouldn’t keep her away long.

“Fine,” he said, as an idea came to mind. It was a dumb idea, something useless he didn’t need. But he couldn’t just do this for free. “I’ll put you to work and fix your problem.”

Her eyes lit up like the sun, set ablaze by excitement. Like she hadn’t known she would get it her way.

“Anything you want, I’ll do it. I’ll run errands for you, make food, find cutomers-”

“Secretary,” he said, stopping her mid-rant. “That is, assuming you can read and write.”

“Of course I can,” she said, her nose wrinkling with the insult. “What exactly do you want me to do?”

Dante sighed, trying to think of things that might help him. “Just keep records. Who’s in and when. Scheduling, I guess. And write down everything that happens in each appointment. After this one, of course.”

“You mean, right after this one? Like, starting immediately?”

“Well of course. Do you want my help or not?”

“Write everything?”

“Absolutely everything.”

He didn’t know if it would help or not, but having written record of all the work he did and what kind of magic was done might help his case with the High Council. Not that he would apply casually again. If he was going to really make his case, he’d have to go in person. Records might help, might not. But at least it was something for Gwen to do.

“Fine,” she said. “Just tell me where you want me and when and I’ll be there. Just, please, fix this before he finds me.”

Dante suppressed his sigh and avoided rolling his eyes. “Alright, then. Let me see what I can do.”

He felt around, just as he had before, felt the magic calling to its other half like a magnet. He could easily dissipate the magic. He hardly even had to think about it.

Controlling his own magic, he moved in and around that surrounding Gwen. They mixed like water and, with a little pressure, both flew off into the air. He kept a shield up around her a moment, just to see if the magic would come back. When he was sure it was gone for good, he let go and looked to her.

“There, you’re a virgin again.”

“Are you sure it worked? He won’t be able to find me?”

“Shouldn’t be,” he said. “I can check again in a few minutes just to make sure, but I believe the link is completely broken. Like I said, it wasn’t a terribly strong link to begin with.”

“Thank you,” she said, her breath escaping her lungs like she hadn’t exhaled in years. “I owe you everything.”

Dante snorted, because she was making a rather big deal out of nothing. He’d seen much worse.

“When you need me,” she said. “You let me know. I will be here anytime.”

“Well, don’t get too set on leaving yet, I’ve got someone coming in, in about an hour.”

She stopped and looked at him. “You want me here now?”

“What, were you going to go home to your house of vampires? Or let me guess, there was a different one there you wanted to hook up with but couldn’t because-”

“There’s no one else, so stop right there,” she said, hissing the words, her index finger jabbing towards him. “And how the hell did you know there was more than one?”

“Vampires live in families,” he said. Then thought about it. “For the most part. You’re very surprised by my common knowledge.”

She sighed and looked away from him. “Well, no, I wasn’t going back to them. But I need to figure out where to go.”

“Well, you now have until the end of my sessions to figure it out. In the meantime, I’ll get you to figure out my scheduling for me. And also make phone calls should I need to cancel, and other such things.”

She snorted and spoke under her breath. “Well, then, you are making me your bitch, aren’t you?”

Next Chapter: Dante