by Deanna Chase
* * *
This time, I was at a table with a werewolf, who was scratching behind his ear.
“Fleas?” I asked, sympathetically.
I had to admit, these beasts all had their characters down. It made the evening more fun.
He showed his fangs in a smile. “I hate the little bastards.”
“I totally get that. I have dogs. You must go through a lot of shampoo. With all that hair, do you shed much?”
He made a so-so motion. “Not on the furniture, but definitely in the shower.”
“Me too!” I laughed. “I swear there’s so much hair in my brush sometimes, I wonder if I’m going bald.”
“You have beautiful, thick hair. I don’t think you have anything to worry about.”
I blushed. “So, what’s the deal with you? You’re not this hairy all the time, are you? Do you hit the depilatory cream after the full moon’s over?”
He laughed and winked at me. “Definitely. Have to. I have so much testosterone, the hair never fully goes away on its own.”
That sounded promising. Maybe Lorelei was onto something with her hair and fang attraction. “What’s your ideal date?”
“We take off on my motorcycle and ride through the night, following the moon, until we find a perfect secluded place and then we—” he raised his eyebrow, seductively.
“—Write and switch!” Karen hollered. In a minute, the whistle blew again.
* * *
I slid onto the bar stool and looked at the Mummy.
“I’m surprised at how many of you beasts are actually movie monsters. I would have expected more mythological monsters.”
The Mummy shrugged. “Movie monsters have a more human shape. It makes it easier to dance with a princess.”
“Must make the bodice ripping easier too.”
“One can only hope,” he said, grinning.
“Do you have a human name, in addition to your beast name?” I asked.
“Garth,” he said.
“Seriously? Like the singer?”
“It used to be Gary, but I prefer Garth. Who’s going to argue with a Mummy?”
He had a point.
“What’s your ideal date?”
“Isn’t it obvious? A trip to Egypt to tour the pyramids, followed by a real Egyptian meal. There is nothing else like it.”
“Write and switch!” Karen yelled, blowing her whistle.
* * *
This time, I found myself with the object of Lorelei’s obsession. Not that he seemed to notice me much. His eyes were still following Lorelei.
“Hi, I’m Mara. Your name is…?”
“Scott,” he said, absent-mindedly.
“I mean, your beast name.”
That brought his attention back to me. “I am Krampus. Krampus Claus.”
Of course! I should have realized. Fur, horns, the Gene Simmons-like tongue. “Any relation to the other Claus?”
“Yes. Not that he wants to admit it. He’s the carrot, I’m the stick.” His eyes traveled back to Lorelei.
“What is your obsession with Lorelei?” I asked.
“She is so… good. She practically glows with it. It’s rare that I meet someone with such a strong aura of light.” He kept watching her.
Then he turned back to me, put his hands on mine and brought them up to his face, so that it looked like we were having an intimate exchange, with my face leaning into his. He lowered his voice into an urgent whisper.
“Listen to me. You need to takes Lorelei out of here. Now.”
I took my hands out of his, put Aunt Tillie’s glasses on and looked around.
“I don’t understand,” I said. “I’m not seeing anything dangerous.”
But when I turned back to Scott, his human image and his beast image were flickering in and out, like they were fighting for dominance.
I sucked in a quick breath.
“Are you all right?” Scott asked, and he actually seemed concerned.
“Uhm… yes… I just… I get hiccups…” What the hell did that image mean? The glasses were supposed to show me the truth. Were they showing me that Scott was more like his beast than was good for him? Was he a method actor? Or was he actually carrying the beast’s spirit?
I mean, witches can go into full-on possessions as well as a not-as-intense carry, where they’re essentially walking with a deity spirit, rather than being possessed by the spirit. Either way, as long as the witch is the person ultimately in control of her body, it’s fine. It’s only when the spirit takes complete control of the body and refuses to let go, that things get hairy. No pun intended.
Was Scott’s human self and his beast spirit fighting for control?
I swear, I should have freaking spelled the glasses to provide detailed footnotes — if that was even possible. That was always the problem with anything sixth sense-related. Magic, visions, spirits. Sometimes, you couldn’t always understand what the heck you were looking at until after the fact, and then it was like, idiot, you saw that, how come you didn’t realize what you were seeing?
“—Write and switch!” Karen blew the whistle again.
A small commotion started down at the end of the ballroom. A six foot tall princess in a blue sequined ball gown, fish nets and sequined heels that looked like they were stolen from a member of KISS was pushing his way through the tables.
I stood up. “Gus!”
“You know this person?” Karen asked me.
“Yes,” I said, “Excuse me.”
I rapidly closed the distance to CinderGusElla.
“Gus?!” I grabbed his arm and pulled him aside. “What are you doing?”
“I was reading the article about this event in the paper, and I realized that it never specified the gender of the princesses. So, I took a taxi here. Why let you have all the fun, Miss Thing? If there are beasts to be wooed, I want in.”
“But if you’re here, who’s watching the baby?”
“You know that baby’s skilled enough to watch herself, right? If she needs anything, she can just levitate it over.”
“You left the baby by herself?!” I screamed, shocked.
“Oh, relax, Elphaba. Don’t go all green. Paul’s watching her. He’s decided to try flying solo again. Although I think he may have a death wish. His new mission seems to be threatening her binky. He’s decided he’s against pacifiers.”
“Oh, Good Goddess. Who’s watching Paul?”
“Who else? Your Aunt Tillie. She’ll drop a brick on his head before she lets him hurt the baby.”
I looked at Gus, uncertainly. “I mean, who’s watching Paul to make sure the baby doesn’t hurt him?”
Gus flashed me a wide smile. “He’s a big boy. He should be able to take care of himself. Now, let go of my arm, so I can go woo some beast meat. Oooh, I see a hot vampire. I love movie monsters.”
Gus sashayed off to grab an empty seat at the vampire table, but a woman dressed up as Merida beat him to it. So he turned on his heel and sat down at a table with a muscular man sporting a bull’s head. I was a little worried that one of the beasts or monsters would take offense at his drag princess disguise and start a brawl, but it looked like they were treating CinderGusElla like one of the girls.
I looked around and spotted Lorelei with a tentacled beast — body of a man, head of an octopus. Chtulu? I wondered.
I walked over to her as Karen blew the whistle again and grabbed her arm, pulling her aside. “Sit the next round out with me,” I told her.
“Why? What’s going on?”
“That Krampus guy you like? He warned me that I need to get you out of here.”
Lorelei burst into laughter. “Scott is so cute! I’m sure he’s just jealous. He wants me all to himself.”
I felt my eyebrow go up. “Are you… into him?”
She blushed. “Well, he is pretty cute. And he’s really nice and old-fashioned. He’s a perfect beast for my princess outfit.”
“You can’t date guys because they access
orize your outfit.”
She blushed even deeper. “I know that. But after my last boyfriend, I could use a guy in my life with old-fashioned values.”
She sashayed off and I returned to my beast mini-dates. Before I knew it, Karen blew her whistle for the final time. “Ladies, you’ve had the chance to sample our beasts. Now it’s time for us to pair the beasts with their ladies.”
5
“Ladies, please gather on the dance floor. My assistants, Tery and Kathy, will be plying you with food and beverage, while I tally up your score cards. Men, please retire to the changing area and return to your human forms. Let’s see if your chosen princesses are as attracted to the man inside the beast.”
Some of the princesses tittered. A friendly-looking woman with a blonde pageboy appeared, carrying a tray of drinks. She was followed by an older woman with mid-length dark hair and a pentacle around her neck, carrying a tray of appetizers.
I looked around and spotted Lorelei on the far side of the grouping, sipping a drink and looking a little guilty.
“I don’t know if I like this,” I muttered to Gus.
“That’s because you have the soul of a cactus,” he replied. “Come on, this is pretty tame. I’ve been to a lot racier parties.”
“Yes, I know. There’s a reason I don’t go with you.”
He grinned. “You don’t know what you’re missing. Don’t tell me Lisette and Lucien didn’t—”
“Stop. We’re not talking about them.” Lisette and Lucien were the spirits I had accidentally unleashed when I first moved out here, and they quickly made themselves at home inside Paul’s and my bodies. Apparently, what spirits miss most from their earth-lives are food and sex. So they had a field day — or month as the case may be.
“Just relax,” Gus advised. “I can’t wait to see who my perfect beast is.”
Soon it was our turn to be wined and dined.
As I helped myself to a taquito, I realized that I couldn’t see Lorelei any more.
“Gus, do you see Lorelei?”
Gus stopped flirting with the woman next to him — I swear, that boy could flirt with a chair and make it blush — and turned to me. “Maybe she left?”
“Without the car keys?”
Gus grabbed my arm and hustled me to the front doors.
“Where are you two Princesses going?” Karen LeMao called out. “No one leaves until after the Ball, when the Beasts choose their Princesses, and vice versa.”
“Honey, I am a Beast,” Gus said, dropping his voice and ripping off his wig, “And I’ve already chosen my Princess. Now, if you’ll excuse us, I’m taking her to my cave, so I can ravage her.”
The women whooped and hollered as he dragged me to the front doors. He braced himself to rip them open in a grand gesture — a gesture that fell flat because they were locked.
“Ow!” Gus said, shaking his hands. “Freaking doors.”
“Sorry, I should have warned you, they’re locked until the event is over,” Karen LeMao smirked. “If you don’t want to participate, you’ll have to sit it out.”
Gus and I slunk to a table in the far corner. “I don’t think that’s legal,” Gus muttered.
“If she didn’t go out the front doors, where is she?” I asked.
I checked out the ladies room, which was all faux marble and fancy tiles. It even had a little anteroom, with a velvety couch, soft armchairs and a piano, of all things. But no Lorelei.
While Gus searched the mens room, I sat at our table and sipped a margarita.
“One of the beasts is missing too,” Gus said, as he came back to the table. “Krampus. Did you meet him?”
“Yeah, his name is Scott. He was putting the moves on Lorelei.” I filled him in on what I had seen with Tillie’s glasses.
“We have to find her,” he said. “I don’t care what his deal is, but I don’t want him near my sister.”
“They didn’t leave, and they’re not in the bathrooms. They couldn’t have just vanished.”
Gus narrowed his eyes at a waiter walking past our table with a full tray. “Unless they’re sending everything up by dumbwaiter, there’s got to be a secondary kitchen up here.”
Black velvet drapery, dotted with twinkle lights, had been drawn around the perimeter of the ballroom, hiding the walls and making it feel like we were surrounded by a starry night sky. The corner seams were blocked off with small, potted trees. And since Karen had dimmed the lights, it was too dark to see where the curtains parted.
“Follow your nose…” Gus muttered. “Did you see where the waiter came from?”
I nodded. “The far side of the dance floor.”
Gus looked over. “The corner seam without a tree in front of it?”
There had been so many women huddled over there, I hadn’t noticed the lack of a tree. But now that the men, dressed in tuxedos, were making their way onto the dance floor, the women had spread out.
Gus grabbed my hand and we ran for it, sliding through the curtain as Karen LeMao was turning our way.
On the other side of the blackout curtain, we found normal restaurant tables and a bar, along with a full kitchen and wait staff.
Gus took a picture of Lorelei out of his wallet and we showed it to the bartender, Claire. She told us she had seen Lorelei heading into the kitchen with a muscular, dark-haired guy who had been built like a tank.
“That sounds like Scott,” I muttered to Gus.
* * *
In the kitchen, one of the busboys tipped us off that Lorelei and Scott took the freight elevator downstairs. He remembered because they closed the doors in his face, instead of holding them like a normal person would.
Just then, the elevator opened and Debbie, another staffer, walked out, pushing a large garbage can and complaining about two party-goers who were attached at the lips and completely oblivious they were blocking the ramp to the dumpster.
* * *
Gus and I took the elevator, then ran down the back hall and out the fire door into the parking lot. Scott and Lorelei were still there, making out, but they had moved from the ramp to the far corner of the lot.
I crammed Aunt Tillie’s glasses on my face. I could see Scott’s form shifting rapidly between man and beast.
I gave Gus the glasses and he swore under his breath.
“It’s got to be a possession, right?” I asked.
“Sure looks like it,” Gus nodded. “We’ve got to stop this before things get worse.”
“Right,” I agreed. “But just how are we planning to stop a demon from having sex with your sister?”
Gus looked lost for a second, then came to a decision. “We’ve got to can his ass. We need a vessel.”
“I have a mostly empty can of Coke in the SUV, with those tops you gave me.”
“Ha! I knew they would come in handy,” Gus said. “I have salt.” He pulled a container of Sea Salt out of his fake bosom.
“What the heck?! Where’d you get that?”
“From the kitchen, while you were grilling the busboys. They have more than enough and we ran out at home.”
I groaned and made a mental note to return it when Gus wasn’t looking.
“We need to be quick. I’ll trap him, you can the spirit. And by the time my sister opens her eyes and puts her tongue back in her own mouth, the dude should be fully human again.”
Unfortunately, the dude must have heard us, because he stopped kissing Lorelei, looked in our direction, and growled. He pushed Lorelei behind him and she fell to the ground with a cry. Then he launched himself at us, his skin changing to fur and horns growing out of his head as he leapt.
Lorelei screamed and backed away, hitting her head on the stone wall behind her.
Without thinking, I pulled the wand out of the holster, aimed it at the beast and yelled “Stamata!!!” as loud and growly as I could. It was Greek for “stop” and it was the first word that popped out of my mouth.
It worked.
Krampus froze in mid-leap.
“I think it’s the wand,” I said.
“How long is he going to stay that way?”
“I have no idea. Whatever you’re doing, hurry!”
“On it!” Gus poured a salt in a circle under Scott/Krampus, then drew a triangle outside of the circle.
My hold faded as Gus was completing the triangle. Scott dropped on the ground, growling, fully shifted into Krampus mode.
I dumped out the Coke remaining in the can, and placed it on the ground, in front of Krampus. In the process, I accidentally cut my finger on the can opening, and a drop of blood fell on the Triangle of Containment. Suddenly, the red color raced through the salt, slamming the circuit shut.
A wall of energy shot up from the ground to the sky. Krampus growled and slammed against the barrier, but it held fast. I had to get him in the can now.
I took a deep breath, sent up a prayer for the right words to be dropped into my head and started chanting.
“Triple Hekate, Goddess of Night,
Guardian of Witches, Keeper of Demons,
Pull this being into your dimension,
Lock the spirit of Krampus in this vessel,
Bound by time, bound by blood, bound by sanctions.
As I will it, so mote it be.”
With a flash of light, Krampus — and Scott — both completely vanished.
“What the heck?!” I turned to Gus. “I thought the spirit riding him was going to vanish, not the entire guy.”
A wisp of smoke started rising up out of the can. I the plastic lid and crammed it into place, sealing the opening. The can shook with an impotent fury, but it remained sealed.
Gus shrugged. “Maybe there was no spirit riding him. Maybe he really was Krampus.”
I shuddered. I had first heard of the Christmas demon years ago, but I didn’t want to believe he was real.
“Was he the only beast up there like that?” Gus asked.