With a sigh, Whysper lugged her carry-on bag through the plastic walkway that connected the plane to Albuquerque International Airport. Her long ruby-colored hair swirled around her in a tangled crimson cloud, and she pushed it back impatiently as she emerged into the waiting room of the airport, scanning the crowd for a familiar face.

Before she could do more than glance, however, she was tackled by twin whirlwinds, comprising her cousins Peter and Becca.

"Whysper, you're here!" Becca was clinging to her leg, giggling with delight.

Peter looked pleased as well, but limited his greeting to a simple, one armed hug, and an offer to take her bag.

"Don't be silly, Peter," Whysper told him, smiling. "You know I like to carry my own weight."

"That you do."

Peter was grinning now too, brown eyes alight with happiness at seeing her. But...Whysper frowned as her hypersensitive empathy picked up something new in Peter's emotional state. He was still the same old Peter, but she knew that something had changed. Something was wrong with Peter.

With Becca too, she realized as she noticed the huge cast on the girl's small arm. A quick scan of her bone structure revealed three bad breaks in her fingers, all placed in such a way that indicated that the injuries had been deliberate.

Whysper's violet eyes narrowed as she considered the ramifications of this. Becca was her cousin, and a part of the family, half-blooded or not. And no one, no one at all, was allowed to insult one of the fey.

"Whysper, so good to see you again."

Whysper looked up, startled, her hand reflexively reaching for the composite dagger she'd hidden at the small of her back, then relaxed when she saw that it was only her Aunt Donna.

Well, Donna wasn't really her aunt, anymore, not since her husband, and Whysper's uncle, John, had been killed by a lycanthrope assassin. Donna still didn't know the entire truth about her husband's death, about the parentage of her children. But she was about to find out.

Not quite yet, of course. Pasting a dazzling smile on her face, she walked over to Aunt Donna, hands outstretched.

"Whysper."

"Aunt Donna."

They embraced, and over her shoulder Whysper noticed that she was being watched. A small dark-haired woman was standing a few feet away, accompanied by a taller blond man. The man looked dangerous, but it was the woman who had Whysper's nearly undivided attention. Small and delicate though she was, the woman radiated a power that was anything but. One taste was all that Whysper needed to know what she was. A Necromancer.

Whysper felt the corners of her mouth turn up in a feral grin as she regarded the other woman.

A Necromancer.

Just like her.

Just like me. Shit. I stiffened, hand reflexively groping for my gun, and Edward looked at me curiously.

"What?"

I swallowed, looking over at the red-haired girl in Donna's arms. "That's the girl that Donna wanted us to meet?"

Edward nodded. "Her name is Whysper. She's her first husband's niece from Ireland. She's an archeologist, and when she heard about all of the fascinating things that Donna's group has been finding..."

"She wanted in on the action," I finished. "Looks a little young to be graduated already. Is that the only reason she's down here?"

Edward shrugged. "From what Donna said, I'd say yes. She also said that Whysper skipped a few grades -- she's only nineteen," he said. "Why?"

I didn't get a chance to answer, because Whysper chose that moment to come towards us, full lips curled in a smile that was echoed in her starry violet eyes.

Unusual name (including spelling variations of common names involving y or e, nicknames, fantasy names, etc.)

"I'm Whysper," she said, her voice soft, with a slight musical lilt to it. She held out a hand to me, and I felt her power pulse over my skin as I took it. Cool, like my own necromantic magic, but with an undercurrent of something else, a sparkle, for lack of a better word, of pure, unadulterated power that brought a gasp to my throat and made me take a big step back from her.

Edward stepped forward when I fell back, smiling as he took her hand and shook it in his best good 'ol boy style. "I'm Ted Forrester," he drawled. "Your Aunt Donna's new fiancé."

He didn't gasp and drop her hand like I had, but then, he couldn't feel Whysper's power beating along his skin like a warm summer rain as she looked at him, eyes wide with shock.

"Fiancé?"

I shivered again as I felt her power swell, one hand groping for a gun that wasn't there. I hadn't been able to sneak it past the airport metal detectors, and with the Red Woman's Husband gone, I wasn't here on police business any longer. Magic strong enough to make my skin crawl shimmered around her like a heat wave. Damn, I wanted my gun.

And then, abruptly, it was gone. A perfectly ordinary teenager stood before me, not smelling of magic in the least.

I gaped at her, just gaped. "How did you do that?" I managed.

She smiled at me, just as Edward sometimes did. Close, secretive. Irritating as hell.

"Do what?" She asked, blinking at me with violet eyes as innocent and guileless as a kitten's.

Innocent. Yeah, right.

I wasn't quite sure what Whysper was, but I was pretty sure that I knew what she wasn't: Human.

"What are you?" I asked, staring at her.

She smiled again, leaning close enough that her deep red hair brushed my arm lightly.

"Daoine Sidhe," she whispered softly.

A fairie. A fairie with necromantic powers like mine. "You're a necromancer, too. The Seelie Court has no dealings with the dead."

She nodded, still smiling at me. "I'm not Seelie Court."

My mouth was suddenly dry.