Son of a Succubus Series Collection

by Dorie, Sarina

  More likely so that he could ask what to pay Lucifer to take his mind off his loss.

  “You forget,” Baba said with a cunning smile. “You would also need to convince me. Our Abby is very dear to us. I can’t afford to give her up. She is useful apprentice.”

  Lucifer studied Baba, trying to figure out if she was lying so that Godric would abandon his plan or she truly felt that way. She barely tolerated Abigail’s presence and was miserly with compliments even when she did help with chores. He couldn’t figure her out.

  Godric bowed his head at the old woman. “I would, of course, compensate you for your loss as well.”

  Lucifer fought to keep his voice level. “You aren’t going to take her home with you. She isn’t something you can buy.”

  Godric’s jaw twitched. “I didn’t mean to insult you.” He turned to Abigail and gave a curt bow. “Or insult Abby. I just thought—while she was asleep, it would be a potential solution—”

  “She isn’t asleep anymore,” Lucifer said.

  “All is forgiven.” Baba eyed the bottle on the table. “Or it will be after we have drink.”

  Lucifer could see he’d been right to be suspicious of Godric. “You can go get your own bloody medicines from the Morty Realm this time.”

  Baba clucked her tongue at him. “Nyet. Lucy will fetch your medicines after he’s had chance to simmer down.” Her eyes narrowed. “Won’t you, Lucy?” There was a challenge in that look, a warning that if he didn’t obey, he would be punished.

  Or Abigail would be.

  “I’ll fetch your blasted antibiotics if you really need them,” Lucifer said levelly. “After I simmer down.”

  But first he intended to put a hex on Godric so that he couldn’t kiss, grope, or take advantage of Abigail in any way while he was away.

  * * *

  Lucifer stalked off into the forest as Godric unsaddled his horse. He suspected he knew what “simmer down” meant from Baba. She expected him to fuel his affinity in order to travel to the Morty Realm. Lucifer did so quickly and efficiently, wasting no time. When he finished, he washed at the stream and returned.

  Lucifer watched from a distance, casting the hex he’d found in a book called, How to Crush Your Enemies and Destroy People.

  He was confident his spell on Godric was stronger than the wards and defensive magics his family’s wizard had cast on the young man. He drew in magic from his affinity to power the hex so that others wouldn’t be able to undo it easily. The spell wouldn’t hurt Godric—not if he kept his hands to himself. He was very specific about his intentions so that the magic wouldn’t activate unless Godric touched Abigail.

  Even so, Lucifer felt it wise to warn his enemy.

  He returned to the cottage, circling around the back where Godric had tied his horse. Kelsie stood just inside the fence, whispering as she leaned conspiratorially closer to him on the other side. They were both turned away from him and didn’t see him approach.

  “That’s why I think it might be the same Fae, not multiple rogue Fae,” Kelsie said. “All the evidence points to leshi. They have to be behind the recent snatchings of children that Vega Bloodmire spoke to Baba about.”

  Lucifer froze where he was, uncertain Kelsie would want him overhearing if she was taking this much care to be secretive. She would probably bite his head off if she caught him. On the other hand, he wanted to hear what she had to say. He backed around the corner of the cottage, listening.

  “Surely the Fae who hurt my little brother and sister have to be the group who caught your sister,” Kelsie said.

  “Your theory might be correct, but I can’t see what good that does either us.” Godric’s voice was as low as hers. “I’m incapable of tracking Fae, and I haven’t enough magic of my own anymore to lend me the protection I need for slaying monsters. The wards on my person aren’t going to be enough to fight against Fae glamours, lures, and other treachery.”

  His wards hadn’t even been enough to protect against Lucifer’s hex.

  “I can help you with the wards. I’m getting better at them, and I’ve been practicing tracking. I don’t think it would take much to find a leshi. Look at what I found.”

  Lucifer burned to peek around the corner to see.

  “What’s so special about that?” Godric asked.

  “This flower keeps regrowing in our garden. One of the leshi is using it to track us. To find us and hunt us. No matter how many times I dig it up, the dog rose grows back.”

  Cold sank into the pit of Lucifer’s belly. She hadn’t told him she’d found it too.

  Kelsie spoke slowly, each word a deliberate lance of pain. “They prey on the weak. Think of what they might do to Abby. Or Baba. We can hunt them together.”

  “I’ll think about your proposition,” Godric said.

  “But if you won’t do it, who will?” Kelsie asked. “Someone has to put a stop to them. And Baba said I’m not strong enough.”

  But Lucifer was.

  Godric’s voice rose. “I told you I would think about it.”

  Lucifer remembered Coinneach and his kin luring unsuspecting children to be marinated in vats of acidic nectar. It was a fate he wouldn’t wish on anyone. The fallout of revenge wasn’t a pleasant fate either. Especially revenge on someone innocent of performing the deeds he was accused of. That leshi Lucifer had encountered was more afraid of him than he had been of it.

  Kelsie and Godric were silent. Lucifer wondered whether they were kissing. Kelsie said she preferred women over men, and he didn’t feel any sudden surges of pleasure singing through the air, but he couldn’t imagine anything else either. Maybe it was just his affinity thinking for him.

  There was a rustle, and a twig snapped. Kelsie rounded the corner and collided with Lucifer. She bounced off him before catching herself.

  “I beg your pardon.” He tried to think of an excuse for skulking around the corner, but none came quickly to his mind.

  Kelsie scowled at him and punched him in the shoulder as she passed him. A surge of pain blazed before he thought to mask the sensation. He wicked it away and sent the energy into his core to save for later should he need to use it as fuel.

  “What was that for?” he asked.

  Kelsie held her head high, not even looking at him as she stalked off. “Because I felt like it.”

  “Are you going to mind Abby when I’m away?”

  She didn’t answer. He ran after her. “Kelsie, you will keep an eye on her, won’t you? You won’t let her out of your sight this time, right?” Like earlier.

  She didn’t meet his eyes. “You’d be better off taking her with you.”

  That wasn’t going to happen. He couldn’t tell what had put her in such a black mood. Perhaps Godric had said something that displeased her. Or she simply might have been vexed that he wouldn’t help her get revenge.

  Lucifer found Godric had slung his blankets, bags, and saddle across the fence. The young man didn’t seem particularly disturbed by draping his belongings over a fence made of human bones. Then again, if he lacked magic, he might only see the candy façade. If that was the case, it was equally as curious he didn’t look the least bit tempted to taste the house.

  Godric glanced up from brushing his horse, his smile fading when he saw Lucifer.

  “While I’m away, you aren’t to touch Abby.” Lucifer kept his voice low so Baba wouldn’t hear in the cottage, though it did occur to him that perhaps she already knew what he was up to—she was the one to suggest he go cool off after all. The all-knowing Baba must have suspected what he would want to do.

  Lucifer met the other man’s gaze. “So long as you keep your hands—and every other body part to yourself—my hex will remain inactive, and you should be fine.”

  Godric crossed his arms. “I’m not going to touch your girl.”

  “No, you’d just kidnap her and have your way with her while she was unconscious.”

  “That is insulting and
uncalled for. I am a gentleman.” Godric lifted his chin, looking Lucifer up and down as if he might dispute the same being said about him. “If you were not about to perform an errand on my behalf, I think I should like to punch you.”

  Lucifer snorted. He was a foot taller than Godric. “I’d like to see you try.”

  Godric inclined his head. “Perhaps when you return, then.”

  “Elfing donkule monger,” Lucifer muttered as he left.

  * * *

  Lucifer didn’t need to use a unicorn to get to a portal this time. Over the last few months, he’d been practicing his magic enough that he’d brushed up on essential skills like locating portals on his own.

  The trip was brief, and he didn’t dally. He was better at using his incubus magic to bend people to his will—mostly women—to get antibiotics again. This time he didn’t have to resort to seducing them. He only used his magic to manipulate people into supplying him with what he needed.

  By the time he returned, he was exhausted. Using his magic, not recharging himself, and being exposed to all the plastic and chemicals in the Morty Realm took its toll on him. He trudged along the path to the cottage and had made it up to the gate when a landslide of pain crashed down on him. His belly cramped, and his insides felt as though they were splitting open. It was all he could do to keep breathing as he stumbled backward. He constructed a shield between himself and his weakness. The lance of pain ebbed away.

  He was getting better at shielding himself—he had to or else he would feel Abigail’s every stubbed toe or skinned knee. Panic flooded through him now as he realized how seriously someone was hurt.

  He rushed through the gate. “Abby?”

  A scream erupted from the cottage. It was a woman’s cry of agony. He’d feared it was Abigail, but it wasn’t the sound of her voice. The door was locked—something Baba rarely did. He knocked, but no one answered the door. He reached out with his awareness, tentatively prodding at the source of the disturbance.

  The wall of pain came again, but this time it was distant. He was able to remain objective and detached as the phantom discomfort prickled his awareness. The ebb and flow of cramps were contractions. That meant Baba had a patient she was tending.

  More mentally prepared, Lucifer knocked again. Baba opened the door. “Thank the stars you are here. We need another set of hands.”

  Kelsie’s voice was high and hysterical. She kneeled before a woman lying across bedding before the fire. Kelsie’s apron was stained with crimson, and her arms were smeared red up to the elbows. Baba shuffled back to her rocking chair, pulled close to the woman. She muttered under her breath. Lucifer didn’t sense magic in the air. That probably meant she was swearing, not uttering words of healing.

  “How can I help?” Lucifer dashed forward, then halted, afraid he might be intruding on a woman’s matter. “Do you need more water? Anything heated? More rags?”

  Kelsie spoke, tears running down her face, but she was incomprehensible above the scream from the woman.

  It wasn’t just the labor that he realized was the problem—that was the worst of the pain—but the expecting mother also had been beaten. Her face was a mask of purple and blue bruises. Pink stripes from being struck with a stick marred her arms and legs. He couldn’t imagine who would do such a thing to another human being, let alone a woman so obviously round with child.

  Baba snapped her fingers at Kelsie. “Heat water. Fetch more.” She stabbed an arthritic finger at Lucifer. “Take Kelsie’s place.”

  Lucifer kneeled at the woman’s feet as Kelsie scurried away. He didn’t see Abigail in the cottage. That was probably for the best. Seeing this would traumatize her.

  Then again, if she wasn’t here and neither was Godric, that meant that son of a duke was babysitting her. He didn’t care for the idea of that.

  “Use affinity to remove pain and collect it for healing,” Baba said.

  Pain was not Lucifer’s strength like pleasure was. He’d successfully managed what Baba was asking once before. That had been the day he’d used the good-luck charm. Now he wished he’d practiced more. He let go of the armor beneath his skin. The molten agony attacked him, and he fought to stay lucid despite the onslaught. The time he’d taken the throbbing from Baba’s ankle and sharp strikes of Kelsie’s beating, he’d drawn the pain into his hand like a ball to play with.

  This was too much to contain in his hand.

  The birthing was like every musical instrument he’d ever imagined blaring a different song in his ears. Colors blazed behind his eyes. He was so overwhelmed, he struggled to breathe. He felt as though he were drowning.

  Only, if he were drowning, he could hold his breath like he did when the sirens forgot not to pull him under the water. He fought against the attack and pushed it away from himself, out of his body, and into the air. A fraction of the pain subsided, and it was enough to bring him back into his head.

  The woman gasped, tears and snot running down her face. Enough of the contraction passed that she was able to sink back onto the blanket and moan.

  “Da, Lucy. Good,” Baba said. “Take pain, so she can focus on pushing. But you must also channel that into yourself. If you do not, you will not be able to use it later.”

  That meant Baba wouldn’t be able to use the energy later. If he failed to save it, this woman or her baby might die.

  The young woman stared into his eyes, her own dull from pain or drugs. Her irises were gray-green, and when he looked closer, he sensed her affinity, not so different from his own. She was a Red affinity, someone who used touch magic, but her specialty was neither pleasure nor pain. He didn’t know enough affinities to understand what more there could be.

  The young woman reached out her hand toward him, and he took it.

  “You’ll be fine,” he said, using the incubus spell of his voice to calm her.

  Kelsie leaned down and wiped the sweat and snot from their patient’s face.

  He readied himself before the next contraction came. He guarded his nerves and channeled the throbbing through his core and into his palm. This time as he accepted the pain, he breathed it in rather than resisting. He swam with the current instead of against it.

  Lucifer closed his eyes, trying to block out the scent of blood and the stranger’s labored breathing. With his eyes closed he couldn’t see, but he could feel the baby coming.

  Baba snapped her fingers at him. “You must be alert and conscious. Take pain and deliver baby.”

  Lucifer stared into the woman’s eyes, drinking in the sensations washing over her. She no longer screamed. She gazed into his eyes, mesmerized. He was aware of the battle going on in her body, but it wasn’t on the forefront of her senses anymore. A calming numbness settled over her as he collected her pain before it had time to flash across her nerves. He stole that discomfort and channeled it into himself. He had need of his hands and couldn’t contain the pain in his palms. Instead, he directed it into his core, where it sparked and raged, a tempest wanting to escape.

  “Ready yourself,” Baba gestured to him. “The baby comes.”

  Lucifer didn’t need her telling him. He felt it. He readied himself and lifted his hands.

  Kelsie crouched at the woman’s side, pushing matted hair from her face. “Push one more time. One more big one.” Kelsie’s eyes were so puffy and red from crying, it was a wonder she could even see.

  Lucy caught the baby as it came out screeching like a bat. It was the most hideous thing Lucifer had ever seen. It was twisted and gnarled like an old tree, but the texture of the skin was more like scales than bark. The face was pinched and the proportions wrong for a human child. But this wasn’t a human child. The woman was Witchkin, and very likely the father was too. Lucifer had seen Witchkin babies in the past, just none that were as monstrous as this one.

  “My baby? Is she all right?” The woman’s voice was raw and raspy.

  Lucifer couldn’t tell if the baby was male or female. Onl
y that it was alive and grotesque. He made himself nod his head.

  The mother reached out her arms for the baby.

  He stared at the thing, trying not to let the horror show on his face. He wasn’t sure the mother would want to see her baby. His grip on the pain faltered, and Baba shouted at him. He forced himself to focus again. Kelsie took the baby and swaddled it before handing the bundle to the mother.

  “Don’t be alarmed if she doesn’t look human for a few days. That’s normal,” Kelsie said.

  Lucifer pressed a rag between the woman’s legs to staunch the hemorrhaging. He had delivered babies years before. This was more blood than he remembered.

  “Now true work comes,” Baba said. “I walk you through healing.”

  Despite the abundance of energy dancing in his core, Lucifer was exhausted. He could hardly imagine working his affinity again. He wished he’d had time to gather up more pleasure magic earlier in the day. Had the sirens been at the stream only that morning? If he had gathered additional pleasure magic, he would have felt more energized.

  There never was any rest for the wicked, especially for an incubus.

  * * *

  Lucifer found out the woman’s name was Isibeal. She cooed at the baby as she held her little monster. Her bruises weren’t completely healed by the time he’d finished with her, but her condition was improved from before.

  “What is your name?” Isibeal asked him.

  “Lucy,” he corrected himself. “Lucifer.”

  “Lucifer? That’s . . . unusual.” Isibeal gave him a quizzical look before nodding her head as if deciding something. “I’m going to name her Lucille.”

  “Ah. I love Lucy,” he said, making a joke.

  Isibeal didn’t laugh. Now that he could see more than blood and birthing, he realized her clothes were wrong for a Morty—or a Witchkin who had lived in the Morty Realm. Though the dress was stained and tattered, it was made of silk and brocade. Some of the places her wrists and throat had been bleeding made more sense when he noticed the jewelry encrusted in bloodstained gems on the table.