Lucifer tried to sift through what he knew, to glean what Baba was hinting at. “Time is passing more quickly for her than it is for me.”
“Da.”
Four months had passed in the outside world, and he hadn’t gathered leshi tears, made the soul blanket, or caught her soul from the underworld. The lost soul was that much closer to dissolving. Her body was that much closer to turning into a monster. “If I put Abigail’s soul back inside her body, will she remember me again?”
“There is no way to know until you try.” Baba lifted a finger in stern warning. “If it is your wish to retrieve remainder of Abby’s soul from underworld, I suggest you do so before they grow her new one and fresh growth completely occupies it.”
“What if too much time passes, and there’s already another soul in there? One that has grown into Abigail’s body?” A twisted monstrous one? It wouldn’t be his Abigail. She would be someone else.
“This is math problem.” Baba nodded to the cauldron boiling water over the gridiron in the hearth. “How much water fits in pot?”
“About a bucket. Maybe less.”
Baba nodded. “What happens when you fill pot with two buckets of water?”
“Some of the water will spill out.”
“Da. Which bucket spills? First or second bucket.”
He eyed the cauldron, imagining it was the vessel of Abigail’s body. “I don’t know. Maybe some of each.”
Baba inclined her head. “So it will be with your Abby. They can grow her more soul with love—or try. It will not be the Abby you knew before, but a new soul who simply looks like old Abby. Or you can collect soul from land of dead and put it back in before it’s too late. You understand your problem now?”
That meant he needed the leshi tears for the blanket. He needed to lure her soul out of the underworld before it was too late for the old soul and the new one.
CHAPTER FIVE
Truth and Tears
Time was passing too quickly. Every precious minute wasted doing chores was hours Abigail’s body grew a new soul that wasn’t the old Abigail. It meant more of her in the underworld might be dissolved and reabsorbed into new bodies.
All Lucifer wanted to do was collect leshi tears so that he could resurrect the soul of his beloved. Baba made him answer Clarissa’s letter and tend to the current Abigail first.
Lucifer wrote to Abigail and told her to behave for Clarissa, even though he resented saying so because Clarissa had told him to.
I miss you so much, he wrote. In truth, he didn’t know if his heart yearned for this version of Abigail or the Abigail he wanted her to be. She’d said she wanted to see him, and part of him wanted to see her, but Baba had always said she was a distraction. He could see it was true.
He wrote:
Show Clarissa you’re a big girl who doesn’t need to throw tantrums to get her way. Tell her that you will be good, and if you are, she should reward you by letting you visit.
He wasn’t certain it would work, but Abigail had raised her children with positive reinforcement and rewards. He wanted to believe Clarissa would do the same for Abigail now that she was the child.
Baba told him to ignore the request for the books and not to respond to that part at all. He tried to draw Abigail a picture of them holding hands, but he was about as good at drawing as she was, probably worse.
Lucifer reused an envelope Abigail had used for his letters since he had none of his own. Baba bade him to set it on the windowsill, weighted down under a rock from the garden so the wind wouldn’t carry it away.
Lucifer hurried through his chores, finding the letter gone when he returned from collecting blackberries. Perhaps the same raven that had delivered the letters had collected his.
“Now it is time for leshi tears,” Baba said.
She instructed him in a new method of divining called scrying. She showed him how to gaze into a pot of water laced with droplets of his blood to track the leshi. Lucifer felt the vines of dark-bright magic planted in the forest, leading him toward their source. In the reflection of the water he saw budding dog roses guarding the leshi’s sanctuary. Lucifer stood, holding on to the threads of that magic from the scrying.
“You know where he is, the leshi?” Kelsie asked, her voice fragile and small.
He blinked, his eyes transitioning from his vision to the tangible world around him.
“If I find out he killed your brother and sister, I will avenge their deaths for you,” Lucifer said.
She crossed her arms and turned away.
“You want to do something useful to help? Make me a truth potion, and I’ll give it to him,” Lucifer said. “If he killed your brother and sister, I can get him to confess.”
She balled up her fists. “I can’t do potions. I’m not a water witch, and I’m not a perfect apprentice like you who can do everything.”
Baba clucked her tongue. “Practice and patience. Those are your weaknesses. Lucy has his own faults to work through. We work on yours today while he is away.”
Lucifer left, attempting to follow the fading threads he’d felt. He didn’t find the leshi. When he returned that afternoon, he found Kelsie working on her next potion.
Baba beckoned for him to come to her. “Gather up all the items you collected to lure Abigail’s soul. Today we start quilting blanket.”
* * *
Lucifer had spent long hours of his apprenticeship reading and translating the books in Old High German. He’d practiced the spells on exchanging souls in animals and switching them back. He’d used his affinity to work forbidden magic and travel to the underworld.
The newest spell Baba taught him required less magic and more artistry. She called it quilting, but it was more like weaving. Abigail had once been adept at weaving plants together, her nimble fingers working magic that had grown vines into a blanket. She had created wards this way, as well as other spells.
Lucifer already knew the magic to cultivate plants. Baba showed him how to grow plants from the essence of the items he’d collected, infusing the weaving with the taste of strawberries and the perfume of pitch. Oak leaves and birdsong rustled under his fingers, making him feel as though he were rooted in the forest.
For hours he guided the soul of each plant into place. His hands ached, and the plants shuddered and lurched, rebelling against him. By the time it was dark, he didn’t so much have a blanket as a twisted knot of vines.
Kelsie snickered from her post at the cauldron.
Baba unraveled the jumbled knot with the ease of a master. “Try again.”
* * *
When Lucifer wasn’t unsuccessfully tracking the leshi or making a mess of the woven lure he needed to weave, he prepared for the inevitability of the order that would be sure to come. Eventually Clarissa would demand Baba’s books. He needed those spells if he was to help Abigail before her body was filled with the wrong soul. It was up to him to get her old soul back and fix the mistakes he’d made.
The one thing he’d done right was give her his love. Baba had said that was what had made her soul start to grow. The sliver of soul had been a seed.
He would be the one to plant the rest.
In his free time, when he wasn’t performing chores or practicing magic, Lucifer copied the spells Gertrude hadn’t translated. He could translate the spells later, but he wanted to be sure he had them if he needed them.
It took a week for Kelsie to perfect her truth spell. The brew smelled like melancholy dreams and the scent of autumn rain. Kelsie stoppered it up in a brown bottle.
“One must be careful with truth. It is potent charm.” Baba warned. “Sometimes you will not like answers.”
“How do we know it will work?” Kelsie asked.
“You must test it.” Baba’s expression was grim. “Who will imbibe first drop?” She looked from Kelsie to Lucifer.
A tremor of anxiety passed through him. “Why do I always have to be the guinea pig for
everyone’s spells?” He remembered all the opium and cannabis Baba had made Abigail test on him.
“You and Kelsie both must understand rewards and consequences of such potion,” Baba nodded decisively. “Both of you will be pigs.”
“Guinea pigs,” Kelsie corrected.
“That’s right. I’m the only swine in this house.” Lucifer flashed a playful smile at her, trying to not let his nervousness show.
Kelsie actually laughed.
Lucifer rubbed his hands over the knees of his trousers. He hoped Kelsie hadn’t accidentally made something that would kill him.
“One drop in tea for each of you,” Baba said.
The potion was flavorless in the tepid tea, though the scent of rainstorms lingered in the air. Lucifer tipped his cup back and gulped it down. Kelsie sipped at hers.
“How long will it take before it works? How long will it last?” he asked.
“The effects will be immediate,” Kelsie said. “But I suspect I didn’t make it strong enough to last longer than a minute or two.” She frowned.
Baba leaned forward with interest. “Ask each other question.”
Kelsie glanced at Baba and then away, her smile fading. “Why do you really want to wake Abigail?”
“Because I love her. I want to make amends for my mistakes.” He didn’t think that was such a difficult question. He might have told her that without the potion.
“Who do you love more? Gertrude Periwinkle or Abby?” Kelsie stared into her cup.
That was a stupid question. He rolled his eyes. “I lust Gertrude. I love Abby.”
“Which Abby do you love more?” Her brows furrowed. “The old one or the new one?”
The truth felt like a thread being pulled out of his heart, a stitch unraveling the secrets inside him. “I love them both, just in different ways. I have a past with the real Abby. The new Abby doesn’t know me. She’s a child. Even if I only capture part of Abby’s soul, it should be enough to make her feel complete.” And then perhaps between that and his love, her memories would return.
“If you don’t push the new Abby out,” Baba said under her breath.
The truth burned in his throat as he attempted to resist it. “That would be . . . unfortunate. I would mourn the loss of her.” The idea of either part of her being left to dissolve in the underworld of souls was unacceptable. He wanted all of her returned. And perhaps more, even if that was illogical.
Kelsie swallowed. “And what about me? How do you feel about me and what I want?”
Lucifer wanted to ask her why she asked that question, but his lips wouldn’t delay the answer she sought. The truth spilled out of him. “I care about you like I would a little sister. I don’t want you to get hurt.” He tried to think of something that was a lie to test the boundaries of this potion before it trapped him along a path of truth he didn’t want to go. He opened his mouth to say that her hair was green rather than blue, but no words would form on his lips. He couldn’t think of the names of any colors. Perhaps that was the magic of the spell. “You are my friend,” he said at last. “Right now, you’re my only friend. I want to help you with your mission if it’s the right thing to do. That’s why I wanted you to make this potion.”
She gave one curt nod. “I believe you.”
Her expression was forlorn. He couldn’t understand that dull ache radiating from her chest and why it was there. “Why do you ask?” Surely she couldn’t have thought he was apathetic to the loss of her kin.
Her lips pressed into a line. She looked like she was fighting the spell.
The temptation was there, the truth he wanted to know but would normally never ask because he couldn’t tell when she spoke the truth or not. “We are friends, aren’t we? You aren’t still planning on killing me, are you?”
She clenched her teeth. She fought against the question.
“How do you feel about me?” he asked.
A groan of wind whipped past him. Wind rustled her blue hair, though the windows were closed.
He could only imagine one answer she might give that would explain her reluctance. Just as Baba had warned, he wasn’t certain he wanted to know.
“I retract that question,” he said. “You don’t have to answer.”
Tears filled Kelsie’s eyes. The words spewed out of her in a twinkling burst of autumn that dissipated as the truth hung in the air. “I’m in love with you.” Her eyes went wide, and she clamped her hands over her mouth.
Lucifer stared at her, shifting uneasily in his seat. The silence stretched out, heavy between them. The only sound in the cottage was the crackling of the fire in the hearth and Baba’s needles knitting. He had feared Kelsie might have a crush on him from the time he’d used his incubus magic—he’d almost convinced himself that she didn’t—but hearing the words spoken out loud made it so much worse.
Kelsie shook, her face turning red. She jumped to her feet, knocking over her chair. Wind raged around her. Her teacup toppled onto the floor.
“You tricked me!” she screamed.
Wind tossed Lucifer’s hair into his face. He rose and edged behind Baba. He wasn’t proud of himself for using an old woman as a human shield, but he suspected Kelsie would be less likely to strike if Baba was in her path.
Baba clucked her tongue. “Kelsie, my dorogaya, he did no such thing. You both agreed to drink potion as test. I warned you not to ask foolish questions. You walked down that path.”
“What other questions would you expect me to ask?” A sob bubbled out of Kelsie. The door flung open and cracked against the wall. She ran out.
Lucifer coughed. “I thought she only liked women.”
“And you.” Baba waved him toward the table. “Stop hiding behind woman’s skirts. Sit at table and clean up mess.”
Lucifer picked up the teacup and the overturned chair.
Baba nodded to the bottle. “At least we cannot doubt effectiveness of Kelsie’s potion. If she was not so busy feeling sorry for herself, she would be proud.”
Guilt gnawed at him when he remembered Kelsie saying she hated him when he’d curled up beside her as a cat. Now he knew why. She didn’t deserve to be haunted by a crush she didn’t want and couldn’t have. “This is because I accidentally used my affinity near her? That’s why she loves me. Or why she thinks she does.” An incubus didn’t inspire love. They inspired lust.
“Mayhap. Or because she is around an incubus every day, and she cannot have you. Such magic and teenage hormones cause confusion.”
“Do you think . . . that my magic made Abby love me?” He swallowed the lump in his throat.
“Does it matter what I believe? What do you think?” One of her wispy eyebrows shot upward.
He clenched his teeth, fighting the words that wanted to worm out of him.
“Is truth potion wearing off?” Baba asked.
He fought against it, sweat beading up on his forehead. With each breath, he came closer to speaking the truth. When he exhaled, it poured out of him like vomit. “I think Abby is better off without me. She’ll be able to decide whether she actually loves me or not if she doesn’t spend so much time near me.”
More words gushed out. “I won’t accidentally seduce her like I did with Kelsie. Like I might have before when we were teenagers. She wouldn’t have married Adam if she had truly loved me. My magic probably only bewitched her. That explains how she could love someone else when I was stuck as a cat. My Red affinity helped hers regrow, and she regained some of her plant affinity in the Morty Realm, but my incubus magic didn’t affect her when I wasn’t a man.” The tide of fear inside him caught him up in that current. He gasped for breath, afraid he was drowning in a truth he hadn’t wanted to admit.
“And?” Baba asked. “Is this fear or truth?”
He clutched at his hair, unable to stop speaking. “I don’t know. I just want everything to be right this time. I don’t want to make the same mistakes again.”
“Thir
ty years as cat is big mistake. Hopefully you learn that, and you will not repeat.”
He nodded.
“Have you had enough torture?” Baba asked. “Or shall I ask you more questions to keep on testing Kelsie’s potion?”
He shook his head.
“Take bottle of vodka and mix with honey and half bottle of truth potion. Then go haunt your leshi.”
“‘Hunt’ my leshi?” he asked. “Or ‘haunt’?” He wasn’t certain if she used that word intentionally or not.
She grinned. “Perhaps Kelsie will be calm when you return, da?”
He nodded. Perhaps he would be calmer when he returned as well.
He examined the bottle, doubt undermining his confidence. “Abby used her blood to tempt the leshi to drink.” It was the only thing that had made them want her culinary creations.
“Too bad you do not have Abby or Kelsie to donate a small piece of finger to quench leshi’s thirst.”
“I could use my blood.” He didn’t need Abigail or Kelsie. Nor did he need to endanger either young woman by making a leshi addicted to their flesh. “I’m an incubus. I can fill any creature with pining.” Witchkin, Morties, and Fae alike weren’t immune to his charms. He had made a lesbian confused enough to pine for him. When he’d healed Godric, one side effect had been inspiring sensations neither man had been comfortable admitting to out loud.
“Incubus blood might be tempting to some Fae, but Abby’s would be better. This leshi said he craved a female. Nyet?”
“I have a lock of Abby’s hair.” Not that he wanted to give that up.
Baba tapped her chin thinking it over. “Best magic requires sacrifice.”
He nodded to the vial, uncertainty still troubling him. “This potion works on Witchkin. Will it work on a Fae?”
“There is only one way to find out, nyet?”
Son of a Succubus Series Collection Page 45