Wolves at the Door

by Lidiya Foxglove

  “Gosh.” Billie waved a hand like, screw that. “Sam must be very old.”

  “They are all very old,” Byron said, with all the heaviness of a ghost who has haunted the same people too long.

  “But he could still live a while,” I said. “Even humans make it to a hundred and ten now and again, but wizards are even more likely. Can we talk to him?”

  “He doesn’t even remember me anymore. He’ll die when he needs to,” Byron said.

  “You wouldn’t hurt him, Byron?” I hated to even ask.

  “I already have hurt him.” Byron said, looking toward the fireplace. “Who do you think has been keeping him alive? At some point…life is crueler than death.”

  I was getting a stomach ache. “I think…um…I want to give Graham an update. This is a pretty big development.”

  “Well, if we’re done sleuthing, I’m gonna get back to my painting,” Billie said. “And you’re helping me out, huh?” She slapped Gaston’s shoulder.

  “I said I would and my word is gold,” he said.

  “No…one…paints like Gaston, no one prunes like Gaston, no one’s word is so shiny and gold like Gaston…”

  “It’s just Ston.”

  “Ston’s not a name; I ain’t calling you that!”

  Jake was looking at me as I took out my phone and the back door shut behind them.

  “I think I need to take a walk to get a signal…,” I murmured. “My cell phone service is dead here.”

  “Ours is dying too,” Jasper said. “Too much magic.”

  “Hel,” Jake said.

  “What?”

  He let out a very wolfish huff. “Go home,” he said. “This really isn’t your fight.”

  “Not this again. It’s not up to you to protect me.”

  “I can see it on your face,” he said. “You’re scared and you have a right to be.”

  I glanced around for Byron. He was standing behind me, but he had vanished, although that didn’t mean he wasn’t still around.

  “I’m not scared.”

  “Please. Your boldness is what makes me want you, but not enough to get you killed. This isn’t what you signed up for.” When I didn’t answer right away, I feared that I damned myself. “Go talk to Graham, then. We still have work to do on the bathroom and then we can turn this into a gorgeous kitchen.”

  “We should probably talk about that,” I said.

  “She’s trying to save herself,” Jake said to his brother.

  “I like a classic white kitchen,” Jasper said.

  “This house is really upscale though,” I said, relieved to talk about anything else. “In a crumbling kind of way. I’m just not sure that matches the rest of the house. White can vibe ‘farmhouse’ more than lux.”

  “I jdon’t want to go too modern either,” Jasper said. “The house is very old money looking. Timelessness is important.”

  “I think you’re both right,” Jake said. “How about that? White cabinets, maybe, but not too cold. A warm white. But then what if we do more of a cream or tan for the floor and backsplash?”

  “Hmm, okay, I can see that.”

  “Personally, I’m glad Billie fixated on her she shed,” Jake said. “She’s staying out of our way.”

  “We do make a good team,” I said. “And I’m not going anywhere!”

  I wondered how they could even think of kitchens and also upending the entire magical world at the same time, but then…part of the reason I couldn’t imagine leaving was that I didn’t want to walk out on a half-finished project. Or the two of them,

  I went out for the walk so I could get a signal. The sun was just thinking about setting. When I looked back at the house, the concentrated light of late afternoon was catching the pink glow of the house and turning it as vivid as a sunset.

  I had a few texts from Graham that I’d missed that morning.

  Good morning sunshine. I know you don’t have a tv/wifi there but it’s election day. Wish me luck. Only thing I’m not sure of is whether luck means win or lose at this point.

  “Election day!? Shit.” I pulled up a Pennsylvania news channel website to see if I could find anything. The polls didn’t close for a few hours. But I did see a social media post from a reporter at a local newspaper.

  There is something definitely odd going on in the Capello campaign. I’ve heard a rumor that Graham Capello’s campaign manager is trying to find him and may have even contacted the police about his whereabouts. After several missed appearances late in the campaign season, you have to wonder what’s going on. Will update as soon as I know more.

  Graham was missing?

  It seemed to me that if he was going to go missing, it should be to be here. With me.

  His last text certainly didn’t sound like that was on his mind, though.

  Graham, are you safe? I know you’re busy but just shoot me a quick hello when you see this, k? I have crazy stuff to tell you when you get a chance.

  I waited a little while, but my phone stayed as quiet as usual.

  I went back to work. Jasper and Jake were putting down the tile in the bathroom. The room that had been so eerily preserved was now a blank slate for a new color palette. The entire master suite was unrecognizable.

  “Oh man, it’s looking great in here,” I said. “I’m going to work on the bedrooms, I think. I’m tired of paint stripping for the day.”

  “So you’re going to strip wallpaper instead?” Jasper said.

  “No, I’m just going to tear out all that weird matching fabric. I like the old bed frames, but they’re pretty beaten up. I think I’ll just paint them white. Or should I stain them?”

  “Nah, I like the white,” Jake said.

  They were so easy to work with. I wished this was all I had to worry about. I kept looking at my phone, despite the lack of signal.

  At eight o’ clock, as the polls closed, having stripped all the fabric into a pile, removed all the bedding from the bed, and hauled the mattress off onto the floor, I ended up collapsing onto it instead of working. I don’t know why…but I was so tired, and I could have sworn I heard Graham calling my name.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Graham

  The morning of election day should have been the biggest day of my life. Instead, as I drank my coffee and looked out over the sunrise from my modern apartment with huge windows, I felt more numb than anything.

  The plan was for me to go to some local polling places and get myself out there one last time, shake some hands and kiss some babies, especially since I’d missed a few events recently. Sandra told me bluntly that I needed more selfies with my “horny female voters”. This only made me feel shittier. Especially when I had eighteen year old girls grabbing my ass for photos. (Who was the demon here anyway?)

  I couldn’t even eat breakfast. Not an egg, not a green smoothie… “Why did I buy such fucking healthy food?” I asked the empty room. I thought this apartment was great when I bought it, but the high ceilings with efficient modernist ceiling fans, black leather couch, cream carpet and white marble gas fireplace looked a little sterile to me right now. I wished I had time for a pet. At least I wouldn’t be talking to myself like a crazy person. I’d be talking to a dog or cat like a crazy person.

  You know what? I’m going for a trashy fast food chicken biscuit for breakfast. Helena would be proud.

  I took the elevator down to my covered parking. I got in my BMW and pulled into a drive-through. I parked to eat in a lonely corner of the lot next to a dollar store that wasn’t open yet and unpeeled the wrapper, releasing the deliciously terrible sodium-laden scent of fast food breakfast.

  A car pulled up behind me and a young man got out of the back seat dressed in a black suit. My danger radar pricked up immediately.

  He flicked out a wand.

  Then he rapped knuckles on my window. “Warlock council,” he said. “Get out of the car.”

  “Why should I?”

  “Because my magic works perfectly here in the Fixe
d Plane, but you’re an incubus and all you can do is seduce me. That won’t do you any good.”

  “I’m part warlock too,” I said, although this was an absurd statement when I had no idea how to do any of the spells Helena could whip out.

  Let’s face it, the entire moment seemed absurd.

  “Okay. Well, give that a try. I’ll wait,” the guy said.

  “Try? Try what? I’m eating breakfast. I don’t know who the hell you are.” We were speaking through the window. I held up my half-eaten sandwich. I leaned down so I could get a better look at the guy since he was standing right up against my car.

  Blonde, pale, regal features, the face of a rich snot. “Are you Helena’s cousin?”

  “Yes,” the guy said. “But that fact won’t save you.”

  My mind seemed even more blank than before. I kept eating the sandwich. This seemed to piss him off.

  “Get out of the car.”

  I laughed gently. I almost felt some relief. I was in trouble with the wizard council. Shit was going to go down. So I would never make it to the polls. My career was over, wasn’t it? It was, in fact, going to go down in spectacular, scandalous flames. Everyone would wonder what in hell happened to rising star Graham Capello. Drugs? Sex scandal? Depression?

  I’d already known that this humiliation and defeat in the human world would come. It was time to just admit it. I was never going to work in this town again.

  But I was meant to be somewhere else.

  At her side…

  Piers tapped his wand to the handle of my car and the locks went up. He pulled the door open, seized my arm, and pointed the wand to my throat. “Come with me peacefully,” he said.

  I never thought I would be facing a scenario in which I had to try not to get in the car with a kidnapper, but life is full of surprises. Piers was scrawny compared to me, so I didn’t give him a chance to do anything. I launched out of the car and caught him around the waist, knocking him down with all the strength and speed I could muster. He hit the pavement and I didn’t let up. I stomped on his wand arm and yanked it from his hand.

  The driver of his car got out to join the fray. The chauffeur was more buff and mean looking than I was. More of a bodyguard than a mere driver. But I had a feeling it was still Piers I needed to keep my attention on.

  I didn’t know what to do with the wand. Could I just point and shout things? Nah. I didn’t even want to waste time trying that. No way was it that easy. To me, the wand just felt like a stick.

  I felt power stirring inside me, though. I understood this feeling by now, and where it came from. Every adoring person who had approached me these last few days of campaigning fed into it…but nothing fed me like that night making love to Helena. I was still carrying a little of that with me.

  The driver rushed me and I took up a defensive stance as he came at me physically. He tried to punch me. I dodged, my eyes darting to Piers.

  Piers said some spell word and I was hit with a wave of vertigo like nothing I’d ever felt. Suddenly down was up and up was down, but I tried to hang on to the world as it spun. I reached for the driver and shoved him against my car, then slammed my fist into his gut.

  “Ungh!” I could tell I got him good.

  “I don’t want to fucking hurt you…but back off,” I panted as the world spun around me.

  “I don’t really want to hurt you either,” Piers said. “But you’re a demon. And you’re in the way. You have a human life, right? I came to demand an oath from you. Stay in your human life. Never see my cousin again. Say the words, and we don’t have any more trouble.”

  “No,” I said.

  “I’ve gone easy on you so far,” Piers said. “Trust me…your fists will be dust in the wind compared to the magic I can unleash on you. The pain I’ll cause you…and I don’t need a wand.”

  “Helena doesn’t want anything to do with you,” I said. “I will not be cowed. Why are you such an ass, anyway? I know what you did to Jasper Sullivan.”

  “I don’t really care if you think I’m a jerk. I took an oath to my people to maintain the safety and purity of Etherium. If doing so makes me a villain to you, I don’t care. You are a demon who feeds on human desire and loneliness. You have the power to take advantage of people and how many women have felt the sting of that power? The emptiness that follows?”

  He might have shaken me, I’ll admit, if not for that conversation with Byron.

  But in fact, an incubus doesn’t prey on the unwilling, but the willing. And when we’re not doing that, we can be quite productive members of society. Talin was always trying to change the world. You’re more like her than you were like your father. Be proud.

  It was his words, but also his confidence. He seemed sure that none of us were evil. Not me, nor the grandmother I never had the privilege of knowing. We were complicated, I would admit that. I wasn’t proud of everything I’d ever done in my life. But I never wanted to hurt anyone. I had always wanted to change the world in some way.

  “I stand by everything I’ve done,” I said. “I own my mistakes. But I’m also proud of the real work I’ve done in this town. I thought I was just a human. I thought this was the whole world, and I tried to make it better.”

  “You should focus on that,” Piers said. “And stay out of magical business.”

  “But I can’t. I know too much.”

  “Alas.”

  I saw the fire in his normally cold eyes and now I tried to retaliate again, to catch him off guard a second time, but he slapped his hands to my chest and said, in a whisper, “May your bones break.”

  Pain shattered through me and I slumped against the car, managing to get into my seat as white hot pain devoured me. Stars danced in my vision. I heard him telling me to stay away from Helena and then everything went black.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Helena

  I was swept into a dream, the vivid kind where Byron appeared to me, and the line between dream and reality was thinner than usual. He was holding my hand.

  “Thank goodness you’re here,” he said. “Follow me. Don’t let go of me. Hurry.”

  We were standing in a dark woodland, so cloudy I couldn’t tell what time of day it was supposed to be. The gloom was heavy, and I heard crows cawing and creatures rustling in the thick growth.

  “Are we in Sinistral?” I whispered.

  “Yes, I’m afraid so.”

  “I shouldn’t be here, Byron!”

  “Graham needs you, angel.”

  “Graham?” It took my mind a moment to connect real life with the dream. “Oh—Graham! I was worried about him. His election was tonight and he went missing or something!”

  I picked up my pace and Byron led me around the bend in the path to where Graham was collapsed on the ground on his side. I could see that his arm was swollen.

  “Graham!” I tried to run to him, but Byron tightened his grip.

  “Stay with me,” he said. “As you said…this is not your world.”

  As I knelt beside Graham, Byron put his hand on my shoulder, shielding me from the dangers of this dark world. Graham’s eyes opened a little.

  “Helena…it’s you. Where am I?”

  “You’re dreaming,” Byron said. “But you must have been attacked in the real world.”

  “Yeah…Piers attacked me,” Graham groaned. “Fuck. Everything hurts. If I can’t escape the pain by going unconscious, I’m really screwed.”

  “So your body is just…all messed up somewhere? I need to wake up and…I don’t know if I can get on a plane in such short notice. Maybe. Or maybe the guys would let me borrow—”

  “No need for that,” Byron said. “He’s here for you, dear. You can help him without setting a foot outside of Greenwood Manor.”

  “Ohh…I…I see.” Of course. Graham was an incubus. I could give him power, even through dreams. “But…I’m not sure he’s in good enough condition to…”

  “There is always the simple act of a kiss,” Byron said.

/>   “I feel like even a kiss might hurt you. I’m sorry.” I leaned down and pressed my lips to Graham’s.

  “Don’t be sorry.” He managed a pained smile. “It’s my own stupid fault. I should have…”

  “No,” I said. “Piers—” I gave the gentlest touch to his back and he screamed, breaking out into a sweat. I whipped my hand back, alarmed.

  “What did he do to you?” I asked.

  “He broke my bones. I don’t know which ones, frankly, because everything…hurts.”

  “Are you at the hospital? In real life?”

  “I have no idea.”

  Very, very carefully, I rested my hand on Graham’s back again. “Le corps….” I whispered a brief spell just for sensing out the state of the body. What I sensed sickened me. Piers had broken Graham’s arms and legs and cracked a couple of ribs. It was a powerful spell and far worse than what he had done to Jasper, which was already bad enough.

  He’s increasing his threats. I can’t trust that he won’t escalate further…maybe even to death. He could just attack us here, but I guess he’d rather pick us off first.

  “Oh, Byron, it’s bad! I don’t know if I can do much for him.”

  “Don’t doubt your powers, angel…nor mine.” Byron slid a hand down my thigh. As usual for these dreams, I was wearing a short, filmy dress. “Not only can we heal Graham, I think we can make it a very pleasurable experience.”

  “Are you sure this is appropriate?” I gasped, as his hand now slid up my thigh and all the way to the very center of my pleasure. I had not been feeling at all in the mood while pondering what my evil cousin did to Graham, but Byron’s hand was so expert that he pried it out of me right then and there.

  Graham was watching. At first, he looked a little jealous, but as Byron lifted the dress off me and he saw me kneeling naked in the dark forest with Byron’s hand between my thighs, his resistance faded.

  “Byron, are you sure—”

  “I am a very experienced incubus and I know exactly what Graham needs right now. The sight of you.”