by Eileen Wilks
"Is that what…" His eyebrows drew together in a frustrated pleat. "There are other ways to prevent infection."
"You didn't want to see a doctor, remember? You're stuck with me, and this is what I know to do."
Grudgingly he nodded and released my wrist. I sat on the bed beside him.
The next few minutes were harder on him than me. I learned long ago how to move into a mental room where sympathy can't intrude. It's a white, private place, nowhere I'd want to live permanently, but there are times when sympathy is a drawback. Besides, I saw no point in both of us suffering.
There were four slashes in his flesh—one in the lower chest, another on the right side of his belly, and two in his thigh. He was lucky. The upper wounds were shallow, slicing through skin and a bit of muscle but leaving his innards intact. One of the thigh wounds was no more than a deep scratch. The other…
I sighed, unhappy with what I saw with the blood cleaned away. "How good are you at healing? The muscle is badly damaged, and I'm not sure my sewing skills are up to putting it back together right."
"Sewing? You wish to sew my muscle?"
"I'll have to, unless you can do something."
He was silent, but with an inward look that suggested he was checking things out in his own way. A moment later, the wound began to close.
It was fascinating to watch. Flesh touched flesh as if hands were gently urging the sides of the wound together, then gradually meshed into unity like dough kneaded back into a single lump. And a delicious energy surged through me, conveyed from him to me through my hand on his leg. My fingers tingled. I licked my lips.
And snatched my hand back. He was a guest, not a meal. Shaken, I let go of my hold on the white, interior space. The slow knitting of his flesh was still fascinating, but my vision was colored by compassion now.
When he finished, the gash was nearly closed and his face was the color of mushrooms. I patted his knee in a motherly way. "Very impressive."
His voice was flat with fatigue. "I cannot do the rest now."
"None of the others are as deep. They'll heal on their own, I imagine." I stood. "Now, if you can stay awake a little longer, you need fluids. Since I can't provide an IV, you'll have to drink as much as you can. Water or orange juice?"
He licked his lips. "Water. Molly?"
I waited.
"What are you?"
I could have pretended I didn't know what he was talking about. That was my first impulse. He was weak, lost, sundered even from his name. He wouldn't be hard to deceive. I could have asked what he meant, then unraveled whatever chain of logic had led him to ask that question. I'm good at that. I have to be. And the thought of how he'd react to the truth ached like a fresh bruise laid down over old wounds.
But those blue eyes held steady on me, and there was something about them… "I'm a succubus."
His eyes widened.
"Cursed, not damned," I added firmly. "A long time ago, by someone who knew what She was doing when it came to curses. I'm not a demon. Originally, I was human."
"Ah." The tension went out of his face, and his eyelids drooped. "That explains it. Better hurry… with water." His speech was slurring as he let go of whatever force of will had been keeping him awake. He smiled at me. "Thank you, Molly."
Chapter 3
HE liked television. And he loved the remote.
At ten-twenty the next morning he was propped up on my couch, channel surfing madly. He'd woken when Erin arrived and had insisted on moving there, over my objections. But he was doing amazingly well.
Erin was outside, readying herself and the spell. She wouldn't perform it out there—between dogs, children, and nosy neighbors that simply wasn't practical. But she needed earth beneath her feet for the preparation.
I'd shown her the spot where my guest arrived last night. Erin had hmm'd and frowned, nodding now and then like a doctor examining a patient, then sent me away.
I was in my galley—it's too small to be called a kitchen—putting together a bouquet garni for the chicken simmering on the stove. The connection between chicken soup and healing may not have been established scientifically, but I'm sure it exists.
"Arthur?" I suggested. "Adam? Aillen?"
He looked away from the television, a sudden smile lighting his face. "You find me handsome?"
"You know Gaelic!" I exclaimed. Another puzzle piece, but I had no idea what to do with it. He looked Celtic, but that lovely, upper-crust British accent… I shook my head and plucked a bit of thyme from the pot on the counter by the window. "Of course I find you handsome. You're gorgeous. You know that. Even if you don't remember, you've seen yourself in the mirror." Before occupying my couch, he'd asked where he could relieve himself. I'd had to explain the plumbing.
He touched his jaw as if reminding himself of the face he hadn't recognized. "It seemed to be a pleasing face, but standards of beauty vary widely."
"I wonder if you talk that way in your native language. Have you remembered any more of it?"
"Any more?"
"You said something to me in another language when you first arrived."
His brows knit. "I don't remember. What way do I talk?"
"Correctly. Formally. Did any of those names ring a bell?"
"Ring a bell… oh. You wonder if they are familiar. No, not in a personal way."
An interesting distinction. The names were familiar, but they didn't belong to him. "Well, we have to call you something. Would you object to being Michael for now?"
"Michael… Hebrew for 'gift from God.'" He cocked a single eyebrow at me—which he could do, blast him. "You consider me a blessing."
The idiot male was flirting with me. "What an odd memory you have. You know the meaning of Irish and Hebrew names, but not your own."
That stole the smile from his face. I tried not to feel guilty. I tied the ends of the cheesecloth together and lowered the herbs into the simmering pot, catching it in place with the lid. Keeping my back to him so I wouldn't see the hurt I caused, I said, "Michael is also the name of a militant archangel. Evil is capable of masquerading as good, but generally it prefers not to annoy Michael. One aligned with evil would not be comfortable borrowing Michael's name."
"I am not evil."
"I don't think so, but we don't know what you are. That's what Erin will try to find out." Reluctantly, I abandoned cowardice and turned to face him. "Do you understand what a succubus is?"
"The Latin term for a female demon who draws life from her victims through sexual intercourse. But you said you were cursed into your condition, which makes sense." He smiled suddenly, blindingly. "You aren't evil, either."
"Nor am I good. Michael—"
"You do like that name for me. Very well. I will be Michael."
I could feel myself softening—inside, where it was dangerous, and outside, my muscles growing lax and warm with wanting. So I was sharp to him. "Listen to me. I look like a middle-aged woman, and I am one. A good deal more than middle-aged, actually. But I'm also a succubus, and I live off the energy of others. The energy of men, to be specific, which I acquire through sex."
"Do you not eat?" he asked, curious. "It smells in here as if you enjoy food."
My breath huffed out. He didn't seem to be getting the point. "I eat, but I don't have to. Other people need food and drink to live, and enjoy sex. I need sex to live, and enjoy food and drink."
"I'm glad you didn't lose those pleasures when you were cursed. Do you need to sup in your fashion daily, the same as others need to eat every day?"
"Not every day. Michael, you're either painfully naive or deliberately obtuse. I'm trying to explain why you must not flirt with me. I am not safe."
"You're worried about me!" He was amazed.
I rolled my eyes. The young always think themselves indestructible, but Michael should know better, after what he'd been through. But then, he didn't remember what he'd been through. "Yes," I said. "I'm worried about you."
For an instant his f
ace softened, and I glimpsed in his eyes the ragged edges of adult vulnerability, not the untried trust of youth, as if my simple words had sliced deep into a place that didn't bear touching. "You needn't," he said, and the edges closed up again, hiding whatever memories that deep place held. "You can take nothing from me I don't wish to give."
"What if you wished to give?" My posture shifted as the energy gathered around me, swirling, aching… "I could make you want to give, Michael. You'd want to give… anything."
The door opened. "Molly!" Erin said sharply.
I snapped back. Then just stood there, disoriented, like a stooping hawk suddenly shoved from its plummet. The breath I drew was ragged. "Well," I said as briskly as I could, "what did you learn?"
"Not much." She came in, eyeing me. Erin is a tall woman, bony by my standards but fashionably slender to her generation. Her face was made for drama, with a wide mouth, sharp cheekbones, and a beak of a nose that she considers unlovely but which I quite envy for its distinction. She's supposed to wear glasses, but often forgets or leaves them somewhere. Her hair is a fabulous red bush that nearly reaches her waist. Today she wore it pulled back from her face with a stretchy headband that matched her apple-green t-shirt.
T-shirts are one of the best things about the current age. And bras. Bras have corsets beat all to pieces. "You must have learned something."
She shrugged. "Node energy isn't my area. You knew he came in at a node?"
I nodded. I'm not so utterly insensitive I'd be unaware of a node so close to where I've lived for twelve years. One of the ley lines from it runs beneath my RV. "What else?"
"He's drawing from it."
I glanced at Michael. "Of course," he said. "I could have told you that, had you asked. How else could I heal?"
"And," Erin added, "he came from a long ways away. I couldn't trace him back—the energies are too foreign—but there's a feeling of a great gulf."
I nodded. "I knew he wasn't from this world."
"Not…" She shook her head. "That isn't possible."
Erin is a very good witch and far wiser than I was at her age. But she is young, and thus prone to certainty. "Obviously it's possible, since he's here."
She looked at Michael, eyes wide and suddenly wary.
"Another world," he said thoughtfully, his voice so much deeper than Erin's light soprano. "That makes sense. I don't seem to know much about this one."
"Supposedly you don't remember anything about any others, either," Erin said sharply.
"I don't remember anything, no. But I think perhaps I know a great deal."
"Is that supposed to make sense?" Scowling, she slung her bag off her shoulder and set it on the table of my little dinette. The bag holds her basic ritual apparatus, and is made of heavy black silk. I'd given it to her for Samhain last year. "The realms haven't been close enough to cross between in over five hundred years. Except for Faerie," she added. "And that's closed to mortals. And you aren't Faerie."
"No," he said agreeably. "I'm fairly sure I'm not."
"What about Dis? The place Christians call hell. It leaks into our world sometimes."
"I'm not demonic, either. No more than Molly is."
She looked startled.
"I told him," I admitted. "Not the details, but it did seem he'd a right to know, if he's to stay with me awhile. Now, let's try applying a little reason. Magic is useful, but logic has its place. Michael said—"
"He's remembered his name?" Her eyebrows made a skeptical comment on that.
"I named him, for now."
Erin's eyes narrowed, for names and naming have power, so I hurried on before whatever lecture was simmering could boil over into speech.
"As I was saying, according to Michael, the energies here aren't what he's used to. And he tastes different, unlike anything I've ever—"
"Molly! He's injured."
"I haven't been nibbling," I said, testy. "But I've touched him. I'm sure I've never encountered his like before—and my experience covers rather a lot of ground."
She nodded reluctantly.
"I don't know what he is, but I know some things he isn't. He's not Gifted, not in the sense we use that term, at least. He's not Lupus. And he's not a sorcerer. Last night he unlocked my door without being aware he'd done it, and sorcery requires focus. So does telekinesis. Poltergeists, though—"
"He is so not a poltergeist."
"Will you stop interrupting? Of course he isn't. But he may be from the same place, or a similar realm."
"Or he may be lying."
"No." That came from Michael, who spoke with simple assurance. "I do not lie."
Erin's lip curled. "What, you're from the angelic realm?"
I suspected I knew what lay behind Erin's, antagonism, and it wasn't getting us anywhere. I spoke firmly. "That's what you're going to find out, I hope. Are you ready?"
Her brow pleated. "I don't know, Molly. I'm tied to this world—my knowledge, power, and rituals are all of this realm. He uses node magic, not earth magic. If he really is from elsewhere, how much will I be able to learn?"
"Ritual magic is practiced in forty-two realms," Michael said suddenly. "Many are variants of Wicca. Depending on how one defines the parameters, between eight and seventeen religiously oriented magical systems bear strong similarities to it."
"Forty-two realms?" Erin shook her head. "There aren't that many."
"Where did that come from?" I asked.
Frustration was plain in his eyes. "I don't know. It was just there, but when I try to follow it… nothing." He spread his hands. "I, too, want very much to know what manner of being I am."
Erin studied him a moment, and I suspected she was using other senses than sight—including, I hoped, the compassionate sense of the heart. Maybe she was finally considering the possibility that he was telling the truth. Erin has a problem with good-looking men. "I'll do what I can," she said at last, and began to unpack her bag.
The tradition Erin follows requires nudity only for major workings, when the god and goddess are called rather than simply included in the rite. This was a spell, not an act of worship—though the two are not entirely distinct with Wicca—so she and I kept our clothes on. Michael sat up on the couch with the blanket providing a modesty drape. Not that he had any, from what I'd seen. Modesty, that is. He was well provided with what the blanket was there to conceal.
Erin took out her athame, a glass vial, a black candle, a little pouch, and two silver bowls, each smaller than a cupped hand. "Stand to the south," she said, nodding at me. "No, a little more to your right. That's good. Michael—you have no objection to that name?"
"I'm content with it."
"I've set wards outside Molly's home for protection, and will cast a circle around the three of us to contain the spell. It's vital that you not break the circle once I've set it. You break the circle by stepping outside."
He looked insulted. "Actually it is a sphere, not a circle, but I understand you are using the accustomed term. What type of spell will you be casting?"
"A basic truth spell. It will urge but not compel the truth from you. If you knowingly speak false, I'll see it. With your permission, after a few questions I'll take the spell deeper. That can feel uncomfortable, intrusive. I'll be trying to bring truth up from wherever it's hiding inside you."
He considered that, then nodded. "A great many things have hurt since I woke and saw Molly. I can abide a little discomfort in order to learn what I am and whether I brought danger here with me."
"Also who you are, I hope."
"I am now Michael. As I said, I am content with that."
He looked at me then, and his smile burst over me with the pungent sweetness of summer berries.
I was going to have to be very careful.
Erin doesn't use a compass. The direction of the cardinal points is as obvious to her as sunlight is to others. She put her bag on the floor and knelt beside it, then removed her portable altar—a hand-cut, hand-polished square of oak
about ten inches on a side and one inch thick. It went on the floor between myself and Michael. On it she set her tools. The two silver bowls were filled with water and salt—salt for the earth, and the north; water for the west. She put a stick of incense in the altar's east quadrant for air, and a candle in the south for fire. Then she waved her hand.
Like a faucet springing a drip, the candle's wick acquired a flame. A thread of smoke drifted up from the incense. She took up her athame and turned in a slow circle, her lips moving, pointing outward.
Michael's eyes followed, not Erin or the athame, but the direction she pointed. I knew he must be looking at the energies she roused, and envied him. I've always wanted to see the colors of magic.
Erin circled three times, then put her athame on the altar with the knife's tip pointing at Michael. She opened the vial, dampened her finger with the contents and touched each of her eyelids. Then she stepped forward and did the same with each of Michael's lips. "As I will, so mote it be."
His eyes widened, though whether he was startled by her touch or some other sensation I couldn't tell.
She nodded, satisfied. "Molly, you ask the questions."
"All right." I licked my own lips, nervous for no good reason. "Michael, do you remember anything of your life from before you arrived here?"
"The first thing I remember is your face. Your skin looked very soft and your eyes were sad. I couldn't see what color they were, and that was strange to me—I think I'm not used to losing colors in the dark. There was a pucker between your eyebrows. I like your eyebrows," he added. "They have a pretty curve."
The eyebrows he'd complimented shot up. Those weren't the curves most men noticed. "You don't know your name from before?"
"No."
"Where do you come from?"
"I don't know. I don't remember it, but it was different from this place. But I do know about this place."
"What do you know?"
"Languages. Facts. Not always the most useful facts," he said ruefully. "And I don't always know that I know until something floats up."