Samantha Sommersby

by Forbidden--The Revolution (lit)

I looked down at the book in my hands, the book Basta had given to me, the one I swore I’d never use. “Dark magic,” I added softly.

  “Why can’t I have a normal boyfriend who reads porn?”

  That made me smile. “I’m not into dark magic, Alex. I swear I’m boringly normal.”

  Alex laughed. “Boringly normal says the vampire that just hocuse pocused the book right out of my hands.”

  “Hocuse pocused?” I repeated.

  “Abra cadabraed?”

  “The command was Alka.”

  Alex climbed to the top of the stairs, turned around, then reached out towards me, towards the book I was still holding. “Alka,” she whispered, hesitantly into the darkness.

  Nothing happened. The house was quiet, still.

  “Alka,” she said again, this time her voice was steadier, more certain.

  “The words are just words, Alex. The spells are of no use to you,” I told her as I walked up the steps, then preceded down the hallway.

  “Then why be so secretive?” she asked, following me into the bedroom.

  I shrugged. “Habit, I guess. You may not possess the gift, but knowledge is a power. Spells like these in the wrong hands...”

  “I get it,” she said. “We’ll find another way.”

  “Yes, we will. There’s always another way.”

  Alex walked over to the bedroom window, the one that overlooked the cliffs and the beach below. The moon was almost full and the sky was unusually clear.

  “How did you discover that you could do magic?” she asked, her voice soft in the quiet of the night. In a way, I was surprised that it had taken her this long.

  I walked over to her, wrapping my arms around her waist and pressing myself against the back of her body.

  “That’s kind of like asking when you discovered you could see or hear. Magic is a part of me. It’s who I am, who I’ve always been. I was around six when I realized that I was…different. I was out trick-or-treating with my parents and our flashlight stopped working—”

  “Trick-or-treating? Don’t tell me you were a vampire.”

  I smiled at the memory of the look of shock on my father’s face when he saw me that night. “Werewolf. Anyway, when the light died, I conjured Sparky.”

  “Sparky?”

  I held my right hand out in front of Alex, then looking over her shoulder I watched as a small light the size of a nickel appeared to emerge from the center of my palm growing in form and shape until it was a bright, burning ball of fire.

  “Meet Sparky.”

  Alex gasped. I released my hold on her and she momentarily pulled away from me.

  “You…made that?”

  The light took off, flitting about the room in a pattern reminiscent of that of a firefly.

  “We traveled a lot when I was young, going back and forth to BaMidbar. It was a dark, frightening place,” I told her, remembering the immense receiving area and the dozens of spookily eerie hallways. Shoving my hands deep into my pockets I confessed, “It’s still a place that frightens me. I haven’t been back for years.”

  “And Sparky would light your way in the darkness?” asked Alex, her eyes sparkling with wonder.

  “More then that,” I said. “He kept me from getting lost, always showing me the way home.”

  The light skittered back over to us, hovering overhead and bathing Alex in an amazingly brilliant glow.

  Alex looked up, into the light. “Back here?”

  “This is just a house,” I replied, realizing that I’d never in my life seen Sparky burn so bright. “My mother always says home is where the heart is.”

  Alex looked at me, her eyes connecting with mine. She was shining, it was as if she were burning from within.

  As I lowered my mouth towards her I admitted what was true.

  “You seem to have stolen mine.”

  Chapter Twenty

  The ecstasy of my lips brushing ever so gently across Alex’s was interrupted by the sound of a voice I didn’t recognize.

  “Intruder alert,” it said.

  “Security system?” asked Alex.

  Before I could reply my father came bounding down the hall, crashing into my room with what looked like the latest Browning automatic in his hand. I’d never seen my father armed before.

  “Dad?”

  “Someone’s penetrated The Vault,” he said. “Alex, you join Lily and Violet in the safe room inside the master closet, they’ll re-open it for you. Dell, you’re with me.”

  Alex was already slipping on a pair of sweatpants. I opened the bedside table where I’d stored our weapons and tossed Alex her Glock.

  “Alex comes with us,” I said to my father, disengaging the safety on my pistol. “We’re partners, Dad.”

  I pressed my back to the bedroom wall next to the door and reached out with my senses before spinning around, pivoting, leading with my gun I stepped into the hallway. Nothing.

  “You take point.” I told Alex. “We’ll follow.”

  Alex’s eyes widened in surprise then she smiled. “Got it.”

  My father opened his mouth in what I was certain was going to be a protest, but before he could say a word Alex took off.

  “Trust me,” I whispered to my father before following her lead.

  Alex paused at the end of the hallway before reaching the stairs, holding her weapon in front of her, careful to sweep the area before proceeding. The three of us moved quickly. There were no signs of danger or disturbance in the living room.

  Just as we were about to reach the stairwell to the basement, the door burst open. I didn’t even have time to register what kind of weapon Chase was holding. It had been pointing towards Alex when he came through the door and, apparently, in that split second before recognition, his intent registered as dangerous. I watched as he flew down the staircase, landing solidly on his back. If he hadn’t been a vamp he would have been knocked out cold.

  “Dell—”

  “That was Alex, not me,” I called out, proceeding down the stairs two at a time. “You okay?” I asked Chase, reaching out to him and offering a hand up.

  “What the fuck was that?” he asked.

  “I’ll explain later,” I promised. “What’s happening?”

  Chase gingerly touched a spot on the back of his head. When he pulled away the tips of his fingers were tinged with blood.

  “Someone claiming to be your succubus has arrived. She materialized inside The Vault,” he said.

  “Claiming?”

  “Something’s wrong. Pixel swears it’s her but… You’ll have to see for yourself,” finished Chase.

  “It’s been years since I’ve seen Luna,” said my father as he walked past me heading into his office. We all followed. “But I’d expect she’d look the same. Once Lilan reach their maturity they don’t appear to age.”

  The entrance to The Vault had been left open. I made a mental note to chastise Chase later for that. It was a careless thing to do and not like him at all. But this was a succubus we were about to encounter and succubi had a well-earned reputation for driving men to distraction.

  We hastily made our way down the narrow hallway. Pixel opened the door at the end of the corridor; there was a stricken look on his face. Not the look I’d expected. I’d been in the process of drawing all of my energy inward, preparing for the need to erect a shield. But as soon as I crossed the threshold and moved into the room, I knew that would be unnecessary. I understood Pixel’s reaction and Chase’s alarm.

  “Luna?” gasped my father, his throat sounding constricted.

  “I am sorry for the late hour, Dominie.” The Lilan lowered her eyes, then she pressed her hands together as if in prayer. I watched as she struggled to lower herself to the floor, the liquid-like layers of her gown swallowing her up to the point of almost sweeping her away. Her frayed wings were fluttering frantically in an attempt to keep her on even keel.

  I’d seen this once before. When I’d first started with the PSF, I’d been ca
lled in to help with a touchy situation. We had two succubi assigned to the unit. One was half human, the other, pure Lilan. The Lilan had been captured and imprisoned in Bejing. She knew things, important things. Before she’d joined us, she’d collected rich and powerful men like some women collect shoes. One of them decided that perhaps he could make use of some of the secrets she’d learned through her new position at the Agency. With the help of a mercenary mage the rat bastard had captured her. Unable to escape, to feed, she was starving when I found her. The mage was none other than Basta.

  The night I penetrated his shield and rescued the succubus was the last night that I saw him. I shouldn’t have been surprised that it was Basta. I didn’t want to believe he was capable of such a thing, but deep down I’d known that he was. I’d known for some time. That’s why we’d parted ways.

  My father had hired Basta to do a job and like all of his jobs he’d done it well. He’d been paid an exorbitant sum over a period of twelve years for mentoring me and I’d proven to be an apt student, so apt that he found he couldn’t resist the temptation to teach me more. It was on my eighteenth birthday that he gave me the spell book, that he asked me to come live with him, promising to teach me all that he knew, to give me all his power.

  I joined the Academy.

  Basta went back to selling out to the highest bidder. Damn the consequences.

  Luna swayed and my father reached out to steady her.

  “You’re ill,” he said.

  Alex pulled out the chair that Pixel usually occupied. “Here. Sit.”

  “How long since you’ve fed?” I asked her.

  Luna raised her eyes slowly to meet mine. They were sunken, dulled with a haunted hollowness. There were great big dark circles underneath reddened rims. Her flesh was pallid and dry, her hair thinned, her lips cracked and peeling.

  “It’s been a very long time, vampire,” she answered ignoring Alex’s offer of a chair.

  “Luna, this is my son, Dell,” interjected my father. “And this is Alex. Christian’s daughter. The one—”

  Luna nodded. “Yes. Yes. You look so much like him. But I see your mother in you too. That will please him, no doubt. He loved her very much, you know. Very much,” she said, the last but a whisper.

  I reached for Luna’s hands.

  “Luna? I’m hoping that you can put us in touch with the person that you had cast the spell, the protective spell that was placed on Alex. Can you do that?”

  Luna looked past me to my father. “How is Christian? Is he well? Has he…found another?”

  “No,” replied Dad. “No, he hasn’t. He’ll be here tomorrow. Or should I say later today?”

  Luna closed her eyes. “I must rest then. I must be gone before he arrives. I don’t want him to see me and…remember me this way. May I impose on you for a place to lie down and a glass of wine?”

  “The spell, Luna,” I repeated. “We need to find the person who cast the spell.”

  “Ah, yes. Basta.”

  “That’s impossible!” sputtered my father.

  I wished that I could have agreed with him.

  “Unfortunately, it’s very possible.”

  “No. Luna, you must be mistaken. Basta worked for me for years. He’s known we’ve been looking for Sophie, for Alex. If he knew something…”

  “Basta does no one favors, Dominie,” Luna replied wearily. “But no matter, fortunately it is not Basta that you need,” said Luna wearily. “You only need the sphere. The sphere was meant to be the key. Reunite her with it and the spell will be broken. It was never meant to be permanent.”

  “Reunite me how?” asked Alex.

  Luna’s knees buckled beneath her. I swept her up into my arms. She felt frail and delicate. “Trust in the magic. It will know,” she whispered. Then she lost consciousness.

  “She needs to feed,” I said, thinking out loud.

  “I can make her a sandwich,” offered Alex.

  My father smiled. “Alex, Luna is a succubus, she gets her nourishment from sex.”

  “By the looks of things,” I told him, “it’s been ages since she’s fed. I’ve seen what starvation like this can do in a year’s time. This? She can’t have had anyone for decades. Let’s get her upstairs.”

  “Show’s over,” announced Dad to the staff. Then turning to Chase he asked, “What were you doing down here?”

  “Research,” he replied, trying to suppress a yawn.

  “We all need to get some sleep. You included,” Dad told him, waving his arm out in front so that Alex and I could lead the way, Luna still in my arms.

  We retraced our steps out of The Vault, up the stairs, and through the living room.

  “Where should I put Luna?” I asked my father as we began our assent to the second floor.

  “How about Lily’s room for now? Speaking of Lily, Chase, can you let she and Violet know they can come out of the safe room? Lily’s probably beside herself by now.”

  “Lily got stuck in one of the caves on the island when she was five. She’s been terrified of small spaces ever since,” I explained to Alex, turning sideways so that I could get through the door to Lily’s bedroom. I paused in the threshold and Alex bumped into me.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Looks…different,” I said, moving into the room so that I could place Luna on the bed. “Where’s the collection of stuffed animals?”

  “You’re sister’s eighteen, Dell. She got rid of the stuffed animals a long time ago,” Dad answered while he straightened the sheets on the bed. I placed Luna in the bed and then helped him replace the covers. Our eyes connected and I could see the sadness in his.

  “I’ve never seen this before. She’s dying, isn’t she?” he asked.

  “I’m afraid so,” I acknowledged. “I don’t understand it, there’s no spell surrounding her, she’s not imprisoned. What could be preventing her from feeding?”

  “Conscience,” speculated my mother as she walked into the room. “Chase is with Lily. I had to sedate her. He told me about Luna.”

  I moved out of the way so that my mother could approach the bed. She wrapped her hand around Luna’s wrist, presumably in search of a pulse. “Dell, get my medical bag, will you? It’s in my bedroom closet, just inside the door. Ren, see if you can get Wes on the phone. He’s treated Succubi before.”

  “Conscience?” asked Alex.

  “Succubi are by nature sexual predators. They require sexual energy to survive, just like we require air or water. One of my colleagues, Wesley Atherton, had some similar cases, one that he treated in London and another in San Diego. They were both young, their powers not well controlled. They each ended up inadvertently killing one of their victims—”

  “If you’ve got to die somehow…” I murmured. Alex backhanded me in the stomach and my mother frowned disapprovingly.

  “This isn’t something to joke about, Randell, we’re talking about rape here,” chastised Mom.

  “Mom, that’s just not true. There are plenty of succubi that have partners that are willing, more than willing, wanting. Trust me,” I said. “I know what I’m talking about.” Stupid, I know.

  “You fucked a succubus?” my father asked, sounding incredulous. “Of all the stupid…”

  “I shielded myself.” Even to my own ears it sounded ridiculous.

  Mom shook her head. “Sometimes you just don’t think. What if she decided she liked you and came back for more?”

  “Hard to imagine,” interjected Alex, her hands on her hips. They were ganging up on me.

  “I’ll go get that medical bag now,” I said, backing quickly out of the room.

  I headed down the hallway, preoccupied with the fact that I was probably going to have to explain the whole succubus thing to Alex when the sound of my sister’s voice coming from Chase’s bedroom caught my attention.

  “Please, don’t go. Stay with me,” she begged. “I don’t want to be alone.”

  I paused just outside the open door and looked in
side.

  Lily was lying on her side in Chase’s bed, her hair spilling like a splash of black ink across his stark, white pillow. She was wearing a white cotton nightgown and it had slipped off of her right shoulder revealing it, as well as the top of one ample breast. Their hearts were beating, loudly.

  “You’re not alone. I’m right here. Just close your eyes and go to sleep. You’re safe, Lily,” Chase whispered, smoothing her hair in a comforting gesture.