Incubus Caged

by A. H. Lee

  “Travel,” said Jessica immediately. “I want to see all the kingdoms. After that…I don’t know. My grandmother always liked my work in her fabric shop, and I think if I made myself useful and paid attention, she might leave it to me. But…I’m really not sure. I’ve always sort of wanted kids.”

  “Well, you’ve got time,” said Yuli. “You don’t have to work at all if you’re careful with your allowance from Azrael. Marry someone for love instead of money, and take them traveling with you!”

  Jessica grinned at the idea. But when she thought about it, all she could see was Mal—how fun it would be to drag him all over the world, giving him new experiences, listening to his running footnotes. Stop that, she ordered herself. The only places you will ever go with him are storybooks.

  Her expression must have changed because Yuli reached out and patted her hand. “Jessica…did Azrael offer to send you home?”

  Jessica pursed her lips. She didn’t think she should be talking about this.

  “Do it,” whispered Yuli. “If you can, do it! Get out of here and go start your real life. And…and get away from that man; he’s creepy.”

  Jessica snorted a laugh. You have no idea how creepy I am. “Will you write to me, Yuli? When you open your bookshop? Maybe I’ll visit the islands and see it!”

  Yuli leaned over to hug her. “I would love that!”

  Chapter 38. Last Time

  When Jessica stepped into her bedroom a few days later and found a lovely blue velvet dress and short cape, she picked up the note with a sense of resignation. “Come for dinner. Stay for stargazing.”

  She put on the dress slowly, took some time with her hair and cosmetics, and then spent the few hours before dinner trying to read and merely staring at the pages.

  This is the last time.

  She’d told herself such things before, but her conversation with Yuli had solidified it. Talking about her home and dreams had reminded her of the world outside this gilded cage. She was even a little excited.

  But she was also sad. I am going to miss them so much. Best not to think about that until later.

  Jessica reminded herself that the Shrouded Isle wasn’t going anywhere. Maybe Azrael will let me come back and visit. Maybe I can at least write to them. I’m certainly going to write to Tod and Yuli.

  She sensed that the coming weeks would feel unbearable, but beyond that pain stood a wide, bright future, beckoning. There will be other men, she told herself. Better men.

  But perhaps none quite so amazing. An incubus and a sorcerer. How do you top that? Although it wasn’t as if Azrael had ever been hers. He’d never been anyone’s. Except Mal’s in some strange way.

  You top that with love and kindness, she told herself, and a future that’s real and not just a storybook.

  She wasn’t going to spoil the evening though, and she knocked on their door with every intention of having a splendid time right up until the end. No tears. I’ve cried enough over Mal. And Azrael? If I begin crying over him, I’ll never stop.

  However, to her surprise, Mal answered the door alone, pulling it open with his teeth. He gave her none of his usual friendly licks or libidinous humor. “Something just happened, Jessica. I think the evening may be canceled.”

  “Oh, no! Can I still come in?”

  “I think so. He’s not saying much.”

  She came into the sitting room and made herself comfortable. Mal was bristling and pacing. “Is it the necromancer?” asked Jessica.

  “Yes.” Mal didn’t say anything else, and at last, he hopped onto the couch beside her and stretched out with his head in her lap. Jessica rubbed his ears, wondering.

  A few moments later, Azrael came into the room, wearing his burgundy dressing gown, cinched tight at the waist. He spoke to Mal as though Jessica wasn’t there. “Well, they’ve all gone at once. Not just dark, but silent. Also, every one of my spell traps.”

  “Which means,” said Mal, “that he probably has enough people for an army.”

  “It means,” growled Azrael, “that I shouldn’t have let myself be lulled into a false sense of security.”

  Mal raised his head from Jessica’s lap. “Tripping everything at once, though… He’s taunting you.”

  Azrael opened a cabinet and began rifling through drawers. “Well, I hope he wanted to see me because he’s about to get his wish.” Azrael was pulling out objects that Jessica had come to associate with magic—vials and folded bits of colored paper, little jars of sand, and woven charms of thread and bone. Azrael stood up with his hands full and seemed to notice Jessica for the first time. “Oh, Jessica, I’m sorry. This has turned into quite a different evening.”

  “It’s alright, my lord,” she said, although she was disappointed. But maybe it’s better this way. A wonderful evening would have made everything harder.

  “Can she at least visit with me?” asked Mal. “I assume you’re not taking me in there.”

  Azrael looked thoroughly distracted. “Yes. I mean…if Jessica really wants to sit around at the foot of the tower. I don’t want you wandering off.”

  Jessica considered. Back where we started. “I would like that, my lord.”

  Azrael finished assembling his supplies and put them into the pockets of a long coat. He emerged from his bedroom in what looked like clothes for trekking through the jungle. I didn’t even know he owned anything like that!

  He smiled apologetically at her expression. “This could get messy. It doesn’t really matter what you wear in the Shadow Lands, but I might as well start off feeling prepared.”

  They left his apartments by way of the secret passage into the library. It was still a little before dinnertime. “I’ve ordered you a picnic,” he said as they reached the tower clearing. “It should arrive in an hour or two.”

  “What about you?” asked Jessica.

  “I’ll probably be back by then. That, or the bear will have shredded me, and Mal will have scampered off to the astral plane. In that case, it has been a pleasure getting to know you, and the provisions in my will should take care of the rest.” He spoke so carelessly that Jessica couldn’t tell whether he was joking.

  Mal didn’t say anything. He watched Azrael disappear into the tower and then paced around the clearing until the illusory river tumbled in all its strange, sinister glory from the tower entrance. Jessica watched as it wound away through the books.

  “What makes the river, Mal?”

  “Hmm?” She had never seen him quite this preoccupied.

  “When Azrael is doing magic in the tower, why does it make a river?”

  Mal blinked. “Oh, it’s not just any magic, only one specific kind.” He peered at Jessica. “You really don’t know?”

  “Should I?”

  Mal gave a flick of his tail as though to say, Isn’t it obvious? “It’s the river between the worlds,” he explained. “Where it runs through Faerie, they call it the Lethe. Where it runs through Death, they call it the Styx.”

  Chapter 39. Into the River

  “Death?” Jessica was taken aback.

  “Death,” repeated Mal. “Well, technically the Shadow Lands. Nobody living can go into Death, but magicians with more skill than sense can get into the place between. Physicians do it sometimes to try to turn back the dying. It’s dangerous, of course; they can get sucked down with their patients. Necromancers use the Shadow Lands to keep bodies animate. Completely dead people can’t move around.”

  Jessica thought about those times when she’d walked in the river in order to find Azrael’s tower and shivered.

  “So it only runs when he’s trying to get into the Shadow Lands,” continued Mal, “or possibly Faerie. The echo of the river is harmless out in the reading room, but it gets stronger and more dangerous the closer you get to the source of the spell.”

  Jessica began to understand Azrael’s gravity. “What did he mean about everything going at once?”

  “He put tracer charms in Solarian villages where there has been sus
picious activity. They were supposed to alert him to the presence of death magic. None of them have so much as flickered since he set them…and then, about an hour ago, all of them went at once. They didn’t just trigger. They were extinguished on the other end by someone using powerful magic. I’m guessing a lot of souls from Solaria are headed down the river just now. Their king already thinks that Aspiria is funding a necromancer for the separatists, and he may see this situation as an act of war. If the two countries attack each other, that’ll just add to the available corpses.”

  Jessica thought of Azrael’s words from what seemed a lifetime ago: “If a corpse army comes marching out of those hills, your home could be in danger, too.”

  Fear coiled in her chest. “Can he fix it?”

  Mal flicked his tail. “Maybe. If he can kill the necromancer, he can at least stop the problem from getting worse. He might even be able to turn the dying souls back. It just depends on how all this is being done. There aren’t many people who could snuff out his charms like that. It’s perplexing.”

  Jessica realized that Mal was annoyed on his own account. Azrael uses Mal’s magic. He can do things with it that Mal can’t. If Azrael is the artist, Mal is the paint. But it’s still Mal’s magic.

  “Why doesn’t he take you with him?”

  “The Shadow Lands are closer to the astral plane.” Mal did not seem inclined to elaborate. He stopped pacing at last and stretched out beside her. For once, he made no attempt to initiate sex.

  Jessica considered trying to tell him that this evening was good-bye, but it didn’t seem like the right time. They sat watching the river until a librarian strolled out of the stacks with a picnic basket.

  Azrael thought he’d be back by now. He wasn’t.

  Jessica felt too anxious to eat, but Mal consumed half a roast chicken as though he were a tiger at the zoo and at last Jessica bit into an apple and then made herself a sandwich. They were halfway through their meal when Mal’s head jerked up, and he cocked his ears as though listening. “He’s calling me.” Mal spoke with a strange, soft reverence.

  Jessica got to her feet, remembering the carnage at the top of the tower last time and anticipating all those stairs. “No…” breathed Mal. “Not up the tower.”

  Jessica looked at him in confusion. Mal turned towards the river with a gleam in his luminous eyes. He looked back at her—dark and beautiful and full of secrets. “Come with me?”

  Jessica stared at him. “Into the river?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you think I can help?”

  “Maybe.”

  She didn’t quite like the way he was acting, but she also couldn’t imagine walking away right now. If Azrael needs my help defending my home from a corpse army, I will do everything in my power.

  “Show me the way,” said Jessica.

  Chapter 40. Shadow Lands

  Mal felt dizzy with excitement. This is really happening.

  Azrael had called him into the Shadow Lands—into a place as close to the astral plane as a living person could travel, where Mal’s magic was stronger and Azrael’s hold on him was weaker.

  Mal didn’t think it would be enough, though, without Jessica. He didn’t dare beg her to come. If he said “please,” if he let her see how excited he felt, she might become suspicious. So he asked as though it wasn’t so important, as though his heart wasn’t in his throat. He watched her think about it, her decision hanging in the air, balanced on a knife edge. When she nodded, he tamped down the triumph coursing through his body and simply led her into the river.

  It was easy to cross with Azrael calling him, like floating downstream. Jessica’s hand clamped tightly in the fur of his neck as the world inverted around them. One moment they were standing in Azrael’s library, looking at the forest reflected in the river. Next moment, they were standing in the forest, looking at a reflection of the library that soon dissolved in the rushing water.

  “Oh,” gasped Jessica. She snatched up her dress to prevent it from getting soaked, but she needn’t have worried. The water of the Styx was not wet. It looked like normal water, but it felt like sand running over their legs—dry as old bones. The forest loomed around them—twilight, always twilight here.

  “This is the Shadow Lands?” whispered Jessica.

  The forest seemed made for whispering and even Mal spoke in a low voice, “This is near the border of Faerie, but yes. There are things lurking here that we don’t want to wake. Best to hurry.”

  “Is Azrael in trouble?” asked Jessica as they waded out of the sand-whispering river and began walking quickly along the bank.

  “He wouldn’t have called me here if he wasn’t,” said Mal. “Although he doesn’t seem desperate.”

  “I shouldn’t have come,” whispered Jessica. “You would be faster without me.”

  “We’ve got time,” said Mal. He repeated this to himself as they walked. I’ve got time. I’ve got time. I’ve been patient for twenty-three years. I can be patient a few moments longer.

  Each time Jessica touched him, he felt a thrill of anticipation. Her touch gave Mal a way to close the channel that gave Azrael access to his power—Mal’s invisible leash. On the mortal plane, this closure was not complete. Mal could lengthen his leash, but he couldn’t break it. In the Shadow Lands, however, where both he and Jessica were stronger, Mal was sure he could do just that for as long as he and Jessica were touching.

  What was more, because Azrael’s blood was in his collar, because Azrael used it as a focus, some of Azrael’s sorcerous magic would linger on Mal’s side of the connection. Mal wasn’t certain what this would do. He’d never been able to find a grimoire that described such a situation. However, he strongly suspected that he would be, for one glorious moment, a demon who could use human magic.

  You’ve been using my power for years, Boss. Now I’m going to use yours. Mal knew the spell to unlock his collar, and with access to Azrael’s magic, he could cast it.

  I could do it right now! The thought was dizzying. Mal held himself in check, however. I’m not going to abandon Jessica in the Shadow Lands. I need to see what Azrael has gotten himself into and make sure she’s going to get back alright.

  And are you going to eat him? Mal had avoided thinking about that part. His instincts screamed that this would be intensely satisfying—to take back as much of his magic as possible, incorporate Azrael into his own essence and return, sated, to his entity.

  Another part of him shrank from the idea. I told Jessica I wouldn’t eat him if she helped. Am I still bound by that oath if she’s helping by accident?

  Maybe I won’t eat him.

  Oh, but I will. When I’m unbound, and he’s right there in front of me, I will.

  No, I won’t. It would make Jessica sad. And besides…besides…

  Mal shook his ears. He was not accustomed to feeling conflicted. This is freedom, he realized. This is what making a choice feels like. And I get to do it. The choice is mine…because I will be free!

  Jessica jumped as something stumbled out of the trees beside them. It was wraith-like, though more solid under the deep shadows of the branches—a young boy. “It’s alright,” whispered Mal to Jessica. “Just keep walking.”

  The ghost’s eyes drifted over them, seemed to flash for a moment, and then focused on the river. The boy came forward eagerly and plunged into the current. He dissolved as the water touched him, becoming a silver flicker like a fish.

  “They’re drawn to the river,” Mal explained. “The ghosts will sometimes attack living things, especially if the ghost died violently and arrives full of anger and pain. But if we stay near the river, they’ll go for it instead of us.”

  Jessica was looking at the water more closely. Mal was sure she’d begun to notice other silver, twisting streaks beneath the surface, swimming downstream. A few were fighting the current, in most cases uselessly. “Are all of those dead souls?”

  “Dead or dying,” said Mal.

  Far off among the twi
light of the trees, something howled. Jessica walked a little faster. “How much further to Azrael?”

  “We’re getting close.” Mal’s pulse beat hard against his skin. So close to freedom.

  The ground became uneven, the river descending in a series of jagged falls. Jessica and Mal made their way down the bank beside it, Jessica trying to keep her blue dress from catching on the branches of the trees. Her boots, at least, were good for walking.

  At last, Mal peered over the edge of a fall about the height of an average building and saw a pool below. He could tell at once that the pool was unnatural. Something had dug away at the swift, smooth course of the river to create this spot where the water eddied. At the center of the pool, a vortex twisted into a deep funnel. Souls were churning in the vortex, turning it silver with their flickering bodies.

  This is how the necromancer is trapping them.

  Other souls had come out of the woods nearby as though fascinated. They were gathered around the edges of the pool, clearly afraid to actually get into the water near the vortex, but unable to take their eyes off it.

  Jessica’s hand in Mal’s fur tightened. “Mal…” He looked where she pointed and finally saw Azrael. His master had somehow gotten himself stuck in quicksand on the edge of the pool. He had sunk to mid-thigh, but wasn’t making any effort to extricate himself, as he was surrounded by ghosts. Mal could tell he’d cast some kind of illusion charm on himself so that they wouldn’t notice him. It would break if he moved too much.

  “Need some help?” called Mal, his voice low, but carrying.

  Azrael’s eyes snapped up with a look that was equal parts relief and tension. “Mal. Don’t come any closer. It’s a trap.”

  At the same time, he drew so much power from the collar that Mal staggered. Azrael barked a spell that was all tearing and painful clarity, a spell to break illusions. The ghosts around him scattered in alarm and then returned in a wave, some of them growing fangs and claws. But Azrael had clearly been busy while he was buried in mud, and the ghosts came up against a salt circle. He dragged himself out of the quicksand in the center of it, the ground around him going hard as ice, spreading in hairline cracks. He drew from his pocket one of those glowing balls and flung it at a ghost on the other side of the pool.