Chapter 63: Lydia learns more of Alex...

Frustratingly, Daniel had no idea where his charge's son was. He could see the mother just fine -- he was her guardian after all, and had been since she was born -- but he had no clairvoyant connection with her son. He'd always had a problem with that. Especially with the son's original guardian angel being so...timid. Daniel had always been of a mind that guardian angels should split their attentions among a single family, not disparate individuals based solely on geographic proximity. Unfortunately, Daniel's concerns didn't really equate to actual change.

When the succubus showed up in his charge's home, Daniel couldn't really intervene. His charge was at no mortal or spiritual risk. It was objectionable, certainly -- certainly! But it was beyond Daniel's ability to intervene. He knew of only one angel who could take direct action because of her unique handicap. She was also very much a part of the situation. But he didn't know where to find her or her charge. As such, he had to ask around a bit. It took a while to track her down.

He finally found Rachel perched on the balcony rail near the top floor of a high-rise hotel overlooking Elliott Bay sometime before sunset. She sat in the drizzle and the cold wind watching the inside of the hotel room intently. She held a partially-empty bottle of Evan Williams bourbon in one hand. Daniel flew up to her, opening his mouth to speak, but Rachel just held up her hand.

"Don't even wanna fuckin' hear it," she said without the slightest change in her gaze toward the hotel room.

Daniel's eyes flared. He thought about saying something to that, and about the blatantly lewd grin on her face, and about a dozen other improper things. Before the comment got out of his mouth, Rachel's hand shifted from an open palm of "halt" to an upturned middle finger.

Daniel flew off in a huff.

Rachel took another long pull off her bottle. "Fuckin' prude," she grunted.

************

"I think you're trying to convince me not to fool around with other guys," Taylor said suspiciously.

"How's that?"

"Oh please. Like anyone else is going to hand-feed me room service lobster?" Even as she spoke, reclined against the side of the whirlpool bath, Alex brought another butter-dipped morsel to her mouth. She kept a smoldering stare at his eyes as she leaned forward, accepting his offer with as suggestive a bite as she could manage.

"Honestly, I always imagined taking you out to dinner before getting you in bed," Alex grinned. "Mmm. Romantic. What a gentleman," Taylor grinned back.

"I certainly hope I am," he shrugged.

"You are. You always were. You don't have to prove anything else to me. On with the decadence and the naughty fun." She took another bite of the offered fork.

"As long as you know I respect you," Alex smirked. He meant it as a bit of a joke. It wasn't as if he still needed to establish anything on those lines.

Just the same, Taylor's eyes narrowed mischievously as she chewed and swallowed. "Stand up," she demanded. Alex blinked, but complied, rising to his feet in the center of the whirlpool bath. He watched Taylor as she took his ever-erect cock in her hand. Her eyes were on his. "This is how sure I am you respect me," she said just before the head and a good deal of his shaft disappeared into her mouth.

"Oh my god," Alex grunted. Taylor had one hand on his ass, pulling him close while she worked his cock with her other hand and her mouth. Alex's right hand fell to her shoulder. The left gently rested against the side of her head.

She pulled off of his cock for only a moment. "That shocked look on your face is half the reason this is so much fun," she grinned. Taylor's mouth sank back onto his dick. She kept looking up at him adoringly as she pleasured him.

His shock faded. Alex remained standing there for her, accepting what she gave without any further words. After a few minutes of Taylor's steady yet eager blowjob, his body was alive with pleasure. Taylor kept staring up at him, a smile in her eyes as his breathing became shaky. She never slackened, even as he began to gasp and his eyes fluttered and he was clearly past the point of no return.

Taylor's mouth was on him when he began to cum. She didn't pull away immediately, still staring up at him, but before he was done her lips pulled away. Her eyes didn't. She looked up at him lustily as white streams struck her shapely chest and neck. As his climax abated, Taylor turned his cock upward again to drag her tongue fondly along its length and head.

"Wow," Alex breathed.

"When I said I want to get a little crazy and dirty, I meant mainly with you," she winked. She made sure he had a very good look at her before her lips enveloped his cock for a second round.

Eventually, he heard the door to the suite shut far behind him. He didn't turn back, his eyes still on his lovely and very intimate friend, who herself didn't let the entrance distract her from her activity. They heard the rustle of Lorelei's dress as it fell to the floor. Heard her step into the whirlpool bath directly behind Alex. They were both very much aware of her presence as she slowly, gently embraced him from behind.

Taylor kept sucking Alex's cock. His pleasure built upon itself. Eventually his eyes fluttered closed and his head tilted back against Lorelei's shoulder behind him.

"Master," Lorelei said in a shaky whisper, "if it pleases you, your slave desperately needs to be ravished tonight. Thoroughly and without mercy."

Taylor stopped long enough to ask, "Can you wait a little on that?"

"For this, yes," Lorelei murmured. "Take your time."

************

"The truth is that this city and its environs are lousy with supernaturals," said the suited man with the perfectly trimmed white goatee. "Werewolves in the rural areas. Plenty of legitimately haunted sites. At least half a dozen different Practices within the city alone...my own group is trying to bring some organization to that, but I'm sure you know how occultists can be. And of course there are all the vampires," he added with a bit of a roll of the eyes. The distinguished gentleman sat back in his plush chair, putting on airs of comfort and security. Behind that great oaken desk, with a bodyguard at either side -- one of them small and serene, the other stocky and solemn -- he probably felt quite secure indeed.

Being a sorcerer, Stefan also likely knew warding magicks. If he did not, surely an associate did. Otherwise, he'd have been on his knees by now sniffing at Lydia's hand and begging for her affections.

She sat in a chair directly across from his in the sorcerer's office overlooking Elliott Bay. To an untrained, unfamiliar eye, the room would seem to be a fairly predictable if tasteful corporate executive's office.

Lydia, however, could sense the wards and could spot the telltale signs of superstitious protections from spirits and faeries, all of them applied with knowledge and understanding.

He was protected from her most potent abilities. That was what made dealing with his kind so frustrating. But he was still a man, and Lydia didn't miss his occasional glance toward the cleavage revealed by her emerald jacket and the long, shapely legs that came out from under her short matching silk skirt. Nor did he seem to mind her smile at all.

"I imagine it gets a bit tiresome," she conceded. "In most cities it isn't so hard for everyone avoid one another."

"No, indeed it normally isn't," Stefan nodded. "This city is deceptively small, though. Oddly crowded. We tend to bump into one another before long. Though I confess, one such as yourself is quite the exceptional and unique encounter."

"One such as I," Lydia smiled with some amusement. "I thought the Brotherhood of Apollo considered an 'encounter' with 'one such as I' to be both a rite of passage and a test of willpower. A summoning and a night's pleasure to test one's emotional fortitude, isn't it? The strong master their desires, the weak fall to the temptations of demonic flesh?"

Stefan inclined his head in a conciliatory nod. "I won't deny what is plainly known to the both of us."

"And how many such exceptional and unique encounters have you had, Stefan?" Lydia teased.

He paused, looking at her evenly. "A few."

"I'll let you in on a little secret, since you've been so cordial and kind," the blonde told him. "There are playthings from the Pit, and then there are succubi. The differences are quite unforgettable."

Stefan was quiet again for a moment, but eventually he nodded. "I'll take that under consideration," he said. "Truly, it's a shame that you couldn't have come to me first with your concerns. But it's certainly understandable how things turned out. And Lady Anastacia's faction is, admittedly, the most prominent in the city."

"Bringing the rest of the natives to heel, is she?"

"We've worked out some arrangements," Stefan shrugged. "Of late she has tried to create a more formalized governance beyond her own kind. Naturally I hesitate to concede anything too soon. You yourself present quite the wild card in all of this."

Lydia's smile became a bit tighter. "I have made my offer to the corpses. I will honor it should they fulfill the requirements I set. But I offered no exclusivity in the bargain. I care not how your local power struggles play out. I am concerned with my own matters. Provide what I seek and you, too, will hold my favor."

Her offer had plenty of layers of meaning. Stefan was certainly erudite enough to catch them all. He was collected enough not to show visible excitement, but as Lydia hoped, he was eager to get ahead of the vampires in currying her good will.

"This young man you seek is not one of the Practitioners we have identified," Stefan began, "and certainly not anyone directly affiliated with us. Nor can I speak directly to the activities of the woman you seek, but after some consultations we have reason to believe that she is likely a succubus like yourself." Stefan smiled at Lydia's arched eyebrow. "We haven't shared that suspicion with Lady Anastacia's people yet. It's barely past sunset after all, and our consultations took some time. Still, I don't think I'm giving away any great secret when I say that our actual knowledge regarding your kind is rather limited...

"...except in one case, but he has recently perished." Lydia inclined her head attentively. "Go on."

"As you say, there is a great difference between random demonic playthings and succubi. We of the Brotherhood of Apollo know better than to plumb too deeply in our dealings with the Pit. There was one local Brother, though, who took a rather obsessive interest in such things. He had mastered the task of summonings and conjurations for pleasure, but his appetites were never fully sated. He always wanted more. After a great deal of research and experimentation, he believed he was on his way to creating a ritual that would establish a permanent hold over such companions as one might find in said summoning. He talked about it quietly, made proposals and requests for support and funding. Our council decided to indulge him largely out of intellectual curiosity, but only up to a point. It became clear that this Brother had let his lusts get the better of him. We had to let him go."

Stefan sighed sadly, "What followed was a typically megalomaniac's rant. He would continue on, he would show us all. This was nearly three years ago. We kept an eye on him, of course, for our own protection. From time to time we saw evidence that he was continuing is research."

"Then last week, he died along with two known associates in a sudden conflagration. We had no direct observation on hand, but there were spirits of the restless dead in the vicinity. The area was thoroughly warded, and thus they could only observe from afar. A couple of them described a young man matching the description you have provided in the immediate area moments before this former Brother's death."

Lydia said nothing, merely encouraging Stefan to continue with a pleased and interested smile. "We have made some investigation, though admittedly not much. It seemed obvious to us initially that this former Brother had simply summoned something beyond his control and paid the natural price for overreaching. But then we received word of your search from Lady Anastacia. A curiously ordinary young man, a woman whom we now know is likely a succubus like yourself..."

"It is a rather curious connection," Lydia nodded. "Would you be willing to tell me all the details?"

"I would," Stefan said, "and I would be willing to work with you further on resolving whatever concerns you have."

"What would you want in exchange?"

"A few things. A pact of non-aggression between the Brotherhood and yourself and whatever demonic faction you may represent. Secondly, as I said, the Brotherhood always maintains its intellectual curiosity. We wish to know what happened to our fallen former Brother, and we wish to know how far he had gotten in his work. Moreover, we wish to know where he went wrong. I realize this might seem presumptuous, given what he was attempting. I won't deny that if he was truly onto something we will likely pursue it. However, I would be more than willing to undertake a binding oath to reassure you that any such knowledge would not be used against you or anyone you might name."

Lydia's smile became genuinely appreciative. "I was about to laugh, but your caveats and concessions are interesting. And amusing. You are correct in that I would not be interested in helping you learn how to summon me."

"Of course," Stefan nodded. "But it is not as hard to ensure exclusions within a ritual as one might expect. It is simply a matter of providing the proper names for invocations." He flashed a friendly, cordial smile. "These are clearly very dangerous waters. We have no wish to make enemies."

"Indeed not. Your offer interests me. Stefan, I realize that this room bears numerous wards, but in order to pursue your proposal further I will require a brief consultation of my own. The telephone simply won't do. Would it be possible to open one of these windows momentarily?"

Stefan considered it for a long moment. "I suppose a momentary breach would not be so great a concession," he mused. Stefan then nodded to the bodyguard on his left. Obediently, he moved to the tall window. He tugged the latches open and pushed on the glass. Cold, damp air blew in, not so much as to create a great wind but certainly enough to get everyone's attention.

For a moment, nothing happened. Stefan waited patiently for whatever little homunculus or other servitor might come flying through the window. Lydia, too, waited patiently.

The huge, taloned, bone-white hand -- if one could call it that -- which slapped down on the next pane of glass up from the open window startled all three men in the room. The hand was attached to a similarly bone-white arm that descended from above. Another reached down past it, gripping the window.

What followed was a monstrosity the likes of which Stefan and certainly his bodyguards had never seen. It swiftly crawled along the glass, impossibly clinging like a spider to the windows as it descended. Twice the mass of a man yet spread out into long, bony limbs, the thing twisted and wrenched itself under the open window, shoving it further open to make room for its oblong, stretched-out white head. Four glaring red eyes gazed out at Stefan and Lydia from the front of its strange horned skull. Its arms and then shoulders followed, one and then the other, before it finally pulled itself through the window.

Each of its digits ended in a vicious talon. It had a long white tail that whipped around like a cat's, also ending in a set of nasty spikes. There were wings there, too, Stefan realized, but it was all just thin, chalky flesh hanging from folded, seemingly crumbling bones.

The thing crouched at Lydia's side, still five feet tall at the shoulders despite the way it more or less folded its torso down to meet its squatting legs. It looked to Stefan and his bodyguards, who were nervously reaching for concealed weapons, as if it were about to pounce. Instead, the thing reached out with one very long arm to close the window.

"There have been angels in the skies," it said in something akin to the echo of a roar. The demonic beings speech gave Stefan a moment to see its mouth, which was naturally filled with row upon row of gleaming black teeth shaped much like a shark. Its eyes narrowed in something that seemed rather like a frown. "One of them very strange. Best not to be careless. We wouldn't want them eavesdropping."

"Stefan," Lydia smiled, "meet Harrow."