Lilith's Children

by Rachel Sullivan

  “Do you know if she’s still alive, my mother?” I asked, still staring at the tree, deep in thought. In that moment it occurred to me that I’d had two differing sides when it came to hope that my mother lived. One side couldn’t wait to find her, rescue her, and make up for lost time. The other side hoped she wasn’t still alive, hoped she hadn’t gone through years of being a ward of the Hunters. This is why I often reigned in my thoughts when they skirted the territory of dreaming of her rescue, why I tried to shift them to more realistic matters like getting Shawna, and now helping the succubi.

  “I do know,” Drosera said.

  A rustle of movement sounded from the side of the house and Drosera jerked her head to study the area again. “When Anwen arrives, be sure to tell her that I will be back.” The rusalka disappeared into thin air as she finished the last word.

  I gasped and jumped back, studying my surroundings to see how the hell the rusalka played a trick of the eye so well.

  A male ran to the railing of the elevated porch that wrapped around the side and back of the house, and called down to me. “You okay?”

  I lifted my eyes to his, to Aleksander’s. His disheveled hair hung forward as he gazed down at me. Apparently my lack of an answer concerned him because he jumped over the rail and landed on the soft dirt below with a quickness. When his shoes hit the grass all six-plus feet of him rushed to my protection.

  Aleksander stopped short a foot away from me and turned in each direction, searching for the culprit. He paused and looked back to me, standing beneath the hazy glow of the front porch light. “I felt an unknown energy and heard you gasp. But, there’s no one here,” he said in that accent of his, a little disappointed and a lot confused.

  “Except for you,” I countered. “Why are you here?”

  The warmth and protection in his eyes disappeared. He crossed his arms and flashed a slightly mischievous smile. “Why, to protect you, of course,” he said as though he spoke a commonly understood fact.

  I put my hand out in front of me. “So let me get this straight,” I started. “You’re a pacifist who refuses to help me get your…cousins…back from the Hunters, and yet you are here to protect me? How? From who?”

  Aleksander side-eyed the steps and exhaled. He dropped his flirtatious sing-song way of speaking and leveled with me. “Look, this isn’t my idea of a good time either,” he said, his voice slightly deeper now.

  “Then go home. Why are you here?” I asked for the second time in a handful of minutes. I shifted my balance and waited.

  “I’ve been guarding the house tonight from a lounge chair on the side deck. Can we talk somewhere more private?” he asked, motioning for me to go before him, onto the first step.

  My initial response was a hard no, but logic told me to listen to what the incubus had to say. I decided not to go much deeper in my soul-searching as to why I took that first step and then climbed the stairs ahead of him. Halfway to the living room, I wondered if he was enjoying the view, and turned to ask him as much, as a way of letting him know I knew all about his kind. But what I saw was not a male ogling my ass, rather an incubus gazing ahead of us, deep in thought. I’d be lying if I said his lack of ogling didn’t pee on my ice cream a little.

  Who likes to be wrong about people?

  No one.

  I didn’t like that he closed the front door behind him. He strode past me to sit on the living room couch.

  “Please,” he said, patting the cushion beside him.

  I ran a hand through my hair, figured what the hell, and joined him. We sat awkwardly searching one another for a few breaths before he started the conversation.

  “I can imagine being here, alone, with me, is not the most comfortable scenario for you right now, and so I want you to know that I appreciate your allowing me to come here,” he said. His eyes smiled and I knew he meant what he said.

  I gave a nod.

  He leaned into the corner of the couch, facing me.

  “Incubi are a walking contradiction,” he explained. He paused before continuing and I sensed hesitation, maybe even nervousness. “We deal in matters of energy and excel in sexual energy. Social norms have no bearing as to whom we share our sexual energy with. Yet, when we lock onto our life mate, there is no key to unlock the intense need we have to protect and adore them, to receive the same from them in return.”

  I looked up at the ceiling fan in thought. A whole galere of succubi were currently being detained at a Hunter’s complex. The mermaids were unwilling to come to our aid because their shoal was tearing apart at the seams. Wild Women I’d never met, kinds I didn’t even know existed twenty-four hours ago, were on their way to maybe help or maybe complicate matters more. I just found out that only non-menstruating Wilds had a chance at saving the succubi, which cuts our already limited ranks to barely anything. And this incubus wanted me to make his feelings for me a priority in my tornado of a world?

  I itched my eyebrow as though any movement was a replacement for words.

  Fuck it.

  I leveled a gaze at the muscular incubus sitting inches from me. “Marcus, my boyfriend, already explained this to me,” I said.

  Had I actually ever determined Marcus was my boyfriend? I couldn’t be sure. But there it was, out in the open, between the incubus and me.

  I leaned back, done playing mind games and easing out information that clearly refused to budge. “Look, I’m going to be honest. For all of maybe an hour, I considered pretending to have a thing for you so that you’d help us.” I looked him in the eye. “It wasn’t my idea and I’m embarrassed that I’d even considering leading someone on, so for that, I’m sorry. But since we’re laying our cards on the table, I should tell you that I don’t feel that way toward you. I admit it’d probably be easier on me if I did, but I don’t.”

  His expression didn’t change even a fraction. He sat there, relaxed, confidently leaning back like he owned the place. Don’t ask me how I could tell he was confident. It just poured from him and not always in that cocky way either.

  “Well,” Aleksander said, inhaling deeply, “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  He stood and stretched before making his way to the back sliding glass door. He didn’t invite me to join him, but he didn’t close the door behind him either. The wooden slats beneath him creaked from his weight.

  “So, are we done then?” I asked, my confusion with this male growing by the second.

  “Done or just begun, the ball’s in your court,” he responded from the deck.

  I stood and started toward the hallway to my room where Marcus slept. I paused again, thoroughly confused when Alek didn’t ask me to join him or say goodbye.

  “Aleksander?”

  “Yes?”

  “If you heard and respect what I told you, why are you still staying the night out on the deck?” I asked.

  He gave one deep chuckle. “In every aspect of my life I have freewill. Except for this one,” he answered. “According to my heart, mind, and body, you’re my life mate. I’m not stupid enough to fight it; stronger incubi have gone mad trying such a feat. Please don’t take this as offensive or me not respecting your wishes, because believe me, I can’t help but care deeply for you and I want whatever will make you happy, which I realize isn’t me. But I’ve locked onto you.” He sighed. “I deal in energy, remember? And your energy is that of my life mate. Where my mate’s energy goes, so do I.”

  A thought occurred to me. “If that’s the case then why isn’t your young incubus at the Oregon Hunter complex trying to get his succubus girlfriend back?” I asked.

  Aleksander shifted his weight, still holding the door handle. “He is probably trying as we speak. He’s younger, so the necessity to be near her once she left took longer to begin. We’ve had to lock him in a cell and keep five incubi guarding him at all times.”

  I willed my brows to unfurrow. “It’s that intense?”

  The incubi leader nodded and scratched the hint of stubble along his jaw. F
or the first time since I’d met him, he looked weary. It seemed he really couldn’t help being here. He wanted to be back with his hoard.

  “If I fought the Hunters, would you join me too, seeing as you’re compelled to be near me?” I asked.

  In folklore humans are taught that succubi and incubi compel them, bend the human’s will to fit the creature’s wants and desires. Hell, that’s what the Hunters taught us huldra. But in reality, the succubi and incubi were the ones being compelled, the ones forced to absorb the whims of others.

  Aleksander’s shoulders slumped a little, which was a lot for his confident stature. “I would,” he said. “Which would put the men I lead in great danger, not to mention intense turmoil over deciding whether or not to follow me or follow our old ways. I imagine it will ruin our hoard.”

  I leaned on the edge of the corner of the hall wall. We could really use the help of Aleksander and his hoard, but not at such a high cost as knowingly destroying familial bonds. If I couldn’t fathom someone doing that to my coterie, I wouldn’t fathom doing that to someone else, especially a group innocent in all of this. “What can I do to break this mate lock thing?” I said. I thought to offer a harpy replacement, but since I hadn’t clearly gotten the okay from Eonza to share her plan of seducing him, I decided to keep that to myself.

  Aleksander’s heavy lids opened and his gaze pierced my own. “Either change your mind about me, or let me change your Hunter.”

  My answer flowed from my lips in one decisive move. “If I agree to consider those two options would you be honest about what all they entail?” I said.

  “What do you want to know?” he asked. He made his way to the couch again, closing the glass door.

  “Everything,” I answered. “I want to know everything.”

  Twenty-Five

  I woke in Marcus’s arms after a fitful night of incubi dreams. Marcus couldn’t have known the process of being changed to an incubus. He couldn’t have, or else he wouldn’t be entertaining the idea.

  His broad chest rose and fell in even breaths as I twisted my body to study his peaceful face. I couldn’t imagine him agreeing to the process of becoming an incubus, a sexual ritual to transfer a key component of Aleksander’s energy, the part that made him immortal and powerful, to Marcus. Last night Aleksander had assured me that he was only able to create other incubi at such a rate as he created them because of his long time spent as an incubus himself—his experience as an incubus grew so much that he had enough energy to share to create new brothers. Normally, he’d told me, an incubus can change one man in his lifetime, maybe two. But this could be because traditionally incubi didn’t tend to travel in groups; to travel to new areas with other incubi meant fewer lovers for each and sharing wasn’t typically their style. Neither was celibacy. So changing one or two men helped to keep the species going without overpopulation.

  Aleksander saw it differently. He believed the humans were increasing in population, so why shouldn’t the incubi? And being the first incubus to create a hoard gave him a safety net, in case the incubi followed in the footsteps of other supernaturals—created groups and then warred to extinction with other, more powerful groups. Aleksander didn’t see his kind as dominant or territorial, but they also weren’t the types to roll over and show their bellies either. They wouldn’t go looking for a fight, but if one was brought to them, one that jeopardized their brotherhood, Aleksander wished to be prepared.

  Shockingly, I respected him more once we parted ways last night, once I’d learned everything there was to know about being a life mate to an incubus as well as the process of changing a man into an incubus. Doesn’t mean I wanted any part of either. And yet, to hold up my end of the bargain, I lay beside my Hunter of a man, considering both avenues, racking my brain for a third, hidden option. I imagined him being turned and the feeling of jealousy, a feeling I hadn’t much felt before, swelled within me. Ultimately, it was Marcus’s decision to be turned or not. But if he decided to go ahead with it, I’d want to be the female vessel that the ritual called for when turning a straight male.

  Aleksander assured me that the female benefited greatly from the exchange of incubi energy in the turning ritual between two straight men. Most came away having achieved what perfect bliss feels like and are placed on which life path, which changes they need to make, to achieve their own personal blissful fulfilment. Not that I was questioning my purpose or anything. I only questioned their method, why it sounded like the woman was being used…yet again…for man’s gain. Knowing the woman gained as well and was in full knowledge of what she was contributing to, helped to keep me from making the incubi my second worst enemies, right behind the Hunters.

  “What are you thinking about?” Marcus asked, stirring beside me. He cracked an eye open and turned on his side to pull me into a horizontal hug.

  My cheek nestled between his bare pecs and I breathed in his clean, masculine scent, like soap and faint traces of crisp cologne. I exhaled. “I learned a lot last night and I’m processing it all,” I said.

  Marcus yawned and his chest expanded enough to push me backwards on the bed. He pulled me to him again and I gladly accepted the nearness. “Was it a dream?”

  “No, more like a rusalka waking me in my mind and then waiting for me out front, and then an incubi leader lurking on the side porch to add another layer of knotted intel for me to work through,” I explained. Really though, despite the fact that they decided to impart this information in the middle of the night and pull me out of bed for it, I was grateful.

  Marcus released me from his hold and sat up. “Why is Aleksander here?”

  I pulled myself to an upright sitting position and faced him. “Because I’m his apparent life mate.”

  Marcus flexed his jaw. “He’s pushing it,” he nearly growled.

  I thought to remind him of Aleksander’s insistence that he can’t help his need to protect me, but I’d just be telling Marcus what he already knew. So I got to the point instead. “If you decide to be changed, I want to be the woman used for the energy exchange. I know it’s immature and territorial, but I just can’t see you with another woman—even if it’s strictly for business reasons.” I hated feeling this…this…claim to a male. It was unfamiliar and uncomfortable and so very not huldra-like.

  Marcus ground his teeth and looked to the ceiling before meeting my gaze again to speak. “Was that his idea? Because we can’t trust him, we barely know him. What if once he has sex with his life-mate the bond is sealed and felt by both parties? What if he transfers his mate energy rather than his incubus energy, or alongside it, and you all of a sudden want to be with him?”

  I cocked my head and studied him. “If you can’t trust him, and don’t want me involved because you worry this is some sort of trap, why the hell are you considering joining his brotherhood?” I asked.

  Marcus exhaled and rubbed the blanket over his legs. “I don’t know.”

  But he did. I could see it in the way he pinched his brows that he was holding something back, hiding something from me. “Yes, you do know why. It’s not like you to make rash decisions like this. You’ve thought this through and mentally weighed the pros and cons.”

  Marcus leveled a blank gaze at me. “It’s what you want. Deep down, I know it’s what you want.”

  I almost jumped off the bed in response. “Excuse me? Since when did you start reading minds?”

  He shook his head. “I’m not saying I can read your mind, but I just know…”

  “Um, no you don’t know,” I blurted. I slid from the bed and stood a safe distance. Nothing pissed me off more than someone telling me what I was thinking, unless it was the rusalki of course.

  “Really?” Marcus said, his voice getting louder. He stood from the bed and crossed his arms over his chest. “You want to explain to me, then, the growing distance between us? Your refusal to admit that we’re anything more than for-now friends with benefits to your coterie? Give me a good reason for your constant reminder to
me that huldra don’t have long term relationships or marry? From my vantage point, you’re dropping hints left and right and I’m doing my best to pick them up and figure out what the hell you want from me.”

  Goddess, how could I be pissed and heart-broken at the same damn time? What kind of sorcery was love to do such things to the heart and mind? I thought of what Marie had said about the love she felt swirling within me. I thought of her and Celeste, how quick and easy they seemed to act on desires of the heart, and how controlled and reluctant I’d been.

  I stared at the beige carpet long enough to pull together enough courage to say how I really felt. I wasn’t sure if there was such a thing, enough courage, but I pushed forward anyhow. “You being a Hunter complicates things, yes,” I admitted. “And I don’t mean to add salt to your wound, but huldra don’t marry, they spend their days and raise their kids with their partner sisters.” I wondered how much thought Celeste had given to this fact and if she’d discussed any of this with Olivia, her partner sister. I wished I’d had the foresight to ask my sisters before diving into this heated conversation with Marcus.

  “It would be easier if I were an incubus,” he said plainly. He wasn’t wrong.

  But easy was a relative term and if I’d learned anything these last few weeks, it was that change brings about its own difficulties, new hurdles to jump, most of which we don’t see until they’re scraping the fronts of our thighs.

  “Maybe so,” I said quietly, still concentrating on the carpet. “But you wouldn’t be you, and I’m in love with you, the way you are, right now.”

  I looked up to the ex-Hunter standing across from me and waited for an indication on how my secret, one I’d even kept from myself, was received. The man took two long strides and wrapped me up in his arms, my feet dangling from the ground.

  “Faline Frey,” he said with more bass in his voice than usual, “you’ve just made me the happiest man on earth.”