Cantrips: Volume #2: Minor Magics Crafted to Amuse and Entertain

by Joey W. Hill

  "Use it to open up and release all that is inside," he said, his voice vibrating through her.

  "You and your Lady are useless. You can't even help a single village. Their lives were already hard enough without sickness. You do nothing for them."

  "The Wheel is far more complex than that. There are all types of loves in the world, but the Love that explains all is a long journey, often blazed by tears and loss."

  "A babe who dies before she gets her first tooth has no journey to take." She closed her hands into fists. "Do your worst. Empty me out through violence and pain, for I can see no other way to accomplish it."

  "Very well." There was a sadness in his voice, yet anticipation too, and she knew it was echoed in her own nature. Pain could feed pleasure, could transcend the body and pierce the soul. She'd dreamed of taking Agnes to those kinds of extremes, her cries and tears resulting in orgasms so intense her girl would be too weak to move afterward, for all the right reasons. Grace would care for her, and then do it all over again.

  But there was a point past which pain was nothing but pain, a place she would never take Agnes. Penance, retribution, torture, mind-breaking. The first strike told her Lucifer had every intention of taking her into that realm and far beyond.

  The agony was horrible beyond description. It was burning, stinging, thudding, a ceaseless poison that whipped through her blood, burying thorns into her very soul. She dropped to one knee, no choice, but she held there, head down, chest bellowing, trying to manage her reaction. The pain held all the concentrated horror of the past several weeks, and it was going to keep coming. The most horrible realization was that he'd only landed one blow. The next one hit her side. She strangled on a sound like what would come from a wounded animal's. She couldn't bear it. But she must.

  "Get up." His voice was implacable. "You must stand for each blow. Do you want mercy?"

  Fuck, she hated him for asking, because everything in her screamed yes, yes, yes. Tasting her own blood, she stood up. She went back down under the next one. Got up again. After every blow, he asked her if she wanted him to stop, which only made it worse. She speared her tongue with her fangs, making sure she couldn't speak. Yet the pain of it was too much, because it was more than a pain of the body. It what was in that walnut, all the sins and disappointments. It was a deer forlornly looking for grass in frozen ground. It was all the hopelessness of the world, pulled inside and through her, the useless tragedy of it mirrored against those few precious moments of joy and happiness. Yet it was those moments that somehow brought her back to her feet every time, even if only to be knocked down again. She could feel Agnes's hot tears in her heart. Her beloved had her fist against her mouth, trying not to scream in protest on her behalf. She didn't want Agnes to know her pain. But she had no strength to protect her from it.

  Love you, Agnes....always have...love you.

  I love you, Gracie. Believe...open yourself up...let it all go...

  The words planted an image in Grace's mind. Agnes, her slim fingers wrapped around a brown egg, bringing it to the edge of a clay bowl. She sucked in a breath and the egg was cracked, Agnes releasing the unrealized life inside, breaking Grace open at the same moment. She screamed into the night air, her arms somehow lifting despite the pain, her body being racked with it. A fiery energy swept through her, and she tasted her sweat and blood. She felt the poison and the strength both, all of it rising, pulling free, roiling out of the right side of her body, through the heart, which pounded and wept. Useless, pointless...meaningless...

  He'd stopped. She was on her knees, weeping as if she'd never stop. "It's too much...no one can bear that. No one can hold that and not wish for all of it to end... Why is there no mercy?"

  He knelt beside her, his wing covering her, slowly furling inward so it wrapped around her. She turned toward him painfully, as if she were an ancient crone whose joints and muscles could only move in small increments, but then her face was pressed into his chest as she sobbed and shook. He held her with arms and wings, all that fiery energy that had burned now swirling around her like a hearth fire. He offered no words. Just an incoherent murmuring, a hum of sound. Over his touch she felt that of Another, a female energy. They were both holding her up.

  "I'm not empty enough yet," she said brokenly. "I've failed them. I am failing them."

  He tipped up her chin and covered her mouth with his. She made a surprised noise, but another form of overwhelming energy swept through her, taking her voice away. The heat was within her as well as without, and she clung to his arms as a very capable tongue and lips caressed and seduced hers. His powerful hands slid down her bare back to grip her buttocks and press her against him, against a male organ impressively engorged. Laying her down beneath him on the ground, he began to taste her skin, starting at her chin and throat, moving to her sternum. The fire mixed with the emotions, lifting her out of that darkness and mire. She couldn't bear the light of hope, but he forced her to feel it, respond to it. She arched up, gasping, as he began to suckle her breasts. Energy was swirling around them, and she lifted quaking fingers, making the fine blue and silver mists swirl over her fingers, a pale green running through it all. The residual pain vibrated through her, the deep relief of its absence giving the pleasure a sharp, silver edge.

  "Help me," she whispered. "Please."

  Let go, dear child. Just let go. Put down your burden for one moment. It is simple as that. Walk through the fire, the snow and ice, the rock, in nothing but your naked soul. Carry your love in your heart and leave your hands free and empty...

  She realized it was Agnes's voice in her head, but it wasn't Agnes. Her girl was channeling the Goddess, speaking into Grace's heart. Pain and pleasure, hope and yearning, twined together around her, binding her to this moment. She cried out as the Lord's mouth went to her thighs and between them, tasting her cunt and finding her slick, her body readying itself for what was to come. His wings spread out, framing the moon rising above. She reached for him. She might not know how to empty her soul, but she knew how to lose herself in this, in the demands of the body.

  "I can't change anything. I can't just love them and lose them... I don't know how to accept that. I'm so angry, and hurt, and desolate..."

  His mouth teased and tasted, tongue licking her in a way that swept an orgasm over her so quickly she had no way to stop the rush of feeling. She cried out her release, but he wasn't giving her time to settle. As soon as she was coming down off that peak, he was driving her up to another. Feeling swirled in her belly, that pre-climactic tension, but it was building, not diminishing, as she went over the crest of each wave. Her cries were becoming stronger, more helpless.

  You have no control. You are ours, and you follow our Will. When the Lord and Lady's Will is accepted, you are able to survive. You will find your heart and soul again, for it resides there.

  Male and Female voices blending. She was going over another peak, and the ordeal of the past few moments and the wonder of the current combined, pounding out any other awareness, the ability to think or do anything but get swept up in all of it. She opened herself and let go, carried along in a tide populated by the faces of those she'd lost, as well as glimpses of Agnes and others drifting on that same current on this Yule night. She heard singing, chanting, voices raised in praise and supplication. The eight women who'd already died, the three more who would die, and Agnes and Gertrude, wavering but unquenched spirits outlining the circle, calling out to the Lord and Lady, believing, having faith, finding hope...

  Lucille, Dan, Peter, Millie and her little boy...all the women and their families. She watched their spirits materialize, drift around her and away, caught in the Veil, a gentle net. They turned into wisps of rose-tinted clouds, of silver smoke and misty fog, journeying to a place far beyond pain and suffering. The singing and chanting grew stronger and she was back in her own immediate reality, finding the Lord poised over her, dark eyes burning into hers.

  He didn't command her to open herself to the
Lady. She'd reached the point she understood that it didn't happen on command. The Goddess entered because an open, empty soul was the invitation She'd never resist. Tears rolled out of Grace's eyes as she felt that power and strength, the Mother of all Mothers waiting. She felt her sadness, her joy, her sheer...life. The Lady grieved as well, for the tragic folly of her children. Knowing she understood and felt the same pain Grace felt turned tears into sobs. They cried together and, like Female energy everywhere, they drew strength from that shared pain and found their feet once more to persevere, to survive and to love.

  Drawing a deep breath, one that went all the way to the bottom of her soul, Grace invited the Lady in. Invited all of it to happen.

  The power of the Goddess lifted her body up into an invitation of another kind. Lucifer's gaze gleamed and he thrust deep inside her. The dual possession took away any conscious thought, leaving just sensation. Grace was moaning with a blend of sensations too overwhelming to describe. The energy vibrated through and around her, and she was limp in his grasp. His rhythmic thrusts took her back to climax, but it didn't stop there. She went over peak after peak as her mind fragmented and she let go of her soul. Something built inside her, something hard to describe, a form of release far beyond the other. It was an energy, with power enough to fuel a sun, gathering. It reached through her and outward, and her eyes opened to something she'd never seen before, that she knew she'd never see again, but would never forget.

  She couldn't describe it, so she hoped with all the love she had in her heart that Agnes could hear her thoughts, feel them. Something like this had to be shared with the most important soul in her life.

  The ecstasy gripping her channeled through the Goddess inside her and the Lord taking them both. She could feel the love between the Lord and Lady. It represented and encompassed all loves, the one that fueled and received every experience of love. It was intense, passionate, overwhelming, quiet, ending, safe, unconditional. It answered all questions, though she knew she could never voice the answers. There were no words.

  It is. She thought of Father Baldwin's bible. I AM. If only those who'd wrote it had been inspired to fill in that missing word. But there were so many, weren't there? I Am Love. Justice. Beginning. End. Healing. Death. Life. All.

  And all back to Love again.

  "Oh..." It was a long, drawn out syllable and her eyes widened as she saw the Lord's face tighten, felt his body gather the way a man's did, that fulfilling, joyous promise of release. She screamed again as he let go inside her, a rush of fire that brought a new wave of climaxes, so close together and intense she was buffeted by them like a storm. She shared that experience with another female energy, One that bonded and connected to Him as if they'd begun time together.

  And perhaps they had.

  * * *

  Time had stopped. Not metaphorically; literally. She was sure of it. She also thought she might truly be dead, that initial act with the stake no longer merely a symbolic gesture. Her body had never felt so drained before. Yet something was different, too. This wasn't the exhaustion she'd felt for the past few weeks, the hunger and despair. It was as if the energy in her was concentrated in her core. Creating, making.

  Her hand dragged across the ground, following that feeling like a homing beacon. When she found her palm on her abdomen, fingers spread over it, that concentration throbbed under her touch, spreading wonder through her. "Oh my God. Dear Lord and Lady."

  The Lord was next to her now, heating her with his proximity like the bonfire, only it warmed her all the way around and within, not just the part that faced him. He picked up Agnes's robe and lifted Grace like a child, wrapping her in it and shifting her into his lap, an entirely unnerving and welcome thing. She heard that Female voice in her mind, vibrating through her body.

  You are far more chivalrous than you admit, my love. You do not like to see her shiver in the cold. The winter spirits say you do not appreciate them.

  They would say it to my face, except my heat would melt their ice into puddles and evaporate them out of existence.

  Far be it from her to interrupt a conversation between deities, but this feeling inside her, so wondrous and amazing, compelled her to do it. "My lord."

  It was so difficult for vampires to conceive, she couldn't be sure of it, not until he confirmed it. She saw the curve of his mouth, the flicker in those crimson eyes, and his hand covered hers on her stomach, an odd tenderness in his touch. Well, that wasn't surprising, was it? If what she was feeling was true, it was his babe as well. She felt the warmth of the Lady in her mind, Her own hand upon it, because all were Her children.

  It does not often happen, dear child. But you wounded Him, in your struggle to understand. Such remarkable strength, such commitment in the face of personal pain, it deserved a gift of hope. For you and those you love. Care well for His son. It is a gift given only to the very worthy.

  A son. Well, this worthy individual suddenly felt terrified and overjoyed at once. Her hand slid through the Lord’s feathers. It seemed a miracle to be allowed to do that, to have her limp, trembling fingers fall on the rounded shape of his shoulder, drift down to his warrior-hard biceps. She wet her lips. There were so many things she could say and ask, but she stuck with something simple, ridiculously inane. "Will he have wings…my son?"

  Lucifer's lips curved. "No, but he will be a warrior the likes of which no vampire has ever seen. When he fights on behalf of your kind, it will seem like he can fly. He will be a protector, a force for justice."

  "Will he know love?" Like I have found with Agnes? She was too much of a vampire to say that aloud, but the benefit of congress with a god was he could read her thoughts. Vampire children were so rare, she would never regret this night, but thinking her son might not feel what she'd seen in the Lord and Lady, what she knew she felt for Agnes...

  Even if she third marked the woman, Grace would likely outlive her, because a third mark had a lifespan of three hundred years and vampires...didn't die of old age. Though an older vampire might call her resolve the zeal of youth untempered by experience, Grace knew when Agnes died she would never again find anything like that, like this. Having a love of that depth more than once would not be her path. She would love, but never be in love again. Agnes would take most of her heart with her, the only part left devoted to Grace's son. As he grew and became a man, her heart would drift back toward the girl who'd become her whole world. It wasn't approved of in the vampire world, such an attachment to a human, but vampires were isolated from one another. She didn't really care what they thought.

  Lucifer's lips curved. "He'll be like that, too. He will set his own path, make his own code. And it will be a formidable one."

  She wondered if he'd answer her other question. After what she'd felt between him and the Goddess, she couldn't imagine he'd consider it a foolish female question. He didn't, because he did answer.

  "Yes. He will find love, my lady. He will wait centuries, but it will come and, when it does, it will make up for the years of waiting. Your son will be a credit to your own courage and heart. As far as female foolishness," his dark eyes glinted, "I would fear the wrath of She who is my heart if ever I thought such a thing, let alone said it. Look. See an echo of what is to come."

  His hand closed over her wrist, slipped to her palm so their fingers twined. As she tipped her head to look into his eyes, the world swam and he drew her through the clouds of time to a different place, as easy as a breath. She stood in a large, open building that had many things she didn't understand: A big metal contraption with an L-shape piece on the front; large crates that looked as if they were made out of thick brown paper; curious fixtures on the ceiling like lanterns, but not, for she saw no flickering flame in their depths, only steady white light. But all those inventions of the future disappeared as she saw the most important thing in the room.

  He was tall and handsome. Such a simple, motherly thing to think, her heart swelling with pride and wonder at it. He was a breathtaking ec
ho of his father, though he kept his black hair cut short. He wore strange clothes. Dark, close-fitting trousers and shirt, with a long coat over them. As he moved forward, she saw his intent dark eyes had a hint of his father's crimson to them. She drew in a breath as he produced a flashing blade from the depths of the coat, the silver reflecting off the odd lanterns. Seven men moved out of the shadows, vampires and servants. Several of them were young vampires, she could tell, but two of them were not, and their servants were seasoned fighters, evident by their lack of fear and the concentrated look in their faces.

  She put a hand on Lucifer's arm in involuntary trepidation. "Watch," he murmured.

  Her son moved. Or rather, as Lucifer said, he flew like a bird without his feet ever leaving the ground. Swooping, spinning, turning, leaping, the blade an extension of his arm and his elegant fingers. She let out the fearful breath she'd sucked in as he faced his foes. He had the deadly grace of every predator she'd witnessed, animal, human or vampire. As he fought, she saw his father in him again, this fearsome angel who touched her so tenderly and ruthlessly at once. Her son would be unstoppable with an angel's blood in him, yet his heart and soul would also be part angel, untainted by evil. It would be the vampire blood that would give him the edge necessary to survive their cruel, bloody world. Tears inexplicably sprung to her eyes as his lips quirked at something one of his enemies spat at him. He would have her smile, and hints of her facial expressions. Agnes would have recognized that sardonic look in a heartbeat.

  The mists closed around him, taking that image away. Instead, now he was but a babe in her arms. His mouth opened against her breast, tiny, needlelike teeth drawing blood from her, sustenance. She would sit by a window in the moonlight and sing to him. Agnes would be there, wouldn't she? Please Lord and Lady... She'd be a quiet shadow that moved forward and closed her arms around Grace, their cheeks pressed together as Agnes trailed her work-roughened finger along the little one's face, both of them enchanted by him. Caring for him would help heal Agnes's heart, ease a mother's deep grief.