Elements of Desire

by C. M. Stunich

  Ginger-bearded hipster was the first to recover. "Crikey," he muttered, stroking his beard in thought. "So me fucking sheila, Alyssa, she's being held prisoner by some dirty cuntstains?"

  "Our sheila," another hipster surfer looking dude interrupted, and a couple of others nodded.

  "Hold up, that bitchy redhead is your spirit?" I squinted at the bearded dude and he nodded. "Damn, good luck with that shit. Anyway, yes they're all being held with spirit collars. So are you going to help us clean up the CUM and rescue your girls?"

  "Fuck yeah, count us in," Beard Boy enthused, and a chorus of agreement rose from the other elementals around us.

  I beamed with excitement. We were going to win this shit. With the Unseelie, the wolves, this group of elementals … all we needed now was to see if those angels had agreed to help and I was pretty sure we'd be unbeatable. Especially seeing as the Seelie Queen was dead.

  Surely nothing could stop us now! Or would those be my famous last words?

  If I had to choose last words, they’d be something more along the lines of fuck, I love wine and dick, but only because that’d look pretty sweet as an epitaph. I could imagine the pearl-clutchers now, gazing at my grave in Puritanical shock.

  Well, I guessed they’d just have to hope that Arizona Smoke-Copthorne-Cornwall-O'Hara-Aarden-MacKenna-Brenton prevailed. Pervs and Puritans, unite!

  The time had come. Our final battle. It almost felt like the conclusion to my story. At least, for now, anyway. Here was hoping the authors of my life didn't get too trigger happy and start killing people off in the next chapter, because that would suck.

  "Are you ready, Darlin'?" Shane asked me quietly as we all piled out of the plumbing van outside the CUM hideout where all the spirit girls were held. We had it on good authority that Britt and Siobhan were being kept in the same location which was either a giant trap or insanely convenient. Or both.

  "Uh-huh," I replied, twisting my unruly blond hair into a French braid to keep it out of my damn eyes while we killed people. Also, I was wearing my black faux leather catsuit which honestly, was uncomfortable as fuck. I did look super cool in it though, so there was that. "Can't fucking wait. Have we heard from Queen Dick?"

  "We have," Shane confirmed. "Her people are already in position. As are the wolves and angels. We're just waiting on the rest of COCS to arrive and then we're good to go."

  “Fuck yeah,” I said, feeling totally pumped as we approached the end of the sidewalk and gazed across the street at the warehouse. I glanced over at Gemma as she came up next to me, frowning and flaring her nostrils, looking like she was this close to stamping her foot like a petulant child. “Sucks not to get your way, huh?” I asked, smirking. Sorry, but I couldn’t help myself. I’d gotten my guys back; I’d won. But since Gemma was now a part of COCS, she was required to show up here and help. The Committee of Combined Supernaturals might have included several species, but it was more of a diplomatic gesture—like the UN. When push came to shove, certain countries … err, species didn’t want to get caught up in others’ wars.

  So when the COCS members started arriving, they brought the boys from the sewers with them, and elementals poured out of a myriad of vehicles to line the street.

  “Joan,” I said as my mother-in-law approached with her own harem of dudes at her back. I felt extra smug since, like, I had one more than she did.

  “Reginald,” she said, refusing to address me and going for her biological son instead. But all he did was give her a tight, sad smile, his blonde hair reflecting the silver moonlight.

  “You have a lot of shit to make up for,” he told her, and when I cast him a furious glare, he continued. “Honestly, I’m not even sure that you can make up for it, but I’ll tell you what? You spend the next … oh, let’s say, five years kissing Arizona’s ass and maybe we’ll let you visit your future grandchild.”

  Joan’s eyes bugged out of her head, and she looked to be about ten seconds away from passing the fuck out.

  Not a surprise. I had the same sentiment.

  “Grandchild?” I snarled, but Reg just leaned in to whisper against my ear, a chuckle threaded through his words.

  “It’s the magic word with her; she wants one so goddamn bad. We seriously don’t have to have a kid, like, ever, but this’ll at least get her to send you fruit baskets.”

  “I hate fruit baskets,” I said and Reg rolled his eyes.

  “Money and spa gift certificates?”

  Oh, now that I could get in line with!

  “Yeah, if you ever want to see this grandkid”—I touched my empty belly—“then you better shape up.” Fuckin Joan. She gave me a look that said you’re a bad mother for fighting a supernatural war while pregnant. Holy crap! I wasn’t even knocked up yet and she was already questioning my parenting skills. This did not bode well for us, did it?

  At least I knew for sure that I wasn’t pregnant yet. I’d just gotten my period because, you know, I was about to fight a super tough battle and the universe wanted to see what happened when a lady elemental shifted with a tampon stuffed up inside her. This oughta be interesting …

  Ready? Aldrich tested, and I responded with an avocado emoji because … why not? I guess he was smart enough to decipher my particular brand of humor because he launched the Hudson Valley Pack into action with a howl.

  There was a small park on one side of the warehouse, and that’s where the wolves came from, a sea of varying colors that surrounded the building at the same moment an explosion rocked one side of the warehouse, removing an entire chuck of wall.

  “Other than the fact that they have wings,” George explained to my shocked face, “angels are physically pretty useless. They are however pretty skilled with explosives. The dust from their feathers can be rubbed off on whatever and ignited with magic.”

  Ah. Well, I’d heard bomb tossed about here and there as we’d coordinated plans with the other groups involved in this little coup de grace, but I hadn’t realized it was like, magic shit. Pretty goddamn cool.

  As soon as the wall came down, the wolves rushed in first—we might not have had supernatural healing powers, but they did—and the Unseelie followed along right behind them. To be honest, it looked like the werewolves were about to be swallowed by puppet rejects from The Dark Crystal, but only after they’d been left outside to mold. That’s how terrifying those things were. I hoped Siobhan and Britt didn’t have to see that horde coming after them, or they’d piss their pants. Okay, so maybe I would’ve pissed my pants in that scenario. I almost peed a little as it was.

  “COCS!” Joan shouted, raising her fist in the air. “We need to be hard, need to stand firm and tall. Let’s thrust inside their defenses and leave our mark!” Several of the elementals around her—most namely her husbands and Gem—cheered while Warden, Reg, Billy, and I chuckled. What? Come on, that was a pretty funny cock joke right there.

  “I’d like to get inside your defense and leave my mark,” Shane purred against my ear, but I just rolled my eyes and ignored him, fascinated as the crowd rippled and changed, shifting into their dragon forms before they took off across the street. Some of those COCS seemed really gung-ho to thrust inside those defenses, and I figured they were men whose spirits had been kidnapped.

  Me and my boys, we had a very specific purpose here.

  While the Unseelie, the wolves, the angels, and the COCS—hah—took on the bulk of the succubi and incubi CUM soldiers … we’d be dealing with the bio parents. And, obviously, trying to rescue Britt and Siobhan. But I had a feeling that if we didn’t move quick, they’d kill them just to spite us. Clearly, there was no negotiating that was going to be happening here.

  “Let’s go,” I said, grabbing Gem by the arm. If I had to face our creepy biological parents, then so did she. Fortunately, even though she jerked herself from my grip with a violent scowl, she followed along as we shifted into dragon form and flew our way over to the hole in the roof. She had an order to accompany us, from the COCS Heads themselves.
Besides that, her girlfriend was here, so I imagined she’d have come either way.

  Dustin and Billy flanked me as we flapped wings literally forged from the elements, and landed on the upper floor of the building. It was a big building, but manageable enough that I knew we’d find Britt and Siobhan shortly … or their bodies anyway.

  Premature tears welled up in my big green dragon eyes, but I ignored them, shifting back into human form and going spirit form right off the bat. This time, I tried really hard to keep my clothes on—I really wanted to fight in that fucking catsuit—and found I was successful when I really tried. As long as I didn’t do anything complicated like, say, shove my entire elemental form down a pipe, I could make my clothes go see-through with me.

  The boys kept their regular forms as Shane led the way, Dustin took up the back, and my other four husbands surrounded me and Gem with two on either side.

  “So you ran away to be a lesbian?” I asked, not even bothering to keep my voice down. The fighting downstairs was so loud, I just prayed the Unseelie Queen and her court would keep any curious humans away. They had glamours of their own, right? Couldn’t they spell this whole thing to look like … nothing at all? I had no idea, but I didn’t let myself worry about it. We all had our roles to play here, and this was mine.

  “Bisexual, you ignorant bitch and no, that’s not the reason I ran away.” Gem’s nostrils flared as Billy, Warden, Reg, and George glanced over at her. They were probably ten times as curious as I was as to why the bitch had left in the first place.

  “Well, you’ve already admitted it wasn’t the zoo,” I said with a little curl of my own lip, “so explain?”

  “This is hardly the time or place,” she snapped, pushing dark hair over one shoulder. But with a sigh, she did anyway. Was it proof that we were related, the fact that we couldn’t keep our mouths shut for all of ten seconds? “Interracial marriage is considered … like a betrayal in the elemental community. And there was all this pressure on me from Joan”—and this time, I was surprised to hear my evil twin say the woman’s name in a way that made me think that she, too, had an alternate name for the bitch inside her own head—“to marry the guys. I liked them, sure, and they were the perfect harem, but …” Gem sighed and shook her head. “I wanted to experiment, and date women, date succubi women. Angels, even. Fae. I just didn’t the traditional middle class suburban elemental life with five point five husbands, a white picket fence, and a classic public orgy wedding.”

  I raised my brows, but didn’t say anything except, “huh.”

  Gemma and I moved in silence down the hallway, the breeze from the hold in the building’s side chasing across our skin and flaming the flames left over from the explosion. I could feel the heat from here, but I wasn’t worried about it, not with Billy the Fire Elemental to protect me.

  We made it about halfway down the line before Shane opened a door and found a staircase that led to the roof. It was open, and even though I hadn’t seen anyone up here when we’d originally flown over … I had an idea that there were people up there now.

  I could feel them.

  “Fuck, this is it, isn’t it?” I asked as I took Reg’s hand with my right, slipped my arm past Gemma to grab George’s on my left, and took a deep breath. “This is it.”

  “You can do this, Blossom,” George promised, but before we could even take a single step toward the staircase, my earth elemental husband was throwing up a shield made of thick, woody vines and stopping a bullet just inches from my skull.

  “Well, fuck, I missed,” Adonis, the Chaos King, said, standing with his leathery wings on full-display. He had that naked freak, Nigel, next to him. His queen, Rachel, was nowhere to be seen. I hoped she was being torn apart by the elementals whose spirit girls she’d kidnapped.

  Adonis didn’t wait before emptying his clip in our direction and then tossing the gun aside. His smile said that he hadn’t expected to hit a single one of us, but thought it might be nice to try.

  “Your friends, the ones you didn’t deem worthy of saving, are on the roof. I suggest you get up there and quick.” The man folded his arms across his chest while Nigel sneered at us and ran his hand down the length of his erect dick. Ugh. Even looking at him made me shiver. I could remember that tussle we’d had, how aroused he’d been at the idea of killing me. What a fucking freak. “I wouldn’t be surprised if you were too late,” he continued when Shane caught my gaze with his own.

  “Could be a trick,” he said, and although I knew that was true, I didn’t have much choice, did I?

  “I’d do anything for my friends,” I told him, and he smiled sadly, like he already thought they might be beyond saving.

  “And I love ya for that, Darlin’,” he drawled, turning back to the staircase and heading up with the rest of us following along behind. Dustin kept his back to our group and his attention focused on the two incubi men until we were safely outside.

  Sure enough, there they were: Daniel and his harem (minus Nevada who was inside the plumbing van and surrounded by COCS guards), Rachel the Chaos Queen … and my besties.

  “Ari!” Britt called out, dressed in a tight white bandage dress spattered in blood. She was kneeling on the gravel coated roof with Siobhan next to her in a similar position, also wearing a skimpy little dress but in black this time.

  “If you’ve raped her,” Gemma started, stepping forward and surprising the hell out of me, “then it’s going to be me draining you.”

  “Please,” Daniel said with a roll of his eyes and a smirk. “You think your mothers would allow that? Killing usually serves a purpose, but rape is for pathetics and perverts.” He shrugged his shoulders and although I was kind of relieved to hear him say that, I was also scared shitless because he had a fucking blade pressed to Britt’s throat. The metal edge was drawing blood from her pale skin, and I sensed he was using magic much the same as Dustin had to fight the wax figures. This was no ordinary weapon, and it could easily take my bestie’s head off before I could I stop Daniel.

  Siobhan stared at me in shock, a sad, regretful expression etched onto her features. I’d heard what Gemma had said, about her protecting Dusty, herself, even me, by putting on that show and spewing those lies. I didn’t know quite what to think, but I’d never get a chance to form an opinion if she died here today. Even if she were evil—which I didn’t believe for a second—I didn’t want her dead. No way.

  “Clearly, this is the part where you ask us to give ourselves up and we say no, blah blah,” Reg inserted as I toyed with my secret weapon, the one I’d been holding in reserve at the edges of my magical limits. I wasn’t going to unleash it unless I had to because I wasn’t exactly sure how to control it.

  “No?” Daniel asked, and then he drove the blade into Britt’s neck as I screamed. It was at that moment that I let out a surge of violent energy that I hadn’t even realized I had. It exploded out of me like a rippling heatwave, knocking everyone on the roof flat, including my husbands.

  Gemma and I were the first to recover, scrambling over to the girls as my men did their best to protect my blind ass. I couldn’t see anything but Britt in that moment, leaking red from her neck and gasping as she yanked the blade from her throat and tossed it.

  “Oh my God,” I sobbed as I put my hand to her neck to stop the gushing red. There was so much of it; it was everywhere. But Brittany just grabbed my hand and shook her head.

  “I’ll heal,” she gasped out, but it took me several seconds to even translate her words. I’ll heal. Oh. Because, werewolf. Right? Still, I kept my hand pressed to her throat as Daniel shifted into dragon form and came at me. The rest of the moms disappeared over the edge of the roof, and I had a feeling that they were going for Nevada.

  Fuck.

  The COCS agents guarding her had orders to put a bullet in her head at the first sign of them, and really, I … didn’t want any of my parents to die. The little girl inside of me was curious about who they were, what they were like. The adult part of me kn
ew that I had little choice in the matter. Daniel and the moms were adults; they were making their own choices. And there wasn’t a damn thing I could do to sway them.

  Shane stepped in front of me and intercepted Daniel’s attack, taking the brunt of Daniel’s snapping jaws and hooked talons. Blood sprayed out across the roof, but I could sense through our connection that the wounds looked worse than they really were. Still, that was the only the first attack of many, and I wasn’t about to sit here and let my men or my besties get their asses kicked by this motherfucker.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Dustin corner the Chaos Queen at the edge of the building, both Nigel and Adonis coming up close behind him. Reaching out a hand, I grabbed hold of both incubi’s spirits and threw them as hard as I could off the edge of the roof. It was doubtful that I’d actually managed to hurt them, but at least I’d gotten them away from Dusty for a second.

  Daniel and Shane tore into each other like rabid dogs, scales and tails and wings flashing, horns locked as they wrestled each other. Their sinuous bodies flailed around the roof, smashing holes in the ceiling of the top floor, breaking chunks off the retaining wall that bordered the edge.

  “I’ll be fine,” Britt gasped out, her palm pressed tight to her wound. Listening to her talk made me feel sick. Her words were garbled and wet, but she seemed like she was telling the truth. “Takes all my energy to heal. Can’t fight. But okay. I’m okay.” Licking my lips, I grabbed her face and gave her forehead a chaste kiss before I rose to my feet.

  Beside me, Gemma and Siobhan were … making out? Totally fucking weird. They pulled apart as I glanced down and I knew, as soon as Siobhan met my eyes, that even if it took years to sort our problems, that we’d eventually make up. Because part of being friends with someone is taking the good with the bad. Best friends are the soul mates you don’t sleep with. And I wasn’t abandoning mine.