Cravings (18 page)

WE got him up the step and into the driver's seat, where he discovered that
he liked sitting better than standing, too. But he'd be visible up there, not to
mention difficult to work on, so we heaved him onto his feet again and staggered
together into my little bedroom, where he fell on the bed and promptly passed
out.

I stood there getting my breath back, and not due to unrequited lust this
time. He was heavy. Then I tossed a blanket over him, grabbed a smudging stick
and the bucket I kept under the sink, and headed back out. He'd left a good deal
of blood on the road. He'd probably also left various magical traces. I wouldn't
be able to get rid of all the blood or other traces, but I could make them less
conspicuous.

Twenty minutes later I'd washed most of the blood off the asphalt and tossed
dirt on top of what remained to disguise it. I'd smudged all the way around my
little lot, quietly calling up what protections I knew. I'm not Gifted, but
there are some things even the magic-blind can do, and the sage I used had been
prepared and blessed by a Wiccan High Priestess.

I couldn't help feeling like the little piggy in the straw house, though. I
suspected that whoever—whatever?—had clawed up my guest could blow away my puny
protections with one big, bad huff.

He was still out cold when I came back in, poor boy. I hated to wake him,
but, magic or no magic, those wounds had to be cleaned. He needed fluids, too.
But maybe I should call Erin first—my Wiccan friend. I was going to need help.
No, better wait until I knew who or what I was dealing with. I needed answers.
Or maybe—

Stop it
! I told myself sternly. But the body sometimes reveals what
we'd rather not know. The hand I lifted to rub my forehead was unsteady, and my
insides were gripped by a fine vibration, like a dry leaf aquiver in the wind
just before it quits its home on the tree.

Why was I doing this? For all I knew, the unconscious man in my bed was the
bad guy, not the victim. Or some complicated mingling of both.

I could do something about that particular uncertainty, at least. I picked up
the phone. "Erin?" I said to the sleepy voice on the other end. "This is Molly."
For a little while longer, anyway.

"Do you know what time it is?" she muttered. There was a sleepy voice in the
background—Erin's husband, Jack, an accountant with a wicked laugh and no trace
of a Gift. A good man, though he holds on to trump too long. Erin told him to go
back to sleep, then spoke to me. "What is it?"

"I need help."

Now she was crisp, wide awake. "Immediately?"

"No, in the daylight will be fine. Um… I've an unexpected guest, mysterious
and somewhat damaged. I'd like you to meet him."

Silence, then a sigh. "I suppose you don't want to tell me more over the
phone."

"I'd rather not," I said apologetically. It's very difficult to listen in on
a call magically—technology is better at that sort of thing. But it is possible.
"Oh, and could you bring me some more of that cleansing mixture you made for me?
The one with rue, broom, and agrimony." Which, of course, are not cleansing
herbs. They were components of a spell granting true vision, used to see through
lies. Used by a Wiccan High Priestess, however, the spell could reveal a good
deal more.

"Look for me about nine-thirty." She was grim. "I'd be there earlier, but my
car's in the shop. I'll have to take Jack to work so I can use his."

"I owe you."

"You know perfectly well it's the other way around. Molly, for heaven's sake,
what have you gotten yourself into?"

"I don't know yet," I said, eyeing the man in my bed—who had woken and was
eyeing me back. "But it promises to be interesting. I'll see you in a few
hours." I disconnected and put the phone down.

In the soft light from my bedside lamp, my guest's eyes were a clear, pale
blue. Quite striking. Also filled with suspicion. "To whom were you speaking?"

Wasn't that just like a man? Earlier he'd trusted for no particular reason,
now he suspected when there was little cause—and little remedy, if he'd been
right. "No one says 'to whom' these days," I told him, heading for my tiny
bathroom, where I collected peroxide and gauze and dampened a washcloth. "You'll
need to learn more colloquial speech if you stay here long."

"Whom is the object of the preposition." He frowned as I returned, either at
having his grammar corrected or at the prospect of having his wounds cleaned.
"How else would one say it?"

"Most people would say, 'Who were you talking to?' Which is technically
incorrect, but language changes."

"Very well. Who were you talking to?"

"A friend. She'll do you no harm, as long as you mean no harm. This, however,
is going to hurt." I poured peroxide into the deep slash on his thigh and
started mopping up the dried blood around it.

His breath hissed between his teeth. He grabbed my wrist. "Stop that!"

I have always wanted to be able to raise one eyebrow, but mine only move in
tandem. I lifted them. "Are you certain you can prevent infection?"

"Is that what…" His eyebrows drew together in a frustrated pleat. "There are
other ways to prevent infection."

"You didn't want to see a doctor, remember? You're stuck with me, and this is
what I know to do."

Grudgingly he nodded and released my wrist. I sat on the bed beside him.

The next few minutes were harder on him than me. I learned long ago how to
move into a mental room where sympathy can't intrude. It's a white, private
place, nowhere I'd want to live permanently, but there are times when sympathy
is a drawback. Besides, I saw no point in both of us suffering.

There were four slashes in his flesh—one in the lower chest, another on the
right side of his belly, and two in his thigh. He was lucky. The upper wounds
were shallow, slicing through skin and a bit of muscle but leaving his innards
intact. One of the thigh wounds was no more than a deep scratch. The other…

I sighed, unhappy with what I saw with the blood cleaned away. "How good are
you at healing? The muscle is badly damaged, and I'm not sure my sewing skills
are up to putting it back together right."

"Sewing? You wish to sew my muscle?"

"I'll have to, unless you can do something."

He was silent, but with an inward look that suggested he was checking things
out in his own way. A moment later, the wound began to close.

It was fascinating to watch. Flesh touched flesh as if hands were gently
urging the sides of the wound together, then gradually meshed into unity like
dough kneaded back into a single lump. And a delicious energy surged through me,
conveyed from him to me through my hand on his leg. My fingers tingled. I licked
my lips.

And snatched my hand back. He was a guest, not a meal. Shaken, I let go of my
hold on the white, interior space. The slow knitting of his flesh was still
fascinating, but my vision was colored by compassion now.

When he finished, the gash was nearly closed and his face was the color of
mushrooms. I patted his knee in a motherly way. "Very impressive."

His voice was flat with fatigue. "I cannot do the rest now."

"None of the others are as deep. They'll heal on their own, I imagine." I
stood. "Now, if you can stay awake a little longer, you need fluids. Since I
can't provide an IV, you'll have to drink as much as you can. Water or orange
juice?"

He licked his lips. "Water. Molly?"

I waited.

"What are you?"

I could have pretended I didn't know what he was talking about. That was my
first impulse. He was weak, lost, sundered even from his name. He wouldn't be
hard to deceive. I could have asked what he meant, then unraveled whatever chain
of logic had led him to ask that question. I'm good at that. I have to be. And
the thought of how he'd react to the truth ached like a fresh bruise laid down
over old wounds.

But those blue eyes held steady on me, and there was something about them…
"I'm a succubus."

His eyes widened.

"Cursed, not damned," I added firmly. "A long time ago, by someone who knew
what She was doing when it came to curses. I'm not a demon. Originally, I was
human."

"Ah." The tension went out of his face, and his eyelids drooped. "That
explains it. Better hurry… with water." His speech was slurring as he let go of
whatever force of will had been keeping him awake. He smiled at me. "Thank you,
Molly."

HE liked television. And he loved the remote.

At ten-twenty the next morning he was propped up on my couch, channel surfing
madly. He'd woken when Erin arrived and had insisted on moving there, over my
objections. But he was doing amazingly well.

Erin was outside, readying herself and the spell. She wouldn't perform it out
there—between dogs, children, and nosy neighbors that simply wasn't practical.
But she needed earth beneath her feet for the preparation.

I'd shown her the spot where my guest arrived last night. Erin had hmm'd and
frowned, nodding now and then like a doctor examining a patient, then sent me
away.

I was in my galley—it's too small to be called a kitchen—putting together a
bouquet garni
for the chicken simmering on the stove. The connection
between chicken soup and healing may not have been established scientifically,
but I'm sure it exists.

"Arthur?" I suggested. "Adam? Aillen?"

He looked away from the television, a sudden smile lighting his face. "You
find me handsome?"

"You know Gaelic!" I exclaimed. Another puzzle piece, but I had no idea what
to do with it. He looked Celtic, but that lovely, upper-crust British accent… I
shook my head and plucked a bit of thyme from the pot on the counter by the
window. "Of course I find you handsome. You're gorgeous. You know that. Even if
you don't remember, you've seen yourself in the mirror." Before occupying my
couch, he'd asked where he could relieve himself. I'd had to explain the
plumbing.

He touched his jaw as if reminding himself of the face he hadn't recognized.
"It seemed to be a pleasing face, but standards of beauty vary widely."

"I wonder if you talk that way in your native language. Have you remembered
any more of it?"

"Any more?"

"You said something to me in another language when you first arrived."

His brows knit. "I don't remember. What way do I talk?"

"Correctly. Formally. Did any of those names ring a bell?"

"Ring a bell… oh. You wonder if they are familiar. No, not in a personal
way."

An interesting distinction. The names were familiar, but they didn't belong
to him. "Well, we have to call you something. Would you object to being Michael
for now?"

"Michael… Hebrew for 'gift from God.'" He cocked a single eyebrow at me—which
he could do, blast him. "You consider me a blessing."

The idiot male was
flirting
with me. "What an odd memory you have.
You know the meaning of Irish and Hebrew names, but not your own."

That stole the smile from his face. I tried not to feel guilty. I tied the
ends of the cheesecloth together and lowered the herbs into the simmering pot,
catching it in place with the lid. Keeping my back to him so I wouldn't see the
hurt I caused, I said, "Michael is also the name of a militant archangel. Evil
is capable of masquerading as good, but generally it prefers not to annoy
Michael. One aligned with evil would not be comfortable borrowing Michael's
name."

"I am not evil."

"I don't think so, but we don't know what you are. That's what Erin will try
to find out." Reluctantly, I abandoned cowardice and turned to face him. "Do you
understand what a succubus is?"

"The Latin term for a female demon who draws life from her victims through
sexual intercourse. But you said you were cursed into your condition, which
makes sense." He smiled suddenly, blindingly. "You aren't evil, either."

"Nor am I good. Michael—"

"You do like that name for me. Very well. I will be Michael."

I could feel myself softening—inside, where it was dangerous, and outside, my
muscles growing lax and warm with wanting. So I was sharp to him. "Listen to me.
I look like a middle-aged woman, and I am one. A good deal more than
middle-aged, actually. But I'm also a succubus, and I live off the energy of
others. The energy of men, to be specific, which I acquire through sex."

"Do you not eat?" he asked, curious. "It smells in here as if you enjoy
food."

My breath huffed out. He didn't seem to be getting the point. "I eat, but I
don't have to. Other people need food and drink to live, and enjoy sex. I need
sex to live, and enjoy food and drink."

"I'm glad you didn't lose those pleasures when you were cursed. Do you need
to sup in your fashion daily, the same as others need to eat every day?"

"Not every day. Michael, you're either painfully naive or deliberately
obtuse. I'm trying to explain why you must not flirt with me. I am not safe."

"You're worried about me!" He was amazed.

I rolled my eyes. The young always think themselves indestructible, but
Michael should know better, after what he'd been through. But then, he didn't
remember what he'd been through. "Yes," I said. "I'm worried about you."

For an instant his face softened, and I glimpsed in his eyes the ragged edges
of adult vulnerability, not the untried trust of youth, as if my simple words
had sliced deep into a place that didn't bear touching. "You needn't," he said,
and the edges closed up again, hiding whatever memories that deep place held.
"You can take nothing from me I don't wish to give."

"What if you wished to give?" My posture shifted as the energy gathered
around me, swirling, aching… "I could make you want to give, Michael. You'd want
to give… anything."

The door opened. "Molly!" Erin said sharply.

I snapped back. Then just stood there, disoriented, like a stooping hawk
suddenly shoved from its plummet. The breath I drew was ragged. "Well," I said
as briskly as I could, "what did you learn?"

"Not much." She came in, eyeing me. Erin is a tall woman, bony by my
standards but fashionably slender to her generation. Her face was made for
drama, with a wide mouth, sharp cheekbones, and a beak of a nose that she
considers unlovely but which I quite envy for its distinction. She's supposed
to wear glasses, but often forgets or leaves them somewhere. Her hair is a
fabulous red bush that nearly reaches her waist. Today she wore it pulled back
from her face with a stretchy headband that matched her apple-green t-shirt.

T-shirts are one of the best things about the current age. And bras. Bras
have corsets beat all to pieces. "You must have learned something."

She shrugged. "Node energy isn't my area. You knew he came in at a node?"

I nodded. I'm not so utterly insensitive I'd be unaware of a node so close to
where I've lived for twelve years. One of the ley lines from it runs beneath my
RV. "What else?"

"He's drawing from it."

I glanced at Michael. "Of course," he said. "I could have told you that, had
you asked. How else could I heal?"

"And," Erin added, "he came from a long ways away. I couldn't trace him
back—the energies are too foreign—but there's a feeling of a great gulf."

I nodded. "I knew he wasn't from this world."

"Not…" She shook her head. "That isn't possible."

Erin is a very good witch and far wiser than I was at her age. But she is
young, and thus prone to certainty. "Obviously it's possible, since he's here."

She looked at Michael, eyes wide and suddenly wary.

"Another world," he said thoughtfully, his voice so much deeper than Erin's
light soprano. "That makes sense. I don't seem to know much about this one."

"Supposedly you don't remember anything about any others, either," Erin said
sharply.

"I don't remember anything, no. But I think perhaps I know a great deal."

"Is that supposed to make sense?" Scowling, she slung her bag off her
shoulder and set it on the table of my little dinette. The bag holds her basic
ritual apparatus, and is made of heavy black silk. I'd given it to her for
Samhain last year. "The realms haven't been close enough to cross between in
over five hundred years. Except for Faerie," she added. "And that's closed to
mortals. And you aren't Faerie."

"No," he said agreeably. "I'm fairly sure I'm not."

"What about Dis? The place Christians call hell. It leaks into our world
sometimes."

"I'm not demonic, either. No more than Molly is."

She looked startled.

"I told him," I admitted. "Not the details, but it did seem he'd a right to
know, if he's to stay with me awhile. Now, let's try applying a little reason.
Magic is useful, but logic has its place. Michael said—"

"He's remembered his name?" Her eyebrows made a skeptical comment on that.

"I named him, for now."

Erin's eyes narrowed, for names and naming have power, so I hurried on before
whatever lecture was simmering could boil over into speech.

"As I was saying, according to Michael, the energies here aren't what he's
used to. And he tastes different, unlike anything I've ever—"

"Molly! He's injured."

"I haven't been nibbling," I said, testy. "But I've touched him. I'm sure
I've never encountered his like before—and my experience covers rather a lot of
ground."

She nodded reluctantly.

"I don't know what he is, but I know some things he isn't. He's not Gifted,
not in the sense we use that term, at least. He's not Lupus. And he's not a
sorcerer. Last night he unlocked my door without being aware he'd done it, and
sorcery requires focus. So does telekinesis. Poltergeists, though—"

"He is
so
not a poltergeist."

"Will you stop interrupting? Of course he isn't. But he may be from the same
place, or a similar realm."

"Or he may be lying."

"No." That came from Michael, who spoke with simple assurance. "I do not
lie."

Erin's lip curled. "What, you're from the angelic realm?"

I suspected I knew what lay behind Erin's, antagonism, and it wasn't getting
us anywhere. I spoke firmly. "That's what you're going to find out, I hope. Are
you ready?"

Her brow pleated. "I don't know, Molly. I'm tied to this world—my knowledge,
power, and rituals are all of this realm. He uses node magic, not earth magic.
If he really is from elsewhere, how much will I be able to learn?"

"Ritual magic is practiced in forty-two realms," Michael said suddenly. "Many
are variants of Wicca. Depending on how one defines the parameters, between
eight and seventeen religiously oriented magical systems bear strong
similarities to it."

"Forty-two realms?" Erin shook her head. "There aren't that many."

"Where did that come from?" I asked.

Frustration was plain in his eyes. "I don't know. It was just there, but when
I try to follow it… nothing." He spread his hands. "I, too, want very much to
know what manner of being I am."

Erin studied him a moment, and I suspected she was using other senses than
sight—including, I hoped, the compassionate sense of the heart. Maybe she was
finally considering the possibility that he was telling the truth. Erin has a
problem with good-looking men. "I'll do what I can," she said at last, and began
to unpack her bag.

The tradition Erin follows requires nudity only for major workings, when the
god and goddess are called rather than simply included in the rite. This was a
spell, not an act of worship—though the two are not entirely distinct with
Wicca—so she and I kept our clothes on. Michael sat up on the couch with the
blanket providing a modesty drape. Not that he had any, from what I'd seen.
Modesty, that is. He was well provided with what the blanket was there to
conceal.

Erin took out her athame, a glass vial, a black candle, a little pouch, and
two silver bowls, each smaller than a cupped hand. "Stand to the south," she
said, nodding at me. "No, a little more to your right. That's good. Michael—you
have no objection to that name?"

"I'm content with it."

"I've set wards outside Molly's home for protection, and will cast a circle
around the three of us to contain the spell. It's vital that you not break the
circle once I've set it. You break the circle by stepping outside."

He looked insulted. "Actually it is a sphere, not a circle, but I understand
you are using the accustomed term. What type of spell will you be casting?"

"A basic truth spell. It will urge but not compel the truth from you. If you
knowingly speak false, I'll see it. With your permission, after a few questions
I'll take the spell deeper. That can feel uncomfortable, intrusive. I'll be
trying to bring truth up from wherever it's hiding inside you."

He considered that, then nodded. "A great many things have hurt since I woke
and saw Molly. I can abide a little discomfort in order to learn what I am and
whether I brought danger here with me."

"Also
who
you are, I hope."

"I am now Michael. As I said, I am content with that."

He looked at me then, and his smile burst over me with the pungent sweetness
of summer berries.

I was going to have to be
very
careful.

Erin doesn't use a compass. The direction of the cardinal points is as
obvious to her as sunlight is to others. She put her bag on the floor and knelt
beside it, then removed her portable altar—a hand-cut, hand-polished square of
oak about ten inches on a side and one inch thick. It went on the floor between
myself and Michael. On it she set her tools. The two silver bowls were filled
with water and salt—salt for the earth, and the north; water for the west. She
put a stick of incense in the altar's east quadrant for air, and a candle in the
south for fire. Then she waved her hand.

Like a faucet springing a drip, the candle's wick acquired a flame. A thread
of smoke drifted up from the incense. She took up her athame and turned in a
slow circle, her lips moving, pointing outward.

Michael's eyes followed, not Erin or the athame, but the direction she
pointed. I knew he must be looking at the energies she roused, and envied him.
I've always wanted to see the colors of magic.

Erin circled three times, then put her athame on the altar with the knife's
tip pointing at Michael. She opened the vial, dampened her finger with the
contents and touched each of her eyelids. Then she stepped forward and did the
same with each of Michael's lips. "As I will, so mote it be."