Lottie didn't let up, not for a moment. She dragged Cobalt all the way down the train station, excitedly babbling to herself with her arm firmly linked with his. Once inside, she bought tickets for the pair of them and immediately boarded a train, much to his surprise. Lottie had a hard enough time putting her shoes on in the morning; it impressed him to see her book a train ride all by herself.

But all the hustle and bustle of the morning had really taken it out of the Incubus, barely giving him enough time to think. He had excused himself from the excitable Golem in order to go to the bathroom and found himself almost falling asleep on the train toilet.

As he washed his hands, Cobalt yawned and splashed some water on his face. He took a deep breath and peered at himself in the mirror.

"I don't get it," Lilith said aloud.

He shuddered upon hearing her voice in the back of his mind. He really didn't want to think about the fact that she was with him every second of the day. Even in the toilet.

"What's there not to get?" he asked, pushing that thought out of his mind.

"You're adamant that there's nothing going on between you and these women. And yet you'll drop everything on a whim to help them out."

Not this again...

"They're my students. I have a duty to be there for them."

"Not to this degree. No, they're more than students to you, kid."

Cobalt gazed into his own amber eyes.

"Sure. I consider them to be some of my closest friends," he answered after a moment of consideration.

Lilith scoffed.

"I'd say more than friends, too."

"Drop it."

"Touch a nerve?"

Gritting his teeth, the Incubus shut off the water and dried his hands, brow furrowed with irritation. Lottie was a friend, as were all the others. He had put their lives in danger the previous year, and they had stood by him even when most would have backed down. He owed them everything, and a few personal favours were a good way to begin paying them back.

"If I'm not privy to your thoughts, then you're not privy to mine. Stop trying to get a rise out of me and just go back to hiding," he grumbled beneath his breath.

"Fine by me."

"So please, stop talking. You're interrupting my life enough as is."

Unlocking the door, Cobalt stepped out of the bathroom and began making his way back to his seat. When they first stepped foot on the train, it was packed to the gills with commuters, but with every stop they made, the crowds began to thin out. Now, a few hours later, Lottie and Cobalt had an entire carriage to themselves.

The Golem in question was sitting with her face down upon the table, snoring loudly. Sidling into the seat opposite her, he sighed and leaned his head back, gazing out the window.

The train was passing through a rural area, racing along a stony ridge that overlooked a deep valley. The sun was shining bright in the crimson sky, illuminating the countless verdant fields and woodlands down below. Herds of shaggy black goats steadily made their way across rocky inclines, and along the banks of a young, rushing river, Cobalt could see a small settlement of wood cabins.

Hell could be beautiful in some ways. He had no idea why humans believed it was some kind of burning pit of fire and brimstone.

"Yaaagh~... where are we...?" he heard Lottie mumble, rolling her head across the table in order to face him.

Cobalt glanced up at the electric timetable on the wall. It said they would be arriving at a town called Yannow. As far as he remembered, it was located somewhere along the eastern midlands of Aporue, nearing the mountain range that separated it and the continent of Sunalos. They were quite a long way from Brimstone.

"Halfway across the continent. Lottie, where are we going?" Cobalt asked.

She yawned again and gave him a smile.

"Nearly home..."

"Home?"

"Yah..."

Well that certainly didn't explain much.

"Mista Traya?" Lottie asked, lifting her head off the table.

"Yes?"

"What's your home like?"

He paused at this.

"Well... you've been to my home, Lottie. Remember last year? That big house?"

The Golem shook her silver-haired head.

"No, your home. Where you were when you were really little."

He frowned. Cobalt was born in Brimstone, he knew that. But his mother, still grieving, couldn't handle raising a newborn boy in a town so steeped in personal history. So she moved them all back to their ancestral home.

"Phrodival..." he murmured, glancing back out the window.

Lottie inclined her head.

"Frodidal? Is it nice there?"

It was a wonderful place to grow up. A charming town free from the contrivances of the modern age built around a crystal-clear lake in the middle of the Hellish wilderness. Protected from the elements by a natural perimeter wall of stone, Phrodival was a true hidden gem of a town. Exotic flowers, plants and fungi grown in its gardens filled the air with a strange-but-pleasant perfume, and the lack of vehicles allowed its streets to retain their historic charm.

"It is," Cobalt eventually answered, giving Lottie a smile.

What memories he could recall of Phrodival were good ones. Outsiders held the belief that a town populated solely by Succubi was no place to raise a child, but in truth, there was no place better. Even as an Incubus child, he was treated with respect and kindness by nearly everybody there, and he felt safe no matter where he was.

'It takes a village to raise a child' rang especially true when it came to his hometown. With his own mother often off shooting films, he found himself learning from everybody else in town.

Cobalt frowned. It could be lonely, back when Jezebel was still working. Some nights the only person still at home was the family's maidservant, Lydia, and while she was someone he cared about dearly, she wasn't family.

"Do you miss it?" Lottie asked, noticing the look in his eyes.

"Do I...?"

He certainly missed the people he got to know there. His extended family members, his friends and his neighbours. Phrodival was full of characters. Like Crazy Vivi, an isolationist who lived way up in the daisy fields, carving wooden chess sets and challenging anyone who visited her to a game. Or Cocoa Lattess, who ran the most popular café in the town. Cobalt remembered spending time with his mother there whenever she wasn't working. The Lattess family was close to his, and he remembered being friends with Cocoa's daughters.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

He scrunched up his face. What were their names again?

There was Cookie, the youngest and barely out of her infancy when he last saw her. Clove, the reclusive second-youngest. Cinnamon and Caramel, the middle twins, who ran rings around their mother. And then there was the eldest. He spent the most time with her, in and out of school.

Her name. Why couldn't he remember it?

Why couldn't he remember her?

Cocoa, Cookie, Clove, Cinnamon, Caramel and... who else?

"Mista Traya? What's wrong?" his student asked in a concerned voice, snapping him out of his confused reverie.

Cobalt shook his head.

"N- Nothing, Lottie. To answer your question, I suppose I do miss it sometimes," he sighed, trying to wipe any semblance of discomfort off his face.

But he could tell she didn't believe him. For all her faults, Lottie was an emotional soul. She seemed to had an unnatural affinity for this kind of thing. She reached across the table and gently took his hand.

"Do you wanna go back?" she asked in a quiet voice.

No.

Phrodival was a fine place as a child. Now that he was an adult, its denizens would see him differently. He didn't want that.

And besides, the last time he was in Phrodival...

"L- Lottie, where are these questions coming fr-?"

"Are you scared of home, Mista Traya?"

Her question slammed into him like a truck. Cobalt stared at Lottie with wide, shocked eyes, but she continued to gaze at him with a look of concern, never once letting go of his hand.

"I..."

He couldn't deny it. Maybe he was frightened of ever returning to Phrodival. He couldn't see that place as home anymore, not after what happened in the Undercroft.

Jezebel led him by the hand through the town under a sky full of stars. It was so late, and yet nearly everyone was awake, clustering around doorways or staring through their windows at the Incubus as he was guided down the cobbled streets. Faces from his childhood. Faces that stared at him then with looks of fascination and apprehension.

He sat with the Matriarch and drank tea with the town's oldest and most respected denizens. They barraged him with countless questions about his life outside of the town, and waxed nostalgic about his childhood. It was odd, but nice.

Until...

"Lottie, I don't want to have to think about this again," Cobalt breathed.

She passed her hand over his, squeezing it tight.

"It's okay," said the Golem reassuringly.

He swallowed hard.

Cobalt didn't feel the needle going in. The Matriarch was a paragon of her people. A skilled umbramancer, psychomancer, alchemist... and poisoner. The paralytic took effect immediately, and he was rendered immobile in seconds.

It was terrifying. He was laid in a boat and sailed out to an island in the middle of the lake, a long elevator shaft leading to the Undercroft deep below. Most of the upper levels were used by the Fesserites as a place of healing, meditation and contemplation. But the lowermost levels still retained their original purpose.

A prison for those few demons cursed to be born Incubi.

So many memories were lost to mists of forgetfulness, but the memory of being bound in leather straps and metal restraints... That was one that had been burned deep into Cobalt's mind.

He never really could look at Phrodival the same after that.

He could never see his mother the same.

"Mista Traya?"

"What is it, Lottie?"

"You're crying."

Leaning across the table, Lottie bunched up the sleeve of her cardigan and wiped her teacher's face.

"It's okay," she told him softly.

"L- Lottie, why are you doing this?" he breathed.

"It's okay to be scared."

He shook his head, remember Lilith's callous words.

"I'm not scared," Cobalt said in a shaky voice.

But she just slowly cocked her head.

"Yeah you are. You're scared of you."

Again, her simple words struck him deep.

She was right, wasn't she? Cobalt was scared. He was scared of Incubi.

It terrified him, once he was told the truth. To think that he would become one of them. To think that his life would end before it had begun.

Everyone hid that fact for him for so long, but he was perceptive. He noticed their subtle changes in voice, their disappointed glances. And when he was almost denied entry to the demonic teacher's course in Oxford simply because of what he was, Cobalt finally pieced it all together.

They were scared too.

They were scared of him.

Back when he was a child, they had raised him up several class, citing his intelligence being that of an older child. But really they just wanted him to graduate as quickly as possible, to get him out of the town. His family moved back to Brimstone once he was ready to enroll in B.I.D., at the unripe age of sixteen.

Brimstone. A town lacking the understanding of his condition. His school days.

Days that he couldn't remember.

Why?

Why?!

Why was it that no matter how hard he tried, Cobalt couldn't remember a damn thing about his time at B.I.D.? Sure, he remembered the odd details, like how scared he was of the Headmistress, or how much he dreaded Madam Pudon's classes, but anything further than that was just... blank! Even when Elya tried to jog his memory time and time again, all the Incubus was faced with was a mire of nothingness!

What the Hell happened to him?!

"Shh," he heard Lottie say, once again bringing Cobalt back to the train carriage.

Refocusing himself, he was surprised to see that Lottie had climbed into the seat directly next to him. The Golem's arms were wrapped tightly around his chest, and she was resting here head against his shoulder, tickling his nostrils with her naturally earthy scent.

"It's okay to be scared, Mista Traya. I'm scared too sometimes. I'm scared of doing a thing that might make things weird. But I'm not scared of you. I'm never scared of you."

Her words echoed in his mind, words that he had been told before. By Karazelle, by Whitney, by all of them... Even after what he had done, after what he had showed them, they weren't scared of him. They didn't fear him the same way he did.

Why?

"Don't worry. Things will get better," Lottie yawned.

He looked down at her. She was already asleep.

Cobalt couldn't figure that girl out. She had a kind of density to her that almost generated its own gravitational pull, and yet when it came down to it, she could say things that truly rocked him to the core.

He dimly remembered meeting her parents at the PTM the previous year, and how they told him what her role was in their faith. An emotional and spiritual guide.

Cobalt shook his head and leaned back, shutting his eyes.

He decided to just put his trust in her for now. Whatever she was doing, wherever they were going, Lottie more than likely had a good reason.

He hoped.

-----

Quinn yawned loudly as she trudged down the hall of the girls' dorms, rubbing her uncovered eye as she moved out of the way of other students. Normally she wouldn't even consider the possibility of getting up before noon on a weekend, but since enrolling with B.I.D., the Imp had since taken on some new responsibilities.

Getting breakfast into Lottie was one of them.

"Ngh... bloody thing..." she grunted to herself, tugging at the bandages covering her eye.

The doctors told her that it wouldn't be long before she would no longer need to keep it protected, and frankly she couldn't wait. Getting stabbed in the eye with a shard of glass was painful, yes, but she'd rather go through that again than have to put up with the maddening itch that was plaguing her any longer.

Reaching Lottie's door, Quinn knocked once before stepping inside.

"Ding dong, only me," she announced, leaving the door open behind her.

Lottie's dorm room was a mess, but an altogether different kind of mess from Quinn's. Whereas the Imp simply wasn't bothered with trivial things like cleaning or picking up after herself, her best friend's problem lay in the fact that she simply had too much stuff. Everywhere she looked, she could see pillows and blankets strewn about, and the bed itself was buried under a massive pile of plush toys.

Lottie didn't so much sleep in her room as she did nest in it.

Quinn left the mountain of stuffed animals undisturbed, figuring she should give Lottie a few more minutes before waking her up. Grabbing some eggs and bacon from the Golem's fridge, she switched on the hob in the kitchenette and prepared to begin cooking.

There was a knock at the door, followed by the sound of someone clearing their throat. Quinn raised an eyebrow and looked over her shoulder to see Whitney standing in the doorway.

"Oh, Whitters. Morning," spoke the Imp, drizzling some oil onto the pan.

"Quinn? What are you doing here?" asked the Nymph.

"Breakfast duty. Last time Lottie used the kitchen she tried to dry-roast a box of cereal. Why are you here?"

The Nymph shrugged.

"I saw Lottie's door open and wanted to check in on her."

"Why's that?"

"She was sleepwalking all over the place last night. Wanted to see if she, like, got back safe."

Quinn stopped right as she was about to crack an egg into the pan. Setting it down on the counter, she slowly turned to face Whitney.

"You mean you didn't bring her back to her room?" she asked.

The Nymph shrugged.

"I tried, but she didn't wanna go back!"

Eye wide with dread, the Imp rushed over to the other side of the room and began frantically digging through the pile of plushes on the bed. Lottie wasn't there. It was empty.

"Oh shit..."

"Nobody's seen her this morning, so I-" Whitney began.

"Shut it one sec!" Quinn cried, rooting through her pocket for her phone.

Lottie had a terrible sense of direction and was prone to getting lost, so Quinn had installed an app on her phone that allowed her to keep track of a small electronic tag she had hidden within a necklace she had given the Golem for her birthday. It was hardly an honest thing to do, but when it came to Lottie, it was a matter of her safety.

Booting up the app, she frantically scrolled through the map of Brimstone, growing more and more panicked as Lottie failed to show up. Confused, Whitney glanced over her shoulder.

"Are you... tracking her? That's a little creepy, Quinn," the Nymph commented.

"It's only for emergencies, like when she sleepwalks right out of the bloody campus! Now where the fuck is she?!"

This wasn't good. She was zooming further and further out, but still no sign of Lottie. Quinn began to panic as she frantically swiped. Lottie didn't own a mobile phone; she didn't even know how to operate one. If she got lost or hurt...

"What the-?!"

Zooming out to a continental map, she was surprised to finally receive a ping from Lottie's tracker. The Golem was almost to the very edge of Aporue, rapidly approaching a town right at the foot of the eastern mountains.

"I gotta go find her!" the Imp cried breathlessly, stuffing her phone into her pocket.

"Wait, Quinn, calm down!" Whitney said, raising her arms.

But she wasn't listening. Barreling out of the room, the Imp pounded down the hallway, ready to take off as soon as she got outside.

She had to find Lottie and make sure she was safe. The thought of the Golem getting hurt... It was almost too much to bear.