“Caroline Helman.” When she spoke, the petite man with half his head shaved flashed Cary a grin and nodded. He accepted the blank piece of paper from Cary as if it bore some essential arcane runes. The name Papa Butch chose for her grated Cary. He knew it, which was clearly why he chose that particular name. Cary imagined the old man was laughing at her right now as she stood there.
“Elenore Jones.” Emilia’s arm snaked into the crook of Cary’s arm as Emilia handed a similarly blank piece of paper to the attendant. The look the attendant flashed her, as if Emilia had interrupted something between him and Cary might have made Cary’s blood boil. But with the cool touch of Emilia’s skin against her own, Cary had trouble stoking the fires of her anger.
Over the month since they’d fought off the warren of sorcerers, Emilia had blossomed. She’d braided her grey-brown hair into a halo of intricate weaves which resembled a crown. It exposed the delicate lines of her neck and ears. Cary adored the cute little discs to either side of Emilia’s head. Emilia giggled if Cary stroked them and that particular sound unlocked a key to something Cary had long thought lost: bliss.
After those four weeks, Emilia had stopped hunching her shoulders forward and hiding her gaze by pointing it to the ground. The confident, assured side of Emilia had the same effect on Cary as her giggle.
Cary was smitten.
When she turned back to the attendant, she noted the look he flashed between Emilia and Cary. It was hungry, almost predatory in aspect. There was a time when Cary would have noted such a look for later vengeance. Or at least fantasized over executing her vengeance as she’d spent most of her years trapped under her master’s control, unmoving and forced to passively observe the world around her..
“What are you looking at?” Now that she had the freedom to act as she pleased, she did not intend to accept any such disrespect from some mere servant.
The man behind the ticket counter turned as red as his starched vest and cleared his throat. “Are you two traveling together?”
“Are you going to answer my question?” This time Cary growled. Scorn from such a minor being would make her look foolish before any who might learn… Emilia squeezed her arm in a clear signal. Cary sighed and scratched at her cheek. “I am a bit tired, never mind.”
The clerk let out a breath he’d been holding as his mind attempted to clank out a fitting response to her hostile question. That she had this effect on the foolish mortal made Cary feel a little better about bullying him. And it would make the minor lecture she’d receive from Emilia on the plane easier to swallow.
Emilia eyed Cary with a quirk to her lips and tip-toed up to the counter. “We are traveling together, please make sure we have seats next to each other.” She made a motion with her hands. “First class, naturally.”
The clerk blinked at Emilia as the glamour took effect. “Of course Ms Jones. Right away.”
They couldn’t buy their tickets online as neither Cary nor Papa Butch knew magic sufficient to manipulate the stream of digital information on which this modern society ran. The fact had made Cary feel old. Cash, the cloth-based currency of this nation, was simple to counterfeit with magic and no one would notice the switch until it reached their central bank. Possibly not even until well after that; Emilia and Papa Butch both possessed top-tier magical abilities.
When Cary met up with the Cabal in Armenia, she intended to learn some digital manipulation magics, even if she still couldn’t cast magic of her own. The convenience of online transactions was irrefutable.
“What were you going to do, challenge the guy to a duel or something?” Emilia teased Cary, she could tell by the tone of Emilia’s voice.
“No, of course not. But I refused to let him disrespect us with his perverse glare. I refuse to allow anyone to do the same.” They walked over to a long winding line that the signs indicated were for a security check. The notion of travel being blocked behind government sanction rankled Cary and reminded her that despite the incredible progression of humanity, parts of it were stuck forever in barbarism.
“Can I tell you a secret?” Emilia blinked up at Cary, who stilled her breath and shifted her face into a passive mask at the question.
“Of course you can.” The mention of “secrets” reminded Cary of the weight of her own. Especially the secrets she held back from Emilia.
Emilia leaned into Cary’s shoulder and lowered her voice. “When you act all defensive like that. It kinda turns me on.”
Cary’s chest rumbled and she regretted that they stood among a herd of mortal sheep. If the choice had been left to her, she would have swept Emilia up in a lascivious kiss, displaying their attraction for the world to see. But Emilia had banned, “public displays of affection” as unseemly. Cary had trouble pinpointing the line between acceptable and unacceptable in this modern society, even with access to Emilia’s memories. For example, Emilia draping herself on Cary’s arm and pressing her chest into Cary’s elbow did not count. But kissing or stripping nude did. All of it amounted to arbitrary nonsense that Cary intended to break Emilia of in a few hundred years. They both had ample amounts of time before them, so Cary tried to enjoy the social maze Emilia forced her to walk.
“So?” Emilia nudged Cary, who looked down at her and blinked.
Right, Emilia wanted Cary to respond. “If we were in a private place, I would press you against a wall and explore the depths of your mouth with my tongue.”
Emilia’s eyes widened and she cleared her throat. “Okay, that kind of turns me on too.”
An older woman ahead of them in line turned back to look at them from the corner of her eye. For a moment, Cary felt certain she would have to defend Emilia’s honor again, but the old woman simply winked at Cary and flashed her a thumb’s up. It was a mortal gesture of encouragement and brought a smile to Cary’s lips.
“We, um. Need to remove our shoes.” Emilia pointed to the sign bearing the same instructions.
“This is just idiotic.” Over the millennia humanity had managed several marvels. Flight, automated transportation, the Internet. But as far as Cary was concerned two of their greatest achievements had been in the form of pants and footwear. The sandals she wore cushioned her feet and let the breezes tickle the hairs on the tops of her toes. These represented a considerable step up — pun intended — from slapping a thin piece of leather under the sole and tying it down with catgut. That the authorities demanded she discalceate only further reinforced the innate barbarism of mankind.
“At least we don’t have much to carry on. That would suck.” Emilia removed her slip on dancing shoes and revealed her stockinged feet.
Cary pushed her nose into Emilia’s ear as she bent over to remove her sandals. “I thought there was an injunction against baring our bodies in public? I find myself ‘turned on’ now too.”
Emilia shuddered beneath Cary’s voice and shook her head. “You are terrible. We can fool around in first class, but not now.” She scooted away from Cary, who considered the blush painted across Emilia’s neck and shoulders an indication of victory.
Their shoes and bags — Emilia insisted Cary purchase a handbag and bring it with her on the plane — rolled down the conveyor belt along with dozens of others. The possibility of someone stealing their shoes grated on Cary and distracted her from the uniformed mortals who waved a metallic wand at her.
Instantly, the hairs rose over her body and Cary prepared herself to defend Emilia. She interposed herself between the man and Emilia with hardly a thought and he hesitated with a confused expression. “I will not allow you to hurt…”
Emilia grabbed Cary’s arm, hard. “Sorry, she’s from out of town.” Lowering her voice, she added, “That’s just a metal detector, relax weirdo. And try not to attack anyone in here. Please?”
After almost ten millennia, Cary discovered a new weakness in the word ‘please.’ One simple word, uttered from Emilia’s lips and Cary’s will departed her mind. She bowed to the odious mortal with his “metal detector” and said, “I apologize. I misunderstood your intent.”
The man raised an eyebrow at Cary but motioned Emilia forward. His wand beeped at her wrist where the charm Cary passed on from Papa Butch hung. Again, Cary’s fury tried to rise as Emilia smiled at the man and removed the magical talisman. It was a foolish, though not entirely unjustified fear. That charm prevented Cynthia — Emilia’s abusive godmother — from locating Emilia. It also prevented Cynthia’s demonic master from doing the same. Every second that charm did not physically touch Emilia’s skin, the young woman’s life was in danger. The chances Cynthia or her infernal master spent every waking moment tracking Emilia were low, essentially non-existent, but still higher than Cary preferred.
The uniformed mortal ushered Emilia on through a plastic archway where a bored-looking second mortal stared forward as if his mind had been captured by the plastic artifice. Cary strode forward, to stand beside Emilia but the first mortal stopped her. “I need to check you too, Ms.”
Cary held herself still while the man waved his vile device over her body. It failed to emit any of its alarms, so he motioned for her to pass through the plastic archway. The same bored attendant instructed her how to stand, in a pose that matched a diagram next to the arch.
Cary adopted the position and stood unmoving while the archway beeped at her. A small commotion took place among the uniformed guard and Cary grew concerned. Ahead of her, Emilia had already retrieved her charm as well as their shoes and bags. A third mortal, this one a uniformed woman, moved to block Cary’s egress from the archway.
“Something’s just wrong, Mack.” The formerly bored arch-starer pointed to the machine while Cary listened in.
“Show me… what the fuck?” The uniformed guard who held the wand, “Mack,” looked where the second guard indicated. “That’s impossible.”
Stolen story; please report.
Mack eyed Cary and waved her over. “I need to check you with the wand again.”
“Is there a problem, sir?” Cary used her most soothing voice. This sentence had magical properties, like seeking a demons’ True Name, mortals tended to explain themselves when they heard it.
“Yes, I mean no. Let’s just check you out again here.” Mack was clearly lying as he waved his wand up and down Cary’s body. He even stepped aside and waved it next to the conveyor belt. The wand emitted its alarm and he tapped it on his palm. Once again, he moved it over Cary’s body and she began to grow impatient.
“Is there something I can do to help you?” It was another magical social phrase, meant to clear the way and give the guard an out for his unusual behavior.
“Everything is fine, but I need you…” he searched the waiting crowd for Emilia, “and your companion to come with me.”
By then, every eye in the line had fallen on Cary. Most held a note of scorn or impatience, attitudes Cary shared. But a few of them wore naked fear in their eyes as if Cary might erupt with nascent violence at any moment.
“What’s the matter, sir?” Emilia stepped over the line, following the large uniformed woman. “Is something wrong?”
“I just need you two to come with me for additional screening.” The man didn’t lay a hand on Cary, which meant he retained his fingers in their unbroken state. Neither did the woman touch Emilia. As if their instincts warned them against taking actions that would result in severe bodily harm.
Emilia nodded to Cary and mouthed, “everything’s fine, cooperate,” so Cary tacked a fake smile to her lips and followed the guards to a small room.
There, they subjected both Cary and Emilia to a “strip search.” When Emilia’s face turned red at the discussion, Cary had started to resist the notion. Again, a signal from Emilia settled Cary’s ire and she permitted the woman to watch them both strip, alone in rooms with her. Cary did not mind the nudity before mortal men or women. But it clearly made Emilia uncomfortable and for that, she would have ripped the spines out of every mortal in the airport, if not for Emilia’s pleading gaze.
The humiliation of stripping in front of strangers behind them, the three guards — Mack, another male human and the woman who’d supervised their search — carried out actions that suggested the two women would return to their flight shortly. Cary began the process of relaxing after the minor ordeal when Mack, the apparent leader of this group, held his hand to his ear. Over the static of the audio transmitter attached to his head, Cary had trouble making out exactly what had been communicated. She distinctly heard her fake name as well as Emilia’s spoken over the audio device.
Mack’s hand went to the electric weapon at his side and he began to draw it. Cary moved too quickly for him, crossing the small room in the time it took Mack to unbutton his weapon. In the meantime, the three other occupants of the room began their own languid responses.
“STOP!” The word reverberated through the room, loud enough for the walls to bow outward as Emilia spoke. Only Cary remained unaffected by the magic as the three guards all hung limp in their former positions. Fortunately for Mack, the word gave Cary pause. Rather than break his wrist and possibly his elbow, she settled for lightly restraining him.
“What the fuck, Cary?” Emilia’s ire slapped Cary against the back. It stiffened her muscles and raised a form of discomfort in the demoness she had grown unaccustomed to.
“They were about to initiate an attack against us.” Cary had to search Emilia’s memory for the word, “Their earpieces alerted them with our names and Mack reached for his weapon, his taser.”
“Shit. Why?” Cary shrugged at the question, but Emilia had only partially directed it toward her. Instead, Cary reached out and tapped Mack on the forehead. The spell she cast under her breath required physical contact. “Why were you about to attack us?”
Mack’s eyes glazed as he stared through Emilia. “A report came back on you two. You are smuggling drugs to Europe and we were ordered to detain you until the authorities arrive.”
“Shit!” Cary and Emilia spoke in unison. From Cary’s own former master, Elelele to Emilia’s, to the former sorcerous associates of Samantha the Chaos Mage, Cary and Emilia had collected a wide array of enemies. Any one of those possessed the magical ability to bring the temporal authorities down on the two women and use those same authorities to bring them to heel.
“Should we kill them?” To Cary, the solution was simple: eliminate the mortals and ensure that their trail went cold here in the Austin International Airport.
“Gods, no!” Emilia bit her lip and paused for a moment to gather her thoughts. Cary waited to see what Emilia would do. Aside from her rare magical gifts, Cary’s apprentice, servant, and partner possessed a keen intellect. She tapped Mack on the forehead and said, “You will report to your supervisor that we were the wrong women. We are different women: Sandra and Kimmy and the women you were looking for, Caroline and Eleanor escaped when you tried to subdue us.”
“Yes.”
“Um, the rest of these events, your magical ensorcellment, and our faces will become blurry to you after this, like a nightmare from your distant past. You will not react until thirty seconds after we’ve left this office.”
“Yes.”
Emilia sighed as Mack leaned back in his chair and his face grew blank. “Okay, two more to go…” she walked over to the other guards and gathered herself up. Her shoulders had started to slump and her posture shrink after she ensorcelled the second man with the same essential instructions.
When Emilia reached the woman, she tapped her on the forehead and the woman shook herself out of Emilia’s enforced trance.
“What the fuck is going on here.” Like her boss, Mack, the woman reached for her weapon. This time, Cary had to break her wrist in order to stop her from reaching the taser. A broken bone disabled most people, but this random security guard possessed both a will strong enough to resist Emilia’s suggestion and strong enough to keep moving with multiple broken bones. “Why are you doing this? Are you terrorists? I won’t give you anythi…”
Tears fell from Emilia’s cheek as she reached out to the woman. At once, Cary knew what Emilia was doing and pity rose up for her in Cary. Hatred for this system and the mortals who’d almost caught them warred with sympathy for the woman. As Emilia reached for her innate magic, the Consumption, she enlivened the mystical connection between her and Cary. At the same time, the gentle caress she drew over the woman’s cheek drained the guard of her vital essence. Her skin grew chalky and cold, and Emilia had to pull herself away forcefully lest she accidentally kill the guard.
“Now, hear me Georgia. We escaped after we broke your arm. Give us the security access we need to use your computer system and inform your supervisors that we escaped and are different women…” Emilia issued the same commands as before, only this time backed by an intense degree of power. The woman, Georgia, could muster no resistance to Emilia’s power now.
Emilia’s body shook as tears rolled from her cheeks. “She’s a mother of three. One of her kids, he’s special needs…”
Cary grabbed Emilia and held her close. The girl’s power ebbed and flowed wildly in its effects. Sometimes the magic gave her nothing more than a nauseous sense and did not even steal the strength she’d intended to. And sometimes, it melded her mind with her victim’s. In the brief contact between Emilia and Georgia, she’d likely experienced vast swaths of Georgia’s life. It was, in that regard, not unlike the Memory Sharing Cary benefited from by binding Emilia to her as a mortal servant. The main difference was that Cary could control the transfer of memories, and her own eidetic recollection allowed her to sift through Emilia’s memories as if she had an index before her. Emilia had no such luxury.
Through sobs, she directed Cary through the process of navigating security’s labyrinthine computer system. They altered their ticket to use the secondary aliases Papa Butch had concocted for them and scrubbed the facial recognition elements associated with their faces.
After they cleaned the room of their fingerprints, relying on Cary’s memory of everywhere they touched, the two women paused. Emilia turned her back to the scene of the three guards disabled in their offices. Georgia had soiled herself against the wall and her throat creaked as if she wept, but Emilia’s compulsion prevented her from emitting more than a small noise.
“Let’s go.” Cary used no terms of endearment for Emilia there, it would have spoiled them later.
Back amongst the sea of mortals, Emilia leaned into Cary for reasons other than lascivious desire. Now, Cary supported Emilia with her size and weight, like the column Cary had been in another life. For the first time in ten thousand years, she did not resent supporting someone or something. She certainly resented the need.
Knowing Emilia’s desire for sweets, Cary stopped and used some of her fake money to purchase cinnamon buns topped with icing for Emilia. Considering only a moment, Cary bought one for herself as well. The vicarious pleasure of watching Emilia consume the treat was nothing compared to the fine spices added to the food.
Emilia poked at her cinnamon bun while Cary ripped at the edges, dipped the breading in icing, and stuffed huge gouges into her mouth. After a few bites, Emilia glanced up at Cary and her eyes widened in horror. It was the first look other than despondency Emilia had worn.
“How… you have frosting and cinnamon all over your face!” The shock written across Emilia’s face looked out of place to Cary, who shrugged and continued to devour her bun.
“You do not understand. For…” she had to perform a bit of mental math, “about sixteen hundred years after the discovery of cinnamon, it was worth more than its weight in gold. Kingdoms battled kingdom, and men were put to the torch over this spice.” Cary motioned to a little boy a few tables away whose hands and mouth bore almost as much icing and sticky spice as her own. “Now you eat the wages of royalty as a snack between flying through the skies. I wish to indulge.”
“No. I mean you’ve made a mess!”
Cary smiled now. Though unintentional, she’d drawn Emilia out of her self-loathing. “So? I would rub myself down with both this icing and this cinnamon filling if given a chance.” She glanced around and recalled Emilia’s sensibilities. “In private, of course.”
“You’re pretty weird.”
“I prefer ‘unique,’ but thank you.” Cary bowed and ripped another piece from her cinnamon bun. She glanced over at the little boy nearby and he waved with sauce-covered hands at her, flexing his digits as if trying to catch something. Cary cocked her head to the right and gave him a thumb’s up. It felt like the proper response to the tiny human.
Emilia began sobbing and laughing at the same time, with a strange hiccuping pattern. She grabbed Cary’s hand and they retreated to the bathrooms, Emilia holding their handbags and the plastic sack with their treats in one hand and Cary’s hand in the other.
Still sobbing, she used a paper towel to wash off Cary’s face and hands, with the occasional spat of giggling in between. “You did this for me?”
Cary shook her head. “Not on purpose. I bought the dessert hoping it would cheer you up, but I did not make a mess of myself to that end.”
“Of course not, this is just… you.” With Cary’s face clean, Emilia lowered her head and brought her forehead onto Cary’s chest. “I didn’t like what happened in the guard’s room. I… what I did was too much like Samantha.”
“No.” Cary put her hands on Emilia’s shoulders and pressed her own head down on the top of Emilia’s. The universe had acted to ensure that Cary stood tall enough compared to Emilia to perform this movement without discomfort for either of them. “Samantha did what she did out of avarice and pride. Like my own master, she enjoyed controlling others. You did it to protect us both. And to protect those guards if we’re being honest.”
Emilia looked up into Cary’s eyes. “What do you mean?”
“I…” this would not make things better, but Cary had grown tired of lying to Emilia about her own nature. “I would have killed all three of them to escape that place. With your methods, they survived.”
As expected, Emilia stepped away from her. “I wish…”
“I know.” Cary didn’t want to hear it again. After Samantha’s death, Emilia had horrible nightmares, nightmares Cary shared after touching her. Contrary to Cary’s own expectations, these nightmares had not involved Emilia being re-victimized at Samantha’s hands. Rather they involved Emilia becoming Samantha, controlling and murdering those around her with little regard to their safety or choices. In a way, it increased Cary’s esteem for the woman. In another way, it struck a chord of terror in Cary’s heart.
A beat went by while those thoughts blazed through Cary’s mind. Emilia sagged again and laid her head in Cary’s chest. “I am sorry.”
“As am I. I do not wish for you to act counter to your nature. And I have difficulty acting counter to my own.”
“We’re still a pair of horrendous messes, aren’t we?” Looking up into Cary’s eyes, Emilia stared into her, as if the woman could reverse the bond between them and peer into Cary’s millennia-long history.
“Perhaps. We would be far better off if others would stop messing us up.”
Emilia snorted. “Messing with us works better there.” She rose on her tip-toes and closed her eyes, extending her lips to meet with Cary’s.
“Is this not, ‘public’ and thus an unfit locale for such activities?” Cary quirked an eyebrow up while Emilia rolled her eyes.
“Shut up and kiss me, demon. It will make us both feel better.”
They did and it worked.