Nine thousand years. It had been at least that long since Cary’s arm had cramped from mere writing. Unlike the first time, Cary’s penmanship was excellent. After all, Elelele had made her suffer until he found her cursive flawless. And unlike the first time her hand cramped up on her, Cary felt wonderful as she stretched her wrist and let the bones and tendons relax. She’d scribbled out half a volume of magical secrets, starting with the earliest she could remember.

Alshin’s floating mechanical orb gave her positive feedback, cooing over the magical spells she recorded for his benefit. Elelele could learn something of motivation from the chief archivist. Not only was Cary happy to write these spells down for the Scriptorium’s benefit, but she actually looked forward to the next session of writing.

She could not tell how much time had passed when a boulder of referred agony struck her right in the middle of her gut, where her Hara lay. Emilia was in trouble. Cary shot up from her desk, excusing herself from Alshin, who didn’t try to stop her. Good for him, he was one of the first leaders of the community Cary had not wanted to behead every time he spoke.

Dorcas rose when Cary did. “Is something wrong?”

“Yes, my mortal…” Cary almost said, “servant,” but managed to swallow the word. “My mortal is in danger. I can feel it.” She grabbed Dorcas’s hand, but suddenly the Temptress doubled over and grabbed her own midsection. “Are you okay?”

Rather than speak, Dorcas waved Cary away and fell into her chair. As much as she liked the Temptress, Cary’s loyalties belonged fully to Emilia. She rushed up through the library as power flared over the link between her and Emilia. Incredible energy flooded into Cary, heady and massive enough a flow as to force Cary to lean against a nearby shelf before she could move her legs again. With the torrent of Prajna swirling in her, Cary moved faster than a gazelle on the hoof. Her memory supplied the path to the Scriptorium’s exit, but the long winding path took forever to cross.

Before Cary cleared the doorway, the energy flow abruptly stopped. Somewhere out in the camp, Emilia passed out, though Cary could not tell if it was from an overload of power or from an attack. It chilled her bones as she roared through the library door, cursing herself for letting Emilia out of her sight for one evening, considering the danger the mortal lived with during every second of her life.

Imaging Cynthia or the remnants of Samanta’s sorceress flock besieging the camp outside, she found Boris and Joshua standing over Emilia’s crumpled body. Joshua bent over to touch Emilia and Cary’s roar shocked them both out of their present activities.

“Cary, stop!” Joshua and another similarly dressed magician brandished a wand at Cary while the doddering old Ogre-magi, Boris, next to him blinked at Cary as if shocked by her appearance and fury.

Faced with unknown magic and an equally unknown situation, Cary forced herself to slow. “What happened, Joshua?”

To his credit, he did not pause. “Emilia was attacking Esme when we arrived. We need to help her and you will only get in the way.” The way he said the last four words formed a warning to Cary.

The fallen form of Esme lay atop the turf, unmoving. Only after lengthy study could Cary tell the Temptress yet lived. “What did she do to Emilia?” It was an obvious conclusion for Cary: Esme tried to attack Emilia, likely with her natural powers, and Emilia responded in kind.

Joshua shook his head. “This is not the time. Please stand back or Emilia could be in further trouble.”

Cary dug her nails into the palm of her hand. Unlike her first meeting with Joshua, he had the drop on her, with two wands separated by yards trained on her. They had Emilia between them and as much as Cary disdained Boris, she knew better than to underestimate him. Not only were they stronger and generally more powerful than their Ogre brethren, they were universally intelligent and mighty magic users. The fact this one had responded to Emilia’s attack suggested he held some kind of leadership role.

Grigo stood over Esme’s fallen body bawling his eyes out and only noticed Cary when she stopped moving. “You bitch! Your filthy human tried to murder my precious wife! I will fucking kill you!” To everyone’s surprise, he actually charged Cary, a ball of magic forming in his palm as he did so.

Without so much as a blink, Cary shifted to her stone form to absorb the magical attack and teach the little Imp a lesson about her. When the green ball shot from his palm, Cary dodged it with incredible speed, moving like mercury shaken in a vial. She could tell her speed had been augmented by the power Emilia accidentally poured into her.

Grigo did not stop when his spell failed to connect. He raised a fist and grew in size as he struck at Cary. She side-stepped the overhand blow and backhanded the now eight-foot Imp casually, as if he were a wind chime who’s tone Cary tested. Her back foot sank into the soil as Grigo’s giant form achieved liftoff under the force of Cary’s strike. He bounced twice and rolled onto his back as his shape change reverted.

At that point, the crowd watching exploded into motion. Joshua shook his head at Cary. Boris finally collected his wits about him. He made a swift motion with his fingers and shouted with a loud voice. “Stop!” Every figure within earshot, Cary included, froze mid-motion. A few people, who were mid-stride, fell over as their muscles seized. “I will forcibly transform the next creature to perform a violent act into something incredibly foul-smelling and unpleasant!” Again, Boris’s voice protected as if through a microphone.

Only Joshua and his wand-wielding companion remained unaffected by Boris’s spell. Joshua lifted Emilia up while his companion did the same with Esme.

“What are they doing with them?” Cary still couldn’t move, though the effects of the Ogre-magi’s spell had started to fade.

“They are taking both to answer questions, demon.”

“I want to go with them.” Cary struggled against the fading spell and found she still could not move her legs or most of her body below her neck.

“Noted.” Boris shook his head as Joshua and the other member of the Cabal lugged Esme and Emilia away. “But that will not be allowed at this time. When the queen has concluded her investigation, you will be permitted to see your master, depending on the outcome of her judgement.”

Cary snarled impotently, unable to do anything more than twitch her body under the effects of Boris’s magic. The Ogre-magi noted her struggles and raised an eyebrow, but scurried away after Joshua before Cary managed to free herself.

Regardless of what Boris or the other authorities of the Sanctorum said, Cary intended to follow and see Emilia. The moment she could move, she chased down the trail left by the thread between them. When she reached the end of the thread, Cary found nothing. From the tugging at her center, she knew Emilia was close by; she should have stood right before Cary. But no amount of sniffing at the sight or prowling about revealed her mortal servant.

Anger surged through Cary. The explanation was obvious to her: the tents the administrators of the sanctorum used did not need to permit entrance from the outside. She did not run into a hidden structure or tangle herself in the supporting lines, which meant they had shifted the entire tent to an alternate realm. Without her magic, Cary would never break through and find Emilia.

Despair clenched its fingers around Cary’s stone heart and squeezed until cracks formed. She should have slain Esme when the Temptress first tried to use her powers on her. She should have taken Grigo aside and explained to the foul little Imp which of them belonged to infernal royalty and why he should never cross her. Cary had been so worried about her actions getting Emilia kicked out of the Sanctorum that she hadn’t considered that the small group of enemies Cary had made on day one could do the job themselves.

Cary was not crying. Only fools and the weak cried in the midst of their despair. The tears that flowed from her eyes belonged to another demoness, another lost statue torn from her socket in the wall and forced into the mortal world.

Sniffling and wiping her eyes, Cary sought after something she could do. The answer came to her as naturally as recording the ambient sounds around her: return to the Scriptorium and pursue an answer to her lost magic, her lost powers of shapeshifting.

The other denizens of the camp had left Cary with a wide circle of avoidance. None of them wished to incur her wrath, or interrupt her mourning. Wise decisions there. But one of the residents lurked at the periphery of the tents, just in sight of Cary and her weeping.

Rage blossomed anew in her chest at the sight: Dorcas. Cary stalked after the Temptress, giving free rein to the fury she had been unable to expel through tears.

As Cary opened her mouth to castigate Dorcas, the Temptress narrowed her eyes and frowned. “What has my evil bitch of a twin done this time?” All thought of venting her frustration and anger on Dorcas faded. Cary stumbled forward and Dorcas gasped. “Oh sweet Boundary. Was it something bad? Are you okay, Cary? Please tell me she didn’t hurt you.”

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Dorcas had a sweet scent, utterly unlike her twin. It made Cary think of bees dancing in a glade, free of any concerns or worries, dusted with pollen and honey as they frolicked. She managed to choke out an answer to Dorcas’s question. “Not me, Emilia.”

“Oh sweet Boundary, I am so sorry, Cary.” Dorcas half carried her through the fields. When they passed into a tent, Cary did not even take note of which one they had entered. “Here, have some tea. It will calm your nerves.” Wariness rose in Cary’s mind, she had not forgetting her first dalliance with mortal beverages and the way she had been drugged. She sniffed at the drink, eyeing Dorcas as she did. The Temptress rolled her eyes and snatched the cup away from Cary. “I am not my sister. Here.” She took a hearty swallow of the tea and opened her dainty, fanged mouth to show Cary that she had indeed swallowed the drink. “I am not my vicious little twin. Do you want to tell me what happened? Is… Emilia okay?”

At the mention of her name, Cary grabbed the cup of tea back and downed the entire cup in a few swigs. “She is alive. But I do not know what will happen now.”

“She’s why you ran out of the Scriptorium, right?”

Cary nodded. “Your twin is why you doubled over, right?”

Dorcas sighed. “We are power-linked twins. When Esme uses her powers, I can sense it. When she is injured, I can sense it too. Thankfully, injuries do not pass between us, only the sensation.”

“Why do you say it like that?” Cary had a feeling Dorcas had been specific with her words.

“Because I felt Esme almost die a few minutes before I found you. I assume Emilia stuck back on account of Esme’s attempt to influence her.”

Cary nodded, suddenly relieved at Dorcas’s information. “You mean Esme tried something on Emilia first?”

“Based on the order of events, yes. I felt Esme flex her powers and then a short time later, she was struck by a powerful magical force.”

“Can you describe it?” Hope had sprouted in Cary’s chest and she needed the tender roots property nurtured.

“Yes, it was as if an empty, craven power drained first her magical energy, her Prajna, and then her life.”

Nodding, Cary was sure Dorcas had told her something like that before, but her mind had grown muddled for the first time in millennia, other than her drugging in the mortal bar. Checking her mental state, Cary realized that she’d panicked when she thought Emilia was in danger. Sitting here with Dorcas, her mind was as clear as it got, so she hadn’t been drugged again. With that self-examination concluded, Cary felt the hope she had ignored bloom into a full shrub. Emilia had struck back at Esme’s power, which made sense considering the trauma Emilia had faced at Samantha and Cynthia’s hands.

The fact that Esme had renewed that trauma, forced Emilia to relive a portion of it, made Cary clench her fists. If she encountered Esme again, Cary would snap her neck.

“What are you thinking? Your face shifted from grief to… satisfaction. Is Emilia okay?” Dorcas earnestly appeared to desire the best for Emilia. The concern written across her face drew Cary to the Temptress more thoroughly than any magical enticement. But she restrained herself for now.

“I am thinking that Emilia almost killed your sister. In fact, I suspect that she is lucky the instructors intervened or Esme would be dead.”

“How?”

Cary took a deep breath. Before too long, the nature of Emilia’s power was sure to make the camp rounds. The question was whether Cary wanted to be the one who provided the information or if she wanted to leave the task to someone else. Better to get ahead of the news and let people know the truth rather than let the rumor mill generate lies about Emilia. “She possesses the Consumption. Your sister made a huge mistake attacking my… attacking Emilia.” Cary wasn’t about to divulge their secret, even to Dorcas. She wanted to trust the Temptress, but to do so this early was foolish. Besides, Dorcas’s very nature made her untrustworthy for several reasons.

Dorcas processed Cary’s answer and blinked at her. “That’s not exactly common.”

“No, it is not. And she does not possess a minor version of the power.”

“I felt it. I can… imagine.” Dorcas put a finger on her cheek. “I guess that explains how she managed to bind a demoness as old as yourself. And with your unique powers.”

Cary nodded, unwilling to directly lie to the Temptress right now. “Where are we?” It spoke volumes of her mental state that Cary only noticed their surroundings now. The room was covered in quaint decor, from a hand-sewn quilt on the wall to the pastel colors that trimmed the eggshell walls. The carpet was a thick pile of pale pink. It would stain something fierce, but Cary could not find the slightest blemish on the surface. They said at a dainty little table, just large enough for two people to sit. It had round metal legs, polished metal trim and a plastic top with floral patterns under a heavy layer of varnish. The table’s top matched the fine china dishes Dorcas used to serve tea. Cary knew the answer from the bed nearby and from the way Dorcas had lain her overcoat on the rack near the door.

“It’s my room.” No longer fussing over Cary, Dorcas had reverted to her shy, reserved persona. Though this was he room, she dropped her gaze and forced herself to study the floor. “I pray you do not consider my… bringing you here unseemly. This was the only place where we could find some privacy. Is that okay?”

“Of course.” Cary forced herself to remain seated rather than stand and investigate the Temptress’s room. Her experience with Dorcas’s variety of demon was thin. But she had imagined that they all lived in some modification of a sex-dungeon with chains attached to the ceiling and torture devices in lieu of furniture. Dorcas’s room was almost paradoxically neat and free of the expected accoutrement.

Perhaps that only meant she hid her tools in case guests visited. But judging from the size of the room and the absence of an obvious crawl space or closet, Cary did not believe Dorcas matched her own expectations.

Dark from blushing, Dorcas jumped up and scurried over to a small stovetop range. It only had two burners and a tiny space for an oven. But the paint had been rubbed off the nobs in places, so the stove had seen regular use. Humming to herself, Dorcas heated up a second pot of tea. She kept her gaze carefully focused on the pot and stove, as if it protected her from glancing at Cary and… feeling whatever disturbed her so.

Cary had assumed the Temptress was interested in her. But the possibility that the Temptress resented her or otherwise had some problem with Cary also existed. Arrogance led Cary to assume Dorcas behaved like an adolescent. As a result of identifying her own assumptions, Cary focused on Dorcas and her movements.

The woman’s humming was soothing, and suggested she had an equally pleasant voice. As far as Cary knew, Dorcas had never attempted to user her powers on her. The resemblance between Dorcas and Esme was complete, but Dorcas went out of her way to style her hair differently and probably never wore a robe that could be brushed aside with a gesture to expose her nude body. Dorcas wore too many layers for that to ever be a possibility anyway.

When Dorcas turned and noticed Cary’s persistent stare, she hopped and gave a tiny squeak. “Did I do something wrong?”

Cary had never developed a special ability to judge people. Without the link between them, she would never have been able to unravel Emilia’s thoughts or feelings. As much as she had suspected Dorcas of some kind of perfidy, Cary could not believe a creature with such reactions could possess a vindictive or cruel streak.

With a sigh and a grin, Cary leaned back in her chair and said, “you have done nothing wrong. Do you mind if I have some more tea?”

Cary spent the next hour chatting with Dorcas and trying to confirm or deny her impression of the gentle Temptress. The longer she spent with Dorcas, the more Cary was forced to conclude she lacked a single nasty bone in her body. She clearly despised her sister, Dorcas made no bones about that. But she also never spoke directly ill of her, as if even though she loathed her, she couldn’t bring herself to bad mouth her family.

Dorcas had just set down their third pot of tea when Cary felt Emilia’s position change. Jumping up without warning, Cary elicited a new squeak from Dorcas.

“What’s wrong, Cary?” When she recovered, she managed a question.

“Emilia is being moved. I want to go find her.”

Dorcas tilted her head. “You love her.”

Cary’s face burned, but rather than admit her feelings, feelings which Emilia had not yet expressed herself, Cary only shrugged. “I should go. Do you want to come with me?”

Biting her lip, Dorcas shook her head. “I don’t want to interfere. Thank you though.”

Cary delivered a lightning quick peck on Dorcas’s cheek and said, “No, thank you for the tea and the company. You really helped me settle my mind. Wish me luck and a safe… companion.”

Dorcas nodded, oblivious to Cary’s hesitation and near-slip. As she rushed out of the short hallway, Cary noted that despite her earlier despondency, she could easily retrace her steps. Once outside of the extra-dimensional space, Cary tore a furrow into the grounds as she charged after Emilia.

Joshua and Emilia walked side-by-side through the grounds, toward a pale green tent. Anxiety that had clung about her shoulders for the last hour finally let go of Cary as she spotted Emilia walking on her own. It meant she was safe and healthy, uninjured. She wasn’t crying or upset, as far as Cary could tell and that meant she had not been expelled from the Sanctorum.

Emilia grabbed her midsection and turned to find Cary before she managed to pounce on her. “I am happy to find you well… Emilia.” Cary swallowed and hugged Emilia rather than name her, “my love.” Though Cary only knew of mortal mating habits from Emilia’s memories and binge-watching television, she knew that such an initial profession of love should stay private, shared only between the two involved.

“Oh my Gods, I’m so happy to see you!” Emilia returned Cary’s hug and, from the contact, Cary could tell that Emilia’s mental state was much closer to calm than she would have suspected.

“You are okay? I arrived after you both… the Temptress and you were already unconscious.”

Emilia stepped away with her hand over her mouth. “I’m so sorry you had to see that. She… she tried to mind control me…”

Joshua, bless his little mortal heart, declined to interrupt Emilia and Cary’s reunion or Emilia’s recollection of the events. Cary remained quiet while doing so, but she also reviewed Emilia’s memories directly. Once she spotted what the Temptress had done, she found a new reason to send Papa Butch a bushel of roses and bars of gold. His lessons preserved Emilia agains the Temptress’s mental influence and let her muster her magic for a counter-attack.

“I am sorry you have to go through that, it is my duty to protect you.”

Joshua cleared his throat with a fist over his mouth. The sound made Cary and Emilia turn to face him as one. “About that. Though I cannot speak for the council, I do not believe that you will be allowed to remain together, especially now.”

Cary’s voice turned icy and her stance lowered. “If you told them…”

Raising his hands, Joshua shook his head. “I maintain my oath, demon. But now you both will be seen as too powerful considering Emilia’s lack of control. Whether she intended to or not, she almost slew Esme, a major demoness in her own right. The council would be foolish to ignore the potential risks you pose, Emilia.” Joshua made a movement in the air with his hands and the sounds from the rest of the camp faded away. “And I would offer you both two pieces of advice: do not seek retribution against Esme or Grigo. And do not allow the council to learn the true nature of your link. Boris may seem doddering, but he is no fool. A demoness and a magician in your circumstances would be considered too dangerous to remain here.” Joshua moved his hands again. “Do you both understand me?”

Cary and Emilia nodded, both staring at the other through the sides of their eyes. After he let them hug and whisper to each other again, Joshua escorted Emilia off to her dorm room. Though she had spent thousands of years by herself spying on the unaware masses, Cary had never felt so alone in her life.