CHAPTER#105

"And whatever happened to this mentor of yours?"

Daryl laughed. "Burned at the stake. She got cocky around the wrong people and a paladin of the church got his hands on her as a result. Holy fire burned her into ash, and they mixed her remains into a concrete block which they buried beneath a church, just in case." Daryl scrutinized a gash by her hip. "Let's get those pants off of you."

Kali obliged, sliding out of her clothes. The town car stank of sulfur, the result of so much burnt hair on her body. The wound on her hip widened, revealing muscle tissue and a small patch of bone.

"You have no idea how grateful I am that you don't bleed like the others." He pulled a set of surgical wands out of his pocket. Digging through them, he picked an appropriately thin one and went to work stitching her muscle back together over her leg.

"Leave no trace," she said, watching him work miracles with his wand. Her magic was enough to sustain her, and she would eventually heal on her own without him. However, he could do in minutes what it would take her days or weeks to do. "Main ingredient of the most powerful hexes is a piece of the victim, and I am nobody's victim."

"I don't think that's true today. Explain to me one more time how this happened?"

"I almost broke the Geas." Kali scowled at the memory. "At least, I almost broke another layer of it. It was a crucial moment, and they distracted me."

"By turning the sprinklers on you?"

"I don't know how they did it. But I bet the nymph was involved." She wiggled her fingers. "If I get in there first, I might tear her face off with my bare hands."

"What a waste of a perfectly good nymph." Daryl halted the growth with the tap of his wand, the gap in her skin almost half an inch across. Using his fingers, he pushed the wound closed. Her skin looked like a burning fuse, the wound cauterizing and healing within a couple of seconds. "Tell you what, I'll trade you something in exchange for the nymph. If, that is, you beat me to the prize."

"We'll see." Kali lifted her arm, feeling the new skin stretch a little. "I need your phone."

"What's wrong with yours?"

In response, Kali pulled it from the pocket of her pants and threw it at Daryl's feet. The metal frame had been melted, the screen shattered.

"Damn." Daryl pulled out his phone and handed it over. "Who are you so eager to call?"

Kali ignored him, looking at the screen. "You have several missed calls from Sebastien."

"Yeah, he's pissed. Something about his homunculus won't reform, and this is all our fault somehow."

"We were supposed to work together," Kali said, dialing the number from memory. "Maybe that should be the way we do this from now on."

"You all got a turn," Daryl said. "It's only fair that I see what my doe-eyed meat puppet can accomplish. If she fails, then we put our heads together."

Kali held the phone to her ear, her breath hitching in her throat when the phone was answered. His presence washed over the interior of the car, even from so many miles away. Daryl shivered, realizing who it was she had reached.

"She's here," Kali said. "The succubus is in the house with the others."

Daryl stopped what he was doing, watching Kali. Kali listened to the silence on the other end of the phone.

"I am coming." The phone disconnected, and she handed it back to Daryl.

"What did he say?"

"He is coming." Kali let out the breath she didn't know she had been holding. "Here. To the house."

"Shit." Daryl looked at the phone. "And you're sure? The succubus is here, you saw her?"

"I did."

"Fuck. Then I don't have a lot of time." Daryl resumed working on her leg. "If he shows up and finds out we've been fighting each other on this, he'll have our heads. The less we tell him, the better."

Kali nodded. "All he needs to know is that we spotted the succubus and have had some trouble."

"Glad we agree." Daryl took a break from knitting her wound shut to text something on his phone. "Let's see if I can speed things along."

-

Dana sat in one of the reading chairs in the office, facing Lily who sat on the desk. Through the window, she could just see the hood of the town car through the gap in the wall at the edge of the property. She had come here from the fountain, intent on asking what Lily had in mind, but the succubus had been staring out the window with an intense look of fear.

"I can feel him from here," Dana said, finally breaking the silence. "It's like a sick feeling in the back of my throat. When I look out there, I know that that is the bastard who killed me and made me this way."

"That's Daryl for you." Lily's hair swished dramatically across her face when she turned her attention to Dana. "He's done some pretty sick shit in his time."

"Like this?" Dana asked, indicating herself.

"Oh, he's done much worse." Lily shook her head. "I've seen and heard things that make my stomach curl."

"Worse than risking my immortal soul?"

Lily nodded. "Are you familiar with the Holocaust? There were rumors that the Nazis were delving into the paranormal, trying to find any angle they could to get a leg up. And I'm sure you heard about how they would do disgusting medical experiments on the people in the camps. Well, at one point, Daryl offered to be of service. To a man like him, the opportunity to explore his abilities on a large scale was too tempting an offer to pass up."

"Oh god. He was responsible for the experiments."