Where the Heart Is, Part 16

You and Mockingbird exchange glances as you prepare to exit the safehouse. The young halfling is doing a somewhat better job of concealing her suspicion, having had the chance to cool down a bit from your subtle provocations last night. She still watches you with a wary eye, however. "Well... you're the one who has the most experience with this demon," she says. "You lead the way."

You exit the safehouse, and are soon traversing the streets outside. Mockingbird follows you in hiding, moving unseen across the rooftops and through the alleyways with her astonishing stealth. You, by contrast, walk in plain view. Ostensibly, you're talking to all the contacts that might put you in touch with the incubus again. And with that as your cover, it's simplicity in itself to justify a visit to Rifek and provide the Thousand Eyes with their new assignment.

"Good work on the rumor-spreading," you say, injecting conspiratorial camaraderie into your voice. "It did the trick beautifully. Next, I need your people to look deeper into these rogue incubi. To find out anything you can about them."

Rifek frowns, and you can tell that he doesn't like the idea of sending his people up against supernatural predators of such inhuman capability. You hold up a forestalling hand. "I'm not asking you to try and hunt them directly," you say. "But they may have left an indirect trail. The incubus I faced in Vekmar... he needed a place to keep the women he was feeding on. Property no one would just stumble onto, but also couldn't be traced back to his main identity."

You start to pace, considering all the angles. "His hideaway was well hidden, because he had centuries to worm his way into their society. Centuries to develop and conceal his resources. But these new incubi? They've only been here a very short time. They aren't familiar with this world. Even with their powers, getting a secure place for themselves in a city like this, on such short notice... it would have to have left traces somewhere. I'm counting on you to find those traces."

The spymaster considers this. Then he nods. "If these traces can be found... then the Thousand Eyes will find them," he says. "We won't let you down."

You talk a bit more for appearances' sake, then depart again. Soon you're moving through the city once more. Thanks to your earlier research into the criminal underworld, you're able to visit the sort of places and people that Mockingbird would expect of someone like you, as you play out the pretense of getting your message out. In reality, however, your full attention is devoted to searching for anyone else trailing you like she is.

Of course, the near-certainty that the enemy has shapeshifting powers as well makes your task far more difficult. You can't just watch the crowd for a repeated face, not when it could be replaced by an entirely different one any time you lose line of sight to them. Still, there are ways of working around it. You chart a swift, winding course, focusing your senses to search for even the subtlest of signs that any of the crowd are watching you.

Even a shapeshifter will still need to keep a close enough watch on their target's movements to avoid losing them. And that could give them away, especially to someone as perceptive as you.

Still, even after protracted searching, you see no sign of anyone in the crowd who doing anything like that. So next, remembering your own recent escapades, you study the animals. The dogs, the cats, even the mice. None escape your surreptitious gaze. But even here, you come up empty.

There's one final place to search, however. The most difficult of all to do naturally, without letting on that you're looking. You start by finding a fountain in a bustling section of the upper city, using your inhuman senses to study the reflections in the water. Searching the air above you. Then you continue on your way, moving here and there, every now and then contriving other excuses to look up. A momentary relaxation on a bench as you lean your head back. A narrow miss with a chamber pot that you engineered, giving you an excuse to shout a few choice words up at the person who dumped it.

It takes the longest of all your investigations to accomplish, and discerning fine details at such ranges strains even your senses. But the results are worth it. Because spread out across your trek through the entire city, of all the birds that occasionally swirl overhead... there is one inconspicuous bird that has been circling directly above you, along your entire winding journey.

A chill settles in your stomach. Your enemy has been observing you. But for how long? You know they were watching Mockingbird, so they may have learned of the safehouse when she showed up there. But was she the only heroine they were keeping under surveillance? If they were watching both Mockingbird and Elianna, then they might well have noticed you from your very first visit. And this aerial reconnaissance means that some of the tactics you've employed—such as ducking into alleys to shapeshift—wouldn't have thrown them off in the slightest.

Just how many of your actions so far have they watched?

There's also the question of what they plan to do. Depending on exactly how long they've been observing you, they may—or may not—have seen you flirting with Elianna or using your own demonic powers. Do they know for sure that you're an incubus? And if so, when will they make their move? And what kind of move will it be?

At the very least, they don't seem inclined to swoop down and try to attack you in public. It makes sense, you suppose. Despite their strength, drawing such attention in a hostile city would be dangerous. Especially a city that has so many heroines in it.

In fact... the more you consider it from their point of view, you realized that it's not just danger from the mortals that they have to take into account. They must know that the brand is empowering you, slowly giving you more and more of the full power of a flat-out demon lord. True, most of that power has so far been non-combat in nature... but that's just been luck of the draw. For all they know, you might have already attained ridiculous fighting ability that few demons can rival.

They need to take you alive. They need to take you without drawing attention. They don't know your true capabilities. And they don't know that you've noticed them. Given all that, how will they use the element of surprise that they still think that they have? They must be planning something, some way to maximize their chances. But what form will it take? How long do you have left before their plan becomes a reality? Will you be able to accomplish everything you need to, before everything spirals out of control?

At the very least, you now know they're tracking you. And just as importantly, you know how they're tracking you. If you need to slip their notice, you should be able to now. Which means you'll have to take careful consideration of what you allow them to see you doing.

Not to mention that you've seen one of your foes with your own two eyes now. Which means you could also dreamwalk the demon later on, if you so desired.

For now, you spend what remains of the morning pretending to spread the story that you agreed with the heroines that you would. Trying your best to lure yourself into a meeting, one that Alicia can use to trap you. It's only once you're confident that you've given Mockingbird a sufficient performance that you start considering what you might do with the latter half of the day.

The young halfling is already intently focused on you. You could certainly start to twist that into allure, creating a situation where the sexual tension between the two of you starts to pull her toward your side.

On the other hand, you've also put in some work on Elianna already. If you wanted to follow up on that progress instead, you could do that as well. Though even if you tell Mockingbird that you're done for the day, she's suspicious enough that she might keep stalking you. If that happens, it may require a bit of shapeshifting to slip away from her, much like how you did so yesterday.

Do you want to focus your efforts on claiming one single heroine quickly, even if it means burning extra Lust? Or do you want to go with the most efficient use of your Lust, even if it means spreading your efforts out? Or perhaps something else entirely... even if it means no progress on the heroines themselves at all?