Where the Heart Is, Part 23

It doesn't take you much time to make your decision. The threat of what these incubi could do if you gave them time to regroup is just too great. You can't afford let up on the offensive.

You give Rifek a grateful nod. "Thank you," you say. "Your help through all this has been indispensable. I will be sure to tell the queen of the skill you and your clan have shown."

"It was a pleasure," replies the young spymaster. And you get the sense that he does actually mean it, a little bit of genuine personal connection slipping past the more calculating attitude he's been holding toward you. "Give those bastards hell."

"Don't worry," you say, as you rise to your feet. "That is exactly what I intend to do."

With that, you leave the Griffon's Feather tavern. Mockingbird falls into step with you as you exit, looking up at you inquisitively. "Next, we're headed to Market Street," you say, in response to her wordless question. "It's time to meet back up with Verika."

The thought of talking to one of her friends who is also sharing your bed is clearly not something that Mockingbird had prepared herself for, and she spends the entire trip there in nervous consideration. By the time you reach your destination, the eastern horizon is starting to glow with the first hints of dawn.

You knock on the door. Eventually, it's opened by a large, heavyset man with thinning brown hair. "I need to speak to your guest," you tell him, before he has a chance to say anything. "It's urgent. Rifek sent me."

The man regards you warily, only for Verika's voice to come from behind him. "It's alright, Gregor. You can let them in."

Gregor steps aside, and you enter to see Verika leaning against the far wall, already geared up and ready to go. She looks Mockingbird up and down, then gives the young rogue a knowing smirk. "So... you got a taste of him too?"

Mockingbird flushes red behind her mask, and starts to study the floor very intently. Verika, not one to pass up on an opportunity like this, saunters over. Then she leans down and whispers in the halfling's ear. "You can tell me all about it... tonight."

There's so much unspoken, seductive promise in the drow's words that Mockingbird quivers with anticipation. This leaves you with the unpleasant, unenviable task of pulling them away from such delightful matters, and back to the problem of the foes stalking you. "I'm afraid we need to leave," you say. "I'll explain everything as we go. Mockingbird, do you know anywhere else we can hide, just for today? Preferably a place you haven't used in the last month or so."

Mockingbird nods. The three of you venture out, Verika pulling up the hood of her cloak to make her distinctive features less obvious. As you walk through that early stillness just before the dawn, you give a quiet, brief explanation of the current situation. Which quickly sobers Verika, as she learns more about the enemies still remaining.

The hideaway Mockingbird guides you to is small and out-of-the-way, a tiny room in a rundown building in the poorer quarter. "This is one of the places I hide particularly hot loot if I'm not ready to fence yet, or when I have other plans for it," she explains. "There's a hidden compartment under the floorboards that I use to keep things safe. Though I haven't used it lately, since I haven't taken many jobs. I was more concerned with... well..."

With protecting Elianna, once she joined the pact of heroines. And particularly once you showed up. "This will be perfect," you say, after sizing up the room. "Now. I'm going to summon the demon and work out a deal. While I'm doing that, I need the two of you to go find the oldest of the prostitutes that we saved, and convince her to come here. They'll be somewhere in the cathedral, on holy ground, so you'll have a much better chance than I would. I doubt that Alicia is holding the girls prisoner, exactly... but she'll definitely have them guarded. So make sure you aren't followed."

"Don't worry, Tal," says Verika, confidence in her voice. "With the two of us working together, it won't be any trouble at all." Mockingbird also agrees, a competitive light flashing in her eyes. This may be the first time the two stealth heroines have been able to collaborate on something this akin to an actual heist. Though this is probably not how they ever envisioned it happening.

The two of them vanish back out into the city beyond. Dawn has now fully broken, bathing the busy, bustling streets of the capitol in its heat and radiance. You shutter the window, then sit down on the floor and extend your hand, carefully crafting the request that you will send out into the Fifth Circle of Hell.

It takes several hours to make all your preparations. But eventually the summoning circle glows on the floor in front of you, its demonic energies primed to send out your offer. Then, after double-checking everything one last time, you close your eyes and begin your search.

More hours go by, as you sit there patiently. Occasionally you feel flashes of interest, but no actual bites. Every so often you adjust your request, tweaking the offer, though never compromising on the key requirements. You make it clear upfront that you're an incubus, that you're seeking a strong summon for a dangerous fight, and that there are no souls on the table as compensation. The only thing you offer is a delectable feast of Wrath for the demon to gorge themselves on.

The second of those three issues wouldn't normally be much of a problem. But when you add on the first and the third as well, you can understand why you're having difficulty. Especially your status as a demon of the Second Circle. This would probably be easier if a mortal was summoning them directly, but the Second and Fifth Circles have clashed many times over the long millennia, resulting in plenty of bad blood to go around.

You do make sure to include that the targets are other incubi, including some that have personally fought against the Fifth Circle. But you doubt that the name "Zethuriel" holds much recognition for most of today's Wrath demons, so many centuries after that ancient clash you saw him briefly participate in.

Step by step, you keep gradually scaling back the minimum requirements of your summoning request, aiming lower and lower in terms of the demon you're willing to accept. You knew you'd probably have to do it to get a response. But you didn't want to do it too aggressively, without feeling out the responses at every step of the way.

Hours later, the door to the tiny room opens again and the older prostitute steps inside, followed by Mockingbird and Verika. You glance up from the summoning circle, looking the woman in the eyes and silently gauging her resolve. Then you speak. "What is your name?"

"Jocela," she replies, her voice tight. "They tell me that you want to kill more of those demons."

"That's right," you reply. "But I need your help to do it."

The prostitute glances down at circle on the floor, at the ominous pentagram within it, its lines and runes glowing with contained hellfire. Then she looks back up at you, and without any hesitation sits down on the opposite side of the circle. "What do you want from me?"

You give her a thin, sad smile. You definitely judged this woman right. "Nothing just yet," you say. "But once I finish this, you'll need to form a contract with the devil that comes through. Just... whatever you do, don't say anything unless I tell you to. Let me handle the talking."

She nods in agreement. You return to your work, continuing to search for a Wrath demon willing to respond to your offer. Again and again you reduce the requirements... but only by slight margins each time, and never without a long search. Even if it takes all day, you intend to recruit the strongest demon you possibly can.

And then, as the evening falls toward night, you finally get a response.

The demon's shape forms within the summoning circle. A bent, hunched-over figure, wrapped in a tattered cloak that hides much of his face in shadow... except for the gleaming red eyes that burn bright in that darkness. Thick, bat-like wings sprout from his back. He wields a pair of rusted sickles, one gripped in each of his clawed hands. He looks at you with suspicion, as though half-expecting that this is all a trick of some kind.

But his attention is almost immediately diverted, as he turns away from his summoner to look at the woman standing behind him. "I see..." he rasps, his voice harsh and sibilant. "So this is the one who has been aggrieved?"

You size up the demon whose attention you've attracted. Not as strong as you'd usually aim for, if this had been a long-term summon. But he should serve for this more short-term purpose. Honestly, given the circumstances and how much you had to work with, this is probably better than expected.

"She is," you answer. "She was kidnapped and tortured by one of my kind. Now we want to hunt him down and kill him."

"And yet the mortal refrains from putting her own soul on the line?" the demon asks, his eyes still focused on Jocela. "Can this truly be of such worth to her, if she does not pursue it with all that she is?"

The prostitute's eyes flash angrily, and she opens her mouth. You can tell, in that moment, that she would be willing to damn her soul, if it only meant that those monsters would die. But you hold up a hand, fixing her with a fierce look that freezes her in place.

Then you address the Wrath demon. "She's not the one making those decisions. She may be the one who was aggrieved, but I'm your summoner. And we both know how rare it is for someone of your rank to get a chance at a meal like this. Which means that if you can't play by my rules... then I'll just dump you right back into the Fifth Circle and find someone else who can."

Truth be told, you are running out of time. And you really don't want to re-expend the Lust it took to bring this demon here. But you don't let any of that show in your demeanor. Instead, you act as though it would cost you nothing whatsoever to simply walk away from this negotiation.

After all, you're not about to just stand by and let an innocent soul be damned to the Fifth Circle. Especially not when you've already made such promising inroads toward getting her damned to your circle instead.

And your gamble pays off. The Wrath demon backs down, shooting you a glare before turning back to Jocela. "State your grievance, mortal," he says. "State it in your own words."

The prostitute looks right into those glowing red eyes. "They caught us at night," she says. Her voice is tight, her expression hard. Yet despite how hard she tries to hide it, it's obvious how much pain it causes her to remember. "Four of us. Thais, Robin, Lydie and me. Robin... Robin they eventually killed. On accident, when one of them got too enraged. That was when they picked up Aline. To replace her. She was the youngest of all of us."

You can see the muscles in her jaw work, as her hands clench so tight you're sure her nails are drawing blood. Her voice trembles as she goes on. "They beat us. They raped us. Over and over and over again. The tortures they came up with..." She closes her eyes. "One of them... the demon they called 'Sevariel'... he liked to break our fingers. Especially Aline. He'd do it in different ways. Sometimes..."

She takes a deep, shuddering breath. "Sometimes... he would make me count. He saw that I was trying to look out for the others. So he... he made me help him. He would... start breaking bones. Ten times, he said. But if I didn't count for him... he would... he would just keep doing it." Jocela's composure is largely gone at this point, her shoulders shaking as she recalls her helplessness in the face of such utter cruelty.

The Wrath demon inhales, as though savoring a delectable scent. As he does, you see him shudder a little in ecstasy. Then he kneels before Jocela, bowing low as he places one of his rusted sickles over his heart. "Thricefold, I swear," he says quietly, almost reverently. "I swear myself to be the agent of your enemy's doom. I swear myself to be the weapon of your retribution."

Then he looks up, meeting her eyes. "I swear myself to be your vengeance."

And with that, the contract is set. You finalize the summoning, and release the Wrath demon from the circle. Immediately his head whips around, looking toward the west. You raise your eyebrows a little. "You have the trail already?"

"Of course," the Wrath demon says, his gaze not wavering from that direction. "There is no place in all the length and breadth of this world that he could hide from me. No place that I could not find him."

"Just him?" you press. "There are two demons in this group. Though one of them tended to keep to himself, and didn't take part in any of the torture."

"Just him," confirms the demon. "If this... other demon... had little direct interaction with my mistress, then her Wrath toward him may not be of nearly the same magnitude. Nevertheless... I would have still expected to sense him."

"He is an extremely powerful sorcerer," you say. "If the trail leading to him is already so much weaker, then it's possible he has defenses against divination that may be able to conceal him. Even from you."

The Wrath demon makes a long, low noise, one that sounds halfway between a hiss and a snarl. "We shall see. If I can get closer, I may be able to detect that one as well. But either way, the one whose own hand harmed my mistress will not escape. There exists no ward or protection strong enough to conceal him from me."

Which means you have a lead to act on. Now that the broad strategy has been decided, all that remains is to figure out the tactics that you'll use, the best way to employ all the different resources that you've gathered for this showdown.

"If our enemies are holding to the plan I saw in Karathiel's dream, then right now they'll be waiting to hear the result of their kidnapping attempt," you muse. "They probably won't try anything until they learn how that turned out. But even if we know where Sevariel is, we can't just assume that Zethuriel will be right there next to him. At least... not in a way we can identify. He's far too cautious for that. We'll need to draw him out somehow."

"If we attack Sevariel, do you think he would try to intervene?" asks Verika. "Or would he just leave him to die?"

"Hard to say," you answer. "I don't believe for a single moment that Zethuriel actually cares about any of those incubi. But Sevariel's dreamwalking power... that would be a serious blow for him to lose. From what we've seen of him, Zethuriel prefers traps and trickery over direct, brute-force confrontation. But if Sevariel were about to die... and if Zethuriel didn't think it was a trap... it might be enough to make him act."

That would be an aggressive option. But its simplicity could allow you to conserve your Lust for a later use. You'd need to carefully gauge the situation, determining when to spring the trap. And you'll need to think on your feet, since you don't know exactly how Zethuriel will respond. It would be a test of your ability to read the situation, and to react in a way that counters whatever tactic the sorcerer might come up with.

"Or we could also try to lead Sevariel away from that area," you continue. "If there's one thing that we can rely on with these monsters, it's their twisted appetites and their lack of self-control. And Sevariel has likely been buring Lust all night, without any food supply to replenish him. I could take on a form tailor-made to tempt him, then lure him into an ambush. If Zethuriel is staying nearby, and if he does keep following Sevariel, that would give us a chance to detect him. But if he doesn't follow, that would give us a chance to take Sevariel out quietly. Then I could replace him, go back to where I was, and wait for Zethuriel to contact me again."

That would be the quieter approach, to be certain. But it's also risky in its own ways. Not least that multiple extra uses of shapeshifting would cut deeply into your struggling Lust reserves.

In addition, before you move against the incubi, you'll also need to decide if you'll involve Alicia and Elianna in any way. Their holy powers could be devastating against demonic opponents... or against you, once the battle against Zethuriel is over. Will you risk contacting them? Can you risk not contacting them, knowing how powerful Zethuriel is?

You could simply leave them out of the loop, hoping that you can face both of the deadly incubi alone, as well as escape before the heroines are alerted to the battle anyway. Alternatively, you could dreamwalk Alicia and try to negotiate a temporary truce. Now that you've successfully corrupted Mockingbird you could even genuinely offer a cease-fire for the remainder of this excursion, without needing to break it yourself once the fight against Zethuriel is over.

Given the circumstances, you're confident you could get the paladin to agree to a temporary pause in the hostilities. In fact—thanks to how much time you spent making the case for this kind of cooperation in Alicia's dreams—you might even be able to send Verika to negotiate the truce in your stead, without Alicia trying to detain her.

Meeting the paladin in person yourself, however, is probably not a good idea until after you've arranged the cease-fire. At the end of the day, she does still see you as a threat to her entire world. Especially considering what you so recently did to the Great Forest. Best to err on the side of caution.

All that said... while Verika is quite shrewd herself, this is Alicia she'd be up against. You don't expect that the paladin would actually break her word... but considering the dire circumstances and the threat to her friends, you do expect that any promise Alicia makes will be phrased very, very carefully. Part of you worries that she might be able to slip something past Verika, however slight.

Then again, with things as down-to-the-wire as they are... might the risk of a slight loophole in your deal be worth saving that extra expenditure of Lust?

There's no way to know for sure. You'll just need to take your best guess... as you push your limited resources toward the endgame.