Demon Queened - Chapter 59 - Rough Draft

Devilla

Abigail wished to date me. Abigail wished to date me. Me! No matter how many times or ways I repeated it, it failed to make sense in my head. It was too difficult a concept for me to wrap my mind around. 

Lucy’s stubborn misconception of me was one thing. She’d only seen the good I had to offer, so far… No, she was choosing to focus solely on the good, and overlook what I’d hidden from her. She lacked an understanding of who I truly was, though. An understanding that Abigail, of all people, should have had! When had I ever caused her anything but trouble? What had I ever done to deserve her affection, or insistence upon my worth?

I’d practically forced her into working for me, not to mention bedding me, all while withholding crucial information from her. I’d eventually informed her of my secrets, of course, along with my plan to leave the tower behind - and she’d called me stupid. She’d stood up to me, and had convinced me to alter my thoughts and plots.

What’s more, she’d taken it upon herself to stay in my life. To handle things on my behalf. Even when my seemingly small request led her into a web of politics and lies and Nivera, of all people, she’d continued to fight on in my name. To help me, without expecting anything in return.

She’d called me her friend. I’d thought it was the best I would ever get from her. A better title than I deserved.

Yet now, she apparently wanted to date me…

“Is everything alright?” Lucy asked from behind me, before working her arms under and above my body to pull me in for a hug. We were currently sleeping together, as we often did, her naked body pressed against my own for warmth. Her breasts against my back, a weighty reminder of everything I’d gained and everything I had to lose. Her love, her affection… it was more than I’d ever deserved. Yet now she was pushing me towards even more?

“Why are you so invested in seeing me and Abigail together?” I asked, unable to resist. Though I wanted to treat it as a simple curiosity, my voice came out far more accusatory than I’d intended. Enough so that I flinched, worrying how she’d react.

“It’s not really that I want to share you,” Lucy told me, in a surprisingly chipper tone. I could practically feel her smile across the back of my neck. “It’s just that I don’t see a reason why not to? I’m pretty sure you’d push me towards anyone who you thought would be good for me, too…”

“Yes, but in my case it would be to see you supported after you’ve given up on me,” I confessed, shaking my head. “I understand the concept of polyamory. I might even be polyamorous, myself - certainly, I feel as if there’s room in my heart for the two of you… or at least there would be, were the panic of potentially losing you both not threatening to tear my heart apart.” 

That was the problem, wasn’t it? I didn’t want to lose either of them. Ridiculous. I didn’t deserve either of them. Yet I was somehow certain that both would lecture me for speaking that way… Lucy would tell me that there was no ‘deserving’ anything when it came to love, only receiving it or not. Abigail, meanwhile, would insist that it wasn’t my choice who she devoted her feelings towards.

“Both of you are wonderful,” I admitted, aloud. “Yet I’d have an easier time seeing you with one another than myself…”

“Well, I did ask her out too,” Lucy informed me, before giving me a little squeeze. “Maybe we can all date each other!”

Or you could dump me for her - that’s what I wanted to suggest, but the words didn’t leave my lips. I could only imagine it angering Lucy, who would insist yet again upon her affection for me… affection I believed to be real, but which I could not see lingering as she grew to know me better. No matter how much I wanted to.

“I just… don’t want to lose the two of you,” I admitted, at last. “You, who’ve helped me, held me, and believed in me. Abigail - she who was first to greet me, after I’d first gained access to my past life memories. She supported me, stood by my side, and made me feel as if I wasn’t alone in this world… If I were to lose either of you, I’m not sure what I’d do - how I’d handle it.”

“Don’t think about that,” Lucy told me - though it sounded less like an order and more like a plea. “Just think about how happy we can all be if it works out! Isn’t that worth aiming for?”

“Bringing the two of you joy would be enough for me. Even if I wasn’t involved in it…” I felt  Lucy tighten her grip around me, and quickly added, “But I suppose it would be better if all three of us could achieve it, somehow.”

“Hmm… I know you don’t really think it’s possible, but… I’m going to convince you otherwise! You’ll see for yourself that you can be happy, and that others can be happy to have you around!”

“For my presence to bring something other than misery… I suppose that’s a dream worth working towards, if nothing else.”

“You’ve already succeeded, for me,” Lucy insisted, somehow cuddling even tighter against me. I swear, she must have been squashing her boobs against my back.

Not that I was in any mood to back away…

“Fine,” I uttered, at last. “Fine. I’ll go on a date with Abigail, and see where it leads me…”

“And then I’ll go on a date with her, too, and see where that goes!”

“If that will make you happy… then so be it.” 

Maybe they’d both figure out they were better off without me. Maybe they’d end up dating one another, and cutting me loose. Maybe I’d get to stay a friend, or maybe they’d decide it too awkward, preferring to never see me again.

Or maybe, some small part of me whispered as I fell asleep, maybe we could all be happy together in the end…

***

The next day came all too quickly. Not that I was dreading it, per se, but knowing that I had a date later that very night… Well, it was a bit nerve wracking, to put it lightly. Nevertheless, the day moved on. I ate breakfast with Lucy, helped to put away the tent in my Empty Bag, and then scooped her up in a princess carry so that I could fly us towards our mysterious destination.

Lucy still hadn’t told me where we were to have our date. The date that would directly follow my date with Abigail. Right before Lucy’s own date with the same…

To distract myself, I eventually ended up focusing on something else that had been bugging me. Namely, my vision. It still bothered me that a mere lantern had ruined my night vision, once upon a time, when now I knew that no such impedance should. Flying had reminded me of something else, though - during my first true long distance fight, I’d noticed that I could spot details fifty feet below me, to the point of being able to make out individual trees on leaves. While I wasn’t entirely sure how that impressive that was compared to what harpies and the like could manage, it seemed remarkably better than my day to day vision. Why?

Only one idea came to me. One easily testable idea. Namely, I tried focusing on the trees I was flying over - and the world seemed to slow before my eyes. Suddenly, I could make out the leaves below me with ease, even spotting what looked to be a beetle atop one. Then, with a thought of returning my sight to normal, time snapped back to how it always was and the world blurred below me once more.

That… probably proved my theory correct. My senses - or at least my eyes - were not only highly adaptable, but incredibly responsive to my desires. My desires or unconscious expectations, if I had to guess. My eyes had misbehaved because I’d been thinking like a human, expecting myself to have human limitations despite all evidence to the contrary. Yet because I’d expected it, it became my reality…

I wondered what else that applied to. My other senses were obvious candidates for testing, but what about my strength? If I was only ever as strong as I wanted or needed to be, then that might be the true reason I’d never struggled with accidentally breaking things, unlike Lucy. What about my durability? Could I somehow make myself weaker? I had no intention of testing that out, but… it would probably be best to assume I was tough enough to handle anything, while preferably trying to avoid everything. If I feared an enemy’s might too much, I might accidentally give it power over me, yet if I recklessly accepted an attack… I shuddered to think of the results. If nothing else, I’d receive endless lectures from Abigail, for risking myself without certainty or necessity.

For now, I decided to experiment with something much safer. Namely, increasing my hearing range. Toning it down… was probably possible, but hard to test. Lucy was focusing hard on keeping an aerodynamic wind shield around us, to block out the sound as we flew and speed us up besides. Tuning it up, however, let me hear those same howling winds again. Much too loudly, in fact, as I’d naively tried to press the limits of how high up I could go. It was, to be truthful, a mental overload - enough so that I almost dropped out of the air for a moment.

“Eena?” Lucy called out, after I’d straightened myself out. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” I informed her, my cheeks bright red. “I was merely paying the price of my hubris, so to speak… are you alright, though? I should have known better to experiment with you in my arms.”

“I’m fine,” Lucy promised. “But what were you experimenting on?”

“My senses… I discovered that I could manipulate them to some degree, in terms of intensity. Yet I went a little too high on the… hearing…” That’s when I paused. I’d been so focused on how overwhelming the sounds had been, I hadn’t really processed them. It was only looking back on that unpleasant memory that I recalled a sound much different from the roaring winds. What it was, I couldn’t tell you. I hadn’t really processed it, after all. I just remembered hearing something different, at that moment. 

“Hold on,” I told Lucy, heightening my hearing again as I began to lower us to the ground. I was more cautious, this time, but perhaps unnecessarily so. The normal sounds of nature were not nearly as overwhelming as the wind… Still, I went slow, only finding what I was looking for after several seconds as a result - the sound of someone cursing up a storm, as they clashed against… something. Something that screeched.

“There’s someone fighting up ahead,” I warned Lucy, placing her firmly on the ground, and then - after only a moment more of hesitation - removing my high heels. “I don’t know how far. We’ll have to hurry…”

“You might want to carry me, still, then,” Lucy said. Her face had shifted to a more serious expression, one full of determination, yet I noticed the way she blushed faintly when she added, “You know, like you were before? Since I’m pretty sure you can move faster than me…”

“Very well,” I conceded, after a moment, placing my shoes into the bag of holding and scooping her up into my arms once more. Then I began to run. The rocks were at first uncomfortable against my bare feet, but by focusing a little I was able to turn down my sensitivity to it, knowing that nothing the ground had to offer could actually deal me damage.

The rest of my body, however, was hard at work dodging through branches, even as I tore through the underbrush. I didn’t care what scraped against me, but I didn’t want Lucy to experience such a rough ride. Even if her skin was too thick to be broken by a mere branch, it would still feel unpleasant in my experience.

Eventually, in this way, we closed in on the problem, bursting free of the forest and finding ourselves upon a paved rode. A broken down carriage was in the middle of it, leaning to one side. A girl stood in the doorway, kicking and punching at any of the small monsters that got close to her.

The leader of the pack wasn’t going to allow that for long, though. Some distant part of me knew that. Knew that she was in danger, if this continued. That the monster was already moving towards her, and I really needed for her to act. In fact, Lucy was already calling my name for that very purpose. Squirming in my hold, trying to get free, wishing to go face that monstrosity.

It had four legs, covered in grey fur. Whiskers, poking outt on either side of its elongated front. Two, massive and sharp front teeth. A naked tail that swayed back and forth.

It was a rat. A giant rat. Surrounded by what had to be at least a hundred of its tinier brethren. A hundred rats.

A hundred.

A hundred and one if you counted the leader.

And Lucy wanted to go fight that? To enter their midst?

She would be safe. She would be. I knew that… and yet… the mere thought of letting her walk into danger… no matter how scared I was… No matter how many rats there were…

I tightened my grip around Lucy, wanting to tell her that it would be okay. I took a step towards the monstrosities, determined to face them this day.

Then the lady in the carriage punched a high jumping rat, with enough power to send it flying right towards my face.

I’m not… entirely sure what happened after that. There was screaming, I think. A lot of it. Some of it from me. Other than that, though? Nothing. Just… darkness. As if I’d closed my eyes and locked the world away.

Yet I obviously hadn’t, because of what I found when I opened my eyes - which is to say, nothing. A massive half dome of ‘nothing,’ where a portion of the road had simply ceased to exist, leaving only a concave imprint of dirt behind.

A wheel of the carriage was also splintered, I noticed. The woman inside of it seemed fine, though, even if she was gaping at me.

Lucy was safe, too, in my arms, and hugging me. And speaking. She was speaking, I realized.

“-right! You’re going to be alright!”

“I… am alright,” I informed her, my tone a little blank as I stared at the destruction I’d wrought. “But I think… I might wish to work on my phobia in the future…”

“....Maybe,” Lucy agreed, after twisting her neck to get a look at what I’d done. “But you didn’t hurt anyone, right? Except the poor rats…”

“Poor rats?” I questioned. “What, exactly, did I do to them?”

“I think you might be better off not knowing,” Lucy replied, not quite meeting my eyes. “You must really hate them, though.”

“They’re a terror,” I confessed. “Left over from another life…” Jacob had lost some of his hearing to an ear infection, after being bitten by one. Ever since, he’d had a phobia of them. One I’d apparently inherited… I wondered why that had sunk in, when other things had not. Perhaps because I had no real experience with rats, to begin with? So my image of them came totally and completely from him…

Regardless, I had something else to deal with in the present. The aftermath. The woman from the carriage - a girl about my own age if I had to guess - was currently stomping towards me, with a manic grin on her lips. Another girl was following shortly behind - this one wearing a skirt and delicate looking shoes, compared to the former’s choice of trousers and heavy boots.

“Hello!” the first woman called out to us, after stopping a few feet away. “My name’s Grell! Wanna arm wrestle?”

~~~

Author's Notes

Merry Christmas/Happy Hanukkah for those who celebrate! Happy holidays in general, in fact...

This chapter's been sitting in my head for a while now. Especially the second half. The first part wasn't really planned - it more demanded to exist, because Devilla was just too confused...

I've been wanting to work in the stuff about how adaptable Devilla's body is for a while now, though. It was just hard to find the right timing... Hope I managed okay?

Also. GRELL! You have no idea how long I've waited for this idiot... Though I only actually gave her a name, like... yesterday? DX She's been in my head forever, though, so I hope you enjoy her and her companion!