Original (Kaeru's Story) - Hello, Amelia
"How long has the Witch had you?"
Luke freezes, his skin tingling suddenly. He can taste the spell now, dry and harsh on his lips - a left over discharge of magic used. There had been something itching his spine, pulling at his attention, but it seems that - despite how well he knows this type of magic, despite how well he knows Magic in general - a Concealing spell can still work on him. The Demon curls and itches under his skin - reaching out to find the expense of the area of the spell. But he can't concentrate.
The rush of power that comes with the crackling break of the spell is wave-like. A rush of Witch-Magic - her words carry the break for the spell, so they ring in his ears like echoes and they shake against his skin like an earthquake. The smell of her magic is like sweet liquor. He can taste it, the pulls on the back of his tongue is like drugs.
She slips into the chair across from him, easily - thin and every bit a slip of existence that every Witch seems to be. Her hair shines like a halo around the top of her glossy black head, and Luke stops breathing.
The cafe is almost empty - sitting outside leaves Luke alone most days, with just a coffee and his paper, for hours. Today is not that different. Well, except for the Witch.
Luke has only ever met five of them in his existence. All of them had long, black hair. All of them had hard features, strong bones and a curved nose. This Witch's eyes are white-blue, and while the last one's hair had been curled, this one's is long and flat. Her bangs cut straight across her face, just above her eyes. Her hair hangs to just belong her shoulders, pin-straight and framing her face. This one isn't tan, no - pale, but sporting a left over summer tan. She smells like magic and frost, with a hint of basement darkness and shadows of hot awnings. Her lips are pink, and full, and she's smiling.
"Amelia." She says, politely, and crosses her legs.
"You'll forgive me for not shaking you hand." Luke says - Daemon is quiet in his chest, more nervous than angry, still trying to reach out and find when the spell started from. Luke breaths deep, magic dissipating, and swallows. It burns his throat. "Or introducing myself."
"Oh, you don't have to." Amelia shrugs, speaking in English. He would have preferred another language - one that made more sense for a Witch to speak, like Galic or Latten, but English worked just as well. She crosses her arms slowly over her chest - hands free of a bag, wrists clean of any charms. Her shoulders are relaxed. "I already know who you - both of you - are."
That makes Daemon snarl, makes Luke's lips twitch up and his eyes shift - flip-flopping. There’s little else Daemon can force him to do in the day light anymore - but it does take Luke a lot of self control to not growl out loud. Amelia watches him, lips pulled up softly into a soft smile.
"How?" The tumble of Luke’s voice is different to his own ears - thin and rumbling - but he doesn’t think she'll notice.
"My Sisters -" The way she says it lets Luke know the Witch isn't talking about someone who was born from the same mother. " - are enchanted by the thought of a Demon for a pet." The girl shifts in her seat, re-crossing her legs. "Few are able to summon one from Below, fewer are able to control them. Your Mistress, however, did both of these things without a Coven around her and managed to tame a pet-beast for herself."
This woman knows too much.
Luke's palms are sweating, fingers wrapped tight around the chair's arms. Most of his willpower is focused on staying in his seat, of keeping the calm curtain over him, keeping his breathing even. Daylight, and the combined fear of Witches and the mention of the past keeps his body planted in the chair. Despite the fact that every fiber of his being is screaming and the pushing need for this....human's death in their hands, he stays still.
"I understand your hatred, Maxwell." The way she says it, the old tilt in her voice, reminds him of how he was once addressed. Before he died. But the tone of her voice rings with something - harsh and grinding. Her eyes are soft - PITTY, Daemon tells him. He already knows. Daemon is smiling behind his lips.
"I don't think you do."He grits.
She nods her head, slightly, considering. "Perhaps not, but I still want to help you."
Luke replays the words in his head two or three times before swallowing, his eyebrows furrowing for a moment. "H-help me?"
"Yes." Amelia - whose power breathes out of her, heavy in the air despite her breath tasting so young, who looks almost identical to her in ways that resonate in his bones and raise all the hairs on his body, who was a witch, wanted to help?
LIE, The Daemon says.
"Lie." Luke echoes. His chest feels very small - the feeling of his heart beating, quick - one-two, one-two - like it hasn't in a long time, makes his stomach tilt and turn. Feelings that he's not used to; his body reacting like he’s not used to. He has to swallow before speaking again. "What's in it for you?"
Because if Luke has learned anything in his two-and-change century’s worth of existence, it's that Witches never do anything for someone unless it helps them out in any way.
Amelia laughs.
The sound is charming - like high, delightful bells - and for a moment it isn't this young girl across from him, it's ANNA, and something screams -
Reality fractures for nanoseconds. Despite the mid-day sun, Luke reaches out and grabs onto the shadows of the chair - kicking out and pulling himself deep down into the cold darkness only to emerge through the shadows of another one four tables away, coming back to himself. The snapping of his Marks prickles down his back, spiking, pulsing with thirst for blood, hate, and love. Amelia is standing - the table they had been sitting at in her hand, held by a quick charm spell that breathes blue and gold sparks down her arm. He must have kicked it when pulling himself through the shadow - Daemon must have aimed it at her. Her eyes are dancing, shining with surprised and power. Her face is delighted.
"I didn't mean to frighten you." She says, placing the table back down. She twists her wrist to dispel her charm, and the table clatters all the way to the floor. "I meant no harm."
TRUTH, The Daemon says.
"Sorry." Luke grits out, stopping his heart beat with a thought - the nonsense is both distracting and unnerving. He grinds his teeth together and stands, swiftly. Its ten steps to get back to the table. He picks the chair up and slips into it in one smooth motion, pulling at the tail of his shirt and reaching up to tug at his undershirt collar. "...You never answered my question."
"No, I didn't." The girl resets herself, sitting and crossing her legs at the ankle.
"What do you want?"
"You." She says, smiling. There isn't any magic behind the word, no release of it, and that surprises him.
TRUTH, The Daemon says. CRUIOUS TRUTH, BUT TRUTH.
"Not possible."
"I know." She leans forward, pushing at the words. "It's a dream, I know. Your Mistress is too strong for anyone to pry you away from her, even in her death. And I’ve seen what a Demon can do when it's unleashed from their prisons, what they can do to the Witch that unleashes them. To take you, either in releasing you or to take you for my own, with how old you are, would be imposable. What I want, Master Maxwell, is your help."
That catches him off guard. "Help?"
"My sister," The way she says it this time, this time it means by blood. "Her name is Alice."
INTIRESTING?, The Demon says. He can feel her fangs, her lips, smiling just behind his. WE KNOW OF AN ALICE, DON'T WE? WHO SMELLED LIKE THIS GIRL...
"My mother wasn't exactly the sanest woman after having me -"
"Witches tend to do that to their mothers." Luke notes. Amelia pauses, her eyes ticking over his face, then away.
"She had Alice four years after me."
"So she's 12 then?" The Daemon says. She's better at telling ages, able to smell it. Her voice sounds a little different to his ears, but there would be no way she could tell that it wasn’t Luke himself who spoke.
Amelia freezes and something stirs in the air. The fresh breath of magic makes every Mark on his fresh scream and writhe, tripping over themselves in movement under his skin. He can feel the dark bramble of webbing crack under his glamour and slip down his spine, electrified in the energy and pulsing against his spine. The girl doesn’t realizes she's doing it, no; she’s to young to control surprise magic flares yet. Maybe from her Sisters, but not from a creature addicted to the scent and taste of it. Luke's hands shake, palms sweating.
If Amelia notices his reaction to her slip up, she doesn't show it. Nothing but that brief spark of fear and surprised magic; without that, Luke wouldn't have been able to tell what her reaction was.
"13, actually." She states, slowly. Luke forces himself to sit back and relax. The Marks on his back writher against the pressure of the chair - he ignores them with force. "She killed my mother at birth. I stayed with my father while she was given up for adoption."
"Your Coven would have rather killed it." Luke states, matter of fact.
Something flutters across her face - hard. "When I say adopted, I mean that she was taken. Legally, and binding, by the government. By a doctor that has remained nameless to a lab somewhere that I can not find. I've scryed countless times, and so have my Sisters, but she has all but disappeared."
"She's probably dead." Luke states, but knows it isn't true when he says it. Witch blood runs through mothers, connects siblings. Amelia would know if her sister was dead.
"She isn't." Amelia is sure about this. It rings in her words. The Daemon curls back, relaxing slightly, paying closer attention to the words she's not saying then Luke could.
"But the Sisters let her go - that means she didn't inherit the Craft."
Amelia licks her lips, quick, and nods. "Yes."
"Then she must be Gifted."
Amelia smiles, slightly. It crinkles the skin at the corners of her face. "You know the kind of lab I'm talking about then."
"Very well."
"Good then." Amelia folds her arms across her skinny chest, sets her shoulders square, and smiles softly at him. "My proposition is this: You help me find and extract her, perhaps even kill everyone associated with taking her, and I’ll help pull some of those marks of your body so you and your Daemon can reach your greatest potential."
POWER, Daemon all but screams, and the marks on his back writher and clench, the ones on his chest and legs constricting and pressing the air from his lungs. TRUE POWER. AND FREEDOM FROM THAT DAMNED WITCH. FINALLY FREEDOM.
No, Luke thinks, breathing deep. Freedom from the Witch, but not for him. For her.
"No." Luke says. He opens his eyes, not realizing that he had closed them, and sets them on the girls face again. Her crosses his arms, pulling at the cramping Marks on his back and arms, and relaxes back. "I'll help you, but not for that."
Amelia blinks. It shows her age. Daemon snarls at it. "What-really?"
And there is the unsure human, hiding under the guise of witchcraft and superiority that every Witch held. Daemon smiles again behind his lips, and it’s a comfortable feeling, because now he knows that he can use it.
"I'll take a Favor then." Luke says, his lips twitching up softly.
Amelia’s face dies. All emotion wipes from her face and a soft prickle of magic sets Luke's nerves on fire. She's testing something - the edges of the residual cloaking circle, maybe, or something else. It's a nervous habit; he can tell immediately. Being bound by the obligation of a Favor is more terrifying than most other things any Witch can agree to. No death, no life; the rules of a favor. A Witch can not kill for a favor, and they cannot bring something to life, but other than that...
Denying a favor marks a Witch as an Oath-Breaker, and it not only destroys their soul slowly, but it eradicates the power.
"One favor owed if you help me save my sister." Amelia states.
"Agreed." Luke nods.
"Agreed." Amelia nods.
That locks something in the cosmoses. Luke feels the contract bind and writhe, settling in his Marks - Witch markings, dark and permanent on his soul, link him to that worldly magic that all Witches pull from.
Amelia stands, fluid, and flips her hair back from her face. She pulls a card out of her back pocket and sets it careful, thumb finger flick, against the table. She smiles at him, settling on the balls of her feet, and her head tilts slightly.
"I'll be expecting a call from you in less than three months." She says, smooth. "If I don’t, I'll find you."
"Is that a threat?" Daemon growls before Luke has time to pull her back. He understand the meaning - the fact that she's bating him, but both him and Daemon are so riled and shaken that she finds words before he does.
She smiles, wider - showing her teeth. "No."
And with that, she’s turns on her heels and disappears, off into the Paris crowd that sweeps past the Cafe. Daemon keeps a line on her for as long as she can - but magic snaps her away, quick - off the continent, too far away from him to follow. Luke breaks out, letting his head fall back, and closes his eyes.
SOMETHING'S STARTED. Daemon says, soft, in his mouth. DO YOU FEEL THAT, LUCAS?
"Hush." Luke says, soft, and places a few franks on the table. The card gleams, shiny and white, across from him. Luke snaps it up - surprised that the paper holds no magic that he can find. He memorizes the number, quick, and rips the card up. The flares of a hidden tracking spell brush against his knuckles and evaporates like water in the sun.
He stands, easy, and steps around to the ally next to the cafe - and falls through the shadows he finds there, slipping easily into the living room of his apartment in New York.
Three days later, his best friend finds him again, and he has very little time to think of the Witch girl and her sister.