“I’m not mad,” Lilly said as she looked at Beldor tiredly. “I just need you to tell me the truth.”

She’d just spent the last hour laying down protection and containment wards around the house to keep any entities from entering the domicile without permission. Afterward, she was drained as fuck and running on fumes magically. The spell in Malsheem had blown the majority of her magical reserves and she still hadn’t fully recovered her strength as a result of her trip to the Feywild. Having to lay down some serious protection on the farmhouse, strong enough to pass through to the Ethereal Plane, had killed the last of her energy to the point where she couldn’t even muster the energy to cast Prestidigitation again to light a few candles. Until she slept for at least eight hours, she was going to be toast as far as magic use was concerned.

Sitting the elf down at the rickety old wooden table in the dining area of the farmhouse, Lilly made Beldor a cup of lavender tea from the can she kept in her bag and sat opposite him while he shakily drank what was offered to him.

“A few years back, when I was still with the Summer Court, I fell in love with a married male,” he said, exhaling as he closed his eyes for a moment. “He was perfect. Everyone loved him. But I went too far. I was obsessed. I went to a Night Hag, hoping she would help. She ended up giving me a potion that would make him want me the same way I wanted him.”

Lilly winced reflexively. Everyone who understood magic knew it couldn’t produce real love, which meant he’d been seriously desperate to think the potion would help. Even when casting to bring love into one’s life, the other person had to come gently and of their own free will. The most magic could do was illuminate the path. They had to choose to walk it on their own.

“He left his husband and started pursuing me like a prize,” he said almost wistfully. “At first, it was incredible. I’d never felt so desired. He went out of his way to make sure I knew he would do anything for me. But, after a while, it didn’t matter how often I tried to tell him I loved him. He started getting paranoid and controlling until, one day, he snapped. He almost killed me.”

“Fuck,” Lilly said.

“I tried to break the spell myself when he first started acting strangely,” he said, almost pleading with her. “But the hag’s magic was too strong for me to get through. I went back to her and begged her to reverse it. She refused, saying I still owed her an item of great power in exchange for the potion. I had nothing to give her. By the time I returned to the court, he was dead,” he said quietly, wincing.

“And now she’s tormenting you in your nightmares until you pay up,” Lilly concluded and he nodded. “That explains why you weren’t too keen on the idea of trying to sleep. It should be safe, now,” she said. “The wards I drew will last for eight hours. If you take that time to rest, you can take watch while I do the same.”

“Aren’t you afraid she’ll come for you now, too?” he asked.

“Not really,” she admitted. “I’m sensitive to the presence of other souls, especially in the Ethereal Plane when they get close enough to me.”

“What about your dreams?” he asked with a distressed furrow to his brow.

Lilly let out a mirthless chuckle and shook her head.

“There’s nothing more terrifying than the nightmares of an Old One,” she said with a mirthless smile. “I have yet to meet a Night Hag brave or desperate enough to stir up mine while they were connected to my mind.”

“That doesn’t sound very restful,” he said sympathetically.

“It’s not,” she admitted.

“What am I going to do?” he asked, shaking his head before scrubbing a hand over his face.

“Well,” she said, not sure how to explain her confidence to him without sounding like she was making shit up to impress him. “Ok. Hag deals.”

“Huh?” he asked.

“It’s just pact magic that holds them in place,” she said. “Overwhelm the bond with something stronger and, ta-da, freedom. Or, we could just kill her outright to nullify the spell.”

“I’m not sure how I feel about you suggesting murder so casually,” he said bluntly.

“Eh,” she said with a shrug. “Murder is a career tool in the Nine Hells. It happens so often out in public, usually because of some dumb squabble between devils, that it’s basically like, ‘oh, ok, that happened’. Same thing with theft, coercion, and violence. For such a lawful place, it can be pretty chaotic sometimes when it comes to that. The only reason I can see it being lawful is that every guilty party has an airtight reason and logic to explain their actions. I mean, fuck, it’s a realm full of narcissistic sociopaths. I got lucky finding the oddballs that keep me even somewhat sane while I’m down there. And it took Divine Intervention on a massive scale to pull that one-off.”

“Again, never visiting the Nine Hells,” he said bluntly.

“No blame,” she said honestly.

“I’ll tell you what,” Beldor said seriously. “You help me with the Night Hag issue,” he started, pausing as he truly considered his words, “you and Bob can crash with me until you get on your feet.”

“I can handle that,” she said with a small smile. “I like bartering for services rendered. But I do have to warn you. Things tend to get weird when I’m around.”

“With as boring as farm life is, a little weirdness is welcome,” he said with a shrug. “Just as long as it’s not the kind of weird that gets people killed.”

“I make no promises,” she said.

“Would you be the one doing the killing?” he asked.

“Umm,” she said, her voice shaping it more like a question as she lifted her shoulders and held her hands palm up in response.

“Am I going to have to chastise you for being a total psychopath and ground you when you step out of line by disemboweling someone in the dining room?” he asked bluntly.

“Oh, gods, no,” she said instantly. “I would never disembowel someone in the house. Outside, maybe, but,” she said letting the statement hang as she looked at him waiting.

“Then, we’re good,” he said, catching on to her joke.

“What about drinking all the coffee before you get up and not making anymore?” she asked, narrowing her eyes at him to watch his reaction.

“That’s pure evil and a deal-breaker,” he said seriously.

“Agreed,” she said with a chuckle. “Now, go get some sleep,” she instructed, getting up to chase him back into the bedroom where a simple, wood-framed bed sat against one wall. “I’m still too wired to think about settling down, so I’ll be awake if anything happens.”

“You think they’ll get in?” he asked as he laid down on the bed and she shook her head.

“The wards will hold,” she said. “Get some sleep,” she said and closed the door to give him some privacy.

Her brain felt foggy and sluggish after being awake for so long and burning off as much energy as she had. Insomnia was a familiar state for her, making it difficult to get a solid night’s rest on a normal day. Having a clear and present danger nearby while in a new place on her own was a perfect recipe for unavoidable sleep deprivation exercises. Grabbing her notebook and quill out of her bag, she sat at the wooden table again and started scribbling notes recording the events of the last few days, trying to make sure she didn’t forget anything important. She’d told Beldor about her writing project and asked if it was alright that she wrote about him, but her gut twisted at the thought of following through. The idea of putting her life on display purely for entertainment purposes didn’t feel right.

If Asmodeus took her deal and agreed to wipe her debts from his ledger in exchange for her help, there was no reason to perform. Lucifer may have agreed to take care of the behind-the-scenes during the show, but she had a visceral hatred of being put on display. It didn’t make sense. Looking down at the page she was writing on, she saw the words “Lucifer’s Mystery” underlined at the top. He told her to analyze her life and the people she’d gravitated towards positively. Figure out what needs they fulfilled and try to craft a character that fulfilled them all. He’d spun it in a way that made it impossible to argue, challenging her to prove how well she knew herself by identifying her True Love beyond a reasonable doubt. Had it not been for his insistence, she’d have done it just out of curiosity.

Things weren’t lining up. She may have trusted Lucifer, but she trusted her instincts more.

Crossing out Lucifer’s name on the title line, she stared at the word Mystery. It may have just been the exhaustion, but the thought that it was someone else’s mystery felt right. Like a piece of a puzzle dropping into place. Someone was playing with her. Tempting her into a game, starting with understanding herself. If she was the key, then perhaps the person she’d invented was the prize. But not the purpose. Place a piece of cheese in a maze and the rat will get lost to find it, only to be trapped when it is found. She’d never allowed herself to be trapped again. Especially not when True Love was the bait. She’d rather be alone for eternity then end up back in a cage.

If the prize was True Love at the price of her freedom, the purpose would have to be something she couldn’t turn away from to get her to play. If the person who had designed the game knew her as well as it seemed, the risk of not playing would be to choose between herself and those she loved. So, what was the purpose of the writing? She knew Lucifer wouldn’t back down, regardless of how unprepared she was. She only had a couple of weeks left before the night he’d declared would be her debut. He wanted her to feel the pressure. He wanted her to know she was running out of time.

“Time,” she said to herself, underlining the word.

By that point, her already exhausted mind felt like jelly. Looking at her pocket-watch, she noted there were only about thirty minutes left on the wards. She’d already decided to make some coffee and wake Beldor when a knock brought her head around. Pulling one of the daggers from her thigh holster, she moved to the door and cracked it open.

On the other side stood a tall, dark-haired elf with a cold scowl in his brilliant blue eyes.

“Can I help you?” she asked, making clear she wasn’t opening the door any further.

“Oh, hello there, my dear,” a bright, sage female voice said and Lilly shifted to see an elderly elven woman with familiar golden eyes, though her pale gold hair was much greyer than Beldor’s. “I’m Anzora,” she said with a smile. “Don’t mind Sour Puss, he’s a bit of a shit,” she explained with a happy chuckle and the dark-haired elf’s expression made Lilly bite her lips to keep from laughing.

“Relative?” she asked the female.

“I am,” she said with a proud nod. “You can call me Grandmother.”

“Good to meet you, Grandmother,” Lilly said, stepping away from the door and allowing her entry. “Sleeping Beauty is in his bed. I was just about to wake him.”

Sour Puss and three more elves, one female and two males, entered the house behind her. The other three were staring around the house in evaluation, chatting between themselves as to what needed to be done to bring it back to rights.

“Is this the cavalry?” she asked Anzora, making the elder elf chuckle.

“This place used to belong to a friend of mine about forty years ago,” she explained. “When Beldor was looking for somewhere he could get away for a while, I told him about it. But I knew it would be in bad shape, so I convinced my friends to come help.”

Lilly glanced at Sour Puss, who was watching her closely, and noted he didn’t seem to be interested in home repair. Narrowing her eyes at him, she made sure his gaze followed her movements as she returned her dagger to her thigh holster. His response was to cross his arms over his chest and square his stance as he returned his cold stare to hers. With a nod of respect to him, Lilly excused herself and went to wake Beldor, letting him know his grandmother was there.

“Is there a reason your grandmother is rolling with an elvish thug for a bodyguard?” she asked Beldor as he sat up on the bed.

“Huh?” he asked, blinking at her, not fully awake. “Oh, she’s a Noble Eladrin,” he mumbled.

“Damn,” she said with an appreciative nod. “That explains the security.”

“She’s also an ancient,” he added. “She over eight-hundred.”

“Shit,” she said with a blink. “Powerhouse?”

“Not anymore,” he said, shaking his head. “She shouldn’t even be traveling.”

“No dibs,” she said, touching her nose with the tip of her finger. “I’m not lecturing the ancient sassy Eladrin about being too frail to leave home.”

Beldor’s brow dropped as he stared at her.

“Coward,” he said, making her snort a laugh.

She was still chuckling to herself as Beldor led her out of the room, immediately affecting an air of the gracious host as he crossed the space to hug Anzora. Watching the genuine affection between the two of them made Lilly smile. It would have been easy to be jealous, given her less than happy home life. But thinking of staining something so pure with pettiness felt wrong. Instead, she opened herself up to their affection, her natural empathic abilities tapping into it. It was like a soothing balm for her soul and the small smile that tugged the corner of her lips was real.

After a few pleasantries between the assembly as the other elves introduced themselves happily to Beldor while Lilly observed from where she’d stopped by the bedroom door, Beldor turned towards her and said her name.

“Dropped out of the sky into the hay pile outside just when I was at my wit's end,” he added.

“Yeah, a real godsend,” she said with a snort, shaking her head at her stupid joke. “Speaking of which, if you don’t mind me asking, which god do you normal pray to?” she asked Anzora.

“Don’t mind her,” Beldor said as Sour Puss bristled.

“The Traveler,” Anzora said at the same time.

“Motherfucker!” Lilly crowed. “Next time you mind-meld with the androgynous, unknowable ass, tell them I’ll take my fee paid in gold this time. As much as I love the map they traded me last time, I can’t sell something that overpowered in good conscience to pay the bills.”

“You think it was the Traveler?” Beldor asked as Anzora let out a sharp bark of laughter.

The three elves in the kitchen came out to stare at her like she’d grown a third head that was quoting bad poetry and Sour Puss shook his head as he pinched the bridge of his nose.

“I know it was,” she said honestly. “I’ve never had dealings with your god before and it’s customary to approach me first to give me the choice of which jobs I take. It being the Traveler’s doing makes a lot more sense because, as much of a pain in the ass as they are, I consider them a friend. Which means they know they’ll be forgiven if they make the proper amends. Better to ask for forgiveness than permission situation. I also know they wouldn’t disrupt my shit without a good fucking reason, so it goes a long way to calm my anxiety,” she explained. “Meeting you two, I know why I’m here, too. So, the sudden territorial urges I’ve been experiencing are justified.”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“It’s a long story,” she said vaguely. “Now, before I continue to babble and end up wandering down pathways of thought that are far too tempting to get lost in, let us commence with the progress of returning this, our darling Beldor’s new home, into a,” she said, pausing to think of the right words for the goal, “habitable hover.”

“Hey,” Beldor said in mock offense, making her smile.

Without waiting for anyone else, Lilly sauntered out of the house. She was moving more sluggishly than she would have liked and she was teetering on the edge of delirium, but helping in the repairs was relaxing to her. Feeling productive always helped when her thoughts were too cloudy to make sense. She helped the elves, Leax, Nook, and Fuk, unload the cart they’d driven from the settlement a day and a half’s ride to the North East in the woods as they told her about their journey. Sour Puss helped to a point, but it seemed he was more accustomed to supervision than manual labor.

When the two male elves, Nook and Leax, broke off to start working on the roof of the main house, Sour Puss surprised her by following her and Fuk towards the barn to start cleaning it out. Within the first five seconds of meeting Fuk, Lilly adored her. The only way she could think to describe Anzora’s protégé and Cleric in training was a total cream puff. Her flowy blond hair bounced gracefully around her shoulders as she practically skipped towards the barn with a sense of relentless happiness. Being around her brought a whole new meaning to Fuk-ing Adorable. It also made Sour Puss’s choice of workstations a little more understandable.

As he broodingly handled the lower level of the barn, carrying the rusted farm equipment outside to be evaluated as either potentially useable or firewood, she and Fuk climbed into the loft of the barn. More than a few times in the process of clearing the old hay and cobwebs out of the space, Fuk managed to time her sweep of the broom to drop small piles of dusty straw on his head with a giggle. When this simply elicited a long-suffering sigh from Sour Puss, Lilly got a solid sense of, at the very least, friendship if not a deep-rooted love between them.

“So, what’s the deal with you two?” Lilly asked her in a whisper as Sour Puss paused by the door after dragging an old distillation rig outside.

Following his line of sight, as he took a drink from his waterskin, she could see the main house where Anzora and Beldor were prepping to make a meal using the fire pit again while the other two elves climbed around on the roof.

“Hmm?” Fuk asked and then looked at Sour Puss when Lilly motion to him with her chin. “Oh,” she said, “he’s my big brother.”

“Ah,” Lilly said with a smile at having her suspicions confirmed. “So, you’re just tagging along with Big Brother on one of his jobs?”

“Jobs?” Fuk asked. “He’s not getting paid for this.”

“Interesting,” she said with a surprised smile.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“Hard to see someone so cold being a family person,” she answered.

“He’s harmless,” Fuk whispered.

“Maybe for you,” she said seriously. “There is a distinct difference between harmless and peaceful, sweetheart. To be peaceful, one must be capable of great violence and choose the path of peace instead. To walk the path of peace without that capability to do great harm is to be harmless. I recognized the look in his eyes the first time I saw him. He may be harmless Big Brother to you, but to everyone else, he’s simply peaceful.”

“What does that mean?” she asked, tilting her head.

“It means I pity anyone who attempts to do you harm in the future,” she said, taking the young elf’s pointed chin between her forefinger and thumb affectionately. “You’re a good kid, Fuk.”

“You sound like my brother,” she said with a chuckle as she smiled at Lilly.

“That’s a terrifying thought,” she said honestly, turning away from the elf to dig through the abandoned belongings in the corner of the loft.

“Why’s that?” she asked.

“Because I know how my brain works,” Lilly admitted over her shoulder as she cleared piles of old papers and maps. “If his brain works the same way, he needs therapy. Lots of it. And probably has an addiction or two as part of his coping strategy.”

“That’s spooky,” Fuk said with a giggle.

“No, what’s spooky is the fact that the previous owner of this land may have been in the same boat,” Lilly said as she started examining the papers to see a seemingly endless supply of disturbing images of pain and suffering.

It wasn’t truly gory by any means. The primary pallet was charcoal and the underlying theme was isolation and fear. Crying eyes clued her into the artist's depression and the paranoia of repeating blurred humanoid shapes hovering at the edges came across with startling clarity. Weapons scattered across the ground or keeping the primary subjects in place repeated as well. Looking through them from the bottom of the stacks upwards, she could see the story of a male broken by images of war and violence struggling to hold himself together as his mind began to fracture. A female figure started to appear at the edges near the top of the stacks and the connected emotions started to soften a bit as the figure started to appear closer and closer to the central figure.

Tragedy turned the theme as the images began to appear shattered. Shattered mirrors, shattered windows, shattered dishes. The female figure had also disappeared from the drawings. Remembering the interior of the farmhouse, two bedrooms and a privy housed inside a cozy little life of simplicity, and the damage to the walls and furniture, Lilly had a sneaking suspicion she knew what happened. The house was built for a family. Swallowing hard, she set the pictures aside, not having the heart to get rid of them. Maybe she could convince Anzora to take them home in case her friend ever came looking for them.

“Wow, look at these,” Fuk said, breaking her mind loose of the artwork’s spell as the elf brought a pair of bracers over from a crate full of knick-knacks and souvenirs.

Lilly frowned as she brought them closer to her. They weren’t ordinary bracers. Lilly sat down on the floor and crossed her legs as Fuk handed them off to her. Setting one down in her lap and holding the other at eye level, Lilly pulled one of the pouches off her belt to retrieve the pearl Destiny gave her for work along with an owl feather. She could already tell there were no charges left in them, considering how damaged they were. But she’d been specializing in the repair, recharge, and resale of magical items since she was teen. Depending on how expensive it would be to repair the item, she could turn them for a decent profit and take it as payment for services rendered.

“Hey, gwanur,” Fuk called down to Sour Puss, using the elvish word from brother, “come look at these,” she said, motioning for him to join them in the loft.

Lilly heard his heavy footsteps on the ladder as she looked at the facets where grey-green crystals were missing from places although most of them remained. They were both bent at odd angles and Lilly got the sense that someone had taken a hammer to them with the intent to destroy them. When Sour Puss joined her on the floor she barely paid attention to him until he reached for the other bracer in her lap.

“Hey now, at least ask me on a date before you start reaching between my legs,” she said, raising an eyebrow at him.

“That wasn’t my intent and you know it,” he said in a low grumble and she rolled her eyes.

“So serious,” she said with a mock pout before taking the bracer back and setting it down with its mate on the floor.

He watched her closely as she attempted to cast Identify, growling to herself and shaking out her fingers as she repeatedly failed to do so.

“Do you want me to,” he started and she growled at him.

“I do this for a living,” she grumbled.

“It’s a level one spell,” he said flatly. “What’s the problem?”

“You’re distracting me,” she said with a bit more attitude than she’d intended.

Raising an eyebrow at her, he pressed his lips together in a line and shifted his legs to rest his elbows on his knees, clasping his wrist with one hand and looking at her expectantly. When she tried again and failed, she growled to herself and shoved the bracers over to Sour Puss.

He frowned at her as he moved them to the side and leaned forward to look at her closely.

“Do I have a booger?” she asked sarcastically.

“You’re exhausted, aren’t you?” he asked, ignoring her.

“I've been awake for close to forty hours at this point and the last thing I did before I got dropped through a portal was burn off all of my magical energy on a spell,” she said bluntly. “Congratulations, detective. You figured it out.”

“You’re a bitch when you’re tired,” he said and she scoffed.

“And you’re an asshole fully rested,” she shot back, crossing her arms and raising a challenging eyebrow at him.

“You need to rest,” he said, not even flinching at the insult.

“I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” she said, flipping him the middle finger.

She knew she was being obstinate, but she didn’t want to admit he was right. Nor did she want to leave everyone else to do all the work while she slept.

“Yeah, that’s not going to work for me,” he said, standing in a graceful motion and grabbing her by the wrist to haul her to her feet. “Fuk, I’ll be back. Stay out of those boxes until I get back.”

“Fuck you,” Lilly said, yanking her hand back and stumbling a little closer to the edge of the loft’s open side. “Whoa.”

“You see?” he said, holding his hand out to use her lack of balance as proof.

“Ha!” she said, “Jokes on you, pal. I can trip standing still stone sober after a sold night’s sleep.”

“That doesn’t help matters much,” he said, obviously irritated with her stubbornness.

To make matters worse, she blew him a two-finger salute with a raspberry before purposefully dropping back to the floor below, activating her Ring of Feather Fall as she did. Landing gracefully on her feet, she turned back towards the loft to see Sour Puss staring down at her in borderline anger as she gave him a sarcastic smile and a sweeping bow. Without waiting for him to make any commentary, Lilly stood, turned on her heel, and left the barn with her hands resting behind her back. She’d only made it a few yards by the time he caught up to her, sweeping her legs out from under her with one arm and cradling her shoulders with the other.

“I am perfectly capable of walking, mister,” she said, even as she rested her arm over his shoulders.

“I’m well aware,” he said unapologetically. “At half speed,” he added. “When you say you burned off all of your energy doing a spell, what did you mean?”

“I mean, the only spells I’ve been able to do since, except the wards I drew last night, have been cantrips,” she said. “The wards drained anything I’d recovered yesterday.”

“You blew all of your spell slots on a single spell?” he asked, pausing to look at her with a furrowed brow she didn’t understand.

“My what now?” she asked.

“Your spell slots,” he said, his rumbling voice shaping it like a question. “Who taught you to do magic?” he asked after a moment of her staring at him with a blank expression.

“My tutors,” she said with a sardonic smirk, “loneliness, boredom, and curiosity. Well, that and getting lost in an Abyssal library regularly.”

“Oh, gods,” he said with a slow groan of a sigh. “Spell slots,” he said as he started walking again, “is the term experienced,” he said, stressing the word to make it clear he thought she was a novice, “magic users apply to the number of spells, broken up by level, a person can cast in a day before their natural magical reserves are depleted and need to be recharged.”

“Then, yes,” she said with a nod. “I blew all of my spell slots on a ritual I wrote myself.”

“Was it at least important,” he asked, soundly slightly aggravated.

“It was to me,” she said bluntly, setting her head down in the crook of his neck despite herself. His drawing attention to her need for rest was making the pull of doing so too hard to ignore. It also didn’t help that he smelled good, too. Like dark amber, jasmine, and rose laced with the underlying warmth of dragon’s blood and the comfort of lavender.

He fell silent after that, making quick work of carrying her into the house and then the bedroom. By the time he set her down on the mattress, she was fighting to keep her eyes open. She knew if she could stay sitting up, she could stay awake as long as she needed to. A firm hand on her shoulder stopped any chance of that happening, however, and he sat down beside her as she tiredly glared at him. Reaching into the pouch on his hip, he pulled a pinch of black rose petals out and held them between his fingers for her to see.

“The choice is yours,” he said in a tone that brooked no argument.

Looking away from his eyes briefly, she curled up on her side, but couldn’t will her eyelids to close completely, feeling tiny second winds as she attempted to relax. After a few moments, her eyelids fluttered shut as the roses began falling around her vision next to her head on the pillow and she felt him lean close to her ear to whisper.

“Sleep, petal,” he said barely above an exhale.

“Petal?” was the last thing Lilly was able to mumble as the world went dark.