Spellscribed: Ascension (7 page)

 
                    Hours later, Endrance held up the fifteenth sheet of parchment to dry. It and the fourteen pages before it were covered in arcane script, geometric symbols, mathematical formulas, and carefully arranged concepts in sequence. He finally had finished his preliminary work. He went to put the page down in the next open space for it, but was surprised to find a plate of now cooled sliced potatoes and a roll of bread taking up the space. Even a cup of tepid tea accompanied the food.

 
                    He looked around the room, confused. The papers he had strewn about the room had been policed and stacked neatly alongside his few remaining books. The other quills he had thrown about and the spare jar of ink held the pages down. Even his bed had been made. Endrance slid a foot across the floor. Had someone even swept? Light battered at the shutters covering the only window into the room.

 
                    His stomach growled hungrily at him. He had been swept up in his task for far longer than he had thought. He gingerly collected the pages in order, and set them aside as he ate the food that had been left out. It was cold, but he didn't care. Only Selene would have been able to do it; Joven was too big and loud, and Bridget wasn't going to be doing him any kindness anytime soon.

 
                    Finishing the tea, he found himself feeling more collected, though he felt dirty and his clothes had gotten tacky from repeated exposure to sweat whenever he had been too intensely focusing on his writing. He supposed it was also a good idea to get a change of clothes and take a bath.

             
Endrance walked to the bathing room, stripping off his shirt. The room was dark as he entered; the fire had either been put out or burned out on its own and there were, obviously, no windows in the back of the house.

 
                    He held up a hand in the dark, and clenched it in a fist as he incanted the final word of power to a spell he had since internalized.

 
                    "
Silustrius
." he spoke. He opened his hand, and a brilliant pinprick of light radiated from his palm. It shivered a split second later and exploded, spraying hundreds of smaller points of light in every direction. The specks of light bounced off surfaces of stone, wood, and the water in the bath, hovering throughout the air like particles suspended in water, each mote was only a quarter the brilliance of the initial light, but there were many hundred times’ more lights. They never completely slowed after most of their momentum was lost, instead drifting serenely throughout the room.

 
                    Among the sea of gentle stars, Endrance could see the family bath had been full, but the fire to heat it had not yet been set. Instead, several small logs of wood had been set near the entrance to the fireplace. Endrance smiled. Selene again. Endrance walked up to the bath, the stars weightlessly bouncing off his body and whirling lazily into the wake of his passing. He placed the logs in the fire pit, lit them, and tested the water. Cold. It must have been hours since she’d prepared it.

 
                    He considered going and asking her to join him. Though the hardships of the last month had put a damper on their passion, Endrance still felt his heart stir whenever he was near her. She loved him, and he had never felt anything like what he felt around her. It would be nice to spend some time with her. She had been working so hard to help Bridget and maintain the house whenever he and Joven were off performing his duties as Spengur, and some time together might make her feel better.

 
                    He left the spell active and went out of the room into the kitchen of the home. Sunlight gleamed through the windowpanes, making him blink at it several times. It was already day, not just early morning like he had thought. Endrance sighed as he searched the area by the front door. Selene’s coat remained on a hook, so he figured she was still in the house. He turned and padded up the stairs, careful not to be too loud. The last time he had made a sudden noise in the upstairs hall, Bridget had nearly taken his head off with a wooden stool.

 
                    Cautiously, he passed the door to Bridget’s room and moved on to the other bedroom. Here, Selene’s things and Endrance’s sparse possessions were kept, though most of his presence was just a pretense; too many nights he had slept in the cot in his workroom. It was no more evident that he was neglecting his Draugnoa than that moment as he stood outside the bedroom with the late morning light shining in the halls, his hand on the door latch and his forehead on the jamb.

 
                    Endrance took a breath, and tightened his grip on the door. He had killed a hydra, fought his way through soldiers and assassins and a mage-king, yet trepidation ran through him. It would have been easier to return to the downstairs and talk to her later once she’d awoken. He could just return to business as usual and she would accept it.

 
                    He shook his head one time and opened the door. She was his Draugnoa, his ‘ghost woman.’ To him, she was life bonded to him, forever his keeper and his assistant. To her, he was the only one she could be with, much less the only one who could understand her. The barbarian’s custom was that anyone ‘sacrificed’ to the Spengur was dead, and were as ghosts among the living. And since they shunned anything unnatural, they were effectively ignored as if they weren’t even there.

 
                    He knew the Draugnoa was his responsibility; they had been sacrificed to him as an appeasement after all. He no longer railed against being forced into what the barbarians would consider ‘marriage’ and understood then that they had no choice left to them. He even admired the strength of character it took them to remain optimistic about it.

 
                    The interior of the room was dark, and he paused in the dark as he closed the door behind him to keep it from waking Selene unnecessarily. He knew the layout of the room from the several times he’d been there. A large double bed in the center across from the door, dressers in the corner, lamp on an end table on each side of the bed, and a closet on the far wall to his right that had room for all of his and Selene’s possessions several times over. Of course seeing as they had lost most of their possessions in the fire that took their longhouse, it wasn’t much.

 
                    He stood for a moment, letting his eyes adjust. His gaze slid over the form in the bed and he could tell she was sleeping. She lay under a blanket of furs on her side, her face barely visible in the dark in contrast to her midnight black hair. The mage considered letting her sleep in, and shifted a step to the right-

 
                    Almost as if she had just been feigning sleep Selene’s eyes snapped open, but instead of their usual dark color, her eyes were glowing red and her pupils were square. Endrance’s head rocked back, surprise rising.

 
                    “Selene?” He whispered quietly. “It’s me, Endrance.”

 
                    The eyes continued to stare at him for many moments without blinking. The wizard’s brow furrowed, wondering what exactly was transpiring. He had never known of Selene consciously using her abilities as a Nephilim.

 
                    “Is it even Selene I’m speaking to?” he asked quietly, trying not to disrupt the stillness that was suddenly evident in the room.

 
                    Silence reigned for several seconds, but she eventually spoke. “You tell her that we are one.” The demoness’ voice was Selene’s, but had a sultry quality that felt more seductive; more sexual than he believed Selene could have mustered on her own. “So you do speak to Selene. But only for so long; I can only supplant her control of our body when she sleeps.”

             
It was her other half. “I don’t believe we’ve had the pleasure of meeting.” Endrance replied quietly, padding over to the side of the bed farthest from her and placing his hands on the furs.

 
                    “Pleasure?” Selene said with a girlish giggle that seemed disturbingly alluring. “We both know we have shared that kind of pleasure before. Nothing she experiences is unknown to me.”

Endrance was feeling too disturbed by her behavior to feel embarrassed by her statement. “But is what you experience known to her?” he asked.

                     “When she wants to know.” Selene said. She rolled onto her back, her head at an angle towards him, though her eyes never lost contact with his. He couldn’t help but notice she slept naked under the furs. “I could… share a few things with you, if you want. Then we could have our own pleasures.”

 
                    “Are you trying to say you want me to… sleep with you?” Endrance asked.

 
                    “Sex? Why, don’t mind if I do.” She replied. “I don’t think she’ll mind; in fact, it might excite her.”

 
                    “That doesn’t seem… right.” He responded.  “Doing that in her sleep.”

Selene shifted in the bed, slowly wriggling under the furs. Endrance could tell her hands were meandering up and down her body. “It’s not like she won’t remember.” She said, one hand stopping at her breast. “And you get to have the fun of being with two different sides of the same girl.”

                     Endrance studied her face intently. It wasn’t that he hadn’t seen her naked before, in all her wondrous beauty. It was more that he realized that the personality he was dealing with was demonic, not human. It thought differently than humans did, and its priorities were likewise alien. There was something she was trying to achieve with this interaction, and he knew it.

 
                    “Tell me, Selene,” He said, putting one knee up onto the bed. “What is it that you want from all this? It can’t just be sex. You’re half succubi, sure, but you have to have awakened as the other half of who Selene is. Why the distinct personality?”

 
                    Selene’s eyes narrowed at him.  One hand slipped out of the furs and caught him by his shirt collar, pulling him towards her. She kissed him fiercely, but not painfully. She pulled him away from her long enough so that she could look him in the eyes again.

 
                    “She loves you, you ridiculous idiot.” Selene huffed. “What do you think that means for me?”

 
                    Endrance froze, perplexed. As he considered it, Selene’s hand let go of his shirt and he realized he was supporting himself with his arms. Her eyes lost their luminance, turning round and black as her eyes fluttered closed for but a second before opening. She saw her husband leaning over her, his hands on either side of her shoulders and his face inches from hers.  Her eyes opened wide in surprise.

 
                    “Uhh…” Endrance said awkwardly. “Good morning, love?”

 
                    Selene blinked up at him. “Good… morning?” she replied meekly.

 
                    Endrance thought quickly. “I was going to give you a wake up kiss, but it seems that I wasn’t subtle enough getting into bed.”

 
                    Selene blinked again, this time wiping the sleep away from her eyes. “Oh.” She said. “For a moment there I thought you were going to have your way with me.”

 
                    “W-what?” he exclaimed. “Why would I-”

 
                    She put a finger over his lips. “I was just joking, love.” She said with a giggle that sounded far too familiar. “But you look so cute when you’re flustered like that.”

 
                    Endrance sighed, rolling away from her and sitting up at the far side of the bed. He lit the lamp on the end table, so they could see. “I wanted to talk to you, but I had been drawn into my work and I didn’t really know how much time had passed.”

 
                    “I know.” Selene said, crawling up next to him. “I saw how engaged you were. I don’t think you even noticed me in the room.”

 
                    Endrance rubbed the back of his head, several strands of hair falling out of the ponytail he’d kept it in while he had been working. “That’s what I wanted to talk about. I-”

 
                    Again Selene managed to silence him with a touch to his lips. “Love.” She responded. “I know that you have duties to the kingdom and those can keep you busy for days at a time.”

 
                    “I know but-”

 
                    “And it’s not like I can’t just grab you and have my way with you when I really want your attention.”

 
                    “Your other half would probably like that.”

 
                    “She would, wouldn’t she?” Selene asked, raising an eyebrow. “Maybe I should.”

 
                    He wondered if she knew about the conversation they’d had. “I would guess she does, all things considered.”

 
                    “I have such erotic dreams when she wants something.” Selene admitted demurely. “These last few nights have been very… hot.”