Lucy’s lips were warm. Warm, soft, and sweet. It was all that I could think about as we flew back to the inn. My first kiss, discounting the time I’d brazenly stolen Abigail’s lips during sex. That had been ‘during sex,’ though, so it didn’t quite count. No… as far as my true first kiss went, I’d pledged it and my commitment both to Lucy. Told her that I would be here, next to her, for as long as she would have me. 

That’s what a kiss meant - to me, at least. To demons in general, really, if the stories I’d read and the gossip I’d overhead was anything to go off of. It was a commitment. Not on the level of a wedding ring, by any means, but it was essentially the first step towards that path. If I had to quantify it… half a step before ‘I love you’? A declaration that you were at least starting to fall for someone. That if things continued the way they were going, you’d be happy to stay with her forevermore. 

That was why I’d been so nervous about giving Lucy my first… but seeing her so vulnerable, so in need… Well. It wasn’t as if I’d ever intended to abandon her. Rather, I’d always been convinced - was still convinced, really - that she’d be the one to tire of me, long before I’d even have the chance. Yet for now, until the day she left me, I wanted her to know that I’d be there for her. That I cared for her. That I was falling for her - and hard, at that.

It was a rather all-consuming thought. Which was why I could hardly focus on Lucy in the present - why my mind kept drifting back to that oh-so-sweet kiss, even as she read the church’s response to her missive.

“They…. want to meet you?”

At least until she said that.

“They what?!” I was aware that I was gawking at her in surprise, but hardly capable of doing more than gaping at her.

“I mean, they don’t specifically say that,” Lucy informed me, before handing the letter over. “But they make a point of mentioning rumors about me picking up a companion and they want me to come to the holy capital in person to pick up the spell. They say it’s because writing holy words on a plain letter would be sacrilegious, but I’m pretty sure that’s just an excuse to get us over there.”

“You sound almost suspicious of them,” I remarked, blinking from surprise. “I thought you were more the sort to take things at face value?”

“Well, I like to!” Lucy confirmed with a smile. “I mean, I’d rather believe someone and be wrong than not believe someone when they really need my help… but that only lasts until I know for sure they’re lying to me, you know? And the church… I mean, I do think most people in the clergy mean well, but… a lot of the higher ups get involved in politics. If someone sent them a letter about me being all close to you, then they’ll probably want to talk to me about it… Especially since they’re really focused on you, without a word about Feyra!”

I let out a noncommittal grunt, too focused on the letter to immediately respond. There was nothing particularly egregious written in it. A flowery greeting, followed by talk of her escapades reaching the church, and a ‘rumor’ about her ‘growing close’ to an ‘unknown highborn.’ Only the last paragraph actually mentioned her request for the depetrification spell, and even then it read almost as an afterthought. It was clearly an attempt to bring her to their capital, where they’d hold all the power.

“What do you wish to do about it?” I inquired, arching an eyebrow.

“Well, I’d like to go,” Lucy confessed, frowning. “I mean, I have a lot of questions, and I think the holy capital might have answers! What about you, though? I could probably get the spell even if you don’t come… I mean, it is sort of enemy territory for you, isn’t it?”

“And in what world would I let my girlfriend go into enemy territory undefended?!” I demanded, giving her a frown of my own. “You might be on their side for the moment, but I don’t want to imagine what they’d do to you if they somehow found out who I really am…”

“I am pretty good at protecting myself, Eena,” Lucy countered, actually sounding a little annoyed. Any trace of that annoyance disappeared a moment later, though, when she gave me a bright smile. “I’m really glad you care, though! And there’s a lot of places I’d love to show you!”

“Then it sounds like our next destination is set,” I declared, privately relieved that I hadn’t upset Lucy too much. I was likely being overprotective… but at the same time, if anything were to befall Lucy due to my own cowardice, my own unwillingness to step into that enemy territory - even knowing nobody there could harm me… The very thought of it felt like a dagger through the heart. “It shouldn’t take us long at all to reach there going at full speed…”

“About that,” Lucy murmured, curling a strand of red hair about her fingers. “I think you might actually be too fast. I mean, I can get anywhere pretty quickly, if I run at top speed, but your flying is a bit… no, way faster than anything I can manage! There’d definitely be questions if we went there at full speed!”

“I suppose that is true,” I conceded, running a hand through my own hair. I was in a bit of a hurry to get the depetrification spell, what with Sylvanna’s time limit taking up space in the back of my mind, but… well, making the church suspicious of Lucy in any way would be akin to putting the cart before the horse. “It would seem we have little choice but to take things at a slower pace, then…”

“Well, actually…” Lucy hesitated. “I was thinking that maybe we could take a detour? There’s a place I really want to show you! And as long as we don’t raise too much of a ruckus, the church won’t send a letter to alert the holy city, so as far as they’ll know any time we spend there is just time we spent traveling!”

Her plan made sense - at least so long as she was right about the church only reporting her presence if she made a ruckus. Honestly, I wasn’t entirely confident in our ability to not cause a ruckus, but if Lucy thought it would help…

“Is it at least somewhat on the way to the church?”

“In the same general direction!” Lucy confirmed. “Though it’s not the most direct route, I guess… If you want to hurry we can, but I really do want to show you this place!”

“What sort of place…” is it. Those were the words I meant to speak, and yet they never left my lips, for even as I began to form them I heard it. A squeak. My eyes darted around, seeking out its source, but there was nothing. Yet I heard it again - another squeak, coming from the direction of the wall.

It could have been a chair moved improperly. Or a mouse, for that matter, happily squealing over a bit of cheese. Neither would bother me, even if the latter did seem slightly unhygienic. Yet if it was what I feared… if it was what I dreaded…

Straining my ears, I could hear something suspiciously like scurrying.

“I have to get out of here,” I whispered. 

“Eena? Is something wrong?”

I nodded, eyes flicking to Lucy. I couldn’t just leave her here, with that… that thing. Even if I knew it likely wouldn’t be able to hurt her. Its teeth probably couldn’t even pierce her flesh, let alone mine. Assuming it was even real to begin with. Yet…

“We need to get out of here,” I corrected myself. “This place might have rats!”

“I mean… maybe?” Lucy agreed, frowning. “The inn probably has cats to deal with them, though!”

“You don’t understand, Lucy…  I… If I see a rat, I… I’m not certain of my ability to control myself. I might very well do something I’ll regret…” Like incinerate this entire building.

“Do you hate rats that much?” Lucy asked, her eyes wide with innocent curiosity - and perhaps a touch of worry.

More than a touch, actually. Which was fair, considering the fact that I was practically trembling. “Hate them? No. That, I could at least attempt to suppress… I fear them, Lucy. With a terror as deep as it is irrational. The last time I saw one… the mere touch of it across my foot… it caused me to black out. And that was likely one of the better possibilities that could have resulted from such an encounter. I’m honestly just glad I didn’t blow up Lissera’s house…”

“It’s that bad?!” Lucy asked, her eyes wide now as understanding began to dawn. As she began to realize the troubles I could bring upon this inn, should a rat appear within this room. “...I’ll tell the innkeeper that we’re checking out in the morning. And I’ll do a really thorough sweep of the room for rats! Maybe you should spend the night at the tower while I do that, though?”

I hesitated a moment, reluctant to let Lucy face this threat on her own - as unthreatening as it may have been to her. Another little squeak made up my mind for me, though, as I soon nodded. “Just make sure not to move the teleportation circle, or put anything on it,” I warned her. “That’s all that it’d take to keep me from teleporting back.”

“Got it!” she agreed as I took the teleportation circle in question out from my Empty Bag and placed it in a corner of the room. Quickly feeding it with my holy magic, I closed my eyes and focused on the circle’s twin, safely located in my tower room. 

When I opened my eyes again, I was there - in my nice, safe, and most importantly rat-free tower room - faced with Abigail, who was currently holding a forkful of eggs and gawking at my sudden appearance.

The only thing I could think to say?

“...Isn’t it a little too late at night to be eating breakfast?”

So, there I was, bored out of my skull after another day of doing nothing in Devilla’s absence - seriously, I almost considered actually asking the other maids if they needed help cleaning anything - when suddenly Devilla was there. Judging my choice of late night snack.

“...The kitchen was closed, alright! And eggs are really simple to make.” Not that I couldn’t have made anything more complex, but… come on, it was a late night snack! And I liked eggs!

“If you say so…” Devilla muttered, clearly judging me a little but too polite to say anything about it.

Which was just… “Ugh, you’re worse than Mom! Can’t a girl enjoy her choice of bedtime snacks in peace?!”

“Sorry,” Devilla replied, looking a little flustered. Then she paused. “Wait… why in the world are you having a late time snack in my room? Aren’t you usually home by now?”

“Usually, yeah, but Mom’s got company over tonight and that gets… loud. Annoyinglyso. And a little icky? I mean, some of the excess lust always ends up wafting my way, and I really don’t wanna get my Mom’s leftovers.”

Even if I was feeling more hungry for lust than regular food, anyways… I’d been spending way too much time in Devilla’s room of late, and not nearly enough time soaking up lust at the brothel. Devilla hadn’t exactly been keeping up with her promise to feed me, either - not that I blamed her, with how busy she was… and besides, her lust was weird. Tasty, but weird - it never seemed to fill me up the way it should. Not that I wouldn’t feel full in the moment, but an hour later…? Famished. The only exception had been when Mifa was going at it with her, but even then it was more like the harpy general was pulling her weight and then some…  Maybe it had something to do with the whole ‘angel’ thing? Like even her lust was different than everyone else’s.

“I see,” Devilla murmured, blissfully unaware of everything going through my mind. “So you came here… Well, I won’t say that you aren’t welcome, but I should mention that I’m planning to spend the night.”

“Does that mean you’re actually going to feed me again?” I asked, arching an eyebrow. Mostly just to see her squirm a little. It was kinda… cute. The way her cheeks flushed red.

“Right… I’ve been rather lackluster in terms of that responsibility, haven’t I?”

“It’s fine,” I told her. “I never intended to rely on you for all my lust, anyway.”

“Still,” Devilla pressed, “if you wish for me to fulfill my duties in bed-”

“Thanks, but no thanks,” I interrupted. “At least not if you’re going to refer to it as a duty anyhow. I prefer my bedmates to be a bit more appreciative, you know?”

“That’s… I didn’t mean to imply… I mean…”

A small smile tugged at my lips. It was actually sort of fun to tease Devilla like this. For all her power, political, physical, and magical alike, she was so quick to turn into a flustered mess when you pushed her buttons just right. “It’s fine, Devilla. Seriously. You’ve been busy.”

“Business is a poor excuse for ignoring someone so dear to my heart,” Devilla protested and suddenly it was my turn to fight off a blush.

Where the hell did she get off spouting lines like that?!

“Dear to your heart, huh?” I teased, determined to get the upper hand. “Bold words from someone who’s only known me for a couple weeks… I know we’re friends, and all, but are you sure you wouldn’t be saying this exact same thing if it had been another maid in my spot after the coronation?”

“Perhaps,” Devilla confirmed. To my surprise the words sent a stinging pain through my heart. Then she continued. “But it wasn’t just any maid who appeared next to me in that state, it was you. By fate or fortune, it was you who stood by me, both physically and metaphorically, as time went by. You who kept me from giving up on myself and simply shoving this mess onto the shoulders of others. You who made me believe it possible that I could make a difference… who made me think I could, perhaps, at least by some be forgiven, no matter how little I deserve it. So while it’s certainly possible that another maid could have worked her way into my heart, I must say all the same - I’m glad it was you.”

“Y-yeah, well… Sappy much?” I grumbled, shoving another bite of egg into my mouth and trying really hard not to blush. “What are you even here for, anyway? I thought Lucy was keeping your nights busy.”

“She was,” Devilla confirmed with a nod. Again there was that sharp pain in my chest, but I pushed it away. I had an unsettling suspicion as to what it might mean, but… well, now wasn’t really the time to delve into all that, was it? “I… had to leave her for the night. The inn was… possibly… infested. With rats.”

“With rats?” I questioned, hardly able to believe my ears. I mean… rats…? Really? “As in the small rodents that squeak?”

“Y-you know what they are?” Devilla asked, seemingly surprised. “You… we… wait-the tower doesn’t have rats, does it?!”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “But we do have rat girls.”

“Rat girls I can deal with,” Devilla announced, letting out a sigh of relief. “But rats… actual rats…. They terrify me, to be honest…”

“Wait,” I said, holding up a hand. “Wait, wait, wait…. You’re afraid…. Of rats? You? The most powerful person on the planet?”

“Laugh if you must,” she grumbled, “but it’s a relic of my past life that I can’t seem to shake. Perhaps because I never had any strong feelings about rats, one way or another, in this world… or indeed, any interactions with them. That void of feeling was vulnerable to being filled.”

“Right… I’ll just pretend that makes sense to me then,” I declared with a shrug before popping another bite of egg in my mouth. “Well, this place is rat-free, at least. Your room especially, probably, seeing as how it’s got all those fancy protections on it. You know, like the whole being ‘spy proof’ thing?”

“Ah! Right…” And we were back to flustered Devilla! Which was just the way things should be - me, calm and collected with my nearly-emptied plate of eggs, and her shifting from foot to foot with a very red face. “I suppose I still need to properly apologize for that… I swear I wasn’t aware the room had such a feature. Much of what the tower can do has caught me off guard, actually… it makes me wonder how the whole thing is powered.”

“By magic?” I suggested, rolling my eyes. “I mean, it seems pretty obvious to me anyways.”

“Well, yes, but… how?” Devilla asked. “How does the tower have such a supply of holy magic? How have things kept running for two thousand years? Just how much power is packed into these stone walls? And how much of it is left?”

“You’d have to ask your ancestors,” I pointed out with a shrug. Honestly, I don’t really want to think about the tower running out. I don’t think it would be a good day for anyone if that sorta thing happened, but it hadn’t happened so far, and it wasn’t like there was anything I could do to change things if it did, so…

“I think I missed my chance for that when I messed up the Rite,” Devilla sighed, settling down on the bed beside me. “Not that I’m terribly upset about how all that ended up… it most certainly saved my life and hopefully helped to better the lives of others as well. But at the same time…”

“Yeah. It sucks to imagine - two thousand years of history coming to a halt because we ran out of power… But there’s not exactly much point in worrying about what you can’t change, you know?”

“I suppose…” Devilla murmured, sighing again.

I shifted a little, bumping my shoulder against hers. “Come on. It’s lasted two thousand years without anything going wrong. It’ll be fine for another year or two while you resolve things with Lucy.”

“And if it isn’t?” Devilla questioned me, turning to look at me with eyes full of… something. Yearning, maybe? For comfort, specifically. For someone to tell her that it would be okay.

Lately that had been Lucy’s job. Lucy wasn’t here, though, so… I put an arm around her.

“Then we’ll face it together,” I said with more confidence than I felt. “Now come on. Let’s get some sleep.”

“Together?” Devilla asked, a teasing smirk on her lips. “I thought you were opposed to us bedding one another tonight.”

“Not opposed,” I corrected, putting my plate on the nightstand. “Just not that interested. Maybe in the morning…”

“In the morning,” Devilla confirmed, clearly deciding not to give it any more thought as she began to shuck her clothing, starting with the heels and moving onto her shirt, skirt, and underwear.

She really was gorgeous underneath it all. With her hair cascading down her back, a few strands falling against her breasts, as if trying to draw attention to the pert little nipples - one of which was currently peeking between two strands.

Before I knew what I was doing, I’d already leaned down to place a kiss on it.

“Goodnight,” I murmured, turning my face away from Devilla so she wouldn’t see that my cheeks were aflame.

“...Goodnight,” she repeated, apparently deciding to shrug the action off as she laid down. Maybe she just thought it was a succubus thing… either way, it didn’t seem to bug her for long, since she was asleep just half a moment later.

Me? I was up for a while longer than that. Just thinking about those pangs of pain in my heart, and what they might mean… 

It was best not to worry about things one couldn’t do anything about, though. Devilla was already with Lucy, and while there was a chance she’d be willing to share… I wasn’t sure if I was… Not with the Heroine, of all people.

Maybe… Maybe Lucy and I should have a talk about it at some point, though.

Maybe.

~~~

Author's Notes