Shannon O'Reilly was bullied and everything his older sister wasn't. When his sister Sarah gives him a chance to change things through a single wish things don't go as planned.     I Wish: Book 5 Chapter 11 Travel Plans By Amethyst

I couldn’t get back to sleep. I was worried about Lisa and Michelle and angry at the way that they had been treated. The Makers, and those who worked for them, were the worst kind of people and I felt the need to do something about them. Not just because they would be heading to the mountain pass too and I didn’t want them coming after us, but because it was the right thing to do.

I quickly got dressed and was about to slip toward the bunker exit when Rebecca asked in a whispered hiss, “Where are you going?”

“I’m going to make sure those assholes who were chasing Michelle and Lisa can’t follow us,” I whispered back.

“Not alone you aren’t,” she replied as quietly as she could with a frown and a shake of her head.

I shook my head right back at her. “I need you to stay here in case they wake up, Beks. I know that you want some payback for what they did to Michelle, but she and Lisa shouldn’t be alone after what they’ve been through and I’m counting on you to look after them. I won’t be long and it’s still dark, so it’s the best time for me to go, their species seems to be fairly lethargic when the sun isn’t up.”

She seemed reluctant but after a look at the two moving around in their sleep in the throes of nightmares she muttered. “Fine. Just promise me that you’ll make sure that those fuckers get what they deserve, Shannon.”

“I’ll make sure that they’re properly punished,” I promised with a nod before leaving the bunker. The two moons were still out and judging from their positions I still had a few hours before dawn. I changed into my Succubus form and took to the sky, heading in the direction that we had encountered Sah Lortae’s goons earlier.

They weren’t where I had left them so I assumed that they were either searching for us or had given up for the night after waking up. I kept flying in the general westerly direction that they had come from, keeping my eyes out below me but I didn’t see any slithering figures below, at least not until their camp was in sight. Even in the camp there was not much movement, only four guards awake and patrolling.

I circled above for a few minutes to get the lay of the land. I could feel some magick energy down there and since my goal was to be quick I used most of my gathered magick energy to cast a sleep spell over the entire camp before touching down in the center of the camp. Following the pull of magick, I found anyone with magick armor or weapons and sucked them dry, but not before studying one of the weapons a bit closer.

The weapons housed a small purple crystal inside them and the enchantment on the weapon itself seemed to draw on the magick energy stored within the crystal when used. I figured that the rest of their artefacts must work similarly. I also found a small satchel of those crystals, I assumed that they were replacements since all but a few of them had been drained. I drained those that hadn’t been already and left the satchel where I had found it before focusing on my main goal.

The wagons were large and shoddy-looking with bars and some form of thick locks on their doors. There were six of them in total and I figured that the only empty one was the one that my friends had occupied earlier. The other ones held Nhekarites that were packed in like sardines and many of them didn’t look very healthy.

I could have looked for the keys but instead, I released the intended slaves from my sleep spell, using as little magick energy as I could to wake them. Some stirred faster than others and looked around in confusion and that was when I used my Succubus strength to tear off the poorly-made iron-barred door of the first wagon cage and toss it casually aside. Once I had their undivided attention I told them, “I have stripped your captors of their earth power and they will sleep until well past dawn. Take their remaining weapons and do with them what you will. I don’t care what you do to punish them, it’s not my place to tell you what to do, you’re free now.”

Without another word, I tore the doors off of the other cages and then took to the sky once again as the freed slaves watched me warily. They were leaving their cages as I circled to gain altitude and it looked like they outnumbered Sah Lortae’s snoozing goons by at least four to one. I had a feeling that they would be showing their captors the error of their ways very soon. With my work done, I headed back to join my friends.

Despite my late-night activities, I was the first of us to wake up. So, while the others slept, I placed some enchantments on clothes for me and Rebecca. All three of them were enchantments that Sarah had used on our Hunting outfits. The first of the enchantments was the one to keep us comfortable in any weather so we wouldn’t freeze while going through the mountains, or bake if we encountered another desert. Another enchantment was to make the clothes more resistant to damage and offer slightly more protection. The third and final one was to make them relatively self-cleaning by expelling dirt, grime, sweat, and such.

For me, I chose what Rebecca teasingly referred to as my ‘Cat without hat’ outfit. It was my warm and cozy outfit from Giselle’s winter line with the warm black fleece leggings and matching zip-up hoodie with hot pink accents, kitty ears on the top of the hood, and a fuzzy tail just above my butt. It hugged my whole body and had an adjustable kitty mask inside the hood and built-in fingerless gloves with flip-up ‘paw’ covers that could be pulled over the gloves to make them into mittens if it got too cold. All that I really needed to add the enchantment to other than those two pieces was my sneakers and a pair of socks, and I was set

For Rebecca, I chose some of my leggings, her sneakers and socks, the pair of gloves and the scarf that I had given her, and her hoodie that we had cut slits into the back of. Our wings and tails wouldn’t be protected but I couldn’t really remember them getting cold during the cold nights flying through the desert. It would have to be enough since I used up nearly all of the magick energy that I had appropriated the night before.

The last of that magick energy was used to add Rebecca to the ‘recognized users’ for my portable bunker. Having to remain in physical contact with her every time that she needed to go inside was getting slightly annoying for both of us and there might be emergencies where we wouldn’t have that luxury. I had just finished my work when the others began to wake up.

After I made my way to a nearby stream for some water to boil, we put together a quick breakfast of oatmeal with dried fruits and berries. Lisa and Michelle were both looking better after a night’s sleep in relative safety but I was still worried by how skittish they both seemed. Still, if they wanted to talk about what was bothering them then they would and they probably just needed time to feel safe, process things, and put them in perspective.

As we ate we discussed our plans. “I’d like to get past those mountains as soon as possible,” I told the others. “Ziralin is on the other side, and probably Ellie too. And if that city and those ‘Makers’ are there too, it’s a chance for us to recharge our magical batteries as well. I was thinking of Becca and I taking shifts flying and carrying the portal entrance while the other takes a break in here with the two of you but I can’t be sure how long the air in here would last with the portal folded up.”

“You’re probably not strong enough to carry one of us, huh?” Michelle asked as she considered the problem.

I shook my head. “No, that’s not the problem, we’re pretty strong in our Succubus forms. We could manage it with enough breaks. The problem is that it would be awkward… for all of us.”

“As in, we can’t control the whole pheromones and mental roofie thing,” Rebecca pointed out with an audible groan. “The best we can do is aim it at one person each. And since you’re both attracted to girls… instant lust zombies.”

“Which would make things awkward for you afterward and for us, both afterward and pretty much the whole time that we’re carrying you. You’re my friends, and Lisa is my apprentice so I’d rather not do that, especially with how Lisa used to feel about me,” I said, looking away.

“And, Michelle, you’re my best friend, I don’t want to make things weird between us,” Rebecca admitted. “Well, at least not any weirder than our lives already are at the moment. And I’m pretty fucking sure that zombifying you or your girlfriend would do that.”

Lisa looked toward her Familiar/girlfriend for a moment and they shared a long look before Lisa looked sternly toward me. “Shannon, listen. Yeah, I used to have those feelings for you but I know who your heart and soul belong to, and mine as well. You’re my friend and my mentor, and I think that I’ve gotten to know you pretty well so I know and trust you well enough to realize that you would never abuse such a situation. You would never let yourself even consider it.”

“Yeah, and if I can’t trust my best friend to behave and make sure I don’t do something stupid while under the influence, who can I trust, Becca? It’s not all that much different than if we were drunk or stoned,” Michelle pointed out. “Sure we could do something stupid while fawning all over you but friends see each other do stupid shit all of the time. Good friends don’t take advantage of you, they support you, even when things aren’t ideal. You showed me that, Shannon.”

I cast an uncertain glance toward Rebecca and was about to speak up when Lisa frowned at me. “No, Shannon. I realize that you’re worried about our mental states right now, and I appreciate that you both care that much about us, but you don’t need to treat us with kid gloves. Sure, we’re not at our best right now but I think that’s understandable after what’s happened since we got here.”

“If you’re really that concerned about this whole lust thing, then you can put that magical genius brain of yours to thinking up some sort of anti-Succubus charm while we’re traveling,” Michelle added.

“Kitten is right,” Lisa said with a nod and a smile to Michelle as she held her girlfriend close. “The two of you won’t be able to fight at full strength around any of us if you’re constantly worried about using the lust thing on one of us. Put your mind to a solution instead of just focusing on the problem itself. If anyone can come up with something, it’s you. Until we cross the mountains, the two of us will place our trust in you both. I don’t know about any of you, but I am sooo ready to find the others, get what we came for, and get the hell out of this place.”

They were right, rather than focusing on the problems that our abilities could cause between us and the others, I needed to look for ways to counteract those abilities. An anti-succubus charm would have been nice to have a few months back. Maybe I could look at the protections that Xuriel had placed on my mind and combine them with some sort of altered anti-toxin spell targeting Succubus pheromones? I would definitely need something with a dual-layer of protection to address both the mental and physical aspects.

“Great, now you two have put her into nerd–mode. You do realize that this means we’ll eventually have to listen to some long and insanely technical explanation of how the whole thing works when she does come up with something, right? I swear, she lives for this sort of shit,” Rebecca said with a roll of her eyes. Her tone was teasing and she was smiling though. “If you’re willing to trust us though, I’m all for getting out of here as soon as fucking possible. The sooner we do, the sooner that I can rip out the heart of that hideous bitch who killed my mom.”

Rebecca’s expression turned cold as ice as she spoke those last words, the raw pain and anger still seething in her tone and her eyes. Lisa nodded in grim agreement. “I’ll hold her down while you do it. I have my own score to settle with her.”

Michelle sighed, looking from her best friend to her girlfriend in concern. “Do I really have to be the voice of reason here? Usually, I’m the one with the horrible and impulsive ideas. I would happily help you both kill her if I thought we had a chance but Khinara is one of the strongest Demons there is. You and Shannon barely survived when she transported you to that jungle, Lissy,” she pointed out sadly. Of course, she left out that part of the reason that we did survive was that she had appeared and distracted Khinara at the critical moment.

I looked up at the trio and shook my head. “Actually, I don’t think Khinara’s strength is going to be a problem for long. She was significantly weaker on the plane and she’s only going to continue getting weaker. Casting those portals drained her, it’s probably why she was content to let other Demons finish us off. I mean sure, she made one big enough for a small plane to pass through but other than the portals and a shield she didn’t use any other magick. When we tangled with her before those kinds of spells would have been nothing to her.”

All three of my companions looked at me in sudden wide-eyed interest and Lisa asked, “What do you mean, Shannon?”

“She had trouble just forming that portal and, thanks to Xuriel’s memories, I have a pretty good idea why,” I began to explain. “Besides Becca, I was the only one to get a good look at her. The tip of her tongue and the two arms that I blew off during our last fight haven’t regenerated, and they won’t. If they had been injuries from more mundane attacks, she would have been fully regenerated in a week at the most. I was wearing platinum on my hand when I ripped off her tongue though and it was holy magick that took her arms. She can eat normal food to stay alive but it won’t do much for her. She needs to feed on emotions or she’ll just keep getting weaker and she can’t do that without sucking on brain juice using the needle-like organ that used to be on the tip of her tongue.”

“See! Nerd-mode!” Rebecca exclaimed, pointing at me animatedly. Then she turned a malicious grin toward Michelle and Lisa. “We are going to rip that bitch to shreds.”

It was a short time later that we decided to get underway and got properly dressed for our flight. While I appreciated the trust that Michelle and Lisa were placing in me and Rebecca, the look of pure bliss and devotion that Lisa was giving me as I carried her and we flew through the mountain pass made me feel sick to my stomach. I wanted to get it over with as soon as possible.

With that in mind, I pushed us hard. We only landed for breaks when it was absolutely necessary for us to rest or when I started getting hungry around lunch and dinnertime. Rebecca didn’t complain and, from the look on her face, she looked no happier about the situation than I was.

We had just finished dinner and Rebecca and I both felt energetic enough to get underway again so we stepped outside to fold up the portal and change into our Succubus forms so we could get moving again. “Okay, let’s get this train wreck back underway, I want to…” Words abandoned me as I realized that something was suddenly very wrong. A feeling of emptiness hit me like a kick to the chest and I fell to my knees in the snow, suddenly unable to breathe.

“Shannon? What’s wrong? Goddammit, answer me, Shannon!” I barely heard Rebecca’s words. Even the sensation of her shaking me was muted as my heart tightened in fear and loss.

The impact and heat of Lisa’s hand slapping my cheek brought my attention somewhat back to the others. I was only vaguely aware of the tears streaming down my cheeks and the choked whisper from my suddenly too-tight throat. “I can’t feel her.”