Page 101 of Succubus

Desperate words form in my mouth against the barrier of the damp cloth. I start to gag, can’t breathe, force myself to draw air slowly through my nostrils. My chest heaves like it wants to split into gills along my ribs.

I told Al very explicitly to wait until Ella was safe. To wait until I was in obvious danger. I left him a short distance from the field, and tracking me is no problem for him. So where is he?

Is he here now?

I feel the proximity of my own death, the cool breath of it rising from an infinite blackness just at my feet. My heart drops toward that open dark.

“Go, girl,” the voice says, the edge in it sharpening. “I told you to go. Do it.”

Do it, I urge Ella in my mind. I turn toward the place where I think she is. I nod. I am desperate to tell her to go, too. She can’t stay here. She needs to be safe. I mumble through the gag, “Please go.” This is the worst possible time for her to find her courage.

There is a silence. And then Ella whispers, “No!”

The voice swears in another language, the strong accent finding its natural cadence. “I’ll have to carry you.”

“Don’t touch me!”

There’s a grunt, a scuffle.

I lunge forward blindly, the air too loose around me. I have the sensation of falling.

And then someone else is there, too, crashing out of the woods.

Al! Thank God.

No. Not Al.

“Put her down!”

Joel.

I feel instantly, illogically safer; something settles in me.

“You found me,” says the kidnapper, sounding mildly surprised.

“Joel! You have to help Titi!” Ella is screaming. “She has something over her head and she can’t see!”

“This is the problem,” says the kidnapper. “This is why you have failed.”

“You need to leave right now,” says Joel, low and menacing. I am so happy to hear his voice right now. Even though it should be Al. Where is Al?

I remember fleetingly that Joel and Al can’t be anywhere near each other.

“You summoned me,” the kidnapper says, her voice hard, matter-of-fact.

I was right. I don’t want to be right.

“You needed help,” she continues. “That was the right move. Now I’m here. I’ll finish it for you.”

“No,” he says, gruff. “You can’t.”

“I can’t?”

“I shouldn’t have brought you here. It was a mistake.”

My heart is a tennis ball being batted between them. I am listening with frantic attention, afraid a wind will sneak in and steal critical words away from my ears. Words that might determine my fate, Ella’s fate, everything.

“It was the right thing. You know that.”