Lilith's Shadow Omnibus: Volume 2, page 46
“I am going to have to assume that you’ve forgotten the rules you agreed to when you signed in,” Another man interjected, and Lilith looked to the side in some surprise, then smiled wryly. Why was it that she kept getting helped by security so much over the last few days?
The man standing nearby reminded her of some of the military personnel she’d met, with short brown hair and a commanding bearing as he looked at the hero, his arms crossed in front of him.
“She’s the one who’s suspicious, though! She came here, where Ivanova is staying, after she spent a couple of hours there!” the hero protested.
“Which doesn’t matter at all,” the guard replied bluntly. “I’m down here because Miss Carpenter was invited to visit on Sunday, but until you decided to harass her I didn’t expect to have to come out at all.”
The hero fumed for a moment, staring at the guard, then threw up his hands and stalked away, shooting a parting comment as he went. “Fine! But don’t come crying to me if she causes trouble!”
Watching him go, Lilith waited for a few moments, then looked at the guard apologetically as she spoke. “Sorry about that. I don’t know why he felt like following me.”
“Not surprising, really. Blazing Passion has been trying to get a meeting with Ivanova ever since he heard she was coming here, and has taken it personally that she hasn’t met him.” The guard said, nodding to Lilith while looking her over, then smiled thinly. “I’m Officer Corvus. Try not to cause trouble while you’re here, the room you’re after is on the top floor.”
With that, he turned and walked away purposefully, leaving Lilith wondering what she’d gotten herself into. After a few seconds she just sighed and shook her head, deciding it wasn’t worth worrying about. Trying to figure out what other people were thinking was an exercise in futility sometimes.
Lilith turned and headed for the nearest elevator she could see, and as she did so, she took in the parking garage. It was beneath the hotel, but what she could see reminded her more of a bunker than anything else. The walls were solid, the sort of construction that would take a great deal of work to damage, but at the same time it was well-maintained and clean, with clearly labeled parking spots, and the vehicles she could see were all far more expensive than the car she’d driven here. There was even a sleek red aircar, one that Lilith knew would cost well over a hundred thousand dollars if it was a ground car. She didn’t want to think about how much an aircar would cost from that manufacturer.
The elevator didn’t change Lilith’s opinion of the building either. It was almost perfectly silent when she hit the button, arriving after only seconds, and when she stepped inside, she had to admit that the only elevator she’d encountered that was as nice was the one at SuperNet, and that one wasn’t as ornate. It also wasn’t for a building that was over twenty stories tall, not that this one went all the way up. It took her to the main lobby where Lilith took a look around for a moment, admiring the scenery.
The Paragon City Arms was nicer than any building Lilith had been in before, as all of Amber’s lairs had been built with an eye toward practicality, not anything like this. Ornate marble floors, gilding, sculptures, and chandeliers… from what Lilith saw, she thought it had to match some of the nicer hotels in Las Vegas, based on the pictures she’d studied online, but this had a more… authentic feel to it. Especially as she saw the people in the lobby, so finely dressed that she looked out of place in her slacks and button-down shirt. Most of them had bodyguards nearby, though Lilith saw a few heroes as well. She thought she even recognized one of them. She didn’t stop, though, instead making her way across the hall toward the other elevator, trying to spend as little time where she could be delayed as she could.
A few of the people started drifting in Lilith’s direction for a moment, but when they saw she wasn’t slowing down, they stopped, which relieved her a bit. There weren’t many people around, or Lilith suspected that some of them would have kept coming anyway. She was mostly happy that they didn’t, as it allowed her to concentrate on what she was doing, and she quickly got into the elevator before letting out a faint breath of relief.
Lilith didn’t have any idea what Daemonia really wanted with her. She’d tried to puzzle out the woman’s words, but Lilith… she just didn’t have the experience to understand her, and the research she’d done online had been more confusing than helpful. Daemonia was one of the most unpredictable heroines in the western United States, and some of the various commentators speculated that she might become a villain at some point, since she’d come very close to killing a few villains over the years. That didn’t match Lilith’s impression of her, but she’d only met the woman for a few minutes. She could easily be wrong.
The elevator opened while Lilith was thinking, and she shook off her thoughts, instead looking around as she stepped out. There was what looked like an exercise room ahead of her, in which Lilith saw a few heroes and civilians working out, the former evident not just because of outfits, but by how much more work they were doing than the others. Strong as Lilith was, she wouldn’t have tried to bench press as much as what one sturdily built woman was lifting easily.
As their gazes started to turn toward the door, Lilith quickly stepped to the side and out of sight, once again annoyed that her power worked so quickly. It took only a moment to determine which way she needed to go, and Lilith moved quickly, hoping that Daemonia’s room wasn’t too far away.
Chapter 62
Wednesday, August 27th, 2031
Paragon City Arms, Paragon City
For good or ill, Lilith found the room in less than a minute, and as she did, her eyebrows rose slightly. The room was a corner one, and with how widely spread the rooms were, she suspected this was a penthouse suite, which was more expensive than even Lilith would want in a hotel. Owning one had been bad enough, and that hadn’t been in Paragon City.
She hesitated, then knocked on the door, settling in to wait… but only a moment later, the door swung open, and Daemonia called out. “Come in, Lilith!”
Lilith paused, then stepped inside, confused by the lack of anyone immediately on the other side of the door. That was when she saw a tendril of shadows had opened the door, which extended into the room and around a corner. The tendril dissipated in a cloud of red sparks after she’d entered, allowing the door to swing shut.
The room was much more crowded than any of the rooms in Lilith’s house, with chairs, sofas, lamps, desks, and the like strategically placed to make the most of the space, and in the middle of the room was a modest-sized table with four chairs around it. There was also the pervasive scent of cooking food wafting through the room.
Daemonia chose to step into view the moment that Lilith took a sniff, trying to identify the food. The heroine was dressed differently than before, wearing a red crop-top that almost blended in with her skin, while a pair of purple satin pants billowed around her legs. The woman had two plates with napkins on them in her left hand, silverware in her right, and her tail had wrapped around two wine glasses to carry them comfortably. Now wearing lipstick a darker shade of purple than her pants, the heroine flashed Lilith a smile.
“Good, you came! I thought you would, but it’s always possible that you would’ve changed your mind. If you hadn’t come, I’d have had to snag the scrumptious CEO who’s been eyeing me in the gym the last few days instead. Mm, that would have been fun,” Daemonia said, her gaze growing slightly distant for a moment, then she shrugged and stepped over to the table. “Not that this won’t be, even if not in the same way. You’re quite attractive, and if it weren’t for your niggling issue, I’d seduce you.”
“You make that sound easy,” Lilith said, frowning as she stepped farther into the room, once again unnerved by Daemonia’s easy grace.
As she watched, the heroine slid the plates to two places across the table from each another as easily as Lilith would have been able to manage with both hands, then placed the silverware on the napkins. She turned, her tail depositing the glasses in place without so much as a clink while she wasn’t looking. That was a touch terrifying.
“Because it would be. You aren’t that complicated of a person, now that I’ve met you, and I guarantee that I could have you waking up in my bed tomorrow, asking yourself how you ended up there,” Daemonia replied calmly, flicking her tail straight, now that it didn’t need to imitate a pretzel, and she pointed at Lilith, her eyes narrowing. “The problem is that if I did that, you wouldn’t want to leave. In your current state, you’d latch on to me, and that would be the end of it. That, my dear, is a problem.”
“What are you talking about?” Lilith asked, taken aback by the woman’s vehemence.
“Let me just hazard a wild guess about how your life has gone so far. I know you’re young, but that just gives less to summarize,” Daemonia said, sashaying off to the side, into what Lilith could now see was a kitchenette. “When you first woke, you were ignorant, so you followed the directions of the AI that you mentioned, going through training programs. That’s all well and good, since you didn’t have any other sense of direction. When you met Morgan and Warden, though… that’s when things changed. I don’t know much of the specifics, but there are lots of reports talking about it, which gives something of a timeline. You then began hanging out with them, and started to do what they suggested. You might have convinced them to change plans slightly, but whenever they gave advice, you listened, and went along with what they wanted. Isn’t that right?”
“I… how did you know that?” Lilith asked, taken aback. As she watched, the heroine began mixing salad in a bowl, with several bowls holding a variety of nuts, berries, and other things next to it.
“It was obvious, Lilith.” Daemonia replied, clicking her tongue as she shook her head slowly. “You’re a submissive when it comes to your personality. Likely an introvert as well, which is ironic with your powers. That submissive streak is exactly why I’m so concerned about you.”
“Submissive? Well, I suppose I don’t really like being in charge,” Lilith ventured, a little unsettled by Daemonia’s explanation. She wasn’t entirely sure she agreed, but she had to admit that there might be something to it. She hadn’t exactly wanted to run her company, even if she’d been able to.
“Ah, but that’s the other half of the problem. You’re also ignorant, Lilith,” Daemonia said, pouring the nuts into the salad, and at the same time her tail reached out to open the fridge, snaking in to retrieve a bottle of dressing. “That personality trait also extends to other things, like sex. Even if I tried to avoid it, I’d end up overwhelming you. Normally you’d probably bounce back afterward, but with having lost your lovers, you’re lonely. I could see that on Sunday, which is why I backed off. If you go into a relationship, any relationship, without knowing what sort of position you’re in… you’re likely going to jump into it just for the companionship, whether or not you’re actually compatible with them. And that will likely lead to you, your partner, or both of you getting hurt. Rebound relationships can be incredibly messy, and usually not in the good way.”
Lilith couldn’t help a bit of a blush, and she wasn’t entirely certain why. It was that Daemonia seemed to know far more about her and her relationship with Gina and Rachel than she’d expected, Lilith realized. The woman speaking so frankly about sex was slightly disconcerting as well, but Lilith hadn’t ever understood why people were so hesitant to talk about it. She simply knew it was a touchy subject, and avoided it.
That didn’t help her, though, and she frowned, thinking for a few seconds as Daemonia finished adding dressing and the berries to the salad, mixing it thoroughly before slipping the dressing back into the fridge.
“How are you so certain about this? Morgan and Warden could come back,” Lilith finally said, looking at the salad closely to distract herself from the hollowness she felt inside. She wasn’t sure about the nuts or berries being mixed into it. “And you seem to be awfully certain about me.”
“Lying to yourself isn’t healthy, Lilith,” Daemonia replied calmly, picking up the salad bowl in one hand, and taking it over to the table, where she deposited it gently. “If you truly believed that, you wouldn’t look so pained whenever you said their names. Regarding you, though… I’m sorry, but I’ve seen plenty of people like you over the years. They might not have possessed your powers or other advantages, but at your core you’re still human, with all the weaknesses and strengths that implies. Besides, I was part of the sex industry for a good five years before my awakening, and that takes all types.”
Lilith stopped, then sighed and shrugged, giving up on protesting as she looked at the table, then asked, “If you say so. What are you making, anyway?”
“Cocktail sausages wrapped in pastry dough, a nice salad, and sparkling cider,” Daemonia replied instantly, and at Lilith’s startled look, she grinned. “What, did you think I’d buy an entire cabinet of seasonings for a trip that’s going to last only a week? I could’ve ordered from the restaurant, but I’d rather keep this more… intimate. Besides, I like sausages.”
The suggestive waggle of Daemonia’s eyebrows with her last sentence, along with her smirk, caused Lilith to blush, and she coughed, turning away, flustered despite herself.
“I thought you were trying to avoid that sort of thing,” Lilith told her, clearing her throat as she tried to think, but was having a rather hard time under the circumstances.
“No, I’m trying to teach you a valuable lesson, Lilith,” Daemonia replied, audibly moving closer, and a couple of seconds later a pair of warm hands rested on Lilith’s shoulders, prompting her to stiffen. The heroine continued after a moment, speaking kindly. “You haven’t been taught many valuable lessons due to your upbringing, if we can even call it that. You lack a great deal of knowledge, particularly regarding relationships… though if I’m being fair, most people manage to completely fuck up relationships. If they didn’t, there wouldn’t be so many divorces.”
“I… well, I guess that’s the one advantage of things happening how they did,” Lilith said, blinking rapidly as heat welled up in her eyes. As the first tear trickled down her cheek, she reached up to hold one of Daemonia’s hands as she continued, her voice trembling. “It… it wasn’t long ago that I was looking at rings, you know? I was trying to figure things out. I wanted to handle things right… and then it fell apart. Amber admitted it. She said that she deliberately forced me together with them, just so they’d keep me safe and she wouldn’t have to. Then she made them betray me to teach me a lesson. I… I can’t imagine them coming back. Not after that.”
Daemonia didn’t reply immediately, her fingers tightening marginally for just a moment, then they relaxed again. A moment later the woman leaned in to give Lilith a tight hug from behind, which was surprisingly comforting, especially when the woman’s wings wrapped around Lilith, giving a much more expansive hug than she’d anticipated.
“That’s even worse than what I thought had happened. No wonder you’re so hurt,” Daemonia murmured compassionately. “I can’t blame them, but what was done to you… ah, I wish she was in arm’s reach. I’d teach her a lesson she’d never forget.”
“I’d think that would be more dangerous for you,” Lilith replied, her voice and emotions steadying slowly.
“Wrong. I may not be as powerful in any single field as a more specialized class S, but my powers are much, much broader than what most possess. Unless she had an absolutely overwhelming amount of firepower, I could beat her into a pulp,” Daemonia replied, finally pulling away. “I’m a jack of all trades, when it comes to superpowers. Many people may say that makes me worse than masters of one, but I think they’re full of shit. Except for someone like Destiny, who’s faster, tougher, and stronger than me, I can hit the weak points of most of the others and wreck them.”
Lilith laughed in response, turning to face the woman as she opened her mouth, but at that moment the timer on the oven began beeping.
“Ah, that’s our signal! Now, no business stuff or any of that over dinner,” Daemonia said, pointing a finger at Lilith as she added, grinning. “That said, once you’re safe to seduce, I’ll have you know that I will be back. I don’t care if you have anywhere between none and twenty lovers. Or more, if it comes to that.”
“I…” Lilith began, only to be interrupted.
“No arguing. I’m doing it, whether you like it or not. Now, I have sausages to deal with,” Daemonia said firmly, her tail wrapping around the oven handle and opening it to reveal a couple dozen tiny sausages wrapped in golden-brown dough resting on parchment paper.
Lilith just watched as she pulled the tray out bare-handed, then couldn’t help a laugh. She had no idea how to deal with Daemonia.
Chapter 63
Wednesday, August 27th, 2031
Paragon City Arms, Paragon City
Despite its simplicity, the meal had been quite good. Lilith wasn’t sure she liked the salad, as the nuts and berries had added elements that she wasn’t used to, and the sparkling cider didn’t really mesh with the sausages, but she wasn’t going to complain. It’d been simple, filling, and Daemonia was rather entertaining when she wanted to be. Now the heroine was lounging lazily on a sofa, her feet over one end, and Lilith was in a comfortable chair, occasionally sipping at more of the cider.
“So, what do you think I’m supposed to do?” Lilith asked at last, letting out a sigh. “Yes, both Archon and Spark have indicated their interest in me, which is flattering, but if I’m not supposed to jump into a relationship…”
“Did I say to avoid relationships?” Daemonia asked, her tail flicking back and forth, but she clicked her tongue, grinning as she added. “Archon, though? Oh, that’s a lady who plays hard to get. Though I suspect she’d be much more amenable if I didn’t play into the expectations of a succubus so much. She gets so prickly when people call her an angel. It’s amusing.”
