Succubus Lord 6, page 5
part #6 of Succubus Lord Series
“There’s only one way to find out, bro,” Todd’s voice suggested from above and nearly made me jump out of my skin.
“Bro!” I protested as I looked up at the floating outline of black Hellfire. “We’ve talked about this. Sneaking up on your friends while you’re invisible is no bueno. Especially now that you have the power to approach us at all angles.”
“That’s what she said,” the imp giggled. “But in all seriousness, there’s only one thing that’ll solve this mystery. A studying montage!”
“A what?” Libidine asked curiously.
“A studying montage,” Todd reiterated. “You know, when a character in a movie has a big test coming up that he can’t miss, so it shows a bunch of different clips of him studying, usually set to whatever pop song is a hit at the time. We need one of those.”
“I agree.” I nodded and turned back to our Jeep. “We need to get back to the mansion and talk to the cultists to figure out what is going on.”
The five of us piled back into Shadow’s cabin, and then I twisted the key and brought the vehicle to life. I kicked the Jeep Wrangler into gear and headed off toward Phoenix. Thankfully, we only had a few hours left in our journey, and it shot by faster than the speed of light.
Cupi and Liby slept the rest of the way home. The fit blonde was snuggled up into Libidine’s warm, inviting chest, and they were both snoring softly like adorable puppies.
Meanwhile, Todd and Tris both passed around a blunt and came up with a bunch of wild theories as to why we suddenly could use each other’s powers. The imp was afraid we’d fucked up the natural order of the universe by killing an Archangel, and the Exalted One was punishing us by making our powers a clusterfuck. Tris, on the other hand, feared that all the times we “made the connection” as a group led to our DNA being intermingled together. Todd shot back almost instantly with another zany idea, the theory that we had somehow encountered a dimension-hopping creature, and by killing him, we created a tear in the space-time continuum and our different timelines were merging.
“You watch too much Cosmos,” I chuckled as we turned into the driveway of our mansion in Phoenix. “I’m sure there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for what’s going on.”
“Yeah,” Todd argued as he slipped out of the still-running vehicle, “the explanation is we fucked the timeline, bro. For all I know, my schlong could shrink three sizes thanks to this fuckery. Of course, that would still make it bigger than it was before…”
I ignored the imp’s words as I killed the engine of the Jeep, woke up the succubi, and then got out onto the warm sidewalk. It was now mid-morning, and the Arizona sun was beating down in full force. Even though we made it to the door of our home with lightning-fast speed, I still felt like my shoes were melting onto the pavement with each step. Todd let out a tiny yelp of pain as his hooves dashed across the sidewalk, and that all but confirmed how damn hot it was today. The five of us made it inside, and the girls instantly headed up to bed.
“I don’t know about you, Jacob,” Cupi sighed, “but I’m beat. I’m headed to bed.”
“Me too,” Liby admitted. “I seriously feel like I could crash right here on the stairs.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I reassured the succubi. “You guys go off to bed, and I’ll consult our librarian.”
“Hold up,” Todd interjected. “We have a librarian?”
“Ronaldo,” I explained. “He’s the cultist who spends most of the time in our basement, organizing and protecting the books of spells and cool artifacts we pick up along our adventures.”
“Ronaldo’s our librarian?” Todd gasped. “I totally thought he was just a plumber or some shit like that who needed to fix our pipes downstairs.”
“For over a year?” I shot back at the imp. “That’d be quite the project.”
Todd just shrugged. “Maybe it was a bad clog, bro,” he offered. “I know I’ve done some things to these toilets I’m not proud of. Usually after eating one of Gula’s scrumdiddliupmtious meals that’s packed with grease and carbs. I wouldn’t be surprised if it took a year to get that literal shit out of our plumbing.”
“First off, ew,” I joked. “Secondly … are you ready to hunker down and do some studying?”
“You know it, broseph,” Todd reiterated. “The Toddster will never reject a good montage scene, no matter what it takes.
“Are you sure?” I asked one last time. “I remember your study habits in college. And high school. And elementary.”
“What study habits?” Todd retorted coyly.
“Exactly,” I said with a twinge of worry in my voice. “You sure you’re up to it?”
Todd reached over and patted me on the leg with his tiny left hand. “Bro, this is the occult,” Todd reassured me. “If there’s one thing in my life I’ll actually put effort into learning, it’s this.”
“Excellent,” I said with a grin. “What about you, Tris?”
There was no answer.
“Tris?” I asked one last time.
Finally, I got a response in the form of buzzsaw-like snoring coming from the living area of the mansion. Somehow, the brunette succubus had snuck off into the main room and fallen asleep while Todd and I were talking.
“Alrighty then,” I laughed and turned to my little red friend. “Looks like it’s just the Dynamic Duo, then. Let’s go talk to Ronaldo.”
Todd stuck his finger into the air. “Quick Jakey, to the Todd cave!” he exclaimed as he took off running toward the basement stairs. “Duna-duna-duna-duna, duna-duna-duna-duna, Toddster!”
The imp disappeared around the corner, but I could still hear his voice belting out the theme song from across the house as I made my way to our archives. Our basement stairs were located all the way in the back of the mansion, in a small hallway connected to a backdoor I didn’t think we’d used even once the entire time we’d lived here. Despite the grandeur of the rest of our home, this was only a simple area with a yellow tile floor, a laundry nook, and the two doors that led to the backyard and the basement.
As I walked past the running washer and dryer, I could hear the clip-clop of Todd’s hooves as they descended the wooden stairs. I arrived at the threshold, descended the creaky steps, and found myself in the basement of Quinn mansion.
The basement was one of the few rooms in our house that we hadn’t renovated. It originally was meant to act as a wine cellar for the billionaire tech mogul, Robert Quinn, but we had slightly tweaked the design. There was still an entire wall packed to the brim with wine bottles that were from as far back as the eighteen hundreds, but many of the wine racks had now been converted into makeshift shelves. Hundreds of books and documents belonging to the Cult of Ralston laid in the built-in racks, interspersed with the occasional historical artifact or two.
“This has been down here the whole time?” Todd whistled as he marveled at a dagger that looked hundreds of years old. “And here I thought this was just a stupid wine cellar.”
“I specifically mentioned the archives when we had our big renovation meeting,” I reminded the imp. “Remember? All of the succubi and I got together and tried to figure out what we wanted to spend our money on?”
“Bro,” Todd said with a shake of his head. “Chances are I was high as Willie Nelson in the seventies. Or the nineties. Or the two-thousands. Point is, my mind was probably too baked to remember anything.”
“Well, here it is.” I motioned proudly to our surroundings. “The Cult of Ralston’s official archives.”
“It’s quite marvelous, isn’t it?” a voice asked curiously from the shadows.
Todd let out a squeal of surprise, and black Hellfire engulfed his body. The imp shot up to the top of the basement, and then there was a loud “bang” as his head collided with the wooden ceiling.
A man with dark, pointed features stepped into view. He had short, curly black hair and wore the same navy blue robe all of my cultists wore. Like the rest of the team, he wore a leather belt wrapped around his waist that held the cultists most important tools. However, instead of a dagger or a book of spells, he carried a notebook and a comically-large pen attached to the leather strap.
This was Ronaldo, our archivist.
“I haven’t been down here in a while, Ronaldo,” I mused. “I absolutely love what you’ve done with the place. It feels like we have our own miniature museum down here!”
“That’s the idea, mast--er, Jacob,” he explained. “I apologize. Azazel forced us to call him ‘master’ for centuries. It’s a hard habit to break.”
I walked over to the man and patted him on the shoulder happily. “It’s alright,” I promised. “At least you’re trying.”
“Ya know, you have a shit ton of cobwebs up here, Jakey,” Todd observed from the ceiling. “You might wanna get the dustbuster up here ASAP.”
The imp looked down, held out his fist in front of his body like a superhero, and floated back down to the carpeted ground of the basement. The black Hellfire subsided, and Todd let out a sigh of relief.
“As much fun as that is, I don’t know how the girls do it all the time,” he admitted. “I feel like I’m about to paint the floor with my breakfast almost every single time.”
“You’ll get used to it,” I chuckled. “Maybe there’s something in one of these books that can help you--”
“Magic flight sickness?” Ronaldo interjected. “That’s actually pretty common for demons who are just learning to fly. Just take some frog’s breath, mix it with your drink of choice, and it’ll calm your stomach right down.”
“Jakey,” Todd said somewhat sarcastically, “remind me to pick up frog’s breath the next time we’re at the grocery store.”
“I’ll have one of Oliver’s guys do it,” I promised and turned to Ronaldo. “Unfortunately, Todd’s flight sickness isn’t the reason we’re here.”
“Oh?” the dark-haired man asked excitedly. “To what do I owe the pleasure, then?”
“We all can suddenly use each other’s powers,” I explained. “It used to be that our magic was limited to matching whatever skill set each member of the group was best at, like Todd with his deception magic or Tris with her necromancy or Liby with her hatred spells. Now, Todd is using fear magic, and I can cast my own enchanted projectiles using hatred magic.”
The dark-haired man rubbed his chin curiously as he pondered my words.
“That is peculiar,” he admitted. “But it’s surely something the three of us can figure out together. Come! We should start with the Scrolls of Solomon. I have an edition that dates all the way back to the sixteen-hundreds that could be quite useful in this situation.”
“Ah, good ‘ol King Solomon,” Todd sighed. “He’s always good for a tidbit of information or two. Although I’m seriously starting to question how good of leader he really was. How the fuck do you figure out all this shit about the occult and rule an entire kingdom at the same time?”
“Very carefully,” I retorted. “It’s not that much different than what I’m doing here, juggling the cult and the strip club and Ira and Gulas’ professional careers at the same time.”
“All while staying a perfect bestie and a generous lover, to boot,” Todd added. “At least, I’m assuming that second one based on what the girls are always going on about.”
“Exactly.” I grinned. “I guess you could call me a modern-day Solomon.”
Todd and I followed Ronaldo over to a small wooden table. At its center sat a large, leatherbound, green book that had certainly seen better days. The book was resting on a pedestal, surrounded by plexiglass.
The archivist reached into his pocket, pulled out a pair of white rubber gloves, and then snapped them onto his hands. Ronaldo slowly opened the hinged plexiglass cover, picked up the text delicately, and then placed it down onto the table in front of us. Finally, he produced two more pairs of rubber gloves and offered them to us.
“I’m good, ‘Naldy,” Todd said with a wave of his hand. “I don’t think those are the right size, anyway.”
“When was the last time you washed your hands?” I asked, even though I really didn’t want to know the answer.
Todd raised his finger in the air, and his mouth fell open as if he wanted to say something. However, nothing came out.
“I, uh--” he tried to think of the last time he had been hygienic. “I honestly don’t remember, bro.”
“Exactly.” I said with a nod. “Wear the gloves, Todd.”
“Alright, alright,” he conceded. “No love without a glove. Got it.”
Todd and I put on the white nitrile gloves, and then we began to thumb through the compilation of the Scroll of Solomon. There was so much information in the text that it was almost overwhelming. Information about various spells and pentacles, first-hand encounters with lesser demons, and general rules for pleasing the Exalted One were littered throughout the book, and the three of us spent nearly an hour just going through it.
After another thirty minutes of looking, I leaned back in my chair and rubbed my eyes. “I’m finding nothing about power transfers,” I sighed. “I’m starting to think this one’s a dud.”
“Do you got anything about Hellfire magic, ‘Naldy?” Todd asked the archivist. “Maybe that’d be a good place to check next.”
“Of course,” Ronaldo said with a nod. “Azazel was the one who taught mankind how to tap into Demonic magic. We have plenty of material that covers Hellfire spells. Just give me a minute or two to find it all.”
The archivist dashed out of the room as Todd and I continued to look through the book in front of us.
“I feel like I’m cramming for an exam,” I grumbled. “I thought those days were long behind me.”
“That’s the trick, bro,” Todd giggled and placed his hands behind his head. “I never made it a habit of studying in the first place, so I’ve never had to go through the PTSD you’re going through.”
“I also don’t think you ever gotten a good grade on a test in your entire life,” I reminded the imp, but Todd wasn’t affected.
The imp shrugged. “Cs get degrees, bro,” he explained.
“But you didn’t even get a degree!” I couldn’t help but laugh at his argument. “You dropped out after two years, remember?”
“I can’t say I do,” Todd continued. “Those years were all a blur. I partied so hard in college I think I’d make Charlie Sheen ashamed, bro.”
Just then, we heard a pair of footsteps make their way down the stairs. I looked up to see both Cupiditas and Libidine approaching. Both of the succubi wore see-through nightgowns with skin-tight lingerie underneath. Their breasts bounced playfully as they bounded down the steps, and the sight made me completely forget what I was doing at the moment.
“How are things going down here, guys?” Cupi asked curiously. “Liby here wants to know when Jacob is coming to bed.”
Libidine crossed her arms over her chest and huffed like a scolded toddler. “I do not!” she protested. “I just said I wished I could cuddle up against his tight, ripped chest right about now.”
“Same thing,” Cupi scoffed. “Either way, I wanted to come down here and see if you’d found anything.”
“Not yet,” I sighed. “We went through the entire collection of Solomon’s Scrolls, and nothing. Ronaldo is grabbing us everything he’s got on Hellfire magic right now, so hopefully we can snag a lead there.”
As if right on cue, the archivist reappeared through the threshold of the other room carrying an armful of papers.
“Here you are, Jacob,” he said proudly as he plopped the ancient works down in front of us. “This collection has scrolls of ancient magic from over sixty-thousand years ago, a few writings from medieval scholars, and even a few of Azazel’s hand-written notes. Surely there will be something of value in here.”
“There better be,” Todd said in his best “gruff newspaper editor” voice. “Or yer fired, ‘Naldy!”
The archivist’s eyes grew wide as his face turned beet red. “I--surely there’s--” he muttered, but I raised a hand to cut him off.
“Todd’s just fucking with you,” I reassured the cultist. “You’ve done more than enough to earn your keep around here, Ronaldo. In fact, I’m starting to wonder if a promotion is on the horizon … ”
Ronaldo’s demeanor completely changed, and a wide grin spread up his face. “Really?” he asked. “As always, it’s an honor to serve you in any way possible. But if I could get a promotion? I’d be truly humbled, Jacob.”
“Let’s focus on the task at hand first,” I said as I tried to steer things back to our research. “Then we’ll talk.”
“Of course,” the archivist said excitedly. “If there’s anything I can do for you in the meantime, please let me know!”
“Will do,” I nodded, and the cultist sauntered off into the other room.
The succubi, Todd, and I all turned our attention back to the massive stack of papers that laid on the table.
“This feels familiar,” Cupi said with a smile. “Although, this is nothing compared to all the books we had to sift through at the Chapel of the Trinity.”
“Nowhere close,” I chuckled. “That was literally a small hill of text we went through back in that place.”
“Then this should be easy,” Libidine interjected. “In theory, we should be able to go through these documents in no time.”
“Yeah,” Todd said sarcastically,“and in theory having a massive schlong should have supermodels all up on my dick every single day. But that ain’t happenin’.”
“Don’t worry, Todd,” I tried to comfort the imp. “Surely there’s something in this pile here.”
The four of us spent the next two hours rifling through the papers, looking for anything that might explain why we could suddenly use other people’s powers. I glanced down at my phone and saw that it was fast approaching the wee hours of the morning. I was fucking tired, and I was about to give up then and there.
Until I heard Cupi’s voice let out a proud “aha!”
The three of us looked over and saw the blonde succubus holding a dirty old piece of parchment above her head victoriously.
