Idle Hands

Dark Reflections

Part Three of The Succubus

Our story so far...

In "Idle Hands," Althea, first among the succubi, was torn from her body by a foolish mortal. In desperation, she sought refuge in the mind of Rachel Wainwright, a successful attorney. Weakened by the ordeal, Althea knows the only way to return to her own body is to restore her power, which she receives by tapping into the sexual pleasure of others.

With this in mind she begins a slow seduction of her host, nudging Rachel towards a more sexually adventurous lifestyle. At the end of "Idle Hands" she has seduced her intern, Jeremy Edwards, and has also attempted a reconciliation with her former husband, Joshua. Meanwhile, her children find her attitude towards them softening, as Rachel becomes resigned to the fact that Sarah wishes to attend culinary school, while Alex wants to become an actor.

The story continues in "The Devil's Playthings." In a heroic courtroom scene, Rachel makes an impassioned argument for the future of the earth in a case involving corporate pollution. In a stunning verdict, the polluters are fined an astronomical sum, one third of which will go to Rachel's law firm. She decides to use her bonus to semi-retire from her work as an attorney, instead choosing to do pro bono work as she sees fit.

At the same time, dark urges are beginning to manifest in Rachel's home. Driven by a compulsion she cannot explain, she makes a full-time job offer to her maid, Maria, with the caveat that she must dress attractively around the house. Maria, for her part, looks on the offer (with a substantial increase in salary and the prospect of a rent-free apartment above Rachel's garage) as the answer to her prayers. When her husband, Joshua, returns home, he finds his daughter, Sarah, strangely flirtatious. The only person who seems immune thus far is Alex.

During dinner one night, Rachel and Joshua agree to let the kids pursue their career goals without interference. Sarah will attend culinary school. With the help of his parents' connections, Alex will transfer from his dead-end community college into the theater department at Northwestern University.

"The Devil's Playthings" ends with Rachel and Joshua reconciling. Driven by admiration of Josh's artwork, which graphically depicts their love for each other, including the night Alex was conceived, Rachel performs oral sex on him. Later that night, they make love for the first time in months. At the moment of her orgasm, Rachel falls unconscious. When she wakes, she finds herself in a beautiful, pastoral scene, where she is greeted by a gorgeous woman who introduces herself as Althea, a succubus who has been sharing her mind.

Rachel does not take the news well.

*****

"My name is Althea," the incredibly lovely woman said. "I am the firstborn daughter of Lilith, who you may recognize as Adam's first wife. I am one of the succubi, and I have been sharing your body with you for the past several days."

"What? Don't be ridiculous," Rachel said. "Succubi aren't real. And the only person I'm sharing my body with is my husband, not some figment of my imagination." In truth, she wasn't quite sure what a succubi was. Or was it succubus? It brought to mind some of the boys she had known in college. The ones who were pasty-faced from never seeing sunlight, and who could speak Elvish and Klingon.

The gorgeous woman standing in front of her sighed at her outraged tone, and Rachel tried to look away from the distracting motions of her chest. Althea was wearing the kind of outfit which would have most women hauled up on an indecency charge. Nude from the waist up, her legs were covered in a short skirt of almost blinding whiteness, which contrasted with her golden skin. Slit on one side, it allowed a distracting flash of thigh to escape whenever she took a step. Her blonde hair, attractively tousled, fell in a tumbling series of ringlets down her back. Her waist was slim, her arms slender and attractive, and her breasts spectacular, teardrop-shaped wonders that sat high and proud on her chest, the nipples tilted slightly upward. Her eyes were an arresting shade of green, dark as jade, and hinted at wicked, private pleasures. She looked sleepy-eyed and sensual, as if she had just crawled out of her lover's bed.

Or was about to crawl into it.

"I knew this would be difficult," she said. Her voice was resigned. "It has been centuries since I shared the body of a mortal. And that was always a choice made by us both, not this bastardized joining I was forced into. Listen, Rachel," she continued. "Do you remember the boy who was killed in the traffic accident? Peter Miller?"

Rachel nodded warily. The face of the young man who had died, almost in her arms, several days ago, still haunted her.

"Well, he was a monster and a fool, but he wasn't an idiot. Somehow he got his hands on an old grimoire, a spellbook. He performed a ritual which he thought would tear me out of my body and into the mind of his would-be girlfriend. So that she would be so horny she would have no choice but to sleep with him." She grimaced in disgust. "As if I would allow myself to be used for something like that!

"But he got it wrong. My soul was pulled away from my physical form," she said, as calmly as if they were discussing a trip to the drugstore. "But instead of going into that poor girl, I was forced into him." She shuddered, her golden skin turning pale and sallow. "It was horrible. His mind was a festering sewer, filled with hate for women.

"And then he got hit by a bus. I have never been so near death. If he had died while I was trapped in his mind, I would have perished as well. I was lucky. I was very, very lucky that you came along, my child. When you took that boy's hand, I had just enough power to transfer my soul to your mind." Her lips quirked with dark humor. "It was like an exorcism, but in reverse.

"But I can't stay here forever," she said. "Mortals are not meant to contain the consciousness of a succubus. Their bodies...change. So I started to work to regain my power, so I could move back into my own form.

"To do that, I had to give you a few hints, nudge you in the direction I wanted you to go. I will not apologize for my actions," she said bluntly. "And I think, on the whole, I have not done you any harm."

"Direction?" said Rachel blankly, her mind whirling. "What direction?" She thought of the whispering voice she had heard in her mind over the last several days. The voice that was always urging her to let go, to relax, to savor the joys of the flesh.

The voice that was eerily similar to Althea's own.

"Succubi get their strength, their physical and mental powers, from sexual pleasure. Preferably that of others, although our own will do in a pinch. A lover, or someone who we are in close contact with. A friend. A neighbor. The closer the bond, the more power we receive. An orgasm, a climax, is as sustaining to us as a good meal is for you." Her eyes closed and a ripple of remembered pleasure coursed down her body, making the flesh quiver enticingly. "So I spoke to you silently, tried to remove a few of your inhibitions." Her face was sympathetic. "Took away those things which were making you so terribly unhappy.

"Tell me, Rachel," she said in response to her shell-shocked silence. "If someone had suggested, two weeks ago, that you would screw your intern as a farewell gift, would that have seemed in any way plausible? Would you have offered your maid a full-time job, but only on the condition that she dress in such a way as to sexually excite you? Would you have kissed her in the middle of your house, where your children could walk in at any time?

"Would you have attempted a reconciliation with Josh, a man who has driven you to screaming rages in the past due to his refusal to conform in his art and his life? Would you have allowed Alex and Sarah to choose their own careers, or would you have kept to your rigid insistence they follow the paths you laid out for them, regardless of their happiness?"

Rachel blinked slowly. When taken in a lump like that, Althea's story was frighteningly credible. Her knees began to shake. She covered her face with her hands, horrified.

"You're...in my head?" she whispered. "So where are we now?"

Althea smiled and shrugged. "Just a little home I've made for myself here," she said. "It was disturbing to float around in your mind, completely disembodied. I needed a template to work from. Don't worry. It didn't take more than a few hundred million of your neurons. You weren't using them anyway."

Rachel fell to a heap on the grass, her legs suddenly strengthless. Uncontrollable shivers racked her body. She wanted to scream her terror aloud, but she couldn't draw a breath deep enough to give voice to her fear.

Before she could collapse into a puddle of full-fledged hysteria, a pair of warm arms come around her from behind, as gently comforting as a mother's embrace. Lips brushed her cheek, and a soft voice murmured into her ear. "Shhhh, lovely Rachel. I will never hurt you. I would sooner cut off my own tits than allow you to come to harm. I have claimed you as my handmaiden, and when I have retaken my own body, thou wilt be my first disciple."

Rachel swallowed, forcing back her tears, then turned in Althea's arms. It seemed she had to accept this incredible story, as outrageous as it seemed. Not for the first time, she was grateful to her law-school mentors, who had taught her that when working on a lawsuit, the only things that mattered were the facts. "All right," she said, "When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."

Althea smiled like a sunrise. "Sherlock Holmes," she said, recognizing the quote.

"So what are you? You say you get power from sex? How old are you? Where do you come from?"

Althea smiled and leaned against a rock which conveniently appeared behind her, stretching her long legs on the sun-warmed grass. "That's a long story."

"We've got all night," Rachel pointed out. She frowned. "I am asleep, right?"

Althea nodded. "Dreaming. But a true dream. That last session you had with Josh allowed me to siphon off a lot of power." She grinned lasciviously, and Rachel blushed. "I can speak to you this way now. Before, I was only able to whisper to your waking mind. After tonight, we will be able to talk here any time you wish."

"Well, let's not do it when I'm driving, okay?" Rachel smiled. "Talking on a cell phone is bad enough. I'd hate to pile up my car and have to tell the cops I was talking with the sexy lady in my head."

Althea laughed, then smiled at the compliment. "So you want to know about the succubi," she said. "How much do you know about the Christian creation myth?"

"What, like Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden?" Rachel asked.

Althea nodded. "Exactly. Adam and Eve is what got put into the Bible and the Talmud and all the other religious literature. But there is a hidden truth that the Christian and Jewish hierarchy did not want people to know.

"Where the Christian God always fails is when he tries to take away the free will of his creations. It happened before the Garden. It happened in the Garden. And it happened for hundreds of years while he constantly fucked around with his 'chosen people.'" Her lips twitched in a small, mirthless smile. "Sometimes I think the entire crucifiction and resurrection was his way of giving up on humanity."

Rachel blinked, completely confused. "I don't understand."

Althea nodded. "I'm sorry. I got a little carried away." She took a deep breath. "My mother was Lilith, who was the first wife of Adam. God created them out of the same clay, breathed the same breath of life into their lungs. Then he ordered Lilith to submit to Adam. To take his orders. To be his inferior." Her eyes filled with fierce pride. "She refused. For that, she was cast out of the Garden."

"So she died, right? With no one else there. No, that doesn't make any sense," Rachel said. She frowned. "You said you're her daughter. How can you be, when there were no other men besides Adam? Did Lilith wait until some of Adam's sons grew up?"

Althea nodded, though not in agreement. "You're quick, child. I'll give you that. But I have to correct one thing. There were lots of other men around."

"But..."

"But Adam was the first man, right? According to Christian and Jewish myth, sure. But all the myths are true. Not just the Christian one. I can't explain it," she said to Rachel's confused look. "You just have to accept it. Christian myth is true. But so is the Norse myth of Ask and Embla, the first man and first woman, who were created from a pair of trees. And so is the Greek myth of how Prometheus shaped men and women out of mud, and Athena breathed life into them. And the Hindu myths. And the myths of the First Peoples of the Americas." She held out her hands, her fingers spread wide. "It's like a river, where many tributaries combine to form one stream. There may be some ultimate truth behind all of them. I don't know. What I do know is that the world was created and mankind made flesh. So my mother had plenty of company when she was cast out of the Garden."

"And your father?"

"Not human," she said, seeming just a tiny bit proud of that fact. "If he had been, I would have been dust thousands of years ago.

"Have you ever heard of the War in Heaven?"

Rachel shook her head numbly.

"It happened among the angels, whom God had created. There were some who had little love for mankind. They rebelled against God, seeking to overthrow him. To take the stewardship of his creation for themselves. They wanted men to be their slaves. Or worse.

"They lost. And the punishment for their rebellion was terrible. They were cast into Hell and we now know them as demons."

"So one of those...evil angels was your father?" Rachel shrank away in fear.

"No. Never." Althea clenched her fists. "The Forsaken are my enemies. I have fought them and their children for years beyond count. They escape, you know, from time to time. Some of history's worst monsters have been demon-spawn. They walk among us even now, spreading anger and hate, committing terrible crimes against humanity.

"No," she said again, calming herself. "My father was a different sort. When the War in Heaven came, there were angels who fought against God. And there were those, of course, who fought at his side.

"And there were," she said sadly, "those who stood by, who did not choose. Who would not rebel against God, but who felt he had erred when he tried to take away mankind's ability to make his own mistakes. My father was one of them. They were not cast into Hell, but banished to earth. My father's name was Imriel. He was an angel. When my mother was cast out of paradise, it was the Fallen that took her in. She met my father and they loved each other beyond all measure. I am their first child.

"They had others, brothers and sisters like me. And in those times, when angels still walked the earth, there were others who mingled their blood with humans. We who are their children bear the taint of their immortality. For God decreed that we were to be set apart. We are cursed, or blessed, with the cravings of the flesh, as my father desired my mother. Our need for humans, for sex, is bone-deep and ineradicable. And we were given a great task. As our fathers and mothers would not take up arms against the demons of Hell, it is given to us to fight them whenever they or their accursed children should appear on earth. If we do not, our souls will be cast down with them, if by accident or mischance our earthly bodies should perish.

"We are effectively immortal. Age does not touch us. Sickness leaves no trace. But we are a sterile race. We cannot bear children. Not when we mate with each other. Nor with humans."

"I'm sorry," Rachel said. Althea's story had touched her deeply. "What happened to them, to your parents?"

"My mother died," Althea said simply. In her eyes was the reflection of an ancient grief. "She was human. And not even my father Imriel's power could increase the span of her years. When she left us my father chose to follow her. They knew, of course, that God's heaven was closed to them forever. But they each hoped there was a place beyond where they could meet again."

*****

"So you're in my head," Rachel said, after a long silence. "And you want to get out."

Althea nodded. "It's very nice in here." Her lips quirked. "But I've had my body for a long time. I'm starting to miss it."

"And to do that you need power, which you get through sex."

"Sex, orgasms, any kind of sexual pleasure, really. Though intercourse is obviously the most intense. You and Jeremy helped a little. You and Joshua helped a lot, as your bond is so much deeper. And I am trying to cast my net fairly wide. Which is why I am so happy Maria agreed to move in. She is one sweet piece of ass, Rachel. I can't wait to see which one of you she trips first." She sighed happily, and Rachel watched in fascination as her nipples peaked. Swollen with desire, they hardened into thick nubbins on her chest.

"Which reminds me," she said. "You should be careful about who you...exchange fluids with in the future. I told you earlier having a succubus in your mind causes changes in your body. This is an example. Saliva, blood, the wetness in our vaginas when we become aroused, even tears. They all have aphrodisiacal properties. You will find that your partners will be somewhat...lustier than they were before."

Rachel rocked back, her mind reeling. "What? Aphrodisiacal qualities?" A series of horrifying images crossed her thoughts:

Her finger, recently bathed in her female juices, brushing across Sarah's innocent lips last Thursday.

Screwing in her office with Jeremy Friday afternoon.

Maria moaning into her mouth, their tongues entwined, on Wednesday.

A loving kiss on Alex's cheek, earlier that evening.

Make-up sex with Josh, just a few hours ago.

"We call it our nectar," she heard Rachel saying. "Or ambrosia."

"No," she moaned, holding her head in her hands. "What have I done? Will they all become like me? Driven by urges they can't control?"

Althea huffed impatiently and stretched her hands above her head, showing off her magnificent breasts. The sound was eerily like that of her mother when she was aggravated with her as a child. "Urges you can't control? Or just don't want to? Get a grip on yourself, Rachel. Tell me. Is a hammer evil?"

"A hammer? No. It's just...a hammer. A tool."

"And so are the powers I possess and will wield through you, until you can stuff me back into my own body. Among those powers is my nectar. It is not good. It is not evil. It simply is. A hammer can help build a house or it can cave in a man's skull. The good or evil rests within the hand that uses it and the mind which gives it action."

"But know this. I have never used my power to harm a human. I have never taken an unwilling lover. I have never raped anyone, man or woman. Every single person who has come to my bed has done so of their own free will. I would have slain that bastard Peter with the power of my own mind before I let him use me to rape that girl. And I know you. You would no more use that power for evil than I would."

"But...what we did the other day with Maria. When we...when I..."

"When you kissed her? When you opened your lips and let your tongue explore her sweet mouth?" Althea grinned lecherously.

She pressed her lips tightly together. "If you want to be crude about it, yes. When I did, it was like she lost control of herself. I don't want to make someone do what they don't want to do. I don't want them to be mindless slaves."

"Haven't you been listening?" Althea said. For the first time, she sounded irritated. "That is not how this works. The changes made to your secretions...they do not take away free will. They enhance it. It allows those we love to act on their desires without being shackled by thousands of years of outmoded morality, passed down from the Almighty to Iron Age barbarians. When you touched beautiful Maria, I was able to catch a glimpse of her mind. That's a woman with one hell of a sex drive, Rachel. And a goodly portion of it was focused on you and your family. But it was all bound and gagged with years of inhibitions. First, her church, which taught her making love outside of marriage was a sin. Second, her church again, which taught her that homosexual relationships are also a sin. Then there was her employer, who ordered her to avoid personal relationships with her clients. And then there are the issues she had with approaching someone so much higher than herself on the economic scale." Her voice grew disgusted. "She knows what happens when attractive young women aren't careful around rich, powerful people.