Hi all! Welcome to the next chapter of Home for Horny Monsters!
New? You're going to want to start at Chapter 1. Each post is a chapter in a series of novels, and you are near the end of book three. There's a ton of monsters, sex and excitement to catch up on.
Returning reader? Welcome back! It's time for a showdown with Oliver, but how do you beat the unbeatable? You're about to find out.
As always, don't forget to rate, review, or comment! I do see them all, but my limited free time is primarily devoted to writing more chapters and working on a side project that will hit Literotica later this summer.
Enough from me, enjoy!
The Devil
Yuki sat on the porch swing, staring out at the front yard with a cup of tea in her hands.
The debris from the magic storm was strewn across the grounds, making the land look like a small junkyard. Somehow, it served as a perfect metaphor for her life right now, a giant mess with nobody to help clean it up. She took a sip of tea, letting out a sigh as the hot liquid streamed down her throat.
The front door opened behind her and Mike walked out, then sat down next to her on the swing. She fought the urge to scoot away, to turn her venom on him, but resisted. It was a knee jerk reaction to years of anger, and she mentally applauded herself for resisting.
"Ratu is working on a cure down in her Labyrinth," he told her. "She seems fairly optimistic that we can undo the gorgon's curse, but it will still take her a couple of days to finish putting what she needs together."
"Good." She sipped her tea, trying to keep her hands from shaking. It was hard existing without that burning rage seething away inside of her, and she was afraid of what would come next. Though Mike had healed her wounds, it was always possible that he might decide to kick her out or put her back in the tower. What didn't scare her so much was his judgment. Whatever the man thought of her, she likely deserved.
What scared her the most was that she would let him do it.
"So, the emerald is gone for good? No way we can get that back and use it on Oliver?"
Yuki shook her head. Discussion of the emerald hadn't happened yet. After the events in the front yard, she had told them everything about what had happened to Beth. The Rat King and Tink had filled Mike in on how Oliver had used Beth to steal secrets from the house, secrets he planned to turn over to the Society if she didn't give herself up.
Beth's contract with the demon weighed heavily on Yuki's mind, and she had gone over what was specifically said in the deal. Mike had frowned at this, but said nothing else.
"The emerald... this is hard." She set down the teacup and gripped the wood of the bench, her fingers biting into the wood. "I'll tell you about the emerald, but no questions until the end. It's something I only want to talk about once."
"Okay, then. I'll keep quiet."
She took a deep breath, remembering the events from so many years ago. "When Emily vanished, I thought she had been stolen away, abducted by a darker force. For years I searched, turning up nothing. You have to imagine my surprise when, one day, she reappears in the tower, as if she never left."
The memory of Emily cut deep, and Yuki bit down on her lip to keep from crying. She could still picture Emily standing against the balcony, the wind tossing her curly hair behind her. In disbelief, Yuki had approached, suspecting it was a dream or a trick. Emily had turned around, a twisted smile on her face, extending her hand as if to take Yuki's and hold it.
"When she came back, we got into a fight. I was caught off guard and it was fairly one-sided. During our fight, she pulled out this clear piece of glass. At least, that's what I thought it was. Have you ever heard about how your eyes are the window to the soul?" She touched her right eye in memory of the pain from the attack. "She apparently needed a piece of my soul. Not even the whole thing, just a very specific part. When she pulled it out, it..."
"Yeah, I can imagine." He gave her hand a squeeze, then retracted his hand. "Continue."
"I don't know why or how, but I came to, and she was holding that emerald. I didn't know it until now, but the emerald was a part of my soul, and she had just built some kind of magical artifact. When you used the gem to make me whole again, it destroyed itself to give back what had been taken from me. You can't just make a new soul, no matter how hard you wish it, but you can give back what was stolen." Yuki took a deep breath, then wiped a tear off her cheek. "And then she left. A few years later, I turned three hundred. For a kitsune, it's when we grow our next tail and choose the magic we wish to master. I was so hurt and angry that I deepened my knowledge of the frost that had grown in my heart, which resulted in this." She touched the white fur of her ears. "Kitsune can change their shapes, but we can't just whimsically change our nature. I've been missing a piece of myself for so long, it's very hard to describe how it feels to have it back."
"She took a piece of your soul?" Mike asked. "Is that... I mean, is that common, or..."
"No. It is powerful, dark magic to do something like this. In fact, I would even say it's lost magic. It's one of the few things abhorred by literally everybody. I would wager that even these Society people would rather destroy someone like that than accept them into their ranks."
"I wouldn't go that far," Mike muttered.
"Giving up your soul or selling it is one thing. Your mind stays behind and, in a way, you are still you. But ripping out a chunk of someone's soul is dangerous magic. It can give you control over someone, can dictate their actions. It can be used as currency, or even as a means of immortality. When Death comes for you, he expects a soul. Handing over your collection is sometimes enough to balance the scales."
"Interesting. Do you suppose she was hoping to control you?"
"I don't know. The last thing she ever said to me was that she wished she could forget about me."
"Mmm hmm." He sat back, rocking the swing. "You do realize that the emerald was capable of granting wishes, yes? Well, one wish per person. It wasn't all-powerful, but it could make your desires real enough."
"I do now, but not at the time."
"When Emily said those words, that's what happened. Whatever her plans for the emerald were, they were dashed the moment she said that. You wouldn't know this, but the moment she left, she handed over the emerald to the rats and then promptly forgot about them. Emily's memories are tied into the house and the geas itself. I can't say this with any certainty, but I know the geas does weird things to our heads. It's why nobody remembers anyone else until I meet them. When Emily forgot about you, it was as if she had never met you in the first place. But what if somebody asked where you went? I suspect the emerald itself took care of that to ensure her wish was properly granted. When the house reset... you were simply gone."
"I don't get it. Why go through all that trouble to hurt me if she was just going to erase me from her memory?" Yuki wiped a tear away from her eye. "It doesn't make sense."
"Did Emily ever mention a shadow? Or a secret staircase in the tower?"
Yuki's ear twitched. "Only once. She thought she saw a secret door in her room, but I was never able to find it again. That was months before she disappeared though."
"I see." His face darkened. "I have a theory, but it's only a small one. When I was in the tower, I came across a shadow man who knew that I was the Caretaker. He offered me advice and power but wanted a piece of my soul as payment."
"Did you tell him no?"
"I did. But I keep thinking back to what he told me. He said this place would burn, and offered to fast track me on my quest, which I'm still unsure of."
"Emily mentioned a quest several times. She thought she needed to fill the house with magical creatures or something."
"A quest? A quest for what?" He suddenly sounded eager. "What was she trying to find?"
"Nothing, really. She was deliberately vague about it all the time, but it's because she didn't know. Said it was a weird feeling that she got, like she needed to fill the house with magic. More creatures, more rooms. Talked about some weird dreams a couple of times, but that was it. Wish I could say more, but..." Yuki sighed.
"Oh." Mike shook his head in disappointment. "Was really hoping you would tell me where I could find the user manual for this house. Guess I'll just have to wing it like I always do." He offered her a weak smile.
"Winging it is a nice way of putting it." Yuki looked out at the yard. "According to Tink, this isn't even the first time the yard has been wrecked this badly."
He coughed. "Anyway, I have a theory that I want you to think on. If Emily made a deal with this guy, do you think she could have been forced to do things? Things she didn't want to do? She hired Ratu to dismantle magic items beneath the house with nobody knowing about it, and Zel has hinted more than once that she may not have been all smiles and sunshine. I think she even banished the fairies to the Labyrinth, and then obviously the whole thing with the rats was a secret. Her behavior before she died was erratic, and the others didn't know what to make of it since none of them had the full story. She was trying to achieve immortality or godhood, according to Ratu, but even Naia didn't know about that."
"It's possible." Yuki took a deep breath and let it out. "Think on this, then. That wardrobe in the hallway upstairs, it's made from a special tree that used to grow in the backyard, that's where the portal was originally. We would go into the backyard and just walk into the woods and emerge by the tower. Emily also had a small grove of younger trees out back that allowed her to walk to places all over the world, but I'm guessing you haven't seen any."
"No, I haven't."
"Do you know how you grow trees that quickly?" She hugged herself. "With a dryad. Her name was Amymone, or Amy for short. Her tree was centuries old, and she was very powerful. Amy could grow a tree to full size in a matter of weeks instead of years. One day, on a lark, she let Emily open a portal in her own tree. You see, Emily still needed to seed her destinations, and Amy got this idea that she could combine her magic with Emily's to grow a portal somewhere else. That's how we found the world with the tower, completely by accident. However, you need to know that dryads need their trees to live, Mike, and sometime after she abandoned me, Emily cut all of the trees down, including Amy's. Its remains sit upstairs, in your hallway, with a lock on the door."
