Here it is boys and girls, the final instalment of the last Emerald Story. Well, the first one was good.
Lusiphur, Jace, Tenth & Hyena are copyrightedby Drew Hayes and used without permision for the purposes of vulgar and poorly written entertainment. Any similarity to persons liveing or dead is a load of bull....
Emerald paced. Luse had no idea how to act like a girl. He wasn't enjoying it in the least, and that in Em's mind was a crime. Par had wisely chosen to stay out of her way, sitting in an armchair beside the wall, which showed the world as Lusiphur saw it. Em turned to face it and thought on what she knew about the elven mind. Then, with quick, neat steps, she marched right through the wall. Lusiphur landed with a thump, a snoring bundle, on the floor of his subconscious.
Emerald stretched with Luse's tensed, well muscled female body. She felt some of the tension in the muscles go out and frowned. No wonder he didn't sleep well. She looked over the edge of the bed.
"Jace?" she called softly.
"What?" snapped Jace a little irritably. His left ear was digging into the ground, and a hardwood floor is not the best thing to sleep on in any case.
"What do you know about back rubs?"
"What?" Jace said, sitting up, not believing what he just heard. His jaw fell open, not believing what he was seeing, Luse was practically pouting at him.
"What do you know about back rubs? I'll trade you one. I'm terribly stiff and tense." The Luse-girl arched her back and yawned. "Please?"
Jace studied the pretty face that he thought he knew (well in a way) and found nothing of a deception in it. He then pinched himself, making sure he was awake. The Luse-girl giggled. Well it was more of a throaty chuckle but it sounded vaguely like a giggle.
"The verdict is?" she said teasingly. Em was enjoying herself.
"I guess I'm awake." Jace said, and climbed up onto the edge of the bed as Em turned her back to him, ready for the back rub she'd requested.
Emerald grinned so that he couldn't see her smile. Ooooooooooooooh she was enjoying this. Depending on how long she managed to keep control she could have a great deal of fun with this. She smiled as the tension drained out of her back. Oh yes, she could have a great deal of fun with this.
*
Reality sighed. "Alright Tenth, you've driven me not only to distraction, but also to the truth."
The powerful elven mage looked skeptical. "Which is?"
"I was out of my league when I made that focus. It's woman's magic." She smiled, baring sharp teeth, almost like fangs. "If you use it, you'll be..." Reality paused trying to work out the best phrase. "Indisposed once a month to say the least." Tenth blinked.
"There's no proof of this."
Reality stood, gracefully and pushed back her great coat, displaying the lithe female body that it covered. "Here's your proof. I meddled with female's magic, and this is what it got me. The backlash of the spell gave me a headache for a week, knocked me out of my workshop, and left me in this condition." Tenth snorted, still not believing, but Reality grinned. "I have the great fortune to be sterile and thereby skip all the messy steps involved. You have no such luck." A vaguely sadistic look crossed her face. "But if you don't believe me, go ahead, try it. I'll be right there to take my focus, which I can now use, back." That, beyond anything else, convinced Tenth that she just might be telling the truth.
*
Par wished he could think of a way out of this. He of all people knew how grumpy Luse was when woken up. But it looked like he had no choice. He reached out to nudge Luse wake, but then drew his hand back. There was, in theory, something wrong with the fact that Lusiphur was asleep in his subconscious. For once, Par was out of his league. And he didn't like it one little bit.
*
Emerald woke up, feeling as happy and contented as a cat. Her back was warm and deliciously so, it took her a moment to realize there was someone else in the bed with her. She rolled over on one elbow and realized it was just Jace. He was soundly asleep, and so adorable. A rougeish thought stole through her mind, and she leaned over, and planted a kiss right on the tall, sleeping elf's lips.
Jace was awakened by the pleasant sensation of lips on his. It was a damned good kiss. He melted into it, helping it along. It was several moments before he even thought to open his eyes. And when he did he got the surprise of his life.
"Crow!" he yelped, leaping backwards "Luse, what were you thinking?"
"I'm thinking," the dark haired woman said, with a sly smile, "that that was fun," the perfect cupid's bow curled into an adorable smile, halfway between sexy and scary. "Don't you agree?" she said, leaning forward, affording Jace a glimpse of magnificent cleavage. Jace decided that Luse had definitely come unhinged. The she-elf leaned forward and nuzzled his cheek softly breath tickling his ear. Jace tried to jerk back again, weirded out, but he was up against the head board at that point and there was no where else to go back. And even though he knew this was Luse, and that Luse would never do something like this, his body was responding, and prodding his caution to leave via door, window, or just go hide in the closet. Nails gently tickled the opening of his shirt, teasing it open.
"Admit it." Purred Em. "It was fun." She flirted her borrowed lips across Jace's face, twirling fingers in his magically stained hair. This brought about the desired result; another kiss.
Luse began waking up, blinking and confused. His head felt muzzy, and he focused on a most unwelcome sight. The fact Par was shaking him awake. He grabbed the undead clown firmly around the throat and tossed him. As hard as he could.
Em felt a stirring in the back of her mind that had nothing to do with the amount of fun she was having with Jace. Luse was awake, and trying to break back through.
Fuck that! she thought and turned energy to keeping him in. The rest of her energy was completely diverted.
Luse pounded ineffectually against the barrier keeping him from regaining control of his body. He even fired several shots into it. Nothing was working.
Despite the fact she would have been perfectly willing to proceeded in the direction they were headed- Jace had talented hands- Em drew back and swallowed, with a smile.
"Yow." she purred. "Now there's a worthwhile distraction." She slipped out of bed and set about changing into one of the new outfits. Once Jace's mind started working properly again, he made up his mind to keep a close eye on Luse as this gender-switching had put him off his rocker.
"Luse," Jace said. "I think this whole thing might be a bad idea- maybe we should go back and get you changed back."
"Whoa," said Luse acidly in the back of his mind, lighting a smoke. "Blondie made a an intelligent observation."
"You want me to go back into the clutches of that scheming, smiling bastard of a mage?" spat Em. "I'd sooner trust myself to a doppelganger's charms. Mages," she said sharply, "can't be trusted."
"True." Luse agreed, as Par stumbled up, with an ice pack pressed to his head.
"You can be a real asshole, Luse." grumbled the creature. "Then again, this entire thing is enough to make Sigmund Freud sick." Luse was too annoyed to even ask what Par was talking about.
"So," Em finished her tirade, as Jace sat on the edge of the bed wide-eyed at some of the descriptive terms she'd just used. She smiled dangerously. "Let's have no more talk about going back Mmm?" With that she turned and flounced out the door.
*
With a self-satisfied smile, Reality tucked the mage focus into her pocket. "Thank you for being so reasonable, Tenth."
Tenth growled under his breath.
"Now about this business of melding a male mind and a female mind in the same body...?" She smiled and shook her head. "Thats a big no-no, friend."
"And what," snarled Tenth, "do you want me to do about it?"
"Why, fix it."
"How?"
"Undo the spell that turned the male female, and it should work."
"And if I don't?"
Reality grinned. "You'll wish I turned you into a girl."
*
Jace was surprised a few hours later, when the slim dark haired elven maid that was Luse came up- god, but Luse made one hot chick- leading two horses.
"Come on Jace, no time to dally, it's time to get going," said Em, taking Luse's pack from the tall elf and tying it to the saddle of the smaller horse. Jace retrieved his jaw bone.
"Uh... Luse?"
"Yeah?" Em answered.
"I thought you didn't like horses."
Em paused, and stroked the handsome gray dappled horse she was leading.
"Well.... I dislike mages more." she smiled.
"But what about..."
"I'll cope... there are other mages in the world ya know, till then, I'll just deal."
"You've got to be kidding me."
"Nope." Em swung up into the horse's saddle with a practiced ease. "Now then," she said, fluttering her eyelashes slightly, "we going to go, or are you gonna stand there all day looking cute?" The half-skirt of the outfit she was wearing left one leg bare in the early morning sunlight.
Jace was more sure than ever that his traveling companion had become more than a little unhinged, but obediently swung up onto the Morgan gelding that she'd obtained. Jace made up his mind not to think about how she'd done that.
"Alright, everything I've tried hasn't worked," Luse muttered "And everything you tired didn't work." He grinned "Let's co-operate."
"Huh?" said Par, but that's all he got out as Luse grabbed him by the front of the shirt and tossed him into the wall that divided his conscious mind from his subconscious. Emerald tumbled through, looking confused, and Luse pounced on her with a snarl. She backhanded him with her punching glove. "I don't think so!"
Luse recoiled from the blow, then they set to fighting in earnest.
Jace saw the Luse-girl fall from his/her horse and dismounted to see if s/he was alight. It was most likely s/he was because s/he was already picking her/himself off the ground. But he reached down to help him/her up anyhow.
Par looked at hand, in the solid world, that he had no business controlling and smiled sweetly at Jace. "Say blondie," he said. "Would you do me the favor of knocking me cold?"
The question in and above itself was crazy enough that Jace did so without a second thought, then tossed the inert elven form over the back of the gray mare and rode at top speed for Tenth's lair.
*
"Anything to get rid of you!" said Tenth. "I'd love to, but for one small problem- I can't find them!"
Reality smiled "Somehow," she said, over an urgent knock on the door, "I don't think that'll be a problem." At the door was Jace, with an unconscious Luse over his shoulder.
"What did you do to his mind?" Jace demanded, sword drawn and pointed at Tenth's throat.
*
Par attempted to separate the two combatants to no avail. Suddenly, as they rolled scrabbling across the ground, he saw that they were edging near the pit of Luse's insanity.
"Stop!" he yelped, just as Emerald went down the great maw of darkness.
"Oops," Luse said and then grayed out of his subconscious.
*
He sat up, in his own clothes, with Tenth looking put upon, and a weirded-out looking Jace and an amused looking blonde woman in his vision.
"I don't even want to know what happened," he snarled as Jace opened his mouth to explain how he'd gotten there. "Just get me out of here."
"The girl is gone." Tenth said to Reality. "She's just gone."
"I know."
"Good, then will you LEAVE?"
"You're cute." Reality kissed him on the nose and gathered Ecco up in her arms, as a ball of golden light enclosed her, then shrunk away to nothing.
=>;-> Aftermath <-;<=
So everything went back to normal. Jace and Luse resumed their flight of Mandratha, Reality and her son went home, and Tenth settled down into blessed silence for a while. (Till Hyena, who Ecco, while practicing his tricks, had made disappear, came back to yell at him some more.) And Par was once again alone in his split level head.
And somewhere, somewhen, a single, pale, bleached hand latched onto the edge of a deep dark pit, followed by a second. A body clad in a motley collection of rags and finery crawled out into a swirling mass of confusion. It bared teeth in a pale face, almost as white as the teeth, defined by black lips. There were thick, dark rings around its eyes.
"Alright," snarled the voice into the confusion. "Who wants some?" In the silent madness, the snick of a sword unsheathing was deafening.
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four