Melsuria the Demon, future Goddess of Lust and ruler of a human empire, stretched luxuriously in her still-new body. Sheema the Healer was close to ideal as a host: stunningly beautiful, thoroughly stacked and curvy, and possessing enough inherent magical ability to level a building once combined with the full might of her demonic powers. Elven and Demonic magic formed a potent mix. She was extremely powerful in this host.

  If only she weren't so damned short.

  Her endurance was also pathetic, but Melsuria was working on that, exercising as much as her body could bear while rutting with Kevin, the besotted human boy. I love young men. He was practically an endless fountain of desire, and with elven magic speeding his recovery periods, he was supplying a great deal of desperately-needed lust.

  Unfortunately, it was desperately-needed because Melsuria had not managed to spawn a single shard to possess someone else, follow her, and boost her powers. All she had was one succubus, Eubexa Corvolli, who had willingly entered into a pact to serve in exchange for restored health and beauty. The woman was patient, at least, having already received a great deal of Healing while serving as Melsuria's prior host.

  Worse, she was surrounded at all times by a group of people on the alert for demonic possession, and all of them wore Amulets of Protection from Demons. Those things hurt like an ever-loving bitch and could actually kill her if she were stupid enough to stay in contact with one for long. She wore an uncharged amulet herself as part of her disguise, and she had managed to drain Kevin's amulet as well.

  Maintaining the charade that Sheema wasn't possessed was greatly helped by the well-known fact among the elves that Sheema (barring her very special circumstances) was completely immune to demonic possession. If Melsuria ever left this host, there was no way she would ever manage to get back in. Not that she had any interest in abandoning Sheema's body.

  She was also hindered by her slow recovery. During the fight against Quazulin, Demon of Hate, she had expended nearly all of the mana she had been painstakingly gathering. Then, to maintain her cover, she had had to spend the night Healing the wounded, draining her elven magic. Finally, she had made a very ill-considered decision to heal both of little Charlie Farmer's parents the next morning.

  The father had been possessed by a shard of Quazulin, which she purged and replaced with a shard of herself. That was expensive enough. But the mother was barren, scarred by Charlie's birth years back, and despondent over it, and some mad impulse spurred Melsuria to fix that too. She had thought that, with demonic magic used on the first task and elven Healing on the second, she wouldn't be completely drained, but she was wrong.

  Doing both had nearly killed her. In the privacy of her own soul, Melsuria conceded that her pride was a bit of a failing. Of course she was strong enough to cure both—she would accept nothing less. When she had started to falter, her stubbornness caused her to push herself much too far.

  But I did cure them both, she thought smugly. I even put another shard in the mother, so the couple will share a lustful and fertile marriage. That boy Charlie will have lots of little brothers and sisters, at least until the Priests catch up with my shards. She enjoyed thinking about that—purely as a matter of pride, of course. She was not plagued by sentiment—her Concept was Lust, after all. There would have to be something very wrong with her for her to be moved by Kindness or Mercy or anything like that.

  Melsuria carefully separated that thought from the concern that there currently was something very wrong with her. She was not recovering as quickly as she should. The elven body was mostly replenished after five days on the road, but her demonic soul was still badly weakened, and that ought not to be happening.

  It's my diet, she decided. Too much love in the lust between these people. Kervan and Daring were fine, but Kevin is getting too besotted with me. Tom and Diavla are delicious together, but I'm eating too many sweets. I'm glad for Varga—now there is a soul that understands pure lust and revels in it. I need to find women who want to rut with the other elf men. It shouldn't be hard to find women to offer pure Lust, since humans and elves can't interbreed, and we're just passing through.

  “They're back,” Arven called quietly.

  All the elves could hear him; Diavla, finally able to speak again, informed Tom. Sheema watched from her wagon as Tom walked over and took half the packages from Kevin. Tom brought gear to the men, with Piper at his side, while Kevin approached her with a smile.

  “My beautiful lady, I come bearing gifts for you!”

  Melsuria smiled and leaned forward to kiss him, but then flinched. His amulet is charged! She was likely to scream in pain if she touched him. With the ease of many years of practice, her expression became coy and playful as she pulled back. “Ask him what happened to his amulet,” she muttered urgently to Eubexa.

  “Kevin, what happened to your amulet?”

  Her human lover looked surprised and then held it up. “Oh, the Priest at the Temple said it was empty of magic. He put a little in for me, but it still needs to be filled the rest of the way.”

  Melsuria thought quickly, as Eubexa began to translate into Elvish, maintaining the illusion that Melsuria didn't know Western, because Sheema didn't. The demon figured that she might survive if the amulet ran out of charge before it killed her, but she badly needed a better plan. Fortunately, she had one.

  Reaching up, she pulled off the empty amulet she wore for show and held it out to Eubexa. “Tell him this one is full, and to swap. You take his. Say I'll fill it later. Tell him I'm very upset that his amulet lost its charge and that it might be broken, and I'm worried about him.”

  Eubexa spoke quickly, and the guileless human followed instructions, proudly putting on the amulet Melsuria had been wearing, possibly feeling it for hints of her warmth. She continued the concerned act, fussing over him, running her hands over his chest, and finally letting him kiss her after skillfully building his anticipation. His lust tasted good, but as always Melsuria wanted more. She would wait, though; she had offerings to examine.

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  First was a pair of boots, better than the looted ones she already wore. One day I'll have to get boots built to make me taller, she mused. Next was a bright yellow dress. It wasn't her favorite color, but it was nice enough and probably cost a gold all by itself, so she acted utterly thrilled and grateful, and teased about modeling it for him later. It will be nice to have a change of clothing. The rest of them are used to long days on the road without washing, but I feel filthy and I can finally wash this red one I got from Summer. Lastly, there was a cloak sized for her.

  Kevin also unloaded two changes of clothing, boots and a cloak for the urchin Piper, who apparently was coming along with them, despite Summer Daring staying in Middleton. He explained that Tom had taken the spare clothes for Rillik, Brallik and Arven to the other wagon. The wagons had mostly segregated during the trip, except that Kevin was almost always with Sheema and Piper seemed to prefer the men's wagon.

  Tom Walker spoke with Kevin for a few minutes, getting details about the guards, the Temple, and their purchases. Meat pies that were still faintly warm were distributed, and then Tom got them on the road again. He drove the women's wagon, followed by Kevin driving the other. Again, all the elves were trying to stay out of sight as much as possible. They didn't know whether town guards had orders to stop anyone traveling with elves, or perhaps were asking people whether they had seen elves on the road.

  They found a small glen off the road near sunset; they were still barely half a day south of Middleton. Melsuria waited for a chance to speak with Eubexa privately. It finally arrived while the others were setting up camp. Sheema and Eubexa were both considered invalids at the moment, so neither had to help with the chores.

  “How are you doing, Mistress?” Eubexa asked quietly.

  “It's exhausting, keeping from bumping against anyone wearing a charged amulet.”

  “Charged means filled?”

  “Yes. Thank you. I need to remember to use the Elvish terms for everything.”

  “Is there anything I can get for you?”

  “No. Kevin will help me walk around after dinner.” Melsuria regarded her succubus a moment. “Take off your amulet, and I'll try to give you some healing.”

  “Don't strain yourself for me, Mistress,” Eubexa urged, which must have been hard for her. She was proving to be a loyal follower. Melsuria would reward her well when the time came.

  “I need to try it sometime, and in secret is best. Give me your hand.”

  Eubexa carefully removed her amulet and set it down, along with the other she was holding. Only then did she offer her hand. Melsuria took it carefully, and gently began to test her powers.

  The elvish power was mostly recovered, and it had better healing than the demonic anyway. Melsuria drew upon the surface mana in the area—her host and other elves would describe it as “calling the spirits,” while humans named it “casting a spell.” Her elven senses were best for healing, and she scanned the sickly woman carefully.

  The red pains disease, a hazard of prostitutes and sex slaves like Eubexa, had been rampaging unchecked through her frail body. She'd have been dead in less than a year if Melsuria hadn't possessed her. She had spent some time and no little demonic energy trying to repair her crippled host on the road to Oak Mill, and had forced the disease mostly into remission.

  After five days of no healing, the disease was attempting to rally. Despite that, Melsuria started with only the barest trickle of power, checking to see whether using the elven magic was harming her demonic soul. It didn't seem to be, so Melsuria increased her draw on mana and restored the earlier progress on burning the disease out of Eubexa. If she could cast regularly, it would not be much longer before the disease was gone entirely.

  Something felt a bit wrong, so Melsuria eased off and then stopped the flow of mana. Just as she finished, Diavla poked her head past the back flap of the wagon.

  “Sheema! Your magic—it's recovered?” As the only other spellcaster in the group (Tom Walker was too weak to count), she would have been able to sense Melsuria's working, if she were concentrating. Melsuria's estimate of the young woman's power went up a bit, as she probably hadn't been meditating but still sensed the healing magic in action. Diavla's abilities seemed still to be growing, probably as an aftereffect of Melsuria using the elf as her first host upon escaping her crystal prison.

  “I'm...still not there. I wish I knew what was wrong, but it's hard to inspect myself well enough. Still, I figured that I need to start using small amounts of magic to see if it helps my recovery.”

  “I could try again to diagnose you, if you like,” Diavla offered. The woman couldn't heal, but she had enough sensitivity to try to find out what was wrong.

  “Maybe in a few more days,” Melsuria temporized. “The last time you tried, it really hurt, so I want to try working on myself first.”

  “You pushed yourself really hard, Sheema. I have to respect that, but please don't do it again. We're all worried about you.”

  “Quazulin had to be dealt with.”

  “Of course. But you kept pushing after, and that's what I'm talking about.”

  “I know, I know. Your reminder is well-taken, it's just that the pain is reminding me constantly already. Believe me, I have no interest in overextending myself that far again. The only thing I would risk it for would be if we fought—” Melsuria caught herself before she said Arthalax, because the others didn't know that name yet. She had to catch herself again, before saying “the other demon.” She winced. “Another demon.”

  “Well, we'll have to stay vigilant, but hopefully we never run into the other two demons. One was quite enough.”

  “Agreed. Is supper ready?”

  “Not quite yet. I just heard you call the spirits and wanted to check on you.”

  “Much appreciated.”

  Diavla nodded and withdrew her head. Melsuria heaved a silent sigh of exasperation.

  “This is maddening,” she whispered a few moments later. “I should be waited on hand and foot. I should have a palace. I should have constant orgies and endless followers.”

  “You had all that before, you've said, and you will again,” her succubus reassured her. “In a month or two, do you think we'll be far enough away to start spreading your influence?”

  “Depends on when the snows start,” Melsuria brooded. “I don't want to be trapped in one place when I first make myself known. I wonder whether Tom Walker has a plan for getting us past the mountain range ahead, or whether we're going to be trapped on this side of them until spring.”

  “Given that you are being hunted as a treasure, I'm sure Tom is eager to get us farther south and out of Baria as quickly as possible. He's a resourceful young man.”

  “Yes. I'm looking forward to tasting his lust firsthand, but I need to overwhelm both Kevin's jealousy and Diavla's before that.”

  “How will you do that?” Eubexa asked.

  “I was thinking of getting Varga to bed Kevin, first. That should reduce the bit of love which is diluting his lust for me. As for Diavla...I may try to bed her myself. She can hardly object to Tom bedding me once she's already done so.”

  “That might be tricky; Diavla seems insecure and competitive around Sheema.”

  Melsuria scoffed. “Remember who you're talking to. I have centuries of experience in seduction.” Eubexa did not respond, but Melsuria suspected that behind the veil was a skeptical look. The demon didn't mind. She'll learn.

  I may have promised not to possess any of these people, but if I'm stuck with them for months, there's no way I'm going to settle for the amount of sex they'll manage on their own.