Succubus Dreams Page 0,51

what Lancaster has to say."

I froze. "What do you mean 'we'?"

Dante grabbed some keys from behind the counter. "You've piqued my curiosity. I want to see how this turns out. Besides, you owe me for my help, seeing as you won't put out."

"'Help,' indeed," I muttered.

He walked to the door with me. "Did it ever occur to you that in spite of how unuseful you think I am, I'm still kind of concerned about what happens to you?"

"No," I said. "It actually hadn't."

But I let him go with me over to Arcana, Ltd. When we stepped inside, we found Erik unpacking a box of books. He smiled without looking up, having sensed me.

"Miss Kincaid, always a - " He stopped when he noticed Dante. For the first time in our friendship, I saw Erik look angry. It was disturbing. Frightening, even. "Mr. Moriarty."

Dante nodded his greeting. "Always nice to see you."

The expression on Erik's face showed the feelings weren't mutual. He straightened up from his work and walked over to the counter. Crossing his arms over his chest, he peered at both of us.

"What can I do for you?" No cordial host or tea chats today. The air between the two men suddenly felt thick and oppressive.

I spoke uncertainly. "We...that is, Dante thinks he has an answer to my dream problems."

Dante laughed, wearing his trademark smirk. If he bore Erik the same animosity, he was hiding it well. "I wouldn't call it an answer, succubus. More like a theory."

"I've had the dream again," I told Erik. "More than once now. And I still keep losing my energy. Dante says it could be some kind of...dream creature preying on me." I stumbled over the words. The concept was still too ludicrous. "But he didn't know what kind. He said you might know."

Erik shifted his eyes from Dante to me. I could tell the old man was still unhappy about us being there together, but he cared about me too much and couldn't stop himself from helping me. I wondered at what point over the years I had earned such regard. And how. He sighed and gestured us to the table. We all sat down, but no tea was offered.

"Something like that going after a succubus is hard to imagine," Erik said at last.

"That's what I thought," said Dante.

His lighthearted mask had slipped a little. He looked much as he had in the store, thoughtful and curious. He reminded me of a mechanical engineer I'd once known. The guy couldn't help himself when it came to fixing some technical problem. Give him something in pieces, and he had to analyze it and figure it out. Dante might give me a hard time, but his nature, corrupt or not, couldn't stay away from this.

Erik's eyes studied me, hard and intent. I was an intriguing puzzle for him too.

"If I had to pick...I'd say the symptoms most match Oneroi."

I'd heard of them. They'd been in the Greek myths I'd grown up with. "Dream spirits?"

Dante considered. "More than spirits. They're the children of Nyx and Erebus."

I shuddered. I'd heard of them too. Nyx and Erebus. Night and Darkness. Primordial entities of chaos. They were powerful and dangerous. The world had been born of chaos, true, but it was also a fact - even science agreed - that the universe was always trying to move back toward chaos. Nyx and Erebus were destructive - so much so that they were now locked away, lest they tear the world apart. The possibility that their children could be sucking away my life made me feel sick again.

Dante was still turning this theory over in his head. "Yeah, that'd be the closest. But they still don't match one hundred percent."

"Nothing does," admitted Erik. "I've never heard of anything attacking a succubus."

"What do Oneroi do exactly?" I asked.

The two men exchanged glances, each waiting for the other to explain. Erik was the one who stepped up.

"They visit mortals in their dreams and feed off the emotions such dreams stir up. Victims of Oneroi wake up drained and sick." More irony. Legend said that succubi visited men in their dreams too and took their life.

"That's what's happening to me," I argued. "Why couldn't it be them?"

"It could be them," agreed Dante, "but like we said, the details don't fit. Oneroi can seize control and shape what you dream. But the dreams they stir up are usually nightmares. Fear and other dark emotions tend to be more intense - they offer more