v1 CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE: (18+) In which the distant past meets a new beginning.

They walked down through the hills towards the city—though of course it was far different from any city Micki had ever visited. The multitude of blocky ochre buildings, piles of pottery and sherds, and deeply rutted roads felt like a scene out of a storybook. The red, arid hills gave way to date palms and orchards as they approached the confluence of two great rivers.

No wonder later people called this “the Cradle of Civilization,” she thought. These people found the perfect location to settle and grow, to gather more people than in all previous history to form a city.

“Yes. The first city, or so it came to be known.” The veiled woman walking beside her spoke as if replying to Micki’s thoughts. “Before this time, humans weren’t concentrated enough for… certain things to happen. Money, trade, writing. Priests—that’s quite relevant to us, hm? We too arose scattered hither and yon, simply existing in dreams and fears, hopes and wishes, stories…”

They walked among crowds of men and women now, many of whom seemed to recognize the woman Micki walked with. They greeted her with reverence; she returned their greetings warmly. Other people were simply hurrying about on business, carrying baskets or pots filled with all manner of goods. Children played in the streets. Merchants haggled over prices, near stalls full of figs, leather, or bronze tools Micki didn’t recognize.

“These people know you.” Micki watched as an elderly woman set down her bundle to bow low before the veiled woman, not noticing Micki at all. The old lady whispered something Micki couldn’t catch; Micki’s companion placed a hand on her forehead in benediction.

“My followers,” the woman murmured. “I had forgotten what this was like. This memory must be from the height of my cult here, before…” her words trailed off, and she turned to walk towards the center of the city. Micki hurried after her, feeling out of place in her tank top and track pants.

In the fashion of a dream, they reached the large buildings in the center of the city more quickly than Micki would have thought possible. At times, the surrounding people seemed to speed up like a sped-up playback, the sun overhead moving quickly as well. When they stepped inside the impressive stone walls—their destination, Micki sensed or knew—dusk was fast approaching, casting long shadows across the dusty courtyard within.

“With so many people in one place, the humans had problems… disease, mostly. Malnutrition, fights. Men whose sole purpose was to fight for others.” She paused, fondling a broad-leafed fern growing in a well-tended bed of vegetation at one side of the walkway. “Travelers flocked here, seeking wealth or gawking at the wonders of Uruk. I was one of those wonders. They prayed to us to help with any or all their problems, you see? Or for pleasure, for release and change…”

As she continued her explanation, the woman led Micki past tall columns into the main hall. To either side, arrayed around a simple courtyard where a fountain played behind an unadorned altar, doorways curtained with beads or cloth led into darker chambers. Sounds of laughter and music—the plucking of stringed instruments, and what sounded like some kind of flute—drifted into the courtyard.

One curtain parted to let a young woman emerge; behind her, Micki glimpsed bodies moving in the dim light. The woman wore only a gauzy wrap that left her shoulders and chest bare. Her breasts were small but round, her hips wide. Henna designs adorned her forehead and cheeks; hair looped into intricate coils that framed her oval face.

She smiled in delight when she saw Micki’s companion and hurried forward. “My lady Sh—” But the veiled woman cut her off with a smooth wave of one red-skinned hand, then twitched her finger, crooking it slightly as if beckoning the newcomer. With a start, Micki recognized the gesture: she had seen a succubus make the same motion months ago, while eating breakfast in a diner.

The young woman’s face flushed, her body squirming suddenly. Her hands flew to her breasts, squeezing the flesh between thumb and forefinger as her breathing grew ragged. Staring at the veiled lady with a rapturous expression of lust on her face, she dropped to her knees, letting out a low moan and pressing her forehead against the ground, her hips twisting.

“There, there,” the veiled woman said in a soothing tone. “Return to your duties, my child.”

Micki gasped as well, startled by the sudden turn of events and unable to look away from the girl’s obvious delight as she prostrated herself. Then the girl lifted her head to gaze up at the veiled woman, tears shining in her eyes. “Thank you,” she murmured, before scurrying backwards to depart the courtyard.

“You see?” said the woman, adjusting her veil and moving towards the fountain. “In this time, the symbiosis was easy. We were bound to the desires of mortals—their wants became our needs. Sometimes, we were little more than that essence, archetypes of lust or revenge, war or fertility. My worshipers sought relief from their pains and cares; they sought satiation. So did we: worship represented an end to hunger, an increase in purpose and power. The systems of prayer and ritual, blessings and miracles seemed to work out ideally, for a time…”

She stopped by the altar and picked up a clay figurine. “Look, it’s me!” She showed Micki a small, ochre-red woman with horns and hooves. The sculptor had emphasized her heavy breasts and wide hips. “I sometimes forget that I had one of the first action figures…”

“What happened to… all of this?” Micki looked around at the idyllic garden, the rooms devoted to pleasure. There was a heady perfume in the air that she realized she wasn’t smelling, but sensing as pulses of energy: desire, of course, practically a wellspring or oasis of it.

The woman shrugged; her movements were quick and impatient. “Too many things to recount, over a long span of time. Some were my fault. Some, the meddling of my sistren or the foibles of humanity. What happened to any of the empires of old? They rose and fell like waves upon the sand.”

Micki’s head spun with questions—and possibilities—but the woman was already striding away from the courtyard again. “Come along!” she commanded. “We have much to do before nightfall… before our enemy does worse to us than he already has. Time passes differently in dreams, but none may claim immunity from its passage.”

They climbed a broad staircase, ascending through more floors of the temple, past chambers decorated with frescoes showing scenes of lovemaking or battles and storerooms stacked with urns and crates.

Eventually, they emerged through a low opening onto a broad roof. From here, Micki could see that this temple was but one among many, rising around her in a variety of shapes and sizes. All were built from the same mixture of brown clay and reddish stone, each roof topped by vegetation and gardens, like the simple circle of grass and flowers in front of them.

“This is the heart of Uruk,” the woman told her, spreading her arms to encompass the city below them. “Even in dreams, it remains a seat of my power. Second only to Nineveh, perhaps… but this first of cities has always stuck in my memory.”

She lifted her veil, and Micki saw Yael’s familiar face—button-nosed and cute, but with a distinctly regal bearing, her cheeks and chest adorned with dots of henna makeup. Her horns, often slightly different whenever she manifested, curled down around her temples like those of a ram.

“Are you ready to begin?” She turned to Micki and took her hands. Micki looked down, suddenly aware that her own hands were as feminine as Yael’s, with the long, sharp nails she’d grown accustomed to, but pale as they once had been. Is this my self-conception? she thought. Part human, part succubus?

She looked up and met Yael’s gaze, her identical succubus eyes. “Begin what? I’m not even sure why you’ve brought me here.”

Yael smiled. “Did I bring you here? Maybe. This is a shared dream. I think you wanted to know something about this time as well… so, have you learned anything?” She gestured towards the city, the red desert beyond, and the open sky.

Micki considered, finding thoughts hard to express amidst the heat flowing up into her body from the accumulated desire below. I’m more than just a succubus, hungry for sexual energy. What would Michael Belmont have learned from this? Or Susan?

“Temple prostitution…? The theories were quite real, that sex demons like succubae were involved in ancient sex rites. They worshipped you, and you fed from it.”

Yael laughed, and her expression was still merry and peaceful, more at home than Micki had ever seen her. “Still acting the priest, are you? I don’t have to tell you how much of that line comes from the propaganda of the monopolists, followers of a one God like your Catholic Church. Sex demons! We didn’t even have the word demon in this time.”

“Sex was certainly a powerful part of my cult,” she continued. “And prostitution? Yes. Our followers made donations, and many of my priests and priestesses enriched themselves in this place. It wasn’t a perfect system by any means. I wish I had spent more time eliminating… exploitative practices, given what I learned later.”

“So, we’re here together… to do what, exactly?” Micki rubbed her forehead in consternation, stopping at the point where her own horns arced backwards over her hair. “Figure out how to deal with Spencer, even as he makes my body clean up the scene of his horrific scientific experiments?”

Yael pouted. “Your body? I thought we were past all of that. You drank enough concentrated demonic energy, just now, to hand the body over entirely to me. Still… We must sort out our own bullshit if we’re to escape. There must be something here in this dream of a memory that could help us… any ideas?”

Micki shook her head. “This is your memory, not mine. I’m not the one with worshippers in ancient Mesopotamia, and I don’t know what other powers we could draw on. Look, I’m not truly a succubus—or a demon of any kind. I’m human, and I’m only here because you’re attracted to the idea of being human.” I’m so frustrated with all of this, she realized. Even if I’ve embraced my new condition, I can’t accept the situation it’s gotten us into.

Yael stepped forward and cupped Micki’s chin. They looked more like sisters than ever, with nearly the same petite, curvaceous body, and the same eyes staring at each other. Micki stood slightly taller, with straighter horns and hair, while Yael’s curves were more exaggerated, her ringlets falling in dark curls around her shoulders.

“Are you so sure you’re just human?” Yael asked. “Were you ever just human, with the inner potential to reach this state? Aren’t human souls potentially divine, or demonic, or both? Perhaps we’re here because I was a goddess of old, and you’ve always carried the calling of a priest, seeking that which is greater than yourself…”

Micki smirked. “You tried to convince me to worship you the first time I saw you. I’ve always had my own faith, even I’ve let you borrow the power of my belief from time to time. I now realize that we’re more similar than different—not just in the way we look, but in that we’re both children of the same creator. We all are, demon or animal or human, whether you call that creator God or simply think of it as the universe, or fate.”

Feeling emboldened, Micki reached out and stroked the side of Yael’s face with her fingertips. She’d never actively sought intimacy with the demoness before; it had always happened the other way around. But so much had changed since their first encounters. “Look… it’s like I said weeks ago, before what happened…. in the park. If there’s some way for us to coexist, share this body, I want us both to continue existing.”

Yael shivered and stared at her with a strange, unreadable expression. She rolled her shoulders, and her robes of gold and white fell away. Beneath, she wore only henna patterns and a loincloth, suspended by golden chains, with another golden pendant at her navel pointing towards the tracery of pubic hair above her loins.

Her body was as Micki remembered it: supple and toned, muscles and soft flesh in perfect proportion, with inhumanly perfect breasts resting huge and round against a slender frame. Micki felt her breath catch; she’d forgotten how breathtaking the demoness was when she exercised her abilities. “You don’t have to seduce me,” she murmured.

Yael smiled wickedly. “Do you remember, Micki, when I tricked you into accepting me? In taking me into your heart? So long ago, at your little parish. I asked you to say some words… to say you accepted me, body and soul.”

Yael’s gaze was intense and hypnotic, and Micki found herself unable to look away. She remembered staring in the mirror in her rectory bedroom, trying so hard to accept… something. Not just an outside force, but also herself. In doing so, she had fallen deeper into Yael, into a changing body and life. She nodded.

“I need you to trust me now. There’s one trick I remember others pulling off way back in this time, though it’s a little more… complex than simple co-existence. I hope you might trust me now… after all, you made the choice to reject Spencer, even at the cost of your own existence.”

She brought her face closer to Micki’s. “You made that sacrifice that for my sake, and for that I owe you, thank you, and grant you my own sacred trust. O Micki, you who are known as the Dark Mistress by your followers, I recognize your divinity. Say the words.”

Micki took a deep breath; this was terrifying, like standing on the edge of a cliff. “I do—I accept you, Yael. Body and soul. I accept… being a succubus. Becoming like you. Being you.”

Yael smiled. Micki looked down at herself. Silent, colorless flames enveloped her form: fire without heat or pain, but feeling as if it was searing some part of her. Her clothes were certainly burning, flaking away into ash, but her flesh remained. “What’s happening—why is this—is this another one of your deceptions, a ruse?”

The succubus shook her head, dark ringlets tossing. “It is a truth, and our truth. Come unto me, sister.” Yael took her hand and drew her close, the flames now wrapping soundlessly around both of them. Micki gasped, and opened her mouth as if to receive a kiss from Yael, but the elder demoness placed a finger on her lips. “Not yet, my love.”

Instead, Yael caressed Micki with one hand while holding her around the shoulders with her other arm. Her long-nailed fingers traced the contour of Micki’s left breast, and rolled her fat nipple gently. Micki moaned; she hadn’t expected this, even after the session where Yael had shown her how to pleasure herself.

She had an urge to pull away, to keep from losing… what? Herself, her restraint? But she could not: she too hungered, in this place of lust fulfilled. The succubus within her wanted to feed, and Yael was the nexus of all nourishment, drawing in the desires of worshippers.

Yael’s fingers traveled lower, between Micki’s legs. The demon’s fingers pressed against the entrance to her pussy. “Come forth,” she whispered. “Give yourself to me.”

Micki felt a sudden pressure building inside her stomach—it wasn’t exactly painful, but it was certainly uncomfortable. A sense of urgency rose like a wave; she couldn’t hold back any longer. “Yes!” she cried aloud.

With a cry like a sigh of ecstasy, her body pulsed with desire, teeming with energy she didn’t know she’d stored within. Her thighs grew slippery with the secretions of her arousal, and Yael slipped one long finger across her lips. No! she realized. That’s not a finger! Her tail, so much like Micki’s own. The thought made her hips twist and her vulva clench. She felt the tip enter her.

Micki shuddered. It felt good: so very good, like when she’d fucked herself with her own tail, but better because of that sense of an other. Yael continued to press her tail inside her vagina, working it in and out slowly. Micki moaned again. Her own tail wrapped around one of Yael’s legs, holding on. In the throes of pleasure, Micki grabbed at Yael and slipped her tongue out to lap at Yael’s nipple. It was sweet, slippery with something dark.

As Yael pushed deeper into Micki’s cunt with her tail, the demoness leaned forward to allow Micki to lick and suckle at her tits, heavy with an essence of darkness. “Yes,” she hissed. “That’s a good girl.” The flames obscured the surrounding rooftops, leaving them pressed together in a realm of shifting light and darkness.

Yael moved her tail faster; Micki’s insides spasmed around the appendage like hot lava. She could feel it pulsing inside her belly—the thing growing and swelling larger. She tried to speak, and it emerged as a wordless moan. Yael’s nipple fell from her mouth, but she felt a hand lifting her up, clasping her under her shoulders.

Micki opened her eyes. Yael, staring up at her with undisguised hunger, had picked her up and held her in the air, with Micki’s breasts at the level of Yael’s mouth. Somehow, the demoness had grown enormous, her shape unchanged, but her power undeniable. Micki screamed, awash in unexpected helplessness. Yael’s enlarged tail continued pumping her, and her cunt flexed in response, her clit twitching as the slippery appendage rubbed past it. “Oh…. Oh God—Goddess,” she amended. “I’m… unhhh… I’m going to—”

“Wait, little one,” the ancient succubus intoned. “I must savor this.” Yael slid her tail out of Micki with slick pop, accompanied by a whimper of sudden pleasure from the small, pale figure in her grasp. Yael’s giant mouth engulfed one of Micki’s breasts, and Micki felt the demoness sucking and tonguing her nipple, her areola, every inch of her ripe tit-flesh.

Micki’s head spun, and she closed her eyes. Yael’s mouth moved, and Micki felt something like a thousand tongues licking at her nipple, each one hotter and more skilled than the last. She screamed from the sheer sensation, not knowing whether she felt pleasure, fear, or pain.

Yael’s mouth released her, but now she was being raised higher, the slender red arms elevating her to the height of the succubus’ face, ten feet above the rooftop. Yael lifted one of Micki’s legs and put it around her own neck and shoulder, then brought Micki’s pubis close to her face and planted a kiss on her sopping cunt. Micki gasped again, feeling the heat of the other succubus’ desire and power drive into her, hotter than any cock.

Yael kissed Micki’s labia, sliding her lips along the swollen folds before opening her mouth wide like a flower to encompass Micki’s entire pussy. Micki could feel the warm wetness of Yael’s lips and tongue covering and filling her cunt, taking up residence between her legs. A wave of ecstasy rushed through Micki’s body as Yael’s huge maw swallowed every part of her sex.

Micki could feel her clit throbbing inside the demoness’ mouth as Yael sucked hard enough to draw blood from Micki’s tender flesh, but Micki’s own body had grown demonically strong, able to endure intense pain and pleasure. She howled like an animal as Yael’s teeth pierced her most sensitive spot; she could feel them scraping away the outer layer of skin to expose the nerve endings beneath.

Yael pushed her tongue deep into Micki’s pussy, exploring every crevice of her lover’s sex. The wounds left by Yael’s teeth healed as quickly as they had opened, fueled by the pulsing energy rising from the temple through their demonic forms. Instinctively, Micki slid her tail down across Yael’s body, questing for the enormous demoness’s openings. As Yael panted and grunted more intensely, something about the taste of Micki’s sex driving her wild—she opened her legs to Micki’s tail slip inside her own cunt.

Two succubae writhed against each other as night fell, and thunder boomed across the sky. The ground shook with every bolt of lightning that lit the clouds above; the storm seemed to come right towards them. Yael sucked and licked at Micki’s throbbing cunt as Micki began to twist and drive her tail deep into Yael while slamming her body instinctively against the larger demon’s face.

Yael pulled her head off Micki’s dripping pussy long enough to let out a guttural cry of delight. Then Micki began to fuck herself on the demoness’ tongue like a bitch in heat, impaling her cunt on the writhing length of flesh emerging obscenely from the succubus’ open, upraised mouth. Rain drove down from the clouds in great sheets, but the flames surrounding them burned every bit of moisture away.

Micki came harder than ever before; all she could do was scream and claw at Yael’s face—her orgasm triggered by the knowledge that Yael might swallow her whole if she didn’t stop thrusting herself against her lover’s mouth. She felt the flesh of her tail bulge and engorge with the pleasure of her climax, rippling deeper into Yael and causing the demoness to howl and shake with paroxysms of her own satisfaction.

When the waves of Micki’s orgasm finally subsided, Yael continued to hold her steady in the air by her shoulders like a doll. Still trembling, Micki watched as Yael lowered her to stare her in the face. Suddenly Yael seemed smaller again, but still impossibly strong, ancient despite her youthful experience, powerful and vulnerable.

“Kiss me now,” she said. Micki did so; Yael’s lips were soft and warm—a perfect contrast to the hard strength of her body. Yael kissed her deeply, passionately, drawing Micki into her embrace. And she inhaled.

Micki felt something leaving her: the shreds of desire and energy that had sustained her. Is she draining me? She felt something of herself, her identity slipping away. The flames burned brighter all around her, and suddenly she was burning too, her flesh searing itself red all over again.

“Wait!” she screamed. “What about me? I want to live, I want to exist! Yael… don’t eat me, Yael!”

Suddenly, they were looking at each other again, two crimson faces regarding each other with identical eyes.

“I accept you, Micki Belmont. For your incredibly human body and your unique soul.” Flames licked the sides of their faces as Yael spoke. “I am and have been jealous of your existence. You’re right: I want to be human.” The succubus’ voice was more fragile and hesitant than Micki had ever heard it. “Please… please, Micki. Help me. I don’t want to just be a force, a feeling. I want to be someone.”

Micki sobbed; she felt as if everything about her was burning away. “I don’t know if I can—if I can hold on to you as we burn—but I just want us to be together. Yael… this body is and has been my home. It is your home. Come with me.”

Yael cried too, as she clung to Micki. She was small again, just shorter than Micki. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Michael. I’m sorry, Micki.” She clung to the other woman’s figure like a child on a tree.

“I love you, Micki Belmont.” The flames rose around them, and from Yael’s shoulders burst two great wings, feathered in black like a raven’s plumage. Micki stared as the wings beat once; they were so beautiful. Then they wrapped around her, both shrouded in the wings’ dark embrace.

“I love you, Yael,” she whispered into that darkness. “I forgive you.”

The darkness whispered a name back, a secret name.

The storm passed, and dawn returned. Freshly spent clouds abandoned the azure sky above. On the desolate rooftop, a pair of huge black wings opened. Only one figure stood inside.

Yael was gone. A figure that looked like Micki stood alone, wine-red and bearing the wings and hooves and horns of the succubus, with something of Yael’s smirk playing around her lips.

Wait, she thought… I’m not Micki, am I? And I’m for damn sure not Michael Belmont anymore, though I remember everything he did.

Am I Yael? Yes, and no. I am Yael, but not Yael.

I am Micki, but more than Micki.

“What is my name?” wondered the new demoness, looking around at the dreamscape of Uruk. She remembered this place only dimly from books and lost lifetimes and a dream she’d just had. She stroked her tail absent-mindedly. The sky overhead was blue and went up forever. She wanted to fly, to soar on these wings.

“What should I even call myself now? Mikael? Nah, way too masculine. Yacki? Absolutely not.” She kicked a pebble with one cloven hoof.

“We were two, and now we are one,” she recited. “I must go by something, and that’s as good an inspiration as any. So, I name myself… Una.” The sound of her name echoed in the sky’s vastness like the opening of a song. It was simple, but right.

Una slapped the end of her tail in her hand, thinking. “There was something I was supposed to be doing, wasn’t there? Ah, that’s right. My body is cleaning up a mess, done up like a sexy French maid. Let’s go deal with that.”

She vanished, and the night of history and memory swallowed the ancient city of Uruk once more.