Chapter 13: The Double Trap
The knock on the penthouse door was too rhythmic. Three precise taps, a pause, then two more. Stacy, who was checking the charge on a non-lethal sonic emitter, went still. Rick looked up from tightening the laces on his boots.
“You expecting anyone?” he asked, his voice low.
“No.” Stacy’s hand went to the small of her back, where the grip of her 9mm was a familiar comfort. She moved to the door, not looking through the peephole but standing to the side. “Who is it?”
“It’s Ben.” The voice was flat, devoid of its usual easygoing cadence. “I need to talk to Rick. It’s important.”
Stacy flicked a glance at Rick, who was already standing. She unlocked the door and opened it.
Benedict Bryant stood in the hallway, his athletic frame seeming oddly slack. His dirty blonde hair was neat, his clothes clean, but his eyes were the problem. They were glassy, fixed on a point just beyond Stacy’s shoulder, reflecting the holographic vines like dull coins. There was no spark, no sign of the guy who’d laughed himself sick at one of Mike’s terrible jokes just last week.
“Ben,” Rick said, stepping forward. “What’s up? Is Mandy okay?”
“Mandy’s fine.” Ben’s lips moved, but the words had a rehearsed quality, like a record playing in an empty room. “I found her. Lorna. I was running by the old industrial park. Heard singing. Saw her go into the old Wharton warehouse by the river. The one with the broken red sign. I thought you should know. You’re trying to stop her, right?”
Stacy and Rick exchanged a look—a swift, silent communication honed by love and shared danger. They had never told Ben about the strike team. They’d deliberately kept him and Mandy out of the planning, wanting them as far from this as possible.
From the corner of the living room, nestled in a deep armchair with Godfrey III a white puffball on her lap, Jan’s fingers stilled in the dog’s fur. Her green eyes, usually sparkling with mischief, hardened into chips of jade. She’d been humming an old Green Moon lullaby, one about calming restless spirits. She’d heard the story of Ewan and Moira from a centenarian initiate decades ago, a cautionary tale about the scars left when love is weaponized. It had taken six months of careful, daily magic to reassemble the pieces of that fisherman’s son, to make him look at the sea without weeping. The hollow resonance in Ben’s voice now was identical. It was the sound of a soul wearing another’s will like a ill-fitting suit.
“That’s… amazing work, Ben,” Rick said, forcing earnestness into his tone. He clapped a hand on Ben’s shoulder. The muscle beneath was rigid, unyielding. “The Wharton warehouse. Broken red sign. You’re sure?”
“Yes.” Ben’s head nodded, a marionette’s jerk. “She’s there now. You should go. All of you. Quickly.”
“We will,” Stacy said, her voice all business. “We just need to grab our gear. You head back home, keep Mandy safe. We’ve got this.”
“Okay.” Ben turned without another word and walked back toward the elevator, his movements eerily precise.
Stacy closed the door. The silence in the penthouse was sudden and thick.
“Oh, kid,” Jan whispered, her hand curling protectively around Godfrey. “She’s tuned him like a damn radio.”
“He’s a thrall,” Rick said, the word tasting of ash. “Just like before, but… cleaner. He’s not just enchanted to love her. He’s a messenger.”
“A Trojan horse,” Stacy spat, striding toward the kitchen. She gestured sharply for Rick to follow. The others—Vivian, Dale, Calista, Yukio and Mai who had been checking gear in the study—drifted into the main room, sensing the shift.
In the sleek kitchen, surrounded by dormant appliance-spirits, Stacy gripped the cool metal of the counter’s edge. She leaned close to Rick, her whisper a bare, furious vibration. “She’s using him. She knows we’re planning something. So she sends us a gift-wrapped location. We walk in, we’re walking into her setup, on her terms.”
Rick’s mind raced, the baker’s precision grappling with chaos. “But we have the bait. Our bait was me in the boathouse. Her bait is her in the warehouse. She’s trying to counter our trap with one of her own.”
A grim smile touched Stacy’s lips. “So we let him think we’re walking into hers. We spring ours first. We use his information, but we don’t follow his script. We surround the warehouse, we hit her before she knows which direction the attack is coming from.”
“She’ll be expecting a frontal assault,” Rick murmured.
“So we give her a fucking panorama.”
They returned to the living room. The team had gathered, a constellation of grim faces. Jan was on her feet now, Godfrey cradled in her arms. Calista’s hands were clenched, tiny heat-shimmers rising from her knuckles. Vivian stood close to Dale, her usual timidity burned away by a focused, anxious energy.
“Change of plans,” Stacy announced, her voice cutting through the tension. “The target location is confirmed. But the confirmation came from an enemy asset. Lorna knows we’re coming. She’s prepared a welcome. So we’re not going to knock on the front door.”
Yukio gave a feral grin, tracing the edge of a blackened blade. “Flanking maneuver. Multiple points of entry. Overwhelm from all sides.”
“Exactly,” Rick said. “Jan, you and Godfrey are point. The second you sense her song, he disrupts it.”
Jan nodded, her free hand coming to rest on Godfrey’s head. The little dog’s dark eyes seemed to understand, his customary boredom replaced by a sharp alertness.
“Vivian, Dale,” Stacy continued. “The moment the song breaks, you’re in. You’re the primary strike. Suck the power right out of her.”
Vivian swallowed, a flush of crimson bleeding into the irises of her eyes. The hunger stirred, but it was a leash she held. Dale’s scarred hand found hers, a silent promise. “We’re ready,” he said, his voice like gravel.
“Calista,” Rick said, looking at his sister. “You’re containment. If she tries to bolt, you make the air too hot to move through. But wait for the signal. We need her disoriented first.”
Calista’s silver hair seemed to crackle with static. “Just give me the word.”
“The rest of us,” Stacy said, sweeping her gaze over Yukio, Mai, and the others, “are the noise. We are the distraction. We come in loud, we come in bright, we come in from every fucking angle except the one she’s looking at.”
There were no cheers, no rallying cries. Only a series of silent, determined acknowledgments. Gear was checked one final time. Jan whispered a quick, lubricious Green Moon blessing that made the air briefly smell of champagne and sweat. Brigid, who had been monitoring from her home via a floating Archimedean equation, sent a final probability matrix that flashed 92.1% success before winking out.
They filed out of the penthouse, a silent procession. They let Ben’s coordinates guide them, but they moved with a predator’s silence, splitting into pre-arranged teams two blocks from the industrial park. The night was cool, the air smelling of rust and stale water.
The Wharton warehouse was a decaying tooth against the lesser dark of the sky, the bottom half of its red sign dangling, squeaking on a single hinge. It was silent.
They converged. Jan, with Godfrey, moved to a rusted service door on the east side. Vivian and Dale ghosted to the shadow of a loading dock on the north. Calista, Rick, and Stacy took positions near the main south entrance, a gaping maw of darkness. Yukio and Mai scaled a fire escape on the west wall like silent spiders.
Stacy gave a hand signal.
All at once, the night shattered.
Yukio and Mai blew the west wall windows inward with small, concussive charges. At the same moment, Stacy kicked in the south door, a blinding tactical light mounted on her pistol spearing the gloom. Rick followed, a sonic emitter in his hand whining to life.
The interior was a cathedral of decay, empty except for pillars and piles of forgotten debris. And in the center, standing ankle-deep in a sudden, inexplicable pool of water that glistened under the invading lights, was Lorna.
She was beautiful, and terrible. Her wavy dark hair flowed as if in a current, her water-blue eyes wide not with surprise, but with furious anticipation. Her lips parted.
The song began.
It wasn’t a melody. It was a pressure, a low, sub-audible thrum that vibrated in the teeth, in the bones of the skull. It whispered of perfect release, of surrendering all thought, all worry. It promised a warm, dark embrace. Rick felt it like a physical wave, his focus wavering, the emitter in his hand feeling suddenly heavy and pointless. Stacy gritted her teeth, muscles corded in her neck as she fought the compulsion to lower her weapon.
Then, a sharp, piercing yap.
It was a small sound, absurdly small, but it cut through the thrum like a diamond through glass. Godfrey III, held firmly in Jan’s arms, had barked. His magical immunity wasn’t a shield; it was a null zone. The song hit him and simply ceased to exist, creating a sonic dead spot that rippled outward, disrupting the careful frequency.
Lorna’s song faltered, warped into a discordant note of shock.
“Now!” Jan yelled.
Vivian moved.
She was a streak of red leather and pale skin, crossing the open space faster than should have been possible. The timid girl was gone, replaced by the succubus in full feed. Her eyes were pools of scarlet hunger. Lorna, momentarily stunned, turned to face this new threat, a hiss forming on her lips.
She never got it out.
Dale was there, his movements a testament to his Consortium training—economical, brutal, effective. He didn’t try to punch her. He grabbed her arms from behind, locking them in a vise-like grip, pinning them to her sides.
Vivian closed the final distance. She didn’t kiss Lorna’s mouth. She pressed her lips to the siren’s throat, right over the fluttering pulse. There was nothing sensual about it. It was a violent, intimate puncture. Vivian’s jaw unhinged slightly, not physically, but magically, and she drank.
It wasn’t blood. It was power. Raw, hydromantic energy, tinged with stolen emotions and the cold essence of the deep. Vivian siphoned it, a greedy, desperate pull. Lorna screamed, a raw, watery sound that contained no song, only agony and rage. She thrashed in Dale’s hold, but he held firm, his own face a mask of concentration, his love for Vivian a solid wall against the psychic backlash.
“Calista!” Stacy shouted.
The half-elf didn’t need the prompt. Her hands thrust forward. A torrent of flame, not a wild inferno but a focused, white-hot whip, lashed out. It didn’t strike Lorna. It struck the ground in a circle around her, the water in her makeshift pool erupting into scalding steam with a deafening hiss. The superheated air shimmered, creating a blistering containment field.
The trap had snapped shut.
Lorna was pinned, being drained, surrounded by a wall of heat. Her screams died into choked gurgles. Her glamour flickered, revealing glimpses of something older, smoother, with slit pupils and sharp teeth. She was weakening.
Rick watched, his heart hammering against his ribs. It was working. They were winning.
Then Lorna’s head, straining against Vivian’s feeding kiss, turned. Her desperate, hate-filled eyes locked not on Rick, but on Stacy. And through the steam and the chaos, her voice, stripped of its music and reduced to a cracked, venomous whisper, slithered out.
“You think… this is a victory? You have no idea… what you’ve awakened. He’s already… tainted. My song… is in the soil now.”
Her body went suddenly limp in Dale’s arms, a marionette with cut strings. Vivian broke contact with a gasp, staggering back, her lips slick with iridescent energy. The circle of flames died. The pool was gone, leaving only scorched concrete.
Lorna Dunlevy lay unconscious, her beauty seeming fragile, pathetic. But her final words hung in the acrid air, thicker and more foul than the smoke.
He’s already tainted.
Stacy’s gaze shot to Rick. His face was pale. He looked down at his own hands as if seeing them for the first time. The battle was over. The siren was caught.
So why did the silence feel so much more dangerous than her song had ever been?
It was broken by the scuff of a boot on concrete. Jan walked over to Lorna’s prone form, Godfrey tucked under her arm like a furry football. She gave the unconscious siren a solid, disdainful kick in the ribs with the side of her sneaker. The body jolted limply.
No one objected. No one even flinched.
“Stupid plan,” Jan sneered, looking down at Lorna’s perfect, slack face. “Send a thrall to lead us into a warehouse? Real subtle. You must not have been thinking too straight since Stacy broke your nose.”
“She can’t hear you, Jan,” Stacy said, holstering her weapon, but her eyes remained fixed on Rick’s pale face.
“I know,” Jan shrugged. “Still feels good.”
The main warehouse doors creaked open again, framing new silhouettes against the night. Brigid O’Connor strode in, her physician’s eyes scanning the scene with clinical speed. Jenny and Amanda trailed behind, Jenny looking awed, Amanda protective.
“I heard the final threat through the comms link,” Brigid said, kneeling beside Lorna without touching her. Her fingers traced glowing diagnostic equations in the air above the siren’s body. “He’s already tainted. My song is in the soil now. Poetic. And medically concerning.” She looked up, her green eyes sharp. “I’ve been running models for a curative counter-agent since Calista carried the comatose Kim into Rebecca and Charley’s house. A targeted psychic antiseptic. I think I’m close.”
“Close isn’t a cure,” Rick said, his voice hollow. The words in the soil echoed. He thought of his baking, his hands in flour, in earth.
“It’s closer than anyone else has gotten,” Brigid stated, standing and brushing dust from her trousers. “We need to get her to a secured medical facility. My lab at Archimedes can hold her.”
Dale, who was supporting a visibly sated but shaky Vivian, let out a rough breath. “So what’s the play here? What do we actually do with her? Give her to the Golden Wands? Hand her over to the Archimedes Society officially? She’s a fucking bio-weapon.”
“Mara will have ideas there,” Jan said, pulling out her phone. “Legal, containment, all that boring shit she’s weirdly good at. But first, we need to make sure Sleeping Beauty here doesn’t wake up mid-transport and start auditioning for the choir.” She thumbed a contact. “I’m calling Bethany. A Golden Wand’s restraint protocols are annoying as hell, but they’re thorough. She can slap so many magical suppressors on her she’ll hum like a transformer.”
While Jan spoke into her phone, barking a quick summary at Bethany, the others gathered around Lorna. She seemed smaller now, deflated.
Across the city, in Mandy’s clutter-filled bedroom at the Williamson house, Benedict Bryant jerked awake with a gasp that was halfway to a sob.
He was on Mandy’s bed, propped against pillows. Four faces swam into view: Beth’s concerned blonde bob, Kim’s elegant intensity, Maryam’s playful smirk under her baseball cap, and Mandy’s own worried brown eyes. The familiar chaos of Mandy’s room—covered in tech parts, art prints, and discarded clothes—was a comforting anchor.
“Woah, easy, tiger,” Mandy said, putting a hand on his chest. “You’re back. You’re home.”
Ben groaned, his hand going to his head. “I… I went for a run. Then there was… a song. And then nothing. Just… instructions.”
“Yeah, we know,” Maryam grinned. “You got siren’d. Again. You’re gonna get a reputation.”
“Beth, can you and Kim go grab some snacks from the kitchen?” Mandy asked, her tone a little too bright. “I think we all need some sugar after… whatever that was.”
Mandy looked at Beth, then at Kim. A silent understanding passed between them. Kim gave a slight nod. “Sure thing. Come on, Beth. Let’s see if your dad bought those terrible chili-lime chips again.”
Once the door clicked shut, leaving Ben alone with Maryam and a suddenly sly-looking Beth, the atmosphere shifted.
Mandy walked over and sat on the edge of the bed. She tsk-tsked, clicking her tongue. “Falling under a siren’s spell again, Ben. Tsk tsk. Whatever will we tell your sister Portia?”
Maryam plopped down on his other side, her shoulder nudging his. “Yeah, she’s gonna be pissed. ‘I manipulate time to save the world, and my little brother can’t even keep his brain to himself.’ Embarrassing.”
Ben flushed, the confusion clearing into acute humiliation. “I didn’t mean to. It just… gets in.”
“We know,” Mandy said, her voice dropping, losing its teasing edge. She traced a finger down his chest. “But you did. And according to your little therapy session revelation, you seemed to want to fuck Maryam more than me when you were all messed up.”
Maryam laughed, a low, warm sound. She leaned in, her breath hot against Ben’s ear. “He’s got a great cock, Mandy. Can’t really blame him for wanting to share it.”
Ben’s breath hitched as Mandy’s hands went to the hem of her own t-shirt. She pulled it slowly over her head, revealing her small breasts, her nipples already hardening in the cool room air. Maryam mirrored her, shrugging out of her tank top with an athletic ease. They were a study in contrasts: Mandy all clever eyes and sly smiles, Maryam all confident, tomboyish grace.
“So,” Mandy whispered, unbuttoning Ben’s jeans. “Since I’m your girlfriend, but you have this… expanded appetite, we think you need grounding again. With both of us.”
“Proper grounding,” Maryam affirmed, her fingers joining Mandy’s to push his jeans and boxers down his hips. His cock, thick and already stirring under their attention, sprung free.
They didn’t rush. They made a game of it. Mandy kissed Ben deeply, her tongue tangling with his, while Maryam’s hand wrapped around his shaft, pumping him slowly to full, throbbing hardness. Then Maryam turned her head and captured Mandy’s mouth in a searing kiss over Ben’s chest, their breasts pressing together. Ben watched, mesmerized, as they played, as Maryam’s fingers slid between Mandy’s legs, making Mandy moan into the kiss.
“My turn,” Mandy gasped, breaking away. She pushed Ben back onto the pillows and straddled his hips. She guided him into her with a slow, slick slide, her cunt hugging him tightly, deliciously wet. “Oh yeah,” she sighed, riding him with a growing rhythm. “You feel that? This is home. This is real.”
Maryam watched, biting her lip, then bent to take one of Ben’s nipples in her mouth, sucking and biting. Her hand snaked between her own legs, rubbing circles as she watched Mandy fuck their boyfriend. The room filled with the wet sound of penetration, Mandy’s sharp breaths, the creak of the bed.
“Okay, switch,” Maryam panted after a few minutes. Mandy climbed off, her thighs slick, and Maryam took her place. She sank onto him with a guttural groan, taking him even deeper, her body a tight, willing sheath. She rode him harder, faster, her breasts bouncing, her head thrown back. “Fuck, yes, that’s the spot, right there, you fucking fill me up…”
Mandy kneeled beside Ben’s head, lowering her dripping pussy to his mouth. “Taste her on me,” she commanded, and he obeyed, licking and sucking her folds as Maryam slammed down on him. The dual sensations, the taste, the tight heat, the building pressure in his balls, were overwhelming. He was lost in a whirlwind of them, their scents, their sounds, their shared possession.
It was building to something frantic, something great. Ben’s hips began to piston upward to meet Maryam’s thrusts. Mandy’s fingers were tangled in his hair, her moans rising in pitch. Maryam’s chanting of “yes, yes, yes” became a broken mantra.
The bedroom door burst open.
Mona Kapowski stood in the doorway, a thick bundle of smoking sage in one hand, her eyes wide behind her glasses. She wafted the smoke vigorously into the room. “I’m cleansing the house of the siren’s residual vibrations! The crystals in the living room were practically screaming!”
From the hallway, Beth’s frantic voice called out, “Grandma, don’t go in there!”
It was too late.
Mona’s gaze swept over the tangled, naked, sweating triad on the bed. There was a long, silent pause filled only with the sound of crackling sage and ragged breathing.
“Oh,” Mona said, blinking. “Green Moon grounding techniques. How… practical.”
She gave a firm, approving nod, turned on her heel, and closed the door softly behind her. The smell of burning sage lingered, mixing with the scent of sex.