The Fever and the Fury

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Instead, she quickly faded from view.

Still, the sight had kicked his already roaring sex drive into a higher gear. The shopgirl was stroking him, thumb smearing the tip of his cock with the sticky evidence of his arousal. And from his oversexed haze, Luke became dimly aware that the fury was right behind him. He should have braced himself for whatever mayhem she was about to cause, but he was in such a state that the warmth of her lips near the back of his ear made his already swollen shaft jump with pleasure. The idea of being tangled up with these two women seared through his brain, burning away any trace of good sense.

Of course, the fury wasn’t a woman—not exactly—and she was dangerous as hell. Ignore her, Luke thought.

The shopgirl mistook his hesitation and pouted. “Don’t tease me.”

No, there would be no teasing. At least not the first time, when it would be all he could do not to embarrass himself. It was going to feel so good to lose himself inside her. All Luke had to do was guide himself into those pink glistening folds, but just as he made ready, the fury whispered, “Do you think she knows that you’re a virgin? At least in this body…”

Shut up! It wasn’t until the shopgirl shrank back that Luke realized he’d said it out loud. Cursing himself, he hastened to explain. “No, no, I didn’t mean you—I just mean, less talking, more making out.”

He captured the girl’s lips and kissed her hard.

The fury’s voice behind him was a throaty purr. “I guess whatever STD you catch from her will burn up the next time you’re reborn from the flames so you don’t have to worry about venereal disease.”

Ignore her. Ignore her. Ignore her, damn it!

The fury was relentless. “Do you think you’ll have enough cash to pay her afterward? She doesn’t look like the kind of girl who takes a credit card for services rendered—“

“Hey!” Luke said, twisting his head around to glare at the fury for insulting his would-be lover. Unfortunately, the girl didn’t appreciate Luke’s sense of chivalry. Her eyes flew wide as if she were in the clutches of a maniac and both her hands went up to cover her breasts. She pulled away as if she thought he were some schizophrenic rapist who might take her to bed and then cook her up in a stew.

“Wait,” he said, quaking with sexual frustration. He needed this!

“You should go,” the girl said, grabbing her clothes with a look of terror.

Luke was having trouble adapting to rapidly changing conditions on the ground. He tried for flattery. “Listen, beautiful, I’m just a little tense. Just let me—“

“Go away now or I call police!”

Okay, so, quite the impression he’d made here. “I’m going,” Luke said, holding up one hand in surrender, fastening his pants with the other. “At least let me pay for the book.”

“Just take it,” the shopgirl cried. “Take book and get out!”

With chalk in one hand and a crystal in the other, Luke slammed open the book of arcana and began copying the symbols on the wooden floor.

“It’s not going to work,” the fury said, standing in the center of his chalk drawings, her arms folded, feigning a little yawn.

“Cute,” he snarled. “If this doesn’t get rid of you, I’ll keep trying until I find something that does, because that was the last fucking straw!”

“Oh, come on,” she said, calmly stepping over the chalk lines that should have imprisoned her. “The last straw is an aborted booty call?”

So, symbols weren’t going to trap her.

“Time for Plan B,” Luke said, dusting chalk from his hands. He rifled through his supplies and found a canister of salt. But as he poured a white grainy line in front of her, she contemptuously ground the salt into the floor with the heel of her boot.

“Someone has been watching too much television,” she said.

There’d never been time for television. Granddad had always told him that the so-called boob tube would rot his brain. So he spent all his time working, studying or training for battle. He just hadn’t expected to be at war with a supernatural creature.

Plan C involved a vial of holy water and an incantation. As Luke began to recite it, the fury rolled her eyes. “Your Latin is a little rusty.”

“Yeah?” Luke sneered. “Go to hell.”

“Hades is where I’d go. If I could die. Which I can’t.”

Of course not. That’d be too easy. Luke pulled the cork on the vial with his teeth, then splashed her with it. The holy water hit her right in the face, stopping her in her tracks and, to Luke’s immense satisfaction, wiping that smug smile right off her mouth. Blinking droplets out of her eyes, she cried out and her hands went to her cheeks.

“It burns!” she screamed. “It burns! Get it off!”

The horrible sounds she made stabbed him with guilt. Damn it, he didn’t want her to suffer. He just wanted her gone. Before he thought better of it, Luke was reaching to get her a towel, but not before she fell to the floor, convulsing with laughter.

“Oh, I’m melting!” she howled at his expense.

“You’re a bitch,” he said, gritting his teeth.

“I’m a fury. Not a bitch, not a witch. And my kind came into existence long before angels or demons. But you are a sinner.” Luke had always associated the idea of sin with the god he’d been raised to worship, and she saw his surprise. “Oh yes, the ancient Greeks understood sin. We called it by many different things, such as hubris or hamartia, but given the way you butcher Latin, let’s stick with English. You’re a sinner, Luke. And there’s only two ways this can end between us. Either you atone or I drive you to madness.”