Chapter Text
The second time a demon climbs in through Lydia's window she awakes with a horrified gasp. Far too many of her recent nightmares have begun with the scrape of claws against her windowsill for the sound to merit anything less.
The demon gives her a condescending look and folds its arms. "And here I was thinking you might have been expecting me."
Several things become apparent to Lydia in quick succession: it's already inside, it's been inside long enough to light a candle, and until it moved, it had one hand resting on the edge of the window, which means it had made that noise deliberately.
Lydia forces her hands to release their death-grip on the edge of the bedclothes and tries, with limited success, to keep her voice from betraying how scared and small she feels in that moment. "What do you mean?"
"Playing innocent," says the demon, sauntering its way towards the bed. "Well, by all accounts, it's worked for you so far. But I think you and I both know that servant boy of yours didn't really poison the last demon to visit you in this room. Question is," the demon's voice falls low with insinuation, "how much else do you know?"
The thought occurs to Lydia that she may be dreaming, that she's to be interrogated by some imbalance of the humours, a spectre of her own subconscious. The very idea is ludicrous – every bit as ludicrous as the idea that Stiles' demon has come to disturb her rest. She grasps that thought and holds it: it will take more than the product of her own imagination – more than a servant's mistake – to cow Lydia Martin. If it wants to talk, then talk they shall.
She looks the demon up and down, and narrows her eyes. "Is this your way of telling me you're the demon Stiles summoned to take care of the one he didn't? Not what one would call a tidy solution, but I suppose there's no accounting for taste."
The demon grins. "You don't think it's going to be that easy, do you?"
That easy to get answers from a demon? No, but one has to start somewhere. Lydia gives a dismissive shrug. "I think it could be as easy as one scream for help. I hear tell you've already met some of our hunters. They are really quite efficient."
"Miss Martin," says the demon, "I can place every living heartbeat in this tower. Don't imagine I don't know exactly how long it would take for them to come to your aid." Barely a pace remains between the demon and the end of her bed. One step closer, even an outstretched arm, and it could... but it stops there, and keeps speaking. "But I didn't come here just to exchange threats. Quite the opposite, in fact."
She can't let her nerves show; one glance the wrong way could be all it takes to give herself away. They can read a human being the way a sailor reads the sky. Lydia resettles herself with some deliberation, denying the creature her full attention as she reaches for the candlestick holder that sits on the table beside her bed. "Well, you obviously didn't come here to explain yourself, and if you're here to seduce me, I can't say your technique has impressed so far..."
A vase on the table tips as Lydia brushes past it with her hand, falling to its side to empty a stream of fine, black dust onto the floor below. The demon freezes as it recognises the ash – as its keen night-vision is at last drawn to the thin line of black dust already surrounding it from all sides. The complete ring stretches all the way from the window to run beneath Lydia's bed, a circle now closed.
Lydia cannot entirely keep herself from flinching when the demon pounces for the bed, meaning to grab her feet before she can pull them to safety over the far side of the line. Instead, it comes up short against an invisible wall that holds it beyond the end of her bed.
The look of disbelief that rushes across the demon's face is a giddying shiver of triumph in Lydia's chest, her heartbeat pounding in her ears. But now is not the time for childish displays of glee; she composes herself before speaking. "Mountain ash, two circles, a... I'm sorry, I don't think you introduced yourself, did you?"
The demon gives her a steely-eyed glare.
"Suit yourself. As I was saying, two circles – overlapping, but separately closed and demarcated. One around my bed to keep you out. And now another around the room to keep you in."
Lydia doesn't miss the flicker of the demon's eyes back to the floor, only now picking out the faint line of the second circle – or first, rather – traced to secure the perimeter of her bed from long before it ever set food in her room. "Oh please," she tells it, "you didn't think I'd let a second intruder invite himself in the same way as the first, did you? I don't think the hunters will have any great trouble making it here before you can make your escape now."
The demon's lips curve into a smile. If there's one thing you can say for its kind, they do share a keen appreciation for trickery – theirs or anyone else's. "Impressively done. Perhaps some of the awe he holds you in isn't so misplaced after all." This last comes out as an aside, and Lydia is still putting together the fact that 'he' can only refer to Stiles when the demon lifts its chin and adds, "Call me Derek. I think you've earned that much."
Lydia raises an eyebrow and ponders how much of that she ought to take as a compliment. "It will take more than flattery to get you out of there."
"Oh, I'm sure," the demon agrees. "But here's the thing: I have a feeling you don't really want the hunters finding you with another demon in your room. I don't think they'll take as kindly to knowing you've kept your servant's blunder from them as I will."
It's guessing, Lydia decides. But now the tables have turned, she can afford to take a risk or two. "Perhaps. So make me a better offer."
"I was going to offer you protection – my solemn word you'll come to no harm by my hand. But since it seems that might not offer much incentive..." Lydia knows it won't offer her safety now, even if she asks for it. "Keep my secret," it pronounces, "and I'll tell you no lies."
Lydia considers the wording of the geas with some cynicism. If she accepts, she's agreed to let it go: she can hardly hide a demon in her room forever, while 'I'll tell you no lies' is a choice of phrase almost without subtlety in how little truth it actually guarantees. She does have considerable scope to negotiate, though bargaining with a demon carries risks of its own. Even so, the opportunity to match wits with one, having won a first round already...
Perhaps this incubus isn't so poor at seduction as she'd supposed.
"Consider me intrigued," she tells it. "Alright. I accept. You will, I hope, have the goodness to wait and answer a question or two before I let you out of the circle?" She knows it won't give her the answers she wants easily, but as long as it remains within the circle, she has leverage, however slight. And an offer of the truth is no mere token – whatever it tells her now, it cannot dare to contradict later.
The demon grins at her, pleased. "By all means, ask away."
"Alright then..." Lydia considers her options. "Your purpose in visiting me tonight?"
Without hesitating, and not without a certain satisfaction, the demon replies, "My purpose was to assure your silence. Did you imagine more?"
There's a measure of logic to that – she's knows she's not the first this demon has bound to silence, but until tonight, there was little for her to betray. "You thought I might let slip your... association with Stiles."
"You've covered for him in the past," says the demon. "And I'm sure you'd do so again, but circumstances change, and loyalties... evolve. Make no mistake, to keep my secret is to keep his."
Interesting. "And the nature of your arrangement with Stiles?"
"Is between he and I, and no-one's business but mine," the demon snaps, with a vehemence that makes Lydia blink.
Until now, she'd assumed it must be some other force that kept this demon lingering here. Whatever Stiles had gotten himself into, the most obvious conclusion casts him as little more than a misfortunate pawn with the bad luck to have seen more than was healthy. But the demon's answer makes little sense if Stiles' part goes no deeper. Granted, she has no great reason to trust it, but the jealousy with which it speaks of her servant... whatever deal this incubus had made with him might truly be the only force keeping it here.
She switches tack. "Our hunters lately came to me with news of your 'latest victim'. A peasant woman said to have lived on the edge of Beacon Fell. Were they correct?"
The demon's answer this time is flat and pointed. "No. I never saw nor laid a hand upon that woman. I have no more idea than you how she came to die."
It would be hard to say what answer Lydia had expected this time – not 'yes', perhaps, but some level of deflection at best. 'No' is far more than she'd hoped for. Stranger still, its reply came too fast to be unprepared – the demon knew the hunters had placed this death upon its head before it ever set foot in her room tonight. Lydia can think of only a few ways that might have come about, none without meaning, but the possibility that Stiles is the answer there too looms large.
Still, the demon cannot lie to her, and with those words some small weight has been lifted from her shoulders. Masking the reaction and remembering what she ought to be asking next takes some concentration. "But you did kill the incubus we found dead in the snow?"
"I did."
"At Stiles' behest?" Here the demon's cooperation comes abruptly to an end. "Is that what you want to hear? Would it be easier for you if he'd saved your life that night? Everything you've done to keep his secret – everything you'll do from this night on – would be so much simpler if you owe him. The boy who'd have everyone believe he put himself in your place, as if that alone would turn the beast away."
It's a strange answer, targeted to hurt. If the answer is 'yes', then mocking her on this one point of all her questions is odd behaviour. But if the answer is no, then Lydia's debt is to this demon alone – why conceal a fact that speaks to his own advantage?
Somehow, it comes back to Stiles. Perhaps she'd rather not know why. She fixes the creature with a glare. "Was that really necessary?"
The demon shrugs, unmoved.
Lydia rolls her eyes, then rolls out of bed, and kneels to break the second circle of mountain ash. (Her feet touch down within both circles. There's no need to take chances.) "Well, I think we're about done here. One last question before you go..." She straightens back to her feet. The demon is waiting with eyebrows raised. "Should I expect to see you again?"
"Expect?" says the demon. "No. But I wouldn't expect not to either." That much said it turns to go, crossing back to the window without further farewell.
The demon has its hands upon the windowsill when one final curiosity occurs to Lydia. Fortunately for her, she's not bound by any oath to keep promises made by implication. "Derek," she calls after him.
Surprised by the sound of his own name, the demon hesitates at the window and looks back over a shoulder.
"Did Stiles ever really believe that old fable about incubi and boys?" Lydia asks.
Derek's grin reflects yellow-white in the candlelight. "Unfortunately for Stiles, I can't tell you otherwise."
Lydia continues staring dumbly out the window long after he's disappeared, then laughs silently into her blankets until her eyes begin to water, until the fear, the relief and the absurdity of it all have become so mixed up in her mind she can no longer tell them apart. So this is what her household has come to. Whatever would her mother have thought?