Evania's eyes opened to both darkness and warmth. It had been about a week or so since she and Sylvia spoke about being mates, and so far things had been going well.
Sylvia tried coming home at reasonable times, and even brought her vanilla sweets as silent apologies.
It was kind of charming.
But today was different.
Evania glanced over at the TV finding it still on. There was a half eaten cake sitting on the coffee table, and Sylvia was laying on top of Evania with her arms wrapped around the girl's waist.
The vampire had to do a double take when she realized that she was sleeping with the succubus.
But when she realized it was actually happening, panic rose in her chest. Her once natural breathing pattern was now completely halted as she stared wide eyed at the woman laying on top of her.
Sylvia was easily able to sense Evania's panic through her nature. And quickly woke. "W-what is it? What's wrong?" She questioned, leaning back and rubbing her eyes.
Evania made no attempt at an answer, and instead stared at the succubus.
"Eva?" Syl questioned, moving her hands from her face and looking down at her. "I'm sorry I must have moved in my sleep." She simply said, not wanting to move to quickly. "I'm going to get off you now, alright?"
Evania answered with a slow nod and Sylvia picked herself up off the girl and stood up. "Sorry Eva. I didn't mean to scare you like that. I must have moved towards your mana in my sleep." She stretched with a grin. "I feel energized though."
Evania continued to stare at the succubus before standing up herself and trying to avoid the taller girl's eyes.
"I've never seen a TV before this dorm." Sylvia noted, changing the subject effortlessly. "We didn't have them at the Tower. Some people did, but I didn't. They talked about it but I never got to see one. They're really cool with their moving pictures and stuff."
Evania couldn't tell if the succubus was lying to her, so she glanced over her shoulder to study her expression. But the succubus just stared at the TV in deep thought.
"Not to mention cake. It's so much better here than in Exodious. There's so much more that they can do with flavors and icing that it just puts the bakers at the Tower to shame. And they have magic."
Evania tried to fight back the smile that crossed her lips but couldn't.
"My little sister always had panic attacks." Sylvia explained. "She always felt like she wasn't good enough, or that she was a monster. That friend I told you about, the deaf one? That's my sister."
Evania watched the succubi's sad expression as she remembered.
"She's not dead or anything. She's stronger than she's ever been now. But it took a lot of work to get her there."
"What's her name?" Evania asked.
"Mani." Sylvia answered. "And her twin's name is Sol. But Mani was always a pain in the ass. The three of us excelled at magic, and I loved helping people. It made sense for me to become a Keeper. They followed in my footsteps."
"Mani and Sol are identical twins. Human world science explains it better when they say they started as one embryo, that split in two. Except for them, they didn't want to split. So Sol doesn't have instincts, and Mani has all of them. She can't change into a full human form and always has scales on her back and shoulders. To make matters worse, she was born deaf."
"Does Sol have any problems?"
"Sol is a lot less physically strong than Mani is, and has trouble taking her true form, but otherwise she's super healthy... you know, for being Hybrids."
"You're a hybrid?"
"Nope. My dad was a human."
"Doesn't that make you half human?"
Sylvia chuckled. "No. Thankfully. Succubi use humans to breed with if they can't find an Incubus. I'm a pure Succubus, I can even show off my true form."
"Did you know your dad?"
"Not for long. He was human so he died pretty quickly." Sylvia shrugged. "He taught me to be kind, and I carried it with me. It was one of the reasons why mom liked him so much. He didn't summon her for sex. He summoned her for someone to talk to."
"Isn't that like buying a hooker only to vent to them?"
"Pretty much. Except mom actually thought it was endearing."
"What about Mani and Sol's dad?"
"Vampire. He's pretty awesome. He taught Mani everything she needed to know about being a vampire. Even taught her to use telepathy to nullify her deafness. If her brain is in someone else's head, she can hear like they do."
"Do you wish you were half vampire?"
"Nope. I'm happy where I am."
"Did Mani have panic attacks a lot?"
"All the time when she was a kid. I'm a couple hundred years older than them, so I was looking like this when they were still in diapers." She smiled. "But she was always self conscious of how she could never look human. She always had scales and couldn't hear right. She thought she was broken. She would wake me up in the middle of the night because she didn't want mom and dad to know that she hated herself."
"What changed?"
"A boy." Sylvia smiled. "A human boy. One who taught her about magic and love. He was a human who lived for a hundred or so years before Merlin's curse overtook him."
"I'm so sorry."
"Don't be. He reincarnated." Sylvia laughed. "And this time she made them immortal, so she can't loose her again."
"Her?"
"He reincarnated as a she." Sylvia grinned. "That's usually how reincarnation cycles go. Next time she'll be a dude again."
"Does she remember Mani?"
"No. But they're mates, so they fell in love all over again." Sylvia smiled. "From what I gather, Zali is the reincarnation of Lady Isirona's past mate too. But she's a ancient succubus so she can still control if and when she has a tail."
"You can't?"
"I have to take my true form for my tail to appear. Once I bed my mate my tail becomes permanent."
"Why are you telling me these things?"
"You were about to have a panic attack." Sylvia stated. "I wanted to help." She looked back over at the TV and it switched off.
"Why do you care?"
"Because I'm not the monster who hurt you."
Evania winced at the woman's words, realizing she was probably treating her like she was a monster.
"I'm sorry. I'm just nervous."
"You have every right to be." Sylvia nodded. "But you can start to relax a bit more."
"You say it like its easy."
"It can be. It depends on the circumstances. I know how I plan on treating you. You don't, so your worried. I don't know what happened in your past, and you don't know about mine, so we both don't really trust each other. We're gonna have to work on it slowly."
"Okay."
"Plus, I'm sorry in advance if I snuggle into you when we're sleeping. I really don't mean to but its a habit. I'll get off right away, and I shouldn't feel you up."
"Okay." Evania repeated. "Thank you for helping me."
"No problem. Panic attacks are my speciality. Did you always have them?"
Evania shook her head. She still wasn't sure what a panic attack felt like. She didn't know that was what was about to happen.
"If you're ever in any pain, I'll know." Sylvia smiled, getting Evania to raise an eyebrow at her. "I can sense your emotions. I can also kinda feel what you feel from taking your mana. It's a succubus thing. Sorry if it makes you feel uncomfortable, there's nothing I can do about it."
Evania took a deep breath. "It's okay. You can't help it."
"No. I really can't." Sylvia smiled softly. "I'm glad you understand. Do you want to head to bed then?"
Evania nodded and moved past the succubus and towards her room. She glanced over her shoulder at the smiling woman before nodding and smiling softly herself before closing the door behind her.
She basically collapsed on the bed, pulling the covers up and not even bothering to change. She pulled a pillow against herself and stared off into the darkness of her room.
Why was she so terrified of the succubus touching her? Why did it really matter? Sylvia was her mate, so she'd never hurt her. Right? So why was she scared?
She was scared because of him. Because of all the suffering that he had put her through, she was terrified to feel that pain again. She didn't want to hurt anymore, and she would do anything in her power to never go through it again.
Pain surged through her chest like someone had slammed a dagger into her heart and twisted the blade. Any attempt at breathing was cut short instantly as she pulled her knees up to her chest in a silent scream. She grabbed at her chest with her hands like she was trying to find the wound, but she could find nothing.
Light flooded into her view before she felt weight on her bed. Someone grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her into an embrace. She tried to push away but could do nothing other than grip the person's sleeve and lightly claw at their arms.
"Did I ever tell you how much I like cake?" Came Sylvia's voice from above her. Evania's face dripped with tears, and she made no attempt at an answer.
"I love cake. Especially chocolate cake. It's my one weakness. Anything chocolate is my weakness, but chocolate cake will get me killed. There's a baker at the tower who actually uses vanilla in it to give it an extra kick, along with a strawberry icing and chocolate chips. It's amazing. I'll definitely get you some next time I visit my sisters."
The tension began to ease, but Evania still couldn't move.
How was she doing this? How was she pushing away the memories of pain? How could she take the hurt away so easily?
"Red velvet cake is pretty good to. Why do they call it velvet? It's red, not velvet, and it doesn't taste like velvet. It tastes like cake. It doesn't look like velvet either, so what's up with that?" Sylvia continued, not even missing a beat or waiting for an answer. "And if ice cream cake has ice cream inside and cake on the outside, doesn't that make it a pie?"
What the hell are you talking about? Why are you talking about cake right now? Evania thought.
"Pies are good too of course. My favorite would have to be apple pie. It's the absolute best. I'll probably make you some with my mom's recipe for it. You'll love it too."
Evania leaned back and looked up at the succubus curiously, tears still dripping down her face. Sylvia was smiling softly even as she put both her hands on Evania's cheeks, so very gently, and used her thumbs to wipe away the vampire's tears.
"Do you want some pie now? I have some left overs that my mom sent me."
"How?" Evania mouthed.
"I already told you. My sister had panic attacks all the time. The easiest way to stop them is to give yourself something else to think about."
Evania released Sylvia's shirt and leaned back a bit more so she had room to sign. "How can you do that when you're so focused on the pain?"
"Easy." Sylvia grinned. "If you're having a panic attack, just look straight ahead of yourself, and find the first thing you see. Do that now." Sylvia pointed towards Evania's desk.
Evania turned her head and looked across her desk, but Sylvia interrupted her quickly.
"You're thinking about it too much. You don't pick something. You just grab the first thing you see." Sylvia explained. "In my case it's the blue book on the corner." She pointed once again. "It's blue, but it's not super dark blue. It's a very light shade of blue, one that looks very close to a warm summer sky color. There's probably five hundred or so pages, and I wonder what the book could be about. Maybe it's a romance story, or a tale of adventure. I wonder how often you read it, or how many times you've read it, and what secrets it might hold. Now you. What's the first thing you see?"
"The lamp."
"Just as yourself stupid questions. What color is it? How bright is it? How much life is left in the bulb? How often do you turn it on? Why do you even need a lamp when you can see in the dark? What kind of work do you do while it's on?"
Evania stared at the lamp as she mentally answered all those questions before looking back up at Sylvia in almost shock. Her pain was barely a memory, and her breathing had returned to normal. Tears no longer slipped off her face, and she was completely fine, like it never happened.
"Thank you."