Inkubus
“Sure you don’t want me to park?”
Harper hated the way Evie was looking at her. With pity.
She’d been determined to salvage the weekend, but so far, she wasn’t on the right track. She grumbled. Gripped the steering wheel. “It’s a tight spot,” she acknowledged, “but I’ve got it.”
Evie nodded from the passenger seat, eyes wide like she was kind of afraid of her best friend.
After a couple of deep breaths, Harper re-aligned her car against the one in front of the spot, then managed to parallel park with only a couple of small adjustments. “See?” she said, though it almost came out as a snap. “Easy. Let’s go.”
Retail therapy. That was what she needed. It always helped. Whenever she had a bad day, she treated herself. A new blouse, shoes, even a purse if things were particularly bad, like the time she got rear ended. Today might be another new purse day, actually. Like a Coach purse day. It felt that shitty.
She checked her phone screen out of habit. “Stop it,” Evie said. “It’s not going to do you any good.”
“I’m not expecting—” She stopped herself, shaking her head. She didn’t even want to say his name.
She’d thought today would be her first full day as an engaged woman, not her first full day single in three years.
Fuck.
They’d gone to a different town, twenty miles out of the way, because Harper was nervous they’d run into her ex if they went to their usual haunts. But this downtown was smaller, and more crowded on a Saturday. They’d had to park a couple of blocks from the main strip, clip-clopping in their heeled shoes up a hilly street.
“You’re better off,” Evie said. “Seriously, I never liked him.”
“I don’t want to talk about him,” Harper said. And the truth was, it stung to hear that, after all the years she’d spent with him. But maybe Evie was just trying to make her feel better. She’d invited Evie to come out with her today without even thinking about it, since they did pretty much everything together. But now she wondered if it had been a bad idea. She turned away from Evie’s gaze, towards the shop they were walking by.
She stopped in her tracks, almost tripped in her shoes at what she saw in the window. “What the fuck?”
Evie stopped behind her. “What’s up?”
Harper could have sworn she saw her ex in the window of the bookshop. Tall, dark-haired, wearing a button-down shirt and slacks. A second later, he went behind a bookshelf and disappeared.
“What’s he doing there?” she said out loud.
“No shit, is he in there?”
Harper didn’t answer, didn’t even think of an answer, before she pulled open the door and went inside.
An old man, the picture of doddering grandfatherliness, stood at the counter. “Hello ladies—”
Harper ignored him and went to check the shelf she’d seen her ex disappear behind while Evie tried to make awkward small talk with the proprietor. “Sorry,” Harper heard her stage whisper. “She’s having a bad day.”
He wasn’t anywhere. There hadn’t been enough time for him to disappear completely.
Great. So now she wasn’t just single; she was also going crazy.
“Was there a guy in here?” she asked the old man. “Just now.”
“In this room?” He shook his head. “No one in here but me, until you two came in. We have a few folks scattered in some of the other rooms.”
“Other rooms?” Evie asked. “How big is this place?”
He chuckled. “Guess you ladies didn’t find us on Instagram, huh? We went viral there recently. We’re built out of the basements of a couple of different old businesses, including a bank. More books than I can inventory too.” He absently scratched the head of a black cat that was curled up on the counter.
“Woah,” said Evie.
Harper looked around. Even this one room had hundreds of books lining the shelves. She wasn’t much of a reader, so she would never have thought to come in here, even if she had seen the Instagram post. She’d never realized how comforting the smell of books was, how well their pages absorbed sound and created a sense of calm that seemed to melt away all the tension she’d had before she walked in.
“All the new ones are in here,” the man explained. “The rest of the rooms are all our used books, arranged as well as I can. We have so many it can get a little unruly sometimes. I’ve got rooms with children’s books, fantasy and sci-fi, cookbooks…”
“Great.” Evie gave her patented fake smile that only a few people knew was fake, including Harper. “Well, I think we gotta get going, so—”
“No,” Harper said. “This is it. Retail therapy.” A new Coach purse was suddenly the furthest thing from her mind. “I’ll find something here.”
“Here?” Evie seemed to be holding back a laugh. “Just ’cause you thought you saw…” She stopped herself. “Alright, girl. Whatever. It’s your day.”
Yeah. It was her day. Damn right. She bit her lip and looked around again. She had no idea what kind of book she was looking for, but she knew that she’d know it when she saw it.
Deeper.
She scratched behind her ear. Yeah, the old man had said this place was huge. Of course she wouldn’t find what she was looking for in this first room.
“Come on.” She grabbed Evie’s hand and dragged her down a narrow hallway.
The first room, right on their left around the corner, was lined with chapter books for children. At first, she thought this might be the place. Her breakup had left her feeling frustrated and vulnerable. Maybe instead of new accessories, she needed something to help her tap into her childhood memories, a book her parents had read to her, or something like that.
She ran her fingers along the worn cardboard spines, reading the titles, trying to see if anything stood out.
“Check it out!” Evie eagerly pulled a book off the shelf. “Pippi Longstocking. I loved this book when I was a kid.” She looked down. “Oh!” The black cat had followed them into the room and was rubbing its head on Evie’s ankle. “He’s super cute. She? Whatever.” She bent down and petted the cat’s back. “I thought this would be lame at first, but this place is actually pretty neat.”
“Yeah,” Harper agreed distantly.
Your future isn’t in the children’s section, a voice inside her seemed to say. It didn’t sound like her at all, if she was being honest. It almost sounded like a man’s voice, even followed by a deep chuckle.
When she’d gotten home from the restaurant the night before, she’d sworn off men forever. At least for a month. But now she was hearing a sensual male voice from out of nowhere that honestly, tickled something in her. So maybe she’d spoken too soon.
She could imagine the voice right next to her ear, even forming an invisible hand that pulled on hers. It was made of something gauzy, like smoke if it could be touched. The voice was smoky too. Go deeper, Harper. There’s so much you’ve yet to explore.
Yes. Deeper. She took in a sharp, shuddering breath.
“Harper?” Evie finally noticed her best friend was staring into nothing. “You good?”
“Yeah. I think I want to check out the next room.” Her tongue felt heavy, like it suddenly wasn’t meant for speech.
“Okay. Call me if you get lost.”
“You’re not coming?”
Evie was already sinking to the floor, eagerly cracking open the copy of Pippi. “Girl, Mark would never stop teasing me if I came home with this book, so this is my only chance to re-read it. Plus, this kitty wants me to keep petting him, and I don’t know about you, but I don’t turn down a cat that wants to be scritched.”
Harper thought about telling Evie that she was being ridiculous, that this was supposed to be a day for Harper to do what she wanted. But whatever. They weren’t going to stay long, anyway. She’d check out a couple more rooms, see what she could find, and then they’d go. If Evie still wanted Pippi, she’d buy the damn book for her and keep it at her place. “Cool. See you.” She turned and went back into the hallway.
Is she always like this? the voice said, and she swore that now, the invisible hands were on her shoulders, wrapping along her collarbone. It was so soothing that she felt warmth and a bit of wetness growing in her sex. So easily distracted? So quick to abandon you?
“She’s my best friend,” Harper found herself saying, without even thinking about it. She paused, waiting to see if Evie had heard her.
The voice chuckled. Sound doesn’t carry well here. Too many books. Besides, she’s very well distracted.
Yeah, that made sense, Harper thought. She had no idea why she was thinking things in a man’s deep voice, but everything it said made perfect sense.
Every square inch of the walls was covered in books. It almost seemed to warp space and make it hard to figure out where the hallway walls ended and curved into the corner of another room. That combined with the horribly sexy voice echoing in her head were probably the main reasons why, a moment later, she blinked and realized she didn’t know where she was.
No, obviously, she knew where she was. In the bookstore. But when she took a few steps back, there was no sign of the room she’d left Evie in. “Evie?” she called. The books might inhibit sound, but surely Evie could hear her name being called loudly. Or maybe an employee or another customer would come out and point her in the right direction.
Hadn’t the shop owner in the front room mentioned something about other customers? She hadn’t seen anyone else in here except for her and Evie. And of course, the cat.
Evie didn’t come, nor did anyone else. “Hello?” she called again.
She turned in one direction, then another, trying to get her bearings. She pulled out her phone. It was kind of pathetic to resort to calling Evie when she couldn’t be more than a hundred feet away from her, but her panicking lizard brain was starting to take over, and it was making her feel pathetic anyway.
Didn’t matter. No signal. Seriously?
Harper had never had a panic attack before, and she wondered if that was what was happening to her now, as her breathing got shallower behind clenched teeth and a dry mouth. The walls seemed to be moving closer together. She swore there were more and more books every time she blinked. “Get it together, Harper,” she muttered to herself. “Get it the fuck together.”
Another dark chuckle again. This time it sounded far away, but rolling closer to her as it went on, like an unstoppable freight train. She pressed her back against a shelf as she felt the hands, holding her in place.
Relax, Harper, the voice urged, more soothingly than she’d ever heard from any man, including her ex. She felt hot breath on her neck. Her hackles fell, melted away like dripping wax.
For the first time since the breakup, she had the thought that maybe she really was better off without him.
So many awful intrusive thoughts in your head. The words seemed to be both spoken and written in black ink before her eyes. She could see the flourish, smell the ink, even hear it being etched as if from a fountain pen onto ribbons of paper around her. Don’t you want to find a story to lose yourself in? Isn’t that why you’re here?
Was it? “I…” Her head was foggy. The mustiness of the old books was making it so hard to think. But at least the walls had stopped moving.
Right now this room feels like your mind, doesn’t it? She felt invisible lips against her neck, trailing up to her cheek as the voice spoke, hands holding her wrists and keeping her arms prone against the shelf behind her. Cluttered, overwhelming. That’s not how books are supposed to be, are they?
“No,” she agreed with a distant whisper, a word that came out without thought or consideration. Her eyes were heavy, and it felt so good to listen, to feel.
What are they supposed to be, Harper? the voice urged.
“I…I don’t know.” It was absurd, but she didn’t want to admit to the voice that she didn’t read much.
Do you need me to tell you? Do you need me to do the thinking for you right now?
She wanted to tell the voice that no, she didn’t need anyone to do any of her thinking for her, ever. She wanted to tell it that what she needed was to be let out of this doorless room, out of this shop entirely. She wanted fresh air. She wanted to smell the perfume of the clothing store, hear the chiming of the cash register as people bought overpriced blouses and skirts they didn’t need. Hear trendy music and the clicking of heels on a tiled floor. But like Evie’s discovery of her favorite childhood book, something about this shop was swallowing her, making her feel like she could be happy and comfortable in a place she’d never even imagined stepping into before a few minutes ago. Made her feel like it wouldn’t be so bad to forget about everything else except this place, this voice, this touch.
Her eyes shut on their own, and she felt her body react. Her hips bent forward, her clit twitching. It felt so right to let the shadow do what it wanted, say what it wanted. She could be happy here, with this voice…
With him…
She felt wetness on her arms, thick and murky. His lips brushed against hers, and a tongue that tasted like ink tried to slip into her mouth.
Harper’s eyes shot open and she gasped. Wrenched her arms free from the invisible man’s grasp and shoved forward as hard as she could. “No!” she yelled.
“You okay?”
As the room came back into focus, another patron stood a few feet away. A boy, no older than thirteen, paperback open in his hands, stared at her, slack-jawed and tentative. But she knew whoever he was, he was real, and he was just as confused as her.
The room was just a room. To her left, there was a threshold leading back out into the hallway. “Sorry,” she muttered. “Do you know where the children’s books are?”
The kid scratched his head. “Dunno, sorry.”
She looked at the doorway, and a soft sound drew her attention to the floor. The cat had found her.
“Never mind,” she said to the kid. She felt so much better already, now that the bizarre daydream had passed, no doubt brought on by the trauma of her longest relationship ending so abruptly. Now that she’d seen another real person, and now that the store felt like just another store, albeit one with obviously no sense of inventory and only a passing nod to organization, but definitely one that existed in the real world.
Of course it did. God.
The cat turned and went down the hall. She remembered seeing a post or something on social media about bookstore cats. How they were almost their own unique species. She didn’t know what that meant, but she had the sense that this cat could take her where she needed to be. Back to Evie, and then, ultimately, out of this place forever.
At least she wasn’t hearing that voice anymore, or feeling a phantom hand on her, a phantom tongue pressing through her yielding lips. Or seeing phantom words or feeling them being written on her skin.
Her stomach clenched. Was she actually disappointed about that?
She must have wandered farther than she thought during her undoubtedly self-induced trance, because the cat led her down a number of twisting and turning hallways. After a minute or so of walking, she started to feel stupid again. Following a cat? What was she thinking? “Great plan, Harper,” she said to herself. “Once again, you’ve proven your intellectual prowess. No wonder you’re single now. Maybe you do need to read more.”
As if in response, the cat turned past an open barred door that must have been from the old bank, and she thought they’d be going down another hallway, but it was a room. The books in here looked ancient, strewn about on shelves, on a large counter in the center of the room, and even on the floor. In addition to books, she saw old magazines with illustrated covers and dates over a hundred years back. This definitely wasn’t the children’s book room.
“No, no,” she said to the cat. “I need the children’s room. Children’s room.”
The cat blinked at her, then darted off.
She moved to follow it again, knowing it was dumb but figuring she didn’t have any better options at this point.
Schick.
There was a sound from behind her that startled her and made her turn just in time to see a book slip out of a shelf on the other side of the room and fall to the floor.
If there was a sure sign that she should nope the fuck out of this room, that was it. She turned, intending to do just that, and ran smack into the closed door.
“Ow. Fuck me, ow.” She nursed the spot on her forehead that had hit the metal, hoping she wouldn’t have a bruise.
Poor choice of words.
Nope. No. Uh-uh. She grabbed the bars of the door, jiggled them. The door wouldn’t open. How had it closed in the first place? “Hello? Anyone there? This isn’t funny. I really need to get out of this room.” She shook them harder. “Come on!” Her voice was hoarse and desperate. Sweat was forming at her forehead and under her breasts, staining her bra and her silk camisole. Her hair was fraying and coming out of her ponytail elastic. She usually cared about things like that, about anything that would make her look less than polished and perfectly put-together. Now she didn’t give a fuck. She just wanted to be free.
What are books supposed to be, Harper? The voice spoke with authority, a hint of impatience, a warning that she was supposed to answer or face unknown consequences.
No. No, no, no. Fuck this. Fuck this store. Fuck this room. Fuck this door. Fuck her ex for breaking up with her. Fuck Evie for leaving her alone. Fuck the cat for leading her the wrong way. Fuck herself for thinking that coming into this God-forsaken place in the first place was a good idea.
You know what they’re for. For holding knowledge. Holding important things. Keeping them safe, printed in ink. To help you escape from the real world. All of those are things you need. You need books. You need to be here.
The sound of pen scratching on paper was back, in time with the voice. So soft. Almost hypnotic, and unquestionably both soothing and disturbing. For a moment, she writhed to the sound of it, but then she managed to snap herself out of it with a quick slap across her own face. “Evie!” she screamed. “Evie, put down that fucking kid’s book and come get me!”
The hand again, on her bare shoulder, flicking aside the strap of her camisole. It slithered by her ear, seemed to burrow into her skin. What was today going to give you? Some fleeting amusement, an overpriced trinket you’d stuff into a closet and forget about. She shivered, tried so hard to keep hold of the bars, but her palms were sweaty and useless and her whole body was shaking with a betraying arousal, a pressure within that was only growing. I can offer you so much more.
“No,” she said, practically trying to climb the bars, hoping there was a way to hoist herself over the door. “No, I need to go, I need to—”
Something pushed her from the front, sending her tumbling backwards, onto a pile of yellowed old newspapers that smelled musky, masculine.
She tried to get up. Her legs felt like jelly. She shuddered.
I’ve seen into your mind, Harper. I’ve seen your memories. The smoke formed into a humanoid shape, towering over her. That man you wanted to marry was barely worthy to glance at you in the street, let alone to be your lover. And you deserve so much more than a trinket to cure your heartache. She could feel the hand sliding up her leg, up her skirt, between her thighs. A moan escaped her lips, wetness growing in her cunt. She’d never felt anything like this before, stroking and teasing her in a way human hands couldn’t. If she moved the wrong way, she might cum.
She tried to push herself up by her elbows, but felt her strength fading fast. Instead, she focused on scooting herself backwards, trying to get away from the entity while she still had the sense to do so. She had to fight. Maybe if she did, it would get bored, or realize she didn’t want this and back off.
Because of course she didn’t, right?
But it could move so much faster than her, in dimensions and forms she didn’t have access to. The energy was swirling all around her now, under her clothes, pressing against her, causing pleasure that was as horrifying as it was blissful and overwhelming. Her hands knocked against hardcovers and flimsy pages. Her neck stretched back and her stomach tightened with another moan as her clit quivered from the entity’s ministrations.
It wasn’t just getting harder to move. It was getting harder to think. Harder to resist. Harder to even remember anything that existed outside of these rooms, outside of this store, or why she came here in the first place, or what she’d wanted to do instead.
She tried to focus. She had a friend. Her best friend. Emily? Edie? No, Evie. Evie. And there’d been a cat that was trying to help her.
Wasn’t it? Was it trying to warn her?
Or had it tricked her?
I can make your existence as soft and eternal as the pages of a book. I can give you pleasure that you can experience over and over again, like a story that will never get old, that you can return to whenever you want.
She couldn’t hear the words being written anymore, but she could feel them on her skin, his touch turning to ink, writing the new truths onto her arms, trailing up towards her breasts and neck. She gasped and shuddered. It felt so good. She never wanted him to stop writing on her, never wanted him to stop touching her. Pleasure bloomed in her lower belly as he played with her clit, faster and faster like a hypnotic, encompassing swirl. She let out little gasps, which only made him press harder into her, only seemed to please him more.
Is that what you want, Harper?
She knew she should say no, of course she didn’t. That there was always a price to an offer like this. Fairy tales were filled with warnings; surely one of them was on one of the shelves in this very room. Warnings of the price that came with pleasure, with getting what you wanted. Monkey paws. Trickster gods. Illusions.
Too bad she couldn’t remember any of them. Maybe she’d never read any of them after all.
Think of it, Harper. No more fears. No more stress. You will want nothing except what I will already give you.
Think, fuck. That word alone was insane. Think? No, she didn’t want to do that anymore. Thinking, wanting, those were the things that had gotten her into this mess in the first place.
Do you want it, Harper? he asked again, his voice smoldering and burning like sulfur.
“Yes.”
Her mind popped as if an explosion had occurred and radiated outside of her, sending books flying around her. And in that cocoon, that tornado of stories, there was him, a solid form at last. A man, handsome, pale and dark-haired, muscular with eyes that bore into her. She was somehow aware, dimly, that this wasn’t his true form. That maybe he didn’t even have one, or if he did, that it was something gruesome and terrible and that the way he looked now was another trick. But the realization dissipated quickly, as if nothing could exist any longer if it wasn’t written by him. And she was the scroll on which he would craft stories of endless, preternatural ecstasy.
She was nothing else anymore but his.
He no longer needed to speak, but the words etched into her skin, beautiful flourishes that heightened her senses. She cried out, moaning and grinding her hips. It was glorious, but it wasn’t enough.
She didn’t just need his words, his form on her skin. She needed it all inside of her.
But she didn’t need to tell him that. She was his story to tell now. His approving chuckle made her spine vibrate, made a primitive grunt escape from her lips, made her body feel warm. There was a sharp sound, like paper flying at her and slicing, and she felt her shirt and skirt split at the front and fall away. Another slice, and her bra and underwear were gone too. His strong hands removed her shoes, and if she could still form her own words with her mind or lips, she might have commented on how expensive they were. But she wouldn’t need them where she was going.
He pulled her legs apart with hands that were solid but still felt smoky, climbed onto her, entered and filled her. And as he did the words on her skin melted into her, creating an agonizing pleasure that made her cry out with a voice that could no longer be heard by human ears. He kissed her, thrusting his tongue into her mouth at the same time he thrusted in her pussy. Ink. Ink inside of her, in every hole and crevice, replacing all her previous desires and needs and anxieties. Only his repository. Only his tome. She let out a trilling gasp as her body shifted on a pile of books and papers.
“Say you’ll be mine,” he commanded. “Say you are mine.”
I’m yours. The words didn’t come from her throat. They came out the way his words had come to her at first, disembodied, written on incorporeal pages. He’d taken her voice. He was taking everything. She twitched, a tiny part of her still wanting to protest. As if in response, the ink inside of her seemed to thicken and grab a hold of her, creating another writhing wave that washed out every final bit of hesitation, and it felt so good, so perfect, to know he was erasing all the clunky parts of her, stripping her down to just the words she needed to experience his esoteric pleasure. That she was this pleasure now, these words. So much more and yet so much less than the girl who had walked into this shop.
She opened her eyes with a shuddering orgasm, and though she couldn’t see her reflection, she knew that they were inky black.
His infernal seed rushed through her, rewriting her permanently, dissolving her physical form. Her essence carried into the dusty air of the bookshop, and what remained of her could feel nothing but bliss, nothing but contentment. If he wanted to, he could bring her back together, draw her again on paper or in any way he liked. He could make her want to revisit this pleasure over and over again, just as he said.
He was glad that Harper was a girl who didn’t read much, because if she did, she might have asked more questions about the true price of his gift. She might have figured out that revisiting it, reveling in it eternally or even frequently, would only give him more access to her energy, more power, more strength. It would make it easier for him to manipulate the walls of the bookstore to his liking, create more illusions, trap more unsuspecting souls inside. Maybe even make it possible for him to leave.
But why should he, when he had so many lovelies ensnared between the pages lining the labyrinthian walls, their stories his to savor, to revise? Maybe at nightfall he’d make Harper into his own personal Scheherazade, have her repeat his words as a lover desperate for his mercy. Or maybe he’d write her as a nymph who guarded a fresh and bubbling spring, easily tricked into giving him access to her waters.
No, he thought to himself. For now, he’d leave her as she was. As the once-angry, still somewhat spirited girl who had wandered into his domain and surrendered to him her pain, her possessions, her body, and everything else to be siphoned out slowly over the years to come.
He felt her essence shudder with a desire that shook the walls, made more books fall off the shelves. He chuckled. She wanted him. She was already eager for more. He should have expected no less from her.
“You know what it means?” he asked, because now that it was too late, there was no harm in telling her. He could possess her with or without her permission now. “What I can still take from you? The power it could give me? The things I could destroy?”
I don’t care, she replied, breathy and mewling, as if she still had a body that could tremble for him.
So, he gave her one once more, just for a moment, just so he could have her. She looked much the same as before, but now she was his thrall, not quite right, almost demonic. Her skin was paper-white and stained with lines of ink. Her eyes and lips were jet black. He enclosed them in a space, smaller than a closet, almost a coffin, walls overflowing with books. He wanted her to know, without a doubt, whose domain this was.
“You’ll want only what I give you,” he reminded her, and she let out a submissive purr in response, raising her chin and torso to him.
He grabbed one of her breasts and tugged on her ear with his teeth. She moaned in pleasure, in complete surrender to this being, her writer, her master. Warmth rushed through her and she was aware that only he could give it to her now. Her handled her roughly, fucking her as her back pressed against the uneven spines of the books behind her. She was aware that even in the real rooms of the bookstore, her cries of ecstasy might be heard, but would be forever unreachable, unreadable, written in a language now that only he spoke. Aware that she’d come here to find something to treat her heartache, and that she’d been tricked, maybe by the bookstore owner, maybe by the cat, maybe just by her own senses.
No longer giving a damn about any of it.