📜🎩 T H E ☆ M A G I C I A N - Act 63 (Including Pic!)

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Spotify🎵 Mel | Mary | Bastet | Lusje | Lynette 🎵

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T H E  ☆  M A G I C I A N

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Act 63

Lusje

The girl had kept her word. All the demon had been able to use Mel’s body for was to maneuver it to the bedroom — then all the abrasion had finally taken its toll, and it collapsed. It had been a miracle that it had worked for so long anyway.

Lusje observed as the human girl lifted Mel into the bed with surprising confidence and strength, then removed the jacket and the one remaining piece of footwear from the nearly lifeless body. She didn’t undress anything else; but as she started to wash and clean Mel, she unbuttoned their blouse over their abdomen. Thankfully, Lusje had been able to cobble its pact holder up so that no broken bones, missing fingers, or big open wounds were visible — externally, at least. So upon inspecting Mel’s gut, Rosemary only found a nebula of massive bruises in all colors, but not a literal hole anymore.

When she was done with her limited basic treatment, she got up and went over to the phone. The demon had feared that she would falter and call an ambulance or someone else despite her promise, but she had called the desk to cancel all forms of room service until further notice with an almost chilling display of  indifferent sweetness and no hint of nervousness. There wasn’t even a grain of unease in her voice. Lusje was, to say the least, impressed. 

Then the steel-nerved girl called her father, telling him that she was very sick and didn’t want to spread it to him, so she would stay in her room for some days and wouldn’t let him in. Wouldn’t the demon have known it better, it would’ve thought that Mary was genuine. Her father apparently thought so, too, because he didn’t ask any further questions and wished her a speedy recovery.

Damn. Who would’ve thought that the fragile, shy, little mortal was such a sly dog? At least in such a severe emergency situation. Or maybe it was particularly so because of that? Humans can occasionally thrive to their full potential in exceptional circumstances.

She portrayed even more care and calculation when she opened up her laptop with its integrated webcam facing the bed and, by extension, Mel, then video-called herself on the phone. With Mel now always in view, she left the suite for about half an hour and then returned with grocery bags. 

She had bought a variety of healthy soups — probably hoping that she might be able to feed those to Mel’s barely functioning vessel —  but also some meds, creams for bedsores, a child’s toothbrush, and even some of those weird pee blankets that were used for puppies or shit like that. In such a short time, that girl has coped with the situation to such an extent that she has even been able to think of those stupid things. 

Mary placed one of the sheets where it belonged, tucked in Mel with such love and care that even Lusje felt her heart ache, gently brushed their sweaty black strands back, felt Mel’s forehead, and placed a cold, wet towel on it. After that, she turned on a playlist containing soft, classical pieces, checked Mel for their pulse one last time, then turned the big wing chair in the room to face the bed, and finally sat down.

She really did as much as she could with the, admittedly, rather harsh limitations.

Like that, the girl watched Mel’s body with an illegible, blank expression for a while, her eyes fixated on Mel so relentlessly that she didn’t even blink; then, it happened. She broke down, finally displaying normal human behavior.

Out of nowhere, and in stark contrast to her calculated, perfectly conducted actions from before, she started to cry and sob in such heartbreaking, hopeless despair that Lusje had trouble keeping it together.

She wanted to comfort her in some way, maybe appear in its little snake form again that the girl loved so much, but she had to use all of her remaining powers to heal and hold Mel’s body together—literally—so there was no way she would be able to leave it or create a second vessel.

Fuck, the demon really had lost more than just his spark over the last couple hundred years. Back then, he would’ve been able to patch Mel back up to consciousness with a mere cough, while simultaneously appearing as the prettiest, cutest, most comforting snake there was. And plot a masterful plan to overthrow kings and monarchs or some shit on top of that.

But now? All she could do was watch the girl cry like a betrayed dog for what felt like hours, until, curled up like a little homeless drug addict, she finally fell asleep in her chair.

It continued like this for three days. She would clean Mel several times a day, reposition them every couple of hours, massage their arms and feet, try to feed them soup or water without success, change the wet towel to cool down their fever, gently brush their teeth, embalm their lips that were beyond dry and broken, and let some anti-inflammatory painkillers melt on their tongue in hopes that it would help in any way. Sometimes she would watch TV, but Lusje could tell that she didn’t take anything of it in. She probably only did it to regain a sense of normality or to distract her senses a little. 

Besides the spoons of soup she tried to feed Mel, she didn’t eat anything herself and barely drank, nor did she take showers or leave the room for any other reason than to use the toilet. She even changed only once, when she noticed that she was still wearing the evening gown, on the second day.

Thankfully, Mary wasn't disturbed by staff, dads, or anyone else, just as she had planned; she texted her dad and teachers with updates about her flu now and then, and only got a call once. It was from Morris. Instead of quickly hanging up though, she again lied with the sweetest voice of an angel, saying that she had no idea where Mel was, but if she knew, the last person she’d tell about them was their slave owner.

If Mel wouldn’t marry that girl, Lusje would make her one of its many wives and husbands. Behind her sweet, innocent facade, she was all kinds of stuff, and one of them was batshit crazy. The demon felt like there were even more layers to explore, even for Mary herself, but that would have to wait. 

Finally, on day four, Mel’s body was able to sustain itself remotely, and Lusje was able to use it again. She opened their eyes.

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