Life After Death

Corryn: previous knowledge

{Corryn}

"I've got it," Lilith announced. She was holding a bottle of whiskey in one hand and a bottle of scotch in the other.

I looked up at her, wondering what she was talking about. She triumphantly set the whiskey down on the counter.

"How to take over Otherworld," she reminded me, pushing back her black hair with the other bottle. "I was thinking about it when you were gone yesterday."

It had been a running discussion between us, and we had come up with some ridiculous methods. She had the means and the magic, and I had the experience. For a demon, she was fun to have bartend with me. Last month she had decided the only way to take Otherworld was through cryptic letters sent to each member of Parliament detailing out some nefarious crime another had done. I'm sure it was the most viable option we had come up with to date.

"Well?" I asked. "What is your revelation?"

"The problem with all of our plans is that we are relying on faeries," she explained. "Faeries are difficult to bend because they can't change. It's not in their nature."

"True," I agreed, and poured a whiskey sour. I floated it over to the waiting table and the green-eyed vapor caught it in one tendril.

"But you learned with Eldreial, you can't just piggyback in their body, because they'll be able to fight you."

"I'm sure you would have better luck," I said. "You're a demon and all. You can possess them better. But possession would be easier to tell that you were a demon and therefore a breach in the treaty."

"Exactly, you'd have to pick someone who no one would suspect that they've decided to take over Otherworld."

"Like me, if I was still alive," I reasoned.

"Exactly," Lilith said. "So now the trouble is finding such a faery and in such an environment to be conducive to a take over. If they were the baker's son, he could hardly be threatening."

The bar wasn't very full tonight, I thought. Just as well, I would be gone soon; Gawain was probably nearly done with his homework.

"Not to mention you'd have to note their magic," I pointed out. "You wouldn't want to get stuck with someone and their earth magic or movement magic; it's not that threatening either."

"I hadn't thought of that," she admitted. "But in theory, I could pick any time, and any place, but once I found someone with a suitable magic, they would still have to be aristocracy. Otherworld would be impossible to infiltrate without nobility."

"Not impossible, I did it," I pointed out. "Easier yes, and faeries would suspect you less. Even I had to masquerade as nobility."

"What if you found the faery and just added them to a noble family?" Lilith suggested. "I mean, if I have all of time and space, I could just steal them as a child and leave them as a foundling on someone's doorstep. If they were out of time, no one would know what else to do."

"Depends on the family," I mused. "Or the first faery who found them. You could leave them on Vercyne steps if you wanted to be really brazen. What is your back up plan?"

"Sorry?"

"If that faery turns out to be incredibly good, I mean, if you pull them from their original home you can't ascertain what they'll be like. So if no one believes that they could want to take over the government, then what do you do?"

"I haven't figured that out yet," she admitted. "I'll work on it. You'll be going soon, won't you?"

But as soon as she spoke, I was transported from my bar to a chalk pentagram and a dusty looking Gawain beaming at me.