“Keep it together. It’s only a dead body,” muttered Trill.

The woman was in the nude and lying on the floor of her living room. It was difficult to tell if she was overweight or simply that bloated from decomposition. Her eyes were bulging out of her head, and a various amount of liquid and wastes were leaking out from the various holes in her body.

Julia was less than thrilled by the experience. She was knelt down in the corner, attempting not to vomit. The smell was worse than the sight was. As Trill continued to investigate, she snuck off to a different corner of the house.

This woman was one of the ones who had done his ritual. She kept a tidy home and had three cats. Three cats that had been locked up in a room with a bag of food and two litter boxes. At least whoever had killed her had put in the effort to make sure her pets wouldn’t eat her.

She had been attracted to a coworker. After performing the ritual, he had moved in with her. After some time together and talks of marriage, the man’s brother grew suspicious. He realized that she was controlling him somehow, attempted to seduce her, and poisoned her when she was most vulnerable. His brother was then freed from her curse, and the two fled the place.

“I am done,” replied Trill as he approached.

“What were we even doing here in the first place?”

“She was a member of a nine-person coven. They are all clients of mine, and will no doubt wish to know what had happened. I merely needed to bait one of them into coming here to check up on her so that she may continue her progress.” Ash swallowed the both of them. They reemerged in what looked like a basement, where a group of three were talking to each other. “The powers I grant are capable of turning people into monsters. They have free will to use those powers as they please, but are often taken out by those who have been harmed or are jealous of what they have.”

Two of those present were talking while a third drew up the arcane circle in blood. They appeared to be college students, who were treating this more like a joke than actual black magic. Trill was taking his time to circle about each of them, examining them closely.

“You appear before the ritual starts?”

“When I have time to notice,” he muttered. “I need to make certain that these individuals are worth my time. I also need to ensure that none of them have any equipment that will record our presence.” Trill gestured for her to get closer. “And you will need to learn how to read the desires of others.”

That was the overwhelming brightness that came off of others. The unfulfilled wishes that others had within them. Mio glowed more dimly since she was getting the attention she needed, but Eli was brighter due to the frustration of his gifts. Julia’s pain from looking at them had been because she was unprepared to use her newly found six sense.

She sidestepped toward Trill like a duckling seeking protection, and he put an arm around her shoulder and whispered in his ear. “The girl over there.” He gestured to the only girl of the trio, who was the one drawing up the circle.

Julia attempted to concentrate. “... She had gotten good grades on an essay that she had turned in, but the professor threatened to tear it apart and give her a lower grade if she didn’t sleep with him.”

“You’re only looking at the surface,” purred Trill. “You see the desire that she wants others to see. The one she presents to everyone. A poor girl who was raped by her teacher, but the truth runs far deeper than that.”

There were glimpses hidden deep beneath the brightness of her will. “She came to this university because of the professor. He spoke at her high school, and she had had a crush on him ever since then. When she came here, she heard a rumor that he forced himself on certain students, because he had a type, and she purposely changed herself in order to become his target…”

“And the only thing now that stands in her way is his wife,” whispered Trill. “What this one desires is to stand side by side with him, as both fellow researcher and wife.” He slipped away from Julia’s side and gestured to the two men. “One here is her boyfriend, who assumes as you have, that she wants vengeance for her rape. The other is a friend from the girl’s class. He has an unrequited love for the same professor, but is unable to act on it due to being a man.”

“Oh god…”

“Precisely,” said Trill with a gleam in his eyes. “Now what gifts should I impart upon them?” Julia shook her head, completely clueless on what to do. She thought maybe it was better to let the situation play itself out, but Trill wouldn’t let that happen. “It simply can’t be anything in the world. We need to be clever. It is dangerous for us to show that magic was involved.”

The statement gave Julia pause. “But what about myself or that man with the razor wire or whatever that was.”

“He is already dead. Taken out by a fellow summoner, and you would be as well if I had not intervened,” replied Trill. “That boy has the power to erase the presence of others. He would have made the nurses and your father forget you, and you would have no idea who he was either. If you had managed to escape that hospital, you would be hunted down as a ghost of your sister, or some imposter who claims to be related.

That is the fate that lays in store for you if you choose to return. That is, unless you choose to kill him. It is only through our shared power that you are able to remember who that boy is and why he is important. You are the only one in the world who has a chance to stop them.”

The girl of the group tossed a dead chicken into the circle. There was no chanting, nor did they hold hands or stand in proper spots. It was becoming apparent to Julia that Trill didn’t care how the ritual was done, not as long as there was a sacrifice of flesh and at least three nearby who had a strong will.

One was just about to ask what was happening when the lights of the room died out. The boyfriend went to flip the switch. He flicked it a few times before stating that the lights may have died. Though the other man wasn’t as convinced, as he had pulled out his phone and had become alarmed when it was refusing to turn on.

The girl began to hop backward as the chicken burst into flames. As they began to shout at each other, the smoke coming off the fire shifted into Trill. His presence made them fall silent, and he was able to coax their wishes out from them one by one. The girl wanted vengeance on her professor, her boyfriend shared her sentiments, and the third half-heartedly muttered that he wanted to find someone to ease his loneliness.

Trill vanished in a swirl of smoke and grabbed Julia along the way. They reappeared in a room where a man somewhere in his thirties was asleep next to his wife. It was a modest room with pictures of the couple from around the world. The two of them were quite the stereotypical married couple with no children.

“What are we doing here?” Julia immediately hid behind Trill as the woman let out a snort. It was a part of her snoring, brought on by her rolling over.

“I only need to increase this man’s libido and encourage him to take on both men and women.” Trill leaned in and whispered something in an unknown tongue within the sleeping man’s ear.

Letting out a low groan as sleep abandoned his senses, the man sat up. He rubbed at his face before looking down at his wife. A grin appeared on his lips, and he immediately rolled on top of her. She let out a surprised cry, followed by a giggle as he began to playfully nibble at her neck.

Julia immediately turned away. “We should leave,” she whispered.

“This man’s lust will encourage him to his loins to conquer more of his students, and his carelessness will find himself reported by one of them. The two who wanted him must then decide if they will continue to fight each other to be by his side once his wife leaves him, or abandon him to his misery.”

“We really should leave,” she repeated. A satisfied moan escaped the woman as her husband pulled off her pajama pants so he could bite at her thigh.

“Such entertainment does not come freely,” replied Trill amusedly.

“Then we need to get you a computer,” she spat back.

Trill put a hand around her waist and a moment of darkness overtook them before they were in the hotel suite again. His grip tightened as he spun around her and lifted her up in the air. Julia let out a yelp and began to flail her legs back and forth while her hands pushed aside his face. Not caring much for her resistance, he dropped her on the bed.

“Stop it!”

“My blood is dust,” he replied in a deadpan manner. “Parts of my anatomy will always fail to work no matter how strongly I will them rise.” He knelt down in front of her and took her hand into his.

“You said that I needed training to take on Eli, but all you’ve done is drag me around and tell me that you make people’s lives worse!” She attempted to yank her hand back, but he refused to let go.

“Moment.”

His free hand sliced into the flesh of her wrist, and he sealed his mouth about the wound. As she tried to beat him back with her other hand, his tail held it back. She attempted to kick at him, but that only lead him to clamber on top of her and sit on her thighs. Julia opened her mouth to shout, yet no noise made it past her lips.

Trill took his time to enjoy his meal, only stopping when Julia began to feel dizzy from blood loss. He licked the wound close before slicing open his own wrist and holding it over Julia’s face. She grasped onto it and began to drink freely while he loomed over her.

“There is a code of conduct when it comes to my abilities,” he explained while she drank. “I am teaching you through example. Our powers are blessed from the beyond, and humans are not meant to know of their existence. The first rule is that only those who have performed the ritual will see and understand these blessings.

The second rule is that the summoners must be the ones to attain their own desires. We merely provide them the means. They are the ones who will take action. You will be using my powers to deal out your punishments, but by doing so, you must abide by my rules.”

Julia released his arm with a gasp of air. She licked her lips, then frowned to herself. “So if I go after Eli, I need to find a way to have him destroy himself.”

“Precisely. Use your powers to punish him directly, and my blood and heart will tear apart your body from within.”

She already knew that the blood disease that the doctors couldn’t identify was caused by Trill. The only times she felt sick was when she avoided delving into people’s desires, and when she forced Kara to show her her memories. By forcing Kara to do so, she was taking direct action, and thus she began to suffer from internal hemorrhaging.

“You were the one who told me to force Kara to show me her memories!”

Trill was pleased that she had caught on so quickly. “Humans learn through pain. You would not have heeded my warnings had you not experienced them firsthand.”

That didn’t stop her from being furious. “And what’s to happen to me after this? You said yourself that you only give strong abilities to those who would not live for a long time.”

“My powers were necessary to protect you… As for what will happen to you afterward…” He leaned in over her, so close that she could nearly feel the coldness of his snout. “I have no idea. And I find that to be quite enticing.”

Julia didn’t have a response to that. She only felt a chill go up her back, which had become a familiar sensation to her by this point. Giving a shove to Trill’s shoulder, he rolled off of her so she could sit up. Just as she was becoming used to being terrified of him, Trill had become accustomed to touching her.

But he also gave her something to think about. She needed to be clever. Eli had already taken the steps to destroy her and her life. Now she was a nothingness that had been given the free will to do as she pleased. He was someone who wasn’t afraid to take control over other’s lives in order to suit his own needs. The nest possible revenge she could have would be to turn those powers on himself, and relish in the despair he felt as his world crumbled around him.