Home for Horny Monsters Ch. 057

"Where is this place?" he asked.

"War zone, most likely. As for where, I couldn't say." Lily swiped at a nearby building and it vanished. "When you have enough death in one place, the boundary between the Underworld and your world thins to accommodate the sudden transfer of souls. In a way, they are both here and there at the same time." She paused as a large shadow, nearly twelve feet tall, lumbered past them. "This may not even be our world."

Cerberus stopped and belched fire at a nearby copse of trees. A group of creatures scattered from behind it and bolted into the woods.

"Scavengers," Lily said. "Looking for an easy meal when someone crosses over."

"This part of the Underworld seems a little more dangerous than over by the house," he told her.

"The house has a Cerberus watching it. This place? Not so much. Actually, I don't know that we want to run across another Cerberus. It may not be very happy to accept the condition this one is in."

Cerberus looked back at the two of them and grunted in the affirmative, or so Mike thought. They continued onward for another hour when he patted Lily on the leg and looked over his shoulder.

"Can you grab a sandwich out of my bag?" he asked. He heard her rustle through his backpack and then went quiet.

"This isn't a sandwich, it's a whole fucking meal." She handed it forward and he took it. It was essentially a BLT on a long hoagie roll, with some type of aioli that Sofia had whipped up this morning. "She made five more of these for you!"

"She didn't want me going hungry. Want some?"

"No. You're gonna need your strength when you inevitably fuck the faerie queen."

"You really think it will come down to fucking her?" He pulled off a piece of his sandwich and held it back for her. There was a moment of hesitation before she took it from him and he heard her chew on it.

"Honestly? I fully expect her to betray you somehow, then you'll seduce her with that big dick of yours. Probably fuck her in the ass in the hopes of dislodging the massive stick that's up there."

He laughed, which caused him to cough a bite of sandwich into his sinuses. This triggered a coughing fit, and Lily smacked him on the back, which allowed him to swallow the offending bite. He finished his sandwich and had Lily hand him a water bottle, which he promptly drained. The scenery was going from urban to jungle now, and they were walking along the side of a river that was cold enough that chunks of ice were caught in its current. From the side of his eyes, he thought he saw people clinging to the chunks, but when he looked directly, they were gone.

"Seriously though, is there a plan? If she betrays you, I mean." There was absolutely no humor in Lily's tone now.

"If she betrays me, she still has to let me return home. She can't harm me directly, that much I know. It's likely she will try to do something regarding Cecilia's capture, but I'm not sure what." He sighed in frustration. "Honestly, the only trick I have up my sleeve is that I can challenge her to a duel, but she has to accept. If we agree on the outcome of the duel, she gets to pick the weapons that are allowed, and I get to pick the location. I debated having Tink build me a giant faerie trap, but that could be seen as outside interference. So the duel is out."

"Maybe you'll get lucky and she'll choose genitals as the weapon of choice." Lily ran her hands along the front of his pants again. "Then you could pick somewhere romantic, show her that thing you do with your lightning..."

He grabbed her hand and moved it off his crotch. "Sorry," he told her. "Got told by a trusted source that I'll be banging a faerie queen later, so I need to have some gas in the tank."

She laughed, pinched his stomach, then leaned her head against his shoulder. He thought he heard her sigh, and he couldn't help but smile.

Beth was busy washing her dinner dishes while looking out the back window. Mike had been gone a few hours already, but she felt like it had been far longer.

Shortly after he left, she had gone out front to see if the sundial would turn for her. On the one hand, she was relieved when it didn't. That meant that Mike was still alive. On the other hand, it also meant that she would be unable to activate the home's defenses if he became trapped in the Underworld, and she wouldn't put it past the queen to find a way to trap him there until the house was overrun by the society, angry gods, or whatever was waiting to pounce on the place.

The others were having a semi-quiet meal in the dining room. Tink was discussing some interior improvements with Reggie, and Sofia sat between Yuki and Quetzalli, the three of them going over some artbooks from the Library. Kisa had stopped in briefly to grab her meal to go, and Beth suspected she was up on the roof.

Dana was out back with some redesigned drones, trying to get in some last-minute adjustments before the sun went down. Undoubtedly she would take her place across from the mysterious door once night fell. Beth wasn't certain what Dana had discovered, if anything, but had heard her talking to the rats a lot of nights in hushed tones. At first, she had wondered if they were helping her make progress, but it turned out that Dana rambled when she had an audience. Her inner monologue would float down the hallway for troubled sleepers to hear, and most of it had been a mess of alchemy, astrology, and Dana's personal thoughts on both.

A small drone whizzed around the yard, then chased a pair of fairies. Cerulea and Olivia left sparkling trails behind as they dashed out of the way, then took turns riding the thing as if it were a bucking bronco. Beth wondered if they would be able to stay on it for eight seconds when she heard the doorbell ring.

The others looked at her with puzzlement as she walked through the dining room, but she noticed that Tink was missing. By the time she made it out to the front room, she noticed the goblin stood at the window with Jenny, both of their faces pressed to the glass. Tink was hopping up and down in excitement, and when Beth looked through the peephole, she saw a witch, a Frankenstein's monster, and a nervous-looking army man.

The door creaked when it opened, and she looked down at the children as they lifted their bags and shouted with enthusiasm.

"Trick or Treat!" they shouted.

Stunned, she realized that she had forgotten to retrieve the bag of candy and asked them to wait. She locked the door and sprinted to the kitchen, then grabbed the bag of candy so fast that she accidentally spilled a box of pasta. On her way back, she noticed that Yuki and Quetzalli now stood at the window, and she was about to open the door when a hand fastened around hers.

"Oh, please, allow me," Yuki asked, then took the candy from her. Her features shifted, making her ears bigger and her nose longer and more fox-like. She threw a card on the ground to summon a large chalice roughly the size of a bucket and then dumped the candy in.

Standing back from the door, Beth watched Yuki open the door and growl at them.

The witch shouted "Trick or Treat" one more time, but the army man broke and ran down the front walk. Frankenstein's monster stared as he took his candy, but the witch clapped her hands in excitement.

"Your costume is so cool," she declared. "Can I get an extra piece for my brother?"

"Sure," Yuki told her.

"Thanks. I like your decorations, the dragon in your yard is so cool!" With that, the witch and the monster departed down the long path to the road and the safety of their parents. Beth couldn't help but notice that the Jabberwock opened an eye as they passed, then puffed out a wisp of smoke.

"Wait, they can see the Jabberwock?" Beth looked at the others with concern. "What happened to the geas?"

"It's Samhain," Yuki replied. "The thinning of the barrier between our world and the spirit world. My guess is that barrier may include the geas somehow. It's still up and protecting us, I can feel it. But maybe the visual protection is weaker. It's not like Emily ever had someone stand out front to test it on Halloween, we always just kept to ourselves. The Jabberwock, on the other hand, is bound to be noticed."

"It won't eat anyone, will it?" No sooner had she asked her question, the doorbell rang again.

"Hold on." Yuki closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them. "It'll just watch, for now."

Tink ran between them and snatched the bucket from Beth. She yanked open the door to reveal a princess and a teenager wearing a rubber horse head.

The princess rose her bucket eagerly, but the horse took a step back. "Bro, your costume is awesome!" he shouted, then took a picture of Tink with his phone.

"Extra candy for cute princess," Tink said, then bared her fangs at the teenager. "Tink is not bro," she declared, then slammed the door on him.

Outside, Beth heard the teen laugh. When she looked through the peephole, she saw that the fairies were now whirring around the yard, leaving spectral trails in their wake. Along the grounds, the carefully cultivated greenery that the centaurs had planted were now illuminated by flashing lights that shot out into the darkness.

"Of course," Yuki said from against the window, "you have a gate to the Underworld out back. With the veil thinning, the souls are using this place as a nexus." She furrowed her hairy brow and looked at Beth. "But why haven't I seen this happen before?"

"Did Emily ever open that gate?" asked Beth.

Yuki shook her head. "Not to my knowledge. But we also didn't have the grim reaper living with us, or a dullahan hanging out in the front yard."

"Speak of the devil," Beth muttered when she looked back through the peephole. Sulyvahn was watching a group of kids as they came up the walk, but they didn't seem to notice him until he popped off his own head. One of the kids screamed and ran down the path, but the others laughed and kept going, clearly under the assumption that he was animatronic. "Well, there's only one thing we can do."

"Which is?" Yuki turned to face Beth, a look of seriousness on her face.

"Not run out of candy." The doorbell rang and she smiled. "Can someone else get that? I have a costume I want to wear."

She sprinted up the stairs, nearly taking out Dana, who was near the top. Once in her room, she started digging through a couple of boxes from her apartment, eventually opening one near the bottom. She dug through the box and pulled out a black cape and tossed it onto her bed. Digging around some more, she found a small black box and a black dress with spiderweb lace.

She stripped out of her clothes and then slid into the dress. It hugged her a bit more tightly than she remembered, and she wondered if it either shrunk the last time she washed it, or if Sofia's cooking was putting some pounds on her ass. When she checked herself out in the mirror, she grinned. It still looked good, so who cared?

Seeing her teeth reminded her to pick up the box. When she opened it, she found a set of false fangs inside and some black lipstick. She popped the fangs in her mouth and examined the lipstick. It looked like it had cracks in it, so she slid it across the delicate skin of her wrist and frowned when it flaked off.

"Oh well," she muttered, then picked up the cape. The inside had red silk trim, and there were finger loops that allowed the cape to move with her hands. She held her arms out wide and smiled at Beth the vampire.

She picked out a pair of comfortable black pumps and then stepped out of her room. Dana looked up from her position at the weird door and then did a double-take.

"Is this...Are you just in costume or is this something I should be worried about?" she asked.

Beth laughed. "It's Halloween, and we actually have trick-or-treaters! Do you want to pass out candy?"

Dana shook her head. "No, thanks. Have you ever had a freshly made sopapilla? 'Cause kids smell like those to me. I'm good up here, thanks."

"Suit yourself." She went down the stairs to see Quetzalli handing out candy to a group of kids all dressed as Power Rangers. A couple of them jumped when they got zapped, but nobody complained. Down by the sidewalk, a small crowd of parents had formed as another group of kids got ready to head up the walk.

"This...is unusually busy, isn't it?" Yuki asked.

"Yeah, it is, but if we're the house with a dragon out front, people will drive across town to come see it." Beth watched Quetzalli close the door, then took the candy bucket from her. "Good god, how much did you give those kids?"

"Just a handful of candy for each of them," Quetzalli said.

Yuki laughed. "If you give me some cash, I'll head out to get some more."

"I..." Beth was tempted to tell her no, but if anyone could handle a trip outside, it was Yuki. "If you think you're up to it, then—"

"Tink go too!" The goblin was hopping from foot to foot. "See decorations, make tricks, steal candy!"

Remembering Mike's comment, she knelt so that she was eye level with the goblin.

"Mike said you could go out if you wore underwear."

Tink's face fell for a moment, but then her expression was replaced with one of determination. "Tink make big sacrifice for Halloween," she declared, then ran up the stairs. When she returned, it was obvious that she had put on a pair of Mike's boxers backward, allowing her tail to poke out of the fly. They were baggy and looked like shorts on her, but if it meant she was decent, then it would be fine.

"Tink ready!" she declared, then opened the closet and pulled out her club. "Smash pumpkins, maybe!"

"Are you just trying to get out of the house to make trouble?" Beth asked.

Tink looked her directly in the eye and nodded her head slowly. "Yes."

"Don't worry, I'll try to keep her from doing anything too inappropriate." Yuki took Tink's hand and then opened the door just as a trio of ghosts were pushing the bell. "Excuse us," she told them and squeezed between them.

"Your kid's costume is so cute," one of the ghosts declared.

"Tink is not a fu—" Tink was cut off when Yuki clamped a hand over her mouth and dragged her the rest of the way down the walk. Once Beth handed out some candy to the ghosts, she wondered how Yuki was going to get to the store without a car, but figured it was best if she didn't know.

"Bold move, for sure and for certain, lass," Sulyvahn declared as he came up the stairs, the ghosts walking around him. "Letting a trickster and a goblin out on Samhain."

"A trickster?" It suddenly occurred to her that Yuki was, in fact, a fox demon known for trickery. "Ah shit."

Suly laughed. "I'm sure it will be fine, lass. I bet they just have a harmless bit o' fun, being as it's been such a busy time and all." He leaned against the door frame. "And look at yerself, would ye now? Ye be lookin' mighty fine as a creature of the night."

"Thank you," she replied.

Sulyvahn followed her inside and sat down on the couch next to Quetzalli. Sofia wandered in from the dining room with a disappointed look on her face.

"Well, I would like to thank everyone for leaving me to clean up." She dried her hands on a small towel she held. "Wait, where is everybody?"

"Sent Yuki out for candy, and she took Tink with her." The bell rang and Beth picked up the chalice.

"Hold on a second." Sofia crossed the room and crouched to look through the peephole. She opened the door and stepped through the door to tower over the cluster of children who stared up at her.

"Whoa," came from a young man in a Scream mask.

"Indeed." Sofia turned to take the chalice from Beth and then handed out candy. "You all look amazing. Listen to your parents, and look both ways before crossing the street."

The kids thanked her and then ran down the walk. She closed the door and handed the chalice to Beth. "I haven't seen a proper child in decades," she stated, her eye suddenly misty. "I'm headed back to the Library tonight. You know where to find me."

With that, she walked into the office and activated the magic book, and vanished.

Puzzled over Sofia's reaction, she sat down next to Suly. "Are all those spirit lights in the yard something to be worried about?"

"Nay. They be spirits that've moved on, just comn' back for a wee visit. They be peaceful." Suly curled his fingers around a lock of Beth's hair. "If not a tad bit mischievous."

She smiled and had put her hand on his thigh when she heard Quetzalli groan. Remembering that the dragon was with them, she leaned forward to see that she was gazing at something in her hand with contempt.

"What's wrong?" Beth asked.

"This...this chocolate tastes terrible! And I fear I have been pranked, for some fiend has put coconut inside of it." Quetzalli threw the half-eaten Mounds bar onto the coffee table, where it slid across and onto the floor. A rat that was passing through scurried over to pick it up, then ran off with it.

Over the next hour, Beth answered the door for the children who rang the bell. The traffic was heavy and she was almost out of candy when Yuki appeared with a couple of large bags tucked under her arms.

"Thanks, you're a lifesaver. Where's Tink?"

The kitsune scowled. "I lost track of her after she pantsed some guy dressed like a preacher. She is out there raising mayhem, and everyone assumed I was her mother, so that wasn't fun for me. I ran into Death, he said he'd keep an eye on her until I get back."

Beth frowned. Could the grim reaper even do anything if someone tried to take the goblin? "You're headed back out?"

"I am. Some guy in a hockey mask kept shouting baka at me, so now that you have your candy, I'm going to hunt him down and teach him to be afraid of his own shadow." She stormed back out the door and ran down the walk. A little girl dressed as a princess stared in awe as Yuki vaulted the stone wall to bypass the group of parents that waited between the lions.

"Now that I'm thinking could become a fair bit o' trouble," Suly said.

"I hope not." Beth wasn't sure she agreed with Yuki letting Tink wander off, but there was nothing she could do about it now. If something happened to Tink, Death would be able to come home and let somebody know. The idea that Mike may come home and discover she was missing didn't sit well with her at all. Or Yuki, for that matter. She wasn't supposed to be their babysitter by any means, but she suddenly felt like the situation was starting to spiral out of control.

Quetzalli and Beth alternated handing out candy. Jenny and Reggie stood in the window and watched them come and go. More than a few kids stopped to take selfies with the Jabberwock. Beth got asked by more than a couple of adults if she was the new owner, and she noticed a bunch of people milling about the yard and admiring the gardens. The centaurs had long ago left, locking their portal door behind them, and she sent Sulyvahn out into the yard to chase off some people who decided to wander the hedge maze.

There were so many people coming and going that she didn't bother to close the door anymore and just waited with the screen shut for the next group of kids to arrive. The energy in the air was high, and she bid farewell to a group of high school kids dressed as ninja turtles when she looked up to see a dark figure in a black hoodie standing at the bottom of the porch.

"Hey there," she said in greeting, but her smile turned to a frown when the figure pulled back the hood to reveal their identity.

"Hi, Beth." Marco stood defiantly on the front walk of the house, his hands in his pockets. "I was wondering if we could talk?"

"About what?" She set down the candy bucket and scowled. "Why are you here? Clearly, it isn't for candy."

"It's for you." When Marco lifted his head to look at her, it revealed that his eyes were wild, his pupils dilated. "It's always been about you."