It wasn't working. Lucas stood at the edge of the cavernous ledge and looked down, felt his stomach crawl, and turned away. "There's no point in going after it," he said, "it'll be long gone into its own dimension by now. And I'm just too exhausted to follow it right now."
Iris looked at her mentor with her eyes wide, "we can't just give up, Lucas!"
"I can," he replied tiredly. "For the moment at least. I know where it is, I know what might meet us there, and right now, I am not going to follow it."
Audeo put her red-skinned hand on his elbow. She still looked rather young, but had blossomed into a beautiful young woman appearing perhaps in her late teens. "We will go home," she said.
"But -" Iris started, but Mistylia interrupted her.
"He is tired, my friend. We will pick this up again when he is ready." The spirit dragoness glanced at the dark haired man and his Avengaean partner, "you need a break. And we can prepare further, in the mean time, right Iris?"
She nodded, and turned to see Lucas whispering something to Audeo. The fire dragoness kissed him on the cheek, and then shifted into her full sized draconic form. With some obvious exhaustion, Lucas rose to her neck and held on as they lept into the air. It was up to Iris this time, to provide the portal back to their home - he was too drained to do it himself.
***
Their homecoming was quiet, though it should have been triumphant. Zora rushed up with a big smile on her face, but it was clear that they had failed in the quest to retrieve Lucas' soul - every part of the returning group said so. Zora wisely decided that announcing their return would wait until Lucas asked her to do so. Instead of asking him about anything, she went to Iris and got the story from her.
Souls of lesser beings, mortal humans, were typically devoured, not bartered. But Lucas' soul had been sold off more than once to demonic bidders in a bizarre kind of auction. Sold to a demon of such greed that it would be difficult at best to even approach him, let alone defeat him or try to reason him out of the trinket. He had to have 'one of everything' or some such desire.
Their trail went cold however, when Lucas learned that the piece of his soul had been sundered into two parts. Magic like that was usually done by the person whose soul it was - not by its 'owner'. Yet, there it was. More proof to Lucas anyway that this idea of getting it back was growing worse by the day. They had been gone for seven weeks, trailing after imps and curriers, higher demons and devils. They only knew for certain the location of one piece, not both.
Shattered, like his soul, Lucas decided they would return and try later. Iris seemed miffed, angry, righteously so. But Zora mulled this over.
"Give him some time, time to recover. He needs some good in his life to counteract the bad. He needs to play," she said. Iris scoffed but Zora said, "It took him decades to work the courage up to train you - someone who could help him. It will take time. Forcing him to go after it is almost as bad as having his soul stolen, dragging him along for a ride. Let him be, he'll be all right soon enough."
***
Though he'd maintained a brave face with Iris and Mistylia nearby, Lucas broke down in huge wracking sobs when alone with Audeo. She held him, cradled his head and cooed at him softly.
"It was right there," he hissed, coughing out a laugh. "So close."
"Guarded by two demons I've never seen the likes of," Audeo reminded him. "No sense in getting everyone killed, we know where to go now."
He was about to say something, something bitter, but Audeo added, "nothing is ever as sure as we want it to be, love. Nor as easy. We will have to go back with more strength on our side."
"Recruiting others?" Lucas said, trying to regain some composure. He pushed his fingers through his messed hair, "but who?"
"Well there are your other-selves," she said, rolling her eyes. "There are enough of those to choke the biggest demon out there, I think."
"But I don't want to risk them," Lucas whispered.
"They know your situation, my love," Audeo said, snuggling up to him and closing her eyes. "They don't judge you by it. Why every time someone even mentions something like this to that Cynonix fellow he practically leaps from his fur."
"He is a bit... jumpy," Lucas said, letting a hoarse chuckle out. "And ... now that Crazy Doc has impressed, perhaps."
"That's it. But not right now. Right now," Audeo announced, "it is bath time. You are filthy."
Lucas' shoulders dropped, and he adopted a silly puppydog look, "well I've been dragged through six layers of hell, you get a little dirty doing that..."
***
Before they announced their return, at least Lucas and Audeo's for Iris refused to hide herself at House Domina, the pair took their leave again. It was for the best: Audeo had decided now was the time to begin her own quest for mates, offspring, love. But it was also time for Lucas to admit some things... To Iris.
And for her to admit that she had fallen for him long ago. Audeo was ready for them to just 'boink' and be done, but she had another tactic in mind. She plotted for a day or so with Mistylia, and then they sprung this new quest on the pair of humans.
Hardly a quest - really, more like a spot to find where they could allow her to drop her eggs. It would be far too much of a distraction for both of them to do it at House Domina, so they went looking.
"It would be good," Audeo said to the surprised paladin and her charge, "to get this out of your systems." She smiled broadly. "I want to get it out of mine too. You both drive me mad with it."
Lucas ducked his head and pulled his hair back, while Iris blushed something fierce. Eventually, with a heated (and probably comical) conversation with her dragon, they agreed to go along with this plan.
It turned out that there was, not coincidentally, such an event waiting for them to attend. It was Audeo who read the invitation to Fa's little shindig and decided that would be perfect. Her island in the tropics of ... wherever it was, is where Audeo, Mistylia, Iris and Lucas went.
Mistylia wasn't going to be flying, this kind of thing wasn't really her style. She was in fact reserving herself for exactly the right partner. If she found a permanent mate, though... that might get sticky for everyone. However this place wasn't where she needed to worry about that! Maybe she might ... find someone to play around with though. There would be plenty of dragon riders around! And they were here to relax and have fun...
There were tents down by the beach, and Mystylia settled onto a shady spot near them. Iris chose one, brought some drinks and drew up a chair to watch the sun set. Audeo and Lucas - both in their dragon forms for the time being - chased each other around until they were both exhausted.
Thus began their first day of many like it, relaxing and fooling around... It was very likely that Lucas would pair up with both females, and very likely that he'd be looking at whoever else was at the place. Iris worried: what if she did ... well, become pregnant? Fa assured them there would be more than adequate resources to take care of everything. She did seem a bit put off by the weird woman's insistance that they remain, should that happen... But what might happen would probably shock her anyway.
Twins did run in the Sangers, after all...
