“I would really like it if you would come and watch, Mom.”

Not wanting to encourage Alex in his pipe-dream, Rachel opened her mouth to give a polite refusal. Then she paused.

~What harm can it do?~ The thought crossed her mind suddenly. ~Look at the poor kid. How many times have you hurt him because you were too damn stubborn to give in? He isn't the only one who has been a mule-headed pain in the ass. How long will you keep trying to shove a round peg into a square hole?~

“I would love to," she said instead. Across the table, Sarah dropped her fork and stared at her in amazement. "Just give me a couple days’ notice so I can be sure I leave work on time to drive over to COD."

Alex nodded, his eyes happily stunned.

“I will."

Rachel picked up her wine glass and took a sip.

“So, tell me more about this play."

Later that evening, Rachel walked upstairs to her bedroom. She had spent a good part of the evening in her home office, going over the case while the kids watched TV.

She felt...good, she decided. Her home had been in a state of cold war for so long that any easing of the tension was welcome.

Was that all it needed, she thought. For me to show Alex I cared? Look how happy that made him. I still think he should buckle down and actually try in his classes, but if I can make my son happy, I should.

God knows nothing else has worked. If we don't mend fences, he is going to leave once he get his degree from COD. He might take off for New

York or LA, and I would barely ever see him. Although there are a Lot of theaters downtown. The Goodman, Second City...maybe I should mention that to him sometime soon.

Meanwhile, in the depths of Rachel's mind, Althea, daughter of Lilith, first among the succubi, hid in shame. If she had had a body, it would be shaking with terror and rage.

How had she come to such an indignity? Pulled out of her own magnificent body through sheer carelessness, forced to join with a puerile youth whose very soul was a foul sewer, and then, in desperation, made to abandon that dying vessel in order to take shelter in the mind of a woman who seemed all but sexless. She fumed as she considered her situation. Right now she had less strength than a newly-hatched imp. It would be weeks before she could even think about reclaiming her old body.

~How could I let this happen? Just because no one had attacked me in centuries did not mean the old knowledge was lost! Lilith's Tits,

Althea, you are supposed to be smarter than this! Why did you stop warding yourself?~

The first step, she decided, was to begin to regain her power. Her reserves were terrifyingly low. The madness of the evening, with transfers of her consciousness to two separate humans, had drained her to the point where she was on the edge of dissolution, barely able to make her voice heard to her host. Without the pleasures of the flesh her previous form had made so readily available, she was now wholly dependent on Rachel.

And Rachel, she thought, was not the most promising of vessels. Even her sins were cold and bloodless, without heat or passion. They were the quiet coups of the courtroom; the polite wars of motions and lawsuits. No blistering anger of Rage; no insatiable hunger of

Gluttony; no seductive poison of Envy.