Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
It's dusk when she pushes the heavy door open.
The air inside is cold and stale. Dust sits in the light spilling through the stained-glass windows. Cobwebs hang all over. A broken angel leans sideways against the wall. Spike's coat is tossed carelessly over a sarcophagus, a blood bag sits half-drunk beside a chipped mug. There's no bed yet, just old stone and a questionable blanket.
Lilith stands in the doorway for a moment, arms crossed. "So this is the crypt of a legend."
Spike is lounging on a slab, smoking a cigarette. He doesn't instantly glance towards her. "Wasn't expecting housewarming gifts."
She walks in like she owns the place, sidesteps a pile of dirt and ancient bones. She kneels beside his record collection—two cracked cases, some stolen vinyl. "You've got Bowie. Color me shocked."
"Dead men have taste too, pet."
She smirks but doesn't respond. Instead, she drags her fingers across the top of the coffin-turned-table, leaving lines in the dust. "You could clean. Just a thought."
"I could. But then who would I be disappointing?"
She sits on the sarcophagus across from him, legs swinging slightly, like she's forgotten how old she is. "Didn't peg you for a crypt guy."
"Didn't peg you for a dorm girl."
She smiles, unexpectedly genuine. "Tara keeps herbs on her windowsill. Smells like sage and safety. Drives me mental."
Before she leaves, she pulls something from her coat pocket and tosses it to him. A clean, unused pack of cigarettes. His type. "You were out."
She doesn't stay, but she leaves the door ajar on her way out.
☀︎
Lilith returns to campus. She's skipped her first two lectures of the day. Who let her pick an 8.00 am? She now knows why there'd been so few enrolled students for it. The other lecture she skipped is an 11.00 am which she didn't go to because she finds the lecturer insufferable. Now there's only her 4.00 pm lecture left, which she happens to like.
She's just gotta make a pit stop at her dorm and pick up her notebook, which might be mildly cursed. It stains the pads of the fingers with ink of anyone who dares open it behind her back. It's harmless but it lasts a week so it ends up being mildly annoying.
She doesn't know if she'll run into her roommate. Her witch roommate.
She has since learned Tara is a witch, just like Tara has learned Lilith is a demon.
☀︎
Lilith finds the first clue of it on the dorm door.
A tiny hand-drawn sigil on the back of a sticky note, half-hidden beneath a DO NOT DISTURB sign. It's harmless and sloppy but old magic nonetheless. Not the kind you learn from a Wicca club pamphlet.
