These details had disturbed him later when he’d been himself. His affinity had craved touch so greatly, he hadn’t wanted to stop. It had overruled his rational mind. He’d been compelled to finish, the incubus in him leaving him a senseless beast.
Afterward, he’d felt guilty. Even when he’d changed back into being a cat, he hadn’t wanted to act like an animal again. He didn’t want to be the kind of person who would fornicate with a woman he didn’t know or like.
All he’d ever wanted was to be with Abigail. He’d wanted their first time together to be special. Instead, she’d been transformed into a cat in heat to try to bring out his affinity. He couldn’t be tender or affectionate or show her how much he loved her in his feline form. She saw the side of him that was a base animal, not who he wanted to be.
If they had succeeded in turning him back into a man this way through animal sex magic, he was certain he would have felt even worse. Yet if they did succeed, at least he would be able to express himself with words and future deeds to demonstrate how much he cared about her.
He resented it even more that he would have to be this base animal and mate with Vega again if he was going to succeed in returning to his former self. All this was rattling around inside him, and he couldn’t even talk about it.
Abigail crouched beside the bed, one hand extended to him in invitation. “You aren’t ready to think about this right now. It’s overwhelming. I understand.” She beckoned to him. “We can talk about this again another time. All right?”
Reluctantly he came out of hiding. She picked him up and hugged him to her chest. He nuzzled against her neck, inhaling her fragrance of homemade cookies and herbs from the garden.
She kissed the top of his head. “I love you.”
Hearing her say those words filled him with even more anguish. He wanted to be human again so that he could be with her. If Vega was correct, he wouldn’t ever be himself again if he didn’t overcome his curse soon, but he needed to feel like he wasn’t trading his soul to the devil in the process.
That meant he was going to need to find another way.
CHAPTER FIVE
Deals with Devils—and Witchkin
Lucifer did as Vega advised. He saved up his magic. Each time he mated with a female cat, he kept that magic in his core where he could store it and it wouldn’t escape to damage wards—not that he mated in Abigail’s yard. He went as far away as possible for that. With each occasion that he sat on Abigail’s lap and snuggled up to her, he saved that soothing touch. He stored the frolicking frenzy brought on by catnip and the thrill of the hunt.
Vega didn’t return at the full moon to transform Abigail as she had previously. He was half-relieved. He didn’t want Abigail to endanger herself, and he didn’t want to damage the wards around the house. Her safety was more important than breaking his curse.
For her part, Abigail was mindful while gardening, not allowing the sliver of returning magic to influence the plants around her. She had been granted a rare gift for her magic to return, even if it was through his influence. It was important she continued to be careful with it.
While abstaining from each other’s company in mutual feline form, the visitations of ravens became less frequent. He had stopped drawing out Abigail’s close-to-dormant powers with passive magic he had no control over, even as he stored more active magic to be used later.
He still hadn’t decided whether he was willing to use incubus magic, or more precisely whether he would mate with Vega as a cat, and she might channel his magic. Every time he thought about it, anxiousness crept under his skin, and he had uncontrollable urges to rake his claws against something soft. He tried to confine his bouts of clawing to the garden beds, grass, the doormat, and the neighbor’s dog that he didn’t like anyway.
Some days he was fine, and then other days he would spot a raven—or even a crow—and he couldn’t sit still. He paced continually and jumped at the sight of his own shadow.
Something was going to have to change, or he would go crazy.
* * *
Abigail’s daughter visited during winter vacation, bringing some of her wayward students who didn’t have families of their own to join for the holidays. The presence of people irritated Lucifer. He resisted the urge to claw people’s faces. Instead he focused his energies on stalking small prey in the snow.
He tolerated their petting, but only because it would help him store more touch magic.
The day Felix showed up on Christmas Eve for dinner, Lucifer shredded his brother’s tweed jacket after he draped it over a chair and left it unattended. Lucifer meant it as a special gift for him to find later.
Even with that accomplished, the deed proved unsatisfying, and Lucifer yearned for an excuse to do something worse.
Felix was tall and lean, a man who resembled a shadow in his gray suit. His hair was as black as midnight, and his stormy eyes probably resembled Lucifer’s own when he had been a human. He held himself stiffly, and everything about him exuded stuffiness. Even his shoulder-length hair was immaculately styled with rakish care. When Abigail had taken Lucifer with her to Womby’s School for Wayward Witches to visit Clarissa, he had known exactly who Felix was the moment he’d laid eyes on him.
As Felix sat down to eat, he said in his overly posh British accent, “My, this feast looks delicious. I hope you didn’t overtax yourself making all of this.”
Lucifer scrunched up his nose. He hoped he didn’t sound as snobby as his brother when he spoke—when he had spoken years ago.
The gentle murmur of Abigail speaking to one of the female students was interrupted by Felix’s grating voice again. “This is the most splendid stuffing I’ve ever had the pleasure of enjoying.”
Abigail beamed at him, obviously ensnared by his compliments. She was almost as bad as Clarissa, who was batting her eyelashes at Felix even though he had to be old enough to be her grandfather. Felix might have appeared young enough to be an extremely older brother to Clarissa, but Lucifer knew how old he really was.
Lucifer couldn’t stand listening to his brother’s simpering tone. He could clearly see what he was doing, trying to get himself in Abigail’s good graces by complimenting her. She was too intelligent to fall for that.
When he heard Abigail giggle and saw her blush, he knew he had to put a stop to his brother’s philandering ways. They were sons of a succubus after all. He wouldn’t allow Felix to use those tricks on Abigail.
Lucifer attacked Felix’s loose shoelace under the table. It brought him some measure of satisfaction when his brother flinched under the attentions of his claws and banged his knee on the table. Felix scooted back in his chair. Lucifer held on to the shoelace with his teeth even as Felix tried to jerk his foot away.
Clarissa peered underneath the table. “What is that cat doing now?”
The teenage girls at the table stared at him. Abigail rushed forward.
“I’m so sorry about this,” Abigail said, lifting Lucifer into her arms. “He isn’t always like this. It’s just overwhelming for him to have so many people over. It gives him anxiety.”
She dropped him outside without even consulting him or asking if that was what he wanted. She treated him like a common animal.
And could he blame her? He was misbehaving like a common animal.
Lucifer sat outside, watching Abigail entertain her guests through the window, feeling like an outsider. His heart felt as though it were breaking.
He felt more alone than he ever had—more so than when he’d first been turned into a cat. The raw, gnawing sensation in the pit of his stomach reminded him of the time his brother had abandoned him.
That was what Abigail had done to him. She’d thrown him out into the cold and left him. Probably she had given up on him as being anything more than a dumb beast.
A raven perched in the naked limbs of a tree, watching the family eat. This one was smart enough that she remained in the tree instead of landing on the
ground where he could strike.
He knew she was a raven from the shape of her tail feathers as she flew and the growling croak she made that differed from what a crow sounded like. Apparently she had broken through Vega Bloodmire’s wards.
When Felix left late that evening, Lucifer prowled after him. He hissed when he saw that his brother had magically repaired his tweed jacket. No wonder that raven had broken through the wards.
Wasn’t that just like Felix to use magic and attract the attention of the Raven Court? He’d put Abigail and everyone else in danger.
Felix stopped halfway to the oak tree where he usually stood to transport himself to the Unseen Realm without Abigail’s neighbors seeing. He turned, his eyes scanning the shadows under a shrub where Lucifer had hunkered down. “You’ve made it known that you dislike me. Now I’m leaving. You will be the man of the house again without me in your territory.”
Lucifer snorted at the way his brother said it, as if he was being generous by allowing Lucifer back into his space. He wondered whether Felix suspected they were related. Probably not.
Felix kept walking. He raised his hand, and the raven in the tree flapped lower, landing on his sleeve.
Lucifer yowled. His rotten, devious brother was working with the Raven Queen? Probably as her spy. That had been the rumor Abigail had heard years ago. He didn’t know why she permitted her daughter to acquaint herself with such a scoundrel.
Felix reached into his pocket and fed something to the raven. “Did you see anything of interest, Priscilla? Any spies or Fae?”
Lucifer flinched back when Felix spoke that name. Surely, he had misheard.
The bird cocked her head at Lucifer. Felix continued walking. He transformed himself and his bird into black mist and disappeared. The magic tasted of lavender and starlight. The scent of dusty books and oil paints lingered in the air. Lucifer continued staring in alarm at the spot where they’d been.
Priscilla was their little sister’s name. Was she a bird? In the service of the Raven Queen? He needed answers to this mystery.
CHAPTER SIX
A Little Birdie Told Me
It had been a long time since Lucifer volunteered to talk using the alphabet board, but the occasion warranted it. He nudged it out from under Abigail’s bed so that it was waiting for her when she emerged from the master bathroom to go to bed. She glanced over her shoulder at the open door. He was quite aware Clarissa might walk in at any minute.
She wrapped herself up in a cardigan and tucked the board under her arm as she snuck into the garage like a guilty child playing with a Ouija board. Lucifer followed.
She crouched on the frozen concrete of the floor behind her car, blocking them from view in case anyone was tempted to follow her into the frigid room. He noticed her shivering, and his instincts were to curl up in her lap and keep her warm, but his pride was still too wounded from being put outside to be the first to reach out and snuggle.
He sat tall and poised, attempting his best indifference to hide his hurt from earlier. He tapped the letters.
She wrote out his message and then spoke it out loud to make sure she got it right like she always did. “Do not trust Felix. He met raven outside. Clarissa in danger.”
Abigail set down the pen. “Lucy, that’s his familiar. Didn’t you see her when we visited Womby’s School? She was in a cage in his office.”
He tapped out his response. “Heard him say that was crow. This was raven.” Not that he’d believed Felix at the time. It was suspicious any man who had once been in the employment of the Raven Queen would happen to keep a raven as a familiar.
Abigail shivered in the cold and rubbed her hands up and down her pajama pants.
Lucifer tapped out what he’d observed. “He called raven Priscilla.”
Abigail nodded. “Yes, that sounds right. That’s the name I remember him calling her last year. It wasn’t a spy from the Raven Queen you saw him with. This was his familiar. I hope you didn’t attack her.”
Lucifer had told her long ago the names of his siblings, just as she had told him her brothers’ names. Perhaps she didn’t remember. It hurt to think she had forgotten something so important. On the other hand, he hadn’t spoken of his siblings in years, whereas she used to recount times with her brothers Emmet and Niall from her childhood. Her youthful memories had been so much happier than his. She’d once had a mother and father who loved her.
He pawed at the letters on the cardboard. “Priscilla my is sister.” Every error he made on the board highlighted his inability to focus. This hammered Vega’s warning into his brain, each blow a reminder that he was losing himself to this cat body.
Abigail chewed her lip. “Felix said the Raven Queen turned someone he knew into a bird to punish him. That was your sister she did that to? No wonder he felt so bad about it.”
She was completely missing the point. He smacked the cardboard with more force than necessary. “Felix is liar. They both work might for Raven Queen.”
She shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. I believe him.”
“I don’t.”
“He’s a good man. He cares about Clarissa.” She gazed into the distance, her eyes dreamy.
She continued to transcribe his message as he struck the board.
“He too old for her. He is lech. He could be her father.” Obviously Felix had bewitched Clarissa. As much of an airhead as she could be, certainly she had enough sense not to fall in love with an older man who was probably using her for his own gain.
Abigail threw down her pen and crossed her arms.
He sank his claws into the cardboard. “Do not let him in again. He danger to Clarissa and you.”
She sighed in exasperation. “How can you say that? He’s your brother. If you’d just let me tell him about your problem, he might be able to help you. He might know a spell that Vega doesn’t.”
He emphatically pawed out his message. “Don’t want his help. I don’t trust him.” Her reasoning was irrational. If Priscilla had been turned into a raven with a spell similar to the curse that had trapped Lucifer, Felix wouldn’t be able to cure him. If Felix knew how to undo it, he would have helped Priscilla by now—if she truly was trapped in that form.
Lucifer wasn’t sure it was for the best he hadn’t pounced and attacked her earlier.
“You’re being stubborn,” Abigail said.
“You’re be naive.” He struggled to retain his train of thought to spell out each word. Each strike of his paw quivered with hurt from earlier, how Abigail had chosen his brother over him at dinner. “He charm you. Sophisticate accent and flatter your cooking. He probly know you uneducated farmgirl with no magic. He take advantage of that.”
Abigail slammed the pen down, her cheeks flushing. Tears filled her eyes.
He could tell those words had hurt her. He’d struck her fear that she stood out as an easy mark because she’d once been a country girl. She’d worked so hard to lose her Gaelic accent and shake the image she’d once had of herself. And here he was, picking at that wound and causing it to bleed anew.
If he’d had a mouth, he would have apologized.
The door to the kitchen creaked open. “Mom, what are you doing out here? Sneaking cookies?” Clarissa poked her head through the doorway, her pink hair so bright it practically glowed in the dark.
Abigail didn’t move from where she sat out of sight behind her car. “I’m just wrapping something up.” Abigail closed her eyes. Speaking calmly looked like it was an effort.
“Like wrapping up a present that I’m not supposed to see?” There was a smile in her daughter’s voice. “Or wrapping up, as in finishing something up?”
“Yes,” Abigail said. “I’ll be going to bed in a minute. Don’t wait for me.”
“Okay.” The door creaked closed.
Lucifer wanted to slink under the car and hide from what he’d just said, but such a thing would be undignified of a cat. He sat taller and star
ed into the distance.
“I’m not a naive seventeen-year-old girl,” she said.
He spelled out the letters, but she didn’t write them down. “I don’t want him in house again. Promise me.” He didn’t look forward to his despicable brother crowding him out of his own house. He didn’t want Abigail choosing Felix over him.
She didn’t promise him.
Felix Thatch returned. And with him he brought a world of pain.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Pain in the Assistance
Felix and Clarissa were to return in mid-January.
Abigail’s tone was nearly as frosty as the layer of ice on the windowsill as she warned Lucifer ahead of time. “I won’t tolerate misbehaving while they’re here. If you attack him, I’m going to put you outside.”
He snorted and licked a paw by way of response.
Ever since Christmas, Abigail’s abundant well of smiles for him had dried up. He eyed the icicles hanging from the window and pointed with his nose, trying to appeal to her nurturing side.
Abigail crossed her arms. “I don’t care that it’s cold. If you act like a feral little beast, you can stay outside where wild things belong.”
A feral little beast? Was that how she saw him?
“And don’t even think about trying to attack Priscilla if he brings her with him. Do you understand?”
He turned away, not deigning to acknowledge her words. He wouldn’t attack his sister. Unless she deserved it.
Abigail continued to chastise him, even though he hadn’t done anything to warrant being punished.
He didn’t like it when she used that tone with him, scolding him like he was one of her children instead of her equal. If he’d had a voice, he would have told her so himself. He wouldn’t resort to using his claws to speak for him. She didn’t understand the danger she was in, and if he had to attack his enemy, he would.
Even if it meant a cold consequence.
On the other hand, if Lucifer attacked Felix, he would be thrown out of the house. That meant Abigail and Clarissa would be left alone with Felix, unable to fend for themselves if he used a sleep spell on them and called to his queen to steal them away.
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