by Maribel Fox
Well, no, not all of them. Near the end of the hallway, one of the cells is occupied. A lovely little succubus curled up on her cot, sleeping fitfully. I stand there transfixed, recognizing her from my first day here.
Valephar must have explained something about her, but when she was suspended in the magical cloud of pink sparkles, I didn’t notice how soft her skin is, how glossy her hair is. Even though she’s a prisoner — and her face is scrunched into a snarl in her sleep — she looks like a high-born lady. There’s an aristocratic look to her, even if I know Demons don’t have that kind of status.
There’s a hiss that doesn’t come from her cell, and I jump at the sound, turning to spot another prisoner in the cell next to hers, pressing himself to the bars. He’s cloaked in shadows, and his hair is dark enough that between the two, he’s just a shape, and I can’t make out much.
Enough to see what he’s doing when he tilts his head back and slowly slides his finger across his throat with a growl.
I swallow and back out of there, leaving that hallway and closing the door tight behind me. I press my back to the door and take a deep breath, trying to steady myself, more unnerved than I care to admit. I don’t know what it was about that guy, but trying to look at him was…
Well it was a lot like trying to look up in Hell. There’s nothing physically stopping you, but doing it leaves you with this uneasy feeling, an unsettling, sickening, dreadful feeling that you just know will go away the instant you avert your eyes. I shudder even from the other side of the door. What kind of power does that?
It’s the most interesting thing to happen to me since the promotion, but the next morning I’m in for one better. There’s a guy waiting for me at my post — I’ve seen him before, sometimes he works the shift after me, I think — and he’s smiling wide as I approach. Not knowing why someone’s looking as happy as he’s looking always makes me suspicious.
“You ready Maalik?” he asks, speaking to me informally like we’re friends. I don’t even know his name. I probably should, but I didn’t bother to learn anyone’s name other than Valephar. He’s the boss, it seems important, but everyone else? I don’t expect to be here too long before they realize they made some kind of mistake promoting me.
“Always ready,” I say, chuckling along, wishing I had the first fucking clue what I’m supposed to be ready for. I expect I should. This is probably something I missed in orientation during that crazy headache. I still get those, and they’re still awful when they happen here, but I’m not real sure where to even start figuring out how to make it stop. Short of quitting my job, that is. Which, let’s be honest, I’d love to do, but doing it without having a back-up plan seems… stupid. Not just irresponsible, but outright dumb.
I might be lazy, unmotivated, and content with mediocrity, but I am not dumb.
“That’s the spirit!” he says cheerfully, opening the door I went through for the first time yesterday. I shudder at the memory of what I know is back here. I know it’s a prison, and these people are behind bars for a reason, but part of me can’t help but feel kinda bad for them when they’re back here all alone.
“All right, go ahead and strip,” the guy says.
“Uh… That’s… necessary, I suppose,” I say, almost a question but not quite, trying my damnedest to feel this out without giving away how few shits I’ve been giving about this job.
“I mean, depends on how you do it, know what I’m sayin’? But yeah, she likes it that way. Means you’re not hiding any weapons or anything.”
“Makes sense,” I mutter, thinking about who ‘she’ might be as I strip down, concern slowly building. Just what exactly am I getting into here?
“Kay, and hands behind your back,” he says calmly, like this is all routine. As alarming as this is getting, admitting I don’t know what’s happening still seems like the worse option. He slips a pair of leather cuffs around my wrists, securing them firmly, and at this point, I’m thoroughly drifting toward panic.
The fuck is happening to me right now?
Was this all some kind of elaborate ruse to imprison me? For what?
I’m trying to keep cool, to not panic, to not start sweating. This guy doesn’t seem like he’s tickled to have ‘got me,’ it just seems like this is part of the plan.
“Oh, yeah, that too,” he say, gesturing at the necklace that’s my badge, door key, and Demon-control all in one — not all the prisoners are Demons, but for the ones that are, it’s a handy tool. “She’s very particular,” he sighs, rolling his eyes like he thinks the whole thing is more than a little ridiculous.
It seems like all the opening I’m going to get if I want to figure this out before it’s actually happening to me.
“Is she now? So these are just her… requirements?” Who is she? Why does she get requirements, and what is happening to me in relation to those two things?
He sighs again, more exasperated this time.
“Yeah. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like we cater to her every whim or anything, but she was threatening to starve herself to death, and we can’t have that. She’s too important to what we’re doing here. Honestly, it’s kind of impressive a succubus even has the strength of will to do that, but she showed us. Gave an impressive demonstration. We almost lost her. So now, unfortunately for you, I’m afraid, we honor the deal: food is sent in cuffed and completely unarmed, and in return, she promises not to kill the food herself.”
Uh…
Wait a minute…
“Kill the…”
“Oh, yeah, I wouldn’t worry about that if I were you,” he says dismissively. “She has remarkable self-control, especially with such infrequent feedings.”
“How often…?”
“Once a month or so,” he says, mistaking my stricken look for one of concern for her appetite. “The goal is to keep her alive, not healthy. We can’t have her strong enough to escape — you don’t want to know the kind of havoc she can wreak, believe me.”
“You’re probably right,” I mutter, connecting all the dots in my head as he leads me down the same hallway I walked down yesterday, past the same empty cells, stopping in front of the woman’s. She’s lounging on her bunk, in hardly more than rags herself, but it’s a lot more than nothing.
Hellions aren’t much for modesty on the whole, but in a situation as weird as this one, I’m not feeling great about having my hands trapped behind my back and my junk fully exposed.
And even though I’ve got a pretty good idea, I’m still not one hundred percent positive about what’s about to happen to me. I’m nervous and curious, and kind of excited too — nothing interesting ever happens to me, and she’s a very attractive lady. She looks up, raises her eyebrows, and her lips twitch up at one corner.
“Fresh meat, eh?” she asks, sitting forward on the cot, the rag dress she’s wearing dipping low enough to show off the shadow over her cleavage, the swell of her breasts clear through the thin fabric.
Damn it, now I’m getting hard.
And she sees it. I’m sure she does. She’s looking at the guard behind me, but the twitch in her lips happens again, more obvious this time.
“Your last donor was getting a little too attached,” the guard says. What exactly is it I’m ‘donating’ here?
“Well, are you going to send him in?” she asks, getting up from the cot to saunter over, her hips swaying, every step lifting the fabric of her dress up her thigh just a bit, drawing my eyes right to the hem, hoping it’ll go higher though it never does.
Finally, I manage to drag my eyes away from her sculpted thighs, and I clear my throat, trying to get a handle on myself.
“Uh… Pardon, but um… What exactly is the uh… the protocol here?” I ask, painfully aware of my growing erection and everyone’s awareness of it.
She gives me a skeptical look. “You did get the briefing, didn’t you?”
“He did,” the guard says.
“Uh…” Is it so wrong that I’d just like someone to spe
ll it out for me?
“I’m a succubus,” she says. “I need to eat.”
“Mhm… I got that, but…”
“Ay cabrón, she’s going to fuck your brains out, you lucky idiota,” says the guy in the other cell — the same one that threatened me yesterday.
Before I even have a chance to process that, the door to her cell is being yanked open, I’m shoved inside, stumbling to keep my balance without the use of my arms, and then we’re locked in here together.
She advances like a predator stalking prey — exactly what she is — and shoves me on the cot forcefully. I wince, lightning shooting up my arms as I land on my cuffed wrists awkwardly. The woman frowns, looking at me for a moment with a contemplative look.
“Would you rather be more comfortable?” she asks.
“Uh… sure?” I answer, not sure if it’s a trick of some kind. None of this is making a whole lot of sense to me, but I’m trying my best to just go along with it because interesting is what I’ve always hoped for and interesting is what I’m fucking getting.
“Okay,” she says, biting her lip, debating with herself. “I’m going to undo your cuffs, but you’re not to touch me, do you understand? This collar might dull my powers, but it doesn’t stop me from being able to kill you with my bare hands if I wish to.”
“Damn girl, you show him who’s boss,” comes the comment from the neighboring cell.
I’d be more embarrassed if I wasn’t insanely turned on by her bossiness. And there’s no hiding it with her straddling me on this cot, me naked and painfully, obviously hard.
“You have my word,” I say, despite my fingers already itching to slide beneath that dress and feel the warmth of her skin under my touch.
She nods, then unfastens the cuffs where they’re joined together. Before I’m able to enjoy my freedom, she’s attached them to opposite sides of the mattress, and I realize I was wrong about this arrangement after all, more helpless than before.
Straddling my lap, her perfect body poised over mine, she’s not making another move. Her eyes are a warm golden caramel, and she’s searching mine for… something.
“You didn’t realize any of this was going to happen, did you?”
“No,” I answer truthfully.
She closes her eyes tight, pulling herself back from me with a shaky breath. To my look of confusion, she shakes her head.
“I might be hungry, but I’m not a rapist. You didn’t agree to this. Not really.”
It’s a surprisingly thoughtful sentiment coming from a succubus, and if I wasn’t already so turned on and into her, I’d probably be lost after that. I’m a sap, I’ll admit it.
“While I appreciate you being so considerate, and I can honestly say this is weird as fuck and not at all what I expected when I came into work today…” Surprisingly, that line gets the tiniest of laughs from her. Just a soft little exhalation of amusement, but shit if it doesn’t ignite something in me. “Well… I don’t mind,” I finish. Too bad I never cared about studying poetry or any of that other bullshit. Maybe if I had I’d be able to come up with some better words for her right now.
“Are you certain?” she asks, head tilted to one side, a cascade of ebony silk falling over her shoulder. Her eyes draw me in, hold me prisoner far more than the shackles on the bed.
“Yeah,” I answer. “I’m Maal, by the way.”
“Lili,” she says after a beat.
“Pleasure to meet you, Lili.”
She makes a face, her nose scrunching, and I snort. That gets another tiny, almost non-existent laugh out of her.
“I’d say the pleasure’s all mine, but…” she says, taking a step toward me, then hesitating at the edge of the bed. At the last minute, she drags her dress up, over her head, tossing it aside, giving me complete and total view of her incredible curves. I can’t touch her, I can’t taste her, but at least I can look at her. It’s something.
After one taste of Lili, I already know why her other guards got too attached, too addicted to her. With her, once will never be enough.
10
Ku
Though days have passed since I arrived in Lupine Bay — even since the werewolf left on some ill-fated quest to Hell — I’m no closer to discovering anything about the headaches I’ve been experiencing, the nightmares that come with them, or the woman I see in those dreams.
And there’s something else: Iseul. There is something strange and intriguing about his magic. Curious. It’s obvious that he’s some sort of shifter, but there was something else I detected, something that was too hard for me to pick up with everyone else around.
It doesn’t help that my headaches have been worse than ever since I’ve been in town. I’m sure I have to be close to the source of what’s causing them, perhaps the woman is being held nearby? Captive somewhere in town? The puzzle is maddening, and I don’t have any of the pieces necessary to solve it.
While I’m not getting any closer to figuring out what’s going on with me, I might be able to figure out what Iseul’s story is. I can’t resist a curiosity, and a hybrid creature is always that. Very frequently one of a kind. I know Iseul is staying at Brigid’s, but he’s been scarce during the days, which leads me to naturally wonder where he’s slipping off to.
Raj — the Devil that’s frequently occupying the front desk — looks up from the device in front of him when I enter the room. My handle on modern technology is shaky, and seeing the bright light reflecting in his eyes seems like magic to me. Of course magic would be less startling.
“Something I can help you with?” he asks, folding the thing in half, the light disappearing.
“Perhaps. I was hoping to have a chat with Iseul, one of your other guests?”
“Mm,” he grunts.
“You wouldn’t happen to know where I could find him, would you?”
“’Fraid not,” he says, not looking too remorseful.
“He’s at work,” I hear from the living room beyond. It’s the boy — Ian, who I’ve learned is the queen’s younger brother — and he’s lingering by the doorway, clearly eavesdropping on our conversation. “At the diner,” he says, oblivious to the sharp look the Devil sends him.
Why the secrecy?
Maybe it’s just bad for business to share the whereabouts of your guests with anyone.
“Thank you Ian,” I say with a half-bow that makes him snicker before he returns it sloppily. I bid them both farewell before going on my way down the hill into the town proper where Foxglove Alley winds down along the shoreline of the bay. On one side of that street, there’s a tiny yellow building, windows all around. It would’ve been a lavish display of wealth before, all that glass, but in this new time, this new world, things are different.
A small bell chimes as I push the door — it instructed me to do so — and head into the warmth of the restaurant. Outside it’s another chilly, gray day, the sun a distant memory this late into the year. Days are short, and cloud cover plentiful. It’s the kind of weather that makes a dragon want to den down and hibernate for a few years.
Napping will have to wait. I wouldn’t be able to sleep properly with this persistent ache in my head anyway.
“Heeeey, Ku!” Iseul calls from his place behind a flat cooktop. There are a few other customers in the restaurant, but it isn’t too busy from the looks of how much dancing and flipping his utensils Iseul is doing. “Come over here, sit by me,” he says, grinning like we’re old friends even though we’ve only met once. I’m surprised he remembers my name.
As I’m taking a seat, he’s already putting a glass of water in front of me, a one-man show it looks like.
“You hungry? What am I saying? Of course you are, that’s why you’re here, right?” He laughs, and I try to laugh with him, not sure why it’s funny.
“Actually…” Now that I’m closer to him and there’s less interference, I’m able to get a better picture of his strange magical mixture. Not just shifter, but… dragon?
“You’re right
, I am hungry. What do you recommend?” I ask, mind whirling. A dragon? But also… not. Not fully. Not yet.
What is he?
“With me back here? Anything on the menu buddy,” he says, grinning still, not a care in the world.
But something brought him here, brought him to seek audience with the local court, and it’s not this job — no matter how much he seems to enjoy it. Iseul might be able to act like there’s nothing wrong in his life, but evidence suggests otherwise.
“I trust you then, surprise me,” I say, the thought of looking at the tome-like menu daunting at the moment. I will study it more thoroughly later. I’ve got enough on my mind without a thousand options for food. People in this time are obsessed with choices. I find it overwhelming sometimes.
Iseul gets to work at the grill, all the while serving other customers, keeping up friendly banter with them. I watch him closely, assessing his movements — fox, I think — and there’s something tugging at the back of my mind. Some story I feel I read long ago.
“Yo, my birthday’s in a couple of days, and that cook at The Shamrock said he’d make me a big fancy meal to celebrate. You should join us.”
My brow goes up, a lump forming in my throat. It’s surprising, is all. To be invited to his birthday party like we’re friends.
Are we friends?
I’m not sure I’ve ever had a friend.
I’ll have to ponder it.
“I would be delighted to join you for the festivities, provided I’m still in town. If all goes according to plan, I won’t be here long, though.”
Iseul frowns over his shoulder at me. “How come?”
“I’m looking for someone. Once I find her…”
His frown deepens, and he flips an egg off the griddle, narrowly catching it on his spatula. “Her? Who you looking for? Maybe she’s come through.”
“I doubt it,” I say, sighing, shaking my head as I lean my elbows on the slightly sticky counter top in front of me. I probably shouldn’t even tell him. It sounds insane, even for a magical creature like a dragon — even a shifter-dragon hybrid, or whatever he is — to be following the call of someone from a dream.