Summary: Chloe deals with the social ramifications of the Vortex Club party, primarily by isolating herself. Unable to summon Rachel herself anymore, she looks to Trevor for outside help.

Chloe makes a deal, and everything begins to change.

Author's Note: If you'd like to see Succubus continue, please let me know via reviews. Because it's closer to an original work than most of my fan fiction, it requires a lot more effort - and quite honestly, I need the engagement to stay engaged with it myself.

I hope you enjoy Chapter 4: "Pride"

"So, Chloe. What brings you back here?"

"I don't know - my mom made me?"

Dr. Gum's office was comfortable but small, with dim lights and a curtain half-open in the corner of the room. The chair Chloe sat in was always her favorite thing about the room - it had and intricate floral pattern along the back and it was comfy as hell, almost putting her to sleep every time she leaned back into it. Dr. Gum herself sat opposite of her in a wooden chair that looked a hell of a lot less comfy, always leaning slightly forward, with her notepad resting on her crossed legs. She was kind of hot in that over-40s white butch way that Chloe deeply suspected she would become sometime in the next 30 years, and it was that resonance with a possible future self that led to them meeting for the soon after her dad died. It hadn't been on the clinic website, but Chloe had hardly been surprised to find out that Gum specialized in counseling for LGBTQ youth - the only such counselor in Tillamook county.

In any other situation, Chloe would probably enjoy being back here with Gum (her first name was Sydney, but Chloe had never gotten comfortable calling her that), but being dragged back here soiled all that.

"I see. And why did she do that?"

Chloe shrugged her shoulders and blew out slowly, as if to say, 'Hell if I know.'

When Gum only quirked her eyebrows in response, Chloe groaned quietly and said, "Well, she found out I was smoking weed, so that probably has something to do with it. She also didn't like me going to parties . . . or having friends, for that matter. Apparently you're supposed to make me stop fucking up."

"Am I now?" Gum asked, amused. "Smoking, going to parties, having friends - all sounds like pretty normal stuff for folks your age. Why do you think that all adds up to fucking up?"

"I mean, I don't," Chloe replied, taking the bait. When Gum only continued the questioning look, she sighed and sat forward.

"Look, okay. I made this new friend named Rachel a few months ago, and we've been doing a lot of stuff together. Skateboarding, smoking, partying, stuff like that. Mom thinks she got me into all of that and that she's ruining my life or something. Which is bullshit, by the way, because Rachel's been pretty consistently the best part of my life all summer, but she found out that I was doing magic and now she thinks Rachel is, I don't know, evil? or something?"

"You and Rachel have been doing magic?" Gum asked.

"Yeah," Chloe replied, "I mean, yeah, for like, fun. It's not like we're . . . summoning the devil or whatever."

"Yeah," Gum said, writing in her notebook. While she wrote, she asked, "So. Is Rachel your girlfriend?"

In literally any other setting, Chloe would have frozen up being asked that, but it felt like an inevitable question in this context.

"Nope," she said quickly, "we're just friends. She's queer too, though. I think. We haven't exactly spelled that out for each other, but we have both mentioned having sex with girls, so I think we're in the clear, anyhow."

Gum chuckled, "Yeah, that's pretty clear signaling coming from high schoolers. Oh. Is Rachel a high schooler?"

"She's 17," Chloe replied, sidestepping the fact that Rachel very much did not and had never attended school.

"Got it," Gum said, making a quick note before looking back up. "So, your mom is worried about Rachel getting you into drugs and partying. You're still going to Blackwell, correct?"

Chloe nodded, and Gum made another note.

"Tell me if I'm way off the mark," Gum said, "but it sounds like your mom might not want you hanging out with girls she reads as queer. Am I on the money, or . . .?"

"I don't . . . think so?" Chloe said with a shrug. "Like, my mom doesn't have the strongest gaydar. And as far as I can tell, she straight-up forgot me coming out to her as genderqueer and all that since she and David got married. She checks in with me about whether I have a boyfriend all the time. Rachel too - which is just kind of a weird subject."

Gum quirked her head, but before she could ask a question, Chloe clarified, "Um, Rachel doesn't want a boyfriend because she's a big slut. Not like, in a bad way - sluts are great, I'm a big fan of their work - I just don't think a relationship is really up her alley."

Gum snickered at Chloe's slut comments, but otherwise just took a moment to write. Then she said, "Well, okay. That is a fairly common way for parents to subtly check to see if you or your friends might be gay, but it's also just a fairly common thing for parents to do, so we probably don't need to read into it."

She glanced at her notes, then said, "Taking a quick step back, though, you said your mom forgot about you coming out to her?"

Chloe nodded. "Yeah. Uh, ever since David moved in - they got married by the way - she's been really hush-hush about stuff with me. She didn't like drugs but she was way more open with me about having sex and drinking and even talked to me about pronouns and maybe changing my name. Then, suddenly, he moves in, and poof, I have to be a good little girl or David will straighten me out." She laughed darkly and said, "Literally straighten me out. He threw away a bunch of PRIDE stuff I used to have in my room."

Gum let the pause hang for a moment, clearly choosing her words carefully. She asked, "When you say 'David will straighten you out', what do you mean?"

Chloe laughed again, nervously. She had looked up regulations on therapy for minors back when she had first started coming, and she knew admitting to ongoing abuse was a surefire way to break through confidentiality limitations. For a brief moment, she considered turning David's behavior into a laundry list, or trying to stuff her step father in the ground the only way she knew how to without a revolver and a shovel. But she was also damn sure she didn't want to deal with any of that - not right now, and probably not ever.

"Oh, you know," Chloe said with a noncommittal shrug, "He's just kind of an asshole. Likes to act like a dad."

Gum hesitated, then nodded, writing a little before flipping her notepad to the next page. She took a deep breath, then asked, "So. While we're already here, why don't you tell me what else is going on with you lately?"

Chloe blew out slowly again, deflating in her seat. "Well," she started, "school blows and I haven't seen my best friend in weeks, so things mostly suck all around right now."

"The school year just started, right?" Gum asked.

"Yep. And it's off to a spectacularly shitty start."

"How so?"

More laughing Chloe. Then, "Well, let's see. My teachers all already either know me or have heard of me and they're just full-on expecting me to be a fuck up, for starters. The campus just switched from a 4-year school to a seniors-only 2-year thing, neatly getting rid of basically everyone I was even kind of friends with younger or older than me. Samantha and Mikey are too young to attend and they're in the public school now, and Steph got into a four-year out of state. Oh, and the only 'friends' I have left have basically stopped talking to me since the start of the year. Except Rachel, who I'm not allowed to see anymore."

Gum's face pinched. "Your friends your age have stopped talking to you? Why?"

Chloe groaned in disgust. "Because . . . Rachel kind of beat up a friend of theirs at a party. Threw him into a wall."

Gum stared with wide eyes for a brief second before she dropped her face back into a neutral. "Why?" she asked.

"Because, uh . . ." Chloe took a slow breath, a bitter taste in her mouth. It took some effort to get the words to come out, and she was uncomfortably aware of the sound of her own voice as she said them: "Well. He raped me, I think. I'm pretty sure. I was . . . not sober at the time."

It was clear Gum was holding something back. Finally, she said simply, "That seems like a pretty good reason to beat someone up."

"Right?!" Chloe replied, relieved at the opportunity to pivot the conversation away from her victimization. "Like that seemed like a pretty solidly badass move to me, but literally everyone else seems to think that . . . uh. I don't. Actually . . . know what they think."

Gum's face was pulled into a strained grimace. "That's a shame," she said.

"It is," Chloe agreed.

Chloe sat down in the middle stall of the girls' bathroom one day the following week, considering her options and dreading virtually every outcome. She had gotten this idea from a book she read in middle school called Speak, but actually going through with it made her nervous. What was the worst possible outcome? That someone drew over it? That the school painted over it? That people wrote snide remarks? That it just sat there, utterly ignored, like the carvings in the plastic stall walls?

Finally, she sighed, pulled the sharpie out of her pocket, and crouched just behind the stall door.

Jordan Harris is a rapist.

What would a good outcome even be for doing this? Did she really think the stall was just going to get covered in messages from girls he'd assaulted? That there would be any repercussions? What sort of repercussions did she even want?

Chloe couldn't work up the nerve to sit in that stall again for weeks. It wasn't until Thanksgiving break had passed that she forgot about it and used the stall by accident.

None of her fears were actualized, and neither was her hope. There were only two messages.

Who?

and

I know. Are you okay? -T

The one thing Chloe hadn't expected was minimal engagement. But still, the second message . . . someone else at least knew.

Chloe pulled out her sharpie.

I'll be OK. I just wanted to warn people. -C

As the weeks until winter break quickly drew to a close, Chloe and T kept writing back and forth. No one obstructed them, and no one commented, either, like the two of them were whispering where no one else could hear at all.

I'm glad you're OK.
He raped me the summer before my freshmen year when I was drunk.
The police didn't do anything and his brother didn't believe me.
Does he still go to VC parties? -T

He was just here on a holiday, but it was a VC party.
I'm sorry about what happened to you, and fuck the cops. -C

I just hope we can warn some other people -T

Yeah.
And stop having VC parties at his house! -C

And it continued like that, until they had nothing left to say, and winter came. While they were gone, it was all scrubbed off as graffiti.

But let's take a few steps back. It was the Thursday before school let out for winter break, and Chloe got her first text from Trevor in months.

Trevor: heya chloe. i know everything was super complicated with rachel and she was some kind of monster from another dimension or something, but i was wondering why i havent seen her around recently.

At first, Chloe was set on not responding to this text - or any other text Trevor sent her - but the longer she thought about it, the more valuable she realized it would be to have Trevor on her side.

Chloe: You havent seen her around b/c my Mom found my summoning circle and had me destroy it.
I cant risk drawing another one, or afford it, really.
If youd really like to see rachel again tho, I can give you the instructions I used to summon her

Trevor: whoah, you like srsly used magic? like youre a witch?

Chloe: No I'm a summoner

Trevor: whats the difference

Chloe: nvm.
Chloe: Look, I'll send you the info. If you can buy the supplies and draw the summoning circle somewhere safe, I can summon Rachel to hang out again.
Chloe: my mom banned her from the house, tho

Trevor: b/c shes a demon?

Chloe: b/c she's a 'bad influence'

Trevor: oh lol
Trevor: but ok
Trevor: ill do it

Chloe: what's your e-mail? I'll send you some PDFs (with some minor edits - there's a rune you really dont want in the circle unless you want Rachel showing up in highly specific fetish gear)

Trevor: why wouldnt i want that?

Chloe: it lets demons from hell read your mind

Trevor: oh ok lol

Trevor and Chloe met up on the first Monday of winter break, having used most of their weekend getting ready (or getting high, in Chloe's case, which was effectively the same thing). He lived alone in a room with two beds, leaving Chloe deeply suspicious he also had a brother away at college. Laundry was piled out of the laundry basket and onto the floor, but he had clearly swept it all together before she came over. Similarly, all of the cords for his Xbox360 were wrapped up on themselves. Garbage and dishes alike sat all over the bed that was actually made; Chloe wanted to be grossed out, but really the only thing that kept her room from falling into the same look was how little she went out these days and how claustrophobic her room became if she didn't clean up the floor.

"Where're your folks?"

"My folks?" Trevor asked, snickering. He crossed the room straight to his laundry basket.

"Your parents, dumbass."

"Like, I know what 'folks' means, I just . . . never mind. They're out of town."

Trevor pulled the laundry basket aside and did his best to stack laundry on top of it - Chloe finally realized why when she saw a square a little more than a foot across had been cut into the carpet. He peeled that away as well, revealing the Sharpie'd conjuration circle underneath. She was impressed to find the symbols were done perfectly, and the circle as a whole was probably cleaner than hers had been after the first use. With five days of prep, he'd pulled off what it had taken her three months to set up - admittedly, with some guidance.

"So, I think I got everything," Trevor said, headed for the bottom drawer of his dresser. "Five black candles, chalk, all the herbs you asked for, measuring tape, ashes of a cremated person - also, by the way, I don't feel super comfortable using any more of my grandma's ashes, so if we could not do that in the future that'd be great - and, uh, lube. Is that seriously part of the ritual?"

"What?" Chloe asked, confused. Then, remembering the list she sent him, "Oh, fuck, yeah, no, the lube was practical."

"Oh, huh." Trevor laid everything out in baggies beside the ritual circle, then tossed the lube over to Chloe, who caught it and looked it over. 'Organic' proclaimed one label. 'All-natural' said another.

"Wait, so, did you fuck Rachel?" Trevor asked. She expected him to leer, but he just pulled out a set of instructions and started working while she sat down on his bed.

Chloe shrugged, but replied, "I mean, no. I wasn't trying to summon her specifically - at least, not at first. I was just trying to get laid. Didn't think I'd make a friend out of it."

"So, what. You'd summon her and she'd . . . have sex with other people?"

Chloe shrugged again. "I guess." She got what he was prodding at, but she didn't want to give him the benefit of a reaction. Yeah, I went and made friends with a sex demon I don't want to fuck. Expensive friendship.

"Huh," Trevor replied. Whatever bullshit he wanted to say, the fact that he was going through with this just proved that he wasn't really any different - sure, he'd had sex with Rachel the one time, but going through this effort wouldn't get him laid. Just being around Rachel felt . . . special. Maybe it was the emotion-reading, maybe it was something else. But they'd both come this far just to keep seeing her.

Several minutes passed while Chloe entertained herself on her phone, periodically checking on on Trevor to make sure he didn't fuck it up. The plan had been for her to supervise him, but quite honestly, he was managing just fine on his own with the right information.

"So, um. I'm sorry about that stuff I said about Victoria at that party however long ago. I didn't really know about any of this gender stuff or anything and just . . . sorry." It took Trevor a little bit after he started talking to look up, finding Chloe staring over her phone with her face glazed, unreadable.

Quite honestly, Chloe had forgotten everything about Victoria from that night other than that specific interaction. Even the mention of her name brought back the rest in an instant, and fresh anger bubbled just underneath the surface. How thankful she'd felt for Jordan's intervention on Trevor's attempt at guy-talk disgusted her to no end.

Trevor's transphobia wasn't really what she wanted an apology for, nor was she really the one who needed that apology. But some part of her felt a glimmer of hope beneath the anger that Trevor and the other guys would ever be a place for a guy like her.

When Chloe didn't respond, Trevor continued, "I talked to Courtney - she's in the Vortex Club-"

"I know who Courtney is."

"Right, well. I asked her about Victoria and she explained 'transgender' to me some, and then I looked up stuff online. I was an asshole, I guess."

The seconds ticked by while Chloe weighed how angry she should be versus how much she should praise him. Both felt gross in the situation, but the longer it was quiet, the more uncomfortable it was getting for both of them.

She said, "Whatever, dude." Then, "Like, I'm glad you're learning stuff, I just don't really want to talk about this."

"Okay."

They stayed quiet until the circle was all set up.

"Okay, now what?" he asked.

"Now you back away and let me summon her," Chloe said, raising the scrap of paper she'd drawn the spiral symbol on.

"Good deal, dude," he said, and they switched places. The summoning circle was a little small, and Chloe had to crouch in it instead of sitting cross-legged to fit. She also didn't like lighting the candles directly adjacent to carpet, but they'd be extinguished quickly.

She pricked her finger, setting the needle on top of her needle cast while she let the drop of blood soak into the paper. Then she grabbed her lighter and lit the paper - a lot less cautiously than she had the first time, just dropping the paper onto the circle. It would be extinguished with the candles, after all.

And the candles did extinguish, right along with the light on in his room, leaving the thin bands of light coming through the window blinds as the only thing casting the room in a dull gray.

"How do you do?"

The sudden addition of a man's voice made them both jump - in Trevor's case, right off his bed. Laying on his side, dressed in nothing but scraps of leather and his dazzling smile, lay a ridiculously hot guy with brown hair and a single rose in his hand.

Once she wasn't actively scared for her life, Chloe half-yelled, "You - you're not Rachel!"

"Uh, no," he replied glancing around the room awkwardly before settling back on the two teenagers in front of him. "Should I be?"

"Yes!" Chloe said, rising from the circle and stepping over the candles. "Or, at least a succubus? This was very specifically a succubus circle."

"Yeah," he replied. When they continued to look at him dumbly, he said, "I'm a succubus."

Trevor waved his hand side to side, indicating the man's body, "But you're, you're a dude."

The man refused to give up his wonderful smile, but his eyes betrayed his increasing discomfort. "Like . . . yeah?"

"So . . ." Chloe began, quickly trailing off, unsure how to clarify. What had gone wrong?

Finally, the man snapped his fingers and said, "Oh! Oh I see what's going on here. You probably thought all succubi are women, and you've only summoned the new girl before, so this - okay. Okay." He nodded to himself, clearly satisfied with the explanation that only he understood.

"So . . . being a succubus doesn't mean that you're a girl?" The gears were clearly turning in Trevor's head. Finally, he said, "Are you trans?"

Chloe facepalmed as hard as she could, but the man ignored her. He said, "Um, no." When all he got was stares back, he continued, "Sorry, I'm just really not used to this many questions as soon as I'm summoned. Succubus doesn't mean woman - um, it comes from the latin succubare, or 'to lie beneath.'"

Still blank faces.

He clarified, "I'm a bottom? Like that's what you ordered . . . if you don't like how I look I could shapeshift into-"

"No, like, you look great, it's just," Chloe cut him off. She looked over to Trevor for help.

Trevor said, "Wait, you can shapeshift?"

Chloe rolled her eyes. "Sorry, we were just expecting our friend."

"Oh, okay," the man replied. They sat in awkward silence for a few seconds before he asked, "Do you two still want to have sex or should I . . . go?"

"You should -" Chloe started, turning to look at Trevor, who just turned to look at her. They were both blushing, awkward smiles impossible to hold back. She scratched the back of her head with a quiet, "Um . . ."

Trevor's awkward grinning became too much, until he started laughing uncomfortable. "I . . . won't tell anyone if you don't?"

Chloe took about three seconds to think about it, then said, "Uh, yeah, deal," and offered out her fist, which he promptly bumped. She exhaled slowly, cracking her knuckles. "But if I'm going to top, I'm going to need a harness or-"

With a wave of his hand, the succubus conjured a strap-on harness and a small row of toys to choose from.

"O-oh my god."

An hour and a half later, Trevor was asleep on his bedroom floor while Chloe stepped out of the shower. She was doing her absolute best not to consider how intensely gratifying and affirming the sex she'd just had was and how much hotter she'd looked to herself as she looked in the mirror. The feeling of control was already something she'd known she liked, but this had been something else. She felt strong. She felt big. And she was still riding the high from that.

As such, she was a little startled when she re-entered Trevor's room and found the succubus under the covers, Trevor's laptop in front of him.

"Sorry, didn't mean to scare you."

"No, you're good dude - I just didn't think you'd still be here."

"Oh, I was just watching some TV . . . should I go?"

"No, no, you're cool." She fiddled with her wet hair a bit, then pointed at the bed. "You mind if I get in there too? It's cold."

"Sure thing," he said, scooting over as she sat on the bed, digging her feet down so they, at least, could be warm.

"Thanks."

A smile crept up on his face, but at least he wasn't keeping one plastered on all the time like he had been when they summoned him.

"So . . ." he started, "Have you always known you were trans or was that . . . new for you?"

Oh god. He's got the empathic reading.

She swallowed nervously and laughed. "Haha . . . um. Shit, I dunno. I kind of came out as genderqueer a while ago but it didn't go great. I've mostly been keeping it under wraps but this was in fact a little new. In a few ways."

He seemed pretty smug, but didn't say anything more, just nodded knowingly.

After a minute or so passed, Chloe asked, "Hey, wait. What's even your name?"

"Patraavex, but you can just call me Vex. You're Chloe, right?"

"Yeah. How'd you know? Did Rachel mention me."

"Nah - I mean, yeah, but not by name. This little dude said it a few times while we were having sex, though," he said, nodding towards Trevor.

Chloe had absolutely no idea what TV show Vex was watching, but it was easier to look at that than his face.

Finally, Chloe noticed something - a spiral tattoo on the inside of Vex's wrist, just like the one Rachel had.

"Oh, hey," she said, pointing it out, "Rachel's got that too. What's that about?"

"Oh, this?" Vex said, holding his arm up so it was easier to look at. "Yeah, that's my brand. Rachels' got the same one because we've got the same master. It's just sort of there when we form – and makes it easy to tell who we are even if we shapeshift."

"Your . . . Master?"

Vex nodded. "Yeah. Like, basically our manager?"

"Oh, huh. I never really thought about that, but I guess hell's got some sort of bureaucracy running it, right? Who's your manager, or master or whatever?"

"I mean, it's a little more complicated than that because we're all effectively immortal, but yeah. And uh, I know he's got a human name? but I can't really remember it right now. But, anyway, he's a contract demon named Muninn. I call him Munny. You probably shouldn't do that."

"Huh," Chloe replied lamely.

They sat and watched TV for a few minutes together before Chloe had her next question. "So, how is Rachel doing?

"Oh, I don't really know," Vex replied, nonchalant, not taking his eyes off the TV. Chloe just kept her eyes on him until he picked up that that wasn't a good enough answer, and continued, "I mean, I hear she got bound to a sorcerer for some long-term gig, first contract work. So I haven't really seen her since then."

"Oh," Chloe replied.

Then she said, "Wait, how long is long-term?"

Vex shrugged, but answered anyway, "Usually until the sorcerer dies. He looked kinda young so maybe . . . 100 years? Wait, no. What's a typical human lifespan anymore?"

"Like . . . 70? Maybe?"

"Oh, huh. Okay, so like half that."

Chloe blinked, her heart sinking. "Wait, seriously? Like 50 years?"

"Give or take."

Perhaps sensing her unease, Vex hit 'pause' on the show before too long, pushing the laptop off of his lap so he could turn on his side and look at Chloe. Meanwhile, she was too busy staring into infinity as she realized she would never see Rachel again. It usually took her a few hours for the real agony of abandonment to set in, but she was fast-tracking the process today.

"I – is there any way out of that? Like, the contract or binding or whatever."

"Um . . ." Vex paused and pursed his lips, thinking. "Well, you can always kill the sorcerer and that fulfills the contract, usually. Actually getting out of one, though? You'd need Muninn to handle something like that, someone who actually signed the contract."

That wasn't much better. Murder wasn't exactly an option and dealing with a contract demon sounded . . . complicated. She doubted she'd be able to have a lawyer present, either. Complicated, but . . . maybe not impossible.

"Um . . . so like. If someone wanted to get in contact with this Muninn, would it be some kind of summoning ritual?"

Vex shook his head and laughed. "Nah, dude. Do you have a sharpie or something?"

"Uhh, yeah, here," she said, reaching under the bed for her pants and grabbing her sharpie, then handing it to him.

He pulled off the cap and pulled her hand towards his lap. She blinked, a little freaked out before she realized he just wanted his leg as a surface to keep her hand flat. Then, he quickly scrawled out –

"- a phone number?" she asked. "That's it?"

"Yep. Give him a call whenever – say I vouched for you. Then just set up a meeting."

"It's that easy?"

"Yep," Vex replied with a smirk.

"Wild . . ."

It took Chloe a little while to work up the nerve to call Muninn – about a day, actually – and as she hit Send, she realized she had no clue what she was going to say, other than what she wanted – a meeting. Hopefully that would be enough.

The other end clicked, and she heard a perfectly human-sounding, "Hello?"

Chloe: "Oh, hello. Is this Muninn speaking?"

Muninn: "Ah, Chloe. I thought I might be hearing from you soon. What can I do for you?"

Chloe: "Well, the thing is, one of your succubi – Rachel – is kind of a friend of mine, and I heard she got bound to this sorcerer guy a while ago, and I was wondering if there was any way we could potentially negotiate . . . that not being the case."

She heard a sigh from the other side of the phone.

Muninn: "I . . . see. Well. We can certainly set up a meeting to discuss a contract, if you would like."

Chloe: "Uh, yeah, that sounds great. When?"

Muninn: "The winter solstice, say, 4:30pm?"

Chloe: "That's . . . okay. Sure, where?"

Muninn: "Meet me at the Lighthouse. The one just outside of Arcadia Bay – I'm sure you know the one."

Chloe: "Yeah . . . I do. Okay."

Muninn: "I'll see you then."

Chloe: "Right. Bye."

Muninn: "Good-bye."

And the call ended.

Chloe had to admit, she was not adequately prepared for this meeting and it was making her just a little bit anxious.

It was 4:20 on the winter solstice and she was, for once, not blazing it no matter how much that might calm her down, just in case Muninn turned out to have a problem with drugs or something. The trail up to the light house was worn and familiar from the years she'd spent coming here, although those had mostly been back when she was a kid. Why he would want to meet her here was beyond her imagination, but at least it wasn't an issue to get a bus ride down to the beach in the first place. She couldn't just tell her mom or David she was going to make a deal with the devil and not expect them to have some words of wisdom to share, after all.

When she first saw him at the top of the hill, she was convinced he was just some random guy who was going to make having this meeting difficult. He stood in front of the bench near the edge of the cliff, smoking a cigarette as he watched the sun slowly dip lower and lower towards the horizon. It was only when he turned to look at her, pulling the cigarette from his mouth and blowing out slowly, that she realized that he really wasn't human.

Muninn's skin was stark red and dry in a way human skin just wasn't. Three horns poked out from underneath his black hair, and a column of spines trailed down his nose like exposed bone. He dressed and sounded like a man, maybe, but for the first time in dealing with demons, Chloe realized they wouldn't all be like succubi.

Once she was a little closer, he dropped his cigarette and crushed it under his shoe. "Chloe Price, I presume?"

"You'd be right. You're Muninn?"

"Please, call me Harry."

Now that she was close, she could see that the same material that made the spines and horns made up his brow, and his skin was flecked with the stuff all over. Worse, his fingers were more claws than anything, which might be hot under completely different circumstances, but in this case just made her keenly aware she'd agreed to meet him in an out-of-the-way location next to the ocean without telling anyone where she would be.

"Right. Harry. Well, um. I'm here to see what can be done to end Rachel's binding so she can go back to being, like, a regular succubus."

"Yes, I heard," he said. His posture was open and comfortable, like he was giving a practiced presentation. This, after all, was just his job, no matter how terrifying it was for Chloe.

"So is that . . . something you can do?" Chloe resisted the urge to scratch her head. She wanted to sound confident but she didn't even know what to sound confident about, exactly.

"Well," he began, "I'm afraid I can't renege on a deal; when I accepted the terms of Rachel's binding, the terms were set and cannot be amended until the conditions stipulated are met. I'm not at liberty to divulge exactly what those conditions are, but I'm sure Vex told you that a summoner's death is a common condition for the release of my succubi."

Chloe nodded. She didn't like where this was going – 'my hands are tied'-type bullshit she was used to getting from school administration.

"But . . . okay, I get that you can't tell me about her contract, specifically, but there's got to be something that can be done, right? She's not just enslaved to some guy for the next 50 years or whatever and that's that?"

Harry gave a smile – a smile that would just be unpleasantly fake if it weren't for how scabbed his lips looked, which gave his face the impression that it could split open if it stayed taut.

"I'm afraid that is essentially it, as long as I am her master."

She hadn't expected him to so calmly agree that the conditions Rachel was under right now constituted slavery – she expected a human response. She bit the inside of her mouth, the pain a reminder that what she was dealing with was evil. But that reminder only strengthened her resolve.

"Please," she said. "There has to be something, some way to free her. You're a contract demon, there's got to be . . . like . . . loop holes and shit."

His uncomfortable smile only widened, which she really didn't like.

"I suppose you could say that. In fact, Rachel's binding is established via a contract with me, her master. If she had another master, however – if someone purchased her for even longer than a lifetime – well, she'd have little reason to follow that contract unless she wanted to."

"I – I see," Chloe replied, not getting it.

Then, "Wait. Me? Like . . . could I become Rachel's master?"

"Certainly," Harry replied, far too quickly. She could already tell this is what he had in mind from the start, though she missed how far back the 'start' of this really was. "All it would take is a contract between us, and she could be yours."

That sent a shiver down Chloe's spine – dread, but also a sick pleasure. Rachel could be hers. Rachel could stay hers.

She swallowed, then swallowed again, struggling to feel okay to talk.

"What would that cost me? A deal like that?"

"Only your soul, my dear."

Ah. She had been afraid of that.

"What . . . what does that mean, exactly? What do I stand to lose? Do I just like, die in exchange?"

Harry chuckled. "No, no, it's nothing like that." He caught her with his stare, and the smile returned, so wide now that he must be in pain, that she could see his teeth, rows of them like a shark, and she was afraid.

He said, "You will not be judged when you die. You would be signing away any chance of ever seeing an afterlife other than one in my employ. No witch or sorcerer will ever be able to bring you back from the dead, either; there will be no soul to call out to, after all. You will be truly dead and gone – once your time is up, that is. No telling how long that might be."

"Ha! . . . um. Shit. Okay."

After a moment of quiet, Harry said, "Of course, you can take as much time as you'd like to think on it, but if-"

"No, no, that's okay," she cut him off. Finally, it looked like the smile reached his eyes, which at this point only added to the creep factor. "I'm not planning on dying anytime soon, and I don't exactly think I've earned myself a ticket into heaven, so . . . I'll do it. I'll become Rachel's master, then work for you when all is said and done."

He chuckled again. "It's not quite that simple, I'm afraid," he said, and her heart sank.

Of course there's a catch. Damn foot-in-the-door tactics.

He continued, "You cannot be a demon's master as you are – human, that is. In order for your body and mind to sustain that sort of bond, you will have to become a demon – or part demon, if you'd prefer, it matters little."

"Become . . . a demon?" She had no idea how to gauge whether that was a cool bonus or a terrible price, considering the demons she'd met. "What would that mean?"

He shook his head and said, "I'm afraid I can't so easily predict what about you will change. Your body will change to suit your soul – your sins and virtues made manifest and immortal. You may find that you like the changes. You may not. I suppose that depends on how well you really know yourself."

"I . . . see."

Seconds ticked by in silence while Chloe tried to weigh it. Who was she, really? What were her sins? What were her virtues? Did she have any? Would she be able to go to school, have a normal life if she had a tail or armored skin? Or might she become something like Rachel – like a human, only better, with whatever body suited her at the time?

"Well?" Harry finally asked, "Will you trade your soul in exchange for your friend's freedom? Will you-"

"Yeah. Let's do it."

Again, she interrupted him, but he seemed unphased.

With a flourish, a scroll appeared in his hand (a little jarring of a sight considering his business suit and otherwise totally contemporary appearance), which he offered to her. She looked it over and found the terms simple – precisely what they'd discussed. Her name was already on it, alongside an empty space.

She looked up, "Do you have something to sign with?"

He nodded. "Hold out your hand and turn your palm face-up."

She did, and in one swift move he reached for her and made a cut across her thumb. It stung like hell, but the bleeding wasn't that bad.

She didn't need to be told what the next step was – she pressed her thumb to the empty space for a few seconds, and when she pulled it away, it left a bloody smear with the faintest impression of a finger print.

"A pleasure doing business with you," he said, offering out his clawed hand.

Unwilling to be intimidated at this point, Chloe reached with her bloody hand and shook his.

And that's when she felt it. Her heart racing, her skin crawling, the hair on her neck standing on end.

Not just the hair on her neck.

She could feel the blood in her veins and it felt electric: wild and powerful, and the sensation was so much and the sound of her own heartbeat so loud that for a second, she thought she would faint.

She didn't even notice Harry was gone as she saw the first sparks of electricity bounce between her fingers.