Chapter 1

"Dean!"

I swore as my brother's angry shouts from upstairs cut off with a pained cry and chopped even more urgently at the thrashing vines trying to either entangle me or block my way out of the solarium. We'd split up upon breaking into the witch's house to search for her and her missing victims, with me taking the ground floor and Dean the upper level. The yelling had started a few minutes ago, but by then I was already caught up in dealing with a very large, very ornery Little Shop of Horrors homage.

I eventually hacked my way free and raced up the back stairs, exchanging my Bowie knife for the pistol loaded with witch-killing bullets along the way. As I reached the top, my brother's invective and sounds of pain turned into an inhuman scream, and I staggered as something hit me. Suddenly I could feel his rage and shock, and the psychic powers that had been dormant for years began to stir.

I shook my head to try to clear it and ran for the second door down the hall, from which I could hear chanting and snarling. The first thing I saw when I burst into the room was the large ritual circle painted on the floor near the center, in which crouched an infuriated mountain lion, yowling and lashing its tail. The witch, Madeline Andrews, was off to one side, standing behind an altar and reciting from a thick grimoire.

"You're too late, Agent Richards!" she crowed triumphantly even as I lunged toward her, throwing a hand up and sending the ritual implements on the altar flying, and she gestured toward the cougar. "Kill him!"

The big cat, apparently freed from the compulsion holding it in place, leapt at me before I could get a bead on it and . . . started rubbing against my legs and purring? I looked down in surprise and realized that its fur was the same tawny gold as Dean's hair, its eyes were the same mossy green as his, and the collar around its neck had the same plaid pattern as the shirt he'd been wearing. In addition, the emotions I'd been receiving seemed to be coming from . . . uh, him and now included love and reassurance.

"De—Dean? Is that you?" I asked incredulously. The cat glanced up at me and nuzzled my thigh in response.

The witch meanwhile appeared equally shaken. "That . . . that's not possible! He should be mine! He's supposed to be my familiar, not yours!"

Dean turned his head and glared at her, a growl rumbling in his throat. Before I could say anything, he loped toward her, hurdling over the altar to knock her down. She cried out as his claws dug into her shoulders, and his lips drew back from his fangs as he prepared to tear her throat out.

"Dean, wait! We need her alive!" I shouted while dashing around the altar. I aimed the revolver at her and ordered, "Reverse the goddamn spell!"

"I—I can't! The spell is permanent once it's been completed—there's no way to remove it! Pl—please, don't kill me! I can . . . I can still help you—I can perform rituals to guarantee you wealth, power, love, or—or whatever else you want!" Madeline begged.

I turned toward the altar and skimmed through a few pages of the grimoire, searching for confirmation of her claim regarding the familiar ritual. I nodded in acknowledgment at what I found, turned back, and shot her through the forehead, hoping that this was the type of enchantment that would end with the caster's death. Dean however remained unchanged and merely stepped off the body, fastidiously shaking his claws clean of her blood.

I crouched in front of him. "Dean? Could you try to shift back? Portia was able to go back and forth between forms pretty easily, so you should be able to also."

Sammy? Uh, lemme give it a shot. His face became intent for a moment, and then Dean was standing before me in his human guise instead of the mountain lion, though the collar was still around his neck.

I stood, pulled him into a fierce hug, and then demanded, "What the hell happened?"

He grimaced and propped a hip against the altar. "I checked out the first coupla rooms, which were just regular bedrooms and a bathroom. In the fourth room . . . you remember the scene in Alien Resurrection when Ripley finds the previous cloned versions of her? Well, think of that but even more fucked up! I guess she tried this spell on those poor schmucks who went missing, but it didn't work right on 'em.

"Anyway, I got to this room after barely managing to not lose my lunch, and she had a trap waiting that immobilized me as soon as I walked in. The bitch started monologuing, saying how she'd been expecting us and planned to take advantage of how big and strong and easy on the eyes we were, and that if the spell didn't take with me, she'd try again with you. She then forced me into the middle of that circle and began the fucking ritual. You can pretty much figure out the rest," he concluded.

"I'm sorry I didn't get here sooner, man! Unfortunately, she had a surprise waiting in her solarium too, and I was busy fighting with Audrey II when I heard you shouting," I explained miserably. "If I'd gotten here earlier, before she'd finished the spell, maybe I could've stopped the damn thing."

"What's done is done, and at least I didn't end up like those other sorry bastards." He patted me on the shoulder comfortingly. "Let's grab her book, torch this place, and head home. Maybe the Men of Letters library will have something that can break this, or maybe Rowena can help us out."

I squared my shoulders and nodded. "Okay, that sounds like a plan."

We pulled into the Bunker garage later that night. We would've arrived sooner, except that Dean insisted on making an hour-long detour to a particular meat market in Kansas City to pick up venison, elk, and mutton sausages, burger patties, steaks, and chops. Other than the sudden interest in game meat, I didn't notice any other obvious changes in his behavior, though he did remain quiet and pensive through most of the drive. I meanwhile used the time in the car to study Madeline's grimoire in more detail, hoping to find something pertinent.

"So . . . did you find anything 'bout uh, un-familiarizing me in that book?" he finally asked after we'd parked and unloaded our bags from the trunk.

"I need to compare against other versions to be sure, but I suspect that she modified the spell," I replied. "You remember what Portia had told us, how it's the familiar who chooses the master? Well, the spell here has an element to compel the newly-made familiar to bond to the caster, which obviously contradicts that. I'll have to check what other changes she made first before we can figure out how to undo the whole thing."

"You can dive into that tomorrow, after we've had a good night's rest. I'm gonna put this meat away and then take a shower. You . . . you wanna join me?" The look he gave me was unusually tentative.

I studied him briefly. His emotions, which were primarily nervousness and worry at the moment, had been coming through quite clearly since the ritual, though I'd been refraining from reading his mind through the newly-formed link. Now though, I reached out cautiously and brushed over his surface thoughts.

"Is this about how witches and their familiars aren't supposed to be . . . intimate?" When he nodded unhappily, I pulled him into my arms and kissed him. Dude, when have we ever let other people's rules define our lives, especially how we feel about each other? Society in general disapproving of our relationship hasn't stopped us yet, so why should we give a shit what a bunch of witches might think? Besides, it'll be irrelevant anyway once we remove this enchantment.

He sighed and leaned into me, resting his head on my shoulder. You're right, Sammy. I guess I'm more freaked out 'bout this mess than I thought. The offer of the shower is still open though!

"Not right now—you know I don't like going to sleep with wet hair. I'll wait for you in bed though," I responded with a smile.

He nodded again, this time with a calmer expression, and headed toward the kitchen with his meat purchases. I took our duffel and garment bags to our bedroom, where I unpacked everything and lugged all the dirty stuff to the laundry room. After getting the first load started, I undressed, washed up, and lay down to continue reading the next Expanse novel. Dean came in a little while later wearing his dead-guy robe, which he shucked off to join me in bed. He was mostly in the mood to cuddle, not surprising given the late hour, our general tiredness, and the stressful events earlier, so we restricted ourselves to some kissing and light petting before falling asleep.

I woke up the next morning to a large furry body pressed up against my side, with the cougar's head and foreleg lying on my chest. I reached up to scratch behind his ears and smiled when he began to purr. He woke up slowly, and his wide yawn revealed a set of sharp fangs and long pink tongue. He opened his mouth to speak and looked comically surprised when a chirping noise emerged instead, and I couldn't help but laugh.

Oh shit—I went all fuzzy in my sleep, didn't I? Quit laughing, bitch, it ain't that funny! He aimed a swat at my head, fortunately with the claws retracted.

That was like the least dignified noise I've heard anything that size make, jerk, and your expression was priceless! I retorted, still chuckling. Here, let me make it up to you.

I sat up, rolled him onto his back, and dug my fingers into the soft, cream-colored fur of his underside. His purring intensified as I rubbed his chest and belly, and he started to nuzzle and bump my thigh with his head. We kept this up for several minutes, until his stomach made a distinct rumbling sound.

"Guess it's time to feed the beast! Come on!" I gave his haunches a slap and rolled out of bed.

Dean yawned again, stretched to his full length, and shifted to human form before getting up himself and donning his robe. I followed him into the kitchen and watched while he made venison sausage, cheesy scrambled eggs, and toast. I'd turned the coffee pot on when we'd first entered the room, and I was amused to see how much cream he dumped into his mug, as opposed to his usual plain black swill.

"I'm guessing that deer, elk, and sheep make up a major part of the cougar's diet, given your little shopping spree last night. You'd better hope that you still like all that once you're no longer taking a walk on the wild side!" I commented.

He shrugged. "Yeah, I wasn't exactly thinking that far ahead—everything there just smelled so good! But all meat is good meat as far as I'm concerned, so I'm sure I can make it work."

After cleaning the breakfast dishes, I joined my brother in the shower. I never could resist the sight of water streaming over those lean muscles and freckled skin, droplets clinging to those long lashes and the gingery thatch around his dusky cock, so it wasn't long before I had him hoisted up against the tiled walls and moaning wantonly while I pounded into his tight ass. He did seem more limber and didn't complain when I had him bent nearly in half, and the contented purring afterward was impossible to miss.

Once we were dressed, I went to the library to dig up everything I could on familiars, while Dean said he'd try to track down James Frampton and Portia. What I discovered supported my earlier suspicion that Madeline Andrews had altered the ritual, since not only were familiars supposed to be the ones doing the choosing, but also they had to be willing participants as well in the original version. It also corroborated that the spell was intended to be irreversible, and I wasn't sure if any of the general counterspells we had would be effective or even safe to use.

Since I was at an impasse, I went looking for my brother. Before this, I probably would've had to search throughout the building, checking the rooms he tended to frequent in order to locate him. Now though, I simply followed my sense of him outside to a small copse of trees behind the Bunker, where I found him basking in the sunlight on the branch of a large oak, his whiskers and the tip of his dangling tail twitching.

I tugged on his tail to get his attention. "Hey man, wake up! Any luck getting a hold of James and Portia?"

Don't disrespect the tail, dumbass! He pulled the aforementioned appendage out of reach before replying, I got nada. The numbers we had for 'em were outta service, and the other hunters who'd worked with James before hadn't heard from either in years. I'm hoping this just means that they decided to drop off the grid and settle down someplace quiet, not that something got 'em. How 'bout you?

"I hope so too, and I don't have much either." I went over what I'd managed to find and added, "I think we need to call in Rowena and get her experienced input on this. I'm not comfortable blindly throwing these counters at the problem and hoping they don't backfire."

No time like the present. Dean dropped down from the branch and changed back to his usual form, and I paused to admire how his dark green Henley brought out the color in his eyes before pulling out my phone.

"Hello, Samuel! What can I do for ye?" Rowena asked when she picked up the call.

"We need your help, Rowena. We were investigating a string of disappearances south of Des Moines, which turned out to be the work of a witch named Madeline Andrews. She was using a ritual to forcibly turn people into familiars and bond with her. Her initial attempts ended up killing the victims, but she was partially successful with Dean—he became a familiar but uh, bonded with me instead," I explained.

"She was compelling people to be her familiar? That's nae good at all! There are a few things that will get ye the hairy eyeball from the magickal community, such as having sexual relations with your familiar—and I know ye boys willnae be changing your ways, so keep this in mind—but this . . . transforming someone against their will and coercing the bond is—is anathema!" she exclaimed. "Where is this person now?"

"I killed her after she insisted she couldn't undo the spell, in the hopes that it would end with her death," I replied. "I haven't been able to find anything in her grimoire or in the Bunker's library that will definitively lift it, and I don't want to experiment with something like this on my own."

"You're a wise boy, Sam—this isnae the sort of magic to be trifled with. I'll need to examine Dean and study the spell she used, since clearly she bastardized the proper version—though I cannae guarantee I'll be able do anything either. Give me a few days, and I can be at your door," she said.

"We appreciate it, and we'll see you then."