Page 9 of Changeling (The Incubus Saga #2)

It was a wonder to Nathan sometimes why Alex wasn’t a seal; the woman definitely knew how to organize a hunting party. But then that’s what she did—got everyone else sorted out while maintaining a safe haven for them to return to.

The four of them had originally planned to systematically raid the attic, hopefully herding the creature toward the center where they could then surround and finally capture it.

Killing it inside the Gatehouse would no doubt be a disaster, since the Gatehouse wards had at least marginally affected it.

But regardless of their humane intentions, once they reached the attic it became apparent almost immediately that Evil Gizmo wasn’t at home.

Each of them were armed with at least one type of iron weapon just in case—Nathan had his knife since it was less daunting than using a gun in the Gatehouse, and he had to remind himself these days that he didn’t like guns to begin with—and a few of what looked like butterfly nets.

They quickly split up to cover the entire building.

As Nathan was nearing the kitchen pantry, he ran into Jim coming from the other direction. Despite what had happened during the night, Jim hadn’t been acting oddly so far today, which Nathan took small comfort in.

“Great. Now Sasha or Alex is going to find it first,” Nathan grumbled.

“What makes you say that?” Jim asked.

“Whoever is at the most disadvantage always runs into the bad guy first. Now we’re paired up and they’re both alone—disadvantage. Didn’t you watch the Halloween movies?” Nathan asked incredulously.

Jim rolled his eyes as he moved past Nathan to enter the pantry. “I vaguely remember being held down and forced to watch some when we were kids, yeah.”

“So you see my point,” Nathan stressed, following behind his brother cautiously. It was a large pantry.

“Well Sasha has had a lot of sex,” Jim smirked back at him. “That’s one of the horror movie cardinal sins, right? Geez, how the hell have you managed this long?”

Very funny . Nathan was about to make some snappy comment about how of course the virgin would say that since he—or usually she—is the one who always survives the horror movie, when there was a rustling from the corner and Jim jumped instinctively back beside him.

They both positioned their weapons—silent, waiting.

Jim had a net ready in his off hand, but Nathan really wanted to just kill the thing, regardless of any backlash.

“There!” Jim shouted as a blur of fur, rounder but no larger than a tomcat, rushed toward their feet.

By the time Nathan had a clear shot to lunge with his knife, he would have been stabbing his own toes more likely than hitting the creature.

It scurried between Nathan’s legs, and Jim thwapped Nathan in the shins with the net while trying to catch it.

Their momentum was all off and the space was too tight.

Even trying to move unbalanced the brothers, and suddenly Nathan was falling.

He landed hard on his back with barely enough time to flinch at how Jim would soon be on top of him.

That more painful impact never came, thankfully, Jim having managed to shoot his arms out and catch himself with hands braced on either side of Nathan’s head. That would have hurt.

“Nice reflexes,” Nathan gasped out; falling to the floor like that had still hurt a little. So much for thinking horror movie rules applied to real life.

“Sorry,” Jim grimaced.

“Forget it,” Nathan said. “Where’d Gizmo go?”

Jim looked up past Nathan toward the entrance. “Out. Come on,” he said, getting to his feet and helping Nathan back up to his feet as well. “Damn, this guy’s fast.”

“Told you,” Nathan said as they raced back out into the kitchen. At least now Nathan wasn’t the only one who had been made to look like a fool.

“Over there!” they heard Alex yell from out in the hallway.

Jim and Nathan immediately picked up their pace.

“It’s too fast! Sasha, get down here!” Alex called just as Jim and Nathan burst out into the main area.

Nathan saw the ball of fluff skitter across the floor right for the stairs, probably hoping to escape back up into the attic somehow.

Sasha appeared up on the landing, a net in one hand and a dagger in the other.

The creature skidded to a halt before reaching him and attempted to head the other way again, but the others had moved in to surround it from behind.

Before any of them could attack or try to catch it, Nathan flinched as it leapt inhumanly fast toward him and started climbing adeptly up his body.

He froze, unsure of what to do. But this time the creature did not bite him or open any wounds.

It climbed all the way up to Nathan’s neck where it curled around his shoulders, shivering in fear and cowering behind his head.

“What’s it doing?” Jim asked from beside Nathan.

“Hiding,” Nathan realized as he said it, though he had no idea why it was hiding on him . He could feel the way the little claws were retracted, the fluffy creature not at all putting up the fight he had been expecting.

The thing really did look like Gizmo from the Gremlins movies upon closer inspection, only it was entirely grey like a tabby cat and had tiny human-like hands that gripped either side of Nathan’s head. It didn’t look quite as vicious during the day; it just looked scared.

“Looks like you made a friend yesterday instead of an enemy,” Sasha said, joining the rest of them at the bottom of the stairs.

“Oh really? Thought you were going to war against me, little fella.” Nathan tucked his knife into his jeans and slowly reached up, coaxing the creature down from around his neck. Eventually, he got it down into his arms, though it clung to him tightly, still shaking.

“What is it?” Jim asked, as they all hovered closer.

Not a fucking raccoon , Nathan wanted to say, but refrained.

He glanced up at the others, hoping someone else might have an answer.

“It’s a chimeric familiar,” Sasha said, a spark of recognition on his face.

“It’s a what now?” Nathan asked. He knew the words ‘chimera’ and ‘familiar’ but he had never heard of those two things together.

“Aren’t those things usually a lot…bigger and more dangerous?” Alex asked.

“If the spell’s done right, yeah,” Sasha said. “I guess her master either didn’t know what they were doing or something went really wrong. You have to be a powerful sorcerer or sorceress to pull off a familiar summoning for a chimera.”

Great. Witchcraft , Nathan thought. But one other thing had caught his attention. “Did you say her ?” he asked. The creature looked genderless as far as he was concerned.

“Yeah,” Sasha smiled, reaching out toward the chimera tenderly, who shied away for only a moment before allowing him to pet her. She soon stopped trembling and the sound of contended purrs like a cat rose from Nathan’s arms. “It’s female.”

“No wonder she likes you,” Nathan smirked.

Sasha chuckled a little and shrugged. “You too. And I don’t know how I know. I can just tell she’s a girl. Must be an incubus thing.”

“She could still be dangerous though, right?” Jim said, obviously a little distrusting of the thing as he drew closer.

Alex nodded. “Chimeric familiars are the most powerful kind, used back in the Dark Ages as guardians against dragons. But she’s so tiny…”

“Don’t worry,” Sasha said, looking like he was really enjoying being able to pet a small furry creature since he had told Nathan before that most of them didn’t like him, “it looks like the spell was disrupted right after the different parts were combined, before she could be imbued with any real power or a mission. She’s just a scared child really. ”

“But what is a chimeric familiar?” Nathan asked. He hated when others talked like everyone should know these things already.

“A chimera in science is pretty much the same as what they are supernaturally,” Sasha answered, “a being with genetic traits from three or four different creatures all together in one. Summoning a normal familiar as a witch isn’t too hard because things like cats exist everywhere.

But transfiguring three or four different creatures into one being is tricky stuff. ”

“Doesn’t the witch have to give up part of her own soul to complete the summoning?” Alex asked.

The incubus nodded. “I’m guessing that’s where the spell went wrong. Probably killed the witch and left our little friend here unfinished.”

“So she has a soul of her own,” Alex jumped in again, unable to hold back a smile as she reached out and touched the bundle of fur in Nathan’s arms, “like a person…”

“Completely autonomous from her maker,” Sasha smiled. “Not like the witch is trapped inside or anything.”

“Wow,” Alex said in awe, pleased that the creature was allowing her to pet it.

“That’s amazing, but…she’s been stealing food and taking things from around the Gatehouse for months now.

I can’t have some witch’s familiar having the run of the place with seals as boarders. If they find her, they’ll kill her.”

That was certainly true. If any of the normal seals caught her, she would be shot dead without a second thought. Nathan no longer had the same desire, but it wasn’t as if they could set her free out in the woods.

Now that Sasha had been stroking her fur for some time, gently, with those long soft fingers of his, along with Alex petting her too, the little chimera peeked her head out of Nathan’s arms finally to look at them.

Nathan saw now that her big, round eyes were bluish grey and very human looking, not black as they had looked yesterday.

“She’s so cute,” Nathan said before he could stop himself.

He grunted at the curious looks and raised eyebrows he received.

“What? I can’t like cute? Nothing unmanly ‘bout that. Not such a bad little thing, are ya?” he said to the creature, placing a hand close to her fur-covered face.

“Sorry about last night, but you got me pretty good, huh? What say we call it even?”

Her lips and face were definitely more like an Ewok, Nathan decided, as she sniffed his hand and blinked up at him. A little mewling purr started again and Nathan decided they must be in agreement. The chimera’s fur was as soft as anything Nathan had ever touched.

“Aww, Ma, can’t we keep it?” he grinned at Alex. “She’s better than any cat.”

“You sure changed your tune quickly,” Alex said, hands on her hips.

“I’ve been known to be wrong about supernatural creatures in the past,” Nathan said, with a none-too-subtle glance at Sasha.

Alex bit her lip. “I’d like to, but how can we keep this…failed familiar like a pet without seals spotting her? I doubt they’d buy that it’s the Gatehouse’s new mascot.”

Nathan knew they couldn’t bring the thing along with them when they left, and if Alex kept the chimera in the Gatehouse it would eventually be noticed by other seals, and the results after that would only be bad.

While they all stood there for a few minutes trying to think of something, Nathan cradled the creature close and continued to pet her head.

She snuggled in and sniffed at Nathan’s chest like she could smell his wounds, making that purring noise again as she touched her little human hands to where the bandages lay beneath his shirt, as if in apology.

“I’m not sure if it will work,” Sasha said suddenly, “but I might have an idea. Alex, will you hold off on a final decision until the three of us leave in a few days? By then I might be able to manage something.”