2. Jeffrey

Chapter two

Jeffrey

I scream, but the sound gets swallowed as the hand squeezes tighter around my throat. I strain with all my strength to get free of it, and suddenly, I'm hurtling toward the ground as I succeed but trip over the sides of my skirt. I catch myself with my hands, the pendant sent skittering across the ground, and my wrists sting from the impact. Not broken, just jarred.

Move, Jeffrey! Get up!

Stone flies around me after sounds like a sledgehammer hitting it. Whatever grabbed me is breaking through the wall. I need to get up! Why can't I move? My limbs won't listen to me, but somehow, I manage to turn my head.

I touch my throat and feel faint scratch marks as I see the claws on the hand still punching more of an opening for the rest of… whatever this thing is. It's huge and such a dark purple color, it almost blends into the shadows, except for faint glimmers of yellow metal like gold, and bright glowing purple eyes.

It bursts through the remains of the wall, and what I see of the rest of it has to mean I'm in a nightmare. He is some sort of purple, black, and gold gargoyle. He can't stand up straight because of the low ceilings and how tall his raptor-like feet make him—gargoyle-like, monster -like. He is barely clothed, but a loincloth covers him in front, and a feathered mantel adorns his shoulders with gold embellishments hanging from its center like jewelry. All the yellow metallic shimmer is gold, gold bangles on his wrists and upper arms, decorating the center of the belt to his loincloth, and as great gilded arching horns from the sides of his head. The purple-black wings that unleash from his back are edged in gold too. His black hair sweeps up like it's floating, like a flame, also slightly purple, and when his glowing eyes find me, his mouth stretches into a fanged smile.

Nothing so terrifying has ever been so insanely hot to me, but this monster is stunning.

"Ah, one of Mattie's beauties has finally freed me." His voice is deeper than mine and vibrates through my bones. "I am in your debt, mistress. Command me. But oh, let me taste you first to offer my thanks and to take some nourishment to regain my strength."

Oh fuck .

He's going to eat me !

I still can't move as he descends on where I'm prone, on hands and knees, facing the ground. The position I've fallen into is a lot more humiliating than I realized, presenting and vulnerable, as he hikes up the back of my skirt. My traitorous cock twitches more than when I touched it through lace, especially when I feel the pricks of his claws scratch the skin at my hips so he can pull down my bloomers.

I do not have underwear on beneath.

"A surprising beauty, I see," he rumbles. Like most people, he must have thought I was a girl until presented with my cock. He doesn't touch me though, other than having undressed me. "How exquisite. Be you mistress or master or otherwise, you are equally as radiant for all your desire pulsating. I would like to taste it," he says with hot breath on my balls.

The story is real. He's an incubus.

How the fuck is the story real?

"Please, grant me permission," he says. "Desire sustains me, and I have been starved for so long. I will offer you unknown pleasures if you say the word… yes."

I shudder. He's not even doing anything, but his breath, his nearness, with my ass and balls and cock exposed to him has me throbbing.

"If I harmed you making my escape, forgive me." He reaches around my throat to gently caress the scratches. "I was desperate, crazed for the taste of freedom. Let me taste you to make up for it, and you will never know harm from me again. "

He has an accent, I think, but it's so subtle, I can't place it. My neck doesn't hurt. The scratches are surface-level, and who wouldn't be crazed after being walled up for… over a century? Holy shit. This is too surreal.

But I kind of want to say yes.

"Wh-what… would you take from me?" I ask, peering over my shoulder again and struck by how gorgeous he is, his purple-black face like the sky right before the sun finishes setting. "My soul?"

His laughter reverberates through my cock with his face and breath still right by it. "Why would you think that?"

"Because you're an incubus."

"Incubus?" He tilts his head, and his golden horns glimmer with reflections from the minimal light. "Perhaps. I have been called daeva, demon, djinn. But it is not your soul I want, nor can I take it. I serve you and your desires should you bear my amulet and choose to free me."

He seems to strain to get closer to me, and I hear the rattle of chains.

When I look more carefully, I can see them on his wrists and ankles, leading back behind the wall where he came from. He can't get closer to me. If I get up and run, I can get away.

But the heave of his toned chest, and the forked—actually forked —tongue that flicks over his lips, has me considering the crazy option .

"Please, a demonstration if you doubt me," he says. "No contract yet, just a taste to ease my hunger and loneliness. Please. May I?"

I think I might be hard enough to be dripping onto the dirty ground.

My knees are literally in smeared dirt on the cracked stone slabs of the underground's floor. The presence of the incubus behind me with me exposed, prostrate, and helpless, yet with him asking permission has me so needy for what I haven't felt in so long that I rock my hips toward him and say the impossible.

" Yes ."

His forked tongue feels incredible when it tickles my hole. It licks and licks , and then moves to curl around my balls like fingers or a prehensile tail.

His tail, I think it's a tail, hooks into my bloomers to pull them the rest of the way down, while his hands grip my ass to spread my cheeks apart.

"Oh fuck ."

He keeps licking and teases the tip of his tongue inside me. The thin tips give way to a normal tongue's girth as he pushes inside, but it's when he licks down and around my balls again, and finally, down the length of my shaft to my dripping slit that I moan and pound the ground with my fist.

Worth it.

"I would like to better look at you," he says. "Might I turn you, mistress? Master? Beautiful one? "

I laugh a little hysterically. "I-I like that last one."

"Then come to me, my beauty." He takes hold of my hips and flips me without my back hitting the ground but gently sets me down again. I'm sprawled beneath him, bloomers at my ankles, skirt hiked, while the rest of me must look like a flushing mess, harlot on a romance cover for real, holy shit .

I wish I could see myself like this.

I can see him, so clearly now. He's like if Goliath from that old Gargoyles cartoon had shorter hair and horns. There is no undergarment for him either besides the loincloth, and I can see the heavy shadow of a cock twitching through the fabric. That shadow makes it look huge, but I don't have time to wonder what it looks like, or what it might feel like, because he tips me backward with both arms under my knees.

"So beautiful," he says again and buries his face between my thighs.

"Oh god!"

No one has ever touched me while I was dressed as Mattie, let alone swallowed my cock like he could suck out my insides through it. How his fangs aren't pricking me while he does it, I have no idea. I can feel his forked tongue teasing my slit the same way it had my hole, and how it looks to watch him with my skirt and corset still on me is mesmerizing.

"Yes! Yes !"

Something tickles my hole too, like licks and little presses inside just past the breach. It can't be his tongue and doesn't feel like claw tips .

His tail again.

" Fuck ." I start to rock, fucking his face and urging his tail to move deeper inside me. Its end isn't as thick as a cock, but I wonder how far it can penetrate and how much thicker it would get as it did. "Yes… please…"

His outstretched wings make me feel enveloped and safe, while he sucks and sucks and slips one of the tips of his forked tongue inside my slit. His tail rams upward in the same instant and finds my prostate.

"F-fuck!"

I'm going to come. It's been too long, and I am definitely going to come down his throat. I try to warn him, groping for his hair and whimpering, unable to form words anymore. I find his horns instead. They really are gold, gleaming and smooth like gilded bone.

His tail and tongue penetrate me at both ends again and again, spearing me in unison, and when I think I might scream so loud that I'd bring more of the stones down around us, I come, humping his face with aftershock shuddering.

He growls and licks me and swallows my release as if I fed him a last meal. First meal? First in a long time, just like me.

I have never come that hard before. I feel boneless and heavy. His tongue and tail slip out of me, but he doesn't pull away. He looks up and licks more of the remnants of cum from my shaft, his handsome and strange purple-black face staring at me from between the contrast of my white thighs .

"Yes," he says, almost like a purr. "You are a worthy beauty to serve. So much passion. So much desire to be nurtured and explored. Please, please , accept my amulet, accept my contract, and I will serve you, always."

The pendant. Amulet . I'd forgotten it and glance at where it fell. "But… there has to be a downside, a trick to this, a catch. There is always a catch."

His claws rake up my thighs, keeping my skirt hiked with my still half-hard cock bobbing close to his face. His tongue slithers out to lick its tip. "Keep me fed, beautiful one, and my lone goals will be to grant your wishes and sate your every desire. Do you accept me?"

Wishes? He said djinn, a genie, just with an amulet instead of a lamp.

He looks toward where the amulet gleams out of reach. I must be out of my mind, all blood having rushed elsewhere, and all sense having been sucked down his throat, because again, I answer, "Yes."

The weight of the amulet on my chest startles me. Neither of us reached for it, it's just on me, and as the purple stone glows as bright as his eyes, his chains snap and disintegrate.

I really hope I don't come to regret this.

"Jeffrey! Are you still down here?"

Shit . "Y-yes, Mr. Bevilaqua! I'll be right there!" I scoot out from beneath the incubus and try to make myself presentable, pulling up my bloomers and thankful that he licked up and swallowed most of the mess .

"A client?" he asks.

"What? No!" I hiss back. "He owns the building. I'll explain later, just… stay here."

"Whatever you command, beautiful one."

He gets to his feet as I do, and wow, he is really hot. And really tall. Like, College Boy was cute, but this incubus is smoldering, and every possible gargoyle fantasy come to life that someone might have, of the cartoon or other variety.

I leave him in the alcove, trusting my new… let's say companion , to behave himself and do as I said, and rush out to cut off any chance of Mr. B discovering there really was an incubus living in the walls. The stories are real, and I just agreed to a contract with him.

I agreed to a contract with him! What does that even mean?

"Jeffrey! Goodness!"

I nearly bowl Mr. Bevilaqua over, having blindly cut to the stairs. Hopefully, how red in the face I am just looks like I'm still angry.

"Let's go up, shall we?" He squeezes my shoulder, looking worried and sympathetic, which at least means he's buying it. And I am still angry about possibly losing this place.

Only… do I have to lose it, knowing now that the stories about an incubus are true, and he grants wishes ?

"Come on now." Mr. B urges me up the stairs. "You know I don't like anyone being down here alone. I even thought I heard some stones crumbling! "

It happened often enough, usually deeper in the tunnels where we can no longer reach.

Usually . This time it was only a few yards from the entrance.

"I'm fine. It's fine. I'm…" I follow him up, knowing it's best we move away from the secret incubus in the basement. "I'm sorry I got so upset earlier. Just promise me, please, that you won't make any deals with those people until I can offer alternatives."

Mr. B's expression, more pitying than anything, tells me his mind is made up, but he still says, "I can hold off for a while. It would be at least several weeks anyway, a couple months even, before anything changed. But I don't know if there are alternatives anymore, Jeffrey. You need to be prepared for that."

No. I didn't. I might not know what having a contract with that creature means, but if he's real, then Madame Mattie used him to succeed too. Maybe he can help. The idea is no stranger than having him give me a rim job and sucking me off a few minutes ago.

"I know you're upset," Mr. B says, "but you promise me something now and don't go poking around down there alone. Even when not alone—"

"Safe and well-travelled tunnels only. I know." I spent almost every night in that alcove where the incubus broke free. I'd just never touched the back wall before.

Had that stone always been loose ?

"This is new," Mr. B says, and I realize he's looking at the amulet, very prominently displayed given my shoulders and most of my chest are bare. "It's beautiful. I can't believe I didn't notice it before."

"I wasn't wearing it before!" I blurt. "I had it tucked away downstairs. I wasn't sure if I wanted to wear it for tours or not."

"You should. Adds a little mystique and glamour to the look." Mr. B always treats the costume with respect more than the joke most patrons see it as. He had the idea of putting a guide in costume, but it was me who volunteered and had the idea of being Mattie. It's no secret that I love it, or that I become someone completely different when I personify Mattie. "Did you find that at Tony's? Or The Magic Shop maybe?"

Tony's is a nearby consignment antique store. The Magic Shop is, well, self-explanatory. "Magic Shop. Crystals section. Just purple quartz or tanzanite or something." Or something.

"Well, I need to get home to bed." Mr. B gathers his things from behind the upstairs checkout counter and heads for the door. I see him out, and he turns back to squeeze my shoulder again before leaving. "It'll be all right, Jeffrey. You and Cas are young, with all sorts of possibilities ahead of you. Someday, you won't even miss spending your nights in a stuffy underground. "

I can't think of anything to say, so I say nothing. I lock the door behind him. Cas is already gone, and she would have locked up everywhere else.

The building itself has a comforting mustiness just like the tunnels. It's directly connected to all our neighboring buildings on this side of the street, but with no internal access between them—unless you count the tunnels, which I would if they were all still open. Madame Mattie never owned the tunnels outright, only what existed within her lease, directly beneath this building. We're granted access to the others by the buildings above each section, and like I said, fewer of them are on board with that every day.

The building is old and cold with red bricks instead of the stones of the underground, wall to wall covered in historical photos and a few smaller displays of items once belonging to Mattie and her seamstresses. Another sewing machine here, a suitcase there, a hairbrush, a hand mirror, all under glass.

There are public bathrooms, the checkout counter for selling tickets to the tour, a back office, a storage room, a back door into the alley, and another door, always locked, that leads upstairs to my home. Those stairs are across the building from the open set of stairs leading down, where an incubus currently waits for me in the underground.

I race upstairs first. Maybe I imagined him. Maybe I conked my head. Maybe I am going crazy. I want out of Mattie's outfit either way so I can clear my head. And because I'd swear I can still smell some of the sex on it.

Upstairs is spacious with multiple bedrooms and a bathroom the seamstresses would have shared. Mr. Bevilaqua could have easily rented out more than just my room. I was always not so secretly glad he didn't. I prefer my privacy. Plus, a couple of the rooms are jam-packed with more items to either switch out at seasonal times, or that are maybe too fragile to be on display.

My room is the only place with any modern touch to it, and that's really only my computer. And the newer bedframe and mattress. The desk my computer sits on is an original antique, Mattie's own. It is gorgeously crafted, dark wood with inlays that have to be hand-carved, but a bit too dinged up to be sold for the mint it would probably be worth in more pristine condition. I was still amazed when Mr. B said I could use it. The gilded mirror on the wall is original too.

Out of the soiled bloomers, dress, and corset, I put on a pair of normal underwear, jeans, and a sweatshirt. I pop out my contacts before I scrub my face clean of the makeup with a wet wipe. My eyes are dried out now. When not in costume, I wear glasses. Too long in contacts, and my vision gets as blurry as if I wore nothing. My hair is still curled, so I tie it up in a ponytail, and when I'm done… well.

This is Jeffrey, a semi-fair-faced nerd.

I hurry back to the main floor, trying to drum up the nerve to return to the incubus. Where am I going to hide him? Just down there in the dark? Can he turn invisible? Does he eat normal food? Does he need to shit? I have so many questions!

A knock at the door startles me so much, I nearly jump out of my sneakers. I am so thankful I changed out of the heels because they would not have gone with this outfit. The front of the building is mostly windows, so I can see who's there, and I immediately wish she couldn't see me.

Speaking of pearl-clutchers—though I don't think that woman has ever gone on our tour, even to complain during it—it's Mrs. Sherman, the worst possible midnight visitor I could have.

Odai

I flex my claws, roll my shoulders, crack my neck. The relief from the loss of those chains is always bliss. The warmth within me from having serviced my new owner is just as delightful. I am hard and hungry still, but until she, he— they , I shall say until corrected—asks it of me, my own satisfaction must wait. Tasting them was close enough.

For now.

Already I can feel my hunger stirring again. I cannot yet discern the level of my new owner's appetite. Will it start small and slowly ratchet upward? Are they greedy and will spiral out of control like those with the least power of personal will? Either way, I am intrigued, as much as I am filled with a sense of nostalgia as I take in these once familiar tunnels.

How much time has passed? I look back at where I burst from my prison and wave a hand to fix the crumbled stones and erase any trace that something was chained there. It does not erase the normal ravages of time on the walls around me. I drag my claws along its surfaces, moving out from the alcove just enough to peer around its edge and take in more of the old underground, but I do not fully leave where my owner asked me to wait.

It has been decades, surely. Many. Mattie is gone, likely more than just gone from these tunnels, this building, but gone from the world entirely. There is a new proprietor, and only one seamstress, if my owner is even that. It is not my place to wonder about what I have lost. If I focus my attention there, it could become all that consumes me, even more than my insatiable hunger. It is better to focus on desire, even if disaster lies there too.

It always does.

My owner is upstairs. I can hear them, see them in my mind's eye, tethered as I am to their whims and wishes. I obey, always, and will wait until I hear them make a request of me. My true chains are desire itself, the constant presence of it and need to fulfil more and more and more .

I pause to stare down at myself rather than the stones and dirt. I am unchanged, as always, my skin the same color as the gemstone on the amulet that binds me. My owners are often afraid of me at first, seeing a creature from myth, yet this one came to trust and accept me quite quickly compared to others. I am glad, but I will an illusion in place regardless, so I am ready when they call.

Wish , I think and pray and plead. Wish .

For the hunger in me grows.