His lips are on mine and they're just as soft as I imagined. He cups my cheek with one hand and supports my limp body with the other. His magic is starlight and shadows. I moan against his mouth. The flavour explodes on my tongue like nothing I've ever tasted. It's like I've spent my whole life eating a watered down version of this ambrosia. I probably have. His magic is so strong and pure that the rush of it makes my head spin. I can feel my strength returning.

I don't know how or when it happens but I'm straddling him. I wind my fingers into his hair, deepening the kiss. His hands find the hem of my shirt and his fingers dip beneath the fabric, caressing the smooth skin there. I feel like I'm on fire. He breaks free from my lips and I almost protest until his mouth finds the soft skin at the nape of my neck.

"Lexi," he breathes as he kisses a slow line across my collar bone.

Heat floods my body and I want to devour him. The thought of my bed, so far away, drifts across my mind. No, we won't make it.

"I don't want to drain you," I whisper into his hair.

He smells like shampoo and heaven.

"You and a dozen of your kind could not drain me, succubus," he murmurs against my neck.

I pull back. He looks shocked at the break of contact.

"I told you not to call me that."

He reaches for me again, eyes heavy with lust. "Apologies."

But I hold up my hand and stop him. "I'm not a sex demon." I tell him, needing him to understand. "I don't need sex to feed. I eat magic. Stop calling me a succubus."

To his credit, he's able to focus on my words instead of my body.

"So what is it that you call yourself if not a succubus?"

"I-" I hesitate, "I don't know what I am."

"So it is ignorance that makes you deny this part of yourself. You do not even know what a succubus is."

"I'm not ignorant," I say, pushing off of him, sad to lose the touch of his hands on my waist but wanted to prove my point even more. For a second I'd forgotten how annoying he is. "I looked it up. Succubi are demons that eat sexual energy and cut women open to impregnate them with their succubi spawn. That's not me."

Eko laughs and I bristle at the sound. "That is a very creative and very inaccurate description of succubi."

"And you're a succubi expert?"

He runs his hands through his hair and gives me a lazy smile that sets me on edge. "An expert? No. But I do have some... experience in the area."

The kiss had enough magic in it to keep me charged for a few days at least and I use that power to stand. I can't believe I almost lost my head and slept with this... this...

I turn on my heels and march out of the office. I don't stop until I've reached my bedroom and slam the door behind me. I grab a pillow from my bed, the one that Snot isn't sleeping on, and scream into it. There's a knock at the door. The sound of it doesn't make me clutch my head in pain and, for that, I'm grateful but I still don't answer it.

"Lexi?"

I ignore him.

"I did not intend to make you jealous with my... experience."

I scoff. "Jealous?" I call through the door, "I've never been jealous in my life. I couldn't care less about how many women you've slept with or if any of them were succubi."

"Then why are you upset?"

"I'm not upset. I'm annoyed. Because you're annoying! This entire week you've been nothing but secretive and purposely obtuse. At every turn you've been unhelpful, uncooperative, uncommunicative, and a general pain in the ass. How about, for once, you just volunteer some information without me having to pry it out of you. We're supposed to be working together! A team! But you seem more focused on pissing me off."

There's a long silence on the other side of the door and, for a second, I wonder if he's left.

When he speaks his voice is almost a whisper. "I apologise, my lady. I am not used to being... vulnerable. I spent a long time in windowless rooms with doctors and scientists who wanted nothing more than to pry information out of me and I am afraid I am no longer familiar with any other way of being. I wish to make up for my shortcomings. May I tell you what I know of your people?"

As I hesitate, Snot yowls at me from where she's been lounging. She stretches towards me and flops on her back. I go to rub her exposed belly but, as I do, she sinks her claws into my hand.

"Ow, what the hell!" I hiss, snatching it away.

The scratches are superficial and close within seconds. I take on some of the properties of the magic I consume which, in this case, is the fast healing of the fae.

I frown at Snot but the pain helps sharpen my mind.

You're being foolish, she's telling me.

"Don't judge me," I hiss and feel stupid for talking to my cat.

She leaps off the bed and sits beside the door, swishing her tail expectantly.

I open the door to a waiting Eko. He's leaning against the wall, his arms crossed and his face concerned. I consider apologising but don't know how. I'm not even sure what exactly I should be apologising for. Instead, I fall back on familiar habits and roll my eyes at him.

"Get on with it," I motion as I take a seat on the bed. "Tell me what I am."

He searches my face for something. What, I don't know. I'm not sure if he finds it.

"I have only met one of your kind and only for a short time while I visited the court of her master. I will tell you what she told me and all that I have gleaned from others."

He walks into my room, not looking at me. I don't have many personal items but he finds a polaroid photo on my dresser and stares at it. I pretend not to care. Pretend like I haven't been waiting for years for these answers. My heart flutters in my chest and I want to shake him so he'll get on with it.

"Is this your mother?"

I shrug.

"She was a succubus too." he says and it isn't a question. "The gene. That's a word the scientists of The Arc taught me. The succubus gene is passed maternally. Is she alive?"

He sits on the bed beside me and hands me the polaroid. It's my favourite picture of her. The one where she hasn't lost her hair yet. Where she's looking right into the camera and she's smiling. She never stopped smiling, really. Even through the chemo and radiation.

"No."

He puts a hand on my arm. "I am sorry."

I pull away. "It was a long time ago." but it still hurts.

He hesitates and, for a second, I think he's going to comfort me but then he continues speaking. "Succubi fed on the magic of those around them. They were rare creatures with the ability to alleviate the burden that magic holds."

"The burden?" I ask, trying not to sound like I'm hanging on every word.

"Magic is a great burden." he murmurs, almost to himself. "It begs to be used. To be shaped and moulded by its user. When one is unable to satiate its needs, as I am now, magic angers. It burns and aches and roils inside of one's belly like a dragon demanding release."

He touches the spot above his stomach where the device blocks his access to his magic.

"Succubi were elusive gems that all rulers desired. Not just for the relief they brought but also for the ecstasy. They said that having a succubus feed on you was like stepping into the heavens themselves." His eyes lock on mine. "It is a feeling unlike any other."

I swallow hard at the smoulder behind his eyes. My cheeks flush.

"Wars have been fought for your kind. Kingdoms have fallen.

But the power of a succubus was beyond simple pleasure. They had power in their own right. They could use the magic they stole and that made them dangerous.

I will tell you a story that has been passed through generations. Whether it is entirely true or not, I cannot say, but I shall tell it to you as it was told to me.

It is a tale of a succubus whose name was only whispered for fear of the power it evoked.

She had spent many years as the consort to a powerful king who treated her as one treats their bride. She spent her days tending to the king or, when he was away, experiencing all the joys and wonders that the kingdom had to offer. It was a comfortable life and all that saw her believed her to be content with it. But she was not. In the shadows of the court she conspired to overthrow the king and steal his crown. You see, she had feasted on his magic for so long and now wielded it so deftly that she considered herself to be not only his equal but his superior. She believed it was therefore her right to rule his kingdom.

With the power she stole from the king, she killed him, his generals, and all his children. With none left with a legitimate claim to the throne she took it. But she was hungry. After glutting for all those years, her stomach had stretched and expanded. It was an endless void that could not be filled. She had killed the great powers she had fed from and there were none left to satiate her and so she took from her subjects. They weakened and starved under her rule and eventually fled to neighbouring kingdoms. The rulers there promised to help but, as soon as their armies approached, she sucked them dry of magic and life.

Enlisting the help of the humans they soon learned that magic was not the only thing on which she could feed. She stole the breath straight from their lungs and turned their bodies to ash.

Seeking a solution they begged the help of another of her kind who taught them how to guard themselves against her. How to contain their magic and lifeforce so that she would not be able to touch them. With this newfound skill, the greatest warriors among them went forth and slew her.

Fearing that others of her kinds would follow her example, the rulers of the land ordered them killed. The warriors were dispatched to the far reaches of the world to hunt them. None were spared."

He watches me as I take the story in.

"But they didn't kill them all," I whisper.

I fold in on myself, wrapping my arms around my legs and hugging tight. I sort through the information that was just presented to me. There's so much to unpack. 

"Is that why I couldn't touch your magic before?" I ask. "Because you knew how to shield it from me?"

He nods. "I may not be able to use it as I once had but I can still hold it inside."

My temper flares. "All that just so I couldn't eat?"

His mouth twitches into a smile. "All you had to do was ask."

"So you would have let me starve? I could have hurt Mar!"

"Your friend was safe. I would not have let you hurt her." He leans against my headboard and stares up at the ceiling. "In truth, I did not know how dire your situation had become. I thought you would surely ask me for my magic rather than see yourself starve. I should not have underestimated your pride, it seems."

"It's not about pride," I seeth. "It's about my secrets being mine."

"So none know of your powers then?"

I shake my head.

"Then you are a thief, stealing your meals."

My hands ball into fists. "I have no other choice!"

He looks at me with sharp eyes. The urge to shrink away overcomes me but I manage to meet his gaze and hold it.

"There is always another choice." He cocks an eyebrow, "You could have taken concubines. That is the way your ancestors handled such things. Or, if the thought is unappealing, you could have taken a lover with enough magic to satiate you. Do you not think your meals deserve to know what you are doing to them?"

The memories flood me. The house we bought on the edge of town, the way he would whisper that he loved me when he was leaving for work and thought I was asleep, the promises we made for our future. The way his face had gone white when I told him what I was, the chaos when Guards had broken down our door to take me in the middle of the night, the piles of ash that was all that was left of their bodies when I had finished with them.

"You've seen what The Arc does to people like us. People with too much power. I risked it once and I won't risk it again. I can't."