Page 10 of Miles's Pact
"Well, I found my mate," I said, and Ollie cheered, then slid off the armchair to settle beside me as he gave me a one-armed hug.
"That's amazing, Miles! Congratulations!"
"Thank you," I murmured as I returned his smile. It was hard not to.
"I'm happy for you, Miles," Devon murmured, then tilted his head, a bit of his bobcat side showing in his mannerisms. Cat shifters were always the easiest to recognize, because their feline qualities somehow managed to shine through their human forms. "But what does that have to do with me?"
"I wanted to talk to both of you. My mate... Duckie, he doesn't want to shift. He's a duck shifter, and he refuses to take a human form."
Devon blinked, his surprise clear on his face, and Ollie made a soft sound of concern.
"Is something stopping him? Like a spell?" Ollie asked, and I shook my head.
"We talked to him, and it's clear he doesn't want to shift. I don't know if he's afraid or doesn't feel comfortable in a human form..."
"We?" Devon questioned, and I nodded.
"He's Mateo's mate too."
"Ah, that makes sense. I'd wondered how you'd handle it if one of you found your mate. I suppose Fate thought of that too."
I smiled at that, knowing he was right. Mateo and I were close. As if being twins wasn't enough, we'd been through some rough shit together, and it'd only brought us closer. I didn't think either of us would've handled it well.
Duckie
The length of a big but cozy bedroom separated me from Alex, the teen incubus Mateo thought I'd get along with. We'd been alone for about ten minutes, watching each other.
I glanced around the room as I waited for Alex to speak, taking in the band posters, the messy sheets on the bed, the desk he sat at that was covered in notebooks, a pen holder overflowing with pens, and a stack of textbooks I couldn't see the titles of from here.
I could hear Mateo talking to Jai and Raphael downstairs, and I kept getting distracted by their conversation. Raphael had given me a health check when we first got here, and once he'd confirmed I was healthy, Mateo had introduced me to Alex and then gone back downstairs, telling me to let him know when I was ready to leave.
"Gus is going to be so mad I got to meet your mate first," Raphael was saying, his voice filled with unbridled glee.
"I know! I didn't think of it until now. He's going to kill me."
Raphael snickered, and I shook my head, and wondered how he could be a 160-plus-year-old mage. He didn't look it, and he certainly didn't sound like it. I also wondered who this Gus was. Another friend of theirs?
"So you don't want to shift, huh?" The soft voice made me jump, and I glanced up at Alex, who was sitting at a desk near the window on the other side of the room.
Their dark brown eyes were focused on me, their straight black hair framing their face as they leaned forward, the faded red tips gleaming in the faint sunlight peeking in through the window.
I shook my head, and they pursed their lips, their fingers tapping a rhythm on the desk. "I get that. If I had an animal form, I'd stick to it too."
I tilted my head, curious why. I wouldn't ask them because I wasn't ready to answer that question myself, but they told me anyway.
"I don't... I don't like the way people look at me," they said with a shrug, turning their head to peer out the window. "Jai and Raphael don't look at me like that. They treat me like I'm a normal kid, but other people..." They trailed off as a tremor ran through their body, and my heart ached for them. I hadn't been around many supes in my life, and they were the first incubus I'd met, but even I could tell they were powerful. I could sense their power, sense their tenuous hold on it, but it didn't affect me. Maybe because I'd already found my mates?
I wanted to say something to make them feel better, but of course, I couldn't. So I did the next thing I could think of. I flew over to the desk, and butted my head against their chin.
Alex snorted, then patted my head. "Thanks, Duckie. You're a good guy."
I didn't know about that. I didn't think I'd done much in my life to be considered good or bad. I just was, like I'd been for most of my life. I was existing because I was too much of a coward tolive.
Everything okay?Mateo asked in my mind, and I wondered if some of my feelings had reached him through the bond.
Yeah, it's all good, I assured him as I took a few steps back, glancing down at the paper I was standing on. Messy scribbles covered the page, and while I had learned to read in school, the writing made the words almost illegible to me. The open textbook beside it made me wonder if they'd been studying, but Alex placed his palm over the text before I could puzzle it out. Their tan skin appeared flushed, and I concluded I'd been trying to read something personal.
I ducked my head in apology, and they smiled and patted my head again.
