Incubus (The Incubus Saga) Read online

  by Amanda Meuwissen

  Eighteen, adult themes not suitable only for any readers below the age of eighteen years old

  BigWorldNetwork.com

  Copyright

  INCUBUS

  The Incubus Saga: Book 1

  Copyright © 2013 - Amanda Meuwissen

  All rights reserved.

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserve above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without prior written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief passages embodied in critical reviews and articles.

  This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this book are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, locales is entirely coincidental. The author holds exclusive rights to this work. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited.

  The publisher does not have control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party web sites.

  Editor - Meagan Hedin

  Book layout/Cover design - Mario Hernandez

  A BigWorldNetwork.com Book

  Published by BigWorldNetwork.com, LLC

  202 North Rock Road | 1303 | Wichita | KS | 67206

  www.bigworldnetwork.com

  First U.S. Edition: July 2013

  Printed in the United States of America

  DEDICATION

  For Lisa, who gave me some of my favorite scenes. For Steph, who so willingly got sucked into a world she never thought she’d know. For Meagan, for reading it all many times through.

  For John, my amazing husband, for putting up with all the long days and nights spent writing. And for all the others who helped shape this story into what it finally became.

  Thank you.

  pisode 1

  Incubus

  Nathan only ever wanted a normal life, but for him, life, family, and love are anything but normal.

  On the other side of the Veil, dark and light fae exist outside the knowledge of most humans. Nathan Grier was born human, but his twin brother Jim is a changeling. On the run since they were children, time for both of them is running out. Turning to fae hunter Sasha Kelly for help, Nathan must soon face his growing feelings for the other man while trying to save himself and his brother from a fate worse than death.

  This series is an Urban Paranormal Fantasy/Gay Romance story that kicks off the beginning of an epic trilogy of love, family, and a fight to save the world.

  Contents

  Copyright

  DEDICATION

  Title

  Episode 1

  Episode 2

  Episode 3

  Episode 4

  Episode 5

  Episode 6

  Episode 7

  Episode 8

  Episode 9

  Episode 10

  Episode 11

  Episode 12

  Episode 13

  Episode 14

  Episode 15

  Episode 16

  Episode 17

  Episode 18

  Episode 19

  Episode 20

  Episode 21

  Episode 22

  Episode 23

  Episode 24

  Episode 25

  Episode 26

  Episode 27

  Episode 28

  Episode 29

  Episode 30

  Episode 31

  Episode 32

  Episode 33

  Episode 34

  Episode 35

  Episode 36

  Episode 37

  Episode 38

  Episode 39

  Episode 40

  Episode 41

  Episode 42

  Episode 43

  Episode 44

  Episode 45

  Episode 46

  Episode 47

  Episode 48

  Episode 49

  Episode 50

  Incubus Volume 2, Coming Soon…

  NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR:

  About the Author

  BigWorldNetwork.com

  pisode 1

  Episode One

  Nathan Grier hit the ground hard on his hands and knees, gasping for breath. Traveling through the Veil with Jim had always been so effortless. Nathan had forgotten how much his brother’s presence protected him. Without Jim, even a brief trip just hurt everywhere.

  Pushing up from the ground and sitting back on his heels, Nathan gulped down air to steady his pulse. He looked around quickly, taking in the dark landscape. It was still night but there was light steadily growing on the horizon.

  He did not have much time.

  Nathan struggled to his feet and took a few pained steps forward to the edge of the cliff. Below was St. Brides Bay, empty of divers and kayaks at this early hour. Normally, Nathan would be able to clearly see the lush green hills, steep drop-offs, and spattering of flowers that had not yet died with the growing autumn cold, but for now the world was covered in darkness.

  He pulled his jacket more tightly around him, swallowing hard as he peered down the long expanse to the beach below. The wind was whipping harshly through his short black hair as if it desired nothing more than to see him blown right over the edge.

  Turning back to the Veil doorway he had come from, Nathan saw that it was no longer visible, though he knew it was still there. He had crossed the ocean in search of a Power Point strong enough to summon a Messenger. The doorway was where the Messenger would appear.

  Nathan dropped back down to his knees, leaving the edge of the cliff behind him. Removing the small blade from the strap on his ankle, he cut a shallow but distinct divided circle into his left palm. He maintained the grip he had on his knife as he carefully pressed the bloody symbol he had carved into his hand to the grass and soil beneath him.

  The words of the summoning spell poured from Nathan’s lips and, with every new line spoken, he could feel something like a current climbing up his arm from the ground. It almost hurt, almost renewed that awful pain he had felt when he first arrived, but he ignored the sensation. As the last line of the spell left him, Nathan stretched his bloody palm toward the doorway in offering.

  Light erupted from the once again visible entrance into the Veil. The beauty of a true fae nearly blinded Nathan as the Messenger he had summoned stepped onto the cliff before him.

  Nathan had seen fae on the other side of the Veil, but never a Messenger. Never any kind of sidhe. Sidhe were fae of royal blood, powerful, but incapable of leaving the Veil unless they were summoned. To see one as she truly was, in the mortal realm, without his brother’s protection, was almost more than Nathan’s all-too-human senses could bear. But he was too stubborn to be struck dumb by the sight of some damn faerie.

  “Nathan Grier,” said the Messenger, sounding pleased. Her voice was like the wind and echoes in a cavern. She was beautiful, as all fae were, but Nathan knew she could also be terrible in appearance if she chose to be. Most fae looked human enough, but the Devil was in the details, and it was more their presence that overwhelmed than any physical trait.

  The Messenger’s hair was auburn and impossibly long, as if it could become a cloak that would drape around her. Her eyes glowed amber from behind a bird-like mask of gold and red, with the long sharp beak covering most of her face.

  This Messenger was a harpy. Her ears tapered to points, her fingernails were sharpened like talons, and the flowing fabrics that covered her body were shredded from harsh winds and battle. Although Nathan could not see wings, he heard the sound of flapping when she moved closer to him and gestured for him to stand.

  Nathan could not afford to show fear. So he stood, confidently, still clutching his knife tightly in his uninjured hand, and spoke, “I offer a trade for the return of my brother.”

  “Do you now?” said the Messenger. “We have been waiting years for James Grier to join the court. What could you possibly offer that would be worth more than a changeling?”

  That word—changeling—made Nathan cringe, but he spoke on. “You can have me.”

  “You?” The Messenger laughed. “You expect me to believe you would offer yourself and willingly become a Shadow Immortal? A slave?”

  Nathan straightened. “If that’s what it takes. You can’t claim a human slave unless they offer themselves freely, I know that, and it’s a rare thing to have these days. I will give myself to the dark fae court. Just return my brother and leave him alone.”

  The Messenger’s head tilted toward Nathan, clearly intrigued.

  Nathan had heard stories of what happened to humans who made bargains with fae. Fae were immortal. Humans were not. But if given freely to the dark or light fae court, a human man or woman could become something almost immortal, only imperfect and obedient, like a wraith without any will of its own. To the fae who owned such slaves, it meant great prestige and power.

  She would take the deal.

  “James is not the same as he was when he left you,” said the Messenger, and although Nathan could not see her lips beneath the beak of her mask, he knew she was smiling. “He is and always has been a changeling. Now that he has been with the dark fae court, his powers will begin to mature and True Awakening is not far behind. We cannot reverse what has already come to pass. We would only be able to cloud his mind for a time.”

  “
Fine, then…then cloud his mind, whatever, just let him go,” said Nathan. “He has to remember that he’s Jim. If he’s Jim when he comes back then I know he can stay that way no matter what you bastards did to him.”

  The Messenger grew silent. She watched Nathan with a scrutinizing stare for some time. Then, without giving the slightest sign that she might move until she did, she swooped toward him. The sound of her invisible wings rustled as she drew closer, and the tips of her long auburn hair dusted the edges of the grass.

  Instinctively, Nathan took a step back. The wind had picked up speed, and he remembered nervously that the edge of the cliff was not far behind him.

  “Your offer is…agreeable,” said the Messenger, so close to Nathan that the sharp point of her beak was practically catching him on the cheek. “Though we cannot promise James will not remember in time and seek us out himself.”

  The Messenger seemed to take up all the air around Nathan, and yet she had no scent. It was unnerving being a hair’s breadth from something that smelled like nothing was there. Nathan could see the slits of her pupils, the sign that she was a dark fae instead of one of the light.

  “Do you understand?” the Messenger pressed.

  “Yeah, I get it,” said Nathan. “Just take the deal and let my brother go.”

  “As you wish.”

  The land went almost instantly black. Nathan couldn’t move. He couldn’t breathe. The ambient sounds around him disappeared. It was like floating in deep space, with only the Messenger’s voice echoing surreally around him.

  “Your offer is accepted by this court, Nathan Grier. James is returned, and you…belong to us.”

  Nathan tried to speak but no sound came out. He trembled when the Messenger reached for him and yet, somehow, despite the tension in his body and that awful pull of the encroaching Veil coming to claim him, he managed to move. Nathan lifted the knife still in his right hand and struck, plunging the iron blade deep into the Messenger’s heart.

  She shrieked in agony. All fae were allergic to iron; it was the only way Nathan knew of killing them, but the Messenger did not fall as quickly as he expected. She lashed back and tore into Nathan’s chest with her talons. They were real talons now, not merely sharpened fingernails, for the Messenger had shed her beautiful guise and become the beast. The mask was her real face now, an ugly beak with beady slit eyes, and her torn garments spread out around her as leathery wings.

  The blackness faded from their surroundings, returning to a buzzing, noisy world where the sun had just risen and the wind was still blowing. The Messenger shuddered, whimpering in the awful voice of her true form, and finally fell at Nathan’s feet.

  Nathan’s chest burned from where her claws had struck him, and he stumbled back. As he watched the Messenger’s form grow still on the ground, a substance thick as tar seeped out from beneath her like blood and covered her body until it consumed her. When she was truly dead, all that remained was Nathan’s knife lying amidst a black stain on the grass. The Veil doorway had long since disappeared.

  Pain seared through Nathan’s chest again, unnaturally, as if something was being freshly branded into his skin. He gasped, stumbling further back at the sudden throbbing until he tripped and felt his feet slip from the edge of the cliff.

  Air rushed past Nathan, blinding his vision. There was too much darkness to see clearly, despite the risen sun. He was freefalling with nothing below to catch him. Falling...

  Nathan braced himself for death, but impact never came. He was just suddenly on the ground, coughing up at the sky as if he had landed hard enough to wind him but nothing more. He should not have been able to survive such a long drop, and yet he had landed safely on the beach, far beneath the cliff he had been standing on a moment ago.

  Reaching a hand to his chest, Nathan felt where the Messenger had dug in her claws. There was a tear in his shirt, and on his skin just above his heart were the grooves of an already healed-over scar. She had marked him for trying to back out of their deal. All dark fae would be after him now to claim the bounty for his betrayal and for killing one of their sidhe. And if no one claimed him before the mark ran its course…

  He had to find Jim.

  Nathan’s entire body ached in protest when he started to move. He wondered if the fall had killed him after all and he was just in shock, but even as that thought flickered through his mind, the pain began to lessen and he was able to sit up.

  He didn’t trust his eyes when he first saw the figure sprawled face down along the shore beside him as if it had washed in with the tide.

  “Jim…?”

  A groan responded, the body already moving, pushing up on trembling arms and taking in gulps of air like coming up from deep water.

  There was no question, no doubt at all. It was Jim, looking just as he had the last time Nathan had seen him, even in the same T-shirt and jeans. His hair was black like Nathan’s but longer and unkempt, and he seemed so much larger than Nathan despite their nearly identical height.

  Nathan didn’t care how it was possible for Jim to look so much the same when the Messenger had said she wouldn’t be able to return him as he was. All that mattered was that Jim was back. Jim was right there in front of him.

  Moving as quickly as his sore muscles would allow, Nathan scrambled toward his brother, seeking some final confirmation. He wanted Jim to look up, look him in the eyes and smile so impossibly wide like he used to.

  It took a moment, took Nathan reaching out and grasping Jim’s shoulder, but finally Jim caught his breath and tilted his head up to meet Nathan’s gaze.

  Slit pupils blinked wearily.

  Nathan jerked back, though he did not release the grip he had on his brother’s shoulder. He couldn’t. He stared into his brother’s dark blue eyes. But as he looked more carefully, he saw that they were not slit. They looked normal.

  “N-Nate…? Wh-what…what’s going on?” Jim shook as he spoke, almost as if he really had washed ashore and was soaked to the bone. He squinted at their surroundings. “Porthclais? Wales? How did we get here? Wasn’t I…out getting pizza?” He looked back at Nathan, completely lost.

  The Messenger may not have been able to wipe Jim’s memory, but she had kept her word and clouded his mind for now. Nathan was grateful, even though he didn’t know how long that brief reprieve would last.

  “I’ll tell you everything,” Nathan said, smacking his brother’s shoulder and giving it a good squeeze. “But first let’s get ourselves somewhere a little warmer, huh? The doorway, remember, is all the way up there.” He pointed up the cliff face.

  Jim groaned. “Then why the hell are we down here?”

  A broader smile tugged at Nathan’s lips. “Quit complaining, you big girl,” he said, and stood to help Jim up as well.

  As pained and wobbly on their feet as both brothers were, Nathan led them back to the top of the cliff to summon the doorway and leave Wales behind. Explanations would come later.

  Episode 2

  Episode two

  “You did what?” Jim exclaimed, anger and disappointment hardening his otherwise boyish features.

  Nathan knew Jim would be upset, but he also firmly believed that in time Jim would come to realize that what he had done was for the best. He said as much aloud.

  “For the best?” Jim shot back. “You think throwing your life away is for the best? I’m the one they’re supposed to take, not you!”

  Nathan was sitting on the edge of the lone bed in their motel room, already with a beer in hand from the bottles he had stuffed into the tiny motel fridge before he left. Rather than respond to his brother, Nathan took a long pull from the bottle.

  They had passed through the doorway in Porthclais and arrived back at Nathan’s Illinois motel about half an hour ago. Veil doorways could lead to any connecting location. All anyone had to do was think of where they wanted to go, assuming they knew how to find a doorway in the first place. The afterimage of the one in their motel room was still faintly glowing on the wall.