Chapter Nine
Marquis
So, uh… You seeing anyone? Mads stared up at Marquis from his arms and showed his teeth in a menacing sort of cringe that he’d seen with young familiars before. An attempted smile.
Marquis took a deep breath and shook his head. “Mads. I think at this point, I’m seeing you.”
Nice! He held his little arms up in the air, tiny black hands fisted in triumph. As if seeing them for the first time, he drew them back in, staring at the appendages as he opened and closed them. The cringe of a grin didn’t fade. His eyes scrunched up with the effort.
“Now, where are your clothes and wand?” Marquis glanced around as the whirr of the garage doors signaled him to glance over.
Over where you dropped me off.
“Then we go there.” Marquis marched off in the direction and deposited Mads by the front door to reclaim his clothes, dragging them and his new wand off behind the old register counter to change.
None of the kids bothered him, and the others seemed to have clothes that shifted with them most of the time.
It was standard process of a morning for most familiars to make sure their clothing was enchanted into an item.
He’d work with Mads on that later. For the moment, they were expecting guests.
Leon, Warring, and the children milled about as Meredith joined them, holding a little girl on her hip—Sheila.
Meredith made it her personal mission to make the little girl over in her image and keep her in human guise more often.
“Everyone stay in unless you’re called. Mads, do you mind staying here for a while?
We can come get you if we need, but I need you comfortable and calm until you have your shifting under control. ”
Gotcha!
Marquis nodded succinctly and headed out while Mads seated himself toward the side of the room, his posture stiff but less guilty and terrified than he’d been.
When he reached the garage, Roan, Rex, and Sailor stood side by side as Midnite lounged nearby on the tailgate of Rex’s truck, licking his paw. The glistening tips of his prosthetics, contrasting in the low light, held a somber note to them.
A car rolled up to the garage door, a glistening dark-blue color with rental car plates on them.
As they rolled in to the open gates, an older, very human woman, hair dyed a boxed black that couldn’t have been too far off of her natural hair color, before the gray settled in, peered about.
Marquis had reached the age that most mages did when they received their first gray hairs, where they’d never age past until their magic ran out.
And no mage knew when their time would come, only that one day it would wane and fade until they left the world.
Roan hadn’t quite hit his biological peak yet, so when the woman slid from the car, her face artificially taut, she looked so much older than her former partner.
The car came to a jerky stop, and from within, three people emerged.
A potbellied man in his late fifties with a walrus mustache and watery dark eyes exited the car and made no move to open the other car doors, letting his partner and another younger woman slide out on their own.
He didn’t even extend a hand to help them stand, his entitled expression disappearing behind a pair of reflective sunglasses of some odd brand and design.
The moment they slid over his dim face, it was as if he became a little more obstinate and visibly unintelligent.
“So, where’s Cade?” He sniffed to clear a nostril and turned his head to spit. Right in front of the fairer ones.
The two females with him appeared not to notice in the least, as if the behavior were common.
Midnite, for his part, gave Marquis a look that belied his disgust.
“Where is my son, Roan?” The shorter, older woman marched up and held a finger up to Roan with a grimace. Her narrow eyes narrowed further at him, her creaseless eyes holding an anger that could only be that of a mother scorned.
“Hello, Min. He’s nearby. I wanted to make sure you weren’t going to come in here grandstanding and trying to bring human morals where they don’t belong.” Roan stared her down.
She sniffed imperiously and glanced around. “It’s wrong what you do to boys. All because they have that little birthmark.”
“Birthmark?” Marquis raised a hand to get her attention.
“The birthmark below their navel!” She rested a hand on her stomach, and Roan rolled his eyes.
“Madam. I must be blunt, but that birthmark is a sign of his gender.” Marquis stepped forward, and Midnite, sitting quietly nearby, huffed.
“He’s a boy!” she snapped at Marquis.
“I’m not arguing that his exterior is that of human males. As far as traditional gender roles, he does keep male norms. His biological identity, internally, serves more or less the same function as a female’s.” Marquis held up a hand placatingly.
“It’s wrong. It’s not normal.” The thick Australian accent of Midnite’s stepfather, Gilbert, grumbled, brow furrowed. “They have laws against this sort of thing.”
Roan rubbed at his forehead as a young woman sighed heavily.
She had a stocky build like the male human and features like Min, Midnite’s mother.
They didn’t look very similar, but elements were there.
“Mum, Dad, fuck off. It’s been seventeen years!
I’ve not seen my big bubba since I was in grade school because you two can’t get off of social media and stop repeating toxic bullshit. ”
“It’s not right, Hannah!” Min stomped her foot.
“No, what’s not right is that the only thing you and Dad have in common is hate.
And if it weren’t for the fact that you’re sleeping with him, he’d be just as shitty to you.
” Hannah, Midnite’s sister, stomped her foot back like her mother and glared as her father tensed up as if he had the slight inclination to raise a hand to the girl.
“Watch it, Hannah!” His warning tone made Midnite bristle.
Listen here, you fat, ignorant fucking cunt! Suck my nonexistent fuzzy nuts! I’ve always hated you—Midnite ranted, his cat form grumbling and meowing as he spewed a plethora of swears. He’d never heard cunt used so prolifically and in so many creative ways before.
“Shut the fucking cat up, for chrissakes!” The human male whipped his head to the side and glanced around as if looking for something to throw. He hopped on one foot, reaching for his shoe as Midnite hissed violently and bristled.
Rex pulled his wand out in a blink as Roan did the same, but Midnite beat them to it in a blink, shifting to his human form, hand swiping out for his wand nearby. “Long time no see, Gilly.”
Gilbert, for his part, stumbled and fell back onto his bottom with a grunt and cried out with a hoarse noise. “Fuck!”
“Cade!” Hannah stared with openmouthed wonder. “How the fuck did you?”
“Magic.”
“I bloody well know that much, but like—” She gestured toward him. “And you look like you’ve not aged!”
“Probably the second-best part of being a mage, yeah?” He gave her a half grin. “Missed you, sis.”
Nite slid down and opened his arms, meeting her halfway with a hug. She squeezed tight and laughed. “What’s the best part?”
“I’d say magic or my husband, but the best part? Your nephews.” Nite pulled back as her eyes lit up.
“Nephews? You adopted?” She tilted her head.
“One of them, yeah. The other—the old-fashioned way.” He laughed as she furrowed her brow in confusion.
“So, you really can, like, get pregnant and all that?” She whispered it conspiratorially.
“Yeah. Part of being omega and a familiar.” He put his hands on his hips and blatantly ignored Gilbert and Min even as she called his name in confusion.
“Grandbabies?” The word halted Min’s fury as Rexford slipped by, grinning. He returned in seconds with Caspian seated in his arms, eyes scanning everything imperiously.
“Oh!” She held her hand over her mouth as Rex leaned in and handed him to Midnite.
“This is Caspian. Rex adopted Vince before we met, but he’s in the other room.” Midnite startled a little as Hannah and Min invaded his space and cooed, fawning over the little dark-haired boy.
“Oh, he’s a big boy. How old?” Min opened her arms, and, for such a small woman, she had a forceful way about her.
“Eleven months.” Midnite gently ceded the child to her.
“Hello, Caspian! I’m your nana.” She cooed, and Hannah introduced herself, both of them trying to crowd out the shying child as he whimpered in confusion. He spotted one of Min’s hair sticks, though, and made a mad grab for it, easily mollified as he chewed on the wooden stick.
Gilbert, standing alone behind them, had his mouth open in an unattractive gape, gawping like a fish in near disbelief that Min and Hannah would so readily drop all pretenses and indignation.
“So, you’re his mother?” Hannah treaded quietly over the words.
“Nope. Papa. It’s how mages do things. Omegas. Dad explained it to you, yeah?” Midnite stuck his hands in his pockets in a nervous force of habit.
“He said how it worked and that you’d been kidnapped.” Hannah stared Midnite down, turning her attention away from Caspian.
“Kidnapped, assaulted in multiple ways, trapped as a cat, mutilated. Yeah. Thanks for keeping me safe.” Midnite huffed and gave Gilbert a sneer.
“You look good, now.” Hannah’s cautious words ended when Nite pulled his hands out and flicked the gem on his collar. His fingertips faded away, leaving his scarred stumps behind. Nite wiggled them and huffed. “Bad kitties get declawed.”
“Oh. Oh, Cade…” Hannah sniffed as her eyes watered, and Min’s face grew hard. The glare of misplaced blame flicked toward Roan before Midnite brought his fingertips back with a pulse of magic to his gemstone.
“My husband fixed it.” Midnite referred to Rexford as partner or husband more often than mate, as it carried different connotations to him. “Rex is good to me.”
“Can’t be that good if you live in a shithole like this,” Gilbert said through gritted teeth.