Chapter 2 Liam
“It’s about time you woke up.”
The harassed-sounding, unfamiliar female voice had Liam jerking upright in his bed. Wait. Not his bed. Someone else’s bed. Where the fuck was he?
“Shower’s over there. I’ve got other appointments to get to. If you don’t hurry up, I’ll just leave you to it. I’ll be having words with Ayden for knocking you out. It’s thrown out my whole night.”
“Sorry that my kidnapping is such an inconvenience to you,” Liam muttered, glaring at the woman. “I don’t need a shower. I need you to tell me what the fuck’s going on and then to get out of … wherever the hell I am.”
“Not hell. You’re still on Earth, for now. You really do need a shower. There’s only one way a lust demon can knock someone out with their power, and it makes a mess of someone with your anatomy,” the woman said, waving vaguely in the direction of his lap.
Liam’s face flamed bright red as he processed what she was saying and the sticky mess in the lace panties he’d worn out to the bar. He’d been knocked out with an orgasm? That should not be so hot. Not at all. Even if he had kinda begged for it.
“Did you say lust demon?!”
“Yeah. Ayden’s an incubus. Would’ve thought the arousal that follows him everywhere he goes would’ve clued you in.”
“Right. Because I come across demons so often in my everyday life that I can definitely name them all. I should probably have the Latin genus and species down by this point.”
“Incubus is already Latin. It means a nightmare induced by a demon. Probably because knocking people out with orgasms was their best form of defence, but the name originally implied somnophiliac practices at best and more sinister connotations at worst. Not really fair to them, of course. They can’t help their nature, and they’re no more or less likely to enjoy somnophilia than the next person. ”
Liam stared blankly at the woman whose name he still didn’t even know, in the corner of the room he still didn’t know the location of, trying to parse that weird-as-fuck, encyclopaedic info dump. “Somnophilia? What?”
“Sex with someone who’s asleep, dear. You should really go shower.”
“Did that guy have sex with me while I was unconscious?” He didn’t think so. He felt far too empty and not nearly delightfully sore enough for that.
“No! Of course not. He may be a pain in the ass, but he would never do that without consent.”
“Right. I’m just gonna—” Liam gestured toward the ensuite bathroom, waiting until the woman got the hint and left the room before throwing the covers off and heading to the shower.
The whole time he was getting clean, he couldn’t stop thinking about somnophilia.
Waking up to someone already taking their pleasure from your body sounded fucking hot.
He really didn’t need to add another kink to his collection when he had no idea where he was or what they were going to do with him.
When he emerged a short time later, the woman was sitting, working at a dining table.
There was a nice-looking kitchen to her right and a comfy couch and TV set up just in front of him.
Judging by the single other door off the room, they were in a small one-bedroom apartment.
But a way nicer one than the studio he’d been living in.
“Right,” the woman said, looking up as she pushed a folder toward the side of the table with a spare chair.
“This is all the information you need. The Council is covering the cost of your accommodation for the first six months, of course. They’ve set you up with a job at Monster Mercenaries.
You start on Monday, 8am. Don’t be late.
You’ve got a new bank account and phone.
It won’t be able to call any numbers outside the city, so don’t even try.
I stocked the fridge for you while you were out, but if you need anything, there is a nominal start-up payment in your account, and the map on page six will show you where the nearest stores are.
Given how rare humans are in Sanctum City, I’d advise you to be very careful with any social interactions.
There’s a summary of the key species and their characteristics on pages 7 through 12 to help with your integration, but it’s best not to take any chances.
Plenty of the residents rely on humans as either food, energy source, or preferred plaything, so unless that’s what you’re after, it’s best to act with caution.
If you run into any trouble, the number programmed into your phone as SOS will take you to a Supernatural Council operative who should be able to help. Any questions?”
Liam dropped into the chair with a thump, staring at the cover of the folder as his mind spun. “Yeah. What the fuck is happening right now?”
The woman huffed with impatience. “You’re part of the 0.
7 percent of the human population resistant to mind manipulation by my kind.
In order to prevent the disclosure of the existence of supernatural species to the general population, you have been relocated to a supernatural city.
The Council provides re-establishment support in these cases in recognition of the change in circumstances. ”
“The change in circumstances?! Your council kidnapped me.”
“Yes, for the safety of the supernatural populations of Earth, you will not be permitted to live outside council-sanctioned areas for the duration of your natural life.”
“What about my family?”
“Visits may be possible in future with a permit, but that’s unlikely to be granted for the first few years.
They’ve already been attended to by a vampire to ensure they recall regular contact from you.
Luckily, they do not appear to have the same resistance that you do.
Memory adjustment will be refreshed once a year to ensure they don’t suffer any distress. ”
“What about my distress?”
The woman shrugged, placed a phone, a bank card, and keys on the table, and then disappeared from the room in a blur of motion. The soft click of the latch left Liam to stare in complete amazement at the front door she’d just booked it through.
What. The. Fuck?
When he finally managed to drag his attention back to the table in front of him, Liam checked the phone to find it was midday on Saturday.
A series of reminders appeared to be pre-programmed, including an alarm for Monday morning to ensure he didn’t miss his first day at the job he didn’t ask for.
A job at ‘Monster Mercenaries’, which wasn’t ominous at all.
A quick flick through the folder revealed it was part tourist guide, part encyclopaedia. The encyclopaedia section left a lot to be desired, though. The introduction raised more questions than it answered:
For ease of integration, we have sorted the species into ‘human-passing’ and ‘primary citizen’ because Sanctum City primarily exists for those who cannot travel openly in their species form in the human world.
The reader should note that various glamours can be used to make a primary citizen appear human, although these are seldom used within the city limits.
You may come across the colloquial collective term of ‘monster’ for species that cannot pass as human, generally used in jest. The reader should note that this slang has arisen from recent amusing trends in human romance fiction, especially from species that mate or play with humans as a preference. Engage at your own risk.
Well, fuck. What did it say about his supposed employer that their business name used the term monster?
What exactly had the Supernatural Council signed him up for?
As curious as that paragraph had him after all the monster romances he’d read, he had no intention of sticking around to find out.
Leaving the phone on the table in case it was being tracked, he scooped up the keys and headed for the door, determined to get out of the city.
He almost immediately second-guessed himself when he emerged into the hallway and almost ran face-first into someone very large and very green. With tusks.
“Fuck. Sorry,” he muttered.
“Welcome to the building, human!” the orc answered cheerfully, striding to the elevator to call it for him.
“Ah, thanks. You too,” Liam replied with a vague wave, wincing to himself at the awkward reply.
Thankfully, the orc must’ve been arriving home rather than leaving, because she just waved enthusiastically instead of trying to squeeze into the elevator with him.
When he stepped out of the front entrance, the street he emerged onto seemed quiet.
Large draping trees arched over a road devoid of traffic, which was overlooked by buildings walled in lush green plants.
Some of them were purely decorative, but the walls he walked past at street level often sported edible plants like kale.
He’d skimmed the map in the folder before he left, so he knew if he headed west, he should reach the border of the city within three blocks.
Sure enough, a shimmering heat haze filled the air ahead of him as he reached a road sign that read ‘Sentry Street’.
The haze stretched far overhead before arching back toward the centre of the city, like the whole place was enclosed in a dome.
Forcing his feet forward, he crossed the road until whatever it was he could see was right in front of him. Reaching out a hand, he touched a single fingertip to the place where light was twisting … and woke up flat on his back on the other side of the road from the barrier.
Groaning, he rolled onto his side before pushing back to his feet.
He’d known it would be too easy if he could just walk out of there, but he’d had to try.
Following Sentry Street around to the north, he searched for a gate or opening of some kind.
Anything. He walked all afternoon until his feet ached and his mouth rasped with thirst. And he ended up right back where he’d started.
There was no road in or out. No break in the barrier. Nowhere he could go to get free.
Giving up in disgust, he limped back to the apartment he’d been left in and shoved his face under the tap in the kitchen to drink straight from the water pouring out.
He had just enough energy to microwave a serving of lasagne he found in the fridge and choke it down before staggering to bed and collapsing.
Sunday brought no more luck than the previous day, but with the added bonus of blisters from his impromptu hike.
The only creepy silver lining was that someone had moved his entire wardrobe with him, so at least he had his own clothes to wear.
When he finally sat down to read the folder more carefully from cover to cover, he cursed himself.
He could’ve saved himself the trip if he’d read it first—the only way to enter or exit the city is by magical portal.
If you require transport, please message your council contact for approval.
Where could he find someone who’d be willing to make him a portal? The wholly inadequate summaries of the species didn’t list which were capable, but he had to assume the lust demon who’d brought him here could. Maybe he could track him down once he figured things out a bit more.
In the meantime, he ate comfort food and binge-watched baking shows in the hopes it would make him forget the list of species he’d just read about—gargoyles, orcs, demons, angels, fae, gorgons, hellhounds, and more.
Along with the carefully annotated footnote that the existence of such species was entirely unrelated to any human religious or mythological concepts, and any individual purporting to be, or be associated with, a deity of any kind should be reported to the Council immediately.
That footnote clearly had a story behind it.
It was all intimidating as fuck. Plus, he had to face his first day in a job he hadn’t applied for tomorrow.
He didn’t even know what he’d be doing. They’d better not expect him to be some supernatural expert.
His love life might’ve been a horny, drama-filled mess back home, but his work life had always been the opposite.
At work, he was dedicated, respected, and conscientious.
That’s part of why it had sucked so much to be laid off. He’d been damn good at his job!
Determined not to let these assholes at the Council ruin his life, he decided he was going to ace this fucking job while he searched for someone to portal him out of there. Monster Mercenaries would never have seen an employee as professional as him.
That determination lasted him all the way through getting his security card from the slender receptionist with glittering wings, past the orcs and hellhounds on the ground floor, and down to the basement where he’d been directed to report.
The rest of the workers located down there must’ve been later starters because there was no sign of anyone as Liam hurried past a dozen desks covered in knick-knacks and what looked suspiciously like stray bladed weapons, and through a cosy employee lounge and kitchen.
The desk just outside the office he was heading to was clear of anything but a closed laptop, presumably waiting for Liam. The office itself was walled in the kind of high-tech glass that could be switched from clear to opaque at the touch of a button.
The door swung open before he could knock, followed by a wave of an all-too-familiar fiery scent. The stern face of the horned demon sitting behind the desk gave nothing away as Liam stepped inside.
So much for professionalism.
What were the chances his new boss would be the same lust demon he’d been all over instead of running away from when he kidnapped him? The same one who’d finally gotten sick of Liam’s whining and knocked him out by making him come in his pants.
He was mortified. He was also hard.