“Tell them we’re human smugglers. Say one of the locals let rest of us come in for a fee,” I instructed the brown-eyed monster. He relayed the words to the frazzled crowd. Clearly, this was no invasive force. Most of them were severely underdressed teenagers or younger. They were herded back inside to avoid freezing. An old man fussed in a shed with black rocks that could have been coal and passed bucketful along to other old people. Strange.

I tried to worry over the safety of my friends, but seeping concern for young strangers killed that notion in its crib.

“Do they got any kids in here?” I asked in a whisper. Sure, it wasn’t a situation to add pint-sized chaos into the fray, but even so, all the faces around were marred with more than just concern. They were old. Youngest specimen in my line of sight must have easily been forty.

“No,” monster revealed.

“Why?” I wondered, but answer was fairly obvious, especially taking battle-preparedness of the townsfolk into consideration. “Are we in danger?”

“No. I’ll kill it,” monster dismissed the minor annoyance.

“Can you, really?” I hoped I implied the current suboptimal health of his.

“Yes,” he hissed in what I assumed to be insistent manner.

“Cool, cool... You sure?”

Hiss repeated without discernable words. I pressed on with my fledgling idea, “Cool. Can you ask them if they’d be willing to take in handful of new folk if their resident menace died on your hands under some mysterious circumstance?”

Brown eyes bore into me as his booming – but thankfully still human - voice carried over to the hovering crowd. Most of the locals were more baffled to receive the visitors rather than question it. The cluster of elders I assumed to be in charge hadn’t forgotten the main issue at hand, if those wary glares was anything to judge by.

Monster and the people in the crowd conversed. I heard disbelief, jeering, anger. I asked for words and shouted back looking at that specific infuriated face. “Make a promise, then!”

There was long-ass rebuke but I assumed he agreed with all these fine people to witness. It was hard to weasel out of such a useful deal. They probably would have let us stay regardless, if current mood was anything to go by, but insurances were handy. Even then, nothing stopped the rat bastard from disregarding any deal made previously. Changing the rules during the play was classic move from those in power.

The snoopy committee still shuffled nearby. They were cautious to begin with, and perhaps the heavy burden now resting over their shoulders inspired additional apprehension. Bilingual guy sidled closer and asked mutedly, “Who are you people?”

“Monster hunters!” I proclaimed merrily. Blank stares met me and I deliberated with my devilish companion. I repeated just as happily in their tongue, “Human-trafficking monster hunters!”

“Stop them,” monster muttered being unnaturally still. Alarmed, I looked around. What horror was I to stop that this omnipotent creature was powerless against? Something very small and human. I scanned the people and saw it. They were feeding the new mouths.

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It would have been laughable, creature like that fretting over mere bread, but I saw him concentrate to the brink of discarding the human façade.

“Citrine!” I called for backup, running towards the house. Most have still been out on the front lawn, just now bundled up in donated fur coats. “The food!”

Some stopped whatever they were doing due to alarm in my voice, several rushed to stuff their bounty into maws out of fear of losing the precious bite. I saw Dentist eat just to spite me. I really wanted to whack him, but he would have kicked my ass. Instead, I caught his ear hissed, “Spit it out right now or I’ll tell Dancer what you’ve been doing in her room.”

It was more effective than the punch. Grudgingly, he spat out the chewed up bits. I smacked back of his head anyway.

“Nobody eat. You’ll get sick!” I announced loudly. Disgruntled grannies were all furiously frowning behind me. I mimicked stomach pain by curling up onto myself. Citrine and Tom probably didn’t understand but were trying to convince the gang anyway.

A young child fell forward listlessly. The old people sprung into action to resuscitate her. I jumped from leg to leg and turned to the bilingual guy who followed right behind me. “Food. Tell them to remove food,” I gestured vomiting and he reluctantly went on to chat with the concerned locals. Those had eventually – skilfully - forced something out as though the bite was just lodged in the throat.

Still unconscious form eliminated and deposited remainder of stomach contents on the snow without any visible spasms, then just woke up as if nothing had happened. Grannies were happy for a minute then the frantic questions came in.

Monster has unfrozen by then and elaborated in some way or another. I had no bright nuggets of wisdom to add, just felt heavily drained, cold and wanted to nap. My feet were wet and I didn’t feel them anymore. I twined around demon’s arm and leaned heavily. My cheek felt warm. He was warm.

Befuddled locals wanted to keep talking and feeding the famished orphans; those were equally starved for such warm attention. I saw no way to stuff this jack back into box. City kids never saw this much space and snow so soft. The weather wasn’t least bit daunting with all that fur either. I eventually unpeeled myself away from the lifeline and caught Citrine and Tom. “I know that’s the opposite of what we normally do, but don’t let them go off alone. We don’t know this place. And no food. I need to go get warm,” I said eyeing the assigned cabin.

“Yeh… Aft’ today everyone should be aware that wusn’t joke. Is a miracle nobody got killed. Fuckin’ Denti and his stupid plans,” Citrine grumbled.

Tom just stared and I gaped back at him tiredly. “What?” I snapped eventually but he just shook his head.

I curled up by the roaring fireplace and hoped to defrost my bones by some time tomorrow. I felt waft of something akin to leather but much much fresher. I unashamedly slunk backwards into his arms to be warm on both sides.

I was wide awake, thinking of all the things that went wrong and that which almost happened. Perhaps sensing my keen agitation, he whispered just above my ear, “I would have taken care of it.”

“Good to have a solid plan B! Sadly, razing another settlement to the ground will not be necessary… by some unknown feats of magic…” Boy was this lucky! Insanely so. Did my new body carry some fortune in its veins at long last?

“It was no magic. You did very well. And I wasn’t going to raze it,” demon sounded dismissive. “I’ve already spread throughout this land. There’s little I can’t do.”

“Well, less spreading and more of you know what.”

“The two are not mutually exclusive. I can move and think at the same time, too.”

I tapped beautiful man’s thigh, “Right… Well, I take it back anyway. No rush. Seems like we are welcome to stick around for a while… I’d rather you do it right than fast.” Regardless, I was on pins and needles and also on the edge of seat. “How long do you think it’ll take?”

“I’ll have the rest ready tomorrow. Then there’s just sifting through the countless fragments in search of something familiar to recovered group.”

Oh. “So… It’s tomorrow or nothing?”

“Not necessarily,” he said diplomatically but that could only have meant the worst.

Damn. Fuck! The suspense… I won’t be able to sleep tonight. What if he wasn’t there, even as gutted as those are going to be? What then? I’ll have no tether to this plane of existence yet again. Hope was such a terrible thing.

I chewed on my lip and grasped for a distraction to hyperfixate on. One was already conveniently in my hands.

“Did you want for me and Citrine to have sex?” I asked.

Demon spent too long a while pondering a yes or no inquiry until eventually settling on, “Rephrase your question.”

I rolled my eyes but did as told, “Were you intending to have sex with me through her?”

“No,” there was no hesitation this time and that left me with additional questions.

“But you did want us to fuck,” I prodded.

“I was sceptical of that occurring, but yes, I’d rather you did it with a part of me. No, I wouldn’t have participated or she would have known it.”

“But you’re already up in their heads?”

“Skimming every third stray thought the mouths radiate is different to giving it my full attention or linking sensations.”

“So that’s… like eating, when you want it to be.”

“Yes.”

I frowned at the discordant contrast to what he’d said before. “And why wouldn’t you do it?”

“Because I want to feel you. Even more so now than before,” his palm lightly brushed my face and I felt something distinctly inhuman cling to the skin for a split second. Unseen tendrils battered against the flimsy skin barrier like a slow soldier at the closed gates.