“Well that was unexpected.” Rebecca said to no one. I nodded, Anne ignored her. “I’m sorry by the way,” Rebecca said, as if it was an afterthought. Anne growled softly and slid her chair closer to me. I looked at Rebecca and shrugged, I didn’t want her to feel bad, and I hoped that my gesture let her know that I wasn’t mad, but Anne was, and it was up to her.

“Can I see it?” Anne asked, looking at the metal box in my hands. I gave it to her. It was a gift, I knew that, but I didn’t want the damn thing. It didn’t do me any good. I had met my first succubus earlier today and now this. I didn’t want to be different, I didn't want anyone to think I was a royalist, I didn’t want the King to be able to decide this for me. How was I supposed to face a group of succubi knowing I have more rights than them? Do I say anything to them, it felt wrong not to, but how could I bring it up? What if they think I think I am better than them? I knew I was spiraling but it would take Anne to pull me out of it.

“What does he want from me?” I asked her.

“He did say he wants us to run for office, and we all painted you as the leader because, well, you know why, so it makes sense he would think you would be the best candidate.” Anne replied.

“Or,” Kate added, “he could want to be a hero to the common people, like his father. He seemed desperate for us to like him, not as King, but as a person.”

Anne glared at her and Kate put her hands up “Hey, you said professional, and this is that. Obviously it impacts Zalgeth the most, but it still matters to all of us. For whatever reason the King wants us close to him, and I don’t like that we don’t know why.”

I pulled Anne onto my lap and put my arms around her. It was important we all talked about this and I didn’t want her to lose her temper. Anne’s loud purring, which I suspected was fake, or at least exaggerated, told me I made the right decision.

“I don’t know why he didn’t ask if I wanted it.”

Rebecca scoffed, “He’s a King, the idea of asking probably didn’t even occur to him.”

I tensed at the thought. I had bad experiences with men giving me unwanted gifts, especially the type who didn’t think about no.

“Do you think I can keep it secret?” I asked everyone.

Rebecca shrugged, and Kate answered. “I think the question is should you? What would happen if he found out?”

I shouldn’t have been completely surprised that I started to get hard. Anne was in my lap, purring, but I was afraid and not talking about anything sexy. I didn’t want someone to control my life, even if it was something good, supposedly. I wanted to talk, to figure out what to do, but I guess my body didn’t get the message. The thought to hide it crossed my mind, to bite my tongue or press my heel into my foot, to have the pain make it go away. I promised Anne I wouldn’t, but gods I wanted to, it was so uncomfortable. I hated myself for this but what kept me from hurting myself wasn’t that I didn’t want to lie to Anne, but that I couldn’t. She was in my lap, if she couldn’t feel it already she would certainly feel anything I could do to get rid of it.

“Do you think he would? Find out that is.” I said, hoping the conversation would be enough of a distraction.

“I don’t get why you want to hide it?” Kate asked me.

“If other succubi think I’m a royalist, it wouldn’t be a good first impression.”

“You worry too much,” Anne said, leaning back into me “they’ll understand, not like you had a choice. You had to not die, and who would turn down the money we are gonna get, and you can’t say no to a King. Have some faith in them.”

“I hate to say this,” Rebecca wearily eyed Anne, “I don’t trust humans, men, or rich people, and the King is all of that, but we, or ideally Zal, could take him up on his offer and run for office. You could be a royalist because of your new connection to the King, a parliamentarian because you're a war hero in their army, and a populist because you are a poor demon. You could maybe do some good with that, playing all sides.”

I shook my head, “I think that would get me killed, and how many reps are there in the house, 300 and something, one vote won’t matter.”

Anne sighed, “I can’t believe I am agreeing with Rebecca but, look, we are living in the building next to parliament. We might as well go to a few sessions and see. Right now I get it, the idea is, repulsive, but we will eventually have to find something to do with our lives, unlike those two. It is worth considering.”

The silence was tense. I worried that Kate or Rebecca would take the bait. Anne, for some reason that I am sure made sense to her, decided this was the moment to wiggle her butt against me, letting me know that she knew the state I was in.

“Look,” Kate said, clearly frustrated, “I get it now, I think, but –”

We all froze when we heard a knock on the door.

“Sorry to interrupt,” a man said as he opened the door. He stared at Anne and I as he walked towards the table, clearly uncomfortable with how close we were. “My name is Robert, I am a financial officer for the royal family.” He sat down across from us and put the stack of papers he was holding onto the table. “Don’t worry,” he said, “it is quite simple really. You get $140 a week, or $560 a month, and so on, up to one payment every five years. The only difficult part is if you move.” He gave each of us a small coin, “those have your name on them, that coin, plus the code on the second page of those documents, is how you prove you are who you say you are and change your address, or change the payments from weekly to monthly or yearly, though I recommend weekly for now. It can be hard to manage money, and it makes sense that soldiers struggle with it, not anything against you, just that when your life is managed and your opportunities to spend are limited, it can be difficult to learn. If you keep the payments weekly you can’t run out, or if you do you only have to wait a few days. There is no shame in not having a skill that has never been useful to you before now, and if you want to learn I am sure you will be able to, and then you can switch to larger payments less frequently if that helps. Anyway, read through the documents in front of you, ask me any questions you have, then sign both copies. You will keep one, don’t lose it or let it get damaged.”

I read them, and it all seemed straightforward. Most of it was making it clear we were only getting the money. We were not nobility, not officers, not employees of the royal family, that sort of thing. I signed them without a second thought, I wanted out of this situation. It was getting hard to think about anything other than Anne and how good it would feel to –

“Zal?” Anne asked.

“What?”

“Any questions?” Robert asked me.

“No, sorry.” He nodded and collected the papers, adding his signature to all of them before handing our copies back to us. I folded mine once and put it in the inside pocket of my jacket.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

“Now for the best part of my job,” he said, smiling with surprising sincerity as he handed each of us a stack of bills. I couldn’t help but smile back at him with the money finally in my hand. I considered asking about our pay from our last two weeks in the army but decided against it. Someone working for the royal family probably wouldn’t know anything about it, and I didn’t want to risk seeming greedy. This was more money than I knew what to do with anyways.

“Finally,” Rebecca said, laughing, “we can find a bar and get properly drunk.”

Thankfully Robert took it well, laughing along. “I can’t imagine the stress,” he said to us warmly, “I am on the timid side so I don’t think you would like the place I drink at, but I think there is a gay bar a few blocks south, or better yet, just ask a cab driver, they know all the good spots, whatever you’re looking for.”

With that the three of them stood up to leave. Anne thankfully had an excuse ready.

“You have fun,” she said, “we have other plans, the first of which is finishing off the wine they left here.”

“So now that we’re alone,” Anne said, taking a sip from the bottle of wine, “how do you want to deal with this?”

“Um, just wait it out?”

Anne rolled her eyes at me, “that’s no fun.”

“It’s been a stressful day, I don’t want to deal with it.”

“That is exactly why you should.”

“Fine.” She was right, but I didn’t have to be happy about it, “but I would rather get back to our room somehow. How noticeable is it?” I asked, standing up, facing Anne, my back to the door.

“Like, I can tell –”

“Fuck”

“It’s not that bad, there isn’t a clear outline or anything, just, something.”

“Still.”

Anne took a few steps closer, “let me try to see if I can fix it,” she said as she put her hand on it, over my pants, as she tried to rearrange things. I thought I could handle it, and I was embarrassed that I couldn’t.

“Anne, you’re making it worse.” Gods why did it feel so good? I’ve fucked her, this should be nothing compare to that.

“Zal, on some level I get it, but why are you worried? Today was stressful, so I’m hungry, and it isn’t even that late, and I ate so much bread here already, it’s normal. I bet if you thought about it you would realize you’re hungry too, and for you this,” she put her hand over it, “is the same thing sometimes.”

“I think it’s pretty obvious it’s different.”

“Yea and humans blush and honestly, think about it, I’m worse than you, I pur, my tail does that little slow s shape wave thing, I get close to you, my pupils get rounder, and like, I know you see it. Sometimes people want to have sex, and they are in public, and it’s kinda obvious, it’s not a crime, there is nothing wrong with it.”

“I can’t, I’m not like that, did you see Ezrylliil? She was so confident, comfortable, and I’m only sure of myself when I am scared for my life. I can’t be that succubus, have that confidence. I can’t be the seductress people want and aren't afraid of.”

Anne laughed, I think it was her way of getting me to relax, “No one is asking you to. You will never be human, doesn’t matter if you become the King’s best friend, so fuck ‘em. Don’t be femme for them, or be anything for them. We’re rich now, let them be afraid or confused or whatever. I promise you a lot, if not most, of her look is for money, it’s not what she would wear if she didn’t have to worry about bigotry.” She started taking off my pants, “what would happen if someone walked in on us? A servant wouldn’t say anything. Some random rich fuck, oh they wouldn’t like it, they might try to gossip, but you are a succubus, like every other succubus, as you should be, so they wouldn’t stop us.”

“I’m not like other succubus.”

“And how is that working out for you?” She put her hand on my horn. They had filled out a little, but they were still too thin, a clear sign of how malnourished I was. My silence said everything.

Anne kneeled between my legs. “You need to get used to the idea that you are never going without again.” She pulled my pants and underwear down just enough to comfortably get my dick out and gently licked from the base all the way to the tip. I pushed my hips up into nothing as she gave it a few gentle strokes, getting me wet enough that she could coat the whole thing with enough of me to comfortably use both hands and long strokes. I couldn’t stop moving my hips, from a gods damn handjob. Fuck, what was wrong with me? I wasn’t even looking at Anne, all I could focus on, all I could feel, was how much I needed this. Anne used her thumb to rub where the head met the shaft and that was all it took. She must have known it would put me over the edge because she had her mouth on me before the first spurt. Anne wasn’t done though, her hands sped up as her tongue worked its way around the head. It hurt, everything was too sensitive, I couldn’t catch my breath, but some part of me needed it to keep happening, needed to come again. It was only a few seconds until she took me as far as she could into her mouth and purred. The vibrations and the surprise of it got me and I moaned louder than I ever had as I came again. I lost myself for a moment, it took Anne kissing me to bring me back.

“You did so good,” she was smiling at me, “got another one in you?” Her hand moved to my still hard dick and my whole body twitched as she touched it.

I nodded, “Need.” I said, it was hard to talk when I was this out of breath, “take your pants off.”

Anne was surprised but thank the gods she listened and was quick with it. I pushed her back towards the table and she got the message and lay back on it. I had my dick lined up with her pussy before I realized I forgot to warm her up. I backed up to kneel and eat her out but she stopped me.

“It’s fine,” she said, rubbing her clit, “just go a little slow for the first bit.” I nodded, but when I entered her she was tighter than normal, and I didn’t like it, it wasn’t what I was used to. I went slow, and she relaxed more the farther I got into her. When my hips were against her I waited for some sign she was ready. She lay back with her eyes closed for a few seconds before she smiled and gave me a squeeze with her pussy. I groaned in frustration as I came again. It wasn’t a big one, but still it was enough that both of us knew what happened. For some reason I still needed to fuck her and I didn’t wait for my orgasm to finish. Each thrust was harder than the last as I chased something. My hands were on her waist and I used all my strength to pull her back into my hips with each thrust. She frantically rubbed her clit and thankfully came quick. I needed to feel her come around me to be satisfied. I slowed down as I came with her, but I couldn’t stop. Gods it felt like I emptied all of me into her.

“Where the fuck did that come from?” I said, my voice shaking. I was going soft but there were plenty of aftershocks and they felt better when I was in Anne so I stayed, still standing over her as she laid back on the table.

“You sure you’re not an exhibitionist?” She was so beautiful after sex.

“What?” It took me a second, “shit, no, I forgot.” I was panicking a little. “Do you think anyone saw?” I asked Anne.

“How would I know?”

“Fuck.”

“It’s fine, told you no one would care, and no one stopped us.”

I moaned as I left her, but I needed to sit down.

“Okay, okay, but, really, where did that come from?”

“There is a joke there, your dick? No, it works, but it’s too obvious.”

“Anne, I’m serious.”

“What do you want me to say? How am I supposed to know, I’m not in your head. It wasn’t like how you normally are, but it was fun, and you’re soft, so your body got what it needed. Doesn’t make sense to worry when nothing bad happened.” I wasn’t convinced, and Anne could tell. “Look,” she continued, “if it is still bothering you a few days from now you will have that meeting with Ezrylliil’s group, you can ask them, or ask them who to ask. People say succubi crave sex, for all we know this is normal, how it should be when you don’t hold back.”

“I don’t like the idea of that.”

“Why not? And give me your underwear, I have decided they are going to be sacrificed to clean this up.”

“Right, sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

I sighed, “it just doesn’t feel like me.”

“Of course it doesn’t, you’re rich now, out of the army, in a city for the first time, in your first relationship, going through a second puberty. Everything about your life has changed, why wouldn’t you?”

I didn’t answer, but she was right, and she knew I knew she was right. Anne cleaned me up best she could and sat on me as we waited for my aftershocks to stop. When we finally left I kept a careful eye on the few people still hanging around, but none of them paid any attention to us. If someone did walk in on us or hear something they either weren't here or were playing it close to their chest. In the cab back Anne convinced me to fall asleep by gently rubbing my horns and telling me it was okay.