Part 1How to Raise Incubus Twins

In the black market, I fell for twin male incubi but could afford only one. I chose the younger brother, who had the better build.

He hated me—resisted in bed, kept running back to the market to complain to his twin.

“Brother, I can’t stand her. She’s plain, poor, and life with her is misery.”

His brother, collared and chained in a steel cage, would soothe him gently:

“She is kind. She won’t hurt you. Go back—don’t worry her.”

I stood listening silently. When my eyes met his gentle gaze, my heart jumped.

I sold my house and bought the older brother too.

We moved into a basement with one bedroom. The older brother, Caelus, offered to sleep in the closet.

“Master, this is fine. I was only bought because of my brother.”

I stopped him, pulled out a contract, and handed it to the one who despised me.

“It’s crowded here,” I said. “Why don’t you leave? Then you won’t suffer with me anymore.”

He stared, eyes slowly reddening.

“You… you only want my brother now? Not me?”

* * *

The incubus I had taken in was disobedient. He had bitten me again.

This morning, as I was getting ready, I saw the bite mark on my neck had turned a deep, angry purple. It hurt to the touch.

I tried to tell myself it was nothing, that it would fade in a few days.

But as I looked at my plain, ordinary face in the bathroom mirror, I couldn’t stop the tears from welling up.

Kael, he despised me.

He despised everything about me.

My looks, my voice.

Even the old house I lived in, he found it utterly repulsive.

We had argued last night.

In his rage, the truth had come out.

“Seraphina,” he had spat, “you were the one who spent all your savings to buy me. I didn’t choose to come with you. If I had a choice, I would never have chosen you as my master, to be crammed into this shithole!”

“So in the year you’ve been with me,” I had asked, a desperate hope clinging to my voice, “have you felt nothing for me at all?”

“Nothing,” he had answered, his voice firm, his gaze sharp and unwavering, even as he was tied to the headboard. “Not a single thing.”

The last sliver of hope I had been holding onto shattered.

I splashed my face with water, took a deep breath, and wiped away the tears that threatened to fall. Then I took the foundation from the counter and carefully dabbed it over the mark on my neck.