Archive of Our Own

Lucas should have known something was wrong the moment the air went too quiet.

The spell had begun perfectly — flawless circular inscription, reinforced barrier wards, incantation echoing with textbook resonance. He’d practiced this blend of disguise and teleportation magic a dozen times before in simulation. But this time, he’d added a new component: a layered concealment sigil to mask mana output during transport. Elegant. Efficient.

And, apparently, catastrophic.

He was halfway through the casting when a pulse of energy kicked back against his ribs. Not a gentle nudge — a sharp, teeth-rattling snap. He barely got a breath in before the spell’s core ruptured. A blinding burst of red-white light cracked through the room like lightning — and then everything collapsed inward.

His limbs twisted. Gravity went sideways. The fabric of the spell folded in on itself and rewrote something it wasn’t supposed to.

By the time he hit the floor, Lucas wasn’t sure which way was up.

The world had gone… strange.

Larger. Crisper. Infinitely louder.

It wasn’t until he tried to speak — and produced a pitiful, high-pitched mrowl — that the panic set in.

He scrambled to his feet — paws, paws — and turned in a wild circle. The reflection in the dark glass of the window confirmed the worst: sleek black fur, a too-long tail, glowing red eyes like a demon in a cat’s body.

He’d botched the layering. Instead of masking his signature, the spell had masked himself and rewritten his presence into something small, shapeshifted, and unstable.

He tried to reverse it, channeling mana toward his core — but the magic inside him stuttered like a broken transmission. It wouldn’t hold. It flickered, surged, then shorted out.

Lucas breathed in through his nose. Out through his mouth.

You are not going to die like this. You are not going to live like this either.

The first thing he did was try to reach Athanasia through their communication tether. But all he got was static. No anchor point. Either she was out of range or had gone radio silent again — probably on some impromptu mission, the way she did when inspiration struck and she vanished into forest temples for a week without warning.

“Of course,” Lucas growled, which came out as a series of short, clipped mews. His tail lashed. “Perfect.”

He had to move.

The apartment was a trap — too many runes, too much risk. So he did the unthinkable. 

He left.

Clawed open the screen on the back window, squeezed through the frame, and leapt into the alley behind his building — heart pounding, paws scraping against the concrete.

The city was chaos.

The smells alone nearly overwhelmed him: smoke, sugar, oil, old rust, distant water. Every sound hit his ears like a bullet. Cars. Music. Footsteps. Conversations. Sirens. A child’s laugh. A busker’s song. Someone shouting three blocks away.

His instincts screamed at him to hide. To bolt. But Lucas pushed forward, darting between shadows, tail low, trying not to draw attention.

It was humiliating. A grown man — a mage — reduced to skittering across sidewalk cracks and ducking behind trash bins. Every time he tried to summon a spell, it sputtered. His body no longer recognized the channeling pattern. And the longer he stayed in this form, the more tangled the spell became.

Worse: the city didn’t feel safe. Not like this. He couldn’t risk being picked up, caged, or — god forbid — adopted.

By the time the sun began to dip below the rooftops, Lucas was exhausted. His fur was damp from a sprinkler he’d misjudged. His paw pads stung from hot pavement. His magic flared every now and then with a painful buzz under his skin, like a static itch he couldn’t scratch.

He didn’t even know where he was.

The buildings were lower here. Houses instead of high-rises. Trees instead of neon signs. Wind chimes clinked somewhere softly in the distance, and the air smelled faintly of cut grass and rain.

He crept beneath the gate of a quiet residential street and collapsed under the low cover of a hydrangea bush.

The lawn was soft. Dry. He curled into it without meaning to, heart still thudding. Every part of him protested the stillness, but he couldn’t move anymore. Not yet. Just a minute to think. Just a moment to breathe.

Above him, the sky turned soft gold.

Lucas shut his eyes.

It’s temporary, he told himself again.

Even if it didn’t feel like it.

Lucas didn’t remember falling asleep, but something roused him.

A shuffle of footsteps. Light. Quick. Not the heavy gait of an adult or the sluggish pace of city life. No, this sound had rhythm — like someone skipping. Or dancing.

He cracked one eye open, fur bristling. 

A little girl stood at the edge of the lawn, not three feet away.

She had a riot of silver curls, half-tamed with a flower-printed headband, and a small backpack swinging off one shoulder. Her jacket sleeves were too long, nearly swallowing her hands, but she didn’t seem to mind. Her eyes were wide and shining.

“Oh,” she whispered, as if she’d stumbled across treasure. “You’re beautiful.”

Lucas blinked.

He scrambled to his feet. Instinct screamed: Run. Now.

“No, wait— please?” she said quickly, dropping to her knees in the grass. “I won’t hurt you. I promise.”

Lucas didn’t move. His heartbeat rattled in his ribs like a spell about to go wrong again.

Children were unpredictable. Loud. Grabby. Affectionate in that awful, smothering way. And this one clearly had no concept of boundaries. She was inching toward him, palms up, every motion slow and hopeful.

“Are you lost?” she asked, voice gentle now. “You don’t look like you belong out here.”

Brilliant deduction, Lucas thought dryly, but the sarcasm fizzled. Her presence was… strange. Not threatening. Something in her inner mana felt bright and comforting — like sunlight warming stone.

She was magic-touched. Not a mage, but touched enough to make his frayed magic ache with the yearning to stabilize.

“I won’t tell anyone,” she added, like they were sharing a secret.

And before he could bolt — before he could even shift his weight — her small fingers brushed against his side.

Lucas stiffened. He should have flinched. Should have hissed, dashed, disappeared beneath a car or into the night.

But he didn’t.

Because he saw someone else.

A figure rounding the corner of the sidewalk, calm and composed. A man with soft silver hair and a long coat, his expression creased slightly in concern as his gaze swept over the yard, landed on the girl, and softened.

“Papa!” she called, voice bright with joy.

Lucas’s body went still.

Lucas had seen him before — once or twice, in passing. Always at a distance. Too poised. Too polished. Too kind in a way that made Lucas suspicious. But none of those impressions prepared him for the way the man looked now, in golden afternoon light, with his tie loose and his expression gentle.

“What did you find this time, Lucy?” her father asked, kneeling beside her.

“This,” she said solemnly, scooping Lucas into her arms like a plush toy.

Lucas let out a startled squeak — but when he met the man’s eyes, everything inside him went quiet.

They were gold. Deep, thoughtful, lined faintly with exhaustion. The kind of eyes that had seen too much and still chose to be kind.

Her father’s brows rose as he examined the bundle of black fur now very awkwardly trying not to panic in his daughter’s grasp.

“You just picked him up?” he asked.

“He was alone, Papa,” Luciana said firmly, hugging Lucas to her chest. “He looked sad.”

Lucas’s tail twitched. He wasn’t sad. He was cursed, magical roadkill, deeply humiliated — but definitely not sad.

Her father sighed. A soft, indulgent sound. The kind that carried more affection than frustration.

“You know we can’t take home a stray.”

“But he’s different,” Luciana insisted. “He has red eyes. That means he’s special.”

Lucas could feel him weighing the situation, studying him.

“Red eyes usually mean demonic possession, sweetheart.”

“Or magic,” she countered. “And he let me pick him up! That means he likes me!”

Lucas thought about resisting. Thought about squirming. Thought about letting his pride win for once.

But her father looked at him again — closely, curiously — and Lucas, against all reason, went still.

He didn’t understand it. Didn’t want to understand it. But his chest ached with something unfamiliar. Longing, maybe. Or want. Or the bitter taste of comfort he hadn’t known he missed.

Another sigh. Defeated, this time.

“Fine. One night. But we’re putting up signs after a few days.”

“Yay!” Luciana beamed and pressed her cheek to Lucas’s head. “Thank you, Papa!”

Lucas’s ears flattened, but he didn’t struggle.

He couldn’t.

Because somehow, impossibly, this was the safest he’d felt all day.

And he had no idea what to do about it.

Lucas had been in many homes before — mansions of marble and gold, cottages of carved pine, towers made entirely of stone and silence. But none of them had ever felt like this.

Warm.

Soft.

Like someone had folded sunlight and safety into a two-bedroom apartment.

Luciana kicked the door open with her small sneaker, one arm looped tightly around his middle, triumphant.

“We’re home!” she sang out to no one in particular, marching straight through the hallway with Lucas squished against her chest.

Lucas might’ve squirmed, but exhaustion was a thick blanket around him now, and the scent of her hair — apples and cotton and static — made it strangely hard to focus.

Her father followed behind, sighing as he set down his keys and shrugged off his coat. The apartment was tidy, lived-in, the air carrying traces of black tea and laundry detergent.

“Straight to the sink,” Ijekiel said gently. “You’re washing your hands first.”

Luciana groaned but obeyed, depositing Lucas carefully on the entryway rug before scampering to the bathroom.

Lucas stretched out his limbs, tail twitching. Now’s his chance, his pride hissed. Run. Before you get even more attached to—

“Stay there, Ruby!” Luciana shouted over the running water.

Lucas froze.

Ruby?

“Ruby?” Ijekiel echoed, poking his head into the hall.

“Because of his eyes,” she called back. “They look like jewels. Ruby jewels.”

Lucas stared into the middle distance, vaguely contemplating death.

‘I am an ancient archmage whose name once made kings flinch and armies kneel,’ he thought darkly. ‘And now I’m Ruby. Ruby.’

The man returned to the entryway and crouched, one hand extended — not to pet him, but just to let Lucas sniff. A gesture of respect.

Lucas blinked.

“You really are something,” he murmured, studying him with quiet curiosity. “You don’t act feral.”

Lucas stared back.

If he could have spoken, he’d have said: I have ten times your magical capacity and more raw intelligence than your entire social circle combined, thank you very much.

Instead, he licked his paw and turned his back to him.

The father chuckled — soft, genuine. Lucas did not find it infuriating. This unsettled him.

Later, while Luciana clattered about setting up a nest of blankets on the floor (“Ruby needs a throne, Papa!”), Lucas wandered the apartment in careful circles.

No wards. No enchanted defenses. No glamours. Just framed photos, soft lighting, and paperbacks on crowded shelves.

He passed a bookshelf lined with illustrated children’s books. One was dog-eared and clearly reread — You’ll Find Me in the Wind. A lullaby of a title. Lucas didn’t know why it made his chest ache.

Luciana ran back in with a pillow.

“Ruby!” she called. “Come here!”

He didn’t want to. But he did.

She tucked him into the little pile with serious care, then sat beside him cross-legged, rambling about her day.

“I had math and it was boring, but Papa says it helps my brain grow, so I guess I’ll do it,” she said, gently brushing his fur. “Papa made lunch today, too. He’s the best at sandwiches. And he sang again while he was chopping tomatoes.”

Lucas tilted his head.

“He used to sing all the time. Not so much now. Only when he forgets he’s tired.”

Lucas curled tighter into the blankets.

Then she whispered, almost like a secret: “Sometimes he gets really quiet when he misses Mama.”

He went still.

Before he could dwell too long, The father’s voice drifted from the kitchen.

“Hey, Lucy? I’m going to call your Aunt Jennette, alright?”

“Tell her I said hi!”

Lucas’s ears perked up. He padded silently toward the open doorway and sat, just out of sight, listening.

“—no collar, no tag,” the father was saying. “Red eyes. Yeah, I thought it was odd too. Do you know anyone who—?”

He paused.

“Mm. No, I don’t think it’s enchanted. He seems… normal. Doesn’t act like a stray. Just… tired.”

Lucas pressed his ears flat in offense.

Jennette said something that made the man laugh quietly. He sounded softer when he said her name.

“No, not keeping him. One night. Maybe two. You know Lucy.”

Lucas couldn’t see his face, but he could hear the smile in his voice. Not carefree, but worn in. Familiar.

“She’s getting too good at convincing me. Just like you were.”

Another pause. Something quieter passed between them.

“…No. Still no news. But it’s okay. We’re okay.”

The call ended. Lucas padded away before the man could notice him.

Later, when Luciana finally crawled into bed — after another round of “Papa, one more story please?” — Lucas was placed reverently beside her on the pillow.

She whispered goodnight against his side.

“Sweet dreams, Ruby.”

He lay awake long after her breathing deepened, staring at the photo on her nightstand.

Her father’s arm wrapped gently around her. A woman beside him, dark-haired with curls and smiling, cradled the girl’s baby form in her arms. They all looked happy. Complete.

The ache returned.

Lucas slid off the bed when the room dimmed fully and padded into the quiet living room. He expected silence.

Instead, he found the man asleep on the couch, papers strewn over his lap, a tea mug still faintly steaming on the table.

Lucas hesitated.

He could leave now. He should.

But his paws carried him forward. He leapt softly onto the armrest and curled there, eyes fixed on the man’s sleeping form.

His gaze drifted over the table.

A paper — likely from work or the landlord — sat half-folded, ink bleeding slightly along the edge where a droplet of tea had landed.

At the top, printed neatly:

IJEKIEL ALPHEUS

Lucas blinked once, slowly.

So. That was his name.

He looked back at the man — at Ijekiel.

He didn’t know what he’d expected. Something colder, perhaps. Something more polished.

But the name fit, somehow. Quiet. Clean. Just a little too kind.

Lucas curled tighter, his tail wrapping close around his paws.

He wasn’t ready to leave yet.

Lucas had once faced a wyvern with nothing but a broken wand and a migraine. He’d fought off magical parasites that burrowed into thought and whispered lies. He’d survived the arcane council’s yearly budget meetings.

Yet none of that compared to the indignity of wearing a frilly lavender bonnet.

“Ruby, you look like a prince today,” Luciana giggled, clapping her hands as she tied another ridiculous ribbon under his chin. “But you need the cape! Wait here, okay?”

He did not wait. He bolted.

The tiny cloak — something stolen from one of her dolls — trailed behind him like a tattered flag of defeat as he dove under the couch, the world’s last refuge for a man turned feline.

He glared into the shadows.

This was fine. This was all perfectly fine.

From his cramped hiding spot, he watched a Cheerio roll slowly across the floor, propelled by Luciana’s socked foot.

“This is your fault,” he muttered under his breath, knowing she couldn’t hear. “This is what I get for doing complex transfiguration with frayed stabilizing runes—”

“Hmm?” Luciana peered under the couch. “Ruby?”

He froze.

Then, footsteps. Softer, heavier.

Her father.

“Luciana,” the man said with quiet amusement, “did you lose your prince again?”

“He ran,” she said mournfully. “He always runs when I try to give him his outfit.”

Lucas stifled a growl. Only because the outfits were humiliating.

“I see. Well…” Ijekiel knelt, and Lucas could see the blur of his smile beneath the couch. “Maybe he just needs some time. Cats can be shy.”

Lucas glared at him. ‘You try having a bow stuck to your tail.’

Still, he stayed hidden until Luciana was distracted by a snack and her father’s soft promise to read the garden book again after dinner. When the coast cleared, Lucas slipped out and jumped onto the windowsill.

The sun warmed his fur.

The humiliation lingered.

Later, Ijekiel passed through the living room carrying a pile of folded laundry. He paused beside the window and looked at Lucas.

“You really do look like a Ruby,” he said.

Lucas narrowed his eyes at him.

Ijekiel chuckled softly. “Stare all you like. She’s not giving that name up.”

Then — more softly, like he didn’t expect a response — he added, “But thank you. For being good with her.”

Lucas looked away.

He wasn’t doing anything. He wasn’t trying to be good. He was just… here. Trapped. A victim of unstable spell matrices. A mage with claws.

But when Ijekiel walked away, Lucas couldn’t stop watching him go.

That evening, Lucas made another attempt.

He perched atop the kitchen counter, waiting until the house was quiet. His core still flickered beneath the enchantment. Magic sparked under his fur, trying to leak through.

He focused. Pushed.

A sigil bloomed beneath him — a faint red circle glowing with arcane glyphs.

Then the lights flickered and the microwave sparked.

Lucas yowled and bolted as the kitchen lamp exploded.

Ijekiel ran in, bleary-eyed, clutching a broom.

“Luciana?” he called, panicked. “Are you okay?”

Lucas lay sprawled under the table, heart pounding.

The sigil fizzled out beneath him.

Luciana, from her room: “What happened?”

“Uh… nothing. Just… power surge. Maybe Ruby chewed something.”

Lucas hissed silently to himself.

So much for subtle.

Lucas had discovered that humans talked to their pets far more than they talked to themselves.

And Ijekiel, despite his composed exterior, was no exception.

It always started quietly. A sigh in the late evening. A faint murmur as he stirred sugar into tea. But soon, Ijekiel’s soft, absent-minded comments became routine.

“You know, I haven’t had jasmine in a while,” he told Lucas one night, setting his mug down on the coffee table. “Jennette says it’s good for the nerves. She’s probably right.”

Lucas blinked at him from the armrest, tail flicking.

“She always is,” Ijekiel added, then smiled faintly. “Don’t tell her I said that.”

Lucas tilted his head, listening. Magic shimmered under his fur—still useless, still volatile. But something about this felt almost like spellwork in itself. The cadence of Ijekiel’s voice, the intimacy of a man who didn’t expect to be heard.

“She wants me to move closer,” Ijekiel continued after a long pause. “But Luciana’s finally happy here. And the garden’s doing well.” His fingers curled around the handle of his mug. “Sometimes I worry I’m not doing enough.”

Lucas stood up, padded along the back of the couch, and bumped his head softly against Ijekiel’s shoulder.

Ijekiel blinked at him.

Then: “You agree?”

Lucas offered a silent stare. He didn’t purr. He absolutely did not purr.

But Ijekiel reached out and gently scratched behind his ear anyway. “You’re good company, Ruby,” he murmured. “I guess we’re both a little lonely.”

Lucas froze, overwhelmed by the casual affection, the weight in those words. Lonely.

He didn’t like how much it echoed in his chest.

Mornings in the Alpheus household followed a quiet rhythm.

Lucas came to know them intimately.

Luciana always woke first — sometimes with bedhead, sometimes with inexplicable glitter on her cheeks. She’d roll out of bed, still half-dreaming, and shuffle toward the kitchen on bare feet.

Ijekiel would already be there. Hair still damp from the shower, sleeves rolled up, eyes softened with sleep.

He always greeted her the same way: “Good morning, starshine.”

She’d giggle every time. Every single time.

Lucas would perch on the windowsill or curl under the kitchen table, pretending not to listen. But he memorized every motion — how Ijekiel stirred cocoa into Luciana’s milk with a gentle swirl, how he always let her choose the fruit for breakfast, how he saved the ripest strawberry for her without saying a word.

It wasn’t fair, really.

Lucas hadn’t come here looking for comfort. He hadn’t asked for warmth. And yet it poured into him slowly, unstoppably — like sunlight through a cracked window. Familiar. Unwelcome. Addictive.

Lucas had once turned a wyvern to stone mid-flight, twisted a mountain’s gravity into spirals, and rewritten a noble’s memory so subtly the man thanked him afterward. He did not think anything in this world could humble him.

Until he got stuck inside a tissue box.

Luciana had left it sideways on the floor during one of her elaborate pretend tea parties. Lucas had peered in, scenting something faintly floral. Curiosity had gotten the better of him.

Now, half his body was wedged inside, back legs flailing, tail smacking the floor.

He hissed once, softly, more at himself than anything. His dignity died.

Eventually, Luciana found him and shrieked with laughter, her little fingers gently tugging him out like a trapped doll.

“Ruby, you silly boy!”

Lucas didn’t respond. He was too busy reevaluating his entire life.

He’d been trying to adapt in his cat form but it’s been… humiliating.

He hated the way his limbs moved — light, twitchy, unreliable. Hated the loss of his hands, his height, his voice. Drinking from a bowl made his ears flatten with shame. He had tried using a spoon once and Luciana had clapped with delight, but it had ended in disaster.

Worse still was the loss of solitude. Luciana followed him everywhere, narrating his every move in sing-song. She carried him like a ragdoll and sometimes put bows behind his ears.

Lucas endured it all.

Because when she curled into Ijekiel’s arms at the end of the night, sleepy and murmuring, “I love you, Daddy,” Lucas could watch the softness in Ijekiel’s eyes, the strength in his silence. He could see something warm and real and whole — and a part of him wanted it.

Some days, Ijekiel worked from home.

Lucas learned what his focused face looked like. Eyebrows slightly drawn, lower lip tucked between his teeth, shoulders rigid. He learned the frown that came with budget reports, and the soft, resigned sigh that followed after Luciana knocked everything off the table in an attempt to “help.”

And he learned the way Ijekiel softened the moment she said, “Sorry, Papa,” with teary eyes and a hand behind her back.

Lucas watched it all.

He told himself he was gathering information. That this was purely observational. A mage caught in a spell trap, marking time until he could escape.

But then Ijekiel started reading aloud in the evenings. Mostly children’s books, sometimes classics with poetic cadences. He had a low, steady voice that made the living room feel like the center of the world. Luciana always curled up against his side. Lucas, despite his pride, always ended up near their feet, pretending he wasn’t listening.

And sometimes, Ijekiel read even after Luciana had fallen asleep.

Soft passages. Lost heroes. Lonely kings.

Lucas stopped pretending, then.

One night, while Luciana was staying over at Jennette’s, Ijekiel came home late and alone.

He dropped his keys, leaned against the doorframe, and exhaled. His posture slumped, tired in a way Lucas hadn’t seen before.

He moved to the couch, sat down slowly, and pressed a hand over his eyes.

No words. No gentle smile. Just silence and exhaustion.

Lucas jumped onto the couch beside him.

Ijekiel didn’t react at first.

Then — tentatively — he reached out and placed a hand on Lucas’s head.

“You’re still here,” he murmured.

Lucas leaned into the touch.

Lucas found the paper one evening, tucked under a coffee mug and a tired hand.

He’d hopped onto the kitchen table expecting to see Ijekiel’s usual stack of reports. Instead, it was a single page — half-filled in with neat handwriting and a blurry, overexposed photo of him.

“Missing Cat,” it read.

“Found in Eastbrook District near Magnolia Lane. Black fur. Red eyes. Responds to ‘Ruby’.”

Lucas sat frozen, claws curling into the wood.

The photo had clearly been taken by Luciana. It was crooked, slightly out of focus, but unmistakably him — ears pinned back in irritation, a doll’s hat on his head. She’d insisted on dressing him up that day.

The injustice of it made his tail twitch.

But the panic settled heavier than annoyance. Missing Cat. As if he was something borrowed. Temporary.

Something Ijekiel was preparing to give back.

He didn’t realize he was pacing until Ijekiel stirred from the couch and noticed him.

“Can’t sleep either?” the man asked, voice groggy with fatigue.

Lucas paused on the armrest, trying not to look directly at the paper.

“I should’ve done this earlier,” Ijekiel murmured. “It’s been nearly two weeks. Someone out there might be missing you.”

Lucas leapt down silently, avoiding his gaze.

“I mean…” Ijekiel hesitated, then rubbed at the back of his neck. “You seem happy here. But it’s not right to assume you don’t have someone waiting.”

He doesn’t mean it cruelly. He sounds torn. Like he’s trying to talk himself into something he no longer believes in.

Lucas wants to hiss. Not at Ijekiel, but at the entire situation. He wants to say, No one is coming for his. He’s not theirs. He’s not anyone’s but—

But the words don’t exist in a cat’s throat.

So instead he sulks under the table until Ijekiel turns out the lights and drifts into sleep.

The next day, Luciana finds the poster draft.

“What’s this?” she asks brightly, holding it up.

Ijekiel sets down his mug a little too fast. “Ah— just something I was thinking of putting up.”

Luciana’s brow scrunches. “But he lives here.”

Ijekiel tries to smile. “Maybe someone else misses him.”

“But I’d miss him more,” she says instantly, clutching the paper to her chest.

Lucas watches from the hallway. She doesn’t even look at him — just stands there, small and fierce and determined.

Ijekiel softens. His expression changes in that way Lucas has come to recognize: conflict smoothed by love.

“I haven’t put anything up yet,” he says gently, crouching down. “Maybe we wait a little longer.”

Luciana nods, satisfied. “He likes it here. I know he does.”

Lucas ducks behind the door frame before they can see how his fur puffs out at that.

That night, Lucas lies curled in the crook of the couch, watching Ijekiel doze beside a stack of unfinished work.

There’s a faint buzz under his skin.

He hasn’t tried casting in days. The instability makes it dangerous — any flicker could get him hurt or seen. But the hum tonight is different. Subtle. Tempting.

He focuses on his paw.

Nothing flashy. Just enough to test it.

The air warps faintly. His fur glows at the tips.

Then, just for a breath, it’s not a paw.

It’s fingers.

Long, pale, ink-smudged fingers.

Lucas gasps — and the magic collapses in on itself like a kicked sandcastle. He’s a cat again. His heart thuds in his tiny ribcage.

But someone saw.

“…Ruby?”

Luciana’s voice, from the hallway.

Lucas scrambles under the couch, wide-eyed.

She peers into the room, blinking sleepily. “Did you fall?”

She doesn’t sound scared. Just puzzled.

Lucas stays very still, heart racing.

She yawns and leaves again, muttering, “Weird kitty.”

He stays under the couch the rest of the night. He can still feel the phantom shape of fingers in his fur.

He tried not to want.

But Ijekiel made it impossible.

Lucas had begun recognizing the man’s routines — how he always made tea at 9 p.m., how he sorted laundry in batches of color even though he only ever wore neutrals. How he read quietly to himself before bed, sometimes mouthing the words.

Sometimes Lucas would curl at his feet, not touching, just being near.

It was terrifying how much he liked it.

It was worse when Ijekiel began speaking to him.

Casual murmurs. Tossed thoughts.

“Too quiet today,” Ijekiel would say while drying his hair after a shower. “Did you get into something again?”

Or: “I haven’t forgotten the posters. Just been a long week.”

Or sometimes just: “Thanks for staying.”

Lucas would curl his tail in, hide his face beneath a paw, and pretend he wasn’t unraveling one thread at a time.

And then there was The Incident.

Lucas hadn’t meant to be in the bathroom.

He’d followed Ijekiel in half-asleep, tail twitching, and settled behind the laundry basket. Warm tile. Dim light. A moment of peace.

Until the water turned on.

And Ijekiel — half-humming and clearly used to privacy — stripped off his shirt with his back to the door.

Lucas froze, ears flat, heart thudding.

He should’ve run. Looked away. Anything.

But he was frozen.

And Ijekiel — who always carried himself like he had nothing to hide was… beautiful.

Broad shoulders, toned from years of lifting a toddler and running a household. Soft lines along his waist. Long neck dampened from steam.

Lucas’s brain glitched. Static.

Ijekiel yawned, scratching his chest absently, and stepped into the shower.

Lucas bolted.

He didn’t stop running until he was under the couch, where he spent the next twenty minutes staring at the floor and contemplating death by embarrassment.

After that, he kept more distance.

But distance didn’t keep his chest from tightening.

Luciana once brought home a drawing from school: her family. She’d drawn herself, Ijekiel, and Ruby.

He was small, crooked, but clearly a cat—red eyes scribbled in marker.

Lucas stared at it too long.

Ijekiel noticed. “Guess you’re family now.”

Lucas turned away before he could make a sound. Or cry. Or combust.

It began with static. The kind that prickled across fur and skin alike. Lucas felt it building for hours, as if the apartment itself couldn’t contain the pressure of his fraying magic. The spell keeping him feline had held for days — too long, he knew — but he’d waited. Observed. Endured.

And then Luciana whispered, voice small and cracked, “I miss Daddy.”

The shift snapped through him like a rubber band. A pull, a burn, a flicker— and then—

“Oof—”

He landed awkwardly, tangled in cushions, limbs too long and too bare. A flash of gold shimmered and fizzled out as the last of the transformation completed. Luciana stared, wide-eyed.

“…Ruby?” she whispered.

Lucas blinked up at her, blanket clutched around his hips like a makeshift robe. “Uh. Surprise?”

She gaped, speechless for a heartbeat— and then gasped, “You’re a boy?!”

Lucas let out a wheezing laugh. “That’s your first question?”

“I thought you were a girl!” She clambered down from the couch. “You’re really, really pretty. Like a prince from a fairy tale.”

“I think I preferred ‘Ruby.’”

“You still are Ruby,” she declared, hands on her hips. “Even if you have legs now.”

Lucas gave up and sat cross-legged, adjusting the blanket around him with all the grace of a man barely holding it together.

Luciana leaned in closer, curious and unafraid. “Are you magic?”

“Yes.”

“Are you cursed?”

“Maybe.”

“Were you born as a cat?”

“No.”

“Do you eat people?”

Lucas arched an eyebrow. “What kind of stories are you reading?”

She grinned. “The fun ones.”

There was a pause. Luciana plopped down beside him, legs swinging.

“What’s your real name?” she asked.

“Lucas.”

“That’s nice,” she said. “But I’m still gonna call you Ruby when you’re a cat.”

He rolled his eyes. “Of course.”

Luciana tilted her head. “Are you gonna stay like this?”

“No. I mean— no, I’m supposed to be fixing it. My magic’s just…weird right now.”

She nodded solemnly. “Daddy says sometimes people get weird when they’re tired.”

Lucas snorted. “Sure. Let’s blame fatigue.”

Luciana leaned a little closer, whispering, “Daddy talks to you when you’re asleep, you know.”

Lucas froze. “He does?”

“Yeah. He says things like ‘You’re lucky she likes you,’ and ‘Stop staring at me while I fold laundry.’” She giggled. “Sometimes he calls you dramatic.”

He huffed. “He’s not wrong.”

They lapsed into silence for a moment, the rain tapping softly against the windows.

Luciana reached out and touched his hand. “I won’t tell anyone, okay?”

Lucas looked down at her tiny fingers in his, unexpectedly moved. “Thank you.”

“I like you better this way,” she said. “But I still like you when you’re fuzzy.”

“That’s reassuring.”

“Do you have a family?” she asked, after a pause.

Lucas blinked. “No. Not really.”

“I can share mine,” she offered easily.

He looked at her. Really looked.

The soft curls falling into her eyes, the gap in her front teeth, the sincerity in her voice. Something warm twisted in his chest — unexpected and deeply terrifying.

“Thanks,” he said quietly.

“You’re kinda like a weird older brother,” she said thoughtfully. “Or like a cool wizard uncle who can turn into animals.”

“I’ll take uncle,” Lucas muttered.

Luciana laughed, then scooted closer until she leaned her head against his shoulder. “Do you think Daddy would be sad if you left?”

Lucas stiffened. “I— don’t know.”

“I think he’d miss you,” she said, yawning.

The words sank like hooks into his ribs.

He didn’t answer.

Because he already knew: he would miss them.

The magic surged again — slower this time. A warning.

Lucas stood, holding the blanket close.

“It’s happening again,” he murmured. “I’m changing back.”

Luciana blinked up at him sleepily. “Come back soon, okay?”

He looked down at her.

“I will.”

By the time Ijekiel returned, Luciana was fast asleep on the couch, curled against the familiar weight of a sleek black cat.

“Miss me?” he murmured, brushing her hair from her face.

Lucas didn’t move.

He just watched him, eyes wide and red and impossibly human.

Lucas woke curled beside Luciana, her hand buried in the fur at his neck, her breath warm against his ribs. Morning light had barely begun to slip between the blinds, brushing soft gold over the apartment. He didn’t move. Couldn’t.

Something in him was too still.

The night before was too fresh — her small voice asking if he had a family, her head on his shoulder, the warm weight of her promise not to tell.

She knew now.

And she hadn’t screamed.

Instead, she’d offered him something terrifying: a place. Something soft and small and quiet that he hadn’t realized he’d wanted until it was given.

He was in too deep.

Luciana stirred beside him and stretched, blinking slowly.

“Morning, Ruby,” she mumbled sleepily.

Lucas’s tail twitched. He made a soft chirp in response.

She blinked at him and smiled. “Still fuzzy?”

He blinked once, deliberately.

Her grin widened, like they had a secret the whole world would never understand.

Breakfast was toast and scrambled eggs. Luciana dropped tiny crumbs onto the floor on purpose, giggling whenever Lucas padded over to eat them.

“You’re extra clingy today,” she whispered when Ijekiel wasn’t looking. “You like us, don’t you?”

Lucas growled lightly under his breath and batted her ankle, but it wasn’t convincing. She beamed at him.

Ijekiel glanced over his shoulder. “Be nice to Ruby.”

“I am,” she said innocently. “He’s just dramatic.”

Lucas wanted to hex something.

He watched Ijekiel butter Luciana’s toast, hair still tousled from sleep, sleeves pushed up to his elbows. There were faint shadows under his eyes, like he’d stayed up reading again. When he smiled at something Luciana said, the warmth of it wrapped around Lucas like a trap he hadn’t seen coming until he was already inside.

He looked away quickly.

That afternoon, Lucas followed Ijekiel into the study. He was curled on the windowsill, pretending to sleep, but he was watching.

Ijekiel ran a hand through his hair, glanced at a thick stack of reports, and sighed.

“Ruby,” he muttered. “You’re staring again.”

Lucas narrowed his eyes.

“You know,” Ijekiel continued, pushing the papers aside, “sometimes I wonder if you understand me.”

Lucas blinked. Twice. Slowly.

Ijekiel laughed softly, rubbing his forehead. “Maybe I’ve been spending too much time with you.”

Lucas’s chest twisted. You have no idea.

Later that night, after Luciana had fallen asleep with her cheek smushed against her favorite pillow, Lucas lingered in the hallway.

Her voice echoed in his head:

“Do you think Daddy would be sad if you left?”

He still didn’t know how to answer. But for the first time — he didn’t want to leave.

It started with little things.

“Ruby,” Luciana said one evening, kicking her feet beneath the kitchen table, “do you think stars are just holes in the sky, or tiny lamps with wings?”

Lucas blinked once, then padded across the floor and rested his chin on her knee.

She grinned. “You agree with the wings, right? I knew it.”

Ijekiel, pouring water into a glass, paused.

“Talking to him again?” he asked lightly.

Luciana looked up with a beatific smile. “Yeah. We’re having a science discussion.”

He chuckled. “About stars?”

“And opinions,” she added seriously. “Ruby has a lot of opinions.”

Lucas licked his paw with a long-suffering air, refusing to meet Ijekiel’s gaze.

It wasn’t just the talking.

Luciana started treating Ruby like a confidant — like she did with her stuffed rabbit, only more…interactive.

“Ruby says I shouldn’t eat the green beans if I hate them,” she whispered one night as Ijekiel cleaned up dinner.

He raised a brow. “Did he?”

“He did. And he says you’re mean for making me.”

“Interesting,” Ijekiel said dryly. “Maybe Ruby would like to do the dishes, too.”

Luciana leaned close to the cat, who lay sprawled on the back of the couch like an elegant shadow. “He says no. But nicely.”

Ijekiel eyed the feline. Ruby blinked. Innocently. Too innocently.

The next day, Luciana set up an elaborate tea party with Ruby seated in a chair too small for him, a floral scarf tied around his neck like a gentleman’s cravat.

“Your highness,” she said, pouring him invisible tea, “we welcome you to the kingdom of Bunnyshire.”

Lucas made a low, offended sound in his throat.

“You’re very important,” she added quickly, setting a plastic cookie in front of him. “You have diplomatic duties.”

He batted the cookie off the table.

“Rude,” she said. “But fair.”

By now, Ijekiel didn’t question it when he heard muffled laughter from behind her door or one-sided conversations where Ruby somehow responded with a flick of his tail or a carefully timed sneeze. Still, something tugged at the edge of his thoughts.

Luciana wasn’t just playing pretend.

She was talking to him. With him.

And Ruby was answering.

There was logic, yes — children imagined. Cats reacted to tone. But this was beginning to feel…too coherent.

Too human.

Too intentional.

Another time, he passed Luciana’s bedroom and paused at the door.

“Do you miss your home?” she whispered to the cat curled beside her.

Ruby blinked slowly.

“It’s okay,” she said, brushing a hand down his back. “I miss Mommy too sometimes. But Daddy says people we love are still with us even if we can’t see them.”

Ruby let out a low, content purr.

“I think you love Daddy,” she added softly.

His purring cut off abruptly.

Ijekiel, halfway down the hall, froze. He hadn’t meant to listen in. He in the hallway, one hand resting on the frame of Luciana’s door.

She was asleep now — tucked under her blanket, a hand curled around Ruby’s paw, her breath soft and even.

He didn’t move for a long time.

That line still echoed.

“I think you love Daddy.”

He exhaled through his nose. Quietly, he stepped into the kitchen and put on the kettle — not because he needed tea, but because doing something was easier than doing nothing.

His fingers tapped against the counter. The hum of the water filled the silence. He reached for the tea canister out of habit. Jasmine. Luciana’s favorite. Jennette’s recommendation. He paused.

Then he set it down and leaned heavily against the edge of the counter.

He rubbed his eyes, tried to gather the frayed edges of his thoughts — but they slipped through him.

He used to think he was enough.

Maybe not a perfect father. But good. Present. Capable. He’d learned to braid hair and bandage knees, to read bedtime stories and memorize the shape of Luciana’s laugh. He’d learned to be the quiet center of their little orbit.

But then Ruby came. Strange, silent, unnervingly aware. And Luciana lit up like she hadn’t in months.

He hadn’t realized how quiet the house had become until it wasn’t anymore.

He wasn’t jealous. Not exactly.

Just tired of wondering if he was only ever going to be the one left standing after everyone else turned into smoke.

He closed his eyes.

He had let someone into his home. Into Luciana’s world. Into his.

He didn’t regret it.

Ijekiel stood on the back step, phone pressed to his ear, one hand curled around a chipped mug still warm from tea.

Jennette answered on the second ring.

“Please tell me this isn’t a bedtime emergency.”

“Just needed to hear someone who isn’t five,” he said quietly.

She paused. “Rough day?”

“No, actually. She was happy. Laughing all afternoon.”

Jennette smiled softly through the line. “Because of that cat?”

He glanced through the glass door. Inside, Luciana slept curled around Ruby’s tiny form, her breathing slow and peaceful.

“…Yeah.”

“She’s attached, huh?”

“She’s in love.”

Jennette chuckled. “I told you — kids don’t pretend around things they trust.”

He didn’t answer right away.

Jennette noticed. “You okay?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “It’s just a cat. But it’s strange how quiet the house doesn’t feel anymore.”

“Quiet’s not always peace,” she said gently.

“No, but it was safe. Predictable.”

Jennette was quiet for a moment.

“You’re scared.”

He exhaled, long and low. “Luciana’s already talking to him like he’s family.”

“And?”

“And I’m… letting her.”

Jennette’s voice turned warm. “Letting her be loved isn’t a failure, Kiel.”

He looked down at his mug.

“I just— I haven’t shared this space. Not since…”

Jennette let the silence stretch.

“She used to hum while folding laundry,” he said. “That was the sound of our evenings. Now it’s Luciana talking to a cat in a bonnet. And somehow that feels worse. Or better. Or both.”

Jennette’s voice was soft now. “You were happy once. You can be again.”

He stared through the glass, heart tight.

And for a moment, he imagined someone staying.

Not as a replacement. Just… staying.

“I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said, voice thin.

Jennette didn’t say goodbye. She didn’t need to.

Inside, the kettle clicked off.

And Ijekiel stepped back into the quiet that didn’t feel quite so quiet anymore.

It started with a spark.

Just a whisper of unstable magic that hummed through Lucas’s spine, prickling under his fur. He barely had time to leap off the kitchen counter before the change surged through him.

He ducked under the table.

Too late.

A shimmer broke across his skin like heat lightning — paws flickering into fingers, fur giving way to pale skin, his form lurching somewhere in-between. He curled up against the cabinet, panting, the world suddenly too loud.

“Ruby?” Luciana’s voice was quiet. Curious. And then— sharp. “Ruby!”

Lucas lifted his head.

She stood just inside the doorway, clutching a juice box and blinking rapidly. Her mouth opened, then closed.

He watched her breath catch — watched her eyes go wide.

But she didn’t scream.

Instead, she looked over her shoulder. “Daddy?”

“I’ll be right there, sweetheart!” Ijekiel called distantly from the study.

Her eyes darted back to Lucas — his hand now halfway transformed, gripping the floor in trembling disbelief.

Luciana didn’t hesitate. She rushed forward, dropped to her knees, and yanked the long tablecloth off the dining table. In one practiced motion, she swaddled Lucas’s not-quite-human form in it and dragged him beneath the table.

“Shhh,” she hissed. “Hold still!”

Lucas let out a strangled sound — half-cat, half-human.

Luciana covered his mouth gently. “Shh. It’s okay. I got you.”

Footsteps.

Ijekiel’s.

Lucas froze.

The light shifted as Ijekiel entered the kitchen. “Luciana? Why’d you scream?”

She stuck her head out from beneath the table, smiling too fast. “I didn’t! Ruby just knocked something over. I was pretending it was a monster.”

There was a pause.

Lucas could feel the doubt radiating off Ijekiel.

“Alright,” Ijekiel said slowly. “But be careful. Don’t let him near anything sharp.”

“Okay, Daddy!”

Another pause. The kind that held suspicion just barely in check.

Then footsteps retreated.

The door closed.

Only then did Luciana exhale. She crawled back under the table, lifted the cloth, and looked at him. He was almost fully human now, naked except for a shimmer of unstable magic still clinging to his limbs.

Luciana blinked.

“You…really are magic,” she whispered.

Lucas nodded, barely.

She didn’t ask questions this time. She just took his hand — his trembling, claw-less hand — and held it tightly.

“I won’t let him find out,” she said, voice trembling too. “I promise.”

And when his magic snapped again — violently — he vanished with a rush of air, fur and ears flickering back into place just before Ijekiel returned.

“Luciana?”

“Still playing!” she called.

Ruby sat perfectly still on her lap.

Lucas felt it that morning like a pulse beneath his skin — faint, electric, familiar.

Magic.

His magic, trickling back into him by slow, uncertain degrees. It had started a few nights ago — small sparks while he slept, the tingle of energy curling in his spine — but today it throbbed with clearer purpose. Something sharp had stitched through his ribs when he woke up in Luciana’s bed, curled in the curve of her arm, her cheek pressed into his fur.

He slipped out of her grasp before dawn, padded down the hallway on silent paws, and leapt up onto the windowsill in the living room. The city beyond the glass was still slumbering, cloaked in gray.

There, in the quiet, the magic rippled again.

Like a whisper, threading back through a bond too long frayed.

Then — ping.

A sudden, faint spark of contact. Familiar. Stubborn. Intrusive.

Athanasia.

Her magic brushed his like a finger tapping on glass. “There you are,” it seemed to say, cool and annoyed and relieved. “What did you do, you idiot?”

Lucas lowered his head. He could feel the full weight of her attention even from a distance, even without words. She knew where he was now. Or near enough. It wouldn’t be long before she came to collect him.

He didn’t answer. He couldn’t.

Instead, he slunk down from the sill and retreated into the couch cushions, hiding beneath the throw blanket Luciana had dragged over him the night before.

She’d fallen asleep curled around him, talking about her mother’s favorite flowers. She’d whispered into his fur, asking if he thought ghosts were real.

“Would my mom like you, Ruby?”

Lucas had only blinked in response, heart tight.

That name still made him want to explode.

Ruby.

Because of his eyes, of course. And because she was seven, and whimsical, and thought it sounded pretty. He hated it. He adored it.

He adored her.

And — worse — he was starting to adore him, too.

Ijekiel returned from work early that evening. It had rained briefly, just enough to dampen his collar and make his hair cling to his temples. Luciana threw herself into his arms the moment he stepped inside, demanding hot chocolate and a story.

Lucas watched from atop the bookshelf.

He told himself he was just keeping his distance for safety.

Not because the sound of Ijekiel’s laughter pulled something raw and unfamiliar in his chest. Not because the sight of Luciana in his arms — like she belonged there — made Lucas ache with something that couldn’t quite be named.

The warmth of it. The home of it.

It was suffocating.

He was a cat. A mage. A stranger. He didn’t belong here.

But he couldn’t bring himself to leave.

That night, after Luciana had been tucked in and the soft click of her bedroom door echoed down the hall, Lucas found his usual perch in the living room. The house was dim, bathed in amber from the lamp on the side table.

Ijekiel sat curled on the couch, a mug of tea cupped in both hands. But he wasn’t reading. He wasn’t even pretending to be occupied.

Lucas settled on the arm of the couch and stared at him. And, perhaps more importantly, listened.

The silence stretched.

Then—

“I miss…” Ijekiel started. His voice was soft. He stared into his mug like it might offer him words. “I miss talking to someone who understands what I’m not saying.”

Lucas stilled.

“I don’t mean I’m unhappy,” Ijekiel continued, almost guiltily. “Luciana is everything to me. She’s my whole world. But there are moments — late at night — when the house is too quiet. When I remember how much I used to share with someone. Even if it was just… stupid things. Old jokes. Half a glance that meant more than it should’ve.”

He exhaled.

“I think loneliness is worse when you’re loved,” he said, quieter now. “Because you feel guilty for it.”

Lucas’s throat constricted.

Ijekiel set the mug down and leaned back against the couch, staring up at the ceiling.

“It’s funny,” he added after a while. “I talk to a cat about this now.”

Lucas turned his head away. He shouldn’t be here. He shouldn’t know this.

But he couldn’t bring himself to leave.

Instead, he slipped down into the seat beside Ijekiel and rested his head carefully near his thigh.

There was a long pause.

Then — Ijekiel’s fingers brushed softly against his fur.

“You’re good company, Ruby,” he murmured. “I don’t know why. But you are.”

Lucas closed his eyes.

It would be so easy to stay. To pretend.

But his magic was returning. Athanasia would come for him. Sooner rather than later.

And when she did — what would he do?

Would he walk away?

He didn’t belong here. He wasn’t a husband. He wasn’t a father. He was a mage. A recluse. An arrogant, centuries-old fool.

But watching Ijekiel in this quiet moment — his voice low, his eyes a little tired, his loneliness so quietly bared — Lucas felt something shift.

He wanted to be someone who could reach for that. Who could offer warmth back.

The choice wasn’t simple. It never had been.

But tonight, curled beside a man who talked to the silence and found comfort in a cursed stranger’s company — Lucas made it all the same.

He wasn’t ready to go.

Not yet.

Lucas was beginning to suspect he’d be terrible at being a housecat even if he wasn’t a disgruntled, semi-cursed ancient mage.

He wasn’t sure when it had started to unravel. Maybe the night he accidentally opened a cabinet with his paw. Or when he tried to paw-write letters into the condensation on the window. Or when he was caught staring at Ijekiel a little too long, a little too intently, and Ijekiel blinked back at him with a furrowed brow like he could almost tell something wasn’t right.

Or maybe it was today.

Because today, Lucas had tried to open a door.

He hadn’t meant to — really. He’d just heard Ijekiel’s voice through the crack, low and distracted, speaking on the phone. Curiosity had gotten the better of him. So he’d hopped onto the desk chair and pushed, carefully, with both paws. It took three tries.

When he finally stumbled into the study, Ijekiel looked up in alarm.

“…Ruby?” he said, voice uncertain.

Lucas, realizing what he’d done, immediately meowed and flopped dramatically onto the rug.

A pause. A silence so deep he swore he could hear the ticking of the wall clock.

Then — footsteps. Ijekiel approached slowly.

“You opened the door?” he said, crouching. “That door was closed.”

Lucas meowed again, innocently, tail flicking once.

Ijekiel stared at him. “You’re either terrifyingly smart or I’m sleep-deprived.”

Lucas pressed his paw to his face like a dignified cat-wash. Subtle deflection.

It worked.

Mostly.

“I swear you give me looks sometimes,” Ijekiel muttered, gently scratching between his ears. “Like you know what I’m thinking.”

Lucas nearly purred.

Then he caught himself and made a disgruntled, sputtering noise instead.

Ijekiel laughed.

“Definitely weird,” he murmured. “But cute.”

Lucas forgot how to breathe for a second.

That night, he tried again.

He waited until the house was quiet — Luciana asleep, the dishwasher humming faintly. Ijekiel stood in the kitchen, drying mugs. The lamplight made his features soft, golden.

Lucas leapt silently onto the counter.

Ijekiel startled. “Oh — Ruby. You scared me.”

Lucas stood on his hind legs and pawed at the cabinet above the stove — the one he’d seen Ijekiel open dozens of times.

He meowed meaningfully.

Ijekiel frowned. “You want something?”

Lucas repeated the gesture. Slower.

Ijekiel stared. “Tea?”

Lucas paused. Then pawed at it again.

“…I’m starting to think you really do understand me,” Ijekiel muttered.

Lucas stared at him, wide-eyed.

Then reached out a paw and gently batted the spoon Ijekiel had set down. It clattered onto the counter.

Ijekiel blinked.

Lucas meowed.

“…You want to… talk?”

Lucas froze.

That wasn’t what he’d meant. He’d just—

Ijekiel suddenly laughed, soft and bewildered. “God, you’re strange. Are you even a cat?”

Lucas meowed indignantly.

Ijekiel bent down to meet his gaze.

And for a long, dangerous moment, their eyes met.

Not casually. Not passingly.

Met.

Lucas felt something seize in his chest—like his body remembered being human. Like it wanted to shift then and there, to reach out, to—

Then Ijekiel blinked and stood up.

“Well,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck, “thanks for the company, I guess.”

Lucas slumped onto the counter, defeated.

Subtle magical signaling, his ass.

It happened in the quiet between rainstorms.

Luciana had fallen asleep in the crook of the couch, one leg still half-draped over a pillow fort she’d proudly built that afternoon. The television played soft music in the background, a nature documentary murmuring about migratory birds. The windows were fogged with the breath of late spring, and the house, for once, was silent.

Lucas sat curled on the windowsill, tail flicking idly, heart pacing with something he couldn’t name.

All day, the magic thrummed under his skin, wound tight as a bowstring.

Even Luciana had noticed — she’d squinted at him over dinner and said, “You’re sparkly again,” like it was the most normal thing in the world.

But Ijekiel hadn’t seen it. Not yet.

He was in the kitchen, sleeves rolled up, drying a glass with slow, absent movements. Lucas watched him as he always did — quiet, lingering, entranced.

He’d memorized that face now. The subtle tiredness under his eyes. The curve of his jaw, too sharp for how soft he was. The way his mouth twitched slightly, like he was thinking of something else, always somewhere else, even when standing still.

Lucas wanted to touch him. Say something — be something.

But the magic surged again, suddenly, violently.

Pain lanced through him. White-hot. Cracking.

And then — he fell.

From the windowsill, from his tiny cursed body, from the lie he’d let stretch far too long.

The shift was fast, brutal. No build-up, no warning hum. Just a rush of magic like a snapped wire, and then—

The sound of glass shattering.

Ijekiel turned sharply, alarm flaring in his features. “Luciana?”

But it wasn’t her.

Standing half-collapsed in the center of the living room was a man. Pale-skinned. Black-haired. Shirtless, trembling, wide-eyed — his hands braced on his knees, breathing hard.

Lucas.

Luciana stirred on the couch, grumbled sleepily, but didn’t wake.

Ijekiel froze.

“Who—?” he whispered, stepping back instinctively. His gaze flicked to the shattered glass on the floor, then to the man now rising slowly, shakily.

Lucas looked up.

Ijekiel’s eyes widened.

Because those were Ruby’s eyes. Crimson and piercing. Familiar. Impossible.

“…No,” Ijekiel breathed. “You—”

Lucas held up both hands. “Wait. Please. I can explain—”

“How did you get in here?” Ijekiel said, voice sharp now. “How do you know my daughter? What are you doing—”

“I was the cat.”

Ijekiel stared at him.

Lucas swallowed. “I know how that sounds.”

“That doesn’t make sense—” Ijekiel was moving now, grabbing a blanket from the armchair, as if preparing to shield himself or Lucas or both. “You— how long have you been here?”

“Since the spell malfunctioned. Weeks. Maybe a month.”

Ijekiel’s jaw tightened.

“I didn’t mean to stay,” Lucas said quickly. “It was supposed to be temporary. Just until I could fix my magic. I didn’t even want to be near people—”

“Then why didn’t you leave?”

Lucas hesitated.

And that silence was enough.

Ijekiel stepped back again, the blanket still clenched in one fist.

“You watched us,” he said slowly. “Lived in our house. Slept near my daughter. And you didn’t think to tell me?”

“I couldn’t,” Lucas said. “I couldn’t shift back at first—”

“But you could’ve signaled. Spoken. Written something. You didn’t.”

“I didn’t know how you’d react. And— and by the time I could’ve tried—”

“You didn’t want to leave.”

Lucas looked away.

Rain began to tap against the window, soft and persistent.

“You liked it,” Ijekiel said, voice quiet now. “Being part of this. Pretending.”

Lucas met his eyes. “I didn’t pretend. I never lied to her.”

“You let her believe you were something else.”

“I let her believe I was hers,” Lucas said. “Because I was. She chose me. Before she ever knew what I was.”

“But I didn’t.”

“I know.”

Ijekiel stared at him, unreadable. The shadows from the kitchen light carved his face into sharp planes.

“Ijekiel,” Lucas said softly, “I never meant to cross a line. But I—” He exhaled. “I started caring. About both of you. And I didn’t know how to stop.”

The silence after that was heavy.

Lucas took a step forward. Barefoot. Unsteady.

“You talked to me like I was part of your life,” he said. “You let yourself be soft around me. You— told me things you didn’t tell anyone else. And I know that shouldn’t mean anything, because you thought I was a cat. But it meant something to me.”

Ijekiel’s jaw clenched. “So this is what? A confession?”

“It’s the truth.”

“Do you even know me?”

Lucas blinked. “What?”

“You watched. Listened. But that doesn’t mean you know me. Doesn’t mean what you’re feeling is anything but misplaced affection. Attachment.”

Lucas flinched.

“You want to stay because you’re lonely,” Ijekiel said. “Because you saw something warm and decided you deserved it.”

“I do know you,” Lucas whispered. “Not just because I listened. But because I saw you when no one else was looking.”

That hit something. Ijekiel’s mouth parted slightly, but no words came out.

“I saw you tuck her in at night, even when you were bone-tired. I saw you fix that leaky pipe with one hand while cooking with the other. I saw you talk to me when you thought no one else cared enough to answer.”

Lucas stepped forward again, slower this time.

“I didn’t fall for a fantasy,” he said. “I fell for you.”

Ijekiel closed his eyes.

The rain kept falling. Steady. Gentle.

Luciana stirred again, rolling onto her side, one hand flopping over the cushion where Ruby usually curled.

Lucas stopped walking.

“I don’t expect anything from you,” he said softly. “You can tell me to leave. I’ll go.”

Ijekiel opened his eyes.

And Lucas, just for a moment, let him see all of it — the longing, the ache, the terrifying vulnerability.

“I just needed you to know,” he said, voice barely above a whisper. “That I stayed because I didn’t know what else to do with a heart that suddenly had something to lose.”

Lucas didn’t move.

Not when Ijekiel dropped his gaze, not when he turned away. Not even when the silence stretched long enough for the rain to start dripping from the eaves, tapping against the balcony railing like the beat of a second heart.

It was Luciana who broke the stillness.

“Ruby?”

She sat up on the couch, rubbing her eyes with tiny fists, voice sticky with sleep. She blinked toward the spot where her cat usually curled — only to freeze when she saw the tall, shirtless man standing in the middle of the living room.

Her mouth parted.

Lucas panicked.

“Luciana—”

She gasped and leapt from the cushions, sprinting barefoot across the floor. “No no no no— Daddy can’t see you like this!”

He barely had time to react before she grabbed the hem of the blanket Ijekiel had dropped and frantically tried to throw it over his head.

“Shh! You’re gonna get us both in trouble—!”

Lucas crouched slightly, more startled by her panic than anything else. “Luciana— wait—”

“He doesn’t know you’re a person!” she whispered, clearly horrified. “You’re gonna scare him and then he’ll make you go away!”

A sound escaped Ijekie l— half exhale, half stunned laugh. It made both of them freeze.

Luciana turned slowly.

“…Daddy?”

“I do know,” Ijekiel said gently. “I’ve known for about five minutes now.”

Luciana looked from her father to Lucas, and then back again, eyes huge.

“You— you do?”

Ijekiel nodded. He ran a hand through his hair, then reached for the folded laundry pile on the back of the couch. Without saying a word, he tossed Lucas a plain black t-shirt and a pair of drawstring sweatpants.

Lucas caught them, blinking.

“You can get changed in the hall,” Ijekiel said, voice too calm to be anything but restrained.

Lucas murmured thanks and disappeared quickly, leaving Luciana standing in the middle of the living room, looking like she’d just been caught stealing state secrets.

When the sound of retreating footsteps faded, Ijekiel knelt in front of her.

“…How long have you known?”

Luciana hesitated.

Her fingers twisted in the hem of her oversized nightgown. “A little while?”

“Luciana.”

“…Two weeks,” she said quickly. “But it’s not his fault! He didn’t mean to be stuck like that — he told me. And — and I promised I wouldn’t tell because he was scared you’d be mad. You do look really scary when you’re mad.”

Ijekiel sighed. “I’m not mad at you.”

She looked up, unsure.

He softened. “I just… want to understand.”

Luciana looked toward the hallway where Lucas had disappeared. “He was lonely. I could tell. So I talked to him. And one night, he… changed. Just a little. But I didn’t scream. I just—” Her voice grew quieter. “He didn’t want to scare you.”

Ijekiel stared at her for a long moment.

Then he reached out, pulled her into a hug, and pressed a hand gently to the back of her head.

She sighed, melting against his chest.

“He’s my Ruby,” she said quietly. “Even if he’s a boy sometimes.”

Ijekiel rested his chin on her hair, his thoughts a blur of too many things he didn’t yet know how to hold.

When Lucas stepped back into the room, clothed in soft cotton and still slightly damp from wiping down in the bathroom, he paused at the threshold.

Luciana was curled into Ijekiel’s lap, half-hidden in his embrace, but her eyes lit up the moment she saw him.

“You fit Daddy’s clothes!” she declared with an eager sort of pride, as if that somehow confirmed Lucas belonged here.

Lucas offered a sheepish smile. “Barely.”

Ijekiel looked up at him — eyes unreadable, but less guarded than before. He didn’t speak.

Lucas hovered by the doorway. The borrowed sweatpants hung a little loose on his hips, and the shirt fit too snug across his shoulders. He felt awkward. Human. Too much and not enough.

“I can go,” he said. The words tasted foreign in his mouth, though he meant them. “I… didn’t mean to get so attached. Or stay this long. I’ll be out of your way—”

“No!” Luciana squirmed in Ijekiel’s arms, scrambling upright. “You can’t leave!”

Lucas blinked. “Luciana—”

“You said you liked us!” she insisted, eyes wide and near tears. “And I like you too! You’re my Ruby! Even if you have legs now!”

Ijekiel exhaled sharply, rubbing his temple. “Luciana…”

“She’s not wrong,” Lucas said quietly.

Ijekiel looked up.

“I did get attached,” Lucas continued, stepping further in. “I didn’t mean to. At first I just wanted to fix the spell, find Athy, go home. But then…” He looked at them both—at the way Luciana clung to Ijekiel’s sleeve, at the soft curve of Ijekiel’s mouth when he looked at his daughter. “You made me feel like home.”

Luciana beamed.

Ijekiel didn’t smile.

Instead, he rose, setting Luciana gently on her feet before crossing the room until he was standing in front of Lucas — close enough for Lucas to see the faint lines of exhaustion around his eyes.

“Do you mean it?” he asked.

Lucas nodded.

“And you weren’t… watching us, pretending, just to make it easier to stay?”

Lucas stiffened. “No. I— if anything, I was trying not to want it. Not to want you.” His voice faltered. “But you talk to cats like they’re people, and you sing when you think no one’s listening, and you fall asleep sitting up just to make sure she has the last blanket—”

Ijekiel’s expression faltered.

“And I was stupid enough to fall in love with that,” Lucas finished, almost breathless.

Silence.

Then, behind them, Luciana whispered, “Whoa.”

Neither of them looked at her.

Ijekiel’s eyes softened — not entirely, not yet forgiveness — but enough to let something fragile pass between them.

“…You’re not going anywhere tonight,” he said quietly. “Not with no shoes and hair like that.”

Lucas blinked. “Wait, so—?”

“Couch,” Ijekiel said, already turning away. “We’ll talk more in the morning.”

“But I wanna sleep next to Ruby!” Luciana protested.

“You can hug him in the morning,” Ijekiel said. “Right now he’s a man. And men don’t fit in your bed.”

Lucas tried not to choke.

Luciana pouted, arms crossed.

But Ijekiel didn’t budge — and Lucas, strangely, felt his heart twist again. Not with ache. But with something like the terrifying hope that he might still have a place here.

Even if he had to earn it.

Later, after Luciana was fast asleep, Lucas stayed awake. He stood in the hallway, unsure whether he was pacing or hiding.

The house was too quiet.

Then a voice drifted from the living room.

“You can come sit down, you know.”

Lucas stepped into the lamplight.

Ijekiel sat on the couch, hunched over a mug he hadn’t sipped in what looked like minutes. His sleeves were rolled, his posture tired.

“I’m not good at yelling,” he said without looking up. “Or slamming doors. I used to think that made me patient. But maybe I just… skip straight to worn out.”

Lucas didn’t answer. He eased down onto the armrest, close but not too close.

Ijekiel exhaled. “You were in my house. You saw me. All of me. And part of me still wants to be furious. Not even because of Luciana. Just because I didn’t know.”

Lucas swallowed. “I never meant to—”

“I know.” Ijekiel’s voice was quiet. “That’s the problem.”

Lucas blinked.

“I don’t know how to be angry at someone who never meant harm. Who helped. Who stayed.”

Silence stretched.

“Luciana calls you family,” he added. “I’m still trying to figure out if I resent that— or if I’m just scared of what it means that I don’t.”

Lucas lowered his gaze. “I’m scared too.”

Ijekiel looked at him then. Really looked. And the tension in his shoulders finally began to melt.

“Good,” he said softly. “Let’s be scared together.”

Lucas woke to the scent of coffee and warm light spilling in from tall windows. For a moment, he forgot where he was — until he shifted, felt the blanket slide down his chest, and remembered the previous night in a slow, jolting rush.

The living room. The couch. The confession. Ijekiel’s unreadable eyes. Luciana’s whispered “Whoa.”

He sat up and rubbed his face. Still human. Still clothed. Still aching in a way magic couldn’t fix.

The house was quiet, except for the clink of a mug from the kitchen. Lucas stood, padded barefoot toward the sound.

Ijekiel was leaning against the counter, sipping from a dark blue mug. His hair was slightly mussed, his sleeves pushed up to his elbows. When he looked up, his expression was calm — but his eyes were sharper than usual.

“I made coffee,” he said.

Lucas hesitated. “Do I get some?”

“That depends,” Ijekiel said mildly. “Are you going to turn into a cat again mid-sip?”

“…Hopefully not.”

Ijekiel set down a second mug and slid it across the counter. Lucas picked it up, cradling it more for comfort than warmth.

“I still don’t know how you like it,” Ijekiel added.

Lucas smiled faintly. “With sugar. But I’m not picky.”

They drank in silence for a few seconds — Lucas cautiously perched on a stool, Ijekiel watching him like he might disappear.

Then, finally, Ijekiel asked, “So. How did this all happen?”

Lucas exhaled. “Magic. Malfunction. Pride.”

“That’s not very specific.”

Lucas ran a hand through his hair. “I was testing a spell. A hybrid one — part illusion, part transformation, tied to teleportation. Something that would let me disguise myself while traveling between fixed coordinates. Athy warned me it wasn’t stable. I didn’t listen.”

“Of course you didn’t,” Ijekiel murmured.

“It backfired,” Lucas said. “The disguise element overpowered the rest. It reshaped me into something small and unnoticeable. Then the tether to Athy severed, and I couldn’t shift back. My magic was too scrambled. I tried to find her — but I got lost. Disoriented. And then…”

“You wandered into a residential neighborhood.”

“…And got adopted by a five-year-old,” Lucas muttered into his mug.

Ijekiel’s lips twitched. Almost a smile.

“I planned to leave,” Lucas said after a moment. “I swear. The first night, I was just waiting for the magic to reset. But then Luciana named me. Started hugging me. And you…” He hesitated. “You talked to me.”

Ijekiel met his eyes. “You listened.”

“Every word.”

Silence again. Not tense — just filled with the weight of too many things unspoken.

“I thought I was going insane,” Ijekiel said eventually. “Luciana would come home from school and talk to that cat for hours. And sometimes it felt like… it felt like you were reacting.”

“I was,” Lucas admitted. “I tried to act natural. I really did. But you’re both too—” He paused, voice softer. “It was too easy to forget I wasn’t part of it.”

Ijekiel looked down at his coffee. “She kept your secret.”

“She’s terrifyingly loyal.”

“I’m not sure whether to be proud or alarmed.”

Lucas chuckled. “Both?”

Another beat passed.

Then Ijekiel asked, “What happens now?”

Lucas hesitated. “Do you want me to leave?”

“…No,” Ijekiel said carefully. “But I need time. And answers. I need to understand what this was — what you are. Not just the mage part. The rest of you.”

Lucas nodded, quiet and earnest. “Ask anything.”

Ijekiel looked at him fully then, eyes steadier. Not trusting yet — but open.

“Then stay,” he said softly. “For now.”

Lucas felt something loosen in his chest. “Okay.”

Ijekiel set his mug down. His voice was quieter now, but steady. “Earlier, you mentioned someone. Athy?”

Lucas blinked, then smiled faintly. “Athanasia. But yeah, I call her Athy. She’s—” He hesitated, weighing how much to say. “She’s a friend. One of the few people who’s known me long enough to get away with scolding me like an old aunt.”

Ijekiel raised a brow. “Aunt?”

“She’s not actually. She’s just… very responsible. Very good. And very fond of telling me when I’m being reckless. She warned me not to mess with the spell.”

“And you didn’t listen.”

“Of course not,” Lucas said with a small huff of amusement. “I thought I had it under control. I always do.”

Ijekiel looked at him for a moment longer. “Is she a mage, too?”

“She is. Stronger than most. Wiser than me, even when she’s being sentimental.”

There was something warm in the way Lucas said her name — affectionate, but not romantic. Ijekiel studied him for a moment, as if trying to see if there was something more. Lucas, perceptive even without magic, caught the glance and added, “She’s not… like that. Athy’s more like family.”

“I see.” Ijekiel’s expression eased, just a little. “And she’s the one who found you?”

“Eventually. It took her longer than usual because the spell scrambled our magical tether. But now that she knows where I am, she wants me to come back.”

“And are you going to?”

Lucas was silent. Then: “I don’t know.”

Ijekiel looked down at his hands, fingers curled loosely around the edge of the counter. “You’ve been here for weeks. Living in our home. Hearing everything.”

“I know.”

“You saw… everything.”

Lucas’s voice was softer now. “Only what I couldn’t help falling in love with.”

That made Ijekiel freeze — eyes sharp, lips parting slightly as if to respond but finding no words. The moment stretched, quiet and aching.

Lucas knew how to be human. What he didn’t know was to belong.

This.

The gentle rhythms of breakfast. The soft sound of cartoons playing in the next room. The way Luciana chattered from the kitchen table, asking him with utter trust if he wanted more toast, if he could still purr, if he was okay.

And the way Ijekiel stood at the counter across from him, sleeves pushed up, eyes flickering with questions that never quite made it to his lips.

Lucas sipped the coffee Ijekiel had made him. He’d had better. But he drank it slowly, like it meant something. Because maybe it did.

“Stop staring at me like I’m going to explode,” he murmured eventually, eyes still on his mug.

“I wasn’t,” Ijekiel said evenly.

“You were. You’ve been watching me like I’m a wild animal that broke into your house and started reading your books.”

A pause.

“Well,” Ijekiel said, “you did.”

Lucas’s mouth quirked.

Later that day, when Ijekiel was doing paperwork at the dining table, Lucas drifted in from the hallway and stood behind the couch. He wasn’t sure what he was waiting for — permission? An invitation?

“Are you going to sit, or just lurk?” Ijekiel asked without looking up.

Lucas sat.

They didn’t talk for a while. Just existed in the same quiet space.

Luciana had gone to bed, the house dim and still. The last ember of the evening’s warmth was fading out of the air.

“I can leave,” Lucas said quietly. “If this is too much.”

Ijekiel didn’t answer at first. He just turned a page. Then, softly, “She’ll miss you.”

Lucas swallowed. “Will you?”

Another silence. Ijekiel’s hands paused on the paper.

“…You’re not what I expected,” he admitted.

“Yeah. I get that a lot.”

“But you’re not… a stranger, either.” Ijekiel looked up at last, expression unreadable. “That’s what’s confusing.”

Lucas leaned forward, forearms on his knees. “I didn’t mean for it to happen. I didn’t mean to fall for all of this.”

“For her?”

“For both of you.”

That made Ijekiel sit still for a long moment.

Lucas didn’t press.

He knew the magic was returning. That Athanasia was still waiting. That any day now, he could untangle the spell fully, walk out of this borrowed life, and go back to the one where he belonged.

But he wasn’t sure he wanted to.

Ijekiel had never minded silence.

His apartment was usually filled with it — quiet corners, unspoken thoughts, the soft hum of Luciana’s voice filling the space when she was home. It was manageable, the solitude. Predictable. Comfortable.

But lately, the silence felt… different.

It wasn’t silence anymore. It was absence — a space that felt like someone had stepped out of it for just a moment, as if the air still remembered a presence and was waiting for it to return.

That someone, apparently, was Lucas.

He hadn’t known what to expect after the reveal. Ruby had been a cat. Now he was a man. An ancient, sarcastic, far-too-composed man with long black hair and unnerving red eyes who brewed better tea than Ijekiel and folded laundry without being asked. He didn’t hover or impose, but he didn’t disappear either. He just existed — quietly, confidently, and entirely there.

Luciana adored him, of course.

She chattered to him like nothing had changed, except now her conversations included more questions, more secrets, more laughter. Sometimes, Ijekiel would pass by the living room and find them on the floor — Luciana braiding Lucas’s hair, Lucas letting her, watching her with an expression too soft for someone who’d once threatened to hex the toaster for startling him.

It unsettled Ijekiel.

It made him pause outside the door before entering.

It made him ask himself questions he wasn’t ready to answer.

He found himself watching.

Not just Lucas with Luciana, but Lucas alone. The way he moved through the space — not like a guest, not like a squatter, but like someone who belonged there. He fit. He laughed at the shows Luciana watched. He cleaned the counters when no one was looking. He corrected her spelling when she wrote thank-you notes to her friends.

And sometimes, when he thought no one was paying attention, he’d look at Ijekiel like he wanted to stay.

And Ijekiel didn’t know what to do with that.

So he did what he always did: he worked.

He shut himself in his office with legal documents and reports, his name printed cleanly at the top of every page. He fielded calls from Jennette, reassured her that everything was fine, that Luciana was fine, that he was fine.

He wasn’t fine.

Because sometimes, he’d come out of his room and find Lucas asleep on the couch, hair spilling over the throw pillow, one arm curled behind his head like he wasn’t a guest but someone who lived there. Like someone who could.

That was the part that kept catching him.

Not that Lucas was there.

But that it didn’t feel wrong.

One night, he couldn’t sleep. He went to the kitchen to make tea and found Lucas already there, bathed in the golden hush of the stovetop light, pouring hot water over chamomile.

“I figured you’d show up,” Lucas said without turning around. “You always do after 2 a.m. when you’re pretending you slept.”

Ijekiel crossed his arms, trying not to let that register. “You’ve been paying attention.”

Lucas handed him a mug. “I pay attention to things that matter.”

Their fingers brushed.

Too intentional. Too warm.

Ijekiel stepped back. “You don’t have to stay here.”

Lucas tilted his head. “Do you want me to leave?”

That was the question, wasn’t it?

And he didn’t have an answer. Not one he was ready to say out loud.

Lucas let the silence sit, unafraid of it. He sipped his tea like they were just two people sharing a night, not two halves of a strange tangle neither of them could define.

Finally, Ijekiel said, “You made a home in a place you weren’t meant to. I don’t know if that’s kindness or cruelty.”

Lucas met his gaze. “It was never meant to happen. But it did. And now I don’t want to forget what it feels like.”

The tea cooled between them.

Ijekiel left the room first.

But the silence followed him — and for once, it didn’t feel like his own.

The first disaster was the dishes.

Lucas, sleeves rolled up, stood by the sink, a dishcloth in hand and his hair tied back with one of Luciana’s sparkly pink ribbons. He’d claimed it was necessary to keep his hair out of the way. Ijekiel suspected it was just another way to amuse Luciana — who now sat at the kitchen table with her coloring books, watching Lucas like he was a Saturday morning cartoon.

“I still don’t understand why we can’t just use magic,” Lucas said as he scrubbed a plate with theatrical effort.

“Because doing things the normal way builds character,” Ijekiel replied, drying a mug.

“You say that like it’s a good thing.”

“It is.”

“Hmm.” Lucas held the plate up like it was a rare artifact. “So if I clean ten of these, do I become a better person? Is that how it works?”

“No,” Ijekiel said dryly. “You’ll need at least fifty.”

Lucas snorted. “Sadist.”

“Slacker.”

“Harsh.”

Ijekiel’s gaze flicked over. Lucas had a bubble of soap on the bridge of his nose and absolutely no idea. “You have something—” He reached out instinctively, thumb brushing the bubble away before he realized what he was doing.

Lucas’s breath hitched — just a little. Just enough to notice.

The moment stretched.

Too soft. Too close.

Ijekiel cleared his throat and turned back to the sink. “You had a bubble on your face.”

“Tragic,” Lucas murmured, voice rougher now. “If only someone would kiss it better.”

Ijekiel dropped the mug with a clatter.

Lucas burst out laughing.

After dinner — pasta, because Luciana had demanded “noodles with swirls,” and Lucas had tried to summon fettuccine out of thin air (he ended up with a single, flaming noodle that nearly set the ceiling on fire) — the three of them ended up in the living room.

Luciana curled between them on the couch, sticky from dessert, whispering sleepy nonsense about spaghetti monsters and magical cats. Her head lolled onto Ijekiel’s shoulder.

“She’s out,” Ijekiel murmured.

Lucas was watching them with a quiet expression, the humor drained from his features, replaced by something gentler. “You’re good at this,” he said.

“At what?”

“This,” Lucas said, his eyes flickering to Luciana’s small frame, her fingers still curled around Ijekiel’s sleeve. “Being a dad.”

Ijekiel’s breath caught. “I don’t know what I’m doing most of the time.”

Lucas smiled faintly. “None of us do. But she looks at you like you built the world for her.”

The words sank into him like warmth through bone.

“I built a routine,” Ijekiel said, voice softer. “That’s all. Routine makes it easier for both of us.”

Lucas tilted his head. “Still. She clings to you like you’re gravity.”

“I have no idea how to respond to that.”

Lucas’s voice dropped a note. “You don’t have to. I’m just observing.”

Ijekiel risked a glance at him.

Lucas was close — knees brushing his, black hair falling loose over one shoulder despite the pink ribbon, dark eyes quietly unreadable.

“You used to be a cat,” Ijekiel said, suddenly overwhelmed by the surrealness of it all.

Lucas grinned. “And you still let me fold your laundry. Very trusting of you.”

“You’re not folding anything ever again.”

“I folded your socks into hearts. That was love, Ijekiel.”

Ijekiel huffed and looked away, but a smile cracked through anyway.

Later that night, when Luciana was tucked in and the house was still, Ijekiel found Lucas in the kitchen, nursing a mug of tea like it was something sacred.

His hair was down. His shoulders relaxed. The magic around him felt quiet for once.

“I thought you’d gone to bed,” Ijekiel said softly.

“I couldn’t sleep.” Lucas looked over his shoulder. “Too many thoughts.”

“About?”

Lucas turned, leaning against the counter. “You. Her. This place.”

“I see.”

“It’s not what I expected,” Lucas said. “Being here.”

Ijekiel stepped closer. “And what did you expect?”

“Chaos. Misery. A lot of cat hair.”

Ijekiel gave a short laugh. “You did shed a lot.”

“I did not.”

“You did. I had to lint roll everything.”

Lucas grinned. “You loved it.”

Ijekiel didn’t deny it.

Their eyes met.

No magic this time. Just breath and silence and the sound of the kettle ticking as it cooled.

Neither of them looked away.

The second morning in a row that Luciana refused to let go of Lucas’s hand, Ijekiel started to worry.

“Do you want Ruby to brush your hair again?” Ijekiel asked gently, pausing in the hallway as his daughter clung to Lucas’s arm with the weight of someone about to be separated from a lifelong friend.

Luciana didn’t hesitate. “Yes! He does it softer than you, Daddy. He doesn’t yank.”

Lucas smirked behind her, clearly proud of himself. “I do have a gentle touch.”

Ijekiel narrowed his eyes. “You’re spoiling her.”

“She deserves it.”

“That’s not—” He exhaled. “Not the point.”

Luciana tugged Lucas toward the bathroom where her brush was, practically dragging him. “Come on, Ruby. You promised.”

Lucas went willingly, casting Ijekiel a shrug as if to say what can you do. And truly, Ijekiel didn’t know what he could do. Luciana had grown more and more attached to Lucas since the transformation — hugging him constantly, sneaking him her snacks, dragging him into her bedtime routine like it was the most natural thing in the world.

“Don’t let her charm you into watching cartoons again,” Ijekiel called after them.

“No promises,” Lucas replied.

By the time Ijekiel entered the bathroom, Lucas had knelt behind Luciana, carefully detangling her curls with the kind of care that made Ijekiel’s chest ache. Luciana sat on the closed toilet lid, swinging her legs and humming a tune only she understood.

“She said she likes it when I do the ‘fluffy round buns,’” Lucas said casually, twisting a small section of her hair. “She’s got opinions.”

“I do!” Luciana chimed proudly.

Ijekiel leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed. “She’s never even let me braid her hair after the fifth time.”

“Maybe you’re too serious about it,” Lucas replied, not looking up. “She says you treat her like she’s fragile.”

Luciana nodded. “You pull like I’m glass.”

Ijekiel raised a brow. “You told him that?”

“She tells me everything,” Lucas said smugly. “We have very deep conversations when you’re not around.”

“About what?”

“Mostly about which Pokémon is the strongest and why pickles are evil,” Lucas replied, deadpan.

“They are evil,” Luciana insisted. “Slimy and green.”

“See? I agree with her on the important things.”

Ijekiel’s lips parted, but no words came. He just watched them — Luciana beaming with her face tilted up toward the mirror, and Lucas utterly at ease beside her, like he belonged there.

Something about it felt… dangerous.

Too much.

Later that afternoon, while Luciana napped in her usual nest of blankets, Ijekiel found Lucas lounging on the living room floor, his long hair loose around his shoulders, flipping lazily through a fashion catalog Luciana had been coloring in. The absurdity of it all nearly short-circuited Ijekiel’s brain.

“You’re not… bored?” Ijekiel asked carefully.

Lucas glanced up. “Of what?”

“This. Life here.”

Lucas’s smile was lazy. “Not even a little. You?”

Ijekiel didn’t answer.

Instead, he walked into the kitchen and busied himself with dishes already clean just to give his hands something to do.

Lucas joined him a moment later, perched on the counter like he had every right to be there. “You okay?”

“I don’t know.” Ijekiel dried a mug slowly. “It’s like she’s — she’s adopted you.”

Lucas was quiet for a beat. “Would that be so bad?”

“She’s five. She gets attached to anything that doesn’t run from her.”

“I didn’t run,” Lucas said softly. “She’s not just anyone to me, you know. And neither are you.”

The words landed with more weight than they should have.

“I haven’t forgotten what you were doing before you turned into a cat,” Ijekiel muttered. “You had a life. Magic. People.”

Lucas shrugged. “And they all expect me to go back to it. But it doesn’t feel like mine anymore.”

He slid off the counter and stood close enough that Ijekiel could feel the warmth of him — solid, human, far too present.

“I didn’t mean to find this,” Lucas said, eyes flicking toward the hallway where Luciana slept. “Or you. But now that I have, I’m not sure I want to give it up.”

Ijekiel looked away, heart unsteady.

“I don’t know what this is,” he admitted. “And I don’t know what to do with you.”

Lucas gave a crooked grin. “You could start by letting me make dinner.”

“You cook again and I’ll marry you on the spot.”

Lucas blinked. Then smirked. “Is that a proposal?”

“God, no.” Ijekiel rubbed his eyes. “I’m exhausted.”

“I’ll take it as a maybe.”

The knock came just after noon, sharp and deliberate.

Ijekiel had been on the sofa, half-dozing with the sound of Luciana’s cartoons humming faintly in the background. Lucas was in the kitchen again, raiding their fruit bowl like a raccoon with expensive taste. Luciana sat cross-legged on the rug, humming to herself while drawing what appeared to be a crayon battle between a flamingo and a toaster.

The knock startled all three of them. It wasn’t the hesitant kind of a neighbor dropping by, or a delivery with nowhere to be. It was confident. Certain.

Lucas froze.

Ijekiel narrowed his eyes at him. “Expecting someone?”

Lucas didn’t answer. But his silence was enough.

Ijekiel rose and crossed the room, gently moving Luciana out of the way. She barely looked up, too invested in her drawing to notice the tension creeping into the air.

He opened the door.

The woman standing there was radiant.

Not in the ordinary, charming sense, but in the way light filters through stained glass — impossible to miss, almost difficult to look at directly. She had a presence that felt old and knowing, the kind that made time ripple around her. Long, golden curls fell in wild waves down her back, and her eyes — clear, crystal blue — were sharp with amusement and weariness both.

She was beautiful. But more than that, she was composed. Like someone who’d seen too much of the world and laughed in its face anyway.

“Hello,” she said with a soft smile, glancing at him with polite curiosity. “I’m looking for someone.”

Ijekiel blinked, wary. “Who?”

Behind him, Lucas hissed, “Don’t let her in.”

The woman’s expression twitched with amusement. “You’re making it sound like I’m a vampire.”

“You’re worse.”

Ijekiel stepped slightly to the side. “He’s in the kitchen.”

“I gathered,” she said dryly, brushing past him with an elegant swish of her coat. The moment she entered, the atmosphere changed — charged, almost electric. Luciana looked up, blinking at her with a mix of curiosity and awe.

“Hi,” the girl said cautiously.

The woman smiled warmly. “Hi there. You must be Luciana.”

Ijekiel followed her in, closing the door. “You are…?”

“Right. Sorry.” She turned with a practiced grace and extended a hand to him. “Athanasia.”

And just like that, his stomach dropped.

Of course. That name — he remembered it from the first chaotic night Lucas had turned human again. When Luciana had tried to hide him, and Lucas, wild-eyed and still half-clothed, had muttered something about “Athy will find me.”

This was her. The Athanasia.

He took her hand, surprised by the softness of her grip. “Ijekiel.”

“I know.”

Of course she did.

Lucas had stepped halfway into the living room, arms crossed, jaw tense. “What are you doing here?”

“Finding you.” She turned toward him. “You vanished.”

“I’m here.”

“You vanished from me.” She cocked her head, her voice kind but sharp. “You know how long it took me to track the residue of your spell? Honestly, it was like tracing glitter in a thunderstorm.”

“Sounds like a personal problem.”

Athanasia smiled like she wanted to strangle him affectionately. “You weren’t supposed to disappear.”

“I didn’t plan to.” Lucas glanced at Ijekiel, as if that were explanation enough.

It wasn’t.

Ijekiel watched the two of them interact — how naturally they fell into rhythm, the way Lucas’s guardedness faded just enough to reveal something like fondness, irritation, trust. They bantered like siblings who hadn’t spoken in years and picked up right where they left off.

And for a moment, Ijekiel stood there like furniture — solid, unmoving, a piece that didn’t quite belong in the arrangement.

He couldn’t help but feel it then. The twist in his chest.

Not jealousy in the bitter, possessive sense. But the aching kind. The kind that bloomed when you saw someone know a version of someone else you hadn’t yet earned. A part of Lucas he couldn’t reach. Not yet.

“Lucas,” Athanasia said gently, “it’s time to come home.”

Lucas’s expression shifted. Not to guilt, but to something quieter. Something that belonged only to Ijekiel’s living room — where warmth had started to replace wariness. Where breakfast was shared and socks were mismatched and Luciana told him stories like he’d always been there.

“I’m not ready,” Lucas said.

Athanasia’s brows rose slightly, but she didn’t push. She only studied him, then turned to Ijekiel with something between a smile and a question. “He’s not causing too much trouble, I hope?”

“Depends on the day.”

Lucas scowled. “Don’t gang up on me.”

“No promises,” she said lightly.

Luciana padded over and tugged on Lucas’s sleeve. “Do you have to leave?”

He knelt to her level, brushing a hand through her hair. “Not today.”

Athanasia watched them closely. When Lucas straightened, her gaze was distant, contemplative. “You really care about them.”

Lucas didn’t answer. He didn’t need to.

She sighed. “You know this can’t last forever, right? You staying like this — avoiding the other half of your world.”

“I know.”

Athanasia looked at Ijekiel again, something unreadable flickering in her eyes. “You’re part of that world now, too, whether you want to be or not.”

“I never asked to be.”

“I know,” she said. Then, after a beat: “But he chose you.”

The words dropped into the room like a pebble in still water.

No one spoke for a long moment.

Then she smiled again, soft and tired. “I’ll give you more time. But not forever.”

Lucas nodded.

Athanasia stepped forward and gave him a tight hug. Ijekiel felt it again—sharp, irrational, unreasonable. Not even envy, just distance. A reminder that someone else had been in Lucas’s story far longer than he had.

Then she pulled back, waved to Luciana, and swept toward the door.

“Nice meeting you, Ijekiel,” she said as she passed.

“You too,” he replied, more polite than he felt.

When the door closed behind her, Lucas exhaled hard and leaned against the wall like he’d held his breath through the entire encounter.

“She’s intense,” Ijekiel murmured.

“You have no idea.”

And yet, he did. He had an idea. He just didn’t know where he fit into it.

The house was still after Athanasia left — too still.

Lucas lingered by the window, eyes distant as he watched the soft swish of golden hair disappear down the path. She hadn’t argued with him. Just looked at him like she already knew what he would say.

She always did.

Behind him, the kettle clicked. Ijekiel moved about the kitchen with quiet efficiency, boiling water, retrieving mugs. No words passed between them until Lucas finally said, “I should go.”

Ijekiel paused mid-pour.

“Not forever,” Lucas added, already turning around, “Just… I need to settle things. Tie up loose ends. Athy wouldn’t have come unless it was important.”

“You said you didn’t want to leave,” Ijekiel said without looking up.

“I don’t,” Lucas replied. “But that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t.”

He crossed the room slowly, hands in his pockets, and dropped into the armchair. “I’ve been hiding here, if we’re being honest. And I owe her answers. Closure.”

Ijekiel placed a mug of tea on the coffee table and sat opposite him, brow drawn.

Lucas ran a hand through his long hair. “You said it yourself. I don’t really have a place here. Not yet. Not really. I’m just… orbiting.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

Lucas gave him a look. 

“I said you don’t know what you are to us.” Ijekiel leaned forward slightly. “There’s a difference.”

Lucas didn’t answer right away.

He reached for the tea, felt the warmth settle into his palm. “Maybe leaving will help me figure that out. And maybe it’ll give you time to figure out whether you even want me back.”

Ijekiel’s expression barely shifted, but something in his eyes tightened.

Luciana’s laughter echoed faintly from her bedroom. A soft thump. Then the quiet hum of a toy spinning to rest.

“I do want you back,” Ijekiel said quietly. “She does too.”

“I’ll be back before you know it,” Lucas promised.

The words didn’t feel like a lie — but they didn’t quite feel like the truth either.

“And until then?” Ijekiel asked, tone guarded.

Lucas looked at him. “Until then, I’ll handle whatever chaos I left behind. I’ll remind the world I still exist. I’ll clean up the mess I made when I turned myself into a damn cat and forgot to leave a note.”

Ijekiel gave a breath of laughter, but it didn’t reach his eyes.

“And when you’re done playing clean-up?”

“Then I come home.”

Ijekiel’s eyes flickered.

“You think this is home?” he asked, voice low.

Lucas didn’t answer immediately. He set the tea aside and leaned forward, elbows on knees.

“I didn’t, at first. But now?” He looked at the mess of toys, the blanket draped across the couch, the faint lingering of Luciana’s scent magic still clinging to the air like sugar and warmth. “Now I think I don’t know how to leave it without looking back.”

Silence.

Ijekiel stood slowly, crossing the small space between them. He knelt — not out of submission, but out of exhaustion. Out of the ache of something he hadn’t wanted to name.

Lucas tensed as Ijekiel reached up and gently fixed a strand of hair behind his ear.

“You’ll come back,” Ijekiel murmured.

It wasn’t a question.

Lucas didn’t smile. He just nodded. “I’ll come back.”

And for the first time, he meant it.

Lucas hadn’t expected packing to feel like this.

It was strange, really — he didn’t own anything in this house. He arrived as a cat, after all. No suitcase, no spare robes, not even a toothbrush. And yet now, as he tucked a neat stack of folded shirts into a borrowed duffel bag, the act felt loaded. Heavy in his chest.

“These are clean,” Ijekiel said, emerging from the hallway with a bundle of soft clothes in his arms. “Just in case… wherever you’re staying doesn’t come with a closet.”

Lucas took the shirts wordlessly. They smelled like Ijekiel — cedarwood, laundry soap, something grounding and faintly spiced. He didn’t trust himself to say thank you, not properly, so he only nodded and folded them into the bag with quiet reverence.

Ijekiel lingered a second too long, then turned and left him alone in the living room.

A small shuffle sounded near the kitchen counter.

Luciana peeked around it, clutching something behind her back.

Lucas knelt, heart already aching.

She crept forward with all the solemnity of a tiny priestess and held out a plush rabbit.

“You forgot this,” she said with great ceremony.

Lucas blinked. “That’s… not mine.”

“It is now,” she declared, pushing it into his hands. “His name is Pickle. He helps you not feel lonely. But you have to give him back when you come back. Promise?”

Lucas’s throat went tight. He nodded, stroking one of Pickle’s floppy ears. “Promise.”

She flung her arms around his neck with surprising strength, whispering fiercely into his collar, “I don’t want you to go.”

He hugged her back. “I don’t either. But I’ll be back soon. Before you even know it.”

She sniffled. “Will you forget us?”

He drew back just enough to reach into his pocket. “No chance.” He placed a small, carved crystal charm into her palm — pale pink and warm with residual magic. “If it glows, it means I’m thinking about you.”

“What if it glows all the time?”

He smiled. “Then you’ll know I’m always thinking about you.”

Luciana looked down at the charm, closing her fingers tightly around it. “Can I tell people I have a wizard best friend?”

“Only if you tell them I’m the coolest one.”

The hallway echoed with footsteps. Ijekiel had returned, now holding Lucas’s jacket. He stopped at the door, eyes on them both.

Luciana didn’t let go of Lucas’s hand until the last possible moment.

The front door opened with a soft groan of old hinges.

Outside, the air was dusky, touched with lavender and the scent of coming rain.

They walked side by side down the steps, a quiet companionship stretched between them.

They stopped just before the front gate, where a black car had just pulled up. The headlights flicked off as Athanasia stepped out, her golden curls shimmering even in the dim light.

Lucas turned to Ijekiel, something unsaid flickering between them.

The silence stretched.

And then Ijekiel said quietly, “Don’t take too long.”

It wasn’t a plea. But it wasn’t casual either.

Lucas’s eyes softened. His smile was crooked, a little sad. “I won’t.”

He stepped forward, pulled open the car door — and paused.

Then he turned back.

“You’ll tell her I said bye?”

“I’m not your messenger.”

Lucas snorted under his breath. “Fine. I’ll call.”

He climbed into the car. Through the rearview mirror, he saw Ijekiel watching him, unmoving at the gate. Luciana’s charm sparkled in his pocket, warm against his thigh. And nestled in his bag, Pickle’s soft head peeked out among the shirts that still smelled like the home he was leaving behind.

Athanasia glanced at him as she started the engine. “You smell like that man’s detergent.”

Lucas, still looking out the window, smiled. “Shut up and drive.”

Luciana didn’t cry when Ruby left.

She promised she wouldn’t. He had knelt in front of her, all warm eyes and funny crooked smile, and made her promise — pinky and everything. “You’ll keep it safe for me, right?” he’d said, folding the charm into her small palm. “It’s magic. It’ll glow when I’m thinking of you.”

So she watches it now, curled up in bed, the way the charm pulses faintly in the dark like a tiny star. It hasn’t stopped glowing. Not once.

She whispers to it sometimes. Just small things.

“Dad made pasta again, but he added those green things.”

“There’s a math test tomorrow and I forgot about it.”

“I miss you.”

She doesn’t say the last one often, but it hums in her chest anyway.

The house is quieter without him. Not empty, just… quieter. No weird bumps from upstairs. No mysterious thuds behind closed doors. No sudden bursts of magic that made the lights flicker and her dad sigh.

Dad tries to act normal. He makes her pancakes on Sundays. He still reads to her sometimes, even though she’s getting a little too old for bedtime stories. But Luciana notices the way he lingers in the hallway after he thinks she’s asleep, standing by the door like he’s waiting for something — or someone.

She’s not supposed to know. But she knows.

One night, she finds him sitting on the couch, staring at the spot Ruby used to curl up on. His fingers are still wrapped around the folded laundry in his lap, unmoving. His eyes look tired, even though he smiles when he sees her.

“Couldn’t sleep?” he asks gently.

She shakes her head. She climbs up beside him and rests against his side, her charm cradled in her hands. It’s glowing, just a little. She lets him see.

“He’s thinking about me,” she says quietly.

Her dad’s breath catches, just a little. He doesn’t answer right away. Then: “I’m sure he is.”

They sit like that for a while. No words. Just the ticking of the clock and the hush of night pressing softly against the windows.

Sometimes, she dreams about Ruby — not cat Ruby, but the real one. The tall, kind-of-weird man with long black hair and the eyes that looked like rubies. In her dreams, he’s always smiling. In her dreams, he always comes back.

Luciana believes in dreams.

She starts setting aside half her snack at lunch. A cookie here. A piece of fruit there. “It’s for Ruby,” she tells her dad when he asks, and he only gives her a soft, tired smile and packs an extra cookie next time.

The charm glows when she wakes up. When she gets home from school. When her dad brushes her hair out of her face and kisses her temple.

It’s always glowing.

So even though she doesn’t cry — she misses him, fiercely.

And she waits.

Ijekiel doesn’t realize how quiet the house has become until he sits at the dining table and there’s no chair being scraped across the floor by magic.

Lucas used to do that — float his own chair out like a brat because he refused to sit like a normal person.

Now the chair stays pushed in. Unmoved. Still.

Luciana is quieter, too. She still hums when she draws and babbles about school, but there’s a softness to her now. A lull between sentences. Like she’s saving space. Holding breath.

The charm around her neck glows constantly. Ijekiel sees it in the dark, hovering near the edge of her blanket like a nightlight. 

Lucas had said he’d be back. With that infuriating smirk. That maddening confidence.

He always says things like it’s inevitable. Like the world just turns to accommodate him.

And Ijekiel believed him. Still does.

But he also knows Lucas walked out the door, and he hasn’t walked back in yet.

The nights are the worst.

He’ll be folding laundry and reach for the second set of towels, only to realize no one’s using the other bathroom anymore.

He’ll make too much coffee in the morning. Instinctively check the couch before sitting, as if Ruby might be curled there, judging him silently.

Sometimes, he talks aloud. To no one. To the cat who isn’t a cat anymore.

“You’re still a menace,” he mutters one night, staring at the glowing charm in Luciana’s room from the hallway.

“And you owe me a new set of shirts.”

He doesn’t say how much he misses him. How full the house felt when Lucas was here.

He doesn’t say how scared he is that when Lucas comes back — if he comes back — he might not stay.

The knock comes just after breakfast, when Luciana is curled up on the rug building an elaborate castle out of magnetic blocks, and Ijekiel is finally sitting down with a mug of lukewarm coffee he’s reheated twice already.

He glances at the door, brows faintly furrowed. He isn’t expecting anyone.

Luciana doesn’t look up. “I hope it’s not Ms. Rena again. She talks too much.”

Ijekiel huffs softly, amused despite himself, and rises to answer it.

He opens the door — and promptly forgets how to breathe.

Lucas stands on the threshold, dressed in black with his long hair pulled into a loose tie at the nape of his neck, an air of casual confidence hanging off him like a well-worn coat. His hands are full — two bags slung over one shoulder, a third in his opposite hand — and perched comfortably atop the largest is a sleek black cat with wide golden eyes and the poise of someone who knows they own the world.

“I thought,” Lucas says, like it’s nothing, “you might be missing the feline presence.”

Ijekiel stares. He hasn’t seen Lucas in two weeks. And yet here he is again, as if no time has passed at all.

Luciana barrels into the entryway. “Did someone say cat—? OH!”

The cat on the bag meows obligingly as Luciana gasps and throws herself at Lucas’s legs, hugging him without hesitation. “You came back! You said you would!”

Lucas chuckles, steadying himself with a free hand on the doorframe. “Did you doubt me?”

“Only a little,” she says, honest as always.

“And who’s this?” Ijekiel asks dryly, eyeing the new feline.

“His name is Obsidian,” Lucas replies, stepping in without waiting for an invitation. “He’s not magical. Mostly. I think. He bites if you insult his intelligence, though.”

Ijekiel shuts the door behind him. “So he’s your twin.”

Lucas tosses him a grin over his shoulder, and it’s stupid how much warmth flares in Ijekiel’s chest at the sight.

Luciana immediately scoops up the new cat, who goes limp in her arms like he’s trained for this exact moment. “I missed having a kitty.”

“I missed being one,” Lucas says lightly, but his eyes linger on Ijekiel as he says it — searching for something. A crack. An invitation.

Ijekiel looks away first.

Later, with Obsidian settled on the windowsill and Luciana humming contentedly to herself as she colors at the kitchen table, Lucas drops his bags by the sofa and pulls out a slim, wrapped parcel.

“I brought something for you,” he tells Luciana.

Her eyes go wide as he presents a floating, softly glowing orb that hums when it spins. It hovers in the air between them, then gently dips toward her palm.

“Whoa,” she breathes. “It’s warm!”

“It reacts to your mood,” Lucas explains. “And it glows brighter when you’re happy. Like a mood orb, but cooler.”

Luciana cradles it like it’s priceless. “It’s magic?”

“Not dangerous magic. Just a little shimmer.”

She runs to show Ijekiel immediately, babbling about how it changed color when she thought about kittens.

Lucas watches them for a moment before producing another package — a simple tin. He slides it across the counter to Ijekiel, who opens it cautiously.

He pauses.

“You remembered this?”

Lucas shrugs. “You mentioned liking that blend. Said it was hard to find.”

“This is imported from Sorentina,” Ijekiel murmurs, tilting the tin. “I haven’t had it since… since Luciana was born.”

“It seemed worth the trouble.”

Ijekiel doesn’t know what to say to that. So he just nods, quietly tucking the tin beside the kettle.

Lucas fishes one last thing from his bag — a parchment scroll, sealed with an elaborate, shimmering sigil.

He kneels beside Luciana and unrolls it with a flourish.

It reads:

“Official Best Friend Contract”

This certifies that Luciana Alpheus is now and forever the Best Friend of Grand Sorcerer Lucas.

She may call upon him for magical emergencies, tea parties, or dragon slaying.

Signed: Lucas T. Cat-Former, Grand Mage of the East Tower.

The signature is oversized and full of loops.

Luciana squeals with delight. “It has a real wizard seal!”

“Pressed by dragon fang,” Lucas says solemnly. “Only melts under very specific hugs.”

Luciana wraps her arms around his neck immediately.

Ijekiel watches them from the stove, a spoon poised in the air, utterly still.

There’s a weight in his chest that wasn’t there two weeks ago.

He’s home, Ijekiel realizes.

And not just because he’s back.

Because he chose this.

The house is quiet when night settles in. Luciana had fallen asleep nestled between her new floating orb and Obsidian, who snored softly at the foot of her bed like he belonged there.

In the kitchen, the lights are low. Ijekiel leans against the counter, arms crossed, sipping the rare tea Lucas brought, while Lucas sits on one of the stools, elbows on the table, a mug untouched between his hands.

They’ve been silent for a while. Not uncomfortably. Just waiting.

“I didn’t need to be gone that long,” Lucas says finally, his voice low and even. “I think I knew that after the first few days.”

Ijekiel glances at him. “Then why did you stay away?”

Lucas exhales, brushing a hand through his loose hair. “Because I didn’t want to come back for the wrong reasons. I needed to figure out what I actually wanted… not just what felt easy.”

“And?”

“And I want this.” He gestures around vaguely. “All of it.”

There’s a beat before he adds, a little sheepishly, “Also, Athy tried to get me to fill out a job application. So I panicked and teleported into a desert.”

Ijekiel snorts. “You could’ve just said no.”

“I did. Twice. Then I panicked.”

A long pause stretches between them. Lucas’s gaze dips to the mug in his hands. “I should probably also mention… I’m not exactly hurting for money.”

“I assumed,” Ijekiel says mildly. “You bought a tea blend that costs more than my monthly grocery bill.”

Lucas grins, but there’s a rare flicker of vulnerability behind it. “I’ve had savings accounts in empires that don’t exist anymore. Entire vaults. Gold that was minted before people figured out indoor plumbing. You could say I’ve been… financially planning for a while.”

Ijekiel raises a brow. “So what you’re saying is, you’re a thousand-year-old sugar daddy.”

Lucas gives a bark of laughter, covering it quickly with a sip of tea. “Not exactly what I meant, but — if the robe fits.”

“But you don’t have to work,” Ijekiel says slowly. “You could just… live anywhere. Do anything.”

“I could,” Lucas agrees. Then, more softly, “But I wouldn’t mind doing something — if it meant I got to stay here.”

Ijekiel goes very still.

“I’m not just visiting,” Lucas adds. “I’ve already shifted a few things around. Tied up the major threads. I’m planning to stay. For as long as you’ll have me.”

Ijekiel stares at him, mouth slightly parted, expression unreadable.

The clock ticks.

The kettle hums faintly behind them.

“What exactly is it you want?” Ijekiel asks, his voice barely above a whisper.

Lucas meets his gaze — steady, calm, but unflinching.

“You,” he says. “This life. You and Luciana.”

It’s quiet.

Too quiet.

Not a confession, not exactly. But it hangs in the air like one. Raw. Vulnerable. Real.

Ijekiel swallows. “You’ve watched us from the outside for so long.”

“I know,” Lucas says gently. “And I didn’t plan for any of this. I was a cat. I was supposed to be a cat.”

“That’s not exactly a strong foundation for—”

“For whatever this is?” Lucas finishes, voice soft.

Ijekiel doesn’t answer.

Lucas rises slowly from his stool, steps forward until they’re standing close — close enough for Ijekiel to feel the heat of him, to see the faint shimmer of magic still clinging to his skin like stardust.

“I don’t expect anything,” Lucas says. “Not now. Not until you want it too. But I meant what I said. I’m not leaving.”

He lets the weight of it settle between them. No charm. No joke. Just the truth, offered like a hand outstretched.

Ijekiel’s breath catches.

Lucas doesn’t reach for him.

He just waits.

They sit in silence for a long time after that.

The tea has gone lukewarm. The lights overhead hum softly. Outside, the world is still — no traffic, no wind, only the occasional rustle of the new cat exploring the kitchen like it already belongs.

Lucas sits with one leg hooked over the other, half-turned toward Ijekiel, eyes flicking over the man’s face as if trying to memorize the calm after the storm.

Then, as if on cue, Obsidian slinks back into the room with the self-possessed grace only cats can manage. With no hesitation, he hops onto Ijekiel’s lap and curls there, purring like an engine, already at home.

Lucas lifts his brows, amused.

“Jealous yet?” he asks, voice low and teasing. “He already likes you better than me.”

Ijekiel glances down at the bundle of fur in his lap, then back up at Lucas. His mouth tilts into the faintest of smiles. “Only a little.”

There’s something soft in the way he says it.

Lucas watches him for a beat longer, then lets out a breath — half-laugh, half-sigh — and leans back, eyes closing briefly.

The quiet holds.

No need to fill it. No tension to cut through.

Just warmth. Tea. A cat between them. And something new settling in the space they share — tentative, unspoken, but real.

A beginning.

Morning comes in gold.

The sun filters through gauzy curtains, catching in Luciana’s loose curls as she pads into the kitchen in oversized pajamas, dragging her wizard contract behind her like a security blanket. She stops in the doorway, blinking blearily.

Lucas is already there, hair still a bit tousled, dressed in Ijekiel’s spare sweatshirt. He’s at the stove — burning toast.

Luciana gasps dramatically. “You’re going to set our house on fire!”

Lucas startles. “It’s just a little smoke.”

“It’s a lot of smoke,” she counters, hands on her hips.

From behind her, Ijekiel appears, sleep-warm and rumpled, a mug of coffee already in hand. He moves past them without a word and waves his hand at the stove. The smoke disappears in a faint shimmer — Lucas blinks.

“…You have magic?” Lucas asks, incredulous.

Ijekiel shrugs. “I read your book. The one you left lying open in the living room.”

Lucas stares at him, flustered. “You’re not supposed to be able to understand ancient runes—”

“I’m smart,” Ijekiel says smoothly, sipping his coffee.

Luciana giggles as Obsidian weaves between their legs. “Daddy’s the smartest,” she declares.

Lucas mock-groans and leans against the counter. “This house is too full of egos.”

“No,” Luciana says, climbing up onto a stool. “It’s just full of family.”

Lucas goes still.

The word lingers in the air like a spell. Not grand. Not complicated. Just warm. Real.

He looks to Ijekiel — who isn’t smiling, but isn’t looking away either. There’s something quiet in his eyes. Something sure.

Lucas breathes out. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “It is.”

He crosses to the table, presses a kiss to the top of Luciana’s head, then turns to Ijekiel. The hesitation is brief. His fingers brush the inside of Ijekiel’s wrist.

Ijekiel doesn’t pull away.

In the stillness, with morning light all around them and burnt toast forgotten, it’s clear:

Lucas came to this house as a cat.

He stays as a man in love.

And he’s finally, undeniably, home.