The mate finding spell business - book 1

*Hey guys, I know I said there was only one chapter left before the end of this book, but change of plans, this one is the last before the epilogue, ENJOY!

Oh, also I didn’t assign a POV to this chapter, I hope y’all don’t mind.*

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Dima and Oksana couldn’t get enough of each other. After Priest Daniel declared them husband and wife, the kisses, small touches, caresses, growls, and the constant sniffing of her skin and hair didn’t stop. They spent more time acting like a lovey-dovey couple in front of the human guests than eating and mingling like the others. Though it was understandable after what happened during their wedding ceremony.

“Oh, for Pete’s sake! If you aren’t going to dance and mingle, just go home and work on making some kids already, if you don’t want me to be blunt. Your kissing and tongue sucking is getting disgusting!” Mrs. Wu Yang yelled at them and hit Dima’s head with a pair of chopsticks she took from her hair.

“Thank you for the suggestion, Mrs. Wu Yang. Oksana and I will have a long trip to our honeymoon destination, so we’re leaving early with the family to say our goodbyes and get our things. Everyone, please enjoy the fest, but we will take our leave now. The cleaning is also taken care of, so no one needs to stay behind. Everything will be gone by tomorrow morning. And thank you for having come to celebrate this big day with us.” Dima said and swiped an unexpecting Oksana out of her feet, carrying her to the limo that would drive them to Elspeth’s house to celebrate with the family.

They were obviously the first ones to arrive, and Dima was going to take advantage of the fact when besides the limo, eight figures suddenly appeared, plus a little dragon the size of a yorkshire. Erlik, Aislinn, Arioch, and Viriato were the only ones whose names they knew, but Viriato didn’t seem to be doing too well. The man was pale and looked sick.

“Get out of there and stand where I can watch you,” Erlik demanded and opened the limousine’s door, helping Oksana’s blushing figure out before he combined all his demons’ faces into one and snarled at Dima with the ugli aberration. Dima and Mato’s faces fuzed into one, and they growled aggressively at the freak face Erlik was goading them on with.

“Give me my mate back, or I’ll shred you to pieces.” They growled out in an animalistic, deep voice, and faster than Erlik expected, Dima and Mato had their claws in his face and scratched him lightly as a warning, drawing up some blood.

“You have the balls, pall. I like you.” Erlik’s weird voice spoke, and he changed his face back before allowing Arioch and Aislinn to let Oksana go back to her mate’s side.

“Do you really have to spend the whole day messing with my mate? As if my father wasn’t enough. Gramps, I like you, but I will not hesitate to attack you if you mess with my mate again. Weak body or deadly consequences, I will mark you for life.” Oksana promised fiercely, and her eyes shifted from her usual amber eyes to dark chocolate brown, the color of her original human eyes, and then to her demon’s eyes before they shifted back to the now usual amber color.

“When you mate, you will be surprised with how much you will change,” Erlik commented with a smile on his face and kissed Oksana’s forehead when she passed by him to get to Dima’s side, who growled at the old demon’s remark.

“Show them the picture, Erlik.” Aislinn urged her husband, and Oksana watched with interest, while Dima was wary, as Erlik took out a picture from inside his suit jacket and involved it in his black shadowed smoke, something that seemed to be the common color and texture for demons’ powers.

“Revel yourself!” Erlik demanded the picture, and Dania’s demon as well as Akir’s and Elspeth’s faint demons showed up. The moon-blessed mark was also present on Zainab, Ivy, Zainab’s brother, Akir, Dania, Axton, Jamila, and Kaavy’s foreheads but Oksana, Axton, and Angus stayed the same.

“What are we supposed to see?” Dima asked impatiently. Not only had his kissing time with his mate been interrupted but he had also been threatened and forcefully separated from his mate for a full thirty seconds. What else did the crazy old but young-looking demon want from him? From them.

“Revel yourself!” Erlik yelled at the picture, exasperated at having to repeat himself twice.

Nothing happened at first except that Dania’s demon decided to catch on fire.

“REVEL YOURSELF!” Erlik yelled angrily at the picture, and just when Oksana and Dima thought he had lost his marbles, flames started appearing from behind Angus’s smiling form. The Angus on the picture smiled and turned back to glare at the flames before a horrendous and slightly lighted up/burning figure appeared from behind him and put an arm around Zainab’s shoulder and the other over Angus’s shoulder, giving a provocative kiss to Zainab and then saluting Erlik, looking the demon master right in the eye.

“Bastard! I’m still your grandfather, some respect would do you some good, but you will see. You three have to get through training now that you shifted, and I will make sure to beat your ass to ashes every training session.” Erlik told the picture, fuming all over. “Now, where the hell are those two trouble makers of yours?” He asked Angus’s demon, but the ugly thing just shrugged his shoulders with a smirk and focused on pissing off Angus and pampering Zainab with kisses and affection.

“Don’t push your human.” Aislinn scolded Angus’s demon when the demon tripped Angus. “He is part of yourself, and you need one another to exist, so behave. And remember that, up until today, Angus had lived all his life without you.” Aislinn carefully reminded the demon and turned to the yelling Erlik beside her.

“Erlik, hon, stop yelling. Let Arioch do that. Otherwise, you will end up losing your voice.” Aislinn scolded her husband and indicated Arioch to take over the job.

Arioch smirked naughtily and gave Oksana and Dima a mischievous smirk before he commanded the picture to reveal itself. On the second try, Oksana and Axton’s demons appeared and Oksana watched as she changed once her demon and she were separated.

They stayed silent for a while, no one saying anything, just letting the couple take in the sign of what Oksana will look like in the future.

“Wow, I will look so different,” Oksana said absently while touching her short hair, and Dima spoke at the same time as her, “Wow, you look so hot!”

“Horny bastard,” Arioch said with a scowl.

“As if you are any better.” Aislinn refuted him and put her hand against Erlik’s mouth, stopping him from saying whatever he was going to say. “And you shut up.” She commanded and glared at him, effectively shutting up both men.

“But why am I going to change?” Oksana asked pensively, ignoring her family’s drama of the moment.

Erlik sighed softly and explained to her and Dima what he had written to Elspeth.

After the explanation, Oksana felt thankful to her inner demon for keeping her alive, but she was still hesitant. All her life, she heard others condemning demons and calling them evil. In one town, the priest accused her and her father of being evil because he had detected their demon genes, and they tried to beat the wickedness out of them.

They were going to burn her in a stack when her father regained conscience and managed to get them out of there with minor injuries. She was four years old at the time, but she never forgot the experience and feared her genes ever since. After that event, her grandma and grandpa always traveled with them.

With Erlik’s explanation, Dima was more than happy to complete the mating bond with Oksana as soon as possible to guarantee her safety. He and Mato were also extremely grateful to the sassy demonesses in Oksana. If it wasn’t for her, their mate wouldn’t be here today, but she was also part of their mate, and as such, Mato was excited to get to know the little demon on a more intimate level... After all, they were the inner ‘animals’ mated to each other, so they should get some alone time to play.

An awkward moment settled upon them and Oksana took it as her cue to take Dima and go inside her grandma’s house to start preparing the things in the backyard for everyone to eat when they arrived.

Dima and Oksana had started taking out tables and chairs outside when Aislinn appeared beside them with Arioch and Erlik.

“Oh, let me help you with that, dears.” She said, and with a wisp of her hands, the tables and chairs all went outside.

The grass grew and started pulling the levitating object into the ground. The trees stretched and began organizing the tables and chairs into place. Soon, the flowers and bushes were also helping, and the demons were bringing the cutlery and dishes outside.

“This is how it’s done,” Aislinn commented with a smile at the end of the job and clapped her hands together, slapping away the imaginary dust.

Just then, the whole parade arrived. Parents, siblings, shifters, cousins, grandparents, all in one place, being loud and complaining about hunger, turning the quiet garden into a loud one.

The pork was roasted; Angus, Douglas, Erlik, and Amos compared barbeque skills while taking care of the meat on the grill; Arioch messed around with his sister, purposely annoying Elspeth and playing with his great-nephews and nieces;

Zainab’s brother appeared, and Dima met Oksana’s uncle. He was a tall, muscular man, burnt from the sun, but he was nice to Dima.

Viriato kept to himself, always in a corner or cloaked, yet, still watching over everyone. Especially over a tiny mischievous firecracker, who would not stop flashing everyone her panties due to not stopping doing cartwheels. Dania was getting on her father’s nerves and on his as well. She almost gave her father a heart attack when during one of her cartwheels, her dress came up, and she fell on her back with the white dress still up. So Viriato enchanted the white dress and turned it into a simple blue jumpsuit that would allow her to jump around at her heart’s will without flashing anyone anything inappropriate.

The demon noticed Angus looking relieved and starting to look around for the person who changed the little demon’s- Dania’s clothes, so he cloaked himself out of view. But his second master still spotted him and pointed him out to his master, and the little troublemaker’s father. Luckily for him, the man was not angry and simply gave an approving nod in his general direction.

However, the peace didn’t last long at the party before Brutus went to confront Dima and Oksana over the witch catastrophe.

“That was black magic! What did that witch want with you?” He asked Oksana abruptly, catching the mates by surprise and causing Dima to get in a defensive position in front of his mate.

“None of your business, uncle.” He snarled with Mato baking him up and giving more power to his growl.

“None of my business? None of my business!? I stood up with you against that shit, and you are telling me that it’s none of my business?!” His uncle growled the words, growing slightly bigger and more muscular the more he and his polar bear got worked up.

“You didn’t have to shift!” Dima yelled back.

“I did because you’re family!” Brutus roared back. “And if you want your cousins’ help, then you tell me what the hell is going on right now, or as the head of my family, I will forbid them from helping you, even if I have to command them or find a spell to do it! I will not put my family at risk with dark magic involved!”

“Oh, look who decided to be a decent father and mate for once, aren’t you touching! But you forget that they are all adults now. They don’t have to respond to you anymore.” Dima answered him while still keeping Oksana behind him. Mato’s hackles were raised, and he got ready to take over when their uncle stepped towards them more fiercely.

“GOD DAMN IT, DIMA, JUST FUCKING TELL ME!” His scream was so loud that the whole party stopped and stared at them. “I watched my mother being killed by that crap, and my father’s soul being sucket out of his shifted body as if he was a piece of dirt being blown away. That witch carried the scent of the man who did that to my parents, so I repeat again. What the fuck did that shit want with your mate?” His aggravated yells turned into an exhausted mumble, and Dima understood his uncle’s aggravation. He felt pity for the man, but when he thought about his own father and remembered the pity looks thrown at him and the hate he felt at those, he chased the pity away and straightened his back, ready to answer his uncle, but Oksana stepped from behind him and beat him to it.

“That was my biological mother.” She explained. “She was human and used the jewel on her shocker to suck my magic out of me and become a witch. I don’t know why she came, but I know she will bring us trouble. I am sorry for your parents, and I understand if you don’t want anything to do with us now.” Oksana kept her voice steady and courageously looked Dima’s uncle in the eyes.

Dima watched his uncle Brutus’ reaction closely, but the polar bear shifter was simply frozen, something that Dima thought he would never see.

The day the humans attacked their family, they had their land surrounded and were closing in on their house, but Brutus did not freeze back then, he had got them moving, and together with Dima’s father, they had held up the humans for enough time for the women and the kids to run to safety. Yet, today, confronted with black magic, the man froze.

“When the time comes, I will fight by your side,” Brutus promised Oksana and Dima with a serious tone. Dima’s aunt hugged the big man and kissed his cheek tenderly before nodding her head back at the newlyweds and guiding Brutus to a faraway table.

No one spoke of what had just happened. A mutual understanding between all and the party returned.

~ A couple of hours later ~

It was now time to cut the cake before Oksana and Dima went away, and Akir was making his way to the cake table when suddenly he felt a sneeze coming. He stopped mid-step and inclined his head back to sneeze, but when he was about to sneeze, the need went away. Akir shrugged his shoulders unbothered and resumed his walk. A few seconds later, Akir sneezed abruptly and sparks came out of him and landed on Kushim, his great grandfather Erlik’s little dragon companion. Unexpectedly, after the kid wiped his itchy nose with the back of his hand, the dragon started growing. When he reached ten feet tall (three meters), people started noticing, and when he finally reached his original eighteen meters height no one could ignore his presence.

“YES! I’m big again!” Kushim projected to everyone and celebrated. He softly grabbed the kid who helped him with his teeth, making sure that none was touching the child before he hurried to his master to show him the godly child who managed to undo the unbreakable curse Aislinn had accidentally put on him the day she meet them both.

A few people laughed at the dragon’s enthusiasm, and others watched in awe the big reptile moving around with a tiny child. Erlik was surprised when he saw Kushim returning to him with his original size, a sign he hadn’t witnessed in over a hundred and fifteen years thanks to his dear wife, who had accidentally enchanted/cursed Kushim after having caught a scare when she came face to face with the dragon in the middle of the forest.

Erlik took Akir from the dragon’s jaw and lifted him up with a smile on his lips, observing the kid’s freckled face. “You managed to bring back my dragon to his normal size, little one?”

Akir looked caught off guard with his eyes wide, observing his grandma’s dad holding him.

Erlik brought Akir close to his chest and propped him on his hip, feeling the kid’s apprehension from the way he was previously holding him. “But I just sneezed, mister. How could I have done that to the dragon?”

Erlik laughed at Akir’s sincerity and hugged the kid tighter to his body before flicking the boy’s nose and praising him. “That makes you a very powerful future wizard, little one. Your great-grandma accidentally turned Kushim, my dragon, into a rat-sized lizard and no one has been able to undo her spell in over a hundred years. That makes you a special boy.” he tenderly explained to the boy and kissed his forehead in utter contentment and gratitude.

“Thank you, Akir,” Erlik told the kid and set him down, bowing on a knee to the boy to express how truly grateful he was.

“I’m still not sure what I did, great-grandpa, but I’m sure there is no need for you to be kneeling, or are you in pain? I can call Axton or grandma to help you if you are.” Erlik laughed at his great-grandson’s innocence, and Dima and Oksana watched the scene with a smile on their lips.

Their wedding day might have started a little troubled but now it was going great.

The time flew by, and soon the moon was starting to appear in the sky. Dima and Oksana began saying their goodbyes to everyone and were ready to go to Vania for her to teleport them to Dima’s house when Oksana noticed Viriato isolated from everyone and looking sick and troubled with himself.

She pointed it out to Dima, and they went up to the troubled man.

“Mr. Viriato, is everything ok?” Oksana gently asked him, feeling Dima embracing her sideways in support.

“I am not a pedophile,” Viriato mumbled, lost in dangerous thoughts and fearful of himself. He could not understand why he and that child were destined to be together. Why did they have to find each other now? Why couldn’t it have been thirteen or fourteen years later? At least she would have been legal then. He was afraid of his actions, of what he could do, or of accidentally hurting or even killing the child. And now he had to stay near the girl. The bond would never allow him to go to the underworld and do his normal life while he waited for her to grow. But why?

Why!?

“I don’t know why, Viriato, but I know that the gods, the goddesses, and the fates are not wrong. Before my biological mother showed up, I would say that this was a matter to which we might never get the answer, but now, I fear that they sent you here to protect my sister.” Viriato growled at those words, yet he immediately forced himself to calm down when he saw that his master’s great-granddaughter still had something to say. “You don’t need to fear for her or for you. You need to protect her and guide her with her demon. The bond will not force you to instantaneously fall in love with her. That’s not how it works, and although I am not a moon blessed, I know that much, and I also know that you can ask my mom and grandma Ivy to guide you and explain things for you, my grandpa Amos as well. They all went through the same as you. My father would be useless to ask since he was instantaneously enamored with my step-mom, but you can count on the others. And if you ever need help, do not hesitate to contact me.” With those parting words, Dima gave an amicable slap on the demon’s back and the pair went to Vania for her to open a portal for them, leaving behind a slightly relieved demon.