“I did what now?” I squeaked out high enough that it was probably only audible to dolphins. She had to be lying, right? Right?

“Relax,” she waved, which was not at all achieving the intended effect, “it’s nothing that serious. All those letters to ‘Santa’ that get sent out every year? Those all technically count as contracts. But it’s not like you’re actually offering up anything on your end, so there’s nothing to worry about. The entire point is that they’re pro bono—It’d kind of undermine the whole ‘selfless acts of kindness’ thing our version of Christmas is supposed to be all about if they weren’t.”

“Why are you here now for a letter I apparently sent when I was five?!”

“Well… “ Her expression grew sheepish while she rubbed at the back of her neck. “Hell tends to be pretty big on their bureaucracy and it turns out that none of the letters over the past, oh you know…  seventy years or so, have actually gotten processed thanks to the whole name mixup until now. We’ve all been putting in some serious overtime to try and work through the massive backlog of contracts, trying to make up for lost time and all, but I really am sorry it’s taken us this long to grant yours when it must be so important to you.”

I barely had any memories from back then. I certainly didn’t remember the contents of this supposed letter, but something about the way she said that last sentence sent my heart racing, even more than it already was. I gritted my teeth, having to force out the next question. “And what, exactly, is that wish?”

I saw fire in Alzette’s eyes. Her face lit up like a Christmas tree and her mouth curled into a pointy-ear-to-ear smile. That copious energy seemed to spill over into her wings and tail as they twitched behind her excitedly.

“I’m here to finally turn you into a girl!”

Oh no. No no no no. “Nonono,” I eloquently said, “No.” This didn’t make any sense. There’s no way I would have wished for something like that unless, unless… “You’re trying to trick me! I’m a guy! Why would I have written something like that?”

Alzette cocked her head, staring at me perplexed. She clearly hadn’t expected my reaction. “...Because you want to be a girl?”

“I never would have written something like that down! You must be lying!” 

Once she’d verified that I wasn’t making some kind of ill-timed joke, she simply shrugged and turned her back to me before crouching back down. Leaving the safety of my comforter, I leaned forward to find the demoness hunched over a bulky burlap sack that had been laid carelessly on the floor, as well as a huge array of strange runes that hurt my eyes to stare at for too long. The pattern was drawn in what appeared to be chalk—which I really hoped would wash out—and encircled a good chunk of my floorspace, centered more or less on my bed. My original intention had been to ask her exactly what she was doing, but it turned out that the back of her leotard was really more of a thong and she wiggled a lot more than just her tail while rummaging through the oversized bag.

A brief moment elapsed before she popped right back up with a piece of paper in hand that had clearly seen better days. It wasn’t until she strutted a bit closer that I realized it was covered in writing. My blood froze and my gut sank as I bore witness to the crude misshapen crayon words scribbled on the page.

Alzette brought the letter in front of her, cleared her throat, and without a shred of mercy recited, “Dear Santa, I would really really really like to be a girl for Christmas. I will give up all of my other presents for this. I want to wear pretty dresses like my best friend but I’m a boy even though all the other boys in my class are meanies. Girls are so much better. I want to be like them and it would make me very very happy. Thank you pretty please. From:—Well, you get the point. Sheesh, your spelling really needed some work. But there you go. You wrote this yourself, and I think it’s pretty unmistakable.”

Had I really written something like that? Fragments of memories lost to time had begun drifting to the surface while she had been destroying my pride with that literally-damned letter. Flashes, dredging up other flashes and connecting to form constellations of feelings that echoed something deep and painful and—no. No. I had been through this before. I had grown past that. It meant nothing. It had to.

“A-And? I wrote that when I was five! Kids say stupid things all the time! It’s been twenty years since then and I sure as hell don’t think that way anymore. You might as well stop wasting your time and go ‘help’ someone else.” I folded my arms across my chest and turned away from her gaze, a weird insecurity washing over me after just telling her to leave like that.

“Oh come on, give us a little credit. Assuming it’s something we actually have the power to do, we only grant wishes under three conditions: A, it won’t result in someone getting seriously harmed. B, the person is reasonably equipped to deal with it. And C, if the person still actually wants it! Not a lot of people who asked for a pony will end up getting one. Usually for all three reasons at once. Horse people also have this odd tendency to end up on the Naughty List, so that’s another thing working against them—It’s weird too because it’s actually pretty difficult to end up on there. Now puppies on the other hand…” Her eyes briefly grew distant as she recalled something pleasant. ”Gosh, hellhound pups are the absolute cutest, you have no idea.”

“That works perfectly then. I don’t want to be a girl, so you don’t have to worry about granting that stupid wish.”

“But you do though.” She looked at me as a teacher might look at a child who just can’t seem to grasp that two and two equals four.

“I…” To be honest, I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. “Who are you to say what I want?”

“Well, that’s kind of why I’m here in the first place. I’m a succubus!—If you hadn’t noticed.”

I took one glance at her outfit and responded in the best deadpan I was capable of in that moment, “Oh. Really. I couldn’t tell.”

“Seriously?” She frowned and looked down at her ensemble, cupping her breasts in her hands and letting them fall mesmerizingly. “Huh. Guess I’ll need to make it more obvious next time.”

She must have noticed me staring, because in an instant, a predatory grin appeared on her face and I was suddenly reminded of how sharp her fangs looked and how very weak I was. “If you couldn’t tell though, I can always just give you a demonstration.” She gently climbed up onto the bed and began crawling towards me. I quickly scuttled back to keep the distance between us, but she was having none of it and oh boy she was awfully close and I could feel the heat radiating off of her in the chilly room and wow she was really pretty. “You know, the great thing about ‘cubi like me is that we can literally sense people’s desires,” she cooed. “Trust me, it is very obvious to me just how much you want to be a girl.”

For a minute there I honestly thought I had been regaining some control of the situation, but her completely underhanded tactic had sabotaged my resistance and left me a blushy stammering mess. It wasn’t fair. I never would have blurted out what I said next if she hadn’t cornered me in a moment of weakness.

“It-It’s just a fetish! It doesn’t mean anything!” 

Her advance froze in its tracks and we both just kind of looked at each other awkwardly for a few seconds. Oh my god, had I really just admitted that shameful secret? To the cute demon girl literally on top of me? Way to go, me. Now she was going to realize what a freak I was and leave.

“Okay, let me get this straight.” The look of revulsion I had been expecting from her was entirely absent, though she was still very much gaping at me like I was an idiot. “You’re saying that you sent a letter literally begging ‘Santa’ to turn you into a girl, when you were five… because of your fetish.”

“...Yes?” Well it did sound kind of silly when she put it like that. ”No! It’s not the same! I didn’t know any better when I sent that stupid letter back then! I didn’t actually mean it. I mean, obviously there’s way more that goes into being a girl than just wanting that… ”

Alzette remained totally silent while I continued my disjointed rambling, hoping that maybe the next excuse would be the one that convinced her, and maybe also convince myself. Being a guy seemed like it was something pretty self-evident, so why did each justification feel so hollow? I found myself with the distinct sensation of digging my own grave, a feeling that really wasn’t helped by the intensity of her gaze on my chest, less like she was looking at me and more like she was looking into me.

“...And I mean if just thinking about how nice it would be to live as a woman was enough for me to become one, then there wouldn’t be any guys left, right? Which isn’t to say that I think about that constantly or anything! I mean I barely even imagine it more than like two or three times a week and—”

“Oh! I finally get it now!” Her fierce concentration broke and I felt an actual pressure lift from me. I might have been relieved were it not for her beaming smile and the gleam in her eye—a very literal gleam, mind you, that made her ruby eyes even more dazzling. “This explains all of the mixed signals I was picking up from you. Your desire isn’t just to become a girl, you want someone else to turn you into a girl ‘against your will’ so you can have plausible deniability and pretend like you didn’t actually want it!”

Oh no. This wasn’t going to end well.

“Jeez, you should have just said so from the beginning and saved us both all this trouble! Err, wait. I guess that would have defeated the whole purpose, wouldn’t it? Don’t worry, I’ve got this handled.”

Just before I was going to ask what she meant by that concerning statement, she snapped her fingers and I watched in concern as silken ribbons materialized out of thin air. They moved like serpents, rapidly ensnaring my ankles and tethering them to the corners of my bed while binding my wrists together behind my head and pulling me upright against the headboard. My silken restraints were snug, though not uncomfortable, and seemed relatively secure from a cursory tug, so I immediately ceased any further attempts or thoughts at escape.

“I don’t actually… I mean you don’t have to do this. It wouldn’t be right.” My face was flush and my heart was beating out of my chest for reasons that were definitely only related to my apprehension about being captured and absolutely nothing else.

She responded in a voice that was utterly incapable of the solemnity she was trying to imitate. “Unfortunately for you, you have no choice in the matter. I’m gonna make you into the cutest, most beautiful woman you’ve ever seen. You’ll get to wear all the cute clothes you’ve ever dreamed of, and sing along to cheesy pop music without feeling ashamed, and cry over silly rom-coms. Whether. You. Like it. Or. Not.” Stupid fetish, giving me all these weird fuzzy feelings at the sound of those tempting words.

Against my expectation, she backed away from my flustered form, the levity present just a moment before now suddenly absent as she spoke. “But just so we’re clear, if you were to say… oh I don’t know, ‘Alzette, please don’t actually turn me into a girl for real’, or even just the word ‘brimstone’ at any point, well then I’d probably get bored and stop.”

She didn’t resume her antics, instead giving me a patient stare, adding a curious eyebrow raise after a few silent seconds.

“I-I mean, obviously that’s exactly what you want me to say, isn’t it? I’m not dumb enough to fall for that trick. Besides, men are supposed to see things through, or whatever.”

Alzette’s face went on a journey of expressions in the span of seconds before finally settling on a knowing smile. “Of course, I should have known you would see through my cunning plan,” she said before making what was perhaps the most exaggerated wink I’d ever seen. A short sigh left her lips as she sat up straight, cracked her back, and rolled her shoulders along with her wings. “Well then, we’re burning enough moonlight as it is. Let’s really get things started.”

With a single snap, the air in the room became charged with some unseen energy that had my hair standing on end. The chalk runes drawn onto the floor began to glow a bright crimson. Her shark-toothed smirk bathed in the ominous blood-red light as she broke into giddy laughter, and I realized that despite her demeanor, Alzette was every bit the demon she claimed to be.