by E J Frost
“You bargaining with me?” He leans on the scythe’s staff.
I nod, bowing my head.
“Not your soul, huh? What else you got to offer?”
Sex. That’s what he wants. I refused him sex and this is both revenge and leverage. “What you wanted before,” I choke, staring at the floor.
“Yeah? You rethinking your answer in light of recent events, witchy poo? All right. You give me what I want. When, how and where I want. No holding back, now.” His deep voice lightens; he sounds almost playful. But I know he’s not. In a second, he could turn on me again. It’s like baiting a shark. With my own bleeding soul.
I nod.
“Mmm.” He scratches his chin thoughtfully on the scythe’s blade. “Not a bad bargain. Sex on my terms for boyfriend’s freedom. But if you want boyfriend not to have any memory of what happened, that’s extra.”
“I’ll do my own memory charm, thank you,” I say bitterly. “That’s one thing I’m good at.”
The demon chuckles, low and dark and evil. “Too bad you’re not as good at banishing demons.” He stretches, muscles rolling. Showing off.
I curl over myself and grip the carpet like a lifeline.
“Oh, c’mon, witchy-poo. Stop actin’ like the world’s endin’. I’da thought listening-in last night woulda convinced you that sex with me ain’t so bad. You might even enjoy it.”
That’s what I’m afraid of. “Are we done?” I whisper.
“For now.”
I risk uncurling and look up at him. He’s leaning against my desk, watching me. Steam, scythe and horns are gone. His eyes glow faintly blue but other than that, he could be just a man.
But he’s not. Even if I never see the horns again, or that unholy light shining from his skin, I’ll always know what he is.
What I just agreed to have sex with. On his terms. I shudder.
“Put Peter back,” I say.
The demon glances at Peter’s crumpled form. “Now? How ‘bout dinner first? Bein’ where he is ain’t doing him any harm. Besides, you’re gonna need to whip up a big fucking memory charm before I put him back. Unless you want him screamin’ the place down.”
I start to protest, but he has a point. I nod.
The demon reaches out a hand to me. No talons. “Get up, witchy-poo.”
“I really hate it when you call me that,” I mutter, rising shakily. On my own.
“What d’you prefer? Beti?”
I freeze, grab the edge of my desk to steady myself. “What have you done to my grandmother?”
“Nothin’. Yet.” The demon shrugs and collects his shirt off Peter’s head. “You gettin’ the picture?”
Loud and clear. I refuse him and he threatens someone I care about. Know thy enemy, he said. In a day, he’s learned almost all there is to know about me. Who I care about. How to hurt me. And I’ve learned almost nothing about him.
That’s going to change. “Did you say something about dinner?”
He lifts a dark eyebrow. “You hungry all of a sudden?”
I don’t think I can carry the lie, so I just nod.
“Posturin’ takes it out of you, don’t it?” His wicked leer. “I started dinner but Pee-ter here interrupted me.” He angles a very dark glance in Peter’s direction. “How ‘bout tapas?”
Thinking about the grim state of my credit card, I shake my head. “How about take-out? I’ll raid the petty cash.”
“To them all the riches of the earth,” the demon says with a deep chuckle. “It’s on me, sweet meat.”
I glance at him skeptically. He can’t possibly have money. Or a credit card, although, God knows, MBNA will issue them to anyone these days. Even the undead. But he did go to the mall yesterday, so he must be paying for things somehow. Maybe he just bespells the store attendants into giving him whatever he wants.
“Fine.”
He shrugs his shirt back on, but as it settles around him, it shifts. A long-sleeved, v-neck, black cashmere sweater, which fits him perfectly. Defines his huge chest and arm muscles. Deepens his skin to mocha.
“You look nice in that,” I say grudgingly.
“Yeah?” He flashes me a smile. A real smile. Not as many teeth as the shark’s grin. Then he frowns. “You look like you’re wearing a sack.” He reaches out and fingers the frayed edge of my sweater. “An old sack. Fuck, you need a makeover.”
He leans toward me and I flinch away from him. But like before, he simply breathes on me. I feel that one breath all through me, fluttering warm across my skin. Like the lightest brush of his hands. Everything in me responds. My nipples harden. My insides melt. Legs go so wobbly I have to clutch at the desk again.
The demon chuckles, and where his chuckle can sound purely evil, now it’s wicked and rich with sexual promise. “See? If you’d relax, we could have all kinds of fun.”
Sure. Right before he eats my soul.
I shift and startle at a creak of leather. There’s no way my Keds could make that sound.
I glance down. My sneakers are gone. Along with my cargo pants and sweater and everything else that I put on this morning. Polished black leather boots hug my calves. Black tights outline an embarrassingly long expanse of leg between the tops of the boots and the bottom of a very short trapeze dress. I’ve never owned boots other than the clumpy winter variety, and the swirly black and orange dress definitely did not come out of my closet.
“These aren’t mine,” I say suspiciously.
“No?” The demon kneels and puts one hand behind Peter’s back. Folds him forward like a rag doll. My mind rejects what I see next. Those huge hands mashing and molding Peter’s body back into a small ball. The demon bounces the ball on his palm and rises. “Look like they fit you.”
I swallow hard. One of the foremost goals in my life has just become never being mashed into a demon-ball. “Right,” I mutter.
“Nice legs.” He touches his tongue to his upper lip. I follow it with my eyes. Fascinated. Fearful. Like watching the movements of a snake.
Or a salamander.
“Do you—?” I pause, wondering. It couldn’t be. But, it was so odd, the salamander showing up without me calling the Elements. And it’s usually Air Elementals that I get by accident. Air to balance my Earth. I can’t think of the last time a Fire Elemental showed up on its own. “You can’t change shape, can you?”
“Some,” the demon says. “Not as much as your buddy the werewolf. Why?”
The reminder of what I did to Peter makes me grit my teeth. “Can you change into a fire salamander?”
“No, but I know one.” He grins. “You want to take Izzy to dinner with us?”
“Izzy!” I spit. “He’s yours?! I should have known.”
The demon holds out the hand he’s not bouncing Peter-the-Ball with. In a foosh of flame, the crimson and cream salamander appears. It wraps its tail around the demon’s wrist and flicks its black tongue at me. Its grin mirrors the demon’s.
I shake my head in disgust. “And to think I shared power with you.”
“He appreciated it.” The demon tucks the Peter-ball under his arm and gives the salamander a friendly scratch under the jaw. “Didn’t you, Iz? You been on short rations while I’ve been under the dead bitch’s thumb.”
The salamander promptly rolls over in the demon’s hand, exposing its ridged tummy. The demon gives it an indulgent scratch.
“You sent it,” I say sourly. “Why?”
The salamander gives me an upside-down grin, tongue lolling. It wriggles its legs in time to the demon’s strokes. I cross my arms over my chest, determined not to be swayed, no matter how cute and puppy-like it looks. Watching flame drip from one corner of that grinning mouth to singe my carpet helps.
“Just keepin’ an eye on you.” The demon scratches the salamander’s neck, ruffling the loose, scaly skin. The salamander closes its snake eyes in delight. “In case you get any bright ideas.”
Please, if anything’s listening, give me some bright ideas.
“Aw, c’mon. You’ll come to love him. Give him a little scratch.”
“No.”
The demon scratches behind the lizard’s jaw. “Right here. He loves it here. Kinda like playing with his nuts.”
I roll my eyes. Things I will never, ever play with include salamander testicles. “He’s setting fire to my carpet.”
The demon tamps out the smoldering shag with the toe of his boot.
“You’ll have to get some fire-proof carpets.”
“No, I won’t!” I shout, finally losing it. “I gave you what you wanted! But I am not inviting fire salamanders and whatever other bits of Hell you tote around with you into my life. Get rid of that thing and let’s just get this over with!”
The salamander arches into an upside-down threat display, legs splayed in the air, throat distended in a hiss. It would be ridiculous if I didn’t know how far it can spit fire.
The demon strokes it soothingly. “Sh, Iz. The nasty witch didn’t mean it. She’s just pre-menstrual.”
“I am not!”
The demon arches a disbelieving eyebrow but whispers to the salamander, “Go on home.” The salamander disappears in another puff of flame.
“That better be your home you’re talking about,” I snap.
The demon grins. It’s definitely not. “C’mon, witchy-poo. Let’s eat.”
He offers me his arm, which I pointedly don’t take. I turn on my booted heel to retrieve my fall coat from the hall closet.
Predictably, it’s become a leather jacket.
Chapter 18
He takes me to Salvador’s, a Spanish restaurant six blocks from my house. Despite how close it is, I’ve never eaten there before. Too rich for my blood. And my wallet.
The unprepossessing, windowless exterior of the restaurant hides an explosion of color within. The bar inside the doorway is tiled in yellow and blue, hung with carnival masks and strings of red peppers. A harried-looking hostess seats us at a table inset with the same bright tiles. Between us, a candle flickers in a red jelly-jar. Overhead, the ceiling is draped with shawls and hanging beads. An interior-decorator version of my Dala’s caravan. I look away, focus on the demon, who orders without even looking at a menu. After a few minutes, the waiter sets a small constellation of dishes between us.
The demon selects a piece of marinated squid from one of the bowls, sits back in his chair, stretches his legs under the table and pops the squid into his mouth. I watch him crunch the white meat between his molars. My eyes feel glued to him. Watching him eat is both disgusting and weirdly sexy.
The demon finishes chewing. Swallows. Eyes me and says with a wide grin, “Want to nip to the bathroom for a quickie?”
I drag my eyes away and focus on a chicken croquette. “No.”
A woman, dressed in a crop top and miniskirt despite the night’s autumnal chill, brushes by the demon’s chair for the third time in five minutes.
“She might,” I say, nodding at the woman’s swaying backside, as she makes her way to the ladies’ room on the far side of the restaurant. “That or she has a bladder infection.”
The demon chuckles and takes a swallow of sangria. My eyes gravitate to the way his throat works as he drinks.
“Have you done something to me?” I ask. I only looked at him to distract myself from the memory-provoking ceiling, and now I can’t seem to look anywhere else. “Cast a glamor on me or something?”
The demon wipes his mouth and I follow the movement of his long fingers over his lower lip with fascination. “Nope,” he says. “Why?”
I can’t manage to look away, but I can narrow my eyes at him. “Take a wild guess.”
The wicked leer. “You finally warming to the idea? That’s just your body’s natural reaction, sweet meat.” The demon licks his finger and touches it to his chest with a soft tss.
I rub my hand over my eyes. “Ugh.”
A darker chuckle. “So, whaddo you like in bed? Other than your thing for ears.”
“We’re not talking about this here,” I mutter.
The demon drapes an arm casually across the back of his chair and glances at the tables around us. This is Somerville, not the Back Bay, and the tables are comfortably spaced. The nearby diners are engrossed in their tapas and sangria. Talking animatedly. No one seems to be watching us. Except the woman in the miniskirt, who is heading back from the bathroom already. She must pee standing up.
“No one’s listening. C’mon, tell me. Whaddo you like? You want me to suck your ears while we’re humpin’?”
I shiver, and not with disgust. Taking a helping of chorizo and potato salad, I begin to dice determinedly. “Let’s talk about you instead.”
The demon shrugs and sits forward in his chair so Miniskirt doesn’t brush him as she sidles past. “I’m a demon an’ you promised to let me fuck you however I want. ‘Nuff said.”
I grit my teeth around the chorizo. “Getting off that topic for a moment, you never did answer my question. What flavor demon are you?”
“Did, too.” The demon spreads his hands in a gesture of mock innocence. It’s not convincing.
“Right, Butter Pecan,” I say. “Do demons come in Mint Chocolate Chip and Strawberry, too?”
The demon grins, his tongue curling the way the salamander’s did when he was petting it. I carve the sausage into smaller bites before trying again. “Why did Ro summon you anyway?”
The demon spears some of the chorizo I’ve just diced and pops it into his mouth. He chews meditatively before he answers. “Don’t think she meant to summon me specifically. It was that ring. My line’s had a weakness for it since Solomon summoned my sire. Can’t tell you how glad I am the fucking thing’s gone.”
“Is that why you destroyed it? So it couldn’t be used against you again?”
The demon shrugs. “I didn’t know that would happen. She musta put part of her soul in the ring. When I took her, the backlash fried it.”
When he ate her soul, he means. “None of her soul is still in the ring, is it?”
“Nope, it’s all mine now.” The shark’s grin.
I swallow hard, nearly choking on a piece of sausage. “Is she really in Hell?”
The demon lifts a dark eyebrow as he steals another piece of sausage off my plate. I glance pointedly at the half-full serving dish between us. He ignores my glare and rubs the bit of sausage over the tip of his tongue before he answers. “Spicy. You keep askin’ like I’m gonna give you a different answer.”
“Hope springs eternal.”
“Not in Hell.”
I start to snap a smart reply, but, just for a second, there’s something in those dark eyes, a moment of bleakness, that makes me moderate my response. “What’s it like? Hell, I mean?”
“Which part?” He takes another forkful of sausage.
I didn’t know there were different parts. “Whatever part you’re from.”
“Dis. Dark. Smelly. Pits of fire. Rivers of ash. Lots of screaming. You’ll love it.”
I shrug off his sarcasm. “Why would you want to go back to that?”
“It’s home.” The demon takes a drink of sangria and I watch his Adam’s apple bob. My belly tightens. “Where I hang my horns. Same reason you bought yourself a place an’ settled down.”
“What do you mean?”
“I looked through your still picture books today. You were a cute kid. I particularly liked the ones where you’re missing your front teeth.” I wince at the memory. Both of my front teeth were knocked out while I was playing ball with my older cousins. My Dala refused to fix them to teach me a lesson and they took forever to grow in. My cousin Stefan teased me about it for years. “Every picture’s in a different place. An’ none of you standing in front of a house with flowers an’ a white picket fence.”
I frown at this fresh invasion of my privacy. But in comparison to his invasion of my mind, I suppose it’s a small violation. “We moved around a lot,” I say uncomfortabl
y.
I try not to think about those years. The years right after my parents died. When I went to live with my Dala in her little caravan and we moved from Maine to Mexico and back every year. Following the sun. Following the carny circuit.
The demon shifts his legs under the table until he captures my ankle between his. “What about now? Don’t you ever hear the call of the road?”
“No.” I don’t even like having to go long distances. At first, I loved traveling. Loved sitting beside my Dala with the sun warm on my face and the wind in my hair while the blacktop unrolled in front of us. The first sight of the next new town on the horizon. The smell of hay and popcorn, and the sounds of the circus penetrating our little caravan at night to fill my dreams. The shy excitement of the local children waiting to get into the bigtop; seeing their eyes widen at the first sight of the clowns and elephants.
But that was before I saw the truth of it. Before I was old enough to understand what people in their houses with the flowers and fences think of people who live on the road. Before I realized that those shy, excited children would never be my friends. That I would never go to their schools, never play in their parks. Before I understood what words like ‘tramp’ and ‘vagrant’ meant.
“Not much of a gypsy, are you?”
“It’s Roma and no, I’m not.” At least, my cousins don’t think so.
We eat in silence for minute. He rubs the toe of his boot up and down my calf, the faint squeak of leather on leather drowned in the restaurant’s hubbub. “You’re lookin’ pensive. What’re you thinkin’ about, witchy-poo?” he asks.
He could crack open my thoughts and see for himself. That he doesn’t makes me answer him truthfully. “Being alone.”
I was never alone when I was with my Dala. There was always someone around. Even when my grandmother was busy, there were my aunts and uncles and cousins. I had no home, but I was never lonely.
And then my talent manifested. To an extent that none of my relatives had ever seen before. To an extent that none of them, not even my Uncle Billigoat, the strongest talent of his generation, could control. So my Dala packed up the caravan again and the blacktop unrolled one last time as we drove north. Far, far north. First to Wydlins, the ‘special’ girl’s school where I learned to channel the adolescent confusion and anger that had brought down the bigtop. And then over the border to Bevington College where I studied the theory behind the practice I had learned at Wydlins. Where I met Rowena. And where my Dala’s winter cough turned into the deadly pneumonia that neither I nor the gorgio doctors could cure.