Behind Bars

by Meredith Katz

  All he could do was stare at her. "He wouldn't," he said. "Bruant wouldn't do that. He knows what happened to his mother."

  "A human being whose mother was killed by another human being might, someday, hold conversations with an unrelated human being," Tari pointed out, strangely caustic.

  "We aren't talking about humans," Pel told her, hearing his voice come out more stunned than offended. "Maybe you've been blinded to the problem since you used to live with demons, but if you spend your time with only humans for a while, I think you'll see the difference."

  "Like I said," Tari said, flapping a hand above herself in the air, "this isn't about our world views right now. Stop changing the subject. What would you do if it happened?"

  His heart was stuttering, leaving an uneven feeling in his chest and tension knotting his stomach. He'd imagined Bruant in Phalene's place often enough. When Bruant had still been a child, Pel's nightmares were of Bruant's tiny body as often as they were of Phalene.

  I don't want to think about this.

  But, with Tari's gaze fixed on him, he forced himself to do it anyway. He closed his eyes and made himself envision it. It'd have to be a demon that had some kind of symbiotic relationship with humans—or parasitic, rather, whatever gains humans believed they got aside—and not one that preyed in any other way. A cubant, maybe. Those didn't want their lovers dead while there was still something to get from them.

  He replayed the scene from yesterday, imagining a demon sitting there when he came in, instead of just Bruant with his cat. Some human-like shape with hooves, horns, and a tail.

  And he tried, he tried, to be fair about it, like Tari was asking. He tried to imagine them seeming to get along. The demon laughing, Bruant happy. Tried to take the image of one of Bruant's normal friends and twist it into demonic shape, then put that abomination next to Bruant. Bruant's lonely; that's why he's found a cat. He lucked out with that needy beast. What if he'd found a demon instead?

  "I don't know," he said finally, defeated.

  "You don't know what you'd do?" Tari asked softly.

  "I still feel like I'd run the demon off. Convince Bruant. He'd have to understand." He hesitated, drawn forward despite his insistence. "But if he didn't want to be convinced…"

  Tari said, "Would you try to see if the Inquisition could straighten him out? Get rid of that demonic influence?"

  "No," Pel said, aghast. He was strangely relieved that he hadn't felt the need to hesitate. "He's my son."

  She was silent a moment longer, watching him with those clear eyes. It looked uncomfortably like she'd realized something from that, but he couldn't figure out what.

  "Then, would you let him keep seeing the demon?" Her tone and face were both distantly thoughtful, nothing else, and almost impossible to read.

  "I couldn't," Pel said. It came out raw.

  "And that's why you don't know. Because what alternatives are there?"

  He stared at her. She was motionless beneath him and still, despite the pain that he could taste with each breath, attractive. But the conversation left him cold, even with the physical heat of his reaction.

  "Well," she said, and smiled again. "At least it's just a theoretical exercise. But I guess you can see why I didn't think it was funny?"

  Almost queasy with horror, he stumbled to his feet. "Yeah," he said. "Sure. I have to—I have to go get ready for opening."

  "Sure," she said, but he'd already left her behind him as he made his escape.

  *~*~*

  Pel replayed that image over and over again throughout work: Bruant and a demon sitting together, laughing and talking. Himself bursting in. What would I have done?

  He knew it was impacting his business, if only a little. He had to ask for orders to be repeated, and kept losing his smile as he got distracted by his own thoughts. Even this preoccupied, he couldn't turn off that part of his mind which paid attention to people, and he caught the way his patrons were looking at him. He'd snap his attention back, only to have it wander off again as soon as the conversation changed.

  They weren't the only ones noticing his lack of focus. When the day was finally over and everyone else had cleared out, Bruant came downstairs to help and Pel found himself staring at Bruant on the stairs like he'd been a ghost walking down instead.

  He saw it all at once: The nightmare image of Bruant dead at a demon's hands, made worse by his similarity to Phalene. The laughing image of Bruant next to some demon he'd horrifically decided to befriend. The real Bruant, standing in front of him.

  "Dad?" Bruant froze in place under Pel's gaze like a spooked animal. He shifted uncomfortably on the last stair before taking it and coming around the bar to face him. "You okay? You look like you saw a ghost."

  Pel shook himself out of his distraction. Get it together, Pel. "Sorry, Bru," he said weakly. "I'm not really feeling well right now."

  "Uh, yeah, you look it." Bruant made a false start, then stepped closer. He pushed the back of his hand to Pel's forehead. "You don't feel warm or anything, but you still look pretty lousy."

  Pel smiled at Bruant and hoped it looked reassuring. "I'll be fine," he said. "Just gotta push through. Lots of work to be done."

  He picked up his mop and went to fill a bucket from the pump by the sink. When he looked back again, Bruant was worrying his lower lip with his teeth.

  Their eyes met. Pel realized he didn't know what expression was on his face anymore, and forced a smile again.

  That seemed to decide Bruant. He straightened up, setting his jaw, and held out a hand. "Give me that," he said, gesturing at the mop. "You go to bed."

  "I'm fine, Bru," Pel protested. "It's a lot of work. It'll go faster with the two of us."

  Despite Pel's objections, Bruant took hold of the mop handle, tugging at it almost too insistently. Holding the bucket with his other hand, Pel was forced to let go after the third yank for fear of spilling the water.

  Some of Bruant's anger seemed to be creeping back in again when he looked up, clutching the mop tightly to his chest, breathing hard. This time, though, Pel thought it might be different. Like this guilt, this anger, had gone inward.

  "You've been worrying a lot lately, huh?" Bruant said.

  "I'm fine—"

  "Stop saying that," Bruant said. He moved to rub the back of his forehead with a fist and almost whacked himself with the mop shaft. "Damn—"

  Pel opened his mouth to protest again, then closed it, not sure what to say. He tried again. "You've been worrying a lot, too," he said. "I know it's… hard. What you learned."

  "Yeah," Bruant said, looking at the floor as intently as if he planned to find all the dirt by sight before cleaning up. "But we're not talking about me right now."

  "I'd rather."

  "Of course you'd rather," Bruant muttered, not quite under his breath. He ran a hand down the mop handle like he was grounding himself, and found some of the impatience Pel was more used to from him. "Dad, let me say it: It's fine. I can handle this tonight. You go to bed. We can talk again when you've gotten some rest."

  "But—"

  "You think this conversation's gonna go well when you feel like shit?" Bruant asked, voice rising a little. "'Cause I can see a lot of ways we'd mess that up."

  Well, that's fucking hard to disagree with. Pel rubbed the back of his head, searching for protests, and, finding no reasonable ones, gave up. "Well, all right," he said finally. "But just for tonight. I really don't like to leave you alone to clean up in here."

  "I'm not alone," Bruant said, with a quick uncertain grin, as if waiting for Pel to start arguing again. He pointed to Kip, who had hopped up on one of the tables and was washing between his splayed toes. "I've at least got company."

  The sight made Pel smile involuntarily. He was embarrassed to realize how strange a natural smile felt on his face—he'd gotten too used to forcing them, somewhere down the line.

  Bruant was right. He needed rest.

  "Fine, fine." Pel sighed. He put the bucket do
wn on the counter and raised both hands, shrugging expansively. "You got me. I'll leave it to you, but you make sure that cat pulls his weight, all right? It's a two-person job."

  Bruant let out a laugh, seeming as surprised by the sound as Pel had been by his own smile. We're a wreck, Pel thought mournfully.

  "Yes, sir," Bruant said, with an incorrectly executed salute.

  Pel saluted back, matching the error.

  He made his way upstairs, past Bruant's empty room, down the hall further beyond the guest rooms, then paused outside Tari's absolutely not empty room. There, in front of the door, he could hear the sounds from inside, and felt himself flush.

  For a moment, he was fantasizing about it: Himself in there, instead of whoever she'd drawn in today. Imagining her underneath. Her hair spread out on the pillow, her fingernails on his back, her legs wrapped around him—

  Some innkeeper, he thought, flustered, voyeuring your guests.

  He hurried on back to his room.

  But it was hard to keep from thinking about it. She had someone in every night, and clearly was comfortable having sex with just about anyone. But although the two of them seemed to be getting closer, she hadn't propositioned him. As the innkeeper, he reminded himself for what was nowhere near the first time, it would be wrong to make the first move.

  He tried to put the thought out of his mind as he slid onto his own bed with a heavy sigh, taking his boots off. But forcing himself not to think of that just made the image of Bruant and a demon rise in his mind again, and he tried to force that out too—

  The images overlapped. Tari with a demon, drawing some monster on top of her to fuck.

  He scrubbed at his face. Tari with a demon. Gods above, she'd probably eat them alive.

  And then another thought occurred and he froze, boot still in his hand.

  She had sex every night. Possibly more, if she looked for it again during the day while she was out. And she wore her partners out. It was reasonable, he reminded himself. It was a normal, human thing to do—some people just really liked to fuck. There was no crime in it.

  But he couldn't stop thinking about it now. The other things that hadn't made sense all rose up at once. She didn't want to move on until she'd resupplied, which she needed money to do, but she seemed to have enough money to pay Pel indefinitely. Sure, her explanation had been convincing enough. But she was popular and charismatic; was there really no jeweler in town who'd buy the lot of her gems all at once?

  She might not look like a succubus, but that didn't mean anything. Succubi were shapeshifters. They were, in fact, the same thing as incubi and the states in between. Humans had just named them differently in the early days of the demon invasion, assuming an inherent sexual binary with no shapeshifting. That had turned out to be flat-out wrong—they were inclined to fit into a binary even less than humans were. Still, would it even be possible for a cubant to maintain a human shape for this long?

  But why wouldn't it be? How much energy might shapeshifting even use?

  He knew he was being paranoid again. She was reasonable, thoughtful. Blunt but kind. If she were a demon, why would she come here? Would someone like her really take on a demon-hating city just for the chance to feed where other demons weren't?

  Then again, if she were a demon, that would mean he'd never understood her at all.

  Pel groaned, dropping his boot and grinding the heels of his hands against his closed eyes until he saw stars. "I'm too tired," he muttered. "I'm stressed out. This isn't making any sense."

  But even as he tried to force himself to shake the it off, he found himself feeling more and more sure it might be the truth.

  Slowly, he took a few steady breaths, and thought: And then what?

  If Tari were a demon and he'd found it out, what would he do?

  The worst she'd done to anyone here was tire them out. She hadn't made a move on Bruant—Pel was still pretty sure Bruant would have given it away if she had. Bruant clearly liked her, but he seemed to do so as a friend or mentor, not a lover. So she wasn't hunting indiscriminately. And the different lovers every night… Even if she were feeding on people, she was at least spreading the damage around instead of focusing on a single target.

  Was it possible for a demon to be harmless? Or, at least, to mean no harm? Tari had implied that it was, but how trustworthy was anything she'd said about demons if she were one herself?

  He didn't know what he'd do.

  But whatever he'd do about it, he needed to know what she was, one way or another. Avoiding the subject was just plain dangerous.

  And he couldn't just ask her. Not and expect an honest answer, at any rate—he was sure he'd get a laugh and then a light, "I'm obviously human," regardless of whether or not it were true.

  There was always the amulet.

  If it worked on her, she was a demon. But that would be a statement of war, a statement of his intent to harm her and turn her in. She'd definitely react to that, and if she were stronger than the binding, both he and Bruant would be at risk.

  There was one other way. The thought occurred, and he groaned again, rubbing his face.

  I could seduce her.

  He was attracted to her. Deeply attracted. If she were a cubant, her demonic powers would have let her know that already. If he made the first move, she'd accept. He was sure of that, especially if she were a succubus. Though that might not mean anything by itself—demon or human, she clearly liked sex.

  But if she were a cubant and had sex with him, she'd drain some of his energy. He'd feel it slip away—would try to force himself into awareness—and he could, at that point, use the amulet if he wanted to. What better way to figure out a demon than by seeming to give them exactly what they wanted while paying close attention to whether they took it? To be prepared to act as soon as they tipped their hand? It was a perfect plan.

  An awful plan, a terrible thing to do to someone.

  But a perfect plan nonetheless.

  Chapter Five

  Pel had gone to sleep trying to force himself to feel secure in that thought, but as the next day went on, he started to question himself more. He had no intention of changing his plans, but he certainly found himself feeling significantly worse for making them.

  Sex under false pretenses was an awful thing to do to someone. It raised issues of morality that he felt fairly certain he'd be on the wrong side of; the other person wouldn't be agreeing to sex with the full knowledge of the terms. Sure, if Tari were a demon, then they'd both be lying to each other. But on some level, it didn't matter what she did. One way or another, his intentions weren't good.

  He wanted to pretend it would be fine. He truly did. He was into her. He liked her. He'd want to do this anyway, just out of hope of something growing between them. If she weren't a demon, he really could trust her.

  But if she were, he couldn't. No matter how he thought about it through the day, he couldn't think of a better way to find out than to set up his own trap by seeming to walk into hers.

  "Bru."

  Bruant glanced over from where he was helping set up for the evening. His cat had jumped onto his shoulder and somehow kept himself perched there, despite how much Bruant was moving around; it gave Bruant a weird, hunched silhouette. "Dad?"

  Pel felt himself begin to flush even before he spoke. "Could I ask you—that is to say, there's a good chance that I might need you to run the bar tonight."

  "Sure, if you need me to. I don't have plans. Still feeling sick?" Sudden concern showed on Bruant's face as he looked Pel over.

  It was no surprise that Bruant was worried, since Pel usually only asked for help when he was too unwell to manage. He found himself fumbling a tankard, almost dropping it twice before he gave up and just put it down. "There's something I need to talk to Tari about later and—well, you know how busy she gets in the evening—"

  "Busy," Bruant repeated, the word a barked laugh, short and fast. "Yeah, I think everyone knows that."

  "Yes," Pel said, st
rained. "Well, I'd like to talk to her tonight, and it might take a while, so—"

  It only took a moment for realization to dawn, leaving Bruant looking half smug and half horrified, face screwing up. A reasonable response, Pel thought with embarrassment, to any boy's realization that his father might be looking to get laid.

  "So," Pel said, a little too loudly, "I think it would be best if you mind things. Here. Tonight. It'll be good training for you."

  "I already said yes!" Bruant protested, voice rising in what was nearly a yelp. Kip shifted from his right shoulder to his left, rubbing against the back of his head as if trying to soothe him. "Look, I'm glad to see you finally interested in someone again, but don't tell me any more about it!"

  "I just—yes. No. I won't," Pel muttered, and rubbed his face with both hands.

  "Just… just finish helping me get things set up, all right?"

  Pel shook himself. "Of course," he said, then cut himself off, head jerking up as the door opened; beside him, Bruant did likewise.

  He stared at Tari as she shut the door behind herself, and was peripherally aware of Bruant doing the same. Turning to see them, her eyebrows slowly raised. "Uh, yes?" she said. "Something on my face? I didn't forget my pants anywhere, right?" She looked down, lifting first one leg, then the other, in a mock-examination.

  "No," Pel said, then flushed. He was obviously being teased. He cleared his throat. "Uh, do you have a moment?"

  "I surely do," she said slowly. "Do you? You're normally getting ready for work right now, aren't you?"

  He tried to find something to say. It'd all fall apart right now if he kept floundering, but he couldn't seem to find the right kind of words to invite her upstairs, failing to find the balance between too blunt and too vague. Trying to charm people was one thing, but trying to flirt, actively moving toward a genuine attempt to go somewhere with it—Gods, but it's been too many long years.