"I bet you could open it between those cheeks of yours," Kibs called.
"It’s in the back of the other drawer."
She walked out of the kitchen with two opened bottles and handed one over to me, then sank back into my good chair. I watched her carefully. She didn't look old enough to be drinking, and even if she was, she didn't look the type to enjoy a dark beer. She caught me staring, gave me another scowl, and lifted the bottle to her lips. Kibs slurped his like usual, wiped his snout clean, then started grooming himself, catlike. Even wearing suits as they did these days, imps were fastidiously clean.
I was prone to slamming them down, but I took my time with this one. Even with my blood regenerating rapidly, I didn't want to overdo it. "So, you want to witness the contract or what, Kibs?"
"Maybe I want another beer first."
"Later. I shouldn't have let you have that one while you're on duty."
"What are they going to do? Fire me?" He chuckled.
I rolled my eyes. "On your head."
"On my head and horns," he said. "All right, kids. Let's get this over with so I can go get properly drunk. Verbal or written contract?"
"You're standing on it," the girl said.
"So I am." Kibs scanned the paper. "All right, this looks pretty standard. You teach him, he teaches you, you both protect each other, and sweetcheeks here is picking up the tab on your dates? What the fuck, Zay? Making the girl pay? What sort of man are you?"
"An unemployed man, thanks to her."
"That's not my fault," she snapped.
"Like hell it isn't."
"Shut the fuck up, both of you," Kibs suggested. "Any last minute quibbles? Say no or I'll fuck your shit up, I don't have time to deal with arbitration today."
"No," I said.
"What else do you have planned for today?" the girl demanded. "You already said you want to get this over so you can go get drunk."
Kibs pointed his tongue at her and she shrunk back. "You really want to get between an imp and his booze, sweetcheeks? Besides, I have a date with Ria from the Montreal branch tonight. She has this French-Canadian accent, it's fucking hot. I think tonight's going to be my lucky night, too." He started pumping his hips.
"You're disgusting."
"Damn right. So say no, or I'm going to shit in your shoes, cockblocker."
"Fine! Let's get this over with."
Kibs burped and wiped his snout again. "Good girl. All right, here goes." He drew the contract up in the air, blood red letters hanging a foot above the table. "The undersigned do agree to abide by all the bullshit in the above contract for one year and one day, anything not explicitly mentioned above is fair game. Failure to abide by terms means the contract can be terminated unilaterally with notice to the Consortium. You both down with that shit?"
"Yes," we both said.
"Good. Zay, repeat after me. I, name here, do swear to abide by the terms of this contract."
"I, Isaiah Bright, do swear to abide by the terms of this contract."
The girl blinked. "Isaiah? That's a weird name for a demon."
"My dad was a weird guy."
Kibs turned toward the girl. "Your turn. Repeat after me. I, sweetcheeks, do swear to abide by the terms of this contract."
Her face burned again. "I, Annabell Glass, do swear to abide by the terms of this contract."
"Witnessed," Kibs announced. Our names burned underneath the text of the contract, signed and bound. "Like always, thanks for using the services of the Malefic Consortium for all your legal needs. Not as if we have a fucking choice. Can I get another beer now?"
"Hey, Tinkerbell, go grab the nice imp another bottle, would you?"
"What did you just call me?"
"Tinkerbell."
For a moment, I thought she was going to throw her bottle at me. Instead, she went for the knife. Everything went downhill from there.
Chapter Two
With the current recession, finding a new job with a spotty resume was not easy. The severance that John had promised failed to appear, my savings weren't going to hold out forever, and I still hadn't been approved for unemployment. Apparently, there was no good cause clause for getting stabbed. "This sucks."
"Quit bitching. I'm feeding you, aren't I?" Tinkerbell scowled at me. She had taken to showing up at random for a few minutes at a time, trading one piece of information for another, and then vanishing again. After the second time she showed up and found my kitchen empty except for beer and ramen, she had started showing up more often, bringing fast food with her. She was probably making sure I didn't starve on her.
"I'm not bitching about being fed," I said. "I'm pissed because I can't find a job. I couldn't even get entry level. Maybe I'll end up flipping burgers for a while. Maybe I should get a job as a Wal-Mart greeter. Can you see that?"
"Welcome to hell, check your soul at the door?" She snorted. "You haven't even been unemployed a month. What do you expect? Sales gimps like you are a dime a dozen. No one's selling anything because no one has money to buy anything. You wouldn't even be able to sell yourself on a street corner."
"Speaking from experience, Tink?" Her scowl deepened. "What do you do for a living? You look like you should still be in school. Middle school. Stealing lunch money?"
"Maybe I'm collecting bounties on demons."
"You wish. Seriously, what do you do?"
"None of your business."
I rolled my eyes and checked the bag for any extra fries. She'd never asked me what I wanted, just got the same thing over and over again, a burger, fries, and soda. If I was fully human, I'd have gained five pounds or more by now. Burning a drop of ichor every couple of days to burn off the extra fat was worth it. I had never seen a fat demon before. Well, I had, once. He had burned off a couple drops of ichor to use all the excess fat as fuel for hellfire. A few seconds later, he was as skinny as I was, and his opponent was a pile of ash topped with blinking eyeballs. Intimidating.
I looked up at Tink. She was flipping through some papers she had brought with her and not paying attention to me. Her tank top was as tight as the one she had worn the day we met, riding up and showing a strip of flat stomach between it and her jeans. The girl was in fine shape for eating the same amount of junk food she brought me. Whatever she did for work, it had to be an active sort of job. Either that or she cheated like me.
"Stop staring," she said without looking up.
"Why?"
"Because I said so."
I crumpled up the bag and tossed it toward the garbage can. "So, the hairband, that's got a spell embedded, right?"
She glanced up from her papers. "You demons aren't exactly known for being observant, are you?"
"It's some sort of defense, isn't it?" She hadn't taught me a whole lot so far. This was the first time she had stuck around for more than fifteen minutes or so. Our lessons so far had been more along the lines of recognizing demons and their power from my end of things, and recognizing runes on the other end.
"It's not defensive in and of itself," she said, putting the papers down. "It's just an early warning system. The circle represents the self, and the triangle represents thought." She took the hairband off, shaking her hair loose, and passed it over to me. The points extended just outside the circle, as I had noticed before.
"So what does it actually do?"
"Put it on and see."
"I don't have long enough hair to pull back."
She sighed. "Just put it on."
My scalp tingled, just enough to warn me that there was something magical afoot. I looked at her, she looked at me, and nothing happened. It was a very uncomfortable nothing. The tingle grew and so did my discomfort. She grinned and it grew sharper, like needles just barely pricking my scalp. "What the hell is this thing?" I asked.
"Feeling it yet?"
"It's starting to sting a little."
"Good."
I took it off and handed it back to her. The sensation vanished as soon as it left my hand.
"So what's the secret?"
She pulled her hair back into place. "It warns you when someone's thinking about you, gives you a taste of their thoughts. It doesn't extend very far, so you're not picking up thoughts from everyone walking by. It's not very high powered either. Don't want to hear your thoughts as you think them. That would drive me crazy."
"So what were you thinking about?" I asked.
"How much I hate demons. How much I enjoyed stabbing you." Her grin widened. "How much I'd like to do it again. You didn't feel very comfortable about that, did you?"
I considered that idea, then looked her up and down. As with all men, regardless of species, I had the inherent mental ability to imagine any woman naked, anywhere, anytime, in ultra high definition. Sometimes, it was a curse, but today, a blessing. I let it flow and licked my lips.
"I will cut your balls off," she said.
It was harder than I thought to let the mental image go, but I managed. "That's pretty basic. What would it do if the points didn't extend past the circle?"
She shrugged. "Not too much. It would only warn about external thoughts entering my head. Since that's impossible, it would be worthless by itself."
"Impossible?"
Her eyebrows rose. "Are you suggesting demonic possession is possible?"
"For the ninety-eighth time, I'm a halfblood, not a demon. Possession is possible, though not quite like the stories. Here, I'll show you." The constant accusations of being a demon were growing old. Giving her an object lesson would be informative for her and fun for me. I burned ichor and turned the power on her before she could object.
I wasn’t subtle. Tink rocked back in her seat, eyes gone wide. I slapped a simple command into her head and cut my power short before it could imprint too deeply. She stood up and walked to the kitchen, every step stiff and mechanical. She brushed the wall and staggered, then managed to turn her head and give me a look that should have reduced me to a pile of ash. I grinned.
She came back with a bottle of beer and knelt down, offering it to me. I took the bottle. As soon as it left her hands, she lurched backwards and crashed into the coffee table. "You filthy son of a bitch."
"Never felt quite that way before, have you?" I asked. She shuddered, then scrambled to her feet and rushed for the bathroom. I popped the cap off with my thumb and drank my beer. The girl had a lot to learn. When she returned, wiping her mouth, I picked up where I had left off. "You fought it the entire time, didn't you?"
"Of course," she snapped.
"That's why you're feeling so terrible," I told her. Her runic hairband had probably been screaming the entire time, too. "Object lesson number one, fighting it directly is just going to leave you worse off. I'm going to do it again and have you get another beer. Don't fight, just do it." Before she could protest, I burned more ichor. Her head rocked back again and she glared at me, but she turned and walked toward the kitchen.
This time, her movements were natural. The fridge rattled open, then shut, and then she was back. I didn't force her to kneel, simply to hand the bottle to me. Just like before, as soon as it left her hand, the command broke. She took a deep breath and stared at me. Her cheeks suddenly flushed. "That's not even right," she said.
I handed the beer back to her. "That's why it works. You fight it, you pay for it. You obey it, it pays you. Do you need some privacy?"
"Bite me, demon." She walked toward the kitchen, a little unsteady. I heard a drawer open. "How do I fight it and win?" she called.
"There's a few ways," I said. "First off, you find a demon who owes you a favor and can counter their control. Before you ask, not a chance. I'm a halfblood. There's no way I can go head to head with a full demon and win. They've simply got more ichor to draw from."
"Shame, that."
"Second, you can't fight it directly and win, but you can fight indirectly. For example, you could have dropped the bottle on my head instead of handing it to me, or thrown it at me. Things like that would have broken the control in a way I wasn't expecting. You all right in there?"
I heard a pop and hiss from the kitchen, then she walked out with an opened bottle. "Does that actually stand a chance of working?"
"Depends on how detailed the command is, and if the demon's actually paying attention to you. There's probably a third way, but that depends on you."
She smiled. "Magic."
I tipped my bottle toward her. "Exactly. How about it? Know any spells for defending your mind, instead of just detection?"
Tink flopped down into a chair and lifted the bottle to her lips. "I guess."
"How old are you?" I asked.
She lowered the bottle. "What?"
"How old? I know I've said this before, but you look too young to be drinking like that. Not to mention you're tiny. I'd say that one beer would put you over the legal driving limit, but I don't think you could drive anyways. You're too short to see over the dashboard."
She looked down at herself, then scowled. "Are you finished insulting me?"
"I'm honestly curious."
"I won't answer that until you ask politely."
"Don't lecture me on being polite, Tinkerbell. I'm the one who got stabbed at our first meeting, remember."
"And I'm the one who brings you food every time I stop by, which isn't covered by the contract," she snapped back. "Without a single word of thanks, too. Not to mention what just happened. I shouldn't expect anything more from a demon, should I?"
"I'm not a demon, dammit!"
"You act like one."
I shut up. I had chosen long ago to emphasize my human side to keep myself out of trouble. For the most part, it worked. Sure, my mother's family dropped in from time to time and tried to convince me to be a pawn, but I had always begged off. In the demonic world, being a halfblood meant all of the work with none of the perks. At least pretending to be human let me enjoy my life without fear of getting my ass kicked.
Until I met her, at least. I glared at her and took a swig from my bottle. "What?" she snapped. "It's true."
"I've spent twenty-seven years trying to avoid this sort of shit," I said. "And you dragged me into it against my will. You're lucky all I'm doing is insulting you."
"I don't have any sympathy for a demon."
My ichor surged, out of my conscious control. She blinked and leaned backwards in her chair. I forced myself under control. "Felt that? Let me make this clear, Tink. I'm a halfblood. I chose to live like a human, like a normal human. I haven't openly used my ichor more than a handful of times in the last few years. You opened the door for the demon inside me. You wanted a contract with a demon." My vision flickered red and I could feel the ichor surging again. She was lucky that I had burned through so much with those two possessions, otherwise my heritage might have gotten the best of me. I switched to the demonic tongue. "Be careful what you wish for, audacious bitch."
She slammed her bottle down on my coffee table. "Don't threaten me. We've got a contract, you son of a bitch. I expect you to hold to it."
"Anything not explicitly in the contract is fair game," I reminded her.
"Don't play semantics with me, demon."
"Don't push me, human."
We glared at each other for another moment, both breaking eye contact at the same time. "Sorry," I said. "I'm a little off balance."
"Yeah. Let's get back to what we were doing earlier. Possess me again. I want to try and fight it off."
I shook my head. "No can do, Tink. I'm running on fumes."
"Seriously? You have no stamina."
"All my ex-girlfriends would beg to differ with you."
She rolled her eyes and picked her beer back up. "Funny. You're a funny guy. Are you really that limited in what you can do?"
I closed my eyes. I had enough ichor for another possession, but that would tip the balance too much. Even demons need to breathe. I opened my eyes and shook my head again. "Halfblood is literal, not metaphorical. Demons burn ichor for power. If I burn too much, I'll pass out.
My human blood can't pick up the slack since ichor's so much more efficient."
"So there is a practical limit to how much power you can use. What about a full demon? Would they pass out too?"
I shrugged. "Never seen it happen. You'd have to push them a lot harder. They can burn off about seventy, seventy-five percent of their ichor volume before collapse. I can burn a higher percentage since I've got human blood to pick up some of the slack, but since I've only got half as much to work with, it's no contest."
"Can't you just regenerate your ichor?" she asked.
"Zero sum game," I said. "Burning some ichor now for an equal amount being produced in the near future doesn't work. I can't produce ichor fast enough to make it worthwhile when I actually need it."
She clicked her tongue. "Can't you burn your human blood?"
The thought had occurred to me, many times. In blood is power, but you only get out what's in there to start with, and there isn't much power in human blood. That was why human mages needed symbols, spells, and runes in order to use magic. I reached for the bottle cap that I had popped off and dragged it across my thumb until I drew blood. I let it well up and tried to perform a simple parlor trick, a brief flame. It had always impressed girls when I lit a cigarette without a lighter. As usual, the blood puffed into smoke with no resulting flame. "Human blood just doesn't cut it."
"How long will it take you to recover? Do you recover as quickly as other demons?" She picked up the papers she had brought with her and shuffled them around. "I'm guessing you'll be fine in an hour or two, right?"
"Right." I would be fine in an hour or two. I would also be fine in ten minutes. Letting her underestimate my recovery rate was holding out, but maybe it would keep her from dragging me into dangerous situations. While I couldn't burn ichor or blood to regenerate ichor, I could burn a small amount of ichor to convert a larger amount of blood into ichor, or turn ichor into blood. It was part of the balancing act for a halfblood. Another part of that balancing act was making sure I didn't pop too many blood vessels from producing too much of one out of the other. There were some epic multi-colored nosebleeds in my past.
The Demon Inside Me Page 3