by Vicky Loebel
“I try to avoid murder.” The blue ward vanished; the coven-witch tumbled to safety. “Particularly my own.”
Rebecca staggered to her feet and fled up the stairs.
“On the other hand,” the sorceress gestured and set her ward back in place. “What sort of demon lets himself fry over a handful of insignificant soulstones?”
White liquid sizzled against Max’s toes. “I will destroy the soulstones before I surrender.” He stripped off the jacket and wrapped his feet to protect them. That just left everything from the shins up to vaporize. “I swear.”
No demon could break a promise. No human could afford the outright murder of a demon. Any sensible, self-preserving sorceress would back down right about now.
This one laughed lightly. “It’s not surrender as long as we agree on terms.” She tipped her head. “How about this? You take seven stones, I get one, and we both keep our skins?”
Seven stones. That was a reasonable compromise, one he could accept without shame. One person would remain a slave, but Margaret Elizabeth could set the other seven free.
Max sighed. Demons—some demons—collected the souls of people after they died. It took a human witch to commit that sort of atrocity against living beings.
“No deal.” With silent apologies, he emptied the bag of stones into the pool. There should have been a ceremony to ease the transition. His boss should have said a few words. But the end result was the same. Eight stolen soulstones vaporized in the goo. Eight liberated souls flashed back to their bodies. At dawn, eight people would reawake, safe and sound with their families.
Kate would deliver the orb to Margaret Elizabeth and that would be destroyed too. The coven Max had infiltrated would go back to palm reading and divination and leave the real magic to Hell.
Thus ends another successful Demonic Intervention. Max swallowed. Eliminating dangerous magical artifacts was an important job, one he believed in. And the rewards in karma made the risks worthwhile.
Usually.
The sorceress shook her head slowly. “How very uncompromising.” She sounded pleased. “Well, since that offer’s vaporized I’ll make another. Trade an unspecified promise. Give me your marker and you can leave here unharmed.”
Max’s marker amounted to a blank check on services. It could cause a lot more trouble than a couple of soulstones.
Oily liquid began to seep over his jacket.
“Despite the trust we’ve built up during our brief acquaintance,” he kept his face blank while his shins burned, “no.”
She tossed her head. “Then promise a simple favor. Swear you’ll help me achieve a mutually acceptable goal sometime in the future. Promise to keep this meeting secret and not to search for me or interfere in my life until then.”
A good demon knew when to accept a deal: once the terms were sufficiently vague and while there was still flesh on his bones.
“All right.” Max nodded. “Agreed.”
The blue protection ward vanished. The sorceress snapped her fingers and the white goo receded. Within seconds, it had been reabsorbed into the paper bird.
Max’s skin steamed painfully as the bird fluttered to her hand.
“I’ve met a lot of demons,” she said. “You’re the first who refused to sacrifice even one human to save himself.”
She made it sound like a test. “I’ve met a lot of witches.” Max shook his jacket and put it on. “They’re all power-crazed kooks.” He searched his pockets and found a battered kilt. Red plaid, printed with Scottie dogs. Kate’s idea of packing. “Are we finished? Or are you asking for help?”
“Not now. Not for a few years, I hope, but the day is coming.” The woman pulled off her veil and ash-blonde curls tumbled free. She was on the young side for so much power—early forties—but then, few sorcerers lived to old age.
“My name is Rose Woodsen,” she said. “I’ve got a task for you. A daughter who’s going to need your help. A Demonic Intervention I believe you’re much too moral to refuse.”
“Sounds lovely,” Max told her. “What is it?”
“All in good time. For now, honor your promise to keep out of my life!”
She snapped her fingers and with a puff of smoke, a flurry of owl wings, she was gone.
Max frowned at the single red rose left behind on the pavement. He’d botched things badly—letting himself get trapped, relying on the link to Kate through his phone. That promise to leave Rose Woodsen alone almost certainly meant trouble.
“Boss!” Kate’s panicked voice echoed through the tunnel. She flowed like mist down the open stairwell and materialized, brunette, long haired and leggy, clutching the soulstone orb in one hand and an assault rifle in the other. Men had been known to fall through open manhole covers, staring at Kate. That was one reason she was still stuck as a mid-karma demi.
“Boss, are you?” Her dark eyes took in the rubble behind him. The ruined asphalt. Max’s scarred shins.
The kilt.
A smirk spread slowly across Kate’s elegant features. She waved her weapon away and stored its miniaturized charm on a conspicuously empty silver bracelet.
Max winced. Kate’s missing charms would make an awkward item on their expense report. Along with the vaporized phone, the missing soulstones, the little coven-witch who’d nearly sliced off his…. He sighed and limped toward his Personal Spiritual Assistant, mentally composing their official report. Some details would have to be kept secret, thanks to his promise. Most details. Which might be just as well.
Not that it mattered. Max shrugged. He’d given Rose Woodsen his word. For good or bad, he couldn’t change the deal now.
Kate punched his shoulder. “Hot date?”
Max brushed past Kate and trudged up the stairs.
“It was magic.”
Keys to the Coven: available on Amazon.com
Hellfire Universe Glossary
MOST OF THE explanations of how the Hellfire Universe works can be found in the text of this novel, but a brief glossary is offered for convenience. Some of what appears here may include slight spoilers in the form of information that would otherwise have been parceled out in bits and pieces. Please note this is a purely fictional universe. No disrespect to existing religions or religious terms is intended.
Afterlife: The collective community of souls who are not eligible to move on after death. This group includes the residents of Hell (primarily demons) as well as assorted demis and ghosts who may remain in the living world.
Alcohol: Provides a handy source of energy for supernatural creatures, reducing the amount of karma needed to operate in the world. Although tastes vary, the widely known favorite is demon rum.
Beau Beauregard: War hero, vaudevillian, dancing heartthrob of Ali Baba’s Arabian Knights and the even more popular Blood of Ali Baba, Beau is a silent film star who agreed to grace Clara’s dance contest with his presence in return for a share of the profits. Sadly, Beau fell from one of the Hollywood Grand Hotel’s cascading golden balconies before the contest opened, suffering internal injuries that led to a lethal case of peritonitis. As Speakeasy Dead opens, Beau is on the cusp of dying amidst a crowd of doctors, nurses, and reporters in his suite at the Hollywood Grand Hotel.
Bernie: Bernard Benjamin (September 23, 1903- ): Clara’s cousin on her maternal side. Bernie’s father, Dr. Teddy Benjamin, was an English immigrant—descended from long distant royal blood, if Gladys is to be believed—who returned to his home country to aid in the Great War and died in 1915, leaving Bernie in the charge of Gladys. Bernie’s mother, Edith, a rare Woodsen who took her husband’s name, died giving birth to Bernie.
Binding: Magical subjugation of one soul by another. The bound soul loses free will, meaning his or her acts become the responsibility (and affect the karma) of the master. Demons sometimes agree to be bound temporarily to warlocks, usually as part of a summoning ritual, often hoping the warlock will run up a debt that makes it easier to eventually purchase the warlock’s soul.
Boy’s Book of Boggarts: A book of pithy advice for spiritualists.
Clara Woodsen (September 23, 1906- ): Bernie’s cousin, a much-indulged youngest Woodsen half-sister, fourth in line to inherit Eleanor’s gift of sorcery. Clara’s father, Bill Johnson, was a railroad man who died of influenza in 1918. Her mother, Martha Woodsen, died when she was born, passing the gift of sorcery onto her eldest daughter, Clara’s half-sister Eleanor.
Coven: An association of witches, usually seven or thirteen in number, who band together to pool magical resources.
Deal: An agreement with a demon. A demon (or other supernatural being) who breaks a deal is stripped of all karma and becomes the lowest, most abject slave, subject to the whim of every dead creature. A human who breaks a deal can be punished by any demon who feels like it, any way up to and including death.
Demi, also Genie: A "half-demon" indentured servant whose natural state is pure hellfire but who may take on physical form depending on the situation. Demis who earn enough karma are automatically promoted to full demon.
A person who sells his or her soul to a demon becomes (upon death) a demi who must work off the debt. This group includes most traditional supernatural creatures (fairies, sprites, the occasional vampire, etc.).
The highest ranking demis (Personal Spiritual Assistants), are essentially genies and have sweeping magical powers which they, of course, use faithfully in the service of their masters.
Although the term indentured servant is polite, demis are, in reality, slaves, bound emotionally and metaphysically to their demons through the mechanics of karma.
A demi who is untrustworthy may be sold, traded, or even bound permanently to a location or object, the latter making it nearly impossible to earn karma or advance.
Demon: The bureaucrats of the afterlife, demons are responsible for ushering dead souls through Hell and into one of two doorways controlled by angels. No demon can say for sure where these doors lead, although angels like to spread propaganda about reincarnation and Heaven.
There are two ways to become a demon. By selling your soul to a demon, becoming a demi, and working your way up through the ranks, or by dying in complete and utter despair. The second, much rarer, option was employed by Max some 300 years before the opening of Keys to the Coven.
Demons need karma and can get it through: (a) work (b) good deeds (c) glorious, life affirming sex with living humans or (d) purchasing human souls and putting them to work after death as indentured servants (demis).
A demon has free will, hellfire blood, and is nearly indestructible, but has strictly limited supernatural power. Most never leave Hell (except for an occasional warlock summoning) but some opt for karma-intense jobs in the living world, such as Max’s position as a Demonic Intervention agent.
To remain a demon, an individual must keep his or her karma within a specific range. A demon who drops below the minimum karma threshold is demoted to demi and auctioned; a demon who earns too much karma is promoted to angel. Demons can lie, murder, cheat, and steal, provided they pay the price in karma. But because prices are steep, they plan their misdeeds with care.
No demon ever willingly breaks a deal. To do so is to lose every bit of karma and be demoted to demi, to restart the afterlife as the lowest, most abject slave in Hell, subject to the command of every other dead soul.
See also: Demon, Physical Presence.
Demon, Physical Presence: Unlike Personal Spiritual Assistants, who shift in and out of hellfire at will, a demon has a permanent physical body with hellfire blood. This body is difficult to harm and quick to heal (by spending karma), but its loss means final death. As far as demons know, there is nothing beyond the afterlife. Their souls cease to exist along with their bodies.
By default, a demon has the body he or she died in. This can be modified with karma, but it’s considered more prestigious to stay close to the original.
Demonic Blood: Also called hellfire, the blood of full demons is the source of all magical power, the stuff of creation in the afterlife. A supernatural creature’s own personal karma can be used interchangeably with hellfire.
Dottie & Lottie Woodsen (1888- ): Clara’s second-eldest half-sisters are, as Bernie snipes, “Siamese twins joined at the brain.” Although not actually conjoined, the twins are known to be volatile, inseparable, somewhat limited in intelligence, and generally poor prospects to take over the coven should something happen to the childless Eleanor. They do, however, play violin beautifully.
Eleanor Woodsen (1886- ): Clara’s eldest, scariest half-sister, the current Woodsen sorcerer, dean of the coven, and consort to Roxashael (see Keys to the Coven).
Falstaff Ninepin Fellowship: The Woodsen family coven, organized around a ninepin bowling alley. The Falstaff Ninepin Fellowship building is adjacent to Mr. Wu’s Fine Advices, one block up from the train station in the mountain town of Falstaff, Arizona. In addition to a two-lane ninepin bowling alley, the Fellowship contains a small commercial kitchen, a bar, and several private rooms. The basement holds an alchemy lab on one side and, on the other, a combination meeting room and coven, complete with a large, hidden pentagram formed out of solid hellfire.
Familiar: A witch’s non-human assistant. The association is one of friendship rather than magical binding. Regular exposure to hellfire may give the familiar increasingly human intelligence and abilities.
Gaspar: A ghost who has spent several centuries, at least, functioning as a spirit guide and who has been attached to Luella Umbridge when she was three.
Genie: Another name for a high-karma demi, also known as a Personal Spiritual Assistant.
George Umbridge, Jr.: Luella’s older brother, a student at Howard Medical School, whom Luella rather ruthlessly plies with Jacques cocktails in order to get him drunk enough to help her in her escapades.
Ghost: A dead person that has chosen to linger in the afterlife. Demons and demis generally view them with contempt, but spiritualist humans have developed a form of low-cost magic that can be used symbiotically with ghosts.
Ghost magic: A symbiotic form of magic created between a human and his or her “spirit guide” which does not directly require the presence of hellfire. This makes it much less powerful than demonic/witch magic, but also involves almost no risk of losing one’s soul to a demon.
Girl’s Guide to Demons: A book of advice for would-be warlocks (male or female) written in the mid-eighteen hundreds, extensively annotated and reproduced despite the best efforts of demons to destroy all copies. The book contains information about the supernatural world as well as descriptions of many known demons, their likes and dislikes, how to summon and negotiate without automatically sacrificing one’s soul, and how to target a demon’s individual preferences. The Guide’s author is rumored to be serving a six-to-ten thousand year sentence inside an active volcano.
Gladys: Bernie’s family retainer/housekeeper, a golem passed down since the time, as Bernie puts it, King AEthelred forgot to pack his BVDs.
Golem: A magically created person, traditionally made of clay, deriving life, instructions, and moral guidelines from the magic scrolls that are place inside the golem’s head. There is an unsubstantiated rumor that the creation of a golem requires angelic intervention, and it’s generally accepted that even the most powerful warlock or demon avoids direct conflict with one.
Grover Aimsley: Ned Aimsley’s seven-year-old brother and aspiring cub newspaper reporter.
Hell: A metaphysical location where demons usher dead souls out of life.
Hellfire: Another name for demonic blood. The stuff of creation in the afterlife, hellfire is the one necessary ingredient in every spell. A supernatural creature’s personal karma can be used interchangeably with hellfire.
Demons have physical bodies with hellfire blood. Demis are made of pure hellfire and take on physical form as appropriate.
Hellfire Charm: A magical object with two forms: the one it’s used in, and a miniaturized version that can be triggered by a demi. The higher st
atus the demi, the more likely he or she is to be laden with hellfire charms.
Hollywood Grand Hotel: Joint venture of local coroner, Dr. George Umbridge, Senior, and millionaire William Randolph Hearst, the Hollywood Grand is an early example of art-deco (although the term was not yet in use) architecture with a cascading golden sequence of balconies, two-story sheets of glass, statues, fountains, and towering potted palms. Speakeasy Dead takes place during the gala opening of this grand hotel, located across the street from the Fellowship building.
Human Blood: Human blood is to demons as demonic blood is to humans. It can be used to strengthen magic (hellfire is still required) and to heal supernatural injuries. Because human blood is highly addictive, cautious demons prefer to spend karma to meet their physical needs.
Jacques Cocktail: The signature drink of the Hollywood Grand Hotel, created by mixing the jake spirits brewed from Jamaican ginger—an old family recipe of the Umbridges—with cheap rotgut provided by Stoneface Gibraltar.
Karma: The balance between good and evil, measured against a dead person’s behavior in the afterlife. Karma is the currency of the dead, the demonic equivalent of sex, power, money, and trading cards. It can be substituted for hellfire to fuel magic, used to heal a demon’s injuries, expended to meet his or her physical requirements, and extracted in payment for debts. Demons earn karma through good deeds, hard work, and glorious life-affirming sex with living humans. The amount of karma a dead person has determines his or her status. With the exception of warlocks, living humans are not subject to karma and are neither rewarded for good deeds nor punished for sins when they die.
Keys to the Coven: A Hellfire Universe contemporary urban fantasy/romance chronicling the (possible) end of the Woodsen family’s association with demons. Sample included in this book.
Limbo: A shifting metaphysical location outside the laws of karma which has a few fixed points of intersection with both the living world and Hell. People who experiment with magic sometimes become lost in Limbo where their souls eventually degrade (as in the case of shades) unless they’re lucky enough to find a way back. Demons use Limbo as a debt-settlement zone. Deals made in Limbo don’t apply in the living world and vise-versa.