My mouth couldn’t get any drier. We called them demons, or djinn, or devils, or a hundred other names, every culture had stories about them. Before the Great Awakening they had been only stories and nightmares, despite the Magi who had worked for centuries to classify and make regular contact with them. Nobody knew if demons were gods, or subject to gods, or Something Else Entirely.
My vote went for Something Else. But then again, I’d always been the suspicious type. “Lucifer was the very first humanist,” I said. “I’m well aware of that, Your Highness.”
“Think of that before you open your mouth again,” he continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “Now get out, and do what you’re told. I give you Japhrimel as a familiar, Dante Valentine. Go away.”
“My lord—” Jaf began, and I rubbed my sweating hands on my damp jeans. I would need a salt tablet and a few liters of water—the heat was physical, pressing against my skin; sweat drenched my clothes.
“Get out,” Lucifer said. “Don’t make me repeat myself.”
I wasn’t about to argue. I looked at Jaf.
The demon stared at Lucifer for a moment, his jaw working, green eyes burning.
Green eyes. They both have green eyes. Are they related? Jeez, who knows? I swallowed again. The tension buzzed against the air, rasped against my skin.
Lucifer made an elegant motion with one golden hand. It was a rune, but not one I recognized.
Fire bit into my left shoulder. I screamed, sure that he’d decided to kill me after all, me and my big mouth—but Jaf stalked across the room, holding my scabbarded sword, and grabbed my elbow again. “This way,” he said, over my breathless howl—it felt like a branding iron was pressed into my flesh, the burning—and he hauled me back toward the door we’d come in through. I struggled—no not that again it HURTS it HURTS it HURTS—but when he opened the door and pulled me through there was no hall, just an icy chill and the blessed stink of human air.
CHAPTER 7
My shoulder ached, a low dull throbbing. It was dark. Rain fell, but I was dry. My clothes were dry, too. I was covered with the smoky fragrance of demon magic.
I blinked.
I was lying on something hard and cold, but something warm was against the side of my face. Someone holding me. Musk and burning cinnamon. The smell drenched me, eased the burning in my shoulder and the pounding of my heart, the heavy smoky pain in my lungs. I felt like I’d been ripped apart and sewn back together the wrong way. “ . . . hurts,” I gasped, unaware I was talking.
“Breathe,” Jaf said. “Just keep breathing. It will pass, I promise.”
I groaned. Kept breathing.
Then the retching started. He rolled me onto my side, still holding me up, and I emptied my stomach between muttering obscenities. The demon actually stroked my hair. If I tried to forget that he had just held a gun to my head, it was actually kind of comforting.
I finished losing everything I’d ever thought of eating. Retched for a little while. Then everything settled down, and I lay on the concrete listening to sirens and hovers passing by while the demon stroked my hair and held me. It took a little while before I felt ready to face the world—even the real human world—again.
I said I’d kiss the ground, I thought. Not sure I’d want to do that now that it’s covered in puke. My puke. Disgusting.
“I suppose this is pretty disgusting,” I finally said, wishing I could rinse my mouth out.
I felt the demon’s shrug. “I don’t care.”
“Of course not.” I tasted bile. “It’s a human thing. You wouldn’t care.”
“I like humans,” he said. “Most demons do. Otherwise we would not have bothered to make you our companions instead of apes.” He stroked my hair. A few strands had come loose and stuck to my cheeks and forehead.
“Great. And here I thought we were something like nasty little lapdogs to you guys.” I took a deep breath. I felt like I could stand up now. “So I guess I’ve got my marching orders, huh?”
“I suppose so.” He rose slowly to his feet, pulling me with him, and caught me when I overbalanced. He put my sword in my hands, wrapped my fingers around it, then held the scabbard there until I stopped swaying.
It was my turn to shrug. “I should go home and pick up some more stuff if we’re going to be chasing a demon down,” I told him. “And I need . . . well.”
“Certainly,” he said. “It is the Prince’s will that I obey.”
The way he said it—all in one breath—made it sound like an insult. “I didn’t do it,” I said. “Don’t get mad at me. What did he do to me, anyway?”
“When we get to your house, you should look,” the demon said, infuriatingly calm. “I hope you realize how lucky you are, Necromance.”
“I just survived a trip to Hell,” I said. “Believe me, I’m counting my blessings right now. Where are we?”
“Thirty-third and Pole Street,” he answered. “An alley.”
I looked around. He was right. It was a dingy little alley, sheltered from the rain by an overhang. Three dumpsters crouched at the end, blocking access to the street. Brick walls, a graffiti tag, papers drifting in the uncertain breeze. “Lovely,” I said. “You sure have a great flair for picking these places.”
“You’d prefer the middle of Main Street?” he asked, his eyes glowing in the darkness. I stepped sideways as soon as my legs seemed willing to carry me. His hands fell back down to his sides. “The Prince . . .” He trailed off.
“Yeah, he’s a real charmer, all right,” I said. “What did he do to my shoulder? It hurts like a bitch.”
“You’ll see,” was the calm reply. He brushed past me, heading for the mouth of the alley. “Let me move the dumpster, and we’ll call a cab.”
“Now you’ll call a cab, where before you had to drag me through the subway?” I chucked my blade free of its sheath, checked the metal. Still bright. Still sharp.
“It was necessary. Leaving Hell is not the same as entering it, especially for a human. I had to find an entrance you would survive, but falling back into mortality is not so hard.” He stopped, his back to me. “Not so very hard at all.” The light was dim—I’ve been in Hell all afternoon, I thought, and felt an insane giggle bubble up inside me and die away. Why do I always want to laugh at times like this? I wondered. All my life, the insane urge to giggle had popped up at the worst times.
“Great,” I muttered, shoving the blade back home. “All right, let’s go.”
He shoved one of the dumpsters aside as easily as I might have moved a footstool. I concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other without keeling over.
Neon ran over the wet street. Thirty-third and Pole was right in the middle of the Tank District. I wondered if it was a demon joke—but then, there was likely to be a lot of sex and psychoactives floating in the air here. It was probably easier to open a door between here and Hell around that kind of energy charge.
We splashed through puddles, the demon occasionally falling back to take my elbow and steer me around a corner. He seemed content to just walk silently, and I hurt too much to engage in small talk. I’d ditch him soon enough.
He hailed a cab at the corner of Thirtieth and Vine, and I fell into the seat gratefully. I gave my address to the driver—a bespectacled, mournful Polish man who hissed a charm against the evil eye when he saw my tattooed cheek. He jangled the antique rosary hanging from his faredeck and addressed all his replies to the demon; he couldn’t See that the demon was more of a threat than little old human me.
Story of my life. Guy didn’t mind the demon, but would have thrown me out of the cab if he could.
CHAPTER 8
Go ahead and make yourself at home,” I said as I locked the door. “There’s beer in the fridge. And wine, if you like that. I’ve got to take a shower.”
He nodded. “I should speak of Vardimal,” he said. “To familiarize you with—”
“Later,” I told him. My shoulder twinged. “Hey.”
He turned back
to me.
“What did he do to me?” I lifted the sword a little, pointing at my left shoulder with the hilt. “Huh?”
“The Prince of Hell has granted you a familiar, Necromance,” Japhrimel said formally, clasping his hands behind his back. He looked a little like a priest in his long black high-collared coat. I wondered where he hid the guns. I’d never heard of a demon with guns before. I should have studied harder, I suppose. But how the hell was I supposed to know that a demon would show up at my front door? I’m a bloody Necromance, not a Magi!
“A fam—” My brain started to work again. “Oh, no. I’m not a Magi. I don’t want—”
“Too late,” he informed me. “Go take your shower, I’ll keep watch.”
“Keep watch? Nobody knows I’m working for—” I put my back against the door. How did I get into this? I wondered—not for the last time, I might add.
“Your entry into Hell may have been remarked,” the demon said. “I’ll make coffee.”
I shook my head and brushed past him, heading for the stairs. “Gods above and below,” I muttered, “what did I do to deserve this?”
“You have a reputation for being honorable,” the demon supplied helpfully. “And your talents as a Necromance are well-known.”
I waved a hand over my shoulder at him. “Fine, fine. Just try not to set anything on fire, okay? Be careful with my house.”
“As my Mistress wishes,” he said. It would have been hard for him to sound more ironic.
I climbed the stairs, my legs aching. Even my teeth hurt. An hour into this job and I’m already wishing I was on vacation. I had to laugh, trailing my fingers along the painted wall. My sword seemed far heavier than it should be. Halfway up the stairs, under the altar niche, was a stash of three water bottles, and I snagged one. I fumbled in my bag for a salt tablet, took it. Dried sweatsalt crackled on my skin. I probably smelled like I’d been stuck in an oven. It was a miracle I hadn’t been hit with heatstroke.
I drained the water bottle, dropped my sword on my bed, put my bag inside the bathroom door, and started stripping down. I paused halfway to turn the shower on, and examined my left shoulder in the mirror.
Pressed into the skin was a sigil I’d never seen before, not one of the Nine Canons I knew. I was no demonologist, so I didn’t know what it meant, exactly. But when I touched it—the glyph shifting uneasily, ropy scar like a burn twisting under my fingertips—I hissed in a sharp breath, closing my eyes against a wave of heat.
I saw my kitchen as if through a sheet of wavering glass, the familiar objects twisted and shimmering with unearthly light. He was looking at my stove—
I found myself on my knees, gasping. I’ve read about this, I thought, oddly comforted. I’ve read about seeing through a familiar’s eyes. Breathe, Danny. Breathe. Breathe in, breathe out. Been doing it all your life. Just breathe. The tiled floor bit into my knees, my forehead rested against the edge of my bathtub. Steam filled the air. Gods, I thought. So that’s what they’re talking about when they say . . . oh, man. Heavy shit, dude. Can’t take the scene; gotta bail.
I’d just been given a demon familiar. Magi everywhere would be salivating—it was the high pursuit of every Magi, to achieve a working relationship with one of the denizens of Hell. I’d never done much in that arena—I had more than enough work to keep me busy inside my own specialty. But occult practitioners are a curious bunch—some of us like to fiddle around with everything when time permits. And a lot of the standard Magi training techniques were shared with other occult disciplines—Shamans, Journeymen, Witches, Ceremonials, Skinlin . . . and Necromances. After all, Magi had been the ones pursuing occult disciplines since before the Awakening and the Parapsychic Act. So I’d been given something most Magi worked for years to achieve—and I didn’t want it. It only complicated an already fucked-up situation.
The steam shifted, blowing this way and that. I looked up to see the water running in the shower. I was wasting hot water.
That got me moving. I stripped off the rest of my clothes with trembling fingers and stepped into the shower, loosing my hair with a sigh. I’ve been dyeing my hair black for years, to fit in with Necromance codes, but sometimes I wondered if I should streak it with some purple or something. Or cut the damn mess off. When I was young and in the Hall, every girl’s hair was trimmed boy-short except for the sexwitches. I suppose growing it out when I reached the Academy was another way of proving I was no longer required to follow any rules other than the professional ones. Purple streaks would look nice on me.
I’d been mousy blonde at the Hall. Dyeing your hair to fit in with the antiquated dress codes rubbed me the wrong way, but part of being an accredited Necromance was presenting a united front to the world. We were all supposed to look similar, to be instantly recognizable, dark-haired and pale with emeralds on our cheeks and accreditation tats if possible, carrying our swords like Shamans carried their staves.
Once I retire I’ll let it grow out blonde, maybe, I thought, and then the shock of unreality hit me again. I slumped against the tiled wall, my teeth chattering.
I traced a glyph for Strength on the tiles with a trembling finger. It flushed red for a moment—I was dangerously close to shock. And if I went into shock, what would the demon do?
I finished washing up and got out, dried off, and padded into my bedroom, carrying my bag. I was dressed in a few minutes, moving automatically, sticking my feet back into my favorite pair of boots. The mark on my shoulder wasn’t hurting now—it just ached a little, a flare of Power staining through my shielding and marking me like a demon to Sight. Black diamond spangles whirled through the trademark glitters of a Necromance’s aura, and I could see the mark on my shoulder, a spot of pulsing darkness.
Great. This will make work so much easier, I thought, and sighed. I needed food. My stomach was rumbling, probably because I’d puked everything out in a backstreet alley. I yawned, scratched under my wet hair, and scooped up my sword, dumping my salt-crusted clothes in the hamper.
Then I paced over to my file cabinet, passing my hand over the locked drawer. The locks—both electronic and magickal—clicked open, and I dug until I found what I needed. I didn’t give myself any time to think about it.
The red file. I held it in a trembling hand for a moment and then slammed the drawer shut. Scooped up my bag from the bed and stood for a moment, my knees shaking slightly, my head down, gasping like a racehorse run too hard.
When I could breathe properly again, I stamped down the stairs, pausing halfway to touch the Anubis statue set in the little shrine tucked in the niche. I’d need to light a candle to him if I survived this.
I found the demon in my kitchen, contemplating my coffeemaker with a look of abstract horror. It was the closest to a human expression he seemed capable of, with his straight saturnine face. “What?” I asked.
“You drink freeze-dried?” he asked, as if he just found out I’d been sacrificing babies to Yahweh.
“I’m not exactly rich, Mr. Creepy,” I informed him. “Why don’t you just materialize some Kona fresh-ground if you’re such a snob?”
“Would you like me to, Mistress?” There was the faintest suggestion of a sneer in his voice. He was still wearing the long black coat. I took a closer look at him. Long nose, winged cheekbones, strong chin . . . he wasn’t spectacular like Lucifer, or horrific like the thing in the hall. I shivered reflexively. He looked normal, and that was even more terrifying, once you really thought about it.
“Just call me Danny,” I mumbled, and stamped over to the freezer, pulling it open. I yanked the canister out. “Here’s the real coffee. I only get this out for friends, so be grateful.”
“You would call me a friend?” He sounded amazed now. It was a lot less like talking to a robot. I was grateful for that.
“Not really,” I said. “But I do appreciate you holding me up out of my own puke. I understand you’re just doing what Lucifer tells you and something tells me you don’t like me much, so we’ll
have to come to some kind of agreement.” I tossed the canister at him, and he plucked it out of the air with one swift movement. “You’re pretty good,” I admitted. “I’d hate to have to spar with you.”
He inclined his head slightly, his ink-black hair falling back from his forehead. “My thanks for the compliment. I’ll make coffee.”
“Good. I’m going to go think about this,” I said, turning my back on him. He looked like a piece of baroque furniture in my sleek, high-tech kitchen. I almost wanted to wait to see if he could figure out the coffeemaker, but I wasn’t that curious. Besides, demons have been fooling with technology for hundreds of years. They’re good at it. Unfortunately for humans, demons don’t like sharing their technology, which is rumored to be spotless and perfect. It occurred to me now that the demons probably were doing now what the Nichtvren had done before the Parapsychic Act—using proxies to control certain biotech or straight-tech corporations. Cloned blood had been a Nichtvren-funded advance; lots of immortal bloodsuckers had grown very rich by being the stockholders and silent partners in several businesses. I guess when you’re faced with eternity, you kind of have to start playing with money to assure yourself a safe nest.
I carried the file into the living room and collapsed on the couch. My entire body shook, waves of tremors from my crown to my soles. I balanced the file on my stomach, flung my arm over my eyes, and breathed out, my lips slackening. Training took over, brainwaves shifting. I dropped quickly into trance, finding the place inside myself that no genemap or scan would ever show, and was gone almost immediately.
CHAPTER 9
Blue crystal walls rose up around me. The Hall was immense, stretching up to dark, starry infinity, plunging down below into the abyss. I walked over the bridge, my footfalls resounding against the stone. My feet were bare—I felt grit on the stone surface, the chill of wet rock, the press of my long hair against my neck. Here, I always wore the white robe of the god’s chosen, belted with silver, the mark on my cheek burning. The emerald flamed, a cocoon of brightness, kept me from being knocked off the bridge and into endless wells of the dark. The living did not come here—except for those like me.