Before I could do anything else, I had to pull my hair back, but since it was shorter now, doing so was a quick process.
“Is hairdressing really necessary?”
I wound the elastic band around it to hold it in place. “Loose hair falls across the eyes and creates a vision impairment. Gives the enemy an advantage.”
“Why don’t you just… cut it all off?”
“My wife likes my hair a little longer.” For centuries, men had done stupider things for worse reasons.
Though it was getting hard to see in the dark, I thought I saw him frown as I slipped the chest piece over my head. “You’re not wearing a cross.”
“Should I be?” Ninety percent of my clients mentioned it.
“Isn’t it… I mean, don’t you need protection?”
“The only thing that gives a cross power is the belief behind it, Mr. Kidd. It’d be useless in my hands.” Not entirely true. Faith was just another tool to harness magical ability. I had a distinct lack of both.
Though the night cooled quickly, the padding beneath my armor was stifling. Hopefully, this would be a quick negotiation and I could get it off.
“You don’t believe in God?” The concept obviously baffled him. It’s not an unusual reaction, but it was one that required more explanation than I usually had the patience to give.
“I suppose there’s something larger than myself at work. But I’ve never seen him, or her, or whatever. So I tend to believe in myself. In the end, I’m the only one who can let me down.”
He shook his head in amazement. “How can you see demons, believe in demons, and not believe in God?”
I had to grin. “Funny how that works, isn’t it?” Even amongst the people who do what I do, I’m an anomaly. I know this. Ivan lectures me on my lack of faith. He doesn’t understand that I do have faith. I have faith in myself.
Mira, on the other hand, carries more than enough faith in the unknown for both of us. The undersides of my leather bracers were carved with intricate patterns. It was Marty’s craftsmanship, but Mira’s precise design. As I slid them on, I swore I could feel a faint tingle, the sensation of Mira’s protective spells settling into place. I consider that the power of mental suggestion. I knew she’d put them there, so I imagined I could feel it. I suppose I did have more faith than I give myself credit for. I had faith in Mira.
Full dark had fallen by the time I finished my preparations and settled my sword on my hip. I sat the squirt bottle of nastiness on the hood of the truck, then motioned for Kidd to step out into the grass. “Go ahead. Call it.”
“You… aren’t going to draw a circle or anything? To… confine it?”
“You can, if you think it’ll work.” I shrugged, the chain jingling faintly. I’ve never seen a circle confine a summoned demon, even if I did have the juice to lay one myself.
Think on that, kiddies. Once you say that name, you give up all kinds of rights. When you speak that name, that demon has permission to be here with very few controls on its behavior. Sure, it can’t hurt you unless you let it, but you also can’t just tell it to sit and stay like a good puppy. Bargains, that’s all they understand. Their language is one of negotiation, tit for tat. And if they can get a bigger tit for a smaller tat, they will.
“Just call it.”
With one last uncertain look in my direction, Kidd stepped out into the tall grass and took a deep breath. “ !”
Not a sound meant for human mouths to utter, it should have been something impossible to pronounce. For one brief shining moment, my sanity rejected the unfathomable tangle of vowels and consonants and rage and despair and greed and… It’s impossible to explain how all that can be rolled up into one word. Pray-if you’re the type that prays-you never understand it.
I tried not to listen, tried to shut out the sound, but a demonic name is something that gets under your skin, into your skull. My ears rang, and my spine tried to crawl out of my body and run away whimpering. The logical part of my mind, the part that screamed that such a thing could not be, was reduced to raving gibberish, and the name lodged there, finding a home amongst others of its kind.
I willed my heart to slow, my breathing to resume a steady cadence. Releasing my grip on my sword was a concentration of effort, one joint, one finger at a time.
With the name seared permanently into my psyche, I could roll it around and compare it to the others that resided there. No, this was not one I’d tangled with before. There was always that possibility: that a demon I’d beaten could regain enough strength to come across again. It hadn’t happened yet. I’m not looking forward to it if it ever does. Demons don’t strike me as the kind to forgive and forget.
Nothing happened at first. Kidd shot me a puzzled look, but I kept my eyes on the edges of the dark clearing. Our bad boy wanted to make an entrance. Demons always did.
Quite often, animal vision is based on movement. You can hide in plain sight of most creatures, so long as you keep very still. In the dark, humans are reduced to animals, the shades of gray and black blending into nothing, leaving us with only our most primitive instincts to guide us. And the first flicker of movement in the trees caught my attention instantly.
An old god stepped from the trees, moonlight casting dappled shadows over a stag’s haunches, though the moon should have been dark for days yet. Leaves and vines twined about the bare male chest, catching in the antlers atop a curly head. He came forward with slow, stately steps, a look of profound sadness on his aged face.
I smirked. Drawn by the feel of Mira’s magic, he’d chosen his form. It was a good show, to be sure, but if he was looking to awe and impress, he’d misread his audience.
I heard Kidd gasp when he first spotted the god-demon, and wondered what he saw. Illusion was easy, even for the weakest of demons. People were inclined to see what they wanted to see. I doubted this one had the strength to take on the stag-god’s form in truth, so Kidd most likely saw whatever his mind conjured when it thought the word “demon.”
When it got close enough, I reached in the window of my truck and flipped on the headlights. The demon drew back with a hiss, out of character with the wise and benevolent god he tried to ape, and shielded his eyes. “Rise and shine, Sparky.”
From the look on Kidd’s face, I was pretty sure he was about to collapse. I shrugged at him, armor chiming. “What, you prefer something more dignified? Into the light, I command thee, foul demon?” I picked up the squirt bottle and stepped into the circle of light.
The god-demon glared at me behind the shadow of his hands, but it would not cross that barrier between light and dark. As far as I know, the light doesn’t actually hurt them. But man, they don’t like it.
“True form now. Please.” Politeness costs nothing. Yet. To illustrate what was going to happen if it refused, I sprayed the spice mixture into the air, adding cayenne to the scents of wilderness.
The demon growled softly. “You come with threats? Who are you to command me?” The voice slid through my mind like an oil slick, oozing taint and power.
“Pleased to meet you. Hope you guess my name.” That joke never gets old. I slay me. “True form. Now.” I changed the squirt bottle from mist to stream. It was like setting the phasers to kill.
It growled again, but the change was made. There was no mystic transition, no light show or swirls of smoke. One moment, he was simply one thing; the next, something else. That something prowled the edge of the light on four legs, and gleaming teeth glistened with the snarl. Hackles of ebon fur bristled in irritation.
I suppose I could call it a hellhound, but it just felt so cliche. It was definitely no Scuttle. I was dealing with a higher order denizen of Hell here, one I not so affectionately dubbed a Skin-that being what I wanted to turn it into.