“Trickery,” Pauz said. He made his way across the roof of the car, his claws scratching and poking through the metal as he did, eliciting nail-on-a-blackboard screeches. “Deception, lies.”
“A little more subtle than that, Pauz. I’m thinking… If we simply bind you and release you, it’s too obvious. He’ll bind you himself, whether you agree or not. But if we give the contract a time limit.”
“Hm?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I’m on the same page as the Imp here. Hm?”
“If we did the binding now,” Rose said, “and I’m not saying we should, we’d give it a time limit of sixty hours. Then you’re free. No fanfare, no announcement, nothing overt changes. We could even mock up a fake connection or binding to hide it, in case he bothers to check… but I don’t get the impression Conquest knows the ins and outs of demons and devils. He wouldn’t be dealing with this or relying on us if he did. You’re in our service and in our power when we turn you over to Conquest, as payment, the time limit runs out, and you’re free to do as you see fit, positioned right next to him.”
“With him there and listening,” Pauz said. “Easily swayed.”
“And,” Rose said, “If we can manage it, you’d have distractions.”
“You’re thinking about the other two,” I said. Fuck me, Rose. This isn’t playing with fire. This is playing with the big red button.
I’d almost protested out loud, but she’d asked me to play ball. I’d asked her to play nice enough times… I supposed this was where we really were the same person, or were siblings. It was only natural the tables would be turned, that she’d reflect my own personality traits.
“Yeah, I’m thinking about the other two,” Rose said. “We have to deal with them one way or another, anyhow. Let’s use them.”
“I’ll need time to consider,” Pauz said.
So do I.
“We can give you that,” Rose said.
“You can return tomorrow,” Pauz told us. “The Dowght home. My realm.”
“No,” Rose said. “Tonight, not tomorrow. We’re on a schedule.”
“Tonight,” Pauz conceded.
“Neutral ground,” I added.
“My realm,” Pauz said, his eyes narrowing. “You’re ‘on a schedule’. It is where you’ll find me, diabolists.”
“We’ll also need a promise of safety, for my companion, when he leaves this circle,” Rose said.
Pauz didn’t reply.
“The deal is off the table if you don’t,” Rose said.
“If I don’t,” Pauz said, “You die. You’ll get colder, others will ask you to move. Something will force you from that meager defense. Then the crows take your eyes, and the dogs eat the softer bits of you.”
“Not me,” Rose said. “My companion? Sure. But you’d only really get one of us.”
“Hey,” I said.
“I suppose it’s up to you, imp of the fifth choir,” Rose said. “One more death at your hands… or a chance to manipulate Conquest itself, possibly affecting this whole city.”
“Or,” he said, “I ask what you’re willing to give me.”
“You’re trying to extort from me?” Rose asked.
Pauz didn’t reply. He left his question hanging in the air.
“My name is Rose Thorburn,” Rose said. “Your kind knows of my blood. Demons greater than you have dealt fairly with us, insofar as there is ever a fair deal. What will they think, if a mere imp were to disrupt that arrangement?”
“Depends who you asked,” Pauz said. His voice was a low growl, tense and wary.
“I’d ask the big names,” Rose said. “Shall I say them? Shall I speak the names of the higher members of the fifth choir? I’d need only say them once, and we would have their attention. Say them five times, and I could negotiate with one of the entities you answer to.”
Pauz was tense.
“You’re not even a pawn to them, Pauz,” Rose said. “You’re not even a pawn on their pawn’s chessboards, so to speak. You’ve been largely forgotten, and I don’t think you want to be remembered. Not when you’re in the act of spoiling a longstanding working arrangement. Not when I could ask them to remove them from the picture as a bargaining point they wouldn’t even think twice about.”
“Brave words, from the woman in a mirror inside a very fragile circle,” Pauz said.
I had only a split second to think about it. I stepped out of the confines of the rabbit-gore circle, passing the threshold, moving closer to Pauz.
Radio static. Outside of the circle, I could feel his presence. It was like radio static in my head. White noise that wasn’t pleasant to listen to, fuzzing around the edges. Prickling at my skin, making me irritable, hypersensitive to everything that might bother me otherwise. The nip of the cold, the discomfort where the hatchet’s holster bunched up my boxers beside my balls, and the feeling of sweat-soaked clothes pressing against my shoulders and back.
Senses in overdrive, distracting white noise.
I could smell him, now. Feces, hot garbage, and blood. More of the same, a physical representation of a presence that was radiating into the area.
I wondered how different this would have played out, without the circle. Would the meeting have opened with a hit of static and stench that would have rocked my senses, kept me from maintaining my senses?
Despite the distractions, I still advanced closer, kept my shoulders square, chin up, my gaze level. I couldn’t react to anything I was experiencing; I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to get my bearings and remain stoic in the face of it all.
I had to move around the snowbank that separated the two driveways to draw closer. My hand involuntarily clenched as the sense of distortion built up. The noise of it steadily increased, dissolving my thoughts now. No longer did I have that one concrete line of thoughts, all the other thoughts at the edges, cross-checking, comparing, searching for ways to expand or elaborate the thought.
Just one, one idea plodding along, and everything outside of that one line of thinking was noise and chaos, working against instead of with.
Dimly, I was aware that what I was doing was stupid, walking headlong into the radiation. I heard flapping nearby, the crows drawing nearer.
The idea became an action, singular, an impulse.
Rose spoke, and I wasn’t entirely able to make it out. The flapping continued, but they weren’t drawing nearer, now.
Somewhere along the way, I crossed another ten feet, reaching the car at the end of the driveway. I had the hatchet in my hand as I looked up at Pauz.
I thrust it out, into the side window of the car. The top of the hatchet’s blade punched through the glass, and frost spread out from the impact site.
Pauz moved back a half-foot as the frost spread along the car’s exterior.
I stayed there, arm extended, hatchet sticking through the shattered window of the car.
I wasn’t able to do much else, besides fight the pressure.
Rose said something else. “Do I need to say a name? Baph-”
“No,” Pauz interrupted. “There is no need. Go, diabolist.”
The word was enough. The order, almost. Still stiff-necked, back straight, I turned to leave. I fought the urge to stop when I saw the animals waiting, clustered on the snowbanks, at the edges of driveways, lurking in the shadows beneath and beside cars. Dogs, crows, rabbits and cats, all in ill-health.