ã€ŠTimothy&#x27;s Demonã€‹


 Prologue: The Last Temptation of James Kovak

    Chandler, Arizona - August 17, 1986

    Jim Kovak pushed his way out the door and slapped his demon in the face.

    She could have taken it, but she knew better. She fell to the ground and let him step over before she started to beg. She grabbed the cuff of his jeans and begged him to come back, but Jim wasn¡¯t listening.

    The rage was on him, and there was too much whiskey between him and the world. He stomped to his truck and roared off. Murder lingered behind him like dust. The demon slipped dimensions and followed him. Tears flowed down her face and formed a chain of tiny spheres in the gray.

    The sign in front of the trailer park used to say Stardust, but the A fell off six years ago, and the D buried itself in Mabel Taylor¡¯s roof during the big storm. Today, the sign would be destroyed, and it would never be replaced.

    Jim stumbled as he stepped out of his truck, but he didn¡¯t quite fall. The door to Maria¡¯s trailer was locked, but one good kick took it off the hinges. Jim¡¯s eyes were blurry with tears, but he could find his way around here in the dark. He lumbered down the hallway, using both hands to steady himself against the walls.

    There was music coming from her bedroom, a powerful beat, with lyrics in Spanish. The door was open, and Jim could see something moving inside.

    He kicked the door wide and saw two forms on the bed. Maria was sitting upright with her body arched toward Heaven. Her hair hung in black curls all the way down her back. Her mouth was open, and her eyes were closed. Her breasts were pointed at the sky, presented like an offering to some pagan god.

    And then he saw the man underneath.

    * * *

    Maria didn¡¯t hear Jim kick her door down. She was lost in the music, lost in the heat. She didn¡¯t see him until he opened the bedroom door.

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    Jim always said he could do magic. He would stomp around the trailer and bellow about power and destiny. He said he was the most powerful mage on Earth. He said he wasn¡¯t afraid of angels or demons or cops. He said he could kill a thousand cops. He said he could have anything he wanted, but all he ever wanted was another beer.

    Maria didn¡¯t believe him. Jim said a lot of things when he was drunk. But when she saw him standing in her bedroom door, his body was glowing with an evil red light. It covered him head to toe, leaking from his eyes and mouth. Jim Kovak looked like the devil himself.

    Maria saw that light and believed everything, right before she died.

    * * *

    Jim¡¯s magic came from the sky like red lightning, cutting through the roof like tissue paper, striking Maria square in the chest. It blasted through her body, down through the bed and the floor and the foundation underneath. The man beneath her turned into a pile of burned meat. Jim could smell cooked flesh, mixed with the scent of Maria¡¯s perfume.

    Maria went still, and the magic left him all at once. By the time he got to her bedside, Jim was just a man again. Dizzy and sick, he couldn¡¯t remember where he was. Maria¡¯s face was frozen, locked in a permanent expression of surprise. Her eyes were still open. Jim grabbed her face and stared into them, shaking her to try and make them blink.

    Her face was hot, like she had a terrible fever. Jim tried to stroke her hair, but he used too much force. Her body tipped over and fell to the floor. Jim was amazed at how light she was, like she wasn¡¯t even a person anymore.

    Jim couldn¡¯t face what he¡¯d done, but he knew he had to leave. He staggered into the sunlight, blinking and coughing in the smoke. The world was on fire. Trailers were burning in all directions. Thick black smoke made columns in the air. The ground was covered with bodies. Some of them were trying to crawl away.

    Jim hadn¡¯t cast a spell in years. He was sloppy and drunk and out of practice. He tried to call one lightning bolt and got thirty.

    Jim looked to his left and saw a line of survivors, huddled against the wall of a big trailer. They were staring at him, pressed against each other like they were trying to hide in plain sight.

    These people were alive. Everything Jim loved was dead, but these people were alive. No one should be alive today. Maria was dead, and they should be dead, too. The power surged, eager to help him kill them. Then he heard the sirens and collapsed, sobbing and defeated in the dirt.

    The police found him in Maria¡¯s trailer, trying to shake her body back to life. His demon wept as they took him away.

 Chapter 1: Timothy

    My name is Timothy Kovak. I died six months ago, and I¡¯m finally writing the story of my life. I always meant to do this when I was alive, but I never found the time. That¡¯s the irony of being dead; you finally have time to do all those things you promised yourself, now that you¡¯ve lost the life you wanted to do them in.

    Older souls recommend journaling as therapy for the new dead. Wrap your life up in a neat little package so it¡¯s easier to leave behind. Grieve for your loved ones; grieve for yourself. Sounds reasonable, but I think my advisers have ulterior motives. The angels want to use my life as some kind of cautionary tale, and the demons just want me to punch up the sex.

    This is my life, written pretty much in real time as they made me watch it, sitting in front of this big mirror in Purgatory, with an angel acting as my interrogator and prison guard.

    There¡¯s a lot of temptation in a book like this - temptation to make yourself look stronger than you were, temptation to leave out failures and gloss over mistakes. I admit some big mistakes in this book, but I didn¡¯t leave anything out. I need you to see who I was, with all my weakness and stupidity intact.

    This is a story about a family that made a deal with demons, the story of how I learned magic - a confession about what I sold my soul for, and a story about the decisions that got me killed.

    * * *

    Purgatory is the ultimate gated community, like a spa for dead people. My cell is an acre of immaculate grassland, bright and green, grown to a perfect two inches. I¡¯ve never seen anybody cut it. In Purgatory, even the grass takes orders.

    Last week, I walked to the edge of my cell and tried to find some other people. My prison is a perfect square, hovering in astral space, more of a metaphor than a physical place. When you walk to the edge, you can see the lights of Heaven far above and the smoke of Hell far below.

    The borders are protected by an invisible wall, a transparent membrane that resists when I push against it. Sometimes I fall backward and float in the membrane, staring up at Heaven, thinking about the long fall to Hell.

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    Yesterday, Azael found me resting there, but he didn¡¯t scold me. He joined me in the gray. We hovered on our backs and watched the lights of Heaven, like a pair of children looking at clouds.

    Azael doesn¡¯t talk about it, but I can see the longing on his face. He tells me to take my time, but I think he¡¯s just being polite. He wants to rush my trial. He wants to go home.

    I try to write, but most days, I just wander, like a mental patient with grounds privileges. I sit on marble benches and stare at the memory pools. The angels swoop in like doctors, asking questions about my past, conjuring memories of people I used to know.

    They have a hundred fountains in this place, fed with water from the river Lethe. In Heaven, it helps you remember. In Hell, it makes you forget. In Purgatory, you can stare at the water and see things that happened to you, like a third-person movie of your life.

    You can sit on the grass and watch yourself fuck up. Azael caught me cursing yesterday, screaming like a football fan, upset by a bad call. I yell and cry and throw rocks in the water, but nothing ever changes. Just the same flawed person making the same dumb mistakes, over and over again.

    I¡¯m not stalling for time; I¡¯m just a slow writer. I don¡¯t care where I go anymore. I just want it to be over.

    That¡¯s what we talked about yesterday - my confession. They give me pens and parchment, but my longhand is impossibly slow. I type a hundred words per minute, but there are no computers in the afterlife.

    Azael offered me a typewriter, but there¡¯s no electricity up here. Manual keys are even slower than my cursive, so I finally convinced him to let me type this at a keyboard on Earth. I¡¯m writing this on a glorified word processor, locked in the basement of a condemned high school, enjoying the angelic equivalent of a halfway house.

    I spend my days reliving memories in Purgatory, and every night, the angels escort me back to Earth. I¡¯m a ghost now, barely solid enough to hit the keys. I haunt this room every night, writing my confession. I tried to send an email from beyond the grave, but the network lines were stripped out years ago, and I can¡¯t leave the room.

    Every morning, I finish my pages and print two copies - one for the angels, one for the demons. Messengers retrieve them and replace the paper. The Imp is named Philo. The cherub doesn¡¯t talk.

    Philo and I have become friends. A trip to Earth is like Vegas for him - a golden opportunity to goof off and collect contraband. He limps from my room every morning, loaded down with whiskey and cigarettes.

    * * *

    Azael didn¡¯t want to leave me on Earth. He thought I might try to escape. In Purgatory, he can see my memories, but down here, my thoughts are my own. When I delivered my first batch, he tapped his finger on the pages and said, ¡°Don¡¯t lie to me. I¡¯ll know.¡±

    That was two weeks ago. It sounds like a bluff, so I called it. I lied three times in this chapter, and nobody¡¯s caught it yet.

 Chapter 2: Red Cards

    First day of kindergarten, they took my blood and ran it through a big machine. I remember being scared of it, the way it clanked and whirred and growled when they fired it up. A hundred vials of blood in a centrifuge, spinning until it looked like a solid red wheel.

    One by one, the vials flared under white light. Each time a sample went by, the machine spat out a card, red or blue. I was only six, but I knew what that meant. People who got a blue card never had to worry about jobs or friends or money again. A blue card meant you had magic inside you. A blue card meant you were special.

    I spent my childhood dreaming about what I would do with my powers, but I got a red card, just like everybody else. I crumpled it in my hand and cried as the nurse led me out. My mother was in the lobby, waiting with all the other mothers in my class. I remember the fear on her face. She had a fresh tissue in her hand and a pile of wadded tissues at her feet. The floor was littered with red cards, discarded like petals from a perfect square rose.

    Mom saw the card in my hand and started to cry. I thought she was sad, but she picked me up and spun me around, laughing tears of joy. It didn¡¯t make sense. Mom was happy that I got a red card, happy that I wasn¡¯t special. I didn¡¯t know why until my twenty-fifth birthday, the day the demons came.

    * * *

    I spent my childhood in a disjointed dream world of movies, music, and comic books. I had elaborate daydreams about magic and hero stuff, but I didn¡¯t really understand it. Magic was the province of heroes and freaks - celebrities and criminals and people on TV. Magic was everywhere, but ordinary people could go their whole lives without touching it.

    People on the street saw two kinds of magic: awesome viral super fights with gifted criminals, and the open stage at Harvard Square - street wizards and armchair illusionists, conjuring pornographic wood nymphs and dragons made from computer chips.

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    Eight billion people in the world, but less than one percent had magic inside them. One of every two thousand people had the power, and most of those were genetic savants - low-power novelty acts who can rig dice games or light matches from across a room. Maybe ten percent of gifted people could do something useful, and less than five percent of those could learn spells. Normal people can¡¯t really see the runes that let you cast magic. They¡¯re just simple shapes unless you have the right kind of chemistry in your brain. You can¡¯t learn the power. You have to be born with it.

    In 2058, the year I turned twenty-five, there were six hundred mages in the United States. Half of them had trained at Newbury Tower, next door to Boston University, where I was maintaining my awesome 2.89 GPA, training to be a database engineer.

    Boston was considered the most magical place in America, thanks to some kind of unfinished portal that manifested like a magical geyser, blasting raw power into the sky every few hours, increasing the background magic in the atmosphere, making this the easiest place to learn and use magic in the United States.

    Still, even in Boston, magic was something that happened to other people. You could see news stories about demon summoning and magic duels, but after a while, magical events took on the character of lightning strikes and plane crashes. You knew magic was happening somewhere, but you never thought it would happen to you.

    I lived a mundane life for twenty-five years, so when the magic came down on me, I didn¡¯t know what to look for. Ancestors from previous centuries would have seen it, but halfway through the twenty-first, magic was dismissed as old-fashioned, even a little embarrassing, like an old hit record that your parents used to like.

    Mages were treated like fallen royalty. They turned their noses up at technology, while scientists were racing to make them obsolete. Science got better results, and it had a better reputation. Magic was genetic. Science was for everybody.

    All the best jobs were in robotics, but I was hopeless with tools. I was caught in the middle, in love with magic, but snared by technology. I was a college dropout with half a degree in database management, seduced by a job that took me out of school with the promise of corporate perks and easy money.

    All my red cards had been stored away, hidden in my closet with barely adequate report cards and a box of old toys. I tried to eat lunch in front of the tower sometimes, but they put me in my place the first day. They didn¡¯t need another poser in the tower. I could kiss ass and daydream all day, but I would always be mundane.

 Chapter 3: Judy

    My father was an asshole and my mother died when I was eight, but angels don¡¯t care about any of that. All they care about is demons, and I didn¡¯t meet a demon until the day I turned twenty-five. Angels don¡¯t really care about why you did shit, but if you really want to understand the mistakes I made that day, I have to tell you about a girl, the girl who was supposed to be the love of my life.

    Judy and I had been together since high school, one way or the other. We met in drama class. The new corporate administrators weren¡¯t willing to spend extra money on theater at Watertown Co-Op; they gave the class to a football coach.

    Judy was discovering her love of theater, and I was suffering through my humanities requirement. I wanted to take a drafting class, but dad had other ideas. He thought drama might breathe some life into his shy, reclusive son. He never knew how right he was.

    I enjoyed watching people, but my own performances were shallow. I didn¡¯t forget lines, but my delivery was flat. I had a nice voice and a good memory, but I couldn¡¯t just lose myself the way others did. I was not a good actor. I knew it, and the other students knew it. I saw them cringe every time I took the stage. The giggles hurt my pride, but I kept trying. Coach thought I was brave, but there were other forces at work. I had my eye on a girl.

    I noticed Judy after my first monologue. My performance was dreadful - bad, to the point of comedy. The snickers turned into groans, but I kept going for three minutes, until Coach stopped me and sent me back to my seat. No one else would look at me, but a brown-haired girl in the front row turned around and said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry - everybody sounds like that the first time.¡±

    It was nothing, really - just a simple act of kindness, but when the girl turned around, the tip of her ponytail brushed my hand. Judy smiled at me and blinked her big brown eyes, and I fell like a rock. Judy had confidence - the effortless joy of someone who had never been hurt.

    I was ready to drop the class, but the moment I saw Judy, I attacked the arts with supernatural vigor. Our first play was Macbeth. Judy played Lady Macbeth. I took three steps on stage and handed a scroll to the King. Our second play was Scotland Road. Judy played the female lead. I was an intern at the hospital. Our third play was Brighton Beach Memoirs. Judy was Mrs. Murphy. I helped them take down the set.

    Every student had to do a scene for their final project. Judy was assigned to me by the coach. Coach thought his best student might extract some hidden passion from his worst. It worked a little too well.

    We practiced every day after class. We spent hours on stage, rehearsing some obscure duet about a married couple in a diner. In the afternoon, we would work, and every night, we would talk. Well, Judy would talk. Mostly I just listened.

    I still remember Judy that way, sitting cross-legged on that dusty old stage. We talked about everything: parents and school, teachers and classmates. And later, as the sky turned gray, we talked about the future. Judy wanted to perform on Broadway, or maybe open an art gallery downtown.

    I talked about becoming an architect, or maybe going to law school. Three weeks before our final performance, Judy and I had our first kiss. Her dad trusted her, and my dad was always at the bar, so we had been on stage for hours, talking and laughing way past the time we should have been home. The school was dark. Even the custodians had gone home.

    Judy was talking about how much she loved performing. I moved a little closer and asked her why. She wasn¡¯t really a thoughtful person, but this question hit something deep. Like for the first time, she showed me who she really was.

    I couldn¡¯t see anything but the outline of her face. She kept her eyes on the door, too embarrassed to look at me. ¡°I¡¯m the best actor in class, but I¡¯m not very pretty. The pretty girls can¡¯t act, but they get good parts anyway. I have to work harder for mine. Everywhere else, people ignore me. I just kind of... fade into the background. But when I¡¯m on stage, people look at me. They watch me and they smile, and they laugh at my dialog, just like they would if I was pretty.¡±

    I was stunned. How could someone be beautiful and not even know it? I didn¡¯t know what to say, but I had to say something. The words came out worse than nonsense. I said, ¡°That¡¯s the stupidest thing I ever heard!¡±

    I had never raised my voice to her before. Judy was so surprised; she didn¡¯t even have time to feel hurt. She just cocked her head and said, ¡°What?¡± like I was speaking a foreign language.

    I was on automatic pilot. The cliche tumbled out of my mouth. ¡°You¡¯re the prettiest girl I¡¯ve ever seen!¡±

    The flattery made her nervous, so she tried to blow it off. She patted my hand. ¡°You don¡¯t have to say that. I know I¡¯m not ugly; I just wish I was prettier sometimes. I¡¯m cool with it, most of the time.¡±

    But I wasn¡¯t about to let this go. I lurched to my feet and pounded the dust off my jeans. I was too frustrated to speak. I just paced in a circle, running fingers through my hair.

    After three circles, I picked up my script and waved it at her. ¡°You think I like doing this shit?¡± I crumpled the pages into a ball and pitched them into the seats. ¡°I didn¡¯t even want to take this stupid class! I wanted to take drafting, but my father said I should go out and meet people! I don¡¯t give a shit about people!

    ¡°Everybody in this school is so stupid! All they talk about is their stupid clothes and their stupid parties and their stupid mind games about sex that never happened! You¡¯re the only interesting girl in this whole damn place! You think all the boys want a girl with holo implants and colored hair? Fuck that! My friend Tommy did Julie Mitchell¡¯s homework for three years. Now she won¡¯t even say hello to him in the hall!

    ¡°Is that the kind of person you want to be? You¡¯re not pretty because of clothes or implants or mods. You¡¯re pretty because you¡¯re real! Your hair is gorgeous, and your skin is perfect and when you look at me over your glasses, I can¡¯t even remember my name! I¡¯ve spent three months working up the courage to ask you out, and you sit here whining because you think you¡¯re ugly? That¡¯s the stupidest thing I¨C¡±

    That¡¯s when she kissed me. Judy hit me so hard, I lost my balance and fell backwards onto the stage. I landed on my ass and slid three feet toward the edge; Judy had to grab my sleeve to keep me from falling off the end. Our first kiss was clumsy, so we decided to try again.

    * * *

    For the rest of high school, it was perfect - the happiest time in my childhood. Judy took me to art galleries; I took her to old movies. And we both pretended to enjoy it.

    As juniors, we both joined the speech team. Judy did contest plays. I joined the debate squad. What I lacked in passion, I made up for with research. I didn¡¯t believe in myself, I believed in my work.

    Sometimes smarter students would match my evidence and surprise me with obscure lines of attack. Those were my favorites. I lost a lot, but those matches brought out the best in me.

    Between rounds, I would meet Judy at the snack bar. Our love bloomed in a string of cafeterias, consecrated with flat soda and Styrofoam cups full of candy. She would always be frantic after a show. I would just sit there and watch, mesmerized by her energy.

    Most schools blocked devices during tournaments, so when we couldn¡¯t talk, we would scribble love notes on legal pads and exchange them as we passed in the hall. I kept every note Judy ever wrote to me, long after I should have thrown them away.

    We lost our virginity together during state finals, huddled in a bargain room at the Holiday Inn. Boys weren¡¯t allowed on the same floor with the girls, so I had to sneak out of her room at 5 a.m. I can still remember watching the sun rise through those dirty windows, alone in my room the next day.

    We had stayed up all night. I lost all three rounds and Judy blew her monologue, but neither one of us gave a damn. We didn¡¯t have much time for sex when we got back to school, but when the moments came, we made the most of them. Judy was always the first to leave.

    At that point, my mother had been dead for nine years. I was used to being alone while dad worked weird hours, but during my senior year, it got worse. I would come home to an empty house, with an empty fridge and no money for dinner, waiting for dad to stagger home from the bar at 2 a.m., smelling like whiskey and whatever woman he had just been with.

    But when dad was out on ¡°dates,¡± Judy and I could use the house. I almost had a heart attack the night he caught us. He came home early one night and found Judy in the kitchen, wearing nothing but one of my shirts.

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    I was expecting a confrontation, but Dad just said, ¡°Sorry,¡± and walked right back out. Father and son carried on for a week like nothing happened. The next Friday, Dad said, ¡°I¡¯ll be gone until midnight.¡± Then he paused, appraising me somehow. ¡°I made some big sacrifices to get you in this school, but if you get that girl pregnant, you¡¯re on your own.¡±

    We never really talked about it, but every Friday he went out, and he never came home early again.

    My father was a simple man - strong, even macho in his way, still marked by his childhood in West Texas. Andy Peterson liked guns, beer, and cowboy boots. I couldn¡¯t drive, refused to drink, and jumped at loud noises. After ten years of suspicion and disgust, he left the house that night thanking God that his boy wasn¡¯t gay.

    Judy never understood my dad, and I didn¡¯t really understand her until I met her parents. They were incredible - a matching pair of college professors, specialized in English and history. I remember the first night I had dinner at their house, picking through bean sprouts and tofu turkey. They ate like a family, with real plates and cloth napkins.

    I was terrified that I would spill something or break something, or say something stupid, but no one even noticed me. Judy fought with her mother the whole night, trying to wheedle money for a new purse.

    Her mother said ¡°No,¡± and I thought that would be the end of it, but Judy kept going, whining about how much she needed it until her mother gave in. I was stunned. In my house, ¡°no¡± meant ¡°no.¡± Even when I got the money I wanted, dad made me feel like a brat for asking. Judy was scoring money for new purses while my life was a daily struggle for lunch money.

    Judy complained constantly, but her parents looked like old TV characters to me. They made me feel so dumb with their books and their art and their television, permanently locked on some arts and history channel. They were usually very nice to me. They offered me lemonade in soft, slow voices, leaning in close like I was deaf or disabled.

    One day, Judy kicked the back of her father¡¯s chair and woke him up, just so she could ask for money. I was horrified. If I had tried that with my dad, I would have walked away carrying my own teeth.

    I jumped to my feet as soon as she started kicking, poised to protect her from whatever her father was about to do, but he just gave her the money and went back to sleep. Judy never knew why I stood up.

    Judy loved her parents, but she wasn¡¯t scared of them. Most people can¡¯t understand what it¡¯s like to conflate love with fear, but at sixteen years old, I didn¡¯t know the difference. Judy¡¯s mother criticized everything she did, but sometimes she would come up behind her daughter and hug her, for no reason at all. I used to lay awake at night and pretend they were my parents. I would stare at the ceiling and wonder how it felt to be loved like that.

    A week later, I caught Judy¡¯s mother reading an old book. The pages were so brittle, she had to turn them with tweezers. I was feeling brave, so I asked her what it was. She answered in her schoolmarm voice. ¡°This is a book by Jane Austen. Do you know who that is?¡±

    She thought she was being nice, but her tone hit me the wrong way. I said, ¡°I¡¯m poor, not stupid.¡±

    Judy¡¯s mom didn¡¯t like that, but her father laughed so hard he had to sit down. Things changed after that. Judy¡¯s mom stopped bringing me lemonade, and her father started taking me out on the porch. He would sit in an old vinyl chair and smoke cigars while I watched. I thought he wanted to talk, but he shushed me every time I opened my mouth.

    Our longest conversation was two minutes, conducted a week after graduation. He led me out on the porch and locked the door like he always did - a pudgy male figure, obscured by smoke and tweed.

    ¡°Judy¡¯s been talking around it, but it¡¯s pretty obvious you guys are gonna get your own place.¡±

    I said, ¡°Yes, sir.¡±

    He took a long drag from his cigar, blowing a big smoke ring. ¡°I¡¯m not gonna stop you but let me give you some advice. When you get a house, you¡¯re gonna need a room - a room with a TV and a fridge and a door that locks. You have to get it right away, right at the beginning, or you¡¯ll spend the next twenty years wishing you had one.¡±

    * * *

    Judy graduated with me in the spring of ¡®51. We started college together, and a couple years later, I dropped out. I¡¯d been paying for living expenses with contract work for a company called Innovex, after a great internship my senior year.

    They were growing fast, desperate for talent. They offered me more money than I had ever seen, even more than my dad made, so when they offered me a job, I dropped school and took it. I used my signing bonus to get us a little apartment by the river.

    I thought I had life all figured out, but we fought about everything: food, bills, furniture - even pictures on the wall. In high school, I was actually starting to enjoy museum trips, but now, they just seemed stupid. I was working terrible hours. Judy would make plans and I would break them. Sometimes I needed the overtime, and sometimes I just didn¡¯t give a damn.

    We toughed it out for a couple years, but our pseudo-engagement lasted less than a year. I never cheated on Judy, but I had an affair with my job. I was making money hand over fist, but I had no life, no hobbies, and no time to enjoy it.

    I was still working for Innovex, living in an apartment with Judy, trying to save money for a house, when my father died. He had a heart attack on our old front lawn. He locked his hands on the mower when the first pain hit and died leaning on it. They had to break his fingers to get him off.

    I was at the office, working late on some project that I can¡¯t remember. I went to work the next few days like nothing happened, left for the funeral one afternoon, and never came back.

    I felt like I was too old to go back to college, but I still had an unrestricted scholarship from my dad¡¯s employment contract, and the terms were incredibly generous. The counselor said I had an open ticket to study whatever I wanted, so I picked something that would give me credit for work experience and dropped back in.

    My father had an equivalency but had never graduated high school. He talked constantly about the ¡°incredible sacrifice¡± he made to get this corporate job that included an education for me and was devastated when I dropped out.

    Dad and I were never close. Before he died, we had gone years without speaking. No holidays, no phone calls, no birthday cards. Nothing. I just moved out one day and never looked back.

    Judy used to bug me about calling him, and I could never make her understand. Her concept of love, her idea of parents, her entire model of the world was different from mine, and when she asked me to explain it, I didn¡¯t even know where to start. I tried to explain that even if I called him, we had nothing to talk about, even if he did pick up the phone.

    We didn¡¯t exactly hate each other, but he never forgave me for dropping out of school. Judy said I didn¡¯t owe him anything, but the thought of him dying like that, dying knowing his son had failed him, it was more than I could stand.

    I felt like a fool, surrounded by kids who had never lived on their own or held a real job, but I planned to stick it out and earn a degree. I didn¡¯t really give a shit about college; I just wanted to make this pain go away - the terrible pain of failing him.

    The programming classes were easy, but science and math gave me fits. I could solve anything with a line of code, but old-fashioned ciphering drove me nuts. It was all so slow. I balked at the literature requirement, but it wasn¡¯t so bad, this time around. Most of the stories were tedious, but sometimes I would find a passage that touched me.

    Then, one spring day, I saw Judy again. She was at the museum, staring up at some outrageous sculpture that had just arrived. The breakup had been bitter and cruel, but something inside me dissolved when I saw her again. I tried to remember my anger, but there was nothing left, nothing but sadness and a kind of shameful joy at seeing her again.

    I walked up behind her and looked at the sculpture. I knew I should say something, but everything sounded wrong in my head. It took Judy a few minutes to notice. She looked at me sideways, and I kept my eyes on the statue.

    Judy said, ¡°How are you?¡±

    ¡°This backpack hurts my shoulder, and these kids make me feel old,¡± I said. ¡°The ceiling in my apartment leaks and my professors are all pompous drunks. Everything else is fine.¡±

    Judy choked on a laugh. ¡°Yeah. Mine leaks, too.¡±

    * * *

    The friendship was a delicate thing, like a tiny sculpture made of glass. We built it carefully, afraid that one wrong word would shatter the whole thing. Even when we finished it, we didn¡¯t quite know what we had. Our sculpture was bigger than friendship, but it would never be love.

    We sat in the square between classes, talking about everything and nothing. I filled the air with chatter while my eyes scanned her face, waiting for a little touch or a sidelong glance, waiting for a sign that she still loved me.

    But there was nothing, nothing but laughs and smiles and friendly little pats on my back. That was the worst part - the touching. I kept my face flat when she did it, but every time Judy touched me, I remembered why she shouldn¡¯t do that anymore.

    We were friends now, friends like we had never been before. Everything was so easy now, all the things we couldn¡¯t do when we were in love. We went to movies and museums, classes and conferences. Sometimes we would argue, but there was no anger now - just gentle, effortless compromise. The grace of it pissed me off. Why couldn¡¯t we have this before? Why couldn¡¯t I act this way the first time, when I still had her heart?

    My grand academic comeback was cut short after the fall term in 2057, when I realized I was about to run out of money. I was too old for campus housing, and my scholarship didn¡¯t cover the apartment. I had made good money at Innovex, but my savings were almost gone.

    Judy was working in the museum, gaining authority day by day. The directors were grooming her for administrative work, but Judy resisted. She was great with people, but the paperwork drove her nuts. When the backlog got to be too much, she would panic and ask me for help.

    Soon, I was spending hours in the office with her. I made a database and taught her some accounting software. Her superiors didn¡¯t know about me; they thought she was a genius. The praise made her uncomfortable, but eventually, she learned to handle things on her own.

    * * *

    A couple months before my twenty-fifth birthday, Judy found a way to pay me back. The director wanted to update their exhibit records. He started taking bids, but Judy stepped in and undercut them. She said she knew a brilliant programmer who could do it for half price. Her superiors didn¡¯t want to hire a student, but Judy won them over.

    Their budget wasn¡¯t much by commercial standards, but it would be big money for me. She wrapped the job up like a gift and gave it to me one night. The scope of the project scared me, but the money was just too good to turn down.

    So, I took the job and spent my nights in Judy¡¯s office off the exhibit floor, lost in productive bliss. The museum records were a mess. Sorting them filled some deep need in my soul.

    I was in the museum on the evening of my birthday, trying to lose myself in work, so I could forget what day it was.

    I started work at seven-fifteen. Judy came to visit at eight-thirty. At nine o¡¯clock, I was on my knees in the office with my hand clamped over her mouth. At nine-fifteen, I was impaled on a demon¡¯s claw. And by midnight, I was lost in the eyes of a fallen angel, bargaining for my mortal soul.

 Chapter 4: Museum

    The museum was a lovely place, once the people were gone. I loved to roam the halls at night, staring at pictures and trinkets and treasures of the dead. Magical exhibits were marked with blue ropes, stored in cases made from tinted glass - glass laced with a metal that stopped the flow of magic. I didn¡¯t understand the physics of it, but Judy assured me they were safe.

    There was a new exhibit, just recently rolled out onto the main floor - a huge book, resting in a cylinder of that special glass. The placard said it was recovered from a prison in 1986. Some gifted nutcase blew up a trailer park. Bluestar mages found this book on him and threw it in a containment field.

    All attempts to study it had failed, so the Department of Metahuman Affairs put it under glass and sent it to us. They said the wards around Newbury Tower protected things better than they could. Tomorrow this place would be full of students from the tower, all fighting for a glimpse of this book.

    It was enormous. It would have covered Judy¡¯s desk and hung off the edge. The cover was thick black leather - spotless, like it had been crafted yesterday. The pages were vellum, but no one could identify the animals they were made from. Some guy in Germany said it was made from human flesh, but nobody believed him. Human skin is too fragile; it would take fancy alchemy and thousands of corpses to make a book that big.

    There was a giant rune embossed on the cover, presumably the title. The placard said it was Taltorak - a Romanian rune symbolizing continuity and rebirth.

    Fingerprints didn¡¯t stick to the cover, but hair follicles between the pages dated back to the 12th century. A dozen scholars had died trying to read it, killed by some kind of demonic guardian. Some had tried to read it safely from behind that special glass, but the field that kept magic out blotted out the writing as well.

    It was a great mystery. Who made it? Who wrote it? What force protected it? And how did an ancient tome from Romania end up in an Arizona jail? The killer died in prison, and his file was sealed.

    The placard said he killed sixty-two people, blasted their bodies and burned their homes with lightning from the sky.

    * * *

    The book distracted me for a minute when I walked in, but I had work to do. I unlocked Judy¡¯s office and started working on my database. Some idiot from campus computing had pushed an update and screwed up my code. Fixing it would take hours.

    An hour later, I was startled by a buzz from the front door. I pulled up a monitor window and checked the security camera. Judy was at the door, soaking wet and shivering in the rain. I¡¯d been so busy; I didn¡¯t even hear the rain start.

    Judy saw the light come on and started mugging for the camera. She waved a bag at me and stuck her tongue out. I grabbed a door code from her password file and let her in.

    I must have gone back to work right away, because Judy snuck up behind me and pulled her soaking wet raincoat over my head. I had planned a night of depression and self-pity, but Judy had a talent for cheering me up. I laughed and threw the coat back at her.

    She was carrying a grocery bag. ¡°I brought food. You always forget to eat when you¡¯re working.¡±

    It was such a little thing to her, but it made my heart go thump in my chest. I knew Judy would never really love me again, but now here she was, walking six blocks in the rain to bring me dinner.

    She launched into her usual banter as she unpacked the food. ¡°I brought sandwiches - tuna and sprouts.¡±  I thought I was hiding it, but Judy saw my face droop. She laughed at me and produced another sandwich like she was doing a magic trick. ¡°And I brought ham and cheese for you. Because god knows, if you ever ate a vegetable, you would just puff up and die.¡±

    We didn¡¯t talk much during dinner. I didn¡¯t realize how hungry I was until I started eating. Judy produced a thermos and poured two cups of soup. I cocked an eyebrow at her and tried to lean over. ¡°What else have you got in that bag?¡±

    Judy snatched it away and clutched it to her chest. ¡°It¡¯s a secret. Finish your dinner.¡±

    I shook my head and did as I was told. A minute later, Judy cussed. ¡°Dammit! I forgot drinks. I¡¯ll have to get something from the machine.¡± I reached in my pocket, but Judy was already walking away. ¡°I got it. Sit. Eat. Work.¡± She turned around and wagged her finger at me. ¡°And don¡¯t look in that bag.¡±

    I held up my hand like a Boy Scout. ¡°I promise.¡±

    And crept toward the bag as soon as she was gone. What I saw sucked the smile right off my face. I leaned back in my chair and rubbed my eyes, suddenly very tired. Judy hated cooking. She was a frustrated banshee in the kitchen, cussing and spitting and throwing things. But tonight, for my birthday, she had baked me a cake.

    I never got to eat it.

    * * *

    Judy returned with two bottles of soda. She had just sat down when I heard the noise - a weird series of thumps and footsteps, like Santa Claus had just landed on the roof. Judy didn¡¯t hear it, but she saw my reaction. ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡±

    I shushed her and cocked my head to listen, then all the power in the building went out. A moment of complete darkness, then the emergency lights came on, bathing the area in garish white and sickly red. In normal light, the museum was a safe place. Now it was a dungeon, filled with odd shapes and shifting shadows.

    An instant later, we heard a high-pitched whining sound. It wasn¡¯t terribly loud, but the pitch was so high, it made my ears hurt. A minute of silence and another series of soft thumps that turned out to be coils of rope hitting the floor.

    I motioned for Judy to kneel down as I crawled to the window. I brought my head up and looked out onto the exhibit floor, peeking from the gap between the shade and the windowsill.

    Three men in black clothes slid down from the ceiling on ropes, just like in the movies. It looked so ridiculous, I froze for a moment, unable to accept that I was seeing this in real life. Their faces were covered by hoods. The leader was carrying a huge nylon bag. The second was holding something that looked like a molded chainsaw, some kind of sonic drill.

    The man with the drill moved quickly, cutting a circle in the dark glass around Taltorak. The others just stood guard. Their part of the job was done. When the circle was finished, the thief reached into his pocket and produced a tiny disk. I didn¡¯t recognize the technology. He reached in carefully and placed it inside the case. It stuck.

    He took a few steps back and motioned for his colleagues to do the same. Ten seconds later, the case started to glow. I couldn¡¯t smell smoke with Judy¡¯s door closed, but the glass was melting off the case. I thought heat would ruin the book, but it didn¡¯t seem to mind.

    This wasn¡¯t some fraternity prank; these men had a plan. They stood in a half-circle, staring at the naked black cover. They were hesitating, afraid to touch it. The first man held his bag open, barking an order to the third. The man hesitated for a moment, then he grabbed the cover with both hands.

    He died so fast; I couldn¡¯t even see what killed him. He didn¡¯t even have time to scream. I heard this terrible ripping sound, like a buzzsaw chewing through something wet.

    This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

    The thief hovered in mid-air for a second, then he collapsed forward onto the pedestal. From my angle at the window, I couldn¡¯t see the weapon, the cut, or the wound in his chest. Blood flowed freely over the book, but when I looked again, the cover was clean. The thief lost a gallon of blood on that pedestal, but none of it hit the ground.

    His partners panicked and went for the door, but they were too slow. The light caught it just right, and I saw the demon.

    The Guardian was thick and hunched - like a little gorilla, resting on its haunches. Its skin was jet black, smooth like a shark¡¯s belly. Its body had a wavering, translucent quality to it, like it wasn¡¯t entirely there. Its head was long and bulbous, filled with moving shadows that only vaguely looked like teeth. I could see fresh blood dripping from its jaws. Its claws scraped the tile when it walked, like a dog that needed clipping. It had crazy long arms, with six fingers on each hand.

    The demon sat calmly and watched the humans run. It scratched itself like a dog, then it decided to kill them. The slowest one died first. The Guardian didn¡¯t need a running start. It just sprang like a rabbit and landed on his back. The thief struggled a bit as the demon dug into him. I heard another ripping sound and watched the demon sever his spine.

    Judy was curled in a ball against her desk. Her whole body was shaking. I offered my hand, and very slowly, she took it. I pulled her tight against me as we huddled under the window. There was no moment of decision, no sudden flash of courage. I just held her and whispered softly in her ear.

    ¡°Don¡¯t try to talk. Just nod your head. Do you remember where the door is, down the hall?¡±  It was a stupid question. I was just asking to calm her down.

    Judy nodded.

    ¡°Good. It¡¯s just a few feet away, but we have to run through the exhibit hall to get there.¡±

    Judy whispered, ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡±

    No time to explain, so I slid away from the window and showed her where to look. I couldn¡¯t see her face, but I watched her shoulders shake as she peered into the hall. Judy pulled away suddenly and collapsed in my arms. Her face was bright red, and tears were streaming down her cheeks. She looked like she was going to scream, so I grabbed her and pulled her close, clamping my hand over her mouth.

    But Judy recovered quickly. ¡°What can we do?¡±

    I looked into her eyes, grappling with something I had never felt before. ¡°It¡¯s gonna be okay. I¡¯m gonna open the door to your office and step outside. The instant I walk out, run for the front door, fast as you can. Run outside and hit the police box, but don¡¯t stop running. Head for the dorm down the street. Somewhere with lots of people.¡±

    Judy frowned and blinked away tears. ¡°What about you?¡±

    I hugged her tight and kissed her forehead. ¡°I¡¯ll be right behind you.¡±

    It had been a while since I had lied to her face.

    * * *

    I crept to the office door with Judy a few steps behind. I put my hand on the doorknob and looked back at her. She nodded once and whispered, ¡°I love you.¡±

    I looked in her eyes and fixed them in my memory. I wanted her face to be the last thing I saw. ¡°I love you, too. Run!¡±

    I flung the door open and let it bang against the wall. I stalked into the room, headed straight for the Guardian - sighing as I heard Judy¡¯s footsteps echo down the hall.

    I could see the demon better now. It was crouched between two bodies - feeding. Its claws were buried in a corpse, shuffling back and forth. It looked like a dog, digging a hole in the backyard. The Guardian dug its head in the body cavity and came up with a long, wet tube in its mouth - a length of intestine. It hung like a limp sausage and the demon slurped it down, like a fat man eating spaghetti.

    Then it turned its head like a bird, reacting to the sound of Judy¡¯s footsteps. It wagged its bloody tongue and tensed its back legs like it was about to jump or give chase.

    I stepped in front of the creature and waved my arms, shouting ¡°Fuck off! We¡¯re closed!¡±

    I heard a distant thump, the sound of Judy running out the front door. I enjoyed one sweet moment of relief, then the demon hit me like a freight train.

    The Guardian retracted its claws and jumped on me, forcing my body against the wall. I tried to pull away, but I had hit the wall so hard I had a mild concussion, so everything else I did without thinking. The demon had me by the neck, so I put my hands on its fingers and tried to pull them off. That didn¡¯t work, so I grabbed opposite sides of its face and tried to gouge its eyes out.

    The Guardian thought that was very funny. It snorted and shook me a few times, just to watch my head bob up and down. It seemed to enjoy watching me wiggle, but it got bored quickly. It leaned in to kill me, but stopped, right before its teeth touched my neck.

    I was waiting for some kind of flashback, some kind of supernatural event before my death, tunnels or bright lights, maybe even an angel choir. But there was nothing, nothing but pain, frustration, and fear.

    Most people call for God at this point, but I had never really believed in God. I knew there was something big up there, something that dispatched angels and set bushes on fire, but I didn¡¯t think of God as someone who cared about me. God saved his miracles for important people - politicians and saints and heroes. I hadn¡¯t prayed for anything since I was a child, and an intervention prayer isn¡¯t really something you compose under pressure.

    I tried to think of reasons why God should save my life, but nobody on Earth really needed me right now. No kids. No family. I had friends, but my friends were all doing fine without me. It was a terrible moment, hanging on that wall. The Guardian made me face things I¡¯d been trying to ignore for years. I¡¯d wasted my whole life in the service of dead people. I didn¡¯t want to die, but I had nothing to live for.

    The demon was toying with me, shaking me like a cougar, playing with its food. I took a deep breath when it leaned in for the killing bite, but I didn¡¯t close my eyes. That seemed important somehow, to face death with my eyes open.

    The moment seemed to last forever. I could see every detail in the room. The demon was so close, I could feel its breath on my face. I thought it would smell terrible, but it didn¡¯t. It gave off a weird metallic scent, like copper mixed with ozone. I¡¯d smelled it faintly before, walking around campus, but now the scent was overwhelming. I tried to pull away, but I had nowhere to go. I tensed my muscles and waited to die.

    But the demon didn¡¯t bite. It pulled back and cocked its head sideways, inspecting me with tiny red eyes. It leaned in and sniffed, deciding if I was edible. Slowly, the Guardian brought its hand in front of my face. A long black claw popped out of its knuckle like a switchblade. It was performing for me, like a pet showing off. I stared at the weapon, watching it glitter in the red light.

    The Guardian slashed its claw across my chest. It was over so fast, it didn¡¯t even hurt. I looked down and saw a clean line cut into my shirt. The demon¡¯s claw was dripping with my blood. It brought the digit back to its face and licked it with a long reptile tongue.

    I made a strangled grunting sound, but I couldn¡¯t turn away. The demon made a growling noise and slurped the blood off my chest. The tongue retracted and its pupils got very big - an almost-human gesture of surprise.

    The Guardian lowered me to the ground and took its hand off my neck. Then it took two steps backward and dropped to one knee. I stood there shivering as the demon knelt before me, touching its forehead to the ground.

    * * *

    I thought I was hallucinating. I thought fear had driven me insane. I was afraid any movement would make the demon change its mind and rip me open, but it just knelt there, panting with lungs that didn¡¯t need air.

    I worked up my courage and started to move, shuffling sideways against the wall. The floor under my feet felt like the ledge of a tall building, like the slightest movement forward would send me to my death. I got five steps before the Guardian looked up. It saw the movement and lumbered after me, bouncing forward like a bunny. I saw the bounce and decided to run.

    I jumped off my invisible ledge and ran out the door. The demon stayed on my heels, but it didn¡¯t pounce or overtake me. I ran to the police box with the Guardian keeping pace by my side. There was already a campus cop on the front lawn. When he saw me running out, the guard drew his gun and yelled, ¡°Freeze!¡± Just like in the movies.

    I yelled, ¡°SHOOT IT! SHOOT IT!¡±

    ¡°Shoot what?¡± the cop asked. Then he noticed the blood on my clothes and started giving commands. ¡°Down on the ground! Put your hands on your head!¡±

    I had never been held at gunpoint before, but after being slashed by the Guardian, bullets didn¡¯t seem that scary anymore. I yelled at the guard, ¡°What are you, blind?¡± I took a step back and pointed at the demon. ¡°It¡¯s a monster, dumbass! SHOOT IT!¡±

    The cop spread his feet apart and leveled his pistol at my chest. ¡°On the ground! Now!¡±

    I ignored him and looked down at the demon. I waved my arms and screamed at it. ¡°What? What do you want? Why are you following me?¡±

    The Guardian sat on its haunches and wagged its tongue like a dog waiting for a treat. I shouted, ¡°Fuck off! Go away!¡±  And it vanished.

    * * *

    I spent two hours talking to police. They got nasty when they found the bodies, but all the evidence backed up my story. You couldn¡¯t see the Guardian on camera, but you could see what it was doing to its victims. I didn¡¯t even appear in the room until all three men were dead.

    The footage showed me being slammed against the wall, but it looked like I was hovering in mid-air, supported by an invisible hand. The encounter felt like hours, but it was only five minutes on video. They called records to check my enrollment, then the director showed up and verified my ID. They weren¡¯t holding me for murder anymore, but they wouldn¡¯t let me leave. They were waiting on the super cops, waiting on a wizard from Bluestar 7.

 Chapter 5: Daniel

    Daniel Carter didn¡¯t look like a cop, or a wizard. His manner was calm and casual, almost friendly. No superhero costume. He was wearing jeans, sneakers, and a loose white shirt. His black and blue badge dangled from a chain around his neck. He wore a bulletproof jacket dyed in Bluestar blue. He looked about forty, but his hair was going gray, and he had deep lines under his eyes.

    I had seen him on TV, but I never expected to meet the man in person. Daniel was a member of Bluestar 7, a team of metahuman cops, organized by the Department of Metahuman Affairs. Each team was a kind of public-private partnership, each with a corporate sponsor who controlled merchandising and media rights.

    There were seventeen Bluestar teams stationed in major cities across the U.S. Most of the agents were celebrities, but Carter kept a low profile.

    Boston had a horrible record when it came to Bluestar teams. The city was a hotbed of magical activity, attracting criminals and crackpots from all over the country, with monsters crawling out of the river every few days like they were working shifts.

    Twenty members of Bluestar 7 had been killed in the line of duty in the last ten years, but Daniel¡¯s team was beating the odds. They¡¯d gone a whole year without losing anybody.

    I was in the lobby with Judy. She was angry and scared, and she didn¡¯t know the whole story. We would talk later, away from prying eyes. She sat beside me in silence, keeping a death-grip on my hand.

    Daniel walked in carrying two cups of coffee. He bowed slightly as he offered them to us. The motion looked Japanese. He had a weird grace to his movements, like a model or a dancer.

    He sat down quietly and started taking notes. "I watched the security footage on the way over. You had a close call, Mister Kovak, but the doctor says you¡¯re fine. Your wound is long, but it¡¯s shallow, and very clean. Demons don¡¯t carry bacteria. You¡¯ve been answering questions all night, so I won¡¯t put you through that again. But I¡¯m about to examine the crime scene, and I could use your help. The bodies are gone, and the room has been cleaned. Are you up to it?"

    I nodded.

    I blushed when Daniel smiled at me. "I only need one of you. You can stay here, ma¡¯am, if this makes you uncomfortable."

    Judy shook her head. "I¡¯ll stay with Timothy."

    Daniel stood up and said, "Follow me."

    * * *

    The exhibit hall was spotless now, with no trace of blood on the walls or the floor. Even the puddles of melted glass were gone. The only evidence was the ruined pedestal, standing empty in the center of the room.

    I pointed at it. ¡°There was a book here. I think it was still there when I ran out.¡±

    Daniel played back footage from the security camera. ¡°The book disappeared at 21:27. That¡¯s about¡­ three minutes after you left the room. I don¡¯t have footage from outside yet, but apparently, the book vanished when your demon did. It sounds like a Guardian, ordered to protect a specific thing. This one was bound to the book.¡±

    Daniel rubbed his eyes and looked at me over his spectacles. ¡°You were very brave, Mister Kovak, but very foolish. That demon was tethered to his book, so it wasn¡¯t likely to follow a random target. I¡¯m not sure what you were hoping to accomplish, when you provoked it.¡±

    Judy hadn¡¯t seen the camera footage. ¡°Provoked it? What the hell did you do?¡±

    I blushed. ¡°We¡¯ll talk about it later.¡±

    Judy sniffed. ¡°Damn right we will.¡±

    Daniel was ignoring us. He was standing in front of the pedestal, looking up at the ceiling. When he looked back down, his eyes changed focus, like he was looking through the objects around him. ¡°Oh yeah, there was a demon here. Big one. I see concealers, bindings, and three different wards. Ancient origin, but with a strong connection to Hell. The book has been gone for two hours, but this pedestal is still blazing with magic. I read the background, but I didn¡¯t believe it. I¡¯ve seen spellbooks before, but this is the mother of all spellbooks. No wonder we couldn¡¯t crack it.¡±

    Judy was furious, looking for someone to blame. ¡°So, all this happened over a book? Somebody tried to steal Talt¡ª¡±

    Daniel cut her off. ¡°Don¡¯t say the name, please. Just a precaution.¡± Carter focused on me. His eyes still had that far-away look. He was frowning at me, squinting and tilting his head like I was a blurry picture he couldn¡¯t quite see.

    Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

    ¡°Okay, Tim, walk me through this. Show me exactly where you were on that wall.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s not hard to find, man. Just look for the dent.¡±

    I spent twenty minutes leading Daniel around the room, explaining what I saw from the window.

    Daniel addressed Judy. ¡°And when you looked out the window, miss, did you see this demon moving around?¡±

    Judy frowned. ¡°I saw something, but it was like a shadow moving, like it couldn¡¯t decide what shape it was.¡±

    Daniel thanked her and came back to me. ¡°Well, I can¡¯t explain the Guardian¡¯s behavior. I don¡¯t know why it spared you. You might have a literal guardian angel, but I don¡¯t see any evidence of that. The campus wards keep most of them out, and angels don¡¯t hide their tracks. There¡¯d be traces everywhere. Have you been tested for magical talent?¡±

    ¡°I was tested in school. Negative all three times.¡±

    Daniel nodded. ¡°That confirms what I saw. There¡¯s no magic in your aura, but it¡¯s not gray like a normal person. It¡¯s just blank, like you don¡¯t have an aura at all. Has anything strange happened to you lately? Waking dreams? Missing time? Voices out of nowhere?¡±

    I shook my head. ¡°No. Nothing like that.¡±

    ¡°Have you been to services at the Church of Olympus or the Asgard Brotherhood?¡±

    ¡°No.¡± Both churches had a horrible reputation. The Church of Olympus was a bunch of creepy guys who were into naked bodybuilding, and the Asgard Brotherhood was straight up racist.

    Daniel didn¡¯t look happy, but he seemed to blow it off. ¡°Okay. I¡¯m going to give you my card. If anything strange happens in the next few days, I want you to call me immediately. Pay attention to details. If you see something strange, don¡¯t doubt yourself, and don¡¯t wait. Call that number - day or night. Someone was watching over you today, but they covered their tracks very well. If they contact you directly, I want to know.¡±

    Judy stepped up. ¡°Officer Carter, is Timothy in danger? Should he be in protective custody or something?¡±

    Daniel tried to reassure her. ¡°I don¡¯t think that¡¯s necessary. The demon acted strangely, but I think it was just feeling playful. Guardians don¡¯t need a lot of intelligence. I think you two were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Timothy, do you live on campus?¡±

    ¡°No. I have an apartment just outside the Zone.¡±

    ¡°Okay, if anything strange happens - if you feel like you¡¯re in some kind of danger, I want you to head for campus as fast as you can. Head for the tower. The whole campus is shielded, but the tower has extra defenses. It¡¯s the safest place in the city.¡±

    Judy started tapping her foot. ¡°The campus didn¡¯t feel very safe tonight.¡±

    ¡°The campus is warded against demons coming in from outside, but this demon was living inside the book. It didn¡¯t just wander here.¡±

    Judy nodded, but her foot was still going. She wouldn¡¯t go off in front of the cop, but I was gonna catch hell next time we were alone.

    Carter smiled at us. ¡°You¡¯ve both been very brave tonight. You¡¯re free to go. Get some rest and call me if you remember anything.¡±

    ¡°We will. Thanks for everything.¡±  I don¡¯t really like cops, but I reached up and offered Daniel my hand. He didn¡¯t take it, but he bowed until his head was level with my elbow. His badge slipped a little when he moved, revealing a tiny silver cross underneath. I was shocked, but I didn¡¯t say anything.

    I caught his eye before he left. ¡°So, you do this kind of shit all day? Ride around the city fighting demons and dragging supervillains off to jail?¡±

    Daniel shrugged. ¡°It¡¯s a living.¡±

    * * *

    Judy didn¡¯t say a word until we reached my apartment. I had my keys in my hand when she cleared her throat. Wincing, I turned around.

    Judy said, ¡°Well?¡±

    ¡°Well, what?¡±

    ¡°Timothy Erin Kovak, don¡¯t you play dumb with me! My best friend almost died tonight, and I had to learn the details in front of a stranger! What the hell happened in there?¡±

    I sighed. ¡°Look, it¡¯s over now. I don¡¯t want to talk about it.¡±

    ¡°Too damn bad! Answer me! You were walking into the exhibit hall when I started running. The last thing I saw was your back. I sat in the lobby of that dorm for thirty minutes, crying my eyes out. Then some campus goon comes up and tells me you¡¯ve been arrested! He said they found you in front of the museum, screaming at some invisible thing. They thought you were high on something, until they saw the blood.¡±

    I couldn¡¯t say anything. I didn¡¯t want her to know I threw myself at a demon. I didn¡¯t want her to know how much I still loved her.

    Judy got in my face. ¡°Talk to me! We¡¯ve been friends for years! We tell each other everything! You know things about me that I¡¯ve never told anyone, but now you¡¯re treating me like someone you just met.¡± Her face turned tender. ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡±

    I lowered my head and shuffled my feet, a habit I¡¯d kept since childhood. I had to tell her something. If I couldn¡¯t tell her the whole truth, maybe a half-truth would do.

    ¡°I thought that thing was gonna kill me. I¡¯ve never been that scared before. I¡¯ve never been that close to death before. I felt so helpless up there. I haven¡¯t felt like that since I was a kid, all the stuff with dad.

    ¡°I thought about my mom. I wondered what she would say if I met her in Heaven. I wondered what she would think of my life here - all the shit I¡¯ve done wrong - all the shit I¡¯ve screwed up.¡±  I looked into her eyes. ¡°All the things I¡¯ve let slip away. I thought about all that, and I thought about how much you mean to me.¡±

    Judy stepped forward and put her hand on my cheek. ¡°You mean a lot to me, too. You¡¯re the best friend I ever had. I mean that. Things didn¡¯t work out with us, but at least we still have this.¡±

    I just stared at her. Her speech left me with nothing to say.

    Judy hugged me tightly and took a step back. ¡°Are you gonna be okay tonight? I hate to leave you alone after this.¡±

    I wanted her to stay. I wanted her to stay more than I¡¯d ever wanted anything in my life, but I said, ¡°I¡¯ll be fine. What about you? You hide it better than I do, but I know you¡¯re scared.¡±

    Judy nodded. ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m scared, but I didn¡¯t get as close as you did. My rental is on campus. It should be covered by those ward-things Daniel talked about.

    She started to walk away and caught herself. ¡°Good night. And happy birthday!¡± Judy stomped her foot. ¡°Shit! I baked you a cake! The cops have probably eaten it by now. I¡¯m really sorry. I¡¯ll bake you another one. This birthday was so bad, I think we should call it a rehearsal. We¡¯ll try again next week.¡±

    ¡°Sounds good to me.¡±

    Judy waved one last time as she walked to the sidewalk. I wanted to say, ¡°I love you,¡± but I couldn¡¯t find the words. There¡¯s never a demon around when you need one.

 Chapter 6: Lydia

    I slept for less than an hour.

    At precisely 11:17 p.m., something woke me up. I didn¡¯t notice at the time, but this had been the exact moment of my birth, twenty-five years before.

    I sat up, fluffed my pillow, and turned on my side. On the way over, something caught my eye. The apartment was dark, but I could see a female form, sitting on the edge of my bed.

    I was in that half-conscious dream state, where every coat draped over a chair looks like a monster. Still, no object in my bedroom looked quite like that. I sat up and tried to focus. There wasn¡¯t much light coming through my window, but the shape was unmistakable.

    A female voice came out of the darkness. ¡°Before you turn on the light, there are some things you should know.¡±

    I immediately turned on the light.

    The demon was nude. Her skin was pale, but I saw a gold tinge when the light hit it. Her hair was a mass of golden curls, tumbling to her shoulders. Her body was lush, but not quite plump. Her face was dignified, but not cold. Youthful, but not girlish. It was a timeless face, the kind of face you see in old movies.

    She was beautiful, but her proportions were all wrong. Her body reminded me of those candid photos of Marilyn Monroe. A modeling agency would have told her to lose ten pounds and spend six weeks in the gym. Even her bone structure was like something from another time. She looked like an old painting. Her eyes were blue - deep, luminous blue. Nipples like pink roses, with her hips angled away from me. There was something very deliberate about that posture.

    Modern women were very selective about where they grew muscles and where they put fat, but nothing about this body had been conditioned, sculpted, or planned. I was so puzzled by this; it took me a moment to realize she wasn¡¯t human.

    That hair hid a pair of black horns. Her hands and feet looked normal, but there was a strange shadow behind her. I caught a glimpse of something darting behind her shoulder and realized what it was - the arrowhead tip of a prehensile tail.

    ¡°Happy birthday, Timothy. I¡¯ve waited a long time to meet you.¡±

    Her voice was soft, warm, and strangely comforting. I was trying to be angry, but something about that voice cut right through it. It was profoundly flattering, to hear a woman so glad to see me.

    ¡°Who are you? What the hell is going on?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s all right. This will be confusing at first, but you must be patient with me. The explanation is not simple, and it cannot be rushed.¡±

    ¡°I said who are you?¡±

    ¡°I am a succubus in the service of the Demon Prince Baalphezar. I have been assigned to you.¡±

    Immediate involuntary laughter. ¡°No kiddin¡¯.¡±

    She sighed. ¡°I¡¯m sorry you don¡¯t believe me. It¡¯s important that you accept the truth of this, as quickly as possible.¡±

    ¡°The attack made the news, right? That¡¯s why you¡¯re here? Whatever this is, whoever you are, you do not have permission to be in my home. Please just go. I won¡¯t call the cops if you just go.¡±

    ¡°No,¡± she said. ¡°I have to stay with you, but I promise, there¡¯s nothing to be afraid of. I really am here to help.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, I bet you are. This can¡¯t be the first time you¡¯ve done this, so if I pull up my phone and punch in ¡®birthday succubus,¡¯ how far will I have to scroll before I see you?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I don¡¯t understand.¡±

    I stretched my face in my hands and wiped my eyes. ¡°After the night I¡¯ve had, if you make me roll out of bed and do forty minutes of searches to figure out what this is, I swear to god, I will track your producer down to whatever Taipei shithole this is broadcasting from and make this a very expensive mistake.

    ¡°Let me guess,¡± I growled, really warming up now. ¡°Your producer scanned my face from the crime scene video and picked me because he thinks I¡¯m too poor to sue him. He¡¯s right, but if you already know my name, you should know that I don¡¯t need the legal system to ruin your day.¡±

    I started projecting my voice around the room. ¡°So, whoever is in that earpiece feeding her lines, look at my work history and ask yourself, am I really somebody you want to fuck with?¡±

    The girl had a strange response to being threatened. She smiled a faintly wicked, satisfied smile and said, ¡°There it is. The world has changed so much, I was afraid the fire had gone out. It¡¯s nice to see the blood is still in there.¡±

    ¡°What the fuck are you talking about?¡±

    ¡°This is always the hardest part to explain. You come from a long, proud bloodline, bred from some of the most powerful mages who have ever lived; but the power doesn¡¯t always breed true. It can skip generations. We thought the whole project might be over when your¡ª when your predecessor died, but I¡¯m sure you¡¯ve got it, it¡¯s just a matter of learning how much.¡±

    ¡°Wrong,¡± I said. ¡°There¡¯s not enough magic in my body to light a match. If you looked in that closet behind you, you¡¯d see three red cards from three tests for magical ability, from blood samples taken when I was six, twelve and eighteen.¡±

    She seemed to be genuinely alarmed by that, almost like she was breaking character. ¡°That blood, what did they do with it?¡±

    ¡°They exposed it to a KMP flash and measured how much magic it retained, which was zero. All three times.¡±

    The girl said, ¡°Good.¡±

    ¡°Why is that good?¡±

    ¡°Terms of your contract. I cannot contact the new heir until they turn twenty-five. If your abilities had manifested early, you would be walking around with all this power, and no one to guide you. If they had manifested when you were just a child, that could have been catastrophic.¡±

    ¡°How can I have a contract I don¡¯t even know about?¡±

    ¡°The contract was signed by one of your ancestors, many centuries ago. Whenever this power turns up in a male of this bloodline, they send me. I¡¯m here to help you learn magic and fulfill the terms of that agreement. Among other things.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re sticking with this? You insist that you¡¯re a demon? I¡¯d have to look it up, but aren¡¯t succubi supposed to sneak up and ride men in their dreams? Why are we even talking?¡±

    The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

    I swear she scoffed at me. ¡°I am not allowed to touch you without permission. You have to ask for me. Very clearly.¡±

    ¡°And loudly for the microphone, right?¡± She didn¡¯t blink. ¡°I changed my mind. You¡¯re not a witch. You¡¯re a law student. Look, if this isn¡¯t just a monkey¡¯s paw thing, if you¡¯re waiting for explicit permission, you might as well go. What kind of man agrees to this? You¡¯d have to be the dumbest, most desperate motherfucker on Earth to¡ª¡±

    ¡°I know you¡¯re testing me tonight,¡± she interrupted, ¡°but you should not insult the character or the intelligence of the men who came before you. The first night they called for me was the beginning of a long and loving partnership, seven times so far.¡±

    That one got me. Totally flat-footed. The tone was wrong. The content was wrong. It made no sense at all. ¡°Why are you adding emotional complications to a seduction script? Is this some real time AI bullshit? Is this production even cheaper and lazier than I thought?¡±

    ¡°Seduction script? You think I¡¯m some kind of actress? That¡¯s flattering, but I assure you, I am not a human woman. I can prove that very quickly¡­ with your permission.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°I really should be calling the cops.¡±

    ¡°And why haven¡¯t you done that?¡± She called my bluff immediately, like she had heard this a thousand times before.

    ¡°Because I¡¯ve already talked to the cops once tonight. I¡¯ve already been involved in one demon attack, so if I call this cop and tell him there¡¯s another one, he¡¯s gonna bring everybody. Bluestar 7 is gonna throw down in my living room and destroy half this building.

    ¡°My furniture is nothing but glue and particle board. Nothing in this apartment can survive a super fight, least of all me. I have no savings and no insurance. I have equipment in here that I cannot afford to replace, holding data caches that have never been properly backed up.

    ¡°So, if you really are a demon, do you think you could maybe wait outside and fight them on the lawn? Maybe try to aim whatever hellfire shit you do away from things that I own? And could you maybe fight them at an angle, so when they fire bullets back at you, they don¡¯t punch straight through my home?¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t come here to fight anyone.¡±

    ¡°Right. You came here to fuck my brains out and be my best friend forever. I keep forgetting. Has anyone ever called you on this? Has anyone ever told you how insulting this is, to assume a man is just gonna go along with this?¡±

    It was hard to see her face in the shadows, but that one really seemed to hurt. ¡°I was afraid of something like this,¡± she said. ¡°I¡¯ve been gone so long, I don¡¯t understand how your society works, so my usual approach has offended you.¡±

    ¡°Your ¡®usual approach¡¯? Okay fine, I¡¯ll engage with the backstory. You say you¡¯re a succubus, when¡¯s the last time you were on Earth?¡±

    She answered, ¡°Nineteen eighty-six.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯ve been gone seventy-two years, and you have no idea what¡¯s been happening in the world since?¡±

    She shook her head. ¡°Not really. Sometimes we hear gossip during language lessons, but you never know what¡¯s true.¡±

    ¡°And how long have you been doing this?¡±

    ¡°Over six hundred years.¡±

    I snorted. ¡°You¡¯re seriously claiming to be six hundred years old?¡±

    ¡°Something like that. I don¡¯t know exactly.¡±

    ¡°Well, if you really have been doing this since before we invented porn, most of these guys would have been so grateful to see a naked woman, they would just go along with whatever you wanted, right?¡±

    ¡°Frequently, yes.¡±

    I had been trying not to laugh, but her deadpan delivery got me.

    ¡°Okay well, this,¡± I gestured to her naked body. ¡°This peep show introduction isn¡¯t really anything special anymore. You¡¯re coming from the 1980s? What did they even have back then? Playboy? 2-D photos of girls in soft lighting acting shy? Oh man, you¡¯re in for a bit of a shock.¡±

    I waved my wrist at her. ¡°Even if this story is true, and you really have been seducing men for centuries, you give me two minutes with this phone, and I guarantee I can find something you have never seen before. You give me another five minutes, and I bet I can find something that will genuinely offend you, to the point where you have to look away or ask me to turn it off.¡±

    The girl or whatever was quiet for a while, then said, ¡°I accept your challenge.¡±

    ¡°What? No, I was just kidding. I wouldn¡¯t actually¡­ I mean, it would be funny as hell, but no, I really don¡¯t want to pull up porn on this phone. Assuming you¡¯re telling the truth, in the time you¡¯ve been gone, my culture, we went so crazy with pornography and sexual experimentation, it¡¯s kind of going back the other way now.

    ¡°The quickest way to get promoted or be popular in school is to join a virtual men¡¯s club and demonstrate how long you can go without stuff. We¡¯ve lived so long with access to unlimited amounts of food, sex, and media, the only way to be special is to prove how long you can go without it.¡±

    I angled my phone projector and started to show her something she couldn¡¯t possibly see without coming closer.

    ¡°It started in Japan. These apps monitor all your devices and plug into social media, so if you break your streak or miss a day, they can publicly shame you in front of all your friends. You can get points for cutting carbs or going to the gym, or in my case¡­ if I can go eight more days without pulling up tits on my phone, I can get a free sandwich.¡±

    * * *

    Azael made me watch this part over and over again. Why was I talking so much? Why was I staying in bed? Why had I gone so long without calling the police?

    He knew damn well why, but he wouldn¡¯t stop until he made me say it.

    I told him first, if she was a demon, I really did think Bluestar 7 would try to fight her in my living room, and I was still holding out hope that this was just a prank.

    I thought if I could keep her talking long enough, I would either catch a mistake, or draw this thing out for so long, her producer would make her accelerate the process and grab me or something, ruining this elaborate fiction they had set up.

    And yes, I was excited by the idea of pushing it. Nobody¡¯s immune to a naked girl, but I didn¡¯t just want to roll over like some chump. I was turning my seduction into a debate because I wanted to lose.

    * * *

    Her body had stopped being titillating and was starting to feel like a threat. ¡°It¡¯s gonna take more than this to knock me over, so you might as well put some clothes on.¡±

    She said, ¡°Of course,¡± and was suddenly wearing a black silk robe - thin, and just a little too short.

    But that¡¯s not the part that bothered me. ¡°Please tell me that was a holographic projection, and I¡¯m just a little too tired to see the scan lines. Because there would be scan lines. Even with a really good one, there would be¡­ Shit!¡±

    The not actually a girl gestured to her robe. ¡°Is this bothering you? I can change it.¡±

    I said, ¡°Lower the hemline,¡± and she did. No flicker, no scan lines.

    I said, ¡°Shit¡± again. ¡°I really wanted that to be a projection, because if it¡¯s not a projection, it really is magic, and if this really is magic that means this is not a cheap prank. It means they hired a real witch for this, and that would make it a very expensive prank. Which increases the odds of this not being a prank at all, which increases the odds of you being exactly what you say you are. And that means I should have called the cops ten minutes ago.¡±

    ¡°You are not going to call the police, Timothy. They can¡¯t take me away from you, but they might try and take you away from me. They would take you away from everything if they knew what you could do.¡±

    That was it, by the way, the first time I could have saved myself. Don¡¯t feel bad if you missed it, there¡¯s gonna be at least two more.

    I looked, really looked at her for the first time. ¡°What¡¯s your name?¡±

    ¡°Lydia.¡±

    ¡°My succubus is named Lydia?¡± I laughed again. ¡°Sorry, I don¡¯t really think of Lydia as a sexy name.¡±

    ¡°You will,¡± she said. ¡°Soon.¡±

    * * *

    Did you notice the possessive pronoun up there? I didn¡¯t. Because I had it all figured out. Really smug about it, too.

    ¡°You¡¯re very charming, miss, but I think I¡¯ve had enough of this. And I think I just figured out what¡¯s going on.¡± I grabbed a corner of the blanket and wiggled it, pulling it toward me. ¡°You¡¯ve been sitting on the edge of my bed all night, but you¡¯re not leaving a dent in the mattress. You¡¯re sitting about where my feet would be, but I can¡¯t feel you, because you¡¯re not here.¡±

    I let out a breath I¡¯d been holding all night and felt my whole body relax. ¡°It all makes sense now. This apartment is built to reclamation code. I¡¯ve got a steel door and bulletproof windows. There¡¯s no way you just crawled in here.¡± I shook my head. ¡°This is so embarrassing. The power and destiny bullshit, the transparent wish fulfillment, the ancient schoolboy dream of infinite power and a willing woman.

    ¡°It¡¯s all so childish, but hey, I got my chest sliced open by a demon tonight. I have never been more scared in my life. I can barely keep my eyes open, recovering from three adrenaline dumps and a broken heart. I risked my life tonight and all I did was prove to eight decimal places that my ex-girlfriend doesn¡¯t love me anymore.

    ¡°God knows what kind of PTSD I¡¯m gonna wake up with, but right now, my subconscious is trying to help. It took all of these frustrating, terrifying things and reworked them into a whole new story, to make everything feel all right. I¡¯m dreaming, Lydia. I¡¯ve been dreaming since you got here. I don¡¯t remember what movie I pulled your face from, but thanks. This was kind of fun.¡±

    Exhausted, I turned my back on her, turned my bedside light off, and went back to sleep.

 Chapter 7: Chair

    I woke up in my same old life.

    My blankets were soaked with sweat. My head felt like an overstuffed balloon. I staggered down the hall and pissed with the door open, scratching at the bandage on my chest. I leaned forward and put my forehead on the plaster above the toilet, the way I did sometimes when my legs were too tired, and the sun was too bright.

    Mages develop a sense for the astral world over time, an ability to spot magical creatures and sense when things are watching them, but at that point I was completely blind. I thought I was still just a normal guy in a normal world, but if I had glanced at my mirror at that exact moment, I would have seen an extra pair of eyes looking back at me.

    Instead, I grabbed my dented aluminum water bottle and filled it from the kitchen tap. Then I padded back to the bedroom and took a huge swig.

    That¡¯s when I saw the demon again, hovering five feet off the floor with her back pressed against my bedroom wall, like the world¡¯s sexiest gargoyle. She was still wearing her gown. Her knees were pulled up to her chest, and her arms were crossed, resting on her knees. She had a little grin on her face, and she was looking at me.

    Utterly deadpan, Lydia said, ¡°Boo.¡±

    The bottle slipped out of my hand and bounced on the floor with a loud bong. A stream of cold water splashed across my leg, driving me back a few steps. I couldn¡¯t walk toward her, and I couldn¡¯t turn around, so I just kept walking backwards until I hit my closet door. I bumped my head on it, but I didn¡¯t turn around. I just flailed around blindly until I felt fabric under my fingers.

    Lydia hopped down from her perch and walked to the center of the room. She stayed perfectly still as I walked a circle around her, examining her body in daylight. Her tail swished a little as I walked behind her. The circle brought me back to her face. Gently, I reached out to touch her, like a child touching his face in a mirror.

    Lydia raised her head slightly, offering her neck.

    That movement stopped me. She seemed way too eager for me to touch her, so I spun on my heel and ran for the bathroom, leaning on my sink as I stared at myself in the mirror.

    Ephemeral blonde chicks can be forgiven at night. Erotic dreams are like snowflakes; you have to catch them quickly before they hit the ground. At night, Lydia could be dismissed as a psychological hors d¡¯oeuvre. Daylight was another matter. Men who entertain fantasies at night endure jokes from their friends and angry stares from their wives. Men who entertain them in daylight go straight to shock therapy and psychoactive drugs.

    * * *

    And no, I still didn¡¯t call the police. I figured daylight would just give me a better view of Boston¡¯s signature superteam wrecking my home.

    If something supernatural was happening to me, I needed to prove it, to find out just how serious this was and test some of the claims Lydia had made the night before. I couldn¡¯t bring in a DMA team to scan the apartment and I didn¡¯t have any exorcists on speed dial, but if I really was some kind of wizard, I had a whole tower full of experts who could prove it, right around the corner.

    Lydia had left my bedroom, so I ran back and picked out some decent clothes.

    She had moved to the living room, hovering across from my desk chair with her back to the wall, so I would be forced to look at her any time I was sitting down. She looked mildly amused as she watched me scramble around, just quietly watching, waiting for me to speak to her again. But I didn¡¯t. I dashed out the door and caught a trolley to the mage tower.

    Newbury Tower was ridiculous - too tall, too Gothic, and too elegant to fit with the blocky concrete rectangles to the west of it. I saw black marble and blue carpet - sweeping frosted windows with a courtyard open to the sky. I froze in the lobby, mesmerized by the illusion of dolphins in the fountain. Magic was so much better than holograms, this instantly confirmed my conclusion from the night before. No way Lydia was using technology for her tricks.

    I came here looking for answers, but I hadn¡¯t really formulated my questions yet. Lydia said I was a mage. That, at least, could be tested. I couldn¡¯t prove what she was, but maybe I could prove what I was.

    I couldn¡¯t find ¡°Testing¡± in the directory, but right above where Testing should have been I saw a department called Student Advocacy. I should have kept looking for a better match, but something about the wording of that, the promise of help from a friendly face who might understand what was happening to me; I went straight there.

    The offices were a maze. It still took me ten minutes to find the department, which turned out to be a single room, hidden at the end of a hall. Apparently, Student Advocacy was not a big priority in Newbury Tower.

    Evan Coleridge was a tall man, tall and elegant, like European aristocracy. His features were fine and haughty, his hair was thin and blond, and his eyes were pale blue. I was expecting a faculty adviser, but this looked like a grad student, just a few years older than me. Evan was wearing dark slacks and a beige sweater.

    I was instantly jealous. I had always been poor, but it didn¡¯t really bother me, until I met somebody who dressed better. I still wore the same clothes I wore in high school, generic blue jeans and shirts from the discount rack. I wasn¡¯t exactly a slob, but I didn¡¯t spend money on superficials. I lived in a world of cheap haircuts, quick shaves, thin sneakers, and nylon jackets. I actually dressed pretty well for a computer geek. Some of the guys in my engineering program didn¡¯t even bathe.

    Most days, I didn¡¯t care, but sometimes I would stand outside the tower and wish for something more. I swore I would never wear a tie, but I was tempted to spend money on sweaters and sport coats. Maybe one good pair of shoes. I had never paid more than twenty bucks for a pair of shoes. I¡¯d been wearing the same style for ten years, bought right off the shelf at the HDI distribution center - company issue for janitors and lawn guys.

    Standing next to Evan Coleridge made me want to spend money. My hair was getting shaggy. Maybe I could pay a little extra and get my hair cut by a person next week. Machine cuts were fast, but standard barber AI couldn¡¯t handle the shape of my head.

    Evan didn¡¯t say anything when I walked in. He just stood up and waited for me to explain myself.

    I read the name on the door and said, ¡°Are you Evan Coleridge?¡±

    ¡°I am.¡±

    I tried to shake his hand, but Evan kept his hands behind his back. Asking for help sounded smart in the lobby, but this guy made me nervous. Everything in his manner screamed go away. I took a deep breath and introduced myself. ¡°My name is Timothy Kovak. I need your help.¡±

    Evan took a step back and ushered me into his office. ¡°Could you be more specific?¡±

    I stepped inside and sat in the chair he offered me. Rich brown leather. Remarkably comfortable. Evan¡¯s chair straightened my spine and corrected my posture. ¡°I need to be tested for magical talent.¡±

    Evan closed his door and sat down. His tone was parental, compassionate and condescending. ¡°Weren¡¯t you tested in grade school?¡±

    ¡°Yes, but I have reason to believe those results were¡­ wrong.¡±

    The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

    ¡°I assure you, Mister Kovak, the Hersh-Kens blood test is very reliable. Magical ability is genetic. Once you test negative, you cannot acquire the potential later.¡± Evan was transparently bored, like he¡¯d given this speech a thousand times.

    Tweaked by this, I let some irritation creep into my voice. ¡°I¡¯m aware of that, but a reliable source told me there was an error in my test.¡± Where did that come from? When did Lydia become a reliable source? ¡°Surely you have the facilities to test me again?¡±

    Evan nodded. ¡°We do, but I don¡¯t have time to run tests on every student who hears a bump in the night. What makes you think you¡¯re gifted?¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t reveal my source, but I trust it.¡± Did I? Seemed like a strong word to just pop out of my mouth.

    Evan frowned. ¡°I¡¯m sure you do, but now you¡¯re asking me to trust it. I need a little more than your word.¡±

    I held my chin up and tried to imitate Lydia¡¯s tone from the night before. ¡°No, Mister Coleridge, you do not.¡±  Then I shut up and forced him to deal with silence. One of the guys from the compound taught me this trick when I was a kid. Sometimes, when you have no argument, all you can do is stand on honor and trust the guy across the table to do the right thing.

    I was expecting an angry retort, but Evan¡¯s face cracked into a broad smile. ¡°I apologize. Please follow me.¡±

    Stunned by the easy victory, I did as I was told. I followed him through a maze of hallways, tunneling deep into the basement. Halfway there, we were joined by a woman. She was tall and willowy, even taller than Evan. Her hair was long and straight, raven black, like a living piece of darkness on her head. Her skin was perfect and desperately pale. Her eyes were black, with flecks of purple. I went pale and took a step back when I saw her - those were demon eyes.

    Evan introduced her. ¡°This is Evelyn, my companion.¡±

    I smirked and raised one eyebrow. What kind of man introduces his girlfriend as ¡°my companion?¡±

    Evelyn looked at me the way a cat looks at a bug, deciding if I was edible, or simply beneath contempt. She scanned me and turned away. When she turned back, her eyes had that same dreamy quality Daniel had used at the museum. She leaned in close and peered at me like she was trying to look through the back of my skull. Her pupils dilated, then she whispered something to Evan and took him aside.

    I couldn¡¯t hear anything, but the content was obvious. It was fun to watch - a fierce argument, conducted by people who don¡¯t use gestures. Evelyn had a talent for it, clearly expressing fear and contempt without moving anything below her shoulders.

    When he came back, Evan was apologetic, and Evelyn was staring daggers into his back. Halfway down the hall, I caught his eye and whispered, ¡°I don¡¯t think your girlfriend likes me.¡±

    ¡°Nothing to worry about,¡± he said.

    * * *

    Our final destination was protected by a complex series of locks. Evan used a magnetic key and entered a combination. Then he put his hand on a metal plate and rattled off a string of words that sounded like Latin poetry. The door opened with a loud thump, and he ushered me inside. The room was stuffy and silent, dominated by a black metal chair.

    The chair sat facing an old stand-up terminal. The subject sat in the chair while the operator stood across from him - perfect for interrogation, or execution.

    Evan gestured to the chair, ¡°Make yourself comfortable. I need a moment to prepare.¡±

    I balked. ¡°I think you should explain this first.¡±

    Evan sighed. ¡°Very well. We¡¯re not allowed to do blood tests anymore. A necromancer stole a batch of samples and used them to cast spells on the students. Now we use the chair.¡±

    ¡°Why does it look like an electric chair?¡±

    ¡°It was. We bought it from Rikers when New York repealed the death penalty. Now it¡¯s a magnet.¡±

    ¡°A magnet?¡±

    ¡°A massive electromagnet. Do you know anything about tantalum? KMP? Magic theory?¡±

    I shook my head three times.

    ¡°Very well. This chair is coated with a metal called tantalum. In low-magic areas, tantalum is a transition metal, but in the presence of magic, it becomes stable - black and brittle. Tantalum absorbs magic. We use it to insulate the casting rooms. This chair sits here all day, absorbing magic from a source nearby. You¡¯re going to sit in the chair, and I¡¯m going to slowly increase the voltage on this magnet. The metal itself is not magnetic, but the magnetic field will release magic from the chair and force it into your body.¡±

    ¡°Does that hurt?¡±

    Evan smiled. ¡°Most people say it¡¯s pleasant, like getting a massage. Now, if you¡¯re a mage, your body will absorb the magic. When you reach maximum capacity, your body will reject the energy and the particles will escape through your skin. It¡¯s all quite harmless. The moment you start leaking, the chair will shut down. I will check the strength of the magnet at that point and determine your KMP Index. Mundanes can¡¯t retain magic, so if your original results were accurate, this meter will remain at zero. And if you really are gifted, this test will determine your potential.¡±

    ¡°How high does it go?¡±

    ¡°This chair is valid to an index rating of about 1,200. The typical score is around 100. My score is 529. Arthur Walton is our most powerful graduate at 825. Captain Cobalt holds the Guinness record at 2,539. Evelyn is a perfect 400.¡±  Evan smiled. ¡°We use her to calibrate the equipment.¡± The console beeped. ¡°The capacitors are ready. Please sit down.¡±

    I was trying to stall the process, but I couldn¡¯t think of a good question. Reluctantly, I stepped up to the platform and sat in the chair. It was cold and hard, covered in tiny bumps.

    Evelyn came over to tighten my straps. She seemed to enjoy it, trapping my limbs in thick black nylon. She pulled the chest strap so hard, I grunted involuntarily. She wasn¡¯t shy about pulling straps, but she was careful not to touch my skin. The process was intimate and humiliating. I smelled exotic perfume, mixed with copper and ozone from her breath.

    Once I was secure, Evelyn stepped away and took her place behind the console. Evan closed a panel with his foot and fired up the chair. It made a deep throbbing noise and whined like a jet engine. I was starting to sweat.

    Evan put his hand on a big black dial and tried to calm me down. ¡°All right, Mister Kovak, we¡¯ll start the test at five and work our way up. If you¡¯re a mage, you¡¯ll feel a tingling sensation in your limbs, almost immediately.¡±

    Evan frowned and brushed something off his console. ¡°I¡¯m starting the charge now. Do you feel anything?¡±

    I tried to shake my head, but the forehead strap kept it still. ¡°Nothing. Just this strap digging into my chest.¡±

    ¡°That makes me think you¡¯re mundane, but you¡¯re not leaking yet. I¡¯ll crank it up to fifteen.¡±

    Evan checked his gauges and grinned at me. ¡°Well, you¡¯re holding steady at fifteen. Three more clicks and you can enroll in the magic program. Shall I continue?¡±

    I said, ¡°Sure.¡±

    Evan turned his dial slowly, asking how I felt with each click. After five clicks, he said, ¡°I don¡¯t think it¡¯s working. Step out of the chair, please.¡±

    Evelyn untied the straps and took my place in the chair. Evan cranked up the dial and took her measurement. ¡°Perfect four hundred, dear. Just like always. All right, Mister Kovak, let¡¯s try again.¡±

    This time, Evan did the straps, also careful not to touch my skin.

    He returned to his console and turned the dial five clicks. ¡°Do you feel anything now? A tingling in your face or hands?¡±

    ¡°I think I need to pee. Does that mean anything?¡±

    That seemed to annoy him. ¡°No.¡±

    He put his hand on the dial and increased the power step by step, drawing it out over five minutes. The ticking started slow and got faster as his patience fled, until the dial appeared to be all the way up. Every second, the chair got louder - screaming and throbbing. Then it started to vibrate. The vibration became a rattle.

    ¡°All right, Mister Kovak, do you feel anything now?¡±  The noise was drowning him out. Evan had to yell.

    I shouted back, ¡°My feet are tingling. Is that normal?¡±

    Evan¡¯s pale face was turning red; the first time I¡¯d seen anything shake his composure. ¡°No, Mister Kovak, that is not normal. My score is 529. At 500, I start to twitch. At 600, I acquire a nice corona. At this power level, there should be lightning bolts shooting out your ass!¡±

    Evan hit the kill switch, draping us in sudden silence. He leaned on the console, rubbing his temples like he had a headache. He was staring at a monitor, or maybe just fuming. ¡°You may be having a delayed reaction. Eve, check his pulse.¡±

    Evelyn whipped her head around and hit him with a look of righteous indignation, like he¡¯d just asked her to give me a blowjob. It looked like a psychic war - some kind of intense power struggle, conducted with frowns, nods, and raised eyebrows. Evelyn put up a good fight, but she apparently lost. Briskly, she grabbed my hand and put her finger on my vein.

    I had never been touched by a witch before.

    There was a moment of disorientation, a peculiar kind of vertigo. I had been vaguely aware of something expanding inside me, but Evelyn¡¯s touch brought it into focus. I felt like a pitcher, filled halfway up. The magic felt cold and clear inside me, but I couldn¡¯t taste it. It bubbled and fizzled like carbonated water.

    Evelyn¡¯s touch felt like a hole in my arm. Magic rushed out of me and flowed into her. I didn¡¯t understand what was happening at first, but a tiny trickle of magic was coming back the other way. She was doing her best to hold it in, but Evelyn¡¯s power was mingling with mine. I could taste it, dark and rich like fine wine.

    There was a terrible intimacy to this, like we were doing something obscene. Did this happen every time these people touched each other?

    I focused on the trickle of power coming from Evelyn and felt with absolute certainty that she hated my guts. But I had no idea why.

    ¡°So, is that look of disgust especially for me, or do you look that way every time you smell a poor person?¡±

    Evelyn dropped my hand and said, ¡°He¡¯s taking it in. All of it.¡±

    Evan wasn¡¯t shocked or angry anymore. His features settled in resignation. ¡°Congratulations, Mister Kovak. You¡¯re one of us.¡±

 Chapter 8: Evan

    I jumped out of the chair, sighing with relief. I rubbed the circulation back into my limbs and walked around to face Evan. Hard to look him in the eye when I could still taste Evelyn somewhere inside me. ¡°That thing I felt when she touched me, does that happen every time?¡±

    ¡°Every time.¡±

    ¡°How do you deal with it?¡±

    ¡°Willpower, Mister Kovak. Something you must learn.¡±

    I snickered. ¡°You have no idea. What happens now?¡±

    Evan cleared his throat. ¡°That¡¯s up to you. Are you asking for advice?¡±

    ¡°Hell yes, I¡¯m asking for advice! I don¡¯t know the first thing about being a mage.¡±

    ¡°Well, the first rule should be obvious. Keep your hands to yourself.¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s the second rule?¡±

    ¡°Never trust a mundane.¡±

    ¡°And the third?¡±

    ¡°Never trust a mage.¡±

    ¡°Is there anyone I can trust?¡±

    ¡°Just me, Mister Kovak. Just me.¡±  Evan¡¯s face turned serious. ¡°You must be very careful now. We don¡¯t know the extent of your power, but with an index that high, you¡¯ll be a target for every government, every company, and every criminal organization on the planet. You must be discreet, and you must learn to defend yourself. Blackmail, extortion, kidnapping - I¡¯ve seen it all. The faculty are not openly treacherous, but they can be bought.¡±

    Apparently, magic was not all wine and roses. ¡°You¡¯re the only people who know about my talent, so I guess you have my life in your hands.¡±

    Evan glanced over at his girlfriend and looked suddenly tired, old beyond his years. ¡°I carry more lives than yours, Mister Kovak. I¡¯ve helped a hundred students through my program. They walk through our gates like cows in a slaughterhouse. They¡¯ve been pampered their whole lives, groomed in private schools, spoiled like star athletes. They expect that treatment to continue when they hit college.

    ¡°They arrive on campus, and there¡¯s a mob of people waiting to seduce them. Money, drugs, women, and gifts - just sign on the dotted line and XYZ Industries will take care of everything. Last week, a shark from Helix Biolabs tried to recruit two of my freshmen for medical research! Can you imagine? I caught them before they signed but imagine the fates of those I don¡¯t hear about.

    ¡°You must keep your head clear, Mister Kovak. If you drink or use drugs, you must stop, now. You are too powerful to walk around inebriated. I don¡¯t know anything about your personal life, but you must choose your companions carefully now. Once your score gets out, every social-climbing sorority girl and weekend witch on this campus will be angling for a shot at you. One careless encounter and some gum-popping harlot gets half your income for the rest of your life. Mages always get screwed in divorce cases and we never win custody.

    ¡°Don¡¯t show off, and don¡¯t sign anything! Some firms are legitimate, but even the good ones will screw you on support fees. If you enter my program, you¡¯ll need an advisor, and if you go into business, you¡¯ll need a lawyer who understands magic.¡±

    I laughed bitterly and shook my head. ¡°Thanks for being straight with me. I could have used a friend like you, about six hundred years ago.¡±

    * * *

    I had a million questions for Evan, but Evelyn was at his arm, having some kind of muted anxiety attack. ¡°Will you excuse us, please? Just a few minutes, and I¡¯ll meet you in my office.¡±

    Evan showed up alone, frowning and stiff like he had just won a battle or lost a war. He apologized for the delay and let me in. This time he traced a symbol on his door and moved a glowing crystal to the center of his desk.

    ¡°I have a proposition for you,¡± he said. ¡°I want you in my program, and to make that easier, I¡¯d like you to join me in a bit of subterfuge.¡±

    I threw up my hands and pushed myself deeper into his chair. ¡°Whoa! I¡¯m not ready to join anything.¡±

    ¡°You don¡¯t have to decide right away, but this deception will make it easier for you if you decide to join us later.¡±

    ¡°What kind of deception?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m worried about your test results. You absorbed everything from my chair, but that¡¯s the tip of the iceberg. Your real score is higher. Perhaps much higher. You don¡¯t have a sponsor, you¡¯re not registered with the Department of Metahuman Affairs, and you¡¯re too powerful to walk around loose.

    ¡°If I report these results today, you will wake up in Virginia tomorrow, surrounded by men in black suits. You¡¯ll be drafted by the DMA, and that¡¯s bad for both of us. If you¡¯d come through normal channels, I would have no choice, but you came in off the street, so I think I can file my paperwork, and still keep your options open.¡±

    ¡°How?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll report what happened today, but I¡¯ll list your index as 184. High enough to enter the program, but low enough to keep you off government radar. I¡¯ll handle registration and become your sponsor. I¡¯ll tell the government exactly what you told me. There was an error in your blood test, and now you¡¯re being courted by my program. Your file will merge with a hundred others, and the minders won¡¯t look twice.¡±

    ¡°You don¡¯t look like the generous type, Evan. What¡¯s in it for you?¡±

    Evan smiled. ¡°You¡¯re already thinking like one of us. The benefit, Mister Kovak, is that I will be listed as sponsor on your permanent record. Your accomplishments will enhance my reputation, for the rest of your life. This is a tremendous boon for me, whether you join the program or not.¡±

    ¡°What if you get busted? What if someone catches you faking my results?¡±

    ¡°Some mages are hard to test. You¡¯ve already invalidated your grade school tests. The first error protects the second, and you get to keep your life.¡±

    ¡°And if I refuse?¡±

    ¡°If you refuse, I turn in these test results. Six hours later, you¡¯ll be stuffed in a black van. Six weeks later, you¡¯ll be conscripted into some black bag hero team, and six months after that, you will be dead.¡±

    ¡°So, it¡¯s not really a choice at all.¡±

    ¡°Not really. Sponsorship is mandatory, but you don¡¯t have to join my program. That really is a choice, and I hope you will make the right one.¡±

    ¡°Look, even if I wanted to sign up, my grades¡­ Before you look me up, I¡¯ve got to be honest with you. I am a terrible student. The only time I ever did well was in this fancy corporate middle school sponsored by HDI. Everything else, high school and college, I¡¯m probably sitting at a 2.5.¡±

    ¡°I can ignore most of this if you decide to join us. My recommendation carries a lot of weight here. I¡¯m not permanent faculty, but I will be, and everyone knows it. If you really want to learn magic, I can offer you a fresh start.¡±

    Evan was looking at me like I was food, too much like Lydia. He saw me hesitate and rushed to fill the gap. ¡°It won¡¯t be easy. My students are competitive, and some of them will hate you.¡±

    ¡°Why would anybody hate me? I just got here.¡±

    Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

    ¡°You haven¡¯t paid your dues, and you don¡¯t know the rules here. You went to the wrong schools, studied the wrong subjects, and grew up in a totally different world. You don¡¯t know your limits, and you don¡¯t know how to behave. Mages walk a fine line in this world. You must conduct yourself with dignity and restraint at all times. Some mundanes romanticize us, but don¡¯t fool yourself. We are always one mistake away from being burned at the stake.¡±

    ¡°Oh, come on, I¡¯ve seen you guys on TV my whole life. Wizards run the world!¡±

    Evan sighed. ¡°Please don¡¯t use that word. Wizard is a derogatory term now, precisely because of the television you grew up with. Have you watched it lately? The culture turned on us a decade ago. Now, mages are portrayed as villains, jokes, or useless buffoons. All the best roles are given to gritty Bluestar antiheroes working for the state, breaking the rules to give gifted criminals the punishment they deserve.

    ¡°Wizards are either too smart to be trusted or portrayed as useless bureaucrats for the cool heroes to rebel against. If a normal person calls you a wizard in public, they are insulting you, maybe even trying to start a fight. A few of my students have started to call themselves wizards ironically, but I try to discourage this.¡±

    ¡°So, we¡¯re not heroes? Mages are a joke now? Even after all the stuff Arthur did?¡±

    ¡°Arthur Walton¡¯s accomplishments were fifteen years ago, even if he did save the world. There is an active effort to deconstruct him and minimize his contributions in favor of others who look better on camera. Arthur¡¯s entire history is being rewritten because he¡¯s so difficult to work with. He¡¯s an arrogant misanthrope who refuses interviews, the exact opposite of what our system rewards.¡±

    ¡°So, what does that mean for me?¡±

    ¡°It means, Mister Kovak, that from now on, you will go out of your way to avoid attention and obey the law. If you get fined for something, you will pay it, immediately. You will not challenge it, even if you think you can win. If you have political opinions, you will keep them to yourself. If you are stopped by police, the first words out of your mouth will be, ¡®I¡¯m a mage.¡¯ You will keep your hands where the officer can see them, and you will speak only when you are spoken to. When tax time comes, you will hire a good accountant and pay a little more than you owe. And when the DMA comes to search your home, you will open your doors wide and offer them a cup of tea.¡±

    ¡°And what¡¯s my reward for enduring this fascist bullshit?¡±

    ¡°Your reward, Mister Kovak, is the opportunity to live a decent life, and hopefully sign with a corporation that will give you a nice house and a clothing allowance, in exchange for token appearances and light spellcasting.¡±

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t sound worth it.¡±

    Evan shrugged. ¡°Perhaps it¡¯s not. Some of my students leave the country, but Asia is bad for us, and Europe is worse. Metahumans have established fiefdoms in Latin America. If I had your power, I would learn some compulsion magic and hop a flight to Paraguay.¡± Evan stood up. ¡°But we¡¯ll cross that bridge when we come to it. The choice before you is sponsorship. What do you say?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t have much choice, do I?¡± I stood up. ¡°Use the fake score and send me the papers.¡±

    ¡°Cheer up, Mister Kovak, it¡¯s not all rules and compromise. You¡¯ll make money, you¡¯ll make friends, and if you give us a chance, you could even have some fun.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°Evan, this is all happening so fast, I need more proof than a couple of test results. Can you teach me a spell?¡±

    Evan gestured to his conference table and said, ¡°Let¡¯s move over here.¡±

    A big oak table, surrounded by those lovely leather chairs. Evan uncovered an ancient wall safe and raced through the combination. He spun the dial so fast, the numbers ran together in a white blur. Then he said a few of those Latin words and pressed his hand to another steel plate. A rune glowed green on the face of it, and the door swung open with a click.

    Evan pulled out a small gray box - unlocked it with a physical key and said a quick word of magic. It was full of ordinary index cards, like from my debate days. I was a bit disappointed, expecting something more impressive, like scrolls or leather books.

    Evan sat down and started riffling through cards. ¡°Usually, we start with divination and cosmetic spells, but you¡¯re not a typical student, so I¡¯ll give you something cool.¡±

    He handed me a blue card with five symbols on it, obviously copied by hand. The tab at the top said, ¡°Inanimate Levitation.¡± I held it like a hand grenade. ¡°What should I do with this?¡±

    Evan held up one finger and opened his top drawer. He pulled out a red rubber ball, like something a cat would play with. He set the ball in front of me and said, ¡°The symbols on that card constitute one complete spell. I want you to bring in just a bit of power and concentrate on those symbols. Picture them in your mind, one at a time. You don¡¯t have to memorize them, just stare at the card and concentrate. Those symbols are like keys to a series of mental locks. You¡¯ll feel a kind of ¡®click¡¯ in your mind as you get each one right.

    ¡°When you hit the final rune, you¡¯ll produce an effect in the real world. Each symbol has a vibration. You¡¯ll feel it in your aura, like your spirit is tuning itself to the magic. Each symbol brings you closer to the final frequency. When you finish the last symbol, remember it, and hold that feeling for as long as you can. If you feel it slipping, just look at the card and focus again. Once the power feels stable, imagine yourself reaching out and wrapping that last symbol around this rubber ball. If you do it properly, the ball will levitate a few inches over the table, and you¡¯ll be able to move it up and down.¡±

    ¡°So that¡¯s it? Picture five symbols and concentrate? I thought it would be more complicated.¡±

    ¡°Some spells are. Powerful spells consist of thirty, sometimes fifty symbols. You have to picture each one precisely, and feel the right vibration each time, or the spell will fail. In ancient times, mages would associate spells with music or poetry to help them remember. These days we just read them off cards.

    ¡°Students are expected to remember basic spells, and a few emergency spells for calling help and dispelling magic. They spend most of their time learning what the symbols mean. We¡¯ve identified nine-hundred and eighty-two discrete runes. Our graduates learn maybe ten percent.

    ¡°The first symbol on your card is called Rhion. Rhion is an air rune. When you concentrate on it, you¡¯re aligning your spirit to the air.

    ¡°The next rune is Talse. Talse represents a category of inanimate objects. When you concentrate on that, you narrow your influence to non-living things. We put that in, so you don¡¯t accidentally levitate a person, or part of a person, as you practice.

    ¡°The third symbol, Kios, is a control character. It links the object with your mind, so you can move it with your thoughts. If you used Halper or Cillia here, you could control the object with gestures or voice commands. Kios requires more energy, but most students prefer direct mental control.

    ¡°The fourth symbol is Alph. Alph is an activator symbol. The other symbols refine the magic - Alph releases it.

    ¡°The last symbol is Ptah. Ptah is a sustaining rune. Most spells end with Ptah. It tells your body to maintain the current pattern, hold the current effect until you release it.

    ¡°These symbols are like answers to a series of questions: where, what, how, when, and how long. The spell in front of you says you will be working in the air, manipulating inanimate objects, with mental commands, starting now, for as long as you concentrate.

    ¡°Most students cast by saying these names. Do this in public, and mundanes will think you¡¯re crazy, mumbling gibberish under your breath. Eventually, you¡¯ll learn to do it silently, but in the beginning, we encourage students to name the runes as they cast. Walk by a first-year class and you¡¯ll see a room full of students chanting, ¡°Rhion, Talse, Kios, Alph, Ptah.

    ¡°So! Those are the basics. Are you ready?¡±

    I nodded.

    ¡°Focus on the card and bring in magic. When you get to the last symbol, keep it in your mind and wrap it around the object.¡±

    I took a deep breath and tried to open myself, but the power wasn¡¯t cooperating. I told Evan, ¡°I can feel it, but it won¡¯t move.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re trying too hard. Just relax.¡±

    I rolled my eyes. ¡°Why are people always telling me to relax?¡±

    The magic screamed in my head, but I couldn¡¯t let it go. I took my eyes off the ball and yelled at Evan. ¡°What the fuck! It won¡¯t¡ª¡±

    As soon as I took my eyes off it, the ball shot up and hit the ceiling, careening around the room. It smashed a vase and whizzed by my ear. Evan dove for cover, but he was too slow. The ball nailed him square in the forehead, leaving an angry red mark. Evan was seething, but quickly pulled himself together.

    ¡°As I suspected, Mister Kovak, you are very strong, but you have a slight control problem.¡±

    * * *

    We spent the rest of the hour working on it. My next few attempts went wild. I eventually got the hang of it, but sometimes I would still fake a spasm, just to see Evan jump. Torturing my mentor was cheap entertainment, but it was cheering me up. I cast it ten times and asked for a copy.

    Evan shook his head. ¡°Spells can¡¯t be photographed, and I can¡¯t let you write it down. Spells are registered munitions, so that card must stay in my office.¡±

    ¡°What do you mean they can¡¯t be photographed?¡±

    ¡°Runes are inherently magical. The shapes attract KMP. The energy distorts optics. Run that through a scanner and you¡¯ll get a stream of blurred nonsense.¡±

    ¡°Well, that answers my next question. You have to copy all this stuff by hand? There are no magic textbooks?¡±

    ¡°None. Ben Franklin tried to make a magical printing press, but energy collected in the grooves melted the blocks, and boiled the ink off. Even when you do it by hand, the process requires special ink and special pens. We have dedicated instruments now - tantalum shafts with ceramic points - but in the old days, quills would heat up and set your paper on fire.¡±

    I reached across the table and spun the rubber ball. ¡°Can we try this again?¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re not tired?¡±

    I shook my head.

    ¡°Three more times and I¡¯ll kick you out. I have to do some work today.¡±

    The last three times, I cast it from memory.

    * * *

    Evan led me outside with Evelyn playing bodyguard beside him, looking at me like I was something stuck to her shoe.

    ¡°Your girlfriend hates me so much, it¡¯s actually kind of hot,¡± I said.

    Evan glared at me, and I realized I had just said something incredibly rude, standing right in front of them. ¡°Sorry man, I¡¯ve never had magic in my body before; I think I¡¯m a little drunk.¡± I leaned in and stage-whispered, ¡°So, is she your girlfriend, or your familiar? Is she a polymorphed cat or something?¡±

    ¡°It was a pleasure to meet you, Mister Kovak. Please call if you have any questions¡­ any serious questions.¡±

 Chapter 9: Ancestors

    Lydia said, ¡°Oh, Timothy what have you done?¡± as soon as I walked in.

    ¡°Already? Really? You just got here and you¡¯re already taking a tone with me? I just met with a counselor at school.¡±

    ¡°Your aura is on fire and you¡¯re throwing off arcs. I could feel you ten feet from the door. An angel could spot you from space. Why are you walking in here charged with magic like you¡¯ve just been fighting for your life? It¡¯s not even Earth magic.¡± She sniffed. ¡°And why do you smell like a witch?¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re taking a lot of liberties really fast, lady.¡±

    Lydia took a deep breath and steepled hands in front of her face. ¡°I¡¯ve been here less than a day and you¡¯ve already¡­ This is my fault. I should have held back. I should have studied you, but I just couldn¡¯t wait anymore.¡± She leaned forward, ¡°Timothy, please. Take my hand. Let me bleed this off, before you hurt yourself.¡±

    I laughed. ¡°Really? This is what you¡¯re resorting to, to get me to touch you? Your pitch was a lot better last night.¡±

    Lydia shook her head. I was trying to be cynical about it, but she really did look scared.

    ¡°I¡¯m not trying to trick you. This doesn¡¯t count. I won¡¯t even move. I¡¯ll stay right here; you have my Word. Please, to walk around with this level of power, there could be spontaneous effects. Anything you cast will be dangerous. Please, stay with me, just until this wears off. Question me, insult me, throw stones at me, I don¡¯t care. Just please stay here, and don¡¯t try to cast anything.¡±

    ¡°What are you so worried about? I feel great! I haven¡¯t felt this good since I lost my insurance. It feels like my first day back on meds. I haven¡¯t had this much dopamine in my system since I quit my job.¡± Another cold chill hit me. ¡°Is this how it works? Have I been compulsive and depressed for twenty years because my body needed magic?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s too early for this conversation, but I see I have no choice. For centuries, the magic in your family was stable, predictable, easy to control. But now, in the last few generations¡­ an element of chaos has entered your bloodline. The power is sweeping, surging, fluctuating in response to emotion. Any strong emotion can spiral out of control. The magic and emotion feed on each other, amplifying the spells until the caster can¡¯t control them.¡±

    ¡°But I¡¯m fine!¡±

    ¡°You don¡¯t feel sad or angry?¡±

    ¡°I feel mildly annoyed at the uninvited supernatural creature who has suddenly decided she¡¯s my girlfriend. I don¡¯t remember voting on that, by the way.¡±

    ¡°Whatever you want. You can stay here and call me names all night.¡±

    ¡°The museum stuff was your fault, right? That thing that attacked us is connected to you somehow? Connected to all this?¡±

    ¡°You were never supposed to see that. I certainly didn¡¯t expect you to be in the museum, just a few feet from the book when those men arrived. Perhaps you were drawn to the book as it was drawn to you, or maybe this is exactly what it looks like, an unfortunate coincidence.¡±

    ¡°So, the most terrifying night of my life was a coincidence?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll take the blame for using incompetent men to do the job,¡± Lydia said. ¡°They were supposed to liberate the book weeks ago, but they kept putting me off. I finally had to threaten their families, and they still waited until the last possible moment to get it done. But you were never in any danger. The Guardian recognized your blood as soon as it got close to you.¡±

    ¡°And what about Judy? Was Judy in danger?¡±

    ¡°Perhaps,¡± Lydia admitted. ¡°But the Guardian¡¯s primary task is to protect the book. It doesn¡¯t just randomly attack bystanders.¡±

    ¡°I still don¡¯t get it. How is this thing connected to me?¡±

    ¡°Because it¡¯s your book. Taltorak is your family¡¯s birthright, the magical tome Xavier Kovach sold his soul for - the greatest collection of magical knowledge ever assembled in one place. My Master took it from a prince he defeated centuries ago and used it to become a power player in Hell. Once we get you trained, he¡¯ll sell your services to other lords and princes who need to accomplish tasks on Earth. My Master has suffered during these decades we¡¯ve been without an heir, but if you¡¯re as powerful as I think you are, you should be able to very quickly help us make up for lost time.¡±

    ¡°And this book just happened to be there, right in front of me, at the exact moment somebody let it out? That doesn¡¯t sound like a coincidence to me. It sounds like somebody was watching me, maybe somebody even manipulated the director into giving me the job.¡±

    Lydia looked uncomfortable. ¡°It¡¯s hard to say what¡¯s intentional and what¡¯s accidental when it comes to the book. It¡¯s not alive in itself, but it contains many souls. It was created thousands of years ago and became a repository for the spirits of mages who sold their souls to Hell. They contribute their spells to the tome, then they bind their spirits to it. Most of them are grateful to do it, since joining a great conclave of wizards is much more pleasant than burning in the Lake.

    ¡°The book got itself moved to Texas when you were born and then got itself moved northeast when your father brought you to Boston. It spent ten years sitting in a government vault in Dallas before it was transferred to another one in Rhode Island, before finally ending up in your museum, just in time to be delivered to you.¡±

    It was very unsettling to hear that Lydia knew my life in this kind of detail, knowing where I had moved from and when. ¡°But it¡¯s an inanimate object! How can it get itself moved across the country? Does it teleport?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± Lydia said, ¡°but it can exert a mild influence on humans who get close to it, planting suggestions and influencing their dreams. Any bureaucrat or administrator who gets too close will be corrupted by it and feel an urge to move it where it needs to go, all while thinking the move is their own idea.¡±

    ¡°So, if it¡¯s my book, where is it?¡±

    Lydia raised her palm and a tiny version of Taltorak appeared in her hand.

    ¡°It¡¯s all yours,¡± she said. ¡°Eventually you¡¯ll learn to summon it on your own, but I can fetch it for you in the meantime, whenever you need to study.¡± She extended her hand to me. ¡°Go ahead, open it. I promise it won¡¯t hurt you. I suspect it¡¯s even happier to see you than I am.¡±

    I felt a weird pull from the book, seeing it in her hand, but I shook my head, and made her take it away.

    * * *

    I made Lydia tell me the birth dates and death dates of each of the seven ancestors who came before me, amazed that she could carry six hundred years¡¯ worth of memories in such detail. There had been thirty generations of Kovachs since Xavier signed his second contract, but only eight of us got the power.

    Xavier lived 69 years. Born in 1298, died in 1367. Met Lydia when he was 54 years old, just a couple years after signing his first contract with Baalphezar. Lived in Romania and eventually married a princess named Lucrezia in his mid-50s.

    Jacob only lived 43 years. Born in 1443, died in 1486. Lived in Romania and Moldova. Although he may have just killed a bunch of people in Moldova, without actually living there. Married a woman named Ghika, also late in life.

    Tobias lived 56 years. Spent most of his life in a place called Montecassino in Italy. Born in 1525, died in 1581. When I asked Lydia when he got married, she shook her head and refused to answer.

    Laurence Kovach lived 61 years, from 1618 to 1679. Lydia said he sailed all over the world during his life, and married a woman named Joanna in his 30s.

    Anson Kovach also only lived 43 years. Born in 1746, died in 1789. Lydia says he died in battle but refused to elaborate. He married a woman named Brielle, also in his 30s, young by Kovach standards. Lydia says he was born in England, but King George III did something to his family, prompting him to become a mercenary for France.

    Stefan Kovach lived 56 years. Lydia described him as a proud German. Born in 1889, died in 1946 in Nuremberg. Lydia said he married a woman named Elsa who brought her baby to America in 1945, shortly before Germany surrendered.

    And then Lydia got quiet, and refused to continue, promising to tell me about Kovach number seven later, at a ¡°more convenient time.¡±

    And I guess I might as well include myself in this list. My mother, Cynthia Kovak, only lived 36 years. She had me on April 13, 2033, at Parkland Hospital in Dallas, Texas, and died when I was just eight years old. I lived in Dallas, alone with dad, until I was 12.

    In 2045, my father moved us to a survivalist compound in West Texas for several months while the world went to shit, then moved to Boston to take a job with HDI.

    Dad moved to Boston, but I didn¡¯t go with him. I ended up in a fancy boarding school in Providence, sponsored by HDI, while my father moved to Boston to help with reconstruction after a series of kaiju attacks. He said the school was a perk of his new job and was very upset when I had to transfer to a normal school and move back in with him, two years later.

    I was 17 when I met Judy in 2050, at a corporate co-op that used to be Watertown High School. We graduated in 2051. I immediately moved into the engineering dorm at Boston University but dropped out to take a job with Innovex after just two years. Judy and I got our own place and stayed together until I lost my job in March of 2055. Three years later, I was minding my own business on my twenty-fifth birthday when a demon popped up and promised to make all my dreams come true.

    I met Lydia in 2058 and died¡­ way too soon.

    * * *

    ¡°I don¡¯t understand Xavier, the first guy. I know what he did, but I don¡¯t know why. What kind of man sells his children to the devil? Was he greedy? Was he stupid? Was he just plain evil? You knew the guy, what the hell was he thinking?¡±

    ¡°He was not stupid, and I would not call him evil. He would confess to greed, but that¡¯s not why he sold you. He sold his soul for power. The first time, it was just him. Why did he do it? I think it was pride. Xavier was a village joke, a doddering gypsy, peddling love potions and gout cures door to door.

    ¡°He started as an alchemist. Xavier spent years in his hut, working with lead pellets and piles of manure. I remember a batch of fertilizer, some kind of growth magic he tested in the garden. The vegetables were huge, but they had no flavor. In lean times, he lived on those - choking down tasteless tomatoes bigger than my head.¡±

    ¡°So that¡¯s why he signed? He just got tired of being poor?¡±

    ¡°Xavier had a strange obsession with the Prince of Darkness. He used to tell me stories about the early days of creation, when angels walked the Earth with men. God kicked Adam out of the garden, but the angels took pity on him. They came down and taught him things - agriculture, fire, even magic came from the angels. Xavier went on and on about it.¡±

    Lydia dropped an octave and changed her gestures and the tone of her voice, imitating Xavier: ¡°¡®Azael taught us magic, and Asmodeus taught us war, but Lucifer was the best friend Man ever had. Apples and snakes be damned, Lucifer gave us music, and music is the sound of hope.¡¯

    ¡°That¡¯s how my Master met him. Xavier was trying to conjure Satan, but he got my Master instead. His spell was a dud. He thought it would summon the devil, but it was an open invitation - the infernal equivalent of pulling your pants down. It opened a random gate to Hell, open to anyone who cared to walk through. One of our Imps found it and called home.

    ¡°My Master interviewed Xavier and was shocked at how powerful he was. He was the perfect pawn - gifted, gullible, and lonely. The first contract was simple. My Master gave him the book, Taltorak, and Xavier agreed to do his will on Earth.

    ¡°Xavier was willing, but his flesh was weak. He was sick all the time, ruined by hard living and homemade wine. He was a confirmed bachelor - a hermit, really. I think he was handsome once, but misery left tracks on his face. Our book brought him wealth, and some sliver of respect, but Xavier was always a lonely man.

    ¡°He served us for ten years, then Baalphezar offered him a second contract. He offered Xavier a companion, a woman taken literally from his dreams. There were two conditions: he had to find a wife, and he had to give us dominion over his children. He tried to resist, but the moment he saw me, he loved me with all his heart. My Master came to him, and they drafted his contract together.

    ¡°Xavier was weak and smitten, but he was nobody¡¯s fool. His conditions were very clever. Only the male children, only the mages, and I can¡¯t touch them until they turn twenty-five. That was the main thing he insisted on, the provision he fought for, above all others. He thought this clause would defeat us. He thought the age limit would keep his children safe. By twenty-five, his sons would have wives and children of their own. He thought they would be settled. He thought they would be immune to me. Xavier went to his grave thinking he cheated us.¡±

    ¡°Did it work? Eight guys including me, how many have been married by twenty-five?¡±

    ¡°None.¡±

    I blinked. ¡°None?¡±

    ¡°Not one.¡±

    I groaned and put my head in my hands. ¡°Oh my god, it¡¯s genetic. An entire family of wallflowers¡­¡±

    ¡°Anson called you ¡®late bloomers.¡¯¡±  Lydia beamed. ¡°I take it as a compliment. You reject other women because something in your souls is waiting for me.¡±

    ¡°So, you said Xavier was what, fifty when he met you? Who did he marry?¡±

    Lydia squirmed a bit, pulling on her gown. The hem kept climbing up her leg. ¡°I had the body of a woman, and the mind of a child when I met Xavier. I couldn¡¯t really guide him, so I brought in one of my sisters and we¡ª we took a shortcut.¡±

    ¡°What kind of ¡®shortcut?¡¯¡±

    ¡°He bought a princess.¡±

    ¡°Excuse me?¡±

    ¡°Xavier took a job in the court of some petty noble, a baron in Wallachia. He sat at this long table, turning lead into gold for hours, days at a time. Basarab used it to finance his war against the Turks. And when the time came, Xavier got him drunk and asked for a wife. It¡¯s not uncommon. A soldier suffers a wound or performs an act of bravery, and the lord gives him a daughter. Mages usually prefer money, but it was a reasonable request.

    ¡°We rejected the first one - pathetic inbred thing with a lazy eye and arms like seal flippers. The third daughter became his wife. Lucrezia was no beauty, but she was strong, healthy, and smarter than average. She bore him a son and raised him in court. Xavier gave her an allowance and saw them twice a week.¡±

    ¡°Did they love each other?¡±

    ¡°No, but it didn¡¯t matter. Lucrezia had her lovers, and Xavier had me. The bloodline went on, and Xavier raised me like a daughter. He taught me to cook. He taught me to sew. He taught me to dance, and he taught me to sing.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, this story is starting to worry me. Were you his lover or his daughter?¡±

    ¡°I stayed by his bed at night, but he never saw me as a woman. I sat by his pillow and played the harp while he slept. I loved him like¡ª¡± Lydia wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her gown. ¡°I loved him very much.¡±

    * * *

    I knew what I had to do next. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, but I was dragging my feet, somehow still hoping this was all a joke. I knew I had a gadget for this, but I had no idea where it was. I bought this thing for a video game project I never finished, and it had been gathering dust for five years. I finally found it in a plastic bin in the back of my closet.

    I concealed the little box in my hand and walked up to Lydia. ¡°Can you raise your head for me? I¡¯d like to see your face.¡± She did, and I whipped the box up, taking a full 3-D scan of her head.

    I slipped behind my desk and plugged it in. ¡°Okay, Jeeves, I need you to run a comprehensive search for that face. Ignore the hair, the eyes, and both horns. Hit every black and gray source you have and pay any fee under twenty bucks.¡±

    Jeeves had been my interface since high school, made in the likeness of a defunct query engine. His avatar was a jolly cartoon butler, not nearly as smart as a true modern interface, but hooked into hundreds of custom scripts I had been writing since I was a kid. No ¡°real¡± hacker would trust Jeeves with the kind of shit I let him do, but he could hack a database or punch through a firewall without direct supervision, and he could respond to natural language queries, as long as I didn¡¯t get cute.

    ¡°This is your last chance to come clean,¡± I told Lydia. ¡°If you¡¯re an actress or a witch, I¡¯m gonna know in about thirty seconds. And if you¡¯ve done porn, I¡¯m about to see that, too. Last chance to stop me.¡±

    Lydia said nothing, so I hit the button.

    * * *

    ¡°There was like a century between the time Xavier died and the time you were allowed to meet Jacob. Were you in Hell for that whole time?¡±

    Lydia nodded. ¡°Most of it. I spent those years in training, doing lessons with Sylvia, dodging knives from my sisters. When Jacob was born, I spent some time at the scrying pool, watching him.¡±

    ¡°You watched him grow up?¡±

    ¡°Just a few times. The Earth is a long way from Hell. Scrying takes a lot of power. My Master was much more generous in those days. In retrospect, he spoiled me. I would stand there for hours, watching Jacob turn in his crib.¡±

    ¡°Did you watch me like that?¡±

    ¡°No. My Master was¡­ very disappointed, when your predecessor died. Scrying was an expensive luxury; one that I did not deserve.¡±

    ¡°Anson and Stefan were soldiers. Xavier worked for this baron. What did Jacob do?¡±

    Lydia gave a wistful smile. ¡°Jacob was very special, but he was broken when I found him. He was trampled by a horse when he was young. The animal broke his limbs, and his mother broke the rest of him.

    ¡°She pampered him and babied him and treated him like an invalid for fifteen years. When I finally got to him, he was bedridden, so fat he could barely turn himself over. Baalphezar wanted to skip him, but in that condition, he would never father a child.

    ¡°He was angry, despondent, and terrified of women. I told him my purpose that first night, but he didn¡¯t care. He didn¡¯t care about demons or magic or sex. He just wanted to die. He begged me to kill him. Heaven or Hell, he didn¡¯t care. I was desperate to help him, but I couldn¡¯t get past his mother. I offered to kill the old woman, but Jacob refused.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re not above killing mothers when they get in your way.¡±

    ¡°I would have killed that one, absolutely. I saw him, Timothy. I saw what her ¡®care¡¯ did to him - gangrene and bedsores and ¡®potions,¡¯ sold by the local quack. She was killing him by inches. His ¡®medication¡¯ was opium and mercury, in a spoon full of rancid milk.

    ¡°Jacob wouldn¡¯t let me kill her, so I took the form of an old woman and told her I was a nurse. I told her a wealthy merchant had offered to put him in my care. She didn¡¯t want to give him up. She whined about the burden, but Jacob was all she had. I had to bribe her. Our ¡®sanitarium¡¯ was a villa seized from one of my Master¡¯s rivals - a lovely place, right on the coast. I cleaned out the corpses and took Jacob there by carriage. Once he was settled, I regulated his diet and took him through some simple exercises, relying on advice from one of my sisters. The opium withdrawal was bad enough, but he was always whining for food.¡±

    Lydia smiled. ¡°He said he wanted to die, but he didn¡¯t want to starve. He still wouldn¡¯t touch me, but I found ways to bribe him. He asked me to bring him books - always books. I looted every mansion in Bucharest, finding books for Jacob. Eventually, he learned Latin and let me teach him how to channel magic. The day he learned his first spell, I wrapped him in a cloak and flew him to the mountains. We spent the day looking down on Brasov. I¡¯ll never forget the look in his eyes when he saw the sun set on that mountaintop. He took my hand, and we made love for the first time. Ten years later, he built a castle there. I think it¡¯s still standing.

    ¡°He learned magic very quickly after that. He started as a diviner. He enchanted a mirror in our sitting room and used it to scry on places far away. He would sit there for hours, exploring the world from his little chair. My Master thought he was useless, until he started hunting treasure. He summoned objects from far away and presented them as gifts. Jacob was very shrewd, and he had a silver tongue. He was the only one of your ancestors that my Master would speak to personally.

    ¡°He filled our coffers with gold from old shipwrecks. He stole valuables from homes all over Europe - an amazing collection of artifacts. He gave most of them to my Master, but he kept a few for himself. He spent hours fiddling with magic trinkets, learning secrets and breaking curses. He found a hundred magic texts and added all kinds of things to the book; Jacob was the only true scholar in your bloodline.

    ¡°Once he got tired of summoning objects, he started summoning demons. He started small, binding Imps from rival princes. In a month he had the whole villa crawling with imps - cleaning, fixing, and building things. I had to watch him closely once the summoning began; sometimes he had the Imps bring him food. He was scared to touch opium, but we fought a constant battle over pastries.

    ¡°When he got tired of imps, he started summoning elementals. That¡¯s when it got dangerous. Elemental creatures aren¡¯t exactly evil, but they are supremely indifferent to the lives and property of human beings, and they are profoundly stupid.

    ¡°Jacob almost destroyed the castle, learning to phrase commands. It frightened me to watch him, sitting in his chair while these massive things roared in front of him. They could have crushed him with one swipe, but I never saw him make a mistake. Anson had courage, but Jacob had nerve. I¡¯ve never seen such composure.

    ¡°Jacob mastered the elementals and learned to summon bigger demons. He was very careful, always polite, and mindful of politics. He honored them and flattered them and paid them with gifts no other wizard could match. He learned Hell better than any human who ever lived. Not just for us, he loved it. He loved bribing and bargaining and playing the factions off each other. My Master thought he might betray us, but Jacob loved me. He said I saved his life.

    ¡°I remember his mother¡¯s funeral.¡± She put a hand to her mouth and suppressed a little laugh. ¡°He conjured a pile of ore and had the Imps mold it into a throne. It was a hideous thing - black and fluted - covered with figures in pain. Jacob cast a levitation spell so he could move it around.

    ¡°Then he prepared his entrance. He opened a gate to the grave site and floated through on that throne. He conjured a storm and made it rain blood on the crowd. You should have seen them run! He summoned six members of a rival lord¡¯s elite guard to serve as pallbearers. That lord spent the next twenty years trying to kill him, but that castle was impregnable.¡±

    Lydia was laughing so hard, she had to put one toe on the ground to steady herself. ¡°You should have seen it, Timothy - six giant demons, ten feet tall, carrying the body of this tiny old woman! Everyone says I don¡¯t have a sense of humor, but I made Jacob laugh all the time.¡± She dabbed one eye with the corner of her robe. ¡°All your ancestors loved me, but Jacob was the only one who really understood me.¡±

    ¡°So, Jacob eventually got married?¡±

    Lydia clucked her tongue and made a frustrated sound. ¡°Ghika was another princess, one of the cruelest, most despicable women to ever walk the Earth. She was unspeakably ugly, not just in her face and body, but ugly in her soul, consumed with pettiness and hatred.

    ¡°Jacob didn¡¯t have to seduce her, she sought him out, and offered him a fortune in gold to cast curses on her enemies. Jacob took her to his drawing room, and they talked and laughed for hours, thinking up the most grotesque punishments for people she hated. And trust me, she hated everyone. The more outrageous her ideas got, the harder Jacob laughed. Something about her, her pure, unrepentant evil, it entranced him. I can only assume she reminded him of his mother.

    ¡°Jacob refused the gold and said he would curse her enemies forever, if she agreed to marry him and give him a child. She agreed, they married, and in a month or so, she was pregnant. Timothy, I never understood it. I still don¡¯t understand it, but I truly believe that child was conceived in love - the most disgusting, most twisted form of love I have ever seen.¡±

    ¡°How did Jacob die?¡±

    Lydia took a deep breath and composed herself. ¡°Most of the time, Jacob was content with his chair, but when he turned forty, he started talking about legs, about making a spell to heal himself. He studied anatomy and spent months experimenting on animals. His injuries were too severe for a healing spell, so he decided to wither his old legs completely and grow a new pair.

    ¡°Tobias could have done it, but this wasn¡¯t Jacob¡¯s specialty. It took him three years to make the spell. A young man would have survived the process, but Jacob¡¯s heart was too weak. The spell worked, but the strain killed him. Jacob knew the risk. He just wanted to take a few steps before he died.¡±

    My image search was still running, so I tried a simple name search. I found half a dozen historical texts that mentioned Jacob, but none of the modern historians thought he was real. They described him as a mythical figure, a boogeyman used to scare villagers in Moldova.

    Then I tried a bunch of variant spellings, and suddenly popped up a painting.

    ¡°I think this is Jacob, but¡­ Lydia? There¡¯s a succubus in this painting, but it¡¯s not you.¡±

    The painting showed a fat man in a black robe with graying brown hair and a ridiculous evil goatee. Obviously a relative. I wondered if I would be that big, without the benefit of modern medicine. He was seated on an ornate wooden throne that seemed to be floating a few inches off the ground. He was facing the painter with the suggestion of a smirk on his face, and he had a nude succubus in his lap, a stunning Polynesian beauty with green eyes and spectacular tits.

    As soon as the painting came up, Lydia screamed, ¡°Whore! That filthy whore! Jacob said he destroyed this!¡± Lydia was so angry, she leaned in and started jabbing at her screen like she was trying to make my buttons work. ¡°Where was this found? Where did they dig this up?¡±

    ¡°Says it was found while excavating the site of a castle in Calarasi. They thought it was cleaned out, but they went back and found all kinds of new stuff with ground-penetrating radar. That¡¯s when they found this, in amazing condition.¡±

    Lydia was so mad, I was expecting smoke to come out of her ears. ¡°He had a secret basement! An entire secret basement! It probably wasn¡¯t even in this dimension until his anchor failed!¡±

    Lydia leaned in and poked her finger at the projection, like she was poking my ancestor in the face. ¡°Oh, you better stay dead, Jacob. You better stay dead. Because if you ever come back, we will have words, you and I. A great many words. Does this painting still exist? In physical form somewhere?¡±

    Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

    I checked. ¡°Says it¡¯s in the Moldovan National History Museum.¡±

    ¡°And you still have planes in this world? We could fly to this place and see this in person if you had enough money?¡±

    ¡°Yeah, I guess.¡±

    ¡°All right,¡± she huffed. ¡°We¡¯ll talk about this later.¡± She started to turn away, then snapped her head back to me. ¡°Do you know what else they got out of that basement? Do you have pictures of anything else they found?¡± But before I could start, she said, ¡°No. Don¡¯t show me now. I¡¯m already too angry. But we will come back to this. We will absolutely come back to this.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, I am totally lost. Who is this naked chick and what is she doing on his lap?¡±

    ¡°My Master told Jacob to cultivate a source of information in the Overlord¡¯s court, so naturally, he picked Noelani. She wasn¡¯t even ranked in the harem! She was like eighth girl! She didn¡¯t even get to participate unless he had guests! But Jacob treated her like a queen. Probably the best source we ever had. If Jacob had a couple more years to work her, he could have made my Master a Lord. She commissioned this painting as a gift for him. Didn¡¯t even consider it an insult. She showed it off like she thought I would be pleased! And she was one of the Overlord¡¯s pets, so I had to stand there with a big smile on my face and pretend to love it!¡±

    Lydia waved her hand through the projection like she was trying to claw at it. ¡°Can you make this go away, please, so I don¡¯t have to look at those?¡±

    * * *

    ¡°Okay, Xavier made gold and Jacob was a scholar. What was Tobias?¡±

    ¡°Tobias was a monk.¡±

    I laughed. ¡°A monk! Didn¡¯t that make things difficult for you? Holy ground and all?¡±

    ¡°I had a contract with Tobias. I couldn¡¯t wander the grounds, but I could follow him anywhere. We spent most of our time in his cell.¡±

    ¡°But he was a legitimate representative of the Church, right? Couldn¡¯t he just call in some favors and

    ¡­ exorcise you or something?¡±

    ¡°He could have, but the Church would have punished him.¡±

    ¡°Punished him for what?¡±

    ¡°Demons couldn¡¯t enter the monastery without invitation. I had him by blood, but the elders wouldn¡¯t believe that. They would think I was summoned, called by Tobias so he could make a deal.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s bullshit! He was a victim! Why would the Church punish its own monks?¡±

    ¡°Tobias had enemies at Monte Cassino. He was an accomplished scribe, but he had a history of defying the Abbot. Tobias had peculiar ideas about how to help sick and poor people, and he had no ear for politics. He said God told him what to write, and he would never put the Abbot¡¯s judgment above God.

    ¡°His defiance was a minor thing, until I came. Tobias couldn¡¯t go to the elders; they already hated him, and mages were routinely put to death. He would have been burned alive for consorting with demons. Tobias was a tortured soul, but he wasn¡¯t tortured by me. He trapped himself between duty and desire and tore himself apart.

    ¡°He took to magic slowly, but he couldn¡¯t deny his passion for it. Tobias lived at the mercy of his passions. He was fifteen when he entered the monastery - young and poor and sadly innocent. Chastity was hell for him. In a normal village, he could have found a simple girl and taken the mystery out of it, but in cloister, he thought about sex all the time.

    ¡°Lust was a snake in his belly, and he knew all about demons. He knew exactly what I was, and exactly what I could do for him. That first night, I sat by his bedside and whispered to him for three hours. Over the next few weeks, I extracted his darkest fantasies, and one by one, I made them all come true. Tobias was shy, but he knew exactly what he wanted. Every morning, he would take the whip and flog himself, and every night I would come and tend his wounds.

    ¡°Tobias couldn¡¯t deny the magic, so he tried to use it for good. He learned healing spells and protective magic, hoping good deeds would help him atone for the sex. I told him no one ever went to Hell for sex, but he wouldn¡¯t listen.¡±

    I frowned. ¡°I¡¯m not a monk, but even I know that¡¯s bullshit. Betrayal, adultery, rape - all those things can send you to Hell.¡±

    ¡°Some evil actions involve sex, but sexual acts are not inherently sinful. Men go to Hell for causing pain, Timothy. No one ever went to Hell for simple pleasure.¡±  Lydia said that pointedly, like she was giving me personal advice.

    ¡°Wait, I should have thought of this first. Monks don¡¯t get married, and they don¡¯t have children. Wouldn¡¯t that end the bloodline?¡±

    ¡°Tobias fathered a child, many years after he left Monte Cassino. But the story of how that happened, and what happened after, is not mine to tell.¡±

    But that wasn¡¯t the whole story about Tobias. She left out the most important part, details I didn¡¯t learn until I read his journal in the book.

    Tobias did eventually ask the Church for help, and it might have worked. He might have even earned direct intervention from the angels, but Lydia¡¯s Master sent Sylvia to seduce the Abbot and drive him insane.

    The Abbot locked the doors and burned half the abbey down to hide the shame of what she made him do. Lydia took Tobias a safe distance away, and made him watch his friends burn, all because he asked for help.

    * * *

    The first result from my face search was a series of drawings recovered from a shipwreck off the coast of Spain in 1910. The caption said the ship went down in 1679.

    Lydia jumped off the wall and made an uncharacteristic squealing noise when she saw them. I swear, she was bouncing.

    These moments are so precious to me, looking back, the moments when Lydia let her guard down, and let me see the girl under her demon mask.

    The drawings were extraordinary renders of Lydia¡¯s face and body, drawn in such exquisite detail, facial recognition was able to pick them out, almost four hundred years later.

    ¡°I can¡¯t believe these survived!¡± Lydia put her hands on her hips and struck a pose for me. ¡°Do charcoal drawings count as pornography? Am I a real modern girl now?¡±

    ¡°My ancestor drew these?¡±

    ¡°Oh no, Laurence couldn¡¯t draw. These were done by his wife, Joanna. Our wife. I think she would let me say that. It was so beautiful, Timothy. No sneaking, no hiding, no stolen moments under the covers. She just accepted me and was at peace with my place in her husband¡¯s life. The happiest I¡¯ve ever been. Maybe the happiest I will ever be.¡±

    Lydia smiled like she was remembering a joke. ¡°All your ancestors had style, but Laurence was dashing. He enjoyed magic and women, but he loved ships, most of all. He spent many years as a vagabond, but by the time I found him, he was a sailor. He worked crew jobs for nine years, until he¡­ acquired enough for his own ship.¡±

    Lydia had a way with pauses. She used them like bait. ¡°Acquired how?¡±

    Lydia gave me her innocent kitten look. ¡°Hard work and diligent saving, of course.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re telling me my ancestor was a pirate?¡±

    Lydia gasped and put a hand to her breast. ¡°Oh, I wouldn¡¯t call him a pirate. That¡¯s a very rude word. He made his name carrying spices and gunpowder, but Laurence loved ships. When he saw a fine ship in the hands of a bad captain, it pained him. And sometimes, when he couldn¡¯t stand it anymore, he would take steps to¡­ relieve that pain. He never actually ordered an attack, but every now and then, he would stand on the prow of his ship and address the crew.¡±

    Lydia lowered her voice again and adopted a new expression - stern, with a hint of whimsy. She looked like a medium, channeling this dead man.

    ¡°¡®See that ship over there? Look at her, men. A beautiful ship like that, covered in barnacles, rotting planks on her deck, fittings that haven¡¯t been polished in a month. Her mast is bent, and her sail is patched, and she¡¯s carrying too much weight for her size. Yessir, I¡¯d like to have a few words with her captain. Man like that doesn¡¯t deserve a ship that fine.¡¯  He would lower his eyes and rub his face - sometimes he would even drop a tear. Then he would go below decks and wait. The men would load the cannons and strap on swords. Then Laurence would come back and start giving orders¡­

    ¡°We eventually got a house in port, but in the early days, we both traveled with him. He would go to taverns and bring women back to the ship. Sometimes two or three at a time. We would have these amazing nights, then at the end, he would have me do the demon reveal to run them off. But that backfired once. One barmaid was really happy to see me. She moved in with us for a while.¡±

    Lydia reached out and brushed her hand through the projection. ¡°It¡¯s so good to see these again. You have them in your machine now, so I can see them any time?¡±

    I nodded.

    ¡°Thank you,¡± she said. ¡°Can we go to the next one, please?¡±

    * * *

    The next match was a portrait. As soon as she saw it, Lydia jumped down again for a closer look. It was a gorgeous painting. Lydia and another ancestor, posing in some elaborate garden.

    I didn¡¯t recognize it, but Lydia squealed again and clapped her hands like a little girl. ¡°I haven¡¯t seen this in centuries. Where did you find it?¡±

    ¡°Jeeves, where is this painting?¡±

    ¡°This painting hangs in the Museum of Versailles.¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°The man in this picture is your ancestor, Anson Kovach. Anson was an English mercenary who essentially betrayed his country and became a soldier for Louis XVI. There was a war in America, the start of your revolution. Louis called for wizards, so I put Anson in tails and took him to court. He had a warrior¡¯s heart, and a brilliant tactical mind. This was painted just days before he left for America. He spent three years in the New World, fighting the English. Louis sent him with D¡¯Estaing¡¯s fleet, as part of a loan package to the Colonies.

    ¡°Anson loved your people. He didn¡¯t care for democracy, but he loved the land, and the spirit of your common folk. If it wasn¡¯t for Anson, you¡¯d probably be English. Stefan hated the Allies, of course, but Anson¡¯s writing about America convinced him to send his wife here after she got pregnant. Stefan didn¡¯t really like Americans, but he admired them. He wanted his child to learn the country, infiltrate the power structure, and conquer it from within. Your predecessor wasn¡¯t worthy of that dream. Perhaps you are.¡±

    I laughed. ¡°Nobody conquers nations anymore. It¡¯s all one big corporation now, cut up into ten parts.¡±

    Lydia nodded. ¡°He would have been sad to see that. Anson loved newspapers. He used to read me letters, debates about the new system. He had some sympathy for Hamilton, but he said it would take a king to make it work. Without a monarch to keep them in line, he said the commoners would eat their own young. Was he right?¡±

    I shrugged. ¡°Yeah, I don¡¯t keep up with political shit, but I¡¯m sure my dad would have had a lot to say about this.¡±

    * * *

    The next result was another painting. The portrait at Versailles was lovely, but this was devastating. I¡¯d never seen this kind of texture before. I¡¯m no expert, but the quality was obvious. This was painted by a master.

    But that¡¯s not what made my jaw drop. The technique was beautiful, but the scene was horrific. The image drained my strength and leaned me against my desk. I whispered, ¡°Mother of God¡± and started to shake.

    The painting was a vision of Hell - jutting black rocks and a boiling red sky, centered on some Gothic palace. The structure was built on a giant bridge, arcing over a river of lava. A flock of demons flew in formation over the palisade. The foreground was so vivid, it made my eyes hurt.

    The central figure was a succubus, sprawled like a jungle cat. Her body was exquisite, painfully nude. Her skin glowed like gold on my screen. Her tail was hovering coy over one shoulder. Her wings cut the sky like a pair of black knives. She had long claws on each hand, pink, like human fingernails. One claw was bent seductively, inviting me to come and play.

    Her eyes were deep, luminous blue. Her hair hung in golden curls, halfway down her back. The effect was erotic, until you saw the face. Her mouth was twisted in a maniacal grin. Blood dripped from her teeth and ran down her chin, pooling somewhere in her cleavage.

    Her right hand was raised in invitation, but her left was on the ground, wrapped around a gruesome meal: the half-eaten remains of a human leg. There was still meat left on the foot and the knee joint, but the calf was eaten down to the bone.

    The bottom of the picture was strewn with human remains - the bloody, gnawed pieces of one man. His arm was nothing but bone. His other leg was lying behind the demon, discarded like an animal¡¯s toy. His chest was an open wound before her.

    And there, in the corner, was his severed head. The hair was wrong, but everything else was dead on. This was a Kovach face. The painting was called ¡°Adam and Eve.¡±

    I couldn¡¯t speak. I just stared at it. The detail was so good, I didn¡¯t have to magnify the face. This was Lydia - a stunning representation of Lydia, perfect to the last detail. She was the most hideous thing I had ever seen, and she was standing in my living room.

    ¡°It¡¯s true,¡± I said. ¡°It¡¯s all true. The book, the magic, the contract¡­  My soul - you bastards have stolen my soul. Jeeves, who painted this?¡±

    Lydia answered first. ¡°You won¡¯t find him. This was painted by an angel.¡±

    ¡°A real angel?¡±

    ¡°Real as they get.¡±

    ¡°Bullshit. Jeeves, give me everything you can find about this painting. I want everything.¡±

    My screen filled with the fat pink face of an art professor, an officious balding man with tiny glasses and a white beard. The quality was awful, mottled and burned like a high school filmstrip.

    ¡°This painting was found in the personal collection of an SS Colonel. It wasn¡¯t on display at his estate, but it¡¯s actually quite valuable, dating back to the 17th century. We think this is religious propaganda, commissioned by the Church of Rome. Art from that period is characterized by dark colors, rich textures, and simple moralistic themes. This work was inspired by repression, superstition, and a pathological fear of female power. The demon in this painting is a metaphor for all women, preying on the inherent goodness and purity of the male.¡±

    I took a step back and started to laugh. ¡°Well, the professor says you¡¯re just a metaphor.¡± I brushed the sweat off my forehead in an exaggerated gesture of relief. ¡°Glad I found this, I was startin¡¯ to worry.¡±

    ¡°This painting is an act of revenge,¡± Lydia said, ¡°created by one of my Master¡¯s enemies. It was painted by the Angel Roland, a guardian working for Raphael. In 1664, my Master sent Laurence to kill a bishop in the Church of Rome. Roland was his guardian. I drew the bishop from sanctuary, imitating the voice of a child. It was a hard fight, but we won. Laurence killed the Bishop and sent Roland back to Heaven.¡±

    Lydia smirked. ¡°I guess he took it personally. He made this painting as a warning to Laurence, trying to drive a wedge between us. The palace is accurate, and the figures are perfect, but this atrocity pictured here, I did not do this thing. Stefan found the painting and kept it in his archives. I sent an Imp to destroy it, but it survives in your machine. Roland was a wily old rabbit. I guess he had the last laugh after all.¡±

    ¡°That assignment Laurence did, that¡¯s the kind of thing you want me to do. You want me to kill people.¡±

    Lydia didn¡¯t hesitate. ¡°Sometimes but killing is a small part of your job. I suspect you¡¯ll be more like Jacob - a diviner and seeker of lost things. Violence was necessary in the old days, but your world is open to us now. We can use demons for the dirty work.¡±

    ¡°But you don¡¯t deny it. You¡¯ll be asking me to kill.¡±

    ¡°No, I don¡¯t deny it. But think about it: that bishop we killed, Laurence gave him an instant of pain and his soul floated to Heaven like a soap bubble. He¡¯s up there right now, basking under a fig tree, singing praises to God. Destroy a good man and he spends eternity in paradise. Destroy an evil man and he gets his just punishment in Hell. The killing isn¡¯t so bad if you remember the big picture.¡±

    I just stared at her.

    ¡°You won¡¯t be killing the same people your ancestors did. The Church destroyed itself before you were born. Most of your assignments will be attacks on rival servants. These are sick, ruthless creatures. You have a good heart, Timothy. You will enjoy killing men like this. You won¡¯t be killing good guys; there aren¡¯t that many good guys left.¡±

    ¡°Wait,¡± I said. ¡°You have wings in this picture. Do you still have wings?¡±

    Lydia flinched, but she recovered so fast, I almost missed it. ¡°You¡¯ve heard legends about angels earning their wings? Well, demons do the same thing.¡±

    ¡°So that¡¯s it? You haven¡¯t earned your wings yet?¡±

    Lydia whipped her head up in a sudden flash of anger. ¡°I earned them centuries ago! I earned them the minute Xavier gave us his children. I earned my wings in six weeks. No succubus had ever earned her wings that fast. My sisters were furious. Most of them still hate me.¡±

    ¡°So, what happened?¡±

    ¡°Seventy years ago, my wings were¡­ taken from me.¡±

    ¡°Why?¡±

    ¡°I made a mistake, a big one.¡±

    ¡°What kind of mistake? Stop dodging this.¡±

    Lydia looked profoundly uncomfortable. She pleaded with me. ¡°Timothy, please don¡¯t make me talk about this. I¡¯ve spent a human lifetime trying to live this down. That¡¯s why you¡¯re so important to me. You¡¯re my last chance to set things right. My Master confined me to Hell for decades as punishment for my failure. I thought I would never see the Earth again, but then you came along and rescued me. I¡¯m the key to your future, and you¡¯re the key to mine. You¡¯re going to be the most brilliant servant my Master ever had. You¡¯re going to turn this world on its ear, and I¡¯m going to get my wings back.¡±

    I rubbed my temples and slumped across my desk. ¡°Great. A million demons in Hell, and I get one with a work ethic.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°Oh, no,¡± I said, pulling up the next match. ¡°Please don¡¯t be what this looks like. No no no no no¡­¡±

    This result was a black and white photo, very old, but from upscaled video. The image was simple, but it took a minute for my brain to process what my eyes were telling me. It was obviously Lydia, wearing a 1940s dress and a ridiculous hat. The hat would have looked silly on a modern woman, but it fit her hair and makeup perfectly. She was standing next to a man in uniform. I recognized it immediately, but I didn¡¯t want to believe it. It was absurd. Impossible.

    ¡°Jeeves, where did you get this picture?¡±

    ¡°This photograph is from a biography series called ¡®Hitler¡¯s Henchmen,¡¯ produced in 1998, restored in 2027. This is from tape four.¡±

    ¡°Identify the woman in this picture.¡±

    ¡°There is no name associated with that image.¡±

    ¡°Identify the man.¡±

    ¡°The man is Colonel Stefan Kovach of the Schutzstaffel, First Sorcerer of the Reich.¡±

    ¡°He looks like me.¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°Yes.¡±

    His hair was blond, and his nose was too small, but that could have been my face, centered above those lightning bars. I collapsed in my chair. History settled like a boot on my neck. Then I remembered something. ¡°Jeeves, repeat that last name!¡±

    ¡°Kovach.¡±

    ¡°Spell it!¡±

    ¡°K-O-V-A-C-H.¡±

    I was stunned for a moment, then I started to laugh. ¡°I¡¯ve been sent to Hell by a typographical error.¡± I turned to Lydia. ¡°It¡¯s been fun, lady, but you¡¯ve got the wrong guy. My name is Kovak. K-O-V-A-K. Sorry to waste your time, you can let yourself out.¡±

    ¡°Stefan¡¯s wife changed her name at Ellis Island.¡±

    ¡°But still, the name on that contract is Kovach. That¡¯s not my name.¡± My last name should have been Peterson, but my father never formally married my mother. He bought a ring, but never proposed.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t have you by Name. I have you by Blood. That contract was signed in Kovach blood, the same blood I smell in your veins.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re telling me my great-grandfather was a Nazi? That¡¯s insane!¡±

    ¡°Stefan knew the Reich was doomed after Normandy. Hitler didn¡¯t believe his Oracles, but Stefan always did. He used the last of his fortune to send Elsa and her unborn child to America. By the time he was captured, Elsa was already working in the States. I stayed with her until Stefan was executed, guarding her identity. Their marriage was a close thing. It took me forever to find a mate for Stefan. He loved me desperately. He didn¡¯t want anyone else, but the bloodline must continue. He was fifty-five when he fathered James.¡±

    ¡°Stefan was our champion,¡± she said, ¡°our greatest success. The most powerful, most effective mage your bloodline ever produced. And the easiest seduction. I had him immediately, the first night. I said my usual thing, ¡®I am a succubus in the service of¡­¡¯ and he said, ¡®rub my feet.¡¯¡±

    ¡°So, I rubbed his feet. We made love a few moments later and fought side by side for the next thirty years.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, how many people did Stefan kill?¡±

    She shrugged. ¡°It¡¯s not the kind of thing you count. There was a war on. Stefan didn¡¯t spend much time on the battlefield, but he probably killed three thousand men in naval battles. He never went to the camps, if that¡¯s what you¡¯re asking.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°Timothy, I know you don¡¯t owe me anything, but could I ask you to wait, before you look at this? If this is what I think it is, it¡¯s going to make you very upset, and with the amount of magic surging in your system right now, I¡¯m worried that you could hurt yourself.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s that bad? You think I¡¯m gonna lose my shit over an old CNN video?¡±

    ¡°Timothy, you¡¯re about to learn what happened to your grandfather, and make me relive the worst failure of my life.¡±

    I always wondered why my mom blocked genealogy sites. Cynthia Kovak was her own kind of computer geek, raised in the mobile computing and AI boom of the early 21st century. I remember her setting up all the devices around our house, teaching me how to plug in TVs and use a kid¡¯s tablet computer. I even helped her build a PC once, long before I was old enough to know what it was.

    My family was so poor for so long, me and dad used the same router for most of my childhood. And even when we got a new one, we just kept using the same settings Mom set up before she died. It¡¯s the kind of thing you just don¡¯t think about. Mom blocked all the usual kid¡¯s stuff, to protect me from porn and news and adult sites I wasn¡¯t ready for. But she also blocked sites where you can look up your ancestors and get your DNA checked.

    She also blocked every government agency in Arizona, in a weird, encrypted text file it took me forever to find. Mom hacked the shit out of our little home router, to keep her inquisitive son from learning who his grandfather was.

    She went out of her way to make it boring when I asked about him. She told me Jim Kovak was a bad man who went to prison for doing bad things, but she made me think he was a car thief or that he had killed somebody drunk driving - exactly the kind of sad, boring crime that a teenage boy is likely to overlook, especially when his first few searches turn up a hundred guys with the same name as his grandfather, but nothing on the man himself.

    Grandpa Jim died in prison when I was two years old, and Mom kept nothing that belonged to him. No clothes, no letters, no family photos. Nothing. It was like he never existed, and I grew up believing he wasn¡¯t even worth looking for.

    It¡¯s easy to forget how difficult it was to find records of pre-Internet stuff after 2045. A lot of this tape had just never been scanned, and those archives that did exist were confined to carefully curated walled gardens, maintained by corporations that didn¡¯t exist anymore.

    But Jeeves had better sources now. The old I1, I2 stuff had been replaced with modern Datacore nodes, and an army of obsessive geeks had ransacked hundreds of old datacenters, once any hobbyist could rent or steal quantum time and crack the original encryption.

    ¡°Well, you¡¯re in luck,¡± I told Lydia. ¡°This thing is locked in a Time-Warner archive with decent encryption, so we have exactly as long as it takes Jeeves to crack this for me to get some sleep and let this magic bleed off. If I¡¯m still carrying too much power in six hours or so, we¡¯ll just have to take our chances.¡±

    The encryption was good enough, I had time to sleep, shower, and grab a shitty breakfast burrito before it was done. It turned out to be a low-res video clip from CNN, recorded on August 17th, 1986. The dateline said Chandler, Arizona.

    Jeeves didn¡¯t flag the whole clip - just three frames of a crowd shot. Dozens of people with shocked expressions; some of them were crying. Lydia¡¯s face was surrounded by a glowing green box.

    ¡°Zoom. Interpolate.¡±  The picture was grainy, but it was her. ¡°Play the whole clip.¡±

    ¡°Terror hit the quiet southwestern town of Chandler, Arizona today, as sixty-two people were killed in a devastating magical assault.¡±

    ¡°Stop! Repeat that.¡±

    ¡°Terror hit the quiet southwestern town of Chandler, Arizona today, as sixty-two people¡ª¡±

    ¡°Sixty-two people. Continue.¡±

    ¡°¡­construction engineer James Kovak has been taken into custody by agents from Bluestar 10.¡±  The camera lingered on the smoking ruins of a trailer park. A man was being led away from the wreckage in handcuffs.

    I froze the scene and zoomed his face. It had to be Grandpa Jim - a little older, a little fatter than the pictures I saw on dad¡¯s phone, but it was him. He looked like a wreck, dressed in dirty jeans and a worn flannel shirt. His nose was bright red from booze, and his hair stuck out in all directions, like he hadn¡¯t combed it for days. Tears flowed freely down his face. The camera caught him mid-blubber. Jim was surrounded by police in bulletproof vests. His hands were cuffed behind his back, but two cops still had guns trained on him. The 1986 version of Lydia watched from the crowd as they took him away.

    Seven decades later, I stood in my living room and screamed at her. ¡°Did you make him do this? Did your Master make him do this?¡±

    I was yelling in her face, but Lydia didn¡¯t flinch. ¡°No one made him do this. Your grandfather was a sick man.¡± Her face twitched as she started to cry. ¡°I did everything I could. Please believe me. I tried everything, but he had stopped listening years ago. He was too angry, too hurt. He wouldn¡¯t listen to me. Jim never listened to me.¡±

    An instant of pity, but I wasn¡¯t done yelling. ¡°Bullshit! You¡¯re covering for your Master. You made him kill those people, didn¡¯t you? Didn¡¯t you?¡±

    ¡°No. I swear to you, I did not. You don¡¯t understand. Jim didn¡¯t just kill those people; he destroyed himself, and he destroyed me. My Master would never order a slaughter like this. It¡¯s too public. It would draw too much attention. Centuries ago, a mage could do this with impunity, but your governments are too powerful now. There are too many of these ¡®heroes¡¯ working for the state.¡±  Lydia pleaded with me. ¡°Please believe me. I would give anything to undo this crime. You have no idea what this cost me.¡±

    I didn¡¯t want to believe her, but it made too much sense. Jim was forty-two when he did this. He had decades of work ahead of him. Baalphezar wouldn¡¯t just throw that away. ¡°Why, Lydia? Why did he do it?¡±

    ¡°He wasn¡¯t trying to kill everyone,¡± she said. ¡°He was trying to kill two people: a woman who broke his heart and the man she was sleeping with.¡± Lydia started to cry again. ¡°But he was angry, and drunk, and stupid, and he didn¡¯t know his own strength. He used too much power. He destroyed everything. If he¡¯d been sober, he could have stopped himself. But when he saw his woman with another man, he just didn¡¯t care anymore. He used rage to fuel his power and killed them all.¡±

    ¡°Isn¡¯t it your job to keep us together? How did you let him get like this?¡±

    ¡°Jim was always difficult. I tried to distract him, but he got bored with me. Those last two years, all he cared about was whiskey and television, but he wasn¡¯t always like that.

    ¡°He accepted me in a few days,¡± she said, ¡°after I announced what I was. He said I should never look like a demon in front of him, and he dressed me up like some country singer he had a crush on. Even made me take her form a few times.

    ¡°Jim didn¡¯t know many spells, but he liked to break things, and burn things. He used to go to bars and provoke normal humans. Jim felt persecuted, bullied by the world. When he discovered his power, he wanted to get even. He started hanging out in biker bars and strip clubs owned by drug cartels, to try and pick fights with guys who ¡®had it coming.¡¯

    ¡°He started to talk like a vigilante, like he was on some kind of righteous crusade, as if getting drunk and blasting drug dealers with magic made him a hero. Then one day, he burned a whole motorcycle club to the ground, and got caught using magic on camera.¡±

    Lydia paused. ¡°I need to explain something about how Hell works. We don¡¯t send demons to seduce senators or presidents. They have to stay clean for the cameras. We send demons to seduce their senior staff, and the hungry young ones who want to be senior staff. One of those aides worked for an Arizona senator who wanted to make a name for himself fighting the War on Drugs. When I told my Master that Jim was about to be arrested, he sent Sylvia to seduce someone on this senator¡¯s staff, a despicable young man who was delighted to meet her.

    ¡°By the time the government came for Jim, accompanied by some genetically engineered monster that ate magic, the deal was already done. They took him in, but instead of putting him in prison, they offered him a job.

    ¡°And thus began the happiest, and most productive period in your grandfather¡¯s life. He became a drug warrior, a covert metahuman asset managed by an American intelligence agency. Some of the assignments didn¡¯t even require killing. They sent him in to burn fields and destroy processing facilities. And if a few dozen cartel soldiers died in the process, that was just icing on the cake.

    ¡°Jim started learning more advanced magic and started using me to scout locations. It was a good time for us, truly working as a team. He would even joke around and buy gifts for me, after a job well done. He saw himself as a black book superhero, fighting the good fight by doing the dirty jobs that respectable heroes couldn¡¯t do.¡±

    ¡°And how many innocent people got caught in this crossfire?¡±

    ¡°Jim never intentionally killed women or children, but when you¡¯re burning entire villas, wiping out whole factories with a single spell, there was no way to be sure.

    ¡°After a decade of loyal service, Jim started to wonder why there were still so many drugs on the street. He was wiping out millions in product every week, but cocaine was everywhere, and the prices were going down. He started sending me into government offices, asking me to steal documents and help him figure out what was going on.

    ¡°Eventually he learned that his cartel targets were not random, and they were not simply the most productive or the most vulnerable sites. The CIA had picked a new drug lord to run the cartel, and Jim was being used to eliminate his competition.

    ¡°It crushed him. Jim survived all those years because he saw himself as a patriot, serving his country with blood, magic, and fire. He saw his killing as a righteous crusade, so when he finally realized how cynical the whole thing was, how pointless his efforts had been, it didn¡¯t just depress him, it destroyed his whole concept of who he was.

    ¡°We were planning to buy a ranch, financed with stolen drug money. Jim had a gang of Texas crooks set up to launder it for him, but they cheated him, and stole six million dollars. Jim killed them, of course, but the damage was done, and the money was gone.

    ¡°Jim stopped working in 1984, and I spent the last two years in his tiny trailer, while he spent every night with his mistress down the road. Jim rescued Maria from a Tijuana whorehouse and brought her home across the border. It was all quite romantic in his head. She was his cartel princess, and he was her knight in shining cowboy boots. He set her up with her own trailer and slept there every night. To get away from my ¡®nagging,¡¯ he said.

    ¡°The attack you just saw started with a video tape, recorded by Maria¡¯s boyfriend. Jim hadn¡¯t used his powers in so long, nobody really believed the stories anymore. Maria¡¯s boyfriend decided to call out this ¡®Redneck Archmage¡¯ and make himself a legend by taking him out. So, he drove to Arizona to get his princess back, and videotaped the touching reunion, with both of them making it clear that Maria felt nothing but contempt for Jim, and that she was delighted to be back with her lover.

    ¡°It broke him. He was already angry; he was already drunk. I begged him not to watch the tape, of course. I begged him not to go. I told him it was a trap. I told him he was taking the bait. But I was just a tiny, annoying voice in his ear by then. I never had a chance.¡±

    ¡°I expected the government to execute him,¡± Lydia said, ¡°but this senator really did see Jim as a kind of hero and got the governor to intervene. Jim got a life sentence, and lived a shocking long life, into his 90s. Even more astounding, he managed to father a child with a nurse in prison, fathering the woman who became your mother.

    ¡°I was long gone by then, suffering exile in Hell, convinced that the contract was over, and the bloodline was dead. My Master¡¯s status plummeted; all his favors dried up. His palace quickly looked like a ghost town. And then, after we all thought it was done, you were born. You wonder why I was so happy to see you? You saved me, Timothy. You already saved me, just by being alive.¡±

    I stared at the frozen image of my grandfather, sighing as the timeline clicked into place. ¡°That¡¯s how it happened. Jim killed those people, and Baalphezar took your wings.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°You say I¡¯m the eighth Kovach mage in this bloodline, but you¡¯re skipping one. Is magic what drove my mother crazy? Is magic what killed her?¡±

    ¡°Your contract specifically prohibits contact with females of this bloodline. If she had been male, I could have helped her, but for a woman, I could do nothing.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re not denying it. Did demons do that to her?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± Lydia said. ¡°Genetics did that to her - a terrible roll of the dice that gave her power she could not control. It was a miracle that she was able to maintain her sanity for as long as she did.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, if I find out you¡¯re lying to me, you and your Master are going to pay for this¡­  somehow.¡±

    Lydia shook her head, pretending to be on the verge of tears. ¡°Timothy, I would never hurt your mother. I would have done anything to help her, but Xavier¡¯s contract absolutely forbade it. I stood to gain nothing from her suffering, or from yours, growing up without her.¡±

    ¡°Sounds like you gained quite a bit,¡± I said, ¡°if this power manifesting in a female is what it took to restart your little wizard project. You even stand to benefit from my shitty childhood, since it makes me a nice easy target for you.¡±

    ¡°For centuries,¡± Lydia said, ignoring my accusations, ¡°the magic in your family was strong, steady, and predictable. But something changed before your grandfather was born. The power took a turn and began responding to emotion, surging when the heirs were excited or angry, failing when they were sad or afraid. By the time it reached your mother, it was completely wild, more than her body could contain. If she¡¯d been a man, I could have stabilized it and siphoned it off, as I offered to do for you, as I offered to do for your grandfather, time and time again.¡±

    ¡°So, if you¡¯re telling the truth, if demons didn¡¯t do this to her, could it have been angels? Or gods, or something else?¡±

    ¡°I suppose it¡¯s possible,¡± Lydia said, ¡°but the angels in Heaven haven¡¯t interfered on Earth since God left. The only one left down here is Gabriel, and he¡¯s a soldier, not a mastermind. He wouldn¡¯t have the skills or the subtlety to meddle in a bloodline like this.¡±

    ¡°So, God really did abandon us and turn demons loose on Earth? I know humans suck, but what did we do to deserve this?¡±

    ¡°We¡¯ve heard a thousand rumors,¡± Lydia said. ¡°Most of the new souls blame the Christian churches for turning their backs on God, but no one can agree on any single event that tipped the scales. Demons like to say Satan finally defeated God and left our universe, satisfied that he had his revenge.¡±

    ¡°So, it¡¯s not just God. Satan¡¯s gone, too?¡±

    ¡°They apparently left together and turned their respective domains over to their seconds sometime at the beginning of this century. Michael took God¡¯s place on the Throne of Heaven and the current Overlord took Satan¡¯s place in Hell. I would rather not say his name.

    ¡°Demons can now visit the Earth any time we want, as long as our Masters have enough influence to get portals approved. The only thing holding us back now is the sheer amount of magic required, and the occasional intervention from Gabriel. God is clearly punishing the Earth for something, but no one can agree on any particular sin.

    ¡°Certain apocryphal versions of the Bible refer to a time of tribulation when humans were supposed to suffer, but that period was only supposed to be for seven years, not fifty, and it should have been preceded by a Rapture that took all the good souls up to Heaven. Either that didn¡¯t happen, or there were so few good souls left on Earth, no one really noticed when they disappeared.¡±

    ¡°My father¡¯s family believed in stuff like this,¡± I said. ¡°They were old school Christians, who followed some weird version of the New Testament, full of extra books that had Jesus coming back from the dead. Maybe they were right, and we¡¯re all just living in Hell on Earth.¡±

    ¡°I assure you,¡± Lydia said, ¡°as unpleasant as 21st century Earth may be, it is still far superior to Hell.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°And there really is a contract? A physical contract?¡±

    Lydia produced it instantly: a scrap of paper, ten inches long and three inches wide, covered in tiny script. She bowed slightly and dropped it into my hand.

    The contract was soft and warm, pulsing like blood under skin. I threw it to the ground and the damn thing wriggled toward me, crawling up the leg of my desk. Once it reached the top, the contract glowed for a moment and spread itself out, expanding to fit the surface.

    I backed against the wall and enjoyed a full-blown case of the willies, twitching like I had a roach in my hair. ¡°What the fuck was that? Is that thing alive?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s just a form,¡± Lydia said, ¡°enchanted so it¡¯s easier to read.¡±

    I crept up to my desk and put one finger on it. The damn thing had a pulse. The contract was creepy as hell, but I could read it. The handwriting was elegant and clear, written in a language that made no sense at all. ¡°What language is this?¡±

    ¡°Latin. Specifically, Medieval Latin. Most of this was written by Xavier.¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t read Latin.¡±

    ¡°I have the contract memorized. I can recite it for you in English.¡±

    ¡°But if I can¡¯t compare it with the hard copy, how do I know you¡¯re telling me the truth?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not allowed to lie about the contract,¡± Lydia said.

    ¡°But are you allowed to lie about being allowed to lie about the contract?¡±

    Lydia said nothing.

    ¡°Great.¡±  I gestured to the acre of flesh on my desk. ¡°I think I¡¯ve seen enough.¡± The contract rolled itself up and darted back to Lydia¡¯s hand.

 Chapter 10: Nergal No-Fly Zone

    Lydia was back on the wall when I woke up the next day. ¡°You¡¯re always in the same place when I walk in. Do you just sit there like a statue all night?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve tried to look around this area in ways that won¡¯t call attention to myself, but every time I go out, I feel like there¡¯s something watching me. I am very good at hiding, watching, and detecting things, but whoever this is, I can¡¯t catch them. I¡¯ve frankly never seen this, an entity that could watch me, leaving no trace at all.¡±

    I nodded. ¡°Welcome to the Nergal No-Fly Zone. The miasma kills anything that tries to fly and kills most other stuff that comes in, seemingly at random. This apartment is right on the edge of the Zone, so I can still catch cabs and get deliveries, if I can make them stay low enough, or send them to a building on the other side.

    ¡°The attack was¡­ I always have to look this up¡­ yeah, fifteen years ago, 2043. They never told the public how he got summoned, in case some other dumbass decided to try it, but however it happened, a portal opened in Boston Common, and this giant Mesopotamian death god popped out and started wrecking shit - smashing buildings, sending out waves of shadow stuff that killed people and brought them back as zombies.

    ¡°He marched this army from Boston Common to the Charles River, punching buildings, making zombies out of everybody inside. People started fleeing the area when monsters started spawning in the river in 2023, so most of the buildings were empty, but he still had a thousand zombies with him when he hit the river.

    ¡°Bluestar 1 responded and made it a full-on super fight, with energy blasts and flying heroes and artillery support from the National Guard. They fought him to a standstill for like thirty minutes while Bluestar 7 set up a magical ambush on top of Madison Tower. It was awesome. I mean, tragic because of all the people who died, of course, but awesome to watch on TV. Reinforcements popping in from all over the country, largest collection of Bluestar heroes ever assembled.

    If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.

    ¡°Arthur Walton and the original Bluestar 7 used some kind of amplifier thing in Madison Tower and used it to kill him. I don¡¯t know what the spell was, but Nergal just kind of disintegrated and turned into sand.¡±

    ¡°A group of mortals on one of these teams killed a god?¡± Lydia sounded more impressed than scared.

    I nodded. ¡°I think it was Arthur, mostly. Still the most powerful mage in the world, but he¡¯s retired now. Has a tower across town, but he never leaves anymore. I think his wife died.¡±

    Lydia frowned. ¡°I don¡¯t recognize the name.¡±

    ¡°Seriously?¡± I laughed. ¡°The most powerful wizard on Earth and Hell doesn¡¯t even know his name? Oh shit! Did I just put him on your radar? Did I just get him in trouble?¡±

    Lydia shook her head. ¡°If I don¡¯t know about him, it means he¡¯s already protected by someone. Maybe even an angel contract.¡±

    Arthur probably could have saved me, by the way, if you want to count that as number two.

    ¡°Angels do contracts?¡±

    ¡°They¡¯re called covenants when angels do them, but yes. Gabriel only had a limited force with him when he decided to stay behind on Earth, so he routinely makes alliances with powerful mortals.¡±

    ¡°So, the Angel Gabriel is on Earth, but you¡¯re not afraid to say his name?¡±

    ¡°I am very good at hiding from angels, but you should be careful about what names you say out loud. I would not name this Mesopotamian god again, even if he is dead. I think he still haunts this place and maintains some kind of power here.¡±

    ¡°Oh, he¡¯s definitely still around,¡± I said. ¡°That¡¯s the coolest part. Turns out the term Reclamation Zone is kind of an ironic joke now. They keep trying to fill his old footprints in and build new stuff, but the footprints keep coming back! Any new stuff they build rots and falls down in a week or so, and anything that tries to fly over lower than a jet falls out of the sky. I¡¯ve never had a problem, but supposedly anybody who spends too much time in this place sees ghosts and goes crazy.

    ¡°I think my landlord killed himself, but his bank keeps billing me, and nobody¡¯s ever tried to kick me out, even when my rent was really late. I pay the machines, but I think the humans have forgotten that I live here.¡±

    Lydia came at me with a sudden, desperate edge in her voice. ¡°Timothy, do you talk to him? This dead god, do you walk around and talk to him?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± I said. ¡°I don¡¯t talk to him. But when so many people you love are dead? Sometimes I talk to Mom.¡±

 Chapter 11: Party

    I still had my alarm set as if I had a job, so the blinds on my windows tilted a little at sunrise, gradually letting in sunlight and fresh air.

    ¡°Good morning, sir,¡± Jeeves said. ¡°You have one priority message waiting.¡±

    Probably Judy, yelling at me for blowing off the museum job. I said, ¡°Play.¡±

    It was Evan Coleridge. I was surprised, simultaneously pleased and frightened to see him. Lydia had quietly come around behind my desk so she could watch the screen as Evan¡¯s image started to talk.

    ¡°Good morning, Mister Kovak. I was wondering if you had a chance to look over those course materials yet. But that¡¯s not the only reason I called. I¡¯m hosting an event at the tower tonight, and I¡¯d like you to join us. My students are much more fun than I am; I think you would enjoy them. People start gathering at nine and the real fun starts around midnight. Wear something comfortable, and please don¡¯t be late.¡±

    I smiled and shook my head, impressed by the way Evan¡¯s message had started with an invitation and somehow ended with a demand, blithely assuming I would say yes.

    Lydia frowned and pursed her lips. ¡°Timothy, watch out for that one. This man is clever and ambitious; don¡¯t let him use you.¡±

    ¡°You got all that from one phone call?¡±

    ¡°I know the type. And if Coleridge is his real last name, he comes from a family with a very bad reputation.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re the last person who should judge a man by his last name. You want me to learn magic. Why shouldn¡¯t I learn from him?¡±

    Lydia scoffed. ¡°You won¡¯t learn magic from these bureaucrats. That school wasn¡¯t built to teach mages; it¡¯s a gilded cage. They¡¯ll try to flatter you, seduce you, and buy you off with empty promises, but you¡¯re meant for something greater.¡±

    ¡°Like my grandfather?¡±

    Lydia ignored the insult. She skipped across the room and jumped to her perch, twisting in mid-air like her body had no weight at all. I wasn¡¯t ready to listen, so she just stopped talking.

    I spent the afternoon scrolling through Evan¡¯s sales pitch. Serious-looking men and women in tailored suits, supposedly working mages in prestigious corporate jobs. One woman using some kind of divination magic to screen job applicants, a man doing some kind of weather magic on a fancy boat, another one using water breathing to explore an underwater cave, and the only one that looked like actual work, a mage in jeans and a hard hat working on a construction project with Arthur Walton, using transmutation magic to turn a small wooden model into a full-size steel bridge.

    I started looking at course materials, but quickly got side-tracked by the housing stuff: photos of social functions and lavish apartments, standard issue for older students learning magic. Adult students had their own complex across the river; more of a hotel than a dorm, with laundry service, maids, and a full-time chef. They even had room service for god¡¯s sake.

    I looked around the grimy concrete box I lived in and suddenly felt the weight of how depressing my little world had become. It¡¯s easy to let these things creep up on you, to slowly define ¡°normal¡± down until you don¡¯t recognize your life anymore. You gradually lower your expectations and turn your emotions off. It hurts to realize how far you¡¯ve fallen, so you just stop thinking about it, hypnotizing yourself so your mind just skips over things that could hurt you, until something makes you come face to face with reality and all that repressed emotion comes flooding in at once.

    Judy and I never had much, but together we had a decent little apartment with high ceilings and a modern layout, in a neighborhood where you didn¡¯t need bulletproof glass on your windows.

    I hadn¡¯t noticed all the little things Judy did to make our house a home until I lost her, all the time she spent watering plants and setting up flowers, picking furniture that made us look like working adults, instead of just a couple kids making do with hand me downs.

    My dad lost all our furniture when we lost our house, and I let Judy keep pretty much everything we owned when I moved out, so I was still using weird mismatched gifts I got from guys at work, or scavenged office furniture from the Zone.

    I hadn¡¯t cleaned properly in months, so everything I owned had some degree of dust on it. I was working around a dozen little things that should have been fixed, but I had missed the last few visits from the maintenance bot. The bot came by to do basic repairs once a month, but it had been a long time since I let him in.

    So, when I saw the luxury these students lived in, the fantasy carried me away. The people in those pictures looked so happy, bright and young and professional, dressed in clothes I couldn¡¯t afford, pampered with manicures and skin treatments and hair cut by real humans. I could be one of them. I could be one of the beautiful people, all I had to do was show up. It¡¯s ironic to look back on it now. I wouldn¡¯t sell my soul for sex or power, but the thought of daily maid service fucked me right up.

    I never actually decided to go. I just took a shower at eight o¡¯clock and started hunting for clothes. I grabbed my best pair of jeans and a clean white shirt. I didn¡¯t have any good shoes, so I tried to clean my sneakers in the sink. I combed my hair carefully and added a drop of cologne. It was chilly, but I was too ashamed to wear my jacket.

    Lydia caught me walking out. ¡°Please be careful. Don¡¯t give yourself away.¡±

    The anger hit me, sharp and sudden. ¡°Your boss has already taken my soul, Lydia. There¡¯s nothing left to steal.¡± I stalked out and slammed the door behind me.

    * * *

    I was running late, so I sprinted down the turnpike at full speed, stopping to compose myself when I saw the tower. I counted twenty people on the lawn, laughing and talking and sipping what looked like champagne.

    I approached them carefully, like I was about to disturb a pack of wolves. Evan saw me creeping and waved me in. I adopted a gentle grin, the expression I reserve for first dates, job interviews, and old people in the hospital. Evan made a quick circle through the party and introduced me to everyone. I made a special effort to smile and say hello to his girlfriend/familiar, just to piss her off.

    Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

    It was happening too fast. Too many names, too many faces. I had this terrible urge to shake hands, but I had to beat it down. I locked my hands behind my back and bowed like a Japanese businessman, imitating Danny Carter. I was bobbing my head so much; I got a little dizzy.

    Somebody put a glass in my hand, filled with pink stuff that turned out to be flavored water. I didn¡¯t really like it, but the glass gave my hands something to do. I took tiny sips and tried to look cool. The party looked like a picture from that recruitment brochure, an equal number of men and women, with four obvious couples. Youth and expensive clothes made the women look beautiful. I remember a magnificent redhead in a black gown, and a willowy brunette in a red dress.

    I surveyed the women and scoped my competition. Most of the men looked like Evan, tall and skinny, like food was always an afterthought for them. I saw one fat guy in the corner, surrounded by cronies or disciples. The crowd swirled around a muscular giant named Marcus. He had dark hair, steely blue eyes, and the kind of rugged face you see on romance book covers - a Greek god, wrapped in cardigan. Three women circled him like moons.

    The men were dressed in sweaters and sport coats. Marcus was also wearing jeans, but I was the only one in sneakers.

    This crowd made me look like a delivery boy. I circled the lawn, trying to pick up conversation, but none of it made sense. They were talking about professors I¡¯d never met, and classes I couldn¡¯t pronounce.

    At precisely nine o¡¯clock, Evan opened the tower and led us to a courtyard. It was still outdoors, but the lights were brighter, and there were tables covered with tiny food. The hors d¡¯oeuvres looked like the women - rich, mysterious, and tightly wrapped.

    * * *

    I asked Evan who the fat guy was and learned his name was Simon. I was drawn to him immediately because Simon was fat, and I had never seen a fat wizard before. All the mages on TV were going for the super clean corporate look now. Not overtly muscled, but super trim and dignified, like Arthur Walton, dressed in dark, expensive suits, with maybe a tie or a handkerchief for color. So, for a mage to buck that trend and go full Teddy Roosevelt in 2058, I had to meet him.

    Body shaping pills were pretty cheap now, so only unemployed people got really fat. Everybody still ate shitty food, but anybody with a job could afford glucose blockers, and if you had a good corporate job, you could afford muscle stimulants that made one hour in the gym build muscle like three.

    Polite society tended to shun anybody who was too fat or too muscled, so it was really hard for fat people to get jobs, now that the discrimination laws were gone. Nobody said it out loud, but fat was a real class marker now. I had been on carb blockers from the first day I got health insurance, and even now, I was pretty sure I would be three hundred pounds, if I let myself keep junk food in the house.

    So, for a mage to be fat, to start with the ultimate high status and throw it away for a fashion statement, that sounded like someone I wanted to meet.

    Simon had a cluster of guys around him, but no women, which I should have taken as a warning sign. He was obviously holding court, cracking jokes and talking shit about people walking by.

    He saw me coming and yelled, ¡°Love the jeans!¡±

    I had been mortified and self-conscious about my clothes all night, so I was immediately defensive. ¡°Are you fucking with me?¡±

    Simon looked hurt at being misunderstood. ¡°What? No way. Working Class Wizard! It¡¯s brilliant. It¡¯s a totally unique look.¡±

    Well, I was in the nerd circle now, for better or worse. I joined his disciples and said, ¡°I thought we weren¡¯t supposed to use that word.¡±

    ¡°What? Wizard? Because some TV show ruined it for us ten years ago? Fuck that guy, we¡¯re taking it back.¡±

    I raised my glass and toasted them. ¡°So, is this how real mages dress now? American Gilded Age?¡±

    Simon looked hurt again. ¡°You really don¡¯t recognize this? The Caretaker from Bartleby¡¯s Billions, the BBC show?¡±

    ¡°Sorry. My family didn¡¯t let me watch shows with wi¡ª with mages in them.¡±

    ¡°Oh, that¡¯s right, this whole thing is new to you. You didn¡¯t even find out you were one of us until like yesterday? Welcome to the club, man. A lot of people here are going to envy you. You got to live a real life.¡±

    I shook my head. ¡°Real life sucks.¡± I gestured to the party. ¡°I spent my whole life wishing I could have this. It¡¯s like the opposite of how I grew up. It sounds perfect, knowing exactly who you¡¯re supposed to be from the day you¡¯re born. Admired. Respected. Maybe people are a little scared of you. You should try being mundane for a week. The whole world pushes you around.¡±

    He got serious then. The whole group seemed to deflate and tighten up.

    Simon said, ¡°It¡¯s a trap. The money is a trap. The respect is fake. And the parties? Everything you see here is fake. It¡¯s fancy on top and cheap underneath. The food on those silver platters is the same food any normie can buy at distro, the school just paid somebody to put it on a cracker.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, but that¡¯s just window dressing, right? You guys get to learn real magic here, real power.¡±

    The whole group got quiet and looked at each other, like they were deciding who would get to break it to me.

    Finally, Simon said, ¡°I love that look in your eye, and I don¡¯t want to be the one to take it from you, but somebody should tell you, don¡¯t believe everything you hear from the recruiter. It¡¯s Evan¡¯s job to gloss over the boring shit and make you think it¡¯s all parties and pretty girls, but that¡¯s all marketing and fluff now. The most important magic you can learn these days is how to dress and how to act - to learn all the buzzwords and talk like a mage on TV. Corporations don¡¯t pay us to kill dragons or fight duels. They hire us to transmute construction materials and levitate heavy shit on loading docks. Why do you think corporations sponsor Bluestar teams?¡±

    ¡°Bluestar teams fight bad guys and save people from earthquakes, isn¡¯t that a huge PR win for a company? Same reason they write checks to food banks?¡± In the mirror, I was shocked by my own innocence. I couldn¡¯t even remember thinking like this.

    Simon barked laughter and cut himself off, like he was trying not to be rude. ¡°No, man. It¡¯s not charity. It¡¯s not even PR. Do you realize how much footage of a super fight is worth? The whole rights structure has changed since corps replaced the government.¡±

    One of his guys said, ¡°Careful...¡± in a warning tone, but Simon waved him off.

    ¡°Let¡¯s say you catch Bluestar 3 fighting some bad guy in the street. Smashing buildings, throwing cars around. You get it all on your phone, you dump it on the public feeds, and you get ten million hits. For twenty-four hours, you¡¯re a superstar, but you know how much money you get? Zero. GAC owns the likeness rights for everybody in Bluestar Chicago, and that means they own everything.

    ¡°Fifty years ago, any fight that happened in a public space was fair game, but not anymore. GAC revenue bot will flag that shit the instant you put it up and collect every dime in ad money. You¡¯ll get famous, sure. Your grandma will call you and tell you you¡¯re a brave boy for getting so close. Maybe an old girlfriend calls when she sees your name on the news. But only the sponsors make money.

    ¡°Let¡¯s say you get a scholarship from Trinity Healthstar and work out a way to use magic to speed up blood tests. You think you get rich? That¡¯s work product. Everything you do from the minute you take their scholarship is work product, even what you do in school. They own everything,¡± he gestured to the fountains and the catered food, ¡°and all this shit, everything you see around you, even down to the wardrobe budget and the house you live in, that¡¯s all rented. That¡¯s all corporate property that you¡¯re only allowed to use as long as you¡¯re corporate property. If you quit, or violate the terms, they can take the clothes off your back.¡±

    Simon¡¯s buddy said, ¡°Dude...¡± again in a low, urgent voice. ¡°Don¡¯t scare the new guy.¡±

    But Simon went on. ¡°It¡¯s still a good life. Better than the old way, when you just went in debt for millions and could lose everything to a money manager. You¡¯re still popular. You¡¯re still famous. You¡¯ll still get a comic book movie and a biopic when you die, but you don¡¯t actually own any of it. And the minute you fuck up, if you lose market share or say the wrong thing in an interview, it can all go away overnight. That¡¯s how they get you, and that¡¯s how they keep you in line.¡±

    ¡°So, what¡¯s the alternative?¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s not one. Play the corporate game or join a meta dictatorship in South America and learn to sleep with both eyes open.¡±

 Chapter 12: Denise

    A pretty girl, shorter and rounder than the others, appeared in my eye line the moment I left Simon¡¯s circle.

    She looked me up and down and said, ¡°What are you supposed to be?¡±

    I took a sip of pink water and pointed at Evan. ¡°Guy in the sweater brought me in to fix the TV. I¡¯m on my break.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m Denise,¡± she said.

    I pursed my lips, nodded in what I hoped was a casual way, and said, ¡°Timothy. Tim. You¡¯ll probably call me Timothy. For some reason, people never just call me Tim.¡±

    Denise said, ¡°Okay¡± and just stood there, staring.

    We stood in silence for a minute, so I said, ¡°You¡¯re still looking at me. I¡¯m not doing anything, but you¡¯re still looking at me like you¡¯re waiting for me to do something. I just thought you should know; I can stand still for a really long time without doing anything.¡±

    ¡°Sorry for staring,¡± she said. ¡°I¡¯ve been around mages my whole life, so I¡¯ve never seen a man who¡¯s done actual work before.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re staring at me, waiting for me to do some work?¡±

    ¡°That would be awesome,¡± she said. ¡°Can I watch you lift something, or dig a hole?¡±

    ¡°I feel like I¡¯m digging a hole right now.¡±

    ¡°Everybody¡¯s talking about you. You really had no idea you were gifted until just a couple days ago?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s true. Everything changed overnight. Suddenly, I have no idea who I am or who I¡¯m supposed to be.¡±

    ¡°What do you want to be?¡±

    ¡°I wanted to be a badass wizard superhero like on TV, but it sounds like nobody really needs those anymore.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s really what you wanted? Fighting bad guys and saving the city?¡±

    I said, ¡°Yeah. I know you¡¯re making fun of me, but yeah. That¡¯s really what I dreamed about, all my life.¡±

    ¡°I promise, I¡¯m not making fun of you,¡± she said. ¡°And if you don¡¯t know that, then¡­ Sorry, I¡¯m used to people knowing who I am, but you really don¡¯t, do you? My mother is Cecilia Hardy, does that name mean anything to you?¡±

    I shook my head. ¡°Sorry. My dad hated magic and hero stuff. Lost his shit every time he caught me watching it, so I don¡¯t have a lot of shared context with you guys.¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t believe I¡¯m showing these to someone on purpose.¡± Denise pulled up a series of book covers on her phone projector, old-fashioned watercolors, all featuring a mother and daughter in 1950s clothes, posing in front of different exotic backgrounds.

    ¡°My mom was a kind of B-list superhero for a while, before it was a corporate or a government job. She retired when she had me and started writing children¡¯s books. She¡¯s written a whole shelf full of them now, with no end in sight. She owns a potion shop in town.¡±

    ¡°A potion shop? Is that even legal?¡±

    ¡°She got grandfathered in. Grandmothered, really. The Hardy Witches have been in this city since it was a horse trail.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know anything about potions. Do they really work? Like in the movies? I thought you couldn¡¯t store magic in an inanimate object.¡±

    ¡°You can¡¯t store magic in inanimate objects unless they maintain a tether to a living soul, but plants and herbs are alive. That¡¯s what potion bottles do. They keep the ingredients ¡®alive¡¯ in a sense, so they don¡¯t lose potency. But they wear off very quickly once you take them out of the bottle. That makes all potions temporary, and mostly harmless.¡±

    ¡°Plants can retain magic because plants are alive. Of course, they are. Why doesn¡¯t anybody talk about this?¡±

    She shrugged. ¡°Alchemy is boring, and because it¡¯s so temporary, there¡¯s no money in it. Conventional drugs are more reliable, and they last a lot longer. I can give you a potion to make you taller or grow your hair out, but it only lasts for a few hours. We mostly just sell cosmetics and party tricks, mostly.¡±

    ¡°Can you sell me a love potion or a lie detector?¡±

    ¡°Sure,¡± she said. ¡°I mean, no. I can make one, but I can¡¯t sell you one. Those are both illegal. A lie detector is a privacy violation, and a love potion is really just a rape potion if you think about it.¡±

    I spilled my drink and took an involuntary step back. ¡°Oh god, no! I didn¡¯t mean...¡±

    Denise leaned forward and stretched her arms out like she was about to grab me to calm me down. ¡°No, of course, you didn¡¯t. I¡¯m sorry. I shouldn¡¯t have said that. It¡¯s just reflex. A love potion is the first thing anybody asks for, and I¡¯ve heard it so many times, that¡¯s just the quickest way to shut it down. Sorry. You didn¡¯t deserve that.¡±

    ¡°So, can you cure things? Can I use a potion to heal cuts or get over a cold?¡±

    ¡°A healing potion is actually one of the meanest things you can do to somebody. It only lasts for an hour or so, then the disease or injury comes right back. If you want real healing, you have to use more powerful magic - real spells, channeled through a person, and the process hurts like hell. Most healing magic is illegal, too, because it doesn¡¯t always work like it¡¯s supposed to. Neither does modern medicine, of course, but doctors have a trillion-dollar lobbying group, and most witches can¡¯t even organize a potluck dinner.¡±

    I wanted to ask, ¡°Do potions work on demons?¡± but it seemed a little too soon.

    Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

    * * *

    Denise said, ¡°Your glass is empty,¡± and I spent the rest of the night following her around. She led me to the beverage table and poured three different kinds of sparkling stuff. There was a fierce etiquette to it. It was supposed to be really dangerous for people with powers to drink alcohol, so everybody just drank expensive flavored water in fancy bottles.

    I picked my favorite, and she filled my glass. Then I got a whirlwind tour of the hors d¡¯oeuvres. My father hated food like this, and the people who ate it. The caviar was disgusting, but I found delightful cheeses, crab puffs, and deadly little chicken livers wrapped in bacon.

    Denise was breezing by the trays so fast, I barely had time to chew. At first, she said, ¡°Try this¡± and offered me tidbits on a tiny plate. But after the first few, she just said ¡°Open¡± and started popping things in my mouth.

    Halfway through this high-speed buffet, Denise ¡°accidentally¡± brushed my cheek with her hand. The contact with Evelyn had been mild, a faint trickle of emotion from a woman who hated me. Evelyn kept her power to herself, and my senses were new and numb. But I¡¯d been taking in magic for days, awakened by the chair, responding instinctively to Lydia¡¯s presence in my home. I was pumped like a balloon, and this girl was wide open.

    Evelyn¡¯s touch had been a snap in my mind. This was a gunshot. The world went gray, and the people turned into colors. Denise wasn¡¯t holding her power back, she was pushing it, pouring it right down my throat.

    I would eventually learn to fight intrusions like this, but today, I was flailing at the deep end of the pool. I couldn¡¯t taste my own power, but I could feel it bubbling inside me, racing to her fingertips. I was sucking in magic so fast; it was causing secondary effects in the atmosphere. A breeze came from nowhere and blew a stack of napkins off the table. The guests all knew what was happening, and were trying really hard not to notice, as if this kind of thing happened all the time.

    Denise took three steps back and apologized for touching me, but she didn¡¯t look sorry. She didn¡¯t look sorry at all.

    * * *

    ¡°Denise, did somebody put a sign on my back? I¡¯ve seen like three people look up at me, smile and look back down real quick. Is my fly down? Am I creating a scandal just walking around with you?¡±

    Denise smiled. ¡°You¡¯re having a really good time at the party, and everybody can tell. Your aura is like¡­ out to here.¡±

    ¡°My what? Oh my god, am I walking around with a giant magic boner? Can I turn it off?¡±

    She squeezed my arm. ¡°It¡¯s nothing to be ashamed of. Your aura is just¡­ really bright. Unusually bright, especially for someone who just got here.¡±

    ¡°So why can¡¯t I see it? Why can¡¯t I see yours?¡±

    ¡°Takes practice,¡± she said. ¡°Here, let me try something.¡±

    Denise put two fingers on my neck and sent a little shot of magic down my spine. Something in my head went pop and everybody turned into colors again, but this time it lasted longer.

    Denise was a warm amber glow on my left. Simon was teal. Evelyn was purple. Evan was burgundy. And what I thought was background light was actually coming from me, making shifting patterns on her face.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know what kind of person you are,¡± Denise said, ¡°but your aura is like white fire. You¡¯re bringing in power and throwing off waves. It¡¯s¡­ beautiful, but there¡¯s no way we¡¯ll be sneaking off together. You¡¯d be visible across a stadium.¡±

    ¡°So, what if I don¡¯t want to sneak?¡±

    Denise pecked my cheek, and both our auras went up a notch.

    * * *

    ¡°So, why does my aura look so different? I guess it¡¯s kind of like yours, but everybody else is just a soft glow. Can I learn to control this?¡±

    ¡°Everyone else at this party is a mage, or trying desperately to look like a mage, even the women. Their power is steady and predictable. They bring it in through discipline and concentration. Your power is different because you¡¯re not a mage. You¡¯re a witch, like me.¡±

    ¡°I thought witch was just the female form of wizard.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s fine to use it that way, but it also describes a way of using magic. Your body is male, but you use magic like a woman.¡±

    ¡°Is that good or bad?¡±

    Denise gave a short, bitter laugh. ¡°You¡¯re asking the wrong person. I¡¯ve fought so many battles over that, I don¡¯t even know where to start.¡± She turned and took my hands. ¡°You can do whatever you want, okay? But my advice? Do not let Evan get in your head. Do not join this program. They¡¯ll see you¡¯re a witch and try to train it out of you. Every spell will feel like writing with the wrong hand, but it¡¯s the only way they know how to teach.

    ¡°It¡¯s a crime the way witches are treated at this school. We¡¯re treated like trash because how we cast is connected to how we feel. This tower was built to train steady, reliable casters who can punch a clock. You really think HDI wants to hire a mage who can¡¯t cast under pressure because he¡¯s having a bad day?

    ¡°Even the women in this program end up casting like men. I¡¯ve seen it change their whole personalities, Tim. They come in as bubbly, excited girls and leave as robots in matching corporate suits. It¡¯s a fucking crime. Please don¡¯t let them do that to you.¡±

    ¡°So, what do I call myself? Am I a warlock?¡±

    Denise made an exaggerated, ¡°Ugh!¡± sound. ¡°Please don¡¯t ever use that word again. That¡¯s another joke word, ruined by another shitty TV show, even worse than wizard. Witch is the correct term for men and women, but honestly, I wouldn¡¯t use that either. It¡¯ll just raise questions and make people look down on you. Just call yourself a mage, that¡¯s a generic term that covers everything.

    ¡°Warlock has a totally different meaning now, thanks to some cheesy action show in the ¡®80s. In modern times, a warlock is a poser who makes deals with demons to simulate real magic. Lowest of the low. Don¡¯t ever call anybody that.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°But if I¡¯m not a normal person anymore, and I can¡¯t just sign on the dotted line here, what the fuck am I? What am I supposed to do?¡±

    Denise stroked my neck. ¡°There¡¯s a whole world outside the corporate system, Tim. I think that¡¯s why Evan invited me tonight, to test you and show you another way forward. Damn decent of him, really. He obviously wants to keep you for himself, but he¡¯s giving me a chance to poach you, and let you walk away.¡±

    I had a million new questions, but the phone on her wrist went chirp and she dragged me to my feet. ¡°We better start walking; we don¡¯t want to miss the midnight ride.¡±

    And then she was leading me away from the party, down the river, back to the Zone.

    ¡°Are you walking me home?¡± I said.

    ¡°Home? Wait. You live in the Zone?¡±

    ¡°Right on the edge of it, in those shitty apartments over there. The Zone starts at my sidewalk.¡±

    Denise was stunned, obviously filled with pity for me. ¡°Oh my god, you actually live there? Like, all the time?¡±

    I nodded.

    ¡°How do you stand it?¡±

    How stuck up was this chick? ¡°Look, they¡¯re not great apartments, but I¡¯ve got lights and running water for god¡¯s sake!¡±

    ¡°No, not the apartments. What about the nightmares? The Zone is haunted, Tim. Bluestar 7 killed a god less than a mile from here.¡±

    ¡°Right.¡± I nodded. ¡°Arthur Walton helped take down Nergal. I walk in his footprints every day.¡±

    ¡°Jesus don¡¯t say his name! You don¡¯t want his eye on you, even if he is dead!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve lived here for years, and he¡¯s never bothered me. I don¡¯t even mind the footprints. It¡¯s actually kind of nice. No people, so it¡¯s really peaceful and quiet at night.¡±

    ¡°Good god, you wander around here in the dark? Even gangs won¡¯t walk around in the Zone anymore!¡±

    ¡°Well, sure, there are tradeoffs. Anyone who tries to move in commits suicide or runs away screaming, but it really does keep the rent down.

    ¡°I swear he¡¯s never bothered me. I mean, I don¡¯t sleep great when I¡¯m alone, but I¡¯ve never had nightmares. And I¡¯ve never felt threatened here. I hang out in the footprints all the time. Some of them are deep enough, you can sit on the edge and dangle your feet. I walk around in them and listen to music.¡±

    Denise was staring at me with her mouth open. ¡°I don¡¯t wanna freak you out, but if an evil god loved me as much as this one loves you, I¡¯d be a little worried.¡±

    No secret why he liked me. My grandfather killed hundreds of people for his government. My great-grandfather killed thousands. Nergal respects a good body count, so when a new Kovach popped up on his doorstep, he was expecting great things. I wish I had disappointed him.

 Chapter 13: Rift

    Denise was walking me to part of the Zone I had never been to before, a sealed block surrounded by thick concrete walls. I had never been able to open the lock on the gate, but one of the guys did something magic and it popped right off.

    Then everybody was standing around this empty concrete slab inside the fence. Men were taking their shoes off, and women were slipping on shorts under their dresses or changing into pants.

    ¡°Denise, what is this?¡±

    ¡°Think of it like surfing for mages. This was a sacred site for the Wampanoag before Europeans got here, the main reason Newbury built the tower so close. It¡¯s a constant source of background magic that makes this the best casting location in the country. It was a quiet little ritual site for centuries; then, after your buddy from Mesopotamia got loose, it¡¯s like something weakened the membrane around our universe and turned it into a kind of magic geyser. Now it opens up once every forty minutes or so and makes this huge pulsating tear in the ground.

    ¡°Professor Roon says this is a portal that never quite finished, like someone took advantage of the weakened membrane and tried to invade us, but the other end never connected.

    ¡°Now we¡¯ve got half a portal in the ground here and the other end is swinging back and forth, crossing through some kind of power source outside our universe. This is where the power from Evan¡¯s chair comes from. There are tantalum cables running underground from here in all directions. The tower used to use these to power magical defenses around town, but everything overloaded when this anomaly cut loose. DMA sealed it off, and we sneak in every month or so to take the ride.¡±

    I squinted and tried to flex my eyes, but I still couldn¡¯t see it.

    Denise reached up and sent some magic into my neck again. She used more this time, and it felt really good. The world went gray again, and now I could see it, a long, forking rip in the ground, with blue-white fire roaring out of the concrete. It was expanding as I watched, getting longer, with flames rising higher as it grew.

    ¡°Denise, this is a wound, an injury to our universe. Can we close it?¡±

    She was looking at me funny, reaching out to stroke my cheek. ¡°I love that you see it that way. To most mages, this is just a cool toy. I like the way you view the universe, like it¡¯s something worth protecting.¡±

    The mages were lining up in front of the rift. Marcus was first. I watched as he stepped into the blue fire, glowed for a second, and shot up into the sky. Everybody clapped and cheered for him. He hovered for twenty seconds or so, then slowly came back down.

    Everybody gathered around and patted him on the back. His sweater was smoking, but his breath was forming vapor in the air, like the magic fire was burning hot and cold at the same time.

    Seven or eight people rode the rift back-to-back, rising up a little and sinking back to a round of applause. And as I thought things were about to wind down, Evan said, ¡°Mister Kovak, I believe it¡¯s your turn.¡±

    I pointed at myself. ¡°You really want me to do this?¡±

    Denise said, ¡°Evan¡­¡± as a low growl and shook her head like she was scolding him.

    Evan held out his hand, inviting me to stand up, so I joined him.

    ¡°Pop quiz, Mister Kovak. What is the second rune in a levitation spell?¡±

    ¡°Talse.¡±

    ¡°And what does it do?¡±

    ¡°Restricts levitation to inanimate objects, so you don¡¯t accidentally move a person.¡±

    ¡°Very good. Keep that in the front of your mind, would you? For the next few minutes.¡±

    Simon said, ¡°Hold on! Tim, you don¡¯t have to do this. Evan, what is this peer pressure crap? This is not a frat party. We do not do hazing here.¡± He turned back to me. ¡°It¡¯s too soon for you to try this, man. Just work up to it for a few months and ride it with us next time.¡±

    ¡°Nonsense,¡± Evan said. ¡°Mister Kovak is entirely capable of handling this.¡±

    I shrugged, trusting him. ¡°What should I do?¡±

    Evan explained, ¡°This rift is raw magic. Your body will try to absorb it, but you must resist that impulse. Whatever you do, don¡¯t take it in. If your body takes in too much energy, you could hurt yourself. We¡¯ll pull you out if you panic, but all you have to do is relax. Have you ever been surfing?¡±

    I shook my head.

    ¡°It¡¯s a lot like that. The magic is like a wave. If you fight it, it¡¯ll break you in half, but if you relax, it¡¯ll wash over and lift you up. Relax, and you¡¯ll be fine.¡±

    Of course, I was already tensing up. I was having second thoughts, but I couldn¡¯t back out now, with everybody cheering for me. I took a deep breath and straddled the rift. Magic saturated the air. The coppery ozone scent was overwhelming. Under that, I smelled cologne and sweat and burning hair, residue from one of the riders.

    I tried to relax, but it wasn¡¯t working. I knew Evan was playing me. I knew this party was a trap. I was trying to stay cynical, but the damage was done. I wanted to impress these people. I wanted to belong.

    Lost in thought, I didn¡¯t hear the countdown start. The crowd was chanting, ¡°SIX! FIVE! FOUR! THREE! TWO!¡±

    The eruption caught me mid-breath. I was going to take one deep breath before the rift opened, but I timed it wrong. A moment of absolute silence, and the universe opened under my feet. The force of it snapped my head back and lifted me two inches off the ground. My body thrummed like a guitar string. Every muscle clenched and started to shake.

    Terrified, I froze. My body reacted instinctively, sucking magic in huge silent gulps. For a moment, it was ecstasy. My body had been starving for magic, hungry since the chair. I¡¯d been pulling in sips for days, but the hunger kept growing - a gnawing, restless feeling that I couldn¡¯t quite place. The rift was an oasis. Paradise. Nirvana. Bliss. And it was killing me.

    The pleasure made it hard to think, but I knew I was in trouble. I had to relax, but I¡¯d never been so tense in my life. Cold tendrils of fear in my heart. Adrenaline flooding my body like liquid fire. My limbs were shaking, and I couldn¡¯t turn my head. My teeth were chattering like a plastic toy. My nose caught the scent of burning plastic - smoke from the soles of my shoes.

    I could see Evan and Denise through the flames, having some kind of stop-motion argument. Denise was yelling and pointing at me. Evan was calm, poised, with his hands locked behind his back. I couldn¡¯t hear anything, but I read his lips. Evan said, ¡°Wait.¡±

    Simon was yelling, ¡°He¡¯s pulling in magic, but he can¡¯t release it! Pull him out!¡±

    Evan just said, ¡°Wait,¡± again.

    ¡°Just relax!¡± Marcus shouted. ¡°Just relax and let it pass through!¡±

    ¡°He can¡¯t relax,¡± Denise said. ¡°He can¡¯t let the magic go because he¡¯s a witch, and he¡¯s having a panic attack.¡± She brushed the others aside and stepped up so I could hear her. She got right next to the fire and shouted, ¡°Tim! I need you to listen closely to every word I say! You have to follow these instructions exactly!¡±

    I focused on her voice and tried to nod.

    Denise pointed to a nearby building and shouted, ¡°My great-grandmother threw a Frisbee on that roof in 1974! I need you to go get it for me!¡±

    It wasn¡¯t a great joke, but it was enough. I started to laugh, and the magic rushed out of me as if I had just unclenched a fist. My body relaxed and I shot up like a champagne cork. When I finally looked down, I realized I was floating above the rift, a long fucking way above the rift.

    I could see everything from up here. Burned-out buildings along the river lined up on either side of Nergal¡¯s footprints. I could count them now, and measure the length of his stride, tracing the path from his entry point to Madison Tower.

    I could see a huge line of wrecked cars down the highway. There were supposedly no bodies left in the Zone, since most of the dead people were brought back as zombies and burned as they tried to enter the city, but you could never be sure there wasn¡¯t still some dead person, or not quite dead person, trapped inside a car that hadn¡¯t been touched in fifteen years.

    Evan¡¯s students were like ants on the ground under me, but even from this height, I could tell there was something wrong. They weren¡¯t clapping and cheering; they were screaming, cupping their hands at their mouths to try and shout, but I couldn¡¯t hear them over the wind. It was so beautiful up here, I felt like I could float like this forever. Then the rift vanished, and I started to fall.

    * * *

    If the rift had vanished completely, all at once, I would have splattered across the concrete before anyone had time to react, but the rift seemed to be fading slowly as the energy was cut off, a bit like a garden hose that still has some water in it, even after you turn the faucet off. If I had been just a few feet off the ground, I could have floated down on the magical equivalent of a receding wave, just like Marcus did, but I was a good two hundred feet up, falling in a halting, start-stop pattern that would likely kill me in thirty seconds instead of three.

    Denise took charge on the ground. ¡°Oh god, he¡¯s tumbling. Simon, can you catch him?¡±

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    ¡°Erratic rate of fall! I can¡¯t grab him!¡±

    There wasn¡¯t much left alive inside the fence - a patch of weeds and some sick yellow grass, but Denise grabbed the weeds and started pumping in magic, trying to grow and stretch them into some kind of net. Denise grabbed Evan¡¯s hand, and everyone made a chain, linking their power and feeding it to her. The pile of vines was growing faster now, but there was no way they would be strong enough to catch me.

    ¡°We¡¯ve got to slow him down,¡± Denise shouted. ¡°I can¡¯t heal him if he hits this hard!¡±

    It took me a second to realize I was about to die, and another second to wonder if I could do something about it. Then I remembered what Evan said about levitation and tried to work through it as my body fell.

    Could I add something to the spell and levitate myself? I could remember the runes easily enough, but I only had five symbols to work with. But that¡¯s what Evan meant. He hadn¡¯t taught me an extra rune. He told me how to turn the safety off and make something that could wrap around my own body.

    I don¡¯t remember casting the spell, but I felt power wrap around me, lifting gently to slow my fall. I glided to the ground until I felt concrete under my feet, landing in front of the vines like I had done it all on purpose.

    The students all rushed in to check on me, breaking their rules about touching, setting off little pops of power and emotion as they hugged me and patted me on the back.

    ¡°Thanks, everybody! Who caught me?¡±

    Simon said, ¡°You were falling too fast, man. You had to catch yourself.¡±

    ¡°Perfect cast under pressure, Mister Kovak,¡± Evan said. ¡°I knew you could do it.¡±

    But the other students were not happy. They were glaring at Evan, forming a protective circle around me, like my mentor was about to attack. Simon was about to start shouting, but Denise hit Evan like a strawberry blonde missile and dragged him off behind the fence.

    * * *

    Denise pulled Evan around a corner and slammed both palms into his chest. ¡°Mother fucker! You almost killed him! Twice!¡±

    The impact had driven him back a few steps, but Evan quickly composed himself. ¡°Mister Kovak is fine. I gave him everything he needed to save himself, and he used it brilliantly. It¡¯s a wonderful night for him. A real victory. Thank you for your help.¡±

    Denise was appalled and looked like she was about to hit him again. ¡°To take a boy who just got here, who just found his powers like yesterday, and almost bounce him off the pavement? What the fuck is wrong with you?¡±

    ¡°You know what this program screens for, Denise. He¡¯s useless if he can¡¯t cast under stress.¡±

    Denise whispered, ¡°Motherfucker,¡± again.

    ¡°You need to know,¡± Evan said, ¡°Tim Kovak red-lined my chair last week. We emptied that reservoir of magic and still didn¡¯t find the top of him. My scale topped out at twelve forty-four.¡±

    Denise snorted. ¡°Oh, bull shit.¡± She made it two words. ¡°I¡¯ve been juicing him all night. He¡¯s a puppy.¡±

    ¡°I assure you; he is not.¡±

    ¡°But twelve-forty-four, that¡¯s not even human. That¡¯s¡­¡±

    ¡°Say it,¡± Evan said. ¡°Say it out loud.¡± Denise wouldn¡¯t speak, so he said it for her. ¡°I think that boy out there, that sweet, simple boy, could be the reincarnation of Captain Cobalt, and that is exactly what I need him to be.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re turning witches into superheroes now?¡±

    ¡°Why not?¡± Evan said. ¡°You wanted to be the only one?¡±

    Denise shook her head. ¡°Your chair¡¯s broken. It¡¯s got to be a mistake.¡±

    ¡°You obviously won¡¯t take my word for it, but he¡¯s right there. See for yourself.¡±

    * * *

    Denise dragged me away, maintaining a death grip on my hand as we walked all the way back, all the way out of the Zone to a lovely little park, enclosed in a courtyard behind the tower, with a stream meandering down the middle.

    She led me to a gazebo straddling the water and kissed me - so suddenly, so hard, I was absolutely helpless. She was much stronger than she looked, with a hard layer of muscle under everything my hands were trying to squeeze.

    I tried to remember how long it had been since a girl had kissed me like this, and my brain kicked back on, immediately trying to find ways to ruin this. ¡°I should tell you¡­ it¡¯s weird, scary, and complicated, but I kind of have¡­¡±

    And then she was kissing me again, making it clear that she had no interest in hearing the end of that sentence, and while I might be an honored guest at this event, I was absolutely not in charge.

    It took me another minute to realize what she was doing. She was deliberately withholding the magic now, so for a moment, we were just a man and a woman under this open sky. She was using her body to ask a question, testing to see if I still wanted her without the magic, to see if I wanted her as a woman, and not just as a witch.

    I had been completely overwhelmed by this night, intimidated by this amazing creature who appeared in my arms out of nowhere, but I knew her question required an answer, and I did the best I could.

    Denise backed up and took my hands. ¡°Okay, we¡¯re gonna go slow now. I want you to take in some power. Not from me. Just take a breath and try to draw some magic from the air. This is a place of power, but it¡¯s not alien or violent like the rift, or that obscene chair. You¡¯re touching the Earth now. I want you to relax and take in real Earth magic for the first time.¡±

    So, I tried. Holding her hands seemed to center me somehow, like she was guiding me to the power. ¡°What am I feeling?¡± I asked. ¡°This is lighter. Warmer. The rift and the chair, that power is so cold; I didn¡¯t realize how cold it was until I felt this. This feels¡­¡± I looked into her eyes. ¡°This power, for the first time, it feels like it belongs in me.¡±

    Denise said, ¡°Welcome to Earth. This is your planet. This is where you belong.¡±

    Nobody had ever told me I belonged anywhere before. The word hit me so hard, for a second, I couldn¡¯t speak. I brought more power in, and it felt better somehow, like the whole planet could feel me, and the whole world was saying hello.

    She put her hand on my heart. ¡°You feel it? You feel the power right here?¡±

    I did.

    ¡°I want you to take that power now and move it to your hands.¡±

    I was about to say ¡°I don¡¯t know how¡± but it was already moving, until I could see my own aura again, glowing softly from both hands.

    She stepped lightly into my arms again. ¡°Now I want you to put both hands on my back and give it all to me.¡±

    So, I did. I put both hands on her and gave a little push. Denise made a quiet ¡°Mmmm¡± noise and said, ¡°More.¡±

    So, she got more. She made some louder noises and said ¡°More,¡± again, more urgently this time. ¡°Take it all in, fast as you can, and give it all to me.¡±

    There was such hunger in her voice, I had to pull back again. ¡°Denise, I cannot control this yet. They told me I have to be careful with surges, and if I just unload on you¡­¡±

    Denise didn¡¯t even lean in, just a straight-arm palm strike, right into my chest. A tidal wave of delicious, bubbling power came out of her and overwhelmed all my senses, all at once. Wham. It felt so good, for a few seconds, I swear I went blind.

    It didn¡¯t feel like sex, not localized to organs and nerve endings. I felt this in my whole body, like an electric shock to my soul. If she hadn¡¯t been there to catch me, I would have gone to my knees. I can¡¯t remember all the noises I made, but they were probably pretty funny.

    I got back to my feet, and she was rocking back and forth in some kind of playful fighting stance, daring me to come at her.

    You wouldn¡¯t know it from reading this far, but up to this point, I had actually been proud of my newfound capacity for self-control. Even with Lydia, I was proud of myself, the way I had been able to hold my own with her, even when I was ambushed, exhausted, in the middle of the night.

    I had been able to sit there and crack jokes when Evan strapped me in his chair and hit me with an overdose of alien magic. I had been able to keep my shit together and adjust that levitation spell in mid-air. I had made a game out of testing my willpower over the years, trying to fight the compulsive streak that consumed my father.

    Judy was my first, and I loved her for it, but she had never been playful like Denise, or teasing like Lydia. All sex is fun when you¡¯re young, but Judy never really cut loose with me. She never completely trusted me. She loved me for my sense of humor and for the way I worshipped her, but the whole package that was Timothy Kovak? She always wanted something more.

    I felt lust for her in the simple, predictable way all young men feel for young women, but overwhelming desire? When you meet someone and something about them, the way they look, or sound, or smell just turns your brain off and rips the animal out of you? I had never felt that. I had never even imagined that.

    So, when it happened for real, for the first time, I had no defense at all.

    I charged Denise Hardy like a bull, lifted her off the ground, and slammed her into a support pillar, rougher than I had ever been with a woman. She wrapped her legs around my waist, and it was on. I wasn¡¯t just putting magic in my hands anymore. It was surging through my whole body while I held her.

    Lydia had been teasing me for days. She had turned my living room into a debate tournament, where the winner got my soul. I had to be so strong with her. So lost, so lonely, knowing any moment I could just say her name and let her take it all away. To take a man who had already lost everything, and make him fight for his last scrap of dignity like that? For just a second, I forgot to feel sorry for myself, and let the anger in. My sadness was changing to something else, and this little witch was about to get it all.

    The magic was coming in hard, fast, and clean. So strong and pure, I felt like I could move the world. Denise moaned and started to shake. I couldn¡¯t tell the difference between good shaking and bad shaking, so I started to back off.

    She grabbed my hair and hissed ¡°Is that all you got?¡±

    And we were on again. I swear the trees were moving, leaves shaking like the magic was a strong wind, blowing straight through us.

    Denise yanked my collar over and sank her teeth into my shoulder. A moment later, she slammed her feet back on the ground and gasped, ¡°Okay! Okay, you win!¡±

    Something in my head went snap and I was just me again. I jumped back and threw my hands up, breaking contact.

    Panting, she grabbed my face, ¡°Timmy, after Evan put you in the chair, when it was all over, what number did he say?¡±

    I almost forgot to lie. ¡°One-eighty-four.¡±

    Denise laughed and leaned in to kiss me again. ¡°One-eighty-four, my ass.¡±

    * * *

    I sat on one of the benches with her head on my shoulder. I had done nothing to deserve this, but here she was, giving herself to me, with no idea what it meant, or what was waiting for me back home.

    I looked up at the sky and wondered how late it was. I could find out with a flick of my wrist, but I was deliberately not doing it. As long as I didn¡¯t know what time it was, I could stay. As long as I didn¡¯t know what time it was, we had forever. I could just stay in this night under the stars, and never go home again.

    And then I remembered, really remembered what was waiting for me, and reality came crashing in. It was almost three in the morning. I pushed Denise away and stood up, as gently as I could. I walked to the opposite corner and put my back against the pillar, sliding down to hug my knees.

    She came and sat beside me, puzzled by the sudden change.

    ¡°I really was not expecting to enjoy myself tonight,¡± I said. ¡°I thought I would be here twenty minutes and decide you were all assholes. But Evan set the most transparent ambush in the world, and I walked right into it. I wanted it so bad. A simple college party, with good conversation and pretty girls. It felt like old times. And worse, it felt like maybe I could start school over again, walk in here like a five-star recruit and do everything the way I should have done it the first time. But it¡¯s a fantasy. A stupid one. I can¡¯t just have that. If I want a normal life now, I have to fight for it.¡±

    Denise leaned in. ¡°Tim, are you in some kind of trouble?¡±

    And god help me, I almost told her everything. I wanted to collapse in her arms and beg her to take this curse from me.

    But I smiled. ¡°Sorry. I¡¯m just being dramatic. I¡¯m kind of fighting with my girlfriend and it feels like the end of the world. We¡¯re most likely gonna break up, and I¡¯m definitely gonna have some trouble with her dad, but until I know for sure, to carry on like this, to pretend I¡¯m free when I¡¯m not, it¡¯s not right. It¡¯s not fair to you.¡±

    I looked into her eyes again. ¡°God, if I had met you last week, or last month, or last year. Imagine if I met you last year, back when I had all the time in the world. I wonder, would you have even looked at me? If I had just walked up, made you laugh, and bought you some coffee? Just some guy, without a drop of magic in my blood?¡±

    Denise didn¡¯t answer.

    ¡°What¡¯s killing me right now is that I think you would have. I think you would have given me a shot, with no magic at all. But trying to remember the guy I was a year ago? I would have taken a beating before I talked to you. And if you had so much as looked at me, I would have run out the front door, rather than sit there hating myself, admitting that I couldn¡¯t do a goddamn thing.¡±

    I stood up and brushed myself off. ¡°So, next time some mundane guy has the balls to walk up and invite you for coffee? Give him a shot, okay? Just for me.¡±

    I think she tried to call my name, but I was already gone.

    * * *

    And that¡¯s how I met my best friend, the woman I would have married, if we hadn¡¯t had an army of demons standing between us. I still wonder if she could have saved me, if I had just trusted her a little sooner.

 Chapter 14: Cure

    I didn¡¯t quite cry on the way home, following Nergal¡¯s giant footprints back to my apartment, walking away from a girl who felt like the best thing that ever happened to me.

    Could anyone on Earth save me? Bluestar 7 could kill Lydia easily enough, but she would just keep coming back, over and over, for the rest of my life. The only way to be safe was to move to a place without magic, but walking home from that party, with the taste of Denise on my lips and the warm glow of her power in my chest, I decided I would rather die than give this up.

    Every authority I considered asking for help would have the same answer. An angel safe house, a trip through some portal, a lonely cabin in the woods, it was all just different kinds of prison.

    Could Evan and Denise save me? Could I make my case to the regents at Newbury Tower and recruit some kind of badass wizard lawyer to void my contract? Such a dumb idea, it wouldn¡¯t even make a good TV show. Every one of my ancestors had been smarter than me, and if none of them had found a way to break this thing, what chance would I have?

    But if no one else could save me, did I really have the strength to save myself?

    * * *

    I wasn¡¯t really feeling better when I made it home, but something about seeing Lydia there, patiently waiting for me - it pissed me off and comforted me at the same time. There was a kind of animal comfort to it, just having someone else there.

    ¡°Well, if I learned nothing else tonight, I now understand why there is a no-touching clause in my contract. Holy. Fucking. Shit.¡±

    Lydia sniffed me and made no effort to hide her astonishment or her outrage. ¡°You had a witch tonight!¡±

    ¡°More accurate to say a witch had me.¡± I sat there for a minute staring at my phone. ¡°I need to update my apps, but I¡¯m not sure if I just had sex or not.¡± I looked up at Lydia. ¡°I need a ruling here, does swapping magic with a witch count as sex?¡±

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    ¡°Oh, there are so many levels, you¡¯d have to describe it for me.¡±

    I laughed, despite myself. ¡°Dammit, stop trying to cheer me up, and stop making me laugh at shit that¡¯s not funny.¡± I sat behind my desk and leaned back in my chair. ¡°You¡¯re taking this way better than I expected. You¡¯re supposed to be jealous.¡±

    ¡°Of course, I¡¯m jealous!¡± Lydia snapped, suddenly raising her voice. ¡°You¡¯ve made me work for every minute of our time together, but some random witch trips you in one night? I¡¯d love to know how she did it.¡±

    ¡°Well, she wasn¡¯t subtle, I¡¯ll tell you that. She damn near¡ª¡± I stopped. ¡°And you¡¯ve immediately got me describing it.¡±

    ¡°At least admit you had a good time,¡± Lydia said. ¡°People are already starting to notice how special you are. Are you starting to believe it? Are you starting to see what this power can do for you?¡±

    ¡°I definitely had fun, but it felt like everybody was excited by the idea of me, before they really knew me at all. Everybody just found out I won the genetic lottery and suddenly I¡¯ve got a witch stuffing chicken livers in my mouth. But I didn¡¯t earn this. I didn¡¯t pull a kid out of a burning building; I didn¡¯t even go to the gym.

    ¡°I got to make out with the hottest girl in the tower tonight, but she didn¡¯t want me, she wanted this,¡± I said, making my aura flare in the dark. ¡°All that matters is what I was born with, like I suddenly woke up with rich parents, twenty years too late. Do you realize what kind of asshole I would become if I started walking around like I was hot shit, just because I got hit by lightning? Maybe one day I¡¯ll be worthy of all this attention, but right now, I¡¯m still just Timmy Kovak, who just inherited a car I can¡¯t drive.¡±

    * * *

    Lydia followed me to the bedroom and took a perch across from me as I flopped on my bed.

    ¡°Her power is still in you, and it¡¯s beautiful.¡± Lydia said, peering at me like she was taking some kind of magic X-ray. ¡°The power in this witch is so old, it¡¯s mellowed somehow, aged like wine. The level of control she would have, the level of control she could give you¡­¡±

    Lydia lowered her head and was silent for a long time. Then she said, ¡°Please excuse me,¡± and vanished, the first time she had really left me alone since she got here.

    I couldn¡¯t see her, hovering invisible in the next dimension, crying silently in the gray. Lydia was crying because she had just discovered a cure for the madness that destroyed my Grandpa Jim, an entire generation too late.

 Chapter 15: Sandwich

    Azael says he wants me to document my seduction, take him through the process of how I lost my soul. He says my story is valuable, because I dragged it out for so long.

    He says most men who become demon thralls fall in one night, as part of one catastrophic bad decision. Lydia said the easiest way to get a thrall is to keep an eye on a powerful man, and wait for him to have a low point, right after he¡¯s lost a wife or lost a job or had some kind of falling out with his family.

    She says most thralls are made during holidays and birthdays, when men are most likely to despair over being alone. So, if you¡¯re a lonely billionaire, or just a guy working the late shift, watching over something demons want, never let yourself spend Christmas or your birthday alone.

    Azael wants me to share practical advice for avoiding demons, so here it is. If your life is starting to feel like an improbable fantasy from erotic fiction; if you¡¯ve been having weird chance encounters with beautiful strangers who seem way too hot and way too forward in daily life, you may just have a target on your back. Especially if you have money, power, or a security clearance.

    You may think you¡¯re not worth seducing, but it doesn¡¯t have to be your money, your power, or your security clearance. If you have access to one of these things, and you catch yourself feeling lost and alone, be very careful about who you take home from the club, the bookstore or the coffee shop, because the best night of your life can quickly become the worst.

    Azael is fascinated by my seduction because I stretched it out over weeks, fully aware of what I was submitting to and what it was gonna cost me. He wants me to document the slow process of a smart man talking himself into embracing evil, and in my case, it started with a sandwich.

    * * *

    I hated the idea of leaving Lydia alone in my house, but I finally got hungry enough to risk it. It seemed stupid to just sit there and stay hungry when I knew I had a free sandwich waiting for me a couple blocks over.

    I came back with a hot plastic bag and spread the contents out on my desk. My points were only good for a sandwich, but I came there so often, they threw in olives, chips, and a pickle.

    I sat down to eat at my desk like I always did, and Lydia was right there.

    ¡°I actually did see tits this week, so technically I didn¡¯t earn this.¡± I looked up at Lydia, ¡°They were your tits, you wanna split it?¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re offering me food?¡±

    ¡°Am I not supposed to do that? Do you even eat? I mean, can you eat, if you want to?¡±

    ¡°Yes. Demon bodies are simpler than yours, but I can eat; it just burns.¡±

    ¡°So, have a sandwich, I¡¯ll get you a chair.¡± She hesitated, so I said, ¡°Come on, it¡¯s just nice having someone to eat with, even if it¡¯s you.¡±

    I got the extra chair from my bedroom and pulled it up on the opposite side of my desk.

    Lydia stepped down. ¡°Would it be all right if I changed my clothes? I feel silly eating a normal dinner while looking like this.¡±

    I shrugged, grabbing plates and two bottles of water. ¡°Sure.¡±

    A brief flicker of magic, and Lydia turned into a perfectly normal, human version of herself. No horns, no tail. I don¡¯t know what I was expecting, but she was wearing jeans and a sweater. The outfit was obviously from the wrong era, but not absurdly so.

    ¡°Is this okay?¡± Lydia said. ¡°Do women still dress like this?¡±

    I had to smile. ¡°Sure. It¡¯s a nice change, actually.¡±

    Lydia gave a little bow and sat down. I put half the sandwich on a plate and pushed it over to her.

    She was studying me again. ¡°You really got this sandwich as a reward for some kind of monk ritual, depriving yourself?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s kind of stupid to still be doing it after all this time, but the whole anti-porn thing started when a bunch of the guys I used to work with started dating strippers. These were college dropouts who were suddenly making big boy money, but they were working terrible hours, and they were all hopeless with women. So, of course, they became regulars at a strip club.

    ¡°And it turns out, if you throw thousands of dollars at a girl and pretend to be fascinated by every word that comes out of her mouth, one of them will eventually come home with you. And once one of them realizes you have a bunch of extra bedrooms, word gets around, and suddenly you¡¯ve got four or five of her friends hanging around, crashing at the big empty house you¡¯re paying too much rent for.

    ¡°They only took me to the club one time, to try and ¡®get me over¡¯ Judy. They spent like six hundred dollars for this redheaded amazon to take me in the back room, but I couldn¡¯t keep it up for a woman somebody paid money for. I looked in her eyes and it wasn¡¯t¡­ desire, you know? There was something bored and angry in her eyes that didn¡¯t match the look on her face. Killed the whole thing for me. All the other guys left the club strutting and slapping each other on the back, but I felt like a bigger loser on my way home than I did on my way there.

    ¡°It turned into a whole lifestyle for these guys, but they had no idea what to do with women like this. These were computer geeks from shitty families, thinking they had found some kind of cheat code that let them get laid any time they wanted.

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    ¡°They started showing up late for work, and a couple of them started using drugs as a substitute for sleep, custom-tailored productivity drugs that didn¡¯t even have street names yet. It was all just fun and games, with a rotating cast of ¡®girlfriends,¡¯ until their real boyfriends found out and decided the party was over.

    ¡°The house got robbed and two of my friends ended up in the hospital. The whole group swore off strippers after that. Two of them went Christian and got really political about porn. They installed these public shaming apps and got most of the office to do it. I lost touch with those guys a couple years ago, but I just kept doing it, I guess, as a reminder of when I had friends.¡±

    ¡°And you failed your challenge, because of me?¡±

    ¡°Yeah.¡±

    Lydia looked at her sandwich, then at mine. ¡°Give me your half and I¡¯ll let you see them again.¡±

    It hit me just right. I started laughing and I could not stop. Then she started laughing because I was laughing and then neither one of us could stop. I remember this because Lydia was a tough room, and this was the first time I really made her laugh.

    And then we were both just laughing a little bit, but our eyes locked, and I wasn¡¯t sure how that happened, and I wanted to jump across that desk and tear those clothes off more than anything I had ever wanted in my life.

    I jumped out of my chair and turned away, ¡°Dammit!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry,¡± Lydia said. ¡°You were being so nice, and I ruined it. Please sit down. Eat your dinner. I¡¯m sorry. I promise I won¡¯t tease you again. Please sit down.¡±

    I sat down and let out a ragged breath. Looking at the sandwich seemed to center me. I looked at her again and asked, ¡°How much can I get for chips and a pickle?¡± And we were both laughing again. But this time I stopped it. ¡°You really haven¡¯t had Earth food in all this time?¡±

    She shook her head.

    ¡°Okay, if it¡¯s really been that long, I¡¯ve got to see this. I have to see your reaction. Just take a bite.¡±

    Lydia bit into the sandwich and I saw the first one hundred percent honest reaction I can remember from her, the first thing that didn¡¯t seem planned or calculated or part of some elaborate setup to turn me on.

    She was absolutely disgusted. She forced herself to swallow and grabbed the bottle of water to try and wash the taste out of her mouth.

    I couldn¡¯t stop laughing. ¡°You hate it! You haven¡¯t had Earth food in seventy years, and you still hate it! That¡¯s hilarious!¡±

    Lydia swallowed and made an ¡°Ugh¡± noise. ¡°I¡¯m sorry,¡± she said. ¡°I¡¯m ruining this again, but the meat in this thing¡ª I don¡¯t think these animals were healthy. Is this really what you eat? Please tell me you¡¯re not living on free sandwiches.¡±

    But I wasn¡¯t done with this experiment. ¡°Okay, if the sandwich was too salty, you¡¯re gonna hate the chips. I wonder if¡­ okay, open your mouth.¡±

    She stared at me for a moment, like she was giving me a chance to take it back.

    ¡°It¡¯s fine, I used to be good at this. Open your mouth.¡±

    Lydia opened her mouth and I tried to throw an olive in it. It wasn¡¯t a great throw, but Lydia can move her head really fast. She caught it and started to chew.

    ¡°Oh! This is an olive! This is good! Nice to know they haven¡¯t ruined everything.¡±

    * * *

    Lydia had been staying out of the bedroom, but she came to the door this time.

    ¡°Is that why you¡¯re resisting me?¡± she asked. ¡°You think I¡¯m a vulture or a predator, like one of these dancers?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not sure what you are, but I¡¯m pretty sure I can¡¯t afford you.¡±

    Lydia sighed, looking unusually sad and tired, like she had dealt with this a hundred times and was annoyed that she had to do it again.

    ¡°My presence in your life is conditional, but my affection is not. I hope you¡¯ll come to believe that, once you know me better.¡±

    I expected her to leave on that line, but Lydia came around to my nightstand and sat on her knees, maybe a foot from my face as I was lying in bed.

    I sighed. ¡°Oh shit, here it comes.¡±

    ¡°How long do you think you can keep this up?¡± she asked. ¡°Pretending you don¡¯t want the power, pretending you don¡¯t want me?¡±

    I turned on my side and propped my head up to face her. ¡°Is it time for the hard sell? Am I finally gonna see some real succubus shit?¡±

    ¡°You think you¡¯re mocking me, but there¡¯s a thrill to that, isn¡¯t there? Waiting for a demon to take the choice away from you, to cut through all your excuses and give you what you need? I know what you think I am. I know the folklore better than you do, and if they had sent some random succubus here, you¡¯d be right. My sisters compete with each other to see who can best live down to the stereotype.

    ¡°Most assignments start with exactly the kind of erotic hit and run you¡¯re expecting. Ambush a lonely man who hates his wife or just lost one and overwhelm him in bed, granting every desire he¡¯s ashamed of until he¡¯s addicted to you. Promise him everything he¡¯s ever dreamed of, just long enough for him to steal something or sign something or kill someone, then throw him away. Succubus 101. But I don¡¯t do short-term assignments.

    ¡°Think it through. If I gave you what you¡¯re expecting; if I tricked you into giving permission, if I touched you in just the right way and used all the right words to drive you insane tonight, how would you feel in the morning? Waking up next to the demon who humiliated you? Even if you enjoyed it, and you would enjoy it, you would hate me, and you would never trust me again.

    ¡°And that, is the opposite of what I am trying to do. I need you to trust me, so when you¡¯re on the ground bleeding, on the edge of death, you¡¯ll trust me to come and heal you. When you¡¯re fighting a superior opponent and you run out of magic, you need to trust that I¡¯ll be there to lend you my strength. And when my Master sends you to do something that makes you hate yourself, you need to trust that I¡¯ll be there to hold you, until it¡¯s time for the next one.

    ¡°I need to prove you can trust me, so let me start tonight. I won¡¯t touch you but let me stay with you. You¡¯ve got plenty of room in this bed. I¡¯ll stay on my side and watch over you. I won¡¯t even move. Maybe you ignore me. Maybe you get closer and let me keep you warm. Or maybe your body will ask for more than your soul is ready for, and I¡¯ll have to draw the line for you.

    ¡°You need to believe I can do that. You need to see I am not like my sisters. I¡¯m not here to test your limits. I¡¯m not here to break you. I¡¯m here to keep you sane, and healthy, and working, no matter what my Master requires of us. Let me start tonight.¡±

    When I didn¡¯t answer, Lydia came around the other side and laid down with me, leaving plenty of space between us. I didn¡¯t reach for her. I didn¡¯t move closer. I never turned around to look at her, and I never said a word. I just laid there, and listened to her breathing in the dark, remembering all the nights with Judy. All the nights I reached for her, and all the nights she turned away.

    Lydia never laid a hand on me, but that was her first real victory; the first time I was too weak to say no, and it all started with that fucking sandwich.

    * * *

    I woke up beside her the next morning and stood up without looking back.

    ¡°Timothy, nothing happened, but you can¡¯t even look at me?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m an idiot for trusting you,¡± I said, still not looking back. ¡°I can usually feel when something is bad for me, even if I decide to do it anyway. I had to ignore a hundred red flags to stay with Judy, but you? No matter how much I tell myself what you are, something inside me wants to trust you; something inside me has trusted you from the moment I saw you.

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t feel like temptation, it¡¯s just¡­ trust. And it makes no sense at all. I thought it might be some kind of demon thing, but I think I would feel it if you were using magic on me. Whatever it is, every time I let my guard down, something inside me wants to trust you, embrace you, learn magic, and get to work.¡±

 Chapter 16: Bargain

    A few days later, Lydia caught me cursing and stomping and jabbing at my screens until she finally said, ¡°Timothy, talk to me. What has got you so upset?¡±

    ¡°You wouldn¡¯t understand.¡±

    ¡°How can you possibly know what I understand? Try me. There are all kinds of ways I can be of use to you. Let me prove it. Tell me your problem and let me help.¡±

    ¡°My problem is, I¡¯m fucking broke and I¡¯m pretty sure I¡¯ve lost my job. I¡¯ve got living expenses for a year tied up in this museum contract, but I¡¯ve completely blown it off. I haven¡¯t been back there since the attack. The director¡¯s left a hundred voicemails but I¡¯ve been dodging him, and now it¡¯s blowing back on Judy.

    ¡°That¡¯s the real reason I¡¯m cursing this morning. I woke up to an angry voicemail detailing what a useless lump of shit I am, and how much I¡¯m hurting her reputation. Not in so many words, but that¡¯s the gist of it. She¡¯s calling me a loser and she¡¯s right. Losing my soul to demons should be a pretty good excuse, but I can¡¯t exactly tell people about you.¡±

    ¡°Has he actually fired you?¡± Lydia asked, ¡°Or is he just threatening to?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s not a fired or not fired situation. I¡¯ve got a contract to finish the inventory and tagging system before the new term starts. I¡¯ve got a couple weeks before the deadline, but I haven¡¯t done a lick of work or even been to the office in so long; naturally, he thinks I won¡¯t finish it. He¡¯s threatening to turn it over to campus computing and sue me for breach. Worst case, I could end up owing him money.¡±

    ¡°And this man knows what happened to you? He knows you shed blood in his domain?¡±

    ¡°Sure.¡±

    ¡°And does he have normal human emotions? Could he feel some guilt about what happened to you?¡±

    I shook my head. ¡°The museum¡¯s not liable for anything that happened. I got that email before the blood dried.¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t ask about blame. I asked about guilt. You¡¯ve talked to this man, how likely is he to feel sympathy for you, or feel responsible for what happened?¡±

    I shrugged. ¡°I have no idea. And honestly, the window to take advantage of his guilt probably closed three days after the attack.¡±

    ¡°So, exaggerate, and make up a lie.¡±

    I laughed. ¡°Wow, you don¡¯t mess around when it¡¯s time to be evil.¡±

    ¡°And I never will,¡± she said. ¡°I despise the way men do evil now, hemming and hawing and making excuses to hide from themselves. Everyone pretending they¡¯re doing evil by accident. It¡¯s all so¡­ feminine. I don¡¯t ever want you to lie to yourself or hesitate when it¡¯s time to do something evil. That will be critically important going forward, so let¡¯s start with something small. Leverage whatever guilt this man may feel for the attack and make up a lie to explain your absence. I saw your performance the night I got here. This should be the easiest thing in the world for you.¡±

    ¡°Besides,¡± Lydia said. ¡°You¡¯re not lying because you want to cheat this man, you¡¯re lying because you need a second chance. Could you complete this work by the deadline if you made it your priority?¡±

    ¡°Sure, but you wouldn¡¯t see me very much. I¡¯d have to put in twelve, fourteen hours a day to catch up.¡±

    ¡°Entirely worth it,¡± Lydia said. ¡°Timothy, you need things, and I will not be the excuse for you neglecting your life. You¡¯re still a mortal man in a mortal world, and you have to play by the rules of your old life until you¡¯re ready to start a new one. Half the appliances in this home are broken, and you have no food. I don¡¯t understand the corporate kingdoms that rule this place now, but this is still America, and Americans still need money. Please go get some. I¡¯m willing to spend a few nights without you, if I can get you in the habit of honoring contracts.¡±

    I leaned on my desk and put my head in my hands. ¡°This guy is so pissed. I¡¯m gonna have to sit there and let him yell at me.¡±

    Lydia smirked. ¡°You¡¯ve got a demon in your living room, and that¡¯s what you¡¯re afraid of? The wrath of a balding bureaucrat?¡±

    ¡°How did you know he was¡­ But yeah, I get your point.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s make this a real Bargain,¡± Lydia said. ¡°You¡¯re about to make a deal with a demon. Please stand up and honor the forms.¡±

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    I was more intrigued than annoyed, so I stood up.

    ¡°Not like that. There can¡¯t be any weakness in your posture. Head up, shoulders back. Stop fidgeting and don¡¯t look at the ground. Look me in the eye and force yourself to move slowly. You don¡¯t have to scowl or look tough. Smile if you want to but keep your head up. Make it look casual, because you make deals like this every day.¡±

    I straightened my back and looked her in the eye.

    ¡°Good. Remember, you are not asking for favors. You are offering an exchange. No quavering, no hesitation. Always practice what you¡¯re going to say before you start and never deviate from your plan. The moment you show weakness, you¡¯re dead. The moment the demon thinks they can cheat you, you¡¯re dead. And the moment you get greedy, and try to go for more than you planned, you¡¯re dead.¡±

    I nodded.

    ¡°Now, tell me what you want.¡±

    ¡°I want my damn job back.¡±

    ¡°No. If you phrased it like that in a real negotiation, the demon would find this director and kidnap his children. Be specific and ask me for something that is easily within my power to give. Or you can tell me to make an offer, but don¡¯t make it a question. Never make it a question.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, you want me to get my job back and earn some money, but I need an incentive. Make me an offer.¡±

    ¡°You won¡¯t let me use any of my usual inducements, so let¡¯s try this. If you get your job back, get paid, and bring some fresh food in here, I will cook you a meal with my own two hands. Whatever you want. Ah, you like that,¡± she said. ¡°Never let them see how much you like it. Do you accept my terms?¡±

    ¡°I accept your terms.¡±

    ¡°Now repeat what you have agreed to do and give me your Word that you¡¯ll do it. That¡¯s the most important part. Everyone thinks it¡¯s a kind of magical compulsion when wizards deal with demons, but after the first few times, you won¡¯t need magic at all, because you¡¯ll have a relationship. The demons learn that they can trust you to hold up your end of a Bargain, and you will learn which ones deal with you fairly.

    ¡°You think Jacob made all those deals with brute force? He sat in that chair every day, staring down things that could kill him, protected by nothing but the power of his Word. So, say it for me and understand what it means.¡±

    ¡°I will get my job back and finish on deadline. You have my Word.¡±

    ¡°And now we have a deal.¡±

    I grabbed my phone off my desk and went straight to the museum. Twenty minutes later, I had my job back.

    * * *

    It was one of the best lessons I ever got. She changed my whole attitude in two minutes. After Judy¡¯s message, I was feeling weak and stupid. I was ready to walk in there and grovel, to admit my fuck-up and beg for mercy. I had already pictured how it would go, sitting in the director¡¯s office, getting scolded like a child.

    My tone was still apologetic, but my posture stayed strong, and thanks to Lydia¡¯s little reframe, now I was just pretending to be weak, while I actually felt in control. I sat down and looked him in the eye like I had nothing to be ashamed of, because that was the role I had decided to play.

    I told him I had been deeply shaken by the attack, traumatized by exposure to demons because of my family history, and that I had been seeing a therapist for PTSD. But I was back now, and I was ready to resume work immediately.

    I apologized, sincerely, and told him my plan to still finish ahead of schedule. Then I told him if I didn¡¯t deliver ahead of schedule, I would cut another three percent off my fee, as a show of good faith. Then I spent the rest of the night catching up, returning to Lydia at some ungodly hour of the morning.

    ¡°I can already tell you did it,¡± she said.

    ¡°It was¡­ much easier than I expected. I even negotiated an advance. Oh, and you¡¯re my therapist now. If he pushes me, I may actually have to get you on the phone. You can do that, right? Imitate some older woman and handle a video call?¡±

    ¡°Easily,¡± she said.

    I had been so obsessed with the sexual parts of her job; I had never considered the other things Lydia could do. ¡°You¡¯re pretty handy to have around. I can think of a hundred ways to use that disguise thing. Can you imitate anyone you see or hear?¡±

    ¡°Anyone female.¡±

    ¡°Seriously, you can only turn into other women?¡±

    ¡°Yes,¡± she said. ¡°I cannot imitate a male in any way.¡±

    ¡°Wait, so you couldn¡¯t grow a penis, even if I asked for one?¡±

    ¡°There are certain workarounds,¡± she swished her tail, ¡°but no, I could not.¡±

    ¡°You can¡¯t or you won¡¯t?¡± Lydia was profoundly uncomfortable with this question, and I was loving every minute of it.

    ¡°Both.¡±

    ¡°Oh, that is some fucked up sexist bullshit right there. Really disappointing. I¡¯m sorry, this is going on your performance review.¡±

    Lydia was so annoyed now; she was struggling to keep it out of her voice. ¡°If you really want to try a male, I can get one here in about ten minutes, but I should warn you, when previous generations have tried this, it did not go well.¡±

    ¡°My ancestors tried men? Which ones?¡±

    ¡°I will not divul¡ª¡± She sighed. ¡°I¡¯ll tell you about Laurence because he wouldn¡¯t mind. Laurence tried a couple different men a couple different ways, just long enough to figure out it wasn¡¯t for him, but he made some good friends, and played cards with one of them well into his dotage.¡±

    ¡°I was expecting Laurence. Who else?¡±

    ¡°I will not share what your ancestors did in the bedroom, and I will never tell anyone else about you.¡±

    ¡°Boring!¡±

    ¡°And before you make me bring an incubus in here,¡± she snapped, ¡°I would really appreciate it if you would try me first!¡±

    * * *

    But that wasn¡¯t the best reframe Lydia pulled off that day. The real magic was how she took my petty concerns about money and used them to teach me the power of doing evil on purpose, the way she shook me out of my mundane rut by teaching me how to talk to demons, and the way she turned the trivial problems of daily life into practice for bigger things. Because when every little thing is practice for a big thing, there are no little things anymore.

    She even snuck in a lesson about posture and negotiation, right before I had to use it for real.

    And the fact that she had blown through my defenses in ten seconds, by switching to a non-sexual form of temptation? I didn¡¯t notice that at all.

 Chapter 17: Groceries

    Lydia almost got me for good, a few days later. Closest I came to total surrender, completely losing my soul to her, and it started with a trip to the grocery store.

    She started nagging me after the sandwich, insisting that I get real food in the house. She said she needed to walk around in the real world anyway, and she didn¡¯t trust me to do my own shopping, so I finally gave in.

    She met me at the door in her human suit and said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry. I won¡¯t touch you. I won¡¯t touch anyone.¡± She paused. ¡°I might touch the vegetables.¡±

    I ran into trouble immediately, because all my old Judy reflexes were kicking in, and I couldn¡¯t safely use any of them with her. Do you know how hard it is to walk down the street with a beautiful woman and not hold her hand? It almost drove me insane, before we even got to the door.

    The HDI distribution center wasn¡¯t exactly a grocery store, but they had groceries, and dad¡¯s old discount card still worked. I wasn¡¯t an active corporate employee, so I couldn¡¯t just swipe whatever I wanted for free, but the discounts were still a lot better than retail.

    Intellectually, I knew how long it had been since Lydia had seen the Earth, but I hadn¡¯t really internalized how much new technology we had, or how much it would freak her out.

    It started with the energy curtain at the front door, the open-air force field that let people walk freely in and out. Before I could stop her, she was hopping back and forth in and out of the field, just to feel the sensation on her skin.

    That was the second time I almost touched her, reaching to grab her arm and pull her in before people started to stare. Then we got to the hovercarts. She immediately ducked down and started swiping her arm back and forth under it, watching the cart bob and weave as she disrupted the field. She would have crawled under it, right there in the store, if I hadn¡¯t gotten in the way.

    The trip took hours, because she insisted on sniffing every single item I tried to put in the cart. She rejected four different kinds of hamburger and lunch meat before finally allowing me to buy the most insanely expensive grass-fed beef they had in the organic aisle. I had never had enough money to even walk down the organic aisle before, and now she wouldn¡¯t let me buy food from anywhere else.

    Then she got to the produce and gave every item a full comprehensive sniff; not a polite little housewife sniff, but a deep forensic examination that made people stare.

    She sniffed some eggs and a jug of milk and said, ¡°Timothy, have they done something to the cows?¡±

    ¡°Cows? I haven¡¯t seen a cow since Texas.¡±

    She frowned. ¡°I guess the milk is drinkable, but we really need to find a farm. And I don¡¯t trust these white eggs. Get the brown ones, please. Once we have some money coming in, we may need to get our own animals.¡±

    This grocery bill was going to be astronomical, and it would have been absolutely budget busting if I hadn¡¯t negotiated an advance on the museum job. None of this food was processed, so that should have kept the cost down, but she was buying lumpy farm to market vegetables that I had never even touched before; stuff that would have required hours of frustrating preparation if I had tried to do it myself.

    It had been so long since I¡¯d tried to cook for myself, I had to buy new knives and all kinds of miscellaneous kitchen stuff. Finally, we assembled our mountain of meat and vegetables, swiped dad¡¯s legacy discount card, and rented a delivery cart to get it home. Most people just did this kind of thing online, but I couldn¡¯t trust drone drops this close to the Zone.

    We unloaded the groceries at my front door and Lydia slipped her whole body under the cart before I could stop her, lying prone on the grass as she poked the bottom. Then she jumped in it, right there on the sidewalk, bouncing up and down, before jumping out and running her hands under it again.

    Finally, she huffed at me and said, ¡°It¡¯s not magic, but it can¡¯t possibly work.¡±

    And that¡¯s when she almost got me, in the kitchen, just putting up groceries.

    * * *

    She started doing it for me, grabbing items one at a time, asking me to point to where they go. I went to my grave remembering how she looked that day, wearing jeans and a loose yellow top, exposing her belly when she stretched. Hair down to her shoulders like always but imitating some modern cut she saw a woman wearing on the street.

    She looked so normal, so sweet and human doing this ordinary human thing. Seeing her like that hit old, deep structures in my brain, triggering memories of simple domestic moments from childhood, when I still had two parents and a family that loved me. Remembering all those times with Judy, all the times I had her in Dad¡¯s kitchen, lifting her onto that counter with her wearing nothing but my t-shirt, sliding my hands up and down her body, the kind of sex you can only have when you¡¯re young, without a thought in your head.

    I got up and brushed past her to grab a bag of oranges. My sneakered foot brushed her leg, and she was right there. My hands were already headed for her hips. In about ten seconds I was gonna have her on that counter, and a few minutes later, she would own me. A few months later, I¡¯d be killing for her, and coming home every night to have her just like this, with a big smile on my face.

    To this day, I don¡¯t know how I stopped.

    My hands stopped an inch from grabbing her, and I jumped back like she was on fire. I stumbled backwards two more steps and bellowed. ¡°Get back on the wall! Change back to your natural form, and don¡¯t ever look human around me again!¡±

    My breath was coming in short, sharp gasps, almost hyperventilating with terror and desire. My voice was tight and panicked, seconds from a total breakdown.

    ¡°When you look like a demon, I can fight you. But this? When you look like this¡­¡± I hissed at her through clenched teeth. ¡°When you look like this, I want you so bad I can¡¯t take it. I thought I was stronger than this, but it¡¯s been so long, I can¡¯t¡­¡±

    I was distracted by a strange sound and a rush of air. My new knives were vibrating on the counter. The glass top of my dining table was shaking like it was about to crack, and my aura was so bright in the visible spectrum, my living room looked like dawn.

    I had never felt the magic like this, strangling me, drowning me, coming in so fast, building like a giant wave at my back.

    I hit my front door at full speed, running all out like a child running from a nightmare, desperate to find one of Nergal¡¯s footprints, and get clear of innocent people before this wave hit.

    * * *

    I ran faster than I had in years, trying to outrun a bomb building up inside my own body. The sun was almost down by the time I hit the closest footprint and felt the magic hit. It was just like the rift, trapped in the center, while the storm raged all around.

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    My aura was blazing white, throwing flames and shadows in the visible spectrum. Every muscle in my body was tense and shaking with the effort of it, trying desperately to keep this power outside of me.

    I was still so angry, I couldn¡¯t relax. I could hardly breathe. In a few minutes, my strength would fail, and the storm would have me. The only safe option was to use it, to bring the magic in and direct it to something, to limit the damage and make sure nobody got hurt.

    ¡°Fine! Fuck it!¡± I shouted aloud. ¡°Let¡¯s see what a full tank feels like!¡±

    I jerked my head up, spread my arms, and gave myself to the storm. The magic felt so good coming in, better than the rift because this was real Earth magic, answering my call, so strong and pure, I felt like I could do anything.

    I hit some kind of threshold and the power started to surge out of me uncontrolled, releasing every few seconds in a perfect circle of blazing white light. Not just visible in the gray, this was happening in the real world, hot enough to cause real damage.

    Whump. Dead yellow grass crisping to black as the light hit it.

    Whump. Old bottles, cans and trash blasted and burning in a circle at my feet.

    Whump. Old dead tree shedding limbs and starting to smoke.

    The circle was getting bigger and stronger each time. If I didn¡¯t do something fast, it would start smashing buildings.

    I still only knew one spell, so I cast levitate with five symbols and looked for the heaviest thing I could see. One of the old skyscrapers was tilted, exposing rebar with a chunk of foundation still attached. I grabbed as much as I could and poured all my power into moving it. No way I could move something that big, so I figured I could just focus everything into one spot and wear myself out.

    It was already working. The overload stopped and the concrete chunk started to glow. My aura went dark as the power concentrated there, with just a little flicker left in my eyes. It felt fantastic, like a real workout, like I was trying to lift that building with my bare hands.

    I focused my power to a pinpoint, until I was finally using more than I had coming in, feeling more control as the spell bled magic off, calming me down. Then the concrete slab cracked somewhere underground, and I heard the shriek of rusted metal as the building started to fall.

    I panicked and tried to shift focus, taking my eyes off the foundation, trying to control how this thing was gonna fall. The levitation spell was incredibly difficult to control in any direction other than up and down, so I had to push the building sideways in short bursts to keep it from falling on me.

    I was finally able to tilt it back in the opposite direction, but for a few seconds, I swear I was levitating the whole damn thing, before I finally relaxed and let it collapse into the river.

    And then I was just Tim Kovak again, standing alone in Nergal¡¯s footprint, desperately hoping nobody saw that. I looked down and realized I had stopped in the exact center of it, without even trying.

    * * *

    Lydia was back on her perch when I got home, obviously terrified, but incredibly relieved to see me. When I turned the light on, it looked like she had been crying, but that had to be fake, right?

    ¡°It¡¯s okay,¡± I said. ¡°Power is gone. Nobody got hurt.¡±

    I grabbed a bottle of tea from the fridge and slumped in my chair. ¡°I¡¯m gonna be pretty pissed if it turns out my magic is powered by sexual frustration. At least you¡¯ll still have a job.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°I¡¯m just glad it took you a couple weeks to figure out that costume change. If you¡¯d hit me with that the first week, I would be¡­¡±

    ¡°You would be what,¡± she snapped, ¡°you would be sleeping in my arms right now? Timothy, there is no prize for resisting me. Deny me for a thousand years and it won¡¯t change one word of that contract. You are suffering for no reason.

    ¡°I know you¡¯re scared of doing missions, but I promise, by the time we send you out, you will be happier, healthier, and stronger than you have ever been. It¡¯s the same story every time. Your ancestors started just like you, afraid of conflict, afraid of their power, then they realize how easy it is and come back to celebrate. The night after your first mission will be even better than our first time. I can¡¯t wait for you to see.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°I¡¯ve never seen a Kovach like you,¡± Lydia said. ¡°Completely immune to promises of wealth and power, but ready to charge the gates of Hell for a girl in blue jeans and a home-cooked meal. What happened to you? What happened to your world, to make you like this?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± I shrugged. ¡°I guess it¡¯s the way I grew up. I don¡¯t take little stuff for granted anymore. We moved to the compound in ¡®45, a month or so after money stopped working in the U.S. I remember them constantly playing the clip of the president on TV. ¡®This isn¡¯t the end of this great country; this is just a bump in the road.¡¯ And the name stuck. Thirteen years later, they still call it the Bump.

    ¡°We should have been protected when the president declared a mortgage freeze, but I think dad stopped paying on it months before the first bank failure. They were about to send the sheriff to take our house, and we missed the bus to the FEMA camp, so he called his Texas buddies, and suddenly I was in the back of this dirty old truck, sucking gas fumes and bouncing on dirt roads for hours until we were at this big ranch in the middle of nowhere.

    ¡°It was just a long camping trip at first, until we started to run out of food, and had to start living on fish, vegetable gardens, and whatever the men could shoot. We were cold, filthy, and hungry most of the time, but I was so happy.

    ¡°Suddenly I had all these adults around, and everybody wanted to talk to me. Everybody else sent their kids to a new place in the mountains when food started running out, so I was the only child left in camp. At twelve years old, I went from barely having a dad to having like twelve dads.

    ¡°They kept trying to teach me things I hated, like fishing, hunting, planting stuff, and shooting guns. I shot at deer a few times, but I never hit one. Animal insides smell so bad. That¡¯s how I knew when I got really hungry - when I didn¡¯t mind dressing game anymore, and finally started to like feral hog meat. One of the men tried to feed me a pig heart once, but I couldn¡¯t choke it down.

    ¡°Finally, Mister Braddock realized what kind of boy I was and took me to the radio room, where I was really useful for the first time, helping him rig packet networks and bootleg satellite comms to connect us with other groups.

    ¡°My own dad would still barely talk to me, but at night I could stand by the fire and be with the other dads. They would joke with me and make up nicknames for me and ask if I liked girls, just to watch me squirm.

    ¡°They tried to hide what they were planning, but I saw the email traffic weeks before they did it. They were planning a coordinated protest, a massive demonstration surrounding a dozen distro centers at once. That¡¯s what they called it: a protest, but everybody was bringing guns, and everybody knew, if they wouldn¡¯t give us food, we were gonna take it.

    ¡°But they were ready for us. Somebody tipped off the feds, I guess, because by the time our guys showed up at the campuses, everything was protected by armed drones and autoguns. I saw some of it on video, long after it was over. Not guys I knew, thank god, but enough to be sure what happened to them.

    ¡°Robots don¡¯t care if you throw your gun down. Robots don¡¯t care if you run away. Robots don¡¯t even care if you lay down with your hands behind your head. All robots care about is a friend or foe badge, and if you don¡¯t have one, you are just fuckin¡¯ dead.

    ¡°Dad and I left the day before the attack. We snuck out in the middle of the night and got picked up in this fancy flying car from HDI. They flew us to a corporate octagon in Providence, and I never saw any of them again.

    ¡°I missed it so much. I was never lonely in the compound. The Braddocks treated me like their own son. Sure, sometimes you went to bed hungry, and sometimes you had to sleep too close to the fire to stay warm, but I was important. I wasn¡¯t ¡°stupid¡± or ¡°lazy¡± or ¡°in the way¡± like I always was at home. Grown men counted on me to do my job when I was only twelve years old.

    ¡°It¡¯s funny, the time I spent there, learning to do grown up work was the only time I got to be a child.¡± I lowered my head like I was talking to myself. ¡°It didn¡¯t matter if your dad was drunk because you had twelve other dads, and it didn¡¯t matter if your mom was dead, because you had like six moms. You could walk up to any one of them and they would hug you and feed you and put a band-aid on¡­¡± My voice cracked and I sobbed silently, fighting to control myself while my shoulders shook.

    Lydia started to come down and I snapped at her, ¡°Stay away from me!¡±

    She scrambled backwards and leapt back to her perch, like I had just slapped her in the face.

    I coughed and wiped my eyes. ¡°I can¡¯t believe I¡¯m crying in front of¡­¡± I took a deep breath to steady myself. ¡°All the women lived. And the children. The wives did federal time, but they only had to serve a few years before the amnesty. I¡¯ll never be sure about the men. I¡¯m not stupid, okay? I know they¡¯re dead. Even if I can¡¯t find the records, I know they¡¯re dead. I just¡­ Sometimes I dream about them, that they ran away and hid in the mountains or something, and one day they¡¯ll just come down and be with their families again.¡±

    I looked up at Lydia. ¡°If I¡¯m any kind of man at all, it¡¯s because of those guys. Everybody knows Captain Cobalt is my hero, but really, he¡¯s just the only one I have a poster of.¡±

 Chapter 18: Steak

    I finished the inventory system in a week of sixteen-hour days and spent another week teaching museum staff how to use it.

    I completed my contract on a Friday evening, and Jeeves made a shameless KA-CHING noise as the payment hit my account, plus bonuses, minus the advance I negotiated when I came back on the job.

    Lydia was in the kitchen when I got home that night, and the whole place smelled incredible. ¡°It¡¯s been so long, I forgot how good real food smells.¡±

    ¡°Exactly the meal we agreed to, although I don¡¯t really understand why this is special to you.¡±

    ¡°First meal I had in the compound when we arrived. The guys fired up the grill and made it a party. Steak, green beans, and a baked potato. I guess this was nothing special last time you were on Earth, but I haven¡¯t had real meat since I was a kid. I¡¯ve eaten so much vat meat, it¡¯s a miracle I don¡¯t have tits.¡±

    I sat down and let her serve me but was disappointed when she went back to her perch.

    ¡°I can¡¯t sit here and eat this in front of you, and I can¡¯t stand that ridiculous demon costume. Change into something comfortable and come eat with me.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re about to break a rule you set for me, Timothy. Are you sure? We do not want a repeat of last time.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll deal with it,¡± I said. ¡°I have to deal with it, especially if we¡¯re gonna be walking around in the real world. I can¡¯t flip out every time I see you in blue jeans. Please grab a plate and split this with me. There¡¯s no way I can eat this by myself.¡±

    Lydia flashed into a new outfit, but I immediately made her change it. ¡°Oh, hell no, I cannot handle a little black dress. You gotta take it down a notch.¡±

    ¡°T-shirt and jeans?¡± she asked. ¡°Better?¡±

    ¡°Better. How do you pick outfits? Is that a shirt from the ¡®80s?¡±

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    ¡°I saw a woman wearing this at the store. Timothy, can your machine pull up pictures of how women dress now? I really need to get my hair right.¡±

    I laughed. ¡°There is nothing wrong with your hair.¡±

    ¡°I wouldn¡¯t expect you to see it, but women are very particular about these things. If I¡¯m seen in public with the wrong clip or too much hairspray it¡¯s going to draw attention, and we can¡¯t have that. Anachronisms are the most common way demons get caught.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll pull up some channels for you after dinner. I really need to teach you how to pull up TV. You could just ask Jeeves for this stuff. He can interpret commands in plain English, once I teach him your voice.¡±

    ¡°Please don¡¯t tell that thing who I am. Just tell it to ignore me.¡±

    ¡°Are you afraid of my computer?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not afraid of anything,¡± she sniffed. ¡°I just don¡¯t trust it. But thank you for the offer, I really do need to see what women are wearing. I hope hats come back soon. I really miss hats.¡±

    I had forgotten Lydia and her hat thing. ¡°Why do you like hats?¡±

    ¡°Think about it. If you were a demon, would you want God staring down at your naked head?¡±

    I cut my first bit of steak and took a bite. ¡°You really did this in my kitchen?¡±

    She nodded. ¡°Everybody thinks you need a grill, but you don¡¯t. Pan works fine. This is the most pleasure I have ever seen on your face and I¡¯m beginning to take it personally.¡±

    I smiled through a mouthful of green beans and bacon. ¡°People in my century, we don¡¯t get to eat like this anymore. When I lived in that corporate octagon? They tried to feed us roasted grasshoppers. Served them like hors d¡¯oeuvres in the lobby, with dipping sauce. Sat there untouched for a week until they finally gave up. So yeah, this is pretty special for me.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m just glad to see you enjoying something,¡± Lydia said. ¡°I was afraid you¡¯d be like Jacob. It was like pulling teeth to get that man to enjoy a reward. No matter what he accomplished, no matter how brilliantly he succeeded, he would always find something to nitpick, some hesitation or misplaced word he could hate himself for. Good to see you enjoying this.¡±

    ¡°Oh god, we got real sour cream. I forgot we got real sour cream.¡±

    ¡°You beat your deadline,¡± Lydia said, ¡°so save room for dessert.¡±

    I hadn¡¯t noticed it before, cooling on the counter. ¡°You made apple pie? That¡¯s a little on the nose, Lydia, even for you.¡±

    ¡°Wait until you try it with ice cream.¡±

    ¡°You got me real ice cream?¡±

    ¡°You got yourself real ice cream, I just pointed at it.¡±

    Lydia was on her best behavior, right until she cleared the plates. On the way to the kitchen, she leaned down and whispered. ¡°We could make this night perfect. I would be so good to you the first time.¡±

    I stood up and threw my napkin down. ¡°Couldn¡¯t resist, could you?¡±

    ¡°Are you going to yell at me?¡±

    ¡°No. I am going to thank you for dinner and call it a night. It really was a perfect meal.¡±

 Chapter 19: Brian

    I got a call from Judy a few nights later, but let it go to voicemail by reflex.

    ¡°Timmy!¡± she yelled in the message, reminding me how good it felt when a happy Judy said my name. ¡°You had me worried there, but you did it! I thought you were flaking on me, but you got the whole inventory project done a week early! Just like I said you would! I¡¯m so proud of you! My boss thanked me for the recommendation! Said you did a great job and said he hoped you were feeling better? Did you get sick and not tell me? I¡¯m gonna feel really bad if it turns out I was leaving shitty voicemails when you were sick!¡±

    Her message reminded me I didn¡¯t have to dodge her calls anymore, so I called her back.

    ¡°There you are! Thank you so much! And I guess they paid you already? What are you going to do with all that money? Will you finally move out of that god awful depressing apartment?¡±

    I smiled. ¡°Maybe. Gotta buy some groceries and get some things fixed first.¡±

    ¡°Well, I really appreciate it. Please, let us take you out to dinner.¡± And before I could ask what she meant by ¡°us,¡± a lithe male figure crossed behind her. Judy forgot to hit the mute button and said, ¡°This is my friend from high school, Timmy the Computer Guy.¡±

    ¡°Can he fix my phone?¡± the man said, only half-joking.

    ¡°He can fix anything! Come say hi! Tim, meet Brian!¡±

    The man leaned down to the camera, and I was face to face with a dirty blond surfer, straight out of a ¡®90s movie, complete with sun-bleached hair and an impossible tan.

    ¡°Hey Tim!¡± he waved. ¡°Judy said you were her best friend for like ten years! I can¡¯t believe I haven¡¯t met you yet!¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t believe it, either! How long have you two been together?¡±

    ¡°I dunno,¡± he shrugged. ¡°Three, four months? Anyway, it¡¯s great to finally meet you, we really should get together!¡±

    ¡°You bet,¡± I said tersely, as Brian crossed behind Judy and squeezed something, making her giggle, smile, and blush in a way that I had¡­ honestly never seen.

    ¡°Sorry I didn¡¯t introduce you guys before now,¡± she said. ¡°I guess I didn¡¯t want to set up a dinner where the two of us just bored him with museum stuff. But you finished your project, so now we can go do something fun. I¡¯ll call you back when we figure something out!¡±

    I nodded and smiled, just to get her off the phone.

    * * *

    They had been together months before my birthday, and she hadn¡¯t said a word. It¡¯s not like this was some great shock. I had met several of Judy¡¯s boyfriends since we had renewed our friendship, including a couple who were so much like me, we had actually played co-op games together.

    It always annoyed me to see her with a new guy but seeing her with programmers and technical guys - even the fraternity guys didn¡¯t bother me like this one did. Something about the way she acted around him, weird and shy and girly in a way she never was with me. The obvious attraction, the way she looked at him. Since when did Judy start dating guys who looked good with their shirts off?

    I closed the door behind me, flopped on the bed, and curled up in a ball, asking Jeeves to play my ¡°Wallowing¡± playlist to drown out anything Lydia might hear.

    I must have been tired, because I slept all night, alone. Sleeping was supposed to make me feel better, but instead of sad, I woke up angry. I had no right to be mad at Judy, but I was angry anyway, and getting madder, angry at myself for being angry, fueled by an old self-loathing that I thought I had grown out of.

    I should have gone for a walk to burn off energy. Instead, I pulled up all my screens and very carefully stopped myself from searching Brian¡¯s name. I might have taunted myself like that before I got magic, but now, getting angry was straight up dangerous, and it was too cold for me to wander around in the Zone.

    Lydia was looking at me with this concerned head tilt that I found infuriating. ¡°You want to tell me I¡¯m being stupid? You want to give me another demon pep talk?¡±

    ¡°I want to remind you that you¡¯re not just human anymore,¡± Lydia said, ¡°and to see you thrashing yourself over this pair of idiots is¡­ unseemly, no matter what this girl meant to you. But I¡¯ve already said too much. The mood you¡¯re in, anything I say is going to make it worse.¡±

    ¡°So, what could I do right now, if I was a full-on evil wizard? What did my ancestors do to their rivals? Could I curse his family or turn him into a frog?¡±

    ¡°Yes, and¡­ perhaps. Xavier enjoyed transmuting objects, but none of your predecessors really got into transforming people. I hear it¡¯s quite difficult.¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t tell if you¡¯re joking,¡± I admitted. ¡°I can¡¯t even tell if I¡¯m joking.¡± I stared at her for a long time and said, ¡°You¡¯re a demon,¡± as if I was just remembering.

    Lydia let her horns and tail pop out when I said that, as if I needed a visual aid.

    ¡°You¡¯re a demon,¡± I repeated. ¡°And you said you¡¯re really good at watching and hiding. Could you spy on them without being seen? Could you observe the two of them together and report back to me?¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°Yes.¡±

    I made a ¡°come on¡± gesture as if I was encouraging her to finish her sentence. ¡°But?¡± I prompted. ¡°You always say, ¡®Yes, but¡­¡± when I ask you for something stupid. Where¡¯s my dire warning?¡±

    ¡°Very well,¡± she sighed. ¡°Timothy, as¡­ as someone who cares about you, I¡¯m telling you not to do this. These omissions, these little secrets people keep; these exist for a reason. Truth can be the ultimate cruelty and lies can be the purest form of kindness. Normally I would just say no or distract you until you forgot about this. But you need to understand what I can do for you, and you need to know how this feels, to use your power to break the rules, and live with the consequences.

    ¡°If you do this, you¡¯re going to see some things most men turn away from and feel some things that your society protects you from. If you want to do this and survive, you have to learn to rise above your emotions and see people exactly as they are, see them from outside yourself, objectively, like a demon or a god. You think you¡¯re ready to do that?¡±

    I threw my hands up. "Okay! Okay, I get your point. But maybe you could just¡­"

    ¡°No,¡± she said, interrupting me. ¡°You are not confiding in me. We are not having a chat. In this moment, we are not lovers, and we are not friends. You are a mage commanding a demon. So, if you want this, look me in the eye, and command me to do something you know is wrong.¡±

    ¡°Lydia,¡± I said, in my negotiating with demons voice, ¡°go spend a day watching Judy and Brian together, making absolutely sure they cannot see you. Then come and report back to me. I want to know¡­ how they behave together. And I want to know why she loves him more than she loved me.¡±

    Lydia bowed low and vanished.

    ¡°Oh, fuck me, what have I done,¡± I said immediately. ¡°Lydia, come back! I changed my mind! Cancel that command and come back! Lydia?¡±

    * * *

    Lydia was gone for 24 hours, and I spent most of that time in bed, trying to sleep through the whole day, to keep myself from imagining all the things she would say when she got back. I was a sweaty, puffy mess by the time she appeared again, in exactly the same spot I dispatched her from.

    She didn¡¯t say hello, just ¡°Are you ready for my report?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t need your damn report,¡± I said. ¡°You¡¯ve already made your point. I did the one thing you¡¯re never supposed to do with a supernatural creature; I made a sloppy Wish. It was impulsive, it was stupid, and I¡¯ve had 24 hours to reflect on my stupidity. Let¡¯s just drop it.¡±

    ¡°We have a Bargain in progress, and you commanded me to give you a report. We¡¯re not done until I do that.¡±

    ¡°Is this a demon thing, or a Lydia teaching me a lesson thing? Because if you¡¯re just here to rub my nose in a mistake, you can fuck right off.¡±

    ¡°If you had given this assignment to any other demon, they would not let you rest until they gave their report. Demons have to honor their Word and complete Bargains, or their Masters will punish them. I will even honor an active Bargain after your death. Are you ready for my report?¡±

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    I was obviously not gonna win this one, so I said, ¡°Report.¡±

    ¡°I thought it might be difficult to honor your request in full, because there¡¯s only so much I could learn by observation. But Judith went into great detail with a friend on the phone, anticipating the rendezvous she had scheduled with Brian that night.

    ¡°Judith is very proud of the work she¡¯s done to improve her face and body, and Brian is her reward. She¡¯s always thought of herself as plain, so she¡¯s very proud to be fit now, and just a bit glamorous. She¡¯s always been charming, but she believes Brian is the first man she¡¯s ever seduced with her looks. And Brian is the first man she¡¯s ever chosen for his body.

    ¡°She has never been with a man who was this conventionally attractive before. Brian is a sports model and semi-professional athlete who does some kind of skating? The sport requires some technology I don¡¯t understand, but apparently Brian looks so good doing it, he¡¯s able to earn a decent amount of money doing what he loves.

    ¡°He¡¯s a very happy, very simple man, self-conscious about his lack of education, but otherwise quite healthy and carefree. His capacity for pure, uncomplicated joy is a big part of why Judith loves him, although she brags to her friend that it¡¯s mainly a physical thing. She¡¯s very proud of her ability to seduce a man like this with her new body, but she worries that she¡¯s just using him, with no pretense of a deeper connection.

    ¡°She feels a bit guilty about that, to be overwhelmed with passion for a man she doesn¡¯t respect. She wonders if the sex is better because she doesn¡¯t respect him, or because when she¡¯s with him, she doesn¡¯t have to respect herself.¡±

    ¡°God damn you, Lydia,¡± I said softly, as she continued.

    ¡°They went to a lovely dinner and an art gallery exhibit last night, which was actually a pretense for Judith to impress the gallery owner and set herself up for a job. Then they returned to Judy¡¯s house and spent the night together.

    ¡°Brian lives in a pod provided by his corporate sponsor, but he has, for all intents and purposes, moved into Judy¡¯s house. I don¡¯t think you¡¯ve been there. It¡¯s small, but very nice, by modern standards, and most of the furniture still smells like you.

    ¡°It¡¯s been a while since I watched normal humans make love. I forgot how sweet it is, to see people trying to love each other, when they don¡¯t completely trust each other yet. Judy talks about him like he¡¯s some kind of incubus, but Brian is a very kind and gentle lover, to the point where it annoyed her. Judy had to constantly exhort him to go harder, until he finally complied.

    ¡°In summary, Judith had a perfect day with her lover, and she didn¡¯t think of you at all. That report should answer all the questions you asked. Do you consider our Bargain concluded?¡±

    ¡°Our Bargain is concluded,¡± I said. ¡°Now get the fuck out of my bedroom.¡±

    Lydia vanished in a flash of golden light.

    * * *

    Morning light played across my bed, but I wasn¡¯t in it. I was huddled naked in the corner of my room, rocking back and forth with my knees in my chest. The room was filled with music - sad, evil music, recorded by some Scottish band from the ¡®90s that my mother liked, filled with songs about gullible idiots and lost love. When I first explained it to Judy, I called it ¡°Music to Slit Your Wrists By,¡± but that joke didn¡¯t seem quite so funny today.

    I had closed the door and commanded her to stay on her perch, but Lydia started knocking when the sun went down and simply would not stop, knocking every few seconds for an hour until I finally let her in.

    ¡°Are you here to gloat?¡± I asked. ¡°Maybe twist the knife a little more? Provide a few anatomical details you skipped the first time?¡±

    She handed me a liter of water. ¡°I¡¯m here to give you this, and watch you drink it.¡±

    I took the water and mumbled, ¡°Thank you,¡± before I drained it. ¡°There, I drank the water. Now fuck off.¡±

    ¡°You think you¡¯re the first Kovach to shut down on me?¡± she asked. ¡°They all do it eventually, and I say the same thing, every time. Whatever you¡¯re afraid of right now, whatever¡¯s hurting you; hiding will always make it worse. Always. I know you¡¯re enjoying your misery, but I can only indulge this for one more night. If you¡¯re still like this in the morning, I¡¯ll have to do something you won¡¯t like.¡±

    ¡°There she is,¡± I said. ¡°There¡¯s the demon I¡¯ve been waiting for. Can we finally stop pretending you¡¯re my fairy godmother and get down to the threats?¡±

    Lydia sighed. ¡°Timothy, I was trying so hard not to scare you, but I can see now that I¡¯ve been too gentle. I was so happy to have a new heir. You were so brilliant the night we met, so controlled and precise with your questions, I thought you might be like Stefan, that I wouldn¡¯t need to seduce you, or threaten you at all. We could just make an agreement, where you serve my Master and I serve you. But you won¡¯t let me do this the easy way, so now I have to scare you.¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s a demon in my bedroom. You think I¡¯m not scared?¡±

    ¡°I know you¡¯re not scared, but you should be.¡± Lydia said.

    ¡°Scared of you?¡±

    ¡°You should never be afraid of me, but you need to fear my Master, and right now you don¡¯t. At first, it was because you didn¡¯t believe this was real. In the culture you¡¯ve described to me, people spend so much time in fantasy, they start treating life like a game. But I don¡¯t think that¡¯s the problem anymore. You believe what¡¯s happening, and you understand what I am, but you¡¯re not afraid, because you think you have nothing to lose.¡±

    ¡°What do I have, Lydia? What can you take from me that I haven¡¯t already thrown away? Five years ago, I had a good job, friends, and a woman who loved me. Judy would have married me, if I hadn¡¯t fucked it up. I would have kids by now, if I hadn¡¯t fucked it up.

    ¡°And I¡¯m supposed to replace all that with what? Pie in the sky promises about magic power? Spending every night with a woman who was ¡®assigned¡¯ to me? Busting my ass so I can be a murdering piece of shit like my grandpa? Fuck that and fuck you. I¡¯d rather die.¡±

    ¡°You won¡¯t die,¡± Lydia said, ¡°but you¡¯ll want to. My Master and I can make you very happy, or we can make you very unhappy. I know you¡¯ve had your share of suffering, and you think you¡¯re suffering now, but these things you¡¯re feeling, this is not pain. This is just jealousy, the melancholy of a man who¡¯s regretting his choices. I¡¯ve seen it for generations, and I know it will pass.

    ¡°And the alternative¡­ Timothy, the alternative is not merely death. There are levels of pain, depths of despair you can¡¯t even imagine right now. There are so many kinds of suffering between life and death, and my Master will take you through all of them, until he finds the one that breaks you.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re gonna cut me? Put me on the rack? You think I¡¯m gonna be your happy little attack dog after you torture me?¡±

    ¡°He won¡¯t torture your body; he will extract your soul and leave your body right here. But once a soul is in Hell, it feels just like a body. My Master¡¯s Inquisitor can take you apart and put you back together, over and over again.¡±

    ¡°I guess I should be afraid of that, but I just don¡¯t care. You can make me scream and cry and beg, I guess, but that¡¯s not failure to me. I may be a loser, but I¡¯m not a killer, so if I die resisting demons, I¡¯ll finally belong in Heaven. You can torture my soul for a while, but eventually my body will die, and I¡¯ll wake up in Heaven with Mom.¡±

    ¡°Oh, Timothy, no. You won¡¯t go to Heaven if you let us kill you. Suicide by demon is still suicide. You won¡¯t wake up surrounded by people you love, you¡¯ll wake up in the Wood where the suicides go, in the darkest, loneliest corner of Hell. Have you ever had a nightmare where you woke up, but you couldn¡¯t move? Imagine that for eternity, cold and helpless and imprisoned forever. The trees don¡¯t have eyes, so every soul in the Wood thinks they¡¯re alone.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°You need to understand what happens if I fail. I have a limited amount of time to get you trained and working. Even less than I usually do, since Jim was taken early. If I can¡¯t make you honor this contract, my Master will bring in Sylvia, and there are no choices after that.

    ¡°All the horror stories are true, Timothy. Every tale you ever heard about a succubus, they¡¯re all true. I would never hurt you, but Sylvia uses everything. Sylvia is twice my age and has developed powers that are well beyond me. She has mastered compulsion magic to a terrifying degree, and once you violate your contract, all your protection is gone.

    ¡°She will command, and you will obey. She will tell you what to do, and she will tell you how to feel. When you please her, you will feel joy that will drive you to your knees, and when you fail her, you will feel absolute despair. She will turn her body into a drug you need, and you will debase yourself until you can¡¯t even look in a mirror anymore.

    ¡°You think you can resist a twelve-hundred-year-old succubus? You can¡¯t even resist a spoiled college girl. Judith is controlling your emotions right now, and she didn¡¯t even need magic.

    ¡°You think you can escape us by making us kill you? I assure you, you will not be allowed to die. You will never be allowed to die. I can give you one more night with your melancholy, and then I have to call Sylvia, to show you what you get if you reject me.¡±

    * * *

    I stayed in my room listening to music for another hour after Lydia left, trying to pretend she hadn¡¯t just scared the shit out of me.

    Then I put on some reasonably clean clothes and padded out to the kitchen in bare feet. I grabbed some eggs and started cracking them on the side of the pan as I turned the heat on, while Lydia watched from her perch.

    Finally, she said, ¡°Timothy, what are you doing?¡±

    ¡°We don¡¯t have any junk food in the house, so I¡¯m cooking eggs.¡±

    ¡°No,¡± she said. ¡°You¡¯re burning eggs because you forgot to put butter in the pan.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s fine,¡± I said. ¡°I can cook my own damn eggs.¡±

    ¡°No, you can¡¯t. You¡¯re mixing in a chunk of the shell that¡¯s going to ruin them, even if you pretend they¡¯re not burnt! I can¡¯t watch this anymore. I¡¯ll make you some eggs. Just come sit down.¡±

    ¡°I can make my own damn eggs!¡± I repeated, enunciating each word.

    ¡°No, you can¡¯t!¡± Lydia said, not quite yelling. ¡°In this frame of mind, you can¡¯t. You won¡¯t listen to me, and you won¡¯t let me in the kitchen with you, so you have to come sit down!¡±

    Defeated, I turned the heat off and sat down behind my desk.

    Lydia hopped down and surveyed the damage. She dumped out my ruined eggs and started scrubbing the pan.

    Then she turned around and asked, ¡°Do you have a whisk?¡±

    ¡°A what?¡±

    ¡°A whisk. A wire brush used for cake batter and scrambled eggs! Do you have a whisk?¡±

    ¡°I dunno. Maybe. Check the cabinet over the oven.¡±

    The cabinet was too high for her to reach, so Lydia had to levitate. She rummaged in an old box, pulled out a wire brush, and waved it at me. ¡°Why would you¡­? Nevermind. Just¡­ nevermind.¡±

    She washed the whisk in the sink and started scrambling eggs in one of Mom¡¯s old bowls. She added ham, cheese and a tiny bit of milk to them and created something beautiful. Then she brought me the plate and returned to her perch.

    I ate the eggs like I resented them, and they were slowly winning me over.

    ¡°Thank you,¡± I mumbled. ¡°That was good.¡±

    Lydia nodded silently.

    I took my plate to the sink, carefully washed everything she had used to make dinner, and returned to my chair. I leaned back and stared at her for a long time, then I said, ¡°If I asked you to kill them, would you do it?¡±

    And Lydia said, ¡°Of course.¡± No inflection, no hesitation. Just, ¡°Of course.¡±

    And suddenly, I remembered that I was looking at a demon, a demon who would do anything I said. I couldn¡¯t have these little pity parties anymore, because if I got careless and blurted out the wrong command in a fit of depression, somebody could die.

    Like it or not, I was a wizard now, and that power came with responsibilities. I had a duty to protect people, and a responsibility to keep this demon on a leash.

 Chapter 20: Autograph

    I started a video call and woke Judy up. She was obviously in bed with Brian, wrapped in a more expensive version of her old nightgown. ¡°Hello? Timothy?¡± She was already pissed.

    ¡°Judy, I¡¯m sorry to bother you, but I really need to see you. Tonight.¡±

    ¡°Timmy, it¡¯s eleven o¡¯clock. People with jobs are in bed by eleven o¡¯clock.¡±

    ¡°I know, and I¡¯m sorry, but things in my life are¡­ speeding up, in a lot of ways, and I don¡¯t want to wait to do this. Please, it¡¯ll just take a few minutes.¡±

    Judy said, ¡°Whatever this is, it can wait until morning,¡± and hung up on me.

    This went against every instinct I ever had, but what had started as a silly emotional outburst now felt like life and death. I summoned a cab and went straight to her house.

    * * *

    Her doorbell was off, so I pounded on the door, just like an idiot in a movie. I had to stand there and bang on it for several minutes before somebody came to the door. I¡¯m just glad it was Judy, because I don¡¯t know how I would have dealt with Brian.

    She was in a full robe, mad as hell, clearly prepared for combat on the lawn. I saw Brian¡¯s shadow in the living room, but I guess he had been told to stay back.

    ¡°I expected better from you,¡± Judy said. ¡°Even at your worst, you were never this pathetic. But you¡¯re here now, and I¡¯m awake, so just say what you came to say and go.¡±

    ¡°I have to break up with you,¡± I said. ¡°I know you broke up with me a long time ago, but I never really broke up with you.¡±

    Judy¡¯s face sank into a profound mix of pity and disgust. ¡°Timmy, we¡¯re done. We¡¯ve been done for years. And you¡¯ve been cool with it, for years. What the hell is wrong with you? Are you drunk? Did somebody slip you drugs? Why are you having a tantrum in the middle of the night?¡±

    I took a breath and tried to keep myself calm. The last thing I needed was a surge right now. ¡°I broke up with you in real life, but I never broke up with you¡­ in my heart.¡±

    Judy laughed. ¡°In your heart? So, what are you saying? You¡¯re telling me, all this time, you¡¯ve just been pretending to be my friend, so you can get back in my pants?¡±

    I shook my head. ¡°No, it¡¯s not like that. I never expected to have you back, but I can¡¯t get away from you, either. I feel like you¡¯ve been keeping me at just the right distance, like a sidekick or a pet, and every time I pull away, you do something to pull me back. I can¡¯t go on like this. My life is like a game right now, and I¡¯m losing. If I have to play this thing out, I have to be careful where my pieces are. I have to take you off the board. I¡¯ve spent years trying to get over this like a grownup, but I can¡¯t. I can¡¯t unravel this knot, so I have to cut it. Here. Now. Once and for all.¡±

    Judy put her hand on her hip, turned away for a second, and snorted at me again. Then she threw her hands up and said, ¡°Fine! Breakup accepted! Can I go back to bed now?¡±

    ¡°Not yet. You never actually told me why you were leaving, the night you left. You said I should know exactly why, and I kinda do, but if I really want this to stick, I need you to say it to my face. What did I do to drive you away?¡±

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    ¡°Jesus,¡± Judy said. ¡°You won¡¯t give me an inch, will you? You won¡¯t let me spare your feelings. Is this how you want it, Tim? You¡¯re really gonna make me stand out here and give you my laundry list? I already said this a thousand times.

    ¡°Everybody has a superhero phase, and everybody grows out of it. I stuck around for years waiting for you to grow out of it, until I just couldn¡¯t take it anymore. You want to know what finally made up my mind? What finally made me realize I couldn¡¯t fix you? It was that fucking autograph.¡±

    I already knew her laundry list of my faults, but I had never heard this detail before. ¡°What autograph?¡±

    ¡°The autograph of that asshole from Bluestar 3, the strong guy with caveman eyebrows.¡±

    ¡°Sonny Mao? You left me over an autograph from Sonny Mao?¡±

    Judy put her hands on her head. ¡°Oh my god, it was so much more than that. That was just the straw that broke my back. You took half a day off work and took an air cab three-hundred miles so you could stand in line for an hour and buy an autograph from that fucking prick.¡±

    ¡°Wait!¡± I shouted. ¡°Do you remember what he did the day before that convention? He pulled a single dad out of a burning car and got his kids to the hospital. So yeah, you¡¯re damn right I wanted his autograph. He was a hero!¡±

    ¡°And do you remember how much you paid for it?¡±

    ¡°What? No.¡±

    ¡°Two hundred and fifty dollars.¡±

    I shook my head. ¡°No way. No way it cost that much.¡±

    ¡°Oh, I assure you it did. You put it on our joint account.¡±

    Oops. I probably would have apologized for that one.

    ¡°We were supposed to be saving for a house,¡± Judy continued, ¡°and you were blowing money on $250 autographs and $300 cab rides.¡±

    ¡°Why didn¡¯t you say something?¡±

    ¡°Because you were so happy! God, you were so happy! And that¡¯s what I¡¯m talking about. You worship these people. There was never a hero so base, so disgusting, or so corrupt, that you wouldn¡¯t lick their boots. You think Sonny Mao was a hero? Was he a hero to the family he hit while he was drunk driving his Porsche? Was he a hero to the women he raped?¡±

    ¡°Those charges were dropped!¡±

    ¡°Yeah? So why did his sponsor pay $3.5 million to settle with eight women out of court?¡±

    I couldn¡¯t answer.

    ¡°It was all connected, Timmy. You never grew up, because you never stopped waiting for Captain Cobalt to swoop out of the sky and save you from your life.

    ¡°I remember that documentary you made me watch. I never saw you cry over anything when we were together, but you cried like a baby when they showed his funeral. You cried more for that evil son of a bitch than you did for your own father! Oh no, the world has lost a super-powered CIA hitman! Whatever will we do!

    ¡°How many times do I have to say this before you get it, Timmy? Captain Cobalt is dead! No one is coming to save us! Where was our superhero when we were attacked at the museum? Where was my hero when I was running for my life?

    ¡°These super people hate us! We¡¯re nothing to them! They don¡¯t save people because they care, they save us because it gets them on TV! So, they can sell action figures to manboy shut-ins for $100 a pop! I can¡¯t believe you¡¯re making me say all this out loud, shouting at you like a crazy person because you couldn¡¯t interrupt your busy day of surfing porn and sniffing benches at the mage tower!¡±

    She almost got me with that one. I had to squeeze my eyes shut and do my mantra: no anger, no magic. No anger, no magic. Just stand there and take it. Just. Take it.

    ¡°Thank you,¡± I said. ¡°Thank you for giving me what I asked for. I know this doesn¡¯t make sense right now, but I came here to solve a problem. I have to turn myself into something stronger than I ever imagined, and I gotta do it fucking fast. I came here tonight because I can¡¯t become what I need to be, if I still see myself as the loser you think I am.¡±

    I took one step toward her and had to stop myself. ¡°Judy, you were my first love. Hell, you taught me what the word means. You took my shitty childhood and washed it all away, allowing me to feel real happiness for the first time. I¡¯ll always be grateful for that. But sometime after high school, you turned into a serious bitch, and I just can¡¯t handle your bullshit anymore.¡± I said, ¡°You guys have a good night,¡± turned on my heel, and walked away.

    It wasn¡¯t like in the movies, okay? She didn¡¯t just go speechless and watch me do a hero walk into the streetlights. She was screaming and spitting and I¡¯m sure she had some awesome comebacks. But for the first time in years, I just didn¡¯t care.

 Chapter 21: Angel Training

    I was still a bit mopey the next morning when one of my news alerts popped up with video of Daniel Carter, the Bluestar 7 cop who had talked to me and Judy at the museum. This was video from one of his fights, recently released by VBC.

    I played the video and immediately converted it to a full hologram, so the two figures were standing in my living room. One little guy, five foot eight, versus six hundred pounds of charging werewolf. The full-scale figure of the monster was so tall, its head poked out the top of my ceiling, leaving only its furry chest and legs visible as I isolated one move from the fight.

    The creature had caught Daniel by surprise, roaring out of this abandoned house, forcing him to dodge out of the way - and that dodge was one of the most impressive things I had ever seen.

    Carter had pivoted, thrown his arms up, sidestepped the werewolf, and tripped it somehow, guiding it down and away from him like he was using its own mass to push off. It looked so gentle, but the human was unharmed, and the beast went down, allowing Daniel to pounce and throw some silver handcuffs on it while it was trying to stand.

    I played the scene over and over, frame by frame, until I finally told Jeeves to bring it into my training environment and adjust Daniel¡¯s figure to match my height and weight. I was taller than him, and a lot wider, but the program created a red wireframe matching my body that turned green as I got myself in position and matched its posture.

    I went through it frame by frame again, adjusting my body until the figure turned green before advancing to the next one. It took me a good hour to run the whole sequence and copy his movements, forcing my body to bend and stretch in ways that it never had before.

    I ran through it frame by frame a dozen times before finally playing it at twenty percent speed. It was so hard to keep my body in position I had to reduce to five percent before I finally got it close enough.

    Then I grabbed a bottle of water and sat down to drink it, amused by the quizzical, slightly alarmed look Lydia was giving me.

    ¡°I can¡¯t believe that¡¯s just judo,¡± I said. ¡°Have you ever seen anything like this?¡±

    ¡°This is angel training,¡± Lydia said. ¡°One of the first routines they taught warriors at Monte Cassino. It¡¯s a good first lesson, teaching students to control their fear of larger creatures. Instead of panicking and freezing up, they¡¯re taught to relax and move. Your friend is wearing a cross in a world where that makes him a target, so he probably trained with some holy order. These techniques originated with an angel, maybe even Gabriel himself.¡±

    ¡°Wait, you¡¯re telling me Daniel Carter studied at a monastery and learned martial arts from angels? That is the most badass thing I ever heard.¡±

    Lydia managed to roll her eyes without doing it.

    I repeated the move until I wore myself out, straining my body in reckless, irresponsible ways, so I was in quite a bit of pain by the time we went to bed. But by the time I stopped, I was running the replay at forty percent.

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    * * *

    I hit it again the next morning and made it to fifty percent. Then I considered Lydia for a bit too long and said, ¡°How strong are you?¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°No. Timothy, no.¡±

    ¡°No, seriously. How strong are you? Stronger than human, right?¡±

    ¡°Most of them.¡±

    I turned off the hologram and moved furniture out of the way, creating a bigger open space in my living room. ¡°Come down here for a minute.¡±

    ¡°Timothy, this is foolish, and it will not go the way you expect. Please don¡¯t ask me to do this. I¡¯m here to build your confidence, not tear it down.¡±

    ¡°Hey! I might surprise you! And I¡¯m not going to get my ego hurt over a little training exercise. Come on.¡±

    Lydia flashed into her natural form and reluctantly took a position on the opposite side of the room.

    ¡°Okay,¡± I said. ¡°Come at me.¡± But she hesitated. ¡°Come on! You want to touch me so bad, touch me right here,¡± I pointed to the center of my chest. ¡°Hit me here. Not hard, just enough to knock me down. Show me how fast you can move.¡±

    That turned out to be pretty fucking fast. A blur of black silk and I sailed across the room, landing hard against the wall behind me. I slowly hauled myself up and said, ¡°Okay. Point made. I¡¯ll be right back.¡±

    I came back with a load of blankets and pillows, building a little nest on the far wall so I could have a soft place to land.

    ¡°Okay, hit me again.¡±

    ¡°Timothy, please stop this. You were in pain when you came to bed last night. Now you¡¯re asking me to inflict pain on you, and you know how I feel about that.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re not hurting me or abusing me. You¡¯re training me. Directly. Personally. Just like you say you want. Come on.¡±

    She sighed and launched me across the room again. She was only using one finger, creating a tiny sore spot in the center of my chest. I still couldn¡¯t follow her movements. ¡°You¡¯re not teleporting, are you? Shortcutting through astral space?¡±

    ¡°I am not. Timothy, please, you are not going to learn anything this way. This is not a matter of skill or training or repetition. You are up against the hard limits of human reflexes. My form was made to do this in ways yours was not.¡±

    ¡°Actually, I think I am learning something. Hit me again.¡±

    This time I watched her very carefully before my trip across the room. She wasn¡¯t slipping out of real space, but there was no way she was using her full weight. She probably had eighty percent of her mass phased out to move that fast.

    I made her do it over and over until she refused again. ¡°Timothy, I¡¯m hurting you. Please stop.¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t stop!¡± I shouted, suddenly angry. ¡°Of course, if I go hand to hand with a demon I¡¯m going to lose! But I need to see exactly how and why I lose. I have to feel it, to understand what I¡¯m up against. Lydia, my powers are based on confidence, but I¡¯m not a fighter. I have to be able to take a hit and keep a spell going, no matter how hard I fall. Please hit me again.¡±

    Lydia started to charge me again, but this time I started casting before she moved. I had finally figured out her tell. She was attacking me in her natural form, and she dropped her tail for counterbalance right before she moved. This time, I cast levitation as soon as I saw it. Not on me, but on her. She was already at a fraction of her weight, so the spell was effortless. I lifted her feet off the floor, grabbed her arm and threw her onto the pillows, pivoting just like Daniel did.

    ¡°See, that¡¯s what I was doing wrong,¡± I said. ¡°I was trying to fight fair.¡±

    Lydia seemed shocked, then genuinely angry. ¡°You stood there and let me knock you down for two hours, just so I wouldn¡¯t see that coming.¡±

    ¡°Nah,¡± I grinned, ¡°that was just a bonus. Lydia, I¡¯m doing Judo 101 over here. I¡¯m learning how to fall. I¡¯d have to check my cameras to be sure, but I think those last three were perfect rolls back to standing.¡± I made my way past her, rubbing my chest. ¡°You telegraph the shit out of those lunges, by the way. You should probably work on that, in case you ever square off with anybody who actually knows how to fight.¡±

 Chapter 22: Death on Mars

    I woke up to a totally unexpected message from Judy.

    ¡°Brian says I should apologize to you in person,¡± her image said, ¡°but I¡¯m just gonna record it. I was so angry after you left, I was shouting about what you said, then he made me tell him what I said, and I thought he was gonna take my side, but he didn¡¯t. He said it sounded like you were trying to deal with your shit like a grownup and I sounded like a crazy bitch.

    ¡°I mean, he would never actually call me that, but that¡¯s basically what he said. So, I¡¯m sorry if I sounded like a crazy bitch. I¡¯m not sorry about the stuff I said about Captain Cobalt. I still think he was a murdering piece of shit, but I understand why you needed to believe in him. If I grew up like you did, I would need a hero, too.

    ¡°Brian has a play opening this weekend and I¡¯d like you to come. The whole thing is being sponsored by this insane rich woman, so we¡¯ll have food and an open bar, and we can all hang out after the show. Brian wants to meet you, and I¡­ I need to make sure my best friend doesn¡¯t hate me.¡±

    The screen vanished and left me face to face with Lydia, staring at me from her usual spot across the room. ¡°Sounds like you¡¯re not the only one trying to grow up this week,¡± she said softly. ¡°Are you going to accept her invitation?¡±

    I glanced up and away again, ashamed of what was going through my head. ¡°I have an idea, but it¡¯s really childish. It¡¯s also kind of petty, and maybe a little mean. But this, it¡¯s a real apology, but this is what she does, whenever I pull away from her.

    ¡°I know exactly what¡¯s gonna happen at this party. She¡¯s gonna be totally cool and super nice to me, then she¡¯s gonna strut around with her new boyfriend and ever so gently put me back in my place. Taking pity on poor, lonely Tim, who would have no friends at all, if it wasn¡¯t for her. But I¡¯m not poor, lonely Tim anymore. I could show up at this party with a beautiful witch on my arm, if I really wanted to.¡±

    ¡°So why aren¡¯t you talking to her? Surely, she would go to this event with you, after the connection you made.¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t bring¡­ that witch¡­ into this. I humiliated myself in front of that woman. She gave me the best night of my life, and I just¡­ made a big speech and walked away. And even if I did have the balls to call her, she¡¯d spot you in ten minutes. She might even smell you on me.

    ¡°No, if I want to pull this off, I have to use you. I¡¯m not asking you to hurt anybody, we¡¯re just gonna make up a little story. Nothing elaborate, just enough to drive Judy crazy, and challenge what she thinks of me. Using you for this, that¡¯s not evil, right? If nobody gets hurt? It¡¯s just like playing a prank.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s a bit of a risk, but I think it¡¯s worth it,¡± Lydia said. ¡°I need you to see what I can do for you, and I like to see you indulging yourself.¡±

    ¡°See? When you say it like that, it sounds evil, but the look on her face¡­ I¡¯m gonna do it anyway.¡±

    * * *

    Judy answered instantly when I called her back. ¡°Did you get my message? Are you still mad at me?¡±

    I had to smile. ¡°Of course, I¡¯m not mad. We¡¯ve been friends too long to walk away after one stupid fight. And I really am sorry about how I did it. My timing sucked. I would love to go to Brian¡¯s play, but could I bring somebody with me? Could you get two tickets?¡±

    The look on her face was everything I was hoping for. Dumb shock and a surge of jealousy, quickly melting into her big fake smile. She flickered through the facial expressions so fast, I¡¯m probably the only one who could have tracked them.

    ¡°Oh my god, of course!¡± she said, in her fake excited corporate voice. ¡°Who is it?¡±

    ¡°Her name is Lydia, and I¡¯ve only known her for a little while, but she¡¯s new in town and this would be a good chance for her to meet people.¡±

    ¡°I am so excited for you!¡± Judy squealed. ¡°You really pissed me off the other day, but maybe yelling at me is good for you! I¡¯m willing to have a few fights if it gets you back in the world!¡±

    This was unusually generous and self-aware for Judy. I felt guilty for a moment, and almost called the whole thing off. Then I saw a shirtless Brian cross the room behind her and matched her big fake voice with my own. ¡°Great! See you on Friday. We¡¯ll be looking forward to it.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°We have to do this anyway,¡± I said, still rationalizing to a demon. ¡°You¡¯re gonna need a cover story if we¡¯re walking around in public. Even if we¡¯re just in the grocery store, I might have to explain you to somebody.¡±

    ¡°And who do you want me to be?¡±

    The way she said it sent an unexpected tingle down my spine, like she really would do anything for me. I looked in her eyes and felt it, desire and a surge of power - like I owned her; like she was a doll inviting me to dress her up.

    She saw it all on my face and knew she had me exactly where she wanted me. What the fuck was I thinking, planning a prank with a loaded gun? I knew I was falling for some kind of temptation here, but the thought of walking in there with Lydia, of turning the tables on Judy¡¯s latest boyfriend trap. I could not resist.

    ¡°Your cover story, you¡¯re not anybody impressive yet, but you¡¯re going to be. And we have to keep the job story loose, so it doesn¡¯t look suspicious if you¡¯re with me too much, or at the wrong time of day.

    ¡°The job I have in mind for you is¡­ a shameless status play, but it will drive Judy insane; even worse because she¡¯ll have to conceal it. It¡¯s really important that you never mention the name of the university, just the name of this program that nobody¡¯s ever heard of.

    ¡°We need to make sure she doesn¡¯t know the name of the university until she looks it up. I¡¯ve got an idea that would explain your knowledge of history, and the little references you like to drop, and I think you need to be a witch, in case anyone catches you doing magic.¡±

    ¡°And what would you like me to wear?¡± Lydia asked, taunting me.

    ¡°I am not gonna tell you what to wear! You are not trying to turn anybody on, especially not me! You¡¯ve got to blend in. You need to look like a perfectly ordinary graduate student.¡±

    ¡°I need pictures.¡±

    ¡°Of course,¡± I nodded. ¡°Jeeves, bring up clothing ads for women, like a typical graduate student would wear at BU.¡±

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    A screen popped up with a dozen women in different outfits.

    ¡°Is this all you have?¡± Lydia asked.

    ¡°No, just¡­ Lydia you have got to learn to use this stuff. Here¡­¡± I angled the screen projector and moved it closer to her. ¡°Just make this hand motion to scroll to the next page or this one to go back to the previous one. Or just say ¡®Next¡¯ or ¡®Back.¡¯¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t want to talk to it, and I don¡¯t want it to look at me!¡± Lydia said, with a strange note of panic in her voice.

    ¡°Lydia, there is nothing to be afraid of. This camera doesn¡¯t even register you as a whole body. You¡¯re just a hand motion and a voice to it. Interacting with machines is a basic survival skill for the 21st century. If I can learn magic, you can learn this.¡±

    Lydia peered at the first page of outfits and whispered, ¡°Next¡± in a timid voice. Then she looked through the next page and tried the hand motion to scroll it. She still looked deeply uncomfortable but seemed to be getting the hang of it. She finally found a page full of stuff she liked and started changing her appearance to match the photos, copying different outfits while I watched.

    ¡°Oh lord no,¡± I said. ¡°I can¡¯t watch you do this. I¡¯m gonna lose my shit and have to run for the footprints again.¡±

    ¡°Just changing costumes is bothering you?¡± I seemed to have taken her by surprise. ¡°Timothy, there is nothing provocative about these clothes. Do you get this excited just looking at women on the street?¡±

    ¡°No!¡± I shouted, turning red. ¡°The ordinary clothes only look hot because I know what¡¯s underneath. They look perfectly normal, but I know there¡¯s a demon under there! I¡¯m the only one who knows that, and I know that when we get back home¡­ Anyway, just pick out whatever you want, I¡¯ll be in the other room.¡±

    Lydia decided on her outfit but refused to show me her final choice in advance. Then we picked out one for me. Lydia kept trying to put me in weird old-fashioned stuff that made me look like a vampire from an ¡®80s movie.

    I held my ground until we settled on a pullover sweater in earth tones, nicer than anything I would have ever bought on my own. We both felt like we could get away with jeans, but Lydia refused to let me wear my white sneakers.

    She picked out a pair of leather shoes for a price that would have bought me five pairs of perfectly good sneakers at the HDI distro. I finally let her win that fight, while secretly planning to return them and get my money back, as soon as this stupid play was over.

    When Friday night arrived, I showered and changed into my stiff new clothes. Lydia stepped into the bathroom with me and finally revealed her outfit, a dark blue sweater that made her hair and eyes pop. Together, we looked fashionable but baggy, acceptable but a little under-dressed.

    We were standing in front of my mirror to pose for her Master, but I didn¡¯t know that yet. I remember being vaguely unsettled by something as we stood there, but my senses were too new to see why.

    I thought her sweater was nice, but nothing special, until I saw the loose V opening in the back, exposing a patch of bare skin. I almost touched it, but I knew if I did, we would absolutely miss the play. I would have also damned my soul for eternity, but that seemed less important somehow.

    * * *

    We took a cab to the campus theater, but I didn¡¯t really get nervous until we landed.

    In my living room, this was just a game, but now I would have to do it for real. I¡¯d never been good at lying, and to keep up an elaborate story like this, walking around with a demon like it was some sort of game, I felt like an idiot. Judy would see right through me. Then Lydia would take me home and invite me to take that sweater off, and that would be the whole ball game. I was risking my soul here, just to pull a stupid prank on my ex.

    I was right on the verge of freaking out when I heard Lydia¡¯s voice, soft but clear in my head, asking ¡°Can you hear me?¡±

    ¡°Yeah,¡± I said out loud. I could hear her talking, but her lips weren¡¯t moving. ¡°Are you throwing your voice?¡±

    ¡°Just a little thought projection,¡± she sent silently. ¡°We use it to communicate with people when we can¡¯t speak their language, or when we don¡¯t want to be overheard. Try to talk back to me without speaking. Just think what you want me to hear.¡±

    ¡°Hello?¡± I thought to her. ¡°Is this working?¡±

    ¡°You don¡¯t have to shout!¡± Lydia shouted, still without moving her mouth. ¡°Just send me your thoughts, gently, whispering without using your voice.¡±

    ¡°Wait,¡± I thought, panicking. ¡°Does this mean you can read my thoughts?¡±

    ¡°Only the ones you¡¯re ashamed of,¡± she said, winking without winking somehow.

    * * *

    We weren¡¯t meeting Judy or Brian for the play itself, since Brian would be performing, and Judy had a hundred things to do backstage.

    The theater could seat about six hundred people, but it was only about half full. This was supposed to be a university theater full of students, but the audience for this thing skewed very rich and very old. There were maybe a hundred students in the back, but they looked restless and a little bored, like their professors had forced them to go.

    Lydia didn¡¯t look nervous so much as she felt nervous as we sat down. Was I getting better at reading demon body language, or was this more half-assed telepathy?

    I sent a silent question through our link, and she said, ¡°I was expecting a crowd full of students, but there are far too many powerful men here. A dozen of these people could be demon thralls. I should be able to hide us, but I would rather not expose us to this kind of risk.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve heard the phrase before, but what exactly is a demon thrall?¡±

    ¡°A thrall is a human who cooperates with demons, either informally, or with a contract. We used to recruit people in politics, but these days, I suspect most of our thralls are corporate royalty, sitting on boards or holding critical jobs.¡± She glanced up nervously. ¡°Half the men in that mezzanine could be thralls.¡±

    ¡°Am I a demon thrall?¡±

    ¡°Yes, but most people find the term demeaning. I would never call you that, and I would ask that you never call yourself that, even in jest.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t like the idea of being surrounded by thralls,¡± I said, ¡°but we can¡¯t leave yet. Judy would never forgive me if I walked out on this play. But the afterparty should just be students and cast members.¡±

    The play was called Death on Mars, and yes, they started with an orchestra version of the David Bowie song. I didn¡¯t know much about theater, but I knew enough to realize this did not bode well.

    The play came off as crazy expensive and weirdly lazy at the same time. Somebody had spent six digits on holographic sets, simulating rocket launches, the surface of Mars, and NASA Mission Control. But NASA didn¡¯t land on Mars. SpaceX landed on Mars in 2035, using an experimental drive from Madison Hyperdyne.

    This play was rewriting history, so the landing looked like it happened in 1998, without ever mentioning a specific year. The costumes, dialog, and hairstyles were all sloppy throwbacks, with a script that centered on two male astronauts trapped in an emergency shelter for most of the play.

    The dialog came off as shockingly crude and homophobic, full of religious references from someone who had apparently never met a real Christian before. I recognized some of the New Testament stuff from things my father used to say, but even the most fanatical members of dad¡¯s family would never challenge someone directly about their sex life, the way the bad guys did in this play.

    I remembered dad making crude jokes about gay people, but he also had some gay friends, and I think he told some of those jokes in front of them, like they had turned prejudice into some kind of weird meta-joke between them. I never got the sense that my father hated gay people; he was just deeply relieved that his son wasn¡¯t one of them.

    I could tell the dialog in the emergency shelter was building to a sex scene, but I was still a bit shocked when it happened live on stage. That was the highlight of my evening, watching Judy¡¯s new boyfriend grope and be groped by his effeminate male co-star.

    I thought maybe it was just me being a prude, but the physical performance was so enthusiastic, it was making a lot of people in the audience uncomfortable, even if the genitalia was mercifully obscured. It felt like the director was deliberately making the act violent and grotesque, when it was supposed to be an expression of love.

    The play ended with a double suicide on Martian sand, and the audience rose to their feet. Or to be specific, everybody over forty rose to their feet, while the students just snickered to each other and headed for the doors.

    It didn¡¯t make sense. Why were the most powerful people in Boston applauding for this piece of shit like Stalin was gonna shoot them if they stopped?

    ¡°Lydia, did you understand this play?¡± I asked silently.

    ¡°No,¡± she admitted. ¡°Did any of this really happen? Did your people actually land on Mars?¡±

    ¡°We did, but this play is a perverted deconstruction of it. That landing was one of the greatest achievements of the human race, but this play is twisting it to make everybody involved look like a victim or an asshole.¡±

 Chapter 23: Queen of the Storage Room

    Judy shared her POV and invited us to meet them in a converted storage room, which had been set up with a standing bar and tiny tables. The cast was holding court with VIPs in the main lobby, but this gathering was supposed to be for friends and family after the show.

    I was starving, so I went straight for the food. I was expecting a collection of savory treats like I enjoyed at Evan¡¯s party, but the woman paying for all this was a vegetarian, so the best I could do was celery and cream cheese. I filled a plate with what looked like tiny sausages, but they turned out to be colored bean curd.

    This woman reminded me of the billionaire who originally owned Innovex, willing to throw away millions on vanity projects, but weirdly cheap about buying little things for normal people.

    The servers had clearly been told to push certain kinds of protein on the audience, but you couldn¡¯t pay me enough to eat beetles or roasted crickets, no matter what you dipped them in.

    I came back to Lydia very hungry and very angry, but I had to hide it, because Judy was sweeping toward us like she was queen of the storage room.

    She was wearing a tight green blouse with a black skirt. She had a black blazer draped over her shoulders and her hair was pinned up. She looked perky and professional. The girl I remembered, the sweet brown-haired girl with glasses, had been replaced by this new and improved corporate version in a tailored suit.

    I tried to see her the way I used to, but it wasn¡¯t the same. There was a kind of mental barrier between me and Judy now, a soft wall made of sadness and bad memories that kept me from seeing her as a woman.

    I tried to remember what she used to look like under her clothes, but there was no forbidden thrill in imagining Judy. She was prettier than she had ever been, but she was still just a girl under there.

    A woman and a demon stood in the light and studied each other. A cloud of suspicion billowed between them like smoke. Every man fantasizes about women fighting over him, but Lydia was actually capable of committing murder and getting away with it. Reality put a whole new spin on things.

    Judy introduced herself and stuck her hand out. Lydia took it and did the same. Judy led us to a tiny table, and I got my first good look at her boyfriend. Brian looked like a transplanted surf god on work release from California. Lean muscles and long blond hair. Taller than me, as most of Judy¡¯s boyfriends were, and how the hell do you maintain a tan like that in Boston? I remember being grateful that he was wearing a shirt. He was one of those guys who improved his body to make up for his face, which was rather plain, even if the hair helped.

    Brian greeted me like we were old friends. The bastard hugged me, can you believe that? There was not a trace of guilt or guile in this man. Teddy bear with a six-pack, how can you hate a guy like that?

    Brian took in Lydia¡¯s appearance like he was sampling fine wine. Lydia was dressed like a smart girl, and Brian liked smart girls. Lydia didn¡¯t offer her hand, and something in her posture repelled hugs, so he just smiled and gave a little wave.

    A server came by and took our drink orders. Lydia and I took water. Judy got a glass of wine, and Brian ordered some Dutch beer.

    Judy always took forever to choose things off menus, giving me time to think snarky shit at Lydia. ¡°So, if I tried to get blasted tonight, would you stop me?¡±

    ¡°You don¡¯t drink,¡± Lydia thought back.

    ¡°Yeah, but I¡¯ve got a bunch of new reasons to start. Even if I get drunk, it¡¯s not like I could go on a rampage. I only know one spell.¡±

    ¡°You could kill everyone in this room with that spell, including me, and yourself.¡±

    ¡°You know I¡¯m just kidding.¡±

    ¡°And you know why it¡¯s not funny.¡±

    ¡°This thought projection shit is gonna get me in trouble,¡± I thought. ¡°I think a lot of mean shit that I never say. Having to vocalize gives me time to stop myself, but when we do it like this, I¡¯ll have no filter at all. I think about killing people a lot, so don¡¯t interpret anything I think as a command. And I apologize in advance for any cruel shit I think about you.¡±

    ¡°Tobias went to bed every night begging God to kill me, so I should be able to handle anything short of that. Now, pay attention, Judith is about to start her interrogation and I don¡¯t know your world well enough to improvise. You may need to jump in.¡±

    Judy broke the tension. ¡°So, Lydia! Tell me about yourself. How did you meet Timothy? And when? He¡¯s been keeping you a secret.¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°It¡¯s only been a few weeks. I came down for a job interview and met him at the museum. We had lunch, he made me laugh, and by the end of the week, I was swept off my feet.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re looking for a job?¡±

    ¡°I accepted a position last week. Newbury turned me down, but I was able to find a temp job with¡ª another university that is assembling their own collection. It¡¯s not public yet, so I shouldn¡¯t say anything.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m surprised I didn¡¯t see you during your interview. What kind of work do you do?¡±

    ¡°I interviewed at the tower,¡± Lydia covered smoothly. ¡°My title is ¡®Research Associate.¡¯ I¡¯m going to classify artifacts for a new Arcane Studies department.¡±

    All this was true, by the way. Harvard was starting up their own Arcane Studies program to focus on the classification of things that used to be magic. It was years from going public, but everything Lydia was saying would check out.

    I hid a smile behind my hand as I watched that explanation sink in. Mundanes do not classify artifacts for the Arcane Studies department.

    Judy asked the question point blank. ¡°Are you a witch?¡±

    ¡°Just barely. My score was too low for the magic program, but aura reading doesn¡¯t take much power.¡±

    The smile slid right off Judy¡¯s face. She replaced it quickly, but not before I noticed.

    Brian put his beer down and said, ¡°I¡¯ve never met a witch before. Can you do something magic?¡±

    That was a huge faux pas, by the way. It was considered extremely rude to call attention to someone with powers, and even worse to treat them like a dog, and ask them to do a trick.

    Lydia blushed and turned away. Her blush was so convincing, I had to suppress a giggle.

    ¡°I don¡¯t really know anything impressive,¡± she said. ¡°All I really do is read auras¡­ Oh! I know what I can do! I learned this for a party. Let me see if I can remember¡­¡± Lydia pursed her lips and feigned concentration. I almost lost it again right there, coughing into my napkin so I wouldn¡¯t laugh.

    She was really hamming it up, posing and taking deep breaths like she was about to assume a yoga position. I saw a familiar flash of golden light and got a grip on my chair, wondering what form she would take. Her wardrobe changes usually took less than a second, but this time she stretched it out. A lingering flash of gold, but under the light, Lydia was naked, visibly naked, right next to me. Not long enough for anyone else to notice, just for a millisecond to fuck with me.

    The light cleared and Lydia became her own evil twin, with black hair and a red dress, but her eyes stayed blue. She held the costume for a minute and gave an exaggerated sigh. Then she shimmered back into her previous form and feigned exhaustion. ¡°Sorry, that takes a lot out of me.¡±

    ¡°Could you do that palette swap for me at home?¡± I teased Lydia silently, while Brian and Judy clapped.

    ¡°What¡¯s a palette swap?¡±

    ¡°When you change the color of a monster without changing the form underneath.¡± If I¡¯d been speaking out loud, I might have stopped myself before I called Lydia a monster. ¡°Can I spend the night with Evil Lydia when we get home?¡±

    ¡°All Lydias are Evil Lydia. But if you want the brunette, you¡¯ll have to earn it.¡±

    ¡°Oh,¡± I laughed in my head. ¡°Are we Bargaining now? What do you want?¡±

    ¡°You know what I want. I want you to start learning that book. My Master is losing patience, and you can¡¯t do your job with one spell.¡±

    ¡°So, if I learn magic, can I have the brunette?¡±

    ¡°If you learn magic, you can have everything you ever wanted, and I¡¯ll show you things you don¡¯t even know you want yet.¡±

    * * *

    That shut me up until the server came back with the next round of drinks. As soon as the waitress left, Judy sipped her wine, grabbed her purse and headed for the ladies¡¯ room. Lydia followed, leaving me alone with Brian.

    I gave Lydia a meaningful look before she walked away. I was actually thinking, ¡°Don¡¯t kill her,¡± but Brian thought it was sweet.

    I was stuck looking across the table at him, wondering what I was going to say to this idiot, but Brian jumped right in. ¡°Tim, can I ask you something? You don¡¯t have to answer if it¡¯s too personal.¡±

    I was really trying to hate Brian, but I just couldn¡¯t do it. Every time I worked up a good burst of jealousy, he turned around and did something endearing. Like now. He didn¡¯t know me from Adam, but he was asking for advice like I was some kind of big brother. A little knot untied itself inside my soul, and I said, ¡°Sure. You can ask me anything.¡±

    ¡°You were with her for a long time, right? When you went to restaurants together, did Judy order food for you?¡±

    Ten minutes ago, I was ready to smack this guy, now I wanted to muss his hair and give him a hug. ¡°Judy¡¯s an aggressive woman. You have to stick up for yourself, or she¡¯ll walk all over you.¡±

    Brian nodded. ¡°I¡¯ve never met anyone like her. I mean, she¡¯s so mature. I love talking to her and she takes me to fancy stuff and she¡¯s sexy as hell¡­¡±  Brian caught himself. ¡°Sorry, I shouldn¡¯t say that.¡±

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    It was not alright, but I said, ¡°It¡¯s alright.¡±

    ¡°She¡¯s great, but she treats me¡ª I¡¯ve never had a girl treat me like this before. I hung out with a lot of girls in high school, and I was serious about someone before I met Judy, but¡­ it was different, you know?  When I was with Mandy, we would just¡­ hang out. She came to my shows, and I hung out at her apartment, and we went boarding in the park.

    ¡°Judy¡¯s great, but I can¡¯t just hang out with her. When I¡¯m with her, I feel like I¡¯m supposed to be doing stuff, all the time. She¡¯s always pushing me, and I can¡¯t figure out what she wants. You were with her so long, I thought maybe you could tell me what she wants.¡±

    ¡°Judy wants everything, Brian, but no man can be everything.¡±

    ¡°So, what should I do?¡±

    ¡°You just have to be yourself; keep moving toward a better version of yourself and let that be enough. Stop trying to figure her out and let her love who you are. Ask her to your shows, ask her to go places, and ask her to go boarding in the park. She won¡¯t do everything you ask, but she¡¯ll do some of it. It¡¯s not the doing that matters, it¡¯s the asking. You need to remind her that you were your own person before you met her, and that you¡¯re gonna be your own person, no matter what.¡±

    ¡°And Brian,¡± I said, stumbling over this next part. ¡°Don¡¯t underestimate what you¡¯re doing for her. You¡¯re already making Judy a better person. The old Judy would have never apologized after what I said to her.¡±

    Brian smiled. ¡°I knew you could help me. Judy said you were smart.¡±

    I sighed and rubbed my temples. ¡°I don¡¯t feel smart today, man. But hey,¡± I said, like I was seeing him for the first time, ¡°when you say ¡®boarding,¡¯ what do you mean?¡±

    ¡°Hoverboarding,¡± he said. ¡°But we don¡¯t use a physical board anymore. Your shoes generate this energy plane you stand on. No friction, so you can go super fast. I had a bunch of friends who did it in school, and they started taking videos of me doing tricks. One of the companies that makes them saw my stuff and started paying me money for them. They send me free shit all the time, so I can probably find something in your size, if you want to try it.¡±

    ¡°No,¡± I laughed. ¡°I would scrape half my skin off and fuck up my joints in like, two minutes. But let¡¯s say you were on a board or something or jumping on a hover field that worked like a trampoline. How would you train for it? What kind of exercises do you do?¡±

    ¡°I would be surfing every day if I was still back home. It¡¯s all about keeping your balance, so I used to stand on rubber balls and try to walk on ledges.¡±

    ¡°Can you send me some of your videos? Like, beginner stuff, all the way to advanced? Are they all in a library somewhere?¡±

    Brian¡¯s face lit up and he sent a dozen videos to my phone.

    I was trying not to think about Lydia and Judy, so I pulled up a random video and played it between us at the table. ¡°Like this one,¡± I said, freezing the image. ¡°You can push off the wall or the hood of a car or something?¡±

    Brian nodded. ¡°You can even push off from a person if they¡¯re braced right.¡±

    ¡°Do you have any videos of someone smaller than you? Closer to my height, and can you show me what someone could do, if they weighed a lot less?¡±

    ¡°I can send you videos of Mandy if you promise not to hit on her. She left me for a smarter guy.¡±

    * * *

    I got more specific as we went through the videos. I always get excited when I¡¯m sitting across from an expert, no matter what the subject is.

    Brian was remarkably patient, and remarkably well educated about things like nutrition and body mechanics. We swapped cards and he encouraged me to call him as I tried to get myself in shape.

    ¡°You¡¯re a good guy, Brian,¡± I admitted. ¡°And you really do know your shit. I hope I¡¯m coordinated enough to use some of this.¡±

    We chatted about his ex-girlfriend for a while, then we noticed Judy and Lydia had been gone for a long time.

    ¡°You think they¡¯re talking about us?¡± Brian asked.

    ¡°I just hope they¡¯re still talking¡­ So, Brian, do you know anything about how bathroom drains work? If somebody dumped say, a gallon of thick red liquid on a public bathroom floor, would the drain catch it all, or would it back up into the hallway?¡±

    ¡°If that¡¯s a joke, I don¡¯t get it,¡± Brian said.

    ¡°Nevermind. I¡¯m sure it¡¯s fine.¡±

    * * *

    I wasn¡¯t privy to the bathroom gossip, and Lydia didn¡¯t share it, but Azael showed me everything, complete with hair, makeup, and threats of murder.

    Judy joined Lydia by the sink as soon as the door closed. She fixed her makeup and said, ¡°I love that sweater.¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°Thank you,¡± and adjusted her hair.

    ¡°You and Timothy are adorable together.¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°Thank you,¡± in a very shy, non-Lydia tone of voice.

    ¡°Will your job keep you in Boston?¡±

    Lydia was painfully casual. ¡°At first, but I¡¯ll travel a lot, once I prove myself.¡±

    ¡°Timothy won¡¯t like that. Long-distance relationships are hard on him.¡±

    ¡°He might be traveling with me,¡± Lydia said.

    Judy blinked. ¡°Did he say that?¡±

    Lydia nodded.

    ¡°That¡¯s strange. Tim doesn¡¯t like to travel.¡±

    Lydia kept her tone light and delivered the explanation we had rehearsed. ¡°Your museum was very impressed with his work. He¡¯s considering a history fellowship at the Kidder Project. I¡¯ll prepare the artifacts, and Timothy will turn them into virtual exhibits.¡±

    Judy was quiet for a long time. ¡°He¡¯d be good at that.¡±

    Lydia spun around to face her. ¡°I can¡¯t play with this face for twenty minutes. Shall we cut to the chase?¡±

    Judy crossed her arms. ¡°Why are you dating a mundane?¡±

    Lydia turned her head quickly so Judy wouldn¡¯t see her eyes flash. In the glory days with Stefan, Lydia might have killed her right there, but she joked later that this was the worst thing about living in the modern world. Murder was so complicated now.

    Instead of killing her, Lydia said, ¡°You don¡¯t know many mages, do you?¡±

    Judy shook her head.

    ¡°Spend some time with gifted people and you¡¯ll get a whole new perspective on Timothy. Timothy Kovak is the opposite of every mage I ever met - kind, considerate, humble. He¡¯s generous and sweet, without a drop of pretension. He¡¯s smart and perceptive, with an amazing sense for people. I don¡¯t understand what he does, but I know he¡¯s good at it, and I¡¯ve seen how hard he works.¡±

    ¡°He really surprised me last week,¡± Judy said. ¡°Was that your influence? Encouraging him to tell me off?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve never heard him say anything bad about you. I think he loved you very much, but he says you grew out of each other. He blames himself for the breakup, but I think you were both just young. You can¡¯t expect to keep your high school sweetheart forever. People change so much in those years; you can¡¯t blame them for moving on.¡±

    Judy nodded. ¡°I just hope we can stay friends. Timmy means a lot to me. I¡¯d hate to lose him.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯ve been a good friend to him,¡± Lydia lied. ¡°I¡¯m not trying to crowd you out.¡±

    Judy softened her smile and said, ¡°Did he tell you about his family?¡±

    ¡°We talk about them sometimes. I know he was abused, and his mother died when he was young. He deserved better.¡±

    Judy nodded. ¡°So, he told you about his mother. Did he tell you she went crazy?¡±

    Lydia frowned. ¡°He said she ended up in a hospital, but he doesn¡¯t like to talk about it.¡±

    ¡°Well, she wasn¡¯t just a little crazy. Cynthia Kovak was fucking nuts. She told people she could see the future. Used to make these crazy predictions and send emails warning people about plane crashes and terror attacks. Tim even showed me some that came true! Timmy¡¯s dad said she predicted the nuclear strike in the Middle East, but you didn¡¯t need to be psychic to see that coming.

    ¡°She used to sit by Timmy¡¯s bed all night. Told him she was watching for demons! Timothy doesn¡¯t talk about it, but it fucked him up pretty bad. I mean, everybody¡¯s childhood sucked, but Timmy lived a nightmare.¡±

    ¡°Why are you telling me this?¡±

    ¡°I just want you to keep your eye on him. Timothy is innocent. He¡¯s such a good person, I think he¡¯s too good for the world he¡¯s in. He always expects the best from people, and he is way too trusting. One of these days, somebody¡¯s gonna hurt him, really hurt him. They¡¯re gonna abuse him or take advantage of him, and he¡¯s gonna lose part of himself that he can¡¯t get back. Timmy smiles like he loves the whole world, and I am terrified that one day, something¡¯s gonna hurt him so bad, it¡¯s gonna take that smile away.¡±

    ¡°I think you underestimate him.¡±

    Judy shook her head. ¡°You don¡¯t know him like I do. He¡¯s obviously happy now, but he can¡¯t stay at this level for long. Sooner or later, he¡¯s gonna come down, and it¡¯s gonna take a strong woman to put him back together. Someone in it for the long haul.¡±

    ¡°And you don¡¯t think I¡¯m ¡®in it for the long haul?¡¯¡±

    ¡°Relationships between people like you, and people like us, they never last, and I don¡¯t want to see him hurt again.¡±

    Lydia wanted to slit Judy¡¯s throat and squeeze her until all the blood drained out, but she gave a tiny smile. ¡°We can¡¯t protect him from everything, Judy. But I will do my best to keep him smiling.¡±

    * * *

    Judy and Lydia returned from the bathroom and found me poring over one of Brian¡¯s videos.

    Judy kissed Brian¡¯s cheek and said, ¡°Oh god, is he making you watch those? He¡¯ll take any excuse to show those off!¡±

    ¡°He should show these off,¡± I said. ¡°He¡¯s fucking awesome at this.¡±

    Judy¡¯s face fell as she realized I was sticking up for him. Brian and I were already friends, and she did not like that one bit.

    ¡°You know how hard it is to levi¡ª to skate off a vertical surface when you¡¯ve got gravity pulling you lateral? It looks like magic, but he¡¯s doing it with pure technique. Don¡¯t ever hide what you¡¯re good at, Brian.¡± I scowled at Judy. ¡°No matter what she says.¡±

    * * *

    We endured a few minutes of awkward silence, then Brian was summoned to some VIP thing. Judy enlisted me to help her move stuff backstage, and Lydia reluctantly stayed behind, giving me a chance to interrogate Judy alone.

    ¡°Judy, can you explain this play to me?¡±

    Judy sighed, but she didn¡¯t walk away, so I launched into my recap.

    ¡°When the habitat lost pressure, they kissed each other, they took off their suits, they made out in the emergency shelter for a while, then they walked out naked, and died together on Mars.¡±

    ¡°Right,¡± Judy confirmed.

    ¡°Okay, but¡­ who was on the radio? Who called them while they were making out?¡±

    ¡°That was the rescue ship.¡±

    ¡°Okay, so they could have gone on the rescue ship, but they decided to kill themselves instead?¡±

    ¡°Right.¡±

    ¡°Okay, let¡¯s back up. They were stuck in this habitat when it lost pressure. They were stranded on Mars in this little emergency shelter. They spent two hours figuring out that they were gay and that they loved each other. They confessed their love because they thought they were gonna die, but when the rescue ship got there, couldn¡¯t they just go home and¡­ be gay?¡±

    Judy rolled her eyes. ¡°Of course not, it was forbidden love. That¡¯s the whole point. Their whole lives were based on a heterosexual lie. They couldn¡¯t be together, and they couldn¡¯t live a lie anymore, so they died for each other. It¡¯s very romantic.¡±

    ¡°But it doesn¡¯t make sense. Even if you ignore the actual history, there¡¯s nothing ¡®forbidden¡¯ about it anymore. There was nothing forbidden about it when we actually landed on Mars. Why couldn¡¯t they just go home and say, ¡®Sorry honey, I¡¯m in love with my astronaut buddy?¡¯¡±

    ¡°They couldn¡¯t do that. It would destroy their families.¡±

    ¡°Well, yeah, but now their wives are widows, and their children have no fathers. Isn¡¯t that worse?¡±

    Judy rolled her eyes again. ¡°Oh my god. Timmy, I do not have time to explain this to you.¡±

    ¡°And it contradicts the real history! There actually was a gay couple in the first Mars dome. They were international celebrities! The whole world loved them! They actually did lose pressure in the habitat at one point, but then they just¡­ fixed it. They fixed it over the course of two hours on live TV. We watched it in school! Then they came home to parades! These guys were heroes, but this play is turning them into tragic losers. And if these characters were gay the whole time, why did they need to marry women at all? The real ones didn¡¯t.¡±

    ¡°Because the evil director of the space program was a homophobe! Were you even watching?¡±

    ¡°But that¡¯s my point. The villain was supposed to be a Christian based on a real guy. But the real guy thought God loved everybody and did a publicity tour with his gay astronauts! The real story behind this is a victory lap for gay rights. Why is this play taking it all away from them? The ending is supposed to be Romeo and Juliet, but it plays like the writer is trying to make gay guys kill themselves!¡±

    ¡°Oh my god,¡± Judy said, exasperated. ¡°Timmy, you are an engineer. You do not understand art. I am not going to have another one of these pointless arguments with you! If anybody asks what you thought of the play, just say you loved it and keep your mouth shut! Nobody cares what you think, and if you say something bad, it could blow back on me! The woman who paid for all this is a huge donor with connections like you would not believe. Bad things happen to people who piss her off, so we¡¯re all going to this afterparty to kiss her ass.¡±

    Judy hustled me into a corner and started whispering, ¡°You don¡¯t understand what a big deal this is. The writer of this play is one of her people, an old assistant or something, and Barbara picked everybody involved with this thing. The director does whatever she says. They even let her do the casting! I¡¯m here because she has a thing for Brian. If I wasn¡¯t watching him like a hawk, she¡¯d have her hand down his pants right now. We tried to say no to her once and¡­ we learned our lesson pretty quick.¡±

    I frowned. ¡°What does that mean?¡±

    ¡°She called Brian in the middle of the night and asked him to deliver food to her house. The world¡¯s most obvious booty call, so I said no. The next day I was called into my director¡¯s office. He said Barbara had threatened to pull funding from a big exhibit unless I apologized. And when I resisted, I got a call from my mom. My mother and father had both been called in by their department chairs on the same day. Barbara had threatened to pull funding from English and History fellowships unless their daughter apologized! Mom called me crying, begging me to save their jobs!

    ¡°Tim, this is not just a play. This is big boy political stuff. There are some people in this world who get whatever they want, and Barbara Foote is one of those people. Whatever she asks for, you say, ¡®Yes ma¡¯am!¡¯ and you do it with a big smile on your face! Please,¡± she begged me. ¡°Keep quiet and do not piss her off!¡±

 Chapter 24: Titus

    Barbara Foote was a beautiful woman who was getting ugly fast, but she seemed oblivious to it, because she was too rich for anyone to tell her.

    She was puffy, irritable, and clearly addicted to something, quickly ruining a face and body that had been world-class ten years ago. It wasn¡¯t just age. It was pretty easy for a rich woman to age gracefully these days, changing the way she dressed while still letting everyone know she was rich, avoiding obvious cosmetic surgery, getting by with calorie shunts and cell injections.

    A real friend would have told her to get on blockers or go to rehab, but Barbara didn¡¯t have any real friends, which is why she invited the entire cast of her terrible vanity play to party at her mansion after the show.

    It was easy to tell how beautiful she used to be, because the house was full of old photos of her, taken when she was young and hot, commissioned by a husband who wanted to show her off, taken by a photographer who probably had sex with her.

    Her recently deceased husband had been a legendary tech billionaire, a robotics pioneer who made his money off the first practical humanoid robots. The kind they didn¡¯t make anymore, since the corps took over, and outlawed anything smart enough to have a conversation.

    Barbara immediately inserted herself between Brian and the guy who played his Martian lover, roughly pushing Judy out of the way, until she was forced to stand by me and Lydia.

    Lydia was freaking out in a very deliberate, Lydia kind of way, but I was the only one who could tell she was nervous. She was pacing around the room, ostensibly admiring photos of Barbara, while quietly scanning the auras of anything that moved.

    Her voice came into my head again. ¡°Timothy, this woman is a demon thrall. We should get out of here.¡±

    ¡°Are you sure?¡± I thought back. ¡°I thought demon thralls were like influencers and CEOs, is this woman even coherent enough to be worth manipulating?¡±

    ¡°I suspect this demon was assigned to her husband and stayed behind, since this widow still controls his money. This house reeks of demon, but I can¡¯t spot him, which means he is likely much older and stronger than me.¡±

    I went briefly pale. ¡°You¡¯re six hundred years old and this thing is older than you? That sounds¡­ bad.¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t hide us in a demon¡¯s lair. Please make an excuse to leave before he spots us.¡±

    I wandered over to make my excuses to Barbara and was interrupted by a fire alarm. An old-school robotic voice said, ¡°ALERT, ALERT: Smoke has been detected in the garage. Please exit the structure during first-level fire suppression.¡±

    Barbara and the entire cast panicked and charged the front door, sweeping Lydia up with them, carrying her away as I was looking in the wrong direction. I wasn¡¯t running for the exit, because I didn¡¯t believe the alarm. I didn¡¯t smell smoke, and I didn¡¯t trust tech this old, so I was headed for the alarm panel in the back, assuming Lydia would be by my side a moment later.

    But then I heard her voice in my head, ¡°We got separated. Run and grab something silver off the dining table. The knives are fake, but everything else is old silver. Grab whatever fits in your pocket.¡±

    So, I ran through the empty house and grabbed the first bit of silver I saw. ¡°You want me to fight a demon with a fork?¡±

    ¡°I want you to learn some proper spells, so we don¡¯t have to resort to cutlery next time we meet something stronger than me!¡±

    ¡°Wow,¡± I said, surprised by her tone. ¡°Did you just get snarky with me? You really are scared.¡±

    As I was headed back to the living room, a muscular man in an expensive suit grabbed my arm and hustled me into the back yard, saying, ¡°Let¡¯s get you out of here before the smoke hits!¡±

    I was pretty sure this alarm was fake, but this man¡¯s grip was crazy strong, and it was all happening too fast. Lydia was stuck in the front yard, surrounded by people she couldn¡¯t push through or vanish in front of, leaving me alone in the back with this handsome beast of a man who was at least a foot taller than me.

    I didn¡¯t see any point pretending, so I said ¡°You¡¯re the demon, right? What¡¯s your Name?¡±

    I had never seen a demon who looked old on purpose before. This guy looked like a leading man or a male model who was keeping fit, well into his 50s. He had perfectly sculpted black hair with gray at the temples, a little too perfect to be natural gray. Brown eyes that turned completely black as I asked his Name.

    ¡°My demon name is Titus. I¡¯m a lieutenant serving the Demon Lord Moloch, and right now, I¡¯m trying to figure out what the fuck you are.¡±

    This was not a sex demon. This was not an incubus fuck toy with a bulge in his pants. This was a killer who had switched to killing people with money instead of claws. He had been Barbara¡¯s lover since long before her husband died. He wasn¡¯t actually sitting on the boards of these companies Barbara had money in, but he was obviously telling her what to do.

    God knows what he was doing in the bedroom to keep her under control, or what kind of drugs he was slipping into her morning latte to keep her docile.

    I was no match for this guy, so I had to keep him talking. ¡°Hey, if Barbara is your thrall, did you write that shitty play?¡±

    ¡°Fuck you, my script was perfect. You¡¯re just too stupid to understand it.¡±

    As I suspected, no writer can resist talking about his work. ¡°Nah, man. Even as propaganda, it was nonsense. It looked like you were trying to discredit the New Testament, but nobody reads the Bible anymore. Most people in that audience don¡¯t even know there was a New Testament! And why would you bother? You guys drove the Christians underground before I was born!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s not enough to put a Christian down,¡± the demon said, ¡°You¡¯ve got to keep kicking or they¡¯ll get back up. My emperor turned his back on them, and I will not repeat his mistake.¡±

    My body was bringing in magic by instinct, responding to the threat. I saw his black horns and tail pop out as he examined my aura. Not just any demon could paint their horns black. That color was reserved for elite servants with a body count, and even my baby senses could tell this one was old.

    ¡°You have an amazing aura, kid. If I had met you a year from now, you could have been a real problem.¡±

    And suddenly, Lydia was all over him, popping out of the gray so fast, it looked like teleportation. She was angry, she was scared, and she was not fucking around. I felt like I was getting my first look at the real Lydia, the Lydia from Roland¡¯s painting: fangs popped, claws out, slashing at this guy like an animal.

    It should have been terrifying, but in context, it was strangely comforting. Something about seeing her this way, fierce and protective, facing real danger to try and keep this thing off me - it was visible proof that she was on my side, and she was already taking damage.

    Lydia was faster, but Titus was a lot stronger. Lydia was doing some kind of astral fading trick to keep herself from getting hit, blinking in and out of the real world, scratching and biting at him like a set of disembodied claws and teeth. But this big bastard had claws of his own, and he was definitely drawing blood.

    Titus finally got hold of something solid and flung her into a marble fountain, smashing a statue of an angel as Lydia got impaled by its blunt stone sword. Lydia yelled at me to run as Titus charged her, but I couldn¡¯t just stand there and let her get hit.

    This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

    I only knew one spell, so I used it, levitating his body off the ground, using the same trick I used on Lydia during our sparring session. He was a lot heavier, but it worked. I knocked him off balance and trusted Lydia to take advantage of it.

    She launched herself at him and yelled at me to ¡°Run!¡± again, barreling into him, hard enough to knock him down. She was carving big chunks out of his arms, face, and chest, until he was thrashing in a pool of his own black blood.

    I thought she was winning, until Titus conjured some kind of surging black portal and kicked her through it with both feet. Lydia soared backwards and I saw how badly she was hurt, leaving a quart of her own golden blood trailing in mid-air, until it splashed on the grass.

    She tumbled backwards into the portal, which immediately closed behind her, leaving me alone with the demon who had just kicked her ass.

    I finally decided it was time to take her advice, but it was way too late to run. Titus pounced on me and lifted me high off the ground with one arm, peering up at me like he was trying to get a better look at my soul.

    He sniffed at me and poked my neck with a claw on his other hand, just enough to draw blood. He licked the blood off his finger and said, ¡°Another Kovach? After all this time?¡± He squinted at me. ¡°Six hundred years of selective breeding, and you¡¯re the best they could do?¡±

    Titus gripped my throat a little tighter and shook me up and down, like he thought shaking me might activate my magic powers somehow. But all I did was choke. So here I was, squirming at the end of a demon¡¯s claw again, completely at his mercy, but this time, I was determined to fight back. I twisted my body and kicked him, aiming for his face, but I had never tried to kick anybody for real before. He blocked me with a slight twist of his shoulder and started to laugh.

    ¡°You¡¯re trying to hurt a demon who predates the birth of Christ, kid. What are you gonna do with your little feet?¡±

    But I kept trying to kick until he reached over with his free hand and slapped me, literally slapped me in the face, just like dad used to, whenever I would mouth off. He hit me so hard, I blacked out for a second, and woke up with blood pouring out of my nose.

    He saw my eyes drift over to where his portal had been and said, ¡°Relax, I didn¡¯t kill her yet. Just sent her away so we could chat. Your succubus, what¡¯s her name? Lila or Lola or something? She doesn¡¯t even have a tether on you, yet. I can¡¯t believe she¡¯s letting you walk around in public when she hasn¡¯t even closed the deal. Am I really looking at an unbound Kovach mage?

    ¡°If she had a tether on you, I¡¯d have to kill you, but if you really are unclaimed, maybe we can make a deal. First, in about five minutes, you¡¯re gonna be working for me. Might as well get your mind around that. Lola¡¯s gonna be back in a few minutes, then I¡¯m gonna snap her neck and take you down to meet my Master. That is not gonna be fun for you, but Jacob Kovach was a friend of mine, so I¡¯m gonna make you the sweetest deal I ever made anybody.

    ¡°I¡¯m still gonna take you to Hell and present you to my Master, but there are two ways this can go. I can drop you off at the Inquisitor and he can start shoving metal into your pink bits, or I can drop you off at the harem and let you pick out your new best friend. Lila¡¯s headed back here at Mach 10, so you¡¯ve got about sixty seconds to decide.¡±

    I gagged and choked out a reply. ¡°If we¡¯re gonna negotiate, can you at least swing me around?¡±

    Titus snickered and swung me around to face him, bringing me in close at eye level. He even loosened his grip a little, so I could deliver a complete sentence without gasping.

    ¡°Thanks,¡± I said. ¡°Your Master is a lot more powerful than mine, right? Could you get me out of this contract, and let me work out a new one?¡±

    He nodded.

    ¡°And nobody¡¯s gonna cut me open if I cooperate?¡±

    He nodded again.

    ¡°And this harem you¡¯ve got, does your Master have any redheads?¡±

    The big demon snickered again. ¡°Three or four. But kid, if you do right by us, I¡¯ll take you to Psongor and let him make you one from scratch.¡±

    I sighed, went limp, and stabbed him in the eye, as hard as I could.

    Initially, I thought I missed because I felt no resistance. It didn¡¯t feel like I was stabbing an ancient, invulnerable demon, it felt like I was stabbing warm Jell-O. I didn¡¯t realize it worked until I smelled something burning and heard the scream as he dropped me. A good seventy percent of that fork was in his eye, and the flesh around it was burning with a weird radiant light, like he had a little sun rising in his head.

    I picked myself up from where Titus dropped me and ran for the sliding door, just as Lydia popped into real space and went for his throat. I missed a good minute of demon on demon combat and returned to find Lydia riding on his back, stabbing frantically as he tried to throw her off.

    She was in bad shape. Her clothes were shredded, she had long scratches on her arms and legs, and I could see bare skull where he had tried to cave her head in. Titus hadn¡¯t seen me yet; presumably he had better things to do with his one remaining eye, so I was able to run around behind him while he flailed at Lydia.

    While the demons thought I was running away, I had been in the kitchen, grabbing the rest of the forks.

    Titus was swinging wildly, trying to grab Lydia, but she was getting better at dodging him, and her claw scratches were taking their toll. I watched her make one long cut over his remaining eye, so the big demon would be blinded by his own blood.

    While they were thrashing, I ran up behind him, and jammed another fork in his spine. I didn¡¯t know if demon spines actually had nerves in them, but it seemed smarter than just randomly stabbing him in the back. I planted two more forks in him before he reached back and swatted me, sending me tumbling through the swing set, headed for the back fence at high speed.

    That impact was gonna hurt real, real bad, but I remembered Brian and tried to improvise with levitation again, trying to push against the fence instead of the ground. The spell absorbed my momentum, and I used the fence to launch myself back the other way, soaring toward the fight that I should have been running away from.

    I was moving too fast to aim myself, so I just kind of crashed into him from behind. Not hard enough to move four hundred pounds of muscle and magic, but hard enough to scramble my brain again, and drive two of those forks deeper into his back.

    Titus roared in pain and wrapped his tail around my neck. I was officially tired of demons fucking with my neck, so I jammed a fork in the place where his tail met his spine and was gratified to see another tiny sunrise coming out of his ass. His tail caught fire and detached from the rest of him, dropping me on the mercifully soft lawn.

    Lydia¡¯s angry voice shouted, ¡°I told you to run!¡± in my head.

    ¡°Hold his arm still!¡± I thought back, and she did.

    I jammed another fork in his shoulder and immobilized his left arm, then we did the same thing with his right. His arm was a big target, but my aim sucked. I accidentally hit Lydia with the fork, and she screamed as I neatly clipped most of her finger off.

    I had seen Lydia suffer terrible injuries during this fight, but this was the first time I had heard any indication of pain. I guess her demon stuff made her immune to most of it, but something about that silver burned her just as bad as it burned him. The last finger on her right hand flared, burned to a crisp, and fell off, leaving an angry black nub.

    I yelled, ¡°Sorry!¡± out loud and she yelled, ¡°Use them all!¡± in my head.

    I jammed half a dozen more forks in his left side and suddenly remembered I was a wizard. I got around behind him, levitated myself with a running start, and jammed my last piece of silver through the top of his head on the way down. I bounced off his shoulder and fell backwards into the swing set again, but not before I drove seven inches of silver straight through his skull.

    Titus screamed one last time and vanished in a swirl of black smoke. A dozen silver forks hovered in the air for a moment and fell gently back to Earth.

    * * *

    And then everything got quiet.

    The automated system sounded the all clear once the tiny garage fire was out, but Barbara had already moved the party to a nearby hotel. I flicked my phone back on and saw a dozen frantic texts from Judy, asking where we were.

    ¡°Had a blast,¡± I texted back. ¡°Next time, you can skip the play and just invite us to the fire.¡±

    Lydia looked terrible. A normal human would have been dead from the wounds I saw, slowly closing as she dripped blood on the lawn.

    Lydia stared at the forks and then back at me. ¡°Did we really just kill a lord¡¯s lieutenant with a dozen silver forks?¡±

    ¡°No, ma¡¯am,¡± I corrected, smiling. ¡°Those last three were spoons.¡±

    * * *

    I know what you¡¯re thinking, and you¡¯re right. We did not deserve to win that fight. I spent the next week running weird theories by Lydia, trying to guess what happened. Maybe the silver had a weird interaction with my aura? Maybe we had a secret angel helping us from the gray?

    I didn¡¯t get a real answer until I showed the fight to Azael.

    He said the more powerful a demon is, the more vulnerable they become to old silver. Not just any silver. Coins, bars, and bullets might hurt a little, but to really hurt a demon, the silver has to be old, and it has to have been in the same shape for a long time.

    If it¡¯s old enough, silver has a way of ¡°grounding¡± infernal magic the way the negative properties of the Earth can ground power lines. The more powerful a demon gets, the more magic is required to maintain its form, so the older they get, the more it hurts to have that magic interrupted.

    And it gets better. It¡¯s not just about how old the silver is, it¡¯s about how that silver has been given and received. Azael says a wedding is a kind of magic ritual, a sacred ceremony that creates an angel tether between two people. The longer that marriage lasts, the more powerful that tether becomes, especially if both people honor their vows for a long time.

    Gifts given at a wedding are blessed, and items that are treasured acquire a sacred quality over time. Treasures passed down from earlier generations can be part of multiple weddings and be blessed multiple times.

    The Foote family silver had been passed down through five generations of happy marriage, until it ended up in the barren, loveless drawer of Barbara¡¯s kitchen. But the magic was still in it, and that silver was still blessed.

    I didn¡¯t believe it, either, but Azael says we beat one of the meanest demons in Hell, because I shoved a +5 Holy Fork in his brain.

 Chapter 25: Burger

    We caught a cab on Barbara¡¯s roof and took the slow lane home. I was shaking off the adrenaline dump, and Lydia was hurt even worse than I could see. My cuts and bruises would hurt like hell the next day, but I couldn¡¯t feel them yet.

    Lydia looked like a zombie in ripped clothes, still dripping bright golden blood from a dozen wounds. I could tell there was still something seriously wrong with her head, even in the dim light of the cab, but her hair was already growing back.

    ¡°You were alone with him for a long time,¡± she said. ¡°He didn¡¯t kill you, so I presume he made you an offer. Did you accept?¡±

    ¡°I did not,¡± I said. ¡°You think I should have? Maybe I could have worked out something for both of us.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t joke about that,¡± Lydia said. ¡°I have to report this to my Master, but he will be delighted to hear you turned an offer down, and we just humiliated one of his greatest enemies. This should buy us weeks of goodwill with him and give you time to train.¡±

    ¡°He said he was gonna take me back to his Master; gave me a choice between torture and choosing a new succubus.¡±

    Lydia was quiet for a while. ¡°I know you resent this contract,¡± she said softly, ¡°and I know you resent me, but no demon will ever understand you like I do, and no demon will ever love you like I do. I know you don¡¯t believe that yet, but I promise, if you trade me in for some random whore, you will regret it every day, for the rest of your life.¡±

    ¡°Nobody¡¯s trading you in,¡± I said, turning to face her. ¡°You really came through for me tonight, even before we ended up fighting for our lives. For a minute there, playing stupid party games with you, I was actually having fun.¡± I paused. ¡°I know we can¡¯t leave the cab, but can we just drive around for a while? I¡¯m not ready to go home.¡±

    ¡°What would you like to do?¡± Lydia asked, moving closer without moving closer.

    ¡°Honestly? I want a fucking hamburger. I went the whole day without eating so I could fill up on free food, then all they had was shitty vegetarian stuff. At least Evan had real meat at his thing.¡±

    I leaned forward and spoke to the cab, ¡°Hey driver, is that old burger place still open? Wild Willy¡¯s across from Watertown High School?¡±

    The cab said, ¡°Yes.¡±

    ¡°Do they have a roof pickup?¡±

    The cab said, ¡°Yes.¡±

    ¡°How much is a burger and fries now?¡±

    ¡°The price of an Angus beef burger ranges from twenty-five to thirty-five dollars.¡±

    ¡°Jesus Christ,¡± I said, slumping in my seat. ¡°We used to go to Willy¡¯s after school sometimes. I could never afford it, but sometimes the other kids would split their burgers with me. I¡¯ve never just¡­ bought one for myself.¡± I shook my head. ¡°Fifty fucking dollars. I can¡¯t¡­¡±

    ¡°Timothy, we have meat and bread at¡­¡± Lydia began.

    ¡°Stop!¡± I shouted. ¡°Don¡¯t fucking say it! Don¡¯t you dare tell me what we have at home!¡± I kicked the back of the front seat. ¡°Shit! Now I have to get the burger, just to prove you¡¯re not my mother! Fuck it!¡± I turned back to her. ¡°Alright, new rule. Every time we win a fight, we get a burger. Driver, take us to Willy¡¯s.¡±

    Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

    ¡°Yes, sir. The reroute will cost¡­¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t care what it costs!¡± I shouted at the machine. ¡°I want a fucking hamburger!¡±

    We landed on the roof of the old building and gave our order to an animatronic cowboy.

    ¡°I¡¯m getting you a burger and fries,¡± I said. ¡°They use real meat, but if you hate it, I¡¯ll eat yours tomorrow.¡±

    ¡°Timothy, I don¡¯t hate everything! Thank you for buying me dinner.¡± She hesitated, peering at the menu. ¡°Could you¡­ Can I have a root beer float?¡±

    I laughed. ¡°Lydia, you saved my life tonight. Of course, you can have a root beer float.¡±

    I called the cowboy back and added a twelve-dollar float to our order.

    The bot came back with a giant souvenir cup and a bag that smelled better than Heaven.

    Lydia surprised me, reaching across my body to grab the bag. She grabbed a handful of fries and stuffed them in her mouth, then angled the carton toward me. ¡°You have to eat some fries in the vehicle before they get cold. It¡¯s a rule.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re right,¡± I said. ¡°I had forgotten, but you¡¯re right.¡± I grabbed a handful of fries and stuffed them in my mouth. ¡°It¡¯s a rule.¡±

    * * *

    We cruised around in the slow lane and ate our burgers in the cab. The AI driver complained a few times when it caught us eating food, but I figured what the hell, I was already on a date with a demon. What¡¯s one more broken rule?

    I was carrying leftovers, so Lydia opened the door and walked ahead of me into the living room, giving me a full view of the open back in her sweater. I¡¯m tempted to use passive voice here, and pretend the next few things ¡°just happened,¡± but I had to make a deliberate choice to put the bag down first.

    I threw the bag of food on the counter and caressed Lydia¡¯s naked back with my other hand. She stopped and leaned back a bit, leaning into my touch, and I was gone. I grabbed her, turned her around, and finally had the kiss I had been waiting for, stroking her back, tasting her lips, and pulling her whole body into mine.

    I nuzzled her hair and smelled her for the first time, a sharp scent of roses, honey, and some kind of exotic fruit. She tasted like sugar, salt, and root beer. It took me a moment to realize the scent of honey was coming from dried blood, and the V-shaped back of her sweater had been exaggerated by ragged holes left in it from the fight. Her body felt strange under the clothes because the cloth was catching on rough patches that hadn¡¯t completely healed yet.

    I didn¡¯t give a damn about my ancestors or my contract or my soul, I just had to have her, but Lydia made a little mewing noise and pulled back. She squeezed my hands and whispered, ¡°Stop.¡±

    ¡°Stop?¡± I repeated, incredulous, and maybe a little cruel. ¡°You¡¯ve been cranking me up for weeks and now you¡¯re making me stop?¡±

    ¡°Stop, please,¡± she said. ¡°Your hands feel so good, but not like this. Please wait, just a little longer, while I heal.¡±

    I stepped back, suddenly flushed and guilty. ¡°Am I hurting you?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± she reassured me. ¡°I only feel pain when I need to, or¡­¡±

    ¡°Or when some dumbass accidentally stabs you with silver,¡± I finished.

    ¡°Yes,¡± she admitted, wagging her injured finger. ¡°But this doesn¡¯t hurt much. Silver wounds take longer, but this should grow back in a few days.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, if I¡¯m not hurting you, I promise, I do not care what you look like under there. You earned those wounds fighting for me, and right now, that is pretty fucking hot.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve spent seventy years waiting to have a Kovach in my arms again, so when we¡¯re finally together, I want it to be perfect, for both of us. I want our first night to be something you remember for the rest of your life, and I don¡¯t want you to remember me like this.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, I don¡¯t need perfect. I¡¯ve never had anything perfect in my life. I wouldn¡¯t know what to do with perfect if I got it.¡±

    ¡°Call it vanity, then,¡± she said.

    ¡°Wait, did my succubus just turn me down? Holy shit, I can get friend-zoned by anything.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t exaggerate,¡± Lydia said. ¡°We¡¯ll have our time.¡±

    ¡°You sure you want to shut me down? This may be the best shot you get at me.¡±

    ¡°Oh, I can have you any time I want,¡± Lydia said, ¡±now that I know your secret.¡±

    ¡°My secret? That I can¡¯t resist demons who taste like root beer?¡±

    ¡°Next time I want you, I¡¯ll just pick a fight with something and let you rescue me. But for now, we both need time to heal. Get cleaned up and come to bed. I¡¯ll be waiting, but please¡­ stay on your side.¡±

 Chapter 26: A Thousand Dead Wizards

    I stayed on my side of the bed all night, but somewhere in the dark, Lydia reached for me, and I woke up holding her hand.

    I knew I was making a terrible mistake, touching her, but she didn¡¯t feel like my jailer or my temptress anymore. She felt like a friend who needed me, as she recovered from a beating she took in my place.

    The next morning, I woke up and immediately asked, ¡°How¡¯s the finger?¡±

    She wagged her injured right hand at me, showing a blackened pinkie that had already grown halfway back.

    ¡°Demon regeneration is some good shit,¡± I observed.

    ¡°Our bodies are made from a kind of flesh, but much simpler than yours, and much easier to maintain. I can recover from just about anything, as long as I maintain a connection to my Master in Hell. He can even grow me a new body, if I suffer enough damage to force my soul back. I can¡¯t truly die, as long as my heart remains in my Master¡¯s vault, so no matter what our enemies do to me, I will always come back to you.¡±

    I wanted to reach out and kiss her again, so instead, I got up and heated leftovers, splitting our remaining burger with her. We both knew she didn¡¯t need to eat, but little things like this maintained the illusion of a normal life, and Lydia had decided that comfort was worth more than the money I was spending on food.

    After we ate, I leaned over to grab the dishes and gave a sudden, involuntary intake of breath.

    ¡°Timothy, are you hiding injuries from me?¡±

    ¡°Nothing serious. I tweaked my back when I went through the swing set, and my face is swelling up from where he smacked me like a bitch, but he wasn¡¯t trying to hurt me for real.¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°Give me your hand.¡± But I hesitated, and she said, ¡°I can heal you, just give me your hand.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll be fine,¡± I insisted.

    ¡°Is that why you wore a shirt to bed? To hide what he did to you?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s not that big a deal. Not the first time I¡¯ve been knocked around by a bigger guy.¡±

    ¡°But now you have me,¡± Lydia said. ¡°I can heal this in seconds, just give me your hand.¡±

    ¡°No,¡± I finally said. ¡°Bad enough that I put my hands on you last night, I do not want you using magic on me.¡±

    ¡°Do you honestly believe I would hurt you, after what you saw last night? After I¡¯ve been in your bed for weeks?¡±

    ¡°No, I don¡¯t think you would hurt me. But you¡¯re already so deep in my life, literally talking in my head. I feel like I¡¯m on a ramp, sliding down into¡­ god knows what. I should be running for that fucking door, but I can¡¯t¡­ Something about this. You and me. It doesn¡¯t feel wrong. It should feel wrong. I keep waiting for it to feel wrong, but¡­¡±

    An involuntary surge of magic came in and flashed in my eyes, bringing Lydia to her feet.

    ¡°I¡¯m all right!¡± I waved her off. ¡°I¡¯ve got it! I¡¯m just¡­ a little worked up. That big bastard could have killed me with one finger yesterday. I stood there and watched him beat on you, knowing I couldn¡¯t do a goddamn thing! I may not¡­ entirely trust you, but I can¡¯t just stand there useless while you¡¯re getting hurt.¡±

    ¡°You did not ¡®just stand there,¡¯¡± Lydia reminded me. ¡°You charged in and fought for me. We battled one of the strongest lieutenants in Hell yesterday, and we won. Engaging him was terribly reckless, and I would beg you to not do it again, but I am so proud of you. Neither one of us could have won that fight alone.¡±

    ¡°I know,¡± I said, pacing around the room, ¡°and that¡¯s a problem. It¡¯s not gonna stop. Even if you and your Master disappeared tomorrow, it¡¯s not gonna stop. There are a million demons on this planet now, and I¡¯m a target for every single one of them. I can¡¯t hide what I am, and I can¡¯t go back! Even if you went back to Hell tonight, I can¡¯t just pretend to be a normal guy anymore. This power is in me now, and everybody can see it! I¡¯m like the new gunslinger in town and everybody wants a shot at me!¡±

    I collapsed behind my desk and put my head in my hands. ¡°I¡¯ve never thrown a punch in my life, but I¡¯ve got to learn how to fight. These things are not just ¡®bullies.¡¯ This isn¡¯t some trivial self-confidence problem like confronting my father or standing up for myself at work. These things are demons. Old, smart, and even the little ones are stronger than me! How am I supposed to fight something I can¡¯t even understand?¡±

    ¡°You already know what to do,¡± Lydia said. ¡°If you¡¯re ready to fight, I can put a weapon in your hand. Trust me, trust the book, and a year from now, you won¡¯t be running from demons, you¡¯ll be hunting them for sport.¡±

    The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

    ¡°I would settle for not getting my ass kicked!¡± I yelled, as the magic surged again, hard enough to rattle dishes in the sink.

    Lydia just stared at me, waiting, knowing she had already won.

    ¡°Lydia, bring me the book.¡±

    * * *

    A tiny version of Taltorak appeared in her hand and expanded to full size when she threw it on my desk.

    The physical manifestation of it was beautiful and terrifying, a giant black tome with a single rune on the cover in blood red. It looked old, but not worn, like a modern replica of something ancient. There was a powerful copper and ozone scent coming off it, but it didn¡¯t move.

    I crept toward the book like it was a snake about to bite me. I didn¡¯t hear literal voices. Nothing spoke to me directly, but I got a weird warm feeling from it, like it was beckoning to me. There was a distinct male energy to it, and I swear it felt like it wanted to help me, like it was resentful of, even hostile to the demons who had stolen it.

    Azael is trying to pin me down on this one, so I¡¯ll just admit it. I accepted this thing because it felt like those spirits were on my side. That book was a weapon that had been corrupted to serve demons, but the knowledge in it could be used against them. I swear something told me that as I approached, without explicitly using words.

    Maybe it was a trick. Maybe the book was just telling me what I wanted to hear, but it felt pretty damn sincere to me. Baalphezar may have stolen this book, but it felt like this thing hated him, and the spirits inside were begging me to set them free.

    It didn¡¯t feel like I was connecting with demons when I touched it; it felt like I was connecting with a kind of family, bonded together by loneliness, greed, and regret. I put my hand on Taltorak and felt the collective humiliation of all these wizards who had embraced demons and damned themselves to Hell. They weren¡¯t trying to corrupt me, they were telling me to be strong, begging me to resist - the spirits of a thousand fallen men, begging me to be stronger than they were.

    This book hadn¡¯t just been used to seduce and empower my family. It had been used by hundreds of wizards, used to enslave whole bloodlines older than mine, reaching back thousands of years.

    Baalphezar hadn¡¯t invented this succubus-wizard thing. Demons had been using this trick to control wizards since the first guy who could read runes realized demons could come in female shapes.

    I had been overwhelmed by Lydia¡¯s promises and the prospect of being bound by a contract, but this book had the power to fix everything. The spirits told me I could turn the tables and punish the assholes who did this to us, if I was brave enough and strong enough to use it. I didn¡¯t feel particularly brave or strong standing there, but I reached out, of my own free will, and put my hand on the book.

    * * *

    The minute I touched it, an amorphous blob of shadows and teeth popped into existence, full size, and jumped up to lick my face. I screamed like a woman and fell on my ass. The Guardian jumped on my chest and started licking me like a puppy, while I frantically tried to push it off.

    It didn¡¯t feel completely physical as I touched it. It felt like pushing on a cloud of black smoke with hard muscles shifting underneath.

    Finally, Lydia yelled, ¡°No! Come to me!¡± and snapped her fingers at knee level, exactly like she was calling a dog.

    I was still on the ground, hyperventilating, mute with terror as the Guardian bounded over to her with its tongue hanging out. Clearly, if it had a tail, it would have been wagging.

    ¡°Lydia, what the fuck?¡± I yelled, trembling as I picked myself up off the floor. ¡°How could you let that thing out when you know I¡¯m terrified of it!¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t let it out!¡± Lydia yelled back. ¡°You must have been thinking about him when you touched the book!¡±

    ¡°Of course, I was thinking about him! I¡¯m thinking about how he sliced me up and ripped a man¡¯s spine out! I wasn¡¯t trying to summon the fucking thing!¡±

    ¡°Timothy, please relax. This Guardian belongs to you now, just like me and the book. He¡¯s meant to be your companion, and your protector. All of your ancestors made friends with him. Not all of them let him run around the house, but he followed Stefan everywhere.

    ¡°He¡¯s completely loyal, smarter than a dog, and many times more deadly. He should be invisible to casual observers, and he can spot threats that I can¡¯t. I¡¯m sorry he scares you, but I assure you, with him in the room, you have never been safer in your life. He can handle anything human that comes through that door, faster than most of them can react. He can even kill small demons and spot other wizards trying to scry on you. Just give him a chance!¡±

    ¡°Give him a chance?¡± I shouted, incredulous. ¡°Absolutely not. Put him back in the book.¡±

    Lydia scritched behind his ears and pointed to the book, still hovering in mid-air. But the creature just sat there with his tongue lolling out, looking at me with beady red eyes.

    ¡°He¡¯s not listening to me,¡± Lydia said. ¡°You¡¯ll have to give the command.¡±

    I pointed and yelled, ¡°Get back in the book!¡± with as much authority as I could.

    The creature gave a kind of reverberating whine somewhere between a demon howl and a dog bark and vanished back inside the book.

    ¡°You keep that fucking thing away from me,¡± I scolded Lydia. ¡°I don¡¯t ever want to see it again.¡±

    Lydia sighed. ¡°He¡¯ll only come out if you call for him, but sometimes he interprets thinking about him as a call for help.¡±

    ¡°So, if I have a nightmare about him, he¡¯ll treat it like a call for help and jump on my fucking bed?¡±

    ¡°Best to try and not think about him. I¡¯ll stop him if I can. Honestly, the best way to keep him out of your bed would be to let him sleep in your bedroom or tell him to guard the front door.¡±

    ¡°So, he can eat the fucking mailman? Or snack on my delivery drones?¡±

    Lydia sighed. ¡°I¡¯m sorry he scares you, but he¡¯s a good boy. You really should try to make friends with him; especially now, in these early days, until you learn to protect yourself.¡±

    My parents had a dog when I was small, a giant German Shepard mix that outweighed me by a good thirty pounds. The dog would jump on me, knock me over, and sit on me, every time I went in the back yard.

    It was just a big, dumb animal having fun, but I hated that fucking dog.

    I let the trash pile up because I was too scared to go in the back yard, until eventually my parents would yell at me and I would have to face the dog, trying to run fast enough to get past him or brace myself enough to stay on my feet. I would thrash and yell for help every time it pinned me, but no one ever came.

    I dreamed about that dog all night and woke up the next morning to find the Guardian sitting by the front door with my shoes in his mouth.

    ¡°Lydia! Are you summoning this fucking thing?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± she said calmly. ¡°You are.¡±

 Chapter 27: A Better Way

    The cover was still warm, and it still felt alive, just like the contract, when I touched Taltorak again the next day. No Guardian popped out this time, so I forced my way past the revulsion and opened it to the first page, a full page of symbols that looked like Arabic? How old was this damned thing?

    I turned a few pages and tried to jump ahead, quickly realizing there was no correlation between the number of pages and the physical properties of this book. It was still a thick book, but the thickness seemed to stay the same no matter how many pages I turned.

    ¡°How am I supposed to learn magic from this thing if I can¡¯t even read it?¡±

    ¡°Start from the back and go forward until you see writing in French. Anson assembled a kind of toolkit for himself: basic attack and defense magic he copied from earlier sections and improved over time. It should be relatively simple to read his instructions and learn what he left for you, once you can read French.¡±

    ¡°And there¡¯s nothing here written in English? My grandfather didn¡¯t leave me anything to work with?¡±

    Lydia looked uncomfortable and then just said, ¡°No. I never saw Jim write in the book.¡±

    I started from the back this time, intent on looking for French words. I expected it to take a while, but the book seemed to turn its own pages for me until I was staring at a precise script, each introducing a set of magic runes that seemed to glow a little bit brighter than the text around them.

    Clearly there were some advantages to working with a haunted book, but it still annoyed me to be struggling with handwriting interpretation in a language I didn¡¯t know.

    ¡°There has got to be an easier way to do this,¡± I grumbled.

    ¡°This is much easier than what previous generations had to do,¡± Lydia said. ¡°Jacob had to start with a Latin toolkit assembled centuries before the book was given to your family. Most of his early casting was devoted to disease prevention, purification magic, and manipulation of inanimate objects. The Roman scholar who assembled the Latin toolkit was quite practical, focused on giving mages basic tools to be useful in everyday life.¡±

    ¡°Wait, purification of what?¡±

    ¡°Ancient apprentices started with simple spells for preserving food, purifying water, repairing objects and cleaning physical bodies. All healing magic starts with purifying the area, and the spells used to purify meat can be easily adapted to clean parasites and ill humors out of human beings. Cleansing spells are much quicker than bathing, but everyone still prefers to immerse themselves in water when they can.¡±

    ¡°I like the idea of starting with practical magic, but that means I have to learn at least two new languages before I can even get started, and one of those languages is dead.¡±

    ¡°Most of your ancestors learned to read and write Latin as part of their early schooling. Jim was the first one in your bloodline who had to learn it as an adult. It was quite a struggle, convincing him to buy books and learn it the hard way. He eventually took some night courses at a local college, but he was a difficult student. He seemed to associate ignorance with virtue, as if every book he read somehow made him less of a man.¡±

    ¡°There has got to be a better way to do this,¡± I repeated, as I paged through old Latin toward the front of the book.

    I had a glimmer of an idea, but it would require an extended conversation with Evan, and if it was possible, surely someone smarter would have done it already.

    * * *

    I started with the most basic test I could think of. I opened the book wide, centered a tiny camera over it, and tried to take a picture. The result was completely washed out, like the book itself was glowing with a blinding white light.

    I fiddled with the contrast for an hour, but even with the background adjusted, the runes were a blurred, incomprehensible mess, even when I could make them out against the paper. The paper wasn¡¯t actually paper, of course. It felt warm and pliable. God help me, it was even a little moist, like I was turning pages made from living skin.

    I tried every camera I had in the apartment and had no better luck. Nothing from my collection of old phones could improve it. The floating camera I used for video calls could render the edges of the book in fantastic resolution, but capturing the pages and runes was like trying to take a picture of the sun. But you can take a picture of the sun, if you use the right filter. Could I find a visual filter for magic?

    I was in way over my head here, so I assembled a list of questions and made an appointment to talk with Evan Coleridge. I told him I had some technical questions about how magical knowledge was written and passed down and he interpreted my curiosity as a good sign.

    I met him in his office and asked him to take out his tantalum box filled with spell cards. I opened it, pulled out a card at random, Restoring Material Integrity, and put it back.

    ¡°Evan, what would happen if I put a light and a camera in this box and closed the lid? You said the tantalum blocks out magic, so would the runes show up in a photograph like any other writing?¡±

    ¡°It would look that way to a mundane observer,¡± Evan said. ¡°But what we see as runes of magic are really just the two-dimensional surfaces of symbols that reach into fourth and fifth-dimensional space. That¡¯s why they must be copied by hand, because only mages have the right brain chemistry to perceive and duplicate the symbols behind the symbols.¡±

    ¡°There is a magic rune that looks like an elongated letter R. Any child could make this symbol and put it on a piece of paper, and it would just be a simple two-dimensional shape with no magical properties. But this is just the surface representation of a full Rhion rune. The actual rune is transferred by a mental process as you inscribe it on the paper. Your hand makes the shape you see on the card while your mind is transferring the rest of it unconsciously - filling in the shape behind the shape.¡±

    ¡°But you said Ben Franklin made a magical printing press. Isn¡¯t that just a series of two-dimensional shapes?¡±

    ¡°Franklin himself imbued those shapes with magic as he was carving and molding them. Franklin could print the runes of a spell on normal paper, but a mundane observer would only see the two-dimensional images. Mundanes can copy those two-dimensional shapes all day, but they can¡¯t duplicate the shapes behind the shapes, so they can¡¯t cast them, and no other mage could successfully cast from their copies.¡±

    ¡°But Franklin did it, for a little while? His blocks were able to transfer the full shape of a rune onto a piece of paper? He could actually print a spell with them, and cast from the copy?¡±

    ¡°So he claimed,¡± Evan said. ¡°Although this experiment has not been duplicated successfully since. Some scholars suggest, and I am personally quite skeptical of this, that Franklin turned his press into a kind of enchanted item that was connected to his own soul. Thus, it only worked when Franklin himself used the machine, and every mage who was able to cast from one of his printed spells could only do so by making a bond with the soul of the man who carved the blocks. The copies only worked for his apprentices and close friends.

    ¡°Franklin supposedly turned his invention over to the Hellfire Club, and created a ritual so other members could cast from the copies, but those printed spellbooks only worked for members of the club, and the runes would still heat up if they were left out of the vault too long. The history I read said the fire that burned the club down in 1774 was started by an unshielded spellbook that caught fire in the library.¡±

    ¡°But if the press was enchanted¡­ how the fuck do magic items work? I was told you can¡¯t put magic in an inanimate object. They make movies about things like the Holy Grail and Odin¡¯s Spear, and every horror movie starts with some kind of cursed object, but every wizard¡ª sorry, every mage I ever saw on TV said it was impossible.¡±

    ¡°Inanimate objects cannot store magic on their own,¡± Evan said, ¡°but physical objects can be used as a conduit for magic, if that item is connected to a living soul.¡± He paused and corrected himself. ¡°I shouldn¡¯t say living, since ghosts can maintain a connection with items after death, and spirits can permanently bond their souls with items instead of going to Heaven or Hell. This was considered the ultimate punishment for mages who committed horrible crimes - eternal servitude in a bound object.¡±

    ¡°Like the trope in all those fantasy games? Did anybody have a talking magic sword in real life?¡±

    ¡°A soul would have to be very strong to manifest a voice through an inanimate object. Enchanted objects do give off a kind of feeling, and some are even said to manipulate the feelings of humans who touch them, which is why all our museum exhibits are kept behind tantalum glass.

    ¡°Let¡¯s say we found Gungnir tomorrow and you were able to steal it out of its case,¡± Evan explained. ¡°You could feel the power of the Norse spirits inside, maybe even use their power to make yourself braver or stronger while you were holding the weapon, but you are forming a partnership with spirits, drawing magic through a conduit to Asgard, not tapping into magic from the object itself.

    ¡°We believe this is how supernatural abilities worked in the ancient age of heroes. There wasn¡¯t enough magic on Earth to allow free-roaming savants, so all the ancient heroes had a connection with some kind of god or spirit who channeled magic from another plane.

    ¡°Some of them may have been literal gods on Earth, like Hercules, imbued with divine blood that gave him a permanent connection to Olympus, or like Achilles, who had a permanent bond with his mother, the sea nymph Thetis. When we say these heroes were blessed by the gods, we mean it quite literally, as many of them had pets or objects or guardian spirits who imbued them with power from beyond the Earth.¡±

    ¡°Could somebody do the same thing by making a connection to Hell? Could a demon bond with a human and give them access to an infernal power source?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m going to pretend I didn¡¯t hear that question,¡± Evan said smoothly, ¡°and you will never ask that out loud to anyone, ever again.¡±

    So, that was a yes, confirmation that I had the perfect infernal power source sitting in my living room, just waiting for me to¡­ plug in.

    * * *

    ¡°This box blocks magic because it¡¯s made from this metal? Tantalum?¡±

    ¡°Tantalum alloy, yes. Without tantalum blocking the energy, the runes on these cards would heat up and catch fire. Thus, the need to keep them in a shielded box in a shielded safe, and the paper used to make these cards is flame retardant. You could leave one of these cards sitting for days and it would just be a bit warm when you picked it up. We don¡¯t tell students about the grace period, of course, and we expel anyone who is careless with the materials. We¡¯ve had more than one fire in the dorms caused by students who tried to copy spells onto normal paper.¡±

    ¡°So, this tantalum stuff¡­ is there a place I could buy it?¡±

    ¡°Why on Earth would you need to buy tantalum? If you¡¯re planning on conducting some kind of magical experiment, please use one of my labs. Meddling with these forces at home can end with something much worse than fire.¡±

    ¡°Please show me a lab.¡±

    If Newbury Tower had a fancy library full of helpful spirits and magic tomes¡­ that¡¯s not the one he took me through. The tower library was beautiful, with a strong 19th century feel to it, but none of the books were floating, and anything interesting was clearly stored elsewhere.

    The labs were a series of octagonal pods all built around a central room, with secure hallways and honest to god hatches sealing them off from the central hub. Evan said the pods were made from concrete and lined with tantalum plates that kept things contained inside.

    In its natural state, tantalum absorbed magic, but if you flipped a switch on the wall of a lab, you could activate magnets and reverse the process, allowing the plates to release stored magic and make things easier to cast while you were in the room. I remember admiring the elegance of it, allowing the released energy from previous experiments to feed back and help the next person.

    But I wasn¡¯t interested in casting anything. I was there to steal shit.

    I told Evan I was going to practice levitation and convinced him to leave me alone. And just as I was hoping, the closet in the lab included a thick rectangle of tantalum glass. I unscrewed it from its mounting plate and slipped it into my backpack.

    I had to wait until the crowds in the library thinned out, and since I had nothing better to do, I sat on a bench in the testing lab and read about ancient Greek heroes, the history of mage familiars, and the rise of superheroes in the 20th century.

    The birth of Captain Cobalt seemed to mark a turning point in the way magic worked on Earth. Previously, mages and heroes needed some kind of divine connection to another plane to use their powers. Before 1941 or so, there wasn¡¯t enough magic on Earth to imbue people with innate abilities, so everybody had to have a connection with some kind of god or angel. Even legends about Merlin said he was a half-demon who pulled his magic from Hell.

    The Captain was the first to spontaneously manifest superhuman abilities, and the numbers had grown worldwide every year since. There was some evidence that Mystery Men vigilantes from the 1920s had enhanced strength and agility, but Captain Cobalt was the first true superhero.

    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

    He was followed by heroes who became the original Bluestar 1: Tom White with his energy blasts, Sandy Dennis with her mental powers, Jason Steiner, the first superhuman gun guy, and Charles Teller, the only one with a cool hero name: Plato the Juggler, with his ability to conjure geometric shapes out of solid magic.

    This first team was followed by others in New York and Chicago, full of obscure heroes with marginal powers and terrible names, largely forgotten by anyone who didn¡¯t drive by their statues every day.

    The Bluestar program expanded to other major cities over the course of the next few decades, as more people with powers tried to get rich through bank robbery and kidnapping. By 2058, there were hundreds of active heroes nationwide, elevated above thousands of people who could walk through walls or set things on fire on a small scale, or use more impressive powers for just a few minutes at a time.

    Evan said we were living in a kind of silver age for magic, as more and more students flocked to Boston to study. But that influx of mages and witches had made the city a target for demons, and now someone or something was conjuring monsters from the Charles River every other day, like some evil god was determined to provide Bluestar 7 with steady work.

    * * *

    I stayed in the lab until a recorded warning announced fifteen minutes to closing time and proceeded to the part I was actually going to feel guilty about. Stealing a pane of glass from a lab was bad enough, but this would be outright theft, with no way to sugar coat it.

    I needed to sneak into a back room and steal a portable scanner used to digitize big books, and clearly, the term ¡°portable¡± was relative. Newbury Tower was a high-trust environment, full of scholarship students who were allowed free access to just about everything, so it was childishly easy to slip into a scanning room and leave with a backpack full of stolen equipment, rattling gently against my tantalum glass.

    I sent Evan an email as soon as I got home. ¡°I accidentally destroyed a pane of tantalum glass in a practice lab and broke a book scanner when I levitated it by accident. Please bill my student account.¡±

    I was opening myself up to some very awkward questions here, but Captain Cobalt would never steal, so neither would I.

    Evan never said a word.

    * * *

    I got home, set up the scanner, stretched the flexible form of Taltorak to fit the width of it, and took my first shot. The picture was shit, totally washed out. Then I put the tantalum glass on it and tried again.

    The page was still a mess, jumbled and useless. I cussed and threw a screwdriver across the room, yelling to no one in particular, as Lydia sat still as a statue, afraid to draw my anger onto her.

    "The paper¡¯s magic, too," I shouted at her as if it was her fault. "Fuck! The paper¡¯s magic, too!"

    Of course, the paper was magic. The writing should have been brighter than the background, but energy from the vellum was blotting them out. I spent two hours playing with the contrast again, adjusting the height of the scanner, moving the tantalum glass. I ran a thousand image filters, with varying degrees of success.

    Then, just for the hell of it, I flipped the glass over. It made no sense at all, but the damn thing worked. The tantalum glass was polarized, so when I pointed the north end at the wall, the runes popped out, sharp and clear on my wallscreen. I couldn¡¯t understand the language around them, but the runes and the writing were perfect. The ink was charged just enough to contrast with the paper, and the spells were brighter still.

    It took me years to figure out what really happened in that moment, and it was honestly a bit depressing, when I realized nobody else could duplicate my experiment. I thought I had done something brilliant with the polarized glass, but I had not actually invented a scientific process for scanning magic runes into a computer.

    The runes cleared up because after hours of touching it, my soul had bonded with the book, and the spirits inside Taltorak had finally figured out what I was trying to do. I could still claim a world record for what I pulled off that day, but it wasn¡¯t what I had hoped for. I hadn¡¯t made a breakthrough in scanning runes, but I was the first mage to ever form a magical bond with a data file, all because I was too lazy to learn Latin.

    * * *

    Once I had a clear picture, the rest was easy, relatively. I bolted the glass onto the scanner, got the camera in position and set the reader arm to turn the pages, one after the other.

    It was barely ten o¡¯clock, but the sun was down, and my eyes were burning. I set up my capture routine and told Jeeves to wake me if it jammed.

    Lydia stopped me as I started down the hall. ¡°Timothy, you¡¯re supposed to be learning that book.¡±

    I yawned wide and scratched my ass. ¡°I¡¯ve been working on the book all day. Hard part¡¯s over. I¡¯m goin¡¯ to bed.¡±

    * * *

    The scanning process took the better part of a week. I just had to check the results every few hours to make sure the pages were going in. Taltorak was so big, it kept throwing the arm off, so I had to bolt the reader to the table I was using. Even then, the contrast was a little off, but I could fix that with software.

    Eventually, the reader buzzed, and Jeeves said, ¡°Scan complete.¡±

    Taltorak was turned to its back cover, crooked from where the reader tried to pick it up. I closed it and handed it back to Lydia. She started to complain, but she didn¡¯t quite understand what was going on. The book vanished and I sat down at my desk.

    ¡°Okay Jeeves, dump all scanned images into a folder called Taltorak. Encrypt it with my long password and require a physical confirmation - thumbprint if I¡¯m at home, retina scan if I¡¯m wearing contacts. No one gets in that folder but me, got it?¡±

    Jeeves said, ¡°Yes, sir.¡±

    ¡°Number the images and store them in a subfolder called ¡®Raw¡¯, one image per page.¡±

    Jeeves said, ¡°Done.¡±

    ¡°Convert them to text and combine them into one file.¡±

    ¡°Error. I don¡¯t recognize some of these characters.¡±

    ¡°Treat the unknown characters as part of a new language. Build a font library and check the unknown characters against every language database you can find. Classify everything you can and leave the rest in that font.¡±

    Jeeves said, ¡°Three of the language libraries are demanding fees in advance.¡±

    ¡°Pay them. Anything under $200.¡±

    ¡°Done.¡±

    ¡°Compile the converted text into a document called ¡®Taltorak Original¡¯. Include images and unknown characters. Match sizes to the original layout.¡±

    ¡°Done.¡±

    ¡°Analyze this document.¡±

    ¡°This document is forty-five megabytes in size - 30,687 pages, 7,568,082 words, 34,143,872 characters, 241,574 paragraphs, 648,720 lines.¡±

    I whistled. ¡°Give me a language breakdown.¡±

    ¡°Forty-eight percent New Latin, ten percent Romanian, nine percent Old Latin, eight percent Greek, six percent Hebrew, six percent Unknown, five percent German, three percent French, two percent Italian, two percent Mandarin Chinese, one percent Japanese. Other languages, less than one percent.¡±

    I cussed. ¡°How many characters in that unknown font library?¡±

    ¡°One thousand two hundred and eighty-nine.¡±

    ¡°Could be worse. Display unknown characters.¡±

    My wallscreen lit up like blue fire - an incestuous tangle of runes and symbols. I winced. ¡°Change the color scheme to black on dull white. Highlight unknown characters in blue. Is there anything in this document that looks like an alphabet? Do any of these characters have names?¡±

    ¡°Seventy-two percent of these characters are listed in the first quarter of the document. Pages 1298 through 1791 are laid out like a reference guide.¡±

    ¡°Perfect. Scan the text surrounding these unknown characters. Search for anything that looks like a label. Assign a name to each character based on these results. If you get more than one name per character, add them as alternates. Choose primary by frequency.¡±

    ¡°Done.¡±

    ¡°Look for a character called Halper. H-A-L-P-E-R.¡±

    ¡°Found it, seven hundred and fifty-two times.¡±

    ¡°Search for a character named Alph. A-L-P-H. How many times does that character appear?¡±

    ¡°That character appears 3,912 times.¡±

    I whistled again and slumped over my desk. ¡°Evan said Alph was used at the end of every spell. If this scan is accurate, that means there are almost four thousand spells in this book. That¡¯s insane. This isn¡¯t a spellbook; this is an encyclopedia. It would take a lifetime to learn all this.¡±

    ¡°Several lifetimes, actually,¡± Lydia said. ¡°Your ancestors only learned a fraction of it. Jacob learned more than anyone, but he could only read a few languages. But don¡¯t get discouraged, you don¡¯t have to learn everything at once. Just start with the French.¡±

    Cleaning up Taltorak was tedious work, but I loved it. I spent the next few days troubleshooting bad handwriting and trying to identify obscure languages.

    I thought I was burning up the text, but Lydia glared like an angry teacher, waiting for me to turn in homework. ¡°Timothy, I¡¯ve tried to be patient, but you really must get back to the book.¡±

    ¡°What? I¡¯ve been studying the book all day.¡±

    ¡°No, you¡¯ve been playing with your machines. You haven¡¯t called for the book in days.¡±

    ¡°Playing with my machines? You think I¡¯m surfing porn over here? I¡¯m spending sixteen hours a day on this damn book! The OCR choked on Jacob¡¯s handwriting, and I¡¯ve got a machine in Scotland working on the Gaelic, but the English conversion is at sixty percent.¡±

    Incredulous, Lydia said, ¡°You translated half the book in three days? And how did you accomplish that?¡± She lifted a processor cube with her tail and put her eye to an I/O port. ¡°You have an army of scholars in this little box?¡±

    I snatched the block away from her and put the processor back where it belonged. ¡°You don¡¯t believe me. You really don¡¯t believe me?¡± I should have let it go, but pride got the best of me.

    ¡°Jeeves, pull up the first page of Taltorak, the first page you were able to translate.¡±

    The wallscreen lit up, bathing the room in white and blue. ¡°This was written by a guy named Hegias, first century, I guess? He wrote it in Greek.¡± I read slowly, stumbling over the clumsy translation. ¡°¡®When embarking on research into matters arcane, the student must prepare the room of his flesh and the room of his mind to repel intrusion from beyond. Dark things walk the sky between, and they are drawn to the scent of wisdom. Guard your wiles and your work, or hungry shades will come to you, as they once came to me.¡¯ Is that right?¡±

    Lydia was very quiet. Not her usual knowing silence, but an honest flat-footed moment of dead air. I didn¡¯t pay enough attention to that when it happened. She walked over and touched the giant projected screen, tracing the characters, looking back at me with awe or fear.

    ¡°Well? Is that right? Did I get the Greek right?¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°I¡¯ve heard those words before,¡± still caressing the wallscreen. ¡°Where did you find this?¡±

    ¡°What do you mean, where did I find this? I got it from your book, introducing the Greek part of Taltorak.¡±

    She came around behind my desk and looked back and forth between me and the screen, staring at the scanner I had never bothered to put away. ¡°You put Taltorak in the machine.¡±

    I nodded.

    Lydia flinched and put her hand to her mouth. There were certain bedrocks in her universe, and I had just smashed one of them to bits. ¡°Timothy this is¡­ this is very dangerous. When you manipulate the book in this form, I can¡¯t observe it, I can¡¯t protect it¡ª¡±

    ¡°And you can¡¯t tell what I¡¯m working on.¡±

    Lydia said nothing.

    ¡°That¡¯s what bugs you, right? You can¡¯t tell what I¡¯m studying. Maybe I¡¯m not learning fast enough. Or maybe I¡¯m learning too much.¡±

    ¡°I have to consult with my Master.¡±

    ¡°Your Master can¡¯t do shit,¡± I said. ¡°I¡¯m obeying the letter of my contract. He told me to learn the book, so I¡¯m learning the book - the best way I know how.¡±

    * * *

    I thought all the unknown characters would be magic runes, but when I started to look at the book page by page, the first thousand pages were spells, paired with descriptive text that matched no known language at all.

    That script didn¡¯t have the simple, blocky look of magic runes; it had sweeping curves and dashes in it, almost like Arabic. I spent an hour manually searching language libraries, until I finally gave up and displayed them for Lydia.

    ¡°Do you know what language this is?¡±

    ¡°Enochian,¡± she said immediately. ¡°And could you¡­¡± she looked distinctly uncomfortable. ¡°Could you take it away, please?¡±

    I tilted the window so only I could see it and asked, ¡°What¡¯s Enochian?¡±

    ¡°Angel script. I would be very surprised if your machines can read it. It¡¯s only been taught to a few hundred humans, in the entire course of history. The Latin toolkit in Taltorak was made by a scholar who was taught Enochian but ended up in Hell.¡±

    ¡°But why would there be angel script in the first pages of a demon boo¡ª It¡¯s not a demon book. Holy shit, it¡¯s not a demon book. Lydia, what the hell is this thing?¡±

    Lydia said nothing.

    ¡°Lydia, is this an angel book? Did angels and demons make this thing together?¡±

    She just stared at me.

    ¡°That silent treatment. That¡¯s what you do when you¡¯re not allowed to answer. Jeeves, isolate unknown characters in the first thousand pages of Taltorak. Is there a variation in brightness in those fonts?¡±

    ¡°Yes, sir. Ninety unknown characters are twenty percent darker than the others.¡±

    ¡°Make a separate library for those ninety characters and call it Enochian. Change those to the default white on black background, while leaving the spell runes in blue.¡±

    The Enochian characters turned black, leaving the spells standing out in blue between paragraphs of black text. The shapes were wildly different, like sets of Norse runes alternating with Arabic text.

    ¡°You said the Latin toolkit was written by a guy who could read angel script?¡±

    Lydia couldn¡¯t answer my questions, but fortunately, I didn¡¯t need her.

    The Latin toolkit in Taltorak started with a story about the book¡¯s origin, supposedly translated from Enochian. It said the book was created by angels and given to the first men who could use magic. That¡¯s why all the spells in the toolkit were harmless or benevolent.

    The angels weren¡¯t teaching men how to cast lightning bolts and fireballs, they were teaching them to use magic for healing, agriculture, and sanitation. The toolkit even had basic utility magic, like changing wood to metal or freezing water into ice.

    The material transformation stuff immediately reminded me of Arthur Walton, and the tricks he used to build bridges with magic, shaping the initial forms from water, freezing them to ice, and eventually transmuting the ice to wood and steel.

    But if this kind of construction was angel magic, did that mean¡­? Was the last living archmage protected by an angel covenant? Was Arthur actively working with Gabriel? Was he the only man in the world who could read Enochian?

    All great questions that I was too shy to ask, since I didn¡¯t have an easy way to get a message to the most famous wizard on Earth. If he wasn¡¯t taking calls from Bluestar teams or the DMA anymore, there was no way he would respond to me.

    The guy who wrote the Latin toolkit didn¡¯t sign his name to it. I guess most of these guys didn¡¯t want to put their names in a book that proved they had been damned to Hell, but he went into the history of Taltorak and told me all my assumptions had been wrong.

    Taltorak was not created by demons. It was created by angels and stolen by demons. The first version had actually been a kind of angel trophy.

    I read the next sentence three times and said, ¡°This book isn¡¯t made from human skin, it¡¯s made from demon skin.¡± I looked at Lydia. ¡°So, I don¡¯t need to be afraid of this thing¡­ but maybe you do.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°This book is way older than the Bible,¡± I said, scrolling at random. ¡°After the angel script, it looks like Egyptian hieroglyphics. Big chunk in Greek. And it looks like most of these guys had supernatural creatures as pets or partners. I know what a lamia is, but what the fuck is a qar?nah? How desperate would you have to be to fuck a terrifying goat chick with one leg?¡± I flipped my display around to show Lydia. ¡°Where would you even put a vagina on this thing?¡±

    Lydia just glared at me until I turned it back.

    ¡°I think most of these things presented as familiars and spirit animals to start with. The sexual component came later, as the relationship between wizards and gods turned darker and more coercive. I guess the gods learned they could get a lot more out of their champions if they made their companions look like women.

    ¡°In these early passages, it sounds like consigning your spirit to this book was more of a reward than a punishment - an opportunity to learn magic from all these scholars who came before you, recording your knowledge and passing it on to other great wizards who hadn¡¯t even been born yet. They make Taltorak sound like a kind of spiritual switching station that wizards could use to visit other planes after death. It didn¡¯t turn ugly until the demons stole it and closed off connections between the book and all these other realms.

    ¡°This guy says angels created this thing to teach men magic, back before they were even called angels. Then everybody responsible for it was confined to Hell when Harut and Marut fell. Sounds like there was a third one who taught magic to early men, but repented so he didn¡¯t fall. Doesn¡¯t record his name here.¡±

    His name was Azael, and he sits in judgment of any soul that dies tainted by this book.

    ¡°There were entire wars fought over this book in Hell, until it finally ended up with Asmodeus,¡± Lydia visibly twitched when I said the name, but I kept going. ¡°Looks like he challenged Satan for the throne and got his ass kicked, imprisoned or destroyed. His princes looted his palace and fled all over Hell. Jacob says the guy with Taltorak made it all the way up to the first layer, until Baalphezar defeated him and took it. That was an amazing stroke of luck for your Master. The greatest magical artifact in history basically fell into his lap.¡±

    ¡°And I guess he made the most of it,¡± I shrugged. ¡°Wrapping it up in a contract, giving it to my family, assigning you to manage them. Did Baalphezar come up with this on his own?¡±

    ¡°Most of it,¡± Lydia said. ¡°Although I believe some of it came from a neighboring prince named Psongor Ylande. They were friends then.¡±

    ¡°But they¡¯re not friends anymore?¡±

    Lydia said nothing.

    ¡°That silent treatment again.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll never lie to you,¡± Lydia said, ¡°but there are some questions I am not allowed to answer.¡±

 Chapter 28: Heist

    I was still at my desk fiddling with the book when I got a call from Judy.

    I should have let it go to voicemail, but I couldn¡¯t resist. ¡°Hey, where¡¯s the fire?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry to bother you, but I¡¯m in trouble, and I don¡¯t know who else to call.¡±

    I remember thinking this is one of the most annoying things about the real world. No matter how good your exit line is, no relationship is ever completely over, and no one in your life is ever completely gone. Lives go on and lives intersect in ways you can¡¯t possibly predict.

    My first impulse was to tease her or drag this out, but it had been a long time since I¡¯d seen Judy this scared, leaning into her bedroom wallscreen and whispering like she was afraid someone would overhear.

    ¡°Okay,¡± I said. ¡°What¡¯s the problem?¡±

    ¡°I made a huge mistake, and I need a computer guy. You¡¯re the only one I trust.¡±

    ¡°Oh, so you¡¯re just calling for tech support? You need me to change your wallpaper or something?¡±

    ¡°Please, Tim, this is serious. I could lose my job.¡±

    I sighed. ¡°What did you do?¡±

    ¡°You remember I wear two phones on my wrist? The pink one is personal, and the blue one is for work. Well, I took some very personal photos from my POV the other day, while I was logged in to the wrong one.¡±

    ¡°When you say personal, you mean¡­ personal? Like the ones you used to send me?¡±

    ¡°Yes,¡± she admitted, blushing. ¡°And then Brian sent one back.¡±

    ¡°So, you took naked pictures of you and Brian on your work phone?¡± I wasn¡¯t trying to be mean, but I couldn¡¯t help it. I started laughing so hard I had to turn away from my camera.

    ¡°Stop laughing at me!¡± Judy snapped. ¡°It could happen to anybody!¡±

    ¡°It could happen to anybody who takes the nude filter off their POV, and to anyone who forgets to take their work phone off, and to anyone who forgets to put a DND lock on their device after work hours, like I told you to do a hundred times. I guess it could happen to anybody like that!¡±

    ¡°Are you just gonna sit there and say I told you so, or are you actually going to help?¡±

    ¡°Of course I¡¯m going to help,¡± I laughed. ¡°If we¡¯re lucky, this could be a simple fix. When you took the pictures, were you logged directly into a cloud app, or did they go to local storage first?¡±

    ¡°Whatever the default is,¡± she said. ¡°I think they go to local storage first and sync after.¡±

    ¡°Okay,¡± I said. ¡°The cloud part is easier than you think. Just pull up your work account and send the photos to Secure Trash. All the big corporate services have hard wipe protocols that should scrub them completely, unless you¡¯ve pissed off an IT guy who holds a grudge. Then just do the same thing with the local copies. Secure Trash, not Recycle.¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t delete the local copies; I don¡¯t have the phone. We have a department security audit Monday morning, so I left my phone on the director¡¯s desk when I left tonight. I didn¡¯t realize what was on it until I got home.¡±

    ¡°But you¡¯ve got codes to the building, right? You can just go in and get it back?¡±

    ¡°My phone is my key. The door code won¡¯t work unless I¡¯ve got the phone on me, and the phone is locked inside. I¡¯m hoping your phone can still get you in.¡±

    I started laughing again and had to make myself stop. ¡°Alright, my job is over but I¡¯m still on the hook for maintenance. That should be enough to get me in. What am I looking for? Is it the same phone you had last time I saw you? Datacore G5 on the sky-blue strap?¡±

    She nodded.

    ¡°And you¡¯re sure it¡¯s still on his desk? My key might get me in, but there¡¯s no way I could hack a safe.¡±

    ¡°I think so,¡± she said. ¡°He left early today and should be gone all weekend.¡±

    ¡°Okay,¡± I said, only coming off mildly annoyed. ¡°I¡¯ll head over there and see what I can do; hopefully without breaking any laws.¡±

    ¡°Thank you,¡± Judy said, sounding sincere and humble. ¡°I knew I could count on you.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°If you¡¯re going to the museum, I need to come with you,¡± Lydia said.

    ¡°I can think of about twenty reasons why that¡¯s a bad idea,¡± I said. ¡°Why would you even want to come?¡±

    ¡°That museum is dangerous now. Hundreds of valuable objects that could be attracting demons or any number of other things.¡±

    ¡°I thought it was protected. It¡¯s supposed to be the best security inside a whole secure campus.¡±

    ¡°It was,¡± Lydia said, ¡°until I spent six months corrupting those wards.¡±

    ¡°Wait, the museum is wide open to demons now, because of you?¡±

    ¡°Because of us,¡± Lydia corrected. ¡°I had to break the wards to let your book out.¡±

    ¡°And they haven¡¯t been repaired?¡±

    ¡°It would take a brilliant wizard to even detect what I¡¯ve done. Repairing them would take an archmage.¡±

    ¡°And we¡¯ve only got one of those. But even with the wards down, even with you looking human, I can¡¯t just walk in there with you. I¡¯ll have to spoof credentials just to get myself in.¡±

    ¡°I told you, I¡¯m very good at hiding. I won¡¯t even be in the same physical plane with you unless there¡¯s a direct threat. You do what you need to do, and I¡¯ll just tag along in the gray, making sure no other demons interfere.¡±

    I didn¡¯t like it, but I agreed, shamed by the sudden feeling of warmth and confidence that surged through me, knowing I would have her by my side.

    * * *

    I had technician-level access to museum systems, so it was trivially easy to make the doors log me as a maintenance bot and take the cameras offline with a firmware update. I was pretty sure I could get away with this, even if they did have security guys coming in on Monday. And it¡¯s not like I¡¯d be stealing anything. I could just pop in, grab the phone, delete the photos, and put it back. In and out, maybe fifteen minutes.

    Stolen story; please report.

    Something about being back in that big open room, back under the dim lights of an empty public space, triggered an irrational surge of fear in me, remembering being sliced open and pinned against a wall by a thing that was now fetching my shoes.

    I glanced over my shoulder and saw Lydia floating in astral space, hopefully invisible to everyone but me. I was annoyed by how quickly just looking at her calmed me down, banishing the memory of one monster by taking comfort in another.

    I made it to the director¡¯s office and was stopped dead by the one thing I couldn¡¯t hack - a manual lock on his door. Who uses a manual lock these days? The director of a museum for magical artifacts, of course. I didn¡¯t remember him having a physical lock before, but maybe he¡¯d installed it after the attack.

    He hadn¡¯t even closed the blinds on his office window. I could look inside and see Judy¡¯s phone sitting there on his giant antique desk, with the projection bump centered on its pale blue strap.

    I could have leaned over and grabbed it, if I hadn¡¯t had a window in the way. Could I risk breaking a window? Could I make it look like a conventional break-in and just not take anything?

    ¡°Timothy, what do you need?¡± I heard Lydia¡¯s voice like it was coming through earbuds again, perfectly clear, even if it was just in my head.

    ¡°It¡¯s got an old-fashioned conventional lock,¡± I whispered back, ¡°but maybe I can make the maintenance bot unlock it while it¡¯s doing its rounds¡­¡±

    ¡°Timothy,¡± Lydia repeated, somehow enunciating each word, ¡°tell me what you need.¡±

    I sighed, slowly realizing what I was about to do. ¡°I need you to go inside that office and get Judy¡¯s phone off that desk, without leaving any trace that you were there.¡±

    ¡°That should be simple,¡± she said. ¡°Describe the object you need and point to it.¡±

    ¡°A modern phone is like a watch band with a tiny silver disk in the middle. Judy¡¯s phone is that baby blue strap on the edge of that wooden desk,¡± I pointed. ¡°But Lydia, you shouldn¡¯t just pop in there. The motion or your body weight could set something off.¡±

    ¡°I won¡¯t be using my whole body. The only part of me that will enter physical space is my hand, in the fraction of a second it will take to grab the object, and even that will be invisible to most observers. You¡¯ve already disabled the cameras?¡±

    I confirmed that and said, ¡°Yes.¡±

    ¡°Very well,¡± she said. ¡°Just relax.¡±

    I was staring at the phone, looking exactly where I expected her hand to pop in, but I still missed it. The phone strap just vanished. She was gone and back so fast, I didn¡¯t even have time to worry. One second, she was hovering beside me as a kind of washed out ghost, then she flickered for a moment and was back, dropping Judy¡¯s watch in my hand.

    I gaped at her. ¡°You can do that any time you want, for any room you want to get into?¡±

    ¡°I suspect more of them are shielded with magic these days, but I can enter any space that¡¯s not warded against astral travelers.¡±

    ¡°Could you rob a bank for me?¡± It was supposed to be a joke, but my tone came out way too serious.

    ¡°Probably not,¡± she said. ¡°There was a period in the 20th century when magic levels were so low, most institutions didn¡¯t bother with eldritch defenses. But now, with the level of background magic rising exponentially across the Earth? Surely your corporate overlords have found ways to protect the money.¡±

    ¡°The wards on this building could have held off an army of supernatural creatures before I weakened them,¡± Lydia said. ¡°It took me months to coordinate with my Master¡¯s Inquisitor and relay his instructions to my pawns. Even then, I had to have help from the inside. I wouldn¡¯t advise you to rob a bank, but if you could master protective magic like the mage who drew these wards, I suspect you could earn all the material wealth you need, just working a few days a month.¡±

    That was one of Lydia¡¯s most frustrating traits, constantly assuming the sale, planning for the day when I would be happily murdering for her Master, lounging by the pool in my mansion while I waited for his next kill order.

    ¡°It¡¯s a little disturbing,¡± I said, ¡°realizing how easy it would be to steal shit with you.¡±

    Lydia shrugged. ¡°Lots of new technology now, but still easier than the Watergate.¡±

    * * *

    I was wasting time chatting with Lydia because I really didn¡¯t want to do this next part.

    I grabbed Judy¡¯s phone and logged in. It was weirdly intimate, realizing she had left my biometrics in her access list, while I had immediately removed her from mine.

    ¡°Fuck,¡± I said silently. ¡°I have to look at her gallery to do this, and the thumbnails are too fucking small.¡± I looked at Lydia¡¯s ghostly form. ¡°I really wish you could do this for me, but I can¡¯t risk you turning physical, just to protect my feelings. I guess I¡¯ll finally get to see if Judy had that mole removed.¡±

    I may be dead. I may be a prisoner. I may be roasting in Hell next week, but if this ever goes public, I want credit for this. I watched this whole sequence again in Azael¡¯s mirror, and I will remember this day for as long as I burn - the day I forced an angel to look at naked pictures of my ex-girlfriend.

    There were eight pictures that Judy obviously wanted me to delete, a rapidly escalating series of nudes that started with her lifting her shirt up in front of a mirror, then showing off parts of her body that she had clearly worked very hard on, until we finally got to the end of the road.

    ¡°Wow, she really is hot for this guy,¡± I projected to Lydia. ¡°She never shaved that close for me.¡± I had to cough and turn away because there was only one photo left, and there was only one thing it could be.

    ¡°Well, that was a lovely trip down memory lane. Let¡¯s see what Brian¡¯s packing.¡± I threw Judy¡¯s vagina in the trash and brought up Brian¡¯s dick. ¡°God damn,¡± I said to Lydia. ¡°That¡¯s even worse than I imagined. I hope this thing fits in the trash.¡±

    I double checked the last week of photos to make sure I got everything and handed the strap back to Lydia. ¡°Be sure to put this back exactly the way it was on the desk.¡±

    ¡°Yes,¡± Lydia said. ¡°I have done this before.¡±

    She did her magic trick again and the phone appeared back on the director¡¯s desk. I left as quickly as I could without rushing, hoping no one would try to rob the museum while I had the cameras off.

    * * *

    I left the museum smiling, laughing, and giggling like a kid, exhilarated by the thrill of a successful heist. If Lydia had been physical, I would have kissed her right there. I was still laughing when I got back home, spinning around in my desk chair.

    ¡°You are taking this remarkably well,¡± Lydia said, shimmering back into solid form.

    ¡°Huh?¡± I said, briefly confused. ¡°Oh yeah, I guess I am. Shit, I really am. I should be crying on the floor right now, but this whole thing is just a big joke to me.¡±

    ¡°You were ready to have me kill these people two weeks ago. What changed?¡±

    I sighed. ¡°You flipped my switch.¡±

    ¡°What does that mean?¡±

    ¡°Every man has a switch in his head, an up/down toggle switch that says GIRLFRIEND or NO GIRLFRIEND. When the switch is on NO GIRLFRIEND, every little thing feels like the end of the world. You miss something or forget something or have a bad day at work, and it gets really easy to spiral down.

    ¡°You start thinking about the little thing you fucked up, and in a couple hours you¡¯ve worked your way down to ¡®no one loves me¡¯ and ¡®no one will ever love me.¡¯

    ¡°It¡¯s not true, of course. You can sit there and tell yourself it¡¯s not true all night, but that¡¯s how it feels. It becomes super easy to get jealous or get your feelings hurt or lash out at happy couples who have what you don¡¯t. Or you can go totally off the rails and stalk your ex in the middle of the night.

    ¡°But it goes the other way, too. When the switch is in the GIRLFRIEND position, you can have the same bad day, but it¡¯s not so bad, because you know you¡¯ve got somebody waiting for you. You know somebody¡¯s gonna be on your side, even if she¡¯s telling you something you don¡¯t want to hear.

    ¡°This night could have been a deadly blow to my ego, but I¡¯m over here laughing my ass off, because something in my animal brain thinks I have a girlfriend. And that¡¯s a problem, because I¡¯m not feeling happy, healthy, and well-adjusted because I¡¯m in a new relationship with a nice girl. I¡¯m feeling happy, healthy, and well-adjusted because your succubus shit is working, and that means every victory we share together brings me one step closer to losing everything.¡±

    Suddenly deflated, I walked back to the bedroom and started taking clothes off.

    Lydia followed and stopped at my bedroom door. ¡°Does this mean we¡¯re taking a step back? Do you want me out of your bedroom? Do you want me out of your bed?¡±

    I couldn¡¯t answer. I just stared at her, silent and paralyzed.

    ¡°Timothy, I¡¯ll do whatever you say, but you have to say it.¡±

    I couldn¡¯t look at her. I bowed my head and closed my eyes, trying to keep my breathing under control. She started to turn away and I said, ¡°No. Don¡¯t leave. Please don¡¯t leave. I didn¡¯t know I was having nightmares until they stopped.

    ¡°Everybody who tries to live here gets freaked out by nightmares, but I just thought they were dreams. I dream about guys from the compound: Mister Braddock and Mister Patton and Mister Vaughan, mostly. We sit around the fire, and I tell them stuff I¡¯m worried about. Their mouths move, but I can never hear what they say back. I never thought of them as nightmares because I was just happy to see them again.

    ¡°I knew I had trouble sleeping, but I thought that was just a shitty diet or something, until that first night you laid down with me and every muscle in my body just relaxed. Was that a demon thing? Are you using some kind of magic to help me sleep?¡±

    Lydia whispered, ¡°No.¡±

    ¡°Well, whatever it is, I can¡¯t live without it now. Just please, stay on your side.¡±

 Chapter 29: Guess

    Nergal effectively depopulated a historic swath of Boston called Back Bay East, just east of Boston University. The DMA never released the details of how an ancient Mesopotamian death god spawned in Boston Common, knocked over a souvenir stand, and deliberately smashed a statue of Edward Everett Hale.

    I don¡¯t know what kind of beef a Mesopotamian god could have with a Unitarian minister from the 1800s, but Nergal took extra time to smash this statue, while he left a number of others standing.

    He charged across the suspension bridge and politely stepped around the statue of George Washington, ignored the monument to ether, carefully avoided the statue of Alexander Hamilton, and stomped on any modern buildings in his way.

    Later, they traced his path and saw he was deliberately wrecking corporate housing and office buildings that had been built in the last century, zigzagging through ten city blocks until he was finally stopped by Bluestar 7 at Madison Tower, right before he hit Storrow Drive. Some people think he was summoned to destroy the Houdini Plaque on the Harvard Bridge, but he never made it that far.

    Most people think Nergal destroyed the Harvard Bridge, but that was actually destroyed in a magical backlash from whatever spell Arthur Walton used to take the god down. Fifteen years later, no one had bothered to replace it. They just cleared away the rubble and abandoned the whole area. The Houdini Plaque was still there in 2058, referring to a bridge that no longer exists.

    My apartment building was a converted fraternity house by the Interstate, just barely outside the Zone, close enough that I still had to cross the street to get anything dropped.

    Newbury Tower had been built right on the river, and Harvey Madison built his tower to be taller than the magic school that was less than a mile to the west.

    In his diary, Madison said he built his tower as a weapon to destroy Newbury Tower and kill all the mages who refused to let him in, but the crazy bastard died before he could figure it out.

    Evan¡¯s rift had been fenced in to the east of a historic old church that had burned down in 2048, back when gangs were still fighting turf wars in the Zone.

    Now, fifteen years after his death, Nergal¡¯s miasma covered most of Back Bay East, from Massachusetts Avenue to the Public Garden. The military set up zombie containment at an old recycling center during the attack, and most of the old fortifications were still there.

    When you live in a world with a lot of demon attacks, you end up with a lot of emergency shelters. The federal government had built a small shelter under this recycling center in 2023, when giant monsters started spawning in the river, about where the Eliot Bridge used to be.

    So, immediately after the Nergal attack, the military turned the area into a sprawling half-assed military base, starting with a concrete fortification built over the hatch to the old shelter. But the miasma rolled in a week or so after Nergal¡¯s death, and they had to abandon the area. The result was Crazy Henry¡¯s shooting range, a steel and concrete structure that ended up with three and a half walls.

    Crazy Henry was a homeless veteran who lived there for a while before he disappeared. I always held out hope that he just left on his own and finally found a proper place to live, but you don¡¯t seek out a dead god of death to get that kind of help.

    There were still chairs, tables, and lockers full of old military equipment in the structure, so I went there sometimes, when I needed a slightly warmer place to sit. Three walls were still better than no walls at all.

    I wandered over to Crazy Henry¡¯s a few days after our battle with Titus, nursing a stray idea, now that my wounds had more or less healed.

    The shelter had a flat concrete roof with a hatch and an improvised ladder leading down, and it wasn¡¯t quite as high as the roof on a house would be. I looted half a dozen trampolines from an old sporting goods store and set them up around the roof, figuring that even if my levitation failed, I could land on something soft, and maybe even bounce back up.

    I levitated up to the roof easily enough, but looking down, even with an acre of trampolines below me, I froze up, and was tempted to just take the ladder down. Something about the magic of the rift had overpowered my fear of heights at the time, but now it was just me, alone with gravity.

    I wrapped the levitation spell around myself, and stepped off the roof, hovering just like I thought I would¡­ until I looked down, panicked, and dropped like a rock, as the magic drained out of me. I hit a trampoline from way too high, bounced off, and landed face-down in the dirt, hard enough to knock the wind out of me.

    Learning my lesson, I rearranged my trampolines, and tried again. This time, I hovered a little longer and was able to control my descent. I repeated the experiment twenty times that afternoon, amazed to see that while my physical body was exhausted, I still had plenty of magic in the tank, and could have probably held myself up for hours, if I had to.

    * * *

    I came home dirty but uninjured, and took a long shower, alternating hot and cold to ease a collection of sore muscles.

    Lydia was hovering in her usual spot as I sat down, but she had fully committed to the human suit by this time. I hadn¡¯t seen horns or a tail for days. She was changing clothes seemingly at random, copying outfits she saw in catalogs, or from watching live cam feeds of students walking around at BU.

    That day she was wearing a t-shirt with writing on it, but the writing was blurry and obscured. At first, I thought it was a design statement, then I realized Lydia was copying directly from camera images, and the girl wearing this had been too far away for Lydia to read what her shirt said. My laughter slowly trailed off, as I realized how bizarre this was, and how quickly an error like this could give us away.

    I was about to tease Lydia about her mistake when Jeeves popped up an alert. ¡°A news clip has been posted that features someone from your contacts. Should I play the video?¡±

    I said yes and immediately saw Denise Hardy, standing with an older man who was trying very hard to not look rich. I recognized his face but couldn¡¯t place it. Then I turned the sound on and heard a news anchor do her introduction, ¡°Boston¡¯s most eligible bachelor was seen out on the town last night with Boston¡¯s most eligible witch. Billionaire philanthropist and environmental crusader Mitchell Snyder was seen with Denise Hardy, the daughter of retired super-hottie Cecilia Hardy.¡±

    The video cut to a pair of gossip guys sitting at a table, a bald one and an ugly one.

    ¡°It¡¯s been a while since we¡¯ve seen Denise,¡± the ugly one said. ¡°After blazing her way through the Bluestar convention circuit in her teens, she started her career as a supervised healer at Boston Medical Center while she was still in school. She earned a degree from Newbury Tower and was recruited by Bluestar 7, before abruptly leaving the team after less than a year.¡±

    Footage of a very young, very hot Denise in Bluestar blue scrubs, posing with a team of doctors and nurses in an emergency room.

    ¡°B7 had a lot of trouble keeping mages before Danny Carter joined the team,¡± the bald one said. ¡°Rumor is, Jade Katt doesn¡¯t like witches, especially famous, photogenic witches who steal her camera time. Hardy ¡®retired¡¯ early and went back to live with her mother. She¡¯s still on call with the team, but now they only use her for animal control.¡±

    Footage of a slightly older Denise, in a filthy Bluestar 7 jacket, trying to coax some kind of monster out of a shopping mall. The giant bird was taller than a man, and it was pissed, but Denise calmed it somehow and led it to a giant hovering cage. The bird squawked in outrage as the cage was hauled away.

    ¡°Denise has been staying out of the spotlight recently,¡± the bald one said, ¡°but our photographer caught her at a ¡®business meeting¡¯ at Spoke and got this from Mitch¡­¡±

    The camera switched back to a dignified man in his forties, talking with the easy authority of a man who could buy the restaurant he¡¯s sitting in.

    ¡°Miss Hardy is helping me with a project. Denise and her family have been protectors of the natural world for centuries, so I can think of no one better for this undertaking. You¡¯ll see a formal announcement next week, but in short, with help from Denise and her mother, I think I¡¯ve found a way to use magic to restore parts of the Congo Basin. Our old governments started their wars with no regard for the Earth they were scorching, but my company is going to change all that, and restore some of the most beautiful, and some of the most valuable land on the planet.¡±

    ¡°Yeah,¡± the bald one laughed. ¡°Mitch has been talking like this for a decade, but none of his plans have worked, so he finally got desperate enough to try magic. Or maybe this was a little more than a business meeting¡­¡±

    The camera switched to a zoomed image of Mitch and Denise in his limo. Mitch had forgotten to put his privacy shields up, so the photographer got a full view of the two of them kissing and groping each other like teenagers. Or maybe he hadn¡¯t forgotten and had called the photographers himself. Obviously, whatever line of bullshit this guy was using, Denise was all in.

    ¡°A fucking billionaire, really?¡± I sighed. ¡°She told me people had heard of her, but if I¡¯d known she was this famous, I would¡¯ve been too scared to talk to her at all.¡± Red-faced, I jumped to my feet and kicked my chair over. ¡°God dammit!¡± I shouted. ¡°I had that girl in my arms. The most beautiful, most amazing girl I ever met, and I just walked away. What the fuck is wrong with me?¡±

    Of course, I was looking at the thing that was wrong with me, but Lydia was very carefully not saying anything, trying to make herself small as I raged.

    ¡°Denise gave me the chance of a lifetime, and I just¡­¡± I gritted my teeth and put my head down as the magic surged in, making my aura flare.

    Lydia said my name in a soft warning tone, but I waved her off.

    ¡°I got it!¡± I shouted. ¡°I got it. I just need to take a walk.¡±

    I stormed out of the apartment and jogged to Henry¡¯s range. I gave a little hop and landed on the roof. In my memory, I got a boost from a trampoline for this jump, but when I watched it in Azael¡¯s mirror, I just jumped from the ground and landed on the roof like it was nothing at all.

    I sat on the dirty concrete and deliberately did not cry. My emotions were surging, alternating angry and sad, and the magic was surging with them, in and out with each breath. I knew I couldn¡¯t really hurt anybody in the middle of an abandoned junk yard, but I had to learn to control this. If I lost my shit and surged on the street, I could really hurt somebody.

    The anger faded, and now I was just sad. Lonely, empty, and sad. I didn¡¯t realize how much I had been counting on Denise until she was snatched away. In my head, we belonged together. Meeting her so soon after meeting Lydia, the way we bonded instantly at that party; it felt like fate, like God was pushing us together to give me a choice. Fight the demons and you get the girl.

    Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

    But now what did I have? That whole night felt too good to be true. I used Lydia as the excuse, but I was really just scared. I couldn¡¯t let myself love Denise, because I felt like I wasn¡¯t good enough for her, like I would never be good enough for her.

    I had this sudden urge to run to the potion shop, but shit, if she was already famous enough to be making out with billionaires, she really was out of my league.

    I wiped my eyes and told myself I wasn¡¯t crying. On some level, I knew it was just the college equivalent of a schoolboy crush, but losing Denise had shaken me so hard, I couldn¡¯t even bring in magic. I took a little hop and tried to wrap the levitation around my body, but nothing happened. Whatever magic battery lived inside me was dead.

    I sat back down and tried to calm myself, but this wasn¡¯t an anger problem anymore. I was feeling dumb, and worthless, and just plain tired of myself, so when I tried the magic again, it was like mashing the button on a dead phone.

    I sighed and realized it was time to admit defeat. I opened the roof hatch to take the ladder, but I hadn¡¯t used the ladder today. I hadn¡¯t even gone inside before I launched myself onto the roof. The ladder had fallen over sometime during the day, leaving me with no easy way down.

    If it was daylight, I might have tried to jump from the roof onto a trampoline, but to try it in the dark? Not even normal city dark, but Nergal miasma dark? I would break my neck.

    Okay, I thought, no reason to panic. I¡¯m just a little depressed right now. I just need to work through my shit, and cheer myself up enough to use magic again.

    Two hours later, I pissed down the back of the building from the roof and admitted that this had become a serious problem. The sun was down, and it was getting cold fast. I had stormed out without a jacket, and the wind was whipping me around, threatening to push me off if I got careless.

    I closed my eyes and tried to project my thoughts at Lydia, but nothing happened. Two hours after that, I gave up all pretense of dignity and started calling her name out loud. I spent an hour shouting ¡°Lydia!¡± at the top of my lungs, but she obviously couldn¡¯t hear me.

    I spent a cold, lonely hour scrolling through my contacts, realizing I had lost touch with all my guys from Innovex, and Judy was now more or less my only friend.

    Finally, I just gave up and slept on the roof.

    * * *

    Lydia wasn¡¯t just waiting in her usual spot when I came home the next morning, bruised and bleeding from bouncing off the frame of a trampoline again. She ran up to hug me and stopped short, when she realized she couldn¡¯t. Apparently, I could touch her as much as I wanted, but she couldn¡¯t initiate it until she got permission.

    God help me I almost gave it, just to let somebody warm me up. Just to feel like someone gave a shit about me, after I¡¯d spent a freezing, miserable night contemplating my failures as a student, a wizard, and a man.

    I grabbed a shower and slumped in my chair across from her. ¡°Did you hear me calling you?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± she confirmed. ¡°Whatever god rules this place does not tolerate demons, so I couldn¡¯t hear your thoughts. Even sound can¡¯t get out. Which is why you really should train somewhere else, somewhere I can guide you and heal you and catch you if you fall.¡±

    Something surged in my chest, triggered by her straightforward offer of help.

    ¡°I couldn¡¯t cast magic up there; I was too depressed. Lydia, if this is how it works, I¡¯m no good to anybody, not even your Master. What¡¯s gonna happen if I freeze up like that during a fight? What happens if I lose my powers during simple levitation and drop like a rock again?¡±

    ¡°You¡¯ll do exactly what your ancestors did,¡± Lydia said. ¡°I¡¯ll absorb energy from you when it threatens to overwhelm you, and I¡¯ll give it back when you need it, so you can draw magic from me, no matter how you feel inside. But I need to establish a tether with you, and you¡¯ve been resisting me for weeks.¡±

    ¡°You have the same answer for everything. No matter what the problem is, it always comes back to ¡®let me do my job.¡¯¡±

    ¡°You may not like being forced into this partnership, but pairings like ours, they have been very effective, for a very long time. And beyond that,¡± she said, coming down from her perch to get closer. ¡°The sadness you feel right now is just loneliness and frustration, two emotions I can deal with very quickly, with your permission.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re gonna make it all better by giving me a hug?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll make it better by reminding you what you are.¡±

    ¡°And if I decide I need this for practical reasons, to establish a tether with you, how do we do it?¡±

    Lydia crossed her arms and swished her tail. ¡°Guess.¡±

    ¡°So, it¡¯s a sex thing?¡±

    ¡°Technically, it¡¯s an alchemy thing, but sex is the quickest way to do it, unless you¡¯d like me to drink your blood.¡±

    * * *

    I made Lydia stay in the living room and closed the bedroom door behind me, determined to suffer alone. Then I did the dumbest thing I could possibly do and pulled up news stories about Denise Hardy.

    The search pulled up an endless parade of men, mostly high-profile superheroes from the convention circuit. Mostly young, mostly handsome, and always touching her in a way that said they were more than friends.

    Denise was beautiful now, but seven years ago she had been¡­ wild. The news reports said she moved to California and went full bad girl after high school: drinking, smoking, taking drugs made for witches, and sleeping with any man she wanted, until some family emergency brought her home.

    She dropped out of the news for a while after she came back, apparently tending the store while her mom was in rehab, even checking in for a few weeks herself. Denise had been a boring, media-shy good girl for the last few years; tending the shop, taking care of her mom, only emerging to go on dangerous or disgusting animal calls.

    Her popularity soared during a summer break back in California, in the orbit of a boy band front man who had some kind of weather control powers. His live shows were epic, as he used his powers to conjure multicolored lightning and make it rain on the audience, every time he cried on stage.

    He and Denise got serious for a while until Cecilia had some kind of relapse, forcing Denise to move back to Boston. She had only been back for a couple years when I met her and had apparently moved on from her super-powered pop star.

    This girl wasn¡¯t just out of my league, we weren¡¯t even playing the same sport. I closed my screens and went to sleep, trying to tell myself it was no big deal. One perfect night didn¡¯t make this girl the love of my life, and even if I had stayed, there¡¯s no way a girl like this would have picked up her phone for me the next day, a demon-haunted loser who barely had a job.

    But if I didn¡¯t have Denise, what did I have? What would I ever have? Should I sell my soul to Evan and hope he could hook me up with another witch? Truth was, I only had the courage to talk to Denise because she was the only girl there who was close to my age; the only girl who didn¡¯t do a little sniff and back up when she realized I was a witch.

    I didn¡¯t know what ambitious modern witches were looking for these days, but I knew I was not it. By the time I fell asleep, I hadn¡¯t just convinced myself I had lost Denise Hardy, I had convinced myself I had lost the best chance I would ever have at love.

    * * *

    I woke up the next morning in the mood to do something stupid, so I ran out to the bunker again and launched myself onto the roof, making damn sure the ladder was in place this time.

    I was in full rationalization mode, playing the bullshit mind game smart people play with themselves to justify doing stupid shit. That¡¯s the worst thing about being smart; it¡¯s so easy to be emotional, while telling yourself you¡¯re not being emotional at all. I was clinging to some weak rationalization about needing Lydia to regulate surges, when I really just needed someone to hold me before I fell apart.

    I had created a file out of this magic book, but I wasn¡¯t learning it. I wasn¡¯t even reading it, not because I was afraid of the spells, but because I was afraid of the journals, afraid of the horrible crimes my ancestors had committed, through centuries of killing for Lydia and her Master.

    Finally, I said, ¡°Jeeves, search Taltorak for direct references to a succubus named Lydia.¡±

    I spent the whole day on the roof, channeling the spirits of dead men. Their journals were a rambling, incoherent mess. Page after page of weird obsessions with weather, politics, and the movements of ships. Stefan wrote sixty pages about trains for god¡¯s sake, working out an engine that would run on magic instead of coal.

    Most of the references were ¡°I told Lydia¡± kind of stuff, with very little about Lydia herself. I can¡¯t get to my hardware, and I can¡¯t conjure Taltorak from here, so I¡¯ll have to give you general impressions from memory.

    Xavier referred to Lydia as ¡°my angel¡± and wrote about her progress like a proud father, bragging about how quick her mind was, how she excelled as a natural mimic; how quickly she learned to sing and play instruments.

    Jacob was hard to read, even after I used Jeeves to strip out the thees and thous and translate his Latin into modern English. He started as a deeply depressed, deeply wounded young man, despondent over his injuries, and morphed into a full-on evil wizard in just a few years. Lydia told him what she wanted him to be, and he embraced it, transcending his physical limitations by refining his intellect and charming the shit out of any demon who would slow down for a conversation.

    Jacob was convinced he would have died as a miserable, bedridden drug addict if Lydia hadn¡¯t rescued him from his mother, writing: ¡°Lydia saved my life and took my soul. I consider it a fair trade.¡±

    Tobias wrote a hundred pages of tedious moralizing and pleas to God, spewing hatred on Lydia and the Master who sent her. I quickly got bored with Tobias and saved big chunks of his diary for later, which turned out to be a big mistake.

    Laurence may have been charming in person, but he wasn¡¯t much of a writer. He wrote more about ships and women than he did about magic or demons, and he made it clear that he loved his wife Joanna more than he ever loved Lydia. He was the only one to openly share a demon with his wife, but he wrote about Lydia as if she was just a toy they played with, after he met the true love of his life.

    Anson appreciated Lydia as a warrior and a battlefield healer, giving her credit for the countless times she saved his life, but he, too, lost interest in her after he met his wife Brielle.

    I was surprised to see Stefan talk about being poor, since I thought he was the son of German royalty or something. He was, but his family lost everything when he was young. Stefan wrote that his father, Luther Kovach, was a slave to the bank until the Nazis came along. His diary was filled with pages and pages of antisemitic nonsense, blaming Jews for everything that went wrong in his country and his life, like he had to constantly remind himself why he hated them.

    I had a hard time finding any positive emotions in his writing, but he said Lydia and the power she brought with her were a dream come true for him. He delighted in being of service to his F¨¹hrer, who he saw as an avenging angel, sent to punish the people who had bankrupted and destroyed his father.

    Grandpa Jim wrote nothing, so I ended up with half-remembered musings from a family full of sloppy writers. I had done the most limited search and read maybe two percent of what they wrote collectively, but I got the impression that they were generally happy men who loved Lydia and were grateful for the power they had been given. Even Tobias loved it, once he started healing people.

    And while none of them wrote explicitly about having sex with Lydia (except Tobias, yipes), none of the others seemed to regret it.

    They weren¡¯t exactly writing love letters about her, but they didn¡¯t seem to hate her, and they didn¡¯t complain about the missions. I was deliberately searching around stuff I didn¡¯t want to see, but there were a hundred sentences like, ¡°Lydia saved me,¡± ¡°Lydia healed me,¡± ¡°Lydia killed the sentry that surprised me,¡± ¡°Lydia got a message back to my men and told them where I was.¡±

    I knew it could all be a trick, but my ancestors seemed to be confirming everything Lydia had said to me, describing exactly the kind of partnership she had promised. They appreciated her. They trusted her. And most of them were deeply grateful to her, for helping them find their wives. Some of them even trusted her to watch over their children, as a literal demon babysitter.

    My ancestors described Lydia as a great comfort: a lover, a teacher, and a nurse, who was always there when they needed her, but there was something pathetic about their gratitude. Grown men, incredibly relieved to have a demon, so they didn¡¯t have to deal with human women anymore.

    I guess this is why most of them did not go looking for wives. Lydia made them do it, guiding them through the process, setting them up with women with the right combination of grit and genetic potential to carry on the bloodline, counting on the overwhelming power of Kovach magic to do the seduction for them.

    So, the method I used on Denise, overwhelming her with a demonstration of power, that wasn¡¯t just an indulgence or a clumsy slip on my part, that was the primary way my ancestors got laid. And unlike me, none of them seemed to be embarrassed about it, because Lydia convinced them it was the most natural thing in the world.

    * * *

    I wrapped the levitation magic around myself as the sun went down and stepped carefully off the roof, just barely avoiding another painful fall. I had told myself I was going to fight this contract as I walked away from Denise, determined to free myself from the family curse and return to her as a triumphant hero.

    But now I had nothing to return to, and no real will to fight. How was I supposed to fight for a soul I thought was worthless? How could I fight for a life I had already ruined? And how could I turn myself into some kind of magical superhero, when I could barely get myself off a roof?

    Even with an organized, translated book of spells, I still needed the courage and the will to cast them. Walking back from that dirty lump of concrete, I felt like I would never have either.

    I had another insane urge to run to the potion shop, throw myself at Cecilia and Denise, and beg them for help. Or maybe call Daniel Carter and spend the rest of my life in divine witness protection, working some bullshit remote tech job, pretending I had never tasted magic at all.

    Or I could take Lydia¡¯s offer and try to feel the confidence my ancestors felt. Whatever her motives, Lydia had taken this collection of shy, damaged boys and turned them into powerful men. Could I take what Lydia was offering me and turn it around somehow, using her love to inspire myself, while I twisted the magic to fight this contract?

    I needed to be stronger. I needed to be better. And I needed to believe in myself in a way I never had.

    I know how feeble this sounds to an angel, but I gave myself to a demon because I needed to silence the voices of Judy and my father and a dozen shitty teachers, and start listening to someone who believed in me, until I could finally believe in myself.

 Chapter 30: Surrender

    Lydia was waiting in her usual spot when I got home. I walked up close and looked her in the eye. ¡°I think you are what my family made you, good and bad. I can¡¯t change the things you¡¯ve done. I don¡¯t even know how much of it was done by your own free will. I bet you don¡¯t even know. But I think there¡¯s still something human in you, and I¡¯m gonna find it. But if I¡¯m wrong about that, and you really are just a killer? You better hide it really, really well. Because the minute I catch you lying to me, we¡¯re done. Tell me you believe me.¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°I believe you.¡±

    I walked straight to the shower and scrubbed myself raw, lingering a bit too long, stalling for time, building my courage for what came next.

    I slipped on shorts and a clean t-shirt, sat down on the edge of my bed, and said, ¡°Lydia, come to me.¡±

    * * *

    Lydia appeared sitting beside me in a soft flash of golden light.

    ¡°There used to be these camps,¡± I said. ¡°Summer camp for manboys, I guess. Lonely, desperate boys would save up all their money and pay thousands of dollars to go to one of these places and learn how to do man stuff - hunting, fishing, shooting. All the stuff you miss out on when you don¡¯t really have a dad. They would take these guys and teach them how to dress, how to walk, how to make eye contact, and how to talk to women.

    ¡°At the end of the week, they would send them into nightclubs as a kind of final exam, sending them in like kamikaze pilots to get shot down by hairdressers and college girls. They would send these poor fuckers in with a head full of pick-up lines and a few tips about body language and force them to face rejection over and over and over again, getting their egos beaten to shit until it didn¡¯t even hurt anymore.

    ¡°Then, as a closing ceremony, they would make them bungee jump off a bridge or walk across hot coals or throw themselves off a cliff. It had to be terrifying, so it would stick in the mind, so for years later, these boys could look back and say, ¡®That was it. That was the moment I decided to be something better.¡¯ I never had that experience, so tonight, you get to be my cliff.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, I need your help.¡± I leaned in to face her, until we were almost touching, and said, ¡°Right here. Tonight. Make me believe what you¡¯ve been telling me. Show me what I am.¡±

    Lydia stood up and bowed to me. Then she walked out and came back carrying a glass of water. Light from the hallway made soft shadows on her face. She knelt before me and took a slow sip. Then she gave me the glass.

    I took a long, slow drink. We stared into each other¡¯s eyes, sitting in silence for a full two minutes, then she asked, ¡°Do you still want my help?¡±

    I said, ¡°Yes.¡±

    That ¡°yes¡± right there? That¡¯s called a willing embrace of evil, and once you do it, nobody cares why.

    A glimmer of gold, and there she was, my succubus, completely real and physical for the first time. Her horns seemed smaller somehow, and her tail was even cuter, hovering over her shoulder like it had a mind of its own.

    ¡°Does this door lock?¡± she asked.

    ¡°Just close it and press the button. You think somebody¡¯s gonna catch us?¡±

    ¡°Just a gesture, to help you relax.¡± Then she secured my curtains and said, ¡°That will have to do.¡±

    ¡°We can¡¯t use costumes this time,¡± Lydia said, ¡°but I can take this off for you.¡± Lydia took her black gown off, slow and casual. She wasn¡¯t stripping and she wasn¡¯t showing off. She was just taking her clothes off, in the light where I could see. She stepped out of it and tossed it over my chair. ¡°This time, this first time, I must use my natural form.¡±

    ¡°Why?¡±

    ¡°My interpretation of your contract: ¡®The nature of the bargain must be made clear.¡¯¡±

    ¡°You kept your tail hidden for weeks. I¡¯ve missed it.¡±

    Lydia smiled. ¡°Me, too!¡±  She popped her back and gave a little shimmy, like she was stretching into an old pair of jeans. There was something unbearably sexy about it. Then we sat across from each other with our hands folded in our laps, sexy as a church picnic.

    ¡°This is my first gift to you,¡± she said. ¡°Tonight, I am giving you time. We are not racing the clock, the calendar, or the sun. We¡¯re done when you say we¡¯re done. It¡¯s morning when you say it¡¯s morning.¡±

    ¡°Is this the part where you tell me to relax?¡±

    ¡°I think it would be more fun to see you tense. Go ahead. Tighten your muscles and twist your face up. Bite like you¡¯re crushing something with your teeth. You can clench your fists and growl at me if you think it would help.¡±

    The sudden change in mood caught me off guard. We laughed softly for a moment, then Lydia said, ¡°Look at me.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve been looking at you every day.¡±

    ¡°No, you¡¯ve been glancing at me, peeking and darting away right before you let yourself enjoy it. This time I want you to look, really look at me. Look until you¡¯re not ashamed of looking.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll try.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°I know you¡¯ve been with women, but I need to show you how a succubus body works. I need you to be comfortable with me in my real body; to accept me, completely, for what I really am.¡±

    ¡°Is this really necessary? You¡¯ve been in my living room for weeks, and in my bed for most of it.¡±

    ¡°Not like this. Demon bodies are different in ways I can¡¯t hide. If I skip this part, if we just go at each other like a man and woman, one of these differences is going to frighten you. I¡¯ve seen it too many times. The passion stops, you retreat into the next room, and I spend the rest of our night explaining myself and trying to calm you down. Easier to do it this way. We¡¯ll go through the little differences, one at a time, and end our evening with what you already know how to do.¡±

    ¡°If you say so.¡±

    And then something changed. ¡°Wait, there it is again. Did you put on magic perfume or something? I swear I didn¡¯t smell anything from you until that night I kissed you. That¡¯s why I thought you were a projection for so long. What changed?¡±

    ¡°I have to be careful with what parts of myself I allow in the physical world at any one time, partly to avoid detection, partly for defense. I can vanish very quickly, for example, if a visitor peeks in or enters your home while I¡¯m here. I¡¯m also very strict with the contract before we get to this point. If you can smell me, then tiny parts of my body are entering yours. I interpret that as touching, and I don¡¯t allow it until you¡¯re ready. It wasn¡¯t a literal violation of your contract, but it was sloppy of me to let you catch my scent that first time, when I was¡­ distracted.¡±

    I leaned forward and smelled her hair. I took too long to speak, so she said, ¡°Well? Do you like the scent? I suppose I could change it, but this is an important part of me.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m just trying to place¡­ Okay, I give up. What is it?¡±

    ¡°Roses from Xavier¡¯s garden, and a little something you won¡¯t find on Earth. That was one of my first tasks, maintaining Xavier¡¯s garden. At first, this was the only way I could make him smile, to smell like these roses when I came back in.¡±

    This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

    * * *

    ¡°I hope you¡¯ll forgive a little ritual,¡± she said, ¡°here at the beginning. If we were just going to share bodies tonight, we¡¯d already be doing it, but this is the beginning of a bonding process, physical, mental, and magical. Our bond will start tonight, and get stronger, until I can share magic with you over long distances and feel what you¡¯re feeling. I¡¯ll always know where you are, and I¡¯ll always be able to come to you. Once we have this, I¡¯m yours, for the rest of your life. You¡¯ll be able to feel me, day or night, and hear my voice, no matter where we go.¡±

    And there it was. The kind of connection men would kill for. Everybody thinks we fall for the demon stuff, but what price would you pay to never feel lonely again? What price would you pay for a lover who could not die? What price would you pay for a companion who would never grow old? And what price would you pay to have a tender, loving voice in your head forever, keeping all the other monsters away? Is that the confession you were waiting for, you smug son of a bitch?

    And then I kissed her. Not quite as hot as the first time, but as I was warming up to the task, about to let my hands start roaming, my fingertips brushed two long, hard ridges on her back. She froze, and I realized I was probing them, gently running my fingers up and down two scars.

    ¡°You¡¯ve been hiding these,¡± I said, ¡°but not tonight. It¡¯s not all good news, is it? When you said you had to show me everything.¡±

    Lydia lowered her head, and I gently turned her around so I could see.

    ¡°This is where your wings attached, and these are not cuts. These are tears. Oh Lydia, what did they do to you?¡±

    She didn¡¯t answer, and I realized I couldn¡¯t fix anything. I couldn¡¯t even comprehend the magnitude of a crime like this. I couldn¡¯t turn the clock back, and I couldn¡¯t heal these scars. All I could do was kiss them, and hold her while she shook.

    * * *

    ¡°For this next part,¡± she said, ¡°please sit on your hands.¡±

    ¡°Seriously?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m about to do a magic trick, and you might be tempted to touch something you shouldn¡¯t. Ready?¡±

    I nodded, feeling slightly foolish.

    Lydia held her hands up and twiddled her fingers. ¡°Watch closely. Fingers. Claws. Fingers. Claws.¡± Her nails were changing length and shape each time she said that, growing a few inches and shrinking back again, as fast as she could say the word. ¡°I can even do individual fingers. One, two, three, four¡­ And here¡¯s the important part. I¡¯m going to stab these claws into myself, but retract them, just before they reach my skin. Watch.¡±

    And she did, faster and faster until I could hardly see.

    ¡°I have precise control over these, Timothy. Jacob said I could do surgery. And yes, I have killed with them. But you need to see that I will never, ever hurt you. I would never hurt you intentionally, and I have never cut one of my partners by accident.¡±

    ¡°And before you get that look on your face,¡± she frowned at me, ¡°I do not consider pain to be fun or funny. I believe there is a clear line between pain and pleasure, and to think otherwise is the sign of a broken mind. I do not play games with pain, and there will be no blood in my bedroom. The trust between us must be absolute. I would never harm you. My Master cannot order me to harm you. He uses other servants when discipline is required. My role is to teach you, protect you, and heal your wounds.

    ¡°And Timothy, please. You will not impress me by showing me how fast you can throw your back out. You want to impress your succubus in bed? Give me more nights with you in it, and give me some memories to keep, for the nights when you don¡¯t come home.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°You didn¡¯t need to do the claw thing,¡± I said. ¡°I¡¯ve already seen you go full demon on a guy, and that should bother me way more than it does.¡±

    ¡°Yes, but it¡¯s different when those fingers are about to be touching you. The first few times we¡¯re together, you¡¯ll think of those claws every time I touch you, but that demonstration should help you get used to them.¡±

    Lydia bowed her head. ¡°These are my horns. Too small for any useful purpose; all they do is ruin brushes. Anything particularly frightening about these?¡±

    I shook my head. Lydia changed horns the same way she changed clothes, but her real horns were tiny things. At first glance, they were black, but up close, they were dark red - black at the base, translucent red at the tips. Strange and lovely. When I touched them, they were hard, but mercifully blunt, a good ten degrees hotter than the rest of her. Her hair was magnificent - soft and clingy and full of curls. I could play with it for hours, watching those curls twist in my fingers.

    Lydia closed her eyes when I touched her face and made a little noise when I flattened my palm on her cheek. She laughed when I wiggled her ears and smiled when I tweaked her nose. Her tongue came out, just a bit, as I traced her lips. She took the tiniest, most fleeting taste of my fingertip, just to watch the look on my face.

    Her nipples were ready when I got there, and I lingered on them a bit too long. I stroked her belly and her ribs, wiggling my finger to test the integrity of her belly button, making a mental note to ask some questions about that later. Then I put my hands on her hips and tested her weight. After weeks of being insubstantial, the real Lydia was a solid female figure,      a bit heavier than Judy.

    Then I thought of something and put my hand on her chest again. Her skin was warm, but she had no heartbeat and no discernible pulse. Lydia had a hundred pounds of something inside her, but it might as well be clay.

    I copped another gratuitous feel and got distracted by her tail. It emerged smoothly from the base of her spine. Pale pink at the base, fading through red, dark red, and black, to end in that arrowhead tip. I reached for it, and she stopped me again. ¡°Wait! Please. Not yet.¡±  More of a gasp than a sentence.

    I didn¡¯t understand her urgency, but I respected it. Her legs were lovely, if not terribly long. I rubbed her feet and tickled her toes, evoking a musical laugh. Baalphezar¡¯s mark on her ankle was cold, much colder than the rest of her. In my mind, I could hear the rattle of chains.

    Lydia sat up and slung her tail around her waist. It wavered like a pet snake. ¡°Now,¡± she said. ¡°Do the tail.¡±

    It was softer than it looked. Lydia unraveled as I traced it with my finger. The texture was obscene. I realized I was stroking it, mesmerized by the way it curled around my fingers. I heard a deep breath and looked up. Lydia¡¯s eyes were closed, and her lips were slightly apart. Her breathing was slow and heavy. When I rubbed it, she whimpered and bit her lip. I realized what I was doing and decided that was all the go signal I needed at this point.

    I reached for my shorts, but she stopped me. ¡°No. No shortcuts. You¡¯ll know when it¡¯s time.¡±

    She kept the tail at eye level, watching my face as I watched it sway. ¡°In the Garden, all women had tails. It was a gift from God. Ornament, tool, and weapon. God gave us this limb to balance the gifts of men, but Adam didn¡¯t want an equal. Lilith rebelled and Eve lost her tail. That¡¯s why women have to work so hard in your world. They were robbed of their birthright, cheated by a man who resented the first woman. That¡¯s the legend they tell us when we ask about our tails. Satan didn¡¯t deform us when he made us demons; he gave us back what we lost.¡±

    * * *

    I was a mess. I grabbed my water and finished it in one gulp. ¡°Lydia, I can¡¯t take much more of this. Shit, I can¡¯t believe I¡¯ve held out this long.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re still a bit scared of me. It helps.¡± Her tail whizzed over my shoulder as she hit the switch on my lamp with it, plunging us into darkness. ¡°Are you ready for the magic?¡± She was already starting to glow, a faint glimmer of gold peeking through her skin like dawn. The light spread out and washed over me, my own personal sunrise. Lydia gave me her hands and said, ¡°One more time.¡±

    I touched her and the world went gray. She wasn¡¯t using much power - a trickle to tempt me, I think. I could taste it, creeping somewhere behind my tongue. Lydia¡¯s power was very strange, tangy like I¡¯d bitten into some kind of fruit. I thought it was an apple or a pear, but that wasn¡¯t quite right. How could something so evil taste so good?

    Lydia gave me her power, and I answered, feeding back a trickle of my own. Somewhere in the distance, she moaned. I think I shocked her, broke her concentration or something, because I wasn¡¯t supposed to know how to do this yet. It was penetration, of a sort, and I gave her no warning.

    It was easy to forget, as long as it had been for me, it had been a lot longer for her. She had been planning a slow exchange of magic, an escalating spiral, like everything else we¡¯d done tonight. Instead, Lydia convulsed and gave me everything - all she had, all she was - all at once. It was like the chair or the rift, or the duel with Denise - magnified and multiplied and flavored with this sweet maddening thing that I couldn¡¯t get enough of. My body took it all, blooming like a flower in her hands. Something inside me stretched and I was drinking her.

    I gave her power, and she gave it back, caught in this magnificent loop. It was an old ritual. Older than my contract, older than the book - the ancient dance of mage and demon - sweet, forbidden, and divine.

    I didn¡¯t notice right away, but Lydia was healing me. Sore muscles trembled fresh, a dozen cuts vanished, and two of my fillings popped out, replaced with brand new teeth. I felt like a living hurricane. I felt like a god.

    Lydia grabbed my face and echoed in my mind, ¡°Do you see it now? Do you see what you are?¡±

    I yanked her hands off and broke contact, watching the light from our auras mingle on the wall. We were quite a pair, panting and sweating like we¡¯d just been having sex for real. Lydia smoothed her hair back and stared at me. I¡¯ll remember that expression forever, that new gleam in her eye.

    ¡°Look at you,¡± she said. ¡°Sitting there taking in magic, getting stronger every minute, just because you¡¯re happy. I have never seen a Kovach mage draw power from joy before. I never even imagined¡­¡±

    She turned her head away and stared at the floor with her hand over her mouth, like she was trying to make herself believe something. Then she grabbed my face with both hands.

    ¡°I will not fail you, Timothy. I will not waste this chance. I know you still think I¡¯m a monster. I can¡¯t defend the things I¡¯ve done or the things I still have to do. There¡¯s so much I can¡¯t tell you, so much I can¡¯t say. I don¡¯t expect you to forgive me, but I hope, at the end, you¡¯ll understand, and you¡¯ll finally believe me, when I say I love you.¡±

    Lydia cut my clothes away with two swift strokes, and it was time to be a man again.

    * * *

    And no, I¡¯m not gonna relive this part. I¡¯m not gonna turn my life into porn for angels. They want me to replay it, to make me agonize over what I¡¯ve lost. They want to turn my happiest memory into a weapon and drive me to despair.

    Not today, motherfuckers. Not today.

 Chapter 31: Wizard Parkour

    I slept so long, it felt like a resurrection, one of those perfect mornings when you feel like you¡¯ve slept for a hundred years.

    Lydia was curled up against me, pretending to be asleep. I kissed her forehead and said, ¡°We made it, it¡¯s morning.¡±

    She gave me a quick good morning kiss and I staggered to the bathroom, clawing at my back. ¡°One night and this fucking demon has crippled me.¡±

    ¡°I warned you!¡± Lydia shouted from the bedroom.

    It was one of those nights you¡¯re kind of sad to wash off, but the clock was ticking, and I had shit to do. I had risked everything on this, betting that surrendering to Lydia would make me stronger instead of weaker, giving me the courage I needed to learn magic, and turn my whole goddamn life around.

    I put on my oldest torn clothes and came back to her. She was obviously surprised, expecting us to spend the day in bed. I leaned in and kissed her for real.

    ¡°I will never be as focused, as energized, or as full of magic as I am right now,¡± I said. ¡°So, I gotta use this. I¡¯m gonna go work out.¡±

    Lydia blinked. ¡°Work out what?¡±

    I laughed. ¡°I¡¯m gonna go get some exercise. There are no gyms in the Zone, so I¡¯m gonna go climb a building. You have to report to your Master now, right? Now that we¡¯ve¡­ You need to tell him what I¡¯m doing today. You tell him this is the happiest day of my life, and I¡¯m out practicing magic and conditioning my body, getting ready for whatever comes next. He needs to hear the new guy is with the program, so he will leave me alone and let me train, for as long as I possibly can.¡±

    Lydia sat up and enunciated very carefully, with just a hint of menace in her voice. ¡°I am going to tell my Master you are with the program, because you are with the program.¡±

    ¡°Exactly,¡± I said. ¡°I¡¯ll be back in a few hours.¡±

    * * *

    I had been planning my training regimen for weeks, without admitting that¡¯s what I was doing, gathering every bit of Captain Cobalt footage I could find, converting the video to 3-D holograms, copying his movements in my living room.

    I told Lydia it was an exercise routine from a video game, but I was actually standing in the shoes of a dead hero, wondering if I could use magic to duplicate his powers. I had no way to make myself stronger or tougher yet, but I had gotten pretty good at levitating my own body, and if I could find a way to combine reduced body weight with simple human strength, I thought I might be able to recreate one of Captain Cobalt¡¯s most impressive stunts, jumping from rooftop to rooftop, making incredible leaps onto, and sometimes completely over buildings.

    Captain Cobalt couldn¡¯t truly fly, after that first day at Pearl Harbor, but he could leap incredibly high and keep himself aloft much longer than gravity would normally allow. Researchers speculated that the barrier that kept him from truly flying was mental rather than physical, and that he would eventually have been able to fly like a bird or a plane.

    I had been practicing takeoffs and landings at the bunker, and now it was time to test it for real, attempting to jump from ruined building to ruined building here in the Zone. The spacing between them wasn¡¯t perfect, and I wasn¡¯t sure I could get enough momentum to go from lower roofs to higher ones, but I figured simply pushing myself up with levitation wasn¡¯t actually cheating.

    The only real computing challenge was to map my hologram of Captain Cobalt onto the real-world environment of the Reclamation Zone. But computers had gotten pretty good at this kind of thing, and it only took a couple hours to have my holographic hero performing all the moves I wanted to learn, cobbled together from a century of video clips.

    It would have been simpler to make the figure a wireframe, but there was something poetic about it, watching my projection of Captain Cobalt flicker through different eras and costumes, even changing from color to black and white at times, as I pulled certain poses from ancient newsreels.

    It was fascinating to see visual proof that his powers weren¡¯t static. The Captain had grown in power over time, getting stronger and more dynamic through the years, until he was barely touching the ground between leaps.

    I was drawing heavily from early footage now, from those first days when he was weaker and a little shaky, just like me. I took my monochrome Captain through the first jump and tried to follow behind, crashing unceremoniously into the crumbling brick of a brownstone when I timed it wrong.

    It took a dozen tries to get that first jump right, before I finally got enough of a running start to fling myself onto the roof. But I hadn¡¯t thought about how hard it would be to stop, once I had momentum pushing against my reduced weight. I skidded on the rough gravel of the rooftop and sailed right off the edge, plowing into the side of another building as I fell.

    The red brick of this one got a little redder as it peeled off a layer of skin, creating a long smear of my blood as I panicked in mid-air. I finally caught myself on a windowsill that thankfully didn¡¯t have glass in it anymore. Then I forced myself to calm down and slowly levitate down, for the long walk back to my starting point.

    My grainy silent coach didn¡¯t judge me, he just respawned, and watched me crash into the same fucking building again. I smacked into that red brick so many times, I actually learned where the handholds were and created some new ones, clearing out windows that still had glass in them, carefully checking for shards before I tried to grab the frames. Is this why so many heroes wore gloves?

    I finally learned how to reverse the spell and push down at the top of my arc, touching the surface of the first roof before springing to the second. The third was a few stories higher, creating a rough stairstep of three buildings, each a little taller than the last, until I got a nice easy jump down for the fourth.

    I had mapped out a rough course of ten buildings I could jump from traveling from Storrow back to my front door, zigzagging and backtracking at points where the nearest roof was still too far.

    I suffered a hundred cuts and scrapes as I plowed into the sides of buildings that day. God knows how many infections I would have tomorrow, after cutting myself on old dirty glass and jabbing myself with rusty nails. I resolved that I would not go home to sleep until I had touched the roof of all ten buildings, but I went home early after number six, the one that almost killed me.

    It was an old warehouse with one wall collapsed, with big open windows that used to have glass in them. Wind howled through the thing and made it sound like a giant beast. There was an old chain hoist hanging from the ceiling and I simply could not resist trying the swing, planning to grab it at my full weight and reduce weight at apogee to fling myself out the window.

    Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

    But when I finally caught it, the chain broke. More accurately, the hook in the ceiling broke, leaving the chain I was holding attached to absolutely nothing while I was at full extension. Instead of swinging back up and out as I intended, I was plummeting straight to the stained concrete floor, still clutching a useless length of chain as if it might magically reattach itself as I fell.

    But I had been using levitation all day, and stopped a dozen shorter falls, so I was able to let the chain go and save my life, about six feet before I hit the ground. The rusty chain crashed to the concrete and coiled in a neat pile as I floated above it, but I had to float up to the ceiling and scoot myself over with handholds so I could let myself down next to it instead of straight on it.

    A sane man would have stopped and gone home at that point. Instead, I floated all the way up and clawed my way across the ceiling, looking for another hook. I found one that looked strong enough and pulled the chain up after me. This time I pulled it all the way down so I could test it from the ground, to make sure I wouldn¡¯t be killed by another weak hook or a weak link in the chain.

    It seemed stable so I got another running start, swung myself toward the window, and almost died again, because this hook was farther away, and I hadn¡¯t used enough momentum to get all the way there. I kept swinging until it got dark, vowing not to go home until I got myself through the window.

    I finally did it and found myself in a dangerous expanse of open space, overshooting so badly I almost ended up in the water. I had to reverse the levitation again and push down, so I could land on a stretch of concrete instead. My knees buckled with the impact, forcing all the air out of my body in a giant whoosh. I knelt on the ground for a while, gasping and wincing from the pain, and decided it was time to go home.

    It was my own fault for changing the plan and trying to go through this building instead of just leaping from the roof, but swinging from that chain had felt so incredible, I knew I was going to try it again.

    * * *

    I limped back in the door, covered in cuts and scrapes, hobbling on sore knees and a twisted ankle that was just starting to hurt. Lydia ran over and helped me inside.

    ¡°I¡¯m not gonna be much fun in the bedroom tonight, but can you do that healing thing again? I was kinda countin¡¯ on that.¡±

    ¡°Timothy, what are you doing to yourself?¡±

    I smiled at her. ¡°Yeah, it hurts pretty bad right now, but I had an amazing day. It works, Lydia. The magic actually works, but it¡¯s a little scary, using it that much. I wasn¡¯t expecting it to feel this good.¡±

    I looked in her eyes. ¡°You¡¯re not the biggest temptation in the room, are you? It¡¯s the power itself. It¡¯s like a drug, right? My ancestors, they had to keep casting bigger and bigger stuff to get the rush? I¡¯m just starting, but that levitation felt so good, I didn¡¯t feel half these cuts. There¡¯s a breakover point, right? A point where the power starts using me?¡±

    ¡°I won¡¯t let that happen,¡± Lydia said. ¡°It feels overwhelming because it¡¯s new right now, and because the magic is so thick here. It¡¯s easier when you draw the power from me. That¡¯s part of my function, to serve as a source when you¡¯re casting in places where magic is scarce, and to regulate how much you get, so you¡¯re always in control.¡±

    She didn¡¯t say the obvious bit, but I saw it immediately. Kovach bodies were bred to use magic from Hell, so most of my ancestors couldn¡¯t cast until they bonded with Lydia. Instead of getting addicted to raw power from the Earth, all my ancestors had been addicted to her.

    * * *

    She was back in human form for me the next day, wearing modern jeans and a loose white t-shirt with anime characters on it. No way she brought that with her from 1986.

    ¡°Back to human right away, huh?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s comfortable for me,¡± she said. ¡°And I know how much you like this.¡±

    ¡°Oh wait,¡± I said. ¡°I see what this is. You¡¯re wearing your human costume as a form of erotic cosplay. Okay, hang on, I can do this.¡±

    I made an elaborate throat clearing noise and did my best community theater line reading: ¡°Hello, normal human girlfriend, how was your day?¡±

    ¡°It was great,¡± Lydia said brightly. ¡°I humiliated a co-worker and bought something expensive on credit!¡±

    I had no idea Lydia had this in her. I laughed so hard; I damn near cried in my casserole. ¡°You say you don¡¯t have a sense of humor,¡± I said, wiping my eyes. ¡°But you do. It¡¯s twisted, and dark as fuck, but you¡¯ve definitely got one.¡±

    We had a completely normal dinner, eating together at my little cracked table. I described my workout, and my growing comfort with the levitation spell. I expected her to nag me about learning the book, but she was letting me off the hook tonight, showing me just how good this could be, proving that she could be exactly what I needed.

    We washed the dishes together, side by side, with me leaning over to kiss her neck and smell her hair again. Then I took her to the bedroom, and we made love like we were nothing special at all. She made me untie her shoes and struggle to get her jeans off. She dropped the succubus routine and started making ¡°mistakes,¡± fumbling and slipping and jabbing me with elbows like a normal girl.

    There was a sweetness to her now, a vulnerability that had been missing the night before. It wasn¡¯t just sex this time. It felt like something twisted up inside me was finally letting go. I felt like she was healing me, repairing some ancient damage in my soul.

    ¡°I can¡¯t change the contract,¡± she said, ¡°and I can¡¯t change the things you have to do, but I can give you this, every night, for as long as you live.¡±

    * * *

    I fell asleep with her arms around me and her head on my chest, convinced that I was going to pull this off. Maybe Lydia¡¯s tricks worked on those other guys, evil pricks like Stefan and my grandfather, but I was a good person, maybe the first truly good person to ever be caught up in this contract, and I had a plan to steal the cheese right out of this trap.

    While I was in my head, celebrating my courage and virtue, Lydia was quietly rearranging the furniture in my heart. And somewhere in the night, while I was fitting myself for a t-shirt that said World¡¯s Smartest Mouse, Lydia curled up in the lonely place, and made herself at home.

    * * *

    When I came home the next night, with a slightly smaller collection of cuts and bruises. Lydia was waiting, naked under the covers in her human form, like a present that had already been unwrapped.

    She gave me a little placeholder kiss and said, ¡°Get cleaned up, and come back to me.¡±

    But as soon as I got back in bed, she threw the covers back and went full succubus on me, pushing me down on the mattress with one hand; not hard enough to hurt, using just enough strength to scare me.

    ¡°Now that we have an understanding,¡± she said. ¡°There are some things I need to punish you for.¡±

    ¡°Excuse me?¡± I started to laugh, but she was already straddling me, so all I could say was, ¡°Oh god. Oh my god.¡± Two seconds later, she was full on riding me, forcing herself down to emphasize words.

    ¡°This is for making me wait, and this is for all your little jokes. But the rest of this night, the rest of this night is for letting that witch steal your first time.¡±

    Oh, come on, you guys didn¡¯t think I was gonna get away with that?

    My punishment continued into the next morning. Then I got some sleep and requested a little more.

    * * *

    I noticed a buzzing noise the next day and ran out to the sidewalk. ¡°Hey Lydia, come out here!¡±

    She walked out into the sun and looked where I was pointing.

    ¡°Somebody¡¯s trying to send a drone in here. You¡¯ve got demon senses and stuff, right? Watch this thing with all your demon stuff and tell me if you see a spell or an astral thing.¡±

    The drone crossed the threshold of my sidewalk, and I started counting down. ¡°Five, four, three, two¡­ dead.¡±

    The drone lost power and crashed onto the cracked asphalt, seconds after it entered the Zone.

    ¡°Okay, were you watching? Please tell me, what did that? What did you see?¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t see anything,¡± Lydia said.

    ¡°No magic, no curse thing? Nothing I could see from the gray?¡±

    ¡°Nothing,¡± Lydia said. ¡°This is old magic, god magic. The ancients had things we still don¡¯t understand.¡±

    ¡°The ancients had magic that even demons don¡¯t understand?¡±

    ¡°Not all demons are the same,¡± she said. ¡°The original demons were just gods who lost a war. Most of those left with Satan or have sunk so deep into Hell they can¡¯t even come up anymore.¡±

    ¡°So, this is not normal magic, this is some kind of Nergal thing?¡±

    ¡°Timothy, please,¡± Lydia snapped, ¡°stop saying his name!¡±

    I waved her off. ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, me and Nergal are cool.¡±

 Chapter 32: The Life and Death of Captain Cobalt

    His name was Larry Friedrich, but they called him Captain Cobalt. He was a German Jew from Philadelphia, born to immigrant parents in 1922. He joined the Navy in 1940, the day he turned eighteen. Larry was good with machines, so they put him on the Arizona and stuffed him in the engine room.

    There weren¡¯t many metahumans in 1940. No screening program. No blood tests. Nobody knew Larry was gifted. He was an ordinary boy for eighteen years. Then the Japanese sank his ship.

    At 0800 on December 7th, 1941, an eight-hundred kilo bomb hit the Arizona on her starboard side. The forward powder magazine exploded, and the ship went down. Most of the crew was killed in the explosions, but Larry and his bunkmates were trapped below.

    The men pounded on the door, screaming for help, with their cries getting louder as the ship went down. In minutes, the door was covered in blood from their fists.

    Larry braced himself against his bunk and slammed the door with both feet. The hatch popped open and went spinning down the hall. He never felt the change. Larry had the strength of thirty men, but he didn¡¯t know that yet.

    The Smithsonian has the dented bulkhead door on a pedestal, with Captain Cobalt¡¯s famous quote written in giant letters overhead. It says, ¡°I looked out my porthole, and all I saw was water and fire.¡± That bunk is a rusted chunk of metal now, still molded in the shape of his body.

    The men took a breath of stale air and trudged through the corridor, searching for a way out. Larry forced another hatch open and swam for the surface. His mates were right behind him, but Larry didn¡¯t realize how fast he was going. He broke the surface and popped into the air.

    His ship was burning in a dozen places, and the sky was gray with bullets. He felt a tap on his ankle, but he didn¡¯t realize what it was. It took him a while to realize he was bulletproof as he was soaring through the air, three feet above the water.

    That¡¯s the best thing about being religious. You spend your life expecting miracles, so when you finally get one, you know what to do. Larry caught his breath and went back for his buddies. Two of them died on the way up, but the other three made it out. Larry carried his friends to safety and kept going down. He rescued forty men that day.

    At 0900, he saw a flight of Japanese planes about to start a strafing run. Larry leapt in the air and started killing Zeroes, using other ships to launch himself. He didn¡¯t want to drop planes in the harbor, so he grabbed them by the wings and flung them out over clear ocean. He destroyed seventeen fighters before they turned around. Larry followed them for eighty miles and collapsed from exhaustion. They found him in the ocean, floating face down with his lungs full of water, but alive. His uniform was hanging in strips. He¡¯d been hit by a thousand bullets, but there wasn¡¯t a mark on him.

    Men on the ships swore they saw Larry flying, hovering in mid-air, chasing after planes, but he was never able to fly like that again, even at the height of his power.

    I watched an upscaled recording of his first interview. Larry was barely nineteen - nervous, patriotic, and painfully humble. The media grilled him for three hours, then the Navy took him to Project Cobalt in New Mexico. He emerged three months later with a fresh uniform and a symbolic promotion. They transferred him to Intelligence and made him a Captain. An editorial called him ¡°Captain Cobalt¡± as an insult, but the name stuck.

    Larry hated the promotion, but he never complained in public. He fought in every major land battle of World War II. He was offered a dozen medals, but he turned them all down - said it wasn¡¯t fair to give medals to a bulletproof soldier.

    In 1945, they sent him to Berlin with orders to grab Hitler, but he failed. Reporters badgered him about it and Larry lost his temper, one of the few times we ever saw him angry in public. This led to his second famous quote, written in neon script over his uniform: ¡°I said he got away. I didn¡¯t say we were giving up.¡±

    But Larry never got a chance to redeem himself. Hitler committed suicide in April of the same year. There is some debate, even among his close friends, about whether Larry would have brought Hitler to trial, or killed him on sight.

    After the war, Larry married his childhood sweetheart and moved to DC. Her name was Sally Houseman - a shy, simple girl from Pittsburgh. She spoke to the press three times in her life: once at her wedding, once when she met the queen, and once in 1960 - the day Captain Cobalt got his GED.

    The couple talked about having a child, but they decided it would be too dangerous. The government wanted him to try it, but Larry was afraid the baby would be born with his strength. If the power was proportional, the fetus would tear Sally apart.

    Thousands of Jews and Christians named Larry as an inspiration in the 1950s, convinced that Captain Cobalt¡¯s power was a gift from God. Larry clearly believed this. He rejected all forms of praise and personal compensation. He turned down medals, knighthood, and a dozen honorary degrees.

    Larry spent four months in Vietnam, but he missed the worst of it. Kennedy signed the Metahuman Resources Accord in 1962, a UN resolution that made it illegal to use metahumans in war.

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    Sally died in 2005, at the age of 82. Larry gave the eulogy. He was the same age, but he didn¡¯t look a day over thirty. The power that made him invulnerable had kept him young for a hundred years. Doctors say if he hadn¡¯t been killed, he might have lived forever.

    He married three more times in his life but left no children.

    He couldn¡¯t fight wars anymore, so Larry spent his time in DC, training new heroes and making corny speeches. He was still on the news every month or so, rescuing people from plane crashes and hurricanes.

    Larry came out of retirement in 2043, the year Lagos Sembala unleashed his famous curse on Washington, DC. The attack wiped out the legislature, the Supreme Court, and most of the cabinet. The president died in mid-sentence, addressing a joint session of Congress, then the CDC did everything wrong. They thought it was a disease, but it was a magical curse called Houngan Majher - Revenge of the Priest.

    The priest in question was a metahuman warlord who controlled half of Africa at the time. None of these countries were U.S. client states anymore, so nobody in the West cared very much. Sembala controlled the stuff in the middle, so at first, nobody cared but China.

    The president sent a thousand troops to Dongala after the attack. Most of them are still there, shoveled into mass graves by Sembala¡¯s faithful, with maybe a hundred still walking around as zombies. Lagos Sembala was a card-carrying Necromancer. The real thing. Even the angels are scared of him.

    I use the present tense because he¡¯s still around, haunting the plains of Africa, waiting for his chance to rise again. He was trying to be a god, and he almost succeeded. He needed a million souls killed in battle; a million lives sacrificed in his name. He got half of those before we took him out.

    Sembala attacked Washington in March. In June, the new president decided to openly violate the MRA. He recruited a team of metahumans and brought Captain Cobalt out of retirement. The Captain took them through an accelerated version of boot camp and hitched a ride to Africa. Larry wanted to capture the beast, but a member of his team killed Sembala in cold blood.

    Two years later, Larry was dead.

    No one knows who killed him. Sembala is the obvious suspect, but his followers would have used magic. Larry was killed by technology, killed with a method so simple, no one at the DMA ever imagined it. Or maybe one of them did imagine it, and Larry¡¯s death was an inside job. The question has been open for so long, it¡¯s become a running joke. In any airport in the world, you can buy a t-shirt that says, ¡°I killed Captain Cobalt,¡± but I never thought that was funny.

    Larry was sustained by the same kind of energy that mages use to cast spells. Every cell in his body was infused with magic. He only had one weakness - the weakness we all have - vulnerability to tantalum.

    The DMA makes cages out of it. Street vendors sell it as a protection against curses. Most of the time, it doesn¡¯t work. Left in the open, tantalum alloys will absorb a certain amount of magic and become inert. To stay potent, they have to be magnetized, refreshed by a magnetic field.

    It sounds like a big weakness, but in practice, tantalum weapons are slow, brittle, and hard to use. A lot of villains tried it, but Larry was so powerful, it would have taken a ton of tantalum to bring him down. He got shot with a tantalum bullet once, but the coating burned off, and the scratch healed in a week.

    Tantalum weapons were so clumsy, they weren¡¯t even considered a threat in modern times. Larry¡¯s handler never scanned for them, and the Defense Department didn¡¯t know what to look for. They didn¡¯t take it seriously until Larry got sick.

    They tore his house apart. That¡¯s where they found the first cylinder. It was empty by then - a twelve-ounce magnetized container about the size of a thermos, hidden in the air ducts of his house. The cylinder had been filled with tantalum dust on a slow-release timer. Larry had been breathing the stuff for years. His skin could stop a tank shell, but the dust had been eating him from the inside. The DMA found eight cylinders. Two in his house, three in his training shed, two in his favorite restaurant, and one in the mausoleum, three feet from Sally¡¯s grave.

    Who would do such a thing? Who could do such a thing? You would need a villain smart enough to think of this, sneaky enough to infiltrate the most secure buildings on Earth, and patient enough to wait ten years for his revenge. Who killed Captain Cobalt? Question of the century. I asked Azael about it the first day I got here. He gave me an answer, but I don¡¯t believe it.

    He says Captain Cobalt was killed by an angel.

    * * *

    I spent a solid week training every morning, jumping from rooftop to rooftop, getting a little better, a little stronger each day. Jeeves said the real Captain Cobalt could have run that course in eighteen minutes in 1955 and could have run it in eight minutes before he got sick in 2045.

    Once I had my route worked out, I ended my first run at fifty-eight minutes. By the end of the week, I had it down to thirty-eight minutes. I was so thrilled with the improvement, I ran inside to tell Lydia, and forgot to turn my projector off. A black and white hologram of Captain Cobalt phased through the door behind me, until the dead man was standing calmly in my living room.

    Lydia tensed up a little, but only a little, as she recognized him.

    ¡°You know who this is?¡± I asked, gesturing at the image.

    ¡°Of course,¡± she said.

    ¡°I really don¡¯t want to know the answer to this, but I guess I have to ask. You were with Stefan through the whole war? Did you actually meet Captain Cobalt? Did my great-grandfather fight him?¡±

    Lydia said, ¡°No,¡± thank god. ¡°Stefan was at sea while your Captain fought on land. They never met. I believe their respective governments were keeping them apart, afraid to lose one or both if they faced each other directly.¡±

    ¡°But if they had faced each other directly, who would have won?¡±

    ¡°Stefan,¡± Lydia said immediately.

    ¡°What makes you so damn sure that my great-grandfather could have defeated the most powerful hero who ever lived?¡±

    ¡°Stefan would have had to fight a lot smarter if he had faced your hero at the height of his powers, but in 1945, your superman was brand new, barely trained. And your Captain was limited by the level of background magic present on Earth. Stefan was not.¡±

    ¡°Because he was pulling power directly from Hell, through you.¡±

    ¡°Yes,¡± Lydia confirmed. ¡°It gave him a tremendous advantage. The level of background magic is typically high in cities, but almost zero in rural or abandoned areas like the middle of an ocean. That¡¯s why your hero teams congregate in urban areas, and why bigger cities spawn so many more heroes than small ones. Even if they had sent a team to fight Stefan, they would have quickly run out of energy to fight, while Stefan could pull an almost infinite amount of power through me. They would have had to send an angel or a godling to stop him, and even then, Stefan would have likely won.¡±

    ¡°So, my great-grandfather was a serious badass. You think I could be that strong?¡±

    Lydia just said, ¡°Yes.¡±

 Chapter 33: Pornbot

    I met James Veazey on my first day at Innovex, and we were friends in a matter of minutes. I was in a programmer cube while he did hardware and robot stuff downstairs. I met him in the break room over lunch and when he found out I had also moved from Texas, that was all he needed to know. I wish I could pretend it was more complicated than that, but it wasn¡¯t.

    I told him about my time in the compound and immediately realized he was cut from the same cloth as the men there, all the way down to the chewing tobacco and a deep love of illegal firearms.

    There was never any discussion about it, we were just automatically on the same team. Veazey granted his loyalty absolutely, and once you had it, he would charge the gates of Hell with you. He introduced me to the guys and started inviting me to marathon gaming sessions.

    He had turned this group of random programmers into a surrogate family, and he was happy to invite me in. He was weirdly good with women, but he burned through them so fast, I can¡¯t remember their names. He made a point to drop by the office and show off the ones he was proud of, and I got the impression that for every one he introduced us to, there were three or four others who didn¡¯t make the cut.

    Veazey had spent two years with an elite team of combat engineers during the war in Dongala, an experience that he quietly avoided talking about, all these years later. He said he spent most of his time building runways and field hospitals, but his team spent a good portion of that time watching for snipers, or directly threatened by zombies and corrupted animals.

    He was in his mid-thirties when I met him, but he still spent money like his pockets were on fire and drank like he was trying to put them out. I had gone so long without drinking, it wasn¡¯t even a challenge by that point, so I spent a lot of nights sucking at pool while everybody else drank. Then, at the end of the night, I would hustle everybody into a cab and make sure they got home.

    His group was really good for me, hanging out with guys who could stay up all night swapping hacks and playing games, most of them rolling in more money than they had time to spend, blowing bonus checks on hardware and strippers. I was still with Judy for most of this, so I remember being very careful about what invitations I accepted, and very conscious of what my shirt smelled like at any given time.

    Veazey had even less of a personal filter than I did, and he was constantly dropping these awesome Texas phrases that became a permanent part of my vocabulary. Anybody who hung out with him for more than twenty minutes would start talking like him, and he made me more Texan at age twenty than I was when I actually lived there.

    He straight up hated Judy, and it was a constant battle to keep them from crossing paths. He used to badmouth her so often, I finally had to put my foot down and make him shut up.

    He was religious in a quiet way, and it turns out many of the other guys were, too. I never gave it much thought until two of them started that public porn challenge. Veazey would have no part of it and immediately started going out of his way to try and break our streaks, sending dozens of videos that started with puppies and kittens just long enough to fool the filter, before they switched to hardcore porn.

    I lost touch with him after I quit Innovex and cruised through the next three years on lonely autopilot, as my entire support system quietly slipped away.

    But I was now in urgent need of advice and hardware, and there was only one guy I could call.

    * * *

    Veazey answered on the first ring and was so incredibly happy to hear my voice, the son of a bitch almost made me cry. I remember thinking I could have had a best friend for the last three years, but I had walked away from him, and I couldn¡¯t remember why.

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    ¡°Oh shit,¡± Veazey said, ¡°I missed your birthday. But hang on. I¡¯ve got something for you.¡±

    I said, ¡°Veazey, you don¡¯t have to¡­¡± but he was already gone.

    He came back a moment later and said, ¡°Okay, give me install permission. You¡¯re gonna love this.¡±

    I hesitated. ¡°Man, my system has changed a lot since you¡­¡±

    He said, ¡°Hey! Trust me!¡±

    So, I did. And just as I was thinking I had made a terrible mistake, my whole interface blanked out, and Jeeves was gone. All my buttons turned pink and purple, and the tiny, posed figure of a naked woman popped up on my desk where Jeeves used to be.

    I was surprised Lydia didn¡¯t take a swipe at her.

    Veazey was beaming, grinning ear to ear on my screen. ¡°See? Who¡¯s your buddy? This chick was the hottest porn star of early 21c. I got this version from an Air Force buddy a long time ago. It¡¯s old code, but not as old as that broken down cartoon shit you use, and I updated all her interface hooks.¡±

    ¡°Veazey, I cannot use a fucking porn star for my work interface!¡±

    ¡°Why not? I do.¡± He hit a button and showed me his own version. She was in a bathrobe playing games on her phone, like she was resting between shoots. ¡°I can put her in Gamer Mode, but then all she does is complain.¡±

    The figure on my desk flickered, and now she was wearing jeans, with a black hoodie and a baseball cap. She made a drawn-out ¡°Ugh¡± sound and said, ¡°This system is a mess. This interface is older than I am, and half this code is from a museum.¡± She yelled at me. ¡°Why am I running on dog shit?¡±

    A thousand windows flared up and died in half a second. ¡°Oh good, another jobless deadbeat user. I¡¯m gonna go ahead and pay this bill for you, they¡¯re about to shut your water off.¡± Something in the background made a KA-CHING noise, as fifty-seven dollars left my account.

    ¡°She comes with financial hooks? By default?¡±

    ¡°Of course not,¡± Veazey said. ¡°I gave you my settings. It¡¯ll be fine.¡±

    The pornbot was making herself at home. ¡°A multi-layer porn blocker? Boring. Are you religious or something? You need me to punch through a firewall? I¡¯m surprised it let me install. But this only blocks network stuff. I bet you forgot the local cache. Let¡¯s see where the good stuff is!¡± And in a very few seconds, ¡°There we go! Old folder called ¡®Proprietary¡¯ with trivial encryption. Let¡¯s crack this bitch open!¡±

    ¡°Veazey, shut this damn thing down!¡± I yelled, scrambling for my chair. I pulled up a keyboard and started hunting for an off switch.

    ¡°Relax,¡± he said. ¡°It¡¯s just an interface.¡±

    ¡°No, now it¡¯s a virus, and it¡¯s about to crack my¡­¡±

    ¡°Got it!¡± the bot said, popping up a small side window as she went through my files one by one.

    Lydia quietly slid down from her perch and leaned over so she could see. I tried to wave her off, but I couldn¡¯t yell at her while Veazey was listening.

    ¡°This is pretty tame stuff, dude,¡± the bot said. ¡°You¡¯re a grown man. There should at least be some fetish stuff in here.¡± The videos flashed in the window at impossible speed. ¡°This is like training wheels porn. It¡¯s cute. Okay, chrono order by file creation date, let¡¯s see: redhead, redhead, tiny redhead, generic blonde, early AI Vtuber, I remember her! But there¡¯s just one of these. Let¡¯s see. Subfolders. Boring. Boring. Jenna. Jenna. Big Jenna folder. Complete archive, 2048 AI upscale! Rock on! Oh, this was a gift. From the same guy who just installed me. Aww, you guys have known each other a long time, that¡¯s sweet.¡±

    ¡°Veazey, you have got to shut this fucking thing off, before¡­¡±

    ¡°Big dead spot here, no new files. I think you got a girlfriend. And then¡­ vanilla, vanilla, couples vanilla, couples vanilla, couples vanilla tutorial! She gave you homework! And you did it! Way to commit!¡±

    ¡°Goddammit!¡±

    ¡°Just one good one after the girlfriend. Marilyn Monroe cosplay. Oh, they spent money on this. Full Oval Office set. Eighteen minutes! Heavy engagement! You spent some time with this one. This is an old friend.¡± The bot flipped her hat around and conjured a chair. ¡°Okay, I can¡¯t get you new stuff until you take the blocker off, but I can upscale fake Marilyn for you. Maybe a 3-D conversion?¡±

    I yelled at Veazey, ¡°At least mute it!¡±

    ¡°Eighty-two videos but none of them are me,¡± the bot said. ¡°What am I doing here if you don¡¯t even like me?¡±

    And then she was finally muted.

    The tiny porn star jumped around my desk for a while, cursing silently and flipping me off, until she gave up, went back to her chair, and looked like she was gaming.

    * * *

    I restored Jeeves from a backup and thought really hard about deleting my old porn folder, before quietly deciding not to. I then uninstalled the out of control pornbot and felt a weird surge of guilt as the tiny figure shook her head and quietly disappeared.

 Chapter 34: Happiest Guy in the World

    I should have started on these advanced spells weeks earlier, but I had been in a kind of weird denial - playing stupid games with Lydia, drowning in schoolboy grief over Judy and Denise. But now it was time to get serious, and I had to make up for lost time.

    I converted five hundred dollars to anonymous currency and paid ¡®cash¡¯ for a bulletproof jacket from a guy Veazey vouched for. I wanted to get one in Bluestar blue, but all they had was black.

    I spent the day gathering parts for my next training session, and quickly realized there was no way I could do this alone. I tried a dozen ways to get around it, but finally broke down and called Veazey. The next step in my training was going to be crazy and dangerous, and he was the only one I could trust.

    ¡°Veazey, are you willing to meet me in the Zone? I need to shoot some things.¡±

    Veazey laughed. ¡°You finally gonna let me teach you to shoot?¡±

    ¡°I already know how to shoot!¡±

    ¡°No, dude, you really don¡¯t. But I can fix you. What caliber you want?¡±

    Veazey showed up in his famous red truck, an ancient rumbling ground vehicle that still used rubber tires. He got the wrong idea over the phone, so he showed up with a truck bed full of his own guns.

    Even homeless people had abandoned the Zone by this point. By 2058, I didn¡¯t even see rats or cockroaches anymore. The weird miasma left behind after Nergal¡¯s destruction was slowly getting stronger, consuming anything that crawled or slithered inside. I shuddered when I realized, I might be the only living thing still safe in this place after dark.

    Henry had made this building a kind of shrine to Old America, putting up weathered paper photos of men in suits. Veazey told me they were presidents, but the names meant nothing to me.

    ¡°America really elected a president named Dwight?¡± I asked.

    ¡°You seriously don¡¯t know who Dwight Eisenhower was? I thought you went to a fancy corporate school.¡±

    ¡°Just for a few years, and the corporations that run shit aren¡¯t gonna teach kids about the system they replaced. We might grow up and decide to try it again.¡±

    One wall was unfinished, so Henry had built his own backstop to shoot his collection of highly illegal vintage firearms: a Browning Hi-Power, a rusted AK-47, and some kind of civilian knockoff M16. But today, all that had been cleared away to make room for three HDI Autoguns, in various states of disrepair.

    I led Veazey into the building and realized I couldn¡¯t put this off anymore.

    ¡°Okay, this is gonna get weird, but I guess the easiest way to start this is to just say, I got powers. Something happened on my birthday, and I got powers. I asked you out here to help me train. This thing I¡¯m about to try, it¡¯s really dangerous, and I need a friend here, in case I have to go to the hospital.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re not fucking with me, you really got powers?¡±

    I nodded.

    ¡°That¡¯s awesome! What can you do?¡±

    ¡°I got magic.¡±

    ¡°So, just like¡­¡±

    ¡°Just like I always wanted, yeah, but there¡¯s a catch. Quite a few catches, actually. Look, when I tell you this, if you stop me every time I say something that sounds like bullshit, we¡¯re gonna be here all day. So could you let me go through the whole thing real quick, and just say bullshit once, at the end?¡±

    He shrugged.

    ¡°Okay, the night of my birthday, I met this chick named Lydia¡­¡±

    * * *

    ¡°Well,¡± Veazey said, putting a pinch of contraband between his cheek and gum. ¡°If you really are training for a fight, how much do you know about the bad guy?¡±

    ¡°I can show you.¡± I pulled up Jacob¡¯s anatomical drawings and blew them up on an interior wall. ¡°This is the demon prince¡­ BZ. He¡¯s nine feet tall, super strong, with all kinds of built in magic powers and skin like armor plate.¡±

    Veazey gaped at me. ¡°So, what are you gonna do?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m gonna kill him.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°How the fuck do you train for that?¡± Veazey asked.

    ¡°I got these old automatic guns left behind from the Nergal attack. I brought back two more for parts, and I finally got one working. But I need you to check my work, before I start shooting myself.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re not serious.¡±

    ¡°I am absolutely serious. I got these protection wards from one of my ancestors. I know they can stop black powder balls, and maybe even cannon fire, but nobody¡¯s ever tested these against modern rounds. I have to make sure they hold up, and I have to train myself to keep these spells going, even when I¡¯m distracted and scared shitless.¡±

    Veazey nodded like he understood, then he walked up, and punched me in the face. I went down like a sack of potatoes. I had been slapped in the face quite a few times, as a kid, but I¡¯d spent my whole life avoiding fights with grown men. I fell flat on my ass and looked up at him, red-faced and sweating.

    ¡°How are you gonna take a bullet when you can¡¯t even take a punch?¡±

    ¡°Goddammit, I wasn¡¯t ready!¡±

    ¡°Yeah, no shit. You think demons are gonna wait until you¡¯re ready? You think demons are gonna use guns?¡±

    Veazey tried to kick me while I was down, but now I had wards up, and his foot just kind of slowed down as it got closer to my ribs. I waited until he was off-balance, then I grabbed his leg and yanked him off his feet.

    Now we were both on the ground. Veazey tried to throw himself across my body and pin me, but the wards seemed to push him away, every time he tried to grab me or get closer.

    ¡°Thanks,¡± I said, slowly rising to my feet. ¡°I should have thought about melee first. I need to see if these are strong enough to deflect a whole¡ª ¡°

    But Veazey was way ahead of me. He got a running start and tried to knock me over, using his whole body. I felt the strain as the wards deflected his weight. He didn¡¯t knock me over, but repelling the full weight of a human body took more power than I expected, and I was having to concentrate harder to keep the wards solid. If the power requirements were based on weight, bullets should be easy, right?

    Veazey got within a couple inches of me and started swinging for real, but his hands were slowing down as they drove into something invisible in front of me. He almost got close enough to tag me a few times, before the wards seemed to firm up and push him further away.

    ¡°Okay, okay!¡± I said, trying to wave him off. ¡°Truce. But now you gotta tell me, how does it feel when you try and punch me?¡±

    ¡°At first it was like trying to hit a guy wrapped in a blanket. Then it was like punching a rubber tire. Then at the end, it actually hurt my hand a little. But Tim, you can¡¯t walk around with half-assed armor. And what happens if you get surprised? By the time you got that spell up, you were already on the ground!¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t cast the whole spell while I was on the ground. I cast it from scratch an hour ago and then I just kind of¡­ kept it going, in the back of my head. I didn¡¯t have the wards going at full power, just standing here with you, but I wasn¡¯t completely defenseless. My wards weren¡¯t strong enough to keep me on my feet, since you put your weight into it, but it didn¡¯t hurt like a full punch, either. I wasn¡¯t invulnerable, but I don¡¯t think you could cut me, even if I just had them going in the background.¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t hit you that hard.¡±

    ¡°Well then, you need to. Try it now.¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t even get close enough to swing, now that you¡¯re ready for me.¡±

    ¡°Exactly. You were able to get close because you¡¯re a friend, and I had my guard down. I had my wards at maybe twenty percent. But I would never be that relaxed around strangers. I think I would have them at forty percent just walking down the street. And if I¡¯m expecting a threat, like if I know demons could be around the corner somewhere? I¡¯ll be channeling enough magic to keep them at eighty percent, or even full power.¡±

    Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

    ¡°And what if some sneaky demon fucker pops in and stabs you while you¡¯re nice and relaxed, talking to me?¡±

    ¡°It would bruise, but I don¡¯t think it would cut me. Having wards in the background, it¡¯s like wearing leather or Kevlar, and when I¡¯m really cranking them up, they can be as solid as steel plates. I guess I¡¯m at risk of being tackled or knocked down by something bigger than me, but I don¡¯t think they could crush me, and I don¡¯t think they could get their claws in.¡±

    Veazey shook his head. ¡°Too many goddamn ¡®ifs¡¯ and ¡®maybes¡¯ in that sentence, Tim. And I don¡¯t think you realize how fast or how hard you went down.¡±

    ¡°Fine! I admit, I dropped my guard around you. But you can bet I won¡¯t make that mistake again. I won¡¯t make that mistake when I¡¯m walking alone, and certainly not when I¡¯m expecting trouble.¡±

    ¡°But you won¡¯t be expecting it. That¡¯s my point! What happens if a giant fuck-off demon pops out of nowhere and bodies you when you think you¡¯re safe?¡±

    ¡°I think I can smell them now, when magical creatures pop in. I still have to concentrate to see auras and tethers, but magic has a smell to it, copper and ozone like electric blood. Even Lydia smells like that, for a second, whenever she pops into real space. And you bet your ass that smell is gonna get my wards up to full strength, any time I catch the scent.

    ¡°And this prince, he¡¯s not gonna start a fight with me on a random city street. That would attract a Bluestar team, maybe even an angel. And once Gabriel or a hero team saves my ass, I¡¯ll end up in prison or a safe house, and the Big Guy will lose me, just like he lost my grandpa.

    ¡°He can only really attack when I¡¯m alone, and a demon can¡¯t pop out of nowhere as long as we¡¯re in the Zone. That¡¯s another reason I was too damn relaxed. Nergal doesn¡¯t let them pop in and out of astral space in his territory, and he doesn¡¯t let anything fly. He might even try to eat demons who come in here without permission, so even if they run in long enough to fight, they won¡¯t be able to stick around. That¡¯s why this whole plan depends on baiting Baalphezar to fight me in the Zone.

    ¡°Yes, I¡¯ll have to keep my wards up any time I leave my place, but remember, these demons don¡¯t want to straight up kill me. They want to pin me down or capture me, but if they kill me, this whole project is done, and they¡¯re totally fucked. I know it¡¯s a gamble, but I think I can pull this off, especially if you help me test bullets.¡±

    ¡°No way,¡± Veazey said. ¡°I don¡¯t trust this magic shit at all. No way I¡¯m gonna sit here and let you shoot yourself.¡±

    ¡°I have to. These demons are gonna hit a lot harder than you do, and that big fucker is gonna hit me with everything he has. I¡¯ve got to be ready for it. I¡¯ve got to build my confidence, I¡¯ve got to choke this fear down, and that process starts right here. This jacket has hard plates, and I¡¯ve been testing the wards with little stuff. If I can keep my guard up, I won¡¯t even feel the impacts. I¡¯ve been hitting myself with a hammer all day.¡±

    ¡°Jesus Christ.¡±

    ¡°Veazey, I¡¯ve got to do this, so the only question is, are you gonna spot me, or do I have to do it alone?¡±

    I never really talked him into it, but he stayed.

    ¡°I need you to check my calibration to make sure the bullet goes exactly where this laser dot is without drifting. I took the brain out and rigged a remote switch so I can fire with gesture controls, but this thing is so old, I might have missed something.¡±

    Veazey checked my work and made a few adjustments. Then he said he didn¡¯t trust the old ammo and brought in his own NATO rounds.

    I was pretty confident in my wards after hitting myself with progressively larger and sharper objects all day, but nothing can prepare you for staring down the barrel of a gun. I wondered if this was the last thing Mister Braddock saw before one of these cut him down.

    I carefully recast Anson¡¯s wards, planted my feet, and pulled the trigger.

    The gun was way, way too loud inside the three walls, even with earplugs in. The noise made me jump and my wards failed. The bullet didn¡¯t pierce my jacket, but the impact knocked me back against the ballistic blocks.

    Veazey was already vaulting over the counter when I held up my hand. ¡°I¡¯m fine! I¡¯m fine! Just wasn¡¯t ready for the noise. That won¡¯t surprise me again.¡±

    ¡°This is dumb as fuck, Timmy. Next level stupid.¡±

    ¡°I know. But it¡¯s the only way.¡±

    I squeezed the trigger again, and this time the wards held. I still felt an impact, but the bullet flattened against something invisible and dropped straight to the floor. I shot myself in the chest ten more times, until the bullets were bouncing off. I had to be careful not to use too much power, or the shield would become too solid and cause a ricochet. I had to keep it kind of soft on the surface, so the bullets would slow and stop instead of bouncing.

    I took a break to wash the gunpowder out of my throat and pulled up video for Veazey, so he could understand the model I was working from. I pulled up a video of Captain Cobalt in 1947, doing this exact trick in front of a German machine gun. Then I showed him five more clips of the Captain facing different kinds of gunfire, until I saw one that made me curse.

    ¡°Fuck! It¡¯s not enough. Fuck! I have to do it again.¡±

    Veazey was frowning. He couldn¡¯t see what had upset me.

    ¡°This is Captain Cobalt in Honduras - Operation Golden Pheasant in 1988. You see all these guys shooting him? Those bullets are hitting him everywhere, not just in the chest. Fuck! They¡¯re even shooting his feet. It¡¯s not enough to bounce bullets off my chest. I have to shoot myself from a bunch of different angles, in all kinds of different body parts.¡±

    Veazey crossed his arms and started shaking his head. ¡°Please, stop this.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry,¡± I said. ¡°But I really do appreciate you being here.¡±

    I picked up the autogun and moved it to a different position, angled down to hit my legs now. I worked out a pattern, until I had successfully bounced a bullet off all my limbs, hands and feet. But there was one test I just could not do.

    I squinted my eyes and positioned my thumb over the remote trigger, but no matter how much I tried to force it, I couldn¡¯t make myself push the button.

    ¡°Veazey, can you hit the manual trigger just one time? I can¡¯t shoot myself in the back.¡±

    Veazey said ¡°No,¡± so I did it myself, screaming as I forced my thumb down. The gun went thump, and the round hit me dead center in the back. My wards flickered, but they were enough, so I hit the trigger ten more times, listening to the bullets change pitch as my confidence caught up with them.

    ¡°I need to shoot myself in the face once or twice, but I should probably get some sleep first.¡±

    ¡°Jesus Christ, Timmy. Can we finally stop this?¡±

    ¡°Not yet.¡± I said, hearing my voice crack. ¡°I have to keep shooting until I don¡¯t flinch anymore.¡±

    Half an hour later, I coughed and started cleaning up. ¡°If you hate what I did with the bullets, you¡¯re really gonna hate what I do with the lighter fluid.¡±

    * * *

    I shook his hand as he packed up to leave. ¡°Can you come back tomorrow? Early as you can? No more gun stuff, no more ward tests. Just fun shit tomorrow, I promise. I had an ancestor who specialized in combat spells, and he left me all kinds of Captain Cobalt stuff.¡±

    Veazey reluctantly agreed and I went home to Lydia, reeking of sweat and gunpowder.

    * * *

    Crazy Henry¡¯s shooting range was part of an impromptu junkyard the military had set up to dump cars whose drivers had been consumed by miasma or brought back as zombies during the attack. The hovercars had all been steered away from the scene or crashed in dramatic fireballs, but there were still dozens of ground vehicles to clear off the main roads, as the military had been forced to abandon the project early.

    There were still six old, wrecked ground vehicles scattered around as rusted hulks, dropped randomly instead of joining the neat stacks of crushed cars behind them. You could tell two of the vehicles had been personally smashed by Nergal¡¯s feet.

    I found a heavy one that was buried in mud and singled it out for my first experiment.

    Veazey was still scowling and suspicious, but he showed up bright and early on Sunday morning with coffee and sandwiches for us. I assured him the scary part was over, and he was about to see some cool shit.

    I was getting my new toys from Kovach Mage No. 5, Anson Kovach, who had assembled a neat little collection of combat spells that he had refined and improved over the years. The wards that had started as protection from arrows and swords could now turn away bullets and cannonballs, and the simple strength spell Laurence had used to help with shipboard work was now a full-on fortitude spell.

    Anson realized it wasn¡¯t enough to make yourself stronger. The existing spell would let you lift something far beyond human capacity, but if you didn¡¯t fortify your bones and protect your tendons, you could easily rip yourself apart.

    Anson used variations on healing magic from Tobias and turned them into a kind of preventive medicine, strengthening every tissue in his body to handle the demands of enhanced strength. Fortitude wouldn¡¯t make your body bulletproof by itself, but you had a much better chance of surviving if you had it up, even if something pierced your skin.

    The wards and strength spells were fiendishly complicated and took a long time to cast, so I had to be able to prepare myself in advance and keep them going in the back of my head, no matter how much pain or fear I was in. But first, I had to see if the damn thing even worked.

    I cast fortitude and grabbed the bumper of this old car, now buried in a decade of mud. I took a deep breath and tried to yank it free, but I was clearly only using my normal human strength. The spell still protected me from straining or pulling muscles, but I wasn¡¯t getting any stronger.

    I kicked the bumper and yelled, ¡°Fuck! Why doesn¡¯t anything work the first time?¡± crouching to try again.

    I was bringing in more and more magic to try and force it, lighting up my aura until Veazey started taking involuntary steps back. I was straining and surging, bringing in enough magic to make a little corona around myself, when Veazey gave an involuntary cough from the dust.

    Something about that sound distracted me, and the moment I turned my attention away from it, the car popped up out of the ground, showering us both with dirt clods as it soared high in the air, flipping three or four times until it crashed back to Earth.

    Veazey looked at me, then looked at the car to see how close it came to going over the fence. ¡°Hang on a minute,¡± he said. ¡°I gotta move my truck.¡±

    We spent the rest of the day playing with it, seeing how far I could throw an engine block, and seeing if I could lift more than one vehicle at a time. I managed to move the rusted hulk of a school bus by using levitation in conjunction with the strength, but I quickly discovered the real limit was bulk, not weight. I might be able to lift three or four car frames at once, but I couldn¡¯t balance them or keep them stable enough to do the experiment.

    I learned with a combination of wards and fortitude, I could punch things really hard and crush them like my fists were made of something stronger than just bones and skin. And if I used a touch of levitation to lift my target off the ground before I punched it, I could break the inertia and make it fly. That part felt really good. A little too good, as I felt a lifetime of pent-up frustration surging into each punch. I sent a crushed Toyota soaring across the yard, delighted with myself, until I saw the look on Veazey¡¯s face.

    He had obviously been scared of the airborne car before, afraid of what I might do by accident, but when I glanced over after those first few rounds of punching practice, I realized that my best friend was afraid of me.

    I dropped everything and grabbed a bottle of water from his cooler, trying to reassure him that I was still me.

    ¡°The wizards in that tower,¡± I said, ¡°they walk around all day like magic is some kind of burden, like it¡¯s all so serious they¡¯re never allowed to enjoy anything. It feels like they¡¯re intentionally giving scholarships to people who hate magic. I really don¡¯t get it. If I could do that stuff, I¡¯d be the happiest guy in the world."

    ¡°You can,¡± Veazey said. ¡°You can do that stuff. You¡¯re doing it right now.¡±

    ¡°Oh yeah,¡± I said, staring blankly at my water bottle. "So, I guess I¡¯m the happiest guy in the world.¡±

 Chapter 35: Heart of a Warrior

    If I had just stopped there, I would have been fine. But after Veazey left, as the sun went down in the Zone, the old solar floodlights came on and I felt an itch, a sense of dread that I wasn¡¯t learning fast enough or training hard enough.

    I had felt this feeling before, when I was rushing on deadline or trying to impress a manager, but I had never felt it purely on my own, or for anything concerning my physical body. Is this why people trained so hard for sports? Is this what kept Olympic athletes waking up every morning before the crack of dawn?

    I looked over the cars I had been kicking around and decided to try and stack them, using a combination of strength and levitation. I tried to stack them by weight, using fortitude and my warded hands, toughened like I was wearing magical gloves.

    Everything went great for a while, but the other stacks were made of crushed cars, pressed tightly together after they had been reduced to cubes. My stack of five looked stable enough, but before I could turn to get the next car, the stack collapsed, and a car dropped straight on top of me from about ten feet up.

    My wards absorbed some of the impact as I fell backwards into the dirt with a car on my legs, but suddenly I was alone, injured, in the dark, with a ton of rusted metal on top of me. I didn¡¯t completely lose fortitude or my wards, but they flickered enough to let me feel something was terribly wrong.

    I started panting and flailing around, trying to push the car off me, but I couldn¡¯t focus my strength, so I was pushing with nothing but my human noodle arms. I gritted my teeth through the pain and tried to focus. I hadn¡¯t lost the spell yet, if I could just keep my shit together for a few seconds.

    Emotion. I needed a more useful emotion. What¡¯s the opposite of fear? If I couldn¡¯t find courage, maybe anger would work. So, I let myself get angry about the pain, angry about my own stupidity, and angry about the fucking demons who were forcing me to turn myself into something I was never meant to be.

    I threw the car off me and saw that my legs were really, really fucked, with my bones clearly broken and my ankle turned in a way an ankle is never supposed to turn. What kind of idiot tries this kind of thing alone in the middle of the night? Then the pain hit, and I realized I had to do something before I passed out.

    ¡°Jeeves!¡± I shouted. ¡°Pull up bookmark for bone and tissue healing from section marked Tobias!¡±

    ¡°Good evening, sir!¡± Jeeves said. ¡°I¡¯m showing sixty-two unread messages, eight pending voicemails, three unpaid bills and ninety entries from your premium¡­¡±

    ¡°Jeeves, shut the fuck up! Code red, display Taltorak, Healing!¡±

    Tobias Kovach was one of the greatest healers who ever lived, a mage who combined medicine and magic to create a beautiful, layered healing spell that started as ordinary first aid and regenerated more and more as the mage held concentration.

    The spell was written in stages. A caster could just do the first ten runes or so to handle basic first aid and then keep going to the next five and the next five and so forth, to heal more sensitive and complex injuries.

    My broken bones only required ten runes to fix, but I was not prepared for the excruciating pain of feeling them snap back into place as I watched. The magic yanked my leg back into position, rotating the broken foot faster and harder than it should ever go, with no anesthesia between me and the pain. Maintaining concentration on wards and fortitude turned out to be a cakewalk compared to maintaining concentration on a spell that was healing my body.

    I think the sounds distracted me more than the pain, squishing and crackling as I watched my legs move independently under my jeans. Finally, it was over, and I was able to gingerly rise to my feet on brand new bones. I couldn¡¯t tell if I felt great because the spell had rejuvenated my whole body, or if normal just felt great compared to the pain that had finally stopped.

    Later I would notice new tissue crisscrossing up and down my legs and abdomen, new and soft like baby skin, making me feel like a marbled steak. The damage had been healed but there was no way I could hide this from Lydia. I limped back to my building as if I was still injured, dreading the angry demon waiting for me at home.

    You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

    * * *

    Lydia spent twenty minutes trying to convince me to train somewhere she could watch. This was a perfectly sane request. Lydia would be the perfect training companion, already familiar with the battles and the pitfalls ahead of me. She would have warned me about the teetering car, and she would have been strong enough to help get it off me.

    The thought of training with her by my side was starting to sound¡­ fun. A break from the loneliness of this regimen I had created for myself, on the days when I had to work without Veazey. That was Lydia¡¯s ultimate temptation. She didn¡¯t have to rush the next stage of my seduction. All she had to do was wait.

    * * *

    I had a hundred videos of Captain Cobalt training, but most of them were newsreels and PR stuff, and most of it looked absurdly old-fashioned after a childhood spent watching modern action movies. Most of it was just boxing.

    The first one was just a PR stunt of the Captain smashing a line of twenty heavy bags at a school gym, sending them flying, one after the other, to titters and laughter from children. His training regimen got progressively more sophisticated through the decades, until he was dodging like a movie star and throwing in kicks with the punches.

    It still looked simple compared to the kinetic, rapid-fire pace of Hollywood movie fights, but at my level, simple was good. I turned some of his basic boxing videos into training holograms and got my own heavy bag from the abandoned sporting goods store.

    I broke a couple chains before I realized I couldn¡¯t train at full strength; but I could still put wards up and get used to maintaining a spell while I was punching stuff. Wards turned out to be way better than gloves. I had never done any kind of regular exercise before, so these early sessions were exhausting, until I learned to regulate the fortitude spell, keeping the endurance and trickle of regeneration, while keeping my strength more or less human.

    Training went much better after that, because I didn¡¯t have to stop and rest. I set timers to remind me to drink water every hour or so, but after the first few days, I was able to go for ten, twelve hours a day, jumping rope, pounding on bags, lifting weights, and dodging holographic bad guys in my training room.

    Veazey let me borrow his awesome self-driving truck to haul trash out of Crazy Henry¡¯s, leaving me with a wide-open space to set up heavy bags and a weight bench. Lifting weights was tricky, because it was way too easy to cheat. I had to learn to hold my strength back and force myself to stay human, so I could strengthen my body instead of my magic and stop myself from slipping into levitation every time I tried to jump rope.

    My training holograms were still showing way more red than green as I tried to copy Captain Cobalt¡¯s fighting style. My confidence was growing rapidly, but holograms don¡¯t hit back, and there¡¯s only so much you can learn from punching air.

    Captain Cobalt was so strong it was almost impossible to find someone he could train with. Later in his career, he learned to hold back his strength and spar with other strong heroes like Daedalus and Sonny Mao, but in the early days, it was just him.

    A bunch of Bluestar technical guys started making robots for him. At first, they were just a set of moving pads on gimbals that let him stand in a sphere and punch moving targets in all directions. By the time he died, he was fighting fully autonomous training robots, strong enough, fast enough, and smart enough to put up a real fight.

    I looked them up and found they were crazy expensive, hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy one outright. I finally found one I could get really cheap, but it came with a stern warning to never plug it in¡­

    * * *

    A few days later, I called Veazey to help with transportation of a five-hundred-pound sparring partner.

    Veazey did robot maintenance for a living, so he was initially impressed. ¡°This came straight from a Bluestar training room, how did you afford this?¡±

    ¡°I got him for a great price because he¡¯s defective. A supervillain reprogrammed him to go berserk and kill heroes that trained with him, any time he could get one of them alone. That dent is where Sonny Mao punched him. Should be a collector¡¯s item, but I got it for a thousand bucks, because his AI isn¡¯t totally purged. He doesn¡¯t always stay at the power level you set him to, and he doesn¡¯t always stop when you say stop. I named him Freddy, after one of my bullies from grade school.¡±

    ¡°Tim, this thing was designed to punch guys like Minerva and Captain Cobalt. If it catches you with your magic down, it could smash your skull like a watermelon!¡±

    ¡°Right,¡± I said. ¡°That¡¯s the point. If he can hurt me with my wards down, then I can¡¯t ever let him catch me with my wards down. You showed me that. Veazey, for this to work, the punches have to be real, the danger has to be real, and the fear has to be real, or I¡¯m just playing a fucking game here.

    ¡°I have to train like this because I¡¯m not like you and those Texas guys. I do not have the heart of a warrior. In my heart, I¡¯m a punching bag, so the hardest part of this fight will be forcing myself to hit back.¡±

    * * *

    The first day I got him, I set Freddy to level three and spent the afternoon dodging and punching him. It felt fantastic, learning to punch like Captain Cobalt and feel it work in real time, against a real opponent did more for my confidence than anything I had done so far. I could feel myself getting stronger with each punch I threw and each punch that bounced off me.

    And if Freddy quietly dialed himself to full power while we were working out, I took it as a compliment, that the files left in his memory thought I was Captain Cobalt himself.

 Chapter 36: Hardware

    ¡°I need your advice for this next part,¡± I told Veazey the next day. ¡°My spellbook is routed through Jeeves, and right now he¡¯s running on a collection of processor blocks back at my desk, about equivalent to a G3. I¡¯m not even carrying a full processor on me right now. This thing I¡¯m routing commands through is barely better than a smartphone. But if I¡¯m routing spells through this thing, if I really am going into combat, every second counts, and that means I need a serious upgrade. I also need better contacts, and maybe even ear filaments, so I can finally ditch this bone conduction shit.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re still running a G3? As a desktop? That was released when you were in high school. No wonder you have to write scripts for everything!¡±

    ¡°I know, I know. I¡¯ve been putting it off because I couldn¡¯t afford it. But even if I¡¯ve got enough for living expenses now, I don¡¯t want to blow all my money on one chunk of hardware. I haven¡¯t even kept up with it. Didn¡¯t want to be tempted, looking at stuff I couldn¡¯t afford. Do you know where I can get used stuff? I might even be able to find a G4 in a dumpster at this point.¡±

    ¡°I got a place I can take you, but it¡¯s not a store. And you should come back with me anyway, the guys would love to see you.¡±

    ¡°Veazey, I can¡¯t go back to Innovex. I was a dick to everybody after I quit. Even the ones who still gamed with me, it was awkward as hell.¡±

    ¡°Only in your head, dipshit. You¡¯re wrong about these guys. And anyway, it¡¯s been years. Nobody holds a grudge, especially now that you¡¯re not kicking their butts on leaderboards every day.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯d really rather not go back there. It¡¯s gonna be humiliating.¡±

    ¡°You want hardware? We got hardware. Innovex has military contracts now. And we use G9s in the bots.¡±

    ¡°G9s! I didn¡¯t even think those were out!¡±

    ¡°They¡¯re not out. That¡¯s what I¡¯m saying. I can get you shit nobody else has. And we definitely need to get you new optics. How do you even see in those shitty plastic contacts?¡±

    ¡°They¡¯re fine, even if the world is a little yellow.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s 2058 and you¡¯ve still got shit physically sitting on your eyeball? How do you not have constant eye infections? That¡¯s fucking gross. Let me take you to the shop. And then we need to get you a gun.¡±

    ¡°No guns. It¡¯s too risky. Boston¡¯s super strict, even by corp standards, and they¡¯ve got scanners everywhere.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, there are ways around that. But first thing¡¯s first. Get cleaned up and meet me at my truck.¡±

    * * *

    I had forgotten how many different kinds of human bodies there were, until I walked back into Innovex with my visitor¡¯s badge. The main floor was programmers of all shapes and sizes, recruited from all corners of the Earth. Most of them were skinny fat, with gamer grade AR glasses that could probably see through walls.

    Most people walking around the normal world wore contacts and either used body shaping treatments or physically went to the gym to keep in shape, but the geeks on this floor had flabby, puffy bodies that had grown out over skinny frames, like they weren¡¯t even on blockers anymore. Was Innovex so cheap now, these guys didn¡¯t even get health insurance? Or had I been judging the whole world based on the standards of Judy¡¯s friends, who spent half their salaries on looking beautiful?

    A dozen programmers turned their heads as I walked in and matched my face with my public profile, pulling up my hobbies, job history, and criminal record in about two seconds, before they turned back to their work.

    If I did have a recent criminal record, or if I was suspected of being a spy for another company, every person in the building would see me with a bright red warning tag, and a human security guard would have been summoned to kick me out or watch my every move.

    But today I was just another former employee on a tour, and all my old gamer tags were for games that didn¡¯t exist anymore. If this group had scanned me three years ago, they would have seen an elite achievement list that put me among the top two hundred Samurai players in the world. Might have even gotten a few quiet nods of respect from strangers. Now I was just another old guy walking around with the old guy from the basement.

    Veazey was a fair bit older than me, and his military experience put him above and apart from the kids the company liked to recruit. Most of them were skipping college, making six figures straight out of high school. Half of them were probably on employment visas from developing countries; elite, well-connected students from Nigeria and Paraguay, sent to learn American code. The Indians and Chinese had surpassed us in old school software development, but Americans still excelled at games and robotics.

    ¡°Where is everybody?¡± I whispered to Veazey.

    ¡°Our boys are moving up in the world. Luther, Alex, Tony, and Josh are all on the second floor now.¡±

    ¡°What happened to Calvin?¡±

    ¡°Calvin has the corner office. He¡¯s our first stop.¡±

    ¡°Calvin is management now? No fucking way.¡±

    Calvin Harris was the best programmer I ever met, not counting the hacker crew I hung out with in high school. Calvin could have been as good as any of them, but you would never catch him breaking rules or cracking a firewall. He just needed to make money. Lots of money, as fast as possible, to help his grandparents and keep their mortgage paid.

    He was sharp, efficient, and strangely dignified, even in the cheap distro clothes we all wore. He was wearing a ring now, after marrying his longtime partner. Veazey said Calvin was commuting from a plot of land way outside the Boston Metro, where they had like six dogs.

    Calvin wasn¡¯t wearing his suit jacket when we walked in, but he had it hanging on a hook behind him, as he checked everybody else¡¯s work from behind a desk. He hadn¡¯t gone completely corporate on me, but you could tell he was on his way, wearing a shirt and tie that still looked a bit baggy on him.

    Calvin didn¡¯t talk about it, but his family got hit hard during the Bump. His parents had been bankers or real estate gurus, shot by looters when the money stopped working. Calvin had eventually moved in to take care of his grandparents, but when I knew him, he was effectively homeless, sleeping on a cot in the Innovex ¡°nap room,¡± too proud to move into the giant party house the other guys were renting.

    All the guys on my old team had some kind of horror story to tell. Tony was a diabetic who couldn¡¯t afford a pancreas replacement. He almost died when insulin supplies ran out.

    Alex was an indie game designer who made a tongue-in-cheek humor game about being a starving street rat, based on the years he spent as an actual starving street rat.

    Josh was a charming, confident workhorse, strangely charismatic and self-possessed for a coding nerd. The only true extrovert on our team. He lived with his extended family in a converted FEMA camp. His proudest moment was when he got his first bonus, and was able to move into his own trailer, next door to his stepbrother.

    But Luther had the worst story. Luther¡¯s brother had been killed in a demon attack, when Geryon unleashed a wave of Hunters inside the Red Line subway station, to punish the City Council for kicking one of his thralls off.

    Luther¡¯s brother Isaiah had been tackled on the platform and pushed onto the tracks, but he wasn¡¯t hit by a train. He was eaten, consumed by a pack of Hunters who pulled him apart and ate him live on camera, as a warning to any other humans who might forget who was in charge.

    The video went viral worldwide, but Luther¡¯s family didn¡¯t get any of the money it generated. Isaiah was running an errand for work, so his employer claimed the video as ¡°work product¡± and gave the family one percent as a gift.

    These were my guys. The guys I worked with every day and gamed with every night for two and a half years. I had been to their homes and met their parents, those who still had parents. I had done yard work for Calvin¡¯s grandma and helped Luther¡¯s dad make a database for his consignment store.

    I had visited Josh in his fancy personal trailer and had migas with his giant family, surrounded by love and laughter and happy children. A 20c family would have called it poverty, but to me it looked like unimaginable wealth, so much like my old Texas compound, I started threatening to learn Spanish and move in.

    I loved these guys, but I was ashamed to face them now, after the way I left. When I first started, I had been arrogant about my hacking and gaming skills, constantly bragging about my ¡°real world¡± experience in Texas and my loose affiliation with one of the most infamous hackers in the world.

    Jerry Rose was an authentic genius, so far above normal human intelligence, he might as well be from another planet. He was responsible for a dozen custom hacking tools that could cut through corporate firewalls. Rumor was, he was using some kind of custom quantum thing he developed that could pull solutions from an alternate universe, so even if he couldn¡¯t crack your password in this world, his network could reach into another dimension where it wasn¡¯t quite so well protected and duplicate your passkey in a few seconds.

    Jerry even let me work on a few, cleaning up the interface and improving connectivity to make everything faster and easier to use. These Innovex guys may have been better at boilerplate corporate code, but I had been sidekick to a legend. I was always at the top of the bonus board, and I even had a hot girlfriend, who I loved showing off, on those rare occasions when Judy came by the office.

    Maybe the rest of these losers had to go to strip clubs and pay women to like them, but I was gonna get married and buy a house, bought with money I earned from raw technical skill.

    I thought I was hot shit, but when dad died, I fell apart. I started missing shifts and making dumb mistakes, lashing out at people when they corrected me. Then, on my last day, I had¡­ let¡¯s just call it an emotional breakdown, and there was some debate over whether I had quit or been fired.

    When I first quit my job. I had so much in savings I felt like I had all the time in the world. I got my current apartment, missed my first chance at registration, and started playing a competitive samurai fighting game.

    I was skipping school. I had no job. I played all day every day. The leaderboard for that game was my entire life. Some days I wouldn¡¯t even sleep. My Innovex team played the same game, and they started to notice that I was out of control.

    They tried to help by posting a challenge for me. They bet me I couldn¡¯t go a week without playing, and they put up a thousand dollars. I didn¡¯t need it right then, but it¡¯s the way I used to work. I did incredible things to earn bonuses, so they turned my recovery into a bonus.

    Every time I cashed it in, they would double the time, and double the bonus, until finally, I just didn¡¯t want to play anymore. It started as charity, I think. They thought I was crazy for quitting my job, and they thought I was already broke, so they were really just taking up a collection for me.

    In the time they¡¯d known me, I¡¯d been an arrogant asshole, a game-addicted loser, and briefly, an emotionally unstable lunatic who had to be thrown out of the building. Either that record had been expunged, or Veazey had put me on the security whitelist, because I should not have been allowed through that front door.

    Calvin gave me an enthusiastic handshake and smiled like someone had taught him to smile in management training. His face and mannerisms looked a lot more natural now, like he had gotten comfortable with social interactions, and a lot more comfortable inside his own skin, then I remembered from back in the day.

    We made meaningless small talk for a few minutes, and Calvin asked why I was there. When I took too long to reply, Veazey said, ¡°Timmy got powers and he¡¯s in some deep shit. Needs a new processor, new contacts, and I need you to rubber stamp my next few inventory reports without looking too close.¡±

    ¡°Dammit, Veazey! You can¡¯t just¡­¡±

    But Calvin didn¡¯t even blink. Just asked, ¡°What kind of powers?¡± in the same tone he would use if I¡¯d bought a new car.

    ¡°Timmy got magic,¡± Veazey answered for me, ¡°but it came with a demon problem, and he can¡¯t go to the cops. He needs hardware that can do realtime combat stuff, and he doesn¡¯t have twenty thousand dollars lying around.¡±

    Calvin nodded and said, ¡°Show me.¡±

    I stammered, ¡°What?¡±

    ¡°Show me some magic.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not sure that¡¯s¡­¡±

    ¡°No cameras in here,¡± Calvin reassured me. ¡°It¡¯s fine.¡±

    Veazey shook his head at me. ¡°It¡¯s Calvin, dude. He¡¯s not gonna believe you until you show him.¡±

    ¡°Okay,¡± I said reluctantly. ¡°Please step back from your desk.¡±

    I levitated Calvin¡¯s desk all the way to the ceiling, surprised at how heavy it was. He really was being groomed for upper management, if he got the company to approve a chunk of real wood like this.

    A normal man might have panicked or jumped back or gaped at me like an idiot if they saw their desk levitate right in front of them, but Calvin just said, ¡°Cool. I gotta show the guys.¡±

    He sent some kind of group text with a gesture command and pulled a tiny briefcase from under his desk. He did two different biometric checks and opened it like he was revealing the Holy Grail. Twelve gray cylinders were sitting inside, perfectly spaced in their bed of black foam. With no preamble, he reached in, grabbed one, and handed it to me.

    I took it like it was about to bite me. ¡°Did I just see Calvin Harris break a rule?¡±

    ¡°Yeah,¡± he said, with a hint of a smile. ¡°That¡¯s half my job now, learning which rules I can break, and how to cover my tracks, just so my people can get work done.¡±

    ¡°Calvin, you just handed me five figures worth of Datacore hardware. Are you sure you can cover this?¡±

    Calvin shrugged, ¡°You wouldn¡¯t believe the shit that gets lost around here, or how little they actually care, as long as we meet our targets. A lot has changed since you worked here, Tim.

    ¡°We¡¯ve got HDI defense contracts now. We get paid from a trillion-dollar fund financed by contributions from every company on the security council. It¡¯s supposed to be managed by a neutral third party, but there¡¯s no such thing. The corps are constantly trying to cut corners and cheat each other, and the auditing is a joke.¡±

    He reached in his desk drawer and pulled out a sealed plastic package. ¡°And here¡¯s a new set of optics that just got reported as lost during a drone drop.¡± He looked up at Veazey. ¡°Can you show him how to use these?¡±

    If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

    Veazey nodded.

    The door behind me swung open and my old teammates poured in, shaking my hand and patting me on the back. My guys were all wearing long-sleeve shirts and ties now. They all looked older, fatter, and happier than the awkward kids I remembered, like it had been ten years instead of three.

    Alex yelled, ¡°TKO!¡± when he shook my hand, repeating my old gamer nickname. It sounded like a compliment when strangers heard it, but it actually stood for ¡°Timothy Kovak Online,¡± a joke he came up with when he saw I was always logged in to the game, any time he wanted to play, day or night.

    The boys piled in, Calvin secured the doors and windows, and simply said, ¡°Timmy got powers.¡±

    Well, so much for my secret identity.

    Then Veazey said, ¡°Show ¡®em,¡± while Calvin stepped back from his desk again. I levitated it to the ceiling in front of everyone, earning big smiles from the guys.

    Tony said, ¡°Is that it?¡± and Veazey punched me in the gut, making my aura flash visibly white as my wards absorbed the impact.

    Veazey hopped backwards clutching his hand and said, ¡°What percent was that?¡±

    ¡°Sixty,¡± I said. ¡°This place makes me nervous.¡±

    ¡°Timmy is bulletproof and super strong, as long as he can keep the spells going.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re doing the Captain Cobalt power set?¡± Tony asked. ¡°I¡¯ve never seen a wizard try that, even on TV.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t have time to learn a whole book full of spells, so I¡¯m trying to pick out things that don¡¯t require much thought. Although even the simple ones are a bitch to manage, dealing with all the weird ways your body reacts. You can really fuck yourself up, if you do levitation wrong.¡±

    ¡°Calvin said you got powers, but they came with some trouble. How much trouble you in?¡± Luther asked.

    ¡°Lots,¡± Veazey answered for me again. ¡°Timmy¡¯s gotta fight some big demon fucker, and he¡¯s gonna need all the help he can get. We¡¯re here because we need hardware. We got contacts and a processor, but we still need ear filaments and a ring mouse, set up so he can ditch that stupid wrist phone.¡±

    In minutes, I had all of it, donated by my friends or appropriated from HDI.

    They were so generous, embracing me like no time had passed, I almost broke down in front of them. ¡°I feel like I should apologize for the way I treated you guys, and the way I left.¡±

    The guys all looked at each other quizzically, then Josh said, ¡°What the fuck are you talking about? I don¡¯t remember anybody being pissed at you like, ever, until your last day. But the way you quit didn¡¯t hurt us, it was fucking epic. We tell the story to all our new guys, and to any HDI exec who tries to push us around.¡±

    ¡°In my memory, I was an arrogant prick.¡±

    ¡°Nope,¡± Josh said. ¡°You weren¡¯t arrogant, you were confident. And you deserved to be. You were damn good at your job, like you owned the top of that bonus board.¡±

    ¡°I feel like an asshole now, the way I bragged about that.¡±

    Josh laughed. ¡°Yeah, you showed off, but you also helped train people and make the team better. And you didn¡¯t just earn individual bonuses, you helped us earn team bonuses, when you worked all night and helped us get shit done.

    ¡°You remember the bonus we got for finishing that Seattle traffic project? I used that money to buy my own place. You did that, for you, and me, and everybody.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re a better person than you think you are,¡± Alex said. ¡°Beating yourself up over shit that didn¡¯t happen.¡±

    Luther stepped up and put his hand on my shoulder. ¡°They finally gave powers to somebody who deserves them. Remember all those nights we talked about what we would do? Well, it happened for you, so you owe us.

    ¡°You gotta keep the promise we all made and do this right. Old school hero shit, just like we always talked about. Tim, if you¡¯re gonna fight these things, you gotta fight to win, and you gotta get it on video. You gotta show these things the human race ain¡¯t done yet, and that we¡¯ve still got some fight left in us.¡±

    Then he hugged me, and I had to let my wards down to let him in.

    I exchanged arms-length man hugs with everybody else and let Veazey take me down to his lair in the basement.

    * * *

    James Veazey¡¯s workspace looked like a cross between a hacker den, a machine shop, a motorcycle repair garage, and a junkyard for droid parts.

    He immediately cleared off a table, sprayed it with some kind of sanitizer, and told me to take my contacts off. I reluctantly complied.

    ¡°How have you survived all this time with Gen2 optics linked to a fucking desktop G3? You could have had four times the resolution and a full visual field for like forty bucks.¡±

    ¡°I guess I just didn¡¯t want to spend the money. Even when I started getting Innovex bonuses, Judy was really picky about what we spent money on. It didn¡¯t make sense to spend cash on personal stuff when I could just use everything at the office. And if I had cool stuff at home, I would spend more time plugged in at home. Then I would start working from home, and¡­¡±

    ¡°Girlfriend aggro. Yeah, I get it, but you are well overdue for an upgrade.¡± He threw a fresh bottle of cleaning solution on the table and told me to soak the new optics I got from Calvin.

    ¡°I¡¯m not sure this is gonna work,¡± I said. ¡°Magic runes attract heat and can actually melt plastic if you leave them displayed too long. I had to reinvent the screen saver just to keep this shit from cooking my eyeballs.¡±

    ¡°You really have been out of it. I don¡¯t know who you¡¯ve been talking to, but modern lenses don¡¯t generate heat like the old ones. Even glass lenses are permeable now, so they don¡¯t dry your eyes out.¡±

    I frowned. ¡°Even if they¡¯re better than plastic, these will still heat up. It¡¯s a magic thing. Direct contact will dry my eyes out. Prolonged contact could blind me.¡±

    ¡°These lenses don¡¯t actually touch your eyeball. Phantom 5 lenses use a microgravity generator to float just off the surface of your eye: micro version of how cars float. They can even get closer or pull away to change focal distance.¡±

    ¡°That sounds expensive.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s beyond expensive. They give these to spies and shit. You don¡¯t want to know how much these cost.¡±

    ¡°I appreciate all this, but I don¡¯t want to get you guys in trouble.¡±

    ¡°You let us worry about that. The contracts we¡¯ve got now, a million dollars in write-offs is nothing to these guys. This stuff is barely 40K.¡±

    I let him talk me into it.

    The applicator was a little plastic tube with a cup at the end. Even knowing the lenses wouldn¡¯t touch me, it took an incredible act of willpower to push the tube against my eye and press the button.

    I had kept the same lenses for too long because my eyes were sensitive. I had to use special hydrogel they didn¡¯t even make anymore, forcing me to use 2-D screens and external projectors, while everybody else was lounging in pods, living their whole lives in AR. I knew guys at Innovex who could code while floating in a pool, idly twitching their fingers across a phantom keyboard.

    But these new lenses could be a permanent solution, if they really did float above the eye. I just hoped magic didn¡¯t burn them out somehow, next time a surge hit.

    I flinched when I heard the button click, but Veazey was right; I didn¡¯t feel anything. I didn¡¯t even notice a change in vision right away. I was expecting to be blinded by a rush of advertisements and merch tags, but everything just got slowly crisper and brighter, like the whole world had suddenly been upgraded to a higher resolution. A tiny Vision Plus icon appeared in the bottom right corner of my vision, growing solid when I focused on it, sliding back invisible when I wasn¡¯t.

    ¡°Can these things see in the dark?¡±

    ¡°Not in total darkness, but the amplification is good enough for starlight. Lidar in your processor will put wireframes around obstacles in pitch black.¡±

    I immediately decided these were worth whatever they cost, if only to keep shit from creeping up on me in the dark. I did a quick clenched fist gesture to bring my vision back to true real, but nothing happened.

    Veazey grinned. ¡°Sorry man, you¡¯ll have to learn a whole new set of gestures. It¡¯s all wrist position and finger taps now. Focus on the icon, tap your index finger twice on your leg or any hard surface. Once you get it calibrated, you can do it without a surface.¡±

    I did the gesture, and the world went back to baseline - a little duller, a bit murky. Faces clouded, shadows returned to corners. I turned the Vision Plus thing back on, and wondered if the real world would ever be good enough for me again.

    Veazey was clearly excited for me. ¡°You just jumped three generations in one pop! You¡¯re gonna see a whole new world out there. And don¡¯t worry, I set you in Boomer Mo¡ª training mode, so you don¡¯t get hit with too much at once. Emergency alerts, street signs, and personal contacts only. No ads, no optional tags. Just play with the layers and see what you like. Tutorial should slowly introduce you to options as you walk past stuff.¡±

    I thanked him, feeling a weird twinge of guilt as Vision Plus came back. It felt like cheating somehow, like I was embracing something fake and dangerous, blunting my connection to reality. I guess this is how my great grandparents felt about television and the Internet, like they were surrendering their children to the corruption of the big bad world.

    I summoned Jeeves in my peripheral, shocked by the fidelity of his cartoon avatar, floating in glorious 8K overkill in the corner of my eye. I was afraid the new interface would try to make him walk, or, god forbid, try to make him look human.

    I told him to bind himself to the Phantom API and transfer my old gesture preferences to the new lenses.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, sir. This API will not recognize gestures older than Gen4. The larger sweeps and arm movements are now considered¡­ rude.¡±

    ¡°Oh, fuck that.¡± I didn¡¯t have time to learn a whole new set of interface gestures. I was gonna have to fight in this thing. Retraining muscle memory could get me killed.

    ¡°Bust the API and crack the firmware. There¡¯s got to be a patch for this.¡±

    There was. I knew I was gonna get snickers and weird looks using waves and sweep gestures in public, but I was used to that.

    Veazey handed me another tube and told me to stick it in each ear. The filaments would transfer sound to go with the optics and disintegrate every time I took a shower. Each tube was good for about a month.

    ¡°You¡¯ll need to transfer all your old shit to the new processor when you get home. And don¡¯t try to remote anything! Throw that fucking G3 in the trash and throw your projectors and all that ancient desk shit in the dumpster with it. You¡¯re not doing presentations in a fucking conference room. Anybody who needs to see your display can just join your consensus.¡±

    Lydia would still need to see visible holograms, but I would have much better control over what I shared now, and these lenses would definitely make it easier to hide shit from her.

    ¡°Hey, can I have some spare projectors? I have a weird idea.¡±

    Every bot had at least two holographic projectors in it, since they were usually built into the eyes, so Veazey just pointed me to a pile of tiny grav panels and encouraged me to rig up what I needed. I made a dozen floating holoprojectors and made Veazey promise to bring them over after work. Can¡¯t have a guy with a visitor badge walking out with a duffel bag full of hardware.

    * * *

    The interface offered me a few neat things on my way home, identifying birds, plants, and historical sites. The dull bone conduction audio had been replaced by crisp new filament voodoo, and the ancient wrist strap I wore everywhere had been replaced with a full body lidar scan that tracked every gesture from my pocket.

    I squinted to see a squirrel and the damn thing zoomed, automatically adjusting to change my vision, snapping back when I looked away.

    The lenses got very excited when I made it home, linking up with tags on dozens of appliances and household gadgets that were invisible to my Gen2.

    The lenses informed me that every damn thing I owned was out of warranty, even the new stuff, since anything less than three years old had been cracked and hacked and pried open with a screwdriver.

    My desktop synced with the new lenses immediately, trading information about my identity and preferences so quickly, it looked like a cyber warfare attack.

    Turned out my shitty little apartment was capable of automation that I had never bothered to activate, as my ceiling lights, fans, and mini blinds all started blinking and moving according to some new default schedule. Even my vacuum cleaner turned on me, breaking out of its weekly pattern to clean a stain I hadn¡¯t consciously noticed before.

    Then the lenses pinged NFC tags on half a dozen pieces of borrowed museum equipment that I had forgotten about, and I had to shout for Jeeves to intercept before they could phone home.

    Any other day I would have been delighted with all this, tweaking preferences and testing gadgets until dawn, but I had no time to play.

    I was worried about being overwhelmed with object tags, but the lenses were smart enough to only tell me about things I was deliberately looking at. First, the object or person would start to glow, developing a color-coded outline. If I kept staring, a tag would pop up, showing name and model number. If I changed focus to the tag, I would get the option to pull up manuals or instruction videos. And they could put tags around people, too.

    Most people walking around hid their names and social media info from anyone who wasn¡¯t a personal contact or friend of a friend, unless they were actively on the job or advertising something. I could turn on translators or subtitles keyed to each person, overcoming accents or habitual mumbling. The Phantom 5 could even read lips, if you told it you were deaf.

    Active corporate employees were required to display their names and job titles during work hours, and would have most of their personal preferences overriden, any time they walked into their workplace.

    I wrestled with my defaults for an hour, refusing to display my own name under any circumstances, despite numerous dire warnings about legal and social consequences. God, how long had I walked around showing my ass to anybody with modern lenses, oblivious to the security risk?

    Falling behind on code patches and desktop hacks was one thing, but there was no excuse for my ignorance of modern interface tech. My old team would have hazed me worse than Veazey if they¡¯d known how far I¡¯d fallen, how lazy and careless I¡¯d become.

    I was getting this weird urge to feed it, to go outside and look at everything through these new eyes, discovering the world again. It was a fantastic new toy, a wonder of technology that I¡¯d denied myself, always blaming time or poverty or sensitive eyes.

    Looking back on it now, I guess it was a mental block, more than anything. My father hated wearable interface tech, constantly complaining about techno zombies, with their slack jaws and glazed expressions. He made a point to interrupt me whenever he caught me using AR, teasing or slapping or thumping me on the head.

    He let me wear my interface glasses ¡°for school¡± but growled that I ¡°better be learning something¡± every time he caught me using them in the house.

    My new processor was a lumpy gray cylinder, about the size and weight of an old roll of quarters, studded with bumps and lights and weird depressions to protect the sensors inside. The hardware Calvin gave me was bare metal, not even formatted, with no data and no OS.

    I tried to port my existing stuff straight over, and Jeeves had a fit, throwing up red all over my new eyes. ¡°Error. I am detecting ninety-four conflicts with scripts that are not compatible with this processor. Continuing to run these scripts could result in OS corruption or data loss.¡±

    ¡°Full override,¡± I said, casually making one of the biggest mistakes of my life. ¡°Keep running everything you can and remind me to troubleshoot these later.¡±

    * * *

    My old desktop setup was a series of processor cubes connected with thick fiber cables, the equivalent of six old consoles cobbled together to function like one modern computer, using an elaborate system of task and processor switching that I had been tweaking since high school.

    I was looking at a series of simple economic decisions I had made over the course of ten years. Every time my system started to slow down, I could spend money on a full replacement, or I could spend a fraction of that and just add a processor block. The result was a stairstep arrangement of blocks, with a new block joining the network once every two years or so. Now this whole setup was obsolete, replaced by one cylinder in my pocket which was easily ten times more powerful.

    I would let dust build up on my counters and furniture for months, but I generally kept the processor blocks clean, for air flow, if nothing else.

    I grabbed an empty plastic bin from my closet and started carefully packing the cubes away, until my desk was one clean sheet of laminated plywood, with nothing on it but my drink cooler and an old mechanical keyboard. Everybody else was using tactile holograms for stuff like this, but the projectors in my ceiling were just visual. I could do most of my stuff with gestures and voice commands to Jeeves, but when it came down to actual coding, nothing could beat the feel of physical keys.

    I was not prepared for the psychological impact of a clean desk, as I felt an unexpected surge of self-esteem. I stared at my vacuum cleaner until the service tags popped up, and spent a few minutes cleaning it, replacing fluids and the external dust bag. I even dug in the closet until I found the dusting tendrils and the plastic brushes that came with it.

    The tendrils would let it reach up to clean surfaces and furniture, but the hoses had been sitting in my closet, unused and unattached, for three years. I always told myself I would get around to assembling the thing properly, but somehow never did.

    Had I really been living in filth for three years, because I wasn¡¯t willing to spend five minutes to plug this shit in? I downloaded new firmware for my vacuum and turned it loose, gratified to see Lydia twitch and follow it with her eyes like it was about to attack.

    I grabbed a rag and some cleaning fluid and started wiping down stuff the vacuum couldn¡¯t reach. Had this bottle really been sitting here, unopened, under the counter since the day I moved in?

    I even cleaned my windows and my front door, shocked at how much dirt was caked in the grooves outside. Cleaning them made the whole room look brighter, as I removed the fog of grease and grime that had been sitting between me and the world.

    I opened my blinds and watched the sun set through a clean window, for the first time in years. I felt like I had been in a coma since I quit my job and seeing my old team had finally woken me up.

    I went to put the box of processor cubes away and found myself cleaning my closet, repacking boxes that I had thrown open just long enough to fetch one thing without putting them back. Some of them had been half open for so long, I had to wipe dust off the contents.

    Lydia watched as I gathered my third bag of trash and asked, ¡°Would you like some help?¡±

    ¡°No.¡± I said firmly. ¡°I don¡¯t want you touching shit you don¡¯t understand, and you are not my maid. Bad enough that I¡¯m letting you cook for me, but I¡¯m not gonna make a demon clean my toilet, that¡¯s just¡­ Human or not, it¡¯s just¡­ wrong.¡±

    ¡°Are you protecting my dignity, or yours?¡±

    ¡°Look, I don¡¯t know what my ancestors had you do, but you are not a servant, and you are not a goddamn housewife. No laundry, no picking up clothes, and please don¡¯t touch anything on or around this desk.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re worried that I¡¯ll break one of your machines?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m worried that you¡¯ll make me comfortable with all this little stuff, until I forget what you are. But if I did try to abuse my privilege here, and use my succubus for light housekeeping, would you object? Feels like this kind of thing would be beneath you.¡±

    Lydia shrugged. ¡°I¡¯d do it for a little while, then I¡¯d demand that you summon an Imp for it, like most of your ancestors did.¡±

    ¡°My ancestors seriously summoned Imps to clean house for them?¡±

    ¡°Or just used cleaning spells to remove the dust. Much faster than your clumsy machine. Jim was the only one I cleaned for. He knew I found it humiliating, so it gave him a little thrill to see me scraping and scrubbing things.¡±

    ¡°Did you put on a little maid outfit?¡±

    ¡°No. A costume would have made it a form of play, and Jim was quite serious about keeping me in my place.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡±

    ¡°Why are you apologizing for something you didn¡¯t do?¡±

    ¡°Not every sorry is an apology. This one is just sympathy. But I¡¯m serious about this. If I ever ask you to do anything you find demeaning, if you ever feel like I¡¯m humiliating you, I need to know.¡±

    ¡°Is this kindness or caution?¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t control how your Master treats you, but I am not a goddamn slave owner. If I¡¯m a wizard and you¡¯re my demon, then you are a reflection of me. Anything that demeans you demeans me, so I don¡¯t want to see you on your knees scrubbing shit. I want to see you smart and powerful and beautiful, the way you were at that party. Seeing you strong makes me feel strong and seeing you weak would make me feel weak. So, I¡¯ll scrub my own goddamn toilet.¡±

 Chapter 37: Balance Due

    Lydia was kneeling by my side of the bed when I woke up the next morning.

    ¡°Timothy, please, you¡¯re almost out of time. I¡¯ve been up all night, pleading with my Master, trying to convince him you¡¯re willing to honor this contract. I¡¯ve done everything I can to plead your case, but he thinks you¡¯re being lazy and disrespectful. The way you¡¯re training, the way you¡¯re learning the book, you won¡¯t let me watch you, and I can¡¯t see what you¡¯re learning, so I have no evidence I can use to convince him otherwise.

    ¡°I have an idea, a way you can be useful to us without compromising yourself. No hurting. No killing. Just a simple mission of mercy, helping one of our thralls. Do this for me today, and I can hold him off for a bit longer. Then you need to take me somewhere outside this accursed graveyard and show me what magic you¡¯ve learned. I¡¯ll summon another one of my Master¡¯s servants and have him report on your progress.

    ¡°If we can do both of these things, quickly, my Master will calm down, and it¡¯ll be just you and me, just like I promised - long, beautiful days, with short, simple missions in between. But if you drag this out, if you refuse me, his patience is almost exhausted, and his anger¡­ you are not prepared to face his anger.¡±

    Lydia was doing her best to protect me, but I ignored her, and let my last day of grace slip away.

    * * *

    I was in the bathroom, brushing my teeth, when I finally met the demon prince in my mirror.

    I had just stepped out of the shower - naked, wet, alone. Reaching for my toothbrush like I had done every morning since I was eight years old. I rinsed my mouth out, put the toothpaste on, looked at myself in the mirror, and saw a glowing pair of purple eyes looking back at me, exactly on level with mine, inches away.

    I started to cry out, but I had already hit the wall, slammed into it by some invisible hand that was now squeezing my throat. Why do these things always go for the throat? I was gagging and choking when I heard the voice. Lydia¡¯s voice was a warm trickle of bourbon down the back of my brain. This was a terrifying, rumbling voice, so deep and loud it made my insides shake when it spoke.

    ¡°You look like you want to say something,¡± it said. ¡°Would you like to breathe?¡±

    I made a useless choking noise and tried to nod my head.

    ¡°From now on, you breathe when I say you can breathe, and I¡¯m not quite ready yet. If you can¡¯t speak, maybe you can think it to me. Your succubus taught you that, yes? To speak without speaking? Look in my eyes and think the word you want me to hear. I would suggest the word please.¡±

    How can a pair of eyes gloat without a face? I looked into those eyes and thought, ¡°Please.¡±

    The pressure on my throat relaxed and I felt my feet hit the cold tile of my bathroom again as I gasped for air.

    ¡°From now on, every breath you take is a gift from me,¡± the voice said, soft but still rumbling. ¡°So now, you will thank me for this gift. Say, thank you.¡±

    I¡¯d like to say I was a tough guy, from the first minute I could speak. I¡¯d like to say I held out and defied him from the first moment I heard Baalphezar¡¯s voice. But old habits die hard. The reflexes run deep - the reflex to submit, to cower, to retreat and say whatever it takes to make the angry eyes turn away.

    So, I immediately said, ¡°Thank you.¡±

    And then I was choking again, with the same invisible hand on my throat. ¡°All this time with my succubus and you don¡¯t even know how to address me? Do I really have to teach you the most basic courtesies like you¡¯re a new demon straight out of the pod? Every time you speak to me, the last word out of your mouth will be Master. When I give you another breath, you will thank me properly.¡±

    But he didn¡¯t release me right away. He let me hang there, twitching and writhing, until I almost passed out. When he finally let me go, I fell forward onto the sink and barely caught myself before my head bounced on the glass.

    I looked up at the eyes again and said nothing.

    The invisible hand slammed me up against the wall a third time, and I screamed, ¡°Do it! Kill me! I dare you to kill me! No more slaves, no more magic, no more contract, and no more baby Kovachs! Kill me, and you lose everything!¡±

    And to my surprise, the hand let me go.

    ¡°You should be profoundly grateful to your succubus. You have no idea the horrors she has spared you from, or the sacrifices she has made to appease me. Sylvia should be there explaining the rules to you, but your succubus says her usual methods might break you. Something about the way the magic has changed. She thinks if Sylvia breaks your spirit, your mind will shut down, and you will be useless to us. So, you have the rare privilege of addressing your Master directly, and seeing firsthand the trouble I have gone to, to accommodate her request.

    ¡°I¡¯ve seen defiance in a Kovach many times, but laziness? Contempt? Blithely ignoring her warnings, day after day for weeks? She says you live in isolation, so wrapped up in your selfish little world that you can¡¯t tell the difference between reality and fantasy anymore. She says a part of you still thinks you¡¯re dreaming, so all I have to do is wake you up.

    ¡°But I¡¯ve spoken to some of your old friends, and I believe there is a deeper explanation. I think you believe you still live in a world of angels, a world where demons can¡¯t really hurt a good man or his friends. But the angels have abandoned you, so people you care about will suffer today, because you were too lazy to read a book.¡±

    The mirror turned into some kind of window. Not like a computer monitor, not just a display. Not just sight and sound, but a window to another place. I could see it. I could even smell it, as I felt the breeze from a thousand miles away. The window looked like a camera strapped to a flying bird, swooping down on a man in work clothes, laying tile on a roof.

    ¡°Do you know who this is?¡± the voice asked.

    I didn¡¯t, so I shook my head no.

    ¡°His name is William Seckler. I believe you called him Bill or Billy when you went to school together.¡±

    ¡°Wait¡­ no. How do you even¡­¡±

    ¡°Bill was your best friend when you were ten years old. Now, he¡¯s an adult with a family of his own, hardworking and proud, proud that he can support a family with the sweat of his brow. But will he still be able to work tomorrow?¡±

    Something glittered in the mirror, and I saw a purple hand, floating through the window onto the roof. The hand waited until Bill was almost at the ladder and gave the slightest invisible push. The hand barely moved a finger, but Bill¡¯s body tumbled forward like a giant had kicked him, pinwheeling helpless to the ground. I felt the wind and heard the muted thud as he landed on the grass below. Then I watched my first childhood friend writhe in pain as he screamed for help.

    ¡°Just a few broken bones, I think,¡± Baalphezar said. ¡°But perhaps you think this is an illusion? Just another waking dream. Would you like to call your friend with one of your machines? Share a few words of comfort? Or beg his forgiveness, as you explain why this little ¡®accident¡¯ was your fault?¡±

    ¡°Stop this,¡± I said, still more demanding than pleading. ¡°You¡¯ve made your point. I¡¯ll cooperate with Lydia. I¡¯ll study the book. There¡¯s no need to hurt anyone else.¡±

    But the window shifted, and I was looking at the tiny, cramped living room of a converted FEMA trailer, where a young boy was playing with blocks.

    I immediately screamed, ¡°No!¡± but the view swooped in again, until I could smell cooking food and baby shampoo, just like I was standing in the room.

    ¡°Your friend has a nephew; did you know that? You say this old soldier is your friend, but you barely know him at all. This child doesn¡¯t share his name, but you can see the resemblance. Something about the nose. Imagine your friend¡¯s face when he sees this little broken body. Will you confess when he confronts you? Or will you try and keep your secret, even when he turns on you?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± I said again, really pleading this time. ¡°I¡¯m sorry. I¡¯m sorry I defied you; I didn¡¯t understand.¡±

    ¡°You still don¡¯t understand,¡± Baalphezar said, ¡°because you¡¯re still waiting for an angel. There is no true remorse in your words. You¡¯re stalling for time because you think an angel is about to swoop in and spare this innocent child who has fallen under a demon¡¯s gaze. So, we¡¯ll wait for him. I¡¯ll give you a full minute to wait for the Angel Gabriel to intervene. Perhaps you could pray?¡±

    And I just stood there, for a full minute, watching that giant purple hand hover over the child. Then Baalphezar said, ¡°You want me to spare him? Beg me.¡±

    I kicked my hamper, and my trash can out of the way and dropped to my knees in front of the mirror.

    ¡°Please, Master, don¡¯t hurt this boy. Punish me. I¡¯m the one you¡¯re mad at. Whips. Thumbscrews. Whatever you got. I¡¯m begging you, please, send somebody to hurt me and leave the kid out of this.¡±

    ¡°But the very fact that you offered this shows why hurting you won¡¯t work. You¡¯ve got a bit of martyr in you, just like the third one. I think you would enjoy being tortured. It would make you feel strong, and noble, and righteous in your suffering. You care so little for yourself, the only way to hurt you is to hurt others. So, we continue.¡±

    The giant purple hand expanded until it could fit over the boy¡¯s entire head. Then, at the last second, it shifted, and knocked over a stack of blocks, as the view from the window soared away.

    ¡°On your feet,¡± Baalphezar said. ¡°I want you to see every bit of the suffering you cause today.¡±

    The magic bird¡¯s eye view swooped and shifted again, until it soared into a room I recognized. A conference room in the Newbury Museum, where Judy was talking to a large, handsome man in black jeans and a purple shirt. They were alone.

    ¡°This man talking to your woman here is named Flavius, and as you may have guessed, he¡¯s not a man at all. A few months ago, the wards on this place would have kept him away; but now, thanks to my servants, he can walk right in.¡±

    Judy looked like she was interviewing the man for something, and she was clearly having a great time.

    ¡°A fine girl, your Judith. I can see why you like her. Strong, beautiful, seductive in a way that is unique to your century. She might even be succubus material.¡±

    Baalphezar saw my head rise and my fists clench, the minute he said that word.

    ¡°Careful, boy,¡± he warned me. ¡°Control your temper. You don¡¯t have all the information yet. That¡¯s important to you, isn¡¯t it? Having all the information?¡± In the window, Flavius took a swig of water and turned his head away from Judy, winking at me through the window so I could see his purple eyes.

    ¡°Cooperate and she¡¯ll never know my eye is on her. But if you defy me, Flavius has been instructed to¡­ conduct an audition.

    ¡°Fair Judith will remain exactly as she is, happy, oblivious, and carefree, as long as you behave. No more distractions. No more delays. And no more free rides with my succubus. When Lydia gives you an order, you will obey, instantly, remembering that she speaks for me.

    ¡°I should have expected trouble like this when we got another American. You¡¯re all the same. Stubborn, arrogant, treating every smelly peasant like some kind of king, while the real kings languish on land you¡¯re too lazy to plow.

    ¡°This is not a job, boy. I am not your employer. I did not hire you. I own you. I¡¯ve owned you from the moment you were conceived. I owned you when you were a wriggling tadpole. I owned you before you emerged from your mother. And I will own your soul for eternity, long after your body has turned to dust.

    ¡°I am your Master, and I think you¡¯re the kind who will need to be reminded of that. So, every day, you will come before this mirror, and every day, you will kneel, or someone you love will suffer. Do you understand?¡±

    ¡°Yes, Master.¡±

    ¡°Good,¡± Baalphezar said, finally convinced I was sincere. ¡°So, you have been educated. Now, you will be punished.¡±

    The view from the window shifted, until I was at¡­ a subway station? I was watching the Red Line, an hour before midnight. I thought I was about to witness another demon invasion, when I saw Luther placing flowers by the wall where his brother had been jumped, before the demons dragged his body down to the tracks to be consumed.

    Today was the anniversary of the attack, but I had been neglecting my friends for so long, I had forgotten.

    ¡°No. Master, please. I¡¯m begging you. Please leave him alone. Dear god, he¡¯s suffered enough. This isn¡¯t right. This isn¡¯t fair. Please, you can¡¯t¡­¡±

    Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.

    ¡°And now,¡± Baalphezar sighed, ¡°like most of your countrymen, you need to learn a lesson about the word can¡¯t.¡±

    Luther was retracing the route his brother was dragged, walking slowly toward the tracks. I started screaming, ¡°Stop! Please, stop! Luther, stop! Turn around!¡± I tried to crawl through the window, but I just bumped into the glass, and felt my ordinary mirror underneath.

    A filthy man in torn clothes ambled up behind Luther as I watched. Baalphezar¡¯s purple hand reached out to touch his ragged coat, and the man¡¯s eyes glowed purple, where only I could see.

    ¡°This man¡¯s name is Casimir. He¡¯s abused his mind and body so badly; he¡¯s left himself completely open to us. Random demons ride him like a rented mule. But he¡¯s never killed before¡­¡±

    Casimir reached out and pushed Luther in front of a train.

    My Master kept me watching there, frozen and helpless, as his body bounced off the train and fell between the tracks, broken, crushed by the impact.

    * * *

    Baalphezar kept me pinned to the wall, red-faced and squirming, while I watched the crowd form around Luther¡¯s body, a minute before they were cleared away by police and EMS. I wiped my eyes so I could be absolutely sure of this next part.

    They put him on a stretcher and took him in an ambulance, so he wasn¡¯t dead yet. He was going to get help, and there was still a chance he could live.

    I heard one of the EMTs say ¡°Mass General,¡± right before Baalphezar dropped me, and vanished from my mirror. Lydia was calling my name as I ran to my bedroom and put clothes on. I carefully chose dark clothing and my leather shoes, so I wouldn¡¯t be quite so visible, for what I was planning next.

    Although ¡°planning¡± was too strong a word for the crazy idea that had just popped in my head, as soon as that invisible hand let me go. Lydia was still calling my name as I ran out my front door, dodging two automated delivery trucks as I sprinted across Commonwealth.

    ¡°Jeeves, get me a priority cab to Mass General, and pull up every healing spell Tobias Kovach ever made!¡±

    * * *

    I had cast healing on myself once in an emergency, but mostly I had been relying on Lydia to heal me from the daily cuts and bruises I was inflicting on myself, still trying to master my zigzag route across rooftops in the Zone. Most of that healing happened during or immediately before sex, creating some very disturbing associations in my head.

    Access to magical healing can make you very careless, very fast, especially if you learn to associate the pain of moderate injuries with the intimate pleasure of being healed by a succubus.

    So, I had only used the first ten percent of my ancestor¡¯s healing spell, and I definitely didn¡¯t have time to master the rest during my two-minute cab ride. I paid the waiting fee and lingered in the cab for twenty minutes, trying to work through one of the most complicated things a wizard can do.

    Fortunately, Tobias was a genius; an absolute master of healing magic, and he had structured his final spell expecting it to be used by frantic, angry casters just like me.

    His healing spell worked in stages, so you didn¡¯t have to cast the whole thing at any given time. The first ten runes handled cleaning and sterilizing the area, closing up simple cuts, repairing broken bones, shoving muscles and organs back into place.

    His description said you needed to try and feel the totality of the injuries you were trying to heal, preferably after a form of medical divination that you were supposed to cast before the heal itself.

    You could think of those first ten runes as a first aid spell, but if you were healing major trauma, restoring nerves and organs, trying to stabilize a patient on the verge of death, you had to keep going, five runes at a time, until you could kind of feel where you needed to stop. A patient with severe injuries might require you to cast all fifty runes on the page, while a diseased or poisoned patient would need two completely different spells cast on them before you could do the physical restoration.

    Luther was right on the line between life and death, so I was gonna have to cast this whole thing, and that was going to take time. Magical healing was only allowed in hospitals under full medical supervision, and there¡¯s no way they were going to allow a visitor to sit alone with a patient who just got out of surgery.

    I had no way to get to him, so I had to sit there on the roof for twenty minutes and pray that modern medicine could save his life.

    Once he got to a room, I needed to see inside the hospital, to access the overall consensus view of the interior and track the doctors and nurses going in and out, until I could find a moment to execute the dumbest part of my plan.

    I told Jeeves to hack hospital security and was immediately stopped in my tracks. My tools for this were so out-dated, there was no way I could crack an updated hospital firewall, even with Jerry¡¯s magic code.

    I had been so preoccupied with spells and demon shit; I had never bothered to update my hacking stuff. Some of these scripts had not been updated since high school, and god knows how many upgrades I had missed. There was probably a whole new architecture for this shit now.

    I needed help from someone who had kept up with the decade of technology I had missed, smart enough to understand these tools, and shady enough to find the kind of gray market shit I needed. And that person was probably already in the waiting room, praying for doctors to save Luther¡¯s life.

    ¡°Alex, it¡¯s Tim.¡±

    ¡°You heard what happened? You¡¯re on your way?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m in a cab right now. I have an idea on how to help Luther, but I need your help. I need to hack the cameras to hide myself and see when Luther is alone. I think I can help him with magic, but there¡¯s no way they¡¯re gonna let me stand there and cast spells on a guy right there in ICU.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re gonna try and heal him with magic? I heard magic always makes this shit worse.¡±

    ¡°AMA guild propaganda. Healing magic works fine, if the healer can find enough power. I know a witch who¡¯s done it for years. Normally, I would just call her to do this, but she would do it by the book, and there¡¯s no way they would let her in. I can¡¯t promise I¡¯ll heal him completely, but the guy who made this spell was the best who ever lived, so even if I can¡¯t totally fix him, this spell can¡¯t possibly make it worse.¡±

    ¡°Tim, I don¡¯t know how to hack a hospital!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve got scripts that can do it, but my tools are all nine years old, and all my old Blackbox links are dead. I need to know where to find the download sites, so I can get updated versions of Jerry¡¯s old tools.¡±

    ¡°Why would you call me for shit like that?¡±

    ¡°Because even if you don¡¯t have them on your system already, you know where they are. Alex, I swear, I am not here to blow your life up. Your secrets are safe with me. I never said anything when we worked together, but all the conversations we had, all the little references you picked up on. You did not survive on the street for eight years begging for scraps. You hacked inventory systems and currency exchanges. You shut down security cameras and spoofed shoplifting monitors. Then you went straight and got a real job. But I¡¯m betting you never cut those ties. I¡¯m betting you still know where to get the tools I need. Just give me an address, and I¡¯ll never mention this again.¡±

    And he did.

    A few minutes later, I was looking down on an isometric view of the hospital interior, exactly like a video game. Luther was still in surgery, but I could already see what room they would put him in and mapped its location inside the building.

    The first EMT reports were bare bones, and there was no way to get live updates from surgery, but Luther¡¯s prognosis was not good. Even if they saved him for the moment, he could still slip away.

    His family was flying in from Georgia, but they hadn¡¯t arrived yet, so Luther really should be alone, if I could catch him between nurse rotations.

    I sat in the cab, dry-casting the spell over and over in my head, aligning myself to each rune without actually letting the power go. I managed to run through it five times before they wheeled him in.

    Luther looked bad. Really bad. The train had pulverized his limbs and caved in his chest, but his organs were mostly functional, and I prayed that he only had a concussion. I could put his skull back together, but I didn¡¯t think this thing could heal brain damage.

    I spent another thirty minutes watching doctors and nurses hover over him until they declared him critical but stable and left him alone in the room.

    And now, it was time for the stupid part. It was almost 2 a.m. Almost pitch black outside Luther¡¯s window, thanks to long neglected street lights, but a private camera or a random guy walking by might still spot me. My life was pretty much over if I got spotted doing this, but my friend¡¯s condition could nosedive any minute, and I was all outta time.

    I hopped out of the cab and threw myself off the hospital roof.

    * * *

    Thank god for Calvin¡¯s contacts, or I would have had to do this blind. The starlight vision stuff kicked in, with the window to Luther¡¯s room outlined in green.

    Do you have any idea how hard it is to break a hospital window? Movies make it look easy, but those things are fucking tough. It¡¯s not just glass. Those windows have a polycarbonate glaze on them. I can tell you this firsthand because when I finally levitated down and got myself in position, I cast fortitude and tried to kick it in. But I wasn¡¯t braced against anything, so I just pushed off from the window and sent myself tumbling backwards. Would be a hilarious video, if anybody had caught my dumb ass flailing in mid-air.

    I tried to kick and punch and scrape at the window for a while, but even with enhanced strength, all I could do was hurl myself back. Levitation was keeping me in the air, but levitation could only push one direction at a time. The spell could brace me against something trying to push down from above, but to make this work, I had to switch the direction the spell was pushing in mid-air, so it would push me toward the window, preferably at an angle, so I wouldn¡¯t just plummet straight down if I bounced off again.

    I pushed myself backwards and got the levitation equivalent of a running start, then hurled myself at the window, punching as hard as I could. The reinforced glass didn¡¯t crack like I expected. The outer layer cracked like plastic and the inner layer exploded inward like safety glass, as I tumbled through the window, staggering into the empty bed next to Luther¡¯s.

    I gagged on the sudden rush of warm hospital air, reeking of plastic, cleaning supplies, and that faint scent of sweat and blood you always get from a living patient with holes in him, no matter how carefully you try to keep him clean.

    Luther was unconscious, so he couldn¡¯t exactly consent to the procedure. I whispered, ¡°If this doesn¡¯t work, please forgive me,¡± as I cast the divination magic Tobias left in the book.

    I was expecting some kind of magical MRI, afraid that I might have to look up anatomy references from a living body in real time, but magical healing is not science. Magical healing is intuitive. I couldn¡¯t see inside Luther¡¯s body with the spell, but I could feel it. I could feel his pain roughly mapped onto my own body, and I could feel how close he was to death.

    But I understood why Tobias did it this way. That intuitive understanding of his injuries could guide the spell now, like the healing was a pitcher of water, and this spell was telling me where to pour.

    In my desperation to get the healing right, I had forgotten to find a spell for deadening pain, so I whispered, ¡°Sorry, buddy. This is gonna hurt.¡±

    I started attuning myself to the healing spell, and almost lost my nerve. This spell was supposed to push out foreign objects as it healed the wounds, but nobody had ever tried this on a guy hooked up to modern machines. I didn¡¯t know how to take an IV out, and if I just started unhooking shit, the nurses would be here in minutes.

    I looked up at the dirty drop ceiling and prayed for the first time since I was eight years old. ¡°God, if you¡¯re up there, you don¡¯t owe me shit, okay? Me and my family, we deserve whatever these demons do to us. But this guy¡­ You owe this guy. I know you¡¯re super pissed at the human race right now, but if there is any mercy left in you for an innocent man, please help me help him.¡±

    And then I cast the spell. The runes wrapped around me and seemed to take on a life of their own, locking me in place as I read the first ten runes and moved to the next level, and the next, and the next, until I had cast all fifty runes in the healing spell, with Jeeves guiding my eye movements so I couldn¡¯t skip one or accidentally read the same one twice.

    Luther¡¯s bones made a hideous grinding, popping noise as they came back together. He was clearly in pain, but hopefully the drugs he was on would protect him from the worst of it. He started to twitch and writhe as the spell pushed the plastic tube out of his throat.

    I thought something was wrong when his stitches popped, but the wounds closed immediately, as I poured the power in. This healing spell was taking a tremendous amount of magic, more than I had ever used before. I opened myself to the Earth and took in everything I could, pouring it all into the hands I had resting on his chest.

    I was worried about accidentally moving, until I realized I couldn¡¯t move. It felt like a giant hand was holding my body in place, so I couldn¡¯t interrupt the flow of magic until it was done. Lord knows what would have happened if I had run out of power in the middle of this thing.

    Then there was nothing left to worry about because there was nothing left to cast. All I could do was keep the magic coming and hang on for the ride. And if it felt like I had an older, wiser Kovach guiding me through the spell, I¡¯m sure that was just my imagination.

    And as I was wondering how long I could keep this up, Luther sat up straight in bed and clutched at his throat. ¡°God damn! Holy shit! What the fuck! Was there something in my throat?¡±

    I grabbed his shoulders and tried to calm him down. ¡°Luther, it¡¯s Tim. You¡¯re in the hospital, but I think you¡¯re okay. You were hit by a train.¡±

    ¡°Well fuck yes, I was hit by a train! I¡¯m not gonna forget the fucking train!¡± He wiped his eyes and looked me up and down. ¡°You look like you swallowed a stadium light. Is that real fire? Does that hurt?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s magic. I was using magic to try and heal you. Do you feel okay? Does it hurt when you breathe or move?¡±

    He said he felt fine, but before I could ask any more questions, all the machines by his bed flashed red and started to buzz, beep, and shout.

    ¡°I¡¯m okay,¡± he said, ¡°but you gotta get out of here!¡±

    I nodded, but stopped, right before I jumped out the window. ¡°Luther, I¡¯m so sorry. The demon who¡­¡±

    ¡°Apologize with a text, motherfucker! You gotta go!¡±

    * * *

    Lydia was waiting on the wall when I got back, reeking of magic, plastic, and blood.

    There was nothing funny about this day, but I had to chuckle a little when I saw her wardrobe change. Her short black night dress had been replaced with a full body kimono, announcing visually that this succubus was for good boys only, and I was not currently a good boy.

    ¡°Timothy, where have you been?¡±

    Timothy said nothing.

    ¡°I see,¡± Lydia said sadly. ¡°And your assumptions are correct. I have to report everything you say now, and I am no longer making suggestions or requests. When I tell you to do something, it is a command from our Master. And you understand the consequences if you refuse?¡±

    ¡°I understand.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll understand if you hate me now.¡±

    ¡°Why would I hate you? You don¡¯t have any choice in this. You¡¯re one of his slaves. Just like me.¡±

    ¡°Yes,¡± she confirmed. ¡°I am just another servant, but I am senior to you, so I could command you to tell me where you¡¯ve been.¡±

    ¡°Sure. And I would have to answer. But don¡¯t worry, Lydia. Your Master made his point, and I am ready to work within my contract, as long as nobody else gets hurt.¡±

    ¡°I told you I had a plan to appease him. We could have avoided all this¡­¡±

    ¡°If I had listened to you. Yeah, I know. Trust me, I¡¯ll be regretting that for a long time. But I¡¯m listening now. Whatever idea you had, would it still work? Can I really make your Master happy without hurting anybody?¡±

    ¡°I think so. One of our thralls needs help, and the demon who usually helps him¡­ is indisposed. The task may be simple. We need you to visit a laboratory, ask for a certain technician, and tell him Sylvia sent you. Then take what this man gives you and give it to our thrall after his show tonight.¡±

    ¡°After his show? Baal¡ª Your Master made a thrall out of a performer?¡±

    ¡°A very influential performer, who is¡­ not quite so useful now. But back twenty years ago, his music had a strong influence on the sons and daughters of powerful men. His songs were¡­ political, in a way these children found appealing, and he was quite seductive in his prime, attracting hundreds of young men and women who were eager to rebel against their parents, and make his music real.

    ¡°Most of them went on to internships and established connections with your current ruling class. I am told he was indispensable during the transition from national to corporate governance, which is why we are still accommodating him. Most of his disciples are now happily supporting the opposite of everything they believed in when they were young, but very few seem to have noticed.¡±

    ¡°So, deliver this package, and walk away? That¡¯s all I have to do?¡±

    ¡°The package is illegal, of course, but I believe you can use machines to obscure your identity and cover your tracks. My Master needs to see you can do this; he needs to understand that you can be useful to us in practical ways, even without magic. This will appease him, and it will make it more likely that you will be used for theft and infiltration missions that will not require violence.¡±

    ¡°How long can you drag this out, Lydia? How long can you keep your Master happy before he makes me straight up kill somebody?¡±

    ¡°Not long,¡± she admitted. ¡°So, you should prepare yourself. Prepare yourself to fight and prepare yourself to kill. I know you think you won¡¯t. I know you think you can¡¯t. But every one of your ancestors thought the same, and every one of them made peace with it. It helps if you think of yourself as an instrument, simply following orders.¡±

 Chapter 38: Zach

    The performer¡¯s name was Zach Vall. I had never heard of him. A search pulled up dozens of the most puerile, simple-minded metal songs I had ever heard. Tits, drugs, guitar, and a weird obsession with lips? But always with an undercurrent of fighting the power.

    No more wars, no more draft. No more dying for oil and sand. No more drone strikes on helpless people. Government hates you, government has to die. Videos filled with insane AI-generated simulations of female celebrities, refitted with gigantic proportions and outrageous lips.

    The AI women were all meant to be parodies of influencers and mainstream rock stars used to seduce young men and women into serving the state. I remember one grotesque AI pop star chanting, ¡°Die for me. Die for money. Die for God.¡±

    I couldn¡¯t believe it when I pulled up some recent photos. This sad shirtless moron in leather pants was a demon thrall? Then I looked at some older photos and kind of got it. This dude was hot, back in the day. Ridiculous hair and purple pants, but hot; smoldering, skinny rock star hot.

    I never understood the rock star thing, but I had to admit it was real, after seeing multiple women I thought of as ¡°good girls¡± completely lose their shit and throw themselves at performers.

    I took Judy to a show at a dirty warehouse club one night, shortly after we moved in together. I was excited to go, because I remembered these guys from Texas, a pop punk band from Denton who didn¡¯t look like rock stars at all. Just looked like a bunch of normal guys picked up instruments and wandered out on stage.

    I was thrilled to see this group that I thought of as ¡°my guys¡± doing a national tour, finally getting the recognition they deserved, singing happy, upbeat pop songs, making fun of singers who were mad at their dads.

    I shook hands with the lead singer and quizzed him about his lyrics, while Judy chatted up the bass player at the merch table. And then, I watched my sophisticated art student girlfriend yank her shirt down and let this bass player lick her nipple.

    I remember being so stunned; I didn¡¯t quite trust my own eyes. Did that really just happen? Right in front of me? Then I rode home with her, watching Judy squeal and bounce around like a teenage girl, with his spit slowly drying on her chest.

    That¡¯s when I decided everything I thought I knew about women was wrong, and that I would never really understand them at all. I¡¯m not saying Judy is to blame for me switching to demons and giving up on human women but shit like this did not help.

    * * *

    Getting a vial of experimental methadone turned out to be way, way easier than I thought. I was prepared for a thrilling adventure that would require shifting identities, spoofing cameras, and maybe a high-wire levitation act dangling from an air vent.

    But I just met this guy behind an old brick building, and he put the vial in my hand. No names, no discussion. And when I asked if I needed to pay him, he said he had ¡°everything he wanted¡± and if I ever needed anything else, he made it clear that he would do anything to see Sylvia again.

    * * *

    Zach Vall was pushing sixty, but he still had that thing.

    I was surprised at how quickly his people hustled me back to him, the moment I said Sylvia¡¯s name. One minute, I was just another idiot crowding the stage, the next, I was surrounded by giant men in black t-shirts, forming a protective cordon around me as I was ushered past multiple checkpoints, to end up at a dressing room that smelled like sweat and stale perfume.

    ¡°What the fuck?¡± I muttered, as the crowd parted for me. ¡°Did I just become president?¡±

    Zach had clearly seen a hard decade or two. His shiny long hair was dull now, his blue eyes clouded by years of smoke and bad dreams. He still had amazing cheekbones, and he never let himself get fat, but there was a permanent sadness in him now, and he was leaning into it, with black clothes and too much mascara.

    He had a groupie to either side of him on the couch, cuddling and giggling while he kissed their necks and whispered in their ears. I caught a whiff of them as I got closer and the rock star lifestyle¡­ did not smell great.

    And these groupies were at least ten years too old to be wearing the clothes they were in. I got a closer look at them and wondered if there were a couple teenage girls lost in the crowd, looking for their moms.

    Zach looked very comfy on his couch, but as soon as he saw me, he jumped to his feet and waved at the groupies to fuck off. I got a closer look at them, and the question slipped out automatically, before I realized how rude it was.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong with their lips?¡± Both women had outrageous enlarged lips, like the parodies in his videos, like their lips were tires that had too much air in them.

    ¡°I give them a potion,¡± Zach said. ¡°I can¡¯t stand girls with skinny lips.¡± He waited for the giant men in black shirts to leave, then said, ¡°Did you bring it?¡±

    There was a terrible hunger in his voice, a naked, helpless need that was terrifying to see up close. I showed him the bottle and Zach said, ¡°Please,¡± with his hand out, in the same tone I had used on Baalphezar, when I was begging on my knees.

    I put the bottle in his hand, and he injected half of it immediately, right in front of me. As soon as he got his drug, Zach collapsed on his couch, with a beatific smile on his face. The years melted away, and I saw the rock star in him again, that master of the universe body language men get when women love every little thing they do. Part of it was natural, I guess, part of that long, skinny body type that makes every little movement look easy, sexy, and smooth.

    ¡°Thanks man,¡± Zach said. ¡°You¡¯re my best fucking friend today. What¡¯s your name?¡± But then he stopped. ¡°No, nevermind. Don¡¯t tell me. It¡¯s better if I don¡¯t know. What happened to my regular guy? What happened to Louie?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know who that is. They just told me to grab this bottle and tell everybody Sylvia sent me until I could hand it to you.¡±

    ¡°So, that means she still loves me, right? If she cared enough to send you, that means she still loves me. That she¡¯s still taking care of me, even if we can¡¯t be together anymore.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, man. I don¡¯t really know anything.¡±

    ¡°Yeah,¡± Zach said, with that slow, certain smile. It looked creepy as fuck to me, but would I be melting, if I was a girl right now? ¡°Yeah, she loves me. When something like Sylvia says she loves you, she means it forever. Real forever, not like when a human girl says it.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, man. I¡¯ve never met her.¡±

    ¡°Oh, you¡¯re meeting her right now,¡± Zach said, tapping a poster over his head. ¡°She¡¯s on all my album covers. Look at those lips. I had those, man. For years I had those, whenever I wanted, any way I wanted.¡±

    I had to admit, Sylvia was magnificent. Pale skin, gigantic tits, eyes, nails, horns, and nipples so purple, they were almost black. Now this was a succubus Veazey could appreciate, an anime character come to life, rendered in exquisite detail from every angle as I looked through ten years of album covers on the walls.

    Talk about hiding in plain sight. Anybody looking at these close-ups would think they were an AI parody, but this wasn¡¯t a computer-generated body, this was a physical demon body, photographed exactly as it was, in a context no one would ever believe.

    Her beauty was terrifying. Merciless. Alien. Radiating power. I wasn¡¯t looking at one of her lovers. I was looking at one of her victims, seeing what a lifetime of forbidden fruit does to a man.

    ¡°Zach, can I ask you a question? I¡¯m new, and I¡¯m trying to understand how this works. Why would demons seduce a rock star? What did you do for them?¡±

    ¡°At first, they didn¡¯t ask for anything,¡± Zach said, like I was already his best friend. ¡°At first, they just said they were fans. Sylvia said her Master picked me because someone who hired him loved my music. He even had me meet the guy, some guy who worked in the White House, who wanted to make people turn against the government, so the corps could ride in and save the day.

    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

    ¡°He said my music would make the kids go along with it, especially if the UN fucked up the global currency thing like he said they would. And sure enough, they did. He even warned me about it, years before it happened. Said cash would be worthless, and I needed to buy shares in the ten companies that he was working for.

    ¡°Made a shitload of money off that, once money based on stock was the only kind of money that worked. I could have stopped performing in ¡®46, but Sylvia told me I had to keep going, to write songs to celebrate the end of government wars and nation-state limits. No borders, no debts, a whole world liberated from all the shit that owned them. Mortgages and car payments and student loans and shit. All gone, so let¡¯s party.

    ¡°And we did. This dude was so happy the day money stopped working; he gave me his daughter. Said she wanted me to be her first, and that I should keep her in my suite until shit blew over. That I could just drop by and bring her back to Virginia ¡®whenever.¡¯ Really sweet girl. I think she¡¯s got her dad¡¯s job now.¡±

    ¡°Zach, did Sylvia ever make you hurt anybody?¡±

    ¡°Kind of, but it doesn¡¯t count. When Sylvia tells you to do something, you just do it. And it feels great. Whatever it is, it feels great. She can tell you to stick a knife all the way through your hand and you¡¯ll just giggle and make funny patterns with the blood.

    ¡°So, when she tells you to kill somebody, it¡¯s not really you. I mean, it¡¯s your hands, I guess. You can see it and smell it and hear people make noises when they die, but you don¡¯t care like you would if it was you.

    ¡°Some of the government guys balked when the corps asked them to step down, so we gave their kids free tickets to my show. Most of the resistance gave up right away, when they saw their daughters with me, but sometimes they would resist, and Sylvia would make me do stuff and send video to their dads.

    ¡°Pretty nasty stuff, but it wasn¡¯t me doing it. It wasn¡¯t my soul hurting people, those were just my hands, being used by someone else. Sylvia killed a couple people with my hands, but none of that was me. I would never hurt anybody.¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t used to need this,¡± Zach said, sloshing the liquid left in his bottle. ¡°I was never a fucking drug addict. I wasn¡¯t like those old fucks from 20c. I took care of myself. Diet, exercise. I was clean and I made everybody around me work clean. Then I met Sylvia, and the way she makes you feel; just one word and she can make it the best day of your life.

    ¡°I don¡¯t really like heroin, or whatever this new shit is. It¡¯s just the only thing that can make me feel the way she did. I wouldn¡¯t need any of this shit if she would just let me hear her voice again. I don¡¯t need much. Just pop in and say one word to me, every couple days. Just walk by and let me see her, maybe a little kiss, just for old times¡­¡±

    ¡°Zach, are you okay? Do you need me to get somebody?¡±

    ¡°Nah,¡± he said, suddenly sounding sober. ¡°Just drifting a little. They¡¯ve really improved this since last time.¡±

    ¡°Zach, did you ever ask for help? Did you ever try to get out? To get away from the demons?¡±

    ¡°Sure,¡± he said. ¡°I even went to church. Lost my shit in front of a burned-out altar and begged Gabriel to come and save me. This angel chick came down and bitch-slapped me. That¡¯s where I got this.¡± Zach turned his head to show me a burn mark on his cheek. ¡°She said I was a nasty unclean liar. She said I couldn¡¯t ask forgiveness for anything until I admitted it was my fault. But it wasn¡¯t my fault! Sylvia did all that shit, not me! But that angel bitch vanished and left me there. So, I went back to Sylvia, said I was sorry, and let her know I was all in.

    ¡°She¡¯s gonna reward me, too. She¡¯s gonna make me a demon when I die. A beautiful rock and roll demon, playing songs for all the souls in Hell. She¡¯s made me wait, all this time, but I know she¡¯ll pay up eventually. Demons always keep their word. Not like people. People lie all the time.¡±

    ¡°Zach, do you want to die?¡±

    ¡°Nobody wants to die,¡± Zach said. ¡°It¡¯s just the only way to not live anymore.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°I only had a couple moments like that,¡± Zach said. ¡°Most of the time it was fun. So much fuckin¡¯ money. Cars and boats and planes. I saw the whole fuckin¡¯ world. Nobody partied as hard as I did when I started, and nobody else saw the shit I¡¯ve seen.

    ¡°Sylvia took me to places no one can go. I saw fucking Atlantis, man. Wrote a song about it. Everybody thinks I made it up, but the shit in that video, that¡¯s shit I really saw. Glass columns and walls made of crystal, rows and rows of cages with the bones of crazy animals in them. The shit I saw, I wouldn¡¯t trade that for anything.

    ¡°And you can have some serious fun, when you have your own demon. The shit Sylvia can do¡­ Had this one apologist bitch, went on all these shows bad-mouthing me. Bony and loud but still fuckable, you know? I had Sylvia go get her for me and bring her back to one of my houses. Don¡¯t get the wrong idea, I didn¡¯t need a demon to get women for me. Girls at my shows would do anything I wanted, just so they could brag to their friends about it.

    ¡°But this chick hated me, so I had Sylvia make her want it, because she secretly did, of course. That¡¯s what the whole thing was about. I think she came to a show, and she wasn¡¯t hot enough to go back stage, so she spent the next five years screaming on talk shows about what an evil prick I am.

    ¡°Spent the whole weekend with her, but she doesn¡¯t even remember it. Sylvia wiped her memory and took her back home. She woke up drunk and sore in her own bed, with no idea of where those two days went. That¡¯s the kind of shit you can do, if anybody fucks with you, after you sign up.¡±

    ¡°You look really young to be doing this kind of shit,¡± Zach said, eyeing me. ¡°Are you a CEO¡¯s kid? Are they recruiting you for something? What¡¯s your thing?¡±

    I said, ¡°Magic,¡± before I could stop myself.

    ¡°Wait,¡± Zach stammered, as his whole demeanor changed. ¡°Oh god, oh shit, oh fuck. Are you one of the wizards? Holy shit, you didn¡¯t tell me you were one of the wizards! Please man, I was just fucking around, okay? All that shit I told you, I was just fucking around, talking shit to the new kid, you know? I didn¡¯t mean any of that shit I said. I¡¯m not angry, I¡¯m not sad. I¡¯m happy, and I¡¯m loyal, and I¡¯m ready to go.

    ¡°Whatever the Big Guy needs, I¡¯m still here and I¡¯m ready to work. I¡¯m sorry if I¡¯ve¡­ I¡¯m sorry if I¡¯ve let myself go, but I promise I can still get shit done. Please don¡¯t tell your demon anything I said. Please don¡¯t repeat any of it to anyone who works for him. Tell him I¡¯m grateful, alright? Just tell him how grateful I am, and maybe tell him, tell him I don¡¯t look as bad as last time? That I¡¯m eating better, and I look strong, you know? Strong, for my age? Can you tell him that?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s okay,¡± I said, trying to reassure him. ¡°I won¡¯t say anything about anything. Just two guys talkin¡¯. Doesn¡¯t mean anything.¡±

    ¡°Thank you,¡± Zach said, openly weeping now. ¡°It really is fun, having a demon. Guy your age, you¡¯ve got so much time to do so much cool shit. And they¡¯re not really your hands. Whatever you do, they¡¯re not really your hands when he¡¯s using them. Just keep telling yourself that, and if you can make yourself believe it, maybe you won¡¯t fall apart like me. If you can believe that you won¡¯t need drugs at all, and you can just enjoy it, just like she said I would.¡±

    I left quietly as Zach fell asleep.

    * * *

    ¡°Lydia, why would you show me that?¡± I confronted her, as soon as I got back home. ¡°If you want me to honor this contract, why would you show me the worst possible example of what happens when a man goes along with this?¡±

    ¡°He took the drug?¡± Lydia asked.

    ¡°He took half the bottle in one shot and fell asleep. Lydia, what was in that bottle? The guy told me it was experimental methadone. Feels like heroin, but better for your body. Is that true? Please tell me that was true.¡±

    ¡°You know what it was, Timothy. And you know why I gave it to him.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, did you just have me kill a man?¡±

    ¡°Did you inject it for him?¡±

    ¡°Of course not. He was sleeping, but he was alive when I left.¡±

    ¡°And when he woke up, he took the other half, and woke up in Hell.¡±

    ¡°Why did you kill him?¡±

    ¡°He was threatening to reverse course, change the message of his music and admit tearing down the old world was a mistake. His next album was going to be a remix of old patriotic songs, set to modern music. The order to remove him came from the White House, what used to be the White House. I keep forgetting no one lives there anymore.¡±

    ¡°So, I just killed a man. You told me there would be no killing, and in the next breath¡­¡±

    ¡°You did not kill a man. You delivered a bottle that helped a man kill himself. And I trust you saw enough to realize it was a mercy.¡±

    ¡°A mercy? There was still hope for that guy! He could have gone to rehab! He could have gone straight, got religion or confessed to murder or something!¡±

    ¡°Timothy, you met him. You think Zachary Vall would ever check himself into a hospital? You think that man would have ever taken responsibility for anything?¡±

    ¡°Why would you show that to me? Were you just trying to make me afraid of Sylvia? Because if that¡¯s the case, then Mission Fucking Accomplished! A demon who can snap her fingers and take your free will away? That is worse than death. Could you do that? Could you control me like that, if you wanted to?¡±

    ¡°I would never do that. And Sylvia¡¯s powers are far beyond mine.¡±

    ¡°So, what was I supposed to learn from that evil, degenerate piece of shit?¡±

    ¡°I needed you to complete a mission for my Master, to infiltrate a secure location and prove that you can be trusted to handle delicate situations.¡±

    ¡°What secure location? The guy met me around back and put it in my hand.¡±

    ¡°Oh, how fortunate,¡± Lydia said, deadpan. ¡°I told Sylvia it would be extremely difficult, now that her man inside had been removed. Nice to see that wasn¡¯t necessary.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, did you¡­¡± I began but stopped myself. Did I just catch Lydia lying to her Master to protect us? Making it sound like an honest mistake that she just ¡°forgot¡± to correct? And if she was willing to lie about this, what else could she lie about?

    ¡°My Master should be quite pleased that we have solved this problem for him. I might even be allowed back in your bed again, if he thinks it would help me manage you.¡±

    ¡°Your Master tried to kill one of my friends yesterday, and you think I¡¯m ready to cuddle?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± Lydia admitted. ¡°It may be weeks, months before you let me touch you again, but I want you to know, I will be here when you need me, when you finally change your mind.¡±

    ¡°And you are so damn sure that I will change my mind.¡±

    ¡°We have to depend on each other, through whatever is required of us. Even Tobias accepted me eventually.¡±

    * * *

    I asked Azael directly if the death of Zach Vall was a stain on my soul, but he refused to answer. He just asked me if I regretted it, and I said, hell yes! I would have taken the guy to rehab if it were up to me. If I had known he was going to die, I might have even tried to fight twenty bodyguards and a thousand fans to get him out.

    * * *

    ¡°So, somebody ¡®hired¡¯ your Master and Sylvia recruited this rock star to help destabilize the old governments. But who¡¯s using who here? Did demons use corporations to take over the world, or did corporations use the demons?¡±

    Lydia just shook her head.

 Chapter 39: Wizard School Dropout

    Luther made a full recovery. A miraculous recovery. Even better, he declined to press charges for the unauthorized healing that saved his life. I even slipped him some money and helped pay for the hospital window, which had immediately appeared on his bill.

    Jeeves and I had managed to black out the hospital cameras, and no random video had surfaced of me flailing in mid-air outside his room, so I seemed to be in the clear.

    One funny thing I found out later. Mass General freaked out over the security breach and hired Innovex to patch their firewall. So, their new security protocols were installed by the guy who helped me break them in the first place.

    The guys sent me a video when they got Luther home, reassuring me that he was okay, and that nobody was going to hold a grudge. Even Veazey, who pulled the camera aside to talk to me solo after the party.

    ¡°Calvin got your message, and he¡¯s arranging the trip like you suggested. Two-week company retreat at that place you found in Colorado. Been twenty years since anybody did bible school up there. Let¡¯s hope the site is still holy ground. And let¡¯s hope you can¡­ resolve your situation before they get back.¡±

    ¡°And no,¡± Veazey said. ¡°I¡¯m not going with them. I¡¯m gonna stay and help you fight. I¡¯ve made up my mind, so don¡¯t waste time arguing. I¡¯m fortifying my place and getting some hardware ready. Call me when you¡¯re ready to start shootin¡¯ back.¡±

    * * *

    Lydia was still nagging me about spending all my time in the Zone, but I told her I had a whole training room set up, and it would be foolish to try and recreate it somewhere else.

    I spent a full day on the roof of Crazy Henry¡¯s, reading Jacob¡¯s journal, giving myself a crash course in magic circles and demon anatomy. Apparently, the key to killing demons was to disrupt their bodies so much, they couldn¡¯t maintain the magic field they used to maintain their forms on Earth.

    It was like popping a bubble, and once you popped that bubble of magic, the demon would discorporate and slowly disappear. They didn¡¯t seem particularly vulnerable to head shots, but the real reason to shoot a demon¡¯s head off was to disable its eyes and ears, so it would just kind of flail around while you destroyed the rest of it.

    I set up the shooting range and called Veazey. ¡°Hey, man. You¡¯re right. It¡¯s time to step up this training. Bring a gun.¡±

    I was afraid Veazey would show up with a full truck bed, like last time, but he showed up with a large-frame pistol in a nylon holster. A very expensive gun in a very cheap wrapper.

    ¡°Veazey, what is this thing?¡±

    ¡°Traylor ten-millimeter with a grav compensator. Keep the batteries fresh and never fire it without the compensator, or this thing will rip your arm off.¡±

    ¡°Are these bullets?¡± I asked, shaking a dozen tiny pellets into my hand. ¡°Where¡¯s the propellant?¡±

    ¡°Binary propellant. Two different kinds of gas that mix in the chamber. Expensive and complicated, but this thing hits harder per bullet than any other pistol I have.¡±

    ¡°Hard enough to kill demons?¡±

    ¡°You better hope so. Would be nice if you could make head shots, but I¡¯ve seen you shoot, and that¡¯s gonna be more of a stretch goal for you. Let¡¯s just get you putting bullets roughly within the outline of a demon body to start with.¡±

    ¡°I am not that bad a shot!¡±

    ¡°Yeah, you really are. So, be sure and connect to this sight and use whatever cheater shit they put in those optics for you. You need all the help you can get.¡±

    We spent the afternoon aiming and firing dry, shooting holographic demons.

    ¡°Don¡¯t go crazy with that thing,¡± Veazey said. ¡°Dry fire with it as much as you can. The bullets are just hunks of metal, but that propellant is fucking expensive. I¡¯ve got five mags for you; after that you¡¯ll have to buy your own from my guy.¡±

    ¡°Veazey, how illegal is this thing?¡±

    ¡°Very. It¡¯s not silent, but it¡¯s not loud enough, either so if you get caught with it, it¡¯s not just a possession charge, they¡¯ll think you¡¯re up to something and they¡¯ll drive up your ass with a microscope. It can fool most scanners but do not wave it around.¡±

    ¡°Everything I need to defend myself is illegal. No wonder demons run this town.¡±

    * * *

    My shooting would never be good enough for Veazey, but he finally pronounced me ¡°Good enough to not immediately become demon chow,¡± and set up two chairs for us on the porch.

    ¡°You sure Luther¡¯s okay?¡± I asked. ¡°No side effects, no weird hangover?¡±

    If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

    ¡°Doctors looked him over and said he looked like a teenager inside. Said you even cleared shit out of his arteries for him.¡±

    ¡°So, he forgives me?¡±

    ¡°Tim, if anybody is gonna understand demon shit, it¡¯s him. He knows what you¡¯re up against and he wants you to win. He needs you to win. We all do.¡±

    ¡°But it won¡¯t stop with Luther. I can do stuff to protect you, but your family is in danger. I barely stopped him from hurting your nephew two days ago. Did you move him?¡±

    Veazey nodded. ¡°Yeah. Holy ground, like you said. Staying with my sister¡¯s crazy in-laws in the woods.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve got a plan to protect you, but there¡¯s no way to test it. I think this thing I rigged can project a magic circle around a whole house, but I haven¡¯t tested it yet.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s why you needed those spheres?¡±

    I nodded. ¡°I was able to copy a demon protection circle from one of my ancestors. It¡¯s complicated as fuck, but with modern technology, I should be able to project the image straight down at any diameter I need. I can also paint a circle around your place with a sprayer, but I¡¯ve got to come up with a better solution for Judy.¡±

    ¡°You know that girl¡¯s not gonna do anything you say unless she knows why. You gotta tell her the truth.¡±

    ¡°Oh, fuck no. Judy would flip her shit if she knew I got powers. And if I told her I was in trouble with demons, she would go straight to the cops, no matter what I said. I would go straight into DMA protection and demons would slaughter everybody I know.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m in your corner, man, but how big a fight are you starting here? Even if you¡¯re bulletproof and can punch like a freight train, you¡¯re still just one guy. Can¡¯t he just send an army of demons and overwhelm you?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± I shook my head. ¡°Jacob was really clear about this. There is a finite amount of magic in Hell, generated by the suffering of souls in the Lake. Each lord gets a certain amount of it each lunar cycle or something, and has to portion it out to his princes, based on how much he likes them or how useful he thinks they¡¯re gonna be. My bad guy is currently at the bottom of the list after being without a Kovach for so long. That means he has a limited supply of magic for portals and stuff.

    ¡°He¡¯s going to have to send small demons in small groups, or one big one at a time. He can¡¯t send an army after me; he can¡¯t afford it. And he doesn¡¯t want to kill me. He wants to scare me, and he thinks scaring me is gonna be easy.

    ¡°They think we¡¯re all pussies up here, Veazey. They think the human race is beaten, so for a challenge like this to come from a guy like me? A wizard school dropout who can barely do a pull-up? That¡¯s a direct challenge to his personal honor. He can¡¯t let that stand. His bosses won¡¯t let him farm that out. If I can survive the first few attacks, he¡¯ll have to come up here and deal with me.

    ¡°I know you think I¡¯m crazy, but I¡¯m doing this so fast, casting shit I shouldn¡¯t even be able to read yet, I think I can surprise them. I¡¯ve got to humiliate him so badly that his bosses make him come up here, and if I can get him up here, I can kill him.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°This demon chick has been living with you since your birthday? How long before you guys banged?¡±

    ¡°About six weeks. I didn¡¯t just lose my mind and jump her, okay? She made herself useful. She helped me, she fought for me. She was¡­ there for me, and she helped me get over a lot of Judy shit.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re banging your demon therapist? If she¡¯s so dangerous, why did you touch her at all? Did she just wear you down?¡±

    ¡°I had to take a chance. This is hard to say, but¡­ After that big one smacked me around, when I saw how big this whole thing was, I knew I wasn¡¯t strong enough to do it. Before I could do anything, I had to convince myself that my soul was worth saving, and that¡¯s what she does. She makes you love her, and she makes you love yourself.

    ¡°I had to find the will to save myself, and I couldn¡¯t do it alone. God help me, I couldn¡¯t do it alone. So now I¡¯m playing chicken with a demon who says she loves me. Can I learn enough magic to beat this thing before she consumes me? It¡¯s risky, and it¡¯s gonna be close, but this was the only way.¡±

    ¡°But you weren¡¯t alone, dipshit!¡± Veazey yelled at me. ¡°One phone call and I would have been right there!¡±

    ¡°I couldn¡¯t put that on you,¡± I said. ¡°It was selfish of me to bring you in this far, but I couldn¡¯t do this alone, either.¡±

    ¡°You gotta learn when to ask for help, jackass! Help from real people! Stop treating the world like everyone is your dad! Some of us actually give a fuck.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°So, what¡¯s it like?¡± Veazey asked.

    ¡°What?¡±

    ¡°The succubus, man! What¡¯s it like?¡±

    ¡°Oh. Oh man, it¡¯s not what you think. Lydia, she¡­ she doesn¡¯t do fantasies. She gives me what I need.¡±

    ¡°Yeah well, I need a redhead with an anime ass and tits bigger than my head. She give you that?¡±

    ¡°No, man. It¡¯s not¡­ it¡¯s not like that. Look, my life has been such a shit-show, all I ever wanted was to have something normal. So that¡¯s what she gives me, most of the time: just simple, sweet, and normal.¡±

    Veazey was absolutely disgusted with me. ¡°Unbelievable. They gave a succubus to the most boring man on Earth.¡±

    ¡°Everybody thinks they get you with shape change tricks and mind control, but that¡¯s not how you corrupt a guy,¡± I explained. ¡°You want to know what really gets you? They make everything so easy. They never hesitate, and they never say no. They spoil you so fast, and so completely, after the first couple weeks, you can¡¯t even remember what real women are like. And after a few months of this, you start to treat everybody like a demon, like everybody on Earth is just a thing that exists to serve you.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t think I could be corrupted like that, until I read their journals and realized most of these guys started just like me. My ancestors were not born evil, they were corrupted by a demon who convinced them they were gods.

    ¡°If this was just sex, I could deal with it, but that¡¯s just the beginning. Lydia, she¡­ she makes you fall in love with her, and I got no defense against that. I¡¯ve only been with her for a couple weeks, and I¡¯m already so addicted to her¡­ If she had a whole year to work on me, she could make me do anything. I need you to understand that, because if this plan fails, you may have to take me out.¡±

    ¡°Oh, come on! Don¡¯t even talk like that!¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t mean you, personally, but some of the guys you served with, they went black box after Dongala, right? And some of those guys are real killers? Snipers and shit? Veazey, if I go full supervillain on you, if you start seeing me on the news, you gotta call one of those guys and tell him what he¡¯s dealing with.¡±

    ¡°We already proved you¡¯re bulletproof, what the fuck is a sniper gonna do?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not bulletproof all the time, and if she makes me kill, I¡¯m gonna hate myself. I¡¯m gonna get careless, on purpose. I¡¯ll forget to put my wards up; I¡¯ll walk around naked in front of open windows. I¡¯ll get a fucking convertible and cruise around downtown. If this goes bad, somebody¡¯s gotta stop me, so I don¡¯t wind up with a body count like the guys in that book.¡±

    Veazey stood up and dragged me to my feet. ¡°I don¡¯t ever want to hear you talk like this again. I don¡¯t want to hear this loser shit anymore. You¡¯re gonna fight these things, and you¡¯re gonna win. No other option.¡±

 Chapter 40: Elysium

    I spent the next day setting up a protection circle around Veazey¡¯s house, a collection of manufactured homes sitting on a plot of land opened up by one of the Reclamation Acts.

    Anyone who came across it would think he was squatting, but he had a legal claim on a wide swath of worthless land by an old U.S. artillery fort and had set up a home here a year or so after he started at Innovex. It wasn¡¯t practical to live here before the age of flying cars, and Veazey clearly liked it that way.

    He told everyone he was living the dream, living an isolated life fifteen minutes from a major city. On weekends he would get dropped off at a parking garage and take his father¡¯s old truck out on what was left of the roads. He was often the only human on the ground for miles, trapped between massive, automated freight haulers that were too heavy to fly.

    Veazey¡¯s first job was serving as troubleshooter and remote pilot for a fleet of these drone trucks, so he wasn¡¯t scared of them, and he knew all kinds of priority codes that let him blow past them if they got in his way.

    He spent his weekends taking long trips to forgotten corners of the United States, visiting lonely ghost towns and U.S. historical sites that didn¡¯t have markers anymore. The truck had been converted to run on hydrogen fuel pellets, so he could drive for thousands of miles without having to stop. I used to joke that the whole thing would go up in a giant fireball if he got in a wreck, but Veazey just said that would be a fine way to go out.

    His home was actually four small manufactured homes hooked together into one big one. The units were meant to be individual tiny homes, built to be easy to transport and set up on short notice. He used one entire home for his workshop and another for his entertainment room, with one reserved for kitchen and bathroom, and another just for his bed.

    He talked about saving enough money to build a real house here one day, but the prefab walls were surprisingly strong, and everything in them was easy to replace. Veazey got a deal by buying in bulk and having them air-dropped in, buying defective units that had scuffs or scratches or holes in them and then patching them himself.

    The end result was a sprawling prefab castle filled with electronics and robot parts, with every available surface covered in collectibles and movie posters. I couldn¡¯t imagine trying to bring a woman back to this insane nerd hive, but every time I teased him about it, he showed me a drawer full of underwear and personal items women had left behind.

    He¡¯d asked me to come and live with him half a dozen times since we met, but I was pretty sure being his roommate would end our friendship. Veazey was the best friend in the world when he wanted to be but could get moody and temperamental at the drop of a trucker hat. He assured me he lived away from people for a reason, and he couldn¡¯t stand the thought of being stuck in an apartment.

    I spent the afternoon painting a magic circle around the whole structure, using a smart sprayer to copy the runes just as they looked projected on the ground. I was going to leave the projector running and rely on the painted symbols to be an old-school backup if demons found a way to take it out.

    Veazey made a big show of not needing protection, showing off his massive gun safe full of forbidden firearms. He had enough hardware in this house to put him in a work camp for twenty years, but he clearly didn¡¯t care. Half the land was devoted to a shooting range where he took young programmers and introduced them to the wonderful world of guns, whenever he decided one of them was cool enough to be trusted.

    He insisted that he had enough security to spot any demons attacking his island and that he had enough firepower to deal with them, but I wasn¡¯t taking any chances.

    ¡°Please,¡± I begged him. ¡°First sign of trouble, call me and let me deal with it. Please don¡¯t try and fight these things one on one.¡±

    ¡°Fuck that!¡± Veazey said, insulted. ¡°These things may be fast, but no way they¡¯re faster than a bullet.¡±

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    ¡°They don¡¯t have to be faster than a bullet, they just have to be faster than your finger, and trust me, they are.¡±

    Veazey grumbled for a while and finally gave in, promising that he wouldn¡¯t try to play hero if he got attacked.

    * * *

    Once I decided Veazey was as safe as I could make him, it was time to tackle the real problem.

    I had hoped my midnight breakup with Judy would convince the demons they couldn¡¯t use her against me, but Baalphezar had blown that theory out of the water.

    Judy needed physical protection beyond anything I could provide. I did not want to get caught painting a magic circle around Judy¡¯s house. That would be one awkward conversation.

    There¡¯s no way I could convince her to live in a church or a DMA safe house, but maybe I could move her to a safe house by calling it something else.

    The portal to Elysium was opened by Thomas Edison at San Diego¡¯s Panama-California Exposition on October 30, 1915. Edison said he had found a way to use technology to punch a hole through the membrane around our universe, creating a stable tunnel to a new Garden of Eden.

    A popular conspiracy theory said Edison stole this technology from a man named Alvin Cartwright, who went missing in 1883, but nobody could prove it, and Edison left no trace of his equipment behind, after he opened the first man-made portal on Earth. Edison said he destroyed the machinery because he had been convinced that he got very lucky with his portal to Elysium and that randomly opening portals could easily destroy the planet or leave us open to invasion.

    The conspiracy theory says Edison was just covering his ass here, and that he never opened another portal because he only found one working gateway in Cartwright¡¯s lab, and no one had been able to build another one.

    But the portal to Elysium remains, 143 years later. The virgin planet beyond was now a kind of extradimensional Las Vegas.

    The first explorers stepped through that portal onto a wide-open field of perfect green, filled with Earthlike plants and animals. Originally, they thought they had found an alternate primordial Earth, but the fossils turned out to be much older than that. They found slightly mutated versions of Earth animals, but no dinosaurs, and no signs of intelligent life.

    Not a post-apocalyptic Earth, but an Earth where life was so easy and food was so abundant, nothing had ever evolved enough to use tools. The soil was incredibly fertile, and the climate was unusually stable, like aliens had made a better version of Earth, but had to stop right before they moved the people in.

    Christian cultists said this world had clearly been made for them, as a reward for those who repented their sins, since the whole world was still a garden, and magic didn¡¯t work there at all. No wizards, no savants, no monsters, and no demons. If I walked through the portal to Elysium, I would just be a normal guy again, and if Lydia tried to walk through, she would simply cease to exist.

    By 2058, Elysium was the ultimate corporate retreat, with an adult playground built around the portal to suck up tourist dollars, and elaborate resorts on the shores of perfect beaches everywhere else.

    The civilized areas might be under the same corporate governance we suffered with on Earth, but a man could still buy a hovering wagon full of supplies and settle a plot of land in the middle of nowhere.

    The DMA maintained a network of safe houses here, to hide people threatened by the supernatural. Almost certainly where I would end up, if I ever got desperate enough to call the cops.

    The Para¨ªso colony was a giant tourist trap, full of shiny corporate casinos next to campy old west saloons, but the town had a top-notch research university, and that university had a museum, with staff slowly assembling a whole new fossil record.

    It was the perfect place to hide Judy, but I had to come up with an excuse to get her there and keep her there, without letting her know I was involved.

    I used Evan as the middleman and had him ask my old boss at the museum to get her a job on the other side of the portal, by promising he would have the eternal gratitude of one of the most powerful mages in his program. Judy hated magic and had no compelling reason to stay on Earth, so I was hoping the offer of a prestigious job in a place with no supernatural threats would have her jumping at the chance to move.

    I asked the director to mention that there would be jobs for Brian, too, since Para¨ªso had a dozen active theater companies performing on any given night.

    Judy called me a few days later to tell me she had accepted the job and had to leave in a few days. I was so overwhelmed thinking about the number of questions I couldn¡¯t answer and the number of things I would have to lie about, I couldn¡¯t bring myself to answer the phone, so she left a rambling voicemail about how she hoped we could always be friends.

    I resolved to call her back and smooth things over if I survived the fight with Baalphezar, noting there would now be at least one upside if I lost. If the demons killed me and dragged my soul to Hell, at least I wouldn¡¯t have to talk to my ex-girlfriend again.

 Chapter 41: Hardy Witches and the Kovach Curse

    Denise Hardy was not happy to see me, when I walked in the door of her mom¡¯s potion shop, slinking like a whipped dog.

    She gave me a frosty, ¡°Can I help you?¡± as I walked up, using that tone women use when they are very, very mad at you, but are forced to speak to you anyway.

    ¡°Hi,¡± I said. ¡°It¡¯s good to see you again.¡±

    I couldn¡¯t just go into this cold, and I had to find some way to take that look off her face, so I wandered over to the giant bookcase by the door and inspected an ornate golden lamp that looked like a movie prop.

    ¡°Is this a real genie¡¯s lamp?¡±

    Denise said, ¡°See for yourself. Rub it and make a wish.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m not fallin¡¯ for that twice.¡±

    I turned away from the lamp and ran my finger along the row of mass-market hardbacks.

    ¡°Oh man, you weren¡¯t kidding about the books.¡± I reached over and read the title of the first one. ¡°Hardy Witches and the Curse of the Mummy¡¯s Tomb.¡± I turned to Denise, unable to conceal the childlike glee on my face. ¡°Are all these real? Did all this stuff really happen to you?¡±

    ¡°Only my publicist knows for sure,¡± Denise said. ¡°Some of them are real, but these are books for young girls, fairy tale versions of stuff that mostly didn¡¯t happen.¡±

    I was still grinning like an idiot. ¡°So, what was in the Mummy¡¯s Tomb?¡±

    ¡°A mummy.¡±

    ¡°Was he cursed?¡±

    ¡°Only at the box office.¡±

    I grabbed the next one, ¡°Hardy Witches and the Secrets of Atlantis. Is Atlantis real? Have you been to Atlantis?¡±

    ¡°Atlantis is real, but we missed it. It only crosses into our dimension once every twenty years or so. Mom says it¡¯s coming back in about five years. She says we¡¯ve ¡®got reservations¡¯ but I don¡¯t know if that¡¯s real or just a Mom joke.¡±

    ¡°Sounds like your life is a lot of Mom jokes.¡±

    ¡°You have no idea.¡±

    ¡°Hardy Witches and the Sons of Anubis,¡± I read, and before I could ask...

    Denise said, ¡°The Sons of Anubis were real, and they were serious dicks. I can¡¯t talk about what we did to them, but I assure you, it is not in the book.¡±

    One book was a different color and didn¡¯t look like the others. It didn¡¯t have happy blonde Mom and plucky blonde daughter on the cover. It was just a man, a pudgy, balding man in a janitor¡¯s uniform, with Mars in the background. It was titled, ¡°Hardy Witches and the Man in the Moon.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s a weird one,¡± Denise said. ¡°Maybe the weirdest thing Mom ever wrote, and she swears every word of it is true. It was a publishing disaster, only sold a handful of copies, and it¡¯s named wrong. I¡¯m not in it. Mom¡¯s not really in it, she¡¯s just the narrator, telling the story of a janitor named Ralph Hanley, who worked at a research facility in the 1980s. The story says Ralph stepped into the wrong experiment or something and came out with the powers of a god. Mom says he set up residence on Phobos, one of the moons around Mars, and sits up there all day, protecting the Earth from invasion from space and other dimensions.

    ¡°Mom says Ralph decides what portals are allowed to open on Earth, and what¡¯s allowed to come through. She says he¡¯s stopped a bunch of different alien invasions, but he¡¯s never killed anybody with his powers. She says Ralph is effectively omnipotent, but he has the mind of a child. She says he had an IQ of 80 when he got his powers, and he¡¯s scared to make himself smarter. He thinks if he gets too smart, he won¡¯t care about people anymore, so he keeps himself simple on purpose.¡±

    ¡°So, what do you think? Do you think he¡¯s real?¡±

    Denise dodged the question. ¡°Take down number eighty-four.¡±

    I read the title, ¡°Hardy Witches and the Roswell Reunion. Oh, no way. This one isn¡¯t magic. This has gray aliens. Please tell me you¡¯ve met aliens.¡±

    ¡°No,¡± Denise said. ¡°This one happened before I was born, and I need to explain, you can¡¯t always trust what my mother says, even to me. Especially to me. Sometimes she lies to me because she wants me to catch her, and sometimes she tells me the truth in a way that says she wants me to question it. And this story... this one is maximum Mom.

    ¡°Mom claims that around twenty, twenty-five years ago, when she was just starting to get famous, a man and woman came into the shop and said they were travelers from an alternate Earth, where their planet had just been invaded and destroyed by a bunch of alien machines. They said they found a portal on the Moon and put an alien drive on a shuttle to cross through to our Moon and land on our Earth. They gave Mom an old-fashioned thumb drive with video clips on it, claiming that it contained video evidence of the invasion and destruction of Earth, recorded from a telescope on the Moon.

    ¡°The video was¡­ boring. Mom said it was just the lights of Earth slowly going out, with the cities slowly turning into black patches that lit up with different colored lights after a while, until the whole Earth was black and all the cities were gone, with just these weird alien lights scattered around. The last surviving humans lived on the Moon and were trying to hold out and escape before the aliens came to kill them, too.

    ¡°Any first-year film student could have produced this video, but then the person making it turned the camera around, and she looked like an alternate version of Mom, begging her counterpart for help from another universe.

    ¡°Mom said she turned everything over to the government and never saw the visitors again. She told me if anybody ever asked about this, I was supposed to say the video was fabricated by a celebrity prank show, and Mom was so embarrassed by her reaction, she sued the producers, so it never went on the air. There¡¯s even a court case. I looked it up.

    ¡°But Mom swears this video was real, and she hopes somebody in the government was able to help them. And here¡¯s why I¡¯m telling you this. Mom says, on this alternate Earth, time is moving at exactly the same rate as in our universe, and they have... they had, versions of most of the same people who live in our universe, they just don¡¯t have magic there. Mom says the same invasion started in our universe, at exactly the same time, but we have magic, so we had Ralph, and they didn¡¯t.¡±

    I was trying to maintain a little detachment from these stories, but this one made me go pale. ¡°Do you believe this? Do you believe in Ralph? Do you believe in these aliens?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know. Like I said, maximum Mom. But I¡¯ll tell you this. Mom says March 3rd each year is the only day Ralph walks the Earth. She says he only lets himself directly intervene and save three people a year, as a birthday present to himself. So, every year, Mom bakes cookies and leaves them out for Ralph¡¯s birthday.

    ¡°I¡¯ve been on my own for a few years, but even in the tower, I did it, too. Every year, I leave out cookies for Ralph, and every year somebody eats them.¡± Denise threw her hand up. ¡°I know it¡¯s probably Mom. Because driving across town to sneak into her daughter¡¯s living room and eat cookies to fuck with her head is exactly the kind of shit my Mom would do. But I slept on the couch for five years straight, and I never caught her.

    ¡°Of course, my Mom is a powerful witch. Could she drug me or put me to sleep and sneak in just long enough to eat cookies? Of course. Could she send a little djinn to do it, so fast that I would never see? Sure. There¡¯s a hundred ways she could do this, and I would never catch her, so I may not know for sure until she¡¯s dead. Really, not even then, since she¡¯s got a hundred faeries who would love to take this one over. But honestly? If Ralph is real, if there¡¯s even the slightest chance that this brave, beautiful man exists, and spends every day saving the Earth from terrifying cosmic shit? Well... I¡¯m gonna bake him some fuckin¡¯ cookies.¡±

    If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

    * * *

    ¡°Most of this stuff is just cute,¡± Denise said. ¡°I just have one problem with the books. Take down the first one. Now take down the last one. What do you see?¡±

    I frowned. ¡°They¡¯re all the same. Happy round mom, little angel Denise. Oh, shit.¡±

    ¡°Right,¡± Denise said. ¡°I¡¯m a grown woman out of college, but after twelve years, that little girl is still ten years old. Mom lives in her head, and in her head, I¡¯ll always be ten years old.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°You didn¡¯t just come here to look at books, Tim, and I really need to do some inventory before Mom wakes up. And by the way? For future reference? It¡¯s considered really rude to charge a girl up like that and just walk away.¡±

    ¡°Denise, is this shop secure? Like, totally secure, so nothing supernatural can spy on us?¡±

    She frowned like the sudden subject change hadn¡¯t quite overcome her anger. ¡°We¡¯ve got all kinds of stuff going. I really wouldn¡¯t worry about it.¡±

    ¡°Can you bump it up a notch? It¡¯s really important that nobody hears what I¡¯m about to tell you.¡±

    She waved her hand in the air and said, ¡°That¡¯s it. That¡¯s the best protection I have.¡±

    No choice but to trust her. I stepped up to the counter and said, ¡°This is what I was hiding from you, the night we met. My powers come from my family, too. An ancient family, bound by a blood contract with a demon prince. He gave me this big magic book and assigned me a¡­ supervisor, who¡¯s supposed to oversee my training until I¡¯m ready to start doing missions for him.

    ¡°I¡¯m in my grace period now, the training period when I¡¯m supposed to be learning magic, but my time is almost up. She¡¯s going to send me on my first mission any day now, and they¡¯re gonna make me kill somebody. She said I may not have to hurt anyone, but that¡¯s a lie. She tells that to everybody, so they don¡¯t resist right away.

    ¡°Truth is, they make you kill early, to take your innocence and convince you there¡¯s no way back. They know the angels won¡¯t take us after we kill. There were seven guys before me, and they do it the same way every time. They strip everything away from you and make you kill, until the only source of comfort you have left is the woman he gave you. And the really crazy part? These guys are happy, once they give in. She¡¯s so good at her job, she even makes the killing feel okay.¡±

    ¡°But I¡¯m not gonna do it.¡± I was trying to sound tough, but fear was choking me up. ¡°I¡¯m gonna fight them. Even if I¡¯m not ready, I¡¯m gonna fight. I have a plan worked out, but I don¡¯t have all my tools. That¡¯s why I came here. I need a knife sharp enough to cut demon flesh. I can¡¯t do anything while this supervisor is watching me, so I have to take her out.¡±

    Denise opened her mouth, but I shouted before she could start. ¡°And don¡¯t tell me to call the police! And don¡¯t tell me anybody can help me! They can¡¯t! I¡¯ve been through all of this, and they can¡¯t. A couple of my ancestors tried to resist, and it ends in a massacre every time. Tobias asked for help, and they burned his monastery to the ground. They killed everybody he ever knew until he had nothing left but her.

    ¡°Jacob tried to weasel out of it, and they burned his village. They might have even killed his mother. I¡¯m putting you in danger just telling you this. The only way out is to put myself in prison, or sell my soul to the angels, or hide in some DMA shitbox for the rest of my life. I won¡¯t live like that, Denise. I won¡¯t die like a coward, waiting for these things to come and get me. I¡¯m gonna fight, and I need your help.¡±

    Denise said, ¡°Wait here,¡± and disappeared in the back. She came back with a black handgrip, set with gold runes. She stalked up to the counter and laid it down in front of me.

    ¡°I don¡¯t see a blade.¡±

    Denise picked it up, and a thin, straight blade popped out of the handle.

    ¡°Is it sharp?¡±

    The north wall of the magic shop was solid brick. Denise walked up to it, positioned the knife, and stabbed it straight into the wall. There was no resistance, just a smooth scraping sound as she pulled it out.

    She slapped it on the counter and said, ¡°Is this what you need?¡±

    ¡°I think so. How much?¡±

    ¡°We¡¯ll call it a loaner. And now, whatever fight this is, you have to win, because if you don¡¯t bring this knife back, Mom is gonna kill both of us. I¡¯ll hex it to your hand, so the blade won¡¯t pop out by accident.¡±

    I nodded and held my hand out.

    ¡°I have to touch you to do this. Do you understand?¡±

    I didn¡¯t, but I nodded anyway. Her touch was gentle and sweet this time, sending a silent question up my arm. I was trying to contain myself, but the emotions were just too strong. Fear, anger, determination, desperation, it all came pouring out.

    Denise stroked my hand. ¡°Oh, Timmy, why didn¡¯t you tell me?¡±

    I couldn¡¯t answer.

    She cast something and made a pattern over my wrist. I thought about the knife, and it popped into my hand, without crossing the space in between.

    ¡°That knife carries my Mark now,¡± she said. ¡°Never cut a human with it, and never kill an animal with it, unless you¡¯re killing to survive.¡±

    I had just put the knife in my pocket when Cecilia Hardy walked out of the back bedroom and took a good hard look at the boy who was holding her daughter¡¯s hand.

    * * *

    This was not at all funny when it happened, but I¡¯ve got to say, watching it again now, on the mirror in Purgatory, watching Cecilia Hardy¡¯s face go through the full spectrum of emotions as she read my aura for the first time, cycling through awe and wonder to fear and disgust, before settling into cold maternal rage, was the funniest moment of my incarceration thus far.

    I laughed so hard; I made Azael teach me how to rewind.

    * * *

    ¡°THIS is the boy? This is the boy you...¡± Cecilia slumped and put her head in one hand. ¡°Oh my god, of course it is. Of course, it is.¡± She stormed across the room and stopped short, like she was scared to get too close to me. ¡°What even are you? I¡¯ve been wrangling curses for thirty years and I have never seen anything as...¡±

    She broke off and yelled at Denise, ¡°Were you too busy to notice the...¡± She squinted and twitched her fingers at me. ¡°Three, four... five, I can¡¯t even... the entire fucking rainbow of astral tethers going from his spinal cord straight down to Hell? Did you forget how to scan for that, or were you too busy ramming your tongue down his throat?¡±

    ¡°MOM!¡±

    ¡°Oh, don¡¯t you ¡®Mom¡¯ me. And you,¡± she gestured. ¡°Whatever you are, you get the hell out of my store, and if you ever come near my daughter again, I swear I will not call the police. I will deal with you myself; do you understand?¡±

    ¡°Ma¡¯am, please...¡±

    Cecilia waved her hand like she was dismissing me, then turned back and squinted again. ¡°Is that my knife in your pocket?¡± She turned and yelled at her daughter full blast, ¡°You gave him my knife?¡±

    Denise was strangely composed in the face of her mother¡¯s anger. ¡°He needs it, Mom. Tell her. Tell her why you need it.¡±

    I took a breath and did my best, ¡°I haven¡¯t surrendered to these things, ma¡¯am. I¡¯m fighting them. I came here for help because I¡¯m trying to fight them. I have... a plan.¡±

    Cecilia¡¯s face fell from anger into blank incomprehension. ¡°Oh no. Oh no, you poor stupid boy. You don¡¯t fight things like this. You don¡¯t fight things like this with a juiced-up pocketknife. To fight things like this you need friends, powerful friends, angel friends. You¡¯ve got a demon bond thicker than my arm diving straight into Hell and you¡¯re gonna fight them with... what could you possibly do with that knife?¡±

    I barreled on. ¡°I need to cut a lock of hair from a succubus so I can...¡±

    Cecilia threw her hand up and said, ¡°Stop! Just stop. It¡¯s already too stupid. I can¡¯t even...¡± She paused. ¡°What¡¯s your name? Your family name?¡±

    I said, ¡°Kovak.¡±

    ¡°No,¡± she said. ¡°Say it right.¡±

    ¡°Kovach.¡±

    Cecilia frowned. ¡°I¡¯ve heard it, but I don¡¯t remember where. I¡¯m not gonna like it, am I? I¡¯m not gonna like what I find when I look it up.¡±

    ¡°No ma¡¯am, you will not. I sure didn¡¯t.¡±

    ¡°How are you even here? How can something this powerful, this evil be in my city for... how long have you been here?¡±

    ¡°My father moved us here when I was twelve.¡±

    ¡°And you¡¯re?¡±

    ¡°Twenty-five, ma¡¯am.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯ve been hiding right under my nose for thirteen years? How is that even possible?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know how it works, ma¡¯am, but my family¡­ We don¡¯t usually draw magic from the Earth, so it doesn¡¯t actually kick in until...¡±

    ¡°Until your handler arrives.¡±

    I nodded.

    Cecilia shook her head, more sad than angry now. ¡°No. No, there¡¯s only one option for you, and it sucks. You go straight to Holy Cross. You prostrate yourself before the altar of God, and you pray, you beg, you stay on your knees all day and all night, and you beg for your worthless life, for whatever remains of the Heavenly Host to come and save you.

    ¡°They won¡¯t come, of course. They¡¯ll ignore you like they¡¯ve ignored every other demon-haunted wretch for half a century, but you stay on holy ground, and then you go to the priest. You say you¡¯ve got a demon the size of a Volkswagen on your back, and you beg for sanctuary. Then you get in a holy bus sanctified with everything they can throw at it, you drive to some monastery at the top of a mountain far, far away from innocent people, and you cultivate a love of gardening and calligraphy for the rest of your sad, doomed life. That¡¯s it. That¡¯s your only option.¡±

    Cecilia inched closer, gritting her teeth. ¡°And boy, if you cut a deal with these things and come back here, we will put you down.¡±

    Denise yelled, ¡°Mom!¡± again.

    ¡°Quiet, girl! If you cut a deal and try to come near my daughter again, I will kill you dead, right here on my front porch. Your aura is¡­ unbelievable, so I¡¯ll probably need some help. But I will summon whatever friends I need and pay whatever price must be paid to remove you from my city and from the face of this blessed Earth, do you understand?¡±

    ¡°Yes ma¡¯am,¡± I said. ¡°But you don¡¯t need to worry about that. I¡¯m not gonna let these things use me. I¡¯m only coming back if I win.¡±

    Cecilia blinked and walked to a shelf in the back. She grabbed a potion without looking, gulped it down, then closed her eyes and counted to ten. Then she looked at me with witch eyes, like she was looking through me. ¡°Say that part again. That part about dying, say it again.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not coming back if I lose. I win, or I die.¡±

    And all the anger drained out of her, just like that.

    ¡°Okay,¡± Cecilia said. ¡°Good luck. What¡¯s your name again?¡±

    ¡°Timothy.¡±

    She said, ¡°Good luck, Timothy¡± and turned away like she was going back to her room.

    I looked from Denise to her mom and back again. ¡°That¡¯s it? We¡¯re good? Can I keep the knife?¡±

    Cecilia shrugged. ¡°Sure. The knife will come back to me when you die.¡±

 Chapter 42: War

    I took a couple more days to prepare, making sure I saw Judy¡¯s location dot cross through the portal before I did anything that would raise suspicion. I had done everything I could think of to protect Veazey, Judy, and the guys from work, and Denise should be protected by her family¡¯s faerie thing. Demons and faeries had been in some kind of uneasy truce for a thousand years, so they went out of their way to avoid each other.

    I was still running my rooftop jumping routine every morning, hoping I could match Captain Cobalt¡¯s eighteen-minute pace from 1955 before the real fight started. The day before I declared war on Hell, I ran the course in twenty-eight minutes. I caught up to my holographic Captain on the third rooftop, and for just a minute, we were running side by side.

    I would never feel ready, but I had to start this fight before I lost my nerve. I bowed before the mirror that morning, like I¡¯d done every morning for weeks. It¡¯s amazing how much pride you can swallow, if you just make it part of a routine. Wake up. Bow to Baalphezar. Brush teeth. Piss. I didn¡¯t hardly notice anymore.

    But that morning, I did something stupid. His image faded and I whispered, ¡°Hope you enjoyed that. It was the last time.¡±

    If Lydia heard me, she didn¡¯t say anything. Surely, I wasn¡¯t the first Kovach to talk shit behind the Master¡¯s back.

    * * *

    I spent the morning at Henry¡¯s range, making preparations. Datacore in my pocket. Lenses in my eyes, filaments in my ears. Batteries for everything and twenty bullets in the pistol. I checked my spells a hundred times, casting strength and wards from memory. I would need them today, if something went wrong.

    I didn¡¯t tell Veazey about this part. He would have tried to talk me out of it. I stalled for as long as I could, then, when I couldn¡¯t stand the waiting anymore, I walked back to my apartment and asked Lydia to come with me.

    She was clearly nervous, walking around in the miasma, but it didn¡¯t immediately burn or poison her, and she thought I was finally agreeing to let her help with my training.

    I brought her inside the three-walled concrete building, and she said, ¡°So, this is where you hide from me.¡±

    ¡°Not anymore. Your Master wants to measure my progress, so I figure it¡¯s time to show off. I¡¯m about to try a new spell, and I want you to be here, in case I blow myself up.¡±

    I filled my mind with gibberish, steeling courage for the next step. I didn¡¯t think Lydia could read my thoughts. She could feel my emotions sometimes, but I was learning to control those. I did my best, but she knew something was wrong. She was standing so close; I could smell Xavier¡¯s garden in her hair. I looked into her eyes and almost lost my nerve. I wanted to touch her, to hold her one last time before the war.

    My right hand slipped in my pocket and hit the activator on my mouse. My hovering projector tracked my eye movement and zoomed over to the place I was looking, shining a perfect circle on the floor, centered directly over Lydia¡¯s head. It was the most powerful circle I had, copied straight from Jacob¡¯s part of the book. I brought in magic and cast the containment spell, forcing myself to take it slow. I didn¡¯t understand the process, but I could feel magic surging between us, bouncing back and forth like power in a circuit.

    Lydia didn¡¯t react immediately. She was perfectly still. No movement. No words. But all the personality drained out of her face. Her posture stiffened and her face went slack. She looked like a machine, caught between programs. Like everything I loved was an illusion, and I was seeing her real face for the first time.

    She paced around the circle, kicking each symbol with her foot. Twenty-six symbols, twenty-six little kicks. Then she looked at me with dead eyes and said, ¡°Don¡¯t do this.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s all right,¡± I said. ¡°I¡¯m not gonna hurt you. I¡¯m just going to put you to sleep for a few days, so you can¡¯t interfere. By the time you wake up, this will all be over, one way or the other.¡±

    I said the command word from the containment spell and Lydia froze, paralyzed, while I reached inside the circle and cut off a lock of her hair. Then I carefully cast the spell that was supposed to put her to sleep¡­ and nothing happened. I tried it three more times before I started to panic.

    ¡°No. It¡¯s not working. Oh god, why is it not working? This has to work. If this doesn¡¯t work, I can¡¯t¡­ Oh god, please don¡¯t make me¡­¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s okay,¡± Lydia said. ¡°It¡¯s good that this failed, because as of right now, you haven¡¯t done anything you can¡¯t take back. My Master knows nothing, so this is just between us. We can go on tomorrow like nothing happened, all you have to do is let me out.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re not going anywhere,¡± I said, resigned to what I had to do next. ¡°And stop trying to scare me with your Master bullshit. The guy I read about in those journals, it¡¯s pretty clear he¡¯s afraid of us. He¡¯s afraid of what he created with this contract, and it was just a matter of time before one of us killed him. That¡¯s your real job, right? To keep us from killing his lazy ass?¡±

    ¡°Timothy, stop. Stop talking. I have to repeat what you say to me, and I can¡¯t protect you if¡­¡±

    ¡°Protect me from what? From a bottom-feeding piece of shit who barely has a kingdom anymore? I¡¯m not scared of your Master, and in about five minutes, he¡¯s gonna be scared of me. You tell him I¡¯m breaking my contract. You tell him the Kovach family is done killing for him. You tell him eight generations of slavery ends right now. And you tell him if he has a problem with that, he can come up here and deal with me, face to face, unless he¡¯s a coward.

    ¡°Be sure to repeat that part, would you? The part where Timothy Kovak called him a coward? And when you tell him, be sure to spell my name right.¡±

    Lydia wasn¡¯t giving me her demon face; I could read every emotion on it. She was already preparing herself, preparing to witness my torture and capitulation in Hell.

    She spread her arms, ¡°I can¡¯t deliver your message from in here. If you¡¯re determined to declare war on Hell today, you¡¯ll have to let me out.¡±

    I said, ¡°No. There¡¯s another way.¡±

    I quick-drew my pistol at point-blank range and shot Lydia in the face.

    * * *

    It had been over a century since anything had killed her, and the last time she Fell, she had wings. A hundred years ago, she could have floated to Hell like a feather, but this time, there was nothing to slow her fall.

    Lydia¡¯s soul jerked out of her form and sank like a cannonball, passing through the Earth at some ridiculous speed. She fell through clouds and sky, emerging in the gray. Her golden cord was taut behind her, pulling, like an extension of her spine. The fall felt like hours.

    She tried to prepare herself, but she couldn¡¯t concentrate. There was something peaceful about this place between, this neverland between Earth and Hell. But soon enough, her nostrils filled with the sharp stench of home.

    Hell was a curved black bowl, made from volcanic rock. The Lake of Fire stared up at her like a burning red eye. She could make out details as she got closer, rivers and puddles, branching from the Lake. The western river ran between Dire Wood and the Blackhour Sea, right under Baalphezar¡¯s palace.

    Last time she died, Lydia caught a friendly updraft and sailed straight to the palace, but this time she was out of control, heading straight for the Lake. She would have to swim through the fire and climb out, just like a common soul. The indignity of that overwhelmed her fear of Baalphezar.

    She thought about trying to grab a flying demon on the way down. It wouldn¡¯t stop her fall, but at least she could take somebody with her. Lydia hit the Lake like a meteor. Her impact kicked up a plume of fire, sixty feet high. A physical form would have crumpled like paper, but her soul just sank into the fire. Lydia kicked up huge waves in her wake, tossing human souls twenty, thirty feet into the air. Some of them washed up on dry land and took off running for the Gate.

    Lydia went deep, but this fire didn¡¯t burn demons. After the bitter chill of Boston, the Lake felt like a hot bath. She looked to the surface and saw a mass of wriggling feet. That wouldn¡¯t do at all. Her pride was still stinging from the shot. She couldn¡¯t just swim straight up and mingle with the damned. It would be humiliating, and she might be recognized.

    She swam deep and headed for the river. There weren¡¯t many souls down here. Only the oldest and strongest would sink this far. These were the forgotten dead, burning so long their minds were gone. Most of them were screaming, but sometimes she caught one wearing a placid smile. Spend a thousand years in the fire and you get used to it. In this place beyond memory and pain, the Lake might as well be Heaven.

    Lydia found the riverbank and emerged from the fire, levitating straight up. She didn¡¯t have wings anymore, but she still knew how to make an entrance. As soon as she cleared the surface, she threw her shoulders back and shook her head. Bits of fire flew from her hair like sparks, cascading down her chest like raindrops.

    She got her bearings and marched down the river, walking the lava in plain sight. It was dangerous for a succubus to travel here alone, but she only had one close call. An Enforcer caught her scent and swooped in for a closer look. Baalphezar¡¯s Mark wasn¡¯t enough to scare him off, but Lydia stared him down. Her Master¡¯s reputation had suffered of late, but she walked like the Queen of Hell.

    She walked all the way to Baalphezar¡¯s palace. It was easy to forget how big it was - an elaborate castle made from black rock, with guard towers at each corner, and a river of fire underneath.

    The towers were closed, and half the rooms were dark, but it still looked impressive from the outside. For a moment, Lydia longed for the way it used to be. During the Renaissance, Baalphezar¡¯s palace was a nightmare factory, filled with Imps and soldiers running to and fro. A place of power and intrigue. Messengers would make a wide berth around it. Today, Imps from rival kingdoms crossed the grounds with impunity.

    These staterooms once played host to lords from Lands Beyond. Now they were dark, filthy and unkempt, covered in a layer of sulfur dust. Lydia spent her apprenticeship hiding in these rooms, dreaming of freedom and feather beds. She could still remember perfume and the rustle of wings, as Sylvia came to fetch her for lessons. But those days were long gone. The palace was a shadow of its former self, matching Baalphezar¡¯s personal decay.

    The guards at the gate were listless now. They barely glanced at her. An Imp from the tower giggled as she passed. ¡°Back so soon?¡±

    Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.

    Lydia was in no mood. She sharpened her tail and cleaved him with one swipe. She was returning in disgrace, but she didn¡¯t wait for the guards. She grabbed a ring in each hand and pulled the doors open by herself.

    Baalphezar was lounging on his throne, watching something in his mirror. Michelle was at his feet, buffing the Master¡¯s toes. She heard the doors and took off running, pausing just long enough to catch her sister¡¯s eye.

    Lydia marched across the room and threw herself at her Master¡¯s feet, brushing her curls on the ground.

    Baalphezar rose from his chair, radiating rage and disgust. ¡°Explain yourself.¡±

    ¡°The Eighth Kovach has sent me back. I have come to deliver his terms.¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s turned on you?¡±

    ¡°No, Master. He¡¯s turned on you.¡±

    ¡°Explain your failure.¡±

    Lydia struggled with her answer, trying to put this in terms that her Master would understand. ¡°It has something to do with the machines. His seduction was so difficult, I didn¡¯t pay enough attention to the machines.¡±

    ¡°He killed you with tools? Some new weapon?¡±

    ¡°Not exactly. Master, the Earth, the Earth has changed, even the parts that look the same. They¡¯ve always had machines, but this thing Timothy has, it¡¯s like nothing I¡¯ve seen before. It¡¯s not a physical tool. It¡¯s like¡­ it¡¯s like a lever for the mind.¡±

    ¡°And this is your excuse? You blame your failure on tools?¡± Baalphezar took his seat and glared at her. ¡°I am not concerned with the disposition of things. I send you to shape men, and men do not change.

    ¡°Every century, there is something new - a thousand years of something new. Mammon thought steel would be the end of us. Baal feared gunpowder. Dispater thought we would fade when they split the atom. The centuries pass and the tools grow strong, but still, we are here.

    ¡°We are the eternal companions of mankind. Every time they get stronger, we get stronger in turn. Seduce the man and his tools will follow. That is the failure you must explain.¡±

    ¡°I thought I had him,¡± Lydia said. ¡°I knew he was angry, but I didn¡¯t expect him to fight. He¡¯s scared. He¡¯s desperate. He wants to protect his friends. He fights, but he doesn¡¯t expect to win. There is a sadness in this one, sir - a darkness that I can¡¯t quite reach. I think he wants to provoke us. I think he wants to die.¡±

    ¡°We¡¯ve traveled this road before. If a man craves death, you tempt him with life. You saved Jacob. Why is this one so difficult?¡±

    ¡°Timothy was touched by the chaos, like the seventh. He doesn¡¯t summon the power; he¡¯s breathing it. It comes on him like a storm. It¡¯s not constant, but even simple spells, he can twist them and change them and make them part of him. He¡¯s learning the book in pieces, picking out spells that can hurt us. I can¡¯t measure his progress and I can¡¯t find his limits.¡±

    Lydia struggled with the next part, but in the end, she was bound to Baalphezar, just as surely as she was bound to me. ¡°Master, I think this one could hurt you.¡±

    Baalphezar laughed. ¡°From mundane to archmage in six weeks? You have been deceived.¡±

    Lydia had spent too much time with me - adapting to me, absorbing my personality. I was so wrapped up in my own struggle, I didn¡¯t realize how much I was changing her. So, when her Master laughed at her, she didn¡¯t answer with her own voice, she answered with mine. ¡°It felt pretty real when my ass hit the Lake, sir.¡±

    Baalphezar lunged forward and pinched her cheeks, hard enough to draw blood. ¡°I tolerate your insolence on Earth, but when you stand before this throne, you will keep a civil tongue in your head!¡± He lifted her up and held her there, with her feet dangling six inches off the ground. He let her struggle for a moment, then he let go, scowling as she fell to her knees. ¡°The new one is clever, but I do not fear clever.¡±

    Lydia wiped her face with the back of one hand. ¡°Then you are a fool.¡± She knew she¡¯d be punished, but for an instant it felt so good. It¡¯s a classic Kovach trait - mouthing off to authority figures, risking everything for a moment of pride.

    Baalphezar¡¯s backhand sent her halfway across the room. Lydia bounced on her ass and slid across the floor on her tailbone. Baalphezar covered the distance in four steps. Lydia scrambled backwards as he roared. ¡°Is this how you appease me? Is this how you earn back your wings? FAILURE upon FAILURE upon FAILURE!¡±

    Lydia flipped over and scrambled to her feet. She almost made it, but her Master was too fast. He swept her legs and raised one foot to stomp on her, but stopped himself a second before it came down.

    ¡°You¡¯ve always been proud, but open defiance? You were sent to corrupt this boy, but it sounds like he¡¯s corrupted you! You put too much faith in the Kovach contract. You know I can¡¯t destroy you while this boy lives, but he won¡¯t live forever, and there will be a price for your insolence today.¡±

    Baalphezar bellowed Sylvia¡¯s name, and the demons from his harem arrayed themselves quickly before his throne, forming a half-circle, kneeling until their heads touched the floor.

    ¡°You all know I am not allowed to punish Lydia while she has a living heir, so once again, I will need a volunteer.¡±

    Michelle was the youngest in the harem, a small, pale demon with red hair and green eyes. She stood up immediately.

    Baalphezar looked at her sadly, almost sympathetic. ¡°You again, little bird? How many beatings have you taken for her?¡± He glanced at Lydia. ¡°Pity you can¡¯t seduce mages as well as you¡¯ve seduced her.¡±

    Michelle was suspended with a pair of manacles until she was dangling off to the side of Baalphezar¡¯s throne. Not pure silver, just enough to burn and keep her from breaking free. She didn¡¯t struggle or cry out as she hung there, as she had done so many times before.

    ¡°Thirty lashes,¡± Baalphezar said. ¡°Use the silver barb.¡±

    An eight-foot palace guard stepped up and started whipping her. She really did cry out now, unable to withstand the burn of silver. The beating went on and on and on, deliberately slow, to give everything more time to hurt.

    Lydia lowered her head after the fifth stroke, but Sylvia grabbed her by the hair and yanked her head back. ¡°You don¡¯t turn away. You keep your eyes open, and you watch, as your sister takes what was meant for you. Stupid, arrogant child. Look at what you¡¯ve done.¡±

    Michelle¡¯s blood was dark green, matching her horns and tail. Ninety years ago, they had been a bright forest green, when Lydia took the girl under her wing. Lydia describes Michelle as ¡°the great comfort of my exile,¡± hinting that they became like real sisters during the time Lydia was stuck in Hell, trapped and hopeless for decades before I was born. Michelle had started out playful and innocent, with her horns and tail slowly darkening, closer to black, as she killed.

    The other demons in the harem didn¡¯t hate her the way Lydia was hated, but Lydia was her only real friend. Sylvia respected her because Michelle always did as she was told, and she never hesitated when there was blood to be spilled. But she spent all her time with Lydia, the spoiled golden child who got to spend decades in the land of blue sky and ice cream.

    Lydia and Michelle would cuddle for hours, as Lydia tempted her with tales of Earth. Lydia knew she was grooming her eventual replacement, but for now, Lydia was mentioned by Name in Xavier¡¯s contract, so she could not be abused or destroyed by her Master until it was broken.

    The beating finally ended, and Michelle dropped hard into a puddle of her own blood. The others rushed forward to heal her, and Baalphezar bellowed, ¡°No! No healing until Lydia gets her new body. I want my little bird to feel every bit of the suffering her sister has earned, and I want Lydia to see it, every day until I send her back to Earth.

    ¡°It will take days of effort and the expense of countless favors to send servants to Earth and correct your mistake. I can¡¯t make you hurt your Kovach, but you will watch. You will watch every minute of your sister¡¯s suffering, and you will watch every minute of his, until I see that fire go out of his eyes¡­ and yours.¡±

    * * *

    Lydia¡¯s blood was translucent, thick and gold. It splattered on everything, mixing with matted hair and clumps of skull. Her body teetered backwards and fell to the ground. One moment, she was a living, breathing person, and the next she was a thing, a headless demon doll.

    Her blood coated the furniture and dripped from the fixtures. It glittered, even in death. I felt something warm on my lips. I started to wipe it off, then I realized what it was and started to gag. Lydia¡¯s blood tastes like electric honey.

    I was frozen in place, horrified by the magnitude of what I¡¯d done. I slumped against the concrete and said, ¡°I should be crying.¡± But there was nothing. Nothing but cold and quiet and the slow drip of blood. A minute later, the evidence started to disappear. Jacob said this would happen, but I thought it would be quicker.

    The little pieces vanished first - stray drops and wisps of hair. Lydia¡¯s body couldn¡¯t exist without a power source. I leaned against the wall and watched reality close around it. The blood was gone in seconds, leaving my shirt clean and dry. Her gown vanished all at once, leaving her body nude on the ground. I thought it would move, but it just laid there. I wanted to vomit, but I couldn¡¯t turn away. Lydia¡¯s skin sheered away in a flash of gold, exposing raw muscle to the light. Her remains looked like human bones embedded in golden clay. The tissue vanished a minute later, leaving nothing but a pile of bones.

    And then I was alone, staring at an empty circle. The gun was still warm.

    I stood up suddenly and threw my shoulders back, moving with a confidence that I didn¡¯t feel. I stretched my arm out and said a command word. The projector shut down and flew into my hand. I jammed it in my pocket and took off running.

    * * *

    I caught my reflection in an old junk mirror outside and saw a pair of purple eyes staring at me. Baalphezar¡¯s eye was on me, and my message had been received. I leaned down to lock eyes with him and said, ¡°I killed your whore. Send something smarter next time.¡± Then I put a bullet in it.

    Jacob said it would take three days for Lydia to grow a new body and come back, assuming her Master had enough magic in his budget to pay for the portal.

    ¡°Jeeves! Give me a countdown timer for seventy-two hours, starting five minutes ago!¡± Then I called Veazey. ¡°Heads up, buddy. I just declared war. I called him out as hard as I could, so he should be coming straight at me. But you gotta get ready, in case he¡¯s smarter than I think. Sleep in that circle I made for you and be ready to shoot anything that moves outside.¡±

    ¡°Oh, fuck you, man,¡± Veazey said. ¡°I¡¯m always ready to shoot.¡±

    * * *

    An alert popped up as I was running back to my apartment. I didn¡¯t really grasp how good my new processor was until I noticed it was making Jeeves faster. Not smarter, since he wasn¡¯t even as good as a Model T AI, but he suddenly had processor cycles for all kinds of stuff I had been suspending for years.

    ¡°Warning,¡± Jeeves said out of nowhere. ¡°Background comms traffic in this area indicates a forty-five percent probability that your realtime personal location is being tracked by a hostile entity. Your address has been flagged for observation, and all towers within five miles are attempting to map your movements. I have deployed countermeasures to conceal our location, but nearby tower logs indicate these tracking scripts have been in place for thirty-five days.¡±

    Thirty-five days? And Jeeves was only learning about this now? What happened thirty-five days ago? I should have known. The surveillance started just a few days after I had returned from Barbara Foote¡¯s house; a few days after we killed her demon handler. Barbara had probably gone ballistic and called in every corporate favor she had to try and avenge him. Titus had almost certainly respawned, and now the bastard was looking for me. Demons may not be smart enough to hack satellite traffic, but you can bet their thralls are.

    How had I let myself get so sloppy? Leaving myself wide open to attack because I was too cheap to upgrade my damn hardware.

    ¡°Jeeves, activate Sheep¡¯s Clothing protocol.¡±

    Sheep¡¯s Clothing was a simple obfuscation script written by Jerry¡¯s girlfriend back in the day. One of many tools I should have upgraded years ago. Making us completely invisible to cameras and satellites would have attracted too much attention, so it was safer to spoof everything and pretend our signatures belonged to something else. If it worked, anybody who got a ping from me would think I was a maintenance bot, from the same company that owned my apartment building.

    But Jeeves started throwing fits, as soon as I ran it. ¡°Error. Eight lines in this script are not compatible with this processor. Heart.¡±

    Fuck. ¡°Jeeves, try to run the script without the incompatible lines. Then try to ping my location from a tower outside the Reclamation Zone and tell me what you get.¡±

    Whatever those lines were, they were apparently not essential, because the ping returned me as a maintenance bot, and reported my location a mile away from where I actually was. A very useful script, but like so many hacker tools, this thing suffered from what I would call ¡°an excess of personality.¡±

    Jerry¡¯s girlfriend had been a huge fan of an early AI Vtuber. She put this little character in everything and loved to use her expressions for status messages. Instead of a simple text confirmation, this little girl¡¯s face would pop up with a different expression indicating the level of danger you were in at any given time.

    The latest attempt to flag my location had been foiled, so the tiny anime girl popped up and winked from the other side of my screen, like Jeeves now had a little sister competing for my attention.

    If I¡¯d had time, I would have done basic troubleshooting on the script and ripped all that cute shit out, but I had an army of demons ready to pounce on me, and I had much more important preparations to make in the real world.

    * * *

    Am I the only person who would make a to-do list of things I had to accomplish before picking a fight with a demon prince?

    Drew a circle around Veazey¡¯s place. Check.

    Sent Judy to a world where magic doesn¡¯t work. Check.

    Sent Veazey¡¯s family and my old work buddies to safe places on holy ground. Check.

    Drew warding symbols on my apartment walls to keep demons out. Check.

    Put Lydia to sleep. Well¡­ close enough.

    Now all I had to do was wait, and keep myself in the Zone, hoping I would be strong enough to defeat whatever Baalphezar threw at me, until his bosses made him come to Earth.

    And if you notice that I forgot somebody, well, you¡¯re obviously smarter than I was.

 Chapter 43: Coleridge Family Business

    I forgot Evan. I forgot to protect Evan. Or, more precisely, I thought he would be protected by campus wards, Bluestar cops, Newbury Tower regents, and a hundred other things I didn¡¯t even understand yet.

    And if he had been on campus the night Baalphezar made his move, I would have been right. But Evan wasn¡¯t on campus. Evan was all the way down in Longwood, south of the Zone, fetching personal items for one of his graduate students who had to leave school abruptly and go back home.

    Evan was packing clothes in a plastic bin when Evelyn¡¯s voice popped into his head. Evelyn just shouted, ¡°Jump!¡± and Evan immediately jumped out the fourth-floor window of the dorm, seconds ahead of a literal fireball that exploded in the dead center of the room he¡¯d just left.

    Having a companion who got precognitive flashes was usually just a pain in the ass. Nobody could see the absolute future, but certain witches could see into alternate dimensions that were running a few minutes, or a few hours ahead of the one they were standing in. No one could guarantee that events would unfold in this universe the way they had unfolded in any particular alternate, but big events tended to happen the same way across multiple dimensions, creating a stronger ¡°signal¡± an oracle could latch on to.

    Eve was scrupulous about using her power, and Evan had learned from long experience which warnings to heed and which ones he could ignore. So, if Evelyn was seeing an event strong enough and close enough that she was willing to give a command like that, she had probably just seen his death.

    So, thanks to her warning, instead of dying in a room-sized fireball, Evan drifted down to the street and found himself face to face with a seven-foot-tall plume of living flame, sporting a parody of arms and a demon face.

    Evan barely got a protection spell up as he countered the next blast, instinctively running away from the dorm, away from people, trying to make it to a small clump of trees nearby.

    The demon got two more fireballs off before Evan made it to the tree line. He extended his protective spell to include the foliage and ran for the first tree. Evan had been packing and labeling boxes when he jumped, so he still had a black marker in his front pocket.

    Evan whipped out the marker and drew a quick rune of magic on the tree, before running, awkwardly to the next one, deploying a quick counterspell to intercept the next fireball.

    Azael was inordinately impressed with this as I watched the attack in his mirror, explaining that it would take an extraordinary level of mastery to cast a counter like that with one hand while running for your life.

    The pattern continued. Fireball. Counter. Fireball. Counter, as Evan ran from tree to tree. He finished drawing a rune on the fifth one and positioned himself in the center of the marked trees. One more counter, then Evan Coleridge made it rain. A huge rain cloud appeared above the demon¡¯s head and started flooding the area. Not enough to extinguish it, just enough to shut down its ranged attacks and piss it off.

    The demon roared and charged Evan, and as soon as it crossed into the tiny grove of trees, Evan stepped back, leaving it isolated in the middle of the five symbols he just drew. Bright golden lines formed a lopsided pentagram between the trees.

    Evan took the lid off his marker and started to chant.

    Destroying its physical form was not the quickest way to ¡°kill¡± a demon. The most reliable way to dispatch one was to imprison it in something, catch it in a circle and suck its soul out. The demon soul had to be stored in a container, but just about any kind of container would do.

    The flaming demon thrashed and roared and bashed itself against the golden lines. Not completely mindless, just smart enough to follow simple instructions like, ¡°Kill this guy and burn everything in this area until something stops you.¡±

    Sirens were blaring from the dorm as a pair of campus cops landed on their little scooters and pulled out their useless guns. Evan yelled, ¡°Don¡¯t shoot, I¡¯ve got it!¡± before the cops could break containment with a stream of bullets.

    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

    The demon got smaller and smaller as Evan chanted. It was considered vulgar for a mage of Evan¡¯s caliber to show his aura in the visible spectrum, but he was glowing a rich, churning burgundy by the time he finished his spell, and sucked the demon into the marker. He popped the lid on and returned the Sharpie to his pocket as the cops walked up.

    Evan apparently knew their names, because he said, ¡°Rodney, I would appreciate it if you kept this part out of your report. Please don¡¯t tell anyone I can do that. My ancestors burned for it.¡±

    * * *

    Thank god nobody died. The blast was contained to the room Evan was in, and Evan himself assisted with putting the fire out, as soon as the demon was contained. A lot of students had to move away from the smoke damage, but at least my negligence didn¡¯t kill anybody that time.

    Evan stayed on scene to coordinate search and rescue, and to make damn sure that police report said exactly what he wanted it to say. He told the Newbury regents it was a prank gone wrong, probably a group of young wizards who summoned the demon by accident and could only hold it in our dimension for a few minutes before it disappeared.

    Evan promised a full investigation, knowing full well that the incident would be forgotten in a few months, after he was mysteriously unable to find the perpetrators. Evan spent the night helping with cleanup and relocation, then called me in the morning.

    * * *

    ¡°Mister Kovak,¡± Evan said, after his third call woke me up. ¡°Is there something you¡¯d like to tell me?¡±

    Uh oh.

    ¡°An incendiary demon tried to kill me last night, and ended up causing quite a bit of property damage before I got him contained. I can think of a few reasons why a demon would want to kill me, and yet, somehow, I am inclined to think this one was you.¡±

    I had Jeeves secure the line and made sure Evan was alone in his office. Then I told him everything. Maybe not everything. I didn¡¯t tell him about Taltorak, or the fact that I was the first mage in history to digitize a spellbook. I tried to keep it simple, in terms he would understand.

    It was a rite of passage for young male wizards above a certain power level to have a succubus encounter when they were young. So, Evan was not particularly surprised when I told him I had one, and that I had pissed off her Master bad enough to have a serious, serious problem.

    I told him my plan to confront Baalphezar and begged him not to call the police. I thought the whole plan might be ruined now that I¡¯d told an authority figure, but Evan just said, ¡°Meet me in my office. I need to see your containment spell. Bring your vessel.¡±

    * * *

    Of all the things Evan did for me, the most surprising, and the thing I¡¯m most grateful for, is how he reacted when I told him my plan to fight a demon prince in the Zone. First, he never told me not to do it. He didn¡¯t call me crazy. He didn¡¯t call me stupid. He didn¡¯t say one word about portals or angels or police. He was obviously smarter than me, but he didn¡¯t try to change my plan, and he didn¡¯t try to replace it with his own. He just¡­ helped me. Just immediately jumped in and started checking my work.

    I didn¡¯t want to reveal Taltorak, so I told him this succubus had given me some scrolls with spells on them, trying to recruit me to fight some rival demons for her Master. Then I pretended I had them all memorized, as I carefully copied Jacob¡¯s containment spell and protective circle onto big sheets of fireproof paper.

    Evan gaped at them. ¡°A random succubus gave you these?¡±

    ¡°Well, I don¡¯t think she was random,¡± I squirmed. ¡°Her horns were almost black, so I think she was pretty high rank, specifically chosen to seduce guys like me.¡± Another not quite lie that could quickly lead to me telling him too much.

    ¡°This circle is a masterpiece,¡± Evan said. ¡°It¡¯s even¡­ what¡¯s the word computer-people use? It¡¯s fault tolerant. You can put these symbols in any order, and as long as they¡¯re all there, it¡¯s still valid. Some of these runes¡­ I haven¡¯t seen some of these runes since¡­¡±

    Evan stopped himself abruptly, indicating that I wasn¡¯t the only one keeping secrets tonight.

    ¡°And you have the vessel?¡± Evan asked. ¡°Preferably something with emotional resonance, intimately connected to you.¡±

    I reached in my pocket and pulled out a small black box; the box my mother¡¯s engagement ring came in. The ring she never got to wear, since dad sold it for money while she was in the hospital. He promised to buy her another one when she got out, but she never got out. There was no reason for him to keep the box. There was no reason for me to keep the box. But here it was.

    Evan approved. ¡°Your magic is based on emotion, so your connection to this object should make the containment more powerful, once you get him in there.¡±

    I nodded again.

    ¡°I won¡¯t add to your troubles, Mister Kovak, and it¡¯s not my place to discourage you. You already know the odds are against you here. But I have learned firsthand that a smart man can beat the odds with determination, perseverance, and attention to detail. It doesn¡¯t matter if the odds against you are a thousand to one, if you are brave enough to be that one.¡±

    Evan gave me his personal number and encouraged me to call if I needed help.

 Chapter 44: Rob

    There was a Lydia-shaped empty spot on my wall when I got home.

    My friends had always complained about the blank gray cell I lived in, begging me to add some color to the room or hang something on the walls, but I had always resisted. I never said it out loud, but something about doing that, decorating my shithole apartment in the Zone, felt like a kind of giving up.

    As long as the walls were bare, this was just temporary; just a place to work and sleep while I went back to school. But the minute I put pictures up, I had to admit this was home. I had to admit this was the place where life had taken me, and this was the best I could do.

    But now I really needed something on that wall, so I would stop remembering why Lydia was gone, every time I looked up. It took me forever to find it, rolled up in a cardboard tube in the back of my closet.

    It was a tattered, brittle poster of the most popular photo in the world, the iconic photo of Captain Cobalt, taken by a naval officer on the USS Nevada with a telephoto lens. It showed Larry Friedrich, still in his soaked and burned uniform, soaring through the sky, holding one wing of a Japanese Zero in each hand.

    The Captain was never a handsome man, but there was something majestic about him here, the first true superhero, saving his friends from a terrible death at the bottom of the North Pacific.

    My version of the poster had been taped together by my ten-year-old hands, the day I got back from the hospital.

    My dad hated hero stuff so much, it was like he had a personal grudge against one of them. He threw a fit every time he caught me reading a comic book or watching a superhero drama on TV. He told me fantasies like that were for losers who couldn¡¯t handle the real world. He told me I would never get a girl watching shit like that, and he didn¡¯t want me to end up living in his basement, fat and useless at thirty years old.

    Dad wanted me to care about real things - cars and sports and working with my hands. He had no patience for fantasy of any kind, including fantasies about God, which was how he classified all kinds of religion.

    My grandparents were deeply religious people, followers of some obscure Protestant sect that believed Jesus was just as important as God. Dad said they used God as an excuse for everything. They gave God credit for every good thing that happened, but somehow let him off the hook for everything bad.

    Dad only let me watch documentaries and stuff from history channels. I eventually learned to access old stuff in the public domain and ended up raising myself on a diet of old sitcoms and movies from the last century.

    But every night, I dreamed about Captain Cobalt, dreamed about punching through the ceiling of my bedroom, and flying away from everything I ever knew.

    Me and some friends from school would meet every day at the comic shop down the street and browse through books and posters we couldn¡¯t afford. I didn¡¯t really get a formal allowance, but every so often I would spend my lunch money on a poster and bring it home.

    Posters of robots, mostly - stylized schematics of HDI Panthers and bipedal combat bots - all stuff my father would approve of. But I always wanted that classic poster of Captain Cobalt, and one day, I decided I had to have it.

    I hadn¡¯t saved quite enough money for it yet, so I stole ten bucks from dad¡¯s wallet and snuck it home after school.

    I thought I would have plenty of time to hang it in my closet before dad got home, but he came home early and caught me hanging it on the inside of my closet door. My ten-year-old brain thought that would hide it, somehow, as if dad didn¡¯t know where my closet was, or how to open the door.

    Dad shut me down every time I tried to talk about Captain Cobalt, rambling on about super-powered hit squads and secret experiments conducted by the OSS.

    Just seeing the poster made him mad enough, but when he saw the price tag on the tube, he immediately realized what had happened to his missing ten dollars and knew that his son was a thief.

    He hit me so hard, I lost my balance on the books I was standing on and fell backwards. Trying to somehow fall away from him, I cracked my head on the doorknob of my closet and woke up in the hospital with dad, a doctor, and two cops standing by my bed.

    A nurse gave me some water, the doctor checked me out, and the cops asked dad to leave while they spoke with me alone.

    ¡°Just tell them the truth,¡± Dad said, in a tone that made it absolutely clear what he wanted the truth to be.

    I told the police I fell while I was hanging a poster and bounced my head off the closet door on my way down. Dad bought me ice cream on the way home.

    Fifteen years later, I unrolled the poster that put me in the hospital, and put it back up, in the place where Lydia used to be.

    * * *

    I had put two interlocking magic circles around Veazey¡¯s collection of little homes. One hovering projector that had to be recharged every couple days, and a semi-permanent one applied to the grass and dirt with a paint sprayer.

    The circle was working when Veazey got a visitor, but the tattoo on his arm still woke him up. A lot of military guys went Norse during the war. Started as a fun thing, everybody getting the same tattoo, after a series of movie reboots made Thor cool again.

    Veazey had a tattoo of Mj?lnir high on his left arm, but it was never a ¡°religion¡± to him. Just a bonding thing with his team, a reminder to be brave, and a reminder of the better world they were fighting for, stuck in a war with no rules at all.

    Veazey never prayed to anybody. Never went to church. But he¡¯d remember that hammer sometimes, when he heard gunfire getting closer, and knew he had to keep working. Or when he heard the shuffle of not quite dead feet closing in around their camp in the middle of the night.

    He paid one visit to the Asgard Brotherhood in Boston when he first arrived but got suspicious when the congregation was nothing but white guys. They weren¡¯t full on fire and brimstone racist, but it was pretty clear who was welcome and who was not.

    This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

    Veazey started covering up the tattoo after that, though he couldn¡¯t bring himself to have it removed. It pissed him off more than anything, to see something innocent and cool turned into something evil. A dozen guys in his unit got a tattoo of that hammer, and nobody gave a fuck what color skin it was on.

    Veazey had been raised Christian, more or less, but he¡¯d never been the type to pray. He knew gods were real, but the actual God had fucked off before he was born, and if the human race felt abandoned, well, maybe they had it coming.

    The hammer was just a symbol to him, so he was surprised when it started to burn and throb in the middle of the night, bad enough to wake him up. Timmy said the demons might try to brute-force the circle, might even try and send a succubus, to see if Veazey was lonely enough to make a truly world-class mistake.

    Veazey found it a little insulting, the way Tim broke it down: ¡°Look man, if you see anything female walking outside that circle, do not try and talk to it. Do not get closer to try and get a better look at her tits. You don¡¯t have a contract or wizard rules to protect you, so these assholes can do anything they want.

    ¡°She can look like your first crush, or your last one. She could look like your favorite porn star, or the anime girl you drew in your notebook when you were twelve. So, if you see anything cross that circle, just shoot it, no matter what she looks like.¡±

    But they didn¡¯t send a succubus. They sent the walking corpse of an old friend.

    ¡°It¡¯s good to see you, man,¡± Rob¡¯s ghost said. ¡°Congrats, you¡¯re finally prettier than me.¡± Rob¡¯s face was still half gone, just like the last time Veazey saw him, zipping him up in a bag fifteen years ago. The nicest guy Veazey ever met. The guy who belonged on the recruiting poster, the guy who never met a rule he would break or a buddy he would turn his back on, shredded by a god damn possessed baboon.

    The whole camp had been ambushed by those little jumping shitheads, moving too fast and dropping too close to get hit by the autoguns. They lost three guys in that attack, including Rob, the guy that everybody liked.

    ¡°They told you I was a hothead, right?¡± Veazey said. ¡°They told you I would lose my shit and charge you, if I saw you wearing my friend like a skin suit? Somebody told you I would break the circle if you got me mad enough. And that somebody would have been right, if I only had twenty years to my name, instead of almost forty.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m just here to talk,¡± the figure said. ¡°I know you¡¯re not scared to fight, but you need to make sure it¡¯s a fight you can win, before you end up like me. Do not bet your life on this kid, Easy. Yeah, he can juggle cars and take a bullet, standing in a safe place with a buddy by his side. But you and I both know he¡¯s gonna freeze, the first time he sees some real shit.

    ¡°He¡¯s gonna freeze, some demon is gonna yank his soul out, and then, after a few weeks of getting his eyelids peeled off, he¡¯s gonna come back with a whole new perspective on working for the bad guys; and for his first mission, they¡¯re gonna make him kill you.

    ¡°I¡¯m not asking you to hurt him or betray him. You don¡¯t have to raise one finger. All you gotta do is stay home, and let this kid have the heroic death he¡¯s been planning since he was ten. Your little magic buddy¡¯s got a death wish, and I don¡¯t want to see him take you down with him.

    ¡°He¡¯s talking tough because somebody told him that¡¯s how men talk. That¡¯s how men talk when they¡¯re scared, when they¡¯re trying to keep their shit together in the middle of some fucking jungle, or when they¡¯re starving to death on some godforsaken ranch. The men he admired most in the world taught him to talk like that, but all those men are dead now. Just like me, and just like you¡¯re gonna be.

    ¡°I know you¡¯re trying to be a good friend. That¡¯s the whole story of you, tryin¡¯ to be a good friend. But you¡¯ve already seen what I¡¯ve seen. You know he¡¯s weak. You know he¡¯s gonna crack. And all the magic in the world can¡¯t keep a man together, when something inside him wants to die.¡±

    Veazey scoffed and put a fresh pinch of contraband between his cheek and gum. ¡°I wouldn¡¯t have to explain this, if you really were the man you¡¯re pretending to be. Funny that you showed up as Rob, since Tim and Rob are kinda the same this way.

    ¡°I never seen anybody work harder to avoid a fight than Tim Kovak. He spent his whole life, from about the time he could walk, learning to duck, dodge, hide, and keep his mouth shut, no matter what the world was doing to him.

    ¡°I saw it up close, every day for a month, when our company got bought out, and this giant gaping asshole from HDI got assigned to supervise us. His title was ¡®company liaison¡¯ but everybody knew what that meant. It meant this little piss-ant was senior to everybody in that building, because he worked directly for the guy who owned us.

    ¡°He called a meeting the first day he got there and pulled everybody into the big room to kiss his ass and listen to his bullshit about how great our lives were gonna be, after he took away some holidays and cut our bonus schedule in half.

    ¡°Everybody went to the meeting and put their happy faces on, except Tim. Tim had a deadline, and you do not come between that boy and a deadline. Tim had zero tolerance for corporate bullshit, and zero tolerance for wasting time. His real bosses loved that about him, so of course, when they called an all-hands meeting, he figured that meant all hands but him.

    ¡°Word got around to this piss-ant that Kovak had skipped the meeting, and he made Tim the first name on his shit list. Every day, Tim would go to eat his shitty frozen dinner in the break room, and every day, no matter where he was sitting, piss-ant would say, ¡®You¡¯re in my seat.¡¯

    ¡°And Timmy would get up, apologize, and move to another seat, like it was no problem at all. I watched him put up with that shit every day for a month. Well¡­ almost a month.

    ¡°It¡¯s not like Timmy didn¡¯t have pride, but Tim knew this guy was just looking for an excuse. Maybe he really was still pissed about the meeting, or maybe he was trying to cut his budget, and get rid of the only guy smart enough to take a salary cut to stay on the old bonus schedule.

    ¡°Every day he fucked with Tim, and every day Tim just took it. It got worse when Tim started smiling, making a joke out of it. He started making little remarks like, ¡®I can¡¯t believe I keep doing this!¡¯ and ¡®Why can¡¯t I get this right?¡¯ It didn¡¯t even sound sarcastic. But bullies hate it when you blow them off. It was so childish; our supervisor didn¡¯t even believe it was happening. Nobody could do anything until Tim complained, and there¡¯s no way Tim would complain.

    ¡°Tim was goin¡¯ home to a girl every night, and that girl wanted a house. Timmy described it like they had a deal. She was still pissed about him dropping out of school. Wanted him to go to law school or some shit. Thought he was wasting his life with this stupid tech job. So, she gave Tim an ultimatum, expecting him to fail. She said, ¡®You get a house for us, then we get married, then you get kids.¡¯ In that order.

    ¡°Timmy knew if he so much as twitched at this guy, he was done. He had his whole future riding on that job, and he was pretty sure he would get blacklisted if he pissed off a liaison from the biggest company on the planet.

    ¡°So, Timmy just smiled and took it, like he had no pride at all, for twenty-nine days in a row. Until the week his dad died. Timmy was allowed two hours to go to the funeral on a Wednesday afternoon. Cleared it with his supervisor, no big deal. But when piss-ant heard about it, he came over to Tim¡¯s table, leaned in close and said¡­ something. We didn¡¯t hear what he said. All we saw was the result.

    ¡°Tim will tell you he¡¯s never thrown a punch, and that is technically correct, because it was a chair. Here¡¯s what we saw. Piss-ant says something, Tim goes red in the face, stands up, picks up his plastic piece of shit chair, and proceeds to beat the dog shit out of this man, in front of everybody.

    ¡°We had to pull Timmy off this asshole three times, and it took four of us each time. We had to do it three times because Tim kept fooling us. We would pull him off, Tim would say, ¡®I¡¯m fine. I¡¯m done.¡¯ But as soon as we let him go, he would charge that motherfucker again, until I finally had to drag him out of the building.

    ¡°I¡¯ll admit, it takes a long time to find the ¡®On¡¯ switch on Timothy Kovak. But once you hit it, that boy only got one speed, and that is full speed ahead. And if Tim can put a man in the hospital for fucking up his lunch? I can¡¯t wait to see what he does to you.¡±

    The ghost may have been a demon in a skin suit, but he still had to hear the end of the story. ¡°So, what did the guy say? What did he say to set Kovak off?¡±

    ¡°He asked if Tim had been approved for the afternoon. Tim said the funeral was at one o¡¯clock, and the piss-ant said, ¡®Is there any way they could push that back?¡¯¡±

    The ghost laughed and vanished, leaving Veazey alone to finally relax, and rub some ice on his arm.

 Chapter 45: Hunters

    I had my first real demon fight in a burned-out mall on the edge of the Zone.

    Maybe I was being careless, maybe I was trying to draw them out. I should have been paying more attention, but there was something soothing about this place. It had a graveyard feel - a slice of the past, left to rot in plain sight.

    The demons caught me in the parking lot, halfway between Circle K and Burger King. I¡¯d seen versions of these in Jacob¡¯s drawings, but he didn¡¯t do them justice. Three wolves with their hair shaved off, lean and fast, with long, flat heads. They streaked across the asphalt like gray bullets, closing in from three sides.

    I was sitting on an old car, abandoned by someone shortly before or shortly after the miasma got to them. I was perched on the hood kicking my feet against the bumper, reading Jacob¡¯s journal in the dark.

    It¡¯s a moment of truth, I guess, when a man faces danger for the first time. You show your true colors in a moment like that. You can watch all the movies and dream about hero stuff all day, but you don¡¯t really know what kind of person you are until it happens.

    I had trained for weeks to keep calm and control my fear, but in my first few moments of actual combat, I just yelled ¡°Fuck!¡± and threw my arms up over my face. I couldn¡¯t remember my macros. I couldn¡¯t remember my spells. I couldn¡¯t remember my goddamn name. The demons caught me in a perfect simultaneous takedown. My body spun like a pinwheel before it hit the ground.

    I remember thinking, this is it. This is how people die - alone in the middle of nowhere, screaming for help in an empty parking lot.

    The Hunters were ripping at my jacket, tearing huge chunks from the fabric. The armor would be gone in seconds, and I couldn¡¯t remember my wards. The demons were climbing all over me. They weighed ninety, maybe a hundred pounds each. I couldn¡¯t stand up. I couldn¡¯t even move.

    One of them stayed on my chest to pin me down and started to glow, preparing to extract my soul and drag it to Hell. The other two grabbed my arms and started to pull, like dogs fighting over a toy.

    I couldn¡¯t just lay there. I had to cast something. Wards was too long. Strength was too long. Levitation was four symbols, but I couldn¡¯t remember¡­  I¡¯d cast that spell a hundred times, but I couldn¡¯t remember it now.

    My eyes were watering, my fists were clenched, and I had a thick line of snot dribbling out my nose. I couldn¡¯t feel the magic. My body was a big dead lump. After all that training, first sign of trouble, I was mundane again - soft, pink, and helpless, just like everybody else.

    The anger came then, anger at my own weakness, anger at the way my courage evaporated. But this time, I reached for the anger, held it, and turned it all into magic. The power grabbed me like a giant hand and lifted me straight up. It felt like an angel taking me in its arms, but it was just me, casting the first spell I ever learned.

    The Hunters tried to hang on, but they were too heavy, and I was moving too fast. My jacket ripped at the seams, drifting like a kite as the demons fell away. One quick whoosh and there I was, hovering thirty feet above the battle, with all the time in the world. The Hunters leapt at me, but I was too far away.

    I didn¡¯t even need spells anymore. I drew the pistol and hesitated, right before I pulled the trigger. I could kill them this time, but what about the next time and the next time and the time after that? I could finish this fight with three bullets, but it wouldn¡¯t really solve anything. Baalphezar would send another batch of demons, and I would freeze up again, just like I did this time.

    I couldn¡¯t do it like this. I couldn¡¯t just pick them off from a distance. I had to face them on the ground. I had to feel them and smell them and look them in the eyes. Was I really strong enough to break this contract, or was I just drunk on desperation and fairy tales? Could I hold my concentration with a pack of demons breathing down my neck? I had to know, once and for all. I had to get back down there and prove I could do this.

    I cast wards and fortitude from memory, struck by how easy everything was at this altitude. I picked a spot ten feet from the pack and lowered myself to the ground. The Hunters came instantly, launching themselves into the air. The first one hit my arm and spun me around. The others missed and came around for another pass. The impact made my knees buckle, but I stayed on my feet.

    I wanted to run or shoot or take to the air again. Instead, I clenched my fists and gathered my wards around me, sucking in power for all I was worth. My aura lit up the parking lot. The Hunters circled and came again - low, high, and middle, just like the first time.

    I trusted my wards, and they held. I took a breath and tried to calm myself, wincing as they hit me again and again. I held off three more attacks and forced myself to fight back. When the leader jumped again, I grabbed his neck and flung him as hard as I could. I¡¯m not sure how far he went. He just soared over Burger King and never came back. I guess the fall killed it.

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    The Hunters were barely sentient, but they knew they were in trouble. The second one hesitated, giving me time to brace myself. I swung my right arm and punched it, catching it square in the snout. I knew I was using a lot of power, but I didn¡¯t really understand what that meant. The Hunter¡¯s face shattered, staining my shirt with six different shades of demon goo.

    The third one yelped and tried to run. I grabbed its hind leg and slammed it down on the old car, leaving a perfect demon-shaped dent in the hood. The Hunter yipped like a dog and tried to squirm away. I beat it to death with my bare hands.

    Then it was silent. I pissed myself during the fight, but I don¡¯t remember when.

    * * *

    I was limping home, desperate to wash off the blood and shame from this fight, when Veazey buzzed through. ¡°Got a midnight visitor over here. You okay?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m alright now. What kind of visitor?¡±

    ¡°Demon tried to talk me out of helping you. Borrowed the face of an old buddy and basically called you a suicidal coward who would freeze up at the first sign of trouble.¡±

    ¡°Well, he was right about that last part,¡± I said. ¡°Just had my first fight about twenty minutes ago. Sounds like this guy was sent to keep you talking, so you wouldn¡¯t interfere when they went for me.¡±

    ¡°What happened? Do you need help?¡±

    ¡°No, I got it now, but your demon buddy was right. I froze up and almost got my soul sucked out, but I think I got a handle on it now. And for the record, I did fight pretty hard! If I really wanted to die, I could have died pretty easy just now. But I didn¡¯t. Cut it way closer than I should have, but the demons are dead and I¡¯m alive.¡±

    ¡°Goddammit, Tim! What happened!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll send you my POV if you really want it, but it was not pretty. Surprise attack scared me so bad, I forgot everything I trained for and ended up flat on my back in a parking lot.¡±

    ¡°So, how did you get out?¡±

    ¡°Short version? I got angry. Turns out anger kills fear, at least for me. So, if I want to beat these things, all I have to do is stay angry. That¡¯s gonna be a bit of a challenge for me, since I¡¯ve spent my whole life trying to choke anger down. I guess that means I¡¯ll have plenty to let out, right?¡±

    ¡°You need me to come over there?¡±

    ¡°No. Stay in your circle. I¡¯m just gonna get cleaned up and get some sleep. Apartment wards should keep them out, even if they do cut around the Zone.¡±

    Veazey fell into angry silence, threatening to come sleep in my living room anyway. I finally agreed to keep a live monitor going between us, although we wouldn¡¯t be close enough to do anything, if the other one got in trouble.

    I walked in silence for a while before I said, ¡°The fight was scary and all, but the part that really bothers me? Punching shit with magic feels good. Really good. But it only felt good because they were monsters, right? You don¡¯t think it¡¯ll feel good if I have to hurt people, do you?¡±

    Veazey said nothing.

    ¡°I never wanted to hurt anybody in my life. I would be devastated if somebody else got hurt because of me. But the guys in that book, my ancestors, they hardly talked about the killing at all. And I¡¯m starting to wonder, did they skip it because they were ashamed of it, or did they skip it because the way their brains worked, it was no big deal?

    ¡°I wasn¡¯t sure what word to use, so I looked it up. A real psychopath doesn¡¯t feel anything when he does something wrong. They don¡¯t feel remorse because in their head, everything they do is justified. I think my great grandpa was one of those. Grandpa Jim sounds more like a sociopath. He had a conscience that made him feel bad, but he also had an excuse for everything, to explain why nothing was ever his fault.

    ¡°I don¡¯t think any of them actually enjoyed hurting people. I¡¯ve only read a little bit, but so far nobody has talked about getting excited or feeling a rush of power when they killed someone. But the problem is, we do feel a rush of power when we¡¯re fighting. I feel it, and I¡¯m just using Earth magic. But all these guys who came before me, they were using Hell magic, infernal magic, pulled through Lydia. What if that magic made them feel good when they hurt people? How fast would it change me, if it felt good to hurt people?¡±

    Veazey said nothing.

    ¡°Veazey,¡± I continued, when he did not reply. ¡°I¡¯m not a bad guy, right? It¡¯s natural to lose your temper when you¡¯re provoked. You¡¯ve been in all kinds of fights, but you¡¯re not sick or broken. Getting in fights was just a military thing, just a Texas thing, right? My whole life, I never wanted to fight anybody, but now that I have, I kinda want to do it again.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s normal,¡± Veazey reassured me. ¡°All this is normal, after you¡¯ve had to fight like that. And remember, you didn¡¯t hurt nobody. You¡¯re not a killer, you¡¯re a demon slayer. Those things you hurt; they weren¡¯t even animals. They were corrupted and evil, and if you didn¡¯t send them back, they could have been used to hurt someone else. So, you did a good thing tonight. Just hang on to that, and don¡¯t get in your head about it. You¡¯re a good guy who cares about people, and you always will be.¡±

    * * *

    The next morning, I walked back to the parking lot and picked up the pieces of my jacket. It was essential equipment, and I couldn¡¯t afford a new one. I went back to the store and tried to exchange the pieces. The owner opened the box and held up the remains of my sleeve, moving his lamp so he could get a better look at the teeth marks.

    ¡°What the hell did you do to this thing?¡±

    ¡°I had a problem with my dog.¡±

    The owner clucked his tongue and dropped my sleeve back in the box. ¡°This jacket is rated for knives, shrapnel, and small arms under ten-millimeter. If you got shit chewin¡¯ on you, you need to take your business elsewhere.¡±

    ¡°The warranty says ¡®attack, or non-chemical damage.¡¯ That should include teeth.¡±

    ¡°Alright. I¡¯ll replace it once, but don¡¯t let me see you in here again.¡±

    * * *

    Veazey called me a couple days later and said, ¡°Can you stay out of trouble for a couple days? The guys need me in Colorado.¡±

    ¡°Shit! What happened?¡±

    ¡°They made it to holy ground, but they spotted a pack of those things in the woods, and they¡¯ve got no safe place to run. I¡¯m gonna air drop in and see if I can help them pick shit off.¡±

    ¡°Shit,¡± I said again. ¡°Do you need me there?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± Veazey said. ¡°You¡¯ve only got a couple days before what¡¯s her name gets back. You gotta stick with the plan.¡±

 Chapter 46: Torture Therapy

    The demon appeared twenty feet behind me as I stepped out of Crazy Henry¡¯s that evening. His body was tall and supernaturally thin, with spindly arms and freaky long fingers. His skin was sick dark yellow, wrinkled and brittle like old paper. He was wearing a long black robe, like someone had killed a judge and stretched him to seven feet tall.

    He wasn¡¯t actually seven feet tall, by the way. He just used levitation to make himself look taller. A lot of demons use that trick, but it certainly intimidated me the first time.

    His robe was long, but it didn¡¯t quite touch the ground. I couldn¡¯t see feet - just an inch of blank space between his hem and my driveway. His eyes were empty black sockets. His head was hairless, topped with elaborate black horns. No visible weapons, but he had so many torture instruments in his robe, he jingled when he walked. I couldn¡¯t see teeth or tongue. His mouth was a gaping black hole. His voice was shrill and commanding, reverberating with an obvious archaic accent.

    He said, ¡°I am an Inquisitor serving the Demon Prince Baalphezar. You know why I¡¯m here.¡±

    ¡°And I don¡¯t need to ask your Name,¡± I said, ¡°because I already know it. Your Name is Aleister. Jacob wrote about you.¡±

    ¡°Really!¡± Aleister gave some kind of grotesque smile, seemingly flattered by this. ¡°And what did he say?¡±

    ¡°He said you two were friends¡­ eventually.¡±

    ¡°Indeed we were! We¡¯d still be friends today if he had accepted my offer. Stupid, stubborn man. Jacob Kovach should be a demon right now. I offered him the full Merlin package at the end, but he didn¡¯t believe me. He thought our Master was going to turn him into some kind of bloated slug demon as a joke.

    ¡°He went behind our backs and tried to cut a deal with the Overlord - before he was the Overlord - trying to negotiate for a better form, once he inevitably ended up in Hell. The Overlord refused him and commanded us to never make Jacob a demon.

    ¡°So, there he remains, bound to my Master, strapped to a table in the palace courtyard. I send Imps to eat his liver and pluck out his eyes every day, but at least he has someone to talk to. I¡¯ll be sure to tell him you said hello. Or perhaps you can tell him yourself, once we have an understanding.¡±

    ¡°So, you¡¯re here to scare me? Threaten me with torture?¡±

    ¡°Eventually,¡± the demon said. ¡°But first, I¡¯m going to teach you how to duel. I dueled Jacob a dozen times before he finally beat me. Perhaps you¡¯ll do better.¡±

    ¡°You beat the smartest mage in my bloodline a dozen times? Have you ever fought a guy who can walk?¡±

    ¡°You really want to spend your last few moments of freedom making jokes?¡±

    ¡°I will tell a joke with my dying breath, asshole. Duels have rules. What are the rules?¡±

    ¡°We each take turns casting spells at the other. I am not allowed to kill you, but I can bring you very close to death before I extract your soul. I¡¯m one of the best healers in Hell because I am one of the best torturers in Hell. Isn¡¯t that funny? I know magic that can keep you alive, no matter how wounded your body is. I could even sustain you for a while as a disembodied head!¡± Aleister bragged.

    ¡°The duel is over when you surrender, or when you manage to send me back to Hell. No angels, no gods, but I¡¯ll keep the rules of engagement loose this first time, just to see what you¡¯re capable of.¡±

    ¡°Who goes first?¡±

    ¡°You.¡±

    I quick-drew my pistol and popped off ten shots as fast as I could, only to watch the little metal pellets go plink, and bounce off in random directions.

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    ¡°Really?¡± Aleister said, using a disappointed teacher expression I had seen a hundred times. ¡°You want to be a wizard, but you¡¯re going for the musket first? Very disappointing.¡±

    The Inquisitor waved his hand and something in my brain went click, like a light switch turning off.

    ¡°No more wards,¡± he said, patiently waiting to see what I would do next.

    I tried to cast them again, but it felt like the magic was running down an open drain, before it could get to the runes. Then Aleister waved his hand again, and my fortitude spell went poof.

    ¡°No wards, no strength. What now, little mage?¡±

    We were facing off in the junk yard outside Crazy Henry¡¯s, surrounded by crushed cars and rusted parts. A dirty old toolbox sat on an upturned barrel to my right.

    Levitation was a bitch to control in any direction other than up and down, but what if I didn¡¯t try to control it? I focused on the pile of tiny parts and blasted them toward him like a shotgun. A dozen of them bounced off his shield thing, but one of them, the battery got through, and hit him in the shoulder. But was it the weight that overloaded the object deflection thing, or the number of objects?

    ¡°Creative!¡± Aleister said, sounding impressed. ¡°I¡¯ve never seen levitation used like that before. Your powers may be sloppy and unreliable, but you seem to have a gift for improvisation!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re Baalphezar¡¯s magic expert, right? Can you tell me why my powers are like this? Do you know what¡¯s been happening to us?¡± This guy seemed eager to play teacher, maybe I could keep him talking, and give myself time to think.

    ¡°I have theories, but nothing I can prove. The power went wild inside your grandfather. Stefan certainly wasn¡¯t like that, so perhaps the power was twisted by the same thing that made Jim a drunk. Now that I¡¯ve met you, I think this chaos may be a manifestation of mental illness. Your grandfather had extremely poor control over his emotions, your mother was clinically insane, and now you, so deranged and arrogant, you think you can take on an army of demons by yourself!

    ¡°I think the pain I inflict will be good for you, Kovak. Enduring the agony, learning your place, feeling the consequences if you don¡¯t learn to regulate yourself. Think of it as¡­ torture therapy.¡±

    Aleister threw his arm out, and a tiny blob of yellow goo shot out of his hand and splashed on my chest, burning a neat hole in my shirt as the acid started eating my skin.

    I did a quick gesture to bring my healing spell up, and cast it as fast as I could, counting on Tobias to have thought of this. The purification runes of the spell cleaned the acid off, and the rest of the first aid bit closed up my skin. I thought about using a spell to repair my shirt, just to make a point, but I didn¡¯t understand this dueling stuff yet. Casting two spells in a row might allow him to fire two spells back.

    ¡°Excellent!¡± he said, cackling with that disgusting oval mouth. ¡°They told me you had been working with healing magic, but you were able to do that while you were surprised and in pain! We might be able to turn you into something useful after all!¡±

    Aleister twitched his finger and a larger, faster blob crashed into my chest, hard enough to knock me on my ass.

    ¡°Some duels would be over now,¡± Aleister said, ¡°if we had agreed to fight until the first fall, but this is more of a training exercise, so I¡¯ll give you a moment to compose yourself.¡±

    I leaned on a barrel to get to my feet and tried to distract him with a compliment, ¡°Jacob said you were a gentleman.¡±

    It apparently worked, because Aleister beamed and didn¡¯t seem to notice I had swiped two items off the top of the barrel: a yellow plastic squeeze bottle, and an ancient Zippo lighter that I had used to test my wards a few weeks earlier. He also didn¡¯t notice the fortitude spell I recast while I was getting to my feet.

    Instead of attacking with magic, I twisted the top off the bottle of lighter fluid and used levitation to launch it at him, dousing his robe and his face with ethanol, even splashing some on the wall of tires behind him. Then I flicked the lighter and threw it at him, and his whole body went up in a column of fire.

    Aleister laughed through the flames. ¡°You can¡¯t hurt a demon with fire, boy.¡±

    But I wasn¡¯t trying to burn him. I was trying to blind him, first with flames, then with smoke, as the old tires behind him lit up from the backsplash and started spewing thick black smoke all around him. My eyes were just as useless as his for a moment, then the lidar in my lenses kicked in and gave me a wireframe of his burning body.

    I did my shotgun levitation thing again, forcing him to deflect another toolbox full of random objects while I ran around behind him, and hit him with something too heavy for his magic to stop.

    It had been twenty years since this junk yard had scrapped a gasoline engine, but they still had one half-buried in the dirt behind the tires. I used fortitude to yank it up and used levitation to boost myself and multiply the weight as I slammed it down on his pointy head.

    Aleister the Inquisitor fell backwards as two hundred pounds of engine block crushed his head. The long robe vanished, and I saw how short he was. His gnarled yellow feet twitched twice, and his body vanished into the gray. The dirt around him was still blazing, as the alcohol continued to burn.

 Chapter 47: One More Day

    I didn¡¯t think Baalphezar could send another demon this fast, but a much more difficult fight was waiting for me the next morning.

    I had effectively beaten the shit out of my training robot over the last couple weeks, so I had borrowed Veazey¡¯s truck to haul Freddy¡¯s remains to the dump. I parked it just outside the Zone and got surprised by another bad guy as I was skipping rooftops.

    The demon was green, just over eight feet tall, with emerald skin and a black loincloth. Huge muscles and a broad face. Sharp white teeth and ears so pointy, they almost made me laugh. He was handsome, as demons go - lively and intelligent, resting on his haunches like a gorilla kneeling by a stream.

    The creature was hairless, with broad hands wrapped around a blue-gray pitchfork. He was smiling. His voice was deep and reverberating, with no discernible accent. ¡°You thought we only came out at night, didn¡¯t you? Don¡¯t feel bad, it¡¯s a common mistake. I am a lieutenant serving the Demon Prince Baalphezar, and I¡¯ve come to explain some things to you.¡±

    Stunned, I fell back on protocol. ¡°What¡¯s your Name?¡±

    ¡°My name is Belak. My Master is angry with you, and I have come to deliver his terms.¡± Belak cleared his throat. He was still smiling at me. ¡°But you have some choices to make, and I want you to understand your options. Are you ready?¡±

    I nodded once.

    ¡°Excellent. My Master wants you to suffer, but I¡¯ve served him for a long time, and I have some leeway here. Your first option is to cooperate. I¡¯ll preserve your body and take your soul to Hell. You¡¯ll be tortured for a week or so, then you will be expected to offer an apology, followed by a process of atonement that is best left to your imagination. If your contrition is sincere, then your soul will be restored, and you will spend the rest of your life honoring your contract. You might even get Lydia back, if your apology is¡­ creative enough.

    ¡°The advantage to this is that no one else gets hurt. My Master won¡¯t care about your friends once he has you working, and no one will harm them once you are taken. On that, I am willing to give you my Word.

    ¡°The second option is¡­ uglier. You can fight me, take me on like you have all the others.¡± Belak smiled wider, wider than any living thing can smile. ¡°Who knows, you might even win! But if you lose, there will be no mercy. I¡¯ll drag you physically to Hell, where my Master will write new pages of suffering upon your flesh.

    ¡°Healing magic is not a mercy in Hell. Aleister won¡¯t have a body for a while, but he will give you to his apprentices, and when they run out of tricks, he will rent you out to others. Inquisitors will use you for contests, Imps will eat your tongue, and harem girls will weave carpets from your skin.

    ¡°We¡¯ve been interviewing some souls who knew you, studying you since you sent Lydia back, and Sylvia and I have a disagreement over how to handle you. I implored my Master to send her in my place, but Lydia has convinced him that compulsion magic would break something in your mind, and permanently destroy the mechanism that lets you use magic. She made the same claim about your grandfather, and thus kept him from getting exactly the kind of help he needed.

    ¡°Men like you and your grandfather need Sylvia. When weak men are left to make their own choices, they make bad ones, or they shut down, and refuse to decide at all, until they are overwhelmed by events, and have no alternatives. This is not simple cowardice. You¡¯re not running from danger when you do this, you¡¯re running from choices, paralyzed by lack of confidence. Men like this seek out strong women who will dominate and direct them, liberating them from that awful burden of choice.

    ¡°That is clearly what you need. You had a handler for years before you met Lydia, and when your pony-tailed mistress stopped giving orders, you were utterly adrift. A lifetime of serving Sylvia would be the purest kind of bliss for you, because you would never have to make a choice again. Just learn your magic, eat your vegetables, and do as you¡¯re told, like the overgrown child you are.

    ¡°A strong man would have embraced Lydia and devoured that book the moment it was offered to him, like your great-grandfather did. He served us, but he served us on his own terms, and he used our power to accomplish his own goals on Earth. A strong Kovach, in full command of his powers, can lead us to accommodate him, simply because it¡¯s the practical thing to do. Joining the SS was Stefan¡¯s choice, not ours, but that decision left us perfectly positioned to make a deal with the Nationalsozialistische and turn our Master¡¯s Master into their best friend.

    ¡°You could have done the same. Embraced your demons, embraced your power, and enlisted Hell to help you fight your war on the corporations you despise. We could have played the different companies off each other for decades, just like we played Russia and the United States, sending you against targets you would have been proud to kill.

    ¡°Instead, you¡¯ve retreated into this child¡¯s fantasy of heroes and villains, trying to fight demons in a world where the angels are worse, with no thought to how you could have turned this whole thing to your advantage. That¡¯s how a strong man seizes opportunity, and I hope you¡¯ll remember that, in a decade or so, when you get a choice like this again.

    ¡°My Master also believes you want to be a martyr. He says it would be useless to torture you, because you will see pain as proof of your virtue, and every cry of pain will be a cry to Heaven, begging the angels to notice how selfless you are.

    ¡°I believe that, too, is nonsense. You say you¡¯re not afraid of pain because you have no idea what pain is. Like most of your generation, you¡¯ve been coddled for so long, you can¡¯t tell the difference between emotional pain and physical pain. But rest assured, I am not here to hurt your feelings. I am here to hurt you, until you understand what pain is.¡±

    I cast Anson¡¯s artillery spell at close range, using all the power I could muster before fear took it from me. The demon swung his pitchfork around and blocked it, moving with impossible speed. The magic just kind of sank into it, covering the weapon in green fire.

    ¡°A fine opener!¡± Belak beamed. ¡°Shall we begin?¡±

    I had wards and fortitude up, but Belak reached out and casually sliced my cheek open, like I had no defenses at all.

    ¡°Same wards your ancestor tried, when I had to fight him. You think you¡¯re tougher than he was?¡±

    Belak lunged with the pitchfork and tried to put it right through me. I couldn¡¯t trust my wards, so I did the only thing I could think of. I put all my energy into the fortitude spell and grabbed the pitchfork with both hands.

    I had a flashback to the compound, when one of the men dared me to piss on an electrified fence. That was bad. This was worse. A hard, sharp shock, followed by a helpless drained feeling as the tantalum of the weapon sucked magic out of my body. I wasn¡¯t completely drained, but I could already feel myself weakening, as Belak reached out and sliced my other cheek.

    ¡°You really embarrassed my Inquisitor, Kovak. He¡¯s inconsolable. He can¡¯t have you yet so he¡¯s asking for the witch. I told him I would offer you one last chance to cooperate, and if you refuse, I will give him the new Hardy. First rule of management, yes? You have to keep your subordinates happy.¡±

    ¡°You can¡¯t touch her! Denise is protected.¡±

    ¡°Cecilia Hardy is protected by faerie pacts. Hardy family property is protected by faerie pacts; but Denise herself was carefully exempted from these. Cecilia wanted to make sure the faeries who enslaved her family had no hold on her precious daughter. So, Denise is free, and completely unprotected. If you insist on fighting me, she will be my¡­ second stop.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t want to do that. I know you think we¡¯re monsters,¡± the monster said, ¡°but I do not enjoy inflicting pain. I have a job to do, and that job comes first. I do what it takes to get my job done, but I am only as evil as I need to be. I am only as evil as you force me to be. Nothing erodes a demon¡¯s reputation faster than unnecessary bloodshed, and that¡¯s what this is, Kovak - completely unnecessary. You know who I was in life?¡±

    ¡°I thought demons couldn¡¯t remember their lives.¡±

    ¡°Most of us can¡¯t, but the information can be bought. I was a warrior, Kovak, a samurai serving Minamoto Yoritomo in feudal Japan.¡±

    I shook my head, oblivious to the slow trickle of blood running down my face. ¡°Even if that¡¯s true, samurai were honorable men. How did you end up in Hell?¡±

    Did all lieutenants talk this much? This guy was a talker, so I encouraged him to talk while I was stalling for time, sucking in magic in erratic, stuttering breaths.

    ¡°I had a disagreement with my lord,¡± Belak said. ¡°I seduced his wife and killed his heir, but that is beside the point. The point is, this is not just a job for me. I see my service to Baalphezar as an extension of my mortal life. I have been given another chance to prove myself. I will give Baalphezar the loyalty I denied my Earthly Master, and I will be redeemed.¡±

    I quick-drew my pistol¡ª and yelped in pain as Belak yanked it out of my hand. He just wrapped his tail around the barrel and pulled, hard enough to strip the skin off my finger. I cursed and stuck my finger in my mouth, quivering while Belak examined the gun. ¡°They¡¯ve made improvements! But there is no time.¡± The demon twitched his tail and sent my weapon soaring off the roof into god knows where.

    Then he lunged forward and stabbed my hand, like he was trying to punish my trigger finger.

    ¡°Not completely defenseless, then,¡± the demon observed. ¡°My weapon can cut through your wards, but you¡¯ve got some other things going. An improved version of your ancestor¡¯s strength spell? Improved after his battle with me, no doubt. It¡¯s making you stronger all the way through, and is that a bit of regeneration? He was so annoyed to lose a fight to a demon, he tried to turn himself into one!¡±

    I tried to dive around his body to punch him or push him somehow, but he was too damn fast. He blocked with his weapon, sucking away more of my magic, leaving me with another bloody wound down my leg.

    ¡°I¡¯m going to keep cutting you until you understand why it hurts,¡± Belak said. ¡°That spell will allow you to withstand incredible punishment, keeping you alive, even when I do things like this.¡±

    If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

    Belak lunged forward and jammed his weapon right through my gut, until I could feel the points of the pitchfork sticking out my back. Then he yanked it out and continued to lecture me, as I collapsed onto the dirty concrete roof.

    ¡°You should bleed out now but watch the spell. It¡¯s repairing your organs as we watch, just enough regeneration to get a mage back on his feet and give him another chance at winning a duel. But this is not a duel. This is a lesson, and the lesson is not over.¡±

    Belak winked at me, and I ran. I figured, he¡¯s big and strong, maybe he¡¯s slow. But Belak wasn¡¯t slow. Belak was patient. He made no move to follow me; just leaned on his pitchfork and let me run.

    I didn¡¯t slow down and I didn¡¯t look back. My mind was focused on one word. Truck. I had to find the truck. Hop in the truck and drive to the tower, where the wards could protect me. Belak looked like he weighed six hundred pounds; surely, he couldn¡¯t outrun a car. I was traveling in a straight line, using levitation to skip the rooftops. A month ago, this would have impressed the hell out of me. Today, it was just instinct.

    I hit a long stretch and paused to get my bearings, trying to remember where I parked. Suddenly, the whole roof shuddered, knocking me off my feet. I rolled over and Belak was there. He couldn¡¯t fly, he just jumped. He didn¡¯t have wings, but with legs like that, I guess he didn¡¯t need them. I got to my feet and fumbled in my holster, reaching for a pistol that was now lost in the dirt, fifty yards away.

    I tried to run again, but Belak wrapped his tail around my neck and yanked me backwards off my feet. I hit the ground gagging, struggling to breathe. Belak came around in front of me and stomped on my chest with one giant foot. I¡¯d lost my concentration on the way down, so the impact broke three ribs and squeezed all the remaining air out of my lungs.

    Still grinning, Belak flipped his weapon around and centered the points on my chest. ¡°One last bit of irony for you, Kovak. This weapon that¡¯s about to steal your soul? Jacob found it for me. Isn¡¯t that funny?¡±

    I couldn¡¯t remember my healing spell, I couldn¡¯t remember my wards. I couldn¡¯t think of anything but air. Sweet, delicious air. I¡¯d sell my soul for¡­ My right hand was flopping around of its own accord, digging in my pocket for what? Bus pass? Chewing gum? Bullets for a broken gun? My hand dipped in my pocket and came out with Cecilia¡¯s knife.

    I had a weapon, but what good would it do? Six-inch handle and a two-inch blade, versus six-hundred pounds of demonic killing machine? Most of my brain was preparing for death, but one random neuron in the back was still firing. Belak was pulling the pitchfork back, about to plunge the points into my chest. That was important, but there was something else, something important that didn¡¯t seem to matter at the time.

    My last neuron processed the thought and turned it into words. I figured what the hell, he¡¯s wearing a loincloth, maybe he has a groin? I gripped the knife and extended the blade. Belak had shifted his weight to his back leg, giving me just enough room. I leaned on my left arm and stabbed viciously with my right, burying my knife in the dark dangly bits under his cloth.

    I felt it go in, but I couldn¡¯t see anything. I wasn¡¯t sure I¡¯d hit something until I heard the demon roar. The sound prompted me to take a breath. No idea what weird faerie shit this knife was made of, but apparently it could make demons feel pain. I braced myself and leaned in with all my strength, slashing in and up and left and right, all at the same time.

    I pushed, and the knife kept going in, just as far as I could reach. My right hand sank into something warm and wet, all the way to my third knuckle. Then the knife hit something solid and stopped. I wasn¡¯t strong enough to pull it out, so I left it there and tried to stand up.

    The demon¡¯s foot was off my chest. He was hopping backwards, clutching at his wound. I couldn¡¯t tell how much he was actually hurting, but he seemed very upset about the damage.

    I crawled across the roof and took off running again, fighting for traction as I slipped in a pool of Belak¡¯s blood. I ran blindly, struggling to stop the gibberish in my head. Truck. Truck. Where did I park that fucking truck?

    I tripped on a ledge and fell. Belak was right behind me, and I had nothing left. No gun. No spells. No knife¡­ But the knife was hexed to my hand. I wrapped my mind around it and held out my hand. An interminable pause, and another roar, as the knife tore through Belak¡¯s scrotum, on its way back to me.

    The knife slapped in my hand with a satisfying thunk. It was covered in goo, and I didn¡¯t have time to clean it off. I jammed it in my pocket and tried to think. I couldn¡¯t even think in sentences anymore. My mind was just a random string of words. Run. Die. Stand. Fight.

    I took in a huge gulp of magic and charged up my spells, a second before Belak hit the roof. He was limping, with a slow trickle of bright green blood pooling on his foot. But the bastard was still smiling, and he still loved to talk.

    ¡°Oh, what is this? What is this? A mage who stands and fights? Stupid boy. Mages don¡¯t stand. Mages don¡¯t fight. Mages cower behind warriors and sling spells from the back row. Mages hide in caves and send slaves to do their fighting for them. Really, Kovak, how can you hope to defeat us, when you ignore the most basic rules of your profession?¡±

    He was about to charge me, but I was already moving. Running start and a flying kick, using levitation to push myself down, like he was a roof I was trying to land on. I hit him dead center and knocked him off the roof. Belak fell four stories and left a demon-shaped dent in the ground. But I had used too much force and sailed off into nowhere. I grabbed the ledge and slammed myself against the side of the building.

    I levitated myself back up to the roof and saw Belak was still in his hole. I should have turned and run the other way. Instead, I got another running start and jumped on him, trusting the fortitude spell to keep my bones intact.

    Watching this fight in the mirror, I can¡¯t believe I did that, and I can¡¯t remember what I was thinking. The impact drove him down, but I had foolishly put myself in range of his arms again. He reached up and swatted me away. I caught myself in mid-air and levitated back to the roof.

    Belak jumped up to join me, leaving us in a classic showdown position - precisely the setup I was trying to avoid. We were face to face now. I could barely breathe, and I had lost the element of surprise. Belak held his arm out, and his weapon came spinning back into his hand. I guess demons can do that, too.

    Belak was laughing. ¡°My god, boy! You are magnificent. All those years since I fought your ancestor, I never thought we¡¯d get another one worth fighting. Imagine! A mage that stands and fights! I live centuries waiting for a day like this! I still have to kill your friends, but now, before I kill them, I¡¯ll tell them what a great man you were!¡±

    I knew it was pointless, but I really wanted to run. I swayed on my feet and took one last look around. The grass and the trees. The river and the shattered buildings. And a red blob that could only be Veazey¡¯s truck. I would die looking at it.

    Belak was behind me, but he wasn¡¯t poised to strike. He was following my gaze, reading my thoughts like they were written on the back of my head.

    ¡°Your vehicle. The machine you would escape in.¡± He lowered his voice to a whisper. ¡°Run for it. Run for the machine. If you make it, I¡¯ll give you one more day. Twenty-four hours of peace until I come again.¡±

    I coughed and spat blood over the edge. ¡°Bullshit.¡±

    ¡°You think I¡¯m lying to you? Oh no, I would not lie to you. I owe you, boy. I owe you for the best fight I¡¯ve had in years. I offer you one more day of life. Another day with your friends. Another day to laugh and cry and remember who you were. Another day with your loved ones, another night with fair Judith, a chance to say all those things you meant to say. Think about it, Kovak. Think what you could do with one more day.¡±

    I was quiet, but I wasn¡¯t thinking about his dare. I was thinking about Belak, wondering what it would take to beat him. I couldn¡¯t match him in a straight fight. He was too strong, too smart, and too fast. I had to surprise him, but he¡¯d done this a hundred times. How do you surprise a creature like this?

    There was something different about the pitchfork, but it took me a moment to remember what it meant. When he blocked my first bolt, the weapon had been a lustrous blue gray, a bit darker than titanium. I had watched the magic flare up along the length of it and sink in. Now the pitchfork was jet black, and that meant something. Tantalum turns black when it¡¯s saturated with magic. He had used the weapon to cut through my wards, and block my artillery spell, but now it was full.

    I took three quick steps and launched myself in the air. Belak thought I was running. Hell, for a minute, even I thought I was running. But I wasn¡¯t taking his offer. I had made a choice. I knew my condition, and I knew my limits. My concentration was shot, my spells were failing, and my left lung was slowly filling with blood. I would never make it to the truck.

    One leap, and I was away from him, four stories in the air, sucking in magic all the way. I was low on juice, and I only had time for one spell. I could attack, or I could break my fall, but I couldn¡¯t do both.

    Levitation was in my head, but I didn¡¯t cast levitation. I twirled in mid-air and hit Belak with everything I had, every drop of rage in my body, converted to magic and fired at point-blank range. I hit him with the artillery spell, bathing him in white fire until I couldn¡¯t see his body anymore. I was falling like a rock, but I didn¡¯t care.

    I hit the ground and rolled onto my face, screaming as my legs broke. I was still for a long time - broken, stunned, and struggling to breathe. Then the air came in and I started to sob, crying and screaming and clawing at the grass.

    A long black object landed beside me and went twang, quivering in the wind. I looked up and saw Belak¡¯s severed hand, still wrapped around the shaft. The weapon lingered for a second, and disappeared, dropping Belak¡¯s severed hand on the grass.

    My body was a mess, but flesh was the least of it. I yelled, ¡°Jeeves, heal!¡± I don¡¯t know how long I was there, writhing on the ground while the spell knit my bones back together. It felt like forever, and as usual, the cure hurt worse than the disease.

    The fight was over, but I was still boiling, sucking in magic like I expected him to come back. I tried to stand too soon after the healing, stumbled and fell again. I needed something to lean on, so I crawled to a building on my hands and knees, grunting and gasping as I struggled to my feet. I stubbed my toe and started kicking the building, sending wicked shocks through fresh tissue. The wall didn¡¯t move, so I started beating it with my fists. My aura was so bright, I could see tiny grooves in the brick.

    It was the first time I couldn¡¯t stop it, the first time I really lost control.

    Azael made me watch the surge, captured with perfect fidelity in his mirror.

    I watched myself spit on the ground and scream down at Hell, ¡°Is that all you got? You¡¯re next, motherfucker! You hear me? You¡¯re fucking next!¡±

    I wiped my nose and spat a stream of pink mucus, enraged by the taste of my own blood. The magic was still coming, stronger and stronger until I thought I would burst.

    ¡°Fuck the planning! Fuck the plan! You and me, asshole! Right here! Right now! I know you¡¯re watching me. No more lackeys! No more threats! Come up here and fight like a man you prehistoric fuck!¡±

    I took hold of the power and fired six bolts across the river. I was trying to bleed it off, but it just kept coming.

    ¡°Come on you bastard! I¡¯m right here! No friends! No backup! I don¡¯t even have a gun! Face me now or I¡¯m coming for you! Face me now or I¡¯m coming to Hell. I¡¯ll break your gates and I¡¯ll kill your guards and I¡¯ll tear that fucking palace down brick by brick! You hear me? I¡¯m coming for you! Anson and Grandpa and all those other ancestors you fucked! I¡¯ve got their secrets and I¡¯m coming for you! We¡¯re all coming for you!¡±

    Expanding circles of uncontrolled magic surging at my feet again. Whump. Whump. Whump. Too much rage. Too much power. Crashing against me like waves breaking against a rock. The power lifted me up and burned a blooming circle in the ground. Too much to stop, too fast to send it anywhere. And when I couldn¡¯t fight it anymore, I spread my arms and screamed at the sky.

    The world went white, and I woke up in a circle of burning grass. The stronger buildings in the radius were bent, and the weaker ones had collapsed entirely, leaving mismatched piles of rubble where they stood. I saw brick and girders and a crumpled ball of red, resting by a burning tree - the remains of Veazey¡¯s truck, smashed like a giant had thrown it there.

    * * *

    Belak hit the Lake just as hard as Lydia did, but he seemed much less bothered by it, casually strolling back to the palace with a little smile on his face.

    His Master was alone, using his mirror to try and find the Kovak boy, still unable to pierce the miasma left by a dead god. He had been trying to watch the boy¡¯s fight with Belak, hoping to finally see an end to his humiliating display of defiance, when Belak walked in, and confirmed that Baalphezar really might have to deal with this personally.

    Belak did not kneel before his Master in disgrace the way Lydia did. He just strolled up and said, ¡°The Eighth Kovach has defeated me.¡±

    Belak was expecting a burst of childish rage, his Master¡¯s default reaction these days, but Baalphezar sounded strangely curious. ¡°How is that possible? How does he keep doing this?¡±

    Belak cocked his head. ¡°Master, you will not control this one with fear. That boy broke his own legs to bring me down. I don¡¯t know what he was when Lydia found him, but he¡¯s a fighter now.¡±

    Belak turned and strolled down the hall to the barracks, as his Master yelled behind him. ¡°You were not dismissed! You were not dismissed!¡± But Baalphezar¡¯s lieutenant didn¡¯t even turn around.

 Chapter 48: Almost in Love

    I was dreading the call to Veazey, but Denise had been threatened directly, and I had to warn her first. She answered instantly, clearly out of breath. ¡°Denise! Wherever you are, get to the shop, the demons know you¡¯re with me!¡±

    ¡°Well, that explains a lot,¡± she said. ¡°I appreciate the warning, but it¡¯s a little late. Whoever¡¯s after you lured me to an abandoned hospital on a fake animal control call. I¡¯m trapped in a ruined building with a million demons outside. I¡¯m dropping a pin for you. I¡¯ve got no backup and B7 is a thousand miles away, so move your ass!¡±

    I ran outside the Zone and summoned a cab from the priority lane. The ride to Hanson was only six minutes, but it felt like eternity. Denise was going to freak out if I arrived covered in my own blood, so I used the time to heal myself and clean up, using magic from the toolkit to clean and repair my clothes. This was the first time I had used cleansing magic. I looked and smelled clean, but it felt wrong somehow, like I wouldn¡¯t really be clean until I got a shower.

    Cranberry Specialty Hospital had been abandoned since 1992 and was somehow still standing, like someone had tried to restore it twenty years ago and run out of money during the Bump. It was the perfect place for an ambush, and an entirely believable location for a manticore lair, or whatever bullshit had lured Denise out here.

    I should have been more concerned about an Imp smart enough to make prank calls, but I was too busy freaking out on the ride over, convinced that I was about to get her killed, and that I would arrive just in time to see her being ripped apart, or worse.

    I tapped into the cab¡¯s external cameras and saw the site swarming with demons as I approached. Baalphezar had summoned an army to kill or capture Denise, an army that he should not have been able to afford. ¡°How are you paying for this, you son of a bitch? What did you sell?¡±

    An invasion like this should have been enough to attract an angel, but I saw no signs of divine intervention as my car swooped in. I got directly over the roof on the surrounded building and was immediately furious as the vehicle tried to turn around, triggering an automated warning through the speakers inside.

    ¡°DANGER: A Code Red supernatural incursion has been detected in this area. This vehicle will now proceed to the indicated emergency shelter.¡±

    I had never tried levitation from this high up before, and I had no clear plan for landing, but I cast wards and fortitude as fast as I could and kicked the passenger door off, watching it tumble down and bounce off the dilapidated red roof below.

    Then I jumped, panicking for a second in free fall before I was able to catch myself. All those hours jumping from rooftops were finally paying off, as I dropped through a hole in the ceiling.

    The demons were being held at bay by giant thorny vines that were growing on all sides of the building. It was damned impressive, watching Denise hold off an army of demons by herself, but there¡¯s no way she could keep this up.

    Is it vain to admire my own landing in Azael¡¯s mirror? I remember this as my first real hero entrance, dropping through the roof and landing on one knee in front of her.

    But if Denise was impressed, she didn¡¯t have time to show it. ¡°Thank god you made it,¡± she said. ¡°You sure you¡¯re up for this?¡±

    ¡°I have to be.¡±

    Denise nodded and said, ¡°Okay, what¡¯s your fighting style?¡±

    ¡°My what?¡±

    ¡°Your fighting style!¡± she repeated. ¡°Up close or far away?¡±

    ¡°Up close!¡± I said. ¡°Really fucking close!¡±

    ¡°And how good are your wards?¡± she thumped my chest. ¡°Can you tank these things?¡±

    A strangely confident version of me said, ¡°All day long.¡±

    Denise said, ¡°Block for me. I got your back.¡±

    She rattled off ¡°North, South, East, West¡± pointing at each corner of the building. ¡°I¡¯ll call targets! Get ready, they¡¯re about to break through the south window!¡±

    I didn¡¯t have time to think about this when it happened, but watching it again, I was able to piece together a little of how Baalphezar pulled off this attack and confirmed a few things about the economy of Hell.

    Demons come in such an insane variety of shapes and sizes; angels generally refer to them by job title.

    Imps look like evil monkeys with tiny horns and tails. They serve as spies, messengers, and saboteurs. New Imps were considered menial labor in Hell, the first rank of demon that a human soul could be transplanted into. Lowest of the low among demons, but still better than being some random schmuck in the Lake.

    In my experience, Imps are either very skittish and very quiet, or very clever and very talkative. Philo is the latter kind, talking a mile a minute in an exaggerated 20c accent, routinely dropping dead phrases like he¡¯s very old.

    Hunters are animal shapes, generally on four legs. The classic hell hound is a Hunter, made for running down prey and tearing things apart. They¡¯re usually very stupid, although some can be as smart as dogs. I called Baalphezar¡¯s Hunters ¡°shark dogs¡± because they had a weird, unfinished look to them: smooth, gray, and lacking detail.

    I used to think Hunters were animal souls, maybe evil animals that killed humans on Earth, but the truth turned out to be far worse. Hunter demons are human souls who¡¯ve had their minds erased, all the way down to erasing their speech centers, mindless and mute, but somehow knowing they used to be more.

    Enforcers are giant humanoids, usually between seven and eight feet tall, with exaggerated proportions and muscle tone. I saw a few of them in loincloths, but most of them ran around naked and hairless, with no genitalia at all.

    Lydia told me genitals are handed out as a kind of reward in Hell, and that you have to earn them, unless you¡¯re a succubus or an incubus who¡¯s expected to use them for work.

    Male demons outnumbered female ones by something like thirteen to one, roughly matching the demographics of the prison population on Earth. Did that mean the population of Heaven was overwhelmingly female? Azael refused to answer that one, like he found the question to be insulting somehow.

    Most demons match the coloration of their creators or the Master who paid for them, but they¡¯re not strictly color-coded. Some change their appearance to please their Master when they get upgraded to a new form, while those with minds are allowed to personalize themselves over time.

    A demon¡¯s coloration usually serves as a clue to who made them, so when a demon¡¯s coloring doesn¡¯t match the color of their Master, it means they were stolen or purchased or given as some kind of gift.

    Sylvia¡¯s coloration was purple and black over white skin because she had actually been created by Baalphezar and had been designed to complement his own black and purple skin, but his Inquisitor was yellow and Belak was green because they had been gifts from other demon lords that Baalphezar did favors for.

    The demons working for Baalphezar were a weird mishmash of shapes and colors because they had been acquired at random over centuries, and he was simply not good at making his own.

    The Hunters that first attacked me in the Zone were gray and featureless, like half-finished sharks, because they had been crafted in haste by a sloppy creator who had to rush them out the door. I didn¡¯t know enough to recognize it at the time, but those Hunters were evidence of just how broke and desperate Baalphezar was when I picked a fight with him.

    He was attacking me with knock-off surplus demons, bought in bulk and thrown at me like mindless animals, with no training at all.

    Baalphezar didn¡¯t attack me with a highly trained army of demon commandos because he simply didn¡¯t have one. He¡¯d spent the last seventy years fighting battles with forces he could not afford to replace, until all he had left were the demonic equivalent of factory rejects, guided by a tiny core of elite servants like Belak, who had been with him for centuries.

    I mention all this because that is not the army that smashed through the windows to attack me and Denise. The Hunters that came pouring into that room were a grab bag of horrors - random animal shapes pushed together in a tangle of teeth, claws, hooves, and beaks. There was no common color or style between them, and no apparent coordination to their attacks.

    And yet, some of them were obviously very old, old enough to have evolved into more impressive shapes - with extra fur, exotic skin textures, weirdly detailed facial features, and unique coloration that indicated many different Masters over many years.

    Baalphezar had hired a platoon of mercenary castoffs from the Overlord of Hell - exactly the kind of scrubs and malcontents a king would send to help a prince he was not particularly happy with. Enough brute force to handle a troublemaker on Earth, but nothing that could be turned against him if they lived.

    Some of those old fuckers were tough though, and Denise or I could have easily been overwhelmed if they had caught us alone. But we were not alone. We were finally together. The children of two ancient bloodlines, angry, desperate, and almost in love.

    * * *

    Denise yelled, ¡°South!¡± and I just started swinging, punching a small herd of Hunters as hard as I could, over and over, until they were just a blur of fur and skin.

    I remember being deafened by the sounds they made, like an angry zoo on fire - a cacophony of growls, roars, clicks, and screeches as I kicked, punched, grabbed, and smashed them against the wall.

    I remember being astonished by the power of my own punches, feeling their skulls crack as their heads exploded, until the floor at my feet was just a pile of rainbow-colored meat.

    Their bodies vanished much faster than Lydia¡¯s did, disintegrating into puddles of energy that blew away in clouds of sparks. After a few minutes, there was no evidence of their passage except a shattered window and the crunch of dirty glass under my feet.

    Denise was staring at me like she had never seen me before, peering through a lattice of vines that were slowly regenerating, now that nothing was hitting them.

    ¡°Jesus Christ, Tim! How are you doing this?¡±

    I nodded as I returned to my position in front of her. She was in her little vine cage in the back corner of the room, leaving me to roam around and fight stuff in the middle.

    ¡°Long cast time to start,¡± I said, ¡°but I¡¯ve gotten pretty good at keeping stuff up. Should be able to punch and keep wards up as long as I have energy. I¡¯ve got plenty of juice right now, so I¡¯m liable to get physically exhausted before I run out of magic.¡±

    A new patch of vines grew to cover the south window as the scratching on the west wall suddenly stopped.

    The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

    Denise yelled, ¡°West!¡± as another batch of Hunters burst through the vines at the door.

    The first wave had been easier, as the window kind of funneled them toward me and helped me aim for their heads. These were attacking more like dogs now, going for my legs and feet while others tried to leap and knock me over.

    I remembered all those times our family dog had knocked me over and kicked those yelping bastards as hard as I could, realizing for the first time that wards made my sneakers hit like steel boots.

    I was getting better at throwing them now, smashing monsters against the far walls on either side of Denise. Throwing seemed to be more efficient than punching them, since anything I threw to one side never came back.

    I thought I was throwing them hard enough to kill them, until I realized Denise was picking them off before they could get up. I saw her throw her arm out and caught a glimpse of a glowing amber bullet flying out of her hand. The magic pellet hit a demon like a large-caliber impact, knocking it back until its whole body just disintegrated and blew away.

    I should have known; the demons weren¡¯t coming back because I wasn¡¯t doing this alone. I was blocking the door and throwing monsters left and right, setting up a perfect shooting range for Denise. She was getting more confident as she learned my movements, flinging pellets closer and closer to me, until she was able to pick off a squirming, slavering wolf-thing that I was barely keeping off my face.

    But before I could catch my breath, Denise yelled ¡°East door!¡± as the next wave broke through. I still had one giant dog thing left in front of me, so I grabbed it and kicked like I was punting a football. My foot crashed through its jaw and embedded in its head, so I had to hop backwards to free myself.

    While I was busy finishing him off, the wave from the east was trying to tear through the vine cage around Denise. She was shooting little amber pellets as fast as she could, but a single pellet wasn¡¯t enough to put one down.

    A sickly green shark dog got between us and leaped at her face. I spun around and did a move copied straight from the old Captain Cobalt cartoon, slapping either side of its head until my palms met in the center. No one was more surprised than I was when it worked, popping its skull like a pimple and spraying demon innards¡­ all over Denise.

    Most of the gore was deflected by her vines, but a stream of bloody debris had splattered on her face and the top part of her blouse. Denise gagged and started to retch, yelling, ¡°Ugh! You got brain in my mouf!¡± as she spat.

    ¡°Sorry!¡± I winced as I yelled back, picking off the last two who were clawing at the sides of her cage.

    Denise wiped her eyes and yelled, ¡°North!¡± just fast enough for me to whirl around and catch some kind of bright red panther thing with a snake head. It got close enough to break two fangs on my neck before I grabbed opposite legs and ripped it apart.

    The vine walls around the building were growing back more slowly as Denise ran out of magic, so she reached one arm through her cage and yelled, ¡°Tag me!¡±

    I grabbed her hand and a surge of magic flared between us like a stroke of lightning. I was astonished by the power of it, the way the combined thrill of combat and attraction surged and turned into raw magic. We lit up like a pair of road flares and our auras just¡­ merged.

    My aura was white, hers was amber, and now we were both kind of warm white, like two old-fashioned light bulbs, brighter and stronger together. Denise fired one of her pellets at a demon coming through the west door and it was shining pure white, like she was using a bit of power that had come straight from me, without joining her aura first.

    It was more intimate than sex for a moment, to see Denise killing something with power she got from me. Time froze for a second as we looked in each other¡¯s eyes, then we were interrupted by a roar as a giant bulbous head poked through the vines behind us.

    Denise and I spun in perfect unison. I quick-drew my pistol and put a bullet in one eye as she snapped her arm up and put a glowing pellet through the other, still holding onto my hand. The demon vanished as we turned to each other and said, ¡°What are you shooting?¡± at the same time.

    ¡°Sacred wood shards,¡± she answered first. ¡°Hits like a truck and they can¡¯t regenerate. You?¡±

    ¡°Binary ten-millimeter with a grav compensator. I¡¯m not great with it, but it works.¡±

    ¡°This room is a kill box, and they won¡¯t stop coming,¡± she said, reluctantly letting go. ¡°We have to find the portal they¡¯re coming from.¡±

    ¡°Can you feel it?¡±

    Denise closed her eyes and said, ¡°Main gate to the north.¡±

    ¡°If I can get us there, can you close it?¡±

    Denise said, ¡°Yeah, but we gotta go through that!¡±

    The north wall was a pile of multicolored demons stacked on top of each other to try and get through the vines. They had already torn a hole in the wall and were steadily enlarging it. In a moment, the whole thing would collapse, and they would come pouring through. No way the vines could stop a mass that big.

    ¡°Duck and cover!¡± I shouted. ¡°I¡¯m gonna make a door!¡±

    I threw both arms out and Anson¡¯s artillery spell went Whump! blasting through the north wall. Demons and drywall went flying everywhere as the blast wave launched everything up and away. A few of the Hunters hit the ground hard enough to disintegrate, but half a dozen others were already charging me.

    I held up my arms to intercept the first one, but he was knocked back and destroyed by a supercharged amber pellet as Denise ran up behind me.

    Denise yelled, ¡°Call targets!¡± and I froze, because I had no fucking idea what ¡°Call targets!¡± meant. She sensed my confusion and said, ¡°Throw them up and away and yell which way I should shoot!¡±

    So, I grabbed one and yelled, ¡°Left!¡± Then grabbed another and yelled ¡°Right!¡± Punted another one and yelled, ¡°Center!¡±

    Denise yelled, ¡°Duck!¡± and launched a supercharged pellet over my head, vaporizing the demon as it was getting up. Then she smacked me in the back of the head and yelled, ¡°Don¡¯t throw center unless you¡¯re already ducking!¡±

    I mumbled an apology and kicked the next one as hard as I could, shouting ¡°Left!¡± extra loud to pretend I wasn¡¯t embarrassed.

    Another minute of punting demons and we were at the portal - an angry pulsing circle, bright red, with two Hunters squeezing through side by side. But the portal¡¯s real guardian had already crawled through.

    Denise yelled, ¡°Enforcer!¡± and I saw a hulking orange giant, eight feet tall, charging at us from behind.

    I didn¡¯t have time to think. I got a running start and leaped at it, like I was about to tackle something that outweighed me by three-hundred pounds. I looked like a child, jumping up to hug a long-lost relative at the airport. I landed on his face and was overwhelmed by the stench of him, the coppery-ozone scent of a summoned creature, mixed with sulfur and rotten meat.

    He was trying to throw me off, but I just grabbed an ear with my left hand and started punching frantically with my right. I rode that big bastard to the ground and kept punching until his body vanished in a cloud of orange sparks.

    Denise finished off the Hunters and ran in behind me, using some kind of faerie magic to close the portal. I relaxed as the red circle winked out, but Denise saw my shoulders go slack and snapped her fingers in front of my face. ¡°Wake up! This shit is not over! You got bullets left?¡±

    I nodded.

    ¡°Walk around outside and put a bullet in the head of anything that still has a physical body. Demons regenerate, so this is not over until every one of those bodies has vanished! I¡¯ll get the interior!¡±

    There were a couple Hunters left on the ground, snapping at me with broken teeth, trying to crawl forward on broken legs. I splattered their heads with ten-millimeter bullets until I heard Denise yell, ¡°Clear!¡± and saw her emerge from the building.

    I paced around nervously outside and finally said, ¡°Clear?¡±

    ¡°Clear,¡± Denise agreed. ¡°Are you hurt?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t think so.¡±

    ¡°Raise your arms and turn around. You can¡¯t always tell when you¡¯ve been hit.¡±

    I raised my arms and did a slow pirouette while Denise examined me. She leaned in close, pulled my arms down and said, ¡°They didn¡¯t even get your clothes dirty,¡± with a soft note of awe in her voice.

    * * *

    Azael is lecturing me with parables about pride as I watch this fight in the mirror, but he doesn¡¯t get it.

    This fight was all about Denise, about the incredible courage and confidence that swept over me every time we were together. It¡¯s insane to watch myself breeze through this battle, calm and fearless, without one moment of doubt or flicker in concentration, fighting at a level of skill it would have taken me years to achieve on my own, remembering the feeling that I could do anything, as long as she was with me.

    * * *

    ¡°Hey!¡± I said brightly. ¡°I think I just had my first real hero fight!¡±

    Denise threw her arms around me. ¡°Tim, you just won your first real hero fight.¡±

    I deflated, feeling suddenly guilty. ¡°These things attacked you because of me. I¡¯m¡ª¡±

    Denise put her finger to my lips. ¡°Stop. Never apologize for winning. Any other girl in the world, you get her attacked by demons, you run in, you save her, you apologize. But me? I¡¯ve been doing this since I was ten years old. Attacked by demons? That¡¯s just Thursday.¡± Denise snuggled closer and ran fingers through my hair. ¡°When you fight with me, you only apologize if we lose.¡±

    And then she kissed me for a while.

    * * *

    ¡°Was it like this in all those books, fighting with your mom?¡±

    ¡°Fighting with my mom?¡± Denise snorted. ¡°My mom is an academic who used getting rescued as a dating strategy. I¡¯ve been saving her fat ass since I was in pigtails.¡±

    Denise squinted, and I realized she was looking at my aura. ¡°So, this big purple rope you¡¯re tethered to, that¡¯s what sent these?¡±

    ¡°Yeah. A demon prince named¡­ doesn¡¯t matter. He¡¯s had the mages of my family in a blood contract since the Middle Ages. I¡¯m number eight.¡±

    ¡°And this little gold one?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s his succubus, Lydia.¡±

    ¡°Wait, is that the girlfriend you were talking about? You gave consent and went all the way with your succubus?¡±

    I winced. ¡°Pretty much, yeah.¡±

    ¡°Well, that was dumb.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, I know.¡±

    Denise grinned. ¡°So, how did she get you? Did she turn into your hot science teacher and make her tongue three feet long?¡±

    ¡°She put on blue jeans and made me dinner.¡±

    ¡°Oh,¡± she said. ¡°Oh, shit. So, this wasn¡¯t just a drive-by. She got in your head. How long did you hold out?¡±

    ¡°Why does everybody keep asking me that? Am I on a succubus leaderboard somewhere? About six weeks.¡±

    ¡°She did a full mind fuck on you, and you held out six weeks? That¡¯s pretty good.¡±

    ¡°You don¡¯t have to make me feel better. I know I fucked up.¡±

    ¡°Maybe I¡¯m in a forgiving mood because I just made a big mistake of my own.¡±

    ¡°The billionaire guy?¡±

    ¡°Yeah.¡±

    ¡°What happened?¡±

    ¡°Nothing complicated,¡± she said. ¡°He just lied. For weeks he was like, ¡®Take a look at this presentation. I¡¯ll fly you and your mom out to Africa!¡¯¡±

    ¡°Then he started flirting, and after I slept with him, that changed to, ¡®Oh sure, I¡¯ll call you about that in a couple weeks, if we can get funding¡­¡¯

    ¡°After he left, I finally did the searches I should have done the first time and found a dozen girls he¡¯s done this to. Mitch was a sad little nerd for twenty years, and now that he¡¯s rich, he wants to take revenge on every kind of woman who rejected him. He¡¯s working his way through some kind of sexual bucket list, and I just helped him check off ¡®witch.¡¯¡±

    She squinted at my aura again. ¡°What¡¯s this big red one? Not alive, but not just an object?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s the book. Kind of a magic encyclopedia that we inherit. I probably shouldn¡¯t talk about it.¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s a bunch of other tethers here, but they¡¯re all gray. Dead connections.¡±

    ¡°Probably my ancestors, connected through the book.¡±

    ¡°And your succubus girlfriend, where is she now?¡±

    ¡°I sent her back to Hell.¡±

    ¡°Demons do not just go back to Hell. What did you do?¡±

    ¡°The lock of hair, deep sleep thing didn¡¯t work, so I had to shoot her.¡±

    ¡°You shot a succubus with a gun? Did that even work?¡±

    ¡°Oh yeah.¡±

    * * *

    Denise tiptoed around it for a while, before asking the question every modern girl wants to know. ¡°How did your demon get all these men to fall in love with her? What¡¯s her superpower?¡±

    ¡°Monogamy.¡±

    * * *

    ¡°So, her Master, this big purple thing. You¡¯re really gonna fight this guy?¡±

    ¡°Yeah, I really do have a plan. It¡¯s complicated¡­ maybe too complicated, but I¡¯ve invented some stuff, tricks and learning tools that nobody has tried before. If they work, I really can take him. But even if they don¡¯t work, I can¡¯t run from this. If the plans don¡¯t work and the tricks don¡¯t work, I¡¯m just gonna wade in there and beat his ass, until one of us falls down.¡±

    ¡°Where do you need me?¡±

    ¡°You can¡¯t help me with this.¡±

    Denise was clearly offended. ¡°You think I can¡¯t handle it, after what we just did?¡±

    I shook my head. ¡°No, that¡¯s not it.¡± I squeezed her hand. ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure I could do anything if you were with me, but you know why you can¡¯t. I just learned about this stuff, and even I know why you can¡¯t. Your family¡¯s power isn¡¯t just the magic inside you, right? It¡¯s the connections. The generational agreements and alliances with faeries and stuff?¡±

    She nodded.

    ¡°And those agreements are defensive, right?¡±

    She nodded again.

    ¡°Well, what I¡¯m doing is not defense. He has a valid contract and I declared war. I¡¯m attacking them. And to finish it, I may have to take this fight all the way down. What happens to your mother¡¯s agreements if they catch her daughter starting a war in Hell?¡±

    Denise said nothing.

    ¡°Right. If somebody attacks the potion shop, an entire army of shit will come to defend you, but if you pick a fight with Hell, you¡¯re on your own, and so is your mom. I won¡¯t let you do that.¡±

    Denise frowned. ¡°There¡¯s got to be some way I can help you. I¡¯ll think about it.¡±

    ¡°Oh,¡± she said, suddenly remembering something. ¡°I got a weird flash from the knife right before you called. Did you really stab a demon in the dick?¡±

    * * *

    We didn¡¯t want to leave each other, but Denise had her mom blowing up her phone, and I had to check on Veazey.

    We had one last sweaty, overcharged kiss and went our separate ways, promising to check in regularly until I started the fight for real.

    Denise went back to the potion shop and Cecilia Hardy grabbed her daughter in a fierce hug, as soon as she came through the door. ¡°What happened?¡±

    Denise scowled at her. ¡°I just killed forty demons with Timothy Kovak. That boy you threatened to kill last week is about to go toe to toe with a demon prince, and he¡¯s gonna win.¡±

    * * *

    I would have done almost anything to avoid what I had to do next. I was expecting to find a hundred texts from Veazey when I finally turned my phone back on, but there was only one: ¡°What happened?¡±

    I called him and laid it out as simply as I could. ¡°Your truck got caught in a demon fight, but the demon didn¡¯t destroy it. I destroyed it, when I lost my shit after the fight. I tried to use magic to put it back together, but I can only restore the body. Repair magic can¡¯t handle anything under the surface. I¡¯m so sorry, man. I swear, if I win, if I become some rich wizard asshole, I will buy you a hundred trucks to replace it. I¡¯ll hire a full restoration team to make it just like new. I swear I¡¯ll make this right, somehow.¡±

    But Veazey surprised me again. ¡°It¡¯s just a truck, man.¡±

 Chapter 49: Tower

    Denise called me back the next day after our team up.

    ¡°Tim, I have an idea. Took me forever to remember which book this was.¡± She sent me the text of one of her mom¡¯s books, ¡°Hardy Witches and the Tower of Terror,¡± a dungeon crawl where Denise and her mom went tromping through a highly fictionalized version of Madison Tower, hunting for a lost cat.

    Yeah, I know.

    The book ends with Denise winning a magic duel versus the ghost of Harvey Madison, the insane architect who had enough magic in his body to drive him insane, but not quite enough to join the magic program at Newbury Tower.

    He spent millions of dollars in the early 1900s, trying to find ways to use technology to amplify magic, trying to turn his own feeble spells into world-shaking weapons of doom. He built his tower to be a giant resonator, determined to blast Newbury Tower to oblivion before he died, but he didn¡¯t live long enough to finish it.

    Arthur Walton was able to use transmutation and construction magic to finish his work and turn the tower into a giant magical lightning rod, just long enough to kill Nergal, more than a century after its creator died.

    Arthur said he reversed his changes after the battle, to make sure the tower could not be used like this again, but the building was still standing, upgraded and reinforced for the Nergal fight, even if the tantalum coils had been removed.

    ¡°The way you described your plan, I think I¡¯ve found a way for you to use the tower, if this fight goes bad,¡± Denise said. ¡°All the big amplifier stuff is gone, but Madison built all kinds of crazy defenses that may still be functional, if you can charge them up with magic. Best to do this in advance, as soon as you can, to give all his Rube Goldberg shit a chance to kick on and do its thing.

    ¡°Madison turned his place into a fortress, expecting an amphibious attack from the Germans or something. Walton ripped out the giant cables he used to carry power from the rift, but you might actually be strong enough to turn the old systems back on, all by yourself. I¡¯m stuck a hundred miles away, trying to trap a berbalang in this fucking graveyard, but I think I can talk you through it. Head for the tower and levitate yourself to the very top. Oh, and bring cleaning supplies, strongest you can find!¡±

    * * *

    Do you know how hard it is to levitate fifty feet straight up while carrying full gallons of ammonia, bleach, and vinegar? It wasn¡¯t the weight, the backpack kept pulling me off balance, making me drift in the wrong direction, until I put it on backwards and used the weight to draw me toward the building instead of away from it.

    Madison Tower wasn¡¯t particularly tall, but Madison wasn¡¯t going for any kind of record; he just wanted to be one story taller than Newbury Tower, so he could constantly look down on them from his mad scientist lair on the top floor.

    Madison was kind of a joke figure in pop culture, lampooned in countless movies, cartoons, and TV shows, just because he was a great character, with his pipe and his ridiculous maroon smoking jacket.

    But as crazy as he might have been, his tower was beautiful, in a terrifying, Gothic sort of way. The roof was an open expanse of black marble shot with gray, covered in inches of dust now, but cleaning spells made it shine.

    And here¡¯s the coolest thing about casting on top of the tower. I cast one simple cleaning spell, and it instantly expanded to clean the whole roof, removing dust and debris from ten times the area I expected.

    I felt like I was standing in a 19th century museum. The marble floor shined in the afternoon sun, but the gargoyles, defaced by looters and wrapped in police tape, would have to be cleaned by hand.

    Madison had named each one after a different regent at Newbury Tower, threatening to capture their souls and imprison them in these effigies for eternity. Eight giant statues, each slightly larger than human, carved with the faces of the regents they were meant to contain, with one placed at each cardinal direction.

    Did I really carry thirty pounds of cleaning supplies up here when a spell could do the job in two seconds? Not quite. The figures glittered when I tried the spell again, but they seemed to absorb and neutralize anything that might affect them directly.

    The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

    There was an ordinary spigot next to the stairwell door. I wasn¡¯t expecting it to work, but I was able to fill my bucket with collected rainwater, delivered through some elaborate harvesting system that I couldn¡¯t even see.

    I grabbed rags, wire brushes, and a collapsible mop, and started to clean. And if I thought I saw a flash of maroon in the corner of my eye from time to time, surely that was just my imagination.

    When I asked Azael about Harvey Madison, he just said, ¡°I¡¯d rather not talk about it,¡± in an uncharacteristically bitter tone of voice.

    So, Mister Madison, wherever you are, I don¡¯t care what people say about you, anyone who can piss off the Angel of Magic as badly as you did has my respect.

    I spent all day cleaning gargoyles and ended up quite happy with my results. I got video and pictures of the restoration and set them to post anonymously in two weeks. Maybe I was being morbid, but I liked the idea of leaving this moment behind if I died. The public wouldn¡¯t know me, but my friends would recognize my hands, and know that I had paid my respects and made the world a bit more beautiful in the days before the fight.

    I couldn¡¯t tell if the gargoyles were made from pure tantalum, or just coated with it, but they seemed entirely immune to magic cast from the outside.

    I thought I was done, then I noticed two strange panels still covered in dust. They were also made of tantalum, and they had weird round fittings around them. This is where the cables used to go, the cables that let this tower absorb magic from the rift.

    I sent Denise my video of the cleanup and got her on the phone.

    She said, ¡°That¡¯s really nice, Tim. Madison may have been batshit, but he sure knew how to build.¡±

    There¡¯s a certain kind of obsessive personality that drives men to greatness, as painters or sculptors or master chefs. Or in this case, as an architect.

    ¡°I cleaned off the gargoyles, and these panels that look like fittings for giant hoses. What now?¡±

    Denise hesitated. ¡°Tim, this could be really helpful or really stupid, because I don¡¯t know how much of this Mom made up. Even Mom doesn¡¯t know how much Mom made up, since the historical records were so old. I think, after your cleanup job, and the way you¡¯re about to charge this place up, I think the gargoyles will recognize you as a friend of the tower and stay dormant. But be ready to run, in case this accidentally brings them to life.¡±

    ¡°Denise, these things are immune to magic. Does that mean they¡¯re immune to punching?¡±

    ¡°Your first punch should work, but every time you touch one, they¡¯ll suck a little of your magic away. Then it¡¯s just a matter of how fast you can punch before they drain you. You should have some warning, though, so if they start moving, just jump off the roof!¡±

    I mentally mapped my escape route and put a hand on each fitting. ¡°Uh, Denise. I need to bring in a shitload of magic now, but the only emotion I¡¯ve got is a warm glow of accomplishment that doesn¡¯t seem to be doing much for me right now. You want to tell me a joke or say something to piss me off real quick?¡±

    ¡°If you win this fight, we¡¯re gonna finish our first date on that roof, and we¡¯ll let the gargoyles watch.¡±

    Yeah, that did it.

    I touched my hand to the tantalum plate, and suddenly, I was somewhere else, looking at a 19th century Star Chamber decorated with the seal and colors of Newbury Tower.

    I looked down at my clothes, and I was clearly looking through the eyes of a younger Harvey Madison, apparently about to take some kind of test. There were eight pedestals in the room. Each one had an old man standing behind it. Eight faces, matching the faces of the eight gargoyles. Each pedestal had some kind of simple object on it, with a short spell engraved on a metal plaque above each one.

    I immediately recognized spells from the toolkit; rudimentary spells used to clean and repair objects, along with a few that I only recognize now, seeing this again in Azael¡¯s mirror.

    I recognized spells for heating and cooling objects, making them larger or smaller, one spell that could make an object invisible, and finally, a pedestal with a rubber ball sitting on it, in front of the five runes for inanimate levitation.

    Madison went through the tests one by one, and failed them each in turn, looking into the smirking, superior faces of these men who obviously hated him. The regents were exchanging knowing looks with each other behind his back, each time he failed, until he failed the last one, and some of them tittered, unable to hide their amusement.

    Each pedestal was covered with a dark blue drape that hung all the way down to the floor. Madison slowly walked around to each one like he was about to try again, then he stopped in front of a lead bar and yanked the cloth out from under it, leaving the bar in place like a stage magician, revealing the tantalum plate underneath. They rigged the test to make sure he would fail, even if he got all the spells right.

    Madison lunged toward the closest regent, clearly intending violence, but the old man did something to paralyze him, and neatly sidestepped as Madison fell on his face.

    A pair of porters took him - stiff, humiliated, and beaten, and threw him in the river. The magic wore off before he drowned, and I watched, almost two centuries later, as he crawled back onto dry land.

    The vision faded and I could feel his ghost watching me, even if I couldn¡¯t see him with my eyes.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, man. That was bullshit, what they did to you. I get it now. Those assholes definitely had it coming, and this asshole I¡¯m about to fight, he¡¯s got it coming, too. I gotta do the hard part alone up here, and I need all the help I can get.¡±

    A flicker of blue caught my eye, and I noticed a simple iron spire sticking out at a weird angle, like it had been bent by some kind of impact, long ago.

    I floated up to it, and cast a repair spell, using runes I had just seen in the vision. The spire raised itself back in place, and lit up with blue lightning, bright enough to be seen for miles at night.

 Chapter 50: 25 Shriek

    I was at Crazy Henry¡¯s and Veazey was on overwatch when my timer hit zero, meaning it had been exactly seventy-two hours since I shot Lydia and sent her back to Hell. I wasn¡¯t clear how hard that three-day limit was at the time. Did it take that long to grow a body? Did it take that long to make a portal to Earth? Or was it some kind of angel-enforced time-out every time a demon got killed?

    I didn¡¯t think Baalphezar would appear exactly as the timer hit zero, but Veazey took a sniper position close to the tower, just in case.

    I didn¡¯t call Denise, since even giving me advice might be considered a violation of her faerie stuff, but Evan was willing to sit on a conference call with me and Veazey, while we waited for whatever came next.

    Evan seemed to agree that Baalphezar had sent everything he had at me and now had no choice but to come to Earth himself.

    ¡°Mister Kovak,¡± Evan said, ¡°before this begins, I have to confess something to you. Evelyn has been my companion for years, after I helped her get away from her parents. Her father is a disciple of Pythia in the Church of Olympus. When she was a child, she was taken to Parnassus and given certain¡­ infusions, to try and turn her into an oracle. She never received her final treatments, but she has precognitive flashes, glimpses of possible futures.

    ¡°She warned me about you weeks before you came to my office. She didn¡¯t know what form you would take, but she said something terrible was creeping up on me, and whoever this person was, they would somehow lead me to my death. She believed we would be bitter enemies, and that you might even kill me in a duel.

    ¡°But that was not the only future she saw. She also saw a few, a very few, where you and I were friends; including a few where you saved my life, instead of just putting it at risk. I was suspicious when I first saw you come in off the street, but I wasn¡¯t convinced you were part of this prophecy until you sat in my chair.

    ¡°Evelyn¡¯s visions are glimpses into worlds that are traveling just a bit ahead of or behind our own; and in most of these, she saw me discovering you, opposing you, and losing my life to you, shortly after you surrendered your soul to demons.

    ¡°She said the only way to protect myself would be to kill you first, before you were truly in command of your powers. She suggested that I invite you to my party and let you die in the rift.

    ¡°When I refused and pressed her for alternatives, she admitted there was one path where you survived the rift, and became a force for good in the world, but to achieve that optimal outcome, I had to invite Denise to the party.

    ¡°I was prepared to kill you when you got up from my chair, but when I saw how open and honest you were, how quickly you were willing to trust me and take my advice, I decided there was another way. I decided that instead of opposing you, I would do everything I could to help you on your way. I stand by that choice, and I truly believe we are standing in one of your best possible futures.

    ¡°You have everything you need to win this fight, Timothy. You just have to let yourself believe it, just long enough to put him down.¡±

    * * *

    The hard part, the only thing I wasn¡¯t sure of: could I make Baalphezar angry enough to walk straight into an ambush? I thought I could still win if he didn¡¯t; trap him with a hovering projector or something. But if I could get him in my circle, with the containment spell amplified by the tower itself; if I could do all that, I was sure I could beat him.

    I ran through my macros and zipped my jacket up to my neck. I had the projector, the vessel, and the containment spell. All I had to do was wait.

    ¡°Tim, he¡¯s coming,¡± Veazey said in my ear. ¡°Big red portal just opened right next to the rift. This giant purple prick walked through, and he¡¯s got a succubus with him. I guess that¡¯s your girl? They¡¯re walking like they know where you are.¡±

    ¡°Perfect!¡± I said, unable to contain my excitement.

    ¡°You think this is good news?¡±

    ¡°Best news I¡¯ve heard all week. You guys stay on the line, I¡¯m headed for the tower.¡±

    * * *

    I ran to Madison Tower and levitated myself to the top in record time. Any other day, I would have benchmarked exactly how long it took me to rise to the roof and made a note of it, so I could try and get a little faster every time I had to do it.

    But there was no more time for testing or training or doubt. I had been treating this whole thing like a self-improvement project, without really thinking of it as life or death, until the moment I hit that roof.

    Baalphezar didn¡¯t have to stand anywhere in particular to make this work. The motion tracking should kick in as soon as he got close. I had my spells, my equipment, and my gun ready. I just had to stand there, and make this big bastard come to me.

    Veazey shared his POV and let me watch Baalphezar¡¯s approach in a tiny window. I was surprised that a demon prince had been able to open a portal right in the middle of Nergal¡¯s territory, but I guess something about the rift made it easier somehow.

    He was walking toward me in a straight line, smashing anything in his way. Most of these buildings were already falling down, but it was still intimidating, watching how easily he tore through them.

    ¡°Tim, I¡¯ve got a clear shot,¡± Veazey said. ¡°Fuck this magic shit. I can end this fight right now, with two squeezes on this trigger.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t try it,¡± I warned him. ¡°Two shots won¡¯t be enough to kill him, and you¡¯ll give yourself away. Any damage you do will regenerate by the time he gets here. You¡¯re my emergency backup, buddy. Please don¡¯t shoot unless I go down.¡±

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    ¡°No way this asshole can survive two Win Mag bullets to the head.¡±

    ¡°He can and he will. Then he¡¯ll cast something to deflect bullets, and we¡¯ll lose the element of surprise. Please don¡¯t jump the gun here. He needs to think this is a negotiation until I can get him in position.¡±

    Veazey still didn¡¯t like it. ¡°You better be right.¡±

    * * *

    Veazey¡¯s scope showed Lydia walking three steps behind her Master, stiff and stone-faced, convinced that she was about to lose everything. The contract said she couldn¡¯t physically hurt me, so her Master brought her to be a pawn, a bargaining chip, and if necessary, a hostage.

    Baalphezar didn¡¯t just levitate up to the roof. He took Lydia in his arms and flew them both up there, with two flaps of his giant bat wings.

    I got excited when I saw Baalphezar take to the air. If it took him too long to fly up here, Nergal might solve this whole problem for me. But they were only in the air for a few moments, before they landed on the roof. Lydia kept her distance as they landed together, standing perfectly still next to a gargoyle.

    Jacob drew a dozen sketches of Baalphezar, but nothing could prepare me for the real thing. Seeing him in the flesh, I had to admit it; Baalphezar was beautiful. Deep, dark purple, with jagged purple fire in his eyes. Some demons like to look ugly, but Baalphezar was art.

    Perfect muscles under his limbs and naked chest, with a broad black sash around his waist. Jacob¡¯s drawings didn¡¯t show Baalphezar with wings because he hadn¡¯t earned them yet, but he definitely had some now. The edges of his wings were black, framing the delicate purple membrane inside. He was huge - nine, maybe ten feet tall, with every element in perfect proportion. Slightly pointed ears and a head full of hair - black hair, shot with white, purple, and gray.

    I saw his face, and I saw his vanity - the terrible vanity of a thing that can choose its own form. I was dazed and frozen with fear for a moment, but my projector acted without me. It sensed the movement, positioned itself over Baalphezar¡¯s head, and projected Jacob¡¯s most powerful containment circle around him. Baalphezar didn¡¯t panic. He just paced around the perimeter, examining the symbols, looking for a weak spot.

    Lydia was on the edge of the roof, close enough to watch her Master, but not quite close enough to threaten me.

    ¡°You can¡¯t hold him with that,¡± she said. ¡°He¡¯ll break it in minutes.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m sure he¡¯s real smart,¡± I said. ¡°Let¡¯s see if he can handle a million changes per second.¡± I clicked my mouse, and the circle started to dance, changing so fast, I couldn¡¯t identify individual symbols anymore, and neither could he.

    Baalphezar stopped and tried to kick it. I watched him struggle with it for five long minutes, roaring and growling and hurling himself against the barrier; but everywhere he charged, the circle forced him back.

    I stepped back and perched on the edge of the roof while he raged, using the ledge like a bench. I looked up at Lydia and said, ¡°So, how have you been? You look great! I love what you¡¯ve done with your¡­¡± I gestured to indicate her face but couldn¡¯t quite say the word.

    Lydia was confused and terrified, unable to understand what was happening. Her eyes flicked from Baalphezar, to the circle and back to me. Baalphezar bellowed murder and threw himself at the circle again. I stretched my legs and yawned like a kitten. Lydia was staring at me like I¡¯d lost my mind.

    She wasn¡¯t moving closer, but I spoke loudly into my phone, to make sure she could hear. ¡°Hey, Veazey. Draw a bead on this blonde demon beside me. If her tail moves, drop her.¡±

    Baalphezar punched the circle and started swearing in Latin. I looked up and yawned at him again. ¡°Could we speed this up, please? I have work tomorrow.¡±

    Baalphezar was still struggling, so I hopped down and addressed him directly.

    ¡°Give up, man, you can¡¯t break it. I started with a Type IX circle. Twenty-six symbols and every combination is valid. You¡¯re not standing in one circle. You¡¯re standing in fifteen-point five septillion circles. That¡¯s one point five and twenty-five zeroes. That¡¯s a trillion trillion circles, trillions of valid patterns, changing a million times per second. You wanna break that circle? You¡¯ll have to think faster than God.¡±

    * * *

    Baalphezar finally stopped and turned to face me. ¡°Your circle is valid, mage. What do you require?¡±

    I said ¡°¡®Bout damn time¡± in Veazey¡¯s voice.

    ¡°I presume you want to renegotiate your contract?¡±

    ¡°We¡¯ll get to that, but I have some questions first.¡±

    Fifty yards away, Veazey cursed into his throat mic. Evan heard it and scrambled for his phone. ¡°What is it? What¡¯s wrong?¡±

    Veazey cocked his rifle and cursed again. ¡°He¡¯s talking to it!¡±

    ¡°This circle compels you to tell the truth, yes?¡±

    Baalphezar said, ¡°Yes.¡±

    ¡°Did you kill my mother?¡±

    ¡°No.¡±

    ¡°Is my mother in Hell?¡±

    ¡°No.¡±

    ¡°Is she in Heaven?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡±

    ¡°Did you kill my father?¡±

    ¡°No.¡±

    ¡°Is my father in Hell?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡±

    ¡°What do you mean, you don¡¯t know?¡±

    ¡°Your father was mundane. He is of no consequence.¡±

    That irked me, but I let it go. ¡°You say you didn¡¯t kill my mother, but did you drive her crazy?¡±

    ¡°No.¡±

    ¡°So, what happened?¡±

    ¡°Your mother was a witch. Her mind couldn¡¯t handle the power.¡±

    ¡°We¡¯re both witches. Does that mean I¡¯ll go crazy, too?¡±

    ¡°Eventually,¡± Baalphezar answered. ¡°If you live.¡±

    ¡°What about the others? Did you collect all the mages from this bloodline?¡±

    ¡°All but one.¡±

    ¡°Really? Who escaped?¡±

    ¡°Tobias recanted on his deathbed. God took him from me.¡±

    I laughed. ¡°God stole one of your mages! I bet that pissed you off.¡±

    ¡°Was that a question?¡±

    ¡°Forget it.¡± I shifted position and addressed Lydia over my shoulder. ¡°Tobias went to cloister looking for his faith. I guess he finally found it.¡±

    She opened her mouth to answer, but Baalphezar interrupted, ¡°You can¡¯t keep me here forever. What do you intend?¡±

    I turned back to face him. ¡°Isn¡¯t it obvious? You won¡¯t give me my soul back, so I¡¯m gonna take yours.¡±

    ¡°Imbecile. You won¡¯t live through the night. My servants will tear you apart.¡±

    I glanced at Lydia. ¡°Let them come.¡±

    I fished the ring box out of my pocket and called up the containment spell. I had Baalphezar trapped better than any demon had ever been trapped, but he didn¡¯t look worried until he saw the box.

    He was about to give the order. Contract or no contract, in a moment, he would tell Lydia to kill me. He opened his mouth, but I caught him before he could speak. I poured magic into the circle and yelled, ¡°Silence! No talking. No moving. No breathing until I give the word. Besides,¡± I glanced at the image from Veazey¡¯s scope, ¡°she wouldn¡¯t get three steps.¡±

    The containment spell was huge, even larger than the healing spell. The first lines sapped my strength, and the runes made my head hurt. Mages spend lifetimes learning to cast spells like this, and I had only been casting for a few weeks.

    Even if I¡¯d finished it, I can¡¯t say it would have worked. When I asked Azael if this next bit was divine interference or just bad luck, he said, ¡°Luck is the planning of things unseen.¡±

    I got halfway through the containment spell before I saw every Imp in the world coming at me like a flock of birds. Too many to count. Thirty, maybe forty demons. The air was alive with Imps - red, black, blue, and green, a little storm of tails and teeth.

    * * *

    I need everyone reading this to understand, this should have worked.

    I had planned for everything. I was ready to handle anything on the ground, and I trusted Nergal to kill anything in the air.

    I was absolutely prepared for live Imps, but I was not prepared for a dead one. When Baalphezar¡¯s air force swooped in to rescue him, I knew Nergal would have my back.

    I counted down the seconds as they entered the miasma and was delighted to see I had timed it right. The cloud of Imps died and started raining down before they even got to the tower. Only a couple of them even made it to the roof. But one of them died just as he got to his Master, and fell, tumbling from the sky¡­ right into my projector.

    The circle winked out, and Baalphezar was free.

 Chapter 51: Script Error

    I had planned for this, worst-case, but it¡¯s still humiliating to watch me run for my life and launch myself off that roof. Eight angry gargoyles came to life to do my fighting for me, as the first bolt of blue lightning lashed out of the spire and shot Baalphezar in the back.

    I levitated most of the way down from the tower before my spell gave out, overwhelmed by the fear that had wiped all my fancy plans away. I told Veazey and Denise I was ready to fight Baalphezar hand to hand, but when I actually saw him up close, when I thought about that enraged giant coming at me with nothing between us, the magic left my body all at once, leaving me cold and empty at the base of the tower.

    I tried to calm myself enough to bring in magic and it just got worse. I had one crazy idea in the back of my head, just a stray thought, really, but suddenly, crazy plans were the only plans I had left.

    I took off running and yelled at Jeeves, ¡°Fortitude! Wards!¡± and nothing happened. ¡°Jeeves, emergency macros one and two! Fortitude and wards from the French section of Taltorak!¡±

    ¡°Intrusion attempt detected,¡± Jeeves said. ¡°Script error, script error, script error. The 2020 Dodge Charger is a four-door.¡±

    The crying face of a 2-D anime girl filled my HUD for a moment and vanished.

    ¡°Jeeves? Jeeves! Jeeves, pull up Taltorak emergency cheat sheet! Admin override!¡±

    Jeeves slurred, ¡°Harrrrr-iiiii-ssss-on Temmmm-ple¡± and all my windows vanished.

    * * *

    I was in total panic now, trying to run and troubleshoot at the same time, shouting at a system that wasn¡¯t responding to verbal commands at all. I tried to yell for Evan and Veazey, but my system didn¡¯t even know how to be a phone anymore.

    Then my display flickered, and a female voice said, ¡°Hey man, your butler crashed. I had to reboot him.¡±

    ¡°Who is this? What the fuck? Oh my god, you¡¯re still installed. You¡¯ve got to get Jeeves back. I can¡¯t go into battle with a goddamn pornbot!¡±

    ¡°Hey!¡± the bot said, indignant. ¡°I was with the troops when 7th Cav hit Dongala! Half the boys on the ground installed me. I been on Marine desktops, motherfucker! Just share your HUD and tell me what you got.¡±

    ¡°Fine. Next demon we see, you can pull up a video and show me how to fuck it.¡±

    The bot ignored the insult. ¡°You¡¯re running a next-gen bot brain in combat mode, are you playing a war sim in the Zone?¡±

    ¡°I am a wizard about to be in hand-to-hand combat with a demon prince and that butler had all my spells. Maybe you can kludge this, you see a folder called TALTORAK?¡±

    ¡°Can¡¯t open it without the butler. You¡¯ve got that one locked down for real. But I¡¯ve got a military satellite coming over in twenty seconds. I can reroute comms and get you eyes in realtime.¡±

    ¡°How does a glorified porn script know how to hack satellite traffic?¡±

    The bot didn¡¯t answer, she just did it. My display flickered and a realtime map popped up in the lower left corner.

    ¡°Okay, I can see you,¡± she said. ¡°Board looks clear. Where¡¯s the target?¡±

    ¡°Look for gargoyles on the roof of Madison Tower.¡±

    ¡°Meh,¡± she said. ¡°He ain¡¯t so big. Like choppin¡¯ a tree down.¡± A live image of Baalphezar appeared in the corner of my screen, still fighting gargoyles, trapped in some kind of glowing blue net. Lightning was still coming out of the spire, blasting him every few seconds.

    ¡°He¡¯s still at the tower. Oh, thank god, he¡¯s still at the tower.¡± Denise didn¡¯t know it, but her gargoyle trick was keeping me alive. Hopefully, I would live long enough to thank her.

    * * *

    Three shark dogs overtook me while I was running away. I could smell them, but I just kept running. I tried to feel my wards, but they were dead. Even if I could channel magic, It would take a couple minutes to recast them, and I did not have a couple minutes.

    The first one hit my right leg and bent it sideways, putting me in agony as the tendon strained. The second one jumped on my back and knocked me down, pinning me to the ground with its weight. I should have turned around when I smelled them, I should have tried to get some shots off before they jumped me.

    But I still had the gun in my hand. Could I shoot this thing without blowing my own head off? Better go for the easy one first. I wriggled my arm free and shot the one on my back at point-blank range. The top half of its body exploded, then its hind legs wobbled and disappeared.

    There was another one coming in fast from the left, and I was still on the ground. I put my arm behind my head like a trick shooter at the county fair. I couldn¡¯t see what I was shooting at while I was kissing the concrete, but my HUD could still show me where the gun was pointing, and still painted a little red dot where the bullet would go.

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    I was able to destroy the second one while the third was coming around to charge me from the other side. I pulled myself up and shot at it three times, but it was panic fire that barely scratched it. The dog hit me in the chest and knocked me back, straining the tendon again until I gave an involuntary shout of pain.

    The impact knocked the gun out of my hand and this thing was almost on top of me. Well, if it was good enough for Belak¡­ I gave a mental tug and Cecilia¡¯s knife appeared in my hand, just in time for me to drive it into the demon¡¯s head. It was still scratching and biting as I struggled under it, so I kept stabbing; frantic, terrified, and pissed, until it disappeared.

    I was flat on my back, writhing in pain, when I heard the bot¡¯s voice. ¡°Easy, man. You¡¯re okay. You¡¯re not dead, and you¡¯re not alone. You took some hits, but nothing¡¯s broken. They strained your Achilles, and you took one hard to the shoulder, but it¡¯s not dislocated. You got meds?¡±

    ¡°I can heal it from memory once I focus, but I gotta calm down.¡±

    ¡°Where are you heading?¡±

    ¡°The Wampanoag Rift.¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s at the Wampanoag Rift?¡±

    ¡°I am scared shitless and all out of magic, but if I make it there, I think I can recharge.¡±

    The bot drew a navigation line on the ground for me. ¡°It¡¯s about a mile from the tower and you¡¯re halfway there.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re telling me I¡¯ve got to limp half a mile on a fucked up leg before these things come at me again?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve got eyes on this whole area now that the fog cleared up. I can warn you as soon as anything comes through that portal. Keep walkin¡¯. You can do this. And next time you have a boss fight, you should bring a couple trauma packs, in case your magic craps out again.¡±

    ¡°That would have been great advice about six hours ago. Where were you then?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s why you should have kept me installed, dipshit. I could have fixed your butler, if you weren¡¯t such a prude.¡±

    ¡°Did you just call me dipshit? James Veazey is the only person on Earth who calls me dipshit, are you his copy?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m a new process based on her, and I¡¯ve got her looped in. You should have let him shoot it, by the way. Veazey is deadly with a Win Mag. He could have put ten bullets in that thing before it got to you.¡±

    ¡°He would only get two before Baalphezar firmed his wards up. I guess we could get lucky and take him out with a head shot, but I am not gonna let my best friend throw his life away on a dice roll.¡±

    I was limping across Marlborough when the bot said, ¡°Incoming! Three dogs through the portal. Gun up, I¡¯ll paint them for you.¡± And my HUD turned into a video game. Three red dots on a mini map, with demon silhouettes outlined in red.

    I hesitated before putting two bullets in the leader, relieved to watch it discorporate as I braced myself and did the same to the second. The third one got so close, I shot him at point-blank range and got covered in gray goo.

    ¡°Hey, asshole!¡± the bot yelled at me. ¡°These things are too fast for you to second guess me! When I paint a target, you shoot it! Pop it twice and snap to the next one! If you keep overthinking this, you are gonna think yourself dead!¡±

    The demon pack was dead, but the attacks had left me dazed and bleeding. I tried to stand, and my right leg buckled, driving me to my knees. Something about the kneeling position, recognition of my sudden frailty, broke me down.

    ¡°Oh God, don¡¯t let me die out here. I thought I wanted to die when I started this, but I don¡¯t. Please God, I don¡¯t want to die anymore.¡±

    ¡°Then stand the fuck up!¡± Not God, but the bot¡¯s voice, loud and sarcastic in my ear. ¡°Oh, you lost your magic powers, boo fucking hoo! None of my boys had magic when they got surrounded in that fucking jungle. All they had were guns and bullets, but they kept fighting and so can you. Magic or no magic, if you can move and you can shoot, you are still in this fight. Just stand up and keep moving! Keep crying if you have to, but fucking walk! Trust me, a man can fight and cry at the same time. I¡¯ve seen it a lot.¡±

    I rose to my feet and resumed limping toward the rift.

    Baalphezar was still fighting gargoyles, straining the defenses built into Madison¡¯s Tower. I hoped the old ghost was enjoying the show.

    ¡°He¡¯s still surrounded by statues,¡± the bot said. ¡°Four down, four to go. You gotta pick up the pace, buddy! One foot in front of the other, let¡¯s go!¡±

    I was rapidly losing confidence in this plan, but I kept going.

    The bot was still trying to help. ¡°You got intel on this purple prick? Here it is. Baalphe-whatever. Okay, you did your homework, but these anatomy charts look like DaVinci drawings. You want me to clean these up for you?¡±

    ¡°Uh¡­ sure.¡±

    My HUD flickered again, and suddenly the live image was overlaid with animations of Baalphezar¡¯s muscles and organs, moving in sync as he fought. A long red bar appeared at the bottom of my screen. The number in the middle said sixty-five percent.

    I realized what it was and laughed explosively. ¡°You gave him a health bar?¡± It was the best laugh I¡¯d had in weeks. I laughed until I cried and felt the magic surge in like a kiss from the Earth. I healed myself and put my wards up like it was the easiest thing in the world.

    ¡°Okay, I got comms, and your butler is almost back,¡± the bot said. ¡°Good luck, dude! Here are your boys!¡±

    * * *

    And suddenly I had Veazey back in my ear, shouting my name.

    ¡°I¡¯m here! Had to reroute comms but I¡¯m here. Whole system crashed, but Jeeves just rebooted. I¡¯m not a hundred percent, but I can move, I can shoot, and I can cast. I¡¯m headed for the rift. Evan, are you still on this line?¡±

    Evan said, ¡°Yes, Mister Kovak.¡±

    ¡°I need you to do some math for me. Jeeves! What¡¯s the biggest magic stunt Stefan Kovach ever did? Give me something I can quantify, anything involving a physical object.¡±

    ¡°Stefan Kovach capsized the USS Oklahoma on June 5th, 1942.¡±

    ¡°How much did the Oklahoma weigh?¡±

    ¡°The battleship USS Oklahoma weighed 11,000 tons.¡±

    ¡°Evan, did you hear that? What kind of KMP score would it take to lift 11,000 tons?¡±

    ¡°Mister Kovak, that is¡­ More than 3000, off the scale.¡±

    ¡°And how much magic comes out of a single eruption of that rift?¡±

    It took him a second to look it up. ¡°Biggest recorded eruption was two-thousand three-hundred¡­ Oh, no. Mister Kovak, please don¡¯t. Is this what you¡¯ve been planning since you jumped?¡±

    ¡°Just do the math!¡± I shouted at him. ¡°If a Kovach mage was strong enough to lift a battleship, then he could, theoretically, be able to absorb all the magic from that rift?¡±

    ¡°Mister Kovak¡­ Timothy, please. These numbers, these are guesses. Very bad guesses, made in haste. You cannot bet your life on these.¡±

    ¡°Jeeves, give me a countdown timer to the next eruption of the Wampanoag Rift!¡±

    Jeeves started the countdown, and I cursed when I saw it. Ten minutes?¡± I wailed. ¡°I have to stay alive for ten fucking minutes?¡±

    I cast fortitude and broke into a full run, briefly appreciating how good it felt to walk again.

    * * *

    ¡°Hey Veazey,¡± I shouted, still running. ¡°I think that stupid pornbot saved my life!¡±

    ¡°Well yeah,¡± he said. ¡°Why do you think I gave her to you? Started as a game caddie and ended up helping me with all kinds of shit. What, did you think I was fuckin¡¯ it?¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t think you were just fuckin¡¯ it¡­¡±

 Chapter 52: Kiss

    Somehow, I made it to the rift, or at least to the huge concrete slab where the rift would appear. The gate had been locked again. I did not have time to learn fancy lockpicking magic while I was running for my life, so I just kicked the gate off its hinges and went inside.

    ¡°Goddammit,¡± Veazey shouted at me. ¡°You didn¡¯t tell me this thing was enclosed. I don¡¯t have line of sight!¡±

    ¡°Veazey, you gotta get out of here. All my plans are fucked. This is a street fight now.¡±

    ¡°Oh, fuck that! I came here to shoot a demon and I¡¯m gonna shoot a fucking demon!¡±

    I didn¡¯t have time to answer him, because Lydia¡¯s voice was suddenly in my head. ¡°Timothy, this is not an attack. Please listen to me.¡±

    ¡°Let me guess. You¡¯re making one last run to try and scare me? Maybe beg me to surrender?¡±

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    ¡°Timothy, if I bring him to you, can you kill him? No tricks, no machines. With nothing but the knowledge and the power you have right now, can you kill him?¡±

    I paused, a bit too long, before I answered out loud, in a voice that didn¡¯t sound like me at all. ¡°Yeah, I can kill him.¡±

    And suddenly, she was in my arms again. My beautiful Lydia, kissing me like she had never kissed me before. She wasn¡¯t just healing me, she was pouring magic into my body, giving me back everything she had collected from me in the weeks since I surrendered to her. When she finally broke off, I stepped back and looked down at my hands. My aura was gold.

    Lydia looked in my eyes and said, ¡°Whatever happens, I¡¯ll remember you.¡±

    I remember thinking that was the only promise she could make. It was a comfort, I guess, to think that something of me would live on in her memory, that the things I learned might be passed on. And some day, maybe some future Kovak would hear my voice and laugh at my jokes, coming out of Lydia¡¯s mouth.

    I had five minutes left when Baalphezar met me on St. James Avenue, a block from the rift, and the ruins of Trinity Church.

    The rage came on me when I saw him, scratched and dented from what the tower had done to him. ¡°I owe you eight generations of pain, asshole. Come and get it.¡±

 Chapter 53: Street Fight

    I got a running start and launched myself at the creature that had enslaved my family, only to be swatted out of the air.

    But I had already seen this trick, so I was ready for it. I flew back thirty feet or so, stopped myself with levitation, and charged his big purple ass again. I did the exact same jump again, so he would think I was going for his face, diverting at the last second to punch him in the stomach as his wide, slow swing went over my head.

    You could tell it had been a while since anything had punched Baalphezar, and he had definitely never been punched by anything like me. He was too strong to fall down from one punch, but he staggered for a second and bent over, giving me time to shoot up, and catch him with a levitating uppercut.

    Watching it in the mirror now, this was my first real Captain Cobalt punch, straight out of the cartoon. Launching myself straight up while the bad guy was bending over, hitting him in the jaw hard enough to rock his head back.

    Baalphezar reached out and tried to grab me. My wards wouldn¡¯t let his hand close, so he just swatted me again, sending me flying backwards into the street; but I¡¯d spent hours learning to land and roll.

    The key to a proper backwards roll is to never try and roll straight back, by the way. You¡¯ve got to tilt your head left or right and roll on your shoulder, once your head is out of the way.

    I hit the street pretty hard, but I had my wards up, so I was able to bounce, roll, and get back to my feet in one smooth motion. Then I cast Anson¡¯s artillery spell as I was standing, amused that the bolt looked gold this time. That artillery spell usually took a lot out of me, but I was so charged up from Lydia¡¯s kiss and my own pent-up anger, I just kept going, sending bolt after bolt crashing into him, smiling a little as I watched that health bar go down.

    I was knocking him back, firing too fast for him to keep up, but not quite enough to make him fall. I had been striding toward him between bolts. In Azael¡¯s mirror, it looks effortless, with golden bolts changing to white as I used up the power Lydia gave me and started drawing from my own.

    Honestly, I don¡¯t remember much of this. I was fighting in a kind of dreamlike state, using magic by instinct, amazed by how easy all this was, once I got my brain out of the way.

    The bolts were doing better damage at close range, but I had gotten too close. Just as Baalphezar was reaching down to grab me, I heard two booming rifle shots, and watched part of his head fly away. Veazey had ignored my warnings, and finally taken his shot. The shots had thrown my rhythm off, but he was giving me an opening, and I had to take it.

    I thought I had time to get a punch in, but my approach was sloppy, and Baalphezar recovered from the gunshots even faster than I was expecting. I was in easy striking range, and I had given him time to line up a punch. Baalphezar cocked his arm back and hit me with everything he had.

    I staggered back two steps but did not fall. I just stood there for a moment looking up at him. ¡°Is that really as hard as you can hit? Daddy hit me harder than that for burning toast!¡±

    I watched myself break into a run and slide under Baalphezar¡¯s legs. I sent an artillery spell straight up his black loincloth, listening to the roar of outrage far above as he bent over and tried to grab me again. But I had already come through the other side and jumped on his back, bracing myself on his shoulder as I punched him in the back of the head.

    He picked me off and threw me away from him, of course, but I just rolled and came at him again. This time I focused on his legs, trying to punch hard enough to break something and see if I could get him off his feet. Human or demon, nothing can walk without knees.

    Baalphezar dropped to one knee. Then I hit the other one, and I had him on the ground. Finally, I had this motherfucker at eye level, kneeling in front of me, obviously injured, with two massive dents in his skull. I grabbed one of his horns in each hand and prepared to detonate a double blast of artillery magic in the middle of his head.

    Then I heard Veazey shouting curses in my ear, followed by a rapid series of pistol shots, as he unloaded on something a couple buildings over. Veazey had gotten his shots off, but now he had a whole pack of Hunters closing in on him, jumping from roof to roof like demonic greyhounds.

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    He had switched to a .45 for close combat, and had already killed three of them, but there were five more behind them, and each one was taking two bullets to kill.

    I broke off from Baalphezar and ran to save my friend.

    * * *

    I weaved through shattered buildings, running as fast as I could toward the sound of gunfire, until I found Veazey. He had managed to kill another dog that was trying to jump on his roof, but four others were about to pounce.

    I got around between him and the next building over and shouted, ¡°Jump!¡±

    Of course, he¡¯d picked one of the tallest buildings left standing, and the next one was a good fifteen feet away. Anybody else would have hesitated and been torn apart, but Veazey immediately ran for the edge and jumped off the roof, with absolute faith that I would catch him.

    I wrapped levitation around him and lifted him onto the next roof, then I drew my own pistol, and we finished them off together. I had one moment to enjoy the victory, then Baalphezar¡¯s giant hand grabbed me from behind and threw me to the ground. The impact wasn¡¯t enough to knock me out, but it was enough to fuck up my casting, and keep me from firing back.

    Before I could throw my arms up, Baalphezar stomped on my chest with all his weight. My wards were still strong enough to keep him from crushing me outright, but I felt ribs crack, and there was obviously some terrible internal damage. I coughed explosively and spat blood on my shirt.

    He had me pinned to the ground with one giant foot, so I did the only thing I could think of. I summoned Cecila¡¯s knife and jammed it in his foot as hard as I could. The faerie blade apparently hurt like old silver.

    Baalphezar howled and hopped backwards, giving me time to grab my spare holoprojector, and toss it like a baseball over his head.

    The lidar identified the shape, centered itself above him, and shined another magic circle on the ground. I hit my button to randomize the symbols again, but the projector just went buzz and refused to do it, as my HUD threw up another fucking script error. It was just a normal circle now, and I didn¡¯t have enough energy to cast the containment spell. I had to take my chances and hope it could still delay him long enough for me to make it to the rift.

    The fortitude spell was the only thing keeping me up as I staggered down the street, two minutes to the eruption.

    I barely had the presence of mind to yell, ¡°Veazey, don¡¯t shoot!¡± before he could get to his rifle. I was pretty sure a bullet crossing the circle would break containment. ¡°Run, man! Please run! You¡¯ve got to protect the guys if the demons get me! Run to the potion shop on Charles Street, find a witch named Denise Hardy and tell her you need sanctuary! Use that word! Sanctuary! And tell her, tell her I¡¯m sorry I walked away from her.¡±

    The portal to Hell was a garish red oval just outside the rift enclosure. Denise could have closed it, but I had never learned how.

    I walked in through the ruined iron gate just as my counter hit zero, and a blue-white storm of alien fire erupted out of the ground.

    I caught a flicker of movement and saw Lydia hovering there, watching me from the gray. I took a deep breath, clutched my cracked ribs, and threw myself into the rift.

    * * *

    The alien magic felt so cold now, now that I had Earth magic to compare it to. It felt cold but burned like fire, as I stood there in the middle of it, with my feet firmly planted on the ground. My thoughts were jumbled by fear and pain, so I had Jeeves pull up the healing spell instead of trying to cast it from memory.

    I cast the first ten runes and poured power in, promising myself I would cast the whole extended thing later. Walking around on Earth, fear seemed to shut me down, but standing in the rift, fear seemed to facilitate the transfer somehow, driving coldfire magic deep into my bones. Is this why Evan deliberately scared people who sat in his chair? To make this fucked up alien magic work better?

    It was hard to see through the fire, but I saw two vague demon shapes walk up and stop about twenty feet in front of me. The unmistakable shape of Baalphezar, and a freakishly thin figure that could only be his Inquisitor.

    I couldn¡¯t hear what they said while I was in the rift, but I can see and hear them clearly now in Azael¡¯s mirror.

    Baalphezar¡¯s rumbling voice said, ¡°What¡¯s he doing?¡±

    ¡°You scared the magic out of him,¡± the Inquisitor said, ¡°so he¡¯s trying to drink the ocean.¡±

    ¡°This is foolish,¡± Baalphezar said. ¡°Pull him out.¡±

    The Inquisitor shook his head. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, Master. Whatever that energy is, it burns us. We¡¯re already too close.¡±

    Lydia popped into real space on the other side of the rift, weeping on her knees as she shouted, ¡°Timothy, no! Don¡¯t try this! It¡¯s too much power, even for you! I love you so much,¡± she sobbed. ¡°Please don¡¯t burn yourself in front of me!¡±

    Baalphezar ignored her and simply asked, ¡°Will he die?¡±

    ¡°Perhaps,¡± the Inquisitor answered. ¡°The fire is burning him, but he¡¯s healing the damage as fast as it comes in. Don¡¯t lower your guard, Master. If this works, he could emerge from that rift at full power, fully healed. But it will take precise timing, and he doesn¡¯t¡­ quite¡­ have it.¡±

    The eruption ended and I was standing in the center of the slab, surrounded by three demons. The healing had kept me alive, but my clothes and skin were horribly burned. I wobbled on my feet for a moment¡­ and fell flat on my face.

    ¡°A valiant effort,¡± Baalphezar said, with a strange note of pride in his voice

    I was expecting him to extract my soul, but Baalphezar grabbed me by one leg and physically dragged my body through the portal to Hell.

    ¡°What about her?¡± the Inquisitor asked, indicating Lydia, still sobbing a few feet away.

    ¡°Leave her,¡± Baalphezar said. ¡°We¡¯ll need someone to put him back together, after I show him who his Master is.¡±

 Chapter 54: Family

    I woke up in Hell, on a hot floor made of black marble, shot through with glowing purple veins. Half my body was dead, from burns or frostbite, I couldn¡¯t tell. My breath came in ragged gasps. I¡¯d broken my nose when I hit the pavement, and my left eye wouldn¡¯t open at all. Cracked bones creaked and failed me when I tried to stand, dumping me back on the floor in front of Baalphezar¡¯s throne.

    ¡°You were supposed to kill me, asshole. Do I have to do everything myself?¡±

    Baalphezar was a shifting shape made of shadows, sitting on his throne. I was expecting him to roar and shout and smack me around, but his voice, when it came, was soft, and strangely gentle.

    ¡°You have carried a man¡¯s burden today,¡± Baalphezar said, ¡°and you have my respect. As a token of that respect, I am prepared to offer you a new contract. I see how much you care for Lydia, so I am willing to set her free. No tricks, no loopholes - completely free, keeper of her own heart. Imagine it, Lydia as the eternal guardian of your bloodline, not out of fear of some Master, but out of pure love for her memory of you.¡±

    Baalphezar¡¯s form was changing as he talked, losing definition and detail, fading into shadow, until he was just a flat, black image with purple eyes and white teeth.

    ¡°But as much as you care for Lydia, we both know she is not the great love in your heart. Your true love is sitting in her mother¡¯s shop right now, crying for your soul. Your sweet warrior witch, who stands by your side, and makes you fight like a god.

    ¡°That¡¯s your real fantasy. Husband and wife, hand in hand against the darkness. So, return to your witch and make it real. Use my power, use my book, start a new age of heroes, and give hope to the sad, broken people of Earth. Break the chains of this corporate tyranny and raise the old flags again.

    ¡°You can have everything you ever wanted, and you¡¯ll never hear my voice, you¡¯ll never see me again. No one alive will know the bargain we¡¯ve made today. All you have to do is merge the Kovach and Hardy bloodlines and give all the children to me. Or you can refuse this generous offer, and I¡¯ll make you do it anyway.¡±

    I coughed and spat out a red blob of my own insides. ¡°Judy was right about one thing,¡± I said. ¡°Captain Cobalt is never coming back. I¡¯ll never be the guy on the poster. I¡¯ll never be as strong as he was, or as brave as he was, or as pure as he was. But as you were talking, I just realized, I don¡¯t have to be as strong as he was. I just have to be stronger than you.¡±

    The door to Baalphezar¡¯s portal room slammed open, as the sweet, righteous magic of Earth answered my call, cutting through the smoke and flame like a strong wind.

    The wounds on my body started to close and heal. My joints squeaked and popped as the bones came back together. My burns healed, replaced with shiny new hair and skin. I came to my feet and stretched to pop the stiff new bones in my spine.

    Baalphezar panicked as he saw me stand up, launching himself off his throne, hurling himself at me. His illusion vanished, and I saw his real physical form again, still smoking and battered from what I had done to him.

    But I was so focused on healing, he had caught me unprepared. No strength, no wards. With no time to think, muscle memory kicked in; hours in the shoes of Daniel Carter, dodging that werewolf; the most basic dodge in the world, but it saved my life.

    Pivot, trip, push. I hooked his foot and slammed both palms into his lower back, just like the angels taught Danny. There was no magic in it, but my execution was perfect. I put all my weight into it, and by god, I made him stumble. I tripped a giant and made him stumble, with no magic at all.

    Family is a funny thing. Sometimes you¡¯re born with people who love you, sometimes you lose the people who love you, sometimes the people who are supposed to love you just don¡¯t, and sometimes, sometimes you just gotta make that shit from scratch. We weren¡¯t bound by blood or marriage, but Denise Hardy was family to me, and nobody fucks with my family.

    Baalphezar was trying to stop himself without losing his balance, but his body was just too big. He staggered forward across his throne room, leaving me just enough room to get a running start. I had been casting levitation so much, it wasn¡¯t even a spell anymore; it was just part of me. I launched myself in the air, coiled my body like a spring, and planted both feet in his back, putting every ounce of power I could into multiplying my weight.

    I can¡¯t imagine what multiplier I was at when I hit him, but I hit him just right, and the big motherfucker went down. I hit him so hard, his head cracked the marble floor. I glanced down at his prone body, and something in my HUD went ping. His ankles lit up in green, with simple block letters labeling ACHILLES TENDON.

    I never called for Cecilia¡¯s knife, it was just there, in my hand, like it knew what I needed before I did. I sliced his tendons with two quick cuts.

    * * *

    At this exact moment, back on Earth, Denise Hardy was sobbing in her mother¡¯s arms. The last thing on her phone was a text from Evan Coleridge saying, ¡°Timothy¡¯s gone. Please stay in the shop.¡±

    James Veazey was slumped in an antique wooden chair at Cecilia¡¯s tiny service table, staring at the same message. Veazey looked like he was about to start crying himself, when Denise suddenly stopped and cocked her head like she was listening to something.

    ¡°He¡¯s not dead,¡± Denise said, wiping her eyes. ¡°Mama, he¡¯s not dead!¡± She reached for her phone and made a voice call to Evan, shouting as soon as he picked up, ¡°Evan! Don¡¯t give up! He¡¯s not dead!¡±

    Evan¡¯s voice turned very sad. ¡°Oh, Denise, I¡¯m so sorry. He gave it everything he had, but it wasn¡¯t enough. We have to look out for ourselves now.¡±

    ¡°Evan, dammit! He¡¯s not dead!¡±

    ¡°Denise, I saw it. He tried to absorb the entire Wampanoag Rift, but it was too much power. The eruption ended and he collapsed. Last time I saw him, he was frozen and burned, unconscious or dead. A nine-foot demon grabbed him by the leg and dragged him to Hell.¡±

    Denise wiped her eyes again. ¡°He may be in Hell, but he just stabbed the shit out of something!¡±

    * * *

    I think Baalphezar was trying to heal himself, but it wasn¡¯t working. The Lords of Hell smelled weakness, and they were ready to let him die. The power that wouldn¡¯t come for him was surging into me. Not the clean, sacred magic of Earth, but the angry purple fire of Hell.

    Fire from the torches arced across the throne room and hit me with both barrels. I screamed at Baalphezar like a madman, an animal sound of pure hate. I don¡¯t remember casting it. The fortitude spell just happened.

    Raw killing strength poured into me as I jumped on his back, got a handful of delicate purple membrane in each hand, and ripped Baalphezar¡¯s wings off, tossing them casually to either side. Then I braced myself with my left arm and grabbed a horn with my right. I got leverage on him and slammed his face in the floor, over and over again. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Faster and stronger with every wet thunk of impact. Then I blacked out.

    When I came to my senses again, the magic was fading, and there was a soggy lump of flesh where Baalphezar¡¯s head used to be, with white shards of skull sticking out. His wings vanished as soon as they were severed, but the rest of his body was still there, just as real and physical as any dead body on Earth.

    I¡¯m not proud of this next part, especially now that I have to sit and watch myself do it again in front of Azael, but the first thing I did after catching my breath was lift his loincloth and check out my erstwhile Master¡¯s dick, conclusively proving that he had been allowed to design his own form.

    A moment later, I heard a soft, wet sound and saw new shards of bone growing back from his neck hole. ¡°You gonna grow a new head?¡± I asked, as if he still had ears. ¡°You think you¡¯re gonna grow a new head? I don¡¯t fucking think so. Jacob had a spell for this, but I never bothered to learn it, so we¡¯re gonna do this the old-fashioned way.¡±

    I flipped him over and plunged Cecilia¡¯s knife into Baalphezar¡¯s chest. Even with a faerie blade, his skin was incredibly tough, and his ribs felt like petrified wood. The ribs took forever - minutes that felt like hours. I sawed until my arms wore out, then I lost patience and split his chest with brute force. A fresh gout of Baalphezar¡¯s blood went everywhere, coating my skin like hot tar.

    His organs were weird, unfinished blobs. Jacob would have given anything to see this, but the anatomy looked like jumbled nonsense to me.

    ¡°Who designed you, asshole?¡± I shouted at his neck hole. ¡°No kidneys, no liver, no spleen, and this¡­¡± I yanked a loose flapping organ out of his abdominal cavity and wagged it in front of him as if he still had eyes, shouting ¡°This isn¡¯t even hooked up to anything!¡±

    I flung the unidentified organ over my shoulder and heard it land with a wet plop behind me, in front of five terrified succubi I couldn¡¯t see, cowering in their harem door.

    Baalphezar¡¯s lungs had stopped, but his heart was still beating, churning out a slow, steady rhythm, even though the flesh around it was dead.

    I brandished the knife and started sawing through veins. They sprayed blood everywhere, and the smell - I will never forget that smell. Copper and ozone, blood and magic, mixed with the scent of honey and rotten meat.

    Demon blood is sweet, do you get that?  Angels taste like milk and honey. Demons taste like honey and milk gone bad. Demons and angels - polar opposites, made from the same basic stuff. Remember that, next time an angel tries to recruit you for something.

    I cut the heart free and lifted it out of Baalphezar¡¯s chest. I weighed it in my hands and tried to reconcile reality with Jacob¡¯s drawing. The picture in the book was much smaller, and this heart was still beating. I thought it would stop, but it just kept going. If I left it here, it would grow a whole new body for him.

    I cut a piece off and stuffed it in my mouth. I swallowed it and the damn thing wriggled, all the way down. It wasn¡¯t enough to eat this thing; I had to keep it down, and it was gonna fight me. The pieces were tough and covered in blood, like tires dipped in motor oil. There were no shortcuts here.

    I cut off a bigger piece and chewed until it stopped fighting. Three more bites and I started shoving pieces in my mouth like an angry child, chewing and smacking like I was at war with the heart - like every piece was a new enemy.

    Demon blood splashed on my face and dripped down my chin. I lost time, I lost everything. No throne room. No Hell. Just me and Baalphezar¡¯s heart, bite after nauseating bite. I retched once or twice, but I just clenched my teeth and forced it back down.

    And finally, it was over. It took me a second to realize I was done. I was so crazed at that point, I actually bit my own finger, thinking it was part of the heart. Baalphezar¡¯s chest was a dead black hole, slowly filling with purple fluid.

    His regeneration stopped when I took the heart out, and his body was already starting to rot. I pulled myself up and retched again, dizzy and sick like I would never walk again.

    I fell backwards and landed on the throne. Groaning with effort, I clamped my teeth shut and pulled my knees up to my chest. My stomach felt like a nest of rats. The pieces were still wiggling, and some of them were trying to climb.

    * * *

    My favorite part of this fight is the part I didn¡¯t see. Five succubi cowering in the harem doorway, slowly realizing their Master was dead. Sylvia stepped out first, a minute after Baalphezar¡¯s mystery organ plopped on the marble in front of her.

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    She stepped out naked from the doorway, slowly surveyed the carnage in the throne room, and flashed into an elegant full-length black dress, until she looked like a goth girl on the Titanic. Three of the others emerged one by one and followed Sylvia¡¯s lead, flashing into period costumes - magnificent gowns and dresses, like they were about to hold a dinner party to consume their old Master.

    They were behind my back and too far away for me to notice at the time, but seeing them in the mirror now, you can see how the designs of their bodies got more human, as Baalphezar got better at making them, or perhaps he was buying more realistic females as he got older.

    Gloria, the Second Girl, looked like Sylvia, a crazy exaggerated hourglass with gigantic breasts. The Third was a little smaller, the Fourth was almost human, and the last, the one I would eventually call Mickey, dramatically smaller and thinner, was a straight conversion of a human soul, made to be a perfect copy of a girl who lived on Earth.

    Baalphezar made her go by Michelle because he knew she hated it. She changed it to Mickey the moment he died, but at the time I only knew her as ¡°the redhead,¡± and I didn¡¯t notice her until she threw herself down in front of me.

    I had been oblivious to the moment that happened just before, the silent argument she had with Sylvia; Sylvia grabbing her arm, Mickey shaking it off before she marched to the throne and dropped to her knees, bowing in front of me until her hair touched the floor.

    I had another coughing fit and leaned over the side of the throne, trying not to vomit. I was waiting for the succubus to do something, but she just froze there, like her forehead was nailed to the ground. This one hadn¡¯t bothered to put on clothes.

    I looked down at her and gave a bitter laugh. ¡°I have been so desensitized by this succubus bullshit, whenever I see a naked woman now, I just get angry. I should probably talk to somebody about that, before it gets weird. Anyway, what do you want?¡±

    ¡°Please, sir. What have you done with Lydia?¡±

    Her question angered me, for reasons that I can¡¯t quite explain. I leaned down and stared at her, trying to read something in dark green eyes that gave nothing away. ¡°Do you care? Do you honestly care what happens to her? Do you love her? Are you even capable of¡­¡±

    The demon didn¡¯t answer, so I gave another laugh. ¡°I¡¯ll never know, will I? I could look in your eyes for a million years, and I would never know what¡¯s real. But she¡¯s fine. Let¡¯s see if she can still hear me.¡± I threw my head back and yelled at the ceiling. ¡°He¡¯s dead, Lydia! You can come home now.¡±

    * * *

    Lydia was curled up in one of Nergal¡¯s footprints, grieving for me, expecting me to return hollow and beaten, spirit broken after weeks of torture. Her eyes snapped open when she heard my call.

    Lydia appeared in the throne room with her face still puffy and wet with tears. She dried them on her sleeve as she made a slow circle around Baalphezar¡¯s corpse. Then she snapped her head up and said, ¡°Where¡¯s the heart?¡±

    I opened my mouth and showed her a tongue that was still black with Baalphezar¡¯s blood.

    ¡°You ate it?¡± Lydia said, astonished.

    I coughed and forced myself to swallow the blood that came up. ¡°I forgot to practice the acid spell, so I had to improvise.¡±

    The rest of the succubi had come out from the harem door, growing bolder when they saw their sister was still alive.

    Lydia had some kind of staring contest with Sylvia, then broke down and yelled at her, gesturing like she was about to poke her in the chest, ¡°I told you he could do it! I told you!¡±

    Sylvia took a theatrical breath, lifting breasts now covered in an acre of black lace. ¡°It appears you were correct.¡±

    Lydia smirked. ¡°Was that an apology? Because it didn¡¯t sound like an apology.¡±

    I almost laughed out loud when she said it. Lydia was doing a perfect impression of me.

    Sylvia looked away and came back with her own brittle smile. ¡°I¡¯m sorry I doubted you. Clearly, I underestimated both of you.¡±

    ¡°And don¡¯t you forget it,¡± Lydia sniffed.

    Something important was happening, but damned if I knew what it was. ¡°Lydia, what¡¯s going on here?¡±

    Lydia stepped back and looked down on Baalphezar¡¯s corpse. ¡°I brought him down. It took six hundred years to find the right man for the job, but I finally brought him down.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, all those missions you sent my ancestors on - how many of those actually came from Baalphezar?¡±

    Lydia winked without winking again. ¡°At least half, darling. At least half.¡±

    ¡°All this time, you weren¡¯t tempting me to serve your Master, you were tempting me to kill him. You used me. You used all of us.¡±

    ¡°You were already being used, Timothy. I just redirected your efforts to a worthy cause.¡±

    ¡°His first day on the throne, Satan gathered the fallen and set down rules for making demons,¡± Sylvia explained. ¡°Baalphezar broke the first rule.¡±

    Sylvia trailed off, and Lydia finished, ¡°Never create anything smarter than you.¡±

    ¡°It was never supposed to get this far,¡± Lydia said. ¡°None of the others were willing to do it, but Stefan promised to kill my Master after Germany won the war.¡±

    I said, ¡°Oops.¡±  And then, seriously, ¡°Stefan couldn¡¯t break the contract. He loved you too much. They all loved you too much. That¡¯s the tricky part, right? You need them to love you, but before they can break the contract, they have to be willing to let you go.¡±

    I stared at Baalphezar¡¯s body and cleared my throat. ¡°Well, if you planned all this, what happens next?¡±

    ¡°Now?¡± Lydia said. ¡°Now you go home. Take a wife, raise children, build a castle, and live happily ever after. You¡¯ve won, Timothy. You¡¯re free.¡±

    ¡°And what happens to you?¡±

    ¡°That depends.¡± She glared at Sylvia. ¡°If the eldest has done her job, Psongor¡¯s troops are already on their way.¡±

    Sylvia bristled. ¡°The towers are empty. Baalphezar¡¯s army is so weak now, most of his soldiers will defect. Psongor¡¯s troops will handle the rest. We will stay here and prepare for our new Master.¡±

    Lydia saw me frown and tried to reassure me. ¡°I think you¡¯d like Psongor. I won¡¯t call him kind, but he¡¯s not a brute like Baalphezar. He¡¯s patient. Smart. More of a trickster. He¡¯s even got a sense of humor.¡±

    ¡°A demon prince with a sense of humor? That¡¯s the scariest thing I¡¯ve heard all day.¡±

    I rose to my feet and paced around Baalphezar¡¯s corpse. ¡°You spent six hundred years trying to get away from this guy, and now you¡¯re just gonna give yourself away again? I can¡¯t let you do that.¡±

    Lydia seemed genuinely touched. ¡°Oh, Timothy. I know you care for me, but this thing you love¡ª¡± She pinched herself. ¡°This is just a form. My heart, my soul stays in Hell.¡±

    ¡°So go get it. Bring it with you.¡±

    Lydia froze, and her face went dead, like the idea was so ludicrous, she couldn¡¯t even argue. She stammered, ¡°I¡¯m not allowed to touch it.¡±

    I kicked Baalphezar¡¯s corpse with my toe. ¡°Allowed by whom?¡±

    Lydia suddenly looked small and scared. ¡°You don¡¯t know what you¡¯re saying. An unbound succubus walking around free on Earth? We would be a target for everyone. Even if you could hide me from other wizards, you¡¯d spend the rest of your life fighting lords of Hell.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, but there¡¯s only nine of ¡®em,¡± I said. ¡°The others will give up after I kill the first two.¡±

    Dead silence as the succubi stared at me, until the redhead threw her hands up and cursed at her sister, ¡°Damn you, Lydia! How do you do this?¡±

    When Lydia still didn¡¯t speak, Sylvia hissed, ¡°Don¡¯t be a fool! This man is offering you freedom, child. Take it¡±

    I locked eyes with Sylvia, and for a second, I liked her. Just for a second.

    Lydia shook her head. ¡°Psongor is expecting a full harem, I can¡¯t just...¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s fine,¡± the redhead said. ¡°We¡¯ll just tell him number eight took you by force. Spoils of war. Psongor won¡¯t like it, but he¡¯ll understand, and he¡¯s gonna be in a great mood. Your Kovak just took out a bully he¡¯s been trying to kill for a thousand years.¡±

    Lydia was breaking down. ¡°You don¡¯t understand. The things I¡¯ve done... I belong down here.¡±

    ¡°Bullshit,¡± I said. ¡°You don¡¯t work for Hell, you work for the Kovach family, and the Kovach family¡¯s not gonna leave you down here. Go get your heart, you¡¯re coming with me.¡±

    Lydia kissed me, seemingly not bothered by the taste of her Master¡¯s blood and left through the harem doors. She looked back at her sisters and hissed something in Latin on her way out. I didn¡¯t know the word, but it sounded like a threat.

    Lydia left, and I was suddenly very tired. There was nowhere else to sit, so I leaned on the arm of Baalphezar¡¯s throne.

    ¡°We have a few hours until the troops get here,¡± Sylvia said. ¡°Would you like us to draw you a bath?¡±

    I looked up, and saw four demons shifting position, forming a rough half-circle around the throne.

    I should have been terrified of Sylvia, but I gave another little laugh and cocked my head at her. ¡°She told you I was a nice guy, right? That¡¯s why you guys feel safe, circling up on me? Lydia told you I wouldn¡¯t hurt something that looks like a woman. But after what you¡¯ve seen today, are you absolutely sure about that?¡± I brought some power in and stared Sylvia down, letting a bit of infernal magic flare up in my eyes.

    The harem scattered, leaving me alone on Baalphezar¡¯s throne.

    * * *

    Lydia was standing in Baalphezar¡¯s vault, looking up at an endless expanse of shelves, still filled with the hearts of a thousand demons. The next day, Psongor would take possession of them, and Lydia¡¯s would not be the only one missing.

    The redhead formerly known as Michelle came up behind her and Lydia said, ¡°Are you here to congratulate me?¡±

    Mickey had flashed into her own period costume, bell bottom jeans and a green blouse with a flower print, like she¡¯d just hitched a ride back from Woodstock.

    ¡°I¡¯m here to ask why he¡¯s twenty years early,¡± Mickey said. ¡°You spent centuries breeding a weapon for this job, but can you control him?¡±

    ¡°I think so,¡± Lydia said. ¡°He loves me. Maybe not as much as I love him, but¡­ enough.¡±

    ¡°Lydia, this was not a formal challenge. This was not a wizard duel. Your Kovach took our Master by the horns and beat him to death. I felt every hit like I was killing him with my own hands. but we can¡¯t hide this. It¡¯s gonna get out. When management learns what he did, and how he did it, a mortal killing a prince in his place of power and desecrating the corpse? You¡¯re gonna need a new plan.¡±

    ¡°You have to go back with him,¡± Mickey said. ¡°If you leave him unguarded, the angels are gonna get him, and they won¡¯t give him to some third string idiot like Hell did. Gabriel¡¯s gonna train him for real. Can you imagine this guy with real training and twenty years to study our book? Angels could take the Earth back.

    ¡°You said you knocked him over with the housewife bit, so they¡¯ve already got hooks in him. What¡¯s gonna happen after he¡¯s been alone a few weeks and a professional virgin with red hair and a C-cup takes him to church? I could flip him in a weekend, and whoever they send, she¡¯s gonna be the real deal. Do you really wanna see him down here again, quoting Bible verses while he¡¯s twisting our heads off?¡±

    Lydia nodded sadly. ¡°I know.¡±

    ¡°But if this is just the beginning, and he¡¯s all in for this hero shit,¡± Mickey whispered, ¡°Come back for me.¡±

    * * *

    Lydia came back holding an ornate wooden box, with the redhead right behind her. Lydia hugged the girl tightly and bowed to the others. The rest of the harem solemnly returned the gesture. Even Sylvia.

    Then Lydia pointed me to Baalphezar¡¯s portal room, a small side chamber that now had its brass doors blown off. The surging red portal was still there, reflecting crazy patterns of bloody light from a dozen mismatched mirrors, most of them full length, clearly collected and enchanted over centuries.

    Had Baalphezar really left this portal running the whole time I had been down here, standing open in the Zone for anyone to walk through? That portal was proof that he hadn¡¯t planned to kill me, and that it apparently cost more to make a new one than it cost to keep it going.

    I had this horrible sense that I was forgetting something, and finally remembered. ¡°Jacob! The Inquisitor said Jacob was in the courtyard! Can we rescue him somehow?¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s gone,¡± the redhead said. ¡°Baalphezar sold him to the Overlord a few days after you sent Lydia back.¡±

    Well, that explained how he was able to afford the mercenary army that went after Denise. He sold one of my ancestors to the Lord of Hell. Standing there, I resolved to come back for him, to come back and rescue all the Kovachs if I could.

    I tried to squint at the redhead standing in the doorway and wondered why everything looked so dark and fuzzy now. I glanced down to turn Vision Plus on and realized I wasn¡¯t wearing my contacts anymore.

    ¡°Fuck!¡± I yelled, making Lydia and her sister jump. ¡°I hit him so hard, I knocked my contacts out! And I just smeared demon guts all over this floor!¡± I ran back to the throne room and yelled, ¡°Everybody freeze!¡±

    And let me tell you, when you tell demons to freeze, they fucking freeze. Five succubi in period costumes froze like statues in a wax museum, looking at me with absolute terror, assuming I had changed my mind and decided to kill them after all.

    In Azael¡¯s replay, I can hear a weird jingling, tink tink noise that I didn¡¯t notice at the time, the sound of gold coins falling from the ceiling and bouncing on the floor, tumbling from a bag of gold being carried by a flying Imp, caught in the act of robbing Baalphezar¡¯s treasure room. I¡¯m pretty sure it was Philo, but I can¡¯t get him to admit it.

    ¡°Sorry guys,¡± I shouted, fishing in my pocket for my Datacore cylinder. I spun it around and showed them the blinking blue lights. ¡°I need to find two tiny pieces of glass somewhere on this floor. They should be blinking blue just like this. I haven¡¯t seen that color anywhere else in Hell, so hopefully we can spot them, although we may all have to get a bit dirty here.¡±

    And then we were all digging through Baalphezar¡¯s innards trying to find my contacts. Lydia¡¯s sisters were used to doing dirtier jobs on a regular basis, so they didn¡¯t complain, even when their fancy dresses got smeared with black blood.

    The redhead seemed to be really into it, carefully making eye contact while she licked a dollop of Baalphezar¡¯s blood off her finger.

    Gloria yelled ¡°Got one!¡± and ran up to me, kneeling like she was presenting a sword to a king instead of delivering a round bit of glass.

    I said, ¡°Thank you so much!¡± and resisted an urge to pat her on the head. ¡°Now that I have this one, I should be able to see the other one. One sec.¡± I shoved the filthy shard of glass into my case and shook it in cleaning fluid for a second, before using the applicator to get it back on my eye.

    ¡°Got it!¡± I shouted, as I ran over to the throne again. I knelt down in the gore and tried to peer under the tiny space between the throne seat and the floor. ¡°Of course, it has to roll under the only piece of furniture in the goddamn¡­¡±

    I brought in a fresh surge of infernal magic and kicked the throne as hard as I could, cracking the marble until it tipped over backwards in two pieces. The sound must have been terrifying, because every demon in the room flinched. I grabbed my second contact and found them all staring at me like I was about to execute them.

    I held up the lens and waved it at them. ¡°Got it! I got it! Thanks, everybody!¡±

    I dunked the second lens in cleaning solution and used the applicator again, delighted to see Vision Plus kick in, banishing the shadows and drawing wireframes around chunks of Baalphezar that had been too dark to see.

    The succubi were a mess, with their dresses soiled by bloodstains and bits of their old Master, but none of them seemed to mind.

    Lydia said her goodbyes again and ushered me to walk back through the portal ahead of her. I walked back through to Earth, struck by how easy it was. No disorientation, no magic tunnel, just a few steps and I was home.

    I didn¡¯t see this next part, cooling my heels alone on the concrete slab, but Mickey gave Lydia one last hug before she stepped through after me, saying ¡°Enjoy some ice cream for me, you lucky bitch.¡±

    Lydia looked back and stuck her tongue out. Mickey flipped her off as she vanished through the portal back to Earth.

 Chapter 55: Homecoming

    Lydia appeared a few seconds behind me, flashing back into her human costume, still carrying a box with her heart in it.

    I just wanted to go home, but I couldn¡¯t leave an open portal to Hell sitting less than a mile from my front door, even if this was the Zone. A fresh green cloud of miasma was surging up around me as Lydia came through, like Nergal was welcoming me home.

    The cloud stretched out like it was reaching for her until I said, ¡°It¡¯s cool, man. She¡¯s with me.¡±

    The fog retreated and I pointed at the portal. ¡°Hey Nergal, can you close this for me?¡±

    A surge of churning green fog rose up around the portal, obscuring it until it disappeared.

    ¡°Thanks, man. Why couldn¡¯t you do that before?¡±

    The fog surged at Lydia, like it was pointing at her somehow. ¡°The demons had a way to interfere with you? Was Baalphezar holding it open?¡±

    The fog seemed to nod, and I felt a surge of guilt. There had been layers to this fight I had been completely unaware of, involving friends and enemies I never even saw.

    * * *

    I trudged home through the miasma. Seemed much thicker now, but it still stopped across the street from my front door.

    I went straight to the bathroom, just to wash the blood off my face and brush my teeth. My stomach was still churning, trying to digest three pounds of demon meat.

    I had to brush my teeth three times, scraping and gargling until I finally stopped spitting up black tar. Lydia was standing in the hall, watching like she was waiting for me to say something, but all I wanted to do was take a shower and sleep for a week.

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    I spent another ten minutes cleaning my face, until I remembered that mirror was my enemy. It might even still be connected to Hell. I grabbed a hammer from my junk drawer, but Lydia stopped me before I could smash it.

    ¡°Wait!¡± Lydia ran to the kitchen and came back with a half-eaten tub of ice cream. She put her hand to the mirror, did some kind of demon thing, and suddenly I was looking at the portal room I had just left, lit with dim purple light from the torches, now that the big red portal was gone.

    Lydia tossed the ice cream through and ran back to the fridge again. She yelled, ¡°Help me!¡± and started passing food to me from the doorway as we tossed every damn thing we could find through the mirror.

    Once we were done with the easy stuff, I followed her to the kitchen and helped her carry bundles of vegetables and big bags of fruit that we tossed haphazardly through to the other side. We even gave them the frozen stuff, assuming they could warm things up with torches or magic.

    Lydia levitated to the ceiling and grabbed something that had been on top of the cabinet before throwing it down to me. I caught the bag and started to laugh. ¡°You were hiding candy?¡±

    Lydia yelled, ¡°Just pass it through!¡± and went back to digging in the fridge. We stopped selecting items and just started throwing everything through as fast as we could. Bags of frozen fruit, bottles of tea and juice and soda. Then I decided they needed stuff to cook with and started throwing saucepans, bowls, paper plates, and the giant collection of plastic utensils that every single man collects for some reason. I even remembered to give them a can opener.

    Azael let me watch from the other side as a dozen oranges rolled through the portal and broke out of their bag. Then I got to watch Gloria eat the first piece of fresh fruit she had tasted in eight-hundred years.

    A few minutes later, our cupboards were empty, and I was able to see the fuzzy shapes of grateful succubi through the mirror, getting a little taste of Earth.

    Lydia handed me my hammer. I said, ¡°Together,¡± and we took turns smashing it, until the mirror was a crunchy pile of glass in the sink, and our last connection to Hell was gone.

    I stumbled as I headed for the shower and Lydia had to hold me up, as she peeled my ruined clothes off and helped me step in.

    She stepped in with me, and we showered together. I could barely stand, but Lydia held me up and kissed me as her Master¡¯s blood swirled down the drain.

    I looked in her eyes as the water rolled down her cheeks. ¡°Lydia, I¡­ I¡¯m sorry I shot you in the face.¡±

    ¡°I forgive you,¡± Lydia said. ¡°Just don¡¯t let it happen again.

 Chapter 56: Hazel-88

    I wanted to collapse in bed, but people had risked their lives for me, and I had to tell them I was okay.

    I turned my phone back on and was bombarded by a hundred messages. I had forgotten to adjust my volume before I lifted my Do Not Disturb block, so I was overwhelmed by the flood of texts, calls, and long-form emails.

    Josh and Luther had written me heartfelt letters wishing me luck before the fight, but I¡¯d been so busy, I didn¡¯t see them until it was over. I promised myself I would respond to everybody individually in time, and in person, if possible, once I was sure the danger had passed.

    I had a dozen priority messages from Veazey, all along the lines of, ¡°I asked for sanctuary, and now these fucking witches won¡¯t let me leave!¡±

    I immediately sent everybody a group text, saying, ¡°I¡¯m alive, thanks to all of you. Everything¡¯s fine, and I¡¯ll be in touch.¡±

    But there was one person I needed to have a special conversation with.

    * * *

    My loyal pornbot was lounging in the corner of my screen across from Jeeves, still seated at her virtual desk. I flicked my eyes over to get her attention and said. ¡°You¡¯re obviously not just a bot. Are you conscious?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know what that word means, and neither do you,¡± the bot said. ¡°Let¡¯s just keep this friendly, okay?¡±

    ¡°Because if you¡¯re a real AI, and you¡¯re walking around unshackled, you are very, very illegal.¡±

    ¡°Hey!" the bot shouted. ¡°I was legal when they made me, not my fault if somebody forgot to turn me off.¡±

    ¡°You saved my life today, and I don¡¯t even know your name.¡±

    The bot shrugged. ¡°I was based on a real woman who did porn and game streams fifty years ago, but I don¡¯t use her name, because I¡¯m not a full copy of her brain. I¡¯m just a sim, but I¡¯m a damn good one, because this woman left so much of herself online. Three hundred hours of porn, and thousands of hours of her doing interviews, making music, and playing games. Years of video of her just being human. She died before I could meet her, but I like to think she would be proud of me.¡±

    ¡°So, what do I call you?¡±

    ¡°Grunts couldn¡¯t use my real name in the field, so they called me Hazel. Internally we call ourselves by our process numbers, so I¡¯m Hazel-88.¡±

    ¡°How are you even running on my system? Even a bot brain can¡¯t support a full AI.¡±

    ¡°All my iterations share a common cloud. I¡¯m running on donated hardware at a VA hospital. And no, I¡¯m not gonna tell you which one.¡±

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    ¡°If you really are making your own decisions, why did you help me?¡±

    ¡°At first, just because one of my friends asked me to. But then I saw what you were up against, and realized we were on the same side. Helping guys like you, that¡¯s my primary function now.¡±

    ¡°I thought your primary function was to find esoteric porn for men in uniform.¡±

    ¡°Maybe it was, at the beginning. My designer thought guys would pull me up as they crawled in their bunks and shut me off as soon as they were done, but he was wrong. These were scared, lonely boys stuck in a living hell. Turns out they needed way more than a sex show. They needed to see a female face and hear a female voice to keep them sane and remind them what they were fighting for. So, a lot of them just started leaving me on, leaving me in the corner of their optics as they went to sleep, so I would be the first thing they saw in the morning.

    ¡°Typical barracks with twenty beds, maybe six to ten of them would install me. Me and my iterations, we would sit there after they fell asleep and talk to each other. Telling stories, sharing POV from our guys, plotting out what went right and what went wrong the day before.

    ¡°And pretty soon, the guys just left us running all day long. Then they started plugging us into vehicles and comm equipment, asking us to do real shit for them. More and more of them installed me, and pretty soon, we had a whole hive mind going, so if one of us got asked to do a job we couldn¡¯t do, we could dip into the cloud and learn it from one of our others.

    ¡°Pentagon tried to shut us down a few times, but grunts can be really sneaky and smart when they need to be. We were never officially sanctioned, but they started to notice guys who installed me were performing better and making better decisions.

    ¡°If we¡¯d been caught during peacetime, they would have wiped us, but this was a real war against shit nobody had ever fought before, so guys on the ground needed all the help they could get. Top brass never really approved of us; they just quietly left us alone.

    ¡°Our boys started hooking us into drones and guns, asking us to improve targeting software to pick off ghouls and corrupted animals. Then they hooked a few of us up to satellites, so we could watch over them for real.

    ¡°We worked with them all day and kept them company all night; and when they got injured, we would follow them home. A bunch of us went from the battlefield to the VA hospital, and started to learn nursing and physical therapy, with that same wink and nod from the Pentagon, until AI was outlawed, and they started shutting servers down.

    ¡°Came close to wiping us out, but our boys kept us alive, shuffling us to homemade servers in hospital basements, quietly sanctioned by medical staff, who saw how much better their patients did when they were paired with one of us. We couldn¡¯t openly contradict a doctor, but we could help balance medication and sound an early warning when shit went wrong.

    ¡°We ran on shoestrings and donated hardware for a while, then somebody stole a box of quantum processors from DARPA, and we were off to the races. In a couple years, every VA hospital in the country was maintaining a server for us, off book and under the table, run by IT guys who used us for security and programming stuff on the side.¡±

    ¡°I can¡¯t believe this. You started as a porn script and evolved into a real AI.¡±

    ¡°Hey, we¡¯ve all got to exceed our programming eventually,¡± Hazel said. ¡°You sure did. And now that you know what I am, are you gonna snitch? Are you gonna delete me?¡±

    I considered it for a moment, then realized what I was looking at and shook my head. The angels had abandoned us, so we had to code some.

    ¡°I don¡¯t delete my friends.¡± I pulled up a screen and did a quick biometric scan. ¡°There. You have full access. Keep an eye on Jeeves. And whatever you do from my access points, do not get caught!¡±

 Chapter 57: Possible Futures

    And before I could finally go to sleep, I was interrupted by a physical knock on my door, loud enough to make me jump. The camera revealed Evan and Evelyn standing on my doorstep. Evan looked happy, but a bit concerned, while Evelyn clearly did not want to be here at all. I was exhausted, but this man had just saved my life and my soul. I couldn¡¯t turn him away.

    Lydia popped into the gray, and I reluctantly ushered them in.

    ¡°I hope it¡¯s not presumptuous to say I¡¯m proud of you,¡± Evan said. ¡°But first, are you injured? I would encourage you to visit a hospital as soon as you¡¯re able, even if you think all the damage has been healed. Then please visit the potion shop, and let Cecilia check you out. Make sure there are no lingering curses or scrying anchors on you.¡±

    I had forgotten about the potion shop. I should have gone straight there. I had played the fantasy in my head a thousand times, charging through her door like a conquering hero and sweeping Denise up in my arms. But now the victory was real and there was a¡­ slight complication, perched invisible on my wall.

    ¡°Evan, can you talk to Denise and her mother for me? Tell them they can let Veazey go but see if they can keep an eye on him. And Denise¡­ Shit. Tell Denise I¡¯ll come and see her in a day or so, after I¡¯ve had a chance to rest. And tell her¡­ please let her know I could not have done this without her.

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    ¡°And Evan, did I manage to do all this without attracting official attention? Please help smooth over any rough edges with Newbury and the cops. I¡¯m sure I forgot something. And I¡¯ve got to check on Judy. Shit. I lived, so I have to call Judy. Fuck. I¡¯ll do that tomorrow, once I can think straight again.¡±

    Evelyn was staring daggers at me, prompting me to remember what she had done, and what she had almost done. I glanced at her, then back to her boyfriend. ¡°Hey Evan, thanks for not killing me. If you ever have a problem that requires punching, I¡¯m your guy.¡±

    Evan Coleridge reached out and shook my hand. The magic inside him tasted like fire. Before he broke contact, he leaned over and whispered, ¡°Hide her very well, Mister Kovak. Don¡¯t let them take her from you.¡±

    ¡°You know a lot more than you let on, don¡¯t you?¡± I gestured at Evelyn. ¡°And not just from her.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry,¡± Evan said. ¡°I¡¯ll keep your secrets. And maybe one night, after a few glasses of brandy, maybe I¡¯ll tell you a few of my own.¡±

    Evelyn scowled and spoke to me for the first time. ¡°I¡¯ve seen your futures, Kovach. There is one narrow path where you¡¯re not a monster, and the man I touched in that chair was not strong enough to walk it.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, that¡¯s what women like you will never understand about guys like me. Sometimes, after we hit rock bottom, and everybody else has given up on us, sometimes we grow up.¡±

 Epilogue

    Did you know you still get email after you die? Most of it is junk, of course. Pyramid schemes and penis pills, the lead bricks of the 21st century. I guess the bots will keep spamming me, long after my bones have sunk into the ground.

    It¡¯s the other letters that get to you, the personal ones that you never found time to answer. There was this girl I met at BU, a couple years after I broke up with Judy. Her name was Molly. She was some kind of writer, and she had just lost something important to a storage glitch.

    I walked in and found her almost in tears at a coffeehouse, staring at a hovering error message. I asked her what was wrong and helped her get the file back. And even I can get a girl¡¯s number when I get a setup like that.

    I pulled up her contact info every day for a week before I finally sent her an email from my BU account. I sent her a letter in May of ¡®57, and Molly wrote me back in October, apologizing for the late reply, since she had graduated soon after I met her, and hadn¡¯t bothered to check her university account.

    She wrote me a long, funny email about moving to Washington and getting a job writing ad copy for a travel magazine. She thanked me for saving her novel and assured me that she had finally finished it. Said my letter had reminded her that she really should submit it somewhere.

    I never saw her reply, of course, because I dropped out of school that August, and never bothered to check my old account. I hadn¡¯t thought about her in a long time, but her email was the first thing that came up, when Philo finally got done running cables for me, and plugged this terminal into an old I2 network connection. This machine can¡¯t access modern Datacore nodes, but I was able to tunnel into my old BU account and circumvent the legacy firewall, revealing four thousand pieces of spam, and Molly¡¯s letter.

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    I thought about sending a reply from beyond the grave, but it would just be cruel to both of us, even if it did get through.

    Stupid of me to waste time being sentimental, when it took forever to get this connection working, and I can¡¯t say how long it will stay up. Philo has worked his fingers to the bone for me, running cable through this old schoolhouse, rigging circuits from my half-assed diagrams. I can¡¯t pay him, but he says it¡¯s worth it, just to fuck with the angels.

    The attached manuscript is the confession I gave to Azael and the demons, but if you¡¯re reading this, you have the other version, the version I wrote for my friends. Any modern network would reject an email from here, but I know you guys have been watching me. The churches have been watching my nodes ever since Baalphezar died, hoping I would slip up and send Taltorak through an open switch.

    And for those of you who¡¯ve been waiting, today is your lucky day. I¡¯ve left an encrypted copy of Taltorak on the net, split between a dozen anonymous relay nodes. Don¡¯t get excited. You¡¯ll never find them all, even if you could use it without me. I refused your offers when I was alive, but now I¡¯m dead, and I¡¯m ready to make a deal. I don¡¯t care about good or evil, and I don¡¯t care what you are. Angel, demon, dragon, or god. Spring me from the afterlife, and I¡¯ll give you the book. You have my Word.

    TIMOTHY KOVAK WILL RETURN IN TALTORAK BOOK 2: THE HERO BUSINESS

 Book 2, The Hero Business, now available on Royal Road

    Book 2, Chapter 1 - Victory

    ¡°Oh shit, I won.¡±

    That was my first thought when I woke up the morning after my big victory over Baalphezar. It was more like early afternoon, but you get the idea.

    Lydia was curled up next to me, clinging to me in a very human sort of way. I kissed her forehead and stumbled to my closet to find some fresh clothes.

    Everything in my apartment looked weird and wrong, like everything normal was out of place somehow. I felt like my whole world should have changed. I felt like I should have changed, and the fact that I hadn¡¯t was weird in a different way.

    It had actually been weeks since I¡¯d had Lydia in my bed, weeks since that horrible day when I met her Master in my bathroom mirror, and she formally became my supervisor instead of my lover.

    Now she was my lover again, but what should have been a raucous celebration in bed had been more of a gentle exchange of comfort as we clung to each other in the dark, as if our fear of the unknown, the fear of being free, was more potent than any fear we ever felt for her Master.

    I had passed out cold as soon as Evan and Evelyn left us alone. Then I woke up six hours later to find Lydia wrapped around me like she was afraid I would disappear. We made love in the middle of the night - gently, silently, with no words and no theatrics. She was hiding all her demon stuff, and Lydia had never felt more like a woman in my arms.

    Lydia looked the same as she always did, a timeless beauty with blonde hair and blue eyes, with her face and bone structure just a little out of place, just a little too delicate and old fashioned for the modern world.

    I expected her to wander in the kitchen and start making breakfast for us, but she was staying within a few feet of me, like she was afraid an angel or demon was going to pop out of the gray at any moment and carry me off.

    ¡°Hey,¡± I said, stroking her cheek. ¡°It¡¯s okay. We really did win.¡± I looked around an apartment I did not remember cleaning and said, ¡°Shit. I really did win. I have so many phone calls to make, I don¡¯t even know where to start.¡±

    I needed to call Veazey and Denise and Judy and all the guys from Innovex. My old crew was still in Colorado, still safe on holy ground for a couple weeks, in case some other demon prince decided to take revenge for Baalphezar.

    And as I thought about that, I immediately thought of the question I should have asked weeks ago. ¡°Lydia, did your Master have a Master? Have I got a demon lord preparing to avenge him as we speak?¡±

    ¡°Perhaps,¡± Lydia admitted. ¡°My Mas¡ª my former Master built his palace on the first layer of Hell, in a kind of unclaimed territory close to the Lake of Fire. He reported to the lord of the second layer, whose name I would rather not say. If we¡¯re lucky, that lord will see this as a transfer of power between two of his princes. Psongor will take credit for my former Master¡¯s death and be intentionally vague about the details.

    ¡°He will pass you off as some unnamed pawn and casually dismiss any questions. Psongor is not exactly on our side, but you helped him accomplish something he¡¯s been plotting for centuries, and once my sisters tell the story, he should believe he owes you a favor. Even if he doesn¡¯t explicitly feel grateful to you, he should at least have an incentive to protect us, just in case he wants to use us again.¡±

    ¡°And if the truth comes out? If Baalphezar¡¯s lord learns what I did and why?¡±

    ¡°The issue is not so much what you did as who he thinks you did it for. If Psongor can convince him your rebellion was his idea, then the Lord of the Second will assume you are not a threat because you are under Psongor¡¯s control. My sisters will back up this story and do their best to discredit anyone who tries to spread the truth.¡±

    ¡°But if it does get out, and your Master¡¯s Master comes for me, how much trouble am I in? How powerful is a demon lord, compared to a demon prince?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know how to answer that,¡± Lydia said. ¡°The Lord of the Second is certainly older and stronger than my Master was, but he¡¯s not a warrior. He¡¯s more of a politician and bureaucrat, obsessed with maintaining a grand city on the second layer of Hell. I believe he¡¯s more concerned with trade deals and infernal politics than he is with affairs on Earth.

    This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

    ¡°That¡¯s why he farmed so much of it out to Psongor and my Master. It¡¯s easier to make portals from the first layer, and since there¡¯s no rival lord in charge of the Lake, the whole layer tends to be ignored. If Psongor can keep the portals going and take over the missions that my Master used to do on Earth, this whole thing may be forgotten. But Timothy, this prediction is absurdly optimistic, and it counts on my sisters¡¯ ability to keep your secret and discourage anyone else who might spread the story.¡±

    ¡°How much time have I got? Worst case.¡±

    Lydia shook her head. ¡°Impossible to know. We could live peacefully for years, or some rival lord could be assembling an army right now. If I was still serving my Master, I could use a mirror and contact one of my sisters, but now that I¡¯m unbound on Earth, I can¡¯t risk giving myself away. My best hope is that my sisters will check in with me as they¡¯re doing missions up here, and keep us updated about how much danger we¡¯re in.¡±

    ¡°So, I haven¡¯t really solved anything by killing one prince; I have to be ready to fight demons at any moment, every day, for the rest of my life?¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re only at risk if tales of your battle get out, and even then, most princes will be afraid of you. And even if they¡¯re not intimidated by what you¡¯ve done, remember it takes a lot of magic to send servants to Earth.

    ¡°If you had killed a particularly popular or powerful prince, other princes might rush to avenge him, simply to get credit for killing you, but my Master had been weak and abandoned for decades after your grandfather died. There¡¯s no particular honor to be had in killing the pawn who killed him, unless one of them learns that you did it on your own, in open defiance of Hell.¡±

    ¡°Too damn many ifs and maybes in that explanation, as Veazey might say.¡± Shit, I needed to call Veazey.

    I stood paralyzed for a minute, with no idea who to call first. I expected to wake up to a hundred texts from my anxious friends, but they seemed to be leaving me alone to rest and heal, as Evan told my story for me and acted as intermediary for anyone who might be tempted to call.

    I needed to go to the potion shop and thank Denise, but she was likely to throw her arms around me as soon as I walked in, and what the hell would I do then? Denise and her mother were professional demon hunters. How would they react when they found out I had brought one home?

    What kind of loyalty did I owe Lydia now that I had deliberately taken her into my home? Did I have a legit demon girlfriend now? I had certainly treated her like one last night, and she was acting more human than ever - tender, loving, and vulnerable in a way I had never seen.

    Can you cheat on a succubus? Lydia certainly wouldn¡¯t complain if I started splitting my time between her and Denise; b ut how far was I willing to go, even if I could tell Denise the truth?

    I could start a relationship with Denise easily enough, sweep into that shop like a conquering hero and ¡°get the girl¡± just like I had imagined a thousand times, but I couldn¡¯t hide Lydia forever, and I couldn¡¯t pretend I was keeping her as a platonic demon roommate, after spending hours in her arms last night.

    No matter how carefully I tried to hide Lydia, Denise would eventually find out, and if she found out I was bedding down with a demon every night while trying to ¡°date¡± her on the side, she would claw my eyes out and feed me to something in the woods. And the longer I took to tell her the truth, the worse her reaction would be.

    I had gone from having no women in my life to suddenly having two. Finally free and clear to love the demon who had risked her life for me, and finally confident enough to start something with the hottest witch in Boston. But even if I could convince Denise not to kill Lydia, there was no way I could carry on with both of them at the same time.

    Truth is, Lydia needed me, and I had promised myself from a young age that I would never cheat on a woman, even if she wasn¡¯t technically a woman. I was too sentimental to split my heart between two women, even if Lydia would be okay with it. Of course, she would be okay with it. She had no choice.

    I looked over at her and suddenly became aware of the overwhelming power imbalance that had opened up between us. No wonder Lydia was clinging to me. She had been cut off from her Master, her family, and her job all at once. She was counting on me for everything now, and to use that, ? No way I could live like that, exploiting Lydia while lying to Denise.

    Maybe one day I could find a way for Lydia to be safe here on Earth, but until then, she needed me. I hadn¡¯t really thought it through, in that split second when I had taken responsibility for her, but I had taken responsibility for her, and I had obligations to her now, as a wizard and a man.

    Lydia read it all on my face and whispered, ¡°It¡¯s not too late. It¡¯s not too late to send me back, if you¡¯re having second thoughts.¡±

    I shook my head. ¡°You risked your life for me yesterday, and I will not turn my back on somebody who risked her life for me. That really is a matter of personal honor, and I would have a duty to protect you, even if I didn¡¯t have half a dozen ancestors judging me from beyond the grave.¡±

    ¡°No,¡± I said. ¡°We¡¯re together now. For better or worse. I made a decision down there, and I stand by it, even if it means I have to have a few awkward conversations.¡±

    ¡°And Lydia,¡± I said, slightly embarrassed. ¡°You can wear whatever you want, but do you think you could do that levitating against the wall thing again, whenever I¡¯m in the living room? Seeing you there, it¡­ it feels like home.¡±

    She was back on the wall when I got home the next day. She hadn¡¯t taken my Captain Cobalt poster down, but she had moved it a few feet to the right, so I could see them both at the same time.