Working for the Devil

CHAPTER 12

I needed to shake out the fidgets and think, and I thought best while moving. I doubted the demon could ride a slicboard, so we walked. The demon trailed me, his boots echoing against pavement. My fingers locked so tightly around my scabbard they ached.

Bits of foil wrappers and discarded paper cups, cigarette butts, the detritus of city life. I kicked at a Sodaflo can, the aluminum rattling against pavement. Little speckles from quartz in the pavement, broken glass, a rotting cardboard Cereon box, a pigeon hopping in the gutter, taking flight with a whir of wings.

Two blocks fell away under my feet. Three.

"That went well," Jaf said finally.

I glanced up at him from my boot toes. "You think so?" I settled my bag against my hip. "Gabe and I go way back."

"Gabe?" His tone was faintly inquiring. "And you're… Danny. Dante."

"I had a classical humanist for a social worker." I stroked my swordhilt. "I tested positive for psionic ability, got tossed into the Hegemony psi program. I was lucky."

"Lucky?"

"My parents could have sold me as an indentured, probably in a colony, instead of having me in a hospital and automatically giving me to the foster program," I said. Though a colony would have been preferable to Rigger Hall. For a moment the memory—locked in the cage, sharp bites of nothingness and madness against my skin; or the whip burning as it laid a stroke of fire along my back—rose to choke me. The Hall had been hell—a true hell, a human hell, without the excuse of demons to make it terrifying. "Or sold me to a wage-farm, worked until my brain and Talent gave out. Or sold me as a breeder, squeezing out one psi-positive baby after another for the colony program. You never know."

"Oh."

I looked up again, caught a flash of his eyes. Had he been looking at me? His profile was bony, almost ugly, a fall of light from a streetlamp throwing dark shadows under his eyes and cheekbones. His aura was strangely subdued, the diamond darkness folding around him.

Like wings.

I was lucky. I didn't know who my parents were, but their last gift to me had been having me in a hospital and signing the papers to turn me over to the Hegemony. Even though the Parapsychic Act was law and psis were technically free citizens, bad things still happened. Psis were still sold into virtual slavery, especially if their Talent was weak or their genes recessive. And most especially if they were born in backroom clinics or in the darkness of redlight districts and slums.

His black coat made a slight sound as he moved. He had a habit of clasping his hands behind his back while walking, which gave him a slow, measured gait. "So what do you do?" I asked. "In Hell, I mean. What's your job?"

If I thought his profile was ugly before it became stonelike and savage now, his mouth pulling down and his eyes actually turning darker, murderously glittering. My heart jumped into my throat, I tasted copper.

"I am the assassin," he said finally. "I am the Prince's Right Hand."

"You do the Devil's dirty work?"

"Can you find some other title to give him?" he asked. "You are exceedingly rude, even for a human. Demons do not conform to your human idea of evil."

"You're an exceeding asshole, even for a demon," I snapped. "And the human idea of evil is all I've got. So what is such an august personage doing hanging out with me?"

"If I keep you alive long enough to recover the Egg, I will be free," he said through gritted teeth.

"You mean you're not free now?"

"Of course not." He tilted his head up, as if listening. After a few moments, I heard a distant siren. My left shoulder twinged. "Where are we going?"

"I'm going to see Dacon. He's a Magi, he'll just love you." My jaw ached and my eyes were hot and grainy. "After that I'm going to get some sleep, then I'll visit the Spider. And by then Gabe should have everything together, and I'll start hunting."

"I suppose you will try to escape me as soon as possible," he said.

"Not tonight," I promised him. "I'm too tired tonight."

"But afterward?" he persisted. "I don't want to lose my chance at freedom for your petty human pride."

"You say 'human' like it's a dirty word." I tucked my free hand in my pocket. My rings were dark now, no longer glittering and sparking. Out here, in the flux and ambient static of city Power, the atmosphere wasn't charged enough to make them react. Instead, they settled into a watchful gleam.

"That's the same way you say 'demon'," he shot back, immediately. Was he scowling? I had never seen a demon scowl, and I stared, fascinated.

I'm not going to win this one, I realized, and dropped my eyes hurriedly back down to the pavement "You stuck a gun in my face." It was lame even by my standards.

"That's true," he admitted. "I did. I thought you were a door-guard. Who knows what the best Necromance of a generation has guarding the door? I was only told to collect you and keep you alive. Nothing else, not even that you were a woman."

I stopped short on the sidewalk and examined him. He stopped, too, and turned slightly, facing me.

I pulled my free hand from my pocket, stuck it out. "Let's start over," I said. "Hi. I'm Danny Valentine."

He paused for so long that I almost snatched my hand back, but he finally reached out and his fingers closed around mine. "I am Japhrimel," he said gravely.

I shook his hand twice, had to pull a little to take my hand back. "Nice to meet you." I didn't mean it—I would rather have never seen his face—but sometimes the little courtesies helped.

"Likewise," he said. "I am very pleased to meet you, Danny."

Maybe he was lying, too, but I appreciated the effort. "Thanks." I started off again, and he fell into step beside me. "So you're Lucifer's Right Hand, huh?"

He nodded, his profile back to its usual harsh almost-ugly lines. "Since I was hatched."

"Hatch—" Then I figured out I didn't want to know. "Never mind. Don't tell me, I don't want to know."

"You're very wise," he said. "Some humans pester us incessantly."

"I thought you liked that," I said. "Demons, I mean, as a whole."

He shrugged. "Some of us have leave from the Prince to answer the calls of the Magi. I have not had much traffic with humans."

"Neither have I," I told him, and that seemed to finish up conversation for a while. I was glad. I had a whole new set of things to worry about—how Dacon would react, and how the news of me hanging out with one of Hell's citizens would get around town really fast, especially if I saw Abra. I couldn't leave the demon behind—he might get into trouble, and besides, I didn't think he'd take to waiting in an alley while I went into Dake's club.