Demon Bound

“No god,” Jack snarled. “I belong to a demon, remember?” Jack wished, viciously, for something to take the edge off his panic and pain.

“’S what I thought,” Seth sighed. “Always had to be the chosen one, the one for whom the rules didn’t fucking apply, didn’t you, Jackie?”

“If you’ve got something to say, spit it out.” Jack unlocked the door and slipped out into the hospital corridor. Seth followed him, digging a Silk Cut from his pack and lighting it with a vicious snap of his power.

“You know you shouldn’t be here, Jack. You stole some time from the crow woman by cutting your deal, but her claws are sharp and her gaze is sharper. We all reach the road’s end. There’s nothing you can do to change that.”

“My road doesn’t end here,” Jack snarled. “Unlike you, sad old bastard, I haven’t given up.”

“Why now?” Seth demanded. “You had thirteen years to cheat the demon—why now, at the end, does it become the thing you’re willing to murder and torture over?”

Jack rounded on Seth, fists turning to knots of bone. “Because I have something to live for.” His cut started bleeding again, soaking the worn towel.

Seth gave Jack a wire-thin, resigned smile. “What’s her name?”

Jack started walking again. The A&E suite had filled while they were with Jao, tourists and locals sitting where they could find space on the floor and the metal benches. “You don’t get to know her name.”

“I guarantee the demon does,” Seth said. “The demon knows that she’s your soft underbelly, and that’s why he’s sent you on this doomed errand.” Seth exhaled, sharp, an arrow of smoke. “Don’t do something you can’t wash off for a piece of skirt, boy. Take it from me, it all comes down on your head in the end.”

“In the end,” Jack said quietly, “she’s the only person who gave a shit about me, who held out a hand, who even pretended to care if I lived or died, so if you say one more word about her I swear to the crow woman I’ll bleed you where you stand, Seth. I mean it.”

“You’ve changed, Jack.” Seth shoved his hands into his pockets. “And though I didn’t think it was possible, not for the better.”

“Same to you, mate,” Jack said. “And a big cheery thanks for all of your nonexistent help.”

“Help? Anyone who helps you ends up dead or broken, boy. I learned my lesson on that score twenty fuckin’ years ago.” Seth shook his head. “I’m finished with you, Jackie. You shouldn’t have come to me, caught me up in this. It’s not considerate and it’s not bloody fair.”

“Fair?” Jack rounded on Seth. “Don’t you talk to me about fair, old man. I suppose to you fair is dumping out an apprentice so addled with the sight he’d put out his own eyes to stop the dead coming. Fair is knowing your friend is wandering the street with skag for blood. Fair is sleeping nice and tight every night because you’re lucky enough to be able to forget your sins.” Jack hissed as his arm throbbed. “If that’s what you think, Seth, then you’re right—it was right fucking unfair of me to expect any help from the likes of you.”

Seth took his hands from his pockets, flexed his fists. “You really want to walk this road, Jackie?”

“No, Seth,” Jack sighed. “I want to find Miles Hornby. I want to find him, and give him to the demon, and go home.”

Seth’s posture slumped, and he passed a hand over his face to clear it of sweat. “You were always so bloody stubborn, Jackie. Always had to be right, even when you missed it by a mile.”

“It’s one of me charming traits,” Jack said. “Ask anybody.”

Seth shook his head, his gaze shifting to a point over Jack’s shoulder. “You won’t change your mind.”

“Can’t,” Jack shrugged. “The demon wants Hornby and I want what the demon promised me. I suppose I don’t want to die, either. Silly me.”

Seth dropped his eyes to the stained vinyl floor. “Then I’m sorry, Jackie. Dead sorry.”

Jack only became aware of the two men in sunglasses when they approached from the entrance of A&E, their dark suits and slacks and gold chains giving them away as a creature not normally found in the bowels of a hospital waiting room.

“Help you, gents?” Jack smiled as they glided up on either side of Seth, like two shadow spilling into a lit doorway.

The man on the left smiled at Jack. “Mr. Winter?” His accent was London, and not the part Jack had spent most of his life in. This accent reminded him more of Nicholas Naughton than it did a gangster. The man was surely that, though—gangsters looked the same the world over, once you got past the superficial costumes. Blank eyes, shark smiles, energy too big and pulsing with malice for the space their bodies occupied.

They always thought they were the worst predator on their patch, and the shit bit of it was that outside the Black, they were nearly always right.

“I’m Jack Winter,” Jack confirmed. No point in lying about his name if they already knew it.

“Then we are to extend you an invitation, Mr. Winter,” Lefty said. Rightie was silent. His hand clutched a string of what looked like Buddhist prayer beads, at first glance, but what Jack saw were really tiny skulls, carved from black stone. A fetish or a focus—Jack wasn’t keen to find out, and even less keen to know the gangsters had some talent for sorcery.

“Sorry, mate.” Jack held up his bloodied arm. “I’ve had my dance for today. Unless your invite is for a stitch-up and a stiff drink, thank you but please fuck off.”

The man inclined his head. “Perhaps I wasn’t clear. This is not a request, Mr. Winter.”

Jack felt the electricity up and down his spine that signaled another mage was close. “You said it was an invitation.”

“It can be,” said the one with the beads. “It can be something else if you don’t feel like being sociable.”

Their magic was thick and hard, like scraping your knuckles against stone, leaving blood and skin behind. Jack favored them with a wide smile. Keep smiling, keep the gangsters calm, and work out how the bloody hell he was going to extricate himself from the situation before someone used that hard, ugly magic on him. Think, Winter, the fix mocked him. You’re so clever. Bright boy, always a quicksilver mind.

Jack spread out his hands, so the gangsters could see they were empty and that he was no threat, just another hapless farang. “Who do you work for, then? Or do you run about like superheroes in chavvy gold chains, striking down wicked men like me where you find them?”

Lefty sighed. “Mr. Winter, don’t make this difficult.”

“Difficult?” Jack shook his head, slow and pitying. “Difficult would be me taking the two of you by the bollocks and tossing you headfirst through the waiting-room window. Difficult would be me cursing you into small, bloody smears in front of all of these nice people. I have not begun to be difficult yet, mate.”

Jack felt the light air-brush of witchfire start to spread from his fingers and anywhere his skin was exposed. Everyone in the waiting room had averted their eyes when the men stepped up, but Jack didn’t care. He was never coming back to this bloody city, with its slick snakeskin magic and its crowded, whispering Black.

Lefty’s hand shot out and clamped down on the spot where Jao had cut him. The pain was deep and dull, a rusted blade in his skin, and Jack ground his teeth to keep from yelling. “Mr. Winter,” Lefty said. “I don’t want to do this, but I have my instructions. You need to come with us. Right this moment.”

Righty clicked his beads. The power around the two mages swelled. Jack felt blood from his wound start to drip again, hitting the linoleum floor with dull splats. Blood was a powerful cantrip. A mage could use blood as a conductor, a cha