Sins of the Demon

“In the demon realm?”

“In both worlds,” she stated. “I borrowed this from the storage room of a museum in New Orleans.”

“Borrowed?”

The demon gave a light shrug. “I suspect that none there knew of its true nature, else it would not have been in a storage room with only a padlock for security. I will return it when you no longer have need of it, or I will make appropriate recompense.”

I’d have thought the demon sense of honor wouldn’t have allowed “borrowing” without asking, but apparently there was wiggle room in there according to whether the borrowed item would be missed. Apparently I still had a lot to learn about their honor. Hopefully I wouldn’t need the artifact for very long, and she could return it before anyone missed it. “Why couldn’t you just ask Rhyzkahl to bring one with him the next time I summoned him?”

She shook her head. “Because of its nature, it is not something that can be transferred through a portal without extreme effort.”

I winced. “Oh. Right. Something that mutes the arcane would screw up a portal pretty good, huh.”

“Precisely.” She watched me steadily. “The lock has been disabled. You will be able to remove it whenever you wish.”

I gave an unsteady smile. “I know. I’m just a little weirded out by the idea of putting on what’s essentially a slave cuff.”

She lowered her head, eyes steady on me. “You can wear this cuff here, or you can truly be made a slave in the demon realm after being summoned and bound,” the demon said, voice abruptly hard.

I clenched my jaw, then gave a curt nod. I was being a weenie. Lifting the cuff, I quickly snapped it onto my wrist. I expected to feel something unusual—a tingling, or, well, anything. But the cuff could have been made of plastic for all I felt.

“I don’t feel any different,” I finally said.

She gave a satisfied nod. “It will take a little time for you to feel any effect. But I would not have you wear anything that caused you harm or made it so that you were unable to function.”

I lifted my wrist and peered at the cuff. “It’s seriously ugly though. I guess I can just wear long sleeves and keep it covered.”

The demon traced a sigil on the surface of the table. Even without othersight I should have been able to see it, but I couldn’t see a damn thing, and I found that it was impossible for me to switch into othersight.

“Now I kind of feel like my ears need to pop,” I said. “I mean, not really my ears, but it feels like the same thing.”

She gave a slight nod. “With your arcane senses instead of your physical. I understand.”

“And I can’t be summoned as long as I’m wearing this?”

Her lips curved in a slight smile. “That is correct. It will be impossible for the ritual to ‘lock onto you,’ so to speak.”

It seemed to remain oddly cool against my skin. “Couldn’t I just wait until I feel a summoning begi

“No, in fact that could be quite dangerous,” she stated. At my frown she continued. “The cuff will prevent a summoning from locking onto you. You may have noticed that each summoning attempt has been stronger and more focused than the last. Soon it will be impossible to simply run as a means of escape. If a summoning locates you, and you then put the cuff on, you will still be summoned. But the cuff will alter the portal—”

“And I’d end up in tiny bits,” I said with a wince.

“Correct.” She reached across the table to touch the back of my hand. “You will not have to wear this forever,” she said. “Lord Rhyzkahl is doing his utmost to eliminate the threat.”

I nodded and resisted the urge to do more mopey whining. “Yeah. It’s cool. I can handle this. It’s just a piece of damn jewelry.” Even so, I pulled it off, breathing a sigh of relief as everything seemed to leap back into focus.

“I have something else for you,” she said, dipping into her pack and pulling out a thick envelope.

“Matching earrings?” I said with a deliberately cheeky grin.

She chuckled. “No. I did not think you wished to wear yet more ugly jewelry.” She pushed the envelope toward me. “I am aware that your finances have been stressed with the additional expenses incurred by my presence. Since it is hardly worthwhile to protect you and yet have you fall into financial ruin, I am hoping that this will ameliorate the situation somewhat.”

Stu

She gave a pleased smile. “I borrowed forty dollars from your wallet and went to a casino on the Gulf Coast. The advertisements on television stated that one could win large sums of money at such places.” Then her brow puckered. “However, I must say, their advertisements are terribly misleading. One must have excellent skills at observation, physics, and mathematics in order to compete with a minimum of disadvantage. Fortunately, I am in possession of all of those skills, but I would venture to say that very few humans have the necessary aptitudes.” She inclined her head. “No offense intended.”

I gri

“And they are seldom disappointed, I am sure,” she said. “I could only remain and partake of the gaming for an hour, but I am hoping the monies within the envelope will help your situation. And the original forty dollars are in there as well.”

Pulling the bills out of the envelope, I counted off five hundred and then handed the rest back to her. “Thank you for worrying about me, but you’re really not a very expensive roommate. However, you do need your own money.”

She paused before taking the envelope back. “Are you certain? If you need more funds, you need only ask.”

“I’m sure,” I said.

A smile spread across her face as she tucked the envelope into her backpack. “My thanks. I do indeed have some purchases I wish to make.”

Somehow I had the feeling that it wouldn’t be long before Fuzzykins was the proud owner of a shiny new Kitty Kondo.

Chapter 8

“I can’t think of a better way to start the day,” my aunt’s boyfriend said as he looked down at the corpse before him.

I cocked an eyebrow at him. “You really need a life.”

A smile ghosted across his lips, which on him was equivalent to a full-belly laugh. Carl was the morgue assistant to Dr. Jonathan Lanza, the parish pathologist. Tall and lean, with short, almost colorless hair and hazel-brown eyes, he managed to avoid looking like the archetypical morgue worker by having a semblance of a tan and a fairly athletic build. However, he was reserved to the point of appearing emotionless, which tended to swing him right back into the stereotype. In the past few months I’d had the chance to get to know him some, and I’d come to learn that he was anything but emotionless. He was a keen observer and tended to think carefully before speaking, but moreover, he was my aunt’s boyfriend—and that right there told me there was something very special about him. My aunt was…odd. But he seemed to understand her. Better than I did, to be honest.

We were in the cutting room of the St. Long Parish Morgue. On the metal table before us was the naked body of Barry Landrieu. The scent of formalin and Pine-Sol mingled, and my stomach gave off an unfamiliar twinge of queasiness. I’d only been wearing the cuff for a few hours, and I was already feeling the effects. As long as I don’t puke during the autopsy I’ll be all right, I tried to reassure myself. I would never live it down if I lost my breakfast.

“You don’t normally come to autopsies of natural deaths,” Carl said as he readied instruments on a side table. Scalpels, scissors, syringes, a bone saw. And one that always made me wince—long-handled pruning shears, used to cut through the ribs so that the pathologist could better examine the internal organs.