Demon Bait (Keeley Thomson) (10 page)

It didn't look like much in
there, since everything was invisible, but she could enter the space and find
things. There was no need to breathe there, since time didn't exist. It made
moving around interesting, but it was doable, using magic. The idea was, if she
had to, that Keeley could walk into the space and simply hold still for a time,
to avoid an attack or to hide from someone. Like a panic room, if it were
portable.

When the knock on the door came,
she decided that she was ready, and answered it, trying to smile. Quince didn't
have a gun or sword of his own in his hands, so she decided it was a good sign.

"Hi Kevin! Come on in. Would
you like something to eat? Or drink?" She said the words as naturally as
possible, still ready to move if he came at her. Darla just watched, standing
back, a smile on her face.

"Oh, that sounds good. Could
I have some water? Please?" That was pretty polite for him, since he'd
come from a time that was so long before things like politeness hadn't really
been invented yet.

She got a glass for him, and a
bag of corn chips to share, putting it all in a bowl. Then had him settle in on
the sofa.

"So, Quince..." Keeley looked
at him, knowing he was hers, but spoke the words anyway. "You can't lie to
me, or fight against me in any way. Right now you're going to be relaxed and can't
even think about becoming violent without my permission. Do you understand
that?"

"Oh, yes. I understand. Why
would I?" He seemed honestly confused, but something inside his eyes
hardened just a little bit, and he winced. She hadn't forbidden him from
thinking, and even a Durg could eventually understand what was happening.
"By my beard! You're the Demon?"

There was no violence, just him
looking at her as if to say he still didn't believe it.

"Well,
one
of them.
Not, as you might have guessed, the one that you've been looking for. I'm The
Mistress of Souls. Darla is The Technician."

There was an open mouthed look
that worked for the young looking man, if not in any way that a thinking person
would enjoy. He had nice full lips, and blue eyes, she noticed.

"The Bold?"

Darla shrugged, and moved to pat
him on the leg. Then she moved to his hand, the drain of his life's knowledge
palpable to Keeley as it happened.

"Fram. Who you knew as Barb?
At least the last one. Before that the part was played by Xenses, The Defiler.
To answer your questions however, the unasked ones, I was the one that killed
your brothers. They killed Rob, who was one of my people, and they did it on my
territory. Yes, they'd been ordered to by the Gatherer, Edith to harm one of
the Raintree high football team members to ensure a victory for her students,
but they
chose
to take it too far. Worse, they knew they were flouting
her intent at the time. She died for that too, by the way. I didn't tell you,
since I felt that you might be obligated to try and fight me if I did. I...
Actually
like
you, Quince. So I hired Keeley here to enslave you
instead."

Because that would make sense to
anyone, ever. Looking over at her sister it was all she could do to not roll
her eyes and make little violin noises. It was, naturally, a very well played
scene, hitting just the right notes, but the fact was, Quince was more than a
little annoying.

Not that Keeley was going to be
mean to him. Her job wasn't about that. Not this time. He wasn't wrong, wanting
revenge for his family members, after all. That just couldn't be allowed. The
fact was, she personally benefited from the idea that no one got away with
doing wrong to a Greater Demon. It would make her entire existence easier to
manage, since they weren't all that popular for some reason. Sure, it was
probably the fact that too many of them were insane killers that would eat your
children for a snack, but even
that
helped to keep a lot of beings in
line. Without that reputation, she'd end up having to fight, and kill, a whole
lot more than she would otherwise.

Even Quince seemed to understand
that. At least inside, where it counted. He didn't tense up, not being allowed
to, but she hadn't told him to be polite all the time, so in a very relaxed
fashion he told Darla to go and fuck herself.

"Or, if you
want
, I
can do that for you? Not in a way that you'll enjoy however. You killed my
brothers... How am I supposed to handle that? I thought we were friends."
That was honest enough that he said it while looking at Keeley.

She grinned.

"It's a matter of
conflicting world views. Now, don't let this get you down, it's all about you
coming to terms with what happened. When you really do, I'll be able to let you
go. In the mean time, how would you like a job? One far away from here?"

There was a lot going on inside,
including thoughts of killing himself, but that ended when he realized that it
would be him attempting to escape, which wasn't allowed. Glaring at her, he
nodded, knowing that choice wasn't a thing he had anymore.

Except that he really did. If he
refused to do the work, she'd place him somewhere else. There was no reason for
her to make his life too hard. It was why she held out hope of being free one
day. Yes, he'd have to die to do it, but here, in this one being, was a chance
for her to do that without dying herself. Given that it could happen inside a
few days or weeks, if he got his thinking around fast enough, she really didn't
want him to be too upset with her.

Or worse, her friends. If that
happened Darla would kill him.

"I guess?"

"Good! What I want, is for
you to watch out for Becky Hoader. Get in good with her. Tell her about how you
got a large inheritance from your grandmother, and want to move out to
Hollywood. Invite her along. Make it about sex or something, but not so much
that she feels trapped. Can you do that?" It might be a little advanced
for him to manage, which would mean giving him a lot of help with the storyline,
but he seemed to think he could do it on his own.

That meant she was able to simply
add a few more explanations, and set up an account for him to use in his own
name. It was hard to do at night, but the others were planning to leave the
next day, for the Grand Canyon. True, Becky's boyfriend was going along as
well, but that relationship was pretty much over anyway. Darla assured them
both of that, explaining how she'd been making certain it would end peacefully.
It made for an interesting story, but didn't take too long.

By midnight Keeley managed to
have everyone out the door, and settled onto the bed in her room, going over
all the information she had, about pretty much everyone. It took some time,
being that several of the beings she was investigating were older than dirt. In
some cases
honestly
so, given the rate of decay and how such things
developed over time. Given the way things broke down and were recaptured by
plants and fungi, most topsoil was less than a few hundred years old, even. The
very surface layer was less than that in most places, unless the farming
practices were just horrible.

She ran the list, going over the
easy ones first. The ones she needed to handle for the Second Crucible. The
Vile came first, which was a good plan, because he didn't have that name due to
proclivities or habits, exactly. The fact was, everything about that particular
Greater Demon was simply
gag
inducing. He
smelled
, which was on
purpose, and covered himself with rotting and festering wounds. It was his own
personal take on the world and didn't make sense to her, but the fact was, he
enjoyed alienating others.

The Cartographer was more normal,
and even sane, which normally would have made things work out well enough, even
with one of the nut jobs being involved. Like his title said, he drew maps.
Highly advanced ones that could show even a normal person how to transverse to
almost any point in space or time. There was a lot of information about that
kind of thing in her memories of him, but that was about all that might be
considered interesting. He was, for the most part, his single task. He produced
maps
. Just that. He didn't bicker, or fight a lot, and wasn't prone to
irregular emotional ups or downs. How he could end up involved in
anything
,
given that, she didn't know.

The Lover was easier to see that
way, since "
Lover
" was a pretty polite way to speak about her.
Her main area of achievement was sex... and related topics. Like the
Cartographer, she was driven by that one thing in all areas of existence. It
was her defining trait, on a level that had to make it hard to live, day to
day. She couldn't do a lot of simple tasks, like shopping or walking down the
street, without stopping for sex every few minutes. That was, no doubt, going
to make the job at hand nice and easy. Hopefully she'd hold together long
enough for the rest of them to come to a conclusion about things. That, or they
could try and hold the discussions needed while she had sex. If so, Keeley was
going to hire someone to do that part. That, or get her friend Kaitlyn to come
in and handle it, since she was a succubus.

The vexing portion was that she
simply had no clue what the issue was. That part was hidden from her, and
Tarsus hadn't been useful there. Oh, these three might well end up in a war or
major blow-up over it, but she wasn't allowed to know what it was, so that she
could walk into the meeting room
prepared
. No,
that
would make
sense, or possibly allow her to actually fix the problem, instead of just
making her look young and inept. Not that the whole point wasn't that. It was
just a thing to distract the others from what she was really doing.

The Rage was male, and filled
with anger at all times. He was so bad that it leaked from him telepathically
into various other parts of the world. He lived in a war zone, constantly,
since everywhere he went the world devolved into that state, just for him. On
the good side he wasn't all that brilliant. Most of the Greater Demons were
decent that way, but The Rage couldn't let himself think that much, because it
angered him to do so, which gave her a possible edge. On the bad side, he
would
try to kill her, if they ever met. Even if she didn't give him a reason to.

The Chaotic was pretty much what
he or she sounded like. That part was strange, but as a being, it was hard for
anyone to know what sex it really was. It didn't have a favorite form either,
so it could show up as anything. Leaving disorder in its wake. On
purpose
,
however. Just being near the area of influence was enough to pretty much ensure
that everything would go wrong, which was going to make dealing with him, or
her, a very interesting task. The very nature of the Demon would seek to block
her powers and make certain she messed everything up. Really, it was too
dangerous to even think about, so she stopped. Even here, far away from
wherever the being lived and worked, it might accidently influence her, if she
focused on it too much. She could feel the sinking of the universe around her,
tugging in that direction, skewing away from her, for as long as she reviewed
the nature of the being. So whatever she did would have to be precise, fast and
done well away from it.

She had to move on, and knew the
most about Helmsman, who was, as Tarsus had told her, a lady. It was her
ability to guide and steer those around her that earned the name. She'd need to
be taken at a distance too. Really, they all would, if possible.

That left The Void, who was a
male, maybe, but otherwise an unknown. Even as to what he did, or how it
happened, there was very little data. She kind of suspected that it might not
be that great of a problem really, and wasn't destructive, just the opposite of
The Librarian, which made it unpopular and scary to the man. At least he didn't
have a big laundry list of wrongs done by the being. If he did, then Tarsus
hadn't bothered sharing that with her, at any rate.

It was oddly comforting, she
realized. Oh, in a strange and possibly insane way, but still, that counted
too.

The first three, the ones for her
Crucible, were all older and more powerful than she was, but only one was
insane on a level that she couldn't understand, and even that one was noted for
mainly being unpleasant, not impossible to deal with. Contrasting them with her
real objective allowed her to see it as far more possible, no matter how hard
it would really be. These three weren't getting along for a reason, whatever
that was. If that was the case, she probably wasn't going to easily fix it for
them. Which, naturally, was what the test would have really been about, if it
had been honest. Her working with them in a fashion that allowed peace to
happen. One way or another. Thankfully, it just didn't matter that much, and
she could simply be reasonable and pleasant to them, and let them go their own
ways if they wouldn't try to fix things.

The last four, well they were
different, weren't they? Three of them were functionally insane and probably
amongst the worst that such beings could be. Dangerous and lethal, while not
caring to play by any rules but their own, most of the time. The Void... Well,
Tarsus had so little information there that the being could be anyone. Even a
person she knew, and she might not understand that to be the case at all. He
rarely interacted with anyone, and while there was a small chance that he
tended to erase himself from history, even that wasn't something anyone knew
for certain.

She didn't even have a clue as to
how to contact most of them. Especially that last one. It would have to start
the next day however, or the one after that, so she could get her new home set
up. Invitations would be needed to be sent out. Or at least some kind of reason
for her to be in contact with any of these beings. That would take thought. The
simple people would also be the ones she didn't really care about. The three
that needed to have a problem resolved, whatever it was.