Keeley Thomson (Book 3): Mistress of Souls (8 page)

"Yes Mistress of Souls. I shall do that at once." He moved toward the door, still hunched over, acting like he needed a door to leave, which was kind of the polite way to do things when dealing with humans. They got worried if you just vanished in the middle of a room, but it wasn't as hard for them to understand at a door. Plus it gave him a few seconds more to speak without looking like a slacker, which was his real point no doubt.

"Please don't hesitate to call on me." He said this to Sherry directly, making nice solid eye contact, smiling again.

"Do I just call Darla's on the phone?" The words were a little hesitant, but not scared, just slightly flirty.

Keeley wanted to roll her eyes. Talk about awkward. She killed the feeling while he answered.

"Nay, simply call out the name Balthias and I shall come, ready to serve at your pleasure. My pleasure too, of course. Until the hour?" Then, just inside the door, without opening it, he vanished. It was a twisting in space, almost like turning sideways without moving, slipping easily into the distance. It looked a bit like shrinking while not moving at all even though he took several steps. Then she could track as he moved back to Darla's house by feel, not three blocks away.

"I'm not calling him Uncle Balthias, just so you know." Keeley grinned though as her mother blushed.

She didn't say anything though.

Keeley went to fix a snack and work out what else she should be doing. It wasn't a lot at the moment. She had a medium amount of homework for school, needed to set up some transfers of funds, for which she needed to get with Darla and really... everything else required sister related chatting, didn't it? Except for trying to figure out how to travel the inroads without seventy-plus years of practice. There was no way that jumped to the front in her memories, but there had to be something. A way to accelerate the needed changes somehow maybe?

That or to fake the walking...

Which wouldn't work. Everyone felt different on the inroads. She had to at least manage it once in front of everyone at Dan's party. Maybe twice just to show she could really handle it and wasn't a noob. How the heck was she supposed to do that though? The real thing about traveling the inroads, what made it so hard, was that the brain had to restructure over time to be able to see and deal with the eccentric space it was located in. It took decades of exposure and time to heal and reorganize neural structures into a pattern that could make it all work.

She needed to get that exposure somehow, many times in a few days, and then work out how to heal and change fast enough between times. That part she could do. Healing wasn't exactly the same thing, but as long as she allowed herself to alter to a new pattern each time, one better able to handle the stress of the space in-between, it should work.

That just left two problems. The first was getting enough food to keep up optimal healing and change rates, which would take some work. The second was finding a way to get the needed exposure. That...

Well, it was simple really, wasn't it? She just needed to use magic for it. It was like what she did to alter her mood or body, but outside herself. That was, when you got right down to it, what Demons did. They altered reality to their will. There was some science to it too, but for now that was all she really needed. If she could replay what she'd seen Balthias do earlier well enough and project it outside of herself, then she should slip onto the inroads as well. Then it would only take getting back and loads of healing.

Piece of cake.

She decided to do her homework first, before trying it. She had no clue how long it would actually require, or how much damage it would do to her brain. There was no time to waste though, past the forty minutes to do her class work. Less if she hurried and ate fast.

At one in the morning exactly she stood by her bed and made herself focus, first blocking out everything in the world around her, then remembering what it had looked like when Balthias had gone onto the inroads. She added what it had felt like when Finias had done it too... and Darla. Then she tried to press that sense of things on the world around her.

Nothing happened.

Not at first. After a while she opened her eyes and saw just the faintest hint of a shimmer in the air, like the reflection of light off of a hot road. She wanted to redouble the effort and try again immediately, but doing that would be foolish. She worked on healing instead, that and changing, trying to bend herself toward being able to understand what exactly she'd really seen.

Then hour after hour she did it all again. First seeing the shimmer, then healing, the whole thing happening faster each time as she got better at it. On the last round before she had to ready herself for school she managed a whole cycle in less than five minutes. The air in front of her was so distorted and clear at the same time she decided to step into it. It was impulsive, but she had a time schedule, so it was worth risking.

As long as it didn't kill her, of course.

She really didn't expect anything to happen, but that was simply wrong. Blinding pain ripped across her mind. She backed out and stood panting, head aching fiercely even as she tried to heal and change, blocking out pain as she went. It was bad enough she was nearly late to school, fighting to get the damage healed enough she wasn't in constant agony.

It hurt, but the move had been the right thing to do, she was nearly certain. As she learned to keep it from hurting as much, she'd adapt. Now it was just a matter of doing it until she could try and actually go somewhere. The next room over was probably a good first step. She still had a lot to do first and a lot to figure out. Too much probably, but that was the life of excitement that she got to live now. No one had ever claimed being a Greater Demon would be easy after all.

No, Darla and the others had actually hinted pretty strongly that it would most likely kill her before the next few weeks were out. Simple, painless or easy hadn't been mentioned at all.

As she drove to school Keeley kept the healing going, stopping for donuts and eating three dozen sitting in the school parking lot, leaving two dozen more just sitting, in case she needed to come out at lunch. It would look funny if she tried, but she could always claim it was due to an eating disorder. Pretend to go throw up after or something. It would work best just not to let anyone see though.

Classes were slow again, though at least in math they got to learn something new. She picked it up the first time through and started working on the homework problems, which got Mr. Nevotney to come over as he spoke and looked at what she was doing. He smiled when he saw it and checked her work, looming over Keeley's shoulder.

"We should get you into Math Decathlon. The team could use someone like you." It wasn't a command, so she decided to let the statement go for now. For one thing she was thinking of trying out for the next school play, after Halloween. She might not have time to do both. Maybe not even that, depending on the Demon related business required of her. Still Mr. Nevotney kept explaining the simple process to the rest of the class while she finished the obvious assignment and the extra credit. It was probably too showy of her, doing it all in class, but it really was more interesting than just listening to the man speak. He was a nice person, but not exactly a dynamic entertainer.

A good teacher made sure the students were engaged. Of course a good student did their part by making that easy to manage, but she was a little out of sorts, wasn't she? Her head hurt a little still, even as she tried to heal and that was making her slightly cranky. It was an act of will not to snap at people and to force herself to smile instead. A lot of people were trying to get her attention too. Most of them were subtle, using no more than a small smile or wave.

"Hey, it's Keeley!" This came from the side, which made her have to turn to look at who said it, even as she recognized the voice. Quince.

He looked like a boy of about sixteen, but was a Durg, which was basically like a mentally handicapped Greater Demon. Physically tough, long lived and even with the ability to change shape, if very slowly, over decades rather than hours or days. They weren't bright though. About like an average human. That sounded mean even in her own head, but humans had an excuse. They only lived for a brief period of time. Durgs had to do things over and over again to learn them well enough to seem like a regular person. It wasn't the same thing at all.

They had the time, but not the brains for it. Quince was decently bright for one of his people though. He'd managed to find his missing brothers using ancient divination tricks and simple sleuthing after all. That had to be tough, since they'd been hidden and had taken him nearly ten years to pull off. He hadn't given up though. Keeley didn't know for certain, but kind of thought that Darla was still planning on killing those other Durgs, since they'd accidently murdered Rob, who was one of her people. Only loosely perhaps, but the whole area was hers. Especially Raintree. Anyone hurting any of the students there would need to be ready to face Darla over it. Keeley too, if in a lesser fashion.

It wasn't her territory after all. She was just kind of squatting while she learned enough to survive. It was a normal enough way to do things. Now at least. Originally the only Demons that survived long at all were the ones that came out of their mothers ready to fight and with enough ability to make them dangerous to anyone stupid enough to take them on.

Keeley preferred the modern way, which allowed Demons like her half a chance to survive. It wasn't assured at all, but it was something. About one out of ten managed it.

She turned to Quince and made herself smile, head pulsing once as she did, pain trying to split the whole thing in two.

"Hi." She tried to keep walking, but the being that looked like a teen boy reached out and grabbed her arm. It sent his life through her again, which hurt this time. It wasn't his pain though, just that the part of her that could understand his being in totality was already damaged. The pain told her where that was though, or nearly. It gave her something to work with. Focusing on that spot more tightly she felt the pain slowly start to ebb as Quince talked.

"So Daryl wanted me to ask if you had a date for the big Halloween party? He knows that you're working on it, but he really wants to go out with you sometime."

Keeley shook her head, the pain nearly gone.

"I can't date right now. Too busy and... my dad just left. For good. It isn't a good time. Please let him know that I'm sorry? I don't want to be rude, I just can't..." Dumb by Demon standards or not, the Durg nodded, seeming to get the general idea.

"I'll let him know. Probably better not to anyway. He's my brother, but he doesn't know how to treat a woman and never has. That means a lot of them want to date him, but it never ends well when they do. I actually like you and wouldn't want you to get hurt. Emotionally I mean." He patted her shoulder gently, but not in a way that seemed sexual. More like how someone might handle a dog or a horse they didn't really know. Remote, but not overly connected on an emotional level.

Then he walked away without looking back.

It was painfully clear that he had no clue what she was. Darla either, as far as that went, even though those two had gone to school together for years. Then the older Demon had totally missed that Quince was an Acadian Apple, which meant that he was not only a Durg, but an ancient mercenary.

Too bad all his brothers were kind of marked for death. They weren't all nice people, but it would be handy having a combat group waiting in the wings in case anything ever happened. Given the way things were going, it probably would in the next few months.

Darla actually showed up at lunch, after having been missing since she'd left Keeley's house the day before last. It wasn't a personal slight, or even because of an emergency, but rather the dinner Keeley had set up for her and the Chief. She really needed to make some calls and see how that went. Deborah was kind of her project after all.

So was Barb now, as long as her sister didn't feel it was stealing her property or anything. Darla slipped in between them on the bench, being a lot cozier than was normal for her. The other girl just smiled, and scooted a little to make room, bumping into Hally, who winced a bit and scooted as if Barb had a contagion. It really wasn't nice of her, but it was largely subconscious. If anyone mentioned it to the redhead she'd probably say she hadn't meant anything by it at all, if she could even realize she'd done it.

Her sister spoke warmly though, leaning into her shoulder a bit.

"There you are Keeley. I was beginning to think you were hiding from me, didn't call or anything. Is everything going well for you?" It was the kind of thing she liked to ask when she already knew the answer. Or thought she did.

Keeley nodded.

"We should chat and catch up. Out in the van maybe? I have something in there to show you. It won't take long, but let's eat first?" She badly needed the food and her stomach was growly, if softly enough no one else seemed to hear it yet.

That let Darla catch up with everyone else, including Barb, who she really wasn't treating any differently than anyone else. Gary was explaining the party idea, kind of a sleep over type of thing, without that pesky actual sleep to annoy anyone. It did sound fun, but the boy also made it clear that he'd be leaving at about ten.

"Otherwise all you beautiful girls will get a bad reputation and mine will skyrocket all out of proportion. Can't have that, can we?"

It was Becky that answered from down the table, Maria at her side again.

"It won't hurt my reputation at all." She seemed down about that for some reason.

It took a few seconds to work out, plus a bit of mind reading, but the honest answer was that, try as she might, Becky was having trouble getting any guys to notice her. She got a brief social blip after she flashed everyone at the Homecoming party, but since that, nothing. She'd kind of hoped that some of the boys that had talked to her at the time would have called, but that hadn't happened at all, not yet at least. It wasn't a lack of interest though, just that no one had worked the courage up. That was obvious from the looks she was getting from half a dozen guys around the room.