The Demon's Covenant

by Sarah Rees Brennan

  The way he’d sounded on the phone, maybe he felt like he had no other choice. Except that was stupid. There was always another choice.

  If he’d told the Obsidian Circle that he had let slip what he was, he could be in trouble.

  Seb wasn’t in school the next day, either.

  She’d noticed him hiding his arms weeks ago. He’d been part of the Obsidian Circle for weeks and come to school every day. Mae was pretty sure he wanted to keep looking normal, to hang out with his friends.

  He’d stayed with her out by the bike sheds.

  Nick would probably be quite pleased if something terrible was happening to Seb. Jamie hated him. There was nobody who knew what was happening to Seb, and who might possibly care, but her.

  Seb had mentioned his new foster family lived on Lennox Street. Mae could just pass by the house.

  The magicians had been living only a few streets away from her and Jamie all this time.

  Mae found Seb’s car parked in the driveway of a house next to a nursing home; the lawn looked smooth as icing, red tulips waving their heavy, waxy heads from a bright, trim bed. The house was white, three stories with an oriel window on the top floor at the center, flowers in the window, like a set piece in marzipan. A toy house, built to look cheerful and perfect, an idea of home dreamed up by someone who’d never had a home.

  There was no sign of movement in any of the windows.

  So that was that, Mae told herself. She’d come by. She couldn’t see Seb. She wasn’t going to risk investigating any farther.

  That was when a black limousine sailed down the road, and Mae ducked behind the hedge just in time to see it stop in front of the house. Two women emerged from it.

  Jessica the messenger, knives swinging in her ears. And Celeste Drake.

  They disappeared inside the front door, and Mae headed for the garden gate. There was a rose trellis that scratched her as she went in, a white petal falling onto her shoulder. She brushed it off and was grateful there seemed to be no spells impeding her way; no guard dogs or, since these were magicians, guard zombies.

  The back door was actually open, as if to let warm summer air filter into the kitchen, which had wooden countertops and a rosy red-tiled floor. Mae entered it cautiously, ready to bolt at any moment.

  She heard Gerald’s voice raised in anger.

  “We are doing perfectly well without your help.”

  “Are you indeed?” said Celeste. “You live here under the demon’s eye, and I see you haven’t even managed to recruit the really interesting young magician.”

  “I hear you had a bit of a run-in with the demon and the interesting young magician yourself,” Gerald remarked, returning to his usual mild tones. “Jamie doesn’t much fancy the Aventurine Circle. And neither do I.”

  “I think you may both change your mind,” Celeste said. “And Jamie will be welcomed with open arms. But you and yours, Gerald? When you come crawling to us for help, the terms I offer then will not be nearly as attractive as they are now.”

  “I’ll take that chance.”

  “I’ll take everything you’ve got,” Celeste murmured.

  “And I’ll show you out,” said a woman’s voice. Mae was pretty sure it was Gerald’s second, Laura.

  Mae froze, listening for a step, ready to flee.

  Seb had obviously been standing very close to the door. She heard nothing until she saw him walk right into the hall and they stood face-to-face, staring at each other.

  Then Seb lunged. He came right at her and Mae backed into a door, and when he kept coming, she ran down the cellar steps.

  Seb only followed her, of course, and then she was trapped in the cellar of the magicians’ house, Seb blocking her way out and a huge circle of stones in front of her shimmering with cold light.

  “Mae,” Seb said. “What are you doing here? You have to get out!”

  He was perfectly fine. He didn’t look like anyone had even said a harsh word to him.

  On the other hand, he also hadn’t immediately started yelling for Gerald.

  “What is this place?”

  “This is the real obsidian circle,” Seb said. “All our demon’s circles are reflections of it. All our power comes from it. So believe me when I say you can’t be here. You have to go.”

  “All your power,” Mae repeated. “So what if someone takes more than their share?”

  “You can’t,” said Seb. “That’s not how the circle works. You all get an equal share, and your natural abilities do the rest.”

  “Natural abilities?” Mae echoed. “I hear you don’t have much. Not a great magician, are you, Seb? But you are a magician.”

  Even in the dim light of the cellar, filtering in from the top of the stairs, she saw Seb go dull red.

  “Yeah,” he said. “I am. I’m sorry. But I don’t want to see you get hurt. Mae, please. They’ll kill you if they find you down here.”

  He advanced on her and she flung up one hand, defensive. He grabbed her wrist and ran, dragging her behind him up the stairs and back into the hall.

  “Seb?” Gerald’s voice said, sharp. “What are you doing?”

  Mae and Seb stared at each other. Mae saw her own complete panic reflected on Seb’s face.

  Then he hurled her bodily through an open door.

  “Stay there,” Seb ordered her in a low voice. He went out, shutting the door softly behind him, and left Mae alone in what was clearly his bedroom.

  The room was plain but big, with wood floors and a little cream-colored rug. Lying on a mahogany desk was the sketchbook Seb always carried, its green cover curling at the edges.

  Where I am now is okay, Seb had told her.

  He was living in a nice house and paying his rent by killing people.

  Mae went over to the desk and picked up his sketchbook. There was always a chance there might be drawings of Gerald’s mark in it, details that could give her some clue how to deal with him.

  She opened the book to a picture of Jamie laughing. It made her shaking fingers still for a moment. Seb’s pencil had been wielded carefully, light in a way that made Jamie’s spiky hair look soft; dark and clean to mark the line of his jaw, his hands that looked even in a picture as if they were in motion, and the crooked slope up of his mouth as he began to smile.

  Mae started to feel angry all over again. The picture was so good. If Seb could create something like this, why did he have to be what he was?

  Everything he’d ever said to her had been a lie.

  She turned a page of the sketchbook with her hands shaking again.

  Jamie was sitting at his desk this time, balancing a pencil on top of a schoolbook. He looked serious and intent, face turned away from Seb, earring winking above the collar of his shirt.

  Mae turned another page. This time Jamie was leaning backward in his chair, talking to someone else. The person’s hair was dark and the features knife-edge clean, so she assumed it was Nick. When she turned another page, Jamie was walking with someone else, smaller than he was and softly curved, presumably herself, but all the people with him were ghosts. Only Jamie stood out, luminous and laughing and living on the page.

  The door opened with a slow creak, the very hinges moaning Seb’s reluctance. Mae looked up and saw him standing there, looking tall and dark and humble, and she wanted to hit him very badly.

  So she did. She strode over to him and whacked him on the chest with his sketchbook.

  “Even if you weren’t a lying murderer,” she said, “I think this means we’re breaking up.”

  “No,” Seb said, almost automatically, as if that was the noise that came out when you hit him. “No, look, Mae, you’ve got it wrong.”

  He grabbed her by her elbows and jerked her toward him, landing a kiss on her mouth like a blow. He held her as if she was a giant doll, an awkward puppet he was trying desperately to learn how to manipulate. The taste of him she got between her tightly closed lips was bitter, already hopeless.

  She opened her equa
lly tightly shut eyes when he pulled back.

  “As if that’s even important,” she said, her mouth twisting. “When you’re—”

  “I’m not a murderer!” Seb snarled.

  “No?” Mae asked. “Where d’you think that mark’s leading you, then? Should I ask again next week?”

  “Look,” he said. “This isn’t—this isn’t the way you’re thinking it is. You’re confused. That demon’s been lying to you.”

  Mae laughed in his face. “You idiot! You don’t know anything, do you? Demons can’t lie.”

  Seb opened his mouth to speak, then checked himself, and visibly faltered even on silence.

  Mae got in his face, his clear green eyes filling her vision. “In April they marked Jamie.”

  “Jamie?” Seb echoed, the name different on his lips.

  “Yeah,” said Mae, and mimicked the way he’d said it, knowing it was cruel and not caring. “Jamie. And the demon and the traitor saved him. And me. I killed a magician. Did the Circle ever tell you about that?”

  Seb just stared.

  Mae smiled. “I’d tell you his name. But I never actually knew what it was.”

  “Mae, I like you,” Seb said with sudden explosive urgency. “That was why—I thought I could—”

  Mae sneered. “I think we both know why you picked me. And we both know who you really like.”

  “No,” Seb said. “No. This isn’t you, Mae.”

  “Maybe you don’t know me,” said Mae, and she stepped away from him, throwing the sketchbook at his feet. “After all, you don’t know much. You think this Circle is an escape for you? You think this is leading anywhere good?”

  “There was nowhere else to go,” Seb said softly.

  Mae took a deep breath. “Well, now there is,” she said. “Let’s go. Both of us. We can work something out.”

  Seb stared at her some more.

  “I know you lied to me in about a hundred different ways,” Mae told him. “No two people in the history of the world have ever been as broken up as we are. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is that you get out of here.”

  Jamie. Nick. Now Seb. She was developing an unsettling habit of wanting to save boys.

  “Seb!” Laura called out. “Get back in here.”

  Seb gave her an agonized look. “Stay there,” he repeated, and left the room.

  Mae sat on the bed and tried to make a plan. She didn’t think for a minute that Seb running around the house like a scared rabbit was going unnoticed. Someone was going to come in that door, very soon. She had to know what to do.

  The door opened gradually, and Jessica Walker stood on the threshold.

  “My, my,” she said. “What have we here?”

  Mae gave her a bright smile. “Hi there,” she said. “I was just thinking about that internship you offered me.”

  Five minutes later she was leaving the house of the Obsidian Circle escorted by a rival magician. Seb went pale when he saw her and Gerald looked furious, but they could all see Mae’s ears. Hanging from them were knives shining in circles.

  Celeste kept her gloved fingers curled at the small of Mae’s back where her T-shirt did not quite meet her jeans; velvet prickled against Mae’s bare skin.

  “I trust you’ll remember we helped you, and let your brother know we regret the little unpleasantness last time,” she said into Mae’s ear before she climbed into the limousine. “My offer still stands.”

  When you’re ready to be your own woman, come find me.

  “I’ll remember,” Mae said, and looked at Jessica. “Do you want these back?”

  Jessica smiled brilliantly. “No. They look good on you.”

  Mae had not known where else to go, so she found herself in the attic again, shadows slipping long fingers through the window and across the floor toward her as she read. The demon watching her was directly under the window, already lost in the spilling darkness.

  Mae raised her voice and tried to make a dead man’s words come clear.

  “Isn’t it time that I started learning how to use weapons?” Alan said to me today.

  He’s nine years old. Last time the magicians came I almost lost an eye, and he had to hit a man with an umbrella stand.

  If he hadn’t, then it would be just him, Nick, and Olivia. They would be helpless.

  It is time, but the sight of him holding a gun with the same serious thought as he holds his pencil when he does crosswords makes my stomach turn over. I should be enough to keep them all safe.

  Alan won’t let Nick touch his new gun. “It’s not a toy,” he said, gentle and worried.

  “I know,” Nick answered, not taking his eyes off it. “Toys are stupid.”

  When I asked Nick what he wanted for his birthday, he said a knife. I told him that knives were not really appropriate birthday gifts. He stood silent, staring at me. I don’t think he understands the word “appropriate” yet, and I couldn’t think of how to explain it.

  “When you’re a little older,” I said.

  “How much older?” he asked.

  “When you’re seven.”

  He doesn’t seem to have any kind of powers. Sometimes I think that he has them and sees no need to use them, has no desire to protect our family. Most of the time I tell myself that it’s the talisman Alan makes him wear. It hurts him. When I saw that it was leaving a mark on his skin, I told him he could take it off, but Alan, merciless and patient as a mother spooning medicine into a crying child’s mouth, said no.

  Not that Nick ever cries.

  He does like watching me fix things. When the drains or the pipes are giving me trouble, when the car won’t start, I get to work and then I feel the hair stand up on the back of my neck, I feel a cold, crawling premonition of danger, and I turn to see black eyes fixed on me.

  Last time we had to move I asked for an old house, a bit of a fixer-upper. I think it’s good for him to learn simple human things.

  Alan stares at us as if we’re performing arcane rituals and goes off to teach himself Aramaic.

  “Just you and me, Nicky,” I said to him once, and a corner of his mouth went up, little hands in his jeans pockets.

  He said, “Guess so.”

  When we go out to the DIY shop and leave Alan at home he reaches up and automatically catches my hand when we cross the road. He pulls away as soon as we reach the other side of the street. It’s just a moment, small fingers curled against my palm. At the shop sometimes I pick him up to show him the wrenches and screwdrivers.

  “My boy likes to work with his hands,” I said last time, without even thinking.

  There are moments like that.

  Then there are moments like at the Goblin Market last month. We were terrified someone was going to notice Nick’s eyes. Alan was holding his hand so hard that it left bruises in the shape of his fingertips on Nick’s skin.

  Nobody noticed. Nobody would expect a demon child. People thought he was a little strange, like they’ve heard Olivia is, but they smiled when they saw Alan holding his hand.

  “Taking good care of your little brother?” Phyllis asked.

  Alan smiled the shy smile that makes everyone smile back at him. “I’m trying.”

  She gave them both some sweets, and when Alan nudged him, Nick even remembered to say thank you.

  Then we passed the dancers, and Nick stood transfixed. There was a demon in one of the circles, in the shape of a woman. She stood wreathed in fire with lips like blood, wearing winding flames as a dress, scorching orange tendrils sliding against her white skin.

  She was staring back at Nick.

  “Come on, Nicky.” I seized his other hand and dragged him away. He had to trot to keep up with me and Alan, and he looked over his shoulder and almost stumbled.

  Nick, who rarely volunteers anything and even more rarely indicates his feelings on any subject, said, “She’s pretty.”

  I looked back as well. The demon woman stood staring after him, after our Nick. Tendrils of fire wrapped like chain
s around her hands, and her fingers were icicles sharp as knives.

  Just before I started writing this, I was putting Nick to bed. Alan was out at the shooting range with Merris Cromwell and her dancers, and Nick was standing at the window until bedtime. I thought he might be feeling a little forlorn, so I read him two stories instead of one and he seemed sleepy by the end, eyelids falling and face scrunched up against the pillow. Almost a child, and almost mine.

  I did not even think about it when I said, “Do you love me?” in the same automatic, instinctive way I used to say it to Alan when he was small. Alan used to smile, wide and bright, as if he’d won something because he got to answer the question. He used to throw his arms up in the air and say, “Yes!” and then Marie or I would have to sweep him up and kiss him.

  Nick turned his face away from me slightly.

  “No,” he said in his cold, hollow little voice.

  Then he went to sleep.

  Mae looked up and saw Nick, who did not look like anyone who might ever conceivably have been called Nicky.

  “That’s how it goes,” he said, expressionless. “We never make humans happy. They always think we might.”

  He turned his face away and added in a soft voice, not gentle but like a rising fire, “I don’t think we can.”

  “Did you know about Seb?” Mae asked. “Not the magician thing, the other thing. About Jamie. Is that why you laughed, when I told you I was seeing him?”

  Nick’s eyes flickered over to her. “Yeah,” he said after a minute.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Alan said to me once that as I couldn’t tell lies, I shouldn’t tell secrets,” Nick said. “I thought you’d figure it out.”

  She should have figured it out. Seb had been far too accepting of her set terms, far too eager to enter into a relationship where he was tested and never touched. Every time they had touched, he’d freaked out, terrified he would not meet her expectations.

  “How did you know?”

  “I’m a demon,” Nick answered matter-of-factly. “That kind of thing, we spent years watching at human windows and learning. I know what humans want.”

  You’re so jealous of me you can’t stand it, Nick had said to Seb.