Except for his eyes. A rich gold, inhuman and absolutely familiar, they caught the light oddly, gleaming—and it didn't look like it was because of the tears. I've let a demon into my home, Pel realized, shocked. Or at least, if not a demon himself, he was someone so demon-touched to visibly show it.
But demon or demon-touched, he had some news about his son. And so he waited, silent, willing himself to ignore his steadily rising sense of dread.
Finally, after what seemed like ages but could only have been a few minutes, the youth sucked a breath in, finding his voice, and said, "Bru got captured. By the guard."
That chill down Pel's spine was pure ice now. "Captured? What do you mean?"
"We were out. I was teaching him. I work best in the moonlight. He got caught. I'm so sorry," the youth blurted. "I'm so sorry! I didn't want anything to happen to him! Since you know the Inquisition, can't you do something? You have to save him! You said you'd do anything to protect him, so please—!"
Shock and anger and terror and grief. They rushed through Pel so hard that he couldn't speak, the air knocked out of him from the sheer force of his emotions. All he could do was stare blankly at the boy—the demon—seated hunched over on the stool, trembling so hard that the empty glass was slipping precariously from his weak grip.
Slowly, Pel reached over and took the glass from him, voice low and surprisingly steady. "And you just left him, Kip? You let him get captured?"
Kip's eyes widened, and he burst out with another wail, crouching forward on his seat and pressing his hands to his face as though he could somehow hold the tears in that way. "I had to! I had to! If he's being accused of consorting and had a familiar right there, I'd be all the proof they need!"
Pel opened his mouth to respond—to yell, to plead, he didn't know—but was interrupted by another sudden knock at the door, loud and commanding. He froze, paralyzed only for a brief moment before making up his mind and pointing to Kip.
"Behind the counter. Now."
Kip stared at him, eyes wide and luminous, then obediently leapt up, slamming a hand onto the counter top and vaulting it with unnatural grace. Pel didn't bother to take the time to see if Kip got himself hidden—he would, he had to—and headed quickly to the door.
He hadn't locked it behind Kip.
Sure enough, the door opened barely a second later. Roselin, a lieutenant in the Inquisition, took a step inside. "Mr. Stone?"
"What is it?" he demanded. Shaking, he stepped forward. "Did something happen? Bruant was supposed to be home by now!"
Roselin took off her helmet and held it between her hands, expression cool and unreadable despite how many years they'd known each other. "Sir, Bruant Stone has been taken in for colluding with demons."
"What?!" He might have been playing up his confusion, but his anger and horror and fear was all genuine. Give her what she wants. He let it seep into his tone, didn't try to disguise it in any way. "Bruant would never. His mother—you know what happened to his mother!"
"Yes, sir," Roselin said. She looked at Pel with a stony gaze. "Then you claim you know nothing of his transgressions?"
"I know he didn't have any!" Pel said. "Don't fuck with me, Roselin, I've been working for you all this time for this bullshit? I promise, if Bruant was up to anything, I'd know about it! You tell them to let my son go!"
She sighed. "Pelerin, I'm letting you know as a courtesy," she said. Fucking hell she is, he thought viciously. She was seeing if he was in on it, too. "Your son will be questioned. If he's found innocent, he'll be let go."
"Roselin," he growled, "I've done this for fifteen years and I've never once seen anyone let go."
"You know what's supposed to happen," she said. "They get released outside the city. We'll inform you if that's the case and you can go to him if you wish."
"I've never heard of that happening either," he said.
"Then I hope your son is the first you hear of." She put her helmet back on. "I've known you long enough to believe that you didn't know what he was doing, so I'm glad for that one damn thing, at least. I'm not enjoying this, but your son will not be released until the investigation is complete. I'll try to make it fast. If you discover any further information at home, turn it in at the earliest juncture so we can be done with this as soon as possible. Good evening, Mr. Stone."
She left. Pel stared at the closed door for a long moment, then kicked it hard.
"Ah…"
He startled, then spun, staring at the counter. Kip was peering up from behind it, just the top of his head and his eyes showing.
It's this demon's fault. His damn fault. Pel wondered furiously what the cat fed on, what part of his son he ate, what he got out of this experience, why he'd picked Bruant, of all people.
But still—right now, Kip was the only source of information he had.
He breathed slowly, evenly. "Come out."
"You're so angry at me." Kip almost sounded awed. "But I'm sorry?"
Rage flared, hot. He swallowed it down again, forcibly. Bruant had to come first. "Come out from there, please. I'm not going to hurt you."
Slowly, a pair of hands appeared on the counter top as well. Then Kip pushed himself up, crawling over the counter to sit on the edge of it, his feet on a stool, fingers bunched in the fabric over his knees, facing Pel like one might face one's executioner.
The demon looked—well, miserable. His eyes were swollen with crying, more a burnished brass than gold right now. His face was tight, and he was still trembling terribly hard, apparently in some kind of shock.
Pel closed his eyes, counted to five, and opened them again. "Tari set the Inquisition on you two."
"What…?" Kip blinked, then shook his head furiously. "No! There's no way. They wouldn't do that, I'm sure of it."
"How sure?" Pel said, trying to keep his voice even instead of sinking into a growl. "How well do you know them? Have you two been working together?"
"No, I mean, I met them here," Kip blurted, so desperate it was probably true. He worried at his lower lip with his teeth—sharp, Pel noticed—his quickening breaths making his voice come more haltingly, choked. It was the same thing Bruant always did when anxious.
It wouldn't do for Kip to panic again, to start crying too hard to speak, not when Pel needed to hear what he had to say. Not when Bruant was in trouble, and they were rapidly running out of time.
Treat him like he's human.
The thought was anathema, but it crossed Pel's mind regardless. Kip looked—mostly—like a scared human youth, barely out of his teenage years. Just like his son. The voice of experience in the back of his mind told him not to buy into appearances, to go upstairs and get his binding amulet, to demand answers. The obvious target for blame was right here. The obvious culprit was right here. A demon was right here.
But he was one damn frightened demon.
Instead of demanding that Kip come closer, Pel went to him, taking a seat on the stool next to the one where Kip's feet rested. Pel sighed, forcing himself to think: not a demon. Just human. Just a scared kid.
"Hey," he said softly. "Yeah, I'm mad. But it's because I'm scared for my son. You're scared for him, too, right?"
A shudder passed through Kip's body, and he let out a sound that sounded more like a yowl than a sob, hunching forward with his narrow shoulders tensed almost all the way up to his ears. His hands turned into fists, knotted on his knees.
If he were human, I'd try to comfort him. Pel exhaled slowly, then put a hand on Kip's back. He was hot through his shirt, like he was running a fever. Pel didn't know if that was normal for a demon of his kind, or some kind of reaction to whatever he had with Bruant. If he assumed the latter, maybe he could have more sympathy.
He found that was a little easier than he'd like. "What's your real name, Kip?" he asked gently.
"Please don't call me by my real name," Kip mumbled. "Most demons, I mean, pick a nickname—"
"I know," Pel said. "I'm not going to try to bind you. I promise. But
I don't know you. I don't know how Bruant knows you. We need to get along if we're going to be any good to Bruant, right?"
Whatever he did about this demon could happen after he got Bruant sorted out. Perhaps Kip would reveal some information Pel could use. Perhaps, instead of Kip damning Bruant further in the Inquisition's eyes, there'd be a way to turn him in that would get Bruant out.
Kip trembled under his touch. "Keperat," he said, almost a whisper. "But I use Kip. Please…"
"Okay, Kip," Pel said. "You called yourself a familiar? Is that what type of demon you are?"
"Familiars aren't…" Kip trailed off. "There are a few types that can become familiars. I'm an imp."
Pel rubbed that warm back. The muscles under it felt slightly off, not quite right, but were clearly tense regardless. They relaxed very slightly under his touch. "What do imps do? I don't understand what drew you to Bruant," he added, after the muscles of Kip's shoulders jerked in response, "and without knowing that, I don't know if there's anything that can help us."
"We eat emotions," Kip said. He looked up at Pel with a sudden visible spike of anxiety. "Not all emotions! We all… specialize. I eat anger at oneself."
"That's… very specific," Pel said, knowing he had to respond somehow but drawing a blank.
Kip tensed again, then drew a series of invisible concentric circles with his fingertip on the bar top. "It's… groups," he mumbled, voice a tremulous whine. "We get the most if we feed from our specific area." He retraced the smallest circle. "Anger at oneself." Redrew the next. "Anger." Redrew the last. "Related feelings. Self-hate or guilt. Then we turn it into energy we can give back to the people we share ourselves with."
"Magicians," Pel said, confirming without having to ask. Kip nodded, and Pel sighed, continuing. "In other words, you've been teaching Bruant magic because he's angry enough to feed you."
"That's a little… it's not quite… I guess you can think of it that way…" Kip voice rose in pitch with each word. "He is really angry. That's how I noticed him. And he has the ability—to do magic, I mean—so I… thought he should know. That he could learn if he wanted."
In other words, whether it was true or not, the demon believed, or at least would claim, that it had been Bruant's choice. "What if he stopped being angry ever again? If you ate too much of it."
"It doesn't work like that," Kip said, frowning uncertainly at Pel. "You know that, right? Even if your anger goes away or you run out of energy for it or you resolve it, you can always get angry again later. I think there are some imps who drain people into numbness, but even so, they'll recover eventually. I wasn't hurting him."
"I believe you," Pel said, though he wasn't sure he did. "You haven't drained my anger right now, though."
Kip shook his head, eyes wide. "No," he said, a breathless squeak, shoulders rising slightly as if he were trying to make himself look bigger. "You're scary when you're angry."
Some demon, Pel thought, the thought more wry than bitter. He shook his head, trying to relax, make his posture even less threatening. "So you're saying that no matter what, you could get anger out of him."
"Well… not when he's not angry at the time? But even if he couldn't support me, I could get it from anyone around me who was angry," Kip said. "I'd eat some of their energy and convert the rest for my partner. Once a familiar is bonded to their magician, they're bonded until that magician breaks the bond or dies, so it wouldn't matter whether I got it from him or someone else."
Pel felt hope rise up, finally. "So you have a bond with Bruant! Can you use that to help him—?"
Kip's lower lip trembled. He only restrained it for a couple of seconds before his face crumpled and he began to weep again, although he was clearly fighting it. "He broke it," he choked out, around the tightness of tears. "When they caught me. He broke our bond and told me to run. I don't know what to do! This is the second time. Maybe it's me? Am I just a bad familiar?"
The news settled like a weight into Pel's stomach. He swallowed. "The second time…?" he prompted.
Kip hunched over completely, folding around his knees. "A lady called Vautour called me into the city," he whispered softly. "I was a pretty new demon. I'd never bonded to a person before. I was wandering around the wilderness, crazy hungry, and she called for a familiar, so I climbed the wall as a cat. I don't know how nobody spotted me. But she was taken away by the Inquisition, and she died. She died."
"Kip—"
"I felt it," he said, his whine getting lower, throatier. "She didn't dissolve our bond. I felt her die. I've been scared to leave the city again in case they catch me trying to leave. I wandered around as a cat and then I met Bru and I thought, this time I could do it right. This time I could love someone and they'd be okay! But I was wrong and he's going to die because of me." He looked up again, eyes brimming with tears and pupils narrowed into slits. "He's going to die because of me, Pel!"
Anger rose in Pel, sharp, as much toward himself as it was toward Kip. He hadn't seen the warning signs. He should have noticed, he should have—but, no, the demon was right.
It was because of him. Pel's fists clenched at his sides with the force of trying to hold his reaction in.
Kip let out another sob, more animal than human, face crumpling again as he bowed his head, shoulders shaking. It looked like he was ready to accept whatever punishment Pel wanted to give him.
And like that, Pel's anger was gone, leaving behind nothing but the exhaustion—just a quiet, sad thing. He didn't know if Kip had gulped his rage down, desperate even in his fear, or if it was just his own empathy for something in pain right in front of him. He wasn't sure it mattered.
"Come on," Pel said softly. He got up, clasping one of Kip's hands and tugging him upright.
"What…?" Kip raised his head again. His face was wet and snot dripped down to his upper lip.
Pel let out a tsk and wiped Kip's nose on his sleeve before he let himself think about it. "We need to go see Tari."
"Tari…" Kip nodded suddenly, perking up visibly. "Yeah! Yes, they'll know what to do."
"It might be their fault," Pel warned. "They threatened to tell the Inquisition that Bru had been consorting with demons. I thought they were bluffing, but they might have been serious. And the demon they meant might not have been themself—it might have been you."
"Tari wouldn't," Kip protested, holding Pel's gaze, his own expression earnest. "I really don't think so."
"I hope you're right," Pel said, tired, "because I don't know anyone else in this entire damned city who might help us."
Chapter Seven
Pel dug up the sign he'd made when Bruant had been badly sick a few years earlier, a hastily-scribbled 'Closed until further notice for family reasons', and hung it on the door. He looked at it, wondering what people would think when they saw it, then decided that he had far more pressing things on his mind. News would get around—it always did.
He knew better than anybody that nothing in Dolana stayed secret for very long.
He pulled on a heavy cloak. Kip, a cat once more, jumped onto his shoulders, and Pel draped the hood around him so he was hidden from sight.
Still, Pel could feel the weight of him, a heavy press against his neck. I'm carrying the demon who corrupted my son. And then, the demon who cried over him. Shit. He tried not to think too much about how those two facts pulled him in different directions at once, the anger and grief and sympathy overwhelming and contradictory. He didn't have the time to sort himself out—didn't know if there could ever be enough time.
He headed out into the dim evening.
Orphie was none too happy to see him on her doorstep. "I don't want any trouble," she warned, in place of a greeting.
"I don't want any either," he responded, hearing his voice come out rough. "I need to talk to Toutarelle Walker."
"What do you want her for?" Orphie asked sharply. "I heard you kicked her out. What, does she owe you money? You can damn well come back during the day then."
"I
s she in?"
"Get on with you!"
He sighed. "No," he lied. "Actually, I owe her money. After our disagreement, she left in such a hurry that I never gave her back her deposit. I just saw it and—and I don't feel right holding onto money that's rightfully hers. I'd like to give it to her, and hopefully an apology with it."
Orphie squinted at him dubiously—or at least, she'd always had a squint, but it was clear she was now making an effort at it. "And that's it? And you aren't thinking of poaching her back for your rooms if you make nice with her again?"
"She's all yours," he said dryly. "Even if we make amends, I doubt either of us want a professional relationship that can be disrupted this easily by an argument."
"Hmm," Orphie said. For a long moment she just glared at him but finally stepped back, holding the door open. "201. If I hear any yelling I'm coming up there with a kitchen knife, mind."
"I'll mind," Pel agreed. He nodded politely as he entered, then headed for the stairs.
Orphie's place was in fine condition, decorated with incongruous paintings of chickens and stitched wall art, more suitable to the old style of a country house than to a city tenement. It was not, Pel thought as he went upstairs, the sort of image that suited Tari at all. But that was probably part of why they had come to Pel's inn first.
He found 201 and knocked. "Tari. I need to speak with you."
Silence.
He knocked again. "Kip's here, too," he added, tired.
After another brief pause, the door opened inward. Tari smiled out at him, seeming completely unoffended at the sight of him. "Well," they said. "Come on in, then."
There was something that looked more delicate and feminine about them today, the softness of their face or the fall of their hair or the set of their shoulders. It was hard for him to put his finger on it exactly, but he doubted it was actually any kind of vulnerability in response to his having hurt their feelings. More likely, they were just trying to keep Orphie's sympathies with them to cover up anything she might find suspicious.
He unfastened his cloak and let Kip hop down. Kip transformed in midair, black shape twisting in a way that almost hurt to look at, before he landed in a crouched human form in front of them both. After a moment, Pel realized with some surprise that Kip had positioned himself directly between Tari and Pel, deliberately—this small, timorous thing was trying to protect one of them from the other.
Behind Bars Page 8
