Demon High

by Lori Devoti

  Nellie stood and took a step toward him. Her shirt was still open; her breasts fell forward and bobbed as she walked. She didn’t seem to notice, or maybe she preferred it that way. “That doesn’t mean we can’t play a little.” Without warning, she turned back to me. “Want to play, kitten? It will be fun.”

  And there it was again, the knee-bending attraction that made me want to throw myself at her feet and beg her to be with me. Luckily, I was already sitting. I dug my fingers into the dirt, clenched my thighs and thought of priests and puppies, and little children on their way to school.

  “Oh, how sweet. Pure thoughts.” She stepped closer and held out her arms.

  Beside me Shane’s eyes flew open and he sat up. He grabbed me by the arm and jerked me down onto his chest. His lips were on me, big and wet like caterpillars soaked by the rain. There was a time I’d dreamed of kissing Shane, of having him want me…but this…this was nothing like what I’d imagined, nothing.

  Panic knocked aside any attraction I’d ever felt for Shane or the succubus. I jerked the compact from my pocket and smashed it against the remnants of the stone foundation. It didn’t break. I clung to the plastic disc and smashed down with it again. There was a crack; pieces of plastic fell through my fingers. Glass cut my skin. I ignored the pain, clawed through the grass for a piece big enough to fight with, to do some kind of damage.

  Chapter 10

  “Stop it.” A foot shoved against me, rolling Shane, who clung to me, too. Then Shane was jerked up. His hands tore at my clothes as he went. I heard cloth rip and felt air under my arm.

  Oscar stood above me, holding Shane by the neck and seat of his unzipped jeans. Shane leered down at me, his mouth open, tongue lolling and his dick swollen and exposed. It was hard to remember at that moment that I had liked him once, even had a bit of crush on him.

  My hand closed around a shard of mirror. The sliver pierced my palm. The reality of what had almost happened crashed down around me hard. I rolled over and threw up in the grass.

  I couldn’t move for a few moments. I lay there panting against the earth, sucking the smell of humus into my lungs and trying to forget the feel of Shane’s mouth on me, his fingers groping me.

  Behind me, Nellie let out an impatient breath. “Why did Kobal send you here with me? I could have convinced her…or Shane could have. You don’t know the desires I see in her, the loneliness. She would be happy. Serving Kobal…” I could tell from the position of her voice that she’d moved. I assumed she was talking to Oscar.

  My logical mind told me to lay still, that I needed to hear what they said, but a bigger part of me couldn’t lay there. I needed to leave, get home, shower and pretend this awful day had never happened. I rolled over and forced myself to a sitting position. With my knees pulled tight against my chest, I tried to hide my trembling.

  Nellie sat six feet away; Shane was passed out across her lap.

  “Kitten, you’re alive.” She started to push Shane away, but Oscar stepped between us.

  “Give it up, Nellie. You failed. Leave her be. Go do what you really want to do, while you still can.”

  Nellie pursed her lips. “You think you know me better than you do. Maybe I really want the little kitten.”

  Oscar grabbed her chin in his hand and looked down at her. “Do you? Do you really want a kitten with tiny little claws? Or a lion who can make everyone run with just the ferocity of his roar?”

  She stared at him with such intensity that for a second I thought she was going to strike him. Then she laughed. “You do know me, especially for one so young.” She sighed. “Too bad you haven’t earned your mane. It could be fun.”

  He dropped her chin. “I don’t have fun, Nellie. You know that.”

  “True. So sad.” She sighed, then glanced at me. “Still, unlike you, brief visits aren’t my thing. If I secure the prize my reward will be worth my efforts.” She ran her fingers through Shane’s hair, but she wasn’t looking at him, she was looking at me.

  “But you didn’t. You pushed too hard. Take your toy and go.” Oscar propped his foot on the wall and stared over our heads. I got the feeling he’d forgotten any of us were there.

  Nellie huffed out a breath, then grabbed Shane by the hand. “Come along. Let’s find somewhere else to play. The company here is tres depressing.” She stepped over the foundation, pulling at the leg of her pants as if she was wearing the finest evening gown, and like a dog, Shane followed her.

  Watching them walk off, all I could feel was relief. I knew I should still be concerned about Shane, that he hadn’t attacked me on his own. He hadn’t even known he was attacking me, but it was still too fresh. His touch still in my mind, I shuddered.

  “Here.” Oscar tossed a cloth onto my lap.

  I stared at it for a second before remembering my hand, the mirror I’d gripped with plans of slashing Shane. I opened my fingers and dropped the bloody glass onto the earth.

  Oscar picked it up and slipped it into his pocket. “You might not want to leave that laying around. Demons walk these woods, but you know that.”

  Horror shot through me at my slip. I’d carelessly tossed aside something with a bit of me on it, and not just any bit of me, my blood. And now, Oscar, a demon had it.

  But there was no way to ask for it back—or no way to force him to give it back. I could ask, though.

  I held out my hand, the non-pulsing non-bloody one. “I’ll take that.”

  Oscar slipped his hands in his pockets, but didn’t offer to return the mirror. I sat there for a second, hand out.

  “Use the kerchief,” he said.

  I folded my fingers back toward my palm and lowered my hand. Then I wrapped the cloth he’d given me around my wound.

  “You can beat her, you know,” he said.

  I jumped. He’d been so quiet, I’d thought he had forgotten me.

  “Demons only have the power you give them,” he added.

  I snorted. A very unprofessional, possibly stupid response, but I was tired. My guard was gone. “Yeah, well.” I pulled my feet under my body and used my good hand to push myself to a stand. “I’ll try to remember that next time hell is breaking loose.”

  “You should.” His gaze was steady, still sad, but strong. Looked strange coming from a face so young.

  But he wasn’t that young, I reminded myself.

  The air around us thickened. I twisted one corner of his kerchief around my finger. “I need to go find Brittany. I asked her to wait for me, but she’s got to be getting concerned.”

  “She isn’t.”

  Same matter-of-fact response, but this time it bothered me. I glanced toward the woods and tried to hide my worry. “She will be. I better go.” I lifted my foot to step over the wall and with every intention of speed-walking back to where I’d left Brittany.

  “She won’t, because only a few seconds have passed in her life.”

  I clomped my foot down and stood straddling the wall. “What?”

  “I’m a demon, Lucinda. There are some…extras that come with that.” He stepped closer. The smell of the woods intensified. I could feel the heat of his body. It was cool and damp in the trees, but I knew if I placed my hand on Oscar’s chest, he would be warm, that that warmth would flow from him to me, make me feel alive, even though he wasn’t. Not really.

  I raised my hand. He stared at me, his eyes soft and dark. There was pain in them, so much pain. I wanted to touch him more than I had ever wanted anything, but I couldn’t. The emotion flowing over me was too intense. My body swaying, I closed my eyes. Then when I opened them I didn’t look back; I couldn’t. I looked to the woods where Brittany waited instead.

  “But Brittany…” I murmured, more covering my discomfort than expressing concern for my friend.

  He sighed and took a step back. “She’s fine. She wouldn’t have been if I hadn’t interfered. Did you really think Brittany would stay waiting in the woods? Let you walk out here alone?” He shook his head.

  The obv
ious truth of what he had said made me feel like an idiot. The moment was over. My body went cold, then hot. Embarrassment followed.

  “You don’t know your friend very well.”

  I tensed. “We’re not that close.” I couldn’t admit I was beginning to look at Brittany as a friend. Not when I wasn’t sure how she saw me.

  He pulled one side of his mouth back in a sad, lopsided smile. “That’s too bad.”

  I stood there, one foot on each side of the wall, not sure what to do. Part of me wanted to race to Brittany and part of me wanted to stay and talk to Oscar while he seemed willing. I placed my foot back on the side of the wall where he stood.

  Brittany was either locked in a time warp as he said, in which case she was hopefully fine, or she was patiently waiting for me. He was right, the last possibility was insane. “She’s really okay?” I asked. It was a direct question, but he wasn’t under my control. He was free to lie to me.

  “Go check if you don’t believe me, but what difference will it make? If I did something to her, it was before I arrived here. The harm would already be done.”

  His words weren’t exactly reassuring, but I didn’t think he meant for them to be. I decided he was testing me, but I wasn’t sure which reaction would be a pass and which would be a fail.

  Finally, I gave up analyzing and went with my gut. I sat down. “Why are you here?” I asked.

  He sat down too, across the space from me, but directly facing me. It felt odd, formal almost, even though we were surrounded by nothing but debris and weeds.

  “Where else would I be?”

  I got it then. I looked around at where we were sitting, how we were sitting. “This was your house, wasn’t it?”

  He ran his hand over the remains of the wall on which he sat. A bit of rock and ancient mortar crumbled off in his hand. He let the pieces fall through his fingers onto the ground. “My family’s home.”

  “Do you miss them?”

  “No. I wish I did. I thought if I came back again, I might.”

  When he looked up the hollowness I’d noticed before was in his eyes.

  “You were human, weren’t you? Not like Nellie?” I asked.

  He laughed, really more an explosion of air than a laugh. There was no humor in it. “No, I’m not like Nellie, never was. Although….” He picked up another hunk of foundation and crushed it in his fist. “In my own way, I’m just as destructive, just as dangerous. You should keep away from me.”

  I knew then, of course, that I couldn’t, that I wouldn’t. I’d already decided what kind of demon he was, the second way for a human to turn demon, the human who lost all hope, happened to die at the one point when they cared about nothing. It seemed an unfair way to be made a demon.

  “Why’d you walk in front of the bullet?” I asked. “The Internet…Brittany and I looked you up. People called you a hero.”

  He raised a brow. “Did they? They were wrong. I wasn’t saving anyone, wasn’t doing anything. It was all just so ridiculous, the fight I mean. Men screaming at each other, threatening each other, and over what? I don’t even remember.” He threw a stone across the clearing. It bounced twice then sank in the overgrown grass. “At that one moment everything was clear, how little any of it mattered, how unimportant any of it, all of it…” He held up his hands. “…was…is. I just started walking and the bullet hit me. Simple as that.”

  “And you died.”

  He shrugged. “Apparently.”

  We were silent for a few minutes. It seemed wrong to keep asking him questions after that.

  Finally, he spoke again. “All demons want to visit the human realm. It goes without saying. There aren’t many opportunities, but I’ve had two.”

  I blinked. I wasn’t sure where the confidence came from, but it was intriguing too. He’d been here before, since he died.

  He waved his hands. “I thought if I could see this place, I’d remember what it felt like to be alive, that enough time had passed, I’d feel something again. But I didn’t, not then.”

  I tore off a piece of grass and ran it through my fingers. “How about now? Do you feel anything?”

  Oscar didn’t reply. When I looked up, he was studying me. My question had been casual, but my heart was beating loudly. I wanted him to feel something now; I wanted him to feel something because I did.

  He glanced away. “I’m an oddity. Most demons are the opposite; they feel too much, make humans feel too much. I’ve often wondered which is worse, but I think I know.”

  He hadn’t answered my question. Maybe it was for the best. Maybe I needed to control my own caring. Feeling awkward, I ran my hand over the grass and changed the subject. “Nellie said something about serving Kobal. What did she mean?”

  He raised a brow. “You called him, but you haven’t declared your allegiance. He wants it.”

  My hand stilled. “I didn’t call Kobal. I called Theodore.”

  “The vaudeville performer? Same difference.”

  “No, I specifically called Theodore. I used his full name and an image.” I wasn’t stupid.

  “Theodore belongs to Kobal. You open the door to him; you open the door to his owner.” Oscar stood and brushed his hands together, looked as if he were going to leave. The intimacy that had peaked and flowed between us disappeared.

  I stood too and let the grass I’d gathered drift to the ground. “I’ve never heard that before.” It couldn’t be true.

  Already in the process of stepping over the wall, he paused and looked back. “Really? And you’ve been calling demons, how long? You are in over your head, Lucinda. Your mother was in over hers too, but nothing like you.” With a shake of his head, he walked out of the clearing and toward the cemetery.

  I balled my fists. What did he know about my mother? One of my knuckles cracked. I took a step to follow him.

  “Lucinda! Where are you?” Brittany rushed out of the woods.

  o0o

  The next day we were all back at Caldera High pretending we knew nothing about demons or demonology. The three college kids had been missing long enough their story had disappeared from the headlines, but Brittany’s family was getting more and more worried. The other two boy’s families had, according to Brittany, arrived in Bethel two days earlier. They were going door to door, looking for their children. While I was standing outside my biology class waiting for Mr. Parsons to open the door, Brittany walked by and dropped one of the fliers onto my notebook.

  My stomach curled.

  By the time I’d looked up, Brittany was gone. She hadn’t been pleased with me when she’d found me standing in the foundation of Oscar’s old home. I hadn’t told her that Oscar had put her in some kind of time warp, but she seemed to sense something had happened. The fact that Nellie and Shane were gone when she arrived, when in her mind she had just heard them, didn’t help. But I wasn’t telling anyone what happened with Shane, not even Brittany.

  Mr. Parsons opened the door and I found my seat. Oscar and Nellie came in right after me. I didn’t look at either of them. I knew I was going to have to, but I wasn’t ready yet.

  The class was settling in and I had managed to relax a bit when the police showed up.

  They pulled Mr. Parsons out of the room. The police didn’t come to Caldera High very often. While a couple of boys joked about him getting caught selling school pig fetuses on eBay, I looked at Oscar and Nellie. Nellie seemed oblivious. She was using the time to suck yet another male into her web, another wrestler. He and Shane were friends, or had been. I wondered if Shane knew. But the thought was fleeting. I didn’t want to think of Nellie or Shane, especially Shane.

  I turned to Oscar and found he was watching me. I got the feeling he’d been staring at me for a while.

  I fidgeted in my seat, then picked up a scalpel and practiced dropping it into the waxed bottom of my dissection tray. I’d managed to get it to stick perfectly upright when Mr. Parsons came back in the door.

  His face was pale and his hair was mus
sed. He pointed at my lab partner, Sheila.

  My scalpel flopped over onto the wax.

  “Sheila, you’re needed in the office.” Normally those words came out in a terse you-have-so-fucked-up-tone but today Mr. Parsons actually made the sentence sound comforting.

  All chatter and movement stopped. The entire class watched as Sheila slipped off her stool. When she glanced at her books, Mr. Parsons gestured to them. “Might want to take those too.” His tone was still soft, still understanding.

  The hair on the back of my neck stood up. I glanced at Shelia’s now empty stool. Oscar did too, but he didn’t look back at me. He turned to stare out the window instead. Something was wrong, and somehow I knew demons were involved.

  The bagel I’d had for breakfast jumped up into my throat.

  After Sheila had shuffled out of the room, Mr. Parsons got us back on track, or pretty much on track. Oscar’s lab partner, a Latino boy who normally answered questions before Mr. Parsons had a chance to ask them, seemed side-tracked by the operation of his Bunsen burner. While Parsons lectured on amphibian lung function, he sat screwing and unscrewing the main pipe. Finally, Mr. Parsons took the thing away, leaving the boy to stare at the spot where the burner had sat.

  The rest of the class was distracted too, but in a completely different way. Police were in the building, in the office, and we knew which student was in there with them.

  The majority of the class was buzzing with the need to escape and spread the word. Gossip was currency at Caldera High. And our pockets were stuffed.

  When the bell rang, everyone rushed out with fevered urgency, everyone except me, Oscar’s lab partner and the demons. I cornered the demons right outside the door.

  “We need to talk.”

  Nellie ran her middle finger along the edge of her perfectly glossed lower lip, then stared at the pad of her finger for a second. In other words, she flipped me the bird and then grinned.

  “If you’ll excuse me, I have prey to stalk.” She took a step.