The Demon's Apprentice

by Ben Reeder

  My eyes narrowed as I caught the scent of mold and dirt from him, and my mystic senses recoiled in recognition as soon as I sent them his way. This was the warlock Brad had been dealing with Tuesday night. I hadn’t been close enough to catch the signs of necromancy off of him that night, though. Most dead-bangers showed some sign of decay, like this guy’s disease-riddled face, and the scent of grave dirt coming off of him. Plus, some part of my mystical senses caught the aura of death around him. Most people would feel a sense of wrongness about this guy, and they would avoid him without knowing exactly why.

  “Mitchell,” the round little mage said with a gulp.

  The necromancer smiled and stepped up to the edge of the table. “That’s no way to treat a customer, Roland,” he said. He reached out and flipped one of the little boxes on the table at Dandry, sending bits of green flying. Dandry let out a little cry of dismay, but he didn’t seem to want to attract attention to himself. He looked left and right with worried glances, as if he was afraid anyone might notice his predicament.

  Of course, it was too late for that. I already had, and my brain had gone to that cold, calculating place where it went when I wanted to hurt someone. I took a step back and moved behind Lucas and Wanda, trying not to make any noise as I stalked up behind Mitchell. Moving over asphalt, it wasn’t really that hard.

  “You’re not a customer of mine,” Dandry stammered, trying to sound defiant. “What do you want?”

  “I want what everyone wants, Roland. To be on the winning side in what’s coming. It’s out in the open now, and my master is going to have it.” Mitchell walked around to the side of the stall, out of easy view, and farther away from me. His right hand dipped into his front pocket, and came out with what looked like a pair of slim pieces of wood capped at either end with brass. The metallic half-moon at one end gave it away as a balisong: the infamous Filipino butterfly knife.

  “I…I don’t know who had it, Mitchell, and I wouldn’t know where it is right now. I’m just a minor mage,” Dandry said quietly. I could hear the desperation in his voice, and my jaw clenched. Dandry seemed like a decent little guy who just wanted to sell his herbs and gardening stuff, and who took a lot of pleasure in the simple, pleasant life he’d made. He didn’t want a lot of power or glory; he just wanted to have his table nice and neat. Mitchell had chosen him because he thought he was an easy mark. I saw a lot of my mom in this pudgy little mage, and seeing Mitchell prey on him really pissed me off.

  “Well, I’m a full-fledged necromancer, fat boy, so you’d better come up with something I can use if you know what’s good for you. You’re too small for the Conclave to give a rat’s ass about.”

  I wish I could say I saw red, or lost control, or that I just exploded. I didn’t. I knew exactly what I was doing when I picked up the heavy marble mortar and pestle on the edge of Dandry’s table. The mortar went into my right hand, and the pestle was wrapped in my left fist. Dandry saw the movement, but the necromancer didn’t, and I thought about taking advantage of it for a second, but, I didn’t want tall, dark, and loathsome to be able to say I hit him when he wasn’t looking. I really wanted him to see this coming.

  “Hey, corpse-humper,” I growled.

  Mitchell turned toward me with narrowed eyes. “Go away, worm,” he sneered, and I felt the edge of a compulsion in the command. I’d been keeping a demon lord out of my head for years, though, and no two-bit necromancer was going to lay a charm on me.

  “No, you carcass-banging loser.” I smiled when his eyes went wide. Finally, he got that I knew what he was.

  “You really should’ve minded your own business, boy,” he hissed.

  He started a complex set of moves to open the balisong, and I laid the mortar across his left temple. He took a staggering sidestep into the stall before his knees gave out and he went down on his butt. As soon as his ass met the pavement, I stepped up and swung with my marble-weighted left fist. The punch hit him across the jaw and laid him out flat on the asphalt. The knife fell from limp fingers, clattering a few inches away from his hand. I put the mortar and pestle back on the table and scooped up the knife before Dandry could do more than gasp in shock.

  “Wanda, keep an eye out for anyone coming our way, Lucas, help me get this guy out of sight before whatever he was using to cover himself wears off,” I ordered.

  They stared at me for a few seconds, then shook their heads and moved into action. Lucas and I dragged the limp Mitchell back into the shadowed space between Dandry’s brown van and the white panel van next to it. Around us, no one seemed to notice that I’d just slugged a guy and dragged him out of sight. Wanda and Lucas’ lack of reaction told me that dead-boy had some sort of neglenom charm on him to make people ignore what he did unless he let them see him. It made sense, since I didn’t feel him until he was actually beside me. Odds were, it wasn’t a spell he’d cast on himself, since more complex and delicate enchantments like that were beyond most necromancers. Charms and enchantments didn’t cast well with the energy most necromancers put off, and most of them didn’t bother to study them anyway.

  I propped him up against the side of Dandry’s van and ran my hands along the side of his neck, hoping to find an amulet, and sure enough, I found the black leather cord. My fingers tingled when they touched it, and I let it be. For the moment, it was doing us as much good as it was him.

  Dandry followed us, making worried noises with each step. “What have you done?” he asked, his voice rising near panic. “He’s going to be mad when he wakes up, and he’ll take it out on me, I know it!”

  “Not if I have anything to say about it,” I told him. “Can you wake him up?”

  He nodded, then stretched his arm as far as he could and touched a fingertip to Mitchell’s shoulder for a half a second. The spell fell from his lips in a rush, and he leaped back as soon as the words left his mouth.

  Mitchell flailed his arms weakly for a second, then his eyes focused on me, and his face curled into a sneer. “Who are you?” he demanded.

  “The guy asking the questions, Mitch. Who do you work for?”

  “I don’t have to tell you, boy. If you run away now, you might not ever find out, and believe me, you really don’t want to know who my Master is.” His voice carried a casual contempt for anyone who wasn’t him. I slapped him, and a little of that contempt slipped.

  “Okay, I tried asking nicely,” I said as he shook his head. “Let me speak a language you can understand a little better.” I shifted mental gears, and asked the next question in Infernal patois.

  “Whose bitch are you? Whose hairy ass do you kiss, hoof-licker?” It was about as pleasant as Infernal got. Behind me, Dandry gasped, and I could feel Lucas stare at me. Infernal patois is a harsh-sounding language, even at its best.

  “How…how can you…” Mitchell asked incoherently. “You can’t act against another servant!”

  “I’m not a servant. Now, who do you serve? Who owns your sorry ass?” I slapped him again, this time adding a backhand as well.

  His eyes went wide as he struggled to understand what I was saying. “Synrhodi’ir!” he snarled back at me. The haughty look in his eyes told me he thought I should be really scared by hearing that name. I’d heard of Synrhodi’ir, and knew he was lower in the ranks of Hell than Dulka. Where Dulka was a noble among demons, Synrhodi’ir was more like a clerk in Hell’s Hall of Records.

  “What does he want?” I asked.

  “Your ass on a platter!” he sneered.

  I grinned as I opened the balisong slowly and put the point under his right eye. “Okay. Question and answer time’s done,” I said cheerfully as I pushed the point against the thin skin of his cheek until blood flowed, and he cried out in pain.

  “What are you doing?” Dandry asked fearfully.

  “He’s not going to cooperate,” I answered, sounding bored and resigned. I turned to Dandry and pulled the bloody point of the knife just far enough away from Mitchell’s face that it was right where the necromancer
could see it. “At least, I hope he’s not. He’s useless to me now, so I’m just going to take his eyes. I’ve got a neat new spell that calls for the eye of a necromancer. I just can’t remember if it’s the left or right eye, so I figure, why take chances? I’ll just take ‘em both, and keep the other one to hex this poor bastard with later. After all, the eyes are the window to the soul, right?”

  As I finished, I winked at Dandry with the eye farthest from Mitchell. Either he didn’t catch it, or he was such a gentle soul that he couldn’t stomach even the threat of torture. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and assumed he was a gentle soul. Either way, he didn’t look too reassured. Lucas, on the other hand, was trying to hide a smile, which I didn’t get until I looked back to Mitchell and saw the fear-stricken look in his eyes. He was shaking like a leaf, and his mouth was working, but no sound was coming out.

  “Aw, crap! He’s trying to talk. Okay, what’s out in the open now? What does your master want?” I kept my tone bored and added some irritated.

  “The…the…the Maxilla!” he finally stammered. “It’s a sword; the wizards have it! It was under some sort of concealment spell, but it was broken a few days ago. Now everyone wants to find it before war breaks out! That’s all I know!”

  “Well, that was disappointing. Maybe I should still take one eye, though, you know, just to make a point. Besides, I’ve still got a fifty-fifty chance of getting the right one!” I gave him a chilling smile as I leaned in and he squealed in terror. I put the point under his right eye again.

  “No! Please! I don’t know anything else!” He sounded so scared, I almost felt a little pity for him. Almost.

  “What did you sell Brad Duncan the other night?” I demanded.

  “Who?”

  “The jock you were making a deal with at Dante’s.”

  “That? That was nothing, just a couple of charms,” he said in disbelief. I pushed the point against his cheek until a bright drop of blood welled up around it. “Just a negator hex, and he asked me to make him a love spell! That’s all!” I felt a growl start deep in my throat, but I managed to choke it off. That made his eyes go wide, and he started to whimper.

  “Damn. That’s two pieces of information you’ve given me: one for each eye. You don’t happen to know any other necromancers that you’re not too fond of, do you? No? Well, here’s how it is, then. I’m going to keep your blade, because it’s kinda cool and I like it. You get to keep both eyes, and you never, ever come near Dandry again. No harm, no bad luck, not even an unkind word about his mother. If I hear that you, your master, or anyone who even knows your name has given him a hard time, you’re going to get your knife back, and I’m going to get the eyes I need. Plus whatever other body parts I want at the time.”

  “You can’t dictate what my master will do!” he managed to spit, finally getting back some of his courage.

  “I laid a beat down on a Count of Hell; don’t think that I can’t do the same to an ass-lick chancellor like Synrhodi’ir.” That got his attention.

  “You’re…you’re…him!” necro-boy managed to stammer. He went pale and slumped against the van as his eyes rolled back in his skull and fluttered shut.

  Beside me, Lucas stood up from where he’d knelt beside me and shook his head. “Man, I think you literally scared the crap out of him!” he said in disbelief. I raised my eyebrows in surprise. It certainly explained the smell.

  “You’re the one who escaped?” Dandry asked. His voice had lost most of its fear, but the look in his eyes was far from friendly.

  “You know who I am?” I asked. Dr. Corwin had said that the wizards were looking for a rogue warlock, but I didn’t figure they had a lot of details.

  “You’re…just a boy,” Dandry said in disbelief.

  “Yeah, just a boy,” I snorted as I pulled the concealment charm over the necromancer’s head and tucked it into my messenger bag. I felt like I needed to wash my hands after being so close to him. “Tell that to the demon.”

  “Chance,” Wanda said quietly from the opening between the two stalls, “Is he going to be okay?” She looked a little pale, and I could see the worry on her face. Wanda wasn’t a violent girl, and her Wiccan teaching probably made her very aware of karma and the Law of Return.

  “I guess so. He woke up pretty quick, and I didn’t hit him that hard.”

  “You’re not what I expected,” Dandry continued. “I mean, for a warlock. The stories make you seem…older.”

  “Older, huh? I was kinda hoping I didn’t come off as evil as you’d heard.”

  “You did just scare the crap out of a necromancer, dude. Not really seeing the warm and fuzzy in that,” Lucas observed. Wanda shrugged and nodded.

  “So, what will you demand from me?” the plump little mage asked me nervously.

  “What?” I asked, displaying my keen grasp of the situation.

  “You extended your protection. There’s always a price.”

  “No price. He was being a dick to you.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Of course I’m serious! It’s not like you asked me to help you out or anything. He was being an asshole, so I beat him down. I just didn’t want you to have to deal with any crap because of me, that’s all.”

  “I don’t understand. Where is the profit in this for you?” Dandry asked, genuinely confused.

  “I’m not looking for a profit, Mr. Dandry. I just want to buy some stuff. He was making that kinda hard, you know?” He looked at me like I was speaking gibberish. “It wouldn’t hurt if it made me look good, though. If anyone asks about me, I’d appreciate a little good publicity with the Conclave.”

  He nodded enthusiastically, making his round little face jiggle like a bowl of my mom’s pudding. “Of course! You’re very powerful, not a, um…person to be trifled with, obviously!”

  “Could we just go with how I’m not so evil? That’s all I’m looking for.”

  He nodded again, his head bobbing up and down so fast I thought it might pop off and go bouncing. “Well, yes, I could do that.” He sounded uncertain, and I decided to take it at that and go on. Someone’s watch beeped on the hour, and he looked around. Money was changing hands, and it was time to do business.

  “You really don’t do the whole negotiation thing very well,” Lucas commented as I started looking over Dandry’s wares again.

  “I used to do it all the time for my old boss,” I said darkly. “I’m trying to get out of that business.” In the end, I walked away with a mortar & pestle, a set of knives, and some essential oils for mixing spells and potions, along with a laundry list of herbs: two bundles apiece of sage and cedar, a jar of bay leaves, and packets of cinquefoil, arnica, and St. John’s wort.

  “You know, you’re going to have to deal with some pretty serious karma for what happened back there,” Wanda said, with a worried tone in her voice, as we headed to the next stall.

  “I already have a ton of bad karma to deal with, what’s a little more?” I asked. It took me a few steps to realize that she’d stopped in her tracks. I turned to face her, and she caught up to me. “What?” I asked when I saw her confused look.

  “People usually dodge that issue,” she said quietly. “They try to justify what they’re doing, or claim that they’re agents of karma or something like that. You just…accept it, like it’s no big deal.”

  “Well, I have a problem with karma. It’s not perfect. I didn’t do anything to deserve being Dulka’s bitch for eight years. If you think I’m going to get back violence three times as bad for what I did today, then let me tell you something. I have enough scars that I ought to have a little credit on the books. But if not, then fine, I can handle it. I’m used to it by now. What I can’t handle is a system that kicks me around for doing something good for someone, even if I have to get a little bloody to do it, just because someone says violence is always bad.” I stopped as Wanda took a half step back, and felt like an ass when I saw the shocked look on her face.

  “I…I
never thought about it…I mean, where your situation was concerned…” she stammered for a few seconds.

  “Hey, it’s okay,” I reassured her. “Sorry I jumped your ass about it.”

  “Still, I gotta wonder,” Lucas mused, “if Chance really wasn’t acting as karma for that necromancer guy, Wanda. And if the good he did outweighed the violence.”

  “Don’t tell me you’re an agnostic Pagan,” Wanda said, exasperated.

  “Nah, I’m just thinking that Chance did pretty much get hosed, karma-wise. And we don’t know what this necromancer dude’s done. He might have gotten off light.”

  “Who knows?” Wanda shrugged. “But we’re wasting good shopping time with this. All I know, Chance, is that if you do good things, you get good stuff back.”

  “I hope you’re right,” I said to her back as I followed her into the throng. The powers knew I needed something good to happen.

  Chapter 17

  ~ Plan in broad strokes. Everything changes on the battlefield. ~ Unknown.

  We pulled into the school parking lot around noon. Shade was already waiting for us when we got to Dr. Corwin’s lab. She looked nervous as we came in. Hot as hell, but nervous. She’d ditched the usual preppy-girl look, but she hadn’t gone all the way to black leather, either. She wore a pair of low-slung black jeans and a pink shirt that had the bottom half ripped off, so that the edge curled up at the bottom to show an expanse of soft skin that ran a few inches below her navel. The word “Bitch” arced over her breasts in cute black letters. She pulled her feet up to rest her white sneakers on the rung of her lab stool and offered us a smile as we came in. I smiled back, partly in greeting, and partly because she was sitting in her usual spot in the room during class, halfway back on the left side from the door. I headed for her side. Lucas and Wanda perched on the table closest to the door, evidently not creatures of habit.