She sighed, deciding to try a different tack. A little subtlety might just be what was needed. Something catastrophic had happened to her little monster, and she needed to find out what it was.
“Mamulya is here, Mikal,” she said, speaking to him as if he were five years old all over again. “Come tell me all about it.”
She slipped into the booth beside her son and gently pried the bottle out of his hands. As she set it on the table, she thought she saw a redhead behind the bar, but the woman was gone in a flash, if she’d ever been there.
“Grace is fucking a demon,” Michael complained.
“That’s a problem?”
“Hell, yes. He gave me demonic crabs, the fiery shits, and screwed Grace in my very own hot tub. Ethelred told me she screamed his name and that he’s better than me.”
Nadja felt a faint stirring of an emotion close to maternal solicitude, at least as close as she ever got. No one was better than her son at anything.
Michael continued. “Sasha disappeared with a girl I bought for him, Petru followed them, and I shot my bartender only to have him replaced by a demon whore who’s tormenting me for some imagined wrong I did her. I’m in hock up to my ears with Ethelred and there’s no end in sight. Grace cast a Karma spell on me, so that when I tried to tag the back door of the new girl, I felt it. How fair is that? It’s not!”
He drunkenly flopped his head back on the table. “I’ve tried to do everything you asked, Mamulya. I’ve lied, cheated, stolen, killed, and punished as you said. I’m no closer to demonhood.”
Nadja petted her son’s head and rubbed small circles on his back like she had when he was a child with a cold. Ivan hit her every time Michael coughed, so it had behooved her to take care of him. Just like it did now.
“No, it’s not fair, Michael,” she said. “I will raise her for you after I am Baba Yaga. I promise, my son. If you want Grace, you shall have her. For eternity.”
Her boy’s eyes were haunted. “Will you also make the whore stop tormenting me?”
“Which one, Michael?”
“That one,” he said, motioning to the bar. “That redheaded bitch I killed and put in a Dumpster. She haunts me. She gives me dreams, visions, chokes me while she touches me. And worse . . .”
“How did she die, my son? Did you strangle her?”
Michael nodded miserably. Then he glanced over toward the bar. “I told you I would tell my mother, you bitch. Ha,” he cackled. His head lolled back drunkenly.
“Answer the question or I can’t hurt her.” She tugged on his hair to make Michael pay attention.
“Yes, I strangled her and dumped her with the rest of the trash. Or my men did.”
“She’s angry then. But how did this dead hooker get magick?” Nadja kept petting her son’s head, hoping to soothe him.
“I don’t know, but she has it. She’s a demon now. She says she’s going to stay with me until I kill myself.” He nodded to a gold-plated nine-millimeter that was on the table, and he looked like he’d been pretty close to using it.
“No, son of my flesh! You mustn’t ever kill yourself. Not when you can kill others,” Nadia advised. “Come here, little whore.”
The words were a magickal command. To her surprise, Jill found herself corporeal and bound, her personal power quiescent, unreachable. She was trapped. Trapped in this bar, trapped in a private hell. It was worse than the real one.
“Why are you tormenting my son?” Nadja compelled her to answer.
“He killed me. He strangled me because the demon crabs made him angry. Or maybe just because he’s an evil bastard.”
Nadja grimaced. “That was your lot in life, girl. You must accept it. He is stronger than you.”
“Not anymore,” Jill crowed.
“No, not anymore, demon. But I—I am stronger than you. You will serve. I bind you to him for all eternity.”
And with that simple sentence, a silver chain sprang from Michael to the inside of Jill’s stomach, attaching them. She belonged to him forever. Only the Devil could break this chain.
“Wait for his leisure!” Nadja screeched in closure. The bar’s heavy atmosphere instantly lightened, and Jill was sentenced to some shadowy place where she’d never again see the light of day. Not unless Michael asked for her or the Devil recalled her to Hell.
“Is that better, my son?”
“Yes.” Michael took a deep breath, his head fell forward, and he began to snore lightly on the table.
That whore had kept him up and tormented him for days. Nadja decided to let him sleep for a few hours. She couldn’t believe that the prostitute had managed to push her strong son almost to the point of breaking. If Nadja hadn’t shown up when she did, his brains would be splattered all over the wall behind them.
Well, she didn’t need him for this part of her plan anyway. Nadja concentrated very hard and changed form into that of an old woman with a basket of apples. Ingenious, if she did say so herself. Very old-world magick—something that Grace wouldn’t see coming until after it choked her to death.
She threw some more magick around the bar, making sure her son was protected at least until she got back, then headed out the door. Slowly, she made her way across town, enjoying the freedom of this cronelike form. Nobody paid her much mind at all. She liked the attention she got wearing the shape of the body Sasha had bought for her—men all liked to stare at her ass—but it was nice to be inconspicuous, too.
Not that anyone respected the elderly in this country. Most were treated like children who couldn’t do for themselves, not as the great sages they were in her culture. In her village, everyone gave grandmothers respect. They had seen so much, had so much knowledge to share....
Also, you never knew who or what was wearing that skin. It was well-known in magickal circles that many creatures preferred the form of an old woman. In her village, an old woman knocking on your door at night was something to be feared. Here it was just a hassle. No one believed anymore.
That was something that she was going to change when she was Baba Yaga. People would remember to fear the night and its creatures. That old saying about how there was nothing in the dark that wasn’t there in the light? It was bullshit. There were all sorts of horrors that crawled in the shadows, just waiting to be acknowledged, waiting to spill out into the world in an ink-dark stain of evil. They would all answer to her, Nadja Grigorovich, descendant of Rasputin, and ruling Baba Yaga.
But for now, gaining the trust of a younger person was best accomplished in an old and withered form. She would see if Grace Stregaria had taken lessons from her grandmother’s knee, or if she was like every other modern youngster who would open the door to an old woman and her basket of apples.
She scattered a few pieces of fruit in the hallway, easing her old frame to the ground as if she’d fallen. When she gave a giggle, the sound emerged as a deranged cackle, but this suited her just fine. She pounded hopefully on Grace’s door.
The door didn’t open, which surprised Nadja. Perhaps Grace had taken to her lessons, after all. The possibility hadn’t really seemed likely; she had to stop assuming people were as stupid as they seemed.
She pounded again, hoping no one else stumbled on her. Nadja didn’t think she could play nice twice; it had just about killed her earlier with Michael. Scratching a final time in desperation, she gave a sigh of relief when the door finally opened.
It was no wonder that Grace was screwing this demon instead of her son. Not that Michael wasn’t handsome; he was. She was proud of his features. But this demon was . . . something else. Maybe he’d be free for a hookup after she’d taken her rightful place as the world’s preeminent witch.
He took one look and shut the door in her face.
“Help, I’ve fallen!” Nadja thought about adding, “And I can’t get up,” but she was sure that would be pushing it. Plus, she’d giggle. She flopped down all the way to the ground and let out a small mewling sound.
“Old woman, sell your sob story
elsewhere. As if I’d let you anywhere near either of us with an apple.”
“He’s so mean,” she howled, hoping she might attract the neighbors and force his hand. “I’ve fallen and he won’t help me.”
“Yes, I am mean. I’m the scourge of old ladies everywhere. Beat it, or I’m going to shove those apples somewhere no one has explored since the Dark Ages. Beat feet, hag!” Caspian called through the door. “I know better than to trust your kind.”
It had probably been too much to hope that this was going to work on Caspian, seeing as he was a demon. But Nadja wasn’t giving up. She howled again in a voice so high pitched and irritating that she annoyed herself. The door opened again, and she peered up into Caspian’s smiling face.
She didn’t know what the hell he had to be so happy about—until he dumped a pitcher of rose water on her. To add insult to injury, he tossed salt on afterward. And not just a pinch of the stuff. He got some in her mouth. Her magickal disguise began to shimmer, and she knew the jig was up. For now, anyway.
“I’ll get you,” she said as she disappeared.
So, now what? If it had been Grace alone, the girl would have been too weak to deny her pleading entreaties. But with the demon there, apparently protecting her . . . ? She had to find a way around him.
Inspiration struck like a blinding light. She’d turn into Sasha and use Petru! Except, she was sure Katerina would have warned the big lug somehow; she wouldn’t leave him to muddle along uninformed. The woman hadn’t been in love with Sasha, and she would have warned him. Now Katerina had love-struck stamped all over her forehead, so it seemed like a foregone conclusion. She likely did it without breaking her vow of silence, too.
So, no. That plan wouldn’t work, but something similar might. She needed someone or something big that could just burst in and take Grace out of Caspian’s hands. Something that could get past the hex bags she’d smelled. Or . . . she could just say fuck it and burn the place down. That sounded like the most expedient of plans. Why bother being tricksy? Seraphim’s magick was strong, but not even hex bags could survive a healthy dose of arson.
Nadja hobbled down the stairs, not daring to change forms. Someone might see her, and that wouldn’t do. She meant to keep her powers a secret. As she exited the stairs, she blew a kiss in the general direction of the building, and magickal flames sprang up wherever she looked. They crawled high up the walls, spreading in an elegant ballet of death that would consume all it touched.
She would have made an excellent getaway if she hadn’t tripped over a homeless man who’d been watching the whole thing.
“I didn’t see shit,” he said as she stood up.
“I know,” she whispered, and then added a few words of magick. His eyes glazed over with a white film. “And you never will again.”
The delay was fortuitous. She turned just in time to see a very interesting development—Grace jumping off the roof and gliding down into the nearby alley sporting lavender wings. But that wasn’t what impressed her most. What fascinated her was that Grace’s demonic sex god was holding on to her for dear life. He had no wings.
No wings. Had Caspian gone native for Grace? It was an interesting and intriguing question, one to which she needed to find the answer. So thrilled with the day’s events was she, Nadja almost clapped like a giddy schoolgirl. Granted, she’d made an ass of herself in the hallway, but everything else seemed to be coming along nicely.
She watched the demon and Grace make their way to the hotel across the street, made sure that Caspian did nothing magickal or demonic. He didn’t. At last, Nadja was satisfied. Smiling to herself, she headed back to her son’s bar. It was time for Michael to go get his girl. He’d have no trouble taking her now.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Every Time a Witch Cries, a Demon Gets His Wings
After the fire took her apartment, Grace was about to crack like a rotten nut. She’d had enough. She’d had load after load of the most heinous crap that could befall any one person, and it had been raining down on her for the past four years.
Okay, so, she knew she was not a normal person. She knew she had extremely powerful relatives, and that this increased the likelihood of having bizarre shit cropping up, but this was getting ridiculous. She just wanted a tiny bit of relief. She’d be happy if she could just manage one day where absolutely nothing out of the ordinary happened to her, good or bad. She wanted just one mundane, banal day. A day to herself. No grandmothers (Love you, Gran!), no Devil (Love you, too, Gramps!), no demons (Fuck it, love you three, Caspian!), and certainly no fires, carriages, hex bags, wings, sex toys, or sex.
Well, maybe not no sex. Sex might be okay. But normal-ish sex. Nothing that fucked with the basic foundations of how she saw the world. Was that just too much to ask?
Apparently it was, because just as the thought entered her head, a bullet entered Caspian’s. It burst right through the door, burrowed through his head, and embedded itself into the wall of the hotel where they’d taken refuge.
The door splintered. Michael stepped through the debris with a smile on his face. “Took care of your demon problem, Grace. And you’ve got one day left.”
She screamed as Caspian fell, a startled look on his face and his blood spraying across her hands and shirt. She called on her power, but Michael was atop her in an instant. He held her down and pinched her nose closed, forcing her to open her mouth to breathe.
She remembered that she didn’t have to breathe much as a quasi-demon, tried to call the Powers That Be and trade her soul for the rest of her demonhood—or even her life for Caspian’s—but nothing happened. And when her mouth fell open to suck in a big ol’ breath, Michael shoved a peanut-butter ball inside. As Grace tried to spit it out, the power that had been gathering at her fingertips sputtered and died like she had a faulty battery.
All she could think about was Caspian. She begged the Universe to let him live, swore that she’d do anything for him. He couldn’t be dead; not now that she’d discovered she loved him. He was a demon, so he couldn’t die.
No, he was human. He’d regained his humanity by being with her. Which meant it was her fault that he was dead.
“I told you to get rid of him, Grace,” Michael was saying. “Didn’t I tell you? Now, will you just come home and do what’s right for our son?”
Grace began fighting. She kneed her onetime lover in the balls, but that didn’t faze him. It didn’t even piss him off, which surprised her. Nonetheless, she vowed she was going to kill him. If she never did anything else with her life, Michael Ivan Grigorovich would die by her hand.
When she didn’t respond to his comment about Nikoli, Michael shook his head. “I see you’ve broken my spell. Good, I’m glad. Then your magick is all the more powerful.” He hit her with the back of his hand, hard. “But see what you made me do, Grace? I wouldn’t have wanted this for you, but you disobeyed me. Not only that, you were unfaithful with your demon.”
Grace had to live, even if it was just long enough to kill this bastard. She stared at the floor, not wanting to provoke him into doing something precipitous. Though she imagined his plan for her was dire in the long run as well.
“Can you see that, demon? She knows her place. Your body isn’t even cold and soon she’ll be screaming beneath me! From pleasure or pain, I have not decided, but she is mine.”
Grace couldn’t look at Caspian’s body. It was terribly wrong that he’d lived so many centuries as a demon, then been human for only a few days before dying. He hadn’t been given a chance to experience what the best parts were like. He hadn’t felt what it was to be well loved. She hadn’t even told him that she loved him!
Suddenly, all of her reasons for not telling him were insignificant. It didn’t matter if he felt the same. Love wasn’t something you confessed to while hoping for something in return, not even hoping to hear it back. It was a gift to be given freely, unconditionally, and with no expectation. And if anyone had ever earned it, Caspian had. She’d never thought h
er infatuation with Michael had been love; she’d known better. But Caspian, no matter what he was . . . he was the one. He was it. He was her forever.
“Help him, Lucy. Please,” she begged, hoping against hope that her grandfather could hear, that he would answer her summons. She wouldn’t say that she loved Caspian now, not aloud; that was too much like admitting she’d never have another chance and that Caspian was really dead. She wouldn’t let him die; she would do whatever she must to get him back. Bullet or no bullet, he was going to be fine. He had to be.
“Who is Lucy? Who else is here?” Michael demanded, shaking her roughly.
Wouldn’t you just like to know, you bastard, she thought. Wouldn’t you just.
“Eh, no matter. My mother is waiting.” Michael secured magickal chains around her wrists and ankles. She looked like an inmate from a women’s prison, and it seemed like that was the angle he was trying to play up to take her out of the downtown hotel.
Dragging her by the hair, he led her out the door and down the stairs. “Don’t fight me, Grace,” he warned. “It will just go harder on you.”
Go harder? How could it go harder?
As Grace watched Michael continue talking, she couldn’t hear any of the sounds that were coming out of his mouth. It didn’t matter, though, because the words didn’t matter. She had one objective and one objective alone: killing Michael Grigorovich. He was going to pay for all of the pain he’d caused, the damage he’d done to numerous families. She’d seen the face of evil and this was it.
It was a good thing she believed true evil never went unpunished.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Caspian’s Deal
How to Lose a Demon in 10 Days Page 23
