by Nazri Noor
At first glance, V was a tarnished old sword, made of bronze, but so old that his blade was turned a powdery bluish-green with verdigris. In truth he was made of star-metal, a mysterious, resilient material associated with the mad beings known as the Eldest. The only things of evident value on him were the garnets set into his hilt, which pulsed brightly whenever he spoke. But it’d been a while since he’d done any talking.
Vanitas was a sentient sword, or at least he was, once, before Thea destroyed him. He could talk, and even fight and fly on his own. It was awesome. But he’d been quiet for a while now, dormant. I knew that Vanitas needed time and attunement with his human companion to replenish his energies, but it’d been long enough since I’d brought him home whole and repaired. Still nothing.
But yeah, when Vanitas was destroyed, I’m talking proper destroyed, like there was no chance of him being put back together, not when he was just a heap of twisted metal and broken garnets. As for how I did get him reforged – let’s not get into that. Let’s focus on how I was reaching for my beer, enjoying its coolness, its dewy glass slick under my hand –
And how, as I took a sip of it, eyes open, I fancied through the gorgeous, amber liquid and the bottom of the bottle that the world, or at least my bedroom, looked beautiful in gold. I swallowed, the bubbles tickling my throat, then set the bottle down against my chest, savoring the chill – only to realize that the world was still golden.
I would have said my room, but I knew that I wasn’t in my room anymore. I was standing, beer in hand, barefoot and shirtless, in a great hall. It was almost completely gold in color, from the floors to the high ceilings, even the frames of the portraits of uncanny, inhuman humans lining the walls. And at the end of it, standing in a pool of molten gold, was the very creature who had put Vanitas back together again.
“Dustin Graves,” said the demon prince of greed, smiling through a mouth of sharp teeth. “Mammon has come to ask for a favor.”
Chapter 4
I squeezed my eyes shut, in some fervent hope that this was only a complex hallucination. Or maybe I’d fallen asleep, and it was just a dream. But the cool glass bottle in my hand and the chill of the marble flooring underfoot were very real. I opened my eyes, sighed, and gave the demon a weak smile.
“Hi. I guess.”
“It has been a while, thing of shadows. Long enough for Mammon to consider how you may best fulfill your half of the bargain.”
“Yeah. About that.” I scratched my nose, doing my best not to show my irritation. “I’ve had the sword with me for a while now. I mean it stays in the same room that I sleep in, and still no sign of sentience. I’m starting to think you might have bilked me out of a fair deal.”
Mammon held a hand to its chest, each of its delicate fingers tipped with a golden nail, then gasped. “Surely you aren’t accusing the demon prince of greed of – well, greed.”
I frowned. “Be serious.”
Mammon sighed. “You may recall, once, when the sword spent a significant amount of time away from your person, then went dormant.”
I raised an eyebrow. “You know about that?”
When I first met Vanitas, it was to retrieve him for the Lorica. They kept him under glass in the Gallery, the organization’s own collection of magical artifacts, which caused him to lose his sentience. I’d learned since then that the sword needed to be attuned to its wielder, kept physically close in order to maintain both its intelligence and animation. But that still didn’t explain why V hadn’t come back to life.
“Give it time,” Mammon said. “It requires more spiritual energy to tether the sword to your soul now that it has been, in a sense, reborn. Have some faith. Mammon governs greed, remember?” The demon smiled. “The prince of lies is a different creature entirely.”
I took a swig of my beer, holding the bottle firmly to hide the fact that my hand was shaking just the slightest. The prince of lies? Was Mammon talking about Satan? Someone else? I was only just becoming acquainted with the concept of demons, and now they were shoving this in my face. I swallowed a mouthful of beer, playing it off casually, grateful that the faint bitterness and prickling in my throat forced me to grimace enough to hide my mild panic.
“Right,” I said, stifling a burp. “Well you better hope that Vanitas gets back to his full power, because that’s what we agreed on in the first place.” I don’t know where I was finding the balls to get all sassy with a prince of hell, but I decided it best to just roll with it.
Mammon spread its hands and made a shallow bow. “Of course. We infernals may have our faults, but a bargain is a bargain. A contract is a contract.” The demon smiled in a way that made my soul itchy. “Now, as for your half of the agreement.”
Something in the hallway shifted just then, and it felt as if ghostly fingers were creeping across my skin. The temperature dropped several degrees throughout the palace of Mammon. The figures in the portraits hung along the walls turned their eyes in my direction, their lips tightening and curling into sharp, wicked smiles.
“Fine.” I finished off my beer, praying that the last of it would be enough to bolster my flagging spirits. “A promise is a promise. Tell me what you need.”
Mammon stepped closer, its feet leaving wet, golden footprints as it crossed the ornate vermilion carpet separating us. “Your task is simple, in spirit, but functionally quite difficult indeed. Mammon seeks the Tome of Annihilation.”
In my ears, I distinctly heard the demon speak the words “Tome of Annihilation,” but it may as well have said “nuclear bomb,” or “a lawnmower the size of the Empire State.” I rubbed the back of my neck, then pinched my nose as I felt the mother of all migraines threaten to break onto the scene.
“Sorry. Just to clarify. The Tome of Annihilation. Is that correct?”
Mammon smiled. “Quite. A frivolous thing, this book. It travels where it wishes, on a whim.”
Oh. Well. A spell book that was capable of independent thought. Even better. “It’s a grimoire, correct? You’re saying that it’s sentient, like Vanitas?”
Mammon lifted its head, its emerald eyes looking up into the chandeliers of its ridiculous mansion. “Not as such. It cannot speak, or cast its own spells, if that is what you mean. But it does have a limited capacity for free thought. Have you heard, perhaps, of the Book of Plagues?”
I narrowed my eyes. “Oh. I’m familiar.”
Total understatement. The Book of Plagues was one of the friskier artifacts I had to retrieve for the Lorica, back when I worked for them as a Hound. It couldn’t quite fly or move around very well on its own, but the thing packed a hell of a bite. I mean, it growled and snapped at me when I tried to pick it up.
I remember how Herald had to put it down by punching it right in its ugly mug. Cover? Whatever. Point is, the Book of Plagues was a vicious, feral little piece of shit, and I didn’t much savor the idea of being sent out to fetch an even more dangerous grimoire with a similarly toxic personality.
“Well, the Tome of Annihilation has its own quirks. It does not like to keep in one place, and will, in fact, resist any and all attempts at restraint.”
“Great.” Something told me I’d need more than a well-placed punch to put this thing under control.
“Indeed. Each time a spell is recited from one of the Tome’s pages, it disappears, relocating itself via an innate teleportation enchantment. Its creator was very clever indeed. That way, the grimoire does not draw undue attention to itself, and can therefore evade capture by those who would mean to contain its magic – say, the Lorica you humans value so much.”
“Sounds to me like it’s a failsafe. Kind of like the Tome’s own survival tactic.”
“Yes, precisely. A collector might keep the Tome in his library for years, decades, centuries, and it would be content to sleep. But the moment a spell is used, it flees the premises, finding some other corner of the earth to hide in, waiting for a new owner. And that is why Mammon requires your services, thing of shadows, the greate
st of thieves.”
I cleared my throat. “Handsomest.” Maybe I flexed a little, too.
“Yes. Right. Now, the grimoire was used recently, and has therefore executed one of its flights of fancy. Mammon has learned of its approximate whereabouts. The Tome of Annihilation has found its way to the city of Valero.”
“Wait.” I chewed my lip, studying Mammon carefully. This all seemed too convenient. “So the Tome recently had a spell cast from it – and I’m going to assume that all of its contents are destructive in nature. And you’re saying that it’s appeared in Valero.” I folded my arms across my chest. “You wouldn’t happen to know about a very recent massacre, would you? Last night. Over a hundred humans dead, bleeding out of their eyes and ears. Sound familiar?”
The demon stood stock-still, its face frozen in an unnaturally neutral expression. “Mammon knows not of what you speak.”
“You had something to do with it, didn’t you?”
I knew it was bold, but my body took over. My hand clenched tightly over the neck of my empty beer bottle – I don’t know, like I was planning to smash it against a counter and get ready for a bar fight – and I approached Mammon, my feet making decidedly unthreatening padding noises as I closed the distance between us.
“You used the Tome to bind that poor, innocent pop star’s tongue, then killed all those people. And now that you’ve conducted your little experiment, you need the Tome back for a bigger, even more explosive ritual.” My chest swelled a little, perhaps in pride over having deduced the demon’s plans so quickly.
“Such hideous accusations you make,” Mammon hissed, backing away from me, each of its steps making a soft, wet plop in the puddles of gold it left in its wake.
“So you did it. You used that spell, and now the Tome is gone, and you – ”
“Silence.”
The voice that boomed around me had changed. Hell, the entire room had changed. I wasn’t in the palace of Mammon anymore. And Mammon – wasn’t Mammon anymore. The demon was gone, replaced by a massive dragon, its scales made of cut rubies, its eyes searing like burning emeralds.
Oh. Oh shit.
“I take it that this is your true form,” I said, all while the voice in my head screamed for me to shut up.
“It is one of many,” the dragon said, its voice rumbling around the cave, its hide slithering over the mountain of gold and treasure that was its throne. “It appears that intimidation is in order. A pity, because this negotiation could have turned out far more smoothly. Must Mammon singe you with viridian flames or pass you through the gullet of this draconine form before you will listen to reason?”
I gulped, examining the surrounding shadows for a choice spot to exit, just in case. My feet shuffled – then I almost stumbled. I was stuck. A pair of golden hands – the fingers of which were tipped with gnarled, cruel talons – grasped tightly around my ankles. One of them ran its razor-sharp nails delicately across the hem of my jeans, making a soft, threatening scratch and leaving faint white lines in the denim each time, like a kind of warning.
“Fine. Message received. I’ll behave.”
The cave brightened, rock and earth sloughing away as if panned in river water, revealing the gleaming gold and marble surfaces of Mammon’s palace once more. In the dragon’s place stood the demon, wearing a more familiar and decidedly less frightening body.
“Gotta admit,” I said, wiping at the sweat on my neck. “The intimidation tactic worked.”
Mammon smiled. “Is it not easier for us to conduct negotiations as equals, perhaps even as colleagues? It is why Mammon takes a shape you deem palatable.”
I looked at the demon, at its tailored red suit, its face that could at once be described as handsome and beautiful, its androgynous swoop of raven hair, and wondered what it meant. I cleared my throat.
“So. Back to the Tome. You claim you didn’t do it.”
“Mammon claims nothing, human. Mammon only wants possession of the grimoire. That is all.”
“And what guarantee do I have that you aren’t going to use it for destructive ends? How am I assured that this isn’t part of some grand, demonic agenda?”
The voice screaming in my head told me that this was the wrong thing to say. Mammon’s expression didn’t change as it stepped forward, sinking into a puddle of molten gold. The demon reappeared mere inches from my face, like it had shadowstepped. It trailed a finger along my chest, its nails pressing gently, lightly, at the scar above my heart.
“You have no guarantees. Mammon has given you what you want, human. Perhaps you fear becoming complicit in the potential chaos that may occur from handing a ruinous relic to one of the princes of hell. And what of it? Guilt is only natural.”
Mammon’s nails pressed harder – not enough to hurt, but enough for me to wonder if it had plans to snatch out my heart. I raised my chin. Where the hell was this bravado coming from?
The demon prince lowered its hand at last, reaching for the beer bottle in my hand. Mammon balanced the bottle on its palm, eyes still gazing into mine.
“No more questions. Only results. You have profited from this business relationship, and now it is time for Mammon to reap the benefits of this investment. Bring Mammon the Tome, thing of shadows.”
The bottle shattered, its fragments clinking to the marble floor. I held my breath.
“Or you forfeit your soul.”
Chapter 5
“Oh, Dustin,” Herald muttered, squeezing the bridge of his nose.
“Listen,” I hissed. “I said I was sorry.”
“Oh, Dustin, Dustin, Dustin.”
Hah. He could judge me all he wanted, as long as he kept it at a tolerable, polite level. We were in, of all places, Valero Public Library, which I thought was a boring way to tackle our conundrum, but Herald insisted. I mean, he was the one who spent half his life working with old artifacts and dusty grimoires, so however reluctantly, I allowed myself to be dragged into a full day of research and burying my nose in way too many books.
Valero Public was actually very well-maintained, a freestanding, three-story building with a surprisingly extensive collection, ample parking, and plenty of crotchety little old women who didn’t work there, but acted like they did, anyway. You know the type, the ones who suck on caramels and give you dagger eyes if you so much as rustle the pages when you turn them, the ones who look like they’re all named Esther.
Herald Igarashi, naturally, fit right in, what with his tendency to wear ties and waistcoats and fitted trousers, and most days, a pocket watch. The horn-rimmed glasses he definitely needed, though. Herald was, professionally, an archivist for the Lorica, working in their Gallery to sort and contain artifacts that the organization’s Hounds found and, uh, confiscated. But he was also an accomplished sorcerer, a talented alchemist, and a bit of a demonologist. In fact it was his idea to beseech one of the demon princes for the favor of putting Vanitas back together again, which was why I felt more than a little comfortable trying to get him to share the blame with me.
“You said that none of the gods or entities would help, remember?” I said through gritted teeth. “You told me to go to Mammon. Hell, you came along, too.”
“Yes, to all of it. But I never said anything about taking the very first deal the demon offered you.”
“Hey man, listen.” I thumbed absently through the pages of the book in front of me. “There’s something about that damn palace. You felt it. Mammon could have given me the worst deal on the planet and I probably would have taken it. It’s like that dimension has a way of warping your mind, you know? Like it’s, I don’t know, enchanted in some way to bend things in Mammon’s favor.”
Herald’s gaze flitted from me, to the pile of books on the table. “I really can’t blame you in the end. The demon princes have their own way of doing things. I wouldn’t put it beneath Mammon to have some kind of aura in place over the entire domicile, like an eldritch field that amplifies your desires, that makes humans even more likely to make stup
id decisions when it comes to getting what they want.”
I threw him a wounded look. “Hey.”
“But Dust, the Tome of Annihilation? Seriously?”
Herald had heard of it, of course. He was probably the smartest person I knew, next to Carver, or maybe that was because I gauged smartness in terms of how much someone knew about books. In Herald’s case, that was a lot. He could rattle off a list of nearly every grimoire in existence from memory, whether penned by mortal hand or otherwise. He’d also read as many as he could lay his delicately-gloved mitts on.
Not a turn of phrase, mind you, just that Herald’s the kind of guy who handles ancient grimoires with gloves, so as not to damage them with horrible, blasphemous things like fingerprints, or the disgusting oils that humans tend to secrete. And yes, I mentioned that he totally knocked out the Book of Plagues with a left hook, but listen – the Book of Plagues is an exception. That thing’s a complete asshole.
“Listen,” I said. “You and I both know that we had no way of telling what Mammon would ask of me.”
“Right,” Herald said, nodding. “Just as you and I have no way of telling which of these thousands of books is the real Tome.”
I flopped back in my chair, scratched my stomach, and sighed. The Tome could be hiding anywhere. The worst thing was that it could look like any other book, part of its self-preservation instinct, its own defense mechanism.
“Three whole floors, and this is just one library,” Herald muttered. “The Tome likes to hide where it can blend in, but what if it’s in a school somewhere? What if it’s in a private collection?” He groaned, then began to massage his temples.
“Great. So it’s a bomb waiting to go off, and it’s got camouflage. What kind of demon came up with this? Who even wrote this damn thing in the first place?”
“Not a demon, Dust. It’s hard to peg who the original author of the Tome of Annihilation was, but all sources say that it was definitely a human mage.” He pressed his lips together, nudging his glasses up his nose as he scanned another book. “It’s easy enough to say that demons and other entities are capable of so much chaos, but let’s be honest. Nothing has a greater drive and propensity for destruction than humanity itself.”
