“Draevus Faust. Yes?” His gaze snapped to mine.
“You’re one of the partners of the firm that’s handling my case, aren’t you? Esmeray is your son…” I squirmed in my seat, my heart heavy with sorrow.
“I am. And it appears that in some way, you may be indirectly responsible for my boy’s death.” He leaned down to my ear, breath like brimstone wafting by. “And the place in hell I choose for you will never be hot enough for my satisfaction if you do not do something. Now.”
The officer who questioned me stood to attention as Draevus pulled away from me. “Take us to the morgue.”
Demonic lawyers? Checked out. Demons with hope? That was what separated them from humanity.
I swallowed hard and nodded once. “If I in some way contributed to his demise, I will pay willingly. I vow it.”
Draevus narrowed his gaze, and an officer grabbed me roughly and shoved, making me stand and stumble. I had no idea what I’d gotten myself into, but my union was about to hear about it.
***
In a room with a temperature a degree or two above freezing, a dogged technician eyed us warily and jerked his thumb toward a set of double doors. I needn’t have been directed, though, for what concerned them was apparent.
Fierce tendrils of shadows lashed beneath the door, unable to reach farther, their cold presence a frost in the already-chilled room. “That’s no good.”
I walked forward, ignoring a protest from the technician. And, as I approached, the shadows hesitated, their threatening lashing motions turning into slow curls, inviting almost.
I continued to step, one foot in front of the other until I faced the door and pushed them open. The entire room reeked of cold death, painted with dark shadows, near inconsolable for the loss of its host with no heir apparent. Despite this pure rage that surrounded me in darkness, Esmeray’s body stood out, almost aglow atop a metal table, neck burned from the magical influence of a garrote. And where the shadow flowed and surrounded every inch of his body, the neck seemed immune.
“Mage. Can you?” Draevus’s cold tones made my skin prickle. My immortal soul was on the line, and I could name two other people who owned it before him. My death would cause a war between several extra-planar beings.
“I’ve not investigated yet. His shadow is letting me near, though.”
“How did you know its name?” Draevus’s concerned tones faltered as he asked.
“I do not. Why?”
“It’s allowing you passage. As if you commanded it.” Draevus silenced as one of the tendrils rose and rubbed against my shoulder almost affectionately, longingly, pleading for something as it made sharp pointing gestures with another.
“I recognized what he was when we met, and I poured him some wine in his shadow. He respects me, nothing more.” I stared closely as his father didn’t remark again.
The bloody line around Esmeray’s neck glistened with thick, dark blood, and I reached into my pocket for a pen before reaching out to tap at the wound. Something metallic clinked back. Satisfied, I dug into the wound just slightly and lifted out inch by inch a long, bloody chain. Silver, if I had any guess. It reeked of burnt flesh.
I sighed and shook my head as the talisman at the end of it came into view. The absolute worst group of people I could imagine had left their mark. The Church. It had no other monikers or pseudonyms, only followers who called themselves Singulatarians. It hailed from Christianity and rooted itself in human superiority and the rejection of magic. Whoever they were, they couldn’t have known who Esmeray was… I barely knew who he was, and I’d just met his father.
A small tendril caressed my ear as I relocated the cross and moth sigil to another table. The shadow calmed and a soft whisper said the words I feared most. “Make a bargain with me, mage.”
“My soul is spoken for, I’m afraid,” I said as I positioned Esmeray’s body with as much reverence as I could. He was still warm, strangely, but dead all the same. Unburdened by rigor mortis.
“I’ve used what energy I have to keep his body in a state similar to that of living.” The whisper of the shadow made me shudder.
“I can tell. You did excellent work.”
“Who are you speaking to?” Draevus demanded, his tone fearful, no longer accusatory.
“His daeva shadow.” I placed my fingers on his neck, touching the place where a pulse should be.
“Fool cannot hear me. He is not tethered to me.” The shadow swirled about my feet in a lazy pool as I detected a pulse in his mana. The shadow gently squeezed his heart and lungs, keeping oxygen flowing to his brain.
“And I am?” I brushed my fingers along the slit in his neck and hesitated, calling out to the coroner. “Find me suture thread.”
“What is he telling you?” Draevus hesitated at the doorway, almost fearful to enter.
“I believe he is offering me a bargain, but my soul is spoken for.” I glanced at the door and extended a hand as the coroner stood in the doorway and threw a few packs of threaded suture needles in. The shadow scooped them from the floor and carried them into my hands as I tore the packages open, perhaps unhygienically, with my teeth and bare fingers. With a simple strike of a needle across the pad of my thumb, I drew enough blood to taint the thread and perfuse it with my magic. The oldest source of binding power, guaranteed to work with a daeva’s need for sacrifice.
