Page 68 of Sinister

“I didn’t know what he was, not then. And maybe he’s not a demon in the way we think: horns and fire and damnation. But he was . . . not human. He stopped, looked down at me, and asked, ‘Do you want to die?’ I couldn’t speak—I could barely make a sound—but he knelt beside me and said, ‘Blink once for yes, twice for no.’

“And in that moment, after all the pain, after being abandoned again and again . . . some part of me still wanted to live. I didn’t want to live the life I had been living, but I wanted to live. So I blinked twice.”

He pauses.

“He asked me why I had done this. I couldn’t answer, but somehow—through some kind of magic, or power, he knew. He could read my thoughts. He saw that I was of two minds. That I wanted to live but only if my life could mean something. Only if it could matter.”

He turns back to me.

“He saw that. He saw that I wanted more. So he offered it.”

“Offered what?” I ask, barely able to breathe.

“Before I could think about what he meant, he let a few drops of his blood fall into my mouth. And then . . . the pain vanished. My bones shifted back into place. The wounds closed. By morning, I was completely healed. I was alive. Whole.”

He looks down at his hands, as if remembering the moment. Mouth ajar in shock, I glance at him, too, letting my gaze trail all over his body. Save for the fresh wound on his arm, there is no evidence that he might have been hurt in the past.

He sees me staring in shock, so he comments, “If it hadn’t happened to me, I wouldn’t believe it either.”

“And then?” I whisper. “What did you do?”

“I left. I knew I couldn’t go back to the orphanage after that.”

“But,” I say slowly, “if that man—that thing—healed you . . . what did he want in return?”

“There it is, that curious mind of yours,” he murmurs appreciatively. “What do you think he wanted in return, Petra?”

I gulp down. I’d heard whispers in the congregation of those damned, who accept the lure of the devil in exchange for their immortal soul. It is something often said about witches, that they willingly sell themselves to the devil in exchange for power, beauty, money.

Looking at him, so distinguished, so successful, I can’t help but wonder. After all, how could a fourteen-year-old runaway get a degree from Harvard, or a professorship at St. Anselm Hall?

“Your soul?” I dare ask.

His lips curve into a sly smile.

19

PETRA

26 March 1896

“Would you begrudge me my deal, darling Petra? Would you blame me if I sold my soul to a demon in exchange for a better life?” he asks smoothly, his eyes pinned on me.

I don’t answer, still reeling in shock from what he revealed.

“Knowing what my life at the orphanage was like, knowing that they left me to rot on that pavement, happy to be rid of me; would you blame me if I sold my soul to escape that?”

“I . . .” I stammer, unable to form a single coherent thought. Do I begrudge him? I don’t know. His life, at least as he’s told it, was full of pain and rejection.

But still . . . we’re talking about a demon.

We’re talking about something evil. Who knows what it really wanted? Who’s to say it didn’t deceive him? Isn’t that what we’re taught from the beginning—that the devil’s greatest trick is deception?

When I don’t answer, he chuckles.

“Don’t worry, sweet Petra. I did not sell my soul. Not yet, anyway.”

I slap his shoulder. “That’s not funny. Selling your soul isn’t something to joke about.”