chapter 33
AT THE JAIL, AMANDA SULLIVAN LAY ON HER COT, reading Redbook. She was alone.
“Trsiel?” I leaned into the hall and called louder, “Trsiel?”
A small face popped out from a cell farther down.
I smiled. “Hey, George. Have you seen Trsiel? The man who was here with me before? He’s about this tall—”
George grabbed my hand and dragged me out of the cell, then dropped it and scampered off toward the end of the row. Again he led me down the old ladder into the basement, past the cells, and along the narrow hall leading to his treasure room. I began to suspect that was where we were heading, and was just about to ask about Trsiel again when George stopped. He looked each way, then ducked into some kind of ventilation shaft. There was no way I was fitting in there, but for his sake, I faked it, rather than walk straight through the wall.
We came out at the bottom of a set of stairs, in the basement room where Trsiel had “misteleported” us earlier. If the sight of the room wasn’t familiar, the smell of bat shit certainly was. George feigned opening a door to the left. Then he turned to me and flourished his hand toward the room beyond, grinning broadly. There, with his back to us, was Trsiel.
Before I could thank George, he brushed past me and darted off again, returning to whatever adventure I’d disrupted.
I looked over at Trsiel. He was pacing the empty room, eyes downcast, hands stuffed in his pockets, shoulders hunched forward. When he turned to pace back, he saw me and stopped short. For a moment, he just stood there, looking at me. Then he took a slow step forward.
“Eve?”
Granted, the lighting down there was next to nil, but I was standing less than a yard away.
“Uh, yeah,” I said, waving my hand in front of his face. “Have I changed that much in the last day?”
“Uh, no. Sorry. I, uh…” He looked over my shoulder.
“Expecting someone else?”
“I, uh—” He blinked as if snapping out of a fog, then took me by the elbow. “You should check in with Lizzie.”
“Uh-huh. Not very good at subterfuge, are you? Let me give you a tip. If you want to get rid of someone, the worst thing you can do is act like you’re trying to get rid of them. Subtlety is the key. Lying helps, but you might be stuck there. Can angels lie?”
“Eve, really, you have to—”
“Leave? Uh-uh. We need to talk. Starting with ‘Who is Dachev?’”
“Dach—” His brow furrowed as his brain switched back from whatever track it had been on, he blinked, and his gaze slid away from mine. “I know hundreds, if not thousands, of people by that name. It’s a common surname in—”
“You know which one I mean. The one connected to the Nix. The one you’d rather not talk about. Now spill it or—”
“Trsiel,” said a voice from the doorway.
I’ll admit, I almost expected that voice to be female. Anytime a guy is that eager to get rid of you, it usually involves a woman. Well, it can involve a man, but the meaning is the same. With Trsiel, though, the chances of him interrupting a mission for a romantic liaison—with someone of either sex—were pretty much zero.
The voice was male, with an angel’s rich timbre. I turned to see a man about my age, sandy blond hair, well built, wearing trousers, a short-sleeved dress shirt, and a tie. Clearly lacking Trsiel’s sense of casual style, but a damn sight less unnerving than those iridescent outfits the other full-bloods had worn.
The man walked into the room and looked around. “The abandoned basement of a penitentiary.” He looked down. “Dirt floor, rat turds and all. You do know how to make a fellow feel welcome.”
He looked around, then stopped, as if seeing me for the first time. His eyes were a clear neon blue, even brighter than Kristof’s. As he turned toward me, Trsiel tensed. Before he could react, the man was right there, less than six inches from my face, eyes boring into mine. Trsiel’s eyes widened, genuine fear flickering behind them, and he jerked forward, but the other man lifted a hand to stop him, then stepped away from me.
“Eve Levine,” he said, with the barest bow of his head. “A pleasure. Your father speaks very highly of you.”
My father? Before I could ask, the man clasped my hand. His grip was firm…and as hot as the blade of Trsiel’s sword. A few degrees hotter than Trsiel’s own touch. None of the angels I’d met had eyes with that familiar inner glow.
“I am Aratron,” he said. “Since Trsiel seems to have temporarily forgotten his good manners.”
I realized who I was speaking to and straightened. The demon at Glamis might have expected my respect, but this one got it. Aratron was a eudemon—a nonchaotic demon, and a high-ranking one. I dipped my head in greeting.
Aratron smiled, then looked from Trsiel to me. “Now, what is Balam’s daughter doing with an angel?”
Trsiel shrugged, hands still stuffed in his pockets. He reminded me of the Cabal kids who’d come to me for black-market spells, making their first foray into the underworld, furtive and nervous, like college kids meeting their first drug dealer.
When Aratron lifted his brows, Trsiel mumbled, “Working.”
“So you’re back in the field? Good. I don’t know why they ever took you out of it in the first place. You were one of the best—far better than most of those ascendeds.”
Trsiel lifted his gaze to search Aratron’s, looking for the insult or insinuation behind the words, but Aratron’s eyes were clear, his tone free of sarcasm.
“It’s…temporary,” Trsiel said.
Aratron looked from him to me again. “A full-blooded angel temporarily working with a supernatural ghost. That sounds an awful lot like training.” He paused, then threw back his head and laughed. “Ah, those Fates are innovative gals, aren’t they? This is one of their most original ideas yet. And deviously clever, if I might say so myself. If you want a good warrior against evil, you need one who understands what she’s chasing. You’ll make an excellent angel, Eve…though I can imagine your father won’t be quite so pleased.”
“I have something to ask of you,” Trsiel said. “You said that you owed me—”
“A favor. And I do…though, I’ll admit, it’s one marker I never expected to be called in. What’s it been now, three hundred years?”
“Er, yes, well, being out of the field, I haven’t needed—”
“You haven’t wanted to call it in. I’m a demon. A eudemon, perhaps, but still a demon, and such a contact—even professionally—is expressly forbidden.” He tilted his head, lips pursing. “Well, perhaps not expressly, but certainly implicitly. Your new partner, however, sees things differently—more pragmatically—and has persuaded you to call in this marker.”
Trsiel snuck a look at me. “Er, uh—”
“That’s right,” I said. “It was my idea, and if it blows up in our faces, I’m in deep shit with Trsiel, so I’m really hoping you can help us. What we need is…” I glanced at Trsiel, lobbing the ball to him.
“To know who the demon at Glamis Castle is,” Trsiel said.
I blinked back my surprise. Seems Trsiel hadn’t been sitting on his hands waiting for something to happen after all.
“Ah,” Aratron said. “The monster of Glamis.” He smiled. “You’ve heard the stories, I suppose. The deformed immortal child locked in a secret room? The earl and the Devil playing cards for eternity? The clansmen being walled up and left to starve? Humans can be amazingly inventive sometimes, can’t they? What they can’t understand, they explain with stories, spiced up with bits of truth, like raisins in a sweet-cake. The real monster of Glamis, as you’ve discovered, wasn’t that poor child, but a demon. Not trapped for eternity, but imprisoned for a few hundred years, just long enough to teach him a lesson. As for who it is…” He looked at me and smiled. “I’m sure Eve could make a few guesses.”
“Demons who’ve been off the radar for a few hundred years?” I said. “Hmm. Amduscias, Focalor, Dantalian—” I stopped, my gut going cold.
Aratron didn’t notice my reaction. “There are more than a few of them, aren’t there? It’s one of Baal’s favorite punishments for underlords who incur his wrath—something, I’m afraid, that isn’t very difficult to do.”
“It’s Dantalian, isn’t it?”
He smiled. “Well done.”
I struggled not to make the obvious connection, to think of anything but that, hurrying on with more questions. “What did Baal lock him up for? It has to do with that room, doesn’t it? With walling in those men?”
Trsiel snorted. “I doubt that was his crime.”
Aratron shook his head. “Your prejudices are showing, Trsiel. A cacodemon could indeed be punished for such a thing, though not for the reason you’d find the deed objectionable. Had Dantalian walled up those men against his lord’s wishes, he would be punished for his insolence. That, however, was not his error.” He looked at me, eyes twinkling. “I doubt it will help your cause, but do you want to hear the story?”
I nodded, brain still numb.
“Excellent. Curiosity for the sake of curiosity is the mark of a true student.” He glanced at Trsiel, eyes still sparkling. “You can move closer, Trsiel. I know you want to hear this as much as she does.”
Trsiel shrugged, but when Aratron looked away, he slid next to me.
“Now, one of the earls of Glamis was a half-demon. Baal’s own child. As Eve knows, even the lord demons have little contact with their offspring. That doesn’t keep them from watching from afar, as Balam does, but it is rare for any cacodemon to play a role in his child’s life. Glamis, though, sought out that contact, and made a very persuasive argument for Baal to do otherwise, providing him with sacrifices and proving as dutiful a son as any father could want. Eventually, Baal took notice, and when Glamis had his father’s attention, he asked for a boon. He would sacrifice a dozen men to Baal, not just killing them, but walling them up. As modes of death go, the only thing more terrible than being buried alive is being buried with others. The…animal instinct eventually asserts itself, providing a veritable feast of chaos.”
I remembered those skeletons in the room, and the teeth marks on the bones. When I shuddered, Aratron studied my reaction with the impassive curiosity of a scientist.
“The boon,” Trsiel said. “What did he ask in return?”
“Ah, well, it had to do with a lady, as these things often do. A married lady who was proving most resistant to his advances. Glamis, being an avid student of Arthurian lore, took his solution from there.”
“He wanted to be able to assume the form of the lady’s husband,” I said. “That’s where Dantalian came in. His specialty is transmigration. Not assuming another form, but possessing one.”
Aratron smiled. “That’s it exactly. Baal went to Dantalian and demanded that he create something to allow Glamis to inhabit another man’s body. This is, of course, a skill every demon possesses.” He waved a hand at his current form—probably that of a prison guard. “But for a half-demon it is impossible. Baal charged Dantalian with the task of making it possible. And he did. He created a piece of jewelry.”
“An amulet,” I whispered. “One that would allow anyone with demon blood to fully possess the body of any living person.”
“Very good. You’ve heard of it, then?”
Before I could answer, Trsiel cut in. “But if Dantalian made the amulet, why did Baal imprison him?”
“Because Glamis never got that necklace. As for why, I fear that is a question only Dantalian and Baal could answer. Some say Dantalian had a follower among the Ogilvies—the clan Glamis walled up. Some say Baal denied him a share of the sacrifice. Whatever the reason, Dantalian changed his mind and secreted away the amulet, and for that, Baal sentenced him to spend five hundred and fifty-five years walled up in that room with the Ogilvies.”
“That’s what the Nix wants,” I said, turning to Trsiel. “Dantalian’s Amulet.”
And I’d been the one who’d told her about it.
Once we’d taken our leave of Aratron, we returned to Amanda Sullivan’s cell and I made my confession to Trsiel.
“That’s why she came to Glamis,” I said as I finished. “All along I’ve been trying to figure out what’s motivating her, and it’s been staring me in the face the whole time. She wants what I want. To be able to act within the living world. She’s tired of relying on her partners for her food. That’s why she went to Luther Ross. Same reason I’ve been interested in him, as a way of breaking through that barrier. But that’s nothing compared to what she could do with Dantalian’s Amulet. And I led her straight to it.”
“We don’t know that,” he said softly.
I didn’t argue, but we both knew it was no coincidence. I remembered the young hunter saying he’d seen something move in the woods near where we’d landed, and I remembered the creak in the hallway before Trsiel arrived. She’d been following me, and I’d rewarded her efforts beyond her wildest dreams. As soon as she’d heard of the amulet, who’d made it, and what it did, she’d headed straight for Glamis, where she’d know Dantalian had been exiled.
“If she gets the amulet, that’ll make our job tougher,” Trsiel said. “But I doubt that will happen. Dantalian isn’t about to tell her where it is.”
“No? He may not like her very much, but how long do you think it’ll take before he decides that telling her—and watching the havoc she’ll wreak in human form—is more rewarding than turning her down? We need to find it first.”
He nodded. “But the only one who knows where it is—”
“Is the only person we can ask.”
“We are not bargaining with a demon.” He glanced over at me. “And don’t tell me I already have. My deal with Aratron was one-sided. I did something once that, unintentionally, benefited him, and he promised me a favor in return. It wasn’t a bargain.”
“We aren’t going to bargain with Dantalian.”
“Good, because—”
“Kristof is. He’s a skilled demon negotiator.”
Trsiel rolled his eyes, as if this didn’t come as a surprise.
“It may not be your way, but we use whatever—and whoever—proves useful.”
“If you’ve done it before, then you can do it. No need to bring in anyone else.”
“I said I’ve dealt with them. I’ve never negotiated with them. For that, I hired professionals. If you do it right, it’s an honest transaction. If you do it wrong, well, then you’re screwed, because there isn’t a demon alive who won’t take advantage of stupidity or naivety. Kris can do it right.”
Trsiel leaned against the wall, arms crossed. After a few minutes, he shook his head. “Go and find him, then.”