The Demon's Covenant

Jamie batted his eyelashes and laughed. “Oh yes, take me away from all this. You don’t listen.”

“It’s you who doesn’t listen!” said Gerald. “You’re a magician.”

“No, I’m not.”

“It’s not a choice,” Gerald said. “You were born a magician. It’s in your blood, and you think you can just stay here in this dull little life, being persecuted by dull little people, when you could be so much more. I could teach you.”

Jamie smiled, so much more at ease with a murderous magician than with school bullies. He spread his hands wide and stepped away from the wall. Gerald was taller than he was, but he didn’t look at all threatening.

He looked protective. They looked comfortable together.

“What could you teach me?” Jamie asked, a dimple flashing in his right cheek next to his earring. “Do I need to learn a secret magician handshake? Do I need to learn to do finger wands?”

Gerald burst out laughing. “I—” he said, and seemed somewhat at a loss. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Like a finger gun, but only magicians get to do it,” Jamie explained, grinning and shifting his schoolbag on one shoulder. He swished one finger in a dramatic circle, making a swooshing sound to accompany the gesture.

“We don’t use wands,” said Gerald.

“Don’t think that wasn’t a crushing blow for me.”

Gerald laughed again and ducked his head, shoving his hands in his pockets. “C’mon,” he said. “I want to show you something.”

“Well, that sounds ominously nonspecific,” Jamie remarked. “How could I refuse?”

They fell into step casually, as if out of long habit. Gerald grabbed the bag that was always sliding off Jamie’s shoulder and adjusted it. Jamie murmured something that made Gerald grin.

When they were leaving the alley, Mae thought that Jamie would see her, but Gerald said, “Look,” and pointed.

As Jamie looked up, the night over Burnt House Lane was torn like a veil. The air shimmered, and the broken road was paved with gold, and the whole world was magic.

“That’s just an illusion,” Jamie said while wonder still held the breath caught in Mae’s throat. He hesitated and added, “How did you do it?”

“I’ll show you,” said Gerald. “I’m going to show you everything.”

The light faded slowly, like honey dripping off a knife. Jamie still had his face upturned to the sky, mouth open, as Gerald led him away with one hand at the small of his back.

The magician brushed by Mae and suddenly she could move, as if she was made of ice and his touch was hot enough to change her to water.

She fell to the ground like a puppet with its strings abruptly cut, gasping and trying to think, trying to make a plan for a situation she would never have believed possible.

She’d always believed there was more to the world than school and clubs and the life Annabel wanted her to live. And she’d found out that there were people in the world who could do magic, people who sold magical toys in Goblin Markets and magicians who called up demons that could do almost anything. For a price.

The last time she and Jamie had seen Gerald, he’d just become the leader of the magicians’ Circle that had given Jamie a demon’s mark. The Obsidian Circle had almost got Jamie possessed by a demon, an evil spirit that would use his body until it crumbled from the inside out. The Circle had almost killed Jamie. Gerald had certainly killed countless others.

Now here he was in Mae’s city, acting like her brother’s best friend. And Jamie had told her nothing about it.

She was in over her head. They needed help.

She struggled up onto her hands and knees, and then sat up. She was leaning against a filthy brick wall in the wrong part of town with no trace of magic left.

She dug out her phone and called Alan.

When he answered she jumped, because he was screaming above high wind and the sound of a storm.

“Hello?”

“Alan?” she said, staring up at the calm, empty sky above her head. “Where are you?”

On the other end of the line there was an echoing snarl of thunder.

“Mae?” Alan yelled, and there was silence.

The sound of the storm had just stopped abruptly, not as if it was dying away but as if someone had thrown a switch and turned off the sky.

Mae realized she was trembling. “Alan, what’s going on?”

She could hear Alan properly now, his low, sweet voice more remarkable over the phone than it was in person, when it was hard to notice much about it other than that it made you want to do whatever he asked and believe whatever he said. There was a warm undercurrent to it, as if Alan was happy to be talking to her.

Of course, that was the way he talked to everyone.

“Nothing’s going on. Is something wrong?”