Caitlin Kittredge - Demon Bound

“Miles,” he started. “You stupid fuck . . .”

“And I take back what I said before, Winter,” Hornby told him. “You’re still pretty good. But I’m done now.”

Jack made it a single step before Miles squeezed the trigger, and the gunshot echoed and rolled back from the buildings around the square. In the jungle, birds and creatures took flight with a cacophony of screeching and warbling.

Hornby’s body hit the floor, landing faceup. The gun thumped on the sisal matting next to him. Pete let out a small scream that blended with the jungle birds.

In Jack’s moment of paralysis, a shadow bent over Hornby. Not the same shadow that had come to him thirteen years ago, not the crow woman. Not the demon, either. This shadow had a lion’s mane, teeth, and a twisted body that bled and flowed indistinctly when Jack tried to look at it.

“Don’t . . . ,” Jack croaked, but there was nothing he could do aside from protest. The demon of Bangkok had a new soul. The demon who owned Jack’s had lost it.

And then the sound faded and the world sped up again and Jack realized he was shouting, wordlessly, and that the floor was pitching beneath him as dizziness and nausea and the realization that he, too, had lost came.

Jack followed Hornby down, down to his knees. “You stupid bastard,” he whispered. “You ruddy, stupid bastard. What the fuck am I supposed to do now?”

The hospital ceiling had gone yellow, acoustic tiles stained with the familiar tinge of nicotine. Taped above his bed, a curled-up poster sporting a monkey would, were it in English, have encouraged him to Hang in there!

Jack groaned and pulled the hard foam pillow over his face. It smelled of bleach and the rough casing tickled his nose.

“You’re awake.” Pete herself looked barely that. She was curled in the plastic chair next to his bed, the black circles under her eyes speaking to days, if not weeks, of nights spent in the same place.

“After a fashion.” Jack cast the pillow aside. Sound came back, the chatter of busy people outside the door of his room, the whoop of sirens from outside the walls, the hum and rattle of an overworked air conditioner blocking most of his window. Jack tilted his face toward it and let it dry his sweat. “Fuck me standing up, that’s nice.”

“Brought you in after Hornby killed himself,” Pete said. “You were a bit shocky. That cut of yours was infected with god knows what. Doctor said it’s a miracle you didn’t lose your arm.”

Jack felt himself over. He wasn’t tied down, so he hadn’t been raving crazy when he came in. There was an IV, and the pleasant cotton-wool feeling of sedatives. Jack laughed. “You didn’t tell ’em I’m a smack addict?”

“In this country?” Pete rolled her eyes. “The very last thing I need at this moment is to spring you from some Thai prison, Jack.”

Jack tried to sit up and the wallowing dizziness from the painkillers put him back down. Pete came to his side, laying the back of her hand against his forehead.

“You all right?”

“No,” Jack muttered. “I’m about seven shades of not right at the moment, luv.”

Pete got him a cup of water and a straw and stuck it between his lips. “You’re dehydrated, too. Drink.”

Jack obeyed, because even dubious city water seemed sweet at the moment, and when he’d emptied the pink plastic cup he sank back against the pillow, which gave not a whit. “Hornby’s dead, Pete.”

“I was there, Jack.” Pete settled herself back in her chair. “Precious little to be done. We’ve got a flight home as soon as the infection is out of your system. I didn’t think you wanted to be around when police started asking questions about the dead farang. ”

“Hornby did the right thing,” Jack said. “He knew what he was in for and he topped himself. He made sure his soul stayed here. That’s the proper thing to do.”

“Christ, you do say stupid things when you’re on drugs,” Pete said archly. Jack waved his hand. The IV needle scraped against the underside of his skin.

In Jack’s mind, Hornby put his finger in the trigger of the gun and squeezed.

Why had a mage had a gun, anyway? Didn’t he know they were for amateurs?

Stupid sod.

Jack pushed back the itchy coverlet and swung his bare feet to the floor. They stuck to it, and he fished under the bed. “Where are me boots?”

“Jack, don’t be stupid. You need to stay in that bed,” Pete said. She rose, but Jack yanked out his IV needle before she could summon a nurse.

“I need to go home,” he said. “My time’s almost up, Pete. It’ll go badly if the demon thinks I’m trying to do a runner like Miles.”

“Jack . . .” Pete caught him as he swayed. Standing up too fast on downers was like pouring all of the blood out of your head.

“I don’t want to think about what I’m doing and I don’t want a lecture, because I know it’s low and I know it’s fucking weak,” Jack said. “But I haven’t got a better idea, so I’m getting out of this fucking hospital and doing what I must.”

He found his boots, yanked them on with difficulty. He couldn’t begin to manage the laces, so he let the tongues flop free. He was halfway down the corridor when Pete caught up with him.

“Jack, wait!”

“Not changing my mind, Pete,” he said. “You can argue if you like.”

Pete shoved a plastic shopping back into his hands. “You forgot your jacket and your kit, idiot. I think you might need them if you’re intending to challenge this demon of yours.”

“Cheers.” Jack slowed, subdued. “Pete, you don’t have to come with me, you know.”

She sighed, brushing past him to the nurse’s station. “Him. The stupid bloody farang. He needs to sign out.”

After their business with the hospital was complete, Pete walked with him to the street outside, where she hailed a motor taxi. “Let’s get one thing straight, Jack: I’m here until the end. One way or the other, I’ll be with you. So the next time you suggest I might want to preserve my delicate sensibilities, I’m going to punch you right in the gob. Clear?”

“Crystal,” Jack said as he opened the taxi door. The demon waited for him in England. Hornby’s soul was planted here, sure as the stones that paved the bones of Bangkok. His innocent’s soul, which had made his shit deal for the right reasons and not out of paralyzing fear.

Jack wasn’t sure which he regretted more.

England rose up to meet the jetliner gray and lacy with mist, the kind of silver-green day that poets scribbled about and tourists lost their wits over.

Jack could have gone down and kissed the oily tarmac of Heathrow when the plane touched down, but the chill in his chest wouldn’t allow him that much happiness.

He’d tried to cheat the demon. And he’d lost. He’d doomed Miles Hornby to his time in Hell and himself to go toe-to-toe with the demon.

Pete sat beside him, but silent on the Heathrow express into Paddington. She’d stopped looking at him by the time they boarded the Hammersmith & City Line back to his flat.

Pete thought he was going to die.

Jack didn’t know that she was wrong.

The tube rattled on its way and Jack mounted the steps, past the street market selling hijab and knockoff purses and kebab, past the White Hart pub, the closed-down shop fronts and shady money-changing kiosks, through the ebb and flow of the dark energy of the only place he’d ever really called home.

The demon was waiting for them when they stepped through Jack’s front door.

“Look at you,” it purred. “Home safe and sound, tanned and rested.” It rubbed the fingers and thumb of its left hand together. “I trust you brought me what I need, Jackie boy.”