Lilith Saintcrow: Working for the Devil

The smile dropped from my face.

The demon bumped me as the train bulleted around a bend. I jumped nervously, would have sidled away if the crowd had allowed. As it was, I accidentally elbowed an older woman with a crackling plastic bag, who let out an undignified squeak.

This is why I never take public transportation , I thought, and smiled an apology. The woman turned pale under her gray coif, coughed, and looked away.

I sighed, the smile again falling from my face. I don't know why I even try. They don't see anything but my tat anyway .

Normals feared psions regardless—there was an atavistic fear that we were all reading normal minds and laughing at them, preparing some nefarious plot to make them our mental slaves. The tats and accreditation were supposed to defray that by making psions visible and instituting tight controls over who could charge for psychic services—but all it did was make us more vulnerable to hatred. Normals didn't understand that for us, dipping into their brains was like taking a bath in a sewer. It took a serious emergency before a psi would read a normal's mind. The Parapsychic Act had stopped psions from being bought and sold like cattle, but it did nothing to stop the hate. And the fear, which fed the hate. And so on.

Six stops later I was heartily tired of people jamming into the subway car, seeing me, and beating a hasty retreat. Another three stops after that the car was mostly empty, since we had passed rapidly out of downtown. The little girl held her mother's hand and still stared at me, and there was a group of young toughs on the other end of the car, sallow and muttering in the fluorescent lights. I stood, my right arm wrapped around a pole to keep my hand free to draw if I had to. I hated sitting down in germ-laden subway seats.

"The next stop," Jaf-the-demon said. I nodded. He still stood very close to me, the smell of demon overpowering the canned air and effluvia of the subways. I glanced down at the end of the car and saw that the young men were elbowing each other and whispering.

Oh, great . It looked like another street tough was going to find out whether or not my blade was just for show. I'd never understood Necromances who carry only ceremonial steel to use during apparitions. If you're allowed to carry steel, you should know how to use it. Then again, most Necromances didn't do mercenary work, they just lived in shitty little apartments until they paid off their accreditation fees and then started trying to buy a house. Me? I decided to take the quicker way. As usual.

One of them got to his feet and stamped down the central aisle. The little girl's mother, a statuesque brunette in nurse's scrubs and Nikesi sneakers, her three plastic bags rustling, pulled the little girl into her side again as he passed.

The pimpled young man jolted to a stop right in front of me. He didn't smell like Chill or hash, which was a good thing; a street tough hyped on Chill would make the situation rapidly unbearable. On the other hand, if he was stone-cold sober and still this stupid—"Hey, pretty baby," he said, his eyes skittering from my feet to my breasts to my cheek and then back to my breasts, "Wassup?"

"Nothing," I replied, pitching my voice low and neutral.

"You got a blade," he said. "You licensed to carry that, sugar?"

I tilted my head slightly, presenting my cheek. The emerald would be glinting and winking under the harsh lights. "You bet I am," I said. "And I even know how to use it. So go trundle back to your friends, Popsicle."

His wet fishmouth worked a little, stunned. Then he reached for his waistband.

I had a split second to decide if he was armed or just trying to start some trouble. I never got to make the decision, though, because the demon stepped past me, bumping me aside, and smacked the youngster. It was an open-handed backhand strike, not meaning to do any real damage, but it still tossed the kid to the other end of the subway car, back into the clutch of teen toughs.

I sighed. "Fuck." I let go of the pole as soon as I regained my balance. "You didn't have to do that."

Then one of the punk's friends pulled out a Transom 987 projectile gun, and I crouched for nonexistent cover. The demon moved, stepping past me, and I watched events come to their foregone conclusion.

The kids boiled up from their seats, one of them yanking their injured, pimply-faced friend to his feet. They were all wearing black denim jackets and green bandannas—yet another minigang.

The demon blinked across intervening space and slapped the illegal (if you weren't accredited or a police officer) gun out of the boy's hand, sent it skittering against the floor. The nurse covered her daughter's ear with her hand, staring, her mouth agape. I moved forward, coming to my feet, my sword singing free of the sheath, and slid myself in between them and the gang, where the demon had broken one boy's arm and was now in the process of holding the gunner up by his throat, taking him as negligently as a cat might shake a mouse.

"You want to get off at the next stop," I told the other, who stared at me. "Trust me."

She nodded. Her eyes were wide and wet with terror. The little girl stared at me.

I turned back to find the demon standing in the center of a ring of limp bodies. "Hello!" I shouted, holding the sword in my right hand with the blade level across my body, the reinforced scabbard reversed along my left forearm to act as a shield. It was a highly unorthodox way to hold a katana, but Jado-sensei always cared less about orthodox than keeping alive, and I found I agreed with him. If the demon came for me, I could buy some time with the steel and a little more time with Power. He'd eat me alive, of course, but I had a chance—

He turned, brushing his hands together as if wiping away dust. One of the boys groaned. "Yes?" Same level, robotic voice.

"You didn't kill anyone, did you?" I asked.

Bright green eyes scorched the air. He shrugged. "That would create trouble," he said.

"Is that a yes or a no?" I firmed my grip on the hilt. "Did you kill any of them?" I didn't want to do the paperwork even if it was a legitimate kill in response to an assault.

"No, they'll live," he said, glancing down. Then he stepped mincingly free of the ring of bodies.

" Anubis et'her ka ," I breathed. Anubis, protect me .

The demon's lips compressed into a thin line. The train slowed, deceleration rocking me back on my heels. If he was going to attack, this would be a great time. "The Prince requested you delivered unharmed," he said, and sidled to the door, not turning his back to my blade.

"Remind me to thank him," I shot back, swallowing against the sudden dust in my mouth. I wondered what other «requests» the Prince had made.

We ended up on the platform, me sliding my sword reluctantly back into the sheath, the demon watching as the nurse hurried her little girl up the steps. The stop was deserted, sound echoing off ceramic tiles as the train slid along its reactive-greased tracks. I took a deep breath, tried to calm my racing heart.

When the last footstep had faded, the demon turned on his heel and leapt down onto the tracks.

"Oh, no," I said. "No way. Negatory." I actually backed up two steps. "Look, I'm human . I can't go running around on subway tracks." For a moment the station seemed to shrink, the earth behind the walls pressing in, and I snapped a longing glance at the stairs.

He looked up at me, his long thin golden hands shoved deep in his coat pockets. "There is nothing to fear," he said finally.

"Says you ," I snapped. "You're not the one who could die here. Come on. No way."

"This is the quickest way," he said, but his mouth thinned even more once he stopped speaking. I could tell he was losing patience with my stupid human self. "I promise you, there is no danger. However, if you keep balking I will have no choice but to drag you."