Into the Abyss полностью

“What?” The demon asked, coming forward again. Apparently bored enough to be interested in anything.

“I just went to get in my diary,” Jenn said not looking up, “and noticed that I’d grabbed the wrong book. This isn’t my diary; it’s something else. It must belong to Jehenna since its magically sealed and in her wagon. So where is mine? This was the only book in the wagon.”

“Magically sealed?” Tom said picking up on the word magical, “you mean like a spell book?”

“Yes, or any book that contained important or secret information.” Jenn looked up and suddenly realized who she’d been giving this information to. She suddenly shut up, naturally the thing would be curious about it. Anything like this would be of interest to a demon wanting to make mischief. Perhaps this is why it was hanging around. “Is this why you’re here demon?” She asked forcefully, “trying to get your claws on this, maybe!”

“What the hell are you talking about? Do you have a one track mind or something? I’ve already told you why I’m here. I don’t give a damn about any book. You’re the one who brought it to my attention. I was just making polite conversation. Something you apparently are incapable of.” Tom flew off angrily, back to his place at the end of the line.

That got rid of him, thought Jenn. It sounded sincere and innocent in its anger, but one could never tell. Demons were the masters of deception. It could have been looking for this; although, if it had been, wouldn’t it have just taken it from her? “Yuck.” More questions, this demon seemed to cause a lot of them. It would probably be best just to not think about him for a while.

The important thing was the book. What could it be? She knew most of the standard book locking spells, even if she couldn’t open most of them, since they required a special password, but this was different. It was a spell unlike any she’d seen before. Certainly the book was old, and apparently valuable. If so, however, why had Jehenna left it.

A thought simply came to her then, what if she hadn’t? Jenn’s diary hadn’t been there. Had Jehenna taken Jenn’s diary by mistake, thinking it was this book. She had to laugh at that. True, she didn’t care to have Jehenna reading her diary; but Jehenna would be suitably upset, and if as was usually the case, Lenamare owned part of it, he would be madder than a Zierlien Hell Hound when he discovered it. Actually, it served them right for abandoning her to a fourth order demon.

“How could this have happened?” shouted Lenamare.

“I don’t know. The stupid girl must have switched her diary with the book.”

“So, she was in the pay of Exador all along!”

“Possibly, possibly not. I think it highly unlikely that she would just happen to have placed her diary in the exact same place I put the book. On the other hand, I don’t think she would be dumb enough to leave something with her name on it for us to find if she were working for Exador.

“The switch could have been made by someone else. I simply don’t know. Whatever the case, we must get that book back. If Exador gets his hands on it, we might as well give up.”

“If I find that girl! I will personally see that she pays for this. I’m sure it’s her fault.” Lenamare paced back and forth in the room. The noonday sun shone in upon the white bearskin rug under his feet. He was still dressed in his morning robe. They’d slept late, then when Lenamare had gotten up to look at his prize possession, he’d found only a girl’s diary.

Jehenna simply ignored his tirade. “Well what do you want to do? The fact is, by now, the girl is probably in Exador’s hands, if the demon didn’t kill her, which is a good bet.”

“Well, we’ll just summon the demon. Have it tell us what happened to the girl, and then go find the book.” Lenamare began looking around, as if in search of equipment to summon the demon.

“Are you going to summon it dressed like that, and in my bedroom?” Jehenna asked amused. Lenamare glared at her.

“Of course not.” By the expression on his face when he first glanced back at her, she could tell he’d been ready to.

“Fine, then let’s get dressed, break our fast, and then we’ll check out a lab room to do the summoning in.”

“Very well,” Lenamare grumped. Jehenna could see he didn’t like the delays, but she just smiled. She enjoyed seeing him riled; it made her feel good.

In all it took about three hours to get around and then prepare to summon the demon. Lenamare seemed to be counting every second, but Jehenna was determined to take her time and do things properly. It was hurrying in the first place that caused the loss of the book. She didn’t want to see any more mistakes made.

Lenamare finished etching the last of the circles, and then Jehenna proceeded to light the appropriate braziers. When she’d finished, she blew out her wick, and took her place in her own pentacle and sealed it. She nodded her readiness to Lenamare.