Void Domain, Book 04 полностью

First and foremost, they were wet. A few stones in the far end of the room had come loose. Water filled the room up to their waist and–thankfully–extinguished the iron rod.

The second thing Shalise noticed was the two statues, one of Prax and one of Shalise, standing in front of her. Both of them had two hands on Prax’s arms. Even with all of his muscles, he couldn’t trash out of their grip.

“Stop changing things! This is my domain.”

Get out of my body!

— — —

“From there, she just started thrashing about in the grip of her statue and the other one.”

Catherine blinked. She couldn’t quite believe what she was hearing. “You said she has a familiar brand on her chest?”

Everyone stopped looking at the woman whose name was apparently ‘Nel’ and turned to Catherine.

Big mistake, Catherine thought as she took a step back, half expecting them to attack.

“Who invited the harlot?”

Catherine looked to Wayne Lurcher with a sneer. “Aww, still upset about being rejected by a succubus?”

Her sneer quickly turned into a smirk. He got all flustered and everyone turned to look at him. Double win. It didn’t matter that it was a lie; the seeds were planted. Baxter was already giving him a look with one eyebrow raised.

“Lies,” Lurcher said with a grunt.

“Perhaps not in so many words,” Catherine said. She shook her hips and ran a hand down one side of her body. “Succubi are the premier shape shifters in Hell. All the better to handle what our targets want. And I,” Catherine ever so subtly flicked her eyes to the other professor–who was still giving Lurcher a look, “know exactly what you want.”

Catherine blinked in confusion. Mentioning something like that often set minds on the subject. However, she was failing to pick up anything resembling lust from the older professor.

Her confusion vanished as he took a threatening step forwards. The tome chained to his waist swung into his hand.

Catherine hopped backwards a few steps, her smile vanishing from her face. That may have been pushing it too far. She had had a brief lapse in judgment regarding the fact that she was essentially surrounded by people–none of whom would be willing to take her side and one of whom was a demon that owned the domain surrounding her.

Lucky for her, Ylva decided to step in.

“Enough.”

Lurcher gave her one death glare before snapping his book shut.

“The succubus was correct.” Ylva turned slightly to give her attentions to Nel. “The designs you described are akin to a bonding brand.”

“You mentioned that a few times,” Baxter said. “What is it?”

“One of the three ways of dealing with demons. Well, four ways, but letting the demon go free doesn’t usually end well for anyone.”

Catherine ticked off one finger of three. “Arachne and, presumably, Ylva are contracted demons. You might liken them to human mercenaries. They retain full free-will, though violating the terms of the contract leads to heavy consequences. For either party.”

After ticking off a second finger, Catherine went on. “I am a familiar. We are bound to our master’s orders. If Martina wished, she could order me never to think the word ‘the’ and I would be entirely unable to until our contract is broken–typically by Martina’s death. There are a handful of topics that can’t be ordered around, such as the ability to willingly break the familiar contract.

“For upsides, I get a long-term vacation in the mortal realm and cannot be banished no matter how many silly words are thrown my way.”

“Not much for upsides,” Lurcher muttered.

“You would be surprised,” Catherine said as she ticked off her last finger. “The bound or bonded familiar is essentially two minds in one body, leaving the human in charge. The demon gets a massive–and I have heard addictive–sense of euphoria from having its powers used, but obviously they have no real body until the human dies.”

“The bond can be broken without the death of the mortal,” Ylva said. “It is not easy.”

“But it leaves the human in charge?” Baxter shook her head. “I can’t see Shalise acting like that. She can be–”

“She doesn’t act like that normally?” Catherine cut in. She paused as something occurred to her. “Here I was considering that I might have to start talking to the human brats if that was common behavior.”

Baxter winced.

Excellent.

Catherine had to fight to keep the smile off of her face. If she could guilt Baxter back into her class, then Catherine could go back to… being Martina’s lapdog. Well, she thought with a mental sigh, at least I can sit around on the computer at the secretary desk all day.

“Are you still standing in for me?”

“I am.” Catherine made a show of pulling out her cellphone. No signal, but the clock still worked. “Speaking of, I’m supposed to be babysitting a handful of the brats while they take a test in a half-hour or so. Not that it matters of course. Just like real life, I am deciding their success by the grace of Chance.”