When we get to the end and pass through a dark wooden door, we’re suddenly outside again, crossing a high, open-air walkway between one building and the next. I try to pay attention to where we’re going, getting a sense of the castle’s layout, but there’s a lot of it to see, and the demon beside me keeps distracting me by asking questions.
“What’s your name?” Vizmodeus asks, sliding a pale, bony hand into a deep pocket. I’m surprised he finds what he’s looking for so quickly, because the brown coat he’s wearing is in fact more pocket than garment. I’m sure it must get confusing remembering what he put where.
Still, he pulls out a thick roll of parchment that looks like it shouldn’t fit in the various folds of his clothes, then tugs a pencil from somewhere beneath his silver hair. Despite the shade of it, I get the sense he’s relatively young, maybe mid-thirties. Except that can’t be right, because I know demons live much longer than humans.
“My name is Rose Radley,” I say, repeating the lie I told Syrus.
The demon scribbles it down. “And where in the Mire are you from?”
I blink, not recognizing the term, which makes him click his teeth.
“The human realm,” he clarifies.
“Oh, um, Pax.”
He nods, making a note of this. “Not that he actually checked before he took you. Still, I suppose it wouldn’t matter…” He trails off before muttering something to himself in Cyrax and amending his pencil scratchings.
I study the demon while I have the chance to. For someone who works for a lord—did Quill call him the chamberlain?—he looks rather disheveled. His hair sticks up at odd angles, the shirt beneath his coat is rumpled, andthere’s smudges of pencil all over his white fingers. His skull-like features might be unsettling, but something about this disarray makes him less frightening.
“Age?” he asks.
“Twenty-four.”
He makes a disapproving noise at this, as if the number offends him.
“And what’s your occupation? Do you do anything?” He glances at the wedding ring on my finger. I hadn’t even realized I was still wearing it. I automatically twist the metal loose before pushing it back into place again. At this moment, I’m too scared and exhausted to come up with another lie—if Syrus needs me, I just have to hope that’s protection enough.
“I used to collect things off the plains and sell them…after a battle.” I avoid using the wordscavenge; it suddenly sounds harsh in my mind. The demon’s deep-set eyes flare anyway.
“You’re a mire rat?” He shakes his head, giving a bitter laugh that makes his jaws clack together.
I don’t answer. I haven’t heard the phrase before, but I can easily guess what it means. It makes sense the wingers have their own, unflattering name for us. Fair’s fair—we have plenty of unflattering names forthem.
“Well, I suppose there may be some advantages to that,” he says, lifting the parchment to write it down. Given he hasn’t bitten my head off yet, I try my luck with a question.
“Do you know what he’s going to use me for?” I ask.
The demon’s jaw tics again. “Something he should’ve left to me. Of course, it’s typical he’d possess first and ask questions later. You know my hair used to be black before I took this job?”
“Was it?” I reply, because he seems to expect an answer.
“No,” he grins, showing his many teeth. “But you believed it, didn’t you? Because even a mire rat like you can see working for that man is a pain in the proverbial.” He goes back to scribbling on his parchment.
I’m surprised he would complain so openly about his lord, but then maybe I’m so much of a non-entity he’s not worried. Perhaps he assumes I’ll bedead from the possession long before anything he says to me comes back to bite him.
It’s a sobering thought, and it puts me back scanning our surroundings, gathering information as he rolls up the parchment and tucks it back into the depths of his coat. We cross another bridge between buildings, giving me a brief glimpse of something that looks like a garden lying below, sharing a wall with the perimeter. A moment later, we stop in front of a heavy black door.
I swallow, trying to prepare myself for what might lie beyond. No matter how old and grand this castle looks, this isn’t the extravagant home of some moneybags landowner. It’s a fortress. The seat of Malice’s power. That probably means iron bars and dungeons and armories. I listen carefully for any noise creeping beyond the door. If therearehuman souls being imprisoned and tortured in this place, maybe Syrus thinks I’m best housed with them.
All this flashes through my mind in the few seconds it takes Vizmodeus to open the door, revealing…a bedroom.
“Terrifying, isn’t it?”
The demon’s grin has a hard edge, and I realize I took a full step back from the door as it swung open. He walks into the room, clearly expecting me to follow. “What awful demonic lodgings have we concocted for you? Best watch out for that bed,” he nods at the very ordinary looking four poster draped in a velvet throw. “And I’d keep an eye on that futon in case it gets any ideas. And oh—holy darkness save us—nota wardrobe.”
He spins around to see my reaction, looking very pleased with himself.
“Come on,” he says, throwing his hands up when I just stare at him. “If my time’s going to be wasted showing you around, I’m allowed to have some fun with it.”
