Light My Fire (35 page)

I believed him. This was my existence on the line. I
looked at Jim. “What are my chances?”

“Truthfully?” Jim shook its head. “Nada.”

My heart fell. I was trapped, bound, wrapped in the
chains of my own ignorance, with no possible way out. I
curled up into a little ball on the chair, my soul sick with the knowledge of what I’d become. It came down to a
matter of survival, pure and simple. Either I agreed to do what he wanted, or he’d kill me. Period. Shame filled me
at the knowledge that I was too weak to die with honor.

“I agree.”

His body shrunk back to its normal size, the over
powering sense of threat lightening somewhat. “Excel
lent. Ah, it would seem Ariton has some outstanding
debts. I’m sure you’ll want to take care of those quickly.
It seems he’s borrowed money from the Furies, and we all
know how unpleasant they can be when crossed.” Peter dropped the stack of papers he was going through. “Such
a long face. I think you’ll find Ariton’s position won’t be
too demanding upon you. He was the seventh prince, you
know, not one of the Four. He held no important posi
tions. To be honest, he was more concerned these last few
hundred years with materialistic concerns than ones in
Abaddon.”

“If he was so minor and unimportant, why did you use
me to get rid of him?” I asked, lifting my head from where it had been resting on my knees.

Peter smiled again. “You’re much quicker than he was.
This will work out very well, I think. It is true that Ariton
held no special threat to me, but he was annoying in his persistent belief that he could hold the throne of Abaddon. I felt the time was ripe for him to be destroyed and
another put in his place before I made it clear to the other demon lords that I would not be stepping down as they
expected.”

I sighed, sick, filled with anguish and pain, and with
no idea what I was going to do to get out of the situation.
“Can I leave now?”

“There is no need to ask my permission. You are
my lieutenant, not a servant. Ah. This, I think, will sum
mon it.”

Peter pressed a bell set into the desk. In the distance of
the house, a buzzing noise echoed dimly, almost immedi
ately followed by the shuffling sound of feet approaching.

“You called for me, mas
...
eh
...
my lord Bael?”

The demon who opened the door appeared as a small
and slight man, balding, with silver-rimmed lenses perched
on a beaky nose. In its hands it held a PDA.

“Traci, isn’t it?” Bael asked the demon.

“Yes.” Traci looked from Peter to me, then to the spot
on the floor. Its lips pursed in irritation. “I see. If I might
be so bold to speak without permission, which of you has
banished my lord .. . my former lord Ariton?”

“Aisling Grey is now your master,” Peter said with a
wave in my direction. “Serve her well.”

He disappeared even before the last word was out of
his mouth, leaving the demon named Traci alone with
Jim and me. “You defeated Ariton.”

I stood up, adjusting my towel. I had brought this on
myself, but by god, I was not helpless. “Yes, I did. Who
are you?”

“I am Traci, lord.” The demon bowed. “I am
...
I was
Ariton’s steward.”

“And what does a demonic steward do, exactly?”

Traci seemed to have a perpetually annoyed look on its
face, but I could see it was struggling to keep its face as
bland as possible. “I tended his lordship’s business af
fairs, ran the house, and oversaw the work of the legions.”

“Right. As of this moment, I am putting Effrijim in charge of everything. You can continue to run the busi
ness stuff and house. But everything else has to go through
Jim or me.”

Traci blinked through its glasses at Jim for a moment
before turning its gaze back to me. “But. . . but that is a
class-six demon.”

“And?”

“A class-six demon cannot be in charge of the legions.”

I lay hands on my hips. If I was going to be a friggin’ prince of Hell, I was going to be the worst prince of Hell
there had ever been. “Who says so?”

Traci’s mouth opened and closed a couple of times be
fore it finally managed to say, “It has always been that
way!”

“Well, things are going to change. I want you to spread the word to the rest of Ariton’s minions that as of this mo
ment, all demonic work is going to cease. There will be
no damning anyone, no curses, no tormenting or torturing
or rending the souls from innocent people.”

I have to give the demon credit. It just stood there
for a moment, its mouth slack, then shook itself. “What
about the next release?”

“The what?”

“My lord Ariton .. . my former lord Ariton, I should
say, had his legions at work in the software company. We
haven’t tormented or cursed or damned anyone for the
last eleven years, ever since Ariton realized there was
much more profit to be had from computer operating
systems.”

“He wasn’t going by the name of Bill, was he?” I asked, suddenly suspicious.

Traci shook its head. “No, although I can see why you
might think that. Ariton Enterprises produces operating
software for corporate systems.”

“Oh.” I chewed on my lip for a minute. “Is there any
thing evil in the system?”

“Many things,” Traci said bluntly. “There is a built-in system whereby the software is obsolete almost immediately, thus forcing the client to update twice a year. Also, specific bugs were planted in it, which will cause minor
problems with the system. The patches to fix the bugs have been a particularly lucrative source of income the
last few years.”

I waved that away. “Is there anything dangerous to
people? Anything really evil?”

Traci blinked a couple more times. “Ariton didn’t
see a profit in that, so we discontinued the damnation
module.”

“OK. Then you can keep everyone working on that. Just remember—no one is to do anything evil without
permission from Jim or myself.”

“As you desire,” the demon said, making a note on its
PDA.

“Great. Oh, crap, look at the time! I’ve got to get to the
fencing club.” I eyed Traci for a moment. “I don’t sup
pose you have any women’s clothing here, do you?”

I could swear it looked startled.
“No, I do not.”

“Damn. Um . . . how about conjuring up something
for me? Parading around in this towel is getting a bit old.”

It frowned at me. “I am not a magician, lord. I cannot
conjure anything.”

“Well, that’s just great. What am I going to use for
clothes, then?”

“I would assume that’s your responsibility,” Traci said
with an irritated sniff.

“Yeah? Assume again. Demon Traci, I order thee to
get me something to wear!”

Five minutes later I narrowed a look at Jim that would
have gutted a lesser demon. “One word, one single word,
about Scarlett O’Hara, and it’s off to the neuterer for you.”

Jim walked around me, eyeing the togalike covering
that Traci had fashioned for me out of the heavy, wine-colored velvet drapes. “I’m not saying a word.”

“Good.” I took a deep breath and tied tighter the gold braid that served as a belt. It wasn’t haute couture—hell it
wasn’t even a real dress—but it was better than a dirty towel.

“Did you ever see that Carol Burnett show where she
did her parody of
Gone with the Wind!
Your outfit is a
hundred times funnier than hers.”

“Shup,” I told Jim, turning back to Traci, who was looking rather proud of itself as it tweaked a fold in my
toga. I slapped its hand. “Is there any special power
demon lords have about getting through rush-hour traffic
really quickly?”

“No,” it answered shaking its head. “You can alter
time and space, though. Would that help?”

I looked at Jim. “Is that evil?”

“Naw. Kind of cool, really, although it hurts like a son
of a bitch if you do it wrong.”

“Right.” I brushed out my toga and faced Traci. “Show
me how to do that, please.”

A few seconds later, I screamed my way into being,
falling through the shredded fabric of space onto the
sidewalk below, cracking both my elbow and my poor,
abused head. “Son of a—”

“Told you,” Jim said, grunting as it landed next to me.
“Man, you have got to take portaling lessons. I just lost
another toe!”

I pushed myself to my feet, glancing at the back foot
it shoved toward me. Around us, the busy evening traffic
of London pulsed past, a few people stopping to stare. I
lifted my chin, brushed off my curtain, and turned toward
the marble-pillared doorway of the London Fencing As
sociation. The doorman eyed me warily.

“I believe I’m expected,” I told him.

“Indeed, you are. I’m glad to see you have not suffered
any harm,” a voice said behind my shoulder.

I didn’t need to turn around to guess who was behind me. Cool fingers took my arm in a grip that was border
line painful. “This is just not my day.”

“Really?” Fiat looked me over. “Something is different about you. Did you have your hair done?”

“Oh, for god’s sake!”

“This garment is fetching, but I preferred the other.”

Fiat considered me for another few seconds, then shrugged.
“I do not understand why you have done what you have
so obviously done, but it is of no matter to me. If you do
not do exactly as I say, you will not live to see another
day.”

21

I am, in general, an easygoing person. I try to take a reed-
bending-with-the-wind attitude toward life, rather than
fight everything. But these constant “out of the frying
pan, into the fire, into a worse fire, into a worse fire than the worse fire before it” situations that had been riddling
my life of late were beginning to wear me down.

“Just once, I’d like something to go right for me!” I
snapped as Fiat and his men surrounded me. I looked
around for any green dragon help, but the lobby of the
fencing club was empty.

“If you do as I tell you, all will be right,” Fiat said
softly in my ear.

“Famous last words. You want to offer me a guarantee
on my satisfaction?”

Fiat laughed as he steered me up a staircase, Jim following. I was just formulating a plan whereby Jim attacked two of Fiat’s bodyguards while I went after him
and the third one, but that idea died quickly.

“It would not work,
cara.
You are physically tired, and Renaldo and I would easily overpower you, even assum
ing your demon could disable Pietro and his cousin Berto.”

“No trespassing!” I growled, reinforcing the mental barriers to keep Fiat out of my mind. The fact that he’d
slipped through them shook me more than I wanted to
admit. Fiat on his own was dangerous enough—Fiat in
possession of my thoughts just about made my blood run
cold.

“You make it so easy
...
ah. Here we are.” Fiat in
dicated a door. It looked like it led to a central court in
the club. I waited until it was a few inches open, then
screamed for all I was worth, the noise echoing off the
high walls of the corridor into which we’d just stepped.
Fiat caught the bulk of my scream in his right ear, but I
didn’t feel any pity for him. He yelled as Renaldo jumped
me, slamming a hand over my mouth, but it did little
good.

“Too late,” I mumbled beneath the hand over my
mouth, recognizing the distant voice that bellowed my
name. “Now you guys are really in trouble.”

Fiat snapped out some orders. The men quickly surrounded me, Fiat pulling out of his jacket a small black
case, the kind diabetics carry around. By the time Drake appeared in the far end of the corridor, shoeless, wearing
pants and the green silk tunic he wore at official dragon
functions, and holding a wicked-looking saber, Fiat had a
good grip on my arm, his men hemming me in on all
sides.