Page 84 of Spit

“I suppose so.” I agreed. “What kind of humans come to the Red City? Does everyone get the choice to serve their sentence here, or is there a criteria?”

“Do we let in murderers, pedophiles, and rapists?” Legion cocked his head to the side, plainly stating the subtext of my question.

My cheeks flushed, but I kept eye contact while waiting for him to answer. He had read me well.

Legion exhaled a sigh. Tired. “We are discerning about who we let in our walls. Let's just say that.”

“And you don’t want to know what happens if a rapist makes their way through.” Sev winked. “Even the satanic commandments stress the importance of consent.”

“How did you come to be in the city, Katalina?” I wondered why the usually loud witch seemed to be trying to dissolve into the upholstery.

Katalina flicked her red hair away from her shoulder. “I auditioned for one of those television shows a few years ago.”

“LikeThe Real Housewives Of The Red City?” I asked.

“OrLust Party House.” Sev’s eyes sparkled. “I love that one.”

Katalina rolled her eyes. “It wasGluttons for Punishment.” She mumbled. “They got a bunch of models together and fed us bugs and stuff. Using magic to make it seem like other things. The money was good. Too good.”

I shuddered. “Who comes up with this stuff?”

“Humans,” Legion said darkly. “Demons don’t tend to go in for that kind of thing unless it serves a purpose. Even if demons punish someone or do horrible and strange things to humans, it serves a purpose. It’s retribution or rehabilitation.”

I eyed Legion cynically. “Yeah, right. Demons aren’t all good pious, misunderstood souls. Beezlebub literally bargained for my soul when I was ten years old.”

Legion didn’t have an answer to that. So, I turned back to Katalina. “You stayed?” I prompted.

Katalina held her hands up in a ‘what would you do?’ fashion. “No one in the Red City knows who I am, but the show was popular enough in the human world that I’d be recognized. Phones don’t work here because of the walls, but I managed to speak to my mom. She told me that the show went big and that my agent dropped me after seeing the writing on the wall. Red City credits are worth a lot if you’re in the city, but not too much once you return to gen pop.”

“Credits?” I wondered.

Katalina glanced at the demons in the car and held out her arm, showing off the brand on her wrist. The burn was a strange color, a mixture of purple and something else as if the magic couldn’t decide which sin she belonged to. The cyclian rune looked similar to the others I had seen, a circle with a smaller circle inside and two interlocking knots. The scribbled writing between the circles was illegible, but somehow my mind translated it.

Belong.

Katalina rubbed her hand over the mark, and the air shimmered as a starburst of symbols rained before disappearing. “The marks keep track of what you’ve earned.” She explained. “Imagine if I walked into the bank of America and flashed a demonic brand and asked to withdraw fifty K, they’d look at me like I was nuts.”

I had to agree with her.

“How do you know Anna-Risa?” I asked.

Katalina squirmed in her seat. “She was on the show with me.”

“But she’s a witch too?” My nose wrinkled. “How’d that happen?”

Katalina shrugged, shooting Legion a look so quickly that I would have missed it if I wasn’t looking at her. Deep in thought, the demon in question stared out of the window, having lost interest in our conversation.

Sev lifted a hand like a child in class. “I can answer that. I hope. Demons tend to like having witches around. Their magic has a different flavor, but it’s more grounded in the human realities than ours is. Demons like to feed through their sins.” My mind flashed back to the orgy in the ballroom, and it took considerable effort to focus when I realized Sev was still speaking. “Witches provide a more filling feast.” He brushed his thumb against his lips—his golden eyes on mine as if I was the only woman in the world.

“Nice try, Romeo.” I chuckled. “I’m a null, remember?”

Sev shrugged. “A witch is a witch.”

Katalina scoffed, looking away.

We continued on the bumpy and unmaintained roads of the human sector before the skyscrapers in the distance grew taller and leary as they shadowed the road. Closer to Magicktek and the city center than I would have liked.

Katalina leaned forward, directing the driver through the intercom to a neighborhood a few blocks from the Magicktek office—the buildings boxy and unattractive, just like most of the human sector. No personality. No personal touches. I wasn’t sure why, but it unnerved me. Humans liked to own things—flowers, pots, and ornaments. They liked to paint their front doors and window frames. But all of the buildings I had seen so far were uniform. Grey.

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