Page 71 of Heir of Ashes

“I know you can’t take me yourself, but what if you owe a favor to Lee in my stead so I can go back? All of you combined?” I pointed my thumb behind me.

“No,” it hissed again.

“Is there anything in this land that you can get or trade to send me back home?”

“No.”

I exhaled. “Alright then, you are no longer bound to me. You don’t owe me anything. You’re free to go your merry way.” I made a shooing motion, but I might as well have been fanning him. “I dissolve you of your duties to me. You owe me nothing,” I reiterated.

He kept his eyes on me, unblinking, with no trace of the previous excitement. I scanned the other creatures, and they were all silent too, watching.

Ah, shit. Had I just freed them to eat me during my first moment of weakness?

I glanced back at Lee, and she had a peculiar look in her eyes. I didn’t like it.

“What did I just do?” I asked, half expecting her not to answer without asking for something in return.

“It is fascinating. No other being has ever dissolved them of a duty and meant it. They are confused. Anyone else would have enslaved them to an eternity of servitude.” She shook her head. “It is intriguing,” she repeated.

I didn’t think it was. But then, I came from a place where freedom of choice was a right. “Well, I’m not anyone else,” I said, uneasy with the strange gleam in her eyes.

I took a long breath, exhaled slowly, and then braced myself to bargain with the devil.

Chapter 22

“How about an open favor,” I began, “but with a few conditions?”

“What do you have in mind?” Lee asked, and I noted the gleam of anticipation was still there.

“Let’s see. Umm. Not a child, and that includes any I might ever have.” I had no plans for children, but neither had my father, and look where that got him. Better safe than sorry, right?

“Second,” I chewed my lower lip for a moment. “You won’t have anything I love, be it a person, pet, or object,” I declared. The gleam of anticipation in her eyes brightened. “And my terms include past, present, and future,” I added. I wanted to cheer myself.

“Anything else?” she asked after I fell silent for a minute or two.

There had to be something more. I knew I was doing well, but my brain wasn’t functioning at full speed, so I gave myself a few more minutes to think.

“You also can’t ask me for something that is not within my power.”

“Is that all?” she asked, and above the anticipation, the beginnings of impatience began to show. Maybe her duty really called her.

There should be something else. What else should a person never bargain away?

“My soul!” I half-shouted at her. “You do not get my soul. Ever.”

“No offspring, no beloved, nothing beyond your capabilities, and no soul? Although I believe the latter is the priority of another entity.” Her lips twisted into a sarcastic smile.I could tell I had managed to insult her. “That aside, what’s left for me?”

“I’m sure you’ll find something useful. You name it, and as long as my terms hold, I will do it.”

“I do not like it.”

“That’s all I can give. I’m not making my father’s mistake. I’d rather die here.” My voice came out firm and fierce.

She clasped her hands together and studied me for a long time. Then she inclined her head once, as if conceding the point, though I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had just walked into a horrible trap. The kind I wouldn’t realize until I was neck-deep in and sinking fast. Again, I wondered if Remo Drammen was the lesser evil. I would never know.

“Very well. We have a deal. I will call upon you soon. Until then, daughter of Fosch, farewell.” Her words were barely out of her lips when there was a flash of light, and the binding of the bargain enveloped me like a cloak of warm silk. The world spun, my vision dimmed, and I was aware of a sensation not unlike floating before I was unceremoniously dumped back on Earth. It was nothing as debilitating as when Dr. Dean had dragged me.

I stood in a rank alleyway, the stench of decay and waste assaulting my senses. Why did people keep dumping me in such places? I guess it was better than finding myself on another planet. I glanced around at the dark alley, praying that I wasn’t in some far-flung corner of the globe, or in Russia or London, or—God forbid—Zimbabwe. The bass of music rumbled nearby, accompanied by the sounds of traffic, a busy night in a busy city. Sirens, horns, tires screeching, people shouting and laughing.

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