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“No way. Not in a million years. Forget it, Mammon. I'm going back to the House.”
“Hey! No takesies-backsies! Ya said you were gonna help me out!”
“When you said to meet you out here, I thought you wanted to go swimming! I'm in my bathing suit, for crying out loud. Why are YOU in a hazmat suit?!”
I can barely see his face anymore. His breath is fogging up the plastic. “I… I keep all my money in here, ok?” (His voice is the muffled garble of a drive-thru speaker.) “So I can carry it all around with me!”
“You don't HAVE any money.”
“But if I did, I could fit so much in here! Look, just do this for me real quick, and I'll owe ya big time, ok?” His suit crinkles loudly as he hands me an empty glass jar. “I just need some water, that's all. Easy peasy, right? Pretty pleeeeeease?!”
I think he's batting his eyes at me, but it's hard to tell.
Ugh. There’s a sucker born every minute, right? With a heavy sigh, I take the jar. “Fine. But I'll be cashing in that favour in bed tonight,” I smirk.
He blushes so brightly that it almost makes the plastic sparkle. “Uh, yeah, that… that sounds ok, I guess...”
And everyone thinks Levi's the shy one, hehe.
Ok, well, at least it’s pretty out here. The stony grotto is tucked away deep in the Devildom's vast forest, shaded and warm and covered with a soft, shimmering mist. Tiny yellow flowers hang over the crystal-clear water, and jingle like bells when the breeze catches them just right. The moonlight filtering through the canopy is bathing everything below in a soft, white light, and I honestly don't think I've ever stood anywhere that made my heart feel so perfectly at peace with itself.
Which, in the Devildom, can only mean one thing.
I sigh. “It's cursed, isn't it.”
“No way! It ain't cursed, it's just kinda, maybe, a little bit enchanted or whatever. It ain't a big fan of demons, that's for sure – but you ain't a demon, so we're home free!”
I eyeball the quietly bubbling water, and frown. “What does it do?”
“No idea. Ya think I'm dumb enough to stick my hands in there to find out?!”
…Yes?
“And you're SURE it doesn't work on humans?”
“Of course! Nothin' down here seems to ever work on you, does it? I'm totally probably almost mostly sure you'll be safe!”
Oh, good. He's totally probably almost…
Ugh. Whatever. Nobody lives forever, right? Holding the jar by my fingertips, I creep up to the spring, kneel on the biggest, flattest rock I can see, and dip it in the water.
“Fill it all the way up, ok? That stuff's worth a fortune!”
“Yeah, I kinda gathered as much.”
I'm letting it juuuuuust trickle in, so nothing splashes on my hands, and it's only about half-full when (of course, because my life is awesome like that) Mammon screams.
He sounds like a five year old girl.
“EEEEEEEEEEEK!”
“What's wrong?!”
“GET'EM OFF ME!” Out of the corner of my eye, the only thing I can see is a baggy white jumpsuit waving wildly at the sky while running frenzied, bow-legged circles between the trees.
“Get WHAT off you?! There's nothing there!”
“NUH UH I SAW A BAT IT WAS HUGE YOU GOTTA SAVE ME!”
“YOU LIVE IN THE DEVILDOM HOW THE HELL ARE YOU SCARED OF BATS?”
“IT'S IN MY HAIR! EEEEEEEEK!”
“IT CAN'T BE IN YOUR HAIR, DUMBASS, YOU'RE WEARING A – HEY, WATCH WHERE YOU'RE GOAAAAAH!"
And in I go.
Gee, Mammon had an idea, and it ended in disaster?
I'm soaked, but not the least bit surprised.
“Oh no! That ain't good! Are you ok?! You don't feel all tingly or on fire or anything, do ya?! Get out of there, quick!”
“What the hell do you think I'm trying to do?!” This damn spring is like a pitcher plant, though; the wet rock walls aren't very high, but they're smooth as glass and slippery as ice, and for all my desperate kicking and clawing and flailing, I'm getting absolutely nowhere. “Why are you just standing there?! Get me out!”
“Hang on, I got ya!” He starts running and ripping apart his papery suit at the same, gets two arms and one leg free, immediately steps on flapping paper leg and crashes face-first into the dirt.
My hero.
Credit where credit's due, though – he's more worried about me than what the mystery water might do to him, and that, my friends, is my Guardian Demon.
At the moment, though, said Guardian Demon is explosively cursing and crawl/run/hopping and still trying to kick off the bottom of his suit all at the same time, and making about as much progress rescuing me as my soggy ass is. “At least… at least it ain't… workin' on ya,” he pants, “so that's good…”
“Dammit Mammon! Don't say shit like that out loud! You're gonna jinx meeeeeEEEEEAAAAAHHHHHH!”
It happens so fast that I don't even have time to process what “it" is before the blinding flash of yellow light that erupted in front of my eyes disappears again, leaving me dazed, numb, and…
…strange.
I feel strange.
That's probably a bad thing.
…Mammon's not freaking out anymore. He's just standing at the edge of the pond, with one pant leg off and one pant leg on, staring at me like I'd just grown three more heads. “Uuuhhhhhh… well, ok, this ain't so bad, right? I mean, it didn't kill ya or nothin'…”
“Not so bad? NOT SO BAD?! YOU TURNED ME INTO A GODDAMN FISH, MAMMON!”
“Err… well, ya look more like a mermaid, really.” He flushes, and awkwardly clears his throat. “You, uhh… kinda look cute like that, actually. Your tail is pretty.”
“I LOVE YOU TOO BUT GET ME OUT OF HERE ALREADY!”
“Uh… well, if I touch ya while you're wet, I'm gonna change too, right? Then we'd both be stuck in there. Can ya maybe dry yourself off a bit, first?”
I heave an irritated sigh, and give up trying to drag myself out of the pond. I'm clearly going nowhere anytime soon, especially considering the fact that the transformation was particularly… aggressive? So, mermaid, yeah, fair enough, with the whole swooshing tail and everything, but it didn't stop there. My arms are too short (stumpy would be an appropriate adjective), like my elbows just up and fucked off to Narnia or something. I still have my hands (thank god), but they're so thin and so weak that I can barely make a fist, let alone haul my scaly ass onto dry land. Judging by the long, flowing fins running from my wrists to my shoulders, I'm guessing what's left of my arms are only good for swimming, and not much else.
I let myself float, treading water with my fancy new fins, and scowl up at my gaping idiot. “Do. Something. I don't care what it is. Call Lucifer. Build a ladder. Rent a zeppelin, and float my ass off into the sunset. I don't care what you do, just GET ME OUT OF HERE!”
“Sure, sure! I'm on it! Lucifer'll know what to do!” He whips out his DDD, stares at the screen… and frowns.
“What now!?”
“I, uhh… there's no signal out here. Ok, no problem, just hang tight, ok? I'll be back in no time!”
“Where the hell do you think you HEY DON'T LEAVE ME HERE ALONE!!!”
…
So, this is nice. Mammon's gone (hopefully to find help?) and I'm just floating here like a fishy idiot.
At least I was already wearing my bathing suit. My bottoms have floated off into no-man's land, but my top is still holding strong – which is good news, because I’d have a hard time covering myself up with these stupid fins.
With nothing else to do, I swim the perimeter of my tiny prison. The water is hot, at least, and clear, and clean… almost soothing, actually. The jingling flowers are pretty. The moonlight is quiet and serene.
Now that I know I'm not about to be boiled alive or struck by divine lightning, it's almost… nice.
If this is the way it's gonna be, I should at least appreciate it, right?
I wonder what things look like from underwater? Now that I can breathe under there, I'm suddenly curious.
I flap my elegant, violet tail, and drive to the bottom of the pond.
…
……
Oh, so THIS is what drowning feels like, is it?
Not a fan.
I crest the surface in a gasping, fin-flapping mess. “Are you fucking serious?! I get all the fish-parts, but can't breathe underwater?! What a screwjob,” I mutter, as I swim back to the edge of the pond and rest against the cool rocks.
“It ain't my fault, I swear! She just fell in, is all! I tried to save her, I really did!”
Oh, thank heavens. Mammon must've hauled some serious ass to get back here that quickly, which means he didn't once stop along the way to pick a convenient pocket or sell a mermaid to the highest bidder.
Good for him.
“Lucifer!” I've never been more happy to see anyone, ever, in my whole life. I swim up to his feet… and can't help but notice that he takes a few wary steps back.
“Evening, my pet,” he sighs. “Besides the obvious, are you still feeling alright? Any difficulty breathing?”
“Only underwater.”
“Well, what are ya waitin’ for?! Get her out already!”
“I wish I could. But I can't touch her any more than you can, and the enchantment on this place is too powerful for me to break without properly studying it, first.”
Mammon blanches like overcooked asparagus. “What the hell's that mean?! If you can’t get her out, why'd ya come back with me?”
Lucifer grabs the back of Mammon's collar in one hand, his belt with the other, and unceremoniously heaves him over the edge. “Because she needs company while the rest of us work,” he smirks. “And you just volunteered.”
“AAAYYYIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEE!”
There's a massive, cannonball splash, immediately followed by a starburst of yellow light.
“WHAT THE HELL, LUCIFER?! YA TURNED ME INTO A FISH!”
“Mermaid.” He frowns, thinks, then smirks down at his brother. “Mer-demon, actually.”
“Shaddup,” Mammon grumbles, as he swims over to my side of the pond and surreptitiously winds his tail around mine. “So what now? You're gonna get us out of this, right?”
“Of course. But it might take some time. For now, enjoy yourselves. This spring is certainly cursed, but it is lovely nonetheless.” He takes a knee at the edge of the pond, and beckons me over. “Do not fret. Satan and Belphegor are already studying the enchantment that clings to these waters. I will shortly join them.”
Mammon unwinds his tail and starts whipping fin-fulls of water onto the shore, aiming every last drop at his brother. “No way! You ain't gonna leave us here alone! Take that! And that!!!”
Lucifer just sighs, and takes another healthy step back. “Stop that. This is your fault, Mammon. Don't think I've forgotten that. Enjoy your private time with your Mistress while it lasts, because the moment this curse is broken, I have every intention of teaching you quite a harsh lesson in self-control.”
“EEEEP!”
“And you, my pet,” Lucifer smiles, “for the record… you really do make a lovely mermaid. It suits you. Rest easy, and know that I'll have you back to normal shortly.”
Without so much as blowing me a kiss, Lucifer takes his leave, and everything quiets down.
“Great,” Mammon mutters, “this is just swell. What are we supposta do now, huh? Just swim in stupid circles? Ugh. Now I know how Levi's goldfish feels.”
“Oh, come on. It isn't all bad, is it?” I playfully flip my tail, and slip up against his chest. “Lucifer was right. You make one hell of a sexy mermaid,” I chuckle. “But… err… which form are you in right now? You splashed down in your human form, but you're wearing your horns. Are you stuck? Like, half-way in between?”
“I dunno what I am,” he mutters. “But I sure look kinda demon-y still, don't I?” He rolls onto his back so he can look himself up and down. “Well, I ain't got any wings, but I still got my horns and all my markings, and…” He pauses long enough to take his first good look at me. “And so do you, actually. Well, look at that. You're finally showin' your true colours, girl!”
“Huh? What are you…”
But he's right. I didn’t notice it at first, since nothing at all looks out of place in wonderland, but I have a curious white marking of my own, too, sketched right over my navel. It's a circle as big as my fist, outlined in complicated runes that surround a strange, faintly glowing sigil. “What… what the hell is that!? Get it off! Gah! I hate this stupid pond!”
Mammon quirks an eyebrow. “Those ain't there ‘cause of this magic water, silly, though that might the reason you can see.’em now. Are you seriously tellin’ me you've never seen your own marks?”
“My own what?!”
“Those are your pacts, dummy.” He curls his tail around mine again, and this time, I let him pull me up against his chest. “When a human makes a pact with a demon, we've gotta… you know… brand’em. So everyone knows what's what. Get it?”
I lay my head on his chest, and sigh. It’s already been a long day, and it just keeps getting longer. “Not really, no.”
“Well… we demons all have a symbol, right? It's a fancy way of writin' our names, with some magic junk thrown in around the outside.” He pulls me close, and slips his fins around my waist. “A symbol, or a crest, or a sigil, or whatever. Whenever we make a pact, we stick it on ya, somewhere. See? That one there, on your tail?” He demonstrates with the softest, most humble touches, fanning out his fins to point out the unfamiliar tattoo decorating the very tip of my tail. “That's Levi's. If ya weren't so fishy right now, it'd probably be on the bottom your foot or somethin'. Levi usually sticks his marks where no one can see’em.”
“So… ok, hang on a sec. You guys all branded me? How many of these things do I have?!”
“Seven, of course. Unless, ya know, you've been makin’ secret pacts with all the lesser demons, too. See, there's Satan's,” he smiles, as he guides my fins up across the back of my neck. “Ya can't see it without a mirror, but trust me: It looks a lot like Lucifer's, just without all the fancy details. And this one here?” He wraps my fins in his, and presses my them up against my stomach.
“Let me guess. Beel?”
“Bingo! See! We all got ways of keepin' track of our humans.”
“So where are the rest?”
“Well, Lucifer's is your back.”
“Uhh… you mean “on my back", right?”
Mammon chuckles. “Nope. He don't make make many pacts, but when he does, he makes damn sure everybody knows it. It's coverin' everything from your neck to your hips. Looks good on ya, though. I dunno where Belphie's is. That sneaky bugger hides his like Easter eggs.”
“And Asmo?”
“Err… well…” He blushes, and stops looking me in the eye. “His is… errr… AHEMEM. Down. Way down. Down THERE.”
“Sonofa… that friggen pervert!”
“How do ya think I feel, huh? Maybe you can't see your marks all the time, but us demons can, and I gotta look at his damn name every time we're… ya know…”
“Well, next time, just keep reminding yourself that he might've written his name on it, but you're the only one who gets to use it,” I smirk.
“Damn right! And you'd better not forget it, girl!”
I look my strange new body up and down, and smile.
There's only one left.
And it's right over my heart.
“Hey, I see that lovey-dovey smile, and I know what you're thinkin'! Yeah, that’s mine, but it ain't like I stuck it there on purpose or nothin’! I just picked a spot and tossed it on ya – totally random, ya hear?!”
“Yes, dear,” I chuckle, just to watch his flush get so bright that you could land a plane by it. “I hear you. I still can't believe you guys branded me, though. Why didn't anybody ever tell me?! And it should really work both ways, shouldn't it? I mean, I own you guys more than you own me. When we get home, I'm gonna find a hot iron and burn my goddamn initials into Asmo's fucking ballsack.”
“Sheesh! And I thought Lucifer was bad! Ya don't have to go that far, though. It already works both ways. Here, check it out.”
He closes his eyes and murmurs something under his breath, and his pale skin begins to sparkle in the moonlight.
(Wait, did Mammon just cast a magic spell?)
(And nothing exploded?)
(…Weird night.)
As the light fades, it leaves behind a dozen tiny sigils, none bigger than a quarter, scattered across his body. They look just like mine, only not nearly as complicated.
Some of them look a bit crude, actually, as if they were drawn by hand. A few of the circles aren't really circles, and I'm pretty sure one of them even has a rune crossed out and re-written beside itself.
The demons must sketch these themselves.
“So these are… all your masters, huh?”
I understand that demons make pacts like the rest of us breathe, I really do, but still… the thought of my demon being bound to so many other people makes my heart ache.
“Right now, yeah.” He must be reading the disquiet in my eyes, because he squeezes me close and quickly adds, “But I, uhh… I haven't made any more pacts since you. I was your first… but you'll be my last.”
“Oh, Mammon…”
Floating in the soothing water, under a canopy of tiny yellow bells and blinking fireflies, he gently wipes my eyes, and kisses me.
I could get used to living in a fishbowl, if it meant that we could stay like this, right here, just like this, forever.
“So,” I smile, as I stretch up to look him over, “which one's mine?” I take a logical guess, and examine the spot right over his heart.
“Hey! No… no peekin'!” He tries to cover up his chest, but I can still see a bit of it through his translucent fins. “It's… it's bad luck! Yeah! That! You ain't supposta see your own mark!”
“You're lying,” I smirk. “Come on, let me see! Why does mine look different than the rest?” All the others have words in the middle, in some archaic alphabet I don't understand, but mine looks more like… “A doodle? You DOODLED in my mark?!”
“It ain't a doodle! I worked real hard on it, ok? I suck at drawing to begin with, and I had to do it lookin' in a mirror,” he frowns. “You don't wanna see it, ok?”
“Why is it a doodle at all? Why didn't you just write my name, like you did with the rest?”
“I barely knew you,” he sighs. “Remember? We'd only just met, and I… maybe it took me a little bit to remember your name, ok? But I already knew, even then, that I was… err, I mean, that you were my…” He frowns, quietly clears his throat, and never finishes that thought. “It doesn't need to be a name to work right. Just somethin’ that separates you from every other human in the world. Somethin’ that reminds me of you, and nobody else.”
“Please…?”
He sighs, and moves out of the way so I can see the mark I never even knew I'd left on him.
Well, he was right. He DOES suck at drawing. It looks like it should be hanging on a toddler's refrigerator, not defiling the skin of a former angel.
…But it's perfect.
It's two tiny crows. They have dots for eyes and little stick feet and the happiest one-line smiles. The big one is holding the little one in his wings, and there’s a cartoon thought-bubble over his head. There aren't any words in it, though.
Just a bunch of little hearts.