Chapter 3
Miriam heard the call on the equinox.
She was in Constantinople. That morning, a drunk and amorous man had offered her his heart and soul in exchange for a smile.
He may have meant it as metaphor—Miriam could never really tell—but she honoured the deal as it was made.
Once she had swallowed the soul and sated her hunger, Miriam had not known what to do with the heart, so she had flung it to a stray dog outside.
It had gulped it down in two bites and then followed her down the street with a reverent expression, its tongue lolling out of its mouth.
Animals typically disliked her, and Miriam had not known how to react.
Eventually, she had become irked by its attention, and she had pulled the shadows around her and flown away.
She existed, as she always had, in solitude; a spider makes no conversation with the flies in its web.
Miriam could engage in human pleasures such as food and drink and flesh, but temptation was rare, and indulgence rarer still.
The centuries grew tedious, but she did not count the years as a person would.
She noticed time passing only with conscious effort.
Otherwise, there was no difference between a decade and an hour.
On occasion she blinked, and weeks would pass.
Miriam measured her existence in deals instead.
She was always hungry, and her greatest pleasure remained the fullness consuming a soul gave her: the brighter it burnt, the more intense the satisfaction.
And there were always exchanges to be made, because humanity was as hungry as she was, even if that hunger was for other things.
She was asked for money, power, magic. Miriam gave her petitioners what they wanted, and she took her rewards happily.
She needed them as much as they needed her, after all.
All magic was give and take, light for dark.
With no light of her own, Miriam needed to take it from others.
Once, utterly overwhelmed by her own inertia, she decided to see how long she could go without consuming a soul.
She had lasted three weeks before that howling emptiness howled too loudly and it became difficult to keep corporeal form.
When she had finally indulged, she had torn the man apart afterwards, seeking some further shred of soul within him that she could eat.
If she were capable of shame, she might have felt shame for it, but she did not.
Her experiment had been successful. She knew her limitations now.
And so came the equinox. That evening, the streets of Constantinople were awash with rain and crowded with bodies: spice merchants, printers, prostitutes, carpet sellers—all the rabble were there.
The air was thick with the scents of sewage, incense, the cool mist from the Bosphorus.
Miriam could sense a thousand deals to be made.
She wandered between the people and ignored their curious eyes, accustomed to the scrutiny.
She was out of place almost everywhere, having retained the same human form for centuries: a woman taller than most men, with wild dark hair and ink-spill eyes, strolling with all the thoughtless confidence of a lord.
A drunkard stumbled into her. She shoved him into the gutter.
Then, as she scrubbed her hand on her sleeve, she suddenly heard a man’s voice, as loudly and as clearly as if he were speaking next to her.
It was an ardent drone in ill-accented Latin: Propitiam vos, ut appareat et surgat Mephistophilis, quod tumeraris…
Miriam paused and cocked her head to listen.
It was an attempt at spell work, that much was clear.
A call—a hand reaching through the void to offer itself to her.
She was impressed. In the past few centuries, many had attempted to find her, but few had actually managed to do so.
Other shadows feared her, and they were reluctant to contact her, for fear of her ire; it was rare that someone had enough to offer the darkness in exchange for the task.
She allowed the man to continue for some time, amused by the spell.
Despite his efforts, he was failing to actually bring her to him, instead only calling out to her as one might shout for a servant.
Miriam was under no obligation to answer.
Still, by the time he reached the end of his incantation, her curiosity had moved her.
She took a step forward, into the shadows, offering them a scrap of her most recent meal.
At the step’s beginning, she was in Constantinople; at its end, she was in a darkened room.
It was a study of some sort. The place had a strange, unpleasant smell, like vinegar and incense and burnt hair.
To the left of Miriam, a crack in the curtains permitted a stripe of dim, sunset-tinted light, bleeding red on the floor like an injured animal.
The room was furnished with a desk, a pair of lit candelabra, bookshelves, and a vast cabinet full of jars; piles of pamphlets and bound manuscripts littered the floor, half covering an ancient rug that had at some point been burnt at its edges.
The scent was of sweat and sweet oils, salt water and the faint iron of old blood.
The air carried the static crackle of power, both lingering from previous rituals and arising from the current one.
There was a man standing over the desk, his hands pressed against the wood, muttering to himself.
Miriam had appeared behind him, so she could see only his back.
‘Surgat nobis dicatus, Mephistophilis!’ he cried, with sudden fury.
The flames in the candelabra blazed higher, although he did not seem to notice; the bottles on the shelves rattled.
He was clearly experienced with magic, but despite the offerings he must have made, his soul remained powerful—one of the brightest Miriam had seen, roaring in his chest like a bonfire.
The shadows behind her stretched forward in curiosity, drawn hungrily to his light, and she raised a silent hand to admonish them. They retreated.
There was an extended pause as the man waited for the result of his incantation; then he stooped further, pressing his forehead against the desk. He groaned in defeat.
Miriam stepped forward and made to tap him on the shoulder—but her hand rebounded inches from him, as if hitting an invisible barrier. She glanced down to see a thick line of salt surrounding her feet, and she sneered.
At the sound of her footstep, the man spun around. Seeing Miriam’s face, he cried out, flinching away from her with such violence that he fell to the ground.
‘Well?’ she said, looking down at him.
He crossed himself, which looked rather ridiculous; he had used charcoal, for some reason, to paint the shape of eyes on the backs of his hands. He stuttered, ‘I— What— Who are you?’
She raised a brow. ‘Who do you think?’
‘You are a woman.’
‘Not particularly,’ Miriam replied. ‘But close enough.’
His eyes widened, and he barked in laughter. ‘Of course. Of course. The Seed of Eve. Just as the curse… I should have known.’
‘The curse?’
‘If the first seed is that of Eve, ruin shall take root,’ the man babbled. ‘The branches of the House of Harding shall wither and fall.’
The man’s pupils were pinpoints, and his fingers trembled and twitched as he spoke, clawing at the air.
A half-empty bottle was standing on the table.
He had taken something, clearly. Miriam stared at him, frowning, as he continued to mutter to himself, scrambling to stand.
He was slightly built, fair-haired, mayhap attractive by human standards, quite ugly by hers: desperation and rancour seeped from his face as ichor stains a bandage.
The man cleared his throat, interrupting his own mutterings. ‘I—if—I—’ He ceased speaking, and he wrung his hands, as if to cleanse himself of the stutter. ‘You are Mephistopheles, yes?’ he asked, finally. ‘The demon of legend?’
Miriam grinned, amused. She had been called many names, and she could not remember all of them; she was as likely to be Mephistopheles, she supposed, as anyone else.
The man took her smile as agreement. ‘I wish to make a deal,’ he said. ‘I require a familiar. You must lend your power to mine.’
Miriam sighed. How dull. ‘You already have power.’
‘Not enough to accomplish what I desire. But were I to use your magic…’
‘And in exchange? I traffic not in pieces. I would want your soul entirely.’
The man squared his shoulders; he raised his head high upon his neck.
There was a new righteousness to his expression, a blazing sort of certainty.
‘I am a Harding, chosen and blessed by God. I have tamed you, foul demon, and entrapped you in my circle. If you ever wish for freedom, you must follow my command.’
Miriam glanced down at the salt circle once more. She was trapped, but hubris of this calibre made men gullible. And his zealotry, amusingly, seemed entirely without foundation: his soul was somewhat exceptional, yes, but it had no touch of the divine.
She was not particularly hungry—she had just eaten, after all—but a meal was a meal. And Miriam could amuse herself, could she not? What use was immortality without a little fun?
She widened her eyes, affected awe. ‘God and all His saints,’ she whispered. ‘I see it now—their heavenly presence.’
His answering smile was triumphant. He was obviously deranged. ‘I shall not be conquered.’
‘Indeed, your soul cannot be mine to reap,’ Miriam said, ‘as long as the angels enfold you within their arms. Even my Lord, Lucifer, could not defeat such power.’
‘You are mine, then? To command as I wish?’
‘I swear it,’ Miriam replied. ‘I shall not take your soul, as long as God protects you. While that is so, I am your servant, sir. These are the laws by which I am bound. Is this amenable to you?’