Chapter 26
Chapter
Twenty-Six
“Get a grip, O’Hara,” Kate muttered to herself as the elevator descended to the bowels of Fiendish’s basements. “Just another day at the office, right? It’s a living, right?”
Granted, it was a living where she had to help the sinfully sexy Thomas Kestrel enslave humans. And potentially rent out their bodies to demons. Along with light administrative duties.
No wonder I get paid the big bucks, she thought, fighting back hysteria.
Prue had made it clear—Kate’s continued employment was her only guarantee of her continued existence. Unless she figured out what Thomas was up to, and maybe came up with some way to protect herself, she was hosed.
So here she was, a red-headed Mata Hari in business casual khakis.
I just need to find out enough to either go to the cops, or maybe Nan’s supernatural friends or something, she thought. Anything I can use to convince him not to kill me.
She squared her shoulders, slapped on a semi-convincing smile, and walked into the basement. “Hey, guys! How’s it going?”
A dull-looking bald worker, one she’d named Earl, gave her a wan smile. “Found two more,” he said, his voice mournful.
“Great!” Her voice sounded too chipper—manic-squirrel cheerful—and she toned it back a bit. “Remember to take breaks, okay? And have you seen Slim?”
Earl nodded slowly. He seemed to do everything slowly.
Kate waited, then sighed. “Where is he?” she asked, remembering just how literal the Basement Boys tended to be.
At a glacial speed, Earl turned, pointing to where her tall friend stood, studying something on one of the long tables. She thanked Earl and sped to where Slim was standing.
If she’d be able to find out anything, it’d be from Slim. Of all the demons, he seemed the most intelligent—and the most likely to know something. He was also the most likely to tell her, since she considered him a friend.
Work friend, anyway. After all, he’d stood up for her when Dexter was still there, and she’d fed him when she found out he was starving.
Okay, maybe he was a friend-friend.
“How’s it going, Slim?” she asked, her voice sounding tight to her own ears. Then she frowned. “What are you reading?”
“These things are fascinating,” he murmured, and she realized: he was reading the manual that came with the laptop. “Every time I saw one, I’ve wondered, and now I realize that they can do so many amazing things…”
She couldn’t help smirking. “You are so one of mine.”
That made him look up. “One of your what?”
“You’re a nerd. That makes you one of mine… never mind, it’s a long story,” Kate prevaricated. “Anyway, I um… I wondered if I could ask you a few questions. About the contracts.”
Instantly, his expression shuttered with suspicion. “I do not think that would be a good idea, Kate,” he said in a low voice. “The less you know, the safer.”
“Well, I already know quite a bit,” she admitted, and he looked both scared and kind of ill. Which was how she felt, so she could relate. “At least some of it.”
“What, exactly?” he asked softly.
She glanced around. The guys were working steadily away—except for a few who were eating Ho Hos with almost carnal delight—and they didn’t seem to be paying much attention, but she didn’t want to chance it.
She shuffled Slim off to a corner. “I know that these contracts sign people’s souls,” she whispered.
He didn’t admit it, but he looked guilty and miserable. Then his eyes narrowed. “May… may I ask a question?”
“Sure. Shoot.”
“Why aren’t you…” He paused, then looked uncomfortable.
“Possessed?” she guessed. “Or insane?”
Slim looked embarrassed, but grateful. “Yes. Why is that?”
Fuck if I know. But that wasn’t the answer that was going to get her any answers.
He stared at her expectantly. She looked sly—at least, she hoped she looked sly—and murmured, “Why do you think?”
“Ah. He signed you.” The relief was palpable. “That makes sense.”
“Well, he won’t answer any of my questions,” Kate said, letting Slim’s assumption ride. “So I was hoping you could clear up a few things for me.”
“I will try,” Slim said, then smiled shyly. “Shoot.”
“Did Thomas… what, sign all these people? The ones whose names are on the documents, I mean?”
“Oh, no,” Slim said, and Kate felt some of her muscles unknot. “No, these are all signed by someone else. These aren’t his.”
There was some relief in that. “Are they all people from around here?”
“Some hundreds of years ago, in fact.”
More muscles relaxed. If he didn’t sign these guys, and some of the signatures were from hundreds of years ago, he was doing research. Most of these people were probably dead. How much harm could that be?
So what’s he looking for? And why?
“What does the symbol mean?” she asked. “The one we’re looking for?”
“It’s a special sort of contract. A power base,” Slim said. “It’s rare, but very effective. When a signatory is part of a base, the person who signs him shares a lot more power—but he gains absorbs all the signatory’s power if he is killed.”
“Huh. Why would he do that?”
“Only someone with a lot of signatories, and a lot of power, would bother with it,” Slim said, his voice low and gossipy. “And there are twelve signatories. An unusually large base.”
“Why don’t more, er, signers,” she said, unsure of her terminology, “have power bases? Seems like they’d be handy.”
“It’s a dark ritual. Even by our standards,” Slim said.
Suddenly Kate realized—she didn’t know how Slim got over here, or even whose side he was on. And the way he said “our standards” suggested that he was into some pretty nasty stuff.
He certainly seemed nice, but obviously she wasn’t a sterling judge of character.
“Dark… how?” she asked tentatively.
“You don’t want to know.” He shuddered a little. “The demon lords have forbidden it, as well, because it makes signatories too powerful.”
“Sounds like whoever signed this thing up is pretty powerful, then. And going rogue,” she mused, making a mental note to ask Prue about demon lords. “Or at least doing something seriously shady.”
Slim looked around furtively. “I believe this base has the approval of a demon lord, because it is for personal protection only.” Slim frowned.
“As long as the other twelve are alive, whoever signed these people, their master essentially cannot be killed. Their souls will support him until he regenerates.”
Kate let out a low whistle. “Handy. So why are we looking for these guys?”
Slim shrugged. “I can conjecture, but that’s all it would be. And I’ve learned the hard way not to dig too deeply in the Overseer’s affairs. Or his employer’s.”
She frowned. Why would a guy go through all that trouble, with such a gnarly ritual, just to protect his own life? Maybe he was afraid of dying, she thought.
“Slim, don’t people who are signed go to Hell?”
He looked stricken, then nodded, slowly. “I’m afraid so.”
“And that must really suck, right?” she said. So did the guy who signed all these people just not want to go to hell, or what? And if so, why was Thomas looking for this guy’s power base? “I guess they don’t call it Hell because it sounds scary.”
Did Thomas want this guy dead?
Slim sighed. His expression made a Bassett hound look cheerful.
“I’m so sorry,” he said. He looked like he wanted to hug her, and to her surprise, he reached out, patting her shoulder.
“If it is any consolation, I believe signing your soul can bring you unnatural longevity. So there’s that, at least.”
She blinked, then remembered—she’d told him she’d signed her soul.
He thought she was going to Hell.
“That’s sweet,” she said reflexively. “Um, thanks.” She paused a beat. “Aren’t you signed, too?”
He jerked, obviously startled. “You don’t know?”
“Know what?” she asked, but before he could answer, her cell phone vibrated. She glanced at the face of it.
It was Thomas’s number, and a text. Come up to my office. We need to talk.
She let out a deep sigh.
“Ah, crap,” she breathed. “It’s the boss. I have to go.”
“Kate,” Slim said. “Don’t ask him what we are. All right? And don’t let him know how much you know. Don’t let anybody know what you’ve learned.”
Since she really wasn’t planning to, she agreed easily. As she started to walk towards the elevators, she turned back.
“Slim, how well do you know Thomas Kestrel?”
Slim shrugged, looking uncomfortable again. “Not well. My contract is through The Overseer, not Kestrel.”
“But you know people, and you know what’s going on around here,” she said. “He seems like a nice guy.”
“I’m sure he does.” Slim’s words were tight.
She swallowed. Then she whispered, “Just how scared should I be?”
If it was physically possible, he looked even more sad.
“I think it’s a little late to wonder, Kate. Don’t you?”
Wow, she thought.
She was in some serious shit. Given her track record, that was saying something.