Page 82 of Carnal: The Beast Who Loved Me

“Your family. Start at the beginning.”

She smiled. “Okay, you asked for it.”

Rosie began with the fact that she had inherited her parents’ memories up to the time of conception, which meant that, intellectually at least, she had a lot of combined experience. She talked about her “aunt”, who was an interdimensional pilgrim, about her father, who was a decorated knight of The Order of the Black Swan, about her mother, who was half demon, half witch, and about her unique upbringing around figures who were legendary in their esoteric world.

The occasional shouts or laughter from the field below had gradually quieted as the trainees and instructors drifted away. The moon had already risen in the fading light by the time she’d finished and there were no young athletes left on the field below.

“I guess I don’t understand why you’d give all that up to stay here,” he said. “But I hope you will.”

Rosie looked down at her hands that had become pale gray in the dusk. “I can’t make any promises right now, Carnal. All I can tell you is that I’m not leaving today. Or tomorrow, so far as I know.”

“You could promise that you’ll keep an open mind and give me a chance to persuade you to stay. With me.”

“A deal?” She smiled. “I love a good negotiation. So how about this? You get a chance to persuade me to stay, but with a handicap.”

His eyes narrowed. “What kind of handicap?”

“No kissing.”

“Fucking?” He looked as hopeful as a child at Yuletide.

She laughed. “No hands or,” she waved at his crotch, “other body parts. You have to convince me without touching.”

“That’s a very hard bargain, little demon.”

“You’d better stop calling me that or you’re going to slip and say it in front of somebody else.”

“Wouldn’t matter. Nobody would guess it was true in a thousand years.”

“Hmmm. Well, if you want me to stay, you need to get used to ‘hard bargains’. Demons are all about the deal.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes.”

“Noted. Just one more question before we go. What could you do with your, um, abilities? I mean, I know you can fix wrecks. What else?”

“Just ask what you want to know.”

“Could you make somebody disappear?”

“Yes.” Rosie started to feel wary about the direction of the questions.

“Could you make a group of people disappear?”

“Like the Rautt?”

“Yeah.”

“I don’t know, but it doesn’t matter. I’ve made promises to Kellareal. The bike thing was a broken promise. As it turned out, it didn’t hurt anybody, but these things… they can easily take unforeseen turns and render unfortunate consequences. I can’t be responsible for that. I have to be hands off and leave Fate to Fate.”

“And Charming’s leg?”

Rosie looked away. “I wasn’t supposed to do that and it worries me that somehow it might have changed something important. It was an impulse, the kind Ihaveto learn how to control.”

Carnal picked up a blade of grass and stared at it as he said, “Could you bring my brother back?”

Rosie didn’t answer verbally, but she put a hand on his knee hoping to communicate that she would if she could.

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