Page 27 of Interior Design for Demons
“What? No! Of course not. I’m just stating the facts.”
He doesn’t look convinced. In fact, he looks like he’s in a towering rage, or maybe just very, very fiercely determined to prove me wrong.
Before we can talk any more, the music kicks up into a frenzied pace, and I spend the next hour dancing and drinking until I can barely see or stand. I munch on delicious hellish delicacies, and kiss several different mouths, cutting my tongue a little on someone’s fangs. I let taloned hands wander over my body, but Rath always halts the attentions of the other demons before they go too far—and when I’m too woozy to stand, he scoops me up and carries me off to my suite.
“It’s the first elimination round tomorrow, little rebel,” he says quietly to me as I drowse against the pillows. “I truly hope you survive it.”
I wake to an infernal alarm clock, still in my gown, with a terrible taste in my mouth. There’s water on the tray beside me, and a vial that says “Drink me” like I’m Alice in freaking Wonderland. I drink it, and it clears up both the oncoming migraine and the sick feeling in my belly. A supernatural anti-hangover tonic, apparently.
I still don’t feel like eating, because I might die today—yet I desperately want to enjoy one more delicious meal,because I might die today.With shaking fingers I dress in a simple, professional ensemble from my richly stocked closet—a silk blouse and slacks, with a touch of jewelry. I have no idea what the judges will be like, or what they’ll want to see from me, but this isn’t Project Runway or America’s Next Top Model so I need to play it fairly conservative when it comes to my personal style—at least for the first round.
Rath comes to get me, accompanied by my two assistant demons, Slate and Rusala. They’ve both got personal style to spare—they’re decked out in dripping jewelry, tattoos on full display. Rusala flutters anxious fingers over my hair, smoothing and tucking, while Slate chews the tips of her claws. Their success is linked to my own fate, so I suppose they have the right to be nervous.
As my demon sponsor, Razenath stalks at my side along the winding hallways. He stands, arms folded and mouth grim, as we ride an elevator with blood-red walls. No one speaks to me until we arrive before a pair of carved ebony doors. Then Slate and Rusala slip off down a side hall with a whispered, “Good luck.”
“Where are they going?” I ask.
“To their seats. We’re about to enter an auditorium. I’ll guide you to your seat and you’ll stay there quietly until you are called. The audience consists of high-level demons. The competitors’ assistants get to sit up front for a better view.” He clears his throat. “Most of the episode has been recorded ahead of time, but the judging and elimination is being broadcast live to all of Hell. So watch what you say. Try to be—charming.”
“I can’t,” I whisper. My shins have melted, my knees are wobbling, and my insides feel jiggly. “I can’t do this, Rath.”
“You said you were confident in your skills, that you loved your design.”
“I was—I am, but—what if it’s not what they’re looking for? I—I could stop existing. In less than an hour. I could cease tobe. Where would I go afterward? What will happen to—”
“Stop.” He grips my face, his dark eyes flaring orange. His scent rolls over me, and I close my eyes to inhale—warm snickerdoodles, freshly baked, on a plate in a mountain cabin that smells of cedar and snow. I lean forward without thinking, my face tilted blindly up to his.
Warm lips seal over mine, kissing me with a supernatural strength that draws the anxiety right out of me. Rath’s mouth is a magnet, a siphon, sucking away my fear, absorbing it, and the blissful sound he releases over my tongue tells me he’s enjoying it immensely.
I expect him to break off the kiss quickly, to act embarrassed and gruff and hurry me through the doors—but instead his burly arm slams across my back, crushing me to his chest, and his other hand presses against my rear, pushing my hips against his body. His muscular thigh is between mine, and I resist the urge to grind against it. He kisses me deeper, a gust of hell-hot breath filling my mouth, his tongue a lash of liquid flame.
“Mmmm,” he groans, and a puff of ashy air crosses my face as his wings unfurl.
My terror is gone, and though a bit of trepidation remains, I feel stronger, more confident. My fate hasn’t changed, but I can face it better now.
I pull back, pushing a hand against Rath’s broad chest. “We’ve got to go in there.”
“The taste of you…” He slurs the words through swollen lips, as if he’s drunk on me,and at any other moment I would be incredibly flattered.
“We have to go,” I murmur, and he opens his eyes.
They’re golden-red fire, from corner to corner, not an iris or pupil in sight.
His golden horns and black wings are out, and he’s taller, bulkier. He looks so strong that more courage floods my limbs. The powerful Razenath is my sponsor, my protector. I think I’ll be okay.
A light above the doors is flashing red, and Rath flings them open with a gesture, without even touching them. There’s a flash of red light, a hiss of smoke as he propels me forward. We walk out onto an immense glossy stage that reminds me of something fromAmerican IdolorAmerica’s Got Talent. The three judges sit in thrones with their backs to the audience, facing the stage and its half-circle of thirteen chairs. Several of my fellow contestants are already in their seats, their sponsor demons standing behind them like forbidding sentinels.
Music swells as Rath and I enter the space. I stumble on my way to my seat, despite his hand on my shoulder, because I’m distracted by the judges. One of them is basically a skeleton of massive black bones, streaming fire and smoke from every crevice, with a core of fire at the center. Immense antlers branch upward from the demon’s skull, and their tips glow red-hot.
The judge in the center has umber skin, a scaly golden tail, and hair of writhing smoke. She is beautiful as a goddess, with immense orange eyes and four graceful arms lined with gold bracelets. Her amber robes pool in a glowing silken river halfway across the stage, shifting and rippling as if they have a mind of their own. The third judge is enormous, stony, like a mountain troll or something, with a snub nose and lots of protruding fangs jutting from his coarse lips.
“That’s Ishtar in the center,” Rath whispers. He pushes on my shoulder and I manage to take my seat without falling off it. If Rath hadn’t sucked away some of my fear, I think I would have already passed out by now.
The rest of the contestants enter, paired with their demons, and then our chairs swivel to face the enormous screen at the back of the stage, and we watch our first episode. It’s clear that the demons are imitating the format of human reality TV shows—there’s a bit of background info for each contestant, some interview segments, a narrator voice-over, clips of each of us working on our designs. There’s even some pretty cool background music. I wonder if they’ve had human help for selecting, cutting, and editing this episode. It’s actually well-crafted—if you can ignore the occasional odd shots of human body parts. It’s like the demons are obsessed with the disparate pieces of us—the ragged edges of someone’s fingernails, the callouses on a contestant’s foot, the movement of a woman’s throat as she swallows.
The clips are also interspersed with occasional footage from torture chambers, and one weird shot of a male contestant pissing, clearly unaware that he’s being watched. I can’t tell which contestant it is, but my stomach drops. They put cameras in thebathrooms? What the hell?
The narrator’s voice takes on a mocking twist as she says, “A ban on human-demon sexual relations was put in place for the first round, but clearly some of the contestants took this rule very lightly.” The camera cuts to one of the male competitors kissing a demon in a dark hallway—and then—
