Page 11 of Hellfire & Tinsel
He sucked it in and went sideways, skirting along the edges until he reached a single doorway that he pushed open. It revealed a bedroom/bathroom combination, and it was there one of Kassel’s eyes spotted the little human.
At least he assumed it was the human. There was a lump on the bed, buried beneath a mountain of blankets. Kassel focused for a second and noticed it moving gently up and down with every breath Beau took.
Nodding to himself, Kassel made his way toward the bed. The sooner he got things over with, the sooner he could go back to Hell and his duties.
Only… how did you wake a human up? They were prone to scaring easily, and Kassel had no experience placating one. Oren was Luc’s, and Kassel just did enough to get by without incident.
Demons were much simpler and less sensitive. Usually, leaving them stewing in hatred and anger worked to relieve stress or upset. Or torturing sinners. Or, in the case of the twins, you threw them into whatever pit you found first and by the time they’d crawled back out, they’d usually mellowed.
Shuffling on his feet in indecision, he did the first thing that came to mind. He cleared his throat very loudly.
The lump on the bed stirred a little bit, revealing a peek of Beau’s sleep-slack face, but settled back down right away.
Kassel added a cough this time. Covered his mouth with his hand and everything like he’d seen Oren do to call attention to the room.
It didn’t help. Beau seemed to be sound asleep still, unaware that there was a demon looming over his bed.
Kassel really didn’t have the time for this.
He took the final few steps toward the bed then reached out with his tail, prodding the lump firmly a few times until he heard the breathing pattern change.
Two pale hands popped out from beneath the blankets, and the next thing Kassel knew, there was an avalanche of plaid being tossed directly into his face.
“GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!” Beau’s voice sounded distressed and rough from sleep, panicked and near hysterical. “There’s nothing to steal here. Leave now or I’ll call the police!”
“Steal?” Kassel asked in exasperation, batting his hands and tail against the blankets until he finally peeled them away from where they were hooked on a horn. He threw them to the ground with athump. The box with Oren’s gift clattered to the floor with them, slipping from his grip during his fight with the thick fabric.
When he looked up, he found Beau crouching in the middle of his bed, a small lamp in his hand extended toward Kassel like a weapon.
“Kassel?” Beau asked in shock after a moment, squinting to adjust to the darkness and running his eyes over him from boots to horn-tip.
Kassel coughed up a few stray tassels from one of the blankets before crossing his arms, decidedly unimpressed so far. “Hello, Beau.”
“What are you doing here?” Beau gasped, letting go of the lamp as if seeing a demon standing next to your bed was a much safer option than a measly human thief.
“Oren sends a gift,” Kassel said, bending down to pick the box up off the floor before handing it to Beau.
“Oren?” Beau frowned, observing first the gift and then Kassel again for answers. His eyes widened. “The author of my book?”
“The same one,” Kassel said, watching Beau place the box on his lap and his hands over the top of it, not opening it, but cradling it like it was precious.
“You came back to deliver a present?” Beau mumbled.
“Among other things.”
“What things?”
“It was brought to my attention that I was sent back without fulfilling my summoning,” Kassel said. “So, I’ve returned.”
“I released you,” Beau said, fumbling for the lamp on the bed and flicking it back on. He held it up, casting strange shadows around the room and over one half of his face.
It fully illuminated the round shininess of his eyes and glinted on his eyelashes as he stared. It also highlighted the distinct, puffy redness of the skin around them that hadn’t been there previously.
Kassel recognized it. He’d made enough souls whimper, after all.
Beau had been crying.
It still made him uncomfortable. He needed to figure out why.
