Worldsoul

Interlude

The Duke knocked, once. She had never been to this place before, but it seemed to her that there was something familiar about it, as though someone lived here whom she had once known. But she was used to palaces, mage-houses, fortresses, not ordinary apartment blocks.

The door opened. She looked through twisted coils of magic.

“You are a demon,” the old lady said.

“That is correct.” The Duke bowed.

“I’m afraid I have no intention of letting you in.”

The Duke had expected this.

“Not a problem. I have no intention of hurting you, however.”

“Then why have you come?”

“I am told that you know a great deal about this quarter, about its magic. I’m looking for someone. A djinn.”

The old lady laughed. “There are many djinns and ifrits in the desert. Have you tried there?”

“I’m reliably informed that this one is in the city itself.”

“I think your informant must be mistaken,” Mariam Shenudah said. “An ifrit in the city would cause a small sensation. They’re quite large, you know.”

“Nevertheless.”

“I can’t help you. I’m very sorry.” Then, guileless, she added, “Have you tried asking Suleiman the Shah? He’s very well connected.”

The demon grinned. “Perhaps a small social call is in the cards.”

Later, she crouched on the roof of the Has, tapping a brass fingernail against the tiles. It would not be wise even for a duke to try to break into the Shah’s palace, but there was more than one way to go about things. From a pocket of her armour, the Duke took a small golden fishing hook and a long line of thread, also gold. Then she cast about for the nearest storyway.

These were evidently rigidly controlled around the domain of the Has. She finally found one, the slightest whisper of an unfinished tale, so gossamer thin that it had crept unnoticed through a crack in the wards. The Duke raised the fishing hook, attached to its line, and dropped it down the storyway. She felt it slide into the Has, and be gripped by a strong rushing tide. The psyche of the Shah, a lodestone within the palace walls. Gremory let the hook be drawn along until it snagged.

The Shah was sleeping. She supposed he had to do that sometimes. His dreams were bloody, and the Duke smiled. A man after her own heart… maybe she’d come back later, pay a genuine social call. Some men were wary of demons, but her grandmother had been a succubus and she could still turn on the charm when she needed to. She sent her own mind down the line, slipping gently into the Shah’s dreaming psyche. She included a few erotic thoughts, just to distract him. But the Shah’s mind was well-guarded. It was like peering at a sealed leaden egg. The Duke cast about for cracks and at last found one in a dream: the Shah, possibly stimulated by her erotic thoughts, was dreaming about a woman. In the dream, she was behaving in a most wanton manner: Gremory wondered idly if this was actually true to life. She could tell that this was a real person, not a dream artefact. She watched with interest as the Shah demonstrated a variety of perversions, culminating as he cried the woman’s name and it snared on the demon’s golden hook.

Her name was Shadow.