#demon!fab

“So.”

He eyed her up and down, the brown-haired girl lounging casually on his bed. 

“You called for me, here I am.”

The brown-haired girl with the razor-sharp, ridged dragon wings that were darker than the smoldering charcoal in her eyes. 

“A demon, huh?” he asked, although it was probably more of a statement. The proof, after all, was right in front of him. 

“Yup.” she sat up, eyeing him as she crossed her legs and folded her wings. If it weren’t for the pointed incisors bared to him as she smiled and the burnt. cracked skin around her eyes, he’d have mistaken her for a regular person. “The summoning spell was specifically for those who wanted to make a deal. So, what’ll it be?” 

Fear flashed through him as she raised her eyebrow and the cracked skin pulled with it, revealing darkness instead of flesh underneath. 

“Protection.”

The word left him involuntarily, yanking itself out of his throat and offering itself to the demon without his permission. The demon chuckled, reaching for and toying with the cross at his bedside. “That’s a first. A Christian boy asking for protection from a demon- and offering his soul for it? It’s been a while since someone’s surprised me like that, Good on you.”

His lungs twisted inside him and he fought for the next breath, the ability to continue. “Someone’s after me, and I don’t know who. I just need prolonged protection from harm, until the contract expires.” he stated, his voice firm but his fingers trembling. 

Her smile spread wider, he could almost see the gears turning in her head. “How long would that be, exactly?” she drawled slowly, honey dripping from her voice and turning into poison as it hit the ground. 

“As long as I need it.” he tried, but she tilted her head back and laughed, the sound bouncing off the walls of his room and invading his ears, curdling around his brain like a vice. 

“I’ll need a time limit to make a deal, sweetheart.” she clarified, cracking the knuckles on her left hand. 

He sighed, accepting the situation for what it was. “Fifteen years and a day. You can do whatever you want to my soul then.”

She arched her other eyebrow, noting the unusual date. “And afterward, I get you soul for eternity. I’m not supposed to say stuff like this, but this seems like you’re asking for the short end of the stick. No money, fame, love of your life? Just fifteen years of safety- really?” she questioned him, and he forced himself to tear his gaze from the floor to look into her obsidian eyes. 

“That, and I can call on you for favours once in a while. Only when I need it, that’s all.” he requested cautiously, and she cracked two more knuckles as something occurred to her. “Okay.”

She lunged forward, her lightning speed catching him off guard as she seized his forearm. “Kenneth San Jose, I will grant you fifteen years and a day of demonic protection from all harm, and you will be able to call upon my services whensoever you deem fit as beneficial to your person. This oath, as sworn and begun the instant you agree to these terms, will be seen to the end of your contract, where you will hand me your soul and I will be given your full permission to do with it what I wish.” she stated, her voice low and powerful. 

He swallowed as she tilted his head up with her finger, forcing him to look straight into her eyes.

“I agree.”

“Alright. The terms are simple, old man. Your soul’s already here, now we just need to torture you for a hundred years or so before it’s twisted enough to-” she was interrupted by her superior pointing to her arms as they began to turn into mist. 

“Cover this guy for me for a while, would you, Ali?” the demon rolled her eyes as her form deteriorated more, and the other demon smiled, revealing crooked fangs as she cracked her neck. “With pleasure, Fab.”

As her entire form was transported into the human world, she landed on two feet, she wondered what he considered an emergency. 

His eyes widened. There she was, burnt eyes and outspread wings in front of him. In front of everyone. 

He was about to open his mouth, but she shushed him, tapping her finger of her temple. Let me into your head, she mouthed. 

Can you hear me? Can they see you? he thought, feeling silly until the familiar voice replied. 

Of course they can’t see me. You’re the only one here with a mark, Kenneth. You’re the only one that can see me regardless of whether I want to be seen or not. 

He breathed a sigh of relief. I need a favour, demon. 

She smiled. Call me Fabiha. 

His favours were few and far between- considering previous cases. Some people developed paranoia over the years, anticipating that the demons would go back on their deals, so they called on them for the slightest thing multiple times a week. Others kept their demons with them at all times, because they assumed the demon served them unconditionally under the terms of the contract. 

Considering he only asked for her to help him out once every three or four months, it wasn’t that bad. 

Until the night of his twenty-first birthday, when she was yanked from hell into the backseat of a car with such urgency that she could barely get her bearings before they slammed into a tree, and the sudden loss of momentum threw his head back from the passenger seat and she saw the blood on his face. 

She assessed the situation as quickly as she could. The person in the driver’s seat was hostile, unfamiliar- and dead. Okay, forget him. 

She kicked the back door open, hopping out and yanking the passenger door open with such force that there were dents in the metal from where it flew off and hit a different tree. 

“Come on, come on. Work with me, damn it.” she said, fingers flying furiously to different parts of his body. Broken ribs. Cut lungs, broken nose from the impact with the dashboard. Severe blood loss. Dented skull. 

Growling, she wrapped her wings around him. Last resort, she thought desperately as she wrapped her wings around him and they both sank into the earth, into Hell. 

“Heal him.” she snarled, ripping past other demons waiting to be healed from conflicts with angels or hunters. Complaints arose from behind her, but she slammed her fist hard on the doctor’s table and her voice dropped an octave, becoming guttural. “I have a contract with this man, and I refuse to break it.”

Everyone became silent. The door to the surgeon’s room swung open, and they entered.

“Good evening, Fabiha dear. Who may this be?” the surgeon smiled pleasantly, but each tooth he showed was different. His eyes glinted in the harsh light, one brown and one blue. In hell, Frankenstein doctors put themselves together. 

“A client, and I’m close to breaking his contract.” she stated, placing Kenneth on the dented surgical table. 

“Then let’s get started.” the doctor said, his words hanging in the air as he snapped his gloves on and picked up a knife. 

He awoke in his bed, the sensation of pain from the dream fading quickly. What time was it? 

“It’s one in the morning. I’m a bit late, I suppose, but happy birthday.” the demon offered, hopping off his desk from where she’d been reading one of his books. 

“Why are you here- why can you hear me if I didn’t let you in?” he asked, alarmed as he sat up. 

“It wasn’t a dream, Kenneth. You could’ve died last night. That’s why I had to bring you downstairs; the doctors up here wouldn’t have a hope of saving you in time.” she said, crossing the room and sitting on the edge of his bed. 

“A few of your ribs- they were splintered, beyond hope. He replaced them with braided asphodel stems. Your lungs were pretty easy, he only needed to sew them back together and seal them with a couple of spells. Nose- realignment was tougher, that took a while and some solvent from a place I’m sure you don’t want to know about- your skull had to be re-molded.”

She gazed at him reluctantly. “I can hear you all the time now, it turns out, when I’m in your presence. We needed a huge blood transfusion and the doctor doesn’t operate on humans very often, so we used mine. You’re welcome.” she said, but her tone was anything but light. 

“So I have demon blood inside me.” he stated, head reeling from the revelation. 

“And the flowers of hell, that too.” she added, “and some magic just floating around keeping you together. It’ll last, don’t worry.”

“That’s not what I’m worried about.”

Silence hung over the room like a death penalty and eventually, she just left. 

“Does this change anything?” he asked, six or seven months later. It was the longest he’d gone without summoning her, and she was almost grateful he’d even remembered. 

“One or two things, but not that much. We’re both still bound to the contract, I’m still protecting you, your soul is still bound for hell. The other things only come into play once I have your soul.”

He fidgeted, opening his mouth to dismiss her but thinking of something else. 

“Why didn’t you just take my soul down there? I’d been abducted, ready to die- why not just take it from me in the car and leave me for dead?” he asked. 

“It would go against the contract. Fifteen years and a day, no less. That’s all.” she said, the words flowing smoothly but her eyes refusing to meet with his. 

She knew this would come eventually. She’d realized what he’d left out the day he’d sworn the oath, but hadn’t brought it up then. Why should she have? Back then, more work would’ve been a hassle. 

He’d asked for personal protection. None for those around him, who he’d either forgotten or neglected to mention that the stalker could target. 

“Fabiha, please. Get her back. Anything to get her back.” he pleaded, tears streaming from his eyes. His mother had been taken, the same people as the guy who had abducted him years ago.

She swallowed, not looking at him. “It’s not part of your contract.” she choked out, “you only asked for personal protection.”

“Then consider it one of my favours!”

“The contract only considers the favours that are beneficial to your person, not those around you.” the words had to strangle themselves out of her throat, and she could barely keep herself in his presence. Her head hung low, eyes watching the tears splash onto the wood floor. 

The next words could have been a fist punching the air out of her lungs. 

“Then take a year off my life. Extend it to the protection of those I love, too.” he said, words raw with emotion as she looked up. 

“You’ll only have a year and three months left, then.” she whispered, and he nodded, his voice evaporating and leaving only enough to cry with. 

Shaking, she reached for his hand, but he grabbed her forearm of his own volition and used a quivering hand to tilt her head up, forcing her to look at him straight in the eye. 

“Kenneth San Jose, I will grant you and those you love demonic protection from all harm, and you will be able to call upon my services whensoever you deem fit. This oath, as sworn and begun the instant you agree to these terms, will be seen to a year before the end of your previous contract, where you will hand me your soul and I will be given your full permission to do with it what I wish.” she said, her voice weak and lacking any power she had had the first time they had made a contract. 

“I agree.”

The closer it came to midnight, the louder the clock seemed to count for him, each tick reminding him how close he was to visiting hell once more. 

“Fabiha?” he asked aloud.

She appeared next to him. They sat in silence for a while, but she couldn’t bear wasting his last few minutes like this. 

“I noticed something the night you were kidnapped, you know.” she broke the suffocating veil of the quiet. “You set the date for death on your thirtieth birthday- now twenty-ninth. Why would you do that?”

He shrugged. “I didn’t really have a reason at the time, but now it feels right. As if there isn’t a better day to leave.”

Thirty seconds until the contract ended. 

“How do you want to die, Ken?” she asked quietly, one last offering. 

He paused. “In my sleep. It seems peaceful enough.”

Twenty seconds. 

“What about your parents, what will they think?”

“I don’t live in their house anymore. They’ll be grateful I didn’t die painfully, at least.”

23:59:50.

“Then I can do one more thing.” she whispered, laying him back and placing her fingers on his eyelids. “Just sleep, okay?”

00:00:01.

He woke up. The place seemed familiar- at least the vibes did, but he had never seen it before. 

“Morning, Ken. I’m a little late, I suppose, but happy birthday.” that voice was so welcoming, and he sat up to see Fabiha hop off the desk. 

“About the whole demon blood in your veins thing- this is the thing I was talking about. You get to skip the whole hundred years of torture thing because technically you’re already demon material.” she said cheerily, handing him a mirror.