The Demon and the Fox Read online

  The Demon and the Fox

  Tim Susman

  For Ned

  Who has always been there

  Contents

  1. The Calyx

  2. The Fight

  3. Dependence

  4. Aftermath

  5. Spiritual Holds

  6. History in the Making

  7. Loyalty

  8. Master Cott

  9. The Isle of Dogs

  10. Master Albright

  11. The Calatians

  12. Spiritual Sorcery

  13. Christmas

  14. Making Plans

  15. Master Gugin

  16. Ignition

  17. Regrouping

  18. Alice

  19. Trust Issues

  20. The Demon

  21. The Answer

  22. Resolution

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  About the Illustrator

  Also by Tim Susman

  1

  The Calyx

  “If you’re going to search the ruins,” Master Odden said, “you’ll have to summon a demon.”

  Kip Penfold, the stout master’s apprentice as of one week before, sat up straighter in the chair in Odden’s office, his long bushy tail curling around one of the chair legs. “I can do it,” he said.

  Behind him in a copper brazier, a large lizard-like creature moved restlessly. Covered in black scales around which the bright red-gold of its nature showed in cracks, it radiated heat and an acrid smell of phosphorus that battled the autumn chill and smell of leaves that crept in through the shutters. Kip’s position in front of the desk, between the brazier and the shutters, meant that his large triangular ears were warm and his fingertips cold. He preferred that, to be honest; the fox-Calatian’s ears were most often cold this time of year, so it was pleasant to have them warmed. And he enjoyed sitting in Odden’s office for two reasons. The first was that he almost always learned something new about sorcery when he sat before the broad oak desk. The second was that he had decided that one day, when he was a master sorcerer (when), he would have an office very like this, packed with old books and scrolls and knowledge, with a phosphorus elemental and a window that looked out from Prince George’s College of Sorcery down Founder’s Hill to the town of New Cambridge. And his friends Emily, Malcolm, and Coppy would have nearby offices. Perhaps the outer buildings destroyed in the mysterious attack some six months before would be rebuilt by then, but Kip still loved the ancient White Tower, even with its cold stone, even living as he did currently in its damp, mold-infested basement.

  Master Odden reached behind him to the large bookshelf and found a large tome by feel without taking his attention from Kip. “Wouldn’t be teaching you if I thought you couldn’t,” he said, bringing it to his desk and flipping pages to the fourth in a dozen thin leather bookmarks. “In the interest of not having three or four demons floating wildly about, you’re going to watch me do the spell first.”

  Kip’s large ears flattened down from their upright position. “What could an unbound demon do?” he asked. “I mean, are there limits on their powers?”

  “Demons can apply their will to bend reality as they see fit,” Odden recited absently, his finger moving down the page. “First order demons like Burkle have little power to do anything more than what Burkle does: clean floors, move desks. They could be a nuisance if unbound but more likely would return home quickly. Second order are more powerful and can affect people, though rarely permanently. Third order are used in war. It was a third-order demon that froze Napoleon’s commanders at Waterloo.”

  He paused at that, and Kip nodded, trying to see the words on the page, but the writing was tiny and the contrast not strong enough for his eyes to make out. “I’ve seen the re-creation, sir.”

  “Many of the wars of the last hundred years have been strategic application of third-order demons and fights between them. Third order demons have particular affinities, so not all of them would be able to freeze fifty soldiers, or burn an entire town. Ah, here we are.”

  Odden’s finger stopped at a name, which he copied with his other hand onto a scroll and slid across the table. “Pronounce that.”

  Kip took the paper and held it to the lamp. “Nikolon?”

  “Knee,” Odden said. “Nee-koh-lahn.”

  Kip tried again, and this time Odden gave a quick nod of approval. Kip returned the paper to the desk. “Isn’t there a fourth order of demons?”

  “Mm, yes.” Odden closed the book. “But it takes an enormous amount of power and discipline to bind one even for a handful of minutes.” He stood. “We suspect it was a fourth order demon that destroyed the college.”

  Kip stood hurriedly, clasping his paws together. He wanted to ask what that would look like, the fury of the most powerful order of demons unleashed on four simple brick buildings and a hundred sorcerers and apprentices. He had only heard the noise of it, rolling down the hill on a warm spring night like thunder, and now the crushed and broken buildings were hidden below wood and canvas tents to all eyes save for demons.

  As Odden replaced the first book and took down a second, Kip asked, “Are the names of the fourth-order demons also in that book?”

  “They are, which is why this book is not in the library but remains under my care.”

  “What about when you’re not here?”

  “The book is well protected.” The sorcerer opened the second book to the summoning and binding spells, on facing pages, and turned it toward Kip.

  “But—”

  “It is not your concern.” Odden’s large, pale hand gestured toward the tome, “The summoning of demons is. Now, recite the spells.”

  The first spell bore enough similarities to the elemental summoning spell that Kip had found it easy to memorize. Rather than asking any of the other questions clamoring in his mind, he asked, “Sir, why does it take more power to summon demons than elementals?”

  “Hm, yes.” Odden leaned back and gazed past Kip to the brazier. “Elementals wish to move around. They are simple spirits—you will have noticed—who grow bored as easily in their home sphere as they do here. Reaching out to them, you provide a conduit for them to go somewhere interesting. Demons are spirits of a different sphere, and understand very well what a summons from a sorcerer means: binding and work.”

  The phosphorus elemental in the brazier, who had introduced itself to Kip as Benny, now peered over the lip of the brazier with curious, ember-bright eyes. "Who's got home spheres?" he demanded in a high-pitched crackle. "We got a Flower, that's all."

  Kip turned to smile at Benny. “The Flower’s at the center of the sphere,” he said. “You just can’t see the edges because you never go far enough from it.”

  “Why would we?” Benny shifted, making a clanking noise in the brazier.

  Odden tapped the book. “Penfold, focus on the lesson.”

  So Kip recited the spell again, slowly and then faster, and then they moved on to the binding spell. “This is the more difficult and important of the two,” Odden said. “An unbound demon can inflict any kind of pain on a sorcerer, from a minor itching curse to a lifelong affliction. They usually stop short of killing, but they have left sorcerers and other people so crippled that they choose death soon after.”

  “Why wouldn’t they kill us?” Kip asked.

  “We do not know. Our bound demons, when asked why they will not kill sorcerers, say only that they have not been ordered to, and unbound demons are not inclined to answer questions. Now attend; this is the most important thing: simply because you have summoned a demon does not mean you can bind it. The binding more than the summoning requires a calyx to enhance the sorcerer’s power. Therefore you w
ill use only the names of demons researched by previous sorcerers, whose power is known. Summoning an unknown demon puts you at great risk, and unless you become a demon researcher, you should never resort to that.”

  Kip nodded, his eyes drifting up to the tome with all the bookmarks in it. “Where do the names come from?”

  “Old manuscripts, from the Greeks and Romans and Carthaginians, and some older than that even. If you care to study the history of demons, Florian will allow you access to the library’s books on the subject. Now, the binding spell.”

  After another hour of recitation of both spells, Odden got to his feet. “Very well, you are at least as prepared as I was for my first lesson. Go to the cupboard there and bring out the items you will find on the top shelf.”

  The tall, narrow cupboard stood as high as Odden; the taller fox reached the top shelf with ease. “Careful,” the sorcerer said as Kip’s paw found a pewter goblet and then the handle of a narrow silver knife. His fur prickled as he lifted the weight of the knife and drew its blade out into the light. Perhaps, he thought desperately, it was only symbolic.

  He turned with them in his paws to see his master stopped, one hand on the handle of his office door. He huffed out a breath. “There are, er, preparations that must be done.”

  “All right.” It took a moment for Kip to realize what he meant, and by the time the door was opening onto the outer room of Odden’s office, Kip knew what he was going to see.

  On one of the beds sat a Calatian, a short dormouse in a linen tunic and trousers. Kip knew him, but not well: Jacob Thomas, whose son Matthew was two years younger than Kip and now worked the Thomas family farm. Behind him stood Master Patris, the school’s headmaster, arms folded under his thick white beard. “We’re ready,” Odden said.

  Staring at his feet, Jacob rose and shuffled past Odden and then Kip into the room. Patris followed him at a slow pace, closing the door behind them. As Jacob made his way to the chair Kip had been sitting in, the headmaster pushed him to one side and took the chair.

  Odden said, “Stay there, Penfold.”

  Kip hadn’t moved, still leaning against the desk. He set down the goblet and knife for Odden to pick up and curled his tail around his legs as his master took them to the other side of the desk where Jacob stood. His father, who had been a calyx for all of Kip’s life, had never told him what happened in that private ritual between sorcerer and Calatian. All Kip knew, vaguely, was that more powerful magics required the participation of a Calatian, of any species. He had also never been told that the headmaster had to attend calyx rituals, but as Patris’s eyes didn’t leave Kip, he suspected he knew the explanation for that.

  Jacob remained still, staring down at his feet, his tail limp. Odden set the pewter goblet on the desk, keeping the knife in his hand. Kip knew that his father had survived many calyx rituals without being killed, but something primal in him wanted to leap across the desk and knock the knife away. He kept seeing the knife plunge into Jacob’s neck, no matter how strongly he told himself that Odden wasn’t going to do that. To control his anxiety, he turned aside, and there met the eyes of Patris, expectant, even hungry for his reaction.

  This, oddly, helped. Turning aside had been a weakness and Patris had seen it, and Kip hated that. His desire to confound Patris flooded him, more immediate than his fear for Jacob; it allowed him to turn back and watch the ritual with the confidence that Odden would not stab Jacob. Indeed, the sorcerer turned the knife so the edge rather than the point faced the dormouse. The silver blade held Kip’s eyes as Odden seized the dormouse’s paw and with a series of quick scrapes exposed the skin on the bend in his left elbow. Jacob took the goblet in his right paw, held it under the bare spot, and then turned his head to his left.

  Odden, with his back to Kip, turned the dormouse’s arm and then pushed the point of the silver knife into the skin.

  Blood pushed past the knife and dripped down into the cup. Jacob’s eyes squeezed closed but Kip’s remained open. He forced himself to remain outwardly calm even as the sharp tang of blood reached his nose through the haze of phosphorus, aware of Patris’s scrutiny. “You must be careful,” Odden said in a toneless voice. “This is where the vein is closest to the skin, but push too deeply and you may pierce the artery. If blood gushes rather than trickles, press the wound closed and call Master Splint immediately.”

  Numb, Kip nodded, though his attention was on the vessel that was gathering the blood. Just because it was a goblet didn’t mean it was for drinking. Maybe they had to hold it, to touch cloth or fingers to it.

  After a time, Jacob lifted his head to the sorcerer. Odden shook his head. “A little more this time,” he said.

  An eternity later, it seemed to Kip, Odden wiped the knife clean with a stained cloth and then, as Jacob placed the goblet on the corner of the sorcerer’s desk, dropped the cloth onto the dormouse’s wound. Jacob pressed his fingers there and waited.

  “That’s enough for now,” Odden said. “Thank you, Thomas.”

  The dormouse stood, still holding the cloth to his arm. Kip waited for Patris to get up, to leave, but when the headmaster remained still, the fox strode to the door and opened it. Jacob walked through without a word of acknowledgment, his thin tail dragging on the ground behind him.

  At the thunk of the door closing, Odden cleared his throat. “Your father never told you.”

  Kip shook his head. Keeping his tail and ears calm was taking all his energy; he felt he couldn’t spare any to speak. Patris had turned, rested an arm over the back of the chair so he could watch the fox, and Kip was determined not to give him anything he was hoping for.

  “That’s good. That’s what we instruct. But you never know when families choose to, ah, you know, parents feel they must warn their children.”

  Kip swallowed against the lump in his throat. The smell of blood refused to dispel in the still air of the office. “No.”

  “The magic that made Calatians,” Odden slipped again into a recitation, “remains in their blood. Though it does not allow them to access magic any more easily…” Here he touched a finger to the goblet and interrupted himself, with a look at Patris. “Hm.”

  “I don’t…” Kip cleared his throat. “I don’t know any other Calatians besides Coppy who can cast magic.”

  “No. And Lutris is not as proficient as you are.” The master lifted his hand. “The blood of the Calatians does help a sorcerer focus and reach more magical energy when ingested.”

  Of course it was ingested. He tried desperately not to picture his father bleeding into a mug.

  “The effects last only for a short time. A swallow is sufficient to summon a demon of the first order, and that’s all we will be working with now.”

  We? Patris’s presence felt even more sinister now. He was going to watch Kip drink Calatian blood.

  Odden’s hand rested on the pewter mug. “We will recite the spell several times until you are confident in it. I will drink and cast the spell first. You will attend, then you will drink and cast the spell with the name I give you. Is that clear?”

  “But—“

  Odden opened his mouth, but Patris spoke first. “Penfold, if you will not follow your master’s most basic instructions, we can bring an end to this relationship.”

  By expelling him from the college, of course; Patris’s meaning was clear. Kip swallowed. “Yes, sir.”

  Patris nodded back to Odden as though he’d rendered the other sorcerer a service, and Kip’s master spoke again. “There is much you do not know or understand.” He picked up the goblet of blood and moved to the empty dais in the center of his office. The movement brought a fresh wave of the smell to Kip’s nose, but he managed not to flinch. “I shall speak the spells slowly so you may follow along,” Odden said. “Binding first and then the summoning.”

  When he’d summoned the phosphorus elementals, Kip had only spoken the summoning spell because he hadn’t been sure it would work, and had had to hurriedly bind his elemental befor
e it set the whole basement ablaze. He focused on that memory as Odden took his first drink. When he set the goblet down on the desk, red smears remained around his lips.

  Kip breathed a little easier when the sorcerer wiped his face with a cloth. He perked his ears, trying to ignore the smell and Patris’s presence as Odden walked around the desk to the work area. The fox came to stand beside his master as the sorcerer recited the binding spell and tied it to the summoning.

  When he finished the summoning spell, the air in front of his hands shimmered and a strong tingle like peppermint oil assailed Kip’s nostrils. The fox had learned to associate that sensation with the presence of a demon, but had only told his friends at the school that he possessed this ability. Fortunately Odden didn’t notice the fox’s nose wrinkling, his attention fixed on the summoned demon, who materialized as a stout young man with pale skin and coal-black curly hair, thick enough almost to make him modest despite his lack of clothes. Between his legs, though, a scaly green serpent emerged from the thatch of hair and looked about the room with glossy black eyes.

  “Clothe yourself so as to conceal your form from chest to knees, Eichann,” Odden said, bored, and a moment later the serpent and much of the demon’s body vanished beneath a dirty white toga wrapped around his waist and over one shoulder. The demon’s expression didn’t change.

  “You must always command demons very precisely, Penfold.” Patris turned his chair to face the demon.

  Odden frowned, half-turning toward the headmaster before he stopped himself. “Yes. Had I simply ordered Eichann to clothe himself, he might have donned a single sock, or a cap.”