Back in her hut, Velvet waited. She had bravely poked the devil, offering him freedom in exchange for a deal, but now what? What if Frenese simply refused to answer?

What if she hadn’t managed to avoid the chains, and was speaking to the cover?

She waited a while longer, until, eventually, when she was about to just give up, a voice sounding both familiar and strange spoke.

The voice was familiar because it was hers, and was strange because it was hers.

“You didn't refuse to keep my prison. Human, you covet power.”

Velvet noticed the double meaning. Yes, Frenese was calling her greedy, but also was implying that the deal she was offering was useless. After all, who will simply release an imprisoned devil? If demons sold for millions of auris, the price of devils was unthinkable. Velvet could ask for anything she desired, no matter how expensive, unique or secret it was, and mages would rush to give it to her.

“Yes, you’re right. I need power and need it fast. Doesn’t that work great for you? A desperate mage; devils and demon’s favorite snack.” She didn’t try to lie. Hyde had told her that demons sensed weakness and troubles, using that skill to make unfair deals, so she didn’t imagine what a devil could sense.

She was already offering freedom to Frenese. Worse deals could hardly be made.

“Corpses don’t fulfill deals.” Frenese replied, using Velvet’s voice.

“And mages who loot corpses don’t give freedom. Seems like me staying alive falls under our mutual interest.” She talked back, trying to make Frenese at least consider the option of a deal.

Frenese sighed, resembling Velvet when she scolded the kids back at Casrey’s orphanage.

Don’t you have any other voices? Dianthus’ for example? On second thought, not his.

“What does your human despair entail?” Was… was Frenese asking about her problems?

Maybe he is waging whenever this conversation is worth maintaining, and that I’m not simply gonna get killed tomorrow.

“The spell I used to seal you made me attract unwanted attention, and keeping you made me attract another type of unwanted attention. I have less than two months to get enough resources to escape the Mergifari untracked.”

“Those chains are not a spell.” Frenese corrected, before making a ‘Hm’ noise. “I’ll hear your offer.”

Velvet almost jumped when Frenese agreed to hear her out. “Be my familiar for a year.”

“No.”

Frenese shot her down instantly, so she was up to a bad start. “Why not? A year cannot be compared to three hundred…”

“Six hundred.” For such a gluttonous devil, he didn’t seem to like it when Velvet said facts wrong.

“Doesn’t that support my offer? What’s a year against six hundred?”

Frenese scoffed, and, this time, Velvet could hear the devil’s real voice behind her own. “Only low ranked demons offer themselves as familiars.”

To be honest, Velvet had almost guessed that on her own. She knew Hyde was weak, being the first demon she crossed on Ars Cryses’ hell. And the one she ate, Siberina’s familiar, was also relatively weak and small.

None of those compared themselves to the crocodile demon who escaped the Mergifari’s market, killing almost half the action’s participants on its way.

If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Demons had a clear hierarchy, not by size, since Udulluay was in the smaller scale (unless all his bodies counted, then her opinion might change), and only the ones at the bottom of the barrel, or the ones at the most surface level of hell, had any interest in becoming mages’ familiars.

“Alright, forget that. Ten wishes. Fulfill ten wishes of mine and you’ll be free.” Velvet offered her second choice.

“I think you are mistaking what I am. I’m no trapped genie.”

Mages really liked to seal things, didn’t they?

“Petitions, it was a figure of speech. I meant ten petitions.” Velvet corrected herself again, under Frenese’s nitpicky personality. He wasn’t that picky eating. “And, before you say I can simply stall the wishes for eternity, the time limit of those wishes is two years. No tricks. From either side.”

Frenese fell silent, the deal not being anything too exaggerated. Even so, he changed the offer. “One year. Ten petitions.”

Before Velvet could complain, he continued. “You might not survive two years.”

Taking a deep breath, she didn’t refute him. “Alright. It’s a deal.”

Even when she said that, they still spent several hours detailing the deal’s contents. None of them trusted the other, so they ended up making clauses for every little detail.

The important ones were the ones preventing Frenese from ‘curling the monkey’s paw’ over Velvet. Every petition was under the demands of the situation Velvet wanted to deal with, and not of free understanding. None of the petitions could endanger Frenese’s or Velvet’s lives. A petition couldn’t be used to ask for more petitions. Petitions had to be confirmed as petitions, and any random comment from Velvet couldn’t be considered one. If any petitions remained unclaimed once the year ended, they would be traded for high-tier knowledge.

And, the last one: once the year ended, Velvet had to open a portal to Frenese’s hell, using the summoning ritual he provided, and release him. The summoning ritual and the following release of Frenese could not harm Velvet in any way, including dragging her to hell, curses… If any harm came to her during that time, Frenese would die.

Velvet would die too if she refused to release Frenese once the deal was fulfilled, unless the current circumstances at that moment made the summon impossible, and, in that case, the summoning would wait until the danger had passed.

Once they were satisfied with the full contract, Velvet repeated the chant she had made with Baraviodos on the train.

“Frenese.” First, recite the devil’s name.

“I”

“Offer this deal under Andras Apolyon.” Like the previous time, when Andra’s name was spoken, the atmosphere changed, and she felt being watched. The string of information covering the Deal’s content filled her mind, and she went over it in silence.

“Accept this deal under Andras Apolyon.” A sharp stabbing pain crossed her mind, times worse than when Baraviodos’ Deal sealed in her. Her Esca trembled, and her whole arm did too, several strings of symbols shining over the skin covering her whole body in red light, before losing their momentum, disappearing progressively.

The only remaining symbol was the two distorted A’s, one normal and one inverted, almost forming a red star.

Velvet opened and closed her hand in repeated motions, trying to recover her mobility and shook off the trembling.

The Devil’s Deal was sealed. She was now connected to Frenese, the devil who caused the death of seventy-two mages, and the insanity of fourteen.

“Now,” She started. “Petition number one: How do I heal someone from the Predator Paradigm affected by your madness?”

She wanted to heal Nereus, but also knew that finding the means might take time, so, the sooner she knew what she needed, the better.

“There’s two options.” Frenese’s stolen voice said. “First, find a sphynx willing to treat them. They are located on the ruins of Ihilia.”

Ihilia… Almost on the other side of the world, the furthest away possible from the Mergifari, for not to say, the second continent more dangerous to explore.

“What’s a sphynx?” She had never heard about that creature.

“Is that a petition?”

“No.” She could search for the correspondent information on the Mergifari’s archives.

“Second, hunt and feed them the Sæhrímnir, until their hunger is satiated.”

She didn’t know what the Sæhrímnir was, but didn’t ask, knowing what Frenese would say.

“You can find it deep inside the Mergifari’s Unnamed Forest.”

Behind the barrier. Behind the barrier from where the members of the tragic gathering had captured the demonic crocodile.

Behind the barrier which hadn’t fallen for hundreds and hundreds of years, where only official mages were allowed entrance.

Also, Frenese used ‘the’ to refer to the creature. Was it only one specimen?