I stayed on my side of the bed all night, but somewhere in the dark, Lydia reached for me, and I woke up holding her hand.

I knew I was making a terrible mistake, touching her, but she didn’t feel like my jailer or my temptress anymore. She felt like a friend who needed me, as she recovered from a beating she took in my place.

The next morning, I woke up and immediately asked, “How’s the finger?”

She wagged her injured right hand at me, showing a blackened pinkie that had already grown halfway back.

“Demon regeneration is some good shit,” I observed.

“Our bodies are made from a kind of flesh, but much simpler than yours, and much easier to maintain. I can recover from just about anything, as long as I maintain a connection to my Master in Hell. He can even grow me a new body, if I suffer enough damage to force my soul back. I can’t truly die, as long as my heart remains in my Master’s vault, so no matter what our enemies do to me, I will always come back to you.”

I wanted to reach out and kiss her again, so instead, I got up and heated leftovers, splitting our remaining burger with her. We both knew she didn’t need to eat, but little things like this maintained the illusion of a normal life, and Lydia had decided that comfort was worth more than the money I was spending on food.

After we ate, I leaned over to grab the dishes and gave a sudden, involuntary intake of breath.

“Timothy, are you hiding injuries from me?”

“Nothing serious. I tweaked my back when I went through the swing set, and my face is swelling up from where he smacked me like a bitch, but he wasn’t trying to hurt me for real.”

Lydia said, “Give me your hand.” But I hesitated, and she said, “I can heal you, just give me your hand.”

“I’ll be fine,” I insisted.

“Is that why you wore a shirt to bed? To hide what he did to you?”

“It’s not that big a deal. Not the first time I’ve been knocked around by a bigger guy.”

“But now you have me,” Lydia said. “I can heal this in seconds, just give me your hand.”

“No,” I finally said. “Bad enough that I put my hands on you last night, I do not want you using magic on me.”

“Do you honestly believe I would hurt you, after what you saw last night? After I’ve been in your bed for weeks?”

“No, I don’t think you would hurt me. But you’re already so deep in my life, literally talking in my head. I feel like I’m on a ramp, sliding down into… god knows what. I should be running for that fucking door, but I can’t… Something about this. You and me. It doesn’t feel wrong. It should feel wrong. I keep waiting for it to feel wrong, but…”

An involuntary surge of magic came in and flashed in my eyes, bringing Lydia to her feet.

“I’m all right!” I waved her off. “I’ve got it! I’m just… a little worked up. That big bastard could have killed me with one finger yesterday. I stood there and watched him beat on you, knowing I couldn’t do a goddamn thing! I may not… entirely trust you, but I can’t just stand there useless while you’re getting hurt.”

“You did not ‘just stand there,’” Lydia reminded me. “You charged in and fought for me. We battled one of the strongest lieutenants in Hell yesterday, and we won. Engaging him was terribly reckless, and I would beg you to not do it again, but I am so proud of you. Neither one of us could have won that fight alone.”

“I know,” I said, pacing around the room, “and that’s a problem. It’s not gonna stop. Even if you and your Master disappeared tomorrow, it’s not gonna stop. There are a million demons on this planet now, and I’m a target for every single one of them. I can’t hide what I am, and I can’t go back! Even if you went back to Hell tonight, I can’t just pretend to be a normal guy anymore. This power is in me now, and everybody can see it! I’m like the new gunslinger in town and everybody wants a shot at me!”

I collapsed behind my desk and put my head in my hands. “I’ve never thrown a punch in my life, but I’ve got to learn how to fight. These things are not just ‘bullies.’ This isn’t some trivial self-confidence problem like confronting my father or standing up for myself at work. These things are demons. Old, smart, and even the little ones are stronger than me! How am I supposed to fight something I can’t even understand?”

“You already know what to do,” Lydia said. “If you’re ready to fight, I can put a weapon in your hand. Trust me, trust the book, and a year from now, you won’t be running from demons, you’ll be hunting them for sport.”

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“I would settle for not getting my ass kicked!” I yelled, as the magic surged again, hard enough to rattle dishes in the sink.

Lydia just stared at me, waiting, knowing she had already won.

“Lydia, bring me the book.”

* * *

A tiny version of Taltorak appeared in her hand and expanded to full size when she threw it on my desk.

The physical manifestation of it was beautiful and terrifying, a giant black tome with a single rune on the cover in blood red. It looked old, but not worn, like a modern replica of something ancient. There was a powerful copper and ozone scent coming off it, but it didn’t move.

I crept toward the book like it was a snake about to bite me. I didn’t hear literal voices. Nothing spoke to me directly, but I got a weird warm feeling from it, like it was beckoning to me. There was a distinct male energy to it, and I swear it felt like it wanted to help me, like it was resentful of, even hostile to the demons who had stolen it.

Azael is trying to pin me down on this one, so I’ll just admit it. I accepted this thing because it felt like those spirits were on my side. That book was a weapon that had been corrupted to serve demons, but the knowledge in it could be used against them. I swear something told me that as I approached, without explicitly using words.

Maybe it was a trick. Maybe the book was just telling me what I wanted to hear, but it felt pretty damn sincere to me. Baalphezar may have stolen this book, but it felt like this thing hated him, and the spirits inside were begging me to set them free.

It didn’t feel like I was connecting with demons when I touched it; it felt like I was connecting with a kind of family, bonded together by loneliness, greed, and regret. I put my hand on Taltorak and felt the collective humiliation of all these wizards who had embraced demons and damned themselves to Hell. They weren’t trying to corrupt me, they were telling me to be strong, begging me to resist - the spirits of a thousand fallen men, begging me to be stronger than they were.

This book hadn’t just been used to seduce and empower my family. It had been used by hundreds of wizards, used to enslave whole bloodlines older than mine, reaching back thousands of years.

Baalphezar hadn’t invented this succubus-wizard thing. Demons had been using this trick to control wizards since the first guy who could read runes realized demons could come in female shapes.

I had been overwhelmed by Lydia’s promises and the prospect of being bound by a contract, but this book had the power to fix everything. The spirits told me I could turn the tables and punish the assholes who did this to us, if I was brave enough and strong enough to use it. I didn’t feel particularly brave or strong standing there, but I reached out, of my own free will, and put my hand on the book.

* * *

The minute I touched it, an amorphous blob of shadows and teeth popped into existence, full size, and jumped up to lick my face. I screamed like a woman and fell on my ass. The Guardian jumped on my chest and started licking me like a puppy, while I frantically tried to push it off.

It didn’t feel completely physical as I touched it. It felt like pushing on a cloud of black smoke with hard muscles shifting underneath.

Finally, Lydia yelled, “No! Come to me!” and snapped her fingers at knee level, exactly like she was calling a dog.

I was still on the ground, hyperventilating, mute with terror as the Guardian bounded over to her with its tongue hanging out. Clearly, if it had a tail, it would have been wagging.

“Lydia, what the fuck?” I yelled, trembling as I picked myself up off the floor. “How could you let that thing out when you know I’m terrified of it!”

“I didn’t let it out!” Lydia yelled back. “You must have been thinking about him when you touched the book!”

“Of course, I was thinking about him! I’m thinking about how he sliced me up and ripped a man’s spine out! I wasn’t trying to summon the fucking thing!”

“Timothy, please relax. This Guardian belongs to you now, just like me and the book. He’s meant to be your companion, and your protector. All of your ancestors made friends with him. Not all of them let him run around the house, but he followed Stefan everywhere.

“He’s completely loyal, smarter than a dog, and many times more deadly. He should be invisible to casual observers, and he can spot threats that I can’t. I’m sorry he scares you, but I assure you, with him in the room, you have never been safer in your life. He can handle anything human that comes through that door, faster than most of them can react. He can even kill small demons and spot other wizards trying to scry on you. Just give him a chance!”

“Give him a chance?” I shouted, incredulous. “Absolutely not. Put him back in the book.”

Lydia scritched behind his ears and pointed to the book, still hovering in mid-air. But the creature just sat there with his tongue lolling out, looking at me with beady red eyes.

“He’s not listening to me,” Lydia said. “You’ll have to give the command.”

I pointed and yelled, “Get back in the book!” with as much authority as I could.

The creature gave a kind of reverberating whine somewhere between a demon howl and a dog bark and vanished back inside the book.

“You keep that fucking thing away from me,” I scolded Lydia. “I don’t ever want to see it again.”

Lydia sighed. “He’ll only come out if you call for him, but sometimes he interprets thinking about him as a call for help.”

“So, if I have a nightmare about him, he’ll treat it like a call for help and jump on my fucking bed?”

“Best to try and not think about him. I’ll stop him if I can. Honestly, the best way to keep him out of your bed would be to let him sleep in your bedroom or tell him to guard the front door.”

“So, he can eat the fucking mailman? Or snack on my delivery drones?”

Lydia sighed. “I’m sorry he scares you, but he’s a good boy. You really should try to make friends with him; especially now, in these early days, until you learn to protect yourself.”

My parents had a dog when I was small, a giant German Shepard mix that outweighed me by a good thirty pounds. The dog would jump on me, knock me over, and sit on me, every time I went in the back yard.

It was just a big, dumb animal having fun, but I hated that fucking dog.

I let the trash pile up because I was too scared to go in the back yard, until eventually my parents would yell at me and I would have to face the dog, trying to run fast enough to get past him or brace myself enough to stay on my feet. I would thrash and yell for help every time it pinned me, but no one ever came.

I dreamed about that dog all night and woke up the next morning to find the Guardian sitting by the front door with my shoes in his mouth.

“Lydia! Are you summoning this fucking thing?”

“No,” she said calmly. “You are.”