Book 2 Ch 14: Bargain

“A good contract relies on all parties involved bargaining in good faith. This is why there are so few good contracts.”

• Daveen Norman, Master of the Guild of Law

Solomon looked at the void in the shape of a horned man in front of him. He hadn’t expected this result, that a demon other than Agog would appear. He hadn’t even realized that was a possibility. He was keenly feeling his inexperience, but it didn’t change his purpose or needs. He noted that the Lord of Shade didn’t have a glow of mana around him, that was good, it meant he wouldn’t need to worry about binding him making it more likely that he’d be caught as a mage.

“Nice to meet you,” he said instead, meeting the purple gaze of the demon, using politesse to mentally reset.

“Is it? It’s rare for anyone to be pleased to see me.”

“Perhaps I’d feel differently if I’d met you as an enemy.”

The demon chuckled. “We’re about to negotiate against one another. We are enemies.” he leaned back on his throne. “Now. Begin with your requests.”

“I wish to bind you into my service. You will teach me the language of your kind. You will assist me in creating binding contracts. You will assist me in matters of the arcane, and you will act in my defense and those I wish protected. You will warn me of impending danger. For the duration of your service you will not harm anyone without my explicit permission. You will stay hidden unless I allow you to reveal yourself. You will not sabotage any contracts you assist with binding, and the method you use to teach me your language will not harm me or damage my mind or mental faculties. You will not lie to me, and I can dismiss you permanently at will.”

The demon’s eyes narrowed.

“For such demands I will require a sacrifice once a week. An intelligent soul. I will also need to feed off of sixty percent of your mana in order to sustain myself. Possession of your body for three hours a day as well.”

“A yearly sacrifice of an intelligent soul, with the option to provide multiple sacrifices early and bank them for following years. Five percent of my generated mana should be more than enough to sustain yourself. Possession is non-negotiable, but I can agree to have a homunculus body that you can possess within three years and use for extended periods of time, with the caveat that you cannot act in a way that harms others or damages other people when utilizing it, and you are still bound to my orders within that form.”

“For this I will assist you in binding contracts, but not matters of the arcane. I will teach you my language. I may lie to you. My dismissal occurs only with your death. I will only protect you if I wish to, and I will reveal myself as I please. I will harm others as I please, but will hide my actions and will not act lethally.”

“You will remain in my service. I will provide you a guaranteed yearly sacrifice of an intelligent soul. For this you will teach me the language of your kind in a way that does me no harm of any kind and aid me in adding binding magic to contracts if I wish it. You will warn me of impending danger, giving me enough time to react to it. You will also answer three requests for assistance per year without additional bargaining. This assistance can be martial, arcane, or anything else within your power. You will remain hidden unless I ask you to reveal yourself, except to provide me with verbal or physical warnings of danger which you will make sure are only knowable to me, and you will not lie to me or speak without me requesting to speak to you. I may ask you unlimited yes or no questions that you must answer. If I wish you to defend me, or take an action beyond what I’ve laid out, we bargain for additional sacrifices or other deals. I will allow you five percent of my mana to sustain yourself in this realm so long as we are bound. When I have the skills to form a homunculus of the quality desired for your possession, we shall bargain for it separately. While our pact is ongoing you cannot harm others without my explicit permission, nor can you harm my holding or belongings. I can end our pact at will. The moment we complete this deal you will remove all evidence of the ritual I used to summon you, leaving the sacrifice, my memories, and the deal itself intact.”

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The demon drummed his fingers on the arm of the throne in thought for a few moments.

“This is… reasonable."

He stood from his throne and took a step toward the edge of the summoning circle, holding out a hand.

"I cannot break any of these rules you have laid out, but if you break those parts of the agreement laid out for yourself, I will not longer be bound to this agreement."

Solomon thought through what he had said, making sure that he hadn’t missed anything. He amended what he’d said a few times, adding in more specific wording regarding what the demon could or could not do. The demon waited patiently, keeping its hand extended until Solomon had finished making every minute change.

He took the demon’s hand, surprised at the solidity of the shadow he was made of. He felt a brief burst of heat pass between their palms, then the demon was gone.

Solomon stood in the quiet for a few moments, the smell of brimstone and sulfur thick in the air around him, and a pair of purple eyes hanging in the air just in front of him.

“Do you feel you got the better of me in that deal, Aristopheles?”

“Yes,” responded his baritone close to his left ear.

Solomon frowned. He knew the demon couldn’t lie to him now that the binding was complete.

“Is there a way in which you could subvert the deal I hadn’t bargained against?”

Silence this time. As it didn’t answer yes or no that meant that it wasn’t certain. That would have to suffice for the moment.

Solomon turned his attention to the corpse in front of him and the ritual around him. He dragged the corpse to the corner before withdrawing all of his blood back into the vials and corking each of them. Once that was done a shadow slowly worked its way across the floor, all of the markings and reagents slowly fell into it and then the shadow vanished with them, even the smell of sulfur and brimstone was gone. After that he moved to Dukat’s corpse and dipped his fingers into his chest wound. He took the blood and wrote the word Thief across the wall. He had considered the word traitor to send any suspicions toward the Tide, but considering that the man had stolen from James and caused him so much trouble, he felt his friend should deal with some trouble as well. After all, if he had the authority or leverage to keep the Etling guard from Moonfallow so long, then some of the men that were sent would certainly recognize the implications of the message. When he was done he cast Cloak of Darkness again to obscure himself.

He quietly made his way back into the main room of the watch, where he found the guard still sleeping at his desk. He crept out of the side door and left it open walking a few blocks up the street. There was an abandoned building there, some kind of storehouse, right near a well, but a fair distance from the other buildings. He searched it to ensure that no one was squatting, and when he was sure it was clear he exited and retrieved the small fire bottle he’d made. He lit the rag stuck within it using spark and threw it through the window, watching for a moment to make sure that the fire spread.

He wanted to avoid making the Moonfallow guards look like larger fools than they were while also giving more evidence that the murder of Dukat had been performed by more mundane means. With the fire they would’ve had a good reason to be distracted.

With the blaze growing he carefully snuck back into an alley and watched, waiting to ensure that the guard was reacting to it. After only a few minutes he saw several guards arrive at the well and begin bringing up buckets of water, a few citizens joining them with shovels to put out smaller fires with soil.

Certain that things were in hand he gradually made his way back to the tree he’d arrived in town through. Once there he cast tree walking to place himself at the edge of the manor. He walked carefully across his grounds until he reached his window. He scrambled up it, landing more heavily than he’d meant to. He undressed, and washed the blood off his hands, adding some ink to it to make it less obvious what he’d cleaned.

After that he lay in bed and closed his eyes pretending to sleep, but actually taking stock of himself and what he’d done. The five percent of his mana that was being constantly drained felt manageable. In an emergency, he could dismiss Aristopheles in order to gain it back, but if a fight got to his last five percent of mana it was likely he was doomed anyway. Aside from that the demon seemed very powerful and the three yearly free assists would more likely make a major difference than that five percent. The sacrifice of an intelligent soul was unfortunate, but considering how many he’d needed to kill since he’d gained his magic he felt that it was likely opportunities would present themselves without issue. If they didn’t he trusted himself to be able to find a solution that suited him. The most important benefit was the warnings he would provide. Too often had Solomon been caught flat-footed and caused more and more suspicion to be heaped on him. If he could react more quickly and proactively, it would save him tremendous trouble in the future.

The summoning itself had flowed incredibly well, both his incantation and his mana. It had the same feel as when he made homunculi or performed blood magic. All of the spells were very different, aside from one element that made them all similar. They were all forbidden. It seemed he’d found his focus. Perhaps it was a good thing he hadn't been born with mana. If he had joining the Union would've meant he'd never have known what he was truly good at.