Breathe in the Embers

Part 9

“What?”

“Balrog.” Martin repeated, still flushed with embarrassment, unable to meet the confused gaze of Lithuega. “Like… there is a creature in The Fellowship of the Ring, by J.R.R. Tolkien. It’s sort of like a demon. Gandalf says it is made of ‘shadow and flame’, and since you can… y’know, turn into a shadow, and control fire… I just thought it was appropriate.”

“No. That sounds like something the roleplay nerds would come up with.” Lithuega objected, arms crossed.

“You do know I’ve played Dungeons and Dragons before… right? I thought I mentioned that.”

“Then case in point.” Lithuega rebutted with a grin, shaking her head. “Come on Martin, the world is filled with superheroes with stylish names and costumes. Like those guys, Caliber and Max Caliber. Isn’t one a sidekick or something?”

“No.” Martin replied, also peeved now. “Caliber is a hero. Max Caliber is a rich guy trolling Caliber for incredibly petty reasons, no matter that he also masquerades as a vigilante. I mean he made an entire line of hot sauce, ranging from Max Caliber, to High Caliber, to Medium Caliber, to Low Caliber, with the hero’s image on the Low Caliber bottle! The litigation has been going on for years. Maxmillian just keeps throwing money into it, just to piss off the poor guy.”

“That’s hilarious.”

“I’m certain you and he both think so.”

“And we’re right.” Lithuega concluded archly. “Anyway, I can’t help but feel we got a little sidetracked with this whole thing. Why don’t we come to an agreement on our basic deal, and we can hash out my heroic identity later on? I’m sure we will have plenty of time to discuss it.”

Martin nodded, thinking back over the terms Lithuega had come to in his absence. They were remarkably reasonable, given the degree of vehemence with which she typically debated such things. Which made him suspicious as hell. “Why precisely have you come around all of a sudden? Last week our talks were more like shouting matches, and your voice can reach pitch and volume that are truly deafening.”

Lithuega sighed, lying down and allowing herself to float idly around in the grey shadows. Her ability to essentially move at will about the place was a trick Martin hadn’t picked up yet, still restricted to walking. “Even I can’t be pissed off forever.” she muttered. “Look, you have the upper hand. It’s obvious. The terms you decide are fair is what we are going to arrive at eventually, and there is little I can do about it. Given that, you’re being remarkably generous, especially since this is your soul we are talking about.”

“A deal is a deal. You held up your end, to a point, and to be fair the wording of my part of the contract was intentionally deceptive.” Martin admitted, having to look away. He wasn’t proud of his behavior precisely, not when the offer had been made in good faith. “The least I can do is uphold the original terms as stated.”

“Even after I tried to murder you and steal your soul.”

“As we originally agreed, if you disregard said deception.”

“You’re an astonishingly fair minded and objective person, given the topic of conversation.” Lithuega admitted, spinning in place so she was floating on her stomach, arms crossed beneath her chin. “Most humans, or mortals in general, would consider this matter with a fair degree of emotion.”

“We tend to do that with a lot of topics, whether it benefits the conversation or not.”

“Which just brings us back to how bizarre you are, my little friend.” Lithuega grinned. “Deceptive phrasing of a contract, detached and empirical analysis of a situation, and you even have the integrity to follow through with at least your version of the contract! If someone described you to me, I’d assume you were a demon yourself.”

“You flatter me.” Martin deadpanned, giving her a nonplussed look. “Well, it seems we both find the deal to be acceptable. The sooner you agree, the sooner you can start wandering about the material plane again. And the sooner I agree, the sooner we can start practicing with your powers.”

“We? If you’re here, my powers are my own to control. And if I am here, you have no access to them at all. Any super-hero-ing will be all me.”

“Which means I need to know the extent and details of your powers, and your knowledge.” Martin pointed out. “I’ll be summoning you after all, so I need to understand how you are likely to view and respond to certain scenarios, just like you need to make sure you understand how to read context.”

“Whatcha mean?”

“I mean, if I call you to an armed robbery, I need to make sure you won’t just light the bank on fire. If I call you to a fight, I need to make sure you aren’t going to rend them limb from limb. And I need to make sure I don’t call you to a situation you aren’t able to handle.” Martin was most concerned about that last one. Lithuega seemed to have a pretty good grasp of human morality, and even some United States law. However, she seemed arrogant and prideful in her abilities to a fault, meaning she might not be willing to back down if summoned.

Which meant he would need to on her behalf, rather than call her in the first place.

“I cannot imagine a situation that would be better handled by yourself, than by me.” Lithuega retorted.

“I know, which would be part of the problem we are going to address.”

*****

And so their conversation devolved into little more than sniping at each other with clever, and less than clever, quips. In the end though, Martin and Lithuega came to a tentative agreement as to what their contract would look like. It was the first of its kind forged, as far as anyone knew. I certainly hadn’t heard of the like myself before, or since. A human who held his own soul hostage to get an agreement from a demon to become a superheroine. It turned out as Lithuega suspected, that what Martin had in mind was going to be very interesting indeed.