Almost two weeks of pleasant, sunny weather eventually had to come to an end. And that meant rain.

The sky over Grailmane was pouring. This was both a blessing and a curse, for while it did wonders in flushing away the muck and detritus that any area sufficiently crowded with people tended to accumulate, the city also didn’t exactly have a single, cohesive storm drain system.

In some of the districts, where the people — or whatever the case happened to be — in charge bothered to care, there were networks of magically shaped hollow pipes just under street level to lead water away from the surface. But those just guided the water out to the next district, where it became someone else’s problem. Mostly, the city just relied on being built on a natural slope to prevent serious flooding. Apart from a few particularly problematic divots and folds in the land, it generally worked.

What it meant, however, was that when it rained, the roads became slick and slippery, as they turned into miniature rivers, with streams of water flowed from one end of the city to the other.

As an inhabitant, the best you could do was make sure you owned a solid pair of waterproof boots. Such as the pair that was currently splashing through the ankle-deep water.

Rain ran down Timothy’s thick, waterproof cowl in rivulets, dribbling around his feet in steady streams as he made his way towards a popular student pub at the edge of the Academy District.

After Ixxy had left, he’d received a not altogether unexpected visit from several of the faculty of the contracts department, investigating a ‘possible demon-assisted attack’. Luckily, he’d had the presence of mind to hide Ixxy’s contract that had still been lying on his desk between his class notes. They’d given his room a cursory search, but with no trace of any summoning nor any records of recent contracts being signed there in the Grand Contract backbone logs — except for the one he’d originally signed with Ixxy, which he’d already handed in as an assignment anyway — they’d come away empty handed.

He’d used the opportunity to explain how Dalten had, in fact, assaulted him, but they’d seemed significantly less interested in hearing about that, doing little but assuring him that a proper investigation would be launched.

Yeah, right. Like anything was going to happen to Dalten other than a slap on the wrist. Hopefully the broken one.

Timothy sighed. The weather matched his mood. Miserable. Some solid sleep had done wonders for his sense of perspective and what it had made him realize had made him shake his head in disgust at himself.

She’d never loved him.

Well, okay, that bit had been rather obvious, really. She was a demon. Demons didn’t love. They manipulated and toyed with when they weren’t outright butchering and murdering. And they’d hung out for, what, an afternoon? Of course she didn’t love him. A human couldn’t really have fallen in love that quickly. Not really. But somewhere, deep inside of him, maybe he’d come under the mistaken impression that she at least liked him, just a little bit.

Idiot. She’d just liked it that he was gullible and easily manipulated when she batted her eyelashes. For goodness sakes, she’d still not paid off her side of their original contract! And now he wasn’t sure he even wanted her to anymore! How was he supposed to look her in the eye after being dumb enough to ask her to be his girlfriend? Wait, not ask, try to force and entrap. Right. Yes.

Her contract had been real. That had been easy enough to check. By necessity, an appendix of the Grand Contract held a record of all currently active contracts signed under its aegis and magically integrated with it.

Not their actual details, those were confidential, but just the magical equivalent of a serial number. And Ixxy’s contract was definitely in there. That meant it was real. And that meant she was really trapped.

And that meant that forcing her into another exploitative contract for his own gain, just because she had no choice but to accept, would mean he was taking advantage of her in the worst kind of way.

Just because Ixxy was a demon and would flay his skin for giggles if she wasn’t contractually obligated not to, didn’t mean he got to impose almost literal sexual slavery on her. It just felt… wrong.

Perhaps it was for the best if he just broke off all ties with her. Just put this whole mess behind him and forget it ever happened. Let her sort out her own problems, without him making them worse. Yes, that was probably the right thing to do.

Even if that meant passing up on what likely would have been the best sex that he would ever have in his life.

In an act of frustration, he kicked at a puddle of water on the roadside, sending drops of water flying over the road, barely noticable in the downpour.

One more semester and his studies would be finished, and his ‘carefree’ Academy days would be over. He’d have to enter the real world and earn a living. Finally, he’d get to be a strong, independent man, instead of a boy, like everyone seemed to see him.

His aunt would probably be able to pull a few strings and get him into the Diabolist Institute, and skilled contractors were always in demand, but his dream was to join the entourage of one of the great Magelords of the city. Sure, they didn’t make extensive use of contractors or diabolists as they did of necromancers, elementalists or runecrafters, but there were certain tasks that he would be uniquely suited to. It shouldn’t be impossible to be accepted as an apprentice.

Timothy peered through the rain at the the pub ahead. His cousin had asked to meet him there for some reason, but he wasn’t complaining. If he was lucky, he was hoping to score a free dinner. Campus food was shit and eating out was expensive.

As he approached the entrance, three other students, swaddled in thick, waterproof cloaks similar to his own, stepped outside and began walking in his direction, heading back to the campus.

This was not an unusual event. The pub was quite popular with those among the student body with sufficient financial resources to go out regularly. He brushed past them, not paying them much attention.

Then one of them suddenly grabbed him by the arm.

“Twigley?” a familiar voice asked, and Timothy groaned inwardly..

Shit.

“Hello Dalten,” Timothy replied.

One of the amazing advantages of modern magical medicine was its capacity for curing wounds. Even serious injuries such as broken bones could be repaired near perfectly in short order with the proper application of skill, knowledge and access to the correct essences. But that did not mean it could be done easily. Or painlessly. Timothy had hoped for at least a few days of peace and quiet as Dalten suffered through getting the bones in his hand reset, but apparently he wasn’t going to be that lucky.

Dalten loomed over Timothy as his two stooges quickly dragged him into an alley and pinned him to the wall. With the thick, pouring rain, either nobody saw, or nobody cared enough to blunder into a muddy alley after them.

“Your fucking demon broke my hand, Twigley!” Dalten said once his lackeys had Timothy firmly held. His right arm was bound and bandaged across his chest, under his cloak. From the look on his face it still hurt.

Timothy felt the urge to point out that he’d broken his own hand by being a dumbass and punching a wall, and that Ixxy had treated him quite gently in the end, all things considered, but he wisely kept his mouth shut. Trying to reason with Dalten was a surefire way to get his ears clobbered. Especially when he was annoyed.

Damnit! And he had been so close to safety! Even now, they were right next to the pub! The window to its ladies’ lavatory was literally above his head!

While it wasn’t unusual that they’d chosen the same place he had, it was simply terrible luck that he’d caught them just as they were leaving. If they’d left just a bit earlier, they would likely have completely missed each other in the streets, or they’d have seen each other inside and he highly doubted they would have risked starting anything with his cousin right there. She could be rather intimidating.

“Well, Twigley? You fucking owe me, you little twerp!” Dalten snarled.

Timothy paused. “For what?” he asked, incredulously.

“For my hand, Dipshit! Your demon girlfriend broke it, so you’re paying! Did you think getting this treated was cheap? Not to mention my pain and suffering! You wronged my by proxy, so now you’re going to make it right!”

What a laugh that was. Even if Timothy had had any control over Ixxy’s actions and could be held accountable for them, Dalten had deserved exactly what he’d gotten. He was the one who'd been beating her up!

Unfortunately, it was clear that Dalten disagreed with that. And while he could argue his point, he rather doubted logic and common sense were going to get him anything but a fist to the face.

“Well, I don’t have any money,” Timothy stated honestly, rather than getting into that argument. What little he had, he had left at home for perhaps not this exact reason, but something close to it. Muggings weren’t common, but they weren’t exactly unheard of. The best defence was not having anything worth being mugged for.

“Yeah, no shit, Poorley,” Dalten replied. “That was pretty obvious from your shit-ass hand-me-down clothes. But I was thinking. Maybe if you bring that demon of yours around and let us take it off your hands maybe we’d be square, yeah?”

Something about the way Dalten was treating Ixxy like property they could just swap between them without her having a say in the matter rubbed Timothy the wrong way. Just because she was a demon didn’t mean she wasn’t a person.

“I don’t own her, Dalten. Our business is done and paid for,” he said with just a hint of smugness in his voice.

It wasn’t even that much of a lie. He’d already gotten everything he’d really wanted from their original contract and was fine with forfeiting the remainder of what he was owed if it meant Dalten couldn’t get his filthy hands on her. It wouldn’t even be that much of a forfeit; he’d get plenty of satisfaction in the non-euphemistic sense just from Dalten not getting what he wanted.

For his part, the bully made a face as if Timothy had admitted to slurping up pond scum.

“Ugh, you’re disgusting, Twigley!” he jeered. “Can’t believe you actually fucked a demon! One pretending to be your sister no less! That your kink, Incestley? You wanna fuck your own sister, you depraved sister-fucker? Is that why you had to get a horn-whore cunt to stick your tiny, little pecker in?”

Timothy just stared at Dalten sullenly. He knew from experience that there was nothing he could say that would stop the bully’s tirade of slurs and insults once he got started. Attempting any form of defence usually just antagonized him more and led to getting his ass kicked.

“When you’ve got Twigley’s prospects of ever getting laid by a normal girl, do you blame him?” the taller of Dalten’s bootlickers, Andrew, snickered.

“You are pathetic, Twigley,” Dalten went on, after the snickering died down. “I mean, I always took you for a sicko little stick-insect, but I never thought you’d be that weak. They aren’t even human, you gross little turd. I guess you’d stick your dick in anything that spreads its legs for you, huh?”

“Probably practiced on a goat,” the short guy, Wurth, commented. There was a round of laughter from the three bullies.

“How’d it feel to stick your cock in something that would be equally happy killing you and fucking your corpse if it had the option?” Dalten demanded when Timothy made no reply.

“Heh, doubt the demon even noticed his little pecker, Dalten,” the shorter guy chuckled, still keeping a firm grip on Timothy. “Probably the easiest soul it ever made.”

“Yeah,” the taller one mocked. “’Is it in yet? Oh, you’re done already.’ Hahaha!”

Timothy’s face burned. He knew he shouldn’t be letting them get to him but… they weren’t completely wrong. Summoning a sex demon because he was too scared to talk to girls otherwise was pretty pathetic. Then not actually having sex with said sex demon was, arguably, even worse.

Then falling in love with the stupid girl? Well, there probably wasn’t a proper word to describe just how pathetic and stupid that was. He was likely plumbing new depths of pathetic-ness, where no man had ever gone before.

“Come on, Twigley, say something,” Dalten insisted. “Tell us how you’re a big man because the pleasure devil faked an orgasm for you. Tell us how much she moaned as she pretended to actually feel you inside her.”

Timothy glowered at him, but refused to say anything. He wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction of knowing how much they were hitting all of his insecurities. He knew he wasn’t the most attractive guy, nor the most experienced, nor the most well endowed…

“Demon got your tongue, Twigley?” Dalten grinned. “Maybe she kept it as a souvenir. Something to play with on the long, lonely nights down in the Abyss, huh, Twigley?” He placed his index and middle fingers on the sides of his mouth before flicking his tongue between them in a vulgar symbol for oral sex.

Timothy just sighed and hung his head. If he just kept his head down and said nothing, eventually they would get bored. As long as he didn’t antagonize them, Dalten’s crew never physically harmed him.

He was therefore quite surprised when Dalten’s fist sunk into his gut, driving the air out of his lungs.

“You’re gonna stop fucking ignoring me, Twigley,” Dalten snarled, leaning in close. “Your new girlfriend isn’t here to protect you this time and my hand fucking hurts. So when I’m taking out my frustration on you, you’re going to scream for me, got it?.”

Another blow smashed into Timothy’s face, the side without the black eye this time. Even left-handed, Dalten’s blows still left him reeling, hanging bonelessly between Andrew and Wurth, with only their firm grip keeping him upright.

So that was what he had to look forward to. Getting worked over by Dalten and his goons. Lovely. He’d never been a fighter by any stretch of the imagination, which was why he’d agreed to do Dalten’s homework in exchange for not getting beaten up. It seemed now that the semester was drawing to a close, that little deal was no longer on the table.

At least the little overhang meant he was out of the rain.

Movement caught Timothy’s eye. Something small was crawling along the wall, just behind his feet. Slowly, eight legs carefully feeling for grip as it moved…

Timothy’s whole body jerked up and away from the horrifying, crawling thing. Dalten had been leaning over Timothy’s hanging form, mouth parted to whisper more abuse into his ears, when the back of Timothy’s head smashed into his face, breaking his nose with a loud crack.

Andrew and Wurth barely managed to keep a hold of Timothy as he tried to climb both of them at once, screaming at the top of his lungs.

“What the fuck, why didn’t you guys hold onto him?” Dalten demanded, lying on his back on the ground and cradling his nose, which was gushing blood.

“Sorry, Dalten! He’s slippery!” Wurth tried to protest, struggling to hold onto a wriggling, squirming Timothy with both hands wrapped around his waist.

“What the hell is wrong with him, anyway?” Dalten asked, picking himself up off the ground.

“Dalten, I think Twigley’s afraid of spiders,” Andrew replied, a nasty grin spreading across his face as he pointed at the tiny spider trying to avoid notice by crawling along the corner of the building and the street.

“Oh really? Is that so?” Dalten asked, snorting a gobbet of blood onto the road. Then he bent down and carefully grabbed the little spider by the thorax.

“Dalten! No!” Timothy protested, starting to struggle with renewed frenzy. “No! Please! I can’t…! Don’t…!”

“Open wide, Twigley!” Dalten sneered through bloody lips.

Andrew grabbed Timothy by the head. He tried to clench his jaw shut, but the young man dug his fingers into his cheeks, trying to force it open. All the while, Dalten held the now squirming spider menacingly above Timothy’s head.

They were going to make him eat the spider. He’d always been terrified of spiders and they were going to make him eat it.

A deeper voice suddenly bellowed out. “Thought I recognized that scream!” Then big, heavy footsteps echoed through the rain as someone came running down the alley.

“Hey! Fuck off, this has nothing…” was all Dalten managed to get out before a big, red hand closed around his still-intact wrist and lifted him off the ground.

For a single, panicked moment, the curved horns made Timothy think it was Ixxy, but even with her shapeshifting stretching things to the limit, Ixxy could never be this bulky.

When he saw her face, he realized this was no demon. As far as Dalten was concerned, this was much, much worse.

“The fuck you think you’re doing?” Gora growled, the unspoken threat of violence clear in her voice.

Dalten, however, did not seem to realize the peril he was in. Instead of shrinking away, he scrabbled at his shirt with his bandaged hand until he managed to fish out his medallion. Clasping it between bandaged fingers, he spoke in an imperious, arrogant voice: “By the power of the Morix Stana, I command you!”

For a few moments nothing happened, with Gora just staring confusedly at him, waving around the little piece of metal to no seeming effect.

Then everything seemed to happen at once.

The medallion in Dalten’s hand suddenly lit up with an eerie blue glow, and, at the sight of magic, Gora’s delver instincts took over.

Before anybody could react, she swung Dalten around by his arm, smashing him first into the building opposite the bar and then into the ground by her feet, each time hard enough to leave cracks radiating out from the point of impact. Then she tossed him over her shoulder, sending him soaring through the air.

He landed just short of the entrance to the alley they were in with a wet splat.

Three wide pairs of eyes stared up at Gora as she glanced awkwardly over her shoulder at the pile of broken meat that used to be Dalten.

“You all saw that, right?” she said awkardly. “He tried to use magic on me. I was just defending myself.”

Three heads nodded furiously in unison, everyone too shocked at the sudden violence for any further reaction.

“Good,” she continued after a few moments of awkward silence. “Now then, why don’t you two get lost? I got business with the Squirt.” She pointed at Dalten’s erstwhile lackeys.

Andrew and Wurth didn’t need to be asked twice. They dropped Timothy like a sack of potatoes and displayed their usual level of bravery, booking it down the alley before the massive cambion could change her mind.

The next thing Timothy knew, her huge form loomed over him.

“Heya, Cuz,” she grinned.

“You… I think you just killed him!” Timothy stammered, looking up at her.

Gora momentarily regarded the pile of meat and broken bones lying a few metres away.

“Tch. Terrible case of suicide,” she replied dismissively, picking Timothy up and putting him back on his feet. “Very sad.”

“Suicide?” Timothy asked, incredulously. “You… there… there are impact craters! His two friends saw everything!”

“Yep. He tried to magic a Delver in their face. Like I said, suicide,” Gora stated calmly as she gently dusted him off with her massive hands.

“What was he trying to do?” Timothy asked, suddenly apprehensive. He’d bragged before that he could dominate demons, did that extend to cambions?

Gora just shrugged her shoulders. “No idea. I saw the thingy light up and reacted. Now come on, let’s get back inside, out of the rain. I ordered you a beer.”

“Thanks… thanks Gora,” Timothy stammered, taking a deep breath and trying to calm himself.

As they walked past Dalton’s body, Timothy shivered and did his best not to look down. His limbs were flopped bonelessly in every direction. As much as he had hated Dalten, he’d never wished for him to die. Secretly, he hoped that he had survived, if only for his own conscience sake.

“Gora, what are you doing?” he asked.

“Found something,” she grumbled. She’d stopped and picked something up off the ground near Dalten’s corpse. His medallion. “Any idea what this is?”

Timothy shook his head. “No idea.”

Gora shrugged and slipped it into her pocket. “Well, it’s mine now. I’ll show it around, see if anyone knows anything about it. Might be good to know who I’ve pissed off this time.”

“Well, the Forbidden A, for one,” Timothy muttered darkly. “He was a student.”

“Eh, those assholes are already pissed at me,” Gora replied dismissively. “No big loss there.”

Then, in a move that caught Timothy completely by surprise, she casually raised her big, muscular leg and stomped down on the Dalten’s head in passing, bursting it like a watermelon.

So much for his secret hope that Dalten had survived.