A Debt With a Devil.

Lydia was trying to enjoy her coffee in peace when a man in a heavy coat sat down at her table uninvited. She thought it strange that anyone would wear a heavy jacket in the heat; her outfit gave as much of her skin air to breathe as possible. It wasn't until she looked at his face that she reacted and focused on the man. Under his battered old fedora was shadow covering his face. It was not simply shaded from the sun but a totally black shadow, even as she tried to subtly reflect sunlight off her phone into it. Unsettled, she checked her surroundings. A streetside cafe was hardly confining; she could get away if she decided to bolt.

“I picked this moment precisely so you wouldn't feel trapped, Miss Montain.” The shadow man calmly explained.

“Right, so firstly, you have no face,” Lydia stated. “Second, that's not my legal name. Maybe if my father stuck around, it would be, but if you call me that again, I will throw hot coffee in your face.”

“That’s iced coffee.” The shadow man replied with his calm voice. “Miss Lydia then. Forgive me. A person in my world understands how important names are. It is, however, about your father that I mean to discuss.”

“He can be dead for all I care and hope.” Lydia fired back, feeling like her weekend plans were about to be ruined.

“He is dead. However, his debt persists.” The news was delivered with the same eerie calmness.

“Good luck getting me to give a damn.” Lydia snapped back, grabbing her purse and getting up to leave.

“You are behind on your rent.” He stated, not even making it sound like a question. “Your landlord will give you an eviction notice when you get home.”

Lydia grumbled, annoyed that the landlord's wife had found out how she had been paying her rent. “Clearly, I am in no position to settle anyone else's debts.”

“Money isn’t the sort of debt that needs to be paid. While I cannot comment on his family issues, your father made a deal regarding you. He had sold his soul to achieve success in life. However, learning of our world and some of its rules, he made a deal to buy back his soul. Children born from a hellbound soul do not develop normally. One parent hellbound leads to a malformed soul, two parents a malformed body. Before his marriage, he was given his soul for a debt, a debt he died before repayment. Now, as his only bloodline, you can repay his debt.”

The shadow face wasn't something Lydia could explain, but she wasn't about to start abandoning reason just yet. “Cool story, bro. If you are telling the truth, keep the soul. I don't want it, and I don't think he deserves to be saved. If not, then you can go to hell.”

As Lydia stood up to leave, he responded. “Had he not made the second deal, your soul would be tied to his owner by default. Your soul is a part of the debt that must now be repaid. The, in conventional terms, interest on the principal.”

Sarcastically indulging the man, Lydia countered. “How much to just pay off the interest and let you keep his soul?”

For the first time, he seemed surprised, as much as a man in a heavy coat and hat with no face could appear to be. “That has never been asked before. Unfortunately, the debt cannot be severed in that way.” He calmly stood up. “I understand you have no reason to believe me. But consider the mark on your breast.”

Lydia looked down at her chest and on her cleavage, on ample display, and noticed a new mark. It wasn't any ink of hers that she had ever gotten done, and it hadn't been there when she had adjusted her skimpy corset earlier. She looked up at the shadow man with a mix of shock and anger.

“His mark over your heart. It wasn't my doing.” He held up his open hands, covered in thick gloves. “I simply drew your attention to it. It has always been there. Nobody sees the other world without their attention drawn to it as I have done.”

“You have a compelling reason why I don't beat you to **** right now?” Lydia shifted into anger.

“I am already dead. I am also not tangible. I possess the clothing to go unnoticed. I am simply a messenger. A go-between. I manage the debts owed. That is all.” His calm voice soothed her as he spoke.

“So you died, and your punishment for all eternity was being made into middle management? Hell really is awful.” Lydia deflected her anxiety with humour.

“I-” The shadow man was nonplussed for a moment. “Yes. Now, I can accompany you to collect your possessions. You will need a new place to live.”

“What? Do you have another place in mind? Are you going to pay my rent and food bills? How am I supposed to repay the debt anyway?” Lydia looked again at the mark on her breast, right over her heat.

“Indeed. Money is easy enough for us to come by. We value other things, a different kind of currency. I can assist you at the hotel. There is plenty of room, and it is where we do business.” He extended a hand to gesture that they move on.

“You could have just sat down and said, ‘Hey, sucks that you are going to get kicked out of your home soon. You want free room and board? Food?’ and it would have gone a whole lot faster.” Lydia started walking towards her apartment.

“There is much of this meeting I would do differently indeed.” The shadow man admitted.

****

Lydia hadn’t been worried when she packed her things, stuffed her clothing into a suitcase, and rolled it down the road with the shadow man. At least not worried about him. It was other things. Noticing small details around her, strange things, things she had seen before and simply not noticed. Her heavyset neighbour had green skin. The birds at the park were humanoids with wings. A couple kissing under an umbrella were actually a person biting into the neck of the person they were holding.

“You are noticing things now.” The calm voice of the shadow man helped her deal with it. “This is normal. The anxiety you feel and the things you see. None of this is new; you have seen it all before; you can simply notice it now.”

“How can I not have noticed before? How could everyone not notice?” She asked, **** for an answer.

“How often do you notice cars? If you buy one, you notice every other one just like it that may have been dismissed before. Becoming familiar with a thing allows you to notice it amidst the bombardment of your senses. Magic can overload your senses so much that your mind refuses to notice it. Edits it out like it does with your nose so you aren’t distracted. Until you do notice it, then it all comes into focus.”

“Vampire eating someone seems like the sort of thing my brain would want to notice.” Lydia looked back but couldn’t find the vampire anywhere.

“You are safer if you don’t notice. We can tell, and you will learn, how to recognize those who don’t know. Those that do. They don’t drink people to ****; it puts a sour taste in the blood. People wake up tired despite a full night’s sleep because they were drained. That is usually the limit of the danger they pose to most. Hunters deal with the outliers.” He stopped suddenly and gestured to a door. “We are here.”

Lydia looked at the brass revolving door and then up at the building. It seemed to extend forever into the sky and curve over her like a cartoon. “Well, fuck me.”

The doorman, who looked right out of the 1920s, pulled out a clipboard and checked something on it. When he saw Lydia looking at him, he showed her what was on it. A number of responses, ‘What the fuck?’, ‘This isn’t real’ and ‘nope’ were alongside her response as the most popular.

He helped her with her suitcase through the door, and if Lydia thought he was from the 1920s, the inside confirmed it. She supposed it went well with the Gothic and Art Deco architecture. The brass, the hardwood, the red carpets—everything looked like the hotel hadn’t changed in the last hundred years.

“This is the lobby; you can find me here most days unless I am out on business. The elevator will take you to your room. You can talk to the front desk here or call from your room if you need anything. Food can be ordered for your room, or you can sit in the dining area. You can learn the rest once you have settled in.”

“I’d like to know just how I am supposed to pay the debt and whatnot.” Lydia looked around as she made her way to the elevator.

“That depends on you. Many jobs need doing. We will find you something simple. You get paid in what is essentially magic coins. You can either spend them on things or give them to me to settle your debt.” He stepped onto the elevator and guided Lydia over the threshold.

The operator in the elevator pressed the only button on the panel and pulled the lever that closed a brass cage door. They started rising at a terrifying speed, yet it didn’t feel any different from any other elevator. Floors whipped by on the other side of the brass cage over the door. Then it suddenly stopped, but there was no jolt of momentum; they were simply still. The cage opened, and the floor was a small room that looked like a hallway, but it only had one door with a zero on it.

“Room zero?” Lydia asked, tentatively stepping out of the elevator.

“The room number is how many days you have stayed at the hotel. Please. Enter and relax. I will be in the lobby when you are ready to work.”

Lydia twisted the knob and entered her room. It was bigger than her apartment. The bed looked comfortable, and there was more furniture than she knew what to do with. There was no television, though, and as she checked her phone, there was no signal. She turned to face the door and saw the shadow man still standing.

“Technology doesn’t work well around magic. Not in a place like this. It will work well enough when you go outside. Goodnight, you need your rest.” He closed the door.

Lydia sighed. Her weekend plans were toast.