The Shadow Salesman

            The worst thing was that they didn’t seem to be doing anything to him. Jim was constrained – Henry had strapped Jim into a chair, which was baffling, as Jim’s own body was normally as fluid as a cloud of smoke, more or less. Now, however, he was somehow stuck. He knew, in a second-hand way, what it was like to be human, and this was like having several joints dislocated at once. Except it wasn’t exactly painful – it just felt wrong.

            He felt solid, as if he were made of matter. When his fingers rested on the wooden arm of the chair, they spread ever-so-slightly, shaped by the simple pressure of a round object and a flat object pushed together by gravity.

            But he wasn’t an object. He was a demon. He wasn’t made of atoms and molecules. And so the fact that his body was acting like he was made him terrified.

            That and the faceless men.

            They would appear and disappear suddenly, without warning. They never did anything except stand there and stare at him with no eyes. And then they would be gone.

            That was not normal.

            Jim was a demon, and he could become totally invisible, intangible, and undetectable by the vast majority of humans. Yet even then he was still there. And as long as he was there – even if he wasn’t made up of the same sort of matter as humans were – there was some way to detect him. These things just blinked into existence and out as if they were figments of his imagination.

            They did not reflect light or cast shadows. They were invisible except that they could clearly be seen. Jim wondered what they would look like to a human. He imagined most people didn’t even see them, or rather, they didn’t realize that they saw them. Jim wasn’t even sure why he was able to see them – his sense of vision was a borrowed approximation of the human version, mixed with his own native sense of sight that predated his choice to be a demon.

            The chair wasn’t in some dank basement or dark closet. He merely sat in the living room where he had been captured. They didn’t seem to mind his being there. Henry Thall left after binding him there. So now Sweet Clara would simply sit in the room and meet with the various assassins that Thall hired. And Jim would watch.

            Jim watched Clara. He had been forced back into invisibility – the assassins who arrived seemed to all know not to ask why there was a chair with leather straps on the armrests in the room. They likely thought it was there for intimidation’s sake.

            Clara had a valet who attended on her. She dealt with the various “contractors” with poise and professionalism. He dearly wished he could touch her mind, but the physical shape in which he had been bound also seemed to limit his abilities. He was practically just a human, albeit an invisible one who, if somehow turned visible, would look like a human-shaped cloud of swirling smoke.

            The faceless men blinked away in the middle of one of her interviews. It was unsettling, not knowing when they would reappear, but Jim felt a wave of relief every time they stopped existing anywhere near him.

            “Clara,” he said. It had been several days, and he wasn’t sure why he decided to speak up now. Perhaps he was getting lonely. He was certainly bored – terror that goes on for so long becomes part of the boredom.

            “I’m not supposed to speak to you,” said Clara. That was a good sign. “Supposed” implied that she was forbidden yet desired some sort of contact.

            “Clara,” he whispered. “Do you see them, when they’re here?”

            “Uh…”

            “I thought so. You know they aren’t even your typical sort of magic like I am.” Jim craned his neck, doing his best to check behind him and ensure that one of them was not somehow standing there. “Clara, when did you start seeing them?”

            “Shortly after I met Mr. Thall.”

            “And have you observed them…”

            “I don’t want to talk about it.”

            “And yet you are talking about it. And I think I know why. I think you’re terrified of those things. And you should be. Clara,” he said, realizing that the tone of voice he was using was much like the one he used when trying to convince a person to become a serial killer – which was a little odd, given that what he meant to suggest would benefit her as well as him, but at least it was persuasive. “Because I’m terrified of those things. And do you know what I am?”

            “A demon?”

            “Yes.”

            “Mr. Thall keeps me safe. I’m useful to him. He won’t let them harm me.”

            “You’re assuming, Clara, that the faceless men are working for him.” If Jim had a real face – or at least one whose swirling-smoke pattern did not obscure facial expressions  - he would have given a patronizing frown. “You don’t really believe that, do you?”

            Clara was quiet for a long moment. Jim might have smiled if he were not so uncomfortable and frightened himself.

            “Clara…” and here he hesitated. A hard sell could put some people off. Merely knowing that you were trying to convince them of something was enough to make such people stonewall the salesman. He wondered which kind of person Clara was. Yet all he had was what he had observed – a performer, certainly, and one who was doing a job, but doing it well – not out of pride, but some kind of desperation. It was not easy to detect all of this under the blanket of creeping fear, but it was there.

            That suggested this was a position of convenience. She was not a fanatic to Thall’s cause, whatever the hell that was. That suggested that Jim should take a rational course in his argument, yet the ever-present threat of the faceless men arriving and… doing something… added a desperation that required the rhetorical equivalent of a slap in the face.

            “You’ll need to get out of here. If you want to be free of him. This house is his way of controlling you.”

            “It is how I am paid.”

            “No it isn’t. It’s not for you. It’s for appearances. It’s the brothel he’s put you in.”

            A flash of recognition. Had he been able to move his arm he would have had to restrain himself from pumping his fist. Yes! Of course, she had been a prostitute. That explained the desperation. Retrein was not a good place to ply such a trade. There were no “Street Priestesses” here – only whores. And now Clara’s face read like a book. She had been in some slum, or even on the streets. Thall had offered her a job, and she was in no position to refuse. But money and safety did not breed fanatical loyalty.

            “I can help you,” said Jim, struggling not to laugh at the fact that he actually meant it.

            “I don’t… need your help.”

            “Do you want to live here until Henry Thall murders you? Before those faceless men grow tired of his games and do to you… whatever it is they’re going to do?”

            “And what is that?”

            “I have absolutely no idea. But I can’t imagine it’s anything pleasant.”

            “Where will I go?”

            “Anywhere. If you feel guilty about any of the murders you’ve taken part in, you could go to Mr. Airbright. Or not. Honestly, the murders don’t really bother me that much, but then, I’m a demon, and you’re a human.”

            Clara stepped back. “Suppose I was interested. How would you help me? You’re trapped here.”

            “Possibly.” Jim pulled at one of the straps, just to be sure that he was still stuck there, and that this desperate measure was truly called for. “My body is trapped here. But yours isn’t.”

            “I don’t understand.”

            “Clara, what do you know about demonic possession?”

(Copyright Daniel Szolovits 2015)