Chapter Text
At the edge of the Earth was a wall. The wall was built from old, slightly charred-looking dry-stone bricks, none of which were quite the same as any other, but fitting together fairly well in spite of the fact. All who lived near the wall, and many who didn’t, were aware that said wall was the only thing separating them (the living) from the dead of the hells. And so, for reasons that were entirely reasonable, such as not wishing to die a grisly death at the hands of an infestor demon, or be ridden vigorously into an early grave by a succubus, crossing the wall was highly illegal and heavily discouraged.
There was only one known way to cross the wall. Somewhere a certain length along it (though none could be sure exactly how far since the wall seemed to stretch endlessly in either direction) was a gap. Just large enough for an average sized person or demon to comfortably walk through. For many hundreds of years the humans mostly avoided the gap in the wall, but as civilisations emerged and people grew bolder, or stupider, or perhaps just very very bored, a circus sprung up alongside it.
The Hellfire Circus attracted thousands of visitors every year. Those seeking mortal thrills, or with a particularly morbid curiosity, came in droves to watch the performers breathe fire, tumble through hoops, and share stories they’d heard whispered through the wall. Of ferocious hounds that walked on two legs and could smell blood from a hundred leagues away. Towering, bird-faced beings who could turn you to stone at a glance. And small, red-skinned horned creatures who would come in the night and steal your babies away.
The circus folk, being not entirely out of their minds, stationed rotating guards, two at a time, to watch the gap in the wall. Preventing mortals from striding right on into Hell was the primary function of the guards, but as no-one had been brave enough to try that in living memory, their secondary purpose was warning the rest of the circus, should something attempt to cross into the living world from the other side. Demons, of course, had many other ways to cross, but this was unbeknownst to mortals.
But once every nine years, there was a single day the humans threw their rules cautiously out of the window. The day of the Demon Market was considered a perfectly safe and legal day to wander into Hell, so long as one entered no sooner than midday, and left no later than midnight. Demons from across the realms brought all kinds of ghoulish and macabre curiosities to the scarlet meadow, Hell’s side of the wall, to trade and barter for souls. As such, most members of the Hellfire Circus found themselves soulless by the age of 18, not that it really affected them in the meanwhile.
Cash Buckzo had turned 18 just two weeks prior when the day of the Demon Market arrived for the third time in his life. He had attended only once, as a 9-year-old boy, but remembered it like it was yesterday. All the strange creatures he’d portrayed night after night at the circus were there, in the flesh, and far scarier in real life than the silly costumes he was always forced to wear.
Then there was the matter of Cash’s soul which, to his despair, belonged entirely to him. All the older circus kids had sold theirs, and he was desperate to be rid of it - it was only weighing him down at this point. So, the morning of the Demon Market, Cash had an excited spring in his step as he went to tidy the supply tent. He usually hated any job that required a modicum of effort. Which was to say all jobs. But at least today he had something to look forward to. He was indecisively staring at a box of juggling pins when a metal hoop clanged to the ground off its hook, and he saw beneath it a tiny, red-skinned child with striped horns standing stock still and staring up at him with big yellow eyes.
“Please don’t scream.”
The child’s voice had a matter-of-fact tone about it, and a nasally quality. Cash wondered if he’d looked like he was about to scream. Surely not. He had seen imps before after all. Had even painted his own skin red on many occasions to give audiences a fright.
“Why would I scream at a baby imp?” he replied.
“Hey, I’m not a baby!” the imp protested, “I’m seven!”
“Ugh, baby.” Cash rolled his eyes. “What the f—heck are you doing here?” Cash thought better of swearing in front of a child, although he then supposed that a child from Hell may well have a fouler tongue than him. He resolved not to censor himself going forward.
The imp let out an exasperated huff. “I’m hiding, obviously.”
Cash found his inflection irritating. “Well you’ve done a pretty shit job then, haven’t you?” he stared unblinking at the smaller figure, who seemed to grow concerned at having that fact pointed out to him.
“Please don’t tell anyone.”
“Or what?”
“Please!” the imp pleaded, “I- I just need to get across the wall without anyone seeing me.”
Cash smirked. “Well you already fucked that up. And I’m gonna tell everyone I saw a little baby imp hiding in the storage tent.”
“NO!” the imp shrieked.
Cash wondered how he’d gone undiscovered for so long if he was this noisy. “Ah- ah- ah,” he quieted him down. “Ok… let’s say I keep your secret. What would you be willing to give me?”
The imp’s brow furrowed. “Give you? I–I don’t have anything!”
“How about your soul?” Cash figured if demons traded in souls, he could end up with two to spend at the market later today, and come back with something twice as impressive than what any of the older kids bought.
But the imp looked at him like he’d just asked why the sky was green. “Imps don’t have souls.”
Oh well. Worth a shot.
Cash let out an over-exaggerated sigh. “Well then, guess I’ve got no choice but to tell the others.” he began turning towards the exit.
“WAIT!”
He stopped, glancing back over his shoulder.
The imp held his tail in his hands like a sad mouse from a fairy-tale. “Perhaps I could… owe you something. A favour.”
A favour from a demon, now that sounded like a good deal. But Cash wanted to watch the imp squirm a little longer. “Hmm, maybe I might consider it. What sort of favour?”
“Something really good, I swear on Lucifer’s crown!” Hope gleamed in the imp’s eyes.
As funny as Cash thought it would be to watch that hope shrivel and die, his tiredness with the conversation outweighed his malicious streak and he reached out a hand. “Fine, you’ve got yourself a deal.”
A bright smile spread across the imp’s freckled face as he shook Cash’s hand. “Oh, thank you, thank you! You won’t regret it, I promise!”
“Tch, I better not.” Cash felt that the imp’s tiny hand was quite fragile. A thought of squeezing it hard enough to make the boy squeal again flitted across his mind. He decided to ignore it.
Then, in a quick scurry, the imp slipped under the loose canvas of the tent and disappeared from view. Cash emerged, glancing around for the little bugger, but caught no more sight of him.
***
When the clock struck noon, Cash was third from the front of the long line stretching from the big top to the gap in the wall. He cursed his chores for stopping him from getting here earlier, and watched impatiently as the two ahead of him, a mother and daughter, took their sweet fucking time hitching their dresses and carefully treading over the broken stones. The girl, Dexie Brooks, was just two months younger than him, and he caught her now, as he often did, smiling at him nervously. It annoyed him, but he attempted half a crooked smile back, if only to hurry her along.
And when she’d gone, finally, Cash Buckzo stepped past the wall and into Hell.
The smell of ash and sulfur quickly flooded his nose, and Cash felt slightly lightheaded as he looked around at the many market stalls in the red grassy clearing, each brimming with otherworldly oddities. He decided he ought to do a full circuit before deciding what to sell his soul for. After all, he’d only get to do this once. Sure, there were the odd trinkets for sale that didn’t cost a soul, perhaps just a memory of a loved one, or all the hair that would ever grow on your head, but Cash was looking for a big ticket item.
He’d only gotten to the third or fourth stall when he spotted a red caravan, painted with colourful flowers, and a red-skinned woman, maybe only a few years his senior. Long dark hair cascaded down her shoulders, and two black horns decorated her head. She smiled at him with a playful, knowing glint in her eye. Nothing like the girlish smiles of Dexie Brooks.
Cash approached the caravan, pretending to take interest in the assortment of jewellery on display, picking up a red skull-shaped pendant absentmindedly.
“Good eye.” The beautiful demon appeared over his shoulder. “That one’s worth a lot.”
“I can tell,” he lied.
The demon chuckled. Cash thought it sounded like wind chimes in a summer breeze.
“So, would you like to buy it then?” the demon asked, walking around to face him.
“Uh, well, it’s very nice. How much is it?” Cash found himself thinking that if he could make the pretty demon lady smile at him again, that alone would be worth his soul.
“This one’s very rare. The prize of the collection, in fact. It’s worth two souls at least.”
Cash cursed imps for not having souls. Stupid imp boy.
“But,” the demon continued, “I suppose I could be persuaded to exchange it for a kiss. If it was from someone handsome.”
Cash felt the hairs bristle on the back of his neck as the demon positioned her face just inches from his and stared resolutely into his eyes. She leaned forward, and he leant to meet her, lips brushing in a short, chaste kiss.
Pulling back, Cash felt as if he were in a daze. The demon leaned back towards him, and his lips parted in anticipation, but she brushed past towards his ear.
“Meet me at midnight in the clearing behind the caravan.” Her voice felt softer than the Queen’s mink robe from the costume trunk. Cash had always been jealous of the girls who got to wear it.
He nodded once, still dazed by the feeling of those soft wet lips on his.
“Tell me your name?” the demon asked.
“Cash,” he replied. And he forgot to ask hers before she had turned away, returning to the stall.
***
Cash had to find the imp boy. There was no way in hell he was gonna pass up a chance to meet the sexy mysterious demon lady at midnight, but there was one problem. If he didn’t return to the circus before then, he wasn’t sure he’d be allowed back. The guards would, at the very least, scold him and put him on shit shovelling duty with the horses for a month for breaking the rules. He scoured the market, dipping and ducking through the now large crowds of visitors. Just as he spotted what looked like a familiar freckled face dipping under a cart, he crashed straight into the back of someone, dropping the skull pendant which had been clutched in his hand. It fell on the soft red grass, and Dexie Brooks bent down to pick it up.
“Oh, sorry Cash,” she fluttered as she reached for the pendant. “Here, you dropped this-”
“Keep it.” Cash was much more concerned with keeping his eyes on the imp boy, as he shoved past her towards the cart. And though Cash didn’t see it, a light pink blush spread across Dexie Brooks’ cheeks as she held the pendant close to her chest.
Cash burst through the crowd and yanked at the thin tail sticking out from under the empty cart, lifting the little imp into the air and dangling him upside down as he clawed frantically at the air.
“Hey, you said you’d do me a favour. Time to pay up.”
The imp stopped and hung there for a moment, slowly spinning.
Cash grinned.
***
The moon rose full over the circus and the market. And the many tourists who had travelled for the occasion crossed back to the living world, settling down in spare circus tents that they’d been charged a heavily inflated price for.
Cash had wandered around the market for a few more hours, ultimately finding nothing that he really felt like selling his soul for. He had, instead, found himself returning again and again to the jewellery stall, disappointed to see an unfamiliar demon now running it, accompanied by a large colourful bird which looked like it would have belonged more in a rich King’s palace garden than in Hell. After the sun had set, Cash hid himself under the same empty cart where he’d found the imp boy. When he was fairly certain he could see no-one else around, he tiptoed carefully to the designated spot and waited, anxiously.
What felt like an age passed, and Cash wondered if maybe the demon had been toying with him, when an alluring dark figure stepped down from the caravan, and led him quietly into the woods.
The bark of the trees in Hell, or at least the ones Cash had seen, was pitch black and covered in knots which peered at him like eyes. When the demon lady pushed him to the ground and straddled him, he couldn’t escape the feeling of being watched. But fuck if he really cared right now. As he brushed a hand down her leg, he suddenly felt something rough around her ankle. Only then did he notice the silver glowing rope tied there. His eyes followed its trail and saw it lead off in the direction they had come from, disappearing in the thick grass.
“Don’t worry, no one will disturb us. It’s quite long.” The demon’s lips turned up at the corners and she raised her eyebrows at the young man beneath her, not oblivious to the set up she’d given him.
Cash’s mind raced to complete the joke, but he was drawing a blank because the most beautifully stunning girl he’d ever seen was slowly rutting her hips against his raging hard-on. Fuck.
As if sensing his frustration, the demon saved him the humiliation of having not come up with a playfully sexy retort by lunging into a sudden, deep kiss. This was nothing like the first one they had shared, and Cash felt the demon’s long tongue slide into his mouth, wrapping itself around his. He felt a hand reach down to undo his fly, and before long they were both lying naked, bodies entwined, chests heaving and slick with sweat, which did nothing to cool them in the heat of the red Hellish night.
As they bathed in their shared afterglow, Cash spoke up first.
“So… what’s with the rope then?”
The demon’s smile faded, and she looked up at the twinkling stars. The moonlight somehow made her even more captivating.
“I’m a slave to a demon witch.” Her eyes were sorrowful, but she did not cry.
Cash felt a pit at the seat of his stomach. “I’ll kill her.” She was his. He wasn’t going to let anyone else have her.
But his bravado dimmed when she responded with a single cutting snicker. “You’re welcome to try, but I should warn you, she’s killed far stronger men than you.”
Cash wasn’t sure whether to take offense at the insult to his strength or find it sweet that she cared to warn him. Still there must be something he could do.
“So you’re just… stuck with her? Forever?” he pushed up to lean on his hands, suddenly feeling too riled up to remain laying on the ground.
“Well, only until the moon loses her son and bubbles grow older than a child,” the demon responded. “So, most likely.”
“The fuck is that supposed to mean??” Cash was raging now.
The demon calmly sighed back, reaching a hand up to stroke the hair out of the human’s face. “Those are the terms of my servitude. You can’t change it any more than I can.”
And the two remained there in silence until the moon sank beneath the trees and the stars began to fade.
Cash returned to the wall, where he found the imp boy laying up against it, fast asleep. He kicked his hoof gently, startling him awake. “I’m going back now, remember the plan?”
The imp boy drearily lifted his head. “Good morning,” he yawned. “Yes, I think so.”
Cash growled. “You better know so, imp. I’m not getting caught because of a stupid baby.”
The boy sunk back into the wall. “Yes, sir. S-sorry.”
And so the two posted guards had the fright of their lives when a small imp dashed through the gap in the wall, stuck his tongue out at them and ran straight towards the circus. They ran after him, hoping to stop him before he could cause any trouble, leaving a conveniently unguarded wall for Cash to slip through. He returned to his tent as though nothing had happened.
The next morning, the circus was upturned after the guards reported the incident, but no sign of the imp boy was found, and soon life returned to normal.
Cash’s mother was soon set upon by Mrs Brooks, claiming that her daughter had been crying for weeks thanks to Cash’s inconsiderate behaviour. Dexie had been delighted to be ‘gifted’ the pendant, but utterly crushed when Cash subsequently ignored her entirely, no longer even willing to make eye contact with her. It was soon decided that Cash had caused enough trouble for the circus, and it was time he married. Both mothers agreed that killing two birds with one stone was the thing to do, and Cash wondered why he was never consulted before being told he was now engaged to Dexie Brooks.
The wedding occurred that very spring, and Dexie was soon expecting, although those who knew her best felt that her excitement for motherhood seemed somewhat put-on.
And two months before the child was born, another strange occurrence happened at the wall. A basket was placed carefully on the broken stones of the gap, neither guard spotting it (as they always stood facing out), until they heard quiet muffled cries. A note in the basket had only one word written on it: “Cash”.