Mimi's Demons

Chapter 87: It's Called Hubris

The first thing made apparent as Mimi started talking to Louis while they waited for someone to get them na'an was that, like her father, Louis was not a good man.

She didn't have to see the demons to somehow feel it in the air of the piano room. It felt heavier and darker, as though one of the lights were going out. He also had a slim black outline like Duke, though she'd missed it on first glance. It didn't stay still, though. The bits and pieces of demons she thought she had seen had actually been this thin outline jutting out as though all the demons were shifting around beneath an elastic tarp he held against his skin.

It was gross.

"Why would you want all those things in you?" she asked. The na'an had finally come, and though it wasn't made by Kavya, it still tasted pretty good. Merriot must've been feeling threatened and brushed up on his Indian cuisine.

"Because they're useful," said Louis, picking up a piece of na'an. "Surely you've found that out by now." He glanced at her arms.

She didn't feel like showing off her scars like some exhibition, so she just took up her own na'an and took a bite.

"Louis," said Duke. "You're still on a thin ice."

"Apologies, sir." He bobbed his head towards Duke, then looked back to Mimi, eyes bright. "I can't say I've met too many like myself, though."

Mimi perked up, swallowing quickly. "There's more?"

"I've only met two others," said Louis. "A rather anxiety ridden monk in Tibet and a man I swear is the reincarnation of Rasputin in Russia. Not too friendly, that one. Demons are his only friends, except for the fact that demons don't make good friends."

"Unless they're bad demons," said Mimi.

Louis raised an eyebrow. "What a curious thing to say."

But Mimi didn't elaborate. She didn't need to, and it made her feel powerful when her hands still felt a little cold and a little damp.

"Demons are useful because they're, otherwise, completely invisible to mankind. Much of what we apes do is decided by whether or not others can see it. We care an awful lot what others think, and the authority that may or may not punish us for it. But there is always a reckoning. Demons just give the illusion that they are hidden from that reckoning, when it's just not your time yet. They're a lie. It's why they like them so much. I'm sure you've found they poke out from their hidey holes real quick when you lie."

Mimi nodded. Interesting thought, that demons are lies.

"I was told demons can't lie."

Louis raised an eyebrow. "By who?"

"A demon."

Louis looked at her for long enough to make Mimi uncomfortable.

"You can hear them?" he said. "Without compelling them by blood?"

Mimi nodded again, feeling a bit confused. "So they can lie?"

"They shouldn't be able to speak at all unless powered by your blood," said Louise. "And then, compelled, they have not the will to lie, as our blood takes that will. Power is all about agency, afterall."

Mimi frowned. "Huh?"

Louis gave her a smile that seemed...patronizing. "You are rather young. Everything I've said so far is already pretty high thought."

"Don't assume my daughter is like any other child," said Duke, his cold voice only just tinged with a drop of warm pride. "If she doesn't understand, she will say so first. Just talk."