Free The Demon's Apprentice by Ben Reeder

bad suddenly, when I thought about seeing my father again.
    Mom pulled into the driveway and handed me a key. “I'll be back in a little while, and hopefully by then, we can get you transferred over to Kennedy, and maybe grab lunch afterward to celebrate,” she said as I popped the door open. After I grunted a yes and hopped out, she pulled out of the driveway and puttered off, leaving me with a whole morning to myself, nothing urgent that needed doing, and a whole shelf full of books to read.
    The knock at the front door came less than half an hour later, just when I was starting the third chapter in the mystery I'd chosen. I memorized the page number and closed the book. Old habits kicked in, and I ducked down beside the couch and bent one of the blind's slats to peer out at the front porch. A cold chill ran down my back when I recognized my father's butler, Jeremy. What in the Nine Hells was he doing here? If my father was going to send someone to bring me back, he'd use a guy with a thicker neck and a smaller brain. Someone who opened doors with his foot instead of knocking politely.
    “You're not taking me back,” I said, when I opened the door.
    He gave the same neutral smile I was used to seeing from him, but this time, I could see it in his eyes, too. “Of course not, Master Chance. I'd hardly dream of it. I am merely doing my part to maintain the illusion that you actually resided with your father,” he said, his accent still the proper English butler. He sounded like a man who was resigned to his fate, and it made my stomach twist.
    “Whether you want to or not,” I said bitterly. I closed my eyes, took a slow breath and opened my Third Eye just enough to see his aura. It was mostly a deep blue, with ugly gray streaks that surfaced in places. Around his neck, though, I could see a band of dark red laced with black tendrils that reached up along his face to hover in front of his mouth like poisonous little vines. It was my own handiwork: one of the first compulsion spells I ever cast. Crude, sloppy as hell, but it worked.
    “I wouldn't be able to speak to that, sir,” Jeremy said, still prim. Guilt settled on me like a lead blanket. Jeremy was one of the few guys who worked for my father who'd ever been nice to me, and he was still under the bastard's thumb, while I was walking free. My own promise from Friday night came back to me, and I felt my lips peel back from my teeth in a wolfish grin.
    “You should be able to. This is for your own good. Don't move,” I commanded him. The compulsion kicked in with the trigger phrase and he went still. Dulka had made sure that every spell I cast had a counter-hex built into it, in case someone tried to screw him over. I reached up and put my hand into the compulsion's stain on his aura, and felt the greasy, chill touch close around my fingers. It tried to creep onto my aura, and I suppressed a shudder as I uttered the counter hex, “ Adactio spretum .” The smear dissipated into a fine gray haze on the edge of his aura.
    His eyes went a little wide, and I saw his jaw go slack for the first time. He could talk and act freely now, but until I destroyed the focus, the spell could be reactivated. “Oh, I say!” he said.
                  “Yeah, say whatever you want.”
    He blinked a few times, and his lips went thin as he stood up straighter, which for him was almost impossible. “Your father…is an absolute…wanker!” he finally blurted. “Master Chance, whatever you just did, thank you! You can't imagine what it's been like all the…well, perhaps you can. Even better than I can,” he went quiet as he finished.
    I shook my head. “I just undid some of my own work. And, I'm sorry for doing it to you in the first place.”
    “No, sir. You needn't apologize. It was all him, and that…thing he called up. Don’t you ever think otherwise. I'm relieved you were finally able to do something about it. Which brings me to the purpose of my visit. Your