Not a thing in sight moved at Brentview Court. The lake could have been a pane of still black glass as even the wind seemed to hold its breath over the moonless night.

A few neon signs buzzed uninvitingly over vacant shops and street lights rooted on the corners set a sleepy orange ambience. Here and there, the glimmer of a television could be seen basting front lawns and cobbled driveways.

Cindy Anne was downstairs in her basement on the edge of the town, skipping circles in mirth as she suckled a large sticky candy.

Melted black candles with sputtering wicks cast ominous shadows on the stone walls, animal skulls of varying shapes and sizes, and poppets made of hair decorated a chalk pentagram drawn haphazardly on the floor.

After her 3rd full circle Cindy giggled and snatched up a hair poppet, took another grand lick of her lolly, and slapped the two together. When she spoke again her voice was an eery whisper that didn’t match her candy stained face.

“Demon bound to me.”

She threw the lollipop down into the center of the pentagram and it disappeared with a loud bang and flash of smoke smelling of sulphur and rot. The candle lights winked in and out rapidly before roaring into spitting flames the size of sign posts. The animal skulls clattered like wound up toys and began to levitate one by one until they formed a slow rotating ring midair.

Mr. and Mrs. Donohue slept on upstairs feeling refreshed after a tranquil 3 day weekend. They didn’t hear a portal ripping through time and space, or the screams of the damned in their basement . They certainly weren’t aware their daughter was summoning a demon for questionable means from an instruction pamphlet.

When Cindy eventually opened her eyes something peered back through several knobbed and slimy limbs. Where the goo dropped, it popped and sizzled igniting little fires that went out after a few seconds. When it opened its mouth to speak, rows of fangs extended back and down its throat.

“A child?“ it’s voice was guttered and layered as if it spoke through several beings. It began to unfold to come closer for a better look, limb by limb, and Cindy could make out exposed bones, and 6 more eyes trailing down its face onto its torso that swiveled and blinked at random.

“You’re ugly!” Were Cindy’s only words of incredulity. All she could do was stare back open mouthed.

The demon blinked 3 of its eyes. Throwing back its head, it began to laugh maniacally- more of a barked hack really.

“Have I, After eons been so lucky? An amateur!

“Free at last” He turned on Cindy and with one last grimace he released great leaping flames at the little girl.

He laughed and laughed, the power coursing through his veins tickled.

A high pitched giggle stopped him cold. He looked in disbelief at what should have been a petite pile of ashes to what instead was that pig tailed girl smiling a toothless grin.

His heart began to sink. Fast. It couldn’t be. No. He summoned blood curses and radiation and cosmic death but nothing, not a single speck of goo left his pentagram.

“What have you done-“

Her smile reached from ear to ear now standing up and brushing off her school dress.

“Wait-

“please!”

Cindy began to hum, packing up her bag and library book.

She didn’t look back as she left the basement, but she would came back there again. Often.

—— ***———-

20 years later

The stench in the basement was familiar to Cindy. The flash and bang barely fazed her now.

The hiss of loathing that filled the basement was almost a greeting.

“I really can’t stand you and one day- I will own your soul”

Cindy didn’t doubt this but before that happened she’d figure out a way to bargain for her freedom. After all she couldn’t keep a demon trapped in her basement forever, something she’d only realized as an adult.

“Then why are you still listening to me” she sighed mindlessly, working over another incantation.

The demon bared his teeth but said nothing. He pondered his situation instead. Could it be sabotage. Some scorned enemy? A sibling? A trapping incantation in a children’s library book had sealed his fate as the slave to a juvenile. Who could do such a thing? He did know the answer to this might hold the key to his freedom.