The Witch's Summoning (Patreon)

Would you be willing to write about a fairly evil witch who summons and traps a demon. And her nerdy partner is like "uh I don't think this is a good idea" but is supportive nevertheless. And then an angel shows up and pleads with the witch to let the demon go because they're best friends/lovers!

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“It’s not cruel to trap a demon,” the witch said. “Just think that I’m protecting everyone else who would make a deal with it, not really knowing what they’re doing.”

“I know,” the witch’s partner said. “I know.”

“But you still don’t think it’s a good idea?”

The witch’s partner grimaced, though there was little point lying about the matter. The witch had always been rather good at reading them, one way or another, in the year or so that they had known each other. Or, maybe, their unease was simply obvious in the way their gaze kept flicking to their creature trapped in the centre of the summoning circle.

They had read a lot about demons, their categorisations and types and nature, but the witch’s partner had never actually seen one before. It was a monstrous looking thing, when not possessing a human body. All darkness and smoke and eyes like blood red rubies glowing above a gaping pit of a mouth and teeth. It certainly looked like it could swallow up an entire world given the first opportunity.

But, still. Never mind the dangers of summoning a demon anywhere near humans and the human realms, there was something terrible about the way it bashed desperately against the invisible walls of its cage. It was something wild. Something powerful. It didn’t belong in a witch’s basement, summoned against its will, bound by magic that left it unable to even speak (lest it speak to temptation.) They hadn’t realised that before the witch did it. It had all seemed so…theoretical. Watching it twist and writhe as if its trap caused it actual pain made it so abundantly clear that the demon was alive, even if not in the traditional way one might think. It wasn’t in pain though, was it? Demons didn’t feel pain. The witch, in all of her arcane knowledge, had told them as much.

“I know you know what you’re doing,” the witch’s partner said, instead, decidedly keeping their attention fixed on anything other than the demon. They shoved down the squirming knot in their gut. It was a demon. It would do worse to them, if it could, wouldn’t it? “I know that the data we can collect from the specimen can do a lot of good.” They tried for a smile, and reached to squeeze the witch’s hand. “It’s just…unnerving, you know? Seeing it.”

The witch cupped their partner’s cheeks, and pressed a kiss atop their forehead.

“I won’t let it hurt you,” she promised. “Thank you so much for helping me with this. It’s what your family would have wanted.”

Despite popular belief, a witch’s blood couldn’t summon a demon after all.

The witch’s partner swallowed, but nodded, melting into the reassuring touches.

The witch had saved them. Had found them, in the empty carcass of their home, when they got back to find that demons had destroyed their family.

They hadn’t done all of their preparations to turn back now, had they?

The angel showed up around two days later.

The witch’s partner was out when it started, but they knew something was – off – when they let themselves back into the house.

A strange, eerie brightness radiated from around the cracks of the basement door. Their first thought was that the demon had somehow escaped, and their mind flashed visceral to blood and guts and carnage.

Then, they heard the voices. One, the witch’s, and the second a stranger’s.

“They’re my friend,” the stranger said. Their voice was lovely, difficult to exactly pinpoint, but utterly lovely. Hearing the heartbreak in it made the partner’s insides wrench, desperate to soothe and fix and make it better. “My best friend. Please. That summoning circle—”

“They’re a demon.” The witch’s voice was prim. Cold. Clearly unaffected. “Demons don’t have friends, and they certainly don’t have friends who are angels.”

Angel.

They dropped the grocery shopping, eggs cracking and milk spilling, across the kitchen floor.

The light suddenly made a breathless sort of sense. They’d never seen a demon, but the available texts and research on angels was even rarer. Angels couldn’t be summoned, after all.

Surely, if an angel was vouching for the demon—

“Though I suppose,” the witch continued, “that the devil was once an angel too. Perhaps that explains your loyalties. Your evil.”

“My evil? You’re hurting them,” the angel snapped. “Every second in that circle is an agony to them.”

No. No it wasn’t. Surely it wasn’t? The witch had said-?

“We both know you cannot hurt humans,” the witch said, “so don’t bother taking that tone with me. You can’t do anything.”

They’d never heard the witch sound like that before.

“Please,” the angel said again. “Whatever it is that you want, whatever you’ve summoned them for—”

The witch’s partner braced themselves, heart pounding, and opened the basement door. They stepped over the grocery debris, palm slick with clammy sweat and fear as they gripped the railing and made their way down.

“Alright.”

The witch’s partner stopped.

“Alright?” the angel asked.

“I’ll let the demon go,” the witch said. “Providing I can have you instead.”

There was a long, dreadful silence.

The witch’s partner stumbled to rest of the way down the stairs, pulse roaring in their ears, certain they must have misheard. Entrapping a demon was one thing, but to cage an angel? It was obscene. Wrong. It had to be wrong.

They rounded the corner into the basement.

The demon’s eyes were furious. Its mouth was a silent scream, a snarl, as it clawed rabid at the barrier. Its gaze was fixed on the angel, as if to –

Pleading.

The demon, in whatever silent way it could, was pleading. Pleading for its…friend, not to make such a sacrifice.

The realisation made the protagonist’s stomach drop. They hadn’t known demons could plead, as anything other than a sly game. There was no game on the demon’s shadowy face. No wicked seduction or anything that all of the research books the witch’s partner had read warned about.

Were the texts even true?

And the angel – they didn’t know how anyone could look at the disappointed sorrow on the angel’s face, the constrained and helpless fury, and not feel like they were the worst person in the entire world. The angel was the most beautiful thing that the witch’s partner had ever seen.

The angel’s attention snapped to them, over the witch’s shoulder.

“No,” the witch’s partner said, mouth dry. “No, you can’t do that.”

The witch turned, surprise flickering across her expression, before it changed to something else. “Go back upstairs, love. I can handle this. This demon is-”

“Angel,” the witch’s partner said.

“It’s only pretending to be an angel.”

“I already heard your conversation!”

The witch tilted her head at that, features hardening. “Go upstairs.”

The witch’s partner shook their head, mutely, taking another step closer.

“Let it go,” they said, fists clenched at their sides. “Let them both go.”

“Don’t be so weak—”

“Their kindness and compassion is not weak,” the angel said. “Thank you.”

“Please,” the witch’s partner said. “I mean – this isn’t the demon that hurt my family, is it? Maybe they’re not all the same. I know you’re angry, I get it. I do. But maybe we got it wrong.”

Maybe it took someone pleading for the demon, treating it like – well, like a person, like loved one – for the enormity of what they had done to sink in. It was nothing like the books said it would be. And if the demon truly was in agony…

“What if I someone trapped me against my will?” the witch’s partner tried. “Would you not save me?”

They expected the horror of it to hit the witch then, too.  The witch’s expression didn’t change. They didn’t move to undo the spell.

The witch snorted. “God. You’re always so desperate for someone to always save you, aren’t you? Why don’t you ever save yourself? It’s pathetic.”

The witch’s partner recoiled like the witch had hit them, not expecting it.

Was it possible that spending so much time around the demon had corrupted her brain somehow? But the angel…

The witch’s partner squared their shoulders.

“You used my blood,” they said. “Well, I remove my consent.”

“You can’t do that.”

“I just did.”

“No, I mean.” A smile that they didn’t recognised crossed the witch’s lips, twisting her pretty face even further. “It’s too late. Your blood already belongs to the magic. It belongs to me. Your opinion on the matter really doesn’t make much of a difference. I knew you’d be one of those idiots I was talking about who would summon a demon, and then let it out because you felt bad for it, even after what its kind did to your family. As if I was going to risk it.”

They had never heard the witch sound so scathing. She had been gentle with the protagonist’s concerns before, because it was only natural to be a bit apprehensive. But it was for the best, what they were doing. The two of them could help people and save lives.

The angel looked at the witch with a withering contempt that would make most people flinch and beg for mercy.

The witch simply stared back, unmoved, maybe even amused.

“If you want me,” the angel said, into the ringing silence. “You can have me, you have my word, providing you release my friend and the human. But you will not hurt them anymore.”

It seemed impossible that everything, the whole world as they knew it, had changed so fast.

They’d got the demon to study it, to stop it from hurting anymore people, not…

Hadn’t they?

“Excellent,” the witch said. “I’ve heard angel tears have magnificent healing properties, compared to a demons. I’ll be excited to see if it’s true!”

“No-“ the witch’s partner began.

But then the air filled with the witch’s power, with the rush of the spell being lifted and the guttering of candles.

And they knew no more.