Ineza felt the beat. The guitars screamed, savage riffs shredding the air, while the vocalist wailed her ballad of fury and power. Ineza didn't listen to the words, but only heard the sounds. Together with the throaty rumble of the bass guitar, she kept the beat.
Practice had honed her into a machine. Her hands knew what to do, thrashing the drums with elegant, ruthless precision. Her wrists and fingers, not her arms, did all the work of bringing down the sticks, while her feet worked the kickdrums to a blazing rhythm. Even though she was sweating, her muscles were relaxed. The music gave her power, and she gave it back.
At last, the song reached its crescendo, and Ineza began to feel a little of the tension she had so studiously avoided. Her limbs tightened, her movements became a little more stiff and imprecise. Her hands threatened to slow down.
'Keep it together, Ineza,' she commanded herself. 'Almost there...' Her wrists rattled off lightning-quick notes on the snare drum, and she crashed the cymbals, running through a scatter of notes before the finale, hitting each one precisely.
For one moment, everything was silent, then the crowd erupted with applause. As the song's echoes faded in Ineza's mind, the sights and sounds of the rock concert came flooding in. The firecrackers that went off on the sides of the stage, the roaring crowd, the hiss of speakers that had been turned too high and all the other senses that Ineza had ignored now assaulted her.
The rest of the band stood up and showboated. Even now, having finished the last song of the concert, they showed no fatigue, prancing and pumping their fists as though they were still just getting started. Ineza raised her fist in token support, but the sweltering heat and blistering energy had gotten to her. As the band retired backstage, she let out a sigh of relief.
Looking at herself in the mirror, Ineza tried and failed to brush down her unruly, shoulder-length red hair with her hands. What little eyeliner she had put on was running down her cheeks, loosened by all the sweat she had worked up under her vest and jeans.
"You look like hammered shit," said Mariana the bassist, delicate as always.
"I'm going to need some time on my own," said Ineza. "I've got to go have a talk with Avan."
Mariana let out a mocking huff. "What are you going to do, draw a pentagram on somebody? Do you need some human skin to bind your book?"
Ineza rolled her eyes.
"Hey," Mariana called after her, "I know a virgin you can sacrifice!"
Ineza walked off, letting Mariana run her mouth all she wanted. In a quiet, dark spot behind the band's trailer, she knelt at a fire pit she had made the night before and threw in some dry kindling, igniting it with the cigarette lighter in her pocket. Drawing out a vial of yew sap- not human blood as her friends so stubbornly believed- she spread it across the fire, letting it pour in the shape of Avan's symbol.
To her delight, the sap went down in the just the right form. On her knees, she waited patiently, not for Satan, but for the old goddess Avan, the old one who had almost vanished from the earth, but who would always be generous with gifts to her followers.
Finally, she could feel her wish granted. Magic suffused her lips. The first man to whom she said the words 'You're Mine' would be hers for the night, and all hers.
* * *
Ineza walked briskly down the dusty street, her hair hidden by a skullcap and with her trademark vest gone so she wouldn't attract attention. The crowd from the concert was spreading as they headed back to their homes, dividing into clusters of friends.
Males of every description were sprinkled among the crowd. Most of them had facial hair, which Ineza hated, and of those who didn't, most were unruly, or slouched, or just looked wrong. But after a few minutes, she found what she was looking for.
His black hair skimmed his straight eyebrows and flowed neatly down the back of his head, neither prim nor messy- just how Ineza liked it- and his skin had just enough copper hue that it went well with the black. He was no muscle man, but he wasn't fat either, and more importantly, he carried his head high, raising himself to a full six feet. A winning smile graced his lips as he chatted with his friends.
'That one,' she thought. That was the one she wanted. She stepped up to him, ready to put his mouth to good use.
One of his friends noticed her first. "Uh... hi," he said awkwardly.
Ineza ignored the friend. "Hey," she said sweetly to the handsome one. "Were you just at that concert?"
"I was. It was pretty amazing. Were you there too?"
"You might say that. Look, I need you for something, and you're mine. So follow me." She split away, circling back to an alley. She couldn't resist looking over her shoulder.
Her target stuttered, his lips working but not saying anything. When he finally regained himself, he faced his companions. "Hey, guys, I'll catch you later."
"What?" said one of his friends. "Julio, what the hell?"
"There's just something I need to take care of. Don't wait for me. I'll catch up with you if I can, alright?"
Julio's friends all traded baffled glances, but then turned away and kept walking.
Ineza waited in the alley, leaning back against a brick wall with her arms lazily folded. "Julio, is it?" she purred, as he stepped up to her. "Tell me, sexy, where do you live?"
His face brightened helpfully. "Not far from here. Just down this street and a couple blocks to the right. Want me to show you?"
"Who else lives there?"
"I've got a roommate, but he works the night shift. He won't be back until four tomorrow morning."
"Perfect." She stood up, grabbing him gently by the collar. "Take me there, big boy."
A few minutes later, Julio unlocked his apartment door and pulled it gently open, waiting like a gentleman for her to go in.
She stepped in, then stopped. His bed hid beneath a tangle of wadded sheets, practically merging with thrown-around dirty clothes and books and papers.
