“Nope.”

“Then how will you pick me up?"

“I'm resourceful." I turned and took a seat on the couch.

“Alright. I want to see that contract when I see you tomorrow. Before anything happens." She had the tone of someone trying to make a deal on terms that she didn't understand.

“That's fair, but it doesn't burn until the end of the night."

“Ok. Do you want my number?"

"I have your soul. I'LL know where to find you." I kept my smile amiable as I said that.

The words seemed to shake her, regardless of their intent. She looked at me for a long time before she finally nodded and turned to head out of the door. I let her go and breathed an enormous sigh of relief as I heard the door close.

That had gone much better than it could have.

I quickly ran through the living room and up the stairs to my room before I snatched up her contract from my hidey-hole. Looking it over,

I saw it was still intact and in pristine condition. Of course it was.

I hadn't done anything wrong when I forged it. For a moment I considered going back on my deal with Olivia. I could quite easily have gotten the date with her and then made her do damn near anything I wanted.

Remember me telling you about how the body has a very strong protection against any kind of invasive magic? Well owning someone's soul provides a convenient back door in that protection. It Lets you do practically anything you Like with them. Of course I'd need a certain amount of preparation time with the contract, but by the time I picked her up the next night, I could have made her cluck like a chicken if I wanted to.

Oh, and in case you're wondering, then yes, I did consider making her do other things, too.

Once you have someone's soul then you can actually change them. You can make them an obsessive piano player, an avid sports fan, or a sex-crazed maniac. Given that Olivia had quite a nice body, I certainly imagined having her spend the night giving me a long strip-tease before bouncing up and down on my cock to her heart's content. What's more, I could make damn sure she loved every minute of it.

I'd like to say I had a sudden surge of conscience and decided to go the gentlemanly route, but the truth is that I've never had all that much in the way of morality in the first place. What stopped me from putting those ideas into action was that I just found them kind of... icky. Sure, it's cool to fantasise about sexually owning someone, but when it comes right down to it I don't really want a sex slave. It takes away the challenge of talking to someone when they mindlessly agree with everything you say, and I'd imagine sex would soon get boring when you didn't have to try.

Plus, taking this woman who had an obviously keen mind, a job, and probably a family somewhere, then turning her into a sex-crazed drone just seemed Like an enormous waste.

So I set about practising some things I'd wanted to try for a while.

Nothing too major, of course, since I was planning on voiding the contract in a day's time. Still, a few fail-safes couldn't hurt in case

Olivia turned up tomorrow with a pack of cops and had me arrested for spiritual bartering or something. Much like a lot of actual magic, the process of playing with a contract isn't as visually thrilling as you might think. You simply place your hand upon the parchment and concentrate on the changes you want to make.