Chapter 1: The Boot and the Dog
The boot pressed down, a relentless weight grinding into the hollow of Seth’s sternum. He couldn’t breathe. Above him, the neon light bled a cancerous red through the haze of cigarette smoke, framing a face of flawless, terrifying symmetry. Santanico Pandemonium watched him, her head tilted with the idle curiosity of a cat watching a pinned insect.
“You are breathing too loud,” she said. Her voice was a dry rustle, like silk dragging over bone.
Seth sucked in a choked gasp, the effort sending a spike of pain through his ribs. The floor was sticky against his back, smelling of cheap beer and something older, something metallic. From the jukebox, a twangy guitar lament died mid-chord, leaving only the low hum of the bar’s electricity and the wet, ragged sound of his own panic.
“Please,” he managed. The word was pathetic. He knew it as soon as it left his lips.
Santanico’s smile showed no teeth. It was a slow, spreading curl of absolute amusement. “Please what? Please stop? Please go on?” She leaned into the boot, and a sharp, grating pop sounded from his chest. A whimper escaped him. “You came into my house. You brought violence and noise and the stink of your fear into my quiet place. You owe a debt.”
With a sudden, effortless motion, she lifted her foot. Seth rolled onto his side, coughing, clutching his ribs. Cool air flooded his lungs, tasting of dust and decay. Before he could think to scramble away, the pointed toe of her boot hooked under his chin, forcing his head up. Her eyes held him. They were vast, dark pools that swallowed the garish light, and looking into them felt like falling backwards into a well.
“The debt is paid in service,” she whispered. “Look.”
She gestured with her other hand toward the floor beside the pool table. A pile of dog shit lay steaming faintly on the cracked linoleum, a foul brown contrast to the green felt. One of the Dobermans that usually flanked her lay dead a few feet away, its throat a ruin of red. This, then, was the source of the present.
“You will clean my boot,” Santanico said, her tone conversational, as if discussing the weather. “With your tongue. You will get every last bit of filth from the sole. And then you will thank me for the privilege.”
Revulsion, hot and sour, rose in Seth’s throat. He tried to look away, but the pressure under his chin was iron. “I won’t,” he croaked.
“You will.” There was no anger in her voice. Only certainty. It was worse. “Or you can join your brother. His body is out back with the rest of the trash. The choice is a courtesy. A final flicker of autonomy before it is gone.” She removed her boot from his chin and placed it, sole-side up, on the edge of a nearby stool. The offending material was smeared across the intricate leather tread. “Now, Spot.”
The name landed like a slap. It severed something inside him, some last cord of resistance. He wasn't Seth anymore. Seth would have fought. Seth would have died. Spot wanted to live, even if living was this.
A low, trembling sound escaped his lips. He pushed himself onto his hands and knees. The movement sent fresh jolts of agony through his torso. The vinyl of the booths, cracked and bleeding yellow foam, watched him. The cracked mirrors reflected a thousand versions of his degradation. He crawled the three feet to the stool.
The smell was immediate—acrid, organic, humiliating. He gagged, his stomach clenching. He closed his eyes.
“Open your eyes, Spot,” Santanico murmured. “Watch your work. Savor it.”
He opened them. He leaned forward. The first touch of his tongue to the cold, gritty leather was an annihilation. He retched, drool and bile spilling from his mouth onto the floor. He heard her soft, delighted laugh from above him.
“Again.”
He did it. Again. And again. A mechanical process. Scrape, gag, swallow. The world shrank to the texture of shit and leather, the coppery taste of his own fear, the sound of his own ragged breaths. Time dissolved. He was nothing but a tongue, a will broken and reassigned to this single, foul task.
When he finally leaned back, empty and hollow, the boot was clean. He stared at it, his mind a blank, white static.
“Good dog,” Santanico purred. She slid her foot back into the boot and stood, stretching like a predator after a nap. She looked toward the dark hall that led to the back rooms. “We have leftovers. Two, I think. Hiding in the storeroom, believing the locked door will save them.” She looked back down at him, her expression now one of mild, practical interest. “You will fetch them for me, Spot. You will bring them into the light. And then you will kill them.”
Seth—Spot—shook his head slowly. The movement felt alien. “I can’t.”
“You can. You will. It is your first trick.” She walked to the bar, poured a measure of amber liquid into a dusty glass, and sipped. “This is your new life. The simplicity of it should be a relief. No more choices. Only commands. Only purpose.” She nodded toward the hallway. “Go.”
He got to his feet. His body ached, his mouth was a poisoned ruin, but his legs held him. He took a step toward the darkness. Then another. His hands flexed at his sides, empty. He needed a weapon.
“Use your hands,” she called after him, as if reading the thought. “Or your teeth. I am not particular.”
The hallway swallowed him. The red light from the main bar didn’t penetrate here. It was black, the air thick with the smell of damp concrete and rat poison. He could hear it now—the shaky, synchronised breathing from behind a door at the end. The soft, muffled sob of a woman.
He stopped outside the door. His heart was a frantic drum against his bruised ribs. He saw Richie’s face, then. Not as he was at the end, but laughing in the car, a joint clamped between his teeth. That was gone. All of it was gone. All that remained was the voice behind him, the queen in the red light, and the name she had given him.
A new sound cut through the breathing. A soft, wet scratching. Then a long, slow, juicy lick.
He turned.
Santanico was leaning against the wall just a few feet behind him, silent as a shadow. She had one of the dead Doberman’s severed ears in her hand. She ran her tongue up its edge, her eyes locked on his, glowing with a faint, infernal light in the absolute dark.
“Don’t keep me waiting, Spot,” she said, her mouth full. “The night is long, and I have so many more tricks to teach you.”
He turned back to the door. He placed his hand on the cold metal knob. He did not think. Thinking was for men. He was something else now.
He turned the knob. It was unlocked.
The sobbing inside stopped, replaced by a sharp, terrified intake of breath.
Spot stepped inside, closing the door behind him, sealing them all in the dark together.