Overview
The Bargain-Carry Demon is the heavy, low, slightly-too-broad shape — thick-limbed, broad-shouldered, with the head that sits a little too low on the body, like a word that is waiting to be spoken in the wrong direction. It is the truest ledger of the demon line: the fiend whose bargain carries across the pit the way the fire carries across the ash, and the carrying is not a choice. There is no will in it beyond the fire and no hunger beyond the bargain, but the carrying arrives anyway, and the carrying is not a choice. Where the other fiends of the pit keep the bargain in the fire, the Bargain-Carry keeps it in the debt.
Habitat
It lives in The Infernal Pits, in the black fire at the bottom of the world, where the broken stone keeps the bargain and the hunger is the only light there is. It keeps the ledger-stone, because that is where the debt is easiest to carry, and because a fiend that leaves the ledger-stone is a fiend that has forgotten the fire. The deeper fiends keep the black fire and the ash-line keep the speaking, but the Bargain-Carry keeps the ledger-stone and does not stop carrying. It is settled in the pit, and the settling is the whole of the territory, because the debt does not leave the pit.
Appearance
The silhouette is the heavy, low, slightly-too-broad shape — thick-limbed, broad-shouldered, with the head that sits a little too low on the body. A Bargain-Carry reads 1.91 m tall and carries 158 kg of dense, low flesh, built broad across the shoulder and thick through the neck. The skin is a deep, muddy umber to a true, quiet black at the jaw, with a faint, almost imperceptible warmth to the cheekbones. The mark is the network of fine, pale red veins at the temples, which glow faintly when the demon is roused or speaking a dark word — the glow is the whole of the warning, and the not-glowing is the whole of the peace.
Behaviour
It moves at 2.1 m/s across the broken stone, deliberate, because the debt does the waiting and the fiend has nothing to do but carry. It does not hunt by the mouth; it hunts by the ledger — the debt lands on the stone, the bargain is kept, and the hunger is taken the way a word is taken, letter by letter. When the bargain thins — a day before it breaks, never a moment after — the pale red veins run bright and the fiend carries the debt a degree harder, the way a hand holds a blade. It heals by the fire: a wound of a type the pit does not recognize simply stops being a wound, and the not-recognition is the whole of the healing.
Natural Weapons & Defenses
The debt is the whole of the weapon — a bargain carried across the ash that lands on the stone and keeps the pit's faith for a century. There is no strike beyond the debt and no defense beyond the fire: the skin is a deep, muddy umber to a true, quiet black, as hard as the fire that keeps it, and the pale red veins hold the word the way the stone holds the debt. A Bargain-Carry that is harmed does not bleed in the way the pit does not recognize — the harm simply stops being a harm, and the stopping is the whole of the healing.
Magic Alignment
Its line belongs to chaos, the fire, the patient, precise holding of the dark word across the pit. The Bargain-Carry carries the line's truest named inborn, Bargain-Carry — its bargain carries across the pit the way the fire carries across the ash, and the carrying is not a choice. It also carries Regeneration, the line's healing, which is not a choice either, because a fiend that could not heal would not be a fiend of the pit. Its signature power is the Dark Word: a word spoken across a century, and the word keeps the pit's faith. The word is the whole of its speech, and the keeping is the whole of its law.
Society
There is no society in it, and the not-having is the whole of the shape. The fiends of the pit speak in parallel the way fire speaks — each one its own word, all of them the same hunger. The deeper fiends keep the black fire, the ash-line keep the speaking, and the ledger-stone keep the carrying, and the three have learned that a word that is not carried is a word that is not a bargain, and the not-carrying is the whole of the peace.
Culture & Lore
The bargain is the only honest conversation the pit has ever trusted, and the lore of the line is the bargain. A fiend that carries its debt a day past the breaking is a fiend that has kept the pit, and the keeping is the whole of its reputation. The pale red veins are the mark the line keeps — the fine, deliberate glow that shows when the dark word is spoken — and a Bargain-Carry whose glow runs true is a fiend the pit will trust with the ledger-stone. The The Forgotten are the only ones who have ever kept a bargain the fire had already forgotten, and the keeping is the whole of the legend.
Home
It lives in The Infernal Pits, a pit of black fire and broken stone at the bottom of the world, where the demons keep their bargains and their hunger. The fiend keeps the ledger-stone, and the ledger-stone is the whole of its home, because the home is the fire and the fire is the home. The Angel of The Sanctum does not come down, and the not-coming is the whole of the enmity. The pit gives the line its fire, its hunger, its one honest conversation, and its one true ledger, and the line keeps all four the way it keeps the word — until the bargain is done.
Relations
The Angel of The Sanctum is the enemy the pit counts, and the counting is the whole of the law, because the fire measures the light the way the dark measures the depth: the light is the only thing the fire cannot keep, and the not-keeping is the whole of the enmity. The The Forgotten are the banished the pit takes in, and the taking in is the whole of the promise, because the forgotten are the ones the fire keeps burning for.
In the Story
The six who arrived through the The Threshold never came down to the pit, but the pit has been carrying since the oaths were sworn above, and the ledger-stone's fiends have been keeping a day earlier than they should. This season a demon came up the fire with a word that was not in the ledger — a word that is not in the hunger, and the not-listing is the whole of the warning. The Bargain-Carry keeps the debt the fire is keeping, and the debt is the whole of the story's edge.