The Innocence of Death

by E G Stone

  “Am I?” I asked. “Alive? Because Fionn killed me, Yolanda. He cut my throat. Stabbed me in the heart. I should be nothing more than a corpse on his mountain.”

  “No.” Yolanda shook her head violently. “You were separated from your life-force. You are an immortal, now!”

  I scoffed. “You told me yourself that immortals can be killed. I’m pretty sure cutting my throat should have killed me. Unless, what, I’m some sort of vampire?”

  “You are human,” Yolanda said. She paused and took a shaky breath. “But you are right. You are not alive. The transition that bound you to Death must have been different because you are human, making you impossible to kill.”

  “So I am some sort of vampire or zombie or whatever,” I said. Bile rose in the back of my throat and for a second, the room spun.

  “No,” Yolanda said. “Vampires may not be dead, but they are not undead. It’s complicated. They…they’re bound to the blood. They take on the life-force of other beings through their blood. This gives them life. They are technically alive, though they had to die first to become as they are.”

  “Right, that makes no sense at all,” I said. I was happy to accept that I wasn’t a vampire. I wasn’t feeling any weird urges to drink blood, so that must mean I was alright. Right? “So I’m some sort of zombie?”

  Yolanda actually snorted in derision at that. “Zombies are animated corpses. They have no connection to either Life or Death because they are held together by pure magic. They do not think or experience. They only do what they are told.”

  I tugged at the sheets on the bed. “So then what am I?”

  “Human,” Yolanda replied firmly. I frowned. “It is the truth. You were separated from your life-force, therefore you are not alive. But because you are bound to Death, you cannot die as such until he either releases you or is killed himself. Which won’t happen.”

  I choked quietly at Yolanda’s words. Something in my chest tightened and wouldn’t let me breathe. I felt tears gathering in my eyes and looked away from my assistant.

  “Most would be revelling in their new power,” Yolanda said, sounding confused. I took off my glasses and blinked furiously while pretending to clean them.

  “I never wanted immortality,” I said. “I just wanted a nice life.”

  “But you shook Death’s hand! You made the bargain for this. This escape from dying. For immortality,” Yolanda said. There was an edge to her voice, like if I was rejecting this, I was rejecting her. I couldn’t stop the hurt and the panic, though.

  “I didn’t think it through,” I managed to whisper. My throat closed and all that escaped me were sobs that shook my shoulders.

  “You are still human, Cal,” Yolanda said, voice soft. Comforting. She lay a hand on my arm. “Don’t forget that. So what if you can’t be killed. At least you still have your humanity.”

  “And what is humanity if not being short lived enough that we must appreciate what we do have? And you know what? I didn’t do that. I never realised what I had and what I actually wanted. Now it’s gone,” I snarled. “Life told me so herself. I was never a warrior. I never fought for life. I just…gave it up.”

  “You’re not dead, Cal,” Yolanda said firmly. “And you are still human.”

  “Yeah. Sure. I’m not alive, but I can’t die,” I said. I shook my head and decided to change the subject. It wasn’t going to help either of us to argue over something that was impossible to change, or to comprehend. My very existence was in question and I doubted that Yolanda had the answers I sought. I couldn’t just lie here and sulk, either. Not when I still had work to do. I stretched and felt my muscles complain loudly in protest. “Why does everything still hurt?”

  Yolanda shrugged, relief flickering through her eyes. “This I do not know. A part of your humanity? You still feel hunger and thirst, so why should you not feel pain? Everyone has limits they must adhere to.”

  “That is not encouraging at all,” I grumbled. The sarcasm and good-natured cynicism was a lie, a facade, and it hurt to wear. “Am I going to grow old? Get sick?”

  “I don’t know,” Yolanda said. “My knowledge of the situation is very limited. Humans are…strange. I only know what Death told me and what I have experienced of his powers. You could ask him.”

  “And he’ll give me another one of those not-quite answers that got me into this whole situation,” I said. “I should have just taken the bullet. It would have been far less work.”

  “But not nearly as much fun, right?” Yolanda smiled, flashing her white teeth at me. I gaped at her.

  “Seriously? You think this is fun? You, the one who is scared of your own shadow, not to mention every being we’ve encountered. Including the guy you work for, by the way.” I sat up a bit more and winced at the pain. This was really, really bizarre.

  “But you are not dead and we have some information, no?” Yolanda clapped her big hands together and looked at me eagerly.

  “Um, right. The, ah…Ennedi Tiger,” I said, pinching the bridge of my nose. “I’ve never heard of it, but Fionn seemed to think that it was important enough to kill me over.”

  I explained what happened on the top of the mountain and Yolanda nodded, looking serious. “Yes, it is bad.”

  “I don’t even know what this tiger-thing is,” I said. “Can it be that dangerous, trying to pit Death against Life and changing the balance of the world and what not?”

  “The Ennedi Tiger is not the one seeking to destroy the balance,” Yolanda said. “It is just a beast. Dangerous, but of no great intellect.”

  “Seriously?” I complained. “I went all the way up to that mountain and got attacked by a bitter has-been and all I got out of it was the murder weapon?”

  “No, you do not understand,” Yolanda said, still sounding annoyingly eager. “The Ennedi Tiger is a sacred being of the Order of Silence!”

  For a moment, her words meant nothing to me. I closed my eyes and tried to think, then jerked forwards. “Wait. The Order of Silence? Like the people that Mercy work for? The assassin?!”

  “Yes,” Yolanda agreed with a broad smile. “We will go talk to them!”

  “Hold on,” I said, shaking my head. “Shouldn’t you be, I don’t know, quaking in terror at the prospect? You nearly had a panic attack when Mercy showed up at the office, and that was just to get information on what Death is like. I’m pretty sure that invading their stronghold and demanding to know why they had Life’s warrior was killed is going to be a whole lot worse than that.”

  Yolanda frowned and shook her head. “You do not know anything, do you?”

  “No, not about this, I don’t,” I snapped.

  “We will make an appointment,” Yolanda said slowly, as though I were a child. I shot her a look. “The Order of Silence is bound to do no harm when you make an appointment. We will be there in an official capacity.”

  “Seriously?” I asked. “These people are bound by the sacred nature of appointments?”

  Yolanda nodded, smiling again. She handed me a clean set of clothes and I took them. Reluctantly. “You dress, we will go. It will be good.” She tromped out of the room, the ground shaking slightly in her eagerness. I looked at the black slacks and black t-shirt. They were in my size, but was the “I work for Death” vibe really necessary?

  I sighed and climbed slowly out of the bed, my muscles still sore but slightly less painful. Still, it took me far longer than it should have to dress, and when I did, I couldn’t help but glance at my subtle reflection in the mirror. I still had a cut on my cheek and some of the bruises had risen to great purple splotches. I looked terrible.

  “Right, well, you’ll have to work on your image later,” I told my marketing-conscious self. “Because you’re off to the sacred land of lawyers. Assassin lawyers. Goodie.”

  I huffed at myself and shuffled to the door. Somehow, I managed to get down to the street. I half-expected Iggie—because, really, I couldn’t remember his name—to be waiting with the Rolls. Instead
, I looked around and found an empty street. No Yolanda, no Iggie, no nothing.

  I looked around, the hair on the back of my neck prickling. I spotted a cobbled side street beside a tudor-style house and wandered in that direction, wondering if maybe Yolanda had just gotten tired of waiting and went for a coffee. Instead, I found the troll standing stock still, her arms pinned to her side by some sort of mysterious force, her eyes wide and her mouth forced shut. She struggled against whatever was holding her in place and stared at me pointedly. I got the message loud and clear: run.

  Maybe if I were more heroic, I would have stayed and done my best to fight off whatever was holding my assistant. But I had no special skills to fight anything and even though I was immune to death, that didn’t mean I couldn’t be hurt. A lot. And I was fairly certain that I wouldn’t be any help to Yolanda if I stayed. Not to mention that whatever was going on, she wasn’t being hurt. She was being held. Logic told me that she wasn’t the target, I was.

  So I did the only thing I knew how to do. I ran.

  I didn’t get very far. Almost as soon as I emerged onto the street, a shadow solidified in front of me. A moment later, two more surrounded me. I turned, looking for a way out, and found nothing. The shadow took form and I found myself facing Thaddeus, Prince of the House of Vampyr.

  He was dressed in a very expensive but sloppy pair of slacks and grey shirt. He still had his hat to protect him from the sun and his hair stuck out at odd angles. The vampire grinned at me, flashing his over-long canines. “Cal Thorpe! It is so good to see you again!”

  “Uh, hi, Thaddeus,” I said. “Look, I’m a little busy. I haven’t had the opportunity to talk to Death about your proposal…”

  “No matter,” Thaddeus said, taking a step forwards. I instinctively backed up and found myself being held by an equally-pretty and unkempt female vampire with blonde hair that was frizzy as I’ll get out in a dress in a garish shade of purple. “We’ve decided this is too important to leave until later.”

  “Now hold on a minute, you can’t just—” I started to protest, doing my best to pull away. The vampiress was exceptionally strong, though. And her smile was really quite creepy.

  “Oh, but I can,” Thaddeus’ pleasant smile turned a bit brittle. He nodded sharply to the other vampire and in a second, we were nothing but smoke and shadow.

  I screamed. At least, I thought I was screaming, but there was very little air and I couldn’t hear anything. I thought I saw features passing us by—a shape that looked like a tree, possibly a house or two—but everything moved too quickly for me to be sure. After what felt like ages, we solidified again.

  I staggered around, trying to gain control of my feet. My brain and my stomach moved at different times and I barely managed to make it to a planter before emptying my stomach. I groaned and clutched at my stomach. “Seriously, let’s never do that again,” I said.

  “You will become better equipped to handle such things,” Thaddeus said, his voice terrifyingly close. I jumped and my still-spinning brain couldn’t move fast enough to catch my balance. I fell over, nearly knocking myself on the head. Thaddeus tsked, drawing my attention.

  What also drew my attention was the enormous castle behind him. Okay, having been to Life’s palatial mansion and Death’s manor, you would think maybe I’m being a bit judicious in my use of the word. But seriously. It was a castle. A gothic castle straight out of Eastern Europe, complete with stones bigger than a standing man, towers and turrets, and walls for soldiers to stand on.

  We were standing in a courtyard that came straight out of a film. I mean, really, what castle actually had a bubbling fountain in the centre, let alone perfectly sculpted hedges in planters, sculptures of prancing unicorns and romantic trellises with roses? I had figured Thaddeus to be a little obsessed with image, but this was ridiculous.

  “Welcome to House Vampyr,” Thaddeus spread his arms wide and did a little bow. The other vampires that he had brought with him crowded close. The female peered closely at me and I crawled backwards away from her. She licked her lips.

  “Can I have a taste, Highness?” she asked, voice deep and throaty. “Just a little one?”

  “No!” Thaddeus’ voice whipped out and I saw the female flinch away. She cowered a little at Thaddeus’ feet, whimpering. “No. Cal is far too valuable for that. He is going to help us refine our image.”

  “Seriously, this is not the time,” I said, clambering to my feet. “Death is going to be mighty peeved that you—”

  “Death is too busy with his marital troubles,” Thaddeus waved his hand dismissively. “Besides, why would he bother with a human like you? No, we appreciate your skills far more than he ever would. We have already started implementing your suggestions!”

  Thaddeus grabbed my hand and dragged me along behind him. I stumbled. His superhuman strength and determination kept me from falling completely on my face. I was pulled into a side yard full of vibrant grass and blossoming cherry trees where four people were sitting behind easels. Before the easels stood four vampires, all holding some sort of ridiculous pose, all looking rather the worse for wear. It wasn’t the vampires that startled me, though, it was the artists. They were bleeding.

  There were various puncture marks on the side of the artists’ necks and from what I could tell, the blood wasn’t clotting. I saw one girl’s hand shaking so badly that she could hardly draw a straight line.

  “What are you doing?!” I cried.

  “We got artists to draw our pictures,” Thaddeus said as if it were obvious. “We found them in a beautiful little art institute in Florence. I love Florence.”

  “They’re bleeding!” I gestured to the man closest to me, who was breathing heavily.

  “I know,” Thaddeus said in distaste. At least, I thought it was distaste. His nostrils were flaring and I could see his pupils dilating in pure desire. “It is sometimes necessary. They were not cooperating. We had to bleed them a little to make them more compliant.”

  I don’t remember much from the Dracula book I read in high school English, but I did remember that being fed upon by a vampire was bad news. It made you addicted. You craved it. And they grew stronger while you suffered and died. And maybe became one of them. I had to get these artists out of here or they were going to die.

  And they were still the breakable, killable sort of human.

  “Let them go,” I snapped.

  “Why?” Thaddeus chuckled. “It was your suggestion.”

  “I suggested you hire an artist! For money! Not coerce them into working for you. You can’t just take people from their lives and force them to paint your portrait,” I said, more than a little desperate. One of the artists looked at me with a flick of his eyes. He whimpered, but a hiss from the vampire he was painting forced his attention back to his work. “I mean, that’s just slavery, plain and simple!”

  Thaddeus looked at me for a moment, his mouth splitting into a wide grin. “You really are that naïve, aren’t you?”

  I took a step back.

  “We’re predators, Cal, that’s what we do,” Thaddeus smirked. “I mean, really. What did you expect we did? Live on tomato juice and steak? We are hunters. And we hunt humans. These artists have a particular skill, or they wouldn’t be alive, here in the centre of House Vampyr. They’re the lucky ones.”

  I took another step back, my hand brushing a stone wall behind me. “You’re keeping them as slaves, though! And you’ve addicted them to whatever it is you do. How can any of that be useful? It’s the worst marketing ploy I’ve ever seen!”

  “It does lower their life expectancy, but what is a few more days when all humans are so short lived?” Thaddeus rolled his eyes at the inconvenience. Anger flared in me and I balled my fists at my side.

  “Let them go,” I snarled. “Or…or you’ll never get me to do any marketing for you.”

  Thaddeus just laughed at that. One of those annoying, two note, mocking laughs, too. He looked at me like I was an idiot. I really want
ed to knock his hat off and see what happened when he got a taste of the sun. I also really wanted to run away. But I wasn’t going to do either. I needed to get those artists out of there.

  “Cal, I had hoped we could do this without any undue…difficulty,” Thaddeus shook his head, putting his hand over his heart. “But you’re being uncooperative.”

  I started to throw back snark at him when Thaddeus surged forwards. He moved faster than I could track him, becoming nothing more than a blur in my eyes. I felt something slam into my throat and then I was being pushed back until I hit the wall. Thaddeus stood there, his hand grasping my throat tight enough to make me see spots. I gasped, but nothing came out. My lungs started burning and the spots grew bigger.

  Then, surprise surprise, Thaddeus drew back his lips and sank his fangs into my neck. The first sensation was one of panic. Then there was almost no sensation at all. It was like floating. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it wasn’t pleasant either. It just sort of was. I didn’t feel like I was going to be addicted to whatever this was. At least I couldn’t die from it, I supposed. I just had to wait until he figured that out.

  Thaddeus pulled back from me with a cry. He blurred until he was standing nearly twenty feet away. His mouth was covered in my blood and his eyes were wide with shock. “What…what is wrong with you?” he breathed. I frowned, confused. Then Thaddeus began to cough. With each cough, his already pale skin moved more towards pallid, then grey. He started wheezing and gagging. I could see the desperation in his eyes when he lunged for me again. Before he could get anywhere near me, Thaddeus crumbled to dust.

  The vampires in the small courtyard started screaming. The sound was like a pack of very large predators doing their best to tell everyone to stay far, far away. The vampires spontaneously turned into smoke or ran as far from me as possible.

  I leaned back against the wall, trying to control the shaking in my legs. The artists all turned to look at me like they were coming out of a drug-haze. I saw the young girl blink a few times and frown deeply. “Well, hi,” I said, trying to sound friendly and non-threatening. “I’m Cal Thorpe. PR agent for…you probably don’t need to know this. How do we get you back to Florence?”