The Tome of Bill Series: Books 5-8 (Goddamned Freaky Monsters, Half A Prayer, The Wicked Dead, The Last Coven)

by Rick Gualtieri

  We were at the edge of the forest, where the tundra began. A large contingent of Gan’s followers had met us there, having already set up a basecamp. Unfortunately, they weren’t coming with us. Though the Feet were willing to hear us out, they only extended the invitation to a small group. Gan’s people were forbidden from entering the forest. If they did, we’d be killed instantly. Though I’d been happy to see them, thinking an extraction force was relatively close if we needed one, in truth, we’d be on our own if anything went south.

  Just wonderful.

  Right as we were getting ready to go, Gan walked away to converse with the leader of her strike team. I figured it was to give instructions for him and his whole family to commit suicide if they forgot to do something minor – typical Gan stuff. However, just as they were finishing up, I noticed him hand her something small and disturbingly metallic.

  My palms began to sweat. Oh fuck. It was another detonator. I was just about to tell everyone to perform an emergency striptease when she walked back and held it out to me, palm up.

  A metal vial lay in her hand. “What?”

  “Blood,” she replied.

  “Yours?” I asked.

  “Yes, as well as a drop from every man you see here. If things go wrong...”

  There was no need for her to finish that sentence. I realized she didn’t need a bomb. She had one standing right in front of her. And I’d been right. This was a detonator of sorts, just not electronic in nature. This small amount wouldn’t last for long, but it was easily palmed. Also, the results were bound to be ... interesting.

  “Thank you, Gan,” I said. “That’s actually a really good idea.”

  “The anticipation of once again seeing the beast inside of you fills my body with joy.”

  “And the moment’s over. Thanks.” I put the vial into my pocket then turned to where most of the others had gathered. “Okay, let’s get this over with. We get in there, present them with our dead rats, and get the hell out.”

  “I don’t know what the fuck you’re complaining about!”

  I turned to find Tom stalking over to us. He seemed a bit miffed. Perhaps that had something to do with the fact that his fur coat was dripping with blood and entrails.

  Though I tried to keep a stoic look upon my face, I couldn’t. Gan had taken seriously our musings on Tom’s lack of scent. Upon our arrival, her people had been waiting for us, complete with a slaughtered moose. Before he could so much as open his mouth in protest, they’d dragged him over and tossed him into a pile of innards.

  Well, that was one problem solved. Now only a shitload more to go.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  “So is there any particular direction I should be going?” Sheila asked from up ahead, her aura alight to keep her from tripping in the dark forest.

  “March forward,” Gan replied stoically. “We are already under observation. The Alma will present themselves at a time of their own choosing.”

  “It had better be soon,” Tom griped. “I think I have a piece of intestine in my shoe.”

  He was walking with us, having been shunned by the witches marching a dozen or so paces behind, their magic lighting their way and making them easily seen despite the foliage.

  I stopped abruptly and spun, not-so-accidentally smacking my friend with the skunk in my hand. “Y’know, a positive attitude would probably do you well.”

  “I never liked you.”

  I grinned back at him, then turned and continued walking. “I can’t see why not.”

  “I’m not really liking anyone right now,” Sally said. “I can’t believe I volunteered to come back up to this God forsaken place.”

  “Adversity makes for strange bedfellows.”

  “Hah!” Tom chuckled. “Like how you and Sally...”

  In a flash, she grabbed him by the greasy collar of his bloodied coat and dragged him down to her level. “What did we discuss about that?”

  Uncertainty flashed in my friend’s eyes. “Um ... that we were never ever to mention it again?”

  “Yes, and what would happen if you did?”

  “You’d melt me down into a pile of suppositories and pass me out to crackheads.”

  “Same rule applies up here, except I might have to substitute our hairy soon-to-be friends instead.”

  “Mention what?” Sheila asked from up ahead.

  “Nothing,” Sally replied, still glaring unblinkingly at Tom. “Just a tiny incident that happened on the road to Boston.” She glanced at me sidelong. “A very tiny incident.”

  I stuck my tongue out at her and continued on my way. It was probably something we needed to discuss at some point, although up until now, Sally had purposely blown me off. She didn’t seem to think it was a big deal – one of those things that happened between vamps. Me, I wasn’t quite so certain. I mean, my alter ego Dr. Death had forced himself upon her with the intent of killing her when he was done. It was meant to be the ultimate slap in the face to me, the last thing I saw before being shunted into my own subconscious forever.

  Pity for him, it hadn’t quite worked out that way.

  Even so, neither Sheila nor Gan knew about it, as far as I was aware. And, quite frankly, I thought it best to keep things that way. Gan might flip out and do something Gan-like. As for Sheila...

  Oh, Jesus. I had no fucking idea there anymore. Talk about getting mixed vibes. Albeit, in all fairness, I was probably giving them off myself. In truth, I had feelings for two women, either of whom was both a wonderful prospect and a potentially dire mistake at the same time.

  I glanced quickly at Sally by my side, then forward again toward Sheila.

  There would have to be a reckoning soon between us all. As for what that would mean, I had no idea.

  No. All I knew was that I was a doofus marching through the woods, searching for Bigfoot with a dead skunk in my hand – the plot of a romantic comedy if ever there was one.

  Fortunately for me, as tended to be the case during times when I really should have been paying attention, fate decided to spare me from such deep thoughts.

  I have little doubt the others noticed it first. They’d stopped walking, causing me to almost saunter into Sheila’s backside, a not so great thing with her aura up. As I backpedaled a few paces, I noticed my footsteps on the cold, hard ground sounded very loud. All sound, save that which we made ourselves, had ceased in the woods.

  “And here we go again,” Tom muttered. “Try not to shit on any sacred trees.”

  “That wasn’t me.”

  “Would you both shut the fuck up?” Sally hissed at us.

  “I am forced to agree,” Gan said quietly. Then, more loudly, “Shining One, now.”

  Sheila glanced back, uncertainty in her eyes ... strange, considering the force that powered her.

  “You can do it!” a voice further back cried – Kelly’s.

  Sheila nodded, then turned to face the darkness before her. She drew her sword, and it blazed white fire as she lifted it over her head, becoming an unmistakable beacon in the night. “I am Sheila O’Connell of the...” She hesitated for a second. I couldn’t really blame her. This next part was kind of stupid. “Of the Silver Eyes. I have come here to parlay between the two great warring nations as set forth in the Humbaba Accord.”

  “Accord broken,” a gravelly voice replied from somewhere up ahead. Even with my enhanced night vision, I couldn’t see the source. However, it probably wasn’t a stretch to imagine the owner was very large and smelled terrible.

  And there it was. One moment there was nothing, save the stench of Tom and our peace offerings. The next came an odor that made me want to bury my face in the skunk’s ass and breathe as deeply as I could.

  Sheila coughed a few times, but thankfully kept her composure. Sadly, the witches behind us weren’t quite as magnanimous.

  “Dear goddess!”

  “I think I’m gonna hurl.”

  Oh well, hopefully their st
atus as a neutral party held.

  “A sword which is broken can be reforged,” Sheila said, her voice tight but loud. I had little trouble imagining her eyes were watering something fierce right now, but she held it together. “So too can a broken accord.”

  The crunch of dried pine needles beneath enormous feet could be heard all around us. Where a moment ago there was nothing, now enormous shapes moved between the trees. We were surrounded.

  If things went badly for us, we would be fucked in the ass as thoroughly as if we were under contract with Vivid Video.

  Maybe it was a trick of the light, but the trees immediately in front of Sheila seemed to bend away from each other, revealing the massive form of a Sasquatch. Over nine feet tall, he approached to just outside her aura and stood looming over her. The look on its face was one of ... well, these things always looked pissed off, so that wasn’t really anything new.

  It occurred to me that none of us really had any clue whether an Icon’s power could work against the Feet. I mean, they were basically spirits given flesh ... really big flesh, that hit really really hard when it wanted to. Then again, hadn’t Alex once said something about vampires originally being like that too before something happened to cause us to adopt our current forms? I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe that something had a name that started with I and ended with B.

  Still, that was speculation best saved for another time. No matter what the Feet actually were, it would be a particularly lousy time to learn that Sheila’s powers didn’t do jack shit against them.

  The two beings, both of them supernatural wonders in their own right – the legendary Icon and fucking Bigfoot – stood there staring at each other. A Mexican standoff in the woods of Canada.

  And then, without a word between them, the impasse was broken.

  C is for Cookie

  Sheila’s sword blazed furiously, casting a ghostly light on the monster in front of her. Its eyes flashed red and its lips pulled back in a snarl.

  Then she drove the tip of the sword into the frozen ground between them and took a step back.

  The ugly fucker in front of her glared down for a moment, then nodded as if it liked what it saw. At last, it opened its mouth and spoke. “Silver Eyes great warrior. Cunt honored by your presence.”

  Wait, what?

  No. I did not just fucking hear that.

  I turned to Tom and saw his eyes widen with surprise as he no doubt wondered the same thing.

  “Excuse me?” Sheila asked. “I’m pretty sure I didn’t hear you correctly.”

  The Sasquatch turned its head and blew out a wad of snot, perhaps the Bigfoot equivalent of clearing its throat, then addressed her again. “Great Cunt, leader of the Northern Clans, welcomes you.”

  “Don’t do it!” Sally warned us, her voice barely audible.

  Tom snorted beside me and I couldn’t help myself. I raised my hand to my mouth so as to not audibly lose my shit – hoping beyond hope that maybe the stupid fucking apes thought I was just caught up in the moment. Oh God, and I thought Turd was bad.

  Sally shook her head and sighed. “We are so fucking dead.”

  “Yes,” the Sasquatch replied. “T’lunta who stupid enough to enter this sacred place die. You here, so must be very stupid.”

  Oh shit, I forgot these things had senses to rival our own.

  “My frien...” Sheila began, then caught herself. Yeah, putting it out there that she was buddies with their sworn enemies was not something she wanted to do. “I mean, these tuh-luntas have come here with me at great risk to themselves. They have approached me with humility. Their nation has suffered great losses at your hands. They have asked me to broker a new peace with you, oh mighty...”

  She trailed off and then glanced back at us, panic in her eyes as she bit down on her quivering lips. Well, at least it was good to know I wasn’t the only one who found these fuckers to be as ridiculous as they were terrifying. A small part of me wondered if whoever had first translated their language to ours hadn’t been a smartass of the first degree.

  “Oh come on,” Meg shouted from somewhere behind us. “He’s a big cunt. This isn’t so hard.”

  Christy could be heard grumbling something under her breath in response.

  Oh yeah, this was going well.

  Thankfully, it didn’t appear as if this Bigfoot had much more in the way of brains than his predecessor did, as he replied, “Magi acknowledge Cunt with honor. Cunt welcome you as witnesses.”

  “Sorry,” Sheila quickly added. “I was overcome with ... emotion at this historic undertaking.”

  That seemed to mollify the monstrous ape. He turned his eyes from her to my group, specifically me. “Freewill T’lunta,” he spat, “we know you. You vanquish Turd.” He said that last part with a growl.

  Oh crap, what if this guy was Turd’s bestie or maybe his brother? If so, quite the family nomenclature. But still, his eyes bored holes into me. I took it as my cue.

  I stepped forward, holding the dead skunk in front of me as if it were some sort of magical talisman against even worse smelling things. “I am sorry for your loss. Turd fought bravely, but you have to realize he attacked me first and...”

  The ugly fucker lifted his head to the sky and roared, utterly drowning out my rambling apology. The sound echoed among the trees for several seconds. I couldn’t help but think that maybe I’d said the wrong thing. Perhaps I didn’t sound sorrowful enough. Perhaps I...

  “Turd traitor! Breaker of our sacred ways.”

  “And that’s why the motherfucker needed to die,” I quickly amended.

  “Yeah!” Tom added. “Bill punted that fucker’s ass for a field goal.”

  I glanced his way and sighed. “Thanks.”

  “Anytime, bro.”

  I already missed being able to shove him into a pocket.

  “Must be mighty warrior to vanquish Turd,” one of the Sasquatches off to the side commented.

  After a year of dealing with this bullshit, I was beginning to get a sense of how these things worked. When someone higher on the food chain gave you shit, you were expected to swallow it and compliment them on the flavor. But when a nobody talked smack, you threw it right back at them. “I am the motherfucking Ty-D-Bol man, asshole. And if you want to find out why, I suggest you step up and find out.”

  Internally, however, I was really hoping he declined.

  “Thought you come to make peace,” Cunt said from up ahead. “Yet you challenge my k’tun to combat?”

  “Um, k’tun?”

  Gan stepped up and nudged me in the side. “You may wish to know, Dr. Death, that means father in their language.”

  Oh Jesus Fucking Christ! “No. That was just smack talk.”

  “Smack talk?” Cunt asked. With that, he backhanded the sapling next to him, shattering it into splinters.

  “Different type of smack,” I clarified. “It’s ... a T’lunta custom, where we say inappropriate things to people we have great respect for.” That’s right, Bill, dig yourself in even deeper.

  “You are such a pussy,” Sally muttered.

  “I see,” the Sasquatch said. “Much like your mate talk to you now. Stupid custom, but Cunt understand.”

  Sheila spun back toward us, one eyebrow raised, but I mouthed “Not now” to her.

  Forget forging a new peace. We’d be lucky if we made it past the next minute or two.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  Fortunately for us, the Sasquatches had continued in their fine tradition of electing complete morons as leaders. The whole “strongest must lead” trope might have made for a good caveman movie, but in actual practice, it ensured that the folks sitting at the other end of the negotiating table were a few quarts short of a gallon when it came to brains.

  Cunt nodded and two more of the monsters stepped forward from the shadows. I guess they were dignitaries or the welcome wagon. Or, fuck, maybe they just liked the taste of skunk, because they took th
em from me and Sally. When they got to Gan, however, they wrinkled their noses.

  “Not T’lunta,” one of them said, sounding confused.

  The other took a long sniff, snorting up what sounded like a gallon of snot in the process. “Not know. Look like T’lunta warrior others claim to fight, but smell different.”

  They grunted a few syllables to their leader, to which he asked, “Why this one offer peace? This one not at war.”

  “I will have you know, I have slaughtered...”

  I stepped in front of Gan. “Yes, she’s slaughtered many cows. Little bugger just hates them. Anyway, she’s one of our allies, just signed a treaty with us, so we figured we’d bring her. But aside from that, she’s new here. Never even met a ... whatever is the polite term for you guys. She just has one of those faces. You know how it is.”

  We were finally making progress but, for whatever reason, I didn’t think letting slip that the vampire nation had a whole new strain, one capable of withstanding sunlight, was a great idea. For all I knew, this would cause our hosts to freak out or demand we offer her as a gift for dissection.

  Don’t get me wrong, a world free of the fear I’d wake up chained to Gan’s bed was something I strived for, but that didn’t mean I was willing to sell the micro-demon down the river for it.

  Cunt nodded toward the Bigfoot closest Gan. He grabbed the dead skunk from her hands and tossed it away, back over our heads, eliciting a quick “Gross!” from Veronica as it hit her with a wet splat.

  Oh fuck it. That was kinda funny.

  Just as the two Feet were about to step away, one of them glanced back and cast an eye on Tom.

  Oh no, not again.

  However, it simply gave a sniff before turning away.

  “This human smell nicer than others.”

  The Negotiating Table

  Much like during our last foray into the Woods of Mourning, we were escorted to a Sasquatch village and deposited into a crude hut until such time as they were ready to talk.

  The place was large enough for us all, but that was pretty much the end of the creature comforts. It might have been clean by Sasquatch standards, but even sitting at the crude stone table in the middle of the place had me wishing I’d brought along a gallon of hand sanitizer.