Strong hands grabbed me, pulled me off the sasquatch, and dropped me to my feet. I broke off the summoning as Zeke shoved me toward the tunnel and said, “Move!”
I let Zeke’s shoves guide me into the narrow tunnel. Weariness washed over me like I’d just taken a three-day math test on a treadmill during a nonstop church sermon. I’d already lost twenty-five years in exile; I didn’t want to think about how much more of my life I’d just lost.
We made our way back into the pitch black of the maze, feeling our way along the cold concrete walls, stumbling over the flat bits of driftwood laid on the floor to keep our feet above pools of collected rainwater. It smelled of wet stone and old urine, and the sound of our heavy breathing was broken only by the occasional crinkle of beer cans or clank of bottles knocked aside by our feet.
We were safe for the moment, but what now? We couldn’t just wait around for the sasquatches to leave. They might simply outwait us, or bring in smaller partners who could reach us.
A light flared in the tunnel behind me. I turned to find Zeke’s baton glowing with a blue-white fire, like a small lightsaber. I imagined him saying, “I’m Zeke Skywalker. I’ve come to rescue you.”
Instead, he grabbed me by the front of my shirt and slammed me up against the side of the tunnel. “If I die here, Gramaraye, I’m gonna kill you.”
A sasquatch roar echoed through the tunnels.
8
Sledgehammer
Zeke looked between me and Mort in the harsh white glow of his baton, as the sasquatch’s roars bounced around the concrete tunnels. “What the hell is going on here?” he demanded.
Mort muttered, “I sure as hell could use some morphine,” and leaned against a tunnel wall.
“I don’t know,” I answered honestly. “But wouldn’t it be better to talk about it back at my house?”
“Gee,” Zeke said. “Let’s see—go back to your center of power surrounded by a family of witnesses and hope you won’t bullshit me; or we could chat here, with nobody to whine about rules, and an angry pair of sasquatches waiting to eat you if don’t make me happy. Tough choice, tough choice. I think I’ll go with door number stop asking questions and tell me what the hell you know right now, Chuck. How’s that sound?”
Anger flared up in me, the kind of righteous, fed-up anger that comes when you find out your tyrannical algebra teacher doesn’t know how to do the math without looking in his teacher’s edition. I shoved at Zeke’s chest with both hands, and he fell back half a step.
“Listen here, Svenny Crocket!” I said. “I got sent into exile for a crime I didn’t commit, I’ve got someone—multiple someones, probably—trying to kill or frame me again, I’ve got more family problems than a white trash Brady Bunch, and you’re going to come around and bully me like I’m the problem here? I just saved your ass when I could have left you to become Wookie food! So back the hell off!”
Zeke considered me for a second with raised eyebrows, then grunted. “Yeah, you did help me. And so far, you haven’t lied, least not as I can detect. So I’ll give you one ‘get out of an ass kicking free’ card. But that still doesn’t make us even for getting me nearly killed in the Other Realm, and screwing up my memory transfer. I want answers, Gramaraye, starting with who attacked you in the Other Realm and why.”
“Yeah, well, when you get those answers, let me know,” I said. “I’d love to hear them.”
“I’m sure that statement was true, but it doesn’t really deny that you know the answers yourself, now, does it? You can’t expect me to believe you’re all innocent here. Obviously your family is into some shady dealings.” He glanced at Mort, then back at me. “And don’t think I didn’t see what happened with the sasquatches.”
I frowned. “What? That they tried to kill us?”
“No, they tried to take your brother. You, they were careful not to harm. Now, why do you think that might be, huh?”
Damn. He’d noticed. “I don’t know,” I said. “And I’m getting pretty tired of saying that. The only reason I’m even here is because I followed my brother.” I turned to Mort. “How could you trade away our family heirlooms? And to feybloods! And what were you trading for?”
“Don’t play all righteous with me,” Mort said sharply, then winced, and leaned back. In a more controlled, even tone, he said, “You’re the one who got exiled for trying to gain power.”
“What?” I felt as though Mort had just punched me in the gut. “You think I actually attacked Felicity, that I really practiced dark necromancy?”
“If you didn’t, why were you exiled, huh?”
“I can’t believe you! You’re the one who’s obsessed with running the business. You’re the only one I can think of that benefited from me being exiled. How do I know you didn’t attack Felicity? And how the hell could you sleep with Heather? You knew—”
Zeke thrust his baton between us. “Odin’s balls! Enough with the family drama already! You two are like a damn soap opera. I want more answers and less whining.” He pointed the baton at Mort. “What were you doing trading with gnomes?”
Mort glared up at Zeke. “You’re not a real enforcer. Hell, you were exiled. I don’t have to answer your questions.”
Zeke conked Mort on the head with the baton, not hard enough to cause any bleeding or sleepy time, but damn, that must have hurt anyway.
“OW!” Mort shouted, confirming the hurtiness.
“Listen up, fool,” Zeke said. “If you don’t answer my questions, you’re gonna wish there was a real enforcer here to protect you. Now, what were you trading for?”
Mort looked from the baton to me, then he sighed, and closed his eyes. “It was a Talker charm.”
“Seriously?” I said. “And you accused me of dark necromancy?” A Talker charm would allow any necromancer to speak to the dead like a Talker, but the life energy it required could be drained from any living being, not just the person using it. Funny thing, people who used Talker charms rarely seemed willing to give up their own life to make it work. And the rituals to create a Talker charm in the first place—I shuddered. It was a very rare artifact, and for good reason.
Mort’s face turned red. “It’s not like I made the thing. It was already made. If I didn’t use it, someone else would, and at least I’m a licensed necromancer.”
“But why?” I said. “Why do it at all?”
Mort laughed. “You really are clueless, aren’t you? About me, about Father, about everything.”
“Gods,” Zeke said. “This ain’t family therapy time. Just tell me why someone would send a sasquatch team after you. Who’d you piss off with enough power or mana to pull that off?”
“Nobody,” Mort said. “At least, not that I know of.”
“Well, who’d the gnomes steal the charm from?”
“Some goth rocker who just thought it was a cool bit of art. Nobody who would’ve sent sasquatches.”
I shook my head. “They destroyed the charm anyway, on purpose. I don’t think they were trying to get it back.”
“Right. Okay,” Zeke said. He rubbed at his forehead with his free hand. “I hate when things don’t make sense. I’m feeling the need to beat the truth out of some fool. That’s always so much easier.” He paced for a second, then said to me, “We’re gettin’ off track here. What I really wanna know is who the hell attacked us in the Other Realm and why? I’d say it was somebody who wanted you sent right back into exile.” He looked at Mort, his eyes narrowing.
“No,” I said. “Even if Mort wanted to stop me coming back, he doesn’t have that kind of power, or the ability to buy it.”
“Gee, thanks,” Mort said.
“I’m defending you, you idiot,” I said. Mort really didn’t have the power to attack the Other Realm. But he might be involved with those who did. Whether he was or wasn’t, I wanted him alive to question him myself, and not have Zeke beat him to death looking for a confession.
Zeke gave a grunt that could have been acceptance, or possibly the result
of a bad lunch, and resumed pacing.
“Okay. Reggie used to always say, start at the beginning. You keep saying you were framed twenty-five years ago. Let’s say that’s true. Were you sleeping with the girl who accused you?”
“What? No!”
Zeke snorted. “I figured. So forget angry lover. Had you recently come into possession of wealth, or a valuable artifact of any kind, that someone would want?”
“No.”
“Then the question is why you, and why then?”
“That’s two questions,” Mort said. “And the answer to why Finn is obvious. He’s a Talker. What else could it be? There’s nothing else all that special about him.”
“Hey!” I said.
“What?” he said in a mocking tone. “I’m defending you, you idiot.”
I shook my head. “Doesn’t matter anyway. Nobody asked me to do any Talking, not that I remember.”
Zeke began stroking his long mustache. “Maybe they wanted to keep you from Talking to someone.” He glanced at Mort. “Or to keep anyone in your family from Talking to someone. If that same enemy sent the ’squatches, it would explain why they wanted the Talker charm destroyed.”
“But then why not just kill me?” I asked. “Why go through all the trouble to frame me and attack the Fey? And the sasquatches sure seemed ready to kill Mort.”
“Maybe they didn’t want you dead, maybe they even need you alive for some reason. So they just want you safely out of the way.”
“Wow, there’s a first,” Mort said. “Someone thinks Finn deserves special treatment.”
“Fine,” I said, not taking Mort’s bait. “So, now what? We figure out who they didn’t want me Talking to?”
“That could be anyone who ever died,” Mort said.
Zeke tapped my head with the baton, causing a starburst of pain. As I rubbed at the spot, he said, “Try to remember anything significant that happened in the days and weeks before you were exiled. Any deaths, any strange visitors or clients, anything at all that was suspicious or struck you as odd or frightening.”
I shook my head. “I don’t remember anything like that. Believe me, I’ve tried remembering anything that could help me figure out what happened and why, and nothing stands out. I was living a totally normal life one day, and being charged with dark necromancy the next.” I remembered the conversation from the previous night with Petey. “Although, there may be some memories I’ve lost, or that are blocked, I don’t know. Maybe they have something to do with all this.”
Zeke’s eyes took on a distant haze, and he tugged a few times at his mustache in an irritated manner. Finally he said, “I might know someone who can help you remember what’s important.” He didn’t sound too excited about it.
“I’m not letting the ARC scramble my brains to dig out memories, not until they make me.”
Zeke’s gaze refocused on me. “I didn’t say nothing about no ARC, fool. I know a girl who’s familiar with mind healing. Trust me, she wouldn’t scramble an egg if she thought it’d hurt the mother hen’s feelings.”
“Maybe,” I said. “I’ll talk to her.” It wasn’t like I had a lot of better options.
“Oh goodie. But first, we got to get outta here.” Zeke grabbed a couple of beer bottles from the ground, and handed them to Mort. “Fill these up.” He looked at me. “And you, go find a couple more and do the same.”
Mort frowned. “You can’t dip them in the puddle yourself?”
“I don’t need water. I need piss. Your piss.” He snatched up another bottle, and walked a couple of feet down the tunnel, his body blocking most of the light from his baton. There was a zip, then a distinctive tinkle.
Mort looked at me in the gray light. “Is he serious?”
“I think so.” I shrugged. “He must have a plan.” I walked down the tunnel away from both Mort and Zeke, found a couple more bottles, and filled them as requested.
Mort and I rejoined Zeke, and I offered him my bottles.
“Not thirsty,” he said. “Just hold on to them.”
Zeke closed his eyes, and black lines snaked up from behind and around his neck, tying into a complex mandala that covered his throat from his chin down to his collarbone, a flowery shape made of interwoven runes and pictographs. The black of the lines wasn’t the dull carbon gray of ink but looked more like thin cracks in reality through which I could see the night sky of an alien world.
Wizards were a bit like the replicators on Star Trek: they could transform the raw potential of magical energy into almost any physical outcome, assuming they could discover the right words and thoughts and images to materialize their goal. In olden times, wizards would lock such a manifestation into an artifact—a wand, a staff, an amulet or ring—which could perform a single function. Then wizards discovered they could make themselves into the Swiss army knives of artifacts by using tattoos.
Such tattoos were now the main tools of wizardry. And they were totally awesome.
I admit, I’d always been envious of wizards. I think all children dream of doing magic of one kind or another, but as an arcana I had the bonus of knowing it was more than mere daydreaming, it was truly possible. And wizardry was the branch of magic that most embodied the awesome potential and power of magic that a person might dream of. It was even possible I had enough of the wizardry gift to perform such magic. But I’d never know. As a necromancer, ARC law forbade me even a single tattoo.
There’d been necromancers in the past who gained wizard tattoos and, craving power, would horde the magic from the dead for themselves. Even worse were the ones who weren’t satisfied to wait for a dead arcana or feyblood to come their way, but went out and deadified folks themselves just to take their magic. Add to that the possibility that a Talker might force secrets of power from the dead, and a necrowiz was a dangerous wiz if ever a wiz there was. So lucky me, I got to play with the dead but not throw fireballs or anything cool like that.
And yet people wonder why necromancers so often lurk in the corner at arcana parties, looking sullen and bitter.
I didn’t recognize the mandala forming on Zeke’s throat, though I did recognize some of the runes and pictographs, and worked out that the Potential had something to do with transformation. I’d seen quite a number of tattoos on dead wizards, and I knew the five standards that enforcers received for superhuman speed and strength, camouflage, armored skin, and controlling their mass. This tattoo was none of those.
I wondered if Zeke had lost his enforcer tattoos during exile. Probably. I didn’t imagine it was something he would want to talk about either way.
Zeke began to utter a series of sounds, shaping and projecting the Potential into an Expression. He motioned for Mort and me to hold up our bottles, and he tapped each one lightly with the baton, causing them to clink in rhythm to his chant. The bottles in my hand continued to vibrate. The mandala on Zeke’s throat pulsed with rainbow light, and that light poured out of his mouth and into the bottles.
The mandala unraveled and snaked back under Zeke’s shirt. He wavered for a second, like he’d taken one vodka shot too many, and then shook his head.
“Okay,” he said, and cleared his throat. “Pour the bottles over yourself.” He began to do just that, yellow liquid running down over his silver-blond mohawk, dripping from his dangling mustache, trailing over the pristine white of his jacket and pants.
“Uh, no,” Mort said. “No way.”
“What will it do?” I asked.
“It will make you invisible, least as far as scent is concerned.”
Made sense. The sasquatches hunted by smell. And using our own pee would key the magic to our personal scent. I sniffed tentatively at the beer bottle and smelled nothing. Even the stale urine and musty scent of the tunnels vanished, canceled out. I paused, then took a deep breath, squeezed my eyes closed, and poured the first bottle over my head.
When I was done emptying both bottles, I shook the excess out of my hair and carefully wiped my face before opening my eyes or
unclenching my lips.
“Not that this spell isn’t handy in the current circumstances,” I said, “but I’m just curious. Why take up valuable tattoo space with something like this?”
Zeke shrugged. “Enforcer spells, they make you strong and all that, but sometimes you need a weapon.”
I nodded to the baton. “Enforcers get enchanted weapons.”
“Yeah, sure, but what if you’re captured or disarmed? And guns, they can run out of bullets. So I thought, what could I use as a weapon, what kind of ammunition could I make anywhere?”
“Piss?” I said.
“Piss,” he agreed.
Mort finished covering himself, and tossed his bottles aside. “Gross magical deodorant isn’t much of a weapon.”
Zeke grinned. “Making the pee mask our scent ain’t the only thing I can do with that spell. Let’s just say, when a doc asks me if it burns when I pee, I tell them, not unless I want it to.”
This unfortunately caused an image to appear in my head of Zeke pissing a stream of flames, laughing wildly as he swung his … weapon around like a flamethrower, engulfing hordes of oncoming enemies.
Zeke clapped his hands. “Enough with the jibba jabba, let’s move.”
We followed the tunnels away from where we’d entered. Mort had stiffened up during our break, and leaned heavily on me now, groaning and moaning with every move.
We reached the back exit, two opposing sets of stairs that led up and out to either end of the structure. Zeke muttered a command and quenched the baton’s glow.
“Which way?” I whispered.
Zeke listened for a second, and whispered back, “The wind’s blowing from our left. The sasquatch would be downwind, to the right of both stairs so it can catch our scent. I’ll go first, but keep an eye behind you in case it decides to come down the other stairs.” Zeke led the way up the left stairs, and I followed with Mort as quietly as possible, glancing over my shoulder every couple of steps.
We emerged on the upper level of the structure. As Zeke had predicted, Harriett stood hunched over on the far side of the stairs, nose thrust forward sniffing the air. The fight or flight jolt surged through me, but we continued to move cautiously, quietly around to the side of the structure, and down a path carved into the sandy soil of the hillside. The ocean wind blasted us as we followed another path away from the beach, up and around to the front of the structure.
Finn Fancy Necromancy Page 9
