by E. A. Copen
Mike was a stocky guy with a square chin and a receding hairline he covered with a flat cap. He looked like he’d be more at home behind the wheel of a taxi in New York than a Benz in New Orleans, and drove like it, too.
Josiah sat in the back as if he were used to being driven around everywhere, so I slid into the back with him once he moved his magic bag out of the seat. He grabbed a couple of papers from Mike and flipped through them while Mike followed the GPS to St. Louis One.
Nibo’s gate had been inside Marie Laveau’s tomb. Ironic, considering that was also where I had first gone to see Baron Samedi. It was also where he’d given me my Horseman powers. Every time I visited the grave of the old voodoo queen, I came out with something new. I just hoped the next time I exited the land of the dead, it would be with Emma’s soul.
I glanced over at Josiah as he turned the page of the paper, scanning it. “What’s with the papers? You reading the comics?”
“Looking for work,” he muttered and turned the page again.
“Figured you’d get two for one while you were stateside, huh?” I leaned back in my seat and shrugged. “Well, good luck. Most people here don’t believe in magic, let alone monsters and demons that can possess a human. They’d sooner look away than bother to see anything out of the ordinary. Doubt you’ll find an exorcist wanted ad in there.”
He lowered the paper to glare at me again. I resisted the urge to shrink away. “And what is it that you do, Mr. Kerrigan?” he asked, holding up the paper. “It looks like your city’s no better off for having you in it. Crime is still up. Confidence is down.”
“That’s not my fault. I do what I can. New Orleans is a big city.”
“It’s four hundred thousand souls, mate. Out of seven billion. Of all the Horsemen I’ve met in my time, you’re the first to stay put in his hometown. There’s a whole world out there that could use your expertise as Death. Yet you squat here, kicking over molehills when you could be climbing mountains.”
I turned my attention forward and crossed my arms. He had a point, one I’d considered more than once. As much trouble as I got into in New Orleans, it was only one city. There were four Horsemen for the entire world. There was no way we could be everywhere at once. Making a dent in worldwide supernatural crime seemed impossible, but saving my hometown seemed a reasonable goal.
“Someone’s got to look out for the little guy,” I answered with a shrug. “You know what they say. You can’t save everyone in the world, but you can save someone’s world. That’s what I like to think I’m doing. After the last couple of years, I figure New Orleans could use the break.”
“What a metric ton of shit.” He shook his head and went back to reading his paper.
“What? You don’t agree?”
He turned the page. “Save every yobbo in the city, and there’ll always be another. I say go to the top, knock together a few heads and make all the gods behave themselves.”
“Easier said than done,” I grumbled. “You’ve got no idea how much flack I’m already catching just for killing a few gods. It makes my job near impossible some days.”
Josiah folded the paper in half and peered over the fold at me. “You’re a bloody Horseman. They’re afraid of you. Use that fear to your advantage. Make them behave.”
I sighed and told Mike to take the next turn. No matter what I said, I wasn’t going to get through to Josiah. It seemed we had a fundamental difference of opinion on how I should do my job. Luckily for every god, Josiah hadn’t been chosen to be a Horseman of any kind. I pitied a world in which he was given any more power than he already had. We’d have an apocalypse looming over our head every other week.
Something tickled my hand, which was resting on the seat. I looked down and froze. A huge, hairy gray spider had crawled onto my hand. Not big grass spider huge. A damn tarantula. My blood chilled to sub-zero. It took every ounce of willpower not to let out a manly yelp and throw myself out of the moving car.
“Josiah,” I managed through clenched teeth, “don’t look now, but you might want to check your car for hobbits because Shelob just crawled onto my hand.”
He lowered his paper. “Milly! You naughty girl. Come here.” He picked up the spider with all the care a normal person would pay a newborn kitten. The guy let it crawl on him. Intentionally.
I shuddered. And here I thought I hated cats.
“Aw, what’s the matter? She’s harmless.”
“She’s a fucking spider!” I shifted further away from the crazy man in the car with me.
“Don’t you listen to him, Milly. He wouldn’t know beauty if it kicked him square in his big head. In you go.” He’d snapped open his magic bag, dug out a plastic container with holes in the lid, and popped the lid off.
Milly the tarantula skittered happily down his arm and into the container.
I stared at Josiah, half plastered against the door. “Any more surprises in your bag of tricks, Crocodile Dundee?”
“Coupla drop bears, a cork hat, a skewer, just in case I need to put some shrimp on the ol’ barbie, and the head of the last Yank who called me that.” He snapped the paper back into position.
Talk about a dry sense of humor. Josiah’d left his funny bone back in the desert.
The rain picked up as I instructed Mike to park alongside the cemetery entrance. Just my luck. While I got out into the downpour, Mike came around with an open black umbrella for Josiah. Someone had taken the time to paint red symbols inside a circle on the underside of the umbrella. Clever. I wondered what it did.
Josiah shouldered the umbrella and lit up a cigarette while I walked up to the cemetery gate. Sybille must’ve already been there because it was unlocked. I grabbed the gate.
“There you are!” An exasperated Jean floated around a car, arms crossed. “I was beginning to think you’d changed your mind. It’s almost dusk.” His eyes moved past me to Josiah and doubled in size before he backed away.
“What’s the holdup?” Josiah growled. “Are we going in or aren’t we?”
I turned away from the gate. “Jean, this is Josiah Quinn. Josiah, meet the soul of Jean Lafitte.”
Josiah squinted at me and tapped some ash from his cigarette.
I sighed. “You can’t see him, can you?”
Jean shivered. “I can see him, and I don’t like what I see. Laz, what are you doing with one of them?”
“One of them?” I looked from Jean to Josiah. Whatever Josiah was, Jean seemed to know, or at least have a suspicion. “I hired him to help us.”
Jean floated back a few inches.
“Look, Jean, if you’re too scared to go—”
The pirate puffed up like a blowfish. “Scared? Let no one say Jean Lafitte was a coward! Onward, to the underworld!” He darted through the open cemetery gate.
I pushed it open wider, but stopped Josiah when he took a step. “You’re going to want to wait a second. I’ll have to let down my mental shields on the other side of this gate, and, no offense, but I don’t know how you’ll react to that.”
He gestured for me to go on ahead.
I stepped into the cemetery and let down my shields, wincing. That was the one thing I both loved and hated about being a necromancer. Inside cemeteries, I got a sort of power boost, but it came at a cost. If I happened to pull too much death into myself, I’d be trapped inside the cemetery by the magic, or worse, trapped in the After itself. Whenever I entered a boneyard, I had to open myself up completely to the death lurking there. For a few seconds, that left me vulnerable.
Black power, invisible to the naked eye, licked at my body, tugging on my clothes like ghostly hands. The normal mental shields I held in place built of stone and bone crumbled. Cold grave essence rushed to fill the space. My skin prickled. Hair stood on end. Magic climbed up my body as if it were a living thing, jerked open my mouth, and crawled inside, cold as ice. It melted down my esophagus, rotting away the tender flesh. The magic ripped a hole through the disintegrating lining of my stomach and went
on to infect every other organ in my body, turning each one to mush. Grave magic overtook me, inside and out, cell by cell until I felt more dead than alive. My ears popped as if adjusting to higher elevation and the magic leaked from the soles of my feet back into the ground, completing its trek through my body.
The process felt like it took hours, but it only took a minute, maybe less. Every time, it was a little easier, but it would never be pleasant.
“Okay,” I called behind me. “You can come in now.”
I glanced over my shoulder to find Josiah giving me a more cautious look. He’d edged into the cemetery to stand just on the other side of the gates, one hand deep in his pocket while the other held the umbrella. His cigarette dangled loosely from between his lips. He’d paled a shade. The appraising look was there a minute and gone the next.
I guess we both know what the other is capable of then.
Sybille and Jean were waiting for us by the tomb under Sybille’s umbrella. It was clear with yellow ducks on it. She took one look at Josiah and showed him her teeth. To an unsuspecting outsider who didn’t know her, it’d almost pass as a smile. “Who’s your friend?”
I made the introductions and explained everything again. If I had to explain to anyone else what was going on, I’d probably fall asleep. That was getting real old, real fast.
“Josiah says he knows a shortcut if I can get him inside,” I finished. “He’s coming with me.”
Sybille crossed her arms. “I only made enough tincture for one. Exactly how do you plan on taking his soul with you?”
I started to answer her, but something bit into my hand. With a curse, I pulled my hand up and found a new cut, about three inches long, on the back. “What the fuck?”
Josiah held up a bloody knife and waved it. “Sorry, mate. Need it for the spell. No worries, gran. With this, I can take care of myself. Shall we?” He gestured to the tomb.
Still cradling my hand, I moved past Sybille and pushed on a few bricks on the side of the tomb. “Let’s see. Which one was it?”
The fourth brick I pulled on lifted with some resistance, revealing a yellow and red bungee cord held it in place. Something clicked, and the tomb door slid aside. Darkness yawned. Jean whimpered.
“Don’t be a scaredy pirate,” I said. “It’s only a grave.”
“And yet another passage to some creepy underworld where one or all of us will likely get eaten.” Jean’s shoulders slumped, and he crept forward.
I followed directly behind him and waited for my eyes to adjust to the dim light.
Josiah muscled past me. Sparks flew, and a tiny flame sprang to life at the head of his lighter, revealing dark stains on the stone slabs decorating either side of the tomb. Rats’ nests made of cotton, weeds, and feathers littered the floor along with bone fragments. Something crunched under Josiah’s foot, and I tried not to think too hard about what it might’ve been.
Sybille went to the center of the room and shuffled around. Another flame sparked to life, this one attached to a beeswax candle. She gave Josiah a look over her shoulder that seemed to communicate a warning.
He flipped his lighter closed, walked over to one of the stone shelves, dusted it off like it was a park bench, and slid onto it like it was nothing.
I shrugged off my coat and spread it carefully over the other stone resting place. My hand brushed against something sticky, and I gagged.
“Lay down.” Sybille shoved me onto the stone surface. She was a lot stronger than she looked. “Drink,” she growled and shoved the same brown substance from last night at me.
I downed it in a few gulps and forced myself to keep it down.
While I lay there, waiting for the concoction to kick in, I glanced over at Josiah, who sat cross-legged in a meditative pose, gripping the blade of the knife loosely in one hand. As I watched him, his soul came into focus without ever having to turn on my Vision. It vibrated over him, jumping around like a TV set stuck on a static channel before breaking away completely to stand on its own. Josiah’s soul dusted itself off before looking at me, pointing at its watch, and wandering through the back wall of the tomb.
A wave of nausea washed over me. That’s it. I’m never taking weird liquid drugs from a witch ever again. I closed my eyes, waiting to die.
Chapter Eighteen
I woke up lying on a riverbank. Green fog floated over black water. Something told me I didn’t want to breathe that in. The ground beneath me was packed dry dirt and wood chips, despite being so close to the water. Naked, skeletal trees with greasy bark leaned over the water, their twisted branches stopping just short of the fog.
“Took you long enough.” The telltale click of a lighter followed.
Josiah leaned against one of the squat black trees a few feet away, somehow seeming brighter, more alive here than on Earth. He pushed off the tree and swaggered over while I was still picking myself up off the ground.
I brushed some wood chips from my clothes. “Where are we?”
“Banks of the Archeron, from which the Cocytus, Phlegethon, and Styx flow, roughly twenty kilometers south of Osiris’ waystation if I’ve got my geography correct.” He stopped beside me, looking out over the water.
I didn’t know what the Cocytus or Phlegethon were, but I knew what Styx was. We were in the Greek underworld, Hades. At least I knew someone there. “No kiddin’. My ex-reaper lives here. You might know her. Goes by Persephone?”
Josiah’s face twitched. “Persephone, queen of Hades, was your reaper? My, aren’t we a tall poppy then.” He rolled his eyes and walked to the edge of the river. The water came alive and reached for him only to sizzle and evaporate on contact.
Curious, Jean wandered closer. Black water twisted out of the banks in the shape of a skeletal arm and gripped his ankle. The whole top half of a skeleton pulled itself from the river using Jean’s soul as leverage. Jean screeched and tried to free himself, but the skeleton soul held tight.
Josiah kicked the surface of the water. The soul screamed and fell lifeless back into the river. Jean, of course, scurried away to hide behind me, shaking in his spectral boots.
Josiah put his hands around his mouth and shouted, “Come on, Charon, you old bastard. Where are ya?”
I inched closer. “Might be a bad idea to let people know we’re here prematurely. Since I know Persephone, we could just—”
“Ah, there he is.”
A boat appeared on the horizon shrouded in black. On the back, a figure in black hooded robes hunched over, pushing the boat along with a long oar. His whistle drifted ahead of him, pushing away the putrid green fog to clear a path. As the boat drifted closer, a small bell at the front rang, announcing its arrival. The water parted, waves moving like bodies in a crowd.
The Ferryman stood straighter and pushed back his hood, revealing a wild-eyed old man with an unkempt beard.
Josiah waved at him. “Charon! Over here, mate!”
Charon’s face slackened. He shook his head frantically, shoved the oar harder into the river and tried to paddle away.
“You bastard! Get over here!” Josiah lowered his hand.
“Not this time, Josiah,” croaked the Ferryman, still shaking his head. “Not after Cairo!”
“What happened in Cairo?” I asked Josiah.
“Nothing!” Josiah waded into the water. It fled from him as if repelled.
“Nothing?” Charon lifted his oar and waved it at Josiah. “You wrecked my boat!”
“That boat was shit. You’ve got a new one. What’re you complaining about?” Josiah was halfway to the boat, which wasn’t going anywhere with the water retreating from under it.
There was a clear path through the dry riverbed from where we stood on shore to the boat. I glanced over at Jean who guessed my intent and tried to dart away. Not this time. I grabbed him by the arm and dragged him to the boat, ignoring his complaints with every step.
Ahead, Charon’s boat ran aground. Josiah grabbed the side and tried to hoist himself over it. Charo
n swung his oar but missed by a mile.
Josiah grabbed it on the return swing. “Swing that thing at me one more time, and I’ll give it back to you in pieces.”
“Do you see?” Charon sputtered at me and Jean as Josiah pulled himself into the boat. “Do you see what I have to put up with?”
“Pull ya head in, mate. If you didn’t want to owe me, you shouldn’t have hired me to get your oar back.” Josiah relaxed in the boat opposite Charon as if he owned the place while I struggled to get aboard.
The black water closed, icy fingers of the damned pricking at my feet through my shoes. I grabbed for one of the boards crossing the inside of the boat and tried to kick them away, but more hands wrapped around my ankles and yanked me back. Another grabbed onto Jean and pulled him away.
“Jean!” But it was too late. The river of souls had swallowed him up.
“Back,” cried the Ferryman and swung his oar at the spirits. “Off with you! Grab hold. Go on. We haven’t got all day, Lazarus.”
I grabbed the oar and held on for my life. “You know me?”
He lifted me into the boat like I weighed nothing. For an old guy, he was surprisingly strong. “Aye, I do. You’re the fella’s been making Persephone pull all her hair out.” He shook the oar, and I let go to drop into the boat.
Jean appeared next to me. He was sopping wet, shivering and hugging himself.
Charon’s oar jabbed at Jean’s side. “Three souls I spy aboard my boat, Josiah Quinn. Last we spoke, it was but one favor you were owed and no more. The Horseman gets a free pass out of respect for the office.”
I finished checking myself over to make sure I was still all there. “Why, thank you, Charon.”
He frowned and continued, “Even if I think he’s a disgrace to it.”
“Thanks retracted.”
