by Tim Waggoner
I took a half step forward. Overkill didn't take her gaze off me, but her finger tightened on the trigger.
"You said you'd heard rumors about me," I began. "What have you heard about what happened last Descension Day?"
Overkill's eyes narrowed and she took a moment before answering. "Word on the street is that someone tried to interfere with the recharging of Umbriel and the city was almost destroyed. You prevented that from happening."
Umbriel the shadowsun is what provides the perpetual dusky half-light that illuminates Nekropolis, but it does much more than that. It also keeps the city stabilized in the dark dimension where it's located and what's more – and I'd only recently learned this – its power keeps the city safe from the native inhabitants of this dimension, who view the Nekropolitans as colonizing invaders.
I took another half step forward. "Anything else?"
Her eyes narrowed another fraction. "They say that your body decayed to dust in the battle to preserve Umbriel and that Father Dis himself restored your physical form."
Dis was once worshipped by the ancient Romans as a god of death, and he's the ultimate ruler of the city. It was Dis who several centuries ago led the Darkfolk to leave Earth and establish their own city in another dimension, where they'd be safe from a humanity grown too numerous and technologically advanced. There are other godlike beings in Nekropolis – most notably the five Darklords that rule the city's separate Dominions – but none are as powerful as Dis… or as feared.
"It's true," I said. "I'm not going to stand here and tell you I saved the city single-handedly, and I'm not going to claim that Dis and I are best buddies and I can ring him up whenever I feel like it. But if Dis went to all the trouble of putting me back together when all the king's men and all the king's horses couldn't, I'd say that means we have more than a casual relationship. How do you think he'll react when I tell him the love of my life was killed by a certain mercenary who's too stubborn to know when she's lost? You're tough, Overkill, one of the toughest in town. But do you really think you can stand up against Father Dis?"
Her brow furrowed and for a moment I thought she was actually calculating her chances.
"You're bullshitting me." She said the words forcefully enough, but there was a slight hint of doubt in her voice.
"Probably," I admitted, "but you have no way of knowing for sure. Look at it this way: if you find out for certain that I'm bluffing, think how much satisfaction you'll get hunting me down and making me pay for lying to you."
Overkill looked at me for a long moment before slowly breaking into a grin.
"Good point." She hesitated a second longer before removing the gun from Devona's forehead and replacing the weapon in her shoulder holster. Moving with a warrior's brisk, economical motions, she stood and tossed me the autograph book. "Well played, Matt. Hope to see you soon."
In other words, she couldn't wait for a rematch. If I had a working nervous system, the statement might've caused a chill to ripple down my spine.
She gave me a nod, one professional to another, before turning and striding briskly through the crimson mist still filling the doorway. Now that she no longer carried anything of Scream Queen on her, the spell allowed Overkill to pass without any ill effect. Once she was gone, the mist dissipated, the enchantment no longer needed.
I tucked the autograph book into my jacket and then knelt next to Devona and took her hand. Bloodtears continued to stream down her cheeks and she grimaced in pain.
"I guess I don't need to ask how you're feeling," I said.
Devona spoke through gritted teeth. "You realize you just made an enemy, don't you?"
"I'll add her name to the list."
Devona kept a steel bladed knife in a sheath on her right boot. With my free hand I reached down and pulled the knife free. "This is going to hurt," I warned her.
"It already hurts," she snapped.
"Then this is going to hurt worse. Ready?"
She squeezed her eyes shut, gripped my hand, and nodded.
Though technically I didn't need to I took a deep breath and then I started cutting.
THREE
"How's the shoulder?"
"Like new." Devona's leather outfit had a tear over the shoulder, the edges crusted with dried blood, but the exposed skin was once more smooth and healthy. "Thanks, Bogdan."
The warlock shrugged in what I thought was a blatantly insincere attempt to appear modest. "Healing magic doesn't always work with Bloodborn – they are, after all, undead – but as you're half-human, I thought I'd make the attempt. I'm glad my spell was successful."
As for my own injury I'd removed Overkill's blade from between my ribs and aside from a new hole I'd need to get sewn up the next time I visited my houngan, I was no worse for the wear. Papa Chatha is able to use his voodoo magic to keep me from rotting away to nothing, but when it comes to torn skin, broken bones and the like, instead of invoking the Loa, Papa tends to rely on thread, staples and superglue.
Devona and I – along with the rest of the team – had returned to the Midnight Watch building and now lounged in the great room. When Devona had first bought the building the stone fireplace was cracked and filled with cobwebs, musty old paintings hung on the walls, and the wooden beams overhead were rotten and falling apart. Devona had spent a significant amount of money to renovate the building's interior and the great room now had all new leather furniture, abstract holo art hanging on the walls – not really my taste, but hey, it's Devona's business, not mine – and an illusory fire flickering in a brazier set in the fireplace, providing plenty of light but no heat. Zombie flesh tends to be on the dry side, especially when I'm due for a new batch of preservative spells, and I try to stay away from fire whenever possible. Devona, considerate partner that she is, had the magical brazier installed just for me.
"She could've healed herself simply by chugging a mug or two of the red stuff before we left Sinsation," I said, trying not to sound irritated with Bogdan and failing miserably.
Devona scowled at me. "You know how I feel about drinking blood in bars, Matt."
Many of Nekropolis's denizens require blood as a major part of their diet and supplying that need is one of the city's major industries. The real thing, as you might imagine, is difficult to come by and the artificial substitute aqua sanguis – while providing a certain amount of nourishment – mostly just takes the edge off the thirst. Vampires often get blood from their shadows, human followers who serve their undead masters in the hope of one day joining their dark ranks, and over at the Foundry, Victor Baron produces blood by the gallons from an army of cloned human bodies that lack higher brain functions, primarily because, as rumor has it, they don't possess any heads. But all of those sources still aren't enough to meet the demand and there's a brisk black market trade in blood – and the sellers aren't too picky about how they come by their supply or who they have to kill to obtain it. According to the law in Nekropolis humans who choose to live in the city are not inferior beings to be exploited, save by their own choice, but they are fair game as prey, as is every other being in the city.
During the decades Devona served her father she lived in the Cathedral and gave little thought to where her food came from. In the stronghold of the Darklord Galm blood flows freely from a large marble fountain that never runs dry. If a member of the household or one of the staff wishes to slake his or her thirst they need only dip a goblet into the fountain and drink their fill. But during the few months since Devona had abandoned her sheltered existence and come to live with me, she'd learned a great deal about what life is like outside the walls of her father's home and she'd developed a social conscience. She refused to take part in exploiting humans – after all, her mother was human – and if she wasn't absolutely sure where blood came from, she wouldn't drink it, like humans back on Earth refusing to eat tuna from companies whose indiscriminate fishing practices result in the death of dolphins. And bars were among the worst offenders when it came to selling black mark
et blood. As a former human myself, I normally admired Devona's attitude, but it bugged me that night… mostly because it had led to Bogdan getting to use his magic to heal her.
Are you getting the idea that I wasn't the warlock's biggest fan?
Devona sat on a couch near the fireplace and she'd just finished arranging five piles of darkgems in front of her on a crystal coffee table. She looked up at everyone and smiled.
"Scream Queen was very happy with our work tonight," she said. "So much so that she gave us each a bonus of ten darkgems." She gestured at the money. "Go ahead. You earned it."
Bogdan, Scorch and Tavi – the latter two once again wearing human form – stood on the other side of the coffee table. I stood next to the fireplace, learning against the wall, arms crossed, a scowl on my face. Normally I enjoyed standing close to the coldfire since I liked to gaze into its flickering flames and I knew they couldn't do any damage to me. But that night I stood there mostly out of habit. I wasn't enjoying myself in the least.
Despite Devona's invitation to collect their pay the three members of the Midnight Watch didn't step forward. Instead they exchanged uneasy glances and remained standing where they were.
Devona frowned. "What's wrong?"
Bogdan spoke for the trio. "Scorch, Tavi and I are reluctant to take a full share of tonight's profits. We don't feel as if we earned it."
"We were hired to protect Scream Queen," Devona said, "and we stopped Overkill from stealing her voice. She was pleased with the service we provided and she paid us. All of us." She looked at Bogdan. "And you were able to cast a spell that returned her voice to her."
Bogdan shrugged. "It was a simple matter. An Arcane child could've done it."
My scowl deepened. You're a modest son of a bitch, aren't you? I thought.
"And all of you-" Devona took in Scorch and Tavi with her gaze now – "participated in the fight against Overkill."
"For all the good we did," Scorch said in a pouty voice, sounding like the preteen she appeared to be. "The three of us got our butts kicked."
"We were up against Overkill," Tavi pointed out. "We're lucky to still be alive." He turned to glance at me. "Uh, sorry, Matt. I didn't mean-"
"Don't worry about it," I said. "Living or dead, I'm still ambulatory and that's all that matters."
"Look, everyone," Devona said in what I'd come to think of as her boss voice. "We all shared the risk, so we all share in the profit."
Bogdan, Scorch and Tavi all glanced at me then as if to see whether I had anything to say about the issue. While none of them seemed to have bought into any of that 'savior of the city' crap that folks like Acantha wanted to saddle me with they did seek my opinion every now and again – though I felt Bogdan did so more to keep up appearances with his fellow employees than because he really cared what I thought about anything.
When I didn't answer right away Devona said, "Well, Matt? What do you think?"
When you're part of a couple there are times when you know your significant other is asking you a question to which there is only One Right Answer. I recognized this as one of those times. Unfortunately I had no idea what the correct response was. So I did what I usually do in situations like that. I gambled.
I shrugged and tried to sound as casual as I could as I replied: "It's your business, so it's your call."
I knew my gamble had been a spectacular failure when Devona gave me a scowl that said We'll talk about this later. Then she returned her attention to her employees.
"So it's settled then."
The three exchanged glances one last time before finally stepping forward and collecting their share of the night's earnings.
"So…" Bogdan said. "When are we going to discuss what happened tonight? I have some ideas on ways we might improve our performance next time."
I'll just bet you do, I thought. And from the way the warlock looked at Devona as he spoke I had the feeling that when he said we he wasn't talking about all five of us sitting down for a chat.
Scorch groaned. "Really, Bogdan, why do you always have to be such a worker bee? It's getting late and I have a pile of newly acquired darkgems burning a hole in my pocket. I say we head on back to Sinsation and see what other kinds of trouble we can get into tonight."
Bogdan frowned at the demon, but Devona cut him off before he could reply. "Was there anything we could've done differently to deal with Overkill? Of course. There's always room for improvement, but that's not important right now. What matters is we got the job done and that's enough for one night. Let's save the post mortem for another time, shall we?"
She gave Bogdan a smile to take the sting out of her words and the warlock responded with a courtly half bow that, if I still had a gag reflex, would've made me want to vomit on the spot.
"Of course, Devona," he said. "It's probably a good idea that you don't work anymore tonight anyway. After the injury you sustained you could use some rest. Magical healing can only do so much you know." The warlock then gave her a wink and Devona actually blushed a little. Considering how pale she is even a mild blush looked like fiery explosions beneath her skin.
I ground my teeth so hard I thought I might have to visit a zombie dentist.
Bogdan begged off accompanying Scorch back to Sinsation. Tavi tried to escape as well, but Scorch wasn't about to be denied twice. She hooked her arm in his and, since she was far stronger than the shapeshifter even while wearing the guise of a preteen girl, he had no choice but to allow her to drag him off in search of further excitement. Given the sort of activities a demon considers fun I hoped the lyke survived the night.
That left Bogdan, Devona and me – and you know what they say about three being a crowd? Well, evidently Bogdan had never heard of the phrase for he sat down on the couch next to Devona, laying his arm across the back, almost but not quite putting it around her. At that point I was a very unhappy dead man.
"You were really the star tonight," Bogdan said to Devona. "It was the security spell you placed on the club's entrance that prevented Overkill from simply waltzing out of there with Scream Queen's voice. It was extremely sophisticated spellcraft, worthy of one of my own people. Very few non-Arcane can work magic of that level. It was most impressive."
The warlock scooted an inch closer to Devona. If she noticed, she didn't react. Maybe, I told myself, she didn't react because she liked the idea of Bogdan – a living man – getting closer to her.
Don't be an idiot, I told myself. You know how Devona feels about you.
Still, there are a lot of disadvantages to being dead and one of them is that I'm not exactly fully functional in certain key areas, if you get my drift. And despite the fact that I disliked Bogdan quite a bit at that moment – actually, loathed might be a more accurate description of my feelings toward him – I had to admit that he was handsome enough, in a sleazy kind of way. And as sheltered as Devona had been for most of her life she hadn't had a lot of experience with men and might not realize just what a superficial, shallow and manipulative jerk he was. Yeah, loathed is definitely the right word.
"Thank you, Bogdan," she said. "That means a lot, coming from a warlock as accomplished as you are."
I'd had enough. Beneath my breath, I whispered, "Sic 'em, Rover."
At first nothing happened, but then Bogdan's red hair began to stir as if tousled by a sourceless breeze. A second later a miniature windstorm erupted in the great room centered, strangely enough, on the couch where Devona and Bogdan sat. They squeezed their eyes shut against the wind and Devona shouted something, but her voice was muffled by the storm's howling. Devona and Bogdan tried to stand, no doubt intending to get away from the couch and the winds that buffeted them, but the small-scale gale was too powerful, and every time they managed to rise off the couch so much as an inch, a fresh gust of air would shove them back down.
I let this go on for a minute or so before whispering, "That's enough, Rover. Heel."
The mini windstorm gave a final howl that sounded almost disappoint
ed before finally dissipating. Both Devona and Bogdan's hair was mussed – revealing the beginnings of a bald spot atop the warlock's head I noted with petty satisfaction – and though Devona's leather outfit had weathered the storm just fine, Bogdan's clothes were now rumpled and in dire need of a good pressing.
"I'm so sorry about that, Bogdan!" Devona said. "I've been working on housebreaking Rover, but as you can see, he still acts up from time to time." She shot me a look then and in an icy tone added, "Doesn't he, Matt?"
"He does have his high-spirited moments," I said, doing my best to keep my tone neutral.
When Devona first purchased the Midnight Watch building we'd discovered that the original owner – a powerful warlock named Leander Crosswise who specialized in security magic – had created a guardian creature for his establishment by granting a level of sentience to a wardspell. Unfortunately for Crosswise when he decided to retire and sell the business the guardian had decided that the warlock had become a threat to the place it was supposed to protect and it killed its creator. The building gained a reputation for being haunted after that, especially since the guardian attacked anyone who considered purchasing the place, and the Midnight Watch building remained empty for decades. The creature had attacked Devona and I when we inspected the property and we'd barely managed to figure out what was happening before the creature destroyed us. We made friends with it, after a fashion, and in a strange way it had become something of a pet to us, hence the name Rover. I'd never been much on having pets when I was alive, but for whatever reason Rover and I seemed to get along pretty well and I could usually count on him to listen to me – especially if I encouraged him to misbehave. In many ways he was just a big puppy. A big disembodied puppy formed of mystic energy that had killed his first master and any number of potential buyers that had been foolish enough to inspect the property he guarded over the years, but hey, nobody's perfect. At least he doesn't piddle on the carpet.
