by M. R. Forbes
“Only until she’s dead,” Gold said.
“So why haven’t you killed her yet?” Amos said.
“They can’t,” Silver said. “Thanks to you for letting Cazen out.”
“What’s the kitty have to do with it?” Frank asked.
“I’ve learned not to trust the other Houses over the years,” Silver said. “I came prepared. Cazen is carrying the most powerful defensive magic I have. Even together, they can’t break it instantly. That’s why they’re holding me.”
“Humph,” Amos said. “How do you like that?” He flipped the other Heads the bird.
“I’m sorry I attacked you,” I said to Silver. “It’s been a long day.”
“Apology accepted.”
“Now, how the fuck do we get you out of here?”
“You don’t,” Yellow said. “You’re going to undo her spell for us.”
“Why would I ever do that?” I asked.
Purple held out her hand. Dannie was instantly slammed to the ground and didn’t move.
“We had heard she was dead,” Purple said. “I don’t know where you’ve been, Miss Black, but I know this one cares for you.” She looked at me. “Let us finish this, necromancer, or we’ll finish her.”
“Conor,” Dannie said. “Don’t.”
Macha started whispering beside me, singing below her breath. I could hear the change in the death magic immediately, becoming more ordered and more powerful.
My heart started pounding. I couldn’t watch Dannie die again. No way, no how. I couldn’t let them kill her. I also couldn’t let them kill Silver. If they got out now, the world was going to be that much worse off. Then again, what would happen to the world if I beat Samedi and there were no Heads to keep it running smoothly?
There would still be Ash. Would that be enough?
How the fuck had all of this come down on my head?
Purple shoved Dannie into the ground a little harder, and she cried out in pain. I eyed Purple, furious, my hand twitching, the death magic practically begging for release.
“I’m sorry, Dannie,” I whispered.
Then I gave the magic what it wanted. I let it go, casting it out into the web the Houses had made around Ms. Silver, breaking it to nothing in an instant. Purple knew it immediately, but she didn’t get to break Dannie’s back or take her life. A bullet hole sprouted in her forehead from seemingly nowhere, leaving her standing there confused for a few seconds before she fell.
Freed, Silver gathered her magic, preparing to lash out at the rest of the Heads, to start her battle with Mr. Yellow all over again.
She didn’t have the chance.
A figure appeared in front of her, standing on the water of the pool at her side.
“Conor,” Death said. “It’s time to go.”
He grabbed her around the waist and snapped his fingers.
The pool vanished. The Mansion vanished.
We were back at my place.
Full circle.
32
Same shit. Different day.
I rushed over to Dannie, who was on my couch, staring up at the ceiling. She realized she could move and she started pulling herself up, waving me back.
“You were going to let them kill me,” she said.
“You told me to,” I replied.
“That’s not the point.”
“Don’t worry, Dannie,” Amos said. “I got you.” He was holding a tiny firearm in his thick fingers. “In case of emergency.”
How the hell he had managed to draw and aim the gun was beyond me, but I was grateful for it. I spun around to face Death. “What the fuck just happened, exactly?”
“Relax, Conor,” Death said, too damn calmly.
“Don’t tell me to relax,” I said. “This shit is getting out of control.”
“Everything is under control,” he said.
I didn’t believe him.
“Hades?” Macha said, staring at Death.
“Hades?” I said. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” She had said she knew him by another name, but this was ridiculous.
“Macha,” he replied, smiling. “It’s good to see you again.”
He held his arms out to her, and she ran into them, wrapping him in a tight embrace and kissing him.
I felt a flutter of jealousy, but it was killed by a sudden need to cough. I started hacking, leaving half my lungs on my new jacket.
“I’ve got questions,” Amos said.
“I’m sure you do,” Death replied. He turned his attention to Ashiira. “I’m sorry about your father. I didn’t intend for him to die in this.”
“Was there anything you could have done about it?” Ash asked.
“No.”
“Then why are you apologizing?”
“Just like your father,” Death said.
“He’s with you now, right?” Frank said. “Mr. T, I mean.”
“Immortals don’t go where the others do when their lives finally end,” Death said. “Part of his essence went to you. The rest returned to the fields.”
I wiped my mouth on my sleeve to get the blood off. I could still taste it in my mouth. I needed a drink. The stiffer the better. I wasn’t going to get it.
“I’ve got questions, too,” I said.
“So do I,” Ms. Silver said.
I had quickly forgotten she was here.
“First off, and I repeat, what the fuck just happened?” I said. “You just let the Heads of the Houses who are siding with Samedi out of the fucking box.”
“How do you figure that?” Death asked.
“Silver is here,” I said.
“Her enchantment is still on the Mansion,” he replied. “Gold, Purple, White, and Yellow are essentially trapped for as long as she remains alive.”
I stared at him. I could feel my mouth hanging open.
“How?” Silver asked.
“How did I do it? You didn’t enchant the Mansion to prevent outsiders from coming in, only insiders from getting out. Except my necromancer created a hole in the box when he entered. You just weren’t smart enough to realize it.”
“I’m not your necromancer,” I said. “I not your fucking puppet.”
“Of course not,” Death said.
He couldn’t have been more condescending, but then, I figured that’s how he felt about us mortals in general. I had gotten the same from Tarakona plenty of times.
“So you found a loophole,” Amos said. “Do the other wizards know about it?”
“No. And I closed it on the way out.”
Amos laughed. “Heh. So they’re all trapped in there?”
“Until they kill one another down to the last. Even then, they won’t get out until Ilyana dies. They’re victims of their own egos.”
“They fucking deserve it,” Amos said.
“I can’t argue that,” Frank said. “And I’m not on Samedi’s hit list.”
“Which leads us to question two,” I said. “Is their bullshit about Samedi serving the world, or the Earth Goddess, or whatever the hell thing is at the center of magic true?”
“I don’t know.”
“I don’t like that answer,” Amos said.
“Me neither,” I agreed. “What do you mean you don’t know? The Houses seemed pretty convinced.”
“And I can’t say with certainty they’re wrong. I don’t know everything, Conor. Something caused magic to happen. Something caused the afterlife to exist. Call it God if you wish. Call it the Earth Mother. Call it Zijibawa if that makes you happy. The only thing that matters if you agree with it or not.”
“You told me Samedi wants to kill everything. The Houses think he only wants to kill homo sapiens. I haven’t seen him reanimate a new human. I haven’t seen him kill a new human.”
“It could be that he isn’t strong enough yet. Old humans have their own rules when it comes to magic. He may not be ready.”
“You know, you sound a lot less sure about things now than you did yesterday,” Amos sa
id. “Or when I helped you bring Conor in to try to kill Samedi in the first place.”
“Does it truly matter?” Death asked, showing a degree of anger I hadn’t seen in him before. He was definitely more agitated than usual, despite his insistence that everything was under control. “You saw what he did in London. He can, will, and is doing the same everywhere in the world. The Morrigan are free, and while it is nice to see my dear Macha again, I would prefer they had remained imprisoned.”
“You could have warned me about London,” I said. “You could have steered me away.”
“I thought you weren’t my puppet?” he replied. “Make up your mind, Conor.”
“He’s got you there, Baldie,” Amos said.
“Fine. Where have you been, and why did you decide to intervene now?”
“I’ve been seeking Samedi. He has the ring, which means I can’t locate him magically.”
“So how have you tried to find him?”
“The internet.”
“What?” Frank said.
“Following the reports. Taking in the clues. He must be somewhere deep. Somewhere he can touch the source of the fields. It’s the only way he can reach so many places at the same time.”
“The source. You mean the Earth’s core?” I asked.
“Yes. But there are a number of potential locations, and finding him would be worse than not finding him right now. What about the spell? Did you get it before Tarakona died?”
I shook my head. “No. We tried to retrieve it from the Machine, but that didn’t work out either.”
His face flashed in a fit of fury, but only for an instant before it was calm and friendly again. “He knew I would send you for it. Of course, he’s kept you from getting it.”
“Spell?” Ms. Silver said. “What kind of spell?”
“To open a portal to the netherworld,” I said. “The place between here and the afterlife, apparently.”
Silver stared at me for a moment and then turned back to Death. “You’re real, then? A true immortal?”
“Yes,” he replied. “You’ve heard of immortals before?”
“I’ve been studying magical history since the reversal. Since I became Silver. My goal has always been to understand it. I thought that if I knew where it came from and why it had disappeared, I could make sure we didn’t misuse it. I was a librarian when the shift occurred.” She smiled. “Talk about an upgrade.”
“How much do you know about Samedi?” Death asked.
“I found the warnings, if that’s what you mean,” Silver said.
“What warnings?” I asked.
“There’s a whole ancient civilization hiding out there, necromancer. Most of it is buried in places where normal people can’t go. It’s the world the old humans lived in before the reversal. The world that we forgot. Caves so deep they near the center of the Earth. Jungles so dense they’ve barely been explored. You may think we’re the masters of our planet, but we’ve barely scratched the surface of our true history.”
The way she said it gave me chills. It was one thing to know there were immortal creatures sleeping closer to the Earth’s center. Another to know there was a whole history that we had simply couldn’t reach.
“Don’t tell me Atlantis is real, too,” Frank said excitedly.
“I’ve seen it,” Silver said. She looked at Dannie. “So did Mr. Black. He asked me to stay quiet about it. He was certain people couldn’t handle the truths they might discover there. The general population may be aware of magic, but some things are still beyond their acceptance.”
“What sort of things?” Frank asked.
“Death, for example,” Silver replied. “In any case, the dead rising was an obvious sign to me. That’s why I wouldn’t side with the others. That’s why I didn’t trust them. It’s why I brought Cezar to the wizard moot.” The familiar was still resting on her shoulders, its eyes closed. “I know a lot of the immortals.” She glanced at Macha. “I’ve heard of the Morrigan, too. Tarakona? He was supposed to be dead.”
“He wasn’t,” Ash said. “Until recently.”
“Why do you hide as a human?” she asked. “You’re much more precious in your natural form.”
“I was in danger at the time,” Ash replied. “Now, I find it makes it easier to travel with my brood-brother.”
“Him?” Silver said, pointing at me.
“I would not have been born without him,” Ashiira said.
“If you’re educated in magical history, you should have more of a healthy respect for death magic,” Death said.
“I fear it more than I respect it,” Silver said. “I know what Samedi tried to do all of those years ago. I know what he’s trying to do now.”
“Then you know why we need the portal spell,” Death said.
“Yes.”
“And you know where it is?”
“Not exactly. But I have an idea where it was taken from.”
Frank leaned in. “Please say Atlantis, please say Atlantis, please say Atlantis!”
“It’s not Atlantis,” Silver said.
“Aww,” Frank said.
“Have you ever heard of the Lost City of Z?”
Frank shook his head. “Nuh-uh, but it sounds cool.”
“It’s a legendary city in the Amazon rainforest. Some say it doesn’t exist, but I’m quite certain that it does.” She looked back at Death. “I also think that’s where you’ll find your spell.”
“Based on what, exactly?” I asked.
“The city was originally inhabited by druids,” Silver said. “I’ve found references to the site in other druidic ruins across the globe that suggest the site became increasingly withdrawn as it was seduced by the flip side of their faith and practice. Where they had originally been drawn to the natural environment, including growth and life, there was evidence that they had taken up a fascination with death and decay.”
“You’re saying you’ve never been there?” Amos said.
“No. The site is difficult to reach, even for someone with my abilities. There’s a darkness around it. A blank spot that makes it impossible to enter through magical means. And the surrounding landscape is as dangerous as you would expect a jungle to be. The lobizon are the least of the problem.”
“Lobizon?” I said.
“Wolves that walk on two legs,” Silver said. “Like werewolves, but much more vicious.”
“I’ve dealt with werewolves before,” Amos said. “Cute little puppies.”
“What about you?” I asked, looking at Death. “Have you been there?”
“No,” he replied.
That was it? Just no? He didn’t explain.
“I guess that’s where we need to go, right?” Frank said.
It seemed that way, didn’t it?
I had a vague feeling that very little of what I had experienced in the last few weeks had been an accident and that Death’s rescue of Ms. Silver and entrapment of the Heads of the other Houses was no accident, either.
It wasn’t sitting well.
I didn’t mention it. I tried to bury it so Death wouldn’t notice. I had always been afraid of him. I had never completely trusted him. Maybe we were working together, but I still didn’t. This wasn’t some benevolent action by a powerful immortal. He had his own motivation.
Which was okay, because I had some of my own.
It was an idea that had planted itself the moment I had opened the door and found Dannie standing there. The moment Death had briefed me on the job and sent me off to complete it.
It had come and gone as my confidence waxed and waned, but now it was back full strength.
He wanted us to go to this Lost City of his. Or more specifically, he wanted me to go. I wasn’t convinced I was going to find the maguffin there, and that’s what this portal spell was fast becoming. A way to keep me moving along the prescribed course. It reminded me of the way Samedi had used the mask and dice to keep me under control. It reminded me that these ancient creatures were using us to p
lay their fucking games.
Same shit, different day.
“Give us an hour to rest and reload, and we’ll be on our way,” I said. “Silver, are you coming?”
“No,” Silver replied. “I need to deal with the fallout of the wizard moot. It won’t be pretty.”
I figured as much. No matter what Death claimed, he was a puppet-master, and he was pulling a lot of strings. I would go along with him for now. Samedi was a real threat, regardless of Death’s true motives. When the time came, I would do my best to be ready to cut the strings.
We would see where everything went from there.
Knowing me?
Probably to hell.
33
Welcome to the jungle.
“The whole fucking world is going to shit, and we’re standing in the middle of the Amazon rainforest.” Amos slapped at a mosquito on his face, leaving a smear of bug guts across his cheek. “Did I mention that this completely sucks?”
“I don’t like it either,” Dannie said. “Death seemed like a pretty good guy the first time I met him. Or rather, my soul met him. But he’s not the same. He’s getting antsy.”
“Samedi is growing in strength,” Frank said. “It’s going to be harder to get rid of him. Why not be antsy?”
“It’s more than that,” I said, glad they had picked up on what I had been thinking. “I’m starting to wonder if this portal spell is even a real thing, or if there’s some other reason he delivered us here.”
“How could he have manipulated things that completely?” Ashiira asked. “He couldn’t know my Father would already be dead. He couldn’t know we would get exiled from the Machine. And if he didn’t know where the spell might have originated -”
“That’s the thing,” I said. “I think he did know. And he knew Silver knew. He has access to the afterlife. To every soul that has ever died. Think of all the information he can gather that way.”
“But he clearly has power over death magic,” Dannie said. “He clearly has power over other kinds of magic, enough to bring us here and supposedly get us out. Why didn’t he just come here himself?”
