by Jack Conner
“You can sense him?”
“Have you no telepathy?”
“Not on your scale, no.”
“I can sense his great disappointment with himself, that he has allowed his kingdom to be overthrown, but he has faith in you ... you’re his Heir! I see it now ... and also, as I sense him, he senses me as well.” A long moment passed. “He sends you good luck, and gratitude.”
Despite himself, Ruegger felt relief flood through him, and he was about to ask if he could be permitted a shared thought with the Dark Lord when the Sabo said, “And now he has finished with his duties, and is returning to his bedchambers, where some friends are waiting for him. He says they’ve been brainstorming. He hopes they’ve come up with something. The sun is up, and he is weak, and he has less than fourteen hours before the Ambassador’s speech, fourteen hours in which either you will succeed, or his friends will arrive at some solution—or the kingdom will fall. If that happens I will stay here, permanently a prisoner of Junger and Jagoda.”
The Sabo fell silent.
“No more?” asked Ruegger.
“Sorry,” replied the birds. “I grow weary. Your Balaklava are growing strong again. It will not be long before I am no longer myself.”
“Maybe we can help each other.” Ruegger said.
“How?”
“Indeed, how?” cawed the birds, speaking with slight Jamaican inflections. "Tell us, Marshal, how do you and our precious Sabo conspire against us?” The birds laughed. “Really, we would like to know. Also ... does it still hurt? Does it? Can we make you hurt more? Yes,” cackled the birds. “I think we can.”
Everything spun into chaos as Junger and Jagoda sent the quasi-pterodactyls to attack. Caught off guard, Ruegger wasn’t prepared for the onslaught, and the things dove viciously at him, tearing at his skin and ripping off chunks of flesh.
He raised his blade, cutting one down, then another.
Each time he killed a pterodactyl, one beak stopped laughing, but the others only laughed louder.
With increasing tenacity, the wicked leathery things dove and slashed and gouged him. Long beaks plunged into his back, his sides and belly. One bird even became entangled in the hole the squidoid had dealt him. He tried to pull it out, but he only had one hand and that could only be used for battle for the moment.
He began slicing a swath toward the far exit.
The birds dogged him at every step and from every angle, maiming him and scarring him cruelly. One even managed to fly off with a piece of his scalp in its teeth. Steadily, if slowly, he was in fact progressing to the far side. Only a dozen more feet ...
A big old bird dove down and ripped at the stump of his right forearm, destroying the healing that had begun there. Enraged, Ruegger slashed at the bird, cleaving it in two, but as he was occupied, another pterodactyl barreled straight toward his face. If he’d had two hands, he could’ve protected himself, but that was not the case. The bird lanced its long beak through his left eye and into his brain. For a moment, Ruegger felt himself sway, light-headed, but somehow he managed the strength to stick the bird with his blade, extract it from his face, and fling it into the tittering throng.
Half-blinded, with only one arm, light-headed, and with a hole through his midsection large enough to entangle a small pterodactyl, Ruegger fought ever harder and more desperately.
Eventually, he cut his way through the birds to the exit. Beyond, a large passage angled downward, torches burning here and there along the walls.
As he prepared to fling himself down the tunnel, the birds cried, “Run, Ruegger, run! Run while you can!”
He ran. Even as he picked up speed, he heard the birds gathering into a different formation behind him. He knew that if they attacked him again, this might well be the end. He stretched out his mind, trying to collapse the wall behind him, but the magics of the Sabo were too strong.
With nothing else to go on, he returned the dagger to its sleeve and seized the bird still struggling to free itself from his intestines. He shook the creature and shouted, both at it and at the walls, “Sabo! Sabo! God damn it, can you hear me!”
The parasite blinked its eyes slowly, and Ruegger thought he saw a twinge of recognition in them—but recognition from the Sabo, or its masters?
“Sabo!” he shouted. “Can’t you focus just a tiny part of yourself, overcome the Balaklava just enough to inhabit this one bird? Damn you, I command you to answer me!”
The bird blinked at him. “I am here.”
“I have a request. We’re both friends of Roche Sarnova, and we both wish to thwart Junger and Jagoda, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then relax your magics, just a little, just enough to allow me to collapse a wall. It may save my life, and that of Blackie as well.”
“Never shall anyone desecrate my home.”
“Without Sarnova you wouldn’t have a home. Besides, your resurrectors have already desecrated your mind. How much worse is your home?”
“I will do this thing for Roche. My energy to speak is gone. Do what must be done.”
“Thank you.”
Ruegger released the bird and faced the direction of the undead atrium once more. Within, he could see busy shadows, congealing into one great column.
They sprang.
In one long cloud, maybe a thousand of the evil prehistoric parasites lit out from their chamber, bright eyes glinting in the torchlight, monstrous teeth bared in menace.
When they saw him, they laughed.
Ruegger focused his telekinetic abilities on the walls and ceiling between him and the hungry horde, and pushed.
Nothing happened.
The birds, laughing, drove closer.
Desperately, he tried again, and this time was gratified to hear the bucking of earth.
Picking up speed, the pterodactyls bore down on him. He could see their large flashing tongues behind their triumphant toothy grins.
Even more strongly, he exerted his will, and suddenly in a great roaring whoosh the ceiling collapsed with a force so strong it crushed the parasites and sent shockwaves that knocked Ruegger to the ground. Afterwards, the earth trembled and dust rose so thickly he could hardly breathe, not that he needed to. Slowly, he stood.
He stepped backwards, shielding his mouth, and nearly trod on the bird he had so thoughtlessly tossed down—the bird that had saved his life. It was up on its talons now, and grinning at him mercilessly.
“Thank you,” he said to it, though he was quite sure the Sabo could no longer hear him.
“Darkling,” said the Balaklava. “You will be ours y—”
Ruegger slammed his heavy black boot down and squashed the pterodactyl.
Gasping, he sagged backward. He was tired, and beaten and battered and weary. He must move on now, or else give in to exhaustion.
He slipped off down the well-lit corridor. It was a long march, because for every twenty yards he covered, another mud-shark threw itself out of the earth toward him. His energies were so drained that several almost succeeded in bearing him off. But he wasn’t that far gone yet.
Instead, he looked at these more frequent attacks as a good sign; it meant that the Balaklava were as desperate as he and expending much of their powers to control the parasites. Soon, he hoped, their powers would be depleted. All he had to do was—
A squad of Libertarian soldiers leapt from an alcove.
“Declare yourself.”
Too tired to feel surprised, he said, “I’m Ruegger, and I have come to see Maleasoel.”
Before he could put up a fight, they pinned him to the ground, and he offered no resistance.
After conferring with each other, the Libertarians sent one of their number on some errand, and when he returned a familiar figure strode at his side.
With his one eye, Ruegger looked up to see the enormous, bald, reptilian-winged Captain Raulf D’Aguila regarding him. For a long time, neither said a word.
Finally, Raulf gave a mirthless laugh. “Well, l
et him up already. And be quick about it. Hurry up, I said!” Once Ruegger was on his feet, the Captain winked. “So you’ve come to see Malie, I hear.”
Ruegger’s head swam. “That’s right.”
“Well, this should be interesting. But how about a pint of ale first? We have things to discuss ... and you look like you could use it.”
Chapter 16
When Byron awoke from his death, he felt muddled and sore. Unable to open his eyes, he explored his body with his hands, finding it naked but in one piece. He lay for a long time trying to collect his thoughts. A smell of decay surrounded him, and at first he didn’t know where it came from, but then, with horrible certainty, he realized the truth. The smell came from him.
He was a fucking zombie.
With every second, he seemed to grow stronger. Finally he was able to open his eyes. Kiernevar hovered over him, staring at him intently, and Byron felt waves of resurrecting energy thrown into his dead flesh. Kiernevar was healing him.
The lunatic slashed one wrist and let his blood drip on Byron, like someone feeding water to a dead plant. Slowly, the big man felt more himself, though his body still didn’t seem quite right, and his thoughts came fuzzily, but not as fuzzy as they had been. He noted countless scars on his dead flesh. They hadn’t put him back together very well. With a sigh, he knew he would not be the well-kept sort of zombie Lyshira had been.
“Stand,” Kiernevar said.
Without his conscious permission, Byron’s body rose. Once on his feet, he saw both Kilian and Loirot standing nearby.
“I cannot abide this,” said Loirot, one hand over his genitals.
“Enough already,” Kilian said.
“I most certainly—look, Byron’s up! Hi, By! Hey, that rhymes. ‘Hi, By’. Hi, then bye. Story of my life. Hi!”
Loirot laughed like an idiot, and Byron realized that both he and Kilian were rather addle-brained, as many zombies that were not well kept tended to be. Byron couldn’t think so well either, but at least he wasn’t acting like an utter moron.
Junger and Jagoda made their entrance. It wasn’t as grand or dramatic as Kiernevar’s had been; rather, they strode in brusquely and with an air of business about them. Following them was a well-armed entourage of their better-kept zombies; Byron felt a twinge of jealously as he studied them. Also, several human children huddled among the zombies’ ranks … but Byron envied them not at all.
“Step aside, Kiernevar,” Junger ordered, the ivory tusks sticking from his cheeks angled severely.
“But you said they were mine to—” began Kiernevar, and Junger cut him off with a wave of his hand.
“We can’t be away for long,” said Jagoda, running an impatient hand through his dreadlocks. “And yes, Kiernevar, Jean-Pierre’s old crew was yours to revive—but not to keep.”
“But—”
“Shut up,” said Junger. “Ruegger will be arriving in the main chamber soon, and we don’t have time for your whining. Fuck, look at those two over there—” he pointed to Loirot and Kilian. “You’re not even a strong enough chalgid to bring them back properly.”
“That’s what you told me to do.”
“No,” corrected Jagoda. “We ordered you to arrange their deaths and then to bring them back, only to spare us the energy of a resurrection, for we had more pressing concerns and could not afford to tax ourselves. Anyway, they aren’t yours to keep. We have other plans for them, and to execute these plans they’ll need our powers, and our influence. We don’t want you mucking about in their minds when we need them for ourselves.”
The two Balaklava turned to the death-squad. Byron felt waves of rejuvenation sweep through him—waves ten times stronger than those Kiernevar had sent his way. When they were done with that part of it, the Balaklava stepped up to Byron, cut their wrists, and poured their own bloods down on him. Then they moved to Kilian and Loirot and did the same.
It staggered Byron to find that he could think freely once more, and the scars on his body were already mending. The foul odor was diminishing. Soon, he hoped, he would be as healthy-looking as Lyshira.
When the Balaklava had finished the resurrection that Kiernevar had started, they bid the three crewmates to gather close.
“How do you feel?” asked Junger, looking first at Kilian.
Kilian shot darts of pure hatred into Junger. “I’d rather be fucking dead!”
Junger smiled. “Other than being mad that we’ve made you our servants, do you feel fine?”
“I serve no one unless I decide to do so.”
“Is that right? Well, what if I wanted you to suck me off right here and now? Would you refuse?”
Kilian snarled.
“Good,” Junger said. “Now do it.”
Suddenly, Kilian fell to his knees before the Balaklava and parted his lips. He unbuttoned Junger’s charcoal trench coat just below the waist and reached up to massage Junger’s lax penis.
Byron tried not to gape, but his surprise did not last long. It was replaced by a fierce anger toward Junger and Jagoda that they could force Kilian—his own leader—to abase himself in such a manner. Then again, thought Byron, a puppy sometimes needed to be swatted with a rolled-up newspaper before it was housetrained. He knew that that’s how the Balaklava saw the three of them—as things to be trained or beaten into obedience.
“Stop it,” Junger told Kilian, who’d yet to get the assassin’s penis erect. “Stand up.” Kilian did so. “I hope we’ve proven our point.”
Kilian, looking pale even for a zombie, just nodded.
“Good,” said Jagoda. “We don’t mean for you to resent us—that’s why we called off the demonstration. We’re your masters, but we want you to serve us willingly. If you do well by us, we shall reward you well—of that, you can be sure. Now, Kilian, how do you feel?”
“Fine,” said the werewolf, his eyes narrowed to slits.
“And Loirot?”
Loirot started, as if suddenly pricked by a cattle prod, and swallowed hard before saying, “Chipper. Oh, real fine. Have no doubt. I’m as merry as a fucking lamb, you sons of bitches. Fucking—”
Loirot started gasping for breath. He put his hands to his throat as if to ward off throttling, then his knees buckled and he landed face-down in the dirt. Slowly, the Balaklava eased off him, and, shaking, he was able to climb to his feet.
“Sorry,” he muttered, but to Byron he didn’t look the least bit sorry—just frustrated. “That just came out. I ...” His voice quavered, and his hands trembled at his sides. “I was not born to serve.”
“But you see now that you have no choice,” Jagoda said.
Gritting his teeth, Loirot remained silent for a long time, obviously biting back his true thoughts before he finally said, “I do.”
The Balaklava turned to Byron.
“And you?” asked the tusked one. “How do you feel?”
Slowly, he said, “Better than when your other zombies were chopping me into little pieces.”
“I like that. Really, though, how do you feel?”
“I think Kilian and Loirot expressed my own opinions quite well.”
“Please, all three of you, try to contain your rage,” said Junger. “If I’d sent Lyshira up to ask you all to become zombies, you wouldn’t have appreciated the offer, would you? Of course not. But we needed your skills. For one, you’re all daybeasts, which is something we find lacking among our zombies that were first immortals. Those, you know, like Lyshira herself—the ones made from vampires and ghensivs and morbines and such—cannot survive the sun, even while our human-turned-zombies can. A shade-zombie, if resurrected properly, maintains the same powers he held before his death—and the same weaknesses, as well. So we needed werewolves. Also, you’ve functioned as a unit for about a century, and are as close-knit as any others we were able to locate. That is good. Plus, you all have quite a bit of, shall we see, cloak and dagger skills. The diplomacy of the blade. That, too, we need. Also, we need deaders that have a past history and
strong knowledge of the Darkling. We need to keep him—alive—as our prisoner. That will be the main part of your duties: to guard him. It will not be so difficult, but it requires deaders with your backgrounds and predisposition toward Ruegger to do it.”
“We’d rather kill him,” said Kilian.
Junger smiled. “As we’ve said, we need him alive, but we don’t want you to spare him any pain, either. So hate him at your leisure; just don’t kill him. But there. That is your job. We’ll bring Ruegger to you shortly. Have you got any questions?”
“Yeah,” said Kilian. “When do we get to eat?”
“Lyshira, please bring out the children.”
From among the huddled mass of the Balaklava’s entourage, the still-naked Lyshira emerged. With one hand, she wiped at her nose in a bored and distracted manner, but in the other she held the leashes of three human children, none older than five. Obviously scared out of their minds, the children followed, stumbling after her. Byron had not noticed their collars earlier, but now that he saw them, a sense of damnation all but drowned him.
Lyshira dragged the children to stand to the side of the tall dark giants and handed over the leashes to one of her masters. Then, with a sad knowing look in the direction of the death-squad, she returned to the other undead minions.
Holding the children’s leashes, Jagoda said to Kilian, “These will be your meals. You will eat them, and then we will drain you of your blood; that is how we, as chalgids, feed. But our draining you will not weaken you much, or at least not for long, so have no fear.”
“Fear?” Kilian said. “I only have disgust. I’ve never eaten a child, and I never shall.”
“Amen,” said Loirot.
Byron said nothing. He, even more than his comrades, abhorred the thought of what was about to happen, but he knew that this was just one more test, just one more rolled-up newspaper that he had not the power to escape.
The Balaklava laughed. Suddenly, Byron felt the Balaklava intrude upon his mind; it felt much like a big fat oily python had plunged into his head and taken over. His actions were no longer his own. Now he was nothing but a minion, a marionette, an extension of the Balaklava’s will.
