by Tim Waggoner
“What’s happening?” Devona said as I walked over to join her and Lazlo next to the demon’s dearly departed death-machine.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe Talaith used up the magic power she borrowed from her people and couldn’t maintain her avatar any longer.”
Bright white light flared into existence around us, revealing a dozen men and women carrying wooden staffs with glowing lux crystals attached to the ends. Most of them wore tunics, but three-two men and a woman-wore loose-fitting hooded robes. I didn’t have to guess who was in charge.
One of the robed men, a portly fellow with a gray mustache and goatee stepped forward.
“Or maybe,” he said with a sinister smile, “instead of wasting more power, our Lady sent us to retrieve you.”
“That’s another possibility,” I said.
“You sure know how to show a girl a good time, Matt.”
“How long have you been waiting to use that line?” I said.
“A few hours,” Devona admitted.
“You two are a riot,” Lazlo said. “Are you guys always this funny or only when you’re tied to stakes and surrounded by pissed-off witches and warlocks?”
Our Glamere welcoming committee had brought us-by force, naturally-to the village of Merrowvale. They’d hustled us into the village square and then tied us to three large wooden stakes atop a stone dais. The three robed Arcane, who I took to be the village Elders, then ordered children to begin piling firewood around Devona and Lazlo’s feet. But not, I noticed, around mine.
The entire square was filled with villagers, young and old, all decked out in medieval dress. It looked like a renaissance fair, only without the funnel cakes and ATM machines labeled Queen’s Treasury. Only about half of them carried magic staffs with lit lux crystals, but that didn’t mean the other half were harmless. Even the smallest child here was capable of casting at least some rudimentary spells. Both Devona and Lazlo were strong enough to break free from the ropes binding them if they wished, but they knew they couldn’t hope to escape from this many Arcane, and so they simply remained where they were while the children stacked the fuel for a good old-fashioned stake-burning at their feet.
The Elders stood at the base of the dais, and I caught the portly one’s eye.
“Why don’t I get any wood? You people have something against the smell of burning zombies?”
“Don’t answer him, Zorian,” said the Elder standing to the portly man’s right, a tall middle-aged woman with her graying brunette hair tied up in a bun. “He’s not worth the breath it would take to speak to him.”
I almost fired off a witty comeback, but I noticed something odd about the woman’s face. I looked at her more closely, and it didn’t take me long to figure out what was bothering me about her. I examined her fellow Elders, and then I turned my head as far as I could-given that I was tied to a stake-and gazed upon asmany of the good folk of Merrowvale as I could. And when I was finished, I smiled to myself. These people had a secret, and they weren’t hiding it very well. But I decided to keep that to myself for the moment.
“Hush, Gizane,” said the third Elder, a tall beefy man with a neatly trimmed brown beard who looked as if he would have made a hell of a quarterback on Earth. “Let Zorian have some fun. After all, it is Descension Day.” He grinned at me, a savage gleam in his eyes. He reminded me of a mean little boy who’d caught a trio of insects and couldn’t wait to start tearing their legs off.
Zorian nodded to the other man. “Thank you, Ortzi.” Then the warlock turned to me. “We have no intention of burning you, Mr. Richter. Our Lady wants you all for herself, and we’d be poor subjects indeed if we kept the pleasure of destroying you for ourselves.”
A scattering of laughter passed through the crowd, but it was more dutiful than enthusiastic.
“She’s en route now,” Ortizi said. “She’s coming here personally to claim you, though to be honest we’re not sure whether she’ll destroy you on the spot or take you back to Woodhome and save you for after the Renewal Ceremony. Me, I’m hoping for on the spot. I’d love to see the Lady in action.”
“That would be a treat,” Gizane admitted.
“Once her avatar forced the three of you off the road, she mentally contacted the three of us,” Zorian said, “and we-along with a few of the more powerful members of our village-went out to find you and escort you back to Merrowvale. Our orders are to hold you here until Talaith arrives, Mr. Richter.”
Ortzi grinned. “But she told as that as a reward for our service, we can do anything we like to your two friends. So we’re going to burn them alive at the stake-while you watch, helpless to save them. Won’t that be just awful?”
The children finished piling up the wood, and they stepped off the dais and returned to their parents. Ortzi’s lux crystal began to glow orange and flames flickered to life around it. The warlock made no move to step forward and touch the flaming tip of his staff to the wood yet. He wanted to make this last as long as he could.
“Uh, Matt?” Lazlo said, his bulbous demon eyes transfixed by the fire atop Ortzi’s staff. “If you have any brilliant ideas, now would be an excellent time to implement them.”
“Don’t worry,” Devona said. “He’ll think of something.”
The simple confidence in her voice was both heartwarming and heart-breaking. I did have an idea, but if it was going to have any chance of working, I had to stall just a bit longer, to give Talaith time to get closer to Merrowvale.
“Out of curiosity,” I said, “how’s Talaith traveling here? Broom? Magic carpet? A pair of ruby slippers?”
The three Elders only glared at me, and someone in the crowd shouted out, “Quit talking and light the goddamned fires!”
I decided I’d better move on to something else, and quickly. “All right, forget that. But tell me this: just how close to the Bridge of Lost Souls were we when Talaith’s avatar knocked us off the Obsidian Way?” When none of the Elders responded right away, I added, “Come on…you’ll just make us more miserable by telling us.” When they continued to hesitate, I said, “You know, if Talaith were here she’d tell me…Now there’s a woman who really knows how to torment a man-and not in the good way.”
“Very well,” Zorian said. “You were less than a mile and a half from the Bridge.”
“You might have made it, too,” Gizane said, nodding toward Lazlo. “If that idiot demon was a better driver.”
“Too bad ugly-or body odor-doesn’t equate with driving skill,” Ortzi said. “Otherwise, he’d be qualified for the Grand Prix back on Earth.”
Lazlo ground his teeth, sending small sparks shooting out of the corners of his mouth. He glared at Ortzi, and from the way his muscles were bunched up, I knew my demonic friend was getting ready to burst his bonds and show the Elders what happens when someone insults his driving.
I couldn’t afford to stall any longer.
“Tell me something, Gizane. Where do you get your make-up?”
Gizane drew up the hood of her robe as if to hide her face and gave her fellow Elders a sideways glance.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, zombie.”
“I’m not criticizing,” I said. “It’s nicely understated-the eye shadow, the eyeliner, the rouge, the lipstick…all very natural-looking. And you, Ortzi. Your beard is a deep, rich brown, but the color is a slightly different shade than your hair, and you’ve got a significant amount of gray at your temples. A man’s beard usually goes gray before his hair. I suppose you imported the stuff you use to color it from Earth.”
Ortiz started to cover his beard with his hand, but then he must have realized he was only drawing attention to it and lowered his hand once more-though it looked like it took an effort for him to do so.
I turned to Zorian then. “And unless my dead eyes deceive me, I see a small flesh-colored hearing aid nestled in your right ear, Zorian. Another import, I take it?
Zorian glanced at his fellow Elders, and all three of them looked
nervous as hell.
“I don’t understand, Matt,” Devona said. “Now that you’ve pointed out those things about them, I can see them all, but why would Arcane bother using mundane items like that? Wouldn’t they just use their magic to improve their appearance or repair their hearing?”
“I’m sure that’s what Talaith would prefer. But these three aren’t the only ones who prefer non-magical ways of solving problems-or just enjoying life. Take a good look at the crowd. You’ll see people wearing wrist-watches, talking on cell phones-the real thing, not handvoxes-texting on BlackBerrys, taking digital pictures and video of us…More than a few folks are listening to music on their iPods, and a number of the children are playing handheld videogames. And if you’ll look really close at that alley over there, you’ll see someone sitting on the ground typing furiously on a laptop. Probably blogging about our imminent demises. All of them are trying to hide their toys, but they’re doing a crappy job of it.”
Now the assembled villagers were starting to look nervous too.
“I still don’t get it, Matt,” Devona said. “Lots of people in Nekropolis use imported Earth technology, whether in its pure form or adapted somehow by dark magic. What’s the big deal?”
“The big deal is that these people are subjects of Talaith,” I explained. “And she’s not particularly fond of technology-especially not after how things turned out with the Overmind. By Talaith’s edict, technology of any sort is illegal for the Arcane to possess or use as long as they are within her Dominion. If she catches any Arcane with technology, she punishes them.” I smiled at the three Elders. “Most severely.”
The Elders paled.
I went on. “Talaith has a huge problem trying to enforce her edict, because pure technology is fascinating to the Arcane, almost to the point of addiction. Chemicals, medicines, and machines that can perform wonders without requiring a spellcaster to use her or her own energy to power them? What could be more wondrous? Merrowvale is one of the outlying villages in Glamere, so close to the Boneyard that it’s a simple matter to smuggle technology in and far enough away from Woodhome that they don’t worry too much about getting caught. If you went into their homes right now, you’d probably find flat-screen TVs, DVD players, videogame systems, personal computers, refrigerators, microwave ovens, washers and dryers…you name it, they’ve got it, and portable generators to power it all. And now they’ve captured us and their mistress is coming here to get me.” I smiled at the Elders. “What makes you think you’re going to be able to hide all your toys from Talaith when you couldn’t hide them from me-and I’m not even a Darklord.”
Gizane grabbed the collar of Zorian’s robe and turned him to face her. “He’s right! Talaith will find out! She may even already know!”
“And if she doesn’t,” I said, “I’ll make sure to tell her the moment she arrives.”
People in the crowd began wailing and crying. They had a good idea what sort of reaction they could expect from their mistress once she discovered their village’s tech-fetish.
“Don’t panic!” Ortzi said. He gave me a sly look. “If we destroy the zombie along with his friends, there will be no one left alive to tell Talaith anything.”
Gizane and Zorian looked at him hopefully.
“But Talaith gave you specific orders not to destroy me,” I pointed out. “If you burn me up along with my friends, how will you explain it to Talaith? And even if you could come up with an excuse that she’d buy, she’d punish you all for stealing her chance to get revenge on me.”
Gizane and Zorian no longer looked so hopeful. In fact, they both looked as if they might vomit at any moment.
“Then we’re lost!” someone in the crowed wailed. “There’s nothing we can do!”
“There is one thing,” I said. “You could let us go.”
“Are you mad?” Ortzi shouted at me. “Talaith would be sure to punish us in ways beyond imagining if we did that!”
“That’s true,” I admitted. “But not if the citizens of Merrowvale release us, then tell Talaith we got away because the three of you screwed up and allowed us to escape.”
“Is your brain as dead as the rest of you?” Ortzi snapped. “Zorian, Gizane, and I would never permit the villagers to do that-and even if somehow they succeeded, we’d simply tell the Dark Lady what really happened.”
“True again. But the villagers could tell Talaith that after you let us escape, they killed you in her name for your incompetence. Then there would be no one left to tell Talaith about what really happened, the villagers could keep all their toys, and the Dark Lady would be none the wiser.”
Zorian tried to look calm, but the lines of sweat trickling down his face told a different story. He kept shooting sidelong glances at the crowd in the square. “I think you’ve underestimated the good folk of Merrowvale, Mr. Richter. They would never do anything so heinous simply to keep their…” He broke off as he noticed the villagers staring quietly at him and his two fellow Elders. The lux crystals of the villagers who carried staffs began to glow a baleful red, while others started making intricate hand gestures and chanting mystic phrases.
I turned my head so I could see Devona and Lazlo.
“You might want to close your eyes. I have a feeling this is going to get real ugly, real fast.”
The villagers let out a roar as they surged en masse toward the dais.
Devona, Lazlo and I were hoofing it on the Obsidian Way. I’d been tempted to ask the villagers if we could borrow some horses, though the beasts tend to shy away from me, probably because of my smell. And if they turned up their noses at me, I couldn’t imagine how they’d react to Lazlo’s stink. But after seeing what the villagers had done to their Elder-and the zeal with which they’d gone at it-I decided not to push our luck. A mile and a half isn’t that far to walk, even on stiff, partially damaged zombie legs. But time, as they say, was of the essence. Talaith had already been on her way to Merrowvale when the villagers released us, and it wouldn’t take her long to arrive. Once she saw that we’d escaped, she’d come looking for us, and as long as we were in her Dominion, we weren’t safe. We needed to get to the Boneyard, and we needed to get there fast, and I doubted we were going to make it on foot. If worse came to worst, I would give myself to Talaith and urge her to let Devona and Lazlo go, but I knew the Witch Queen wouldn’t go for it. She’d kill the both of them just to hurt me further. So either we all made it or none of us did. Once more, I attempted to cudgel my zombified brain into providing a way out.
I knew the Darklords constantly strove against one another-within the boundaries set by Dis, that is. They spied on and schemed against one another, tried to outdo the others’ accomplishments and win favor in the eyes of Dis. They ruled their individual Dominions and the inhabitants thereof absolutely, though some of the Lords were more involved in their subjects’ lives than others. Still, it was considered an act of great transgression for a Darklord to interfere with another’s Dominion and its subjects.
I also knew the four remaining Darklords had to be aware of what Talaith had been up to tonight. Even if it was borrowed, the sheer power she was expending would stand out to them like an atomic bomb detonating at a July Fourth celebration. In fact, the other Lords were likely keeping close watch on the situation right now, if for no other reason than to make certain Talaith wasn’t somehow gearing up for an attack on them.
And then I had an idea.
I lived in the Sprawl. That made me a subject of Varvara, didn’t it? If I called upon the Demon Queen, might she intervene to save one of her subjects? No, I decided. Varvara liked me well enough, but we weren’t friends. What she liked about me was the amusement value I offered as a zombie ex-cop trying to survive in Nekropolis. But I doubted she’d find a confrontation with Talaith amusing, especially when the Witch Queen was filled with the combined mystic power of her subjects. Varvara might miss me when I was gone, or she might get a laugh out of my demise, but she wouldn’t help me.
I loo
ked up, trying to see if Talaith was on her way. I saw no sign of the Witch Queen.
As if reading my mind, Devona said, “I feel psychic pressure at the base of my skull, Matt. She’s coming.”
I quickly explained my idea about the Darklords watching.
“If they are, then that means Father is watching too,” she said thoughtfully. “And he knows I’m here and in danger. But if that’s the case, why hasn’t he done anything?” She looked up into the sky. “Father!” she cried. “Father, help us!” But nothing happened.
Maybe I’d been wrong about the Darklords watching. Or maybe they were, but Galm was constrained by one of the Accords, or maybe he just couldn’t afford to expend any of his power so close to the Renewal Ceremony, even to save the life of his own daughter. Or maybe his reasons were political. From what I understood, Galm and Talaith, while not the best of friends by any means, had about as cordial a relationship as any two Darklords can.
But I knew a Lord who Talaith wasn’t on such good terms with-a Lord she’d planned to attack with the Overmind before Dale and I destroyed it.
A voice whispered in my mind then, thick with barely restrained fury. Another valiant attempt to escape me, Matthew, but you’re too late. Look up.
I did and saw a figure swiftly approaching from the western sky. Talaith sat upon an airborne throne of black marble held aloft by a pair of giant flapping raven’s wings growing from the throne’s back. Despite myself, I was impressed. Much classier than a broom or carpet. I knew we had only moments before she reached us. Once again, it was time to do something desperate.
