Dead Reign

by T. A. Pratt

  Pelham opened the coach door for her. He was limping a little, but his leg was bound up in a bandage, and he didn’t seem too bad off.

  “Come give me a kiss good-bye,” the Sitting Death said.

  “Save it for the honeymoon,” she said, and got into the carriage, followed by Pelham.

  The inside of the carriage was bigger than the outside, as big as a good hotel suite, complete with a bed and a couch, Tiffany lamps, a bathroom, and a walk-in closet. Though there was some vague sense of motion, it was mostly as steady as a good train ride.

  “Costumes here,” Pelham said, and Marla went to examine the clothes hanging in the closet. Nothing too objectionable. She’d seen how men of a certain age liked their trophy wives to dress, and she wasn’t going to put up with that shit. Her outfit was more swashbuckling than slutty, all black silk trimmed with silver, a white shirt with lace at the throat, a black-and-silver domino mask, and a hat with a giant red plume. It would go well with her black-and-silver cloak, too. There was even a sword belt and a sheath that fit her terrible sword perfectly. There were elaborate boots with heels too high for her liking—she would keep her own battered work boots with the magically reinforced toes. “It’s a pirate pimp look, I guess.” She ripped the feather out of the hat. She had her limits. Pelham’s own costume was very simple, a tuxedo with tails and a black mask. They each got dressed, then sat down as the coach rocked and swayed.

  “I bet you’ll be happy to be home,” Marla said after a while.

  “Actually, Ms. Mason, the past few days have been the most wonderful of my life. Even when I was terrified, it was wonderful, in its way. I was never terrified when I lived at the estate, you know. That was a new experience.”

  Marla laughed, and there was the sudden sensation of slowing, and the driver’s voice, from a concealed speaker, said, “Doors are opening.” Pelham swung open the door, and Marla slipped out. They were in the driveway before the Chamberlain’s mansion. Quick trip. She was achingly grateful to be home, but she had work to do.

  One of the Chamberlain’s lackeys stepped in front of the door as Marla went up the steps. “Invitation, miss?” he said, bored.

  She lifted up her mask. “I’m Marla Mason, you idiot.”

  His eyes bugged out, and he stepped aside, tripping over himself to apologize. “Of course, but, ah, that sword. You aren’t supposed to…”

  “What?”

  “Nothing, ma’am. Go on in.”

  “I will. Don’t mention I’m here. I’d hate to spoil the surprise. Tell anyone I’ve arrived, and you’ll get a surprise. A nasty one.”

  He swallowed and nodded, and Marla swept past him, Pelham following. She remembered the route to the ballroom, and when she entered the first room, which was blue, she was annoyed to see so many familiar faces, sorcerers of high and low standing, milling around, eating, chatting, and having a fine old time. None of them recognized her. Wasn’t anyone fighting against the Walking Death? Had they all just rolled over in the past week? She saw Hamil, and Ernesto, and Nicolette, and wanted to beat the crap out of all of them just for being here, but she had work to do first.

  She’d only made it to the green room when people started screaming and running. Marla looked around for the source of the disturbance, but couldn’t find anything. She grabbed Pelham and swung him out of the way, behind a giant ice sculpture of Death, so they wouldn’t get trampled. Pelham doubled over, gagging. “The smell,” he said, “it’s in my head, it’s awful.”

  Marla smiled. So, somebody was doing something on her behalf, then, ruining the party with some kind of psychic stink. That would piss off the ghosts, which would be big trouble, but she was heartened just the same. “Get out of here, Pelly. I don’t smell anything. I guess that’s one of the Sitting Death’s wedding presents.”

  “I should stay,” he said, and then doubled over, retching.

  “No, get out of here, find the Chamberlain, tell her I’m back, and sorting things out, would you?”

  Pelham nodded and scurried away, joining the last of the fleeing guests. Marla tore her mask off. There was no one left in the room but some of the ghosts of the founding fathers, gray (and fuzzy) eminences all, and Marla said, “Hey, fellas! It’s me, Marla. Sorry for the disturbance. Want to come watch me kick Death’s ass?”

  The ghosts consulted. One, with muttonchops and a unibrow, nodded. “Indeed. He’s in the black room.”

  Marla set off, sword swinging at her belt, grinning so hard it made her cheeks hurt. She picked up more ghosts on her way, until she had a good crowd coming after her, but when she entered the black room at the end of the ballroom, she saw there was already an event in progress.

  Rondeau was there, fighting with Death. He leapt around with fiendish dexterity, struck out with incredible ferocity, cackling all the while, and he seemed to be holding his own against Death, who bled from a cut on his cheek. But Marla scarcely paid attention to the fight. She was focused on the thing clinging to Rondeau’s shoulders. It was a monstrous flap of grayish-green skin, a ragged gangrenous beast with leprous patches and hundreds of rheumy red eyes, and teeth like straight pins, and it clung to Rondeau’s neck and shoulders with those teeth, fastened into him, seeming to feed on him, swelling up like a tick engorging itself. And, gods, it reeked, like something half-digested and rotting.

  Marla blinked, and blinked again, consciously trying to dispel the strange new sight she’d gained since marrying the Sitting Death, and in a moment, she saw Rondeau with normal vision—he was wearing her purple-and-white battle cloak. But that hideous monstrous form, she knew, must be the cloak’s real shape, a parasitic thing that pretended to be clothing, the way the venom-dripping sword of Death had pretended to be a simple dagger. She’d let that thing fasten onto her intermittently for years, and now it was fastened on Rondeau. He was fighting for her, but now that she knew what the cloak was, she had to stop him.

  “Rondeau, get back!” she shouted, and even in the grip of his battle fever Rondeau heard her voice, and turned, and then suddenly the cloak reversed itself, the purple cloud around him replaced with pure white, and he collapsed, unconscious, the cloak’s healing energies tending to his injuries. Marla, briefly, stepped up her goddess vision, and the cloak was still a horrible thing, but now its red eyes were slowly drooping closed, one after another, as if it was dropping off to sleep. Maybe it was only really awake when it was being used to fight, and for a short time afterward. That explained the way its malign intelligence lingered in the mind for a few seconds—or even minutes—after battle.

  “Marla Mason?” The Walking Death struggled to his feet. “You—this can’t be. I banished you.”

  “Yeah. About that. I came back. Son.” She drew the sword, and Death actually hissed, like a cat. “I came to cut you down.”

  “You met the Sitting Death, then. I was afraid you might discover my secret, that my predecessor still reigns, when I heard you went to the underworld. Clearly Booth failed to stop you.”

  “He tried. Just like you tried to take my city. Remember how I told you that was a mistake?”

  “The throne should be mine,” Death said, anguish in his voice. “I emerged from the darkness, knowing my purpose, knowing my place, but I was attacked when I entered the throne room. He should have stood up, shaken my hand, wished me well, but instead he threw me out. You allied yourself with that monster?”

  “You should’ve told me what you needed the dagger for. I might have agreed to help you.”

  “It was not mortal business,” he said frostily.

  “But you had to be an asshole instead. Frankly, I don’t like the idea of letting either of you rule down there. You’re an asshole, and he’s pretty much insane.”

  “The land of the dead is fragmenting,” Death said. “Some of the spirits are developing their own autonomy. There are regions of the underworld that are not safe for me. And my father cannot leave his throne to take those regions in hand—he cannot rule, because he is too busy protecti
ng his reign. But his reign is already over. It’s dead. It’s rotting. I just needed the dagger—the sword—to cut him out. He is a cancer, and reality will suffer if he’s not removed. Even his marriage to you won’t stabilize things completely, not for long. Please. It’s not too late. Give me the sword.”

  “You’re cruel, vain, vicious, and egotistical.” Marla glanced at the cages hanging from the ceiling. “You display your enemies like party favors. You don’t deserve to lead, either.”

  Death snarled and attacked her.

  Marla lifted the sword, and using powers she didn’t quite understand, she cut through time itself, and made her enemy hang in mid-stride, much as he’d suspended her before banishing her, though Death was not conscious, as she had been. Marla walked around him. One clean blow. Strike off his head, fulfill her arrangement with the Sitting Death, get her city back, and try not to think about what awaited her after death.

  But she’d just traveled through the underworld. She’d faced every life she’d ever taken. Some, she felt guilty about. Some, she felt justified in. But all of them troubled her, more than she would ever let anyone know. Did she want to kill again? She was now the queen of death, but the idea of spilling more blood did not appeal.

  The sword hummed in her hand, and she thought about what Cole had said. The sword could cut through anything.

  This Death was a bad guy. I could carve a better man out of a banana. She didn’t want the Walking Death, cruel and vain as he was, to win. But maybe…

  Maybe I can just cut out the bad parts. Marla let her goddess vision fill her. She could see now a series of overlapping auras, in colors as diverse as the rooms at the ball. His cruel sense of humor, red. His insecurity, green. His sadism, black.

  Carefully, with deft strokes, Marla began to cut out the most terrible parts of his character, carving away his hatred and his smugness and his villainy, like cutting the bad parts out of an apple, the moldy spots off a block of cheese. She couldn’t add things—not kindness, not wisdom, nothing—but perhaps, like pruning back a tree, he could grow stronger, better, and more healthy after she was done. Finally she stood back, examined her handiwork, and nodded. This sword…she could do amazing things with this sword. Go to the Blackwing Institute and cut the crazy out of the inmates there. Cut up the hatred in her enemies and make them support her. Slice off threats before they even became threats. Eradicate pedophilia, pyromania, and the more annoying forms of political dissent. She could make the world in her image, and it would be good.

  She waved the sword, and time resumed, but Death did not attack her. He swayed. “You changed me,” he said dully. “You…you…”

  “Made you suitable to rule,” Marla said, and tossed him the sword. He caught it, hilt first. “Take it. Go down there and kill the Sitting Death. It’s just a loan, though. I’ll want that blade back. I have plans for it.”

  “I can’t bring this sword back to you,” Death said.

  “The fuck you can’t. You have to. It still belongs to the chief sorcerer of Felport. I’m not relinquishing it.”

  “You must relinquish it,” he said, gently. “You changed me, Marla. You made me better. You made me a better person than you are, and you know it. If you had this sword in your hands, here, in the world…you would have the powers of a god, but you are still a mortal, and so you would not be bound by the rules of a god.” He shook his head. “I can’t believe my father gave you such power. It proves he’s gone mad. Why, you could use this to change people, to change whole populations, to make the world your slave.”

  Marla shifted uncomfortably. “I don’t want slaves,” she muttered. “I just wanted to make some adjustments.”

  “You know what absolute power does. I will keep this. I will have a dagger made for you, which has the same powers this did, in human hands—to cut through ghosts, to cut through all matter, but without the true sword’s terrible capabilities.” He leaned forward then and kissed her full on the lips, and though he’d startled her, Marla didn’t draw back. “You have your city, Ms. Mason. Be good to her.” He bowed, and then stepped sideways, through nothing, away.

  Marla stood, stunned, for a moment. It had worked. She wished she’d kept the sword a little longer, made some fixes, but…

  Around her, the founding fathers (and mothers) were clapping. She’d forgotten they were there. The fiercest-looking one of the bunch came up to her and shook her hand, which was a bit like shaking hands with a skinned eel, all slipperiness and give. “We like a good fight,” he rumbled. “And we like a good kiss. Best Founders’ Ball in years. All those pompous asses running around like fools. Ha! Good show. Good show.”

  “Thank you,” she said, then added, “sir.” The ghost clapped her on the shoulder and sauntered away, and the other ghosts went with him, right through a black-draped wall. Marla went to Rondeau, who was just waking up. “Hey there, kid. What’ve you been up to?”

  “Marla?” He smiled up at her, and she’d missed that smile, she really had. “I was a revolutionary. I kicked ass.”

  “I bet you did. You’ll have to fill me in on everything I missed. But first, let’s get this nasty cloak off you, what do you say?”

  16

  I t was good of you to pardon Viscarro,” Hamil said, sipping a glass of brandy.

  Marla looked up from the mess of reports on her desk. “Are you kidding? I had to pardon him. He’s the only one—including you—who never swore loyalty to Death. Granted, he hid in his spider hole out of cowardice, but he didn’t outright betray me, like nearly everyone else did. I don’t like having that thing in my highest councils, and if he ever gets that crazy vacant my-humanity-is-gone look in his eye, I’ll have him exterminated. I made him give me the phylactery that holds his soul. He’ll be on his best behavior, believe me.” She shuffled the papers before her. All the sorcerers had submitted explanations to her in writing, trying to cover their asses. She’d had an amazing number of secret conspirators, it seemed—everyone was really just spying on Death on her behalf, waiting for contact from the revolutionary force, or acting as sleeper agents, and none of them were actually collaborating with the occupier—oh, heavens, no.

  Marla had decreed a general amnesty for all collaborators with Death, in a spirit of forgiveness and goodwill—and also because if she’d banished or jailed or executed all the collaborators, she’d be damn near the only sorcerer left in town. Then she’d gathered a few of the sorcerers she had special concerns about and reminded them that it never, ever, ever paid to back her opponents. Ousting the god of death had given Marla tremendous cachet. Even the irreverent chaos magician, Nicolette, was in awe of her now. None of them knew exactly what she’d done to get rid of Death, but the ghosts of the founding fathers spread increasingly outrageous stories of an epic battle among Rondeau, Marla, and Death, and Marla let the rumors fly. They only enhanced her legend. For the ones who’d actively helped her cause—Rondeau, Beadle, Partridge, Langford, and in their advisory capacities, Ernesto and Hamil—she saved special rewards. Taking a page from the Bay Witch, she offered each and every one of them a favor. That might come back and bite her in the ass at some point, but they’d all risked their lives for her (and Partridge had lost two toes to frostbite), and they deserved boons. The Chamberlain, for her part, was content with the way the party had gone, psychic stink bomb and all, because the founding fathers had enjoyed it—though she was irked that they wanted to see gladiatorial combat incorporated into the next Founders’ Day ball. That, she’d suggested darkly, was going to be Marla’s job to organize.

  “Things are back to normal, then?” Hamil said. “For our usual values of normal?”

  “Pretty much. Except for the goat shit. We forgot we left Ayres’s goat in the conference room. It crapped everywhere and ate the phone. I’m making Rondeau clean it up, but he thinks that should be Bradley’s job, because apprentices live to get dumped on, he says.”

  “Ah, yes. Bowman is coming next week, correct?”

  “Unless he
comes to his senses before then.”

  “It will be interesting to meet him, after hearing your stories.” He appeared to contemplate the contents of his brandy glass. “And, of course, though I expect you to rule for many more years, it’s never too early for you to start grooming a successor.”

  Marla tapped her fingernails on her desk blotter. “What makes you think I’ve got B in mind for that?”

  Hamil shrugged one of his eloquent, tectonic shrugs. “I find that brushes with mortality tend to make chief sorcerers contemplate their legacies.”

  “Well, Felport could do worse than B, once he’s all trained up, which will take a while anyway,” Marla said, unwilling to outright confirm Hamil’s suspicions. “He’s kind, he considers things carefully, he’s brave, and after being trained by both a seer like Sanford Cole and an asskicker like me, he should be pretty well-rounded.”

  “As I said, I look forward to meeting him, and helping you any way I can. He will be your first apprentice, so if you ever need advice on the care and feeding of such—”

  Rondeau came in, carrying a long box. “Marla, this package—the, ah, return address here is pretty messed up.”

  She looked at the package. She sighed. “Hamil, Rondeau, will you two excuse me?” They withdrew, shutting the door and leaving her alone, and she considered the box. The return address said “Hell,” and Marla figured that didn’t mean Hell, Michigan. She opened the box, and there was her dagger—or, at least, something so similar to her dagger that she couldn’t tell the difference…and neither would anyone else. She tested the edge against an industrial diamond in her desk drawer, and it sliced through the stone neatly. Death had promised it would have the same properties and enchantments as the old dagger. She missed the terrible sword, but maybe she was better off without it.

  There was a letter in the box, along with the dagger, written in a rather childish hand. Marla read it. Then she read it again, and swore. She pulled open another desk drawer and rooted around until she found the silver bell the Walking Death had given her when he first banished her. She rang it furiously.