by Ty Drago
Ramirez regarded us, a sour expression on his face. “He sounded scared but said he had information for me and asked if I’d meet with him at an all-night diner in South Philly. I agreed. But when I got there, they were waiting. Four cops.”
“Corpses,” Steve remarked unnecessarily.
Ramirez said, “Pierce had set me up. I never even got into the diner. They grabbed me, cuffed me, and hustled me into their cruiser. Once inside, I was chloroformed, and the next thing I knew, I woke up here.”
“They had you for something like nine hours,” I told him. “And they didn’t ask you any questions?”
“If they did, I don’t remember them.”
Tom, Helene, and I exchanged looks.
“Amy,” the Chief said quietly. “Could you fetch a magnifying glass?”
I saw the little girl go pale. She, of all people, knew what we were thinking. “Okay,” she whispered.
“What now?” Ramirez asked. He looked suspicious all over again.
“We gotta make sure you ain’t a mole,” Tom said.
“A mole? You mean a spy?”
We all nodded.
“The Corpses got a way to control you,” I explained. “They call it the Pelligog…and it’s just about the scariest thing I’ve ever seen.”
“Pelligog,” Ramirez repeated, as if testing a new word. “Look, kids…I admit my eyes have been opened, but this…”
Tom said, “Don’t be tryin’ to take it in all at once, agent. The bottom line is that we need to see the small of your back—just for a second. So, do you mind liftin’ your shirt?”
The FBI guy stared at him. “This has been the craziest couple of days of my life.”
None of us replied.
Amy returned, carrying a big magnifying glass. Ramirez saw it, uttered a nervous laugh, and pulled up his shirt.
“Dave,” Tom said. “You get on his left, and I’ll take his right. Sorry, agent. Just a precaution.”
“Protocol,” Ramirez said.
“We call ’em rules and regs…but, yeah.”
With the Chief and the Burgermeister flanking the FBI guy, Amy leaned over the cot, peering through the magnifying lens at Ramirez’s bare back.
Why her and not Ian, you ask?
Because Amy knew all too well what she was looking for.
She took her time about it. I felt like I was standing on pins and needles.
“Nothing,” the little girl finally reported in her whispery voice.
“Well, that’s a relief,” the agent remarked, straightening up and pulling down his shirt. “What…exactly…were you looking for?”
Steve said, “We recently found out that the Pelligog, when they enter a host body, leave a tiny cut on the lower back.”
“It looks like a check mark,” Amy said.
Ramirez absorbed this. “And I don’t have it?”
She shook her head, offering him a small, surprisingly pretty smile.
Tom and Dave stepped back. The Chief said, “But it still don’t explain why the Corpses took you but didn’t ask you no questions.”
“Maybe they were gonna Pelligog him,” I suggested. “But we got there before they actually did it.”
“Then you’re lucky,” Helene said to Ramirez. “I’ve had one of those things on my back. So has Amy. We both know what it does to you.”
I went over and stood beside her. I wasn’t sure why; it just seemed like something I should do.
Ramirez said, “I need to get out of here. I need to tell somebody…something. I don’t know what yet. Obviously, the truth won’t work.”
“And who can you tell?” Tom asked him. “You don’t have the Sight, and without it, you may as well be a blind man. How can you even know who to trust?”
“I can’t just do nothing!”
“Sure you can…for now. Go back to DC. I doubt the Corpses’ll risk nabbing you again—at least not there. Keep your head down and wait. We’ll make sure you stay in the loop.”
But the FBI guy shook his head. “You don’t understand. There’s a time limit here. That’s what brought me to Philly.”
“A time limit?” I asked.
He nodded. “The governor of Pennsylvania is visiting Philadelphia this weekend…and I’m pretty sure Cavanaugh plans to assassinate him.”
For several long seconds, nobody said anything.
Finally, Chuck muttered, “How—”
But that was as far as he got before Sharyn started dying.
Chapter 26
The Last Straw
Pierce flew across the office, striking the far wall hard enough to shake it and topple a case full of books the Queen hadn’t and would likely never bother to read. He fell in a heap, his new host body broken in several places.
Lilith staggered across the room and loomed over her personal assistant. He raised his head and looked feebly up at her; evidently, that last blow apparently hadn’t broken his host’s spine.
Unlike what had happened to her a few hours ago.
“There were three of you,” she said, keeping her tone level. “Three. That should have been enough to protect me. But instead, you were bested by three children wielding toys. Worse, they took my new host, leaving me trapped in a worthless shell, helplessly awaiting rescue!”
She seized Pierce’s collar, lifting him effortlessly off the floor.
“And when my minions finally arrived and carried me to my home, did a new host await me? No, they hadn’t found one! So I lay on my human bed, stranded inside a rotting husk, for hours. Hours!”
She cast his body like a rag doll the width of her office. He slammed into the door with such force that the wood cracked and plaster rained down from the ceiling.
This time, when he hit the floor, he didn’t move at all.
Lilith Cavanaugh crossed to him, shuffling on legs that popped and creaked with each step. The body her minions had finally found was at least two months old—the bones brittle and the muscles thin and weak. It required all her considerable Self to imbibe it with the strength necessary to punish her underling in this manner.
In fact, it took all her will to tolerate being inside of it at all.
The Queen glowered down at Pierce, toying with the idea of driving her foot through his skull, smashing it to powder. But doing so would likely shatter her own leg, and given the circumstances, she simply couldn’t risk that.
But oh how she wanted to!
Then Pierce’s eyes met hers. “I’m…sorry…Ms. Cavanaugh,” he wheezed.
Despite his situation, her assistant continued to address her by her human name.
Until that moment, she’d been on the fence. But that simple gesture of respect had convinced her to let him live.
Lilith sighed. “It was our funeral parlor, Pierce. Why would there be salt there?”
He struggled to reply but couldn’t manage it. She knew the answer anyway: because Chang’s was a recent acquisition and her minions had been too afraid of the salt to risk touching it, even to throw it away.
Idiots. I’m surrounded by them.
“You need a new host,” she told Pierce.
And this one’s simply less foolish than most.
Lilith shuffled over to her desk and picked up the phone. With Pierce incapacitated, she was forced to look up the number in the Philadelphia City Hall directory and dial herself. One more indignity.
After the third ring, the chief of police answered, “Pierce?”
“No.”
“My Queen?”
Idiot.
“Is that how you want to address me, Chief D’Angelo?”
“No. I’m sorry. What can I do for you, Ms. Cavanaugh?”
“I need a host brought up to my office immediate
ly.” The Queen frowned at her withered black claw of a hand and added, “A male.”
Then she hung up and sat down in her desk chair.
“Pierce,” she said thoughtfully. Then, when he didn’t respond, she added, “Look at me when I’m talking to you.”
To his credit, he tried, his broken body twitching uselessly around him. He looked feeble—ridiculous.
“Pierce,” she said again. “Last night’s fiasco has convinced me that these Undertakers have grown entirely too bold. Tomorrow is an important day, and I refuse to risk it being ruined by a ragtag collection of human hatchlings!”
“Yes…Ms. Cavanaugh,” Pierce wheezed.
The Queen brooded.
Finally, D’Angelo showed up. The police chief wore his uniform, as did the minion who followed him, carrying a sack over one shoulder. Lilith motioned wordlessly at Pierce’s broken body. Wordlessly, the chief nodded to the minion, who just as wordlessly delivered the sack.
“How fresh is it?” the Queen asked.
“Sixteen days, mistress…er…Ms. Cavanaugh. Unmarked. A drug overdose.”
“Acceptable. Well, Pierce, what are you waiting for? Applause?”
Pierce’s body went still. At the same instant, the sack began to move. For half a minute, they watched him struggle to open the canvas from within. D’Angelo moved to help, but Lilith waved him off.
Lessons needed learning.
Pierce’s fingers, swollen and deep purple, wiggled out through the top of the tied sack and tore downward. At last, it fell away, allowing the body to rise stiffly to its feet. It wasn’t a particularly good specimen—the skin showed signs of faster than normal decay. Probably died in the sun.
Disgusting, these human forms.
“Go and dress yourself properly, Pierce,” the Queen commanded. “Then return here. We have work to do.”
“Yes, Ms. Cavanaugh,” her assistant said. Then he walked past D’Angelo and the minion, disappearing through the door.
“Thank you, chief,” Lilith said. “Are we fully prepared for tomorrow?”
“Of course, ma’am.”
“Any word from the morgue?” she asked.
The chief of police squirmed inside his uniform. “No, Ms. Cavanaugh. I’m sorry.”
“That will be all.”
“Yes, mistress.”
Lilith glowered as her minions departed.
This host of necessity she wore annoyed her on every level. It was much older, in fact, than the one she’d hoped to replace last night at Chang’s.
Humans might have called that “ironic.”
Unfortunately, no other suitable candidate was available. If only she could order her minions out among the rabble to find her something suitable. But, no. However bad her need, caution was paramount. Nothing could be allowed to upset tomorrow’s timetable. After that, a great many things would be changing—if she could keep the Undertakers out of her way.
The Undertakers.
The Ritter boy had stolen her cell phone as she lay helpless. Its loss didn’t overly concern her; aside from contact numbers, there was little of value on it. But the theft was galling—especially given what else had been taken!
But what did Karl Ritter’s band of whelps need with a human cadaver?
Lilith stopped brooding and started analyzing.
Half a minute later, she sat up in her chair, found her notepad, and ran one sticky purple finger down its length until she found the phone number she was looking for.
Then she dialed, doing her best to ignore the bits of skin left behind each time she tapped a number.
“Hello.”
“Susan,” the Queen said. “It’s Lilith. I’m sorry to call you so early on a Saturday.”
“I was up.”
“I may have some news for you.”
“Really? Tell me!”
“Well, it’s rather complicated, and with everything that’s going on this weekend, my schedule’s full this morning. Can we possibly meet in person? Maybe this afternoon?”
“You tell me where and when, and I’ll be there!”
“My office,” Lilith said. “Two o’clock. And feel free to bring your daughter.”
“That’s all right. I can ask my sister to watch her for a couple of hours.”
“This might take longer than that, Susan.”
“Emily gets fussy on the train. It’ll be easier if I can let her stay home.”
Lilith almost argued but stopped herself. While inconvenient, the obstacle was manageable. “All right. If you’re sure. I’ll see you at two o’clock.”
“Lilith?”
“Yes, Susan?”
“Should I be…hopeful?”
The Queen of the Dead grinned into the phone. “Oh yes. I think you should definitely be hopeful.”
Then she hung up…and smiled.
Chapter 27
Desperation
Laying atop her cot, Sharyn’s body jerked. Then it jerked again. Within seconds, she was flopping about wildly, her eyes wide open and sightless.
Tom made a sound that was very nearly a whimper. Then he, Amy, and Ian rushed to his sister’s bedside.
“Hold her down!” the medic commanded. “Amy, get me the stick!” As the little girl hurried off to obey, Tom wordlessly threw his weight onto Sharyn’s struggling form.
As he did, Ian barked, “Come on, guys! Help!”
We all rushed over. Helene took one leg and I took the other while the Burgermeister—his face pale—grabbed the girl’s upper arms. “’S’okay, Chief,” he said to Tom. “We got her!”
Chuck and Ramirez were the last to arrive at the gurney, and seeing no obvious way to help, they apparently decided to ask dumb questions instead.
“What’s going on with her?” Chuck asked.
“Is it a seizure?” the FBI guy wanted to know.
“Not a seizure,” Ian replied. “She’s convulsing. We’d better strap her down.”
“With what?” I asked.
“There’s a bag of rags in the corner. Can one of you get it?”
It struck me as odd that of all of us, Ramirez was the one to obey. He came around the gurney and held the bag open for Ian, who pulled out a fistful of worn but clean rags, passing them around. “Wrists and ankles,” he told us.
“Do we have to?” Tom asked him, looking miserable.
“If we don’t, she could throw herself off the gurney…maybe even break a bone.”
The Chief nodded. We went to work tying the girl down. It wasn’t easy. She was strong and struggling like a panicked animal. But we managed it. With a sigh, Ian stepped back.
Ramirez looked worried at Sharyn’s restless body, bucking against her restraints. “What if she swallows her tongue?”
“That’s a myth,” Ian told him offhandedly. “You can’t actually swallow your tongue.”
FBI guy frowned. “Are you sure?”
It was Tom who answered—a little impatiently, I thought. “He’s sure.”
“What exactly happened to her anyway?” Ramirez asked.
“Head trauma,” Ian replied, “I think maybe it’s a vasogenic edema.”
“A what?” Dave demanded.
“I know what it is,” the FBI guy answered. “Her skull cavity is filling up with fluid, cutting off the oxygen to her brain.” He faced Tom, who wore an expression I’d never seen on him before.
The Chief looked terrified.
“Jefferson,” Ramirez said. “She needs to go to a hospital.”
Tom shook his head.
The agent came around the gurney and squared off with him, toe-to-toe. When he spoke this time, he wasn’t gentle. “She’s your sister, and if she doesn’t get treatment, she’s going to die! Don’
t you get that?”
Tom tore his eyes away from Sharyn’s sweaty face. “No hospital,” he croaked.
“For God’s sake, kid,” Ramirez snapped. “This isn’t a game—”
I knew that the Chief of the Undertakers was fast. I’d seen him in combat. But until that moment, I hadn’t known how fast. He seized the agent’s collar with the speed of a striking cobra. Ramirez was cut off mid-sentence as Tom spun him around and slammed him against the brick wall next to Sharyn’s gurney. The man winced.
Beside me, Helene yelled, “Tom! Hold up!”
But Chief ignored her, his eyes locked on Ramirez. When he spoke, his voice carried more menace than I’d ever heard there. “You figure I think this is a game? That’s my twin sister there. It’s been her and me, just her and me, for almost the whole of our lives. She’s my family, the only family I got!”
“Look,” the agent said, struggling to sound like a responsible grown-up; we were just kids, after all. “I’m sorry if I upset you. But you have to look at this maturely—”
It was the way wrong approach.
Again, Tom shook him, this time so hard I thought his head might hit the bricks and we’d end up having two of them tied down on gurneys. “The Deaders watch the hospitals!” he exclaimed—screamed almost. “All the time! And especially now ’cause they know they hurt her! They’ll watch for her to show, and if she does, they’ll kill her. Quick and quiet so nobody suspects a thing!”
Ramirez stared at him. “That’s…not possible—”
“They’ve done it before! More times than I can stand to think about!”
“But they can’t just murder children in a—”
Tom groaned and released Ramirez’s collar, eyeing the guy like he was the biggest idiot on the planet.
“They’re an army of animated cadavers,” he said flatly. “I know you can’t See that, but we do. An army of rotting, sticking, maggot-riddle wormbags. But you know what they ain’t? They ain’t zombies, and this ain’t the latest chapter of The Walking Dead. The Corpses are smart. Smart as us. Smart as you. And they know what they’re doing. They got a hundred ways to take us out, the kids who can See ’em. They make it look natural…illness or accidents. And they don’t get caught. They don’t ever get caught!”
