Nightlord: Orb

by Garon Whited

  That throw came up seven, no problem. It even looked good on the bounces.

  I got distracted. I started trying to provoke that mental state again, rather than devoting my full attention to controlling dice. Turns out I can do it, but it takes a minute or two before it starts to kick in. My guess is it’s some type of altered brain chemistry. My voluntary nervous system behaves like a superconductor. If that sort of change has made it into my brain, could my processor speed increase? With enough of the right neurotransmitters, this seems like a logical possibility.

  Even during the day, as a mortal, I have faster reflexes, extra-hand telekinesis, and the ability to speed up my time sense. Not bad. There are good points to being a part-time undead.

  On the other hand, it takes an immense amount of focus and concentration to get it going, and it seems to be physically draining. Lucky for me, casinos also have really good deals in their restaurants.

  As far as other potential gambling avenues are concerned, slot machines would normally be ideal for this. Reach inside, feel the spinning wheels, and stop them where you want them. That ought to work, right? But all the slots I could find were electronic. There’s nothing to grab. Oh, I could short one out pretty easily, but that ruins it. It doesn’t go nuts and gush money. Even if it did, I feel certain I would not be allowed to keep it.

  Cards of all sorts—blackjack, poker, baccarat, whatever—aren’t impossible. I can feel with my tendrils, carefully stroking the next card to feel for the differences in the printing. It takes time, though, and knowing the next card, while a huge advantage, only improves the odds of winning by some percent. If I’m playing blackjack and have thirteen while the dealer has eighteen, knowing the next card is a king does me no good. Either way, I lose. Still, given lots of time to play, I could make a significant profit.

  Roulette has some of the best payoff odds in a casino. If you hit the exact number, it pays off at thirty-five to one. Of course, your odds (in America) of hitting that exact number are thirty-seven to one, so the casino makes a small but steady profit.

  I found out that little white ball doesn’t weigh much. The hard part was making it look natural, but it’s nowhere near as hard as making a pair of dice bounce realistically. There’s only one thing to watch, and it doesn’t matter how it lands—the orientation is immaterial. I lost some one-dollar chips while I practiced. I’d wander up, watch a couple of spins while trying to be subtle, place a bet on a number, lose it, and wander off to practice my technique at something else.

  I was down to my last ten dollars before I went back to roulette. I played the colors—bet on black or red—for five straight passes, doubling my winnings each time, before I pretended to lose my nerve. I cashed in my chips and walked.

  To another casino.

  Spread the losses around, that’s the trick. I could take a casino for a million, no problem, but they wouldn’t like that. When they noticed, they would probably want to use me for publicity—“See the big winner!”—so as to recoup some of their losses. A less-reputable place might assist me with carrying all that money… out the back door. But let us not dwell on that.

  There’s also a limit on how much you can win before you have to fill out special tax forms. At that level, they don’t let you leave until you do the paperwork. Since I can’t answer most of the questions, I can’t make that much in one stop. I want to avoid notice.

  Heck, I could have made a living like this and avoided all the day labor jobs. There were only two problems with it.

  First, it’s stealing. Yes, yes—stealing from a casino. Granted. They have money. Lots of money. It’s still stealing. Maybe that’s not too bad, considering I drink blood from people. It’s the financial version of socially responsible vampirism, sucking out a little money without damaging the business. I accept I’m costing them money and lowering their profits to help myself, but that doesn’t mean I like it. As a vampire, I prefer to find someone who is dying—or volunteering to die, as in the case of assailants—rather than take a drink from someone and send them on their way.

  The other reason I don’t make a living this way is the math. If I did this on a regular basis with the local casinos, they would start to recognize me as a statistical anomaly. This scheme depended on hitting each casino for a moderate amount and never going back.

  Getting greedy will get you noticed. And get you in trouble.

  Now, to get some new clothes and a train ticket to Atlantic City.

  Friday, August 28th

  I came through for BitRate; BitRate came through for me. I’m in the system and I exist. I can get pulled over, present my ID, get ticketed, and be told to go on my way—no warrants, no felonies, no misdemeanors, a couple of speeding tickets in manual-drive mode and none of those in three years. He even included a license as a collector of antique weapons. I may not be able to wear Firebrand out on the town, but I can put it in a case and bring it with me if I feel like it.

  This is a good thing; I plan to move out of the northeast immediately. Everything is expensive up here. I did my research in the library and decided Oklahoma was probably best for a vampire intent on avoiding notice. Living a little bit west of Oklahoma City seemed like a good deal. Low cost of living, cheap land, and a major city close by. Colorado was my other possibility, but I wanted someplace with wide-open, flat land for Bronze. She might be able to get out and run.

  Mr. Plamler was not pleased to see me go. I paid my weekly rent on time, kept quiet, and never complained. By his lights, I was the perfect tenant. Ms. Winkowski was also sad when I told her I was moving. She’s promised to make some cookies for me to take along. I appreciate the gesture, but at least I won’t actually have to eat them. Nobody else in the building has done more than nod in passing; I don’t think I’ll be saying any other farewells. Doubtless, Jazz will be heartbroken, but since I’ve only been “that cute guy” she’s never actually met, I think she’ll survive.

  While I could have hired a truck and transported Bronze, she really didn’t like that idea. It’s partly because moving without walking is disturbing to her. Mostly, I think, it’s because she stood perfectly still for so long. It doesn’t bother her, as such, but she does so love to run.

  We compromised. I’ve been building up magical power for a while, now. Tonight, I’ll burn most of it on spells to make us semi-camouflaged and hard to notice. We’ll run as far as we can before dawn, then we’ll take a truck from there.

  Wizard Safety Tip: Radar guns don’t care about spells that affect perception. They scream about the big metal thing breaking the speed limit and demand something be done about it. Fortunately, the police hit the red-and-blues before they do anything else. By the time they pass us, we’re standing still, off the road, trying to be unnoticeable. That only works with the right spells going, obviously. Next time, I’ll remember to include a frequency-shifter to disrupt the radar or infrared or whatever it is they use.

  Bronze wants to outrun a police cruiser. If we were on anything but a highway, I might go for it. She corners better than anything on wheels, but I think they’ll get her in the straightaways. I may have to get a dune buggy or something so we can chase each other for fun.

  I did discover something important about the interstate highway system, though. Typically, they have six lanes—three in each direction. The outer two lanes are for anyone. The innermost lanes, however, are the “fast lanes” and are reserved solely for automated vehicles. Shifting into the automatic lane causes your car to go into a computer-controlled cruise mode. If you enter that lane in an older car without a cruise mode, or if you override it and go manual while in the robot lane, you get a nasty ticket.

  Bronze is certainly an autonomous mode of transport. She’s not computer-controlled, though, and can’t sync up with traffic control. Which means we would have to stay in the outer lanes, among the manually-driven vehicles.

  On second thought, I could see us pulling up alongside somebody as he’s doing twenty over the limit. He looks over
, sees us, does a double-take, and promptly wrecks. How about we don’t do that?

  To be safe, we stayed off the interstate highways entirely. Bronze likes secondary roads; they have more curves and twists. I still get the feeling she wants to race a vehicle.

  Tuesday, September 1st

  I have most of my money invested, now; it provides enough income to excuse not having a job. I figure I’ll pay a visit to Las Vegas and Reno, tap them lightly for funds, pay my taxes, round out the portfolio, and stop worrying about it.

  I’ve also been house hunting outside Oklahoma City. There are quite a number of country places up for sale, but I don’t really want an entire farm if I can avoid it. A sizable lot, yes. A barn, yes. Three hundred acres of genetically-modified broccoli? Not my first choice. Although, if I own a farm, I might be able to flatten out a private racetrack…

  The good news is that living out of a suitcase is surprisingly cheap.

  I’ve also checked with the city, county, and state law people. Apparently, I can ride a horse without a license. As a result, we can take any road that doesn’t have an autonomous lane—meaning, around here, pretty much anywhere but the Interstate highways and related bypasses and loops. It’s unusual, certainly, but it’s not outright weird. The caveat, of course, is I also have to clean up after my horse. Piles of horse dung on the road—or on the sidewalk!—are considered unacceptable. Well, I can’t say I blame them.

  Now that Bronze has her paint job refreshed, I can leave everything hanging off her while I go into a truck stop for a shower, then ride at a leisurely pace to a realtor’s office. I may be on the low end of wealthy, but I won’t stay that way if I squander money. Besides, do I really need a place to stay if I don’t have stuff to keep there? I don’t even have a bedroll, much less a bed. I have a backpack with toiletries and some clothes, a couple of sacks slung behind the saddle, a sword and associated tackle hanging from her saddlehorn, and a bowling bag with Black Ball of Badness.

  We do, occasionally, have someone walk up to what they think is a big, oddly-colored horse. As long as they’re there to admire her magnificence, all well and good. Reaching for anything causes Firebrand to make a psychic throat-clearing noise. This causes the would-be thief to look around suddenly. If he persists, Firebrand warns him off. That’s usually sufficient.

  We haven’t had an incident where Bronze has to rear up and look threatening, but she lives in hope.

  Only a little more time and patience and we’ll have a private little place we can call our own. Bronze can roam the property, Firebrand can enjoy a good fire, and I can finally settle down.

  Wednesday, September 9th

  Finally. Papers signed, mortgage in place, insurance, inspections, fees, taxes, tariffs, bribes, blackmail—wait, no, that’s just government. We’ve got it all settled and the three of us have moved in. Four, if you count Demonic Eyeball Orbs. Let’s not.

  The place isn’t a palace. It doesn’t have to be.

  Some town in Custer County, west of Oklahoma City, hit a building boom and expanded its burbs. They swallowed up a couple of farms and spread east and north, toward the Canadian River.

  Why a river in Oklahoma is named for Canada, I have no idea.

  The building boom ran right up to Mr. Ardent’s farm and bounced. He and his wife simply planted some hedges around the farmhouse yard and went right on raising crops and kids as though their farm was a huge back yard. Now, though, with the kids moved out and the Ardents getting on in years, they thought it time to move somewhere smaller and take things easy. Even with all the modern machines, farmers don’t have a lazy life. So they put the place up for sale and I took it.

  Yes, it’s about two hundred acres of alfalfa. I have no idea how to farm it. I don’t even know what alfalfa is good for. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen alfalfa before. All I know is I’m going to have to mow it. I think. Can I let it grow wild and call it a nature preserve? Or will Bronze chomp her way through it for me?

  The place is old, but I don’t have a problem with old. It’s in good condition; Mr. Ardent knows which end of a hammer hits the nail. It started out as a one-bedroom house, but he added more to it as time went on, including a walk-around porch outside. There’s a basement, too, which is what really sold me on the place. Basements are somewhat rare in these parts. The house even has a real, honest-to-goodness fireplace, much to Firebrand’s delight. There’s even a big pile of old firewood stacked next to the back door.

  Out back, on the east side of the yard, there’s a sort of half-hill with a door in it; this leads steeply down some wooden steps to a brick-walled, wood-floored chamber. That’s their tornado shelter and root cellar. Mrs. Ardent canned everything under the sun, I’m told. The room smells like someone murdered a fruit stand and buried it in a shallow grave. Sadly, she took all her preserves with her, leaving only spiderwebs and the damp.

  Still on the east side of the house, but closer to the street, there’s a walnut tree. It’s far enough away from the house that branches aren’t a problem and far enough away from the root cellar the roots aren’t a problem. From the graffiti carved into the trunk—a heart and initials—I’d say it was there when an old, married couple were a pair of crazy kids. The thing I find most interesting is that the carving is still there, almost as though someone refreshed it every year or so. Like, say, on some special day.

  Just a theory. If the tree had a dryad, I could ask. That might work in Rethven, but not here.

  The property also comes with a barn bigger than the house. The driveway—twin ruts along the west side of the house—runs through the hedge and back to the barn. An unpowered farm-gate blocks it off from the street. Bronze likes the barn; she doesn’t even need to duck to walk through the front or back doors. As soon as I can, I’ll install a bolt of some sort she can work herself.

  At least, I thought I would. She opened the doors herself. Her mane is wire, disproportionally strong, and quite capable of working latches and the like. It’s one thing to see it move on its own, but it’s unnerving to watch her do fine work. She lowers her head until her forehead is on a level with the latch. Strands of mane writhe forward over the top and work the latch. What’s next? Picking locks with a sentient strand of wire?

  Huh. Maybe I should get some locks and let her try. Assuming I can talk her into not eating them, of course. She likes steel.

  I’m not sure what to do with all the land. Right now, it’s a place for Bronze to run—carefully. She’s not allowed to set anything on fire. I wonder, though… should I plant something? I mean, will it look suspicious if I have a farm this size and only grow weeds? Right now, my big goal is to minimize my attention footprint, so this is an important question.

  Speaking of which, the farm is fenced in with that wire-fence stuff—not barbed wire, just a wire grid—so I could do the livestock thing, at least on the small-scale. Goats, sheep, something like that. That could be helpful. Having a handy blood supply might be worth the trouble. What sort of licensing and paperwork is there for a ranch?

  Dammit, I have to deal with the local laws! I’d forgotten how many of them there are! Licenses, regulations, inspections, extortion—excuse me, “taxation”—et al and ad nauseam. This is not a society of law and order, it’s a society of litigation! It’s almost enough to make me want to be a king again. At least there I can abolish laws and tell people to show some sense, instead. Whatever happened to that?

  Anyway, inside the house, I don’t have a stick of furniture. Not even a windowshade. At least the water works. I’m on “city water,” but there’s also a well on the property—the Ardent farm used it for irrigation. I’ve also had the power turned on. Tomorrow I go shopping for some basic furniture and some tools.

  If I’m going to kill some time, I might as well take a more in-depth look at the local magic. If I can figure out how, maybe I can also start hunting for alternate universes. I think I can work on the small-scale prototype stuff in Mrs. Ardent’s hobby room. Any large-scale production is
going to have to be in the barn.

  Saturday, September 12th

  There are nice things about this year. They make a privacy film you can apply to your windows. It darkens when you touch a control. It’s not totally opaque, but it’s pretty dark. Add some Venetian blinds and a set of heavy drapes or curtains—is there a difference between drapes and curtains? Or are they the same thing? Anyway, it’s light-tight, even for us semi-undead types. I like it.

  Mind you, the bathroom window is more than simply blacked out. It’s still there, as far as the outside is concerned, but I’ve covered it over on the inside, added some insulation, hung some sheet rock, and painted it. From the inside, it’s a wall. I even went to the trouble of installing a vent fan in the ceiling to make up for the lack of window. Why? Because, given a choice, I’d rather take my transformations under a hot shower. Preferably without the risk of turning crispy.

  I’m a wimp. I’m okay with that.

  Bronze and I spent some time touching up her paint job. She’s still not going to stand up to a close inspection, but she passes perfectly at a distance. That gives her the run of the farm, for now. If anyone wonders why she’s wearing a saddle all the time, that’s their problem. She could alter her shape to remove it, but she’s reluctant. I think she likes having a built-in seat. We sometimes run into things that can burn or blast a saddle right off her, so I see her point.

  On the downside, it means I don’t get to have any insulating padding between me and her stovetop back. I’m sure her hide doesn’t actually get hot enough to cook on, but—at least as regards my daytime biology—it certainly encourages me to ride like a jockey.

  Where can I get an asbestos blanket? Or do they make something better? I’ll have to look.