“The zombie animals. I’m cursed. I figured it was a necromancer cursing me, but it’s this fucking ring.” I found the rusty-gold band behind the umbrella stand and blew the dog hair and dust off before returning it to my pocket.
“So take it back.” Terrelle shrugged. “Find Andvari and get him to end the curse in return for his magic ring. Or give it to someone else—not me—and let it be their problem.”
Give it to someone else was definitely the easiest of the options, but I’d learned that the easy path often led to a whole lot of shit down the road. I didn’t know anything about what triggered the curse. It would suck if I gave the ring away, only to find out that it had to be sold, or stolen, or certain words needed to be said to complete the transfer of the curse as well as the gold band. No, my best bet would be to take it back to the original owner. If Loki stealing the ring had started the original curse, then I’m sure Lux “stealing” it a second time was the cause of my current woe.
“Uh, Iblis? Have you looked out your front door lately?”
“What now?” I grumbled. Swinging the door open, I immediately slammed it shut. In addition to the various undead rats and other animals, half a dozen corpses were shambling around my driveway. More human zombies. Just what I needed.
“Great. Fucking great.” Normally I’d just send Boomer out front for a snack, but he was refusing to get anywhere near the undead. Sucks when the one time you really needed a corpse-eating dog, he was hiding behind the barn and refusing to come out.
“You find out all you can about this Andvari, and that other ring as well,” I told Terrelle. “Oh, and get out some cereal and milk for Lux’s breakfast. I’m going to go take care of my zombie problem.”
“On it, boss!”
I left Terrelle pouring Frosted Flakes into a bowl, summoned my sword, and did battle in my driveway for the next half hour. The human undead were much more difficult to kill than rats and deer. Even smashing their brains didn’t seem to stop them. Cutting them apart meant I had dismembered arms and legs coming after me as well as whole zombies. Even my Iblis sword seemed less than effective at keeping these fucking things dead.
This had to stop. It had to stop now before I ended up barricaded inside my house, hoarding toilet paper and living off ramen noodles and canned baked beans.
After reducing the zombies to a bunch of twitching, diced-up flesh and bone, I went inside, pulled the ring out of my pocket, and showed it to Lux.
“Sweetie, where did you get this one from?”
Lux swallowed his mouthful of Frosted Flakes, took the ring from my hand, looked at it, then handed it back. “Dirt.”
“Is this Dirt a human? A demon?” Dirt definitely sounded like a Low’s name to me.
“No, dirt. In the ground.”
“What, like buried treasure?”
He shook his head. “No, just the ring. No other treasure.”
Well it was gonna be really damned hard to return a ring to nobody, but I was going to give it a shot. “It was in the very scary pile. What’s so scary about it if it was just lying on the ground somewhere.”
“Cursed ring.”
I’d never wanted to face-palm so bad in my life. “You purposely picked up a cursed ring and took it home?”
He nodded. “Sacred duty.”
Oh for the love of everything unholy. Only my kid would decide his duty as ring bearer meant picking cursed rings up out of the dirt and bringing them home. Wait. Was I the one cursed, or was Lux?
Thinking back, I remembered putting a bunch of the rings on my fingers when I’d first found Lux with them. Had this ring been one I’d worn? Had putting it on been the trigger for the curse, or just taking possession of it? So far the zombies had only been congregating around my house, but neither Lux nor I had worn the ring consistently, and I think I’d only left with it in my pocket once or twice.
Did that mean the zombies followed the ring and not the owner? I really fucking hoped so, because that meant I could just bury this thing back in the dirt and let the undead hang out there instead of my house.
“Let’s do a little experiment,” I told Lux. “I want to see if we can take the ring back, okay?”
He nodded, and took my hand. In a gut-wrenching flash we were off. It took the usual amount of time for us to get there. I was prepared when we arrived and this time didn’t fall over to crash into anything. Not that there was anything to crash into. We were in a plowed field. It could have been anywhere, but now that my own teleportation skill was working, I could tell we were somewhere in southern Italy.
“Show me where you found it,” I told Lux.
“Right here.” The little angel pointed to a spot on the ground.
Here goes nothing. I dug the ring out of my pocket, dropped it on the dirt, then scooted a few inches of soil on top of it.
“I’m going to stay here,” I told Lux. “You go home and hang out for a few minutes. I want to see if there’s still a bunch of twitching body parts outside our front door, or any new ones have shown up.”
He vanished and I stood there in the middle of a field, hoping no farmers appeared to yell at me or chase me off. I didn’t want to lose this thing, leaving me stuck with these zombies and a cursed ring I couldn’t find to try to break the curse. Lux might have been able to find a small band of gold in the middle of a field, but I doubted I’d be able to, and I worried he’d not be able to find it a second time. It would be just my luck to misplace the fucking thing, or have someone else come along and scoop it up.
Although if someone else found it, then maybe they’d be cursed instead. I looked around, realizing the chance of someone stumbling across a ring in the middle of a field was pretty damned slim. I was surprised Lux had found it. He must have some special ring radar going on because this was as close to a needle in a haystack situation as I’d ever found.
It seemed to be taking Lux a while so I sat down in the dirt, nearly planting my ass on the crawling remains of a rotting fox.
“Fuck!” I jumped to my feet, summoned my sword but before I started chopping, I realized the error in my plan. Was this zombie fox coming for me, or the ring? How could I be sure? Using my sword to mark the spot where I’d put the ring, I jogged back a few yards and waited to see what the fox would do.
It took a while, but he turned and shuffled toward me. And as I waited, a few others joined him—the skeleton of a bird, and something that might have once been a cat. I frowned, still not sure if the undead were just heading for anyone near the ring, or me in particular.
Lux appeared by my side. “Lots of dead at home,” he informed me. “Rats. Cats. Deer. People.”
More people? Fuck me, I did not want to have to keep dealing with people zombies shambling around outside my house.
“Okay, let’s try something else.” I walked back to the ring with Lux. “You stay here, and I’m going to go away for a while. If any zombie animals try to attack you, blast them. If they keep coming and you’re scared, then come back to the house. Okay?”
He nodded. Leaving my sword to mark the spot where I’d buried the ring, I teleported, but instead of going home, I went to the nearest city, bought a can of soda, and found a cemetery.
I wasn’t sure exactly what the fuck I was doing. So far none of the undead had been anywhere except my house. Admittedly they didn’t move all that fast. Perhaps by the time the dead had risen and slowly made their way toward me, I’d been gone. Living out in the country, there was a whole lot more roadkill within spitting distance of my house. And I was there for long stretches of time, plus the ring had remained there.
I picked up the phone and called Terrelle.
“Hey, are you at the house?”
“Yeah, I’d be by your pool if it wasn’t for all the dead shit crawling around your house. I’m thinking I might want to move into a hotel until this curse shit gets lifted.”
I hung up on her. Okay, there were still zombies around my house, even though neither I nor the ring were there.
Meandering around the cemetery, I didn’t see any corpses clawing their way out of the ground. Of course, these dudes were six feet under and sealed in both a coffin and a grave liner. That shit wasn’t easy to get through—and I knew this personally. If this experiment was going to work, I’d need to either stay here much longer, or find a dead body that didn’t have to fight its way through concrete and dirt to the surface.
There was a graveside funeral occurring at the newer end of the cemetery, so I made my way there, drinking my soda and trying to figure out how the fuck I was going to break this curse. Lux appeared beside me with a flash of light, nearly making me drop my drink.
“Dead fox is still moving,” he told me sadly. “And dead bird and cat. Lots of others came too.”
Ugh. Did that mean they were heading toward the ring? If so, why were there still zombies in my driveway? Should I just leave the ring in the dirt and hope the effect eventually wore off?
“I think I’m going to have to try to find this Andvari dwarf,” I told Lux, not wanting to take my chances on this.
Lux nodded. “Where is Andvari?”
I sighed. “Fuck if I know. I need to go to Hel anyway to see Doriel. I’ll start with the Klee, since according to the legend he seems to have lived in their mountains. I’ll track the dwarf down and give him the ring in exchange for breaking the curse.”
“I help?” Lux looked up at me with his big blue eyes.
I ruffled his hair. “I got this one. You hang out with Nyalla and get ready for the wedding.”
There was a piercing scream, quickly followed by shouts and more screaming. I looked over at the source of the noise and saw the attendees at the graveside funeral running across the grass as they raced for their cars. The casket rocked on its stand, toppling over onto the ground. The lid popped open and an impeccably dressed corpse struggled to his feet.
I started to laugh. Maybe this cursed ring wasn’t all that bad. All sorts of impish ideas flooded my mind, and for a second I thought maybe I’d just keep the thing.
But then I remembered the dead cow in my pool, and changed my mind. Constantly having to fight off zombies was too high a price to pay even for some truly funny pranks.
Nope. I needed to get rid of this ring and the curse. I just needed to figure out where Andvari was then give the damned thing back to him.
Chapter 22
Doriel was the Ancient I’d given responsibility to for the demon area now known as New Hell. She’d promptly done what every Angel of Chaos since the beginning of time had done and delegated. Thus, instead of spending her days in meetings and administrative crap, she was back in Hel, sunning herself on a rock while members of her household entertained her.
I’d tried delegating, but unlike Doriel, I had an angel who insisted I actually get off my ass and take care of things myself. It sucked, but it was the price I paid for falling in love with an archangel.
“Iblis!” Doriel opened one eye and adjusted the reflective thingy she was using to make her brown skin more of a fire-engine red.
“We’ve gotta talk business.” I sat down on the rock beside her.
Doriel’s face scrunched up with distaste. I’m sure my face had the same expression on it.
“What’s there to talk about? Things are wonderful in New Hell. It’s just like here except with more humans.”
“I’m sure New Hell is lovely,” I assured her. “But the humans are complaining, which means the angels are complaining, which means I won’t get any sex—angel or otherwise—until everyone’s less bitchy about stuff.”
Doriel folded up the reflective thingy and sat up. “Which humans are complaining? Because the humans in New Hell seem to be quite happy.”
Right. Given how many of them had fled the area, I thought not. Perhaps Doriel’s idea of happy and the humans’ idea of happy were miles apart? I’d gotten sick of hearing Nyalla talk about how the human government was financially stressed trying to take care of all the refugees from California and the other states. Some humans who’d owned property in Seattle and San Francisco, and other high-priced areas were asking for reparations from the demons.
We all knew how that was going to work out.
“There are tech companies still operating in New Hell,” I told her. “And there are a shit-ton of orchards, farms, and wineries. The president and his minions want a treaty where they can get a percentage of harvests and stuff at a reduced rate because we stole their land.”
Doriel’s eyebrows shot up. “And what did you tell them?”
“That of course we’d be happy to agree to that sort of trade agreement.”
The Ancient laughed. “And, of course, we have no intention of actually doing so.”
“Right. They can bite my ass. It’s not like they’re giving sixty percent of the gross domestic product to the natives they shoved out when they pulled up on their boats from Europe. It’s not like they gave land and start-up funds to the descendants of the Africans they snatched up and enslaved. There’s legal precedent and whatever for this kinda thing. They’re not getting jack shit except a “sorry, too bad.”
Doriel chuckled. “So what’s there to discuss?”
“Did I mention I like having sex with my angel?”
She sighed. “Fine. Just tell me what we’re doing.”
“We’re assigning someone from your household to a committee with some dudes at the White House. Make sure you pick someone you particularly need to punish so that they can prove their loyalty and earn back their position.”
Doriel’s eyes narrowed. “Is this a human committee or angel committee?”
“Human,” I assured her. “But whoever you pick can’t kill the humans.”
“Can they flip tables? Eat all the snacks? Spit in the water pitchers?”
“Sure. Can’t expect a demon to forgo all fun.”
Doriel nodded. “So what’s the line in the sand for us?”
“I haven’t decided. They want first rights to buy food, wine, and tech up at way below the going rate. Have them agree to everything. If we get caught, we’ll figure it out.”
She nodded and began unfolding the reflective thingy.
“I’m not done,” I told her. “There’s an issue about the border between New Hell and the rest of the world.”
“Yeah, yeah. Let me guess—humans can come and go freely, but demons only can with a hall pass.”
I was impressed by how quickly Doriel had been picking up human slang and modern culture given though she’d been pretty much asleep in hell most of the last millennium.
“Actually no. The president decided he doesn’t want other humans to leave freely from New Hell, because they’re paying us to stick their violent felons there.”
Doriel shook her head. “They’re paying us for that? Humans are stupid.”
“That may be true, but now humans need approval to leave New Hell. Same as the demons.”
Doriel shrugged. “No skin off my nose. I don’t care if the humans stay or go. Most of them are more like demons than humans anyway.”
“I told the president that if he wants to restrict demons and other humans from leaving New Hell, then they’re the ones who need to do it. They’re already working on putting a magical barrier up around the border. I’m assuming humans will be patrolling on their side as well, checking papers or fingerprints or some shit. I just wanted to let you know so you could warn any demons they’ll get killed if they try to hop the magic fence.”
Doriel unfolded her reflective thingy and sat back. “I’ll let them know. Not that any of them will heed my warnings.”
Not. My. Problem.
That done, I headed east to the mountains. It would have been easier to just teleport there, but I’d been in a nostalgic mood lately, so I took to the air and flew.
The elven lands were crumbling. Hel’s natural climate was chipping away at the weakening environmental spells the elves had put over their kingdoms. What had been lush forests were now dried, dead trees, sand begi
nning to cover the meadows. Here and there were patches of green where some elves remained, struggling to keep the desert at bay. Only the highest elves had the ability to command widespread control over the weather and environment, so I had no idea how these groups were managing. It was sad seeing the forests vanish, but they’d never really been natural to Hel anyway.
The mountains were definitely natural to Hel, and unlike their brethren, the Klee elves didn’t fight the landscape of Hel. They saw the beauty of their stark lands, and only modified what they needed to produce food. As I approached the capital city, I hovered, giving them plenty of time to notice my arrival and see that I was not intending to attack.
After circling a few times, I slowly made my way down, landing at the edge of the marketplace. For the most part the elves ignored me. Not many demons made their way here, and those who did were no threat to the scrappy mountain residents. I made my way through the crowds not to the palace, but to the place I figured I’d find what I needed—the library.
The building was tucked into the side of the mountain. Inside, stone shelves rose up four stories with gold ladders that rolled magically along the racks. Cases lined the center of the room, filled with scrolls and maps. I ignored everything, heading straight to the elf at the reference desk. He had dusky brown skin, dark golden eyes, and white braids in a complex top knot. He warily watched as I approached.
“I’m looking for a dwarf,” I told him.
His thin eyebrows shot up. “In the library?”
“As convenient as that would be, I doubt he’s in the library. His name is Andvari and he’s a fish shifter. He’s said to live among the dark elves.”
“A fish shifter? I have never known a dwarf to be a shifter. And there are no dwarves living among us. They all live in the mountains to the west.”
“Maybe they moved? I’ve got no idea how long this Andvari might have been living here.”
The librarian frowned, then put a book on the counter, paging through it. “There might have been dwarves living in these mountains before we got here. Perhaps in the early days we shared this territory. That would have been quite a long time ago, though.”
With This Ring: Imp Series, Book 11 Page 22
