by Karen Chance
I pulled up the trapdoor and dropped down beside Louis-Cesare. “Change places,” I said, trying to push his butt out of the driver’s seat.
“Quoi?” He looked up from frantically shifting gears. “What is it? What is happening?”
“Casanova needs help, and I’m in no shape to provide it. Move!”
To my surprise, Louis-Cesare moved. He launched himself up on deck while I tried to figure out the mess of gears. He’d gotten us turned, but I was left with keeping us from plowing into the flag-waving, bunting-covered mass ahead. I stomped on the brakes and discovered that they were a lot more sensitive than I’d thought. A crew member who must have been standing too close to the prow went sailing past my small peephole into the road. I’d practically stood the float on its head, but at least we’d stopped.
I poked my head out cautiously, in time to see most of the crew go over the side for the second time that night. Several of the rest were down, and judging by their condition, they weren’t going to be getting up again. A trio of vamps were more resilient, and had ganged up on Louis-Cesare. They were busy regretting that decision. The damn man was annoying, but there was a slight chance that he deserved his reputation.
He pinned one vamp to the mainmast by running him through with a sword, until it came out the other side of the wooden post. He took the vamp’s own weapon from his thrashing hand to throw at the second. It didn’t take him out, but even a vamp will be slowed down by a cutlass sticking out of his midsection. The third he knocked into the rigging with a savage elbow to the neck. The vamp in question had been behind him at the time, but his aim was perfect. I made a mental note not to try sneaking up on the guy.
Casanova had apparently decided that his backup had things well in hand, and had located a spot where the bunting had all burnt off, allowing him a flame-free zone to drop to the road. I leapt after him and grabbed his hair, only to have the long black wig come off in my hands. I threw it to the asphalt and got a grip on his shirt instead. “Where are you going?”
He shot me an evil glance and retrieved his wig. “Elsewhere.”
“Not until I get what I came for! You owe me.”
“Then I’ll have to keep on owing you. The Circle raided Dante’s this morning and confiscated the lot. You want weapons? I suggest you see them.”
“The dark wouldn’t dare—”
“It wasn’t the dark.” He began making rude gestures at the float behind us, the crew of which had started yelling for us to get a move on. “Although it’s getting a little hard to tell the difference these days.”
An angry George Washington hopped down from the next float in line and came stomping over to see what the holdup was. Casanova moved toward him, obviously spoiling for a fight with someone he could actually beat up, but I grabbed his arm. “But that goes against the treaty! The Senate will—”
“Swallow the insult. We’re at war, and the Silver Circle is the Senate’s ally, in case you’ve forgotten. They reminded me of that fact at length when I very politely requested reparations. ‘We’ll address that after the war,’ ” he mimicked bitterly.
“They couldn’t have taken everything!”
“If you’d like to search the place yourself, be my guest. If you find anything, I’ll be happy to split it with you.”
“What’s the world coming to?” I raged. “When even the bad guys run out of weapons?”
“I’m not the bad guy—at least, not in comparison.”
George had reached us, and he wasn’t looking happy. “Get this thing moving! You’re holding up the entire—” He caught sight of me and shied back for some reason.
“I’m having a few personnel issues,” Casanova said, with an attempt at dignity. Apparently, he’d decided that the man could be useful, because he trotted out charming smile #48: for suckers who are about to give me something for nothing. “You wouldn’t happen to have anyone who can drive one of these things?”
George nodded, his eyes never leaving my face as he backed quickly away. “So what am I supposed to do?” I demanded.
A vamp landed hard on the street beside us, and Casanova kicked him viciously in the ribs. “I don’t know, but whatever it is, I suggest you do it soon. Everyone who can get out of here is heading for the hills. Except for me,” he added, picking the vamp up and slamming him against the ship’s hull. “I’m not going anywhere. Everyone may as well understand that right now!”
I sighed and gave up. A quick glance showed that Louis-Cesare had cleared the deck and was tying the only human dumb enough to stick around to a barrel with the remains of the rigging. Time to make my exit.
“You don’t know why I was here—I never had a chance to tell you,” I instructed Casanova, as a peri-wigged young man hurried up, only to stop dead at the sight of us.
“Theatrical makeup,” Casanova told him, apropos of nothing. “There’s a trapdoor in the deck.” The guy nodded and scrambled on board, looking a little freaked-out.
I eyed Casanova up and down. He didn’t look that bad to me. “Who are you supposed to be, anyway?”
“Jean Lafitte.”
“And that would be patriotic how?”
“He fought in the Revolutionary War, and in the War of 1812. On the American side.”
“I thought he was a pirate.”
“He was.” Casanova smoothed his brilliant maroon coat. “I told you. Sometimes the bad guys can be good guys. It all depends on the circumstances.”
“Thanks for that nugget of wisdom. I’ll cherish it.”
Casanova ignored me. “Who is he, anyway?” He hiked a thumb at Louis-Cesare, who was standing on the deck, searching the crowd with a scowl on his face.
“Radu’s get.”
“Did you say Radu?”
“Don’t ask. Point is, I doubt he’d make a good impression on my suppliers.” Assuming I could find any. Not to mention that it wouldn’t do my reputation any good to be seen hanging around with a Senate member.
“I never saw you.” Casanova agreed, vaulting back onto the ship, which was slowly starting to move again. He poked his head back over the edge, black curls swinging. “Oh, and chica, we’re having a special on facials this week at the spa. Think about it.”
I scowled, but didn’t have time to respond appropriately. Louis-Cesare had spotted me and he looked a little tense. I dove into the crowd and got gone.
Chapter Ten
My mood wasn’t improved when I found, after dragging my bloodstained self through a large section of Vegas’ demon bars, that most of my old contacts either had left town or were currently doing a Benny impression. It wasn’t until the sky had turned a pale, cloudless blue, announcing the official end of the year’s rain, that I managed to dig up an old acquaintance.
I don’t get out West much—the proximity of MAGIC is a big deterrent—but once in a while a job results in a jaunt to the area. I found one of the guys I occasionally use for backup when that happens in the middle of packing for his patented rat-on-a-sinking-ship routine. Another hour and I’d have missed him.
“Jay, good to see you!” I slammed the door to his cheap hotel room—rentable by anything from the hour to the month—and smiled. It made the sort of impression I was hoping for, mainly because of the dried blood matting my hair and the grimace my split lip made of my grin. I hadn’t seen myself in a mirror yet, but the reactions of the crowds in the bars had been enough to tell me that intimidation probably wouldn’t be a problem.
“Dory!” The Nsquital demon’s face, which was able to pass for human if you squinted, turned violet and sprouted little bumps that looked like acne. They weren’t.
“You spray me and I’ll kill you before I melt.” I flashed a little fang, but held out weaponless hands. “I came to talk, Jay. Relax, would you?”
“I… I wouldn’t poison you, Dory. You know that.”
“Sure. That’s why I came by.” I sat down on the lumpy mattress and thumped his plastic suitcase. “Lucky I caught you, huh?”
; “You know how it is.” Jay was back to ugly-human mode, his oversize teeth, jug ears and carrot top making him look like a grown-up version of the MAD magazine guy. The baggy corduroy trousers—necessary because jeans tended to show the tail—and ratty, oatmeal-colored tee didn’t help with the cool, but they did give him a pathetic edge that sort of relaxed me. “I don’t like the neighborhood so much now that it’s a war zone.”
That was probably the truth. Nsquital don’t like violence. Their position as the twice damned—the literal translation of the name—ensured as much. They were a motley crew of many demonic races, mostly of the minor-functionary level, who had obtained a measure of freedom because each one had killed its master and fled from punishment. They could be found and dragged back by whatever had replaced their dead owner, but most weren’t worth the trouble of hunting. Jay had slaughtered a minor servant at Mammon’s court whom nobody had liked much anyway. Its replacement would stir-fry him as a matter of policy if it ever stumbled across him—like in a war zone, for instance—but otherwise he was probably okay.
Unless somebody ratted him out, of course.
“This visit was well-timed, then. If you’re leaving, you won’t want to drag all that heavy weaponry with you, right?”
He sighed, blinking faded blue eyes that had always reminded me of an accountant’s. Of course, that was what he’d once been, sort of. “Aw, come on, Dory. You have any idea how many times I’ve been held up this week? A guy’s gotta make a living.”
“Exactly. So why are you turning down a customer?”
Jay look shocked. “You’re planning to pay me?”
I smiled. He paled again, but never got more than a violet blush this time. “Well, not exactly.”
“Dory, you know I don’t do credit. This is a strictly cash-and-carry business.” It would have been a better line except for the wobble in his voice.
“Fine. Then get me something to carry out of here, and I won’t cash in the bounty on your head.”
Jay’s shoulders slumped in defeat, which didn’t bother me much, as it was a standard bargaining tactic with him. But then he started to cry and I got shifty. I hate it when anything cries. I wanted to slap him to make him stop, but there was a chance that would only intensify the water-works. And I couldn’t tell him I’d been kidding about the bounty, since it was the only thing he was afraid enough of to give me what I needed.
“Um, hey. Look, Jay, don’t—”
“I knew something like this would ha-happen,” he wailed, collapsing into a heap. “I was trying to get out, but I wanted to sell off the rest of my stock first, for traveling m-money. Greed!” he screamed. “I should have known it would get me in the end!”
“This isn’t the end, dumb ass,” I said, dragging him off the floor. “Would you shut up and listen? I am not having a good day. Make it better and nothing bad is going to happen to you.”
“But I don’t have h-hardly anything left!” he moaned. “I told you, I spent most of the night s-selling out. Bargain-basement prices, too. I’d have kept something back for you, Dory, I promise! But I didn’t know you were in town!” He started to leak again. I looked around for a tissue but couldn’t find one.
“So tell me who is left that can help me. All my contacts beat you out the door.” I was facing a personal apocalypse and was all but defenseless. Typical, but so not good.
Jay wiped his tears on the rough bedspread and looked at me with watery, hope-filled eyes. Maybe the nasty, blood-covered freak wasn’t going to kill him after all. “Not many,” he finally said. “The dark mages have been stockpiling everything they can get their hands on, and once they figured it out, the Senate started doing the same to try to keep as much as possible out of the mages’ hands. Then they both began threatening anyone who supplied the other, and then started stomping on them. That’s when I decided to get out of town.”
“The Black Circle is planning something, then, something soon.”
He nodded, eager to be helpful now that he’d decided he had a decent chance of living through this interview. Why did people always assume I meant them violence? Even a dhampir can have a mellow day.
“Word is, they’ve got some powerful new ally, only nobody is naming names.” Considering that I’d just left Drac surrounded by dark mages, I didn’t really need one. “Most people think they’re going to hit MAGIC again, but I’m not so sure. The rumor is that someone let them in the first time—that they had a mole who gave them the keys to the wards, but of course they’ve all been changed since. Going after that place now would be nuts.”
“What’s your theory, then?”
“Me?” Jay suddenly seemed to recall that having opinions wasn’t usually healthy in our circle. “I don’t think anything. I only want to get out of here before—before it gets worse.”
When the demons start leaving, it’s not a good sign. I sighed. Vegas was going to have to fend for itself; I had other problems. “Okay, how about this? Where is this stockpile the dark mages are making?” He stared at me for a minute, and then his lips started to tremble. I thought he was about to start blubbering again, so was sort of relieved when I realized he was laughing. Even if it didn’t make sense. “What? Are you stoned?”
Jay just laughed harder. While I waited for him to get himself under control, I took the opportunity to rifle through his suitcase. He was right: other than a few human weapons I could steal from any sporting-goods store and a cloaking spell in a crusty old vial that looked like it might have gone off, he was clean.
“You… you’re really going to do it, aren’t you?” he finally gasped.
“Do what?”
”Hit the mages,” he said eagerly.
I shrugged. “Depends on how hard it’d be. But I’m going to need a lot of stuff, and they have it.”
Jay licked his lips and darted a nervous look around. “I’ve heard some things. Nothing definite, but I might have… an idea. The mages, they don’t… they worry about the Senate, you know? And the Silver Circle, of course. But the rest of us… they don’t think we matter.”
There was a tinge of anger to that last comment that interested me. “Like they robbed you at will,” I said slowly, watching his reaction, “and killed Benny without a second thought.”
“Benny?” Jay looked shocked, and I remembered that they had worked together off and on. Might should have left that out. “He’s… dead?”
“That’s why I look like this. I went to him first for supplies, but when we were making a deal last night, a group of dark mages torched his warehouse with us still inside. I got out, but Benny… sorry, I know you liked him.”
Jay didn’t cry again, but he stared at the stained carpet like he didn’t even see it. “I told him he should get out,” he said softly. “But he said it would be okay. That I should leave, because of the bounty, that it was getting too hot for me here. But he wouldn’t go himself.”
I put an arm around his bony, hunched shoulders. “I thought you’d have heard. The warehouse went up like a Roman candle.”
“No. I ran out of stock around midnight and dropped by a place, got some Chinese.” I hoped he meant takeout. He saw my expression before I could hide it. “Mu-shu pork!” he told me indignantly. “And then I came back here.”
“Well, I’m sorry I had to be the one to tell you.”
“I’m glad you did.” This was said with a note of unusual—for him—resolution. “I’m glad I didn’t leave sooner.” He hopped up from the bed and hefted the suitcase. “There’s something I need to do before I go. Something for Benny!”
I grabbed his arm. “That’s great and all, Jay, but you’re forgetting—I need some information.”
“Don’t worry,” he assured me, throwing his remaining possessions haphazardly in the already stuffed case. “I’m going to do more than tell you where you can find those bastards. I’m going to show you!”
That’s how I came, three hours later, to be leading a bunch of motley-looking trolls, demons and a few
humans—mostly friends and ex-employees of Benny’s—toward a boarded-up bowling alley in a bad part of town. I really hoped this plan wasn’t as psychotic as it sounded, but for once at least it wasn’t mine. Jay had dragged me to see Benny’s secretary, a large female Bergtroll, or mountain troll, named Olga. She had a broad nose shaped like a squashed mushroom and an impressive golden beard, and her tiny eyes were still red from crying. After hearing our proposition, she had grabbed her battle-ax and her Rolodex and started organizing some payback. I’d spent several hours feeling pretty useless, waiting for the troops to assemble and some semblance of a plan to be formed, although Olga did show me to her bathroom, where I managed to get most of the blood off.
Once everyone assembled, the pace started to pick up, and so much swearing, weapons waving and mage bashing had been going on that I hadn’t actually heard the plan. I just intended to grab whatever I could while the troops took the mages apart, assuming vice versa didn’t prove to be true. In my own defense, I did try to talk them out of it, but the lynch-mob mentality had taken over and there wasn’t much I could do. Olga had merely crushed me to her enormous bosom and promised to see that no one hurt me. I grabbed a couple of knives and a.44 automatic out of Benny’s office equipment and silently returned the sentiment.
It was almost funny, as our crew of forty or so pissed-off amateurs and a few gimlet-eyed professionals surrounded the small buff building. “Stay behind me, small one,” Olga said, then eschewed subtlety to bash in the door with her ax.
The rest of the crew took their lead from her and made doors for themselves through windows, service hatches and, in the case of one particularly large mountain troll, a brick wall. I followed Olga in as soon as her considerable girth managed to squeeze through the door. It was a bit of a letdown to realize that the building was empty. Even worse, it had the feel of a place that had been so for a while. No electricity lit the overhead lights, a fine layer of dust coated everything and the only discernible odor was a faint reek from the rows of red and blue shoes behind a low counter.
