Death Dealers

by M. G. Gallows

  Fury compelled me to hate Donnie. He’d nagged, pleaded, and blackmailed until I’d given in. But deep under my anger, I hated myself. I let Donnie and his friends run free. Four wights who had been sneaking out for months, letting the hunger build, until one of them had gone over the edge.

  But I’d let them go, because I had a thousand things on my shoulders, and I decided it was easier to give in than force the issue. I’d let them out, gotten them jobs, let them worm their way into a position where they could abuse my friendship and sympathy.

  I let the monsters out, I thought. A moan came from the bedroom. The bloody, dirty grave stirred. And now I’ve made another.

  I regarded my revolver. It wasn’t some fancy automatic, or a monster of a hand cannon that could floor a moose. Just an old army pistol from a century ago. Time and use had worn its ornamental markings to almost nothing, and there were notches carved in the ivory handle. A dealer had laughed when I’d tried to have it appraised. You could buy a better looking piece at a pawnshop for the cost of a burger and fries.

  But it was a family heirloom. It had protected three generations of my mother’s family. When I’d moved out, she had given it to me. I know she had meant well, but given its grim history, especially between her and I, there was an underlying symbolism to it.

  Giving someone the gun that should have prevented them from being born is… it says something. I don’t know what.

  I put the revolver back on top of the fridge, took a deep breath and went into the bedroom. The body under the sheet pushed with unwieldy limbs, tossing aside earth and cloth. I helped her free herself. The girl groaned, bleary-eyed. Black tears stained her face.

  “Wh-where?” She croaked. Her hands went to her neck. It was undamaged, albeit discolored, in the vague shape of a bite. She tried to stand, so I put a hand on her shoulder.

  “Easy. Take a minute to collect yourself.”

  She stared at me like I had two heads, then shoved me aside and stumbled into the bathroom to throw up in my toilet. A hacking session followed as she cleared her lungs.

  “Oh, God.” She stared at the dirt and blood in the bowl. “What is this?”

  I sat on the corner of the bed. “You died.”

  Piercings—loops, studs and little spikes—decorated her face. She kept her hair shaved on the left side of her head, and the rest fashioned into shiny black locks. A little tattoo of a raven in flight sat behind her left ear. Cute, in a naive ‘anarchy-as-fashion’ kind of way.

  But it didn’t hide how young she was, maybe younger than Donnie and his friends. She was gaunt and pale to the point of being unhealthy, and her green eyes had a haunted distance in them. Trembling hands clung to her neck.

  “What did you do to me?” She asked.

  “What do you remember?”

  “I was at the concert. I saw Max he- we-” Her eyes widened. “What did you do to me?”

  “I brought you back. Do you remember coming here?”

  She stumbled, but caught herself. “You- you brought me back?”

  I nodded. “You were dying. I couldn’t save you. So I did what I could.”

  “What you could-?” She echoed. She scratched at her neck. “Why don’t I feel it?”

  “Because it’s gone. I filled it in with a little of you, a little of your grave, and a little of me.”

  “A little of my- a little of y-you? Who are you? What are you?”

  “My name is Alex. Alex Fossor,” I said. “I’m a necromancer.”

  She sank to her knees, her eyes going flat.

  I pulled her to her feet. “Don’t go into shock. A catatonic undead can’t learn what she has to learn, you hear me?” She let me herd her into the living room and I sat her on the couch. “Look at me, kid.”

  “Am I… dead?”

  I grunted. “Technically, yes.”

  “How?” She drew the word out in a sob.

  I sat beside her. “You’ve got a million questions, I know. I’ll try to answer them all. But first, what’s your name?”

  “Maddie. M-Madelyn MacLaith.”

  “Madelyn,” I said. “Take your time, Madelyn.”

  She let her hands fall limp at her sides. “Where am I?”

  “My place. On Sutcliffe Street. Do you know it?”

  “That shitty college neighborhood?”

  “Yes,” I said with a smirk.

  “The men who brought me-”

  “Gone. I sent them away.”

  She closed her eyes. “What happened to Max?”

  I stared at my front door. “He’s gone.”

  “Good.” She wiped her eyes, and her expression hardened. “Why did they bring me here?”

  I ground my teeth. “Because they’re idiots. They thought a hospital couldn’t help, or the cops would get involved, or because they thought I could make you what you are now.”

  “You did this?” She rubbed her throat. “You did this to me?”

  “Yes, I- my magic let me do it. I wish I had the power to have preserved your life. This was all I had.”

  “What am I?”

  “The most accurate term I know is haugbui, from old Norse. It means ‘barrow-wight’ or ‘grave man’.”

  She frowned. “From Tolkien?”

  I smiled. “Yeah.”

  “What does that mean?”

  I shrugged. “You don’t have a pulse, you don’t need to breathe, but your brain will keep trying. Autonomic systems, and all that. You won’t get sick, but you can still poison yourself if you eat something you can’t digest. And you have to stay in or near your grave-soil-” I pointed at the bed. “Or you’ll get hungry and eventually decay.”

  “Hungry? You mean, like-?” Her hand went to her throat again.

  I nodded. “Max and his friends are wights, too. Max had been straying from his grave. The longer you’re away, the hungrier you get. And there’s only one thing that will satisfy it.”

  Fresh tears formed in Madelyn’s eyes. “You mean I have to, to eat-”

  I held her shoulders. “It’s management, kid. Like any disease. Some wights, if they’re smart, can go months or years before they feel hunger pangs. Wights guarded tombs, the graves of kings. The magic that binds them to their grave sustains them indefinitely. When you leave your grave, the magic fades, and your body tries to keep itself going using the life force of others. You’ll get hungrier and hungrier until you get what you need. And if you can’t get that, your body will decay into nothing. Then it’s dead for good.”

  She wiped her face, then grimaced at the sight of her tears. “What the fuck? What the fuck?”

  “All undead have them, if they can cry at all. I don’t know why. But it doesn’t stain.”

  She snorted. “Are you like them? Like, like me?”

  I shook my head. “No. I’m worse. Like I said, I’m a necromancer.”

  “That’s a little geeky, isn’t it?” She snorted.

  “It’s old Greek. For oracles who spoke to the dead. It’s the most apt title for what I do.”

  “Like a wizard?” She couldn’t keep the incredulity out of her voice.

  “I prefer ‘mage’, but whatever the term, they almost always come from a word for ‘wise man’. Pretentious bullshit.” I tried to chuckle. “Magic is real, kid. Surprise.”

  She shuddered. “Fuck, this is too heavy. If you’d told me an hour ago? Fuck. I was- I was alive an hour ago...”

  “You’d have laughed in my face. We don’t go sharing the news. Most people don’t believe in us, it would scare others shitless. And we have our own rules about keeping things secret. Most mages consider it pointless to mess with ordinary people. Normal people.”

  “Normal,” she croaked. “God. I’m… some zombie thing!”

  “Zombies are worse. Speaking of, where did you get those punctures on your wrist?”

  She frowned. “I’m not suicidal.”

  “They’re familiar to me. Stig, right?”

  “I didn’t, I’m not…” Madelyn h
eld her wrists close to her. There were more than a few marks on both.

  “An addict?” I asked. “I’m not here to accuse you of anything, Madelyn. But Stig? That stuff is necromancy too. I’ve seen what it does to people. It’s bad stuff.”

  She blinked. “How?”

  “It’s meant to weaken your mind and leave it vulnerable to a necromancer’s influence. Like the Haitian zombies of old.”

  She rubbed her wrist. “You mean you-?”

  “No. I thought I was the only necromancer in the city. But there’s a new group in town. They call themselves the Brothers Midnight. Heard of them?”

  “Uh, Tyler, my um, dealer. He mentioned a ‘Brotherhood’.”

  “They’re trying to spread the drug as far as they can. I need to know where you got it. I’m running short on leads.”

  “Leads?” She asked. “What are you, a cop?”

  I smirked. “No. I’m a man with a bomb in his chest. If I don’t clear my name and prove I’m not the necromancer behind all of it, I’ll be dead. I try to take care of the wights in this city, undead like yourself. If I go, they won’t have…”

  What are you about to confess to her? My brain asked.

  Everything. I told myself. She’s already in it now.

  “One thing I do as a necromancer is provide them with food. I don’t kill people, but I do work for criminals. I make bodies disappear. And those bodies go to feed the wights. When they need it. Otherwise they could go out and-”

  “Do what they did to me?” She asked, disgusted.

  I nodded.

  She stood. “You fucking suck at your job!”

  “Yeah,” I admitted.

  “So now what? You bury me? Or do I have to spend the rest of my life hanging around near your fucking bed? Like that’s some fucking coincidence!”

  I tried to keep myself calm. “The gravesoil is what matters. We’ll collect it and take you to the Gallows. It’s where the other wights live. Under the city. We can get you a room, we can get you the things you need. TV, clothes, they even have Wi-Fi.”

  “Oh, great!” She said. “It sounds like a fucking party! I can’t wait to hang out with the dead people that killed me, sitting on a pile of fucking dirt and waiting for some asshole to feed me a corpse like hamburger! No. I won’t let you lock me away! I won’t be your fucking pet zombie! I want out! I want to go home!”

  She went for the door. I shot to my feet and pulled her away.

  “Hey! Hey!”

  “Get the fuck off me!” She shoved me. “Don’t touch me!”

  “You can’t go running off! You’re my responsibility now, like it or not.”

  “Fuck you!”

  I slammed my palm on the door, and she jumped. “You don’t get to decide! I told you you wouldn’t like it, but it was this or death! If you go running around, away from your grave, you’ll get hungry.”

  Fear flickered in her eyes, but her lips curled into a snarl. “You fucking bastard! You did this to me! I wish you’d fucking killed me!”

  She slammed her elbow into my jaw. The blow was clumsy, but she had a wight’s strength now, and while it wasn’t superhuman, it was enough to knock me on my ass.

  When the room stopped spinning, my door was open, and Madelyn was gone. I pushed to my feet with a curse and grabbed my revolver from the fridge, but stopped myself at the door.

  I’d done it again. Let a monster out into the streets. Whatever happened, whatever havoc she caused, it would be on my shoulders. And I’d know when the Society found out, when I suddenly dropped dead. I sat on my porch, heedless of the cold, where Max had been when I’d blown his brains out. There was no trace of him. The ashes had scattered.

  I hadn’t even shot him face to face. I’d put him down like a rabid dog.

  Walter was right. Necromancers couldn’t make it to their first century without breaking the Edicts. Destruction came so easily. How many had faltered under the weight of their grotesqueries, and the macabre choices they made?

  I dismembered corpses to feed to the undead, I wiped away crime scenes for the benefit of murderers, and I had the balls to consider myself one of the decent ones.

  “Come on, you old bastard,” I whispered. “Put me down.”

  Nothing.

  Sutcliffe Street stirred. I saw lights in windows, silhouettes peeking out to see what had caused all the racket. I forced myself to go inside and dumped the soil from my bed into the planter pot.

  Maybe a new Madelyn will sprout, I thought in my daze.

  I left the planter near the front door. I didn’t know what else to do with it. I didn’t care. The blood had soaked into the mattress. I conjured my decay magic—weakened from all the juice I’d poured out that night—and scoured the blood without fraying the fabric. I dumped the pillows and blankets into my washing machine, and took a cold shower to torture myself some more.

  Then I laid down on my couch and closed my eyes.

  When I awoke, the sun shone through my kitchen window. The clock on the microwave said it was a little past ten. How much sleep is that? I wondered. Four hours? Three?

  I let the minutes tick by with agonizing slowness, each one punctuated by every mistake I’d made. It always came back to Max and Madelyn.

  I grabbed the landline and dialed.

  “Keller Funeral Home,” said a crisp, morning-ready voice.

  “Dietrich.” I didn’t bother to keep the weariness out of my tone.

  “Alex,” he said. He tapped on a keyboard. “Finally.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Had a bit of trouble last night.”

  “Police trouble?” He asked, a little too fast.

  “No. Max got into a fight at a bar last night. I stopped him, but someone got hurt. I fired him.”

  “Fired him?” He asked. “Just like that?”

  I sighed. “Yeah. Just like that.”

  He paused. “Very well. I’d suggest you take a day or two off as well, Alex. This business with the police has me concerned as your employer. I think you should take some time to consider where you stand in all of this and-”

  “I’ll do that,” I interrupted, and hung up. I didn’t need a lecture from someone who couldn’t fathom the shit I was dealing with.

  So what’s left? A trip to the art gallery, like Agni said? An insightful yet dead-end bit of research? How would that help?

  There was a knock at the door. Detective Runner was on the other side, and Lorensdottr lurked behind him.

  “What?” I asked. “Oh, you. Now what?”

  Lorensdottr’s scowled but said nothing. Runner flashed his million-dollar smile. “Good morning, Mr. Fossor. Can we come in?”

  “You got a warrant?”

  “No.”

  “Then right here is fine.”

  The smile vanished. “We had a few questions about your location last night.”

  “Here,” I said. “Took a long walk for a few hours. Why?”

  “Anyone who can corroborate your whereabouts?” Lorensdottr asked.

  “No. I don’t have friends.”

  Runner shook his head. “We had a complaint last night of a gunshot in the neighborhood, and a vehicle leaving the area at speed shortly after. Know anything about it?”

  I looked at the street. “Punk kids with an engine backfire?”

  “The report was adamant that it was a gunshot. Are you sure you heard nothing?”

  “If something happened I either wasn’t here or I was asleep,” I said.

  “On your walk that no one else saw,” Lorensdottr said.

  I scowled. “Homicide detectives don’t answer domestic disturbance calls, so how about you tell me what you want, or get the fuck off my property? It’s too early in the morning for this bait-and-hook bullshit.”

  “Careful,” she warned.

  “Or what?” I asked. “You’ll arrest me for being grumpy?”

  Runner sighed. “Sorry to disturb you.” They returned to their car, speaking in hushed tones.

  They d
idn’t deserve the guff, but I was sick of people pissing in my face and daring me to do something about it. I shut the door, put on some clothes, and headed for the Westbank Art Gallery.

  Fuck it, I thought. If I was going to be angry, I’d at least be productive.

  FIFTEEN

  Downtown was a mess of traffic on the best of days, but the Arlington fire had turned it into a slog. I cranked the music, and nursed a lukewarm coffee as we inched forward for most of the morning. Every few meters I glanced back at the unmarked gray cruiser in my rearview, about ten cars back. Lorensdottr was in the driver’s seat, wearing a pair of shielded sunglasses and a baseball cap that made her look like the world’s coldest, sexiest soccer mom. I couldn’t see him, but I suspected Runner was in the passenger’s seat, his ostentatious duster replaced with something less obvious, like a tricorne hat and foam football jersey.

  The Westbank Art Gallery sat on the edge of Riverside Park, the beachhead of the city’s efforts to gentrify the area with outdoor cafes, gazebos and pavilions along the water. The Gallery itself was like a castle, surrounded by high walls and stringent security. I parked at the far end of the lot, and when I tossed my coffee in a waste bin, I saw the detectives drift by.

  A pair of enormous stone wolves flanked the front doors to the Gallery, and the interior was spacious, with padded carpets and arching ceilings. People kept their voices muted as they drifted from one gallery to the next. The artwork and historical items sat in glass cases, or cordoned off by velvet rope.

  A doorman with a tweed jacket and an upturned nose greeted me at the door. He reminded me of a capybara, those big South American rodents, calm and unimpressed with everything around them.

  “May I help you find something?” He asked, in a low, nasal voice.

  “Yeah, a friend recommended a gallery here on Vodou.”

  He looked me over. “Membership, please?”

  “I don’t have a gallery membership, I was-”

  He glanced around him, then drew a dull gray eye that hovered in the air. “Versed membership?”

  “Oh.” I gave my finger a shake and drew my anchor magemark, but the magic fizzled half-way through. “Uh, sorry. I had a long night.”