Dead Beat

by Jim Butcher

Chapter 42

  Chapter Forty-two

  The campus of the college consisted of only a few buildings-a couple of dorms, a couple of buildings with classrooms, the Mitchell Museum, and an administrative office. The area between them was a nicely kept lawn, too small to look like a park, but larger than you'd want to mow every week. At the center of the area, directly in front of the museum, picnic tables had been overturned onto their sides around a large circle open to the skies above. I slowed Sue's steps for a moment, to try to get some kind of idea of what we had to contend with.

  Standing in silent ranks around that circle were Grevane's style of undead-very solid, very physical, though there were relatively few of them in the half-rotted or desiccated condition of the corpses that had attacked my place. These undead looked like they might still have been saved by a snappy EMT. They all looked like Native American tribesmen, just as Corpsetaker's specters had, though the styles of clothing and weaponry were slightly different.

  One other thing was different, too: These undead radiated a kind of hideous, ephemeral cold, and their skin almost seemed to glow with its own pale, horrible light. I could sense the raw power that lay within them, even from a hundred yards away. These undead were different from those that had attacked the Wardens, as different as an old pickup truck was from a modern battle tank. These zombies would not be so easily destroyed as those others, and were likely to be far stronger, far faster.

  They stood in ranks around the inner circle, facing outward, but they ranked thicker between the circle and the last location of the Wardens than on the side nearest us. I had managed to outflank the thinking of whoever had those undead in position, and the thought cheered me somewhat. Spirits and specters and formless masses of luminescent light darted and flowed around the circle like strands of kelp and bits of algae caught in a whirlpool. They were all the same unpleasant colors as the lightning in the storm, and even as I watched their numbers visibly grew. Sue paced a restless step forward, and I felt a horrible sensation of cold on the skin of my face and forehead, as if the hovering vortex above was casting out some kind of perverted inversion of sunlight. I crouched a little lower on Sue's back and the feeling faded.

  Lightning flashes from different directions cast a web of shadows over the whole place, trees and buildings collaborating with the storm to conceal much of the open circle continually clothed in shifting blocks and threads of darkness. I could see that there was someone within the circle of picnic tables, but not who, and I couldn't even be sure of how many.

  "That," I said in a low voice, "is a lot of badass zombies. "

  "And ghosts," Ramirez said.

  "And ghosts. "

  "Look at it this way," he said. "With that many of them, how can we miss?"

  "Yeah," I said. "Cool. "

  I didn't want to do it. I wanted to go find myself a hole and crawl into it. But instead I put my hand on Sue's neck, drew her attention to the zombies, and willed her forward into battle.

  Sue leapt forward and hit the nearest rank of zombies before any of them had the chance to notice her. She tore one apart with her vast jaws, smashed several others flat, crushed some with her flailing tail, and generally went to town. After her devastating initial charge, I heard a frantic man's voice shout from within the circle, and the zombies turned to attack.

  The zombies whipped out bows and spears and clubs, or else tore at Sue with their bare hands. It wasn't pretty. Arrows streaked through the air with unnatural speed, and when they struck the Tyrannosaur's hide they sounded almost like gunshots. One zombie rammed a spear cleanly through the massive muscle of Sue's right thigh. A swinging club shattered several of her teeth, and even as I watched, an unarmed zombie leapt up onto her flank, got a hold of the heavy extension cord that held the saddles in place, then drove his fist into her flesh up to the elbow, and started raking out gobbets of tissue by the handful.

  I brought up the sparkling blue cloud of my shield bracelet in time to intercept an arrow, and others smashed against it with the force of bullets even as I held it in place. Without being told, I felt Ramirez turn to our right, his own left hand extended, and a concave disk of green light expanded weblike from his outstretched fingertips, covering that flank from still more of them.

  But as vicious and as strong and as swift and deadly as the zombies were, they couldn't hold a candle to Sue.

  The injuries that might have terrified a living beast only infuriated her, and as that rage swelled, her own grey-and-black hide gained a silvery sheen of power. She roared so loudly that my chest and belly shook and my ears screamed with pain. She caught one zombie in her jaws and flung it away. It sailed up over the nearest five-story building and out of sight in the darkness and rain. When she stomped down with her foot, she shattered the concrete of a walkway and drove a footprint more than a foot deep into the earth around it. The zombie assault turned into one enormous exercise in suicidal tactics, for whenever one of the undead warriors managed to get through to harm Sue, the Tyrannosaur not only crushed the unlife out of them, but grew that much more angry and powerful and unstoppable.

  It was like riding a carnivorous earthquake.

  "Look!" Ramirez screamed. "Look there!"

  I followed his nod and spotted Grevane in the circle in his trench coat and fedora. The necromancer was keeping a steady beat on a drum hung from his belt, and he gripped a staff of gnarled, twisted black wood with the other. He stared at us, his face twisted in hatred, and his eyes glittered with insane malice.

  I willed Sue to head for the circle, but the Tyrannosaur's will was suddenly no longer pliable or easily led. The blood rage and fury of battle had overloaded what little mind she actually possessed, and now she was nothing but several rampaging tons of killing machine.

  "Hurry!" Ramirez shouted.

  "She's not listening!" I told him. I applied my will even more forcefully, but it was like one man struggling to hold back a bulldozer. I gritted my teeth, desperately trying to figure a way to get Sue where I wanted her, and hit on one idea. Instead of trying to stop her battle rage, I encouraged it, and then I pointed her at the zombies nearer to the circle.

  Sue responded with bloodlust and glee, swerving to charge toward the zombies nearest the circle, crushing and rekilling them as she went.

  "We have to jump!" I shouted.

  "Wahoo!" Ramirez cried, his smile blazing white.

  Sue pursued a dodging zombie to within ten feet of one of the fallen picnic tables, and I let out a scream of fear and excitement as I jumped. It was like falling from a little bit higher than a second-story window, but I managed to land feet-first and well enough to absorb most of the shock of impact, though the flash of pain told me that my knees and ankles were going to be sore for days.

  I rose and lifted my shield at once, in time to intercept the deadly flash of Grevane's whirling chain.

  "Fool," he snarled. "You should have joined me when you had the chance. " His eyes flicked up and glittered. I followed the line of his gaze. The vortex wasn't more than ten feet from the ground.

  "You can't draw it in if I'm standing right here," I shouted back, retreating and circling to get into the circle of picnic tables. When I did, that horrible, sickly sense of cold faded. This near, the vortex wasn't drawing the life off of me. It was the eye of the metaphysical hurricane. "One distraction and the backlash will kill you. It's over. "

  "It is not over!" he howled, and the chain whipped out again, striking my shield. "It is mine! My birthright! I was his favored child!"

  I barely heard a footstep behind me, and whirled in time to lift my shield against another zombie with a spear. The weapon shattered against my upraised shield, but even as it did, I felt a burning impact as Grevane's chain wrapped around my wounded leg and jerked hard. My balance went out from under me, and I fell to the ground.

  Grevane's zombie piled onto my back and started biting me. I felt hot, horrible pain on my trapezius muscles l
eft of my neck, even through my cloak and spellworked duster. The zombie let out a vicious cry and let go, then went for the unprotected nape of my neck. I struggled to throw it off of me, to get away, but my battered body was weakened and it was incredibly strong.

  "Die!" Grevane screamed, wild laughter in his unsteady voice. "Die, die, die-"

  His howls broke off into a single quiet, choking noise, and the zombie on my back abruptly froze.

  I struggled out from under it in time to see Grevane standing a few feet away, the chain discarded upon the ground, his hand held to his neck. Blood, black in the night, sprayed from between his fingers. His expression became enraged and he turned toward me, extending a hand to the zombie near me. The zombie turned, once more with purpose.

  But then Grevane's expression became puzzled. His eyes rolled back in his head, and I saw the long, straight, smooth cut that had opened his neck from one side to the other, cutting all the way to his spine.

  Ramirez stepped into my line of vision, his silver sword in hand and coated with blood. In his other hand he held his pistol. Without hesitation or hurry, he raised the gun and aimed at Grevane's head from five feet away.

  Then he executed the stunned necromancer.

  The body went loose, fell, and lay there in the grass and rain, one leg twitching.

  Around us, the zombies had suddenly lost their vibrant animation, and most of them simply stood passively still, staring at nothing. Tyrannosaur Sue couldn't have cared less, and carried on with her killing spree.

  Ramirez came to me and helped me to my feet. "Sorry it took me so long. I had to dodge some bad guys. "

  "You got here," I said, panting.

  He nodded once, grimacing. "Couldn't shoot with you that close, in this light. Had to do it the old-fashioned way. You were one hell of a good distraction, though. "

  "You did fine," I said. I could feel hot wetness trickling down my back. "Thank God he was insane. "

  "How's that?" Ramirez asked.

  "At the end there. You'd opened his throat but he still thought he could keep going. He tried to hang on to his control of the zombies. It was like he didn't think death counted when it came to him. "

  "And that's lucky why?"

  "He refused to believe he was dying," I said. "No death curse. "

  Ramirez nodded. "Yeah, you're right. Lucky us. "

  Then a man's voice said, "I don't know if I'd say that, gentlemen. "

  I whirled as one of the passive zombies still standing nearby turned, lifting its spear-and then shimmered into the form of Cowl. He lifted one hand from the folds of his dark cloak, and there was no warning surge of gathering power when a wave of vicious force flickered out from his palm and took Ramirez full in the chest.

  The young Warden hadn't been ready for it. The magical blow lifted him from his feet and threw him backward like a rag doll. He hit the ground twenty feet later, limbs already flopping limply, and lay there without moving.

  "No!" I shouted, and I whirled on Cowl, Hellfire erupting from the runes of my staff. I lifted the staff, snarled, "Forzare!" and sent a lance of vicious energy at the dark figure.

  Cowl swiftly crossed his hands at the wrists, forming an X shape with his arms, aligning defensive energy before him-but he hadn't been quite swift enough, or else he hadn't reckoned on how much energy he had to deal with. The lash of raw, scarlet force hammered him hard on the right side of his body, spinning him around and stealing his balance. He stumbled in a corkscrewing motion, and went to the ground.

  I drew back the staff for another blow-but then someone pressed against my back, fingers tightened in my hair, and I felt the cold, deadly edge of a knife at my throat.

  "Don't move," Kumori's quiet voice said. She was stretched out quite a bit to be pulling my hair and holding the knife, but she'd done it right. There was no way I could try to escape her without her opening an artery. I ground my teeth, my power still ready to lash out again, and debated doing exactly that. Kumori would probably kill me, but it might be worth it to finish Cowl.

  I looked up at the writhing vortex. Its tip was now barely above the height of my own head.

  Cowl recovered his feet by slow degrees, shaken more than hurt, and anger radiated from him in nearly palpable waves. "Idiot," he said, voice harsh. "You have lost. Can you not see? This game is over. "

  "Don't do this," I growled. "It isn't worth it. You're going to kill thousands of innocent people. "

  Cowl's hood tilted up toward the descending vortex, and he marched over the grass until he stood directly beneath it. "Keep him still," he snapped to Kumori.

  "Yes, lord," Kumori replied. The steel at my throat never wavered.

  Cowl's hand dipped into a pouch at his side, and came out holding Bob the skull. The lights in the skull's eye sockets burned a cold shade of blue and violet.

  "There, spirit," Cowl said, holding the skull up to see the vortex. "Do you see it?"

  "Of course," said the skull, his voice just as cold and empty. "It is precisely as the master described. Proceed. " The eye lights swiveled and came to rest on me. "Ah. The White Council's black sheep. I recommend that you kill him immediately. "

  "No," Kumori said firmly. "His death curse could destroy the working. "

  "I know that," the skull replied, his voice contemptuous. "But if he lives when Cowl draws down the power he might disrupt it. Kill him now. "

  "Silence, spirit," Cowl said in a harsh voice. "You are not the master here. Challenge me again at your own peril. "

  The skull's eye sockets burned colder yet, but he said nothing.

  I swallowed. Bob. . . wasn't Bob anymore. I'd known that he was bound and beholden to whoever possessed the skull he resided within, and that their personality would strongly influence his own-but I'd never really imagined what that might be like. Bob wasn't precisely a friend to me but. . . I was used to him. In a way he was family, the mouthy, annoying, irritable cousin who was always insulting you but who was definitely at Thanksgiving dinner. I had never considered the possibility that one day he might be something else.

  Something murderous.

  The worst part was that Bob had given Cowl good advice. My death curse might well mess up this spell, but on the other hand, Cowl did not seem one to be afraid of death curses. If he gave me the chance to wait until he was actually at the delicate moment of drawing down the power, I wouldn't need anything as strong as a death curse to upset his balance.

  Of course, it would kill me. Kumori's blade would see to that. But I could stop him if I was alive when it went down.

  Cowl set the skull aside on the grass, then raised his hands above his head and let the sleeves fall back from his long, weathered arms covered in old scars. He began a chant in a low voice, steady and strong.

  The vortex quivered. And then, almost delicately, it began to descend to Cowl, drifting toward him as lightly and slowly as a drifting feather of down.

  Power rolled through the heavens, the clouds, the whirling vortex. Spirits and swirling apparitions screamed and wailed their tormented replies. Kumori's hands never weakened or wavered, but I could sense that almost every fiber of her attention was directed toward Cowl.

  I might have one chance.

  "Bob," I said. "Bob. "

  The blue eye lights turned toward me.

  "Think," I said quietly. "Think, Bob. You know me. You've worked with me for years. "

  The blue eye lights narrowed.

  "Bob," I said quietly. "You've got to remember me. I gave you a name. "

  The skull quivered a little, as if a shudder had run through it, but the eyes continued to burn cold and blue.

  And then one of them flickered into a shade of its usual orange, then immediately back to cold blue.

  My heart thudded in sudden excitement. Bob the skull, my Bob, had just winked at me.

  Cowl continued his chant, and the clouds spun more and more rapidly. The rain ab
ruptly stopped, as swiftly as if someone had turned off a faucet, and the air filled with spirits, ghosts, apparitions and specters, caught in some vast and unseen whirlpool that dragged them in accelerating circles. The power in the air made it hard to breathe, and the roar of wailing spirits, vast wind, and an earth-deep rumble grew steadily louder.

  "Bob," I shouted into the cacophony, "you have my permission!"

  Orange light streaked from the eye sockets of the skull and blazed away from the circle of overturned picnic tables-but even so, I saw Bob's glowing body of energy pulled by the whirling currents of magic. He fought against that horrible vortex, and I suddenly realized that without the shelter of the skull or some other kind of physical body, Bob was no different from any of the other spirit beings trapped in that vast maelstrom. If the Darkhallow was completed, he too would be trapped and devoured.

  I thought I saw Bob's form sucked up into the clouds of trapped spirits, but there was too much light and noise for me to be sure of anything.

  Cowl kept on chanting, and I saw his body arch with tension. Over the next minute or so, he actually, physically rose above the ground, until his boots were three or four inches in the air. His voice had become part of the wild storm, part of the dark energy, and it rolled and boomed and echoed all around us. I began to understand the kind of power we were dealing with. It was power as deep as an ocean, and as broad as the sky. It was dark and lethal and horrible and beautiful, and Cowl was about to take it all in. The strength it would give him would not make him a match for the entire White Council. It would put him in a league so far beyond them that their strength would mean virtually nothing.

  It was power enough to change the world. To reshape it after one's own liking.

  The tip of the vortex spun down, danced lightly upon Cowl's lips, and then slipped gently between them. Cowl howled out the last repetition of his chant, his mouth opening wide.

  I ground my teeth. Bob hadn't been able to help me, and I couldn't let Cowl complete the spell. Even if it killed me.

  I drew in my magic for the last spell I would ever throw, a blast to slam into Cowl, disrupt the spell, let that vast energy tear him to bits.

  Kumori sensed it and I heard her let out a short cry. The knife burned hot on my throat.

  And then the dinosaur I'd summoned plunged through the clouds of wild spirits and headed directly for Kumori, her eyes blazing with brilliant orange flames. Tyrannosaur Bob let out a bellow and swiped one enormous talon at Kumori.

  Cowl's apprentice was tough and competent, but no amount of training or forethought can prepare you for the sight of an angry dinosaur coming to eat your ass. She froze for the briefest second, and I turned, shoving away from her. The knife whipped against my throat, and I felt a hot sting. I wondered if that was what Grevane had felt.

  There was no more time. I flung myself across the grass, gripped my staff in both hands, and swung it like a baseball bat at Cowl's head.

  The blow connected, right on what felt like the tip of his upturned jaw, snapping his mouth shut and knocking him to the ground. The vortex abruptly screamed and filled with a furious red light. I choked out a cry and fell down on my right side to the ground, bringing up my shield bracelet and holding it over me in an effort to protect myself from the vast forces now flying free from the botched spell.

  There was more sound, so loud that no word could accurately describe it, incandescent lightning, screaming faces, and forms of spirits and ghosts, and trembling earth beneath me.

  And blackness fell.