“Janus?”
Janus shook his gigantic head. His entire face and head were encased within his mask. His armor screeched as his head moved.
Even a God wasn’t immune to the cold, to the ice in every molecule of moisture in the air.
“You won’t ever give up, will you?” said Janus, sad, but sounding a little impressed, too.
Holland shook his head. He could do that. His head didn’t screech, though it felt as though it should.
“I’m going to kill you, Janus,” he said through chattering teeth and his aching jaw. “Man to God. Right now. Give me a weapon.”
“Seriously? Holland, you’re a laugh…you always did make me laugh.”
Janus shook his head again, like Holland was a kid and Janus was a disappointed teacher.
“You,” he said to a foot soldier beside his tank-throne. “Shoot yourself in the head. Do it right, would you?”
The man took his sidearm, a long-barreled pistol, from his hip, and then placed the muzzle deep in his mouth, and pulled the trigger.
He fell to the ground with a swathe of blood beneath him.
“Close enough fit?”
Holland nodded.
He made no bones about it. He was freezing, and the soldier was dead anyway.
He forced himself to walk to the corpse. Made his fingers work at buttons to strip the man’s uniform away. It wasn’t easy. His hands wouldn’t work properly, and the dead man seemed reluctant to strip.
Holland couldn’t tell which country the soldier came from before Solomon killed him, but his clothes were good and thick. Boots and good socks, thick trousers. The boots and the jacket weren’t right, but in a frozen wasteland, suffering from hypothermia?
Heaven.
Holland put the gloves on, too. He wouldn’t need a trigger finger. That just wasn’t going to happen. Some problems couldn’t be solved with guns alone. Janus was a pretty good case in point.
But at least he wasn’t going to die cold.
Janus didn’t care either way. Holland was going to die. Didn’t matter that he’d promised he’d let the man live…Holland was like a rabid dog. Promise or not, he needed to be put down.
Janus didn’t object when Holland picked up the man’s ugly pistol and stuffed it in his jacket pocket, bloody muzzle and all.
“Gun won’t help. You know that, right?”
“I know,” said Holland. “But like your armor, don’t feel right, dying without a gun in my hand. You get that?”
Janus nodded his massive head.
“You can’t kill a God, Holland. But trying? That’s something to tell the grandkids, eh? Speaking of which…where is that delightful daughter of yours?”
“You can’t touch her, Janus.”
“Oh, I won’t. I won’t. Bit small for me, eh? Split her cunt right in half!”
“Janus…”
“Oh, I’m just fucking with you, Holland. Keep your shirt on…is that the right expression? Whatever…like I fucking care. Don’t need to dirty my hands at all, really. Got an attack dog…want to meet him? Woof, Solomon! Heel!”
Janus laughed, and Solomon walked forward though the ranks of heavy machinery. His face was flat and still. The wizard stood at Janus’ side.
Holland hated him on sight. He knew damn well he could beat Janus…
This bastard?
Holland looked into the wizard’s dark eyes, saw hatred, power, insanity. Reminded him of a storm he’d been in, once. Monsoon, in India. Crazy rain, lightning, flash floods…a killer storm. Nature gone mad.
He was fucked.
81
“Ank.”
David, the book who’d once been a child, spoke in her mind.
No response at all. He was sure she wasn’t dead, because he could feel her breathing and her heartbeat as keenly as if it had been his own…though he had no recollection within him as to how that felt.
Feels like this, thought the sorcerer. It feels like this. Life…is…
Terrifying.
He searched her body, carefully, checking her wounds.
In his panic, he’d gone too fast, hadn’t thought…she’d been running, and he’d shifted her…and he’d knocked her out better than he could have with a punch to the temple.
A gash in Ank’s ink-stained forehead bled hard, and her nose was broken.
“Ank, wake up now.”
She wasn’t moving, nor was she waking. And, David found, there was something about being within Ank’s body he didn’t like at all. With no input from Ank, he was powerless…nothing more than a prisoner.
Her body had shut down. Like she herself had become little more than a book that had been shut, ignored.
He couldn’t move her limbs, or use her voice. Even when he stepped all the way forward…even when he pushed.
Push harder?
He wondered, but he didn’t do it. He didn’t know if it would hurt her…or, if he pushed too hard, maybe even destroy her. He didn’t know how far he could take his power within Ank’s shell.
Her eyes were closed and he was blind. A supreme power, perhaps, upon the earth, and in Ank’s unconscious shell he was immobile. Helpless, in fact, without her.
The only things that worked were her nose and her ears. His/Ank’s sense of smell was off, because her nose was stuffed with blood. Her ears, though…
With Ank’s hearing, David heard some creature, snuffling in the woods, as it approached. At first, he couldn’t tell what it was, but then, something about the snuffling told him. Quick breaths, little sneezes from the snow in and on a wet nose.
A dog.
The dog barked. It carried right on barking. David couldn’t do anything about the dog, or the soldiers that followed and found them.
Still blind, he was forced to lie and wait on them. They didn’t speak, but stood over Ank’s body. Like they were waiting for instructions. But they were slaves…dead things. Even through Ank’s blood-stuffed nose, he could smell their stench.
His father’s puppets.
His anger rose, but he knew it was dangerous, now. Anger was ever dangerous, but here, within Ank, while he was blind and useless?
He pushed it down and waited on his father’s slaves, until, finally, he felt rough hands pulling clumsily at Ank’s coat and her arms within, dragging her upright. They hauled her through the snow, her feet trailing.
The dog barked at her heels while it ran around them in incessant, wide circles, like the dog, too, had been driven mad with blood.
82
Holland kept his face as still and calm as Death herself while Ank was dragged, unconscious, across the snow.
A little dog, a springer spaniel, barked at her heels.
The soldiers carrying his daughter dumped her before Janus and his pet wizard.
Holland hadn’t taken his eyes from the wizard Solomon, until he heard the soldiers approach. It took all his effort to turn his gaze from his unconscious daughter, back to the wizard.
When he did, he saw something that made him want to smile. He didn’t. He kept his face still, devoid of any sign he’d seen the wizard’s face change. A second, no more.
But for a second there, the mad wizard had looked scared.
“He’s here,” said Solomon. He walked forward, booted feet kicking up the light snow. Again, Holland thought he seemed hesitant…afraid, or at least wary, but the wizard controlled himself and reached down to grab Ank’s long white hair. He pulled Ank’s face from the snow and looked at her. The ink, across her face…every single inch of her skin.
“My son…Janus…he’s in her…”
He’ll kill her if I don’t step on him. And quick.
“You mean the son you skinned, Solomon?”
That gave Solomon pause, and that pause gave Holland a reprieve…a finger hold on hope, at best, but he wasn’t dead yet, and neither was Ank.
Or David…
“You judge me? You? A mortal?”
“Fuck you, Solomon,” said Holland as calmly as he c
ould. Raging against the lunatic wasn’t going to help…might get them all killed before Ank even woke. He figured if Ank, and David within her, woke…they might just…
Hope’s tricky, Holland. Concentrate.
“Fuck me?”
Solomon kicked Ank hard in the side. Her body jumped nearly a foot across the snow.
Holland smiled. “Mortal, immortal…you’re no better than that dog there,” said Holland, pointing to the spaniel.
Solomon stalked toward Holland, which was sort of what he’d hoped for. Sort of.
As he came closer, Solomon’s eyes burned with that same mad power Holland only knew from storms.
“What are you? Humanity. Tiny meat puppets. Marionettes of bone with pretty skin. I hold their lives in my hand. I say dance, and mortals dance.”
Holland watched Solomon, but Janus, too. Janus, sitting upon his throne, unable to grin because of his mask, but Holland knew the God was watching. He risked a split second to glance at Ank…and the dog. That damned dog, the spaniel, bounding through the deep snow.
Close, now, he thought. So close.
“You make the dead dance? All these soldiers…they’re shells, Solomon. Your army is all dead!”
“DANCE!”
The soldier who’d blown his brains out so that Holland could be a little warmer began to jitter in the red snow around him, then, pushed himself up onto unsteady feet. Grotesque, mangled and torn, he began to dance.
“He’s not much of a dancer,” said Holland, as though he was bored of the display already. But while he watched the dead man dance, so he watched Janus, and Solomon, and Ank…and…
Wake up, Ank. Wake up.
The dead man, dancing, slipped and fell in the snow, carried right on dancing, there on the floor. An obscene show for Holland’s benefit.
Solomon did not watch the dance, but Holland’s eyes.
Holland stared right back, then, smiled.
“You’re an idiot, Solomon. Supposed to be wise, but really, you’re an idiot.”
Solomon’s eyes told Holland he’d hit the right nerve. Which was good, because he wanted Solomon angry right now, just as he wanted Janus amused.
A couple of seconds was all he needed, just to give her time. Give her time to steady herself. She was quick, she always was. And her eyes were open, there, cold in the snow.
Holland watched her without ever taking his eyes from Solomon.
Janus watched the show, too, but he couldn’t see what Holland could see, because he was watching Solomon and Holland.
Not Ank.
“Peace,” she mouthed. The dancing body stilled.
“What…?” said Solomon, as the dancer began to steam on the crushed snow. “DANCE!”
The body didn’t dance. Couldn’t, not anymore. Because it was turning to rot, decomposing right there.
“Death is peace, Solomon,” said Ank, rising to her feet. “All your power? It isn’t yours. These dead things? You don’t own them.”
“PEACE,” she said, but with all her strength, all her power. Potential fulfilled.
Holland grinned so wide his face hurt.
She didn’t need to say it again. Solomon’s army of slaves, every single man and woman, turned to ash.
83
“You cunt!” roared Solomon. The wizard forgot himself, forgot all his power, and in a moment of pure fury he lashed out at Ank with his fist.
Ank turned her head into the blow and met his punch with her forehead, like a pro. Solomon’s fist connected with the hardest bone in Ank’s body, and broke.
Ank grinned while the wizard stepped back, cradling his useless hand.
But she wasn’t quite Ank anymore. Not now…maybe not ever again. She wasn’t a kid, full of doubt and insecurities.
She was power.
Solomon cried out in rage and shock and pain, unaccustomed to it. Pain he shouldn’t, couldn’t feel.
“Oh, shut up, Solomon,” said Janus.
For a wonder, Solomon did.
Ank stilled herself, and waited. Time did not matter to her anymore.
God, thought Holland with so much pride he could barely stand to watch her. She’s her mother…just…fucking…
Beautiful.
Death. She’s Death, and she’s wonderful.
Holland, facing Solomon’s rage, Janus’ towering insanity, his own death, smiled like an idiot.
“What are you?” asked Janus, pushing himself from his useless, ridiculous throne. “A psychopomp without the pomp…a dead little girl held together by a dead man’s words?”
“Death is not mine,” said Ank.
Holland nearly clapped his hands, but he stopped himself.
Janus was standing, slowly, and it was taking a long, long time. He was, now, more than a giant. Holland watched, a little impressed, despite himself, as Janus rose up, thirty feet of God encased in armor.
The only other living thing in the field barked and ran between Janus’ feet.
Janus didn’t even notice the dog. Instead, he stared from within his dark mask at Ank.
“Join me. You think I put you in my vault for nothing? You are a power…a force. Like the monsoon, like lightning and earthquakes. You are a little Death….Ankou. Join. Me. You can have his place.”
Holland glanced at Solomon.
Don’t forget him, he reminded himself. So busy being happy I’m liable to miss my shot.
“Don’t fucking call me that,” said Ank.
Janus shrugged. His shoulders were massive. It took a while.
“You think you can kill a God?” he asked, staring down at the small woman covered in ink and blood.
“Yes,” she said, simply. “But I won’t. My business is with him.”
She pointed to Solomon.
84
Solomon was still nursing his shattered hand, but he wasn’t a coward, and he wasn’t stupid. Blind, maybe. Evil, certainly.
But not without power.
Ank and David watched him, turning, raising their hand to ward against his might as he raised his good hand and unleashed it.
“You remember it?” David asked.
I remember, said Ank, within her mind. The sigil, etched upon the cane, now at the bottom of the river.
“Together. Now. Share yourself with me, Ank. Give us over to each other.”
Yes.
Ank held out one ink-covered hand as Solomon threw forth a wide gout of fire. The fire burst and sprayed across the field, melting snow, lighting empty uniforms, burning paint on expensive tanks.
The smoke cleared and Ank was still there, crouched in a circle of snow. One hand raised, a ward. The other…drawing in the snow around her.
“What are you doing?!” Solomon asked…frightened?
You should be, thought Ank, but when she spoke, it was not with her voice.
David spoke, not as a child, but as a man.
“You deal with demons, father…”
Ank stood, then, one hand raised, still covered and protected from harm by their power…Ank’s, or David’s, it didn’t matter which. At that moment, they were one.
“…and they deal with you.”
The circle they had drawn in the snow began to glow a color that had never been. A color from a different place, alien, incomprehensible.
“What have you done?!”
“Your seal, Father. The seal on your ring…and on your cane. The cane is lost. Down in the river. Forever, maybe. The ring, gone. The seal, though…it is within our mind.
“And here, in this place? Where the borders between worlds are nought but gossamer?”
Something was coming through the intricate design that Ank and David had drawn in the snow. Something large.
“Oh,” whispered Holland. “You beautiful lunatics.”
Asmodeus the demon rose from beneath the earth…from the pit of Hell itself.
85
Holland turned away from the opening to Hell without looking in. He didn’t need to see it, never wanted to. Figured
he’d be down there, maybe, or some other Hell, soon enough.
He looked away from Asmodeus, too. Not because he was uncomfortable to look at. He was, in his way, pure of purpose.
Holland didn’t need to watch Solomon’s death. He was noisy enough about it.
But, just for a moment, Holland turned away from the death behind him. He strode forward, through the field of empty, smoldering uniforms. The snow underfoot was melted, the ground muddy. His boots were good, and he didn’t have far to go.
He closed his ears to the screaming and wailing that came from behind as Solomon was…taken. Asmodeus and Solomon had their own thing. He didn’t want or need to see it. He just needed a little time.
Just a little. And while Janus grinned in his crazy mask, watching Solomon’s late death with an idiot’s glee, Holland drew his borrowed pistol. It felt uncomfortable and strange in his hand, so long used to his own gun. The bullets in the magazine were not silver. It wasn’t a great gun, but it was solid, and it had bullets in it.
Just the job…he hoped.
Janus was so large it hurt Holland’s neck to look up, but he did. He wanted the God’s attention on him.
“There’s always a bigger God, Janus,” shouted Holland. He had to shout because Solomon was making a bit of a meal about dying.
Janus looked down at Holland, before and below him. The movement was ponderous, inelegant, because he was so big, so unwieldy, bloated with war, that he could barely move anymore.
“Fuck our deal, Holland. Fuck your wife.”
“You and whose army, you big tin man?”
“I’m going to crush you, Holland. Finally. Been a while coming. I’m going to mount you on my throne.”
“You always were a bit thick, Janus,” said Holland, and as Janus raised his great armored fist to crush Holland, Holland shot the dog.
86
Janus stared at the dead dog for maybe two seconds. He couldn’t look confused in his war mask. He could just about manage terrifying.
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