Limbo's Child (Book One of The Dead Things Series)

by Jonah Hewitt

  “It isn’t over,” Miles spoke softly to himself. Then looking at the others, “We can stop him.”

  “Miles…” Sky began in a whining voice as if exasperated by Miles’ stubbornness.

  “We can stop him, Sky!” Miles said enthusiastically and then looked to Tim and Nephys for support. They looked like they were uncertain and still taking stock of the situation. Miles figured he had to take the first step or no one else would, so Miles took a literal first step towards the door.

  Sky moved to block him. “Sit down Miles, you’re embarrassing yourself,” Sky said emphatically.

  Miles looked up defiantly at Sky and then looked at the locked door. Key or no key he wasn’t going to let this happen. He could break that lock no problem. He tried to side-step past Sky and reach for the doorknob but before he got even half of a step, Sky grabbed him and spun him around so hard he flew across the room and landed on the floor a few yards away.

  “Sweet Jude!” Tim cried out.

  Sky stood in front of the doors. Any trace of his carefree personality gone. He looked deadly serious. “Don’t get any cute ideas, Miles. No one is leaving this room.” Sky snapped his fingers at Tim. “Car keys, bro.”

  “What?” Tim asked annoyed.

  “I don’t want you getting any ideas about trying to sneak out of here the next time Miles tries to pull something. Trust me, dude, you’re safer in here.”

  Tim looked dejected, but he snaked his hand into his skinny jeans pocket, pulled out the keys and reluctantly tossed them to Sky. Sky grabbed them and stuffed them in his front pocket.

  “But what about my family? My six brothers and my kid sister?” Tim looked utterly defeated.

  “Them’s the breaks, bro,” Sky said dispassionately. Then he strode across the room where Miles was sprawled on the floor and crouched low over him like a vulture. “And as for you, hero, I can’t help it if you are too stupid to know what’s good for you, but if you get any more ideas about leaving this room, do not think for a moment that I would hesitate to kill you.”

  Tim looked horrified. “But Hokharty said you were to keep us safe! He said we were not to be harmed, remember?!”

  Sky spoke to Tim over his shoulder, but he never took his eyes off Miles, “Actually Hokharty told me to keep you two safe, and don’t think I haven’t already thought up six different ways to keep you from bolting either,” he added hastily, “But Miles here…” And here Sky looked back at Miles with a hungry look. “He didn’t say anything about Miles. Him…” Sky narrowed his eyes at Miles and smiled a wicked grin. “Him…I can kill.”

  Miles looked up at Sky, and he didn’t doubt that Sky meant it. Miles lay there on the floor. He really was stupid. He thought about all the pain and suffering he had endured and thought maybe Sky was right. But beneath all the embarrassment and frustration, there was something else. There was rage. Deep. Boiling. Rage.

  Miles shot out with both fists to hit Sky, but Schuyler was already jumping backward so fast that by the time the blow hit, it never really connected. Still, the force of it surprised Sky.

  “Oh crap!” Tim jumped up and yelled.

  Sky shot towards the ceiling, thrown off balance by Miles’ sudden assault, but he managed to recover well. He did a cartwheel off the ceiling before landing in front of the locked doors gracefully.

  Miles got up off the floor and spoke, “Don’t do this, Sky.” His voice sounded strange, dark and animal-like. Already, smoke was pouring from his body and he was transforming into the dog monster – the same one that Wallach had become.

  “Oh, we’re doing it,” Sky said in a petulant voice.

  They each regarded the other for a half second, when Miles decided he didn’t have time to wait for Sky to make the first move.

  Miles barreled towards him and by the time he was halfway across the room he was on all fours, having transformed into the dog-monster. Sky had already dodged, but Miles was quicker than he expected and nearly had Sky in his teeth before he jumped. Sky flipped over the top of him and struck him hard on his flank, but he just bounced harmlessly away and the blow had little effect. Miles turned around and quickly made another lunge. Sky changed tactics. He faked high but went low, sweeping the legs out from under Miles. Miles flipped onto his back and slid into the wall with a thud. Miles stood up and shook it off like a dog shakes off water.

  “Is that the best you’ve got, little puppy?!” Sky taunted him from the other side of the room. Miles leaped, but Sky spun out of the way, hitting Miles on the side of the head mid-air. It wasn’t much of a blow, but it wasn’t designed to hurt. It was calibrated just enough to throw the large dog-monster off balance and send it crashing into the far wall. Miles emerged from the rubble, stumbling. He had to think! What was Sky doing? Sky had figured out Miles was too tough to hurt in his dog form, at least directly, so he was going to try to make Miles hurt himself by crashing into things. He needed to slow down. No more blind lunges. He had to stalk Sky, corner him. If he could get his jaws on him, he knew Sky would be done for, but then obviously, so did Sky.

  “Over here, puppy,” Sky was in a corner, trying to lure him into another collision.

  Miles resisted the urge to rush in. He paced in a circle. Sky matched his every move. When he got close, he shot forward and snapped but the monstrous jaws which were more like a crocodile’s than a dog’s clenched on thin air. Sky had somehow skidded to the side. Miles tried to turn, but with his snout in the corner, he couldn’t turn and didn’t know where Sky was.

  “Miles, look out!!” Tim yelled.

  Miles twisted just in time to see Sky dropping a huge dresser on top of him from above. Miles caught the dresser in his jaws just in time, but the weight still forced him to the floor. Still, even flat on the ground, he managed to fling the dresser back at Sky and knocked him backward, hard. Sky smacked into the far wall, the dresser landing on him. He groaned, threw off the heavy piece of furniture and grabbed his ribs. He looked across the room.

  Tim and Nephys were cowering on the bed. Sky leaped over and pulled the canopy down on them, gathered them up in it and then tossed them to the side where they tried to disentangle themselves.

  “No more comments from the peanut gallery, thank you.”

  Miles lunged at him, but this time Sky jumped and put his foot between Miles’ eyes. Miles saw stars and went down, hitting the floor hard, but he shook it off, sprung up, turned around and tried to get a bead on Sky, but he was nowhere. WHERE WAS HE?!

  Then he remembered something Sky had said, “You never look up.” Miles turned to look up, but it was too late. Sky dropped from the ceiling, landed on his back and flattened him to the ground. Then he grabbed Miles’ left front leg and pulled it behind his back. Miles yelped in agony. In his dog form, this was excruciating, and he could feel his arm bones cracking. He tried to twist and spin and throw Sky off his back, but nothing worked and with only three legs to stand on he kept falling and staggering forward, and each time he did so, Sky landed on top of his spine. Sky kept twisting the leg slowly, and with him perched on his back, Miles couldn’t reach him with his jaws. The pain was excruciating. Finally, when it felt as if Sky was about to rend his arm clean off, Miles had no choice but to turn back into his human form. Dog’s legs, even monster dog’s legs, just weren’t meant to be twisted behind their backs.

  As he changed, he felt the pressure let up. The human arm could be twisted behind the back without breaking, but the second he did so, he realized he had made a horrible mistake. In his human form he was no match for Sky, and now, with his arm behind his back, Sky had complete control over him, like a puppet on a string. Sky slammed him into the wall first, and then spun him through the bed and the dresser, turning them into kindling. Then he threw Miles to the ground so hard he splintered the floorboards. After that, still holding onto Miles’ left arm, he began to pound Miles’ back with his other fist with concussive force.

  Miles could feel his bones cracking at first, but then, as it went on, he just
began to feel numb. He began to feel detached from his body as if he just wasn’t there anymore. He couldn’t turn back into the shadow-dog-monster, and he couldn’t move. It was just his mind in a box by itself and the sound of the Sky pummeling him into dust somewhere far off in the distance. It was such an odd feeling. Then slowly he began to feel his mind slipping away and knew he was very near the end. As he began to slip away entirely, he thought about Hokharty and how he was about to destroy the world.

  How odd it all was. When he first met Hokharty he thought he was about to die, and then he had helped him defeat Wallach. When Wallach died, everything had changed and then he thought his life was finally going to begin again anew. He had gained powers, and not just any powers, but Wallach’s powers, and for the first time in a hundred years, he felt like he might actually be something more than a cipher or a screw up. But Hokharty had betrayed him. It had all been a lie. As he thought about this, the last miserable day of his life, he remembered something that Hokharty had said to him: the body will fade, but reason and knowledge will always remain. However, what could reason say to Schuyler’s unforgiving fist?

  “Stop it! You’re killing him!!” Tim had thrown off the bed linens and rushed forward and tried to push Sky off of Miles. Tim’s voice brought Miles back. Miles’ mind instantly came back to his body and he felt the horrible, burning pain all over him. Sky brushed Tim back and sent him across the room.

  “BACK OFF, TIM!” Sky yelled, “I like ya, bro, I really do, but back off or I will have to hurt you no matter WHAT Hokharty said!” Tim sat up against the far wall in pain and held his arm. Nephys ran from the corner where he had been hiding and went to help him up, but neither took a step towards Sky out of fear.

  Sky turned back to Miles, grabbed him by the back of his head and twisted it far enough so that he could force Miles to look him in the eye. He was relishing this.

  “You’ve learned a lot of new tricks recently, Miles, but you’re still a lousy vampire. I don’t know how you got Wallach’s powers, but it doesn’t matter anymore. Who knows? Maybe if you weren’t such a poor excuse for a vampire, or maybe if you knew one thing about fighting you might have even had a shot at beating me, which is why I’m going to make sure you never get the chance.” Sky tightened his grip on the back of Miles’ head and raised his other hand for one final blow that would crush his skull.

  “Goodbye, Miles,” he said, smiling.

  Miles winced but looked back at Sky’s burning eyes. He was smiling malevolently. Sky was enjoying this, and with that thought, Miles finally knew what to say. As Sky was about to strike, Miles spoke.

  “Oy! Say goodbye to the coeds for me,” Miles said cryptically.

  Sky hesitated, his fist frozen at the apex of its trajectory. His forehead wrinkled. “What are you talking about, you stupid mick?”

  “The coeds that taste like coconut and strawberries, or even the ones that taste like wheat grass. Kiss ‘em all goodbye, cuz they’ll all be bloody DEAD tomorrow dat’s what!”

  “Shut up,” Sky said back to him in a low voice.

  “What do ya think the end of the bloody world’s gonna do to the enrollment at all those hoighty-toighty colleges, Sky? Do ya actually think that any of ‘em will be around after tomorrow?”

  Sky’s forehead unwrinkled slightly.

  “No more prissy little rich girls to impress. No homesick freshman to swoon over your stupid little sob stories. No more milking them for months! Not even the chubby girls I know ya like cuz they can spare more blood than the others.”

  “I said, SHUT UP!” Sky grabbed Miles by his stubby hair and shoved his face harder into the floor, but Miles was not about to be silenced.

  “Think about it, Sky! No more Italian silk blazers. Who are they gonna make them for after tomorrow anyway? Huh? Corpses?! No more stupid, plastic lollipops, like the ones you special order out of California. No more clothes or nightclubs or cars or anything else, because after today it’s all gone.”

  “After tomorrow we will be the kings of this world!”

  “Ya?! Kings o’ what? Nothin’ but the bloody dirt, that’s what!! And a few ragged survivors to tend like cattle! Think, Sky! Ya actually love bein’ a vampire, ya crazy blighter, but what the bloody heck good is it being a vampire if everythin’ ya love about it is gone?!!”

  Sky responded by grinding Miles’ face into the floor so hard his nose nearly snapped. Miles managed to turn his face enough to catch Sky’s expression out of the corner of his eye. It was pure, awful bloodlust and contempt. He watched as Sky slowly raised his fist for a deathblow and then brought it down screaming. Miles closed his eyes and waited to die.

  “AAAAANGH!!” Sky screamed and there was a thunderous crash. Miles opened his eyes. The fist had crashed through the floorboards just inches from his face. Sky let go of Miles and paced around the room, furious.

  “I HATE YOU, MILES! I REALLY, REALLY HATE YOU!” he screamed at him while he ran his fingers through his blond hair nervously.

  Miles stood up slowly and held his aching ribs gingerly.

  “Does that mean ya will help us?” Miles asked panting.

  “YES, IT MEANS I’LL BLOODY HELP YOU!!” Sky shot back at him.

  Tim smiled and he and Nephys ran over and nearly hugged Miles. Tim patted him hard on the back. Miles winced in pain.

  “Oh, sorry, dude,” Tim apologized.

  “Well let’s not get too pleased with ourselves just yet,” Miles muttered.

  “No kidding,” Sky said sarcastically.

  “So what now?” Tim asked nervously.

  “Now?!” Sky was indignant, “Now we need a plan.”

  “We haven’t got time for a plan.” Miles went to the door. Sky barred his way.

  “I swear, Miles, you are going to get us all killed!” Miles hesitated. Sky just held his own head and stroked his temples in mental anguish. “Hokharty’s got close to forty vampires down there and who knows what else! But all that’s academic if we can’t get past Graber who’s bound to be watching the door!”

  Miles took a breath and stepped forward. “I’ll take Graber.”

  “Noooo,” Sky answered, annoyed, “I’ll take Graber.”

  “Sky…” Miles began, but Sky cut him off.

  “You’re the one with the special powers, remember, dumbhead?! For some stupid reason Amanda can’t kill you that means you’re the only one who even has a shot at getting past her to Hokharty. That means I have to take care of Graber.”

  “Graber will kill ya, Sky. It’s suicide.”

  “Not if he can’t touch me,” Sky said in a cocky voice then he became a little more serious. “Look, I’ll distract him, draw him away, that will give you a shot to get past and go to your own funeral with Amanda.”

  Miles nodded, it wasn’t much, but it was better than nothing.

  “Then who is going to take out Hokharty?!” Tim said anxiously, “Dude, he like killed Ulami and Forzgrim without even trying!”

  Miles looked at Sky, but Sky just shrugged and let out a long breath as he rubbed the back of his head. “I got nothing,” he said a half second later. He put his hands in his pockets and looked off into space. The plan was falling apart before it even got together. Then Nephys took a trembling step forward.

  “I-I’ll do it. I’ll take Hokharty,” he said, shaking.

  Sky “hmmphed” and raised his eyebrows at him. “What are you going to do, baldy? Bore him to death with a lecture on metaphysics?”

  Nephys fingered the edges of his robe and looked down.

  “N-n-no. But I have a psychotic bagpipe with a butcher knife.” He looked up and tried to smile confidently. It wasn’t very convincing. It looked like he was grimacing for a dentist.

  “Hokharty’s a pretty cool customer, kid,” Miles said. “I don’t think that thing is gonna scare him,” he said skeptically.

  “Imps are forged in the depths of hell from the worst emotions,” the kid said a little more confidently, “They are invulnerable and their
blades are unbreakable.”

  Miles and Schuyler exchanged looks. What could even an unbreakable blade do against a cloud of metal locusts? Still, it was better than nothing.

  “Are ya sure ya can find the little devil?” Miles asked.

  “Oh, yes.” The kid closed his eyes tight and turned his head around like he was looking through his eyelids. Eventually, he scanned the floor and then opened them abruptly. “He’s in the basement… in an old icebox…I think.”

  Sky laughed, “Whatever you say kid.”

  “Are ya sure about this, mate?” Miles asked. He was scared about Nep’s chances, but something told him that if anything could get to Hokharty, it was this kid and his pet monster.

  “Oh, yes…b-b-besides, the Chamberlain, I mean, Hokharty, is an Egyptian like me. Mabye I can reason with him. M-m-maybe he will listen to me.”

  “Whaddya mean, Chamberlain?” Miles asked curiously.

  “In the underworld, Hokharty isn’t the Father of All Vampires. He’s the Chamberlain of the Great Master, the grand vizier of Death himself.”

  “Wait a minute,” Schuyler jumped in, “You mean the same guy that sent you to bring the stone here and force open the gates is Hokharty?! The Father of All Vampires? How can he be in two places at once?! Is that even possible?”

  “The soul has many parts,” Nephys stated nervously, “It can be divided many ways, the mind, the memories, the spirit essence, but the heart of the Chamberlain must remain in Limbo. When I was in the Halls of Death I could see his heart, but here, he has no heart, just a well of shadow like any vampire. That’s why I think he’s doing this. I don’t think he’s the same person when he’s here. Maybe I can talk to him. Maybe I can reason with him.”

  Sky tapped Miles and smirked, “Ya gotta love this guy; he’s a real pro. He’s been playing us from both sides!” Miles looked at Sky and could tell that he meant it. He actually admired the man about to destroy the world, just like he had admired Wallach.

  “How can ya be sure?” Miles asked.

  “I don’t think the Chamberlain is a bad man,” Nephys said tentatively, “I just think he’s forgotten what it means to be alive.”